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DEVIANCE AND CAUSALISM
Author(s) -
O'BRIEN LILIAN
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
pacific philosophical quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.914
H-Index - 32
eISSN - 1468-0114
pISSN - 0279-0750
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-0114.2012.01420.x
Subject(s) - dilemma , deviance (statistics) , argumentation theory , epistemology , perspective (graphical) , action (physics) , collective action , psychology , positive economics , social psychology , computer science , philosophy , political science , economics , law , artificial intelligence , physics , quantum mechanics , machine learning , politics
Drawing on the problem of deviance, I present a novel line of argumentation against causal theories of action. The causalist faces a dilemma: either she adopts a simple account of the causal route between intention and outcome, at the cost of failing to rule out deviance cases, or she adopts a more sophisticated account, at the cost of ruling out cases of intentional action in which the causal route is merely unusual. Underlying this dilemma, I argue, is that the agent's perspective plays an ineliminable role in determining which causal pathways are deviant and which are not.