The irrational failure to act
Heeney M.
1 April 2025Oxford University Press
Philosophical Quarterly
2025#75Issue 2560 - 578 pp.
I defend against a salient objection the thesis that practical rationality requires us to perform intentional actions. The objection is that if rationality requires the performance of intentional actions, then agents are irrational for failing to succeed in what they intend to do. I reply to this objection by hewing closely to the principle that the rational ought implies can. We are rationally required not to successfully realize the content of our intentions but to exercise the fallible abilities in our possession. Taking this line permits us to agree that we are not irrational for failing to succeed, while also endorsing the anti-Internalist claim that practical rationality embraces intentional actions themselves, rather than merely the beliefs and intentions that prompt and sustain them.
agential ability , intentional action , ought implies can , rationality
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Department of History Philosophy, and Religious Studies, Nazarbayev University, 53 Kabanbay batyr Ave., Astana, 010000, Kazakhstan
Department of History Philosophy
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