John McDowell's Philosophy of Action

from Saturday, 12 December 2009 to Sunday, 13 December 2009 University of Basel (Switzerland)

In 'Mind and World' John McDowell famously holds that the perceptions of rational beings should not be conceived as non-conceptual acts or states on which judgments are somehow based, but rather as actualizations of conceptual capacities in sensory consciousness. In his new lectures on action he argues that an analogous thesis holds on the side of practical reason. On the view he recommends, the bodily actions of rational agents are not to be understood as events merely caused by conceptual thought, but rather as actualizations of conceptual capacities in a certain kind of bodily movement.

What stands in the way of thinking about action in this way are certain entrenched assumptions about the relation between intention and action. It is widely held that it must be a causal relation between merely mental phenomena in the mind, on the one hand, and merely physical goings-on in the world, on the other hand. In particular it seems we must distinguish between "intentions for the future" that are not causally efficacious yet, but will when the time comes cause "intentions in action" that, in turn, cause certain 'physical movements'.

In his lectures McDowell develops the alternative thought that "intention for the future", "intention in action" and "physical movement" don't name three different causally related items, but rather three different shapes that one and the same act of the mind takes on as the intentional action enfolds towards completion. And he holds that in order to entitle ourselves to this thought we must come to understand the special kind of knowledge a rational agent has of what she is doing intentionally.

The workshop will be devoted to the discussion of the manuscript of John McDowell's lectures on action. The point of departure of each session of the workshop will be one of six papers commenting on different aspects of the manuscript.

Organiser(s):Philosophisches Seminar: Research Projekt ProDoc "Menschliches Leben"

Link(s):

• http://philsem.unibas.ch/

Attachment(s):

• Program.pdf

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