Abstract
Humean promotionalists about reasons think that whether there is a reason for an agent to ϕ depends on whether her ϕ-ing promotes the satisfaction of at least one of her desires. Several authors have recently defended probabilistic accounts of promotion, according to which an agent’s ϕ-ing promotes the satisfaction of one of her desires just in case her ϕ-ing makes the satisfaction of that desire more probable relative to some baseline. In this paper I do three things. First, I formalize an argument, due to Jeff Behrends and Joshua DiPaolo, to the effect that Mark Schroeder’s and Stephen Finlay’s probabilistic accounts of promotion cannot be correct. Next, I extend this argument to a recent alternative offered by D. Justin Coates and show how Coates’ attempt to avoid the argument by introducing a distinction between ‘intrinsic’ and ‘extrinsic’ probability doesn’t help. Finally, I suggest an alternative way of understanding promotion in terms of increase in degree of fit between the causal upshot of an action and the content of a desire. I show how this view, disjunctively paired with probabilism about promotion, solves the problems with previous accounts.
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Notes
Behrends and DiPaolo (2011, p. 5).
Coates (2014).
Schroeder (2007, p. 29, emphasis in original).
Behrends and DiPaolo (2011).
C.f. Behrends and DiPaolo (2011, p. 2).
See also Sect. 4 below, where I discuss the initial probability of D in more detail.
C.f. Behrends and DiPaolo (2011, p. 2).
ibid.
C.f. Behrends and DiPaolo (2011, p. 3).
This is a formal characterization of the view articluated in (Finlay (2006), p. 8).
C.f. Behrends and DiPaolo (2011, p.1–3).
This is a formal characterization of the view articluated in Schroeder (2007, p. 113).
C.f. Behrends and DiPaolo (2011, p. 3–5).
This is a formal characterization of the view articulated in Coates (2014, p. 5).
Coates (2014, p. 5, emphasis in original).
Proof:
-
(1)
pr(D) = pr(D | A) * pr(A) + pr(D | Ã) * pr(Ã) [Theorem of total probability]
-
(2)
pr(D | A) = 1 [[5], definition of a Behrends/DiPaolo situation]
-
(3)
pr(D | Ã) = pr(D | B) = 1 [[4], [6], definition of a Behrends/DiPaolo situation]
-
(4)
pr(D) = 1 * pr(A) + 1 * (1-pr(A)) [(1–3)]
-
(5)
pr(D) = pr(A) + 1 - pr(A) = 1 [(4)]
-
(6)
pr(D) = pr(D | A) = 1 [(2, 5)].
-
(1)
Coates (2014, p. 6–7).
ibid.
One worry with Coates’ proposal is that the notion of the ‘intrinsic’ properties of desire is seriously unclear. For instance, Coates seems to suggest that the ‘strength’ of a desire is one of its intrinsic properties. But at least one standard way of understanding the strength of a desire is in terms of the motivational efficacy of the desire; and this, in turn, is usually understood in terms of the truth of certain counterfactual claims such as: if the agent were to be in such-and-such circumstances, then she would be motivated to ϕ by desire d. If this is the right way to understand the strength of a desire, then it seems some counterfactuals must be relevant to a desire’s intrinsic properties. In that case, we are owed a principled reason for including these counterfactuals as relevant to the intrinsic properties of desire but excluding others. I won’t pursue this worry here. Instead, I’ll assume both that Coates can give some principled account of which counterfactuals are relevant to a desire’s intrinsic properties and that we have a reasonably firm intuitive grip on the distinction between a desire’s intrinsic and extrinsic properties.
Compare the case of self-certifying beliefs, for instance the belief that I have at least one belief. This belief is such that, in virtue of its intrinsic properties (e.g., its content) whenever it is present it is true.
Compare the belief that I have no beliefs. This belief is self-undermining in a symmetrical sense: its mere presence guarantees that it is false. Of course, there are possible worlds that satisfy the description “world in which I have no beliefs”. But in such worlds, my belief that I have no beliefs is not true, it is not even present.
Here I make explicit the fact that it is the intrinsic probability of D on the right-hand side of the inequality.
The locus classicus for this idea is Anscombe (2000). Of course, such talk is largely metaphorical. And there are various ways of trying to cash out the metaphor. See, for instance Smith (2007, 1987), Zangwill (1998), and Humberstone (1992). And there is a growing debate over whether this distinction can help solve any serious philosophical puzzles. See, for instance, Tenenbaum (2006); Sobel and Copp (2001); Milliken (2008). But for present purposes, the metaphor is sufficient, since all I am interested in is the idea that worlds can be evaluated in terms of how well they fit the content of a desire, not in, e.g., whether the direction of fit of desire can generate a norm of desire, whether desires can be shown to be genuine sources of reasons, or whether the idea of direction of fit can tell us anything about the correct theory of agential motivation.
Notice too the following advantage enjoyed by FPP: in order to work, FPP does not need to appeal to Coates’ distintinction between the ‘intrinsic’ and ‘extrinsic’ probability of a desire’s being satisfied, a distinction I said was somewhat suspect. See fn. 21.
I will say this: notice that the relevant function cannot simply be a multiplicative function on the probability that the desire is satisfied and the degree of match, since cases of probability 0 will then systematically yield the wrong result.
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Acknowledgments
Thanks to Finnur Delsén, Matt Kotzen, Marc Lange, Dan Layman, Ram Neta, Kate Nolfi, Wesley Sauret, and Geoff Sayre-McCord, for their comments and suggestions.
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Sharadin, N. Problems for pure probabilism about promotion (and a disjunctive alternative). Philos Stud 172, 1371–1386 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-014-0354-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-014-0354-4