The Normativity of Instrumental Reason
In Garrett Cullity & Berys Gaut (eds.), Ethics and Practical Reason. Oxford: Clarendon Press (1997)
Abstract |
This paper criticizes two accounts of the normativity of practical principles: the empiricist account and the rationalist or realist account. It argues against the empiricist view, focusing on the Humean texts that are usually taken to be its locus classicus. It then argues both against the dogmatic rationalist view, and for the Kantian view, through a discussion of Kant's own remarks about instrumental rationality in the second section of the Groundwork. It further argues that the instrumental principle cannot stand alone. Unless there are normative principles directing us to the adoption of certain ends, there can be no requirement to take the means to our ends. The familiar view that the instrumental principle is the only requirement of practical reason is incoherent.
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Epistemic Rationality as Instrumental Rationality: A Critique.Thomas Kelly - 2003 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 66 (3):612–640.
Seeing What to Do: Affective Perception and Rational Motivation.Sabine A. Döring - 2007 - Dialectica 61 (3):363-394.
Defending the Wide-Scope Approach to Instrumental Reason.Jonathan Way - 2010 - Philosophical Studies 147 (2):213 - 233.
View all 54 citations / Add more citations

Evidence and Normativity: Reply to Leite.Thomas Kelly - 2007 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 75 (2):465–474.
Explaining the Instrumental Principle.Jonathan Way - 2012 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 90 (3):487-506.
Normativity, Commitment, and Instrumental Reason.R. Jay Wallace - 2001 - Philosophers' Imprint 1:1-26.
The Special Status of Instrumental Reasons.Stephanie Beardman - 2007 - Philosophical Studies 134 (2):255 - 287.
Against All Reason? Scepticism About the Instrumental Norm.Stephen Finlay - 2009 - In Charles R. Pigden (ed.), Hume on Motivation and Virtue. Palgrave-Macmillan.
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2009-09-19
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400 ( #7,668 of 2,225,995 )
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6 ( #94,247 of 2,225,995 )
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