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Single Idea 20077

[filed under theme 20. Action / B. Preliminaries of Action / 2. Willed Action / d. Weakness of will ]

Full Idea

Weakness of will is a threat to the outward-looking approach to agency. It seems you can hold one thing to be the thing to do, and at the same time do something else. Many regard this as a decisive reason to follow a more inward-looking approach.

Gist of Idea

If you can judge one act as best, then do another, this supports an inward-looking view of agency

Source

Rowland Stout (Action [2005], 8 'Weakness')

Book Ref

Stout,Rowland: 'Action' [Acumen 2005], p.125

A Reaction

It hadn't struck me before that weakness of will is a tool for developing an accurate account of what is involved in normal agency. Some facts that guide action are internal to the agent, such as greed for sugary cakes.

The 34 ideas from Rowland Stout

20035 Philosophy of action studies the nature of agency, and of deliberate actions [Stout,R]
20036 Intentional agency is seen in internal precursors of action, and in external reasons for the act [Stout,R]
20039 The causal theory says that actions are intentional when intention (or belief-desire) causes the act [Stout,R]
20038 If the action of walking is just an act of will, then movement of the legs seems irrelevant [Stout,R]
20044 The rationalistic approach says actions are intentional when subject to justification [Stout,R]
20043 Evolutionary explanations look to the past or the group, not to the individual [Stout,R]
20049 Maybe your emotions arise from you motivations, rather than being their cause [Stout,R]
20046 For an ascetic a powerful desire for something is a reason not to implement it [Stout,R]
20047 Deciding what to do usually involves consulting the world, not our own minds [Stout,R]
20048 There may be a justification relative to a person's view, and yet no absolute justification [Stout,R]
20053 An action is only yours if you produce it, rather than some state or event within you [Stout,R]
20052 If you don't mention an agent, you aren't talking about action [Stout,R]
20050 Most philosophers see causation as by an event or state in the agent, rather than the whole agent [Stout,R]
20059 I do actions, but not events, so actions are not events [Stout,R]
20058 Not all explanation is causal. We don't explain a painting's beauty, or the irrationality of root-2, that way [Stout,R]
20061 Mental states and actions need to be separate, if one is to cause the other [Stout,R]
20060 Beliefs, desires and intentions are not events, so can't figure in causal relations [Stout,R]
20055 A standard view says that the explanation of an action is showing its rational justification [Stout,R]
20056 In order to be causal, an agent's reasons must be internalised as psychological states [Stout,R]
20065 Should we study intentions in their own right, or only as part of intentional action? [Stout,R]
20073 Bratman has to treat shared intentions as interrelated individual intentions [Stout,R]
20068 Describing a death as a side-effect rather than a goal may just be good public relations [Stout,R]
20066 Speech needs sustained intentions, but not prior intentions [Stout,R]
20067 You can have incompatible desires, but your intentions really ought to be consistent [Stout,R]
20069 A request to pass the salt shares an intention that the request be passed on [Stout,R]
20070 An individual cannot express the intention that a group do something like moving a piano [Stout,R]
20071 An intention is a goal to which behaviour is adapted, for an individual or for a group [Stout,R]
20078 The normativity of intentions would be obvious if they were internal promises [Stout,R]
20077 If you can judge one act as best, then do another, this supports an inward-looking view of agency [Stout,R]
20081 Bicycle riding is not just bodily movement - you also have to be on the bicycle [Stout,R]
20083 Aristotelian causation involves potentiality inputs into processes (rather than a pair of events) [Stout,R]
20079 Are actions bodily movements, or a sequence of intention-movement-result? [Stout,R]
20080 If one action leads to another, does it cause it, or is it part of it? [Stout,R]
20084 Agency is causal processes that are sensitive to justification [Stout,R]