Open AccessReasons Internalism and the Function of Normative Reasons
Author(s) -
Sinclair Neil
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
dialectica
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.483
H-Index - 27
eISSN - 1746-8361
pISSN - 0012-2017
DOI - 10.1111/1746-8361.12177
Subject(s) - internalism and externalism , normative , epistemology , meaning (existential) , connection (principal bundle) , function (biology) , philosophy , adjudication , psychology , political science , mathematics , law , geometry , evolutionary biology , biology
What is the connection between reasons and motives? According to Reasons Internalism, there is a non‐trivial conceptual connection between normative reasons and the possibility of rationally accessing relevant motivation. Reasons Internalism is attractive insofar as it captures the thought that reasons are for reasoning with and repulsive insofar as it fails to generate sufficient critical distance between reasons and motives. Rather than directly adjudicate this dispute, I extract from it two generally accepted desiderata on theories of normative reasons and argue that a new theory can satisfy both. The new theory locates part of the meaning of normative reason statements in their role in normative discussion. It generates a view of the connection between reasons and motives that is distinct from Reasons Internalism, yet distinctively in its spirit.