Abstract

These are eleven previously-published essays, revised to varying degrees, on topics central in recent philosophy of action. As with most articles they tend to concentrate on points of detail, or particular disagreements with other writers, and despite an introductory essay which attempts to relate the issues discussed to each other, and to locate them in the general field of contemporary action theory, this will not serve as an introduction to the subject for the novice. Some of the essays are on relatively minor, if still interesting, points: whether we can intend to do what we believe to be impossible; whether we can forecast our own decisions, as opposed to deciding in advance. One essay opens with the difficult but important question of how far the fact that a man cannot choose to do something means that he cannot do it, turns out to be a discussion of such incidentals as whether decisions can be accidental, involuntary, or dependent on authority, permission or special skills, as actions may be. Other essays usefully criticize the notion of agent-causality, and H. L. A. Hart’s account of strict liability, and they discuss the extent to which actions may be explained non-causally, and the extent to which our knowledge of our own actions is non-observational.