University of Hertfordshire Research Archive

        JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.

        Browse

        All of UHRABy Issue DateAuthorsTitlesThis CollectionBy Issue DateAuthorsTitles

        Arkivum Files

        My Downloads
        View Item 
        • UHRA Home
        • University of Hertfordshire
        • Research publications
        • View Item
        • UHRA Home
        • University of Hertfordshire
        • Research publications
        • View Item

        Are Reasons Like Shampoo?

        View/Open
        Are_Reasons_Like_Shampoo_2.pdf (PDF, 699Kb)(embargoed until 29/11/2020)
        Author
        Sandis, Constantine
        Attention
        2299/21883
        Abstract
        This essay considers various constraints placed by philosophers on what they take to be a shared concept of a reason for action. I try to show that these constraints are incompatible with one another, proceeding to argue that we would therefore do better to embrace a conceptual pluralism. On such a pluralism, there is no such thing as the concept of a reason for action. Interminable debates about the nature of reasons for action arise precisely because no single thing called a 'reason for action' can perform all the varying functions that philosophers require of it. As with products such as three-in-one shampoos, each individual function is performed at the expense of others. Unlike such stuffs, however, some of the desired functions of reasons cannot be combined at all. I conclude that neither disjunctivist nor anti-disjunctivist accounts of reasons for action are capable of providing a unifying account of them.
        Publication date
        2019-06-11
        Published in
        Explanation in Action Theory and Historiography: Causal and Teleological Approaches
        Other links
        http://hdl.handle.net/2299/21883
        Metadata
        Show full item record
        Keep in touch

        © 2019 University of Hertfordshire

        I want to...

        • Apply for a course
        • Download a Prospectus
        • Find a job at the University
        • Make a complaint
        • Contact the Press Office

        Go to...

        • Accommodation booking
        • Your student record
        • Bayfordbury
        • KASPAR
        • UH Arts

        The small print

        • Terms of use
        • Privacy and cookies
        • Criminal Finances Act 2017
        • Modern Slavery Act 2015
        • Sitemap

        Find/Contact us

        • T: +44 (0)1707 284000
        • E: ask@herts.ac.uk
        • Where to find us
        • Parking
        • hr
        • qaa
        • stonewall
        • AMBA
        • ECU Race Charter
        • disability confident
        • AthenaSwan