At one with our actions, but at two with our bodies: Hornsby's Account of Action

Philosophical Explorations 8 (2):157 – 172 (2005)
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Abstract

Jennifer Hornsby's account of human action frees us from the temptation to think of the person who acts as 'doing' the events that are her actions, and thereby removes much of the allure of 'agent causation'. But her account is spoiled by the claim that physical actions are 'tryings' that cause bodily movements. It would be better to think of physical actions and bodily movements as identical; but Hornsby refuses to do this, seemingly because she thinks that to do so would be to endorse the so-called 'standard causal story'. But Hornsby misses a possibility here, for we can insist on this identity claim without endorsing the standard story if we embrace an account which parallels the disjunctive account in the philosophy of perception. This will leave us with a picture of physical action that saves the insights of Hornsby's account without succumbing to its distortions.

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Citations of this work

Basic Action and Practical Knowledge.Will Small - 2019 - Philosophers' Imprint 19.
Aristotle on action.Ursula Coope - 2007 - Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume 81 (1):109–138.
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References found in this work

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Alternate Possibilities and Moral Responsibility.Harry G. Frankfurt - 1969 - Journal of Philosophy 66 (23):829-839.
Philosophical investigations.Ludwig Wittgenstein & G. E. M. Anscombe - 1953 - Revue Philosophique de la France Et de l'Etranger 161:124-124.
Mind and world: with a new introduction.John Henry McDowell - 1994 - Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Content and Consciousness.Daniel C. Dennett - 1968 - New York: Routledge.

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