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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 January 2020
My aim in this paper is to show how confusion and unclarity about reasons for action (reasons for doing) has led to serious error in ethics and the philosophy of action, and to try to set matters right. In Part I I set out what reasons for doing are, and try to make clear the distinction between reasons as justifying actions and reasons as motivating them. In Part II I try to show how, even in the ideal situation of successful and correct deliberation, a justifying reason is never identical with a motivating one, since they are two quite different sorts of thing. However a motivating reason and what one takes to be a justifying reason may be the same. In Part Ill I show how failing to make these distinctions leads to paradoxes and absurdities in the philosophy of action. It emerges that a related distinction must be made between wanting, valuing, and being valuable.
A much shortened version of this paper was read at the Annual Congress of the Canadian Philosophical Association at McGill University on June 10, 1972.
1 “Reasons and Causes,” in Borger, R. & Cioffi, F. (eds), Explanation in the Behavioural Sciences (Cambridge, 1970).Google Scholar
2 Wollaston as quoted by Priestley as quoted by Passmore in Toulmin, op. cit., p. 1.
3 James Rachels (“Reasons for Action,” Canadian Journal of Philosophy, December 1971) argues that motivating reasons are facts. But the reason he offers is that if it were a belief that the agent acted on, he would have to be self-consciously aware of his belief, and he quotes Raziel Abelson in his support (p. 174f.). But all Abelson’s argument shows is that, looked at intentionally, or internalized from the agent's point of view, the reason is a fact rather than a belief. Indeed Abelson himself, in the passage quoted by Rachels, concludes that the reason is a belief-content, not a fact. Rachels simply fails to distinguish between the intentional and the objective points of view. This is confirmed when Rachels argues, later in the paper (p. 179f.) that the reason must actually be true for it to be the reason for acting. Harry can only rush out of the theatre because the theatre is on fire if the theatre really is on fire, says Rachels. If he is mistaken in his belief, then the correct description is that he rushed out of the theatre because he thought it was on fire. This is no doubt true, objectively speaking. But, as Harry sees it, Harry does not rush out of the theatre because he thinks it is on fire, he rushes out of the theatre because it is on fire. So far as the motivation is concerned, when it is viewed intentionally, it does not matter if the theatre is on fire or not. There is also an inconsistency in Rachels’ argument here. He rejects the view that the motivating reason is a belief, on the grounds that the agent would have to be self-consciously aware of his belief and act because of it for this to be so. That is, he views the motivation intentionally. But, by parallel reasoning, when Harry mistakenly believes that the theatre is on fire, he does not rush out because he thinks it is on fire, for in order for that to be so, he would have to be self-consciously aware of his thought, and act because of it. But, as Harry sees it, the theatre is on fire, whether or not, objectively speaking, it is on fire or not. Rachels also appears to confuse motivating with justifying reasons, since another argument he uses in support of his claim that Harry’s belief must be true for it to be his reason, is that if the theatre is not on fire, then there is no reason for rushing out. But ‘reason’ here can only mean ‘justifying reason’, and a justifying reason can really be a fact.
4 In Kantian language, reason must have the power of determining the will.
5 Eth. Nic., 1145b-1147b.
6 Eth. Nic., 1143b-1144b.
7 Cf. Stevenson, C. L. “The Emotive Conception of Ethics and its Cognitive Implications,” in facts & Values (New Haven, 1963).Google Scholar
8 The Language of Morals (Oxford, 1952), 2.2 and 11.2.
9 Cf. Hare, R. M. Freedom and Reason (Oxford, 1962)Google Scholar, Ch. 5.
10 Cf. Hare, Freedom and Reason, loc. cit.
11 Cf. Stevenson, loc. cit.
12 Oxford, 1963.
13 I.e. the situation discussed in Part II of this paper.
14 Possibly also a (full, rich) sense of ‘want’. This is never clear.
15 ‘Desirable’ in turn is treated as equivalent to ‘worth wanting’. Gauthier could have avoided the obvious charge of circularity here—a charge that would stick if ‘wanting’ were defined as ‘considering desirable’—by treating ‘desirable’ as equivalent to ‘worth having or doing or bringing about’, which is nearer the mark in any case.
16 This passage incorporates the other error as well. It is a thing’s being desirable, not its being considered desirable that provides a justifying reason.
