tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6642011.post112574881727063823..comments2023-10-29T10:32:36.914-04:00Comments on Philosophy, et cetera: Constitutive and Extrinsic ReasonsRichard Y Chappellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16725218276285291235noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6642011.post-36890863837250925672007-05-27T23:47:00.000-04:002007-05-27T23:47:00.000-04:00Hey...I stumbled onto your blog while searching fo...Hey...I stumbled onto your blog while searching for Hieronymi. What a great blog! I'm a senior philosophy undergrad at UCLA. I've taken Heironymi before...and I'm writing a paper for Calvin Normore on her wrong kind of reasons paper. I'm in the department's honors program and trying to talk myself out of law school so that I will apply to grad school instead. Best! Barron-at-ucla-eduSedgwickhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03060065349197683367noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6642011.post-1125976616882172002005-09-05T23:16:00.000-04:002005-09-05T23:16:00.000-04:00Update: Hieronymi's 'Controlling Attitudes' paper ...Update: Hieronymi's 'Controlling Attitudes' paper argues that there is real substance to the believing/getting-to-believe distinction. To quote (pp. 25-27):<BR/><BR/>"Consider, again, ordinary action. In performing an ordinary intentional action, one answers for oneself the question of whether to f, therein intends to f, and thus—providing all goes well— f’s intentionally. Even though the intention and the action are distinct—one might intend but fail to act (perhaps due to sudden paralysis)—both the intention and the action are answerable to the same set of reasons, viz., those that bear on whether to f. You are answerable to these reasons just by intending to f—regardless of whether you succeed in f-ing. And if f-ing is a non-basic action, such as preparing dinner or getting a gallon of milk, then each bit of the process is answerable to the constitutive reasons for intending the larger action. Buying a gallon of milk may require going to the store, standing in line, and handing over some cash. Insofar as each of these is part of getting milk, the why-question to which they are vulnerable will be answered, in part, by the reasons bearing on whether to get milk.<BR/><BR/>Ordinary intentional actions display a uniformity of answerability from intention, through process, to successful execution. Turning, then, to believing for extrinsic reasons. As an ordinary mortal, you might take certain reasons to show a belief good to have, therein form a managerial intention to bring yourself to believe, execute that intention through some process (perhaps by conducting an investigation or taking a pill), and, if you are successful, thereby come to believe. In performing this managerial action, you are answerable, at each stage in the process, to the reasons which bear on whether to bring yourself to believe—to the constitutive reasons for the intention to bring yourself to believe (which are extrinsic reasons for believing). Bringing yourself to believe is thus an ordinary, non-basic, intentional action one might perform in response to extrinsic reasons for believing.<BR/><BR/>But notice, further, that if successful this managerial action—bringing yourself to believe p—will create answerability to reasons which bear on whether p. After all, if successful, this action will create a belief, and in believing p one is answerable to such reasons. Importantly, however, neither the managerial intention to bring yourself to believe nor the activities involved in bringing yourself to believe are themselves answerable to reasons which bear on whether p. You have not yet answered the question whether p, and so are not yet answerable to reasons bearing on that question. The managerial intention and action are answerable only to reasons bearing on whether to bring yourself believe. Only if your action is successful will you become answerable to the constitutive reasons for believing.<BR/><BR/>Thus we now see that believing stands distinct from the managerial activity of bringing oneself to believe, not because the believing stands at the end of a multi-step process, but rather because bringing yourself to believe and believing involve very different kinds of answerability."Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6642011.post-1125840617545757172005-09-04T09:30:00.000-04:002005-09-04T09:30:00.000-04:00This reminds me a lot of hilzoy's recent post rega...This reminds me a lot of hilzoy's recent post regarding <A HREF="http://obsidianwings.blogs.com/obsidian_wings/2005/08/explanation_jus.html" REL="nofollow">Explanation vs. Justification</A> over at Obsidian Wings, which is well worth reading. I do remember thinking at the time, that what she calls explanations, when considered beforehand and from the perspective of the person whose actions are being explained, look an awful lot like justifications. In retrospect and from a distance, the distinction seems clearer. I dunno.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com