Instrumental rationality : the normativity of means-ends coherence /
Rationality requires that we intend the means that we believe are necessary for achieving our ends. Instrumental Rationality explores the formulation and status of this requirement of means-ends coherence. In particular, it is concerned with understanding what means-ends coherence requires of us as...
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| Format: | Book |
| Language: | English |
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Oxford ; New York :
Oxford University Press,
2020.
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| Edition: | First edition. |
| Subjects: |
| Summary: | Rationality requires that we intend the means that we believe are necessary for achieving our ends. Instrumental Rationality explores the formulation and status of this requirement of means-ends coherence. In particular, it is concerned with understanding what means-ends coherence requires of us as believers and agents, and why. Means-ends coherence is a genuine requirement of rationality and cannot be explained away as a myth, confused with a disjunction of requirements to have, or not have, specific attitudes. Nor is means-ends coherence strongly normative, such that we always ought to be means-ends coherent. A promising strategy for assessing why this requirement should exist is to consider the constitutive aim of intention. Just as belief has a constitutive aim (truth) that can explain some of the theoretical requirements of consistency and coherence governing beliefs, intention has a constitutive aim (here called "controlled action") that can explain some of the requirements of consistency and coherence governing intentions. We can therefore better understand means-ends coherence by understanding the constitutive aims of both of the attitudes governed by the requirement, intention, and belief. |
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| Physical Description: | x, 229 pages ; 24 cm. |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references (pages [219]-225) and index. |
| ISBN: | 0198746938 9780198746935 |