Associate
Professor
My book, Reasons without Rationalism, was published by Princeton University Press in January 2007.
You can read the Introduction online, search the full text at google or amazon,
and check out a concordance here.
Reviews: Matthew Hanser; Ralph Wedgwood.
Symposium: Summary, Michael Bratman, Michael Smith, Reply
I have also posted some recent papers and book reviews:
Knowing Right From Wrong, down for revision; back soon!
Argues that that the basic task
of moral epistemology is not to explain the reliability of our beliefs but how
their truth could be more than accidental. It is not irrational to accept a
coincidence that cannot be explained, if one is otherwise justified in doing
so. But it is impossible to know that p unless it is no accident that
one's belief is true. This condition can be satisfied in ethics only if our
knowledge is explained by human nature.
Knowledge of Intention, draft of 11/20/09; comments welcome; please do not cite without permission
Argues that it is not by
inference from intention that I know what I am doing intentionally. Instead,
the reverse is true: groundless knowledge of intention rests on the will as a
capacity for non-perceptual, non-inferential knowledge of action. The argument
adapts and clarifies considerations of "transparency" more familiar
in connection with belief.
Does Moral Theory Corrupt Youth? draft of 11/3/09; comments welcome; please do not cite without permission
Argues that
the answer is yes. The epistemic
assumptions of moral theory deprive us of resources needed to resist the
challenge of moral disagreement, which its practice at the same time makes
vivid. Ends with tentative thoughts about the kind of epistemology that could
respond to disagreement without scepticism: one in which the fundamental
standards of justification for moral belief are biased towards the truth.
Reasons and Causes, forthcoming in the European Journal of Philosophy
Argues for a
causal-psychological account of acting for reasons. This view is distinguished from a more ambitious
causal theory of action, clarified as far as possible, and motivated – against
non-reductive, teleological, and behaviourist alternatives – on broadly
metaphysical grounds.
Sympathy for the Devil, forthcoming in
Desire, Practical Reason, and the Good (
Argues
against "the guise of the good" as a claim about rational agency,
conceding that it may hold true as a principle of human nature. Themes discussed along the way – extending the
argument of Reasons without Rationalism – include: desires as
appearances of the good, the intelligibility of vice, and the kind of
essentialist claim that permits exceptions.
Practical Knowledge Revisited, forthcoming in Ethics
Argues that the view propounded
in "Practical Knowledge" survives objections made by Sarah Paul
("Intention, Belief, and Wishful Thinking," Ethics 119: 546-557). The response gives
more explicit treatment to the nature and epistemology of knowing how.
Believing at Will, Midwest Studies in Philosophy (September 2008)
Argues that
we cannot form beliefs at will without failure of attention or logical
confusion. The explanation builds
on Williams' argument in "Deciding to Believe,"
attempting to resolve some well-known difficulties. The paper ends with
tentative doubts about the idea of judgement as intentional action.
Practical Knowledge, Ethics (April 2008)
Argues that we know without
observation or inference at least some of what we are doing intentionally and
that this possibility must be explained in terms of knowledge how. It is a
consequence of the argument that knowing how to do something cannot be
identified with knowledge of a proposition.
Cognitivism About Instrumental Reason, Ethics 117 (July 2007)
Argues for a
"cognitivist" account of the instrumental principle, on which it is
the application of theoretical reason to the beliefs that figure in our
intentions. This doctrine is put to work in solving a puzzle about instrumental
reason that plagues alternative views.
Is Efficiency a Vice? American
Philosophical Quarterly 42 (October 2005)
Argues against the form of
instrumentalism on which being practically rational is being efficient in the
pursuit of one's ends. The trait of means-end efficiency turns out to be a
defect of character, and therefore cannot be identified with practical reason
at its best.
Hume on Practical Reason, Philosophical Perspectives 18 (December 2004)
Argues that Hume was a sceptic about
practical reason only on a rationalist account of what it would have to be.
(This version differs substantially from the published paper.)
Explaining Action, Philosophical Review 112 (July 2003; published September 2004)
Argues that,
in acting for a reason, one takes that reason to explain one's action, not to justify
it: reasons for acting need not be seen "under the guise of the
good." The argument turns on
the need to explain the place of "practical knowledge" – knowing what
one is doing – in intentional action. (A revised and expanded version of this
material appears in Part One of Reasons without Rationalism.)
Against
Internalism, Noûs 38 (June 2004)
Argues that practical irrationality is akin to moral culpability: it is
defective practical thought which one
could legitimately have been expected to avoid. It is thus a mistake to draw too tight a connection
between failure to be moved by reasons and practical irrationality (as in a
certain kind of "internalism"): one's failure may be genuine, but not
culpable, and therefore not irrational.
Review of Appearances of the Good, by Sergio Tenenbaum, NDPR (May 2007)
Review of Agency and Answerability: Selected Essays, by Gary Watson, Mind 114 (July 2005)
Philosophical Review 114 (January 2005)