Explaining the Instrumental Principle
Jonathan Way
University of Southampton
[This is a preprint of an article whose final and definitive form will be published in
the Australasian Journal of Philosophy]
ABSTRACT: The Wide-Scope view of instrumental reason holds that you should not
intend an end without also intending what you believe to be the necessary means.
This, the Wide-Scoper claims, provides the best account of why failing to intend the
believed means to your end is a rational failing. But Wide-Scopers have struggled to
meet a simple Explanatory Challenge: why shouldn’t you intend an end without
intending the necessary means? What reason is there not to do so? In the first half of
this paper, I argue that the Wide-Scope view struggles to meet the Explanatory
Challenge because it takes the principles of instrumental reason to have unlimited
application – to apply to all agents, in all circumstances. I then go on to offer an new
account of these principles. The new account is very much in the spirit of the WideScope view, and shares its central advantages, but lacks its unlimited application. This
view should, therefore, find the Explanatory Challenge more tractable. In the second
half of the paper, I argue that this prediction is confirmed. If the requirements of
instrumental reason apply only when a means is, or is believed to be, necessary for
your end, then plausible independent claims about reasons, rationality, and intentions,
explain why failing to intend the necessary means to your ends is a rational failing.
1
1. Introduction
All summer long you have intended to see the exhibition at the national gallery. But
as the summer has rolled along, you have never quite found the time to do so. Now it
is the last day left, before the exhibition ends. Unfortunately, the new semester is
looming, and you had rather hoped to spend the day preparing for the upcoming
classes. Since you do not have time to do both, you face a choice – either go to the
exhibition today, or drop your intention of seeing the exhibition at all. What you
should not do – and what it would be irrational to do – is to maintain your intention to
see the exhibition, while refraining from forming the intention to go today.
Examples of this sort suggest that means-end incoherence – intending to E,
believing that M-ing is necessary for E-ing, but failing to intend to M – is a form of
irrationality.1 This in turn suggests that an account of practical reason should
recognize an instrumental principle – a requirement against means-end incoherence.
There has recently been considerable debate about how this principle is to be
formulated, and what its grounds are. The debate begins with the failure of the
following, perhaps initially tempting, principle:
NS
If you intend to E and believe that M-ing is necessary for E-ing, you should
intend to M.
The problem with NS is that it implies that you can make it the case that you should
intend to M, simply by intending to do something for which you take M-ing to be a
1
This claim is slightly qualified at the end of this section.
2
necessary means. Since M is arbitrary, this means you can make it the case that you
should intend anything at all. This is very implausible.2
The most influential solution to this problem is the Wide-Scope view.3
According to the Wide-Scope view, the principle violated in means-end incoherence
is:
WS
You should not [intend to E, believe that M-ing is necessary for E-ing, and not
intend to M].
What WS requires is simply that you avoid means-end incoherence. So, since there is
more than one way to avoid means-end incoherence, WS does not imply that if you
intend to E and believe that M-ing is necessary for E-ing, you should intend to M. If
you are means-end incoherent, you can also come to comply with WS by dropping the
intention to E or by dropping the means-end belief. So WS does not have the
implausible implications of NS.
WS is a far more plausible formulation of the instrumental principle than NS.
However, NS is not the only alternative to WS. Consider also the Disjunctive view:
D
If you are means-end incoherent, then either you should intend to M or you
should not intend to E or you should not believe that M-ing is necessary for Eing.4
On this view, means-end incoherence guarantees that you have an attitude you should
not have, or that you lack an intention you should have. So when you are means-end
2
For versions of this objection see, e.g. Bratman [1987: 23-27] and Broome [1999: 409-10].
See, e.g. Broome [1999], Dancy [2000: ch. 2], Darwall [1983: 15-17, 43-50], Wallace [2001].
4
For defence of D, see Kolodny [2007: 251-2], [2008: 452-3].
3
3
incoherent, there will always be a particular move you should make, to resolve the
incoherence. The Wide-Scope view need not accept this. According to the WideScope view, the problem with means-end incoherence is precisely in the means-end
incoherent combination. Taken individually, each of the elements of the combination
may be unobjectionable.5
This is an important advantage of the Wide-Scope view over the Disjunctive
view. Consider the example we began with. In this case, it is – or at least could be –
false that there is one particular way in which you should resolve your means-end
incoherence. You might form the intention to go to the exhibition today. But you
might equally well drop the intention to see the exhibition at all. Either of these
moves would be perfectly acceptable. Nor are such cases unusual. In many cases our
ends are merely permissible – for example, because there is an alternative which is
equally, or incommensurably, worth pursuing, or because there is an alternative which
is supererogatory. In such cases, it is not the case that you should drop the end, and
nor need it be the case that you should intend the means, or drop the means-end
belief. The Disjunctive view appears to rule such cases out.
The Wide-Scope view has a further important advantage over the Disjunctive
view. The Disjunctive view struggles to capture the sense that means-end incoherence
is a distinctive kind of irrationality. This concern is best brought out by considering
cases in which you intend to do something that you should not intend to do. Suppose,
for instance, that you should not intend to cheat on the test, but intend to do so
anyway. And suppose that you are means-end incoherent with respect to this intention
– although you know that cheating requires stealing a copy of the test, you lack the
nerve to do this. Intuitively, two things have gone wrong here – you have an intention
5
This kind of structure should be familiar. For example, it may be okay to take drug 1 and okay to take
drug 2, but definitely not okay to take both drug 1 and drug 2.
4
you should not have, and you then fail to intend the means to carrying it out. You are
both misguided and incompetent. The Wide-Scope view gets this right, because WS is
a distinct principle, holding over and above the fact that you should not intend the
end. But the Disjunctive view gets it wrong. According to the Disjunctive view, all
that is wrong is that you have an intention you should not have. You make no further
mistake in not intending the means to your end.
I take the advantages of WS over NS and D to provide a good prima facie case
for the Wide-Scope view.6 Nonetheless, the Wide-Scope view faces serious
challenges of its own. In particular, Wide-Scopers have struggled to meet a simple
Explanatory Challenge: why should you comply with WS? What reason is there not to
do so? It is this challenge which I consider in this paper. In section two, I briefly
review the problems the Wide-Scope view faces meeting the Explanatory Challenge.
In section three, I argue that Wide-Scopers struggle to meet this challenge because of
a certain feature of WS – its unlimited application. In section four, I go on to offer an
alternative account of the instrumental principle. The account offered is very much in
the spirit of WS, and shares its central advantages, but lacks its unlimited application.
This account should thus find the Explanatory Challenge more tractable. In sections
five, six, and seven, I argue that this prediction is confirmed, by outlining an
explanation of the formulation of the instrumental principle I offer.
Before moving on, two points of clarification should be noted. First, it is not
quite accurate to say that means-end incoherence, as defined so far, is a form of
irrationality. Failing to intend what you take to be the necessary means to an intended
end is only irrational if you also believe that intending the means is necessary for
6
Of course, there are other alternatives to the Wide-Scope view that I cannot discuss here. See, e.g.
Raz [2005], Finlay [2009].
5
taking the means.7 For brevity, I shall continue to omit this condition in statements of
putative instrumental principles. However, it is worth bearing in mind that it is meant
to be implicit, and in the footnotes, I shall observe a couple of points at which the
condition is particularly important.8 Second, one might wonder whether the WideScope view is really a genuine alternative to NS and the Disjunctive view. For on
certain assumptions, both NS and D entail WS.9 However, whether or not we accept
these assumptions, it is certainly not the case that WS entails either NS or D. I thus
take the distinctive claim of the Wide-Scope view to be that WS is true while NS and
D are false.10 It is this claim, after all, that allows Wide-Scopers to avoid the problems
of NS and D.
2. The Explanatory Challenge
In ‘Why be Rational?’ Niko Kolodny argued that Wide-Scopers cannot answer the
question ‘why should you comply with WS?’11 The basic idea here is quite easy to
see. The natural way to explain why you should comply with WS is to show that
complying with WS is either necessary or sufficient for doing something else you
should do. But WS cannot be explained in either of these ways. You can comply with
WS without thereby doing anything else you should do. For instance, you comply
with WS by intending the means to wicked and crazy ends. You do not thereby do
7
Some would insist on the stronger condition that you believe that now intending to M is necessary for
M-ing (e.g. Setiya [2007: 668]). This stronger condition can also be assumed, if it is felt necessary.
8
See n. 26 and n. 35.
9
Consider the view that ‘ought’ is a sentential operator, and that ‘you ought that p’ is true just in case
‘p’ is true at all of a certain set of possible worlds. On such a view, ‘necessarily, if p, you ought that q’
entails ‘necessarily, you ought that not [p and not-q]’.
10
Of course, Wide-Scopers need not deny that many instances of NS and D are true.
11
Kolodny [2005: 542-7]. These arguments are repeated and embellished in Broome [2005], Kolodny
[2007], [2008], Southwood [2008] and Way [2010].
6
anything else you should do.12 And although this is perhaps less clear, it is also
plausible that you can violate WS without failing to do anything else you should do.
We saw evidence for this when considering the Disjunctive view – means-end
incoherence seems not to guarantee that you have any attitude you should not have, or
lack any attitude you should have.13
These difficulties may move us to consider various less obvious ways of
showing that you should comply with WS. For instance, we might try appealing to the
value of the disposition to comply with WS. Or we might consider whether
compliance with WS is in some sense constitutive of being an agent with intentions.
Alternatively, we might wonder whether it is simply a mistake to look for reasons to
comply with WS. Perhaps WS is simply a basic normative principle, and so not the
sort of thing we should expect to find other reasons to comply with.
However, each of these options is problematic. The value of being disposed to
comply with WS would not explain why, as WS claims, you should avoid means-end
incoherence in every case. It can, after all, be good to have a disposition that should
not always be exercised. The same point undermines perhaps the most plausible
version of the idea that WS is constitutive of intention, according to which it is the
disposition to comply with WS that is necessary for having intentions.14 Finally, the
strategy of taking WS as a basic normative principle also seems unpromising. One
way to bring this out is to observe that WS covers only a very limited territory even
within the general field of instrumental rationality and – a little more broadly –
12
Objection: complying with WS is necessary for being rational, which is plausibly something else you
should do. Response: to be rational is, in part, to comply with rational requirements, such as WS. The
claim that you should be rational thus presupposes, and so cannot explain, the claim that you should
comply with WS.
13
Although note that even if D is false, complying with WS may be necessary for something else you
should do. For instance, complying with WS might be necessary for having beliefs you should have
[Wallace 2001, Setiya 2007].
14
Furthermore, Kolodny [2008] makes a strong case that the disposition to comply with WS is neither
instrumentally valuable nor necessary for having intentions.
7
requirements of coherence. This field includes the rationality of taking non-necessary
means to your ends, having consistent intentions, intending to do what you believe
you should do, and having consistent and coherent beliefs. If we follow the suggested
strategy, we will likely end up positing basic normative principles covering each of
these, at the least. But taking this path provides no illumination of what seems to be in
common between these requirements. All we will have is a list of plausible sounding
principles.15
Although these difficulties have received a lot of attention, I think there is still
a tendency to underestimate their significance. In particular, a common reaction is to
take them to show only that we need to distinguish between reasons and rationality.
Although the terminology varies, the core idea here is quite familiar. While rationality
depends on an agent’s mental states, especially her beliefs, reasons are facts of which
an agent may be unaware. The standard example here is of Bernard Williams’ agent
who justifiably believes that he has gin in his glass, when in fact it is petrol. This
agent, it is suggested, would be rational to (intend to) take a sip, although he has no
reason to do so (at least not on account of his false belief).16 Reasons and rationality
come apart.
If we accept this kind of picture, we might reformulate WS as a principle
about what rationality requires, rather than about what you should or have reason to
do [cf. Broome 2005]:
WSRR
You are rationally required not to [intend to E, believe that M-ing is
necessary for E-ing, and not intend to M].
15
But see Hussain [unpublished] for defence of this sort of strategy.
See Williams [1981: 102] for the example. For appeal to this sort of example to make this sort of
point see e.g. Parfit [2011: 34], Schroeder [2009: 228-9], Setiya [2007: 659], Way [2010: 220], and
Wedgwood [2003: 201-2]. But see Gibbons [2010] and Lord [2010] for challenges to this standard line.
16
8
And so understood, we might think that it is not so surprising that we cannot always
find reasons to comply with the instrumental principle. The problems finding such
reasons thus do not undermine the basic Wide-Scope idea that rationality requires
means-end coherence. They serve only to remind us that we need to distinguish
between reasons and rationality.
However, while I am happy to accept the distinction between reasons and
rationality, I think that this move can obscure the fundamental challenge these
problems pose. As I see it, the challenge facing WS is one of explanation. What we
wanted to know was why we should comply with WS. We were looking for reasons to
comply only because, quite generally, we explain why you should do something by
offering reasons to do that thing.17 What the problems rehearsed above suggest is thus
that there is no way to explain WS. But if that is the right way to think about the force
of these problems, the basic worry is only relocated, and not avoided, by the move to
WSRR. For we can just as well ask why means-end coherence is rationally required, as
we can ask why we should be means-end coherent.
Nor is it clear that explaining why means-end coherence is rationally required
will be substantially easier than explaining why we should be means-end coherent.
For notice that Williams’ example does not merely motivate a distinction between
reasons and rationality. It also suggests a picture of the relation between them. It is
plausible to think that we should explain why it is rational for Williams’ agent to
17
I grant that this does not appear to be the motivation of some of those who have looked for reasons to
comply with WS. For Broome [2005], for instance, we should think of rationality as a source of
rational requirements, in something like the way in which etiquette and the rules of chess are sources of
requirements. On this view, WSRR is presumably to be explained by appeal to this source. Broome’s
motive for looking for reasons to comply with rational requirements seems to be to capture an intuitive
distinction between sources like rationality, morality and prudence, on the one hand, and etiquette and
the law, on the other. As I argue elsewhere though [Way 2009], capturing this distinction does not
require that there is necessarily reason to comply with rational requirements.
9
intend to take a sip by appealing to the case in which, because there is gin and tonic in
his glass, there is a reason to take a sip. And this suggests a general framework on
which the rationality of actions and attitudes is determined by appeal to what there is
reason to do in cases in which we have corrected for mistaken beliefs, and perhaps
also for other epistemic shortfalls.
However, if we accept a framework of this sort, then while we can expect
reasons and rationality to come apart when an agent’s epistemic circumstances are
less than ideal, we can also expect them to converge, when epistemic circumstances
are ideal. But the problems finding reasons to comply with WS did not turn on
imperfections in agents’ epistemic circumstances. So much the same problems that
arose in finding reasons to comply with WS will arise in trying to explain WSRR.18 I
thus take the real lesson of these problems to be not simply that we need to
distinguish between reasons and rationality, but that both WS and WSRR resist
explanation.
3. A Diagnosis
I now want to offer a diagnosis of why the Wide-Scope view struggles to meet this
Explanatory Challenge. We can start by observing something surprising about the
Wide-Scope view, which can be brought out by way of some Kantian terminology.
Kant held that instrumental rationality is to be understood in terms of hypothetical
imperatives: imperatives, or oughts, which apply conditionally on your ends. The
contrast is with categorical imperatives, which are supposed to hold unconditionally.
This difference meant, Kant argued, that categorical imperatives, such as the
18
I develop this argument in more detail in Way [2010: 220-2]. Compare also Kolodny [2007: 248],
Setiya [2007: 657-63], Schroeder [2009: 231-2].
10
requirements of morality, raise explanatory challenges that the requirements of
instrumental rationality do not:
[T]he question as to how the imperative of morality is possible is undoubtedly the only one
requiring a solution. For it is not at all hypothetical; and hence the objective necessity which it
presents cannot be based on any presupposition, as was the case with the hypothetical
imperatives. [1785: 4: 419]
Since hypothetical imperatives are ‘based on a presupposition’, we can explain a
hypothetical imperative by appealing to its presupposition. But categorical
imperatives leave us no such resources. We should therefore expect categorical
imperatives to be more difficult to explain than hypothetical imperatives.
As Mark Schroeder has observed, Kant’s point here gives us insight into the
problems the Wide-Scope view faces in meeting the Explanatory Challenge.19 For
notice that, if WS or WSRR is correct, Kant turns out to have been wrong that
instrumental rationality is to be understood in terms of hypothetical imperatives. WS,
for instance, does not say that you should avoid means-end incoherence if you have a
certain end. Rather it says that you should avoid means-end incoherence
unconditionally. And so Kant’s point predicts that there will be difficulties in
explaining WS – as we have found.20
It is important to notice that Kant’s point has nothing essential to do with the
fact that the ‘presupposition’ of a hypothetical imperative is an end. Kant’s point turns
19
Schroeder [2004: 349, n.20], [2005b: 9]. See also Schroeder [2005a].
On some views, Kant himself accepted the Wide-Scope view [Hill 1973 and, perhaps, Hampton
1998: ch. 4]. If so, we should reject the standard understanding of the difference between hypothetical
and categorical imperatives appealed to in the text. However, this would not undermine the crucial
point that hypothetical imperatives, standardly understood, are more amenable to explanation than
categorical imperatives. Rather, it would show that Kant was wrong to think that instrumental
rationality is any easier to understand than the requirements of morality (Hampton [1998: 165-6] draws
precisely this consequence). In any case, Schroeder [2005a] makes a strong case that Kant was not in
fact a Wide-Scoper.
20
11
on a difference between oughts with limited application – oughts which apply only to
some agents, or in some circumstances – and oughts with unlimited application –
oughts which apply to all agents, in all circumstances. When there is something which
someone, in some circumstance, ought to do, we can appeal to idiosyncratic features
of that agent, or that circumstance, to explain why this agent ought to do that thing.
And when there is something which everyone, in some circumstance, ought to do,
then we can appeal to idiosyncratic features of this circumstance to explain why
everyone ought to do this thing, in this circumstance. But, if there is something that
everyone, in all circumstances, ought to do – when an ought has unlimited application
– no such idiosyncratic features will do. So there will always be fewer resources to
appeal to, to explain an ought with unlimited application. But WS is an ought with
unlimited application – it says that everyone, in all circumstances, ought to avoid
means-end incoherence. That is why the Explanatory Challenge is difficult.21
4. The Intermediate-Scope View
I now want to introduce an alternative view of the requirements of instrumental
rationality. This view accepts the distinction between reasons and rationality, and
makes claims about both. The view begins with the:
Reasons Claim*
If M-ing is necessary for E-ing, then you have conclusive
reason not to [intend to E and not intend to M].
21
We might worry about this diagnosis on the following grounds. On certain views of the logic of
‘ought’ (or of ‘rationally required’), it follows from the claim that ‘necessarily, if p, you ought to A’
that ‘necessarily, you ought to [A, if p]’ (cf. n. 9). Given such a view, it will be no more difficult to
explain a claim like WS than a claim like NS or D. However, since the Wide-Scoper’s distinctive claim
is that WS is true while NS and D are false, this form of explanation is not open to Wide-Scopers.
Given this point, it may perhaps be more accurate to say that what makes the Explanatory Challenge
difficult for Wide-Scopers is the underived unlimited application of WS.
12
This claim will require qualification in the next section, but we can see its initial
plausibility by considering the sort of case with which we began.22 When you
discover that today is the last day to see the exhibition, you are faced with a choice –
go today, or give up your intention to see the exhibition. What you should not do is
continue to intend to see the exhibition but not form the intention to go today.23
The Reasons Claim* does not tell us that something is wrong with all cases of
means-end incoherence, since it does not apply in cases where the means-end belief is
false. However, given the sort of connection between reasons and rationality
suggested by Williams’ petrol and tonic example, it is natural to take the Reasons
Claim* to support the:
Rationality Claim
If you believe that M-ing is necessary for E-ing, then you are
rationally required not to [intend to E and not intend to M].
The Rationality Claim does tell us that something is wrong with all cases of meansend incoherence. The means-end incoherent agent fails to combine her intentions in
the way that rationality requires, given her means-end belief.
Since the Reasons Claim* and Rationality Claim are wide-scope with respect
to the combination of intentions, and narrow-scope with respect to the means-end fact
or belief, we may call the combination of these claims the Intermediate-Scope view.
The Intermediate-Scope view has many of the advantages of the Wide-Scope
view over NS and the Disjunctive view. Unlike NS, the view does not imply that
22
Throughout the paper, I asterisk claims which require revision or rejection.
Previous putative instrumental principles have included the implicit condition that you believe that
intending to M is necessary for M-ing (see section one). Here the implicit condition is instead that
intending to M is necessary for M-ing.
23
13
merely intending an end ensures that you should – or are even rationally required – to
intend the believed means to that end. And unlike the Disjunctive view, the view does
not rule out cases of mere permissibility, or deny that means-end incoherence is a
distinctive form of irrationality. Furthermore, the view has these advantages over NS
and the Disjunctive view by very similar means to the Wide-Scope view. It has these
advantages because, like the Wide-Scope view, and unlike NS or the Disjunctive
view, the Intermediate-Scope view sees the instrumental principle as a constraint on a
combination of attitudes – on intending the end without also intending the believed
necessary means.24
However, there is a crucial way in which the Intermediate Scope view differs
from the Wide-Scope view. Neither the Reasons Claim* nor the Rationality Claim
have unlimited application. Instances of the Reasons Claim* apply only to agents for
whom a means is necessary for an end, and instances of the Rationality Claim apply
only to agents with the relevant means-end belief. So if the diagnosis of section three
is correct, we should expect the Intermediate Scope view to be in a better position to
meet the Explanatory Challenge.
We have already seen some evidence that this is the case. If reasons and
rationality are connected in the way suggested by Williams’ petrol and tonic example,
it looks plausible that the Reasons Claim* can help to explain the Rationality Claim.
Here is one way this explanation might go. Derek Parfit [2011: 34], among others,
suggests that reasons and rationality are connected in the following way:
24
These similarities might lead us to call the Intermediate-Scope view a version of the Wide-Scope
view, as I did in Way [2010]. Note also that some will think that the Rationality Claim entails WSRR
(cf. n.9). I leave this issue open.
14
Rational Requirement*
You are rationally required to A if you believe some
things whose truth would give you conclusive reason to
A.
If Parfit is right, we can explain the Rationality Claim in terms of the Reasons
Claim*. This is because if you believe that M-ing is necessary for E-ing then you
have a belief whose truth, according to the Reasons Claim*, would give you
conclusive reason not to [intend to E and not intend to M]. So Rational Requirement*
implies that you are rationally required not to [intend to E and not intend to M] – as
the Rationality Claim asserts.25
The move from the Wide-Scope view to the Intermediate Scope view should
look promising, then. Nonetheless, the Intermediate-Scoper’s claim to meet the
Explanatory Challenge is unsatisfactory as it stands. First, as I shall explain below,
both the Reasons Claim* and Rational Requirement* are subject to counter-examples.
Second, even if suitably modified versions of these claims do explain the Rationality
Claim, we may seem only to have pushed the Explanatory Challenge back a step. A
qualified version of the Reasons Claim* will still postulate a strong reason against
intending the end without also intending the necessary means. And so we will still
face the task of explaining this reason.
The rest of this paper aims to meet these challenges. In sections five and six, I
argue that both the Rationality Claim and a suitably qualified version of the Reasons
Claim* are true if the following, much weaker, claim is true:
25
Some will object to Rational Requirement* on the grounds that it allows irrational beliefs to ground
rational requirements. Suppose, for example, that paranoia leads you to irrationally believe that your
lunch has been poisoned. If your lunch was poisoned, you would have most reason to intend to throw it
away. But many will find it implausible that you are thereby rationally required to intend to throw your
lunch away [cf. Wedgwood 2003: 203; contrast Parfit 2011: 112-7]. I want to remain neutral on this
issue. Readers convinced by the objection can substitute ‘rationally believe’ for ‘believe’ in Rational
Requirement*, and accept a similarly restricted version of the Rationality Claim.
15
Basic Claim If M-ing is necessary for E-ing, there is a reason not to [intend to E
and not intend to M].
In section seven, I sketch an explanation of the Basic Claim. I thus hope to show at
least that there are grounds to be optimistic that the Intermediate-Scope view can meet
the Explanatory Challenge.
5. Explaining the Reasons Claim
There is conclusive reason to A if the reasons to A outweigh the reasons not to A.
Thus – since one way this can happen is if there is a reason to A and no reason not to
A – we can move from the Basic Claim to the Reasons Claim* if the following is true:
No Defeaters*
If M-ing is necessary for E-ing, then there is no reason to
[intend to E and not intend to M].
In this section, I shall argue that a qualified version of No Defeaters* is true. Since we
are assuming the Basic Claim, this will show that a qualified version of the Reasons
Claim* is true.
It will be helpful to begin by thinking in general about when there are reasons
to [intend to A and not intend to B], where A and B are act-types. This will allow us
to assess what reasons there might be to [intend to E and not intend to M], when Ming is necessary for E-ing. I suggest that there are two main possibilities.
16
Type 1 Cases
There is a reason to [A and not B] – that is, to A without also
B-ing. If you intend both to A and to B you will both A and B.
So you have a reason to [intend to A and not intend to B]. For
example, you have a reason to change lanes without
accelerating. If you intend both to change lanes and to
accelerate, you will do both. So you have a reason to [intend to
change lanes and not intend to accelerate].
Type 2 Cases
There are benefits of [intending to A and not intending to B]
other than that you will thereby A without B-ing. These
benefits give you a reason to [intend to A and not intend to B].
If these are the only possibilities, then No Defeaters* will be false if there are
situations in which M-ing is necessary for E-ing but you have a reason to E without
M-ing (Type 1) or there are other reason-providing benefits of [intending to E and not
intending to M] (Type 2).26
The first possibility can, I think, be ruled out. When M-ing is necessary for Eing you cannot E without M-ing. So, on the assumption that ‘reason’ implies ‘can’,
you cannot have reason to E without M-ing.27
The second possibility is more problematic. It can be illustrated by a variant of
Kavka’s [1983] toxin puzzle. In Kavka’s example, an eccentric billionaire offers you
$1m if you intend, at midnight tonight, to drink an unpleasant toxin at noon
tomorrow. To get a Type 2 case, we need only add a further condition on winning the
26
There may seem to be a third possibility. In cases in which (now) intending to M is not necessary for
M-ing, reasons to E may be reasons to [intend to E and not intend to M]. However, as noted in n. 23,
we are restricting our attention to cases in which (now) intending to M is necessary for M-ing.
27
For defences of ‘reason’ implies ‘can’ see Streumer [2007] and Vranas [2007].
17
$1m: that you do not also intend the necessary means to drinking the toxin. You then
seem to have a reason to intend the end of drinking the toxin without also intending
the means. That is a counter-example to No Defeaters*.
Some may be tempted to respond by denying that the $1m prize provides a
reason for this combination of intentions. A number of philosophers insist that, in the
original toxin puzzle, the $1m prize is at most a reason to want to intend to drink the
toxin, and to bring it about that you have this intention.28 Presumably, these
philosophers would also deny that the $1m is a reason to intend to drink the toxin
without intending the necessary means, in our modified version. However, a more
concessive response is available. We can grant that Type 2 cases are counterexamples to No Defeaters* but insist that – in a sense to be explained – they are
examples of reasons of the wrong kind. They thus do not threaten the following
restriction of No Defeaters*:
No Defeaters
If M-ing is necessary for E-ing, then there is no reason of the
right kind to [intend to E and not intend to M].
The distinction between reasons of the right and wrong kind is a way of marking the
very similar contrasts we see between two kinds of reasons for intention, belief, and
other attitudes. In the case of intention, the right kind of reasons to intend derive from
reasons to perform the action intended. The wrong kind of reasons derive from other
benefits of intending – the $1m prize in the original toxin puzzle is an example. In the
case of belief, the right kind of reasons to believe are evidential, the wrong kind of
reasons are pragmatic – Pascal’s wager is a familiar example of the latter. These
28
For example, Pink [1996: 147-52], Shah [2008: 14-16].
18
distinctions share some common marks. First, and most strikingly, there is a clear
asymmetry in the ease and way in which you can respond to the two kinds of reason.
For example, you can form intentions directly on the basis of reasons for action. But
you cannot in the same way decide to drink the toxin because so intending will earn
you $1m, at least when you recognize that there is no good reason to drink the toxin.
Similarly, while you can believe on account of the evidence, you cannot in the same
way believe because believing will have pragmatic benefits. Second, there are types
of overall evaluation to which only the right kind of reasons seem relevant. Of central
relevance here is the fact that only reasons of the right kind are relevant to rationality.
For example, the benefits of believing in God are not themselves enough to make it
rational to believe in God. Nor does the $1m prize make it rational to intend to drink
the toxin. It seems to be rational to intend only if the action intended is, as things
stand, rational to perform.29
The distinction between Type 1 and Type 2 cases of reasons for a combination
of intentions looks to be a further illustration of this distinction. Type 1 cases look
like cases of the right kind of reasons. Type 2 cases look like cases of the wrong kind
of reasons. Type 2 cases are thus no threat to No Defeaters.
Of course, No Defeaters does not support the Reasons Claim*. However, if the
reason specified in the Basic Claim is of the right kind, No Defeaters does support
the:
29
The terminology of the ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ kind of reasons is most familiar from discussions of
fitting-attitude accounts of value (e.g. Rabinowicz and Rønnow-Rasmussen [2004]). In that context, it
is used to mark a distinction between types of reasons for valuing. In extending this terminology to
reasons for belief and intention, I am following Hieronymi [2005] and Schroeder [2010], among others.
19
Reasons Claim
If M-ing is necessary for E-ing, then the right kind of reasons
not to [intend to E and not intend to M] outweigh the right kind
of reasons to [intend to E and not intend to M].
And the Reasons Claim, I suggest, is all that the Intermediate-Scope view should
endorse. For just as Type 2 cases count against No Defeaters*, they also count against
the Reasons Claim*. So nothing stronger than the Reasons Claim is plausible, in any
case. What is more, since our central interest is in the irrationality of means-end
incoherence, and since only reasons of the right kind are relevant to rationality, we
need not worry that there may be reasons of the wrong kind in favour of means-end
incoherence.
We have now seen how to explain the Reasons Claim, granted the truth of the
Basic Claim. In the next section, I explain how this argument can be reapplied to
explain the Rationality Claim.
6. From the Reasons Claim to the Rationality Claim
The Rationality Claim follows from the Reasons Claim along with the following,
slightly modified, version of Parfit’s connection between reasons and rationality:
Rational Requirement**
You are rationally required to A if you believe some
things such that, if they are true, the right kind of
reasons to A outweigh the right kind of reasons not to
A.
20
Unfortunately though, Rational Requirement** is subject to counter-example.30
Consider the following variation on Williams’ gin and petrol example. Suppose
Williams’ agent does indeed have gin in his glass, and suppose that because of this he
has most reason to take a sip (and so most reason of the right kind to intend to take a
sip). But suppose that he also believes, falsely, that he will be drinking wine later, and
is concerned about mixing his drinks. It might then be irrational for him to take a sip,
although he believes something which is true and which makes it the case that his
reasons of the right kind favour intending to take a sip.31
We therefore need a more plausible view of the connection between reasons
and rationality. In the rest of this section, I sketch such an account, and then argue that
the new account still allows us to move from the Reasons Claim to the Rationality
Claim.
As a first step, we need to distinguish between objective and subjective
reasons. Objective reasons are what I have thus far meant by ‘reasons’ – facts which
count for or against an action or attitude, and which together determine what you
should do. As a heuristic – not a definition – we can say that subjective reasons are
considerations which it is rational for an agent to treat as objective reasons in deciding
what to do. For example, in Williams’ original case, it is rational for the agent to take
the content of his belief that there is gin in his glass into consideration in deciding
what to do. However, it is not true that there is gin in his glass, and so this
30
The same example shows, mutatis mutandis, that Rational Requirement* is false. Like that principle,
Rational Requirement** also raises worries about rational requirements being grounded in irrational
beliefs (cf. n.25). As before, such worries may be met by restricting the antecedent of the principle to
rational beliefs.
31
This problem could be avoided by saying that what you are rationally required to do is what you
would have most reason to do if all your beliefs were true. However, this move is highly problematic.
First, if you have inconsistent beliefs, it is not possible for all your beliefs to be true. Second, certain
cases involving ignorance (e.g. Jacob Ross’s ‘three-envelope’ case) are often thought to show that what
you are rationally required to do can come apart from what you have most reason to do even when all
your beliefs are true. See, e.g. Schroeder [2009: 243-5].
21
consideration is not an objective reason to take sip. Rather, it is a subjective reason to
do so.
The distinction between objective and subjective reasons is the analogue, at
the pro tanto level, of the distinction at the overall level between what you should do
and what you are rationally required to do. At both levels, we can distinguish between
a normative relation which turns on the facts of an agent’s situation, and a normative
relation which turns on the agent’s beliefs about her situation. It seems clear that if we
are to draw the latter distinction, we should also draw the former. However, once we
have the notion of a subjective reason, it is also very natural to think that what you are
rationally required to do is determined by the balance of (the right kind of) subjective
reasons – just as what you ought to do is determined by the balance of objective
reasons. For example:
Rational Requirement
You are rationally required to A if the subjective
reasons (of the right kind) to A outweigh the subjective
reasons (of the right kind) not to A.
This account is not subject to the counter-example to Rational Requirement**. In the
modified case, Williams’ agent plausibly has a subjective reason to take a sip, since
he believes that the glass contains gin. But he also has a subjective reason not to take
a sip, because he believes that he will drinking wine later. And although more would
need to be said about the weight of subjective reasons in order to establish this, it is
plausible that the latter reason outweighs the former, so that he is rationally required
not to take a sip.32
32
See Schroeder [2009: 242-5] for further motivations for the sort of picture just sketched.
22
We have now seen why Rational Requirement is a plausible improvement on
Rational Requirement**. I shall now argue that it still allows us to explain the
Rationality Claim. The explanation to be given is structurally parallel to the
explanation of the Reasons Claim. One way for the subjective reasons to A to
outweigh the subjective reasons not to A is for there to be a subjective reason to A
and no subjective reason not to A. So we can explain the Rationality Claim by
defending the following two claims:
Subjective Basic Claim
When you believe that M-ing is necessary for E-ing,
you have a subjective reason (of the right kind) not to
[intend to E and not intend to M].
No Subjective Defeaters
When you believe that M-ing is necessary for E-ing,
you have no subjective reason (of the right kind) to
[intend to E and not intend to M].
Since subjective reasons are considerations which it is rational to treat as objective
reasons, it is natural to expect these claims to be true if, as we are assuming, the Basic
Claim is true and if, as I argued in section five, No Defeaters is true. I shall now argue
that this expectation is confirmed.33
A quick way to argue for the Subjective Basic Claim and for No Subjective
Defeaters is to appeal to the account of subjective reasons offered by Parfit [2011: 35]
and Schroeder [2009: 233]:
33
Again, some readers will want to substitute ‘rationally believe’ for ‘believe’ in these principles, and
in SubjectiveSUF and SubjectiveNEC (see below), so as to yield a similarly restricted version of the
Rationality Claim (cf. n.25). Whether or not we should make these revisions is a question that requires
further attention.
23
Subjective*
You have a subjective reason to A just in case you believe something
which, if true, would give you an objective reason to A.
Subjective* implies the Subjective Basic Claim. For if you believe that M-ing is
necessary for E-ing, you believe something which, by the Basic Claim, would give
you an objective reason not to [intend to E and not intend to M], if it is true. And No
Subjective Defeaters seems to follow too, since, if the argument of section five is
right, there is nothing you can believe which, if true, would be an objective reason (of
the right kind) to [intend to E and not intend to M].
Unfortunately, Subjective* is open to similar counter-examples to Rational
Requirement**. For example, suppose you believe that you promised to A, and also
believe that this promise was coerced. It is at least arguable that it is not rational to
treat a coerced promise as a reason; if that is right, the content of your belief that you
promised to A is not a subjective reason to A. However, if it is true that you promised,
but not true that you were coerced, then you do satisfy the right-hand side of
Subjective*. Subjective* appears to be false.
I do not have a general solution to this problem. For present purposes though,
we can work around it. I shall offer one sufficient and one necessary condition for
subjective reasons. And I shall show that these conditions are enough to defend the
Subjective Basic Claim and No Subjective Defeaters.
The above counter-example to Subjective* rests on the possibility of a
consideration which is a reason to do something in one circumstance, but not a reason
to do that thing in other circumstances. However, not all reasons are of this sort –
24
some considerations are reasons to A in every circumstance in which they occur.34 So
the problem does not threaten the following sufficient condition for subjective
reasons:
SubjectiveSUF
If you believe something which, if true, would give you a
reason to A in any circumstance in which you can A, and you
do not believe that you cannot A, then you have a subjective
reason to A.
However, according to the Basic Claim, in any circumstance in which M-ing is
necessary for E-ing, there is a reason not to [intend to E and not intend to M].35 Thus
SubjectiveSUF and the Basic Claim are enough to support the Subjective Basic Claim.
We can take a similar approach to defending No Subjective Defeaters. Any
subjective reason of the right kind to [intend to E and not intend to M] would have to
derive from a subjective reason of the right kind to [E and not M]. However, consider
the following necessary condition on subjective reasons:
SubjectiveNEC
You have a subjective reason to A only if you do not believe
that you cannot A.
SubjectiveNEC is an analogue for subjective reasons of ‘reason’ implies ‘can’. It seems
a plausible condition. Subjective reasons are considerations rational agents take into
account when deciding what to do. But when deciding what to do, rational agents
34
More exactly, some considerations are reasons to A in every circumstance in which you can A. This
qualification is required since we are assuming that ‘reason’ implies ‘can’. Note also that even holists
can allow that some reasons are of this sort [Dancy 2004: 77-8].
35
Or more exactly, any circumstance in which M-ing is necessary for E-ing and (now) intending to M
is necessary for M-ing. See n. 23.
25
consider only options they believe available to them. So when deciding what to do,
rational agents do not take into account considerations favouring actions they believe
they cannot do.36
SubjectiveNEC implies that No Subjective Defeaters is true. If you believe that
M-ing is necessary for E-ing, you believe that you cannot [E and not M]. So by
SubjectiveNEC, you have no subjective reason to [E and not M]. And since the right
kind of reasons to intend derive from reasons to act, you have no subjective reason of
the right kind to [intend to E and not intend to M], either.
I have now argued that No Subjective Defeaters is true, and that if the Basic
Claim is true, the Subjective Basic Claim is true, too. I have also argued that what you
are rationally required to do is determined by your subjective reasons. Taken together,
these claims imply that if the Basic Claim is true, the Rationality Claim is true.
7. Explaining the Basic Claim
In the previous two sections, I have argued that if the Basic Claim is true, we can
explain both the Reasons Claim and the Rationality Claim. This is a significant result,
for the Basic Claim is very weak. If meeting the Explanatory Challenge requires only
that we explain the Basic Claim, then we should be much more confident that the
Explanatory Challenge can be met. Nonetheless, there is an argument that purports to
show that the Basic Claim cannot be true. The first task of this section is to dispel this
argument. Doing so will also point us towards an account of why the Basic Claim is
true.
36
Note that this is not to say that a rational agent will never believe that she has a reason to do
something she believes she cannot do. It is not necessarily irrational to deny that ‘reason’ implies ‘can’.
However, even if you deny this, it is irrational to decide to do what you believe you cannot do.
26
The Basic Claim says that when M-ing is necessary for E-ing, there is a reason
(of the right kind) not to [intend to E and not intend to M]. However, we have been
assuming that reasons (of the right kind – henceforth I assume this qualification) to
intend to A depend on reasons to A. It may be thought that a corollary of this purist
view is that reasons against intending to A depend on reasons against A-ing. And it
seems to follow from this apparent corollary that any reason against [intending to E
and not intending to M] must derive from a reason against [E-ing and not M-ing].
Unfortunately though, it is not at all clear that there are any such reasons. For when
M-ing is necessary for E-ing, you cannot [E and not M]. So any reason against [E-ing
and not M-ing] would be a reason that you cannot fail to comply with. But at least
according to many philosophers, there cannot be reasons that you cannot fail to
comply with.37 So it seems as if the Basic Claim cannot be true.
My response to this argument shall be to challenge the assumption that
reasons against intending to A must derive from reasons against A-ing. I shall argue
that proponents of purism about reasons for intending should in fact deny that all
reasons against intending derive from reasons against acting. If this is right, the
argument against the Basic Claim collapses.
A central motivation for purism about reasons for intending is the appeal of
the following claim, linking permissible intention to permissibly acting as intended:
Link
It is permissible now to intend to A later only if, in the absence of
relevant new information, it will be permissible to A later.38
37
See Lavin [2004] for extended discussion and references.
‘Permissible’ here is not a moral notion. Rather, it is simply the dual of the overall ‘should’. I shall
also use ‘okay’ to express this notion.
38
27
The intuition behind Link is that the central point of intending is to move us to do
things that are worth doing. If Link is false, it is not clear how intentions could serve
this purpose. And Link supports purism, since if there are reasons to intend other than
reasons to act, those reasons could make it okay to intend even when it is not, as
things stand, okay to act.39
The same intuition that supports Link also supports the idea that reasons to act
provide reasons to intend only when intending makes a difference to whether or not
you will act as intended. If you are already certain to A – for instance, because A-ing
is a side-effect of something else you intend to do – reasons to A do not provide you
with reasons to intend to A. This suggests that we should understand purism about
reasons for intending in the following way:
P+
R is a reason (of the right kind) to intend to A just in case R is a reason to A
and intending to A promotes A-ing.
And if all reasons against intending depend on reasons against acting we have:
P-
R is a reason (of the right kind) not to intend to A just in case R is a reason not
to A and intending to A promotes A-ing.
However, we now have a problem. P+ and P- have been motivated by the appeal of
Link, and the underlying intuition that the point of intending is to move us to do
things that are worth doing. But P+ and P- do not in fact vindicate Link, or the
underlying intuition. To see this, consider a case in which intending to A does not
39
See Pink [1996, especially chs. 4 and 5], for extensive discussion.
28
promote A-ing. In such a case, P+ and P- imply that there is no reason to intend to A,
and no reason not to intend to A. So in such a case, P+ and P- imply that it is okay to
intend to A. And P+ and P- imply this quite independently of the reasons for and
against A-ing, and so quite independently of whether it is okay to A. So P+ and P- do
not guarantee Link.
We can avoid this problem by denying P- and so allowing that considerations
other than reasons not to A can provide reasons against intending. If there are reasons
of this sort, then when intending to A does not promote A-ing, these reasons will tip
the balance, and so it will not be okay to intend to A.
Such reasons would not threaten Link. Link is secure so long as the
permissibility of A-ing is a necessary condition on permissibly intending to A. But to
deny P- is not to reject this necessary condition. Rather, it is to place a further
necessary condition on permissible intention. On a view which accepts P+ but denies
P-, it is okay to intend to A only if there is good enough reason to A, intending to A
promotes A-ing, and there are no sufficiently weighty further reasons against
intending to A.
What might these further reasons be? To answer this question, it is helpful to
recall some of the features of intention emphasised by Michael Bratman [1987].
When you intend to A you are disposed to reason towards A-ing. This requires you to
monitor your prospects for A-ing, and to be disposed to take suitable means as and
when required. At least in many cases, intending also involves being disposed to
reason on the assumption that you will A – for example, not deliberating further about
whether to A, refraining from planning to do anything incompatible with A-ing, and
so on.
29
Bratman and others have emphasized that there are great benefits to having a
capacity for attitudes of this sort. The capacity to settle ahead of time what we will do
allows us to take advantage of good conditions for deliberation, and facilitates interand intra-personal co-ordination [Bratman 1987: especially chs. 1 and 2; Holton 2009:
ch.1]. The point I want to make is that intending nonetheless involves a kind of cost to
the agent, on account of these features. That intending to A requires you to monitor
your progress towards A-ing, and to be disposed to take suitable means if required
means that intending is a way of tying up psychological resources – resources which
are limited, and for which there is always another use. This means, I suggest, that
there is always some reason against intending to do something. Furthermore, it seems
plausible that reasons of this sort are relevant to rationality, and so are of the right
kind. Rational agents display a sensitivity to these costs of intending – that is why
rational agents do not in general intend to do things they expect to do anyway, or
things they know they will not do even if they intend to.40 Rational agents do not
knowingly waste the use of psychological resources intending involves.
So there seem to be good grounds for accepting a view which is purist with
respect to reasons for but not against intention. Accepting such a view undermines the
argument that the Basic Claim cannot be true. We need not think that any reason
against [intending to E and not intending to M] must derive from a reason not to [E
and not M]. It might be that when M-ing is necessary for E-ing, there are costs of
[intending to E and not intending to M] that provide reasons against that combination
of intentions.
40
Note that we cannot explain why rational agents do not intend to do such things simply by noting
that there are reasons to intend to A only if intending to A promotes A-ing. This only explains why
there is no reason to intend to A. But it can be okay to do something if there is no reason to do it, so
long as there is also no reason not to do it.
30
In fact, we have already seen enough to see that this is plausible. I have
suggested that the use of psychological resources in intending means that there is
always some cost of, and so reason against, any intention. These costs will also
provide some reason against [intending to E but not intending to M] unless the lack of
an intention to M cancels out these costs. But clearly that is not so – the lack of an
intention to M does not stop someone who intends to E from monitoring his progress
in E-ing or from disposing him to take means as required.41 And so it seems plausible
that the use of psychological resources in intending will, quite generally, provide
some reason against [intending to E and not intending to M], when M-ing is necessary
for E-ing. And so the Basic Claim will be true.42
8. Conclusion
In the previous three sections, I have tried to show how the Intermediate-Scope view
can meet the Explanatory Challenge. The Intermediate-Scope view makes two main
claims:
Reasons Claim
If M-ing is necessary for E-ing, then the reasons of the right
kind not to [intend to E and not intend to M] outweigh the
reasons of the right kind to [intend to E and not intend to M].
41
This is especially clear in a case in which the agent does not know or believe that M-ing is necessary
for E-ing.
42
The point here is similar to the suggestion made in unpublished work by John Brunero and by Niko
Kolodny that there is reason against [intending to E and not intending to M] because this combination
makes you more likely to take costly and ineffective means to E. (For example, intending to visit
Chicago without intending to book a flight may make me likely to waste money booking a hotel).
However, while I agree that in very many cases there will be reasons of this sort, I worry that this will
not be so in all cases. It seems only to be contingent that intending an end risks taking costly means,
while it is plausibly necessary that means-end incoherence is irrational. For this reason, I prefer to
appeal to costs that are plausibly a necessary part of intending.
31
Rationality Claim
If you believe that M-ing is necessary for E-ing, then you are
rationally required not to [intend to E and not intend to M].
I have argued that these claims are true if the Basic Claim is true, and that the Basic
Claim is indeed true. My strategy has been to show how these claims are supported by
independently plausible views, notably: the view that rationality is to be understood in
terms of subjective reasons, which are in turn to be understood in terms of objective
reasons, the principle that ‘reason’ implies ‘can’, and purism about reasons for, but
not against, intending. Furthermore, the conditions of both the Reasons Claim and the
Rationality Claim have played a crucial role in these arguments. I therefore take the
results of the second half of the paper to support the diagnosis offered in the first half.
The Explanatory Challenge to the Wide-Scope view is intractable because of the
unlimited application of Wide-Scope principles.43
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