Normativity and Misunderstandings: Parfit

Notes and Thoughts on Parfit's "On What Matters", Vol. 2, Chapter on Normativity

Oh! Before we start...Welcome my 100th published post! That's a lot of rambling...Thank you for reading my stuff.  Here are a couple of fun facts about my blog: 

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Ok, back to philosophy...

Overview

In the last post we talked about the disagreement between Parfit and Williams on whether there is such a thing as intrinsic good.  The debate continues but in the context of reasons for action.  For Williams having a reason to act means that you have some desire that you act to fulfill.  For Parfit reasons are facts that count in favour of (or against) a certain act.  You can have a reason to act without having some corresponding desire you seek to fulfill.  

Parfit uses an example to illustrate his point.  It's called the Early Death example:

Suppose that you know that unless you take a certain medicine, you will die much younger, losing many years of happy life.  Though you know this and you have deliberated in a procedurally rational way on this and all of the other relevant fact, you are not motivated to take this medicine. 

On Williams view you have no reason to take the medicine because there is nothing in your motivational set (the set of desires, dispositions, tendencies, etc that motivate your actions).  On Parfit there are facts that give you good reasons that count in favour of you taking the medicine.  The split between the two, in the simplest terms is that for Williams reasons for action must by definition motivate action.  For Parfit reasons needn't in themselves motivate actions, but they can count in favour of certain actions when considered by a rational agent. 

Ok, I've already jumped into the arguments and we're not even out of the intro yet!  I know you're anxious for more, so lets enjoy philosophy! Yay!

[Note: If you get tired of reading what Parfit and Williams say you can skip to the bottom section entitled "My Thoughts"!  Regarding my thoughts on the issues, I appreciate any feedback 'cuz it'll help me identify weakness in my future paper on the topic.  Thanks!]

Misunderstandings

So, check it.  Parfit is all "the problem is that Williams doesn't understand what reasons are".  Again, for Williams reasons can only be things that motivate action, and the only things that can motivate action are internal to us (the things in our motivational set).   The extension of Williams' position is that it is unintelligible to conceive of an "external" reason; that is, a reason for action that is not part of our pre-existing motivational set (i.e. desires).  Now that I think of it, we can say this about Williams' concept of a reason for action:  

1. A reason must have motivational force on the agent
2. Since the only things that have motivational force on an agent are elements of his motivational set, all reasons are internal to the agent. 
3.  Since all reasons are internal, any talk of external reasons for action is stark nonsense. 

Case 1
Parfit's all, "dude, you sooooo don't understand what I mean by external reasons".   Lets go back to the early deph example.  Williams says that when we say that Sick Sam has a reason to take the medicine, it's true that we might mean that it would be better for him to take the medicine.  But Williams doesn't think that taking the medicine would be a reason for Sam.  The distinction is that other people might perceive the facts of the situation and say that they are reasons for taking the medicine but it doesn't mean that the same facts would be reasons for Sam.

Case 2
Lets use a different example to bring out the distinction.  Suppose an unfortunate young girl is raped and gets pregnant as a consequence.  For some people all the facts of the situation would be reasons for her to get an abortion.  For others, the same facts would not be reasons for an abortion.  Suppose the young girl has a motivational set that disposes her toward wanting an abortion.  The anti-abortion group can rant and rave about the facts that are reasons for them for why she shouldn't have an abortion.  

But Williams would argue that unless the girl has some sort of desire (after rational deliberation) to have a child, these facts won't constitute reasons for her.   They don't constitute reasons for her because they don't have any "grip" on her; they can't motivate her to act.  They have about as much motivational force on her decision as do the facts about her perpetrators favorite sports team.  

Again, Parfit wants to deny that reasons need to have motivational force.  He says that reasons are simply facts that count in favour (or against) some action.  But it seems we need to ax, reasons for whom? in favour of what?  Regarding the latter, ultimately in explaining our actions we will say something like "because doing x is right or good".  But good for whom?  How do you know?

I think Parit's position seems most plausible when we give uncontroversial examples.  Examples where "common sense" would tell us what is good.  But Parfit's claim is that there are objective values.  There are things that are objectively good.  When we give examples where people's intuitions or "common sense" differs, his position becomes less plausible.  

I feel like in making this post, I'm repeating myself a lot.  Maybe that's because that's what Parfit's doing in this section.  

Case 3
I don't know why but I'm going to give one more example to contrast the two positions...Suppose Bob the Bully enjoys hurting others; it gives him more pleasure than anything.  It's just the way he's wired.  He also believes that he is more important than any other person.  His motivational set is such that he doesn't care about the suffering of others at all.  There are certain facts that most of us (I hope) could point to that give reasons against acting like Bob.  The question is whether Bob would see these facts as reasons against him acting how he does.  He might agree that certain things are facts, but, given his psychological make up he probably wouldn't see them as reasons that count against his behaviour.  

Of course, Williams position is unappetizing for people who really want to believe in objective right and wrong.  We want to say something like, "look, bullying causes suffering and suffering is bad.  These facts are reasons against bullying-type behaviour." The problem is that while Bob might agree that bullying causes suffering (i.e., the facts), for him it's not a reason that counts against doing it.  Causing suffering makes him happy.  Bob has no reason to stop bullying although most people will think that he does.   The problem with Bob is that, despite being presented with all the facts, he has no reason to stop bullying. 

I just noticed something.  When I'm writing Williams' arguments I agree with him, but when I write Parfit's I want to agree with Parfit.  Moving on...

Normativity and Why Does It Matter?
So how does this all relate to normativity?  In short, normativity for Williams is particular to the agent's psychology.  Facts can only be reasons in favour/against something in relation to a particular agent's values and desires.  What will constitute a 'reason in favour' for a particular agent is a "psychological prediction" based on their desires and psychological make up.   For Parfit reasons are facts in favour/against actions that bring about objectively good/bad things/states.  

Resolving this question is important to Parfit because he believes that certain ways of living are intrinsically better than others.  How are we supposed to decide how to live our lives if we can't appeal to reasons that are for or against one way or another?

My Thoughts
I partly agree with Parfit that some ways of living are better than others.  I'm just not sure that we can say that this is an objective fact.  But suppose for a moment that Parfit's right, that there are intrinsically better ways of living than others and that we can appeal to reasons for or against certain ways of living. The problem is that how we respond to facts and states of affairs is a consequence of our evolutionary, biological, psychological, historical, and cultural history.  How could we possibly hope to disentangle the facts that we consider to be good reasons from our historical, individuals, cultural, and biological biases?  Parfit could reply that that's no reason not to try.

Ok, lets continue with the supposition.  How could we possibly adjudicate between differing opinions.  I think that part of what makes things 'right' hangs on certain biological facts about humans.  For instance, we are social animals thus require some sort of sanction on violence if we are to survive as a species.  I'll admit right now I have some Hobbesian tendencies.  Now, does the fact that a requirement for sanctions on violence is necessary (which arises out of our biology)  make sanctions on violence intrinsically good?  

What if the facts of our biology were different.  Suppose we were like some strange insect species where the female rips the head of the male in order to procreate.  Then would decapitation be an intrinsic good because it arose out of our nature and was necessary for the survival of the species? 

Lets set that worry aside.  There's another worry I have.  There is an assumption in Parfit that all rational individuals would respond the same way to facts that count as reasons in favour of something.  This arises out of his assertion that there are intrinsic goods.  The idea, I think, is that facts that give us reasons to act in ways that aligne with these intrinsic goods (happiness, compassion, knowledge, etc...) will be reasons for all of us.  

Think of it this way.  Fact A counts as a reason for an action because the action alignes the individual with some intrinsic good.  Every rational person who becomes aware of fact A can acknowledge that fact A is a reason in favour of acting a certain way.  But this can only be true if both people recognize the aim of the action as an intrinsic good.  I have trouble accepting the idea that there can be such consensus.  I think there is something to Williams here in that what we consider 'good' has much to do with our psychological make up.

Consider this example.  Suppose I'm walkin' down the street and I see some guy playing an instrument I've never seen before: a kazuba.  I think it sounds amazing--a cross between a kazoo and a tuba.  I'm totally inspired.  I go on the intertubes and look up what it is and order one with an handy instructional DVD.   Here's the thing.  A hundred other people walk by and none of them think the instrument sounds any good.  Non of them order themselves one.  

Pafit's reasons story goes something like this.  The facts about the sounds of the instrument were reasons in favour me learning to play.  But why didn't the others respond to those same facts?  Just as I did, they all heard the sweet soothing sounds of the kazuba.  The plausible story is something like what Williams says: the facts of that sweet kazuba sound gave me reasons in favour of learning to play because there was something in my psychological make up that made me perceive the kazuba sounds good.  If there weren't that particular fact about me, no amount of kazuba sonatas could ever give me reasons in favour of playing the kazuba.    The upshot is that what we value is deeply intertwined with who we are as individuals.  

Given the wide variety of individuals, it's not unreasonable to suggest that there is a corresponding variety of ways to ascribe values to things and concepts.  If it's true that there are differences in how  value ascribed to concepts and things, then some facts will count as reasons for for some people, and those same facts might be irrelevant or against an action for other people.  

The problem for Parfit is this:  It only makes sense to talk about reasons for or against something if that thing has some kind of normative value.  But, as Mackie pointed out long ago, there is ample empirical evidence to suggest that there are important normative disagreements between people and cultures.  Unless Parfit can give us some guidance and to what these objective normative values are, he going to have a difficult time making his case that there are such things.  

Even if he can point to instances of agreement, the fact that there is agreement is not evidence of objectivity.  It is only evidence of agreement.  Parfit for his part can turn things around and say that the burden of proof lies on the skeptic: that there are moral disagreements is only evidence of disagreement, not that one side isn't right.

Normative Truth: Good and Bad Reasons. (Parfit)

(apology--I haven't proof read this yet)


Yo, check it.  I think I might actually have my paper topic for metaFX.  Stop.  That would be the best DJ name for a philosopher ever, DJ metaFX.  Anyway, I is going to talk about whever der is such ting as normativity in reasons--that is, whether there's such a ting as a good, bad, right, or wrong reason for axion.  


Parfit's Preamble on Disagreements
This is an intensely personal section where Parit shares his personal reasons for his quest to determine what matters in life.  The main point, however, is that if we find ourselves in disagreement with someone over a moral issue, the standard assumption is that there is some sort of asymmetry.  Maybe the person with whom we disagree doesn't have sufficient cognitive capacity to see the correct answer, or maybe they just don't have all the right facts.  But, those types of disagreements can be explained away.  


The difficult disagreements are with those that we consider our epistemic peers.  The people who are also on a whole. nuva. level. wif us.  Aaaand they have all same facts as us.  In cases of epistemic symmetry there is no rational reason to suppose our belief is any more correct than our friend's.  What do?  The only thing we can do is to assume that there is an asymmetry in knowledge or capacity somewhere.  But how do we know it's not us that is in the weaker position? Answer: we don't.  Oh! Snap! 


An example of one of these beliefs is retributive justice.  Parfit doesn't think anyone deserves to suffer ever.  To support his view he has to find the asymmetry responsible for his epistemic peers' views to the contrary.  To support his position Parfit suggests that belief in retributive justice may be a case "in which an evolutionary explanation helps to undermine what it explains".
His argument goes that evolution explains why people have reactive attitudes and the desire to inflict harm.  But the fact that these emotions and reaction arise out of the evolutionary process demonstrates that such attitudes are not responses to reasons.  They are simply reactions.  In other words, just because we have an impulse, doesn't mean the action for which we have the impulse is a right action, or that an emotional reaction isn't justification for an action's being right.  Something akin the naturalistic fallacy is going on up in hur. 


The upshot of the section is that he has deep disagreements with some of his epistemic peers so in order to determine whether his view is correct, rather than his peers, he needs to discover the asymmetries between them. 


Parfit on Williams


Parfit has great reverence for Williams and it disturbs him that their moral views are so divergent.  A central issue between them is whether there is such a thing as an intrinsic good.  An intrinsic good is something that isn't good because of any consequences derived from its acquisition rather it is good in itself.  A standard example would be happiness.  We don't pursue happiness for any other reason than happiness itself is good.  Contrast that with money.  We don't pursue money just to have it, but because it allows us to obtain other things we might value like Ed Hardy shirts--which are intrinsically ugly.


So, why is Parfit so pre-occupied by Williams' rejection of the notion of intrinsic good?  Because, without this notion Parit doesn't think we can answer the first question of philosophy: Are we human or are we dancer?  Not only that, but we also can't answer the "other" first question of philosophy, "how ought we to live our lives/which kind of life do I have the most reason to live?"  


You see, if we have nothing with absolute value to pursue, then not only can we not know at what we should aim our own actions but there will be no grounds by which we might judge the actions/life choices of others.  If all values are relative, then the person who pursues a life of causing suffering for others is on equal normative footing as someone who spends their life pursuing justice, happiness, knowledge, and love.   For Parfit we need some objective normative truths in order to know what reasons should count in favour or against engaging in an action.


For Williams the notion of an intrinsic good is inexplicable.  If something were to be intrinsically good-- that is, its essence was goodness--then its goodness should be explainable in advance of human valuation.  This is close to my position.  I don't understand how something is intrinsically good, devoid of any context.  I understand the notion if we say something like "justice and happiness are intrinsically good for humans".  Without humans would justice and happiness be good?  Are justice and happiness also good for ants and bacteria?  It seems that these values are only positive in relation to the benefits they bring to humans (in a community). 


Someone like Parfit might reply that bacteria and ants don't have the capacity for happiness and goodness, so my counter-example is irrelevant.  That's an objection I'll have to reply to.    


But enough about me, lets go back to Williams' argument which is very similar to my own thought, but obviously more sophisticated!  He says that if something has intrinsic goodness then we should not be able to explain its goodness by saying we value it.  So, I can't say that love is good because I value it.  It has to be the other way around;  I must say of something that has intrinsic value that I value it because of its intrinsic goodness.  In the case of love, I need to say that I value love because it is good.   In essence we are saying that something (e.g. love)  is good because it is good.  This seems a little tautologous. 


The suggestion might be that we should value things such as virtue, justice, and happiness because of the other properties that make them good.  Plato says justice is good because it creates harmony.  But just like Palin, Williams refudiates this view too.


Before we get into Williams' argument there, lets return to Parfit's view of reasons.  He says:


When we call something intrinsically good in the reason-implying sense, we mean that this thing has intrinsic properties that would or might give us or others strong reasons to respond to this thing in some positive way, such as wanting, choosing, or trying achieve this thing. 


The basic idea is that certain facts about the world will give us reasons to act in a certain way.  For example, it is a fact that helping an old lady across the street will make her happy and will be kind.  Both of those things are intrinsically good--those are facts!  Those facts give me reasons to act.  If there were no facts about the intrinsic goodness of happiness and kindness, I'd have no reason to act one way or the other.  A central idea is that facts create reasons for a determinate action.


Reasons Internalism Vs. Reason Externalism
Williams thinks this is all claptrap.  He adopts the "Humean" model of action.  The basic idea is that I have a predetermined set of desires, dispositions, character traits, etc called the motivational set...the only way we can explain action is by reference to my motivational set.  If I say I want to study, but I procrastinate on facebook instead, then my dominant desire was to make witty comments on facebook. Every time I ask "why did I do x" the answer will be "to satisfy some desire in my motivational set".  A consequence of this view is that, logically, we can't act in a way that isn't in accordance with something our pre-existing motivational set. 


Parfit sees things differently.  He says that facts about the world give us reasons to have new desires (if we are sufficiently rational and reflexive).  For example, maybe I see an old lady trying to cross the street on my way to work.  For whatever reason Zeus (the one TRUE god) gave me a motivational set that lacks the desire to help her across the street.  My friend sees that I didn't help her then explains to me why it's good to help old ladies across the street.  He states facts about kindness and compassion that give me reasons to include the desire to help many old ladies across many streets.  And I dedicate the rest of my life to helping old ladies across streets.  The end.  


From Parfit's position Williams' view is tragic for humanity.  If all that can motivate action are pre-existing desires, then it is pointless to ask what kind of life we ought to live.  All we can do is internally reflect on our motivational set and decide which desires we weigh more than others.  There is no point in asking what things are important or what we should care about.  It is a sad state of affairs indeed. 


I have to say that while my philosophical sympathies are with Williams, Parfit paints a much nicer picture.  Those in the Williams camp can claim that they are simply doing psychology.  It doesn't make sense to say that someone acted in a way that didn't accord with one of their desires.   Note that Williams' view doesn't necessarily imply profligate behaviour.  Most people have in their motivational set the desire to act in accordance with whatever they consider to be moral.


Moral Disagreement
But I want to set that debate aside and turn to another issue.  This notion of normatively--of intrinsic value.  It's all fine and dandy to say that this and that are intrinsically good or bad, but what do we do in cases of disagreement?  Certainly there are cases where people disagree.  Some people think allowing individuals to end their own lives is a good thing, others think it's baaaaaaad.  Because Parfit believes in intrinsic values, in such cases someone must be wrong.  It's not a matter of, "well, for person A's community it's ok and for person B's community it's not".  Nope.  Someone is wrong.  And it ain't me!


Lets suppose Parfit is right and there are objective moral values.  What do we do in cases of disagreement, especially when er'body has all the same facts?  It seems that the only way to choose between the two positions, given equal epistemic positions, is to presuppose a meta-theory of value.  In other words, suppose I give the reason "dignity is da best" for my position and you give yours "suicide is the da worst".    Now we need a theory of value to determine which values to value more.  But then someone comes along and gives a contrary theory of how we should weigh values.  Now we need a meta-meta theory to adjudicate between those two theories.  


The bottom line is this: once we say there is objective normative value, in a moral dispute given epistemic parity, there is no way to decide which reason for action we should prefer unless we further presuppose a meta-theory of values.  


I didn't really explain that too well but I hope you get the point...


Wacky Mackie and Wile E. Coyote 
Ok, one last thing.  What's the solution to this?  I think Mackie's error theory is the solution.  Here's what he says.  When I say this is good or this is bad, I mean what I say but my statements are false.  There is no such thing as good and bad.  Oh! Snap! The world is going to end! Er'body hide your wife, hide your kids, hide your husband cuz they b rapin' er'body up here!  


Hold on.  Ain't nobody gong b climbin' in ur windows.  Here's Mackie's idea.  Just because moral statements are all false doesn't mean that we need to throw away morality.  Morality and moral concepts serve a very useful purpose.  Just cuz there's no such thing as objective good or bad is no reason to go rapin' er'body in here.  Think of it like this.  (Some people might disgree with this example but I'll try to come up with others later).  Numbers.  What are they?  Can you touch them?  Do they exist?  No.  They are concepts.  Very useful ones at that.  We don't stop using them just because they don't exist in any real sense.  We can do the same with moral concepts like "good", "right", "bad", and "wrong".  Nothing is really intrinsically good or bad, but these are certainly useful concepts.


One interesting consequence of this view is that we are a little like Wile E. Coyote before he realized he's run off a cliff.  We act as if these concepts are real and so long as we don't look down, we should be fine!


Any and all criticisms are welcome as it will give me content for my paper.  Thank you for reading.  

How To Turn An Assailant Into Your Friend: Internalism vs Externalism

Notes and Thoughts on Bernard Williams' Internal and External Reasons


Key Quote:  "Does believing that a particular consideration is a reason to act in a particular way provide, or indeed constitute, a motivation to act?"


Overview


One of the central debates within meta-ethics is between the various strands of naturalism, on the one side, and those of non-naturalism on the other.  Jargon, aside naturalism refers to the idea that moral values such as good, bad, right, and wrong are natural properties of the world; that is, they really exist in one way or another.  A consequence of this view is that if these values actually exist, then they are objective and are not subject to cultural or personal points of view.


Non-naturalists, on the other hand, think that moral terms cannot be expressed or reduced to natural terms.  Otherwise stated, value statements occupy a realm that is apart from natural science.  Later non-naturalists expanded the position to include the notion that knowledge of basic moral truths can be known through some kind of internal reflection which will (hopefully) constitute reasons for action.  


Within this debate there is another sub-debate between what are called internalists and externalists.  As with naturalists and non-naturalists, there are many varieties of each but for the sake of the discussion here we'll focus a narrow set of each.  What what's all the fuss about?


Well, in a nutshell, the internalists say that the only way to account for someone's actions  is if they had some sort of internal motivation for it; that is, the reason for their action had to already, in some sense, be contained within them or derived as a means of satisfying a desire.  


The externalists argue that we can be motivated to moral action by--you guessed it--external reasons or facts in addition to internal reasons.  An external reason would be something like (but not necessarily) a rule like "one ought to always tell the truth" or even someone else trying to convince us to act in a certain way.


The way these two debates come together is that if moral values are part of the fabric of our world and really exist in some external objective sense, then it's possible for these external facts to compel us to act.  But, if moral facts are somehow knowable through internal reflection only then internalists are correct and we can only be compelled to action by internal reasons.


Anyway, in very general terms, that's what's going on.  Now, lets get into some of the nitty gritty...Incidentally, I should say that that my own opinion is that there's a role somewhere in this debate for cognitive science and empirical psychology.  But enough about me...


Internal Reasons


Ok, lets flesh out the internalists position regarding the relationship between desires and motivations/reasons for action.  Before we put in all the qualifications and technical language, internalism holds that every reason for action is arises out of an internal desire.  (Note: I'm going to use the words 'reasons' and 'motivations' interchangeably).  Now, lets add a little bit to this.  First we need to be explicit about what constitutes an internal motivation.  Well, this would include all your desires, dispositions of evaluation (i.e., world view), patterns of emotional reaction (i.e., personal psychological makeup), personal loyalties, and goals (short and long-term).  All of these things we call the subjective motivational set, or 'S' for short.  We should also note that an individual's desires and goals needn't be selfish.


So far we have this massive collection of factors that can cause us to act and that can, given perfect knowledge, be retroactively pointed to as an explanation for our actions.  Lets add a little more information about S--information we can arrive at through deliberation.  It's not uncommon for us to act and not be able to immediately point to why we acted thusly (how often do you get to use thusly?).  However, if we deliberate, (and assume we are rational) we can often explain our action in terms of something in S.


Also, sometimes deliberation works in another way.  It causes reasons for action to be added to or removed from S.  Perhaps I'm in a situation where two or more elements of S are in conflict.  Suppose, I want to both have my cake and eat it too--both desires are part of my S.


A way in which my S set will diminish is if I give up one of these desires, that is, after deliberation I decide my desire to eat the cake supersedes my desire to have it.  Or perhaps after deliberation I decide I will eat half my cake and keep the other half on my pillow for ever and ever.  The conflicting desires in S led to a new element of S-- whatever ends up being the compromise.


The main point is that S is not static and can change (and not just because of deliberation).  If you think about what sorts of things you wanted when you were a child and the kinds of things you want now, it is unlikely that they are the same.


I don't want to go into too much more detail than this but I will just add that it is consistent with internalism to say we can have elements of S that we don't know about.   We can also falsely believe that an element is part of our S when it isn't (i.e., we are often mistaken in identifying our desires).


As a note, this is the part of internalism that makes me uncomfortable philosophically because it's not falsifiable (I know, I know...there are problems with falsificationism, but lets just deal with one issue at a time).   Although, this isn't necessarily a big problem in the context we are discussing: internalism vs externalism.


Under What Conditions Might Externalism Offer a Good Account of Behaviour?


Before working up to such a situation lets see if we can describe a situation where there are clear external reasons for action, but action is better explained by internal reasons (i.e., arising from S).  A model of this type of situation would be where a person acts contrary to their well-being and the action isn't a result of false beliefs or irrationality.


Every student encounters such situations every day when it's time to sit down and study.  As students we know that we need to study but those cat videos on youtube are so damn funny!  The fact that we watch Maru jump in and out of boxes can be explained by there being nothing in our S that is a desire to study, hence no reasons can be generated to study.  However, there are an abundance of internal reasons (desire to feel pleasure, happiness, etc...) for watching Maru.  The desire to study is not part of our S.


One could reply that the student's actions aren't correctly explained by the model.  Surely, at some level the student must want to study and therefore has an internal reason to study.  But suppose the student goes into deep meditation in the mountains of Tibet for a year to search in inner reaches of his mind for this internal reason to study.  After examining his entire S, he cannot find a single desire from which he could derive a reason.


At this point we might say that he has a different kind of reason for studying, an external reason.  Suppose the student never wanted to go to skool in the first place, but was forced to do it by his draconian parents.  Both his parents are world renowned academics and expect the same future from him.  But little Johnny just wants rock 'n roll aaaaaaaaall night, and party ev-er-y day.


His parents are all, "Johnny, you have to go to school, it's our family tradition and you'll have no sekurity if you don't go to school.  If you care about the legacy of this family you will go to skool.  something something family honour."


So, now that we know a little bit more about why Johnny was in skoo in the first place it becomes clearer that there is nothing in his particular set of desires that might give him a reason to study.  But undeniably there are reasons for Johnny to study.  It becomes apparent that any reason for Johnny to study will come from without; that is, it will be an external reason.


Alright, so we have at least one plausible picture of what it might be like for someone to have an external reason for doing something.  Now, the main issue...


Can External Reasons Alone Bring about Action?


Now, here's the big important queshtun: could an external reason, on its own, compel someone to act.  Another way to say this is, if we were to retroactively explain someone's actions, could we ever (correctly) explain them exclusively in terms of external reasons?


Lets go back to Johnny and figure this out.  Lets say after listening to his parents express their desperate desire for him to go to school and to carry on his family's lofty tradition, Johnny decides to go back to skool and study.  What sort of story can we tell to explain his new course of action?


Lets begin by saying, that there are still no desires in Johnny's S that might give him a direct reason for going to skool.  That much hasn't changed.   But we still need something to explain his motive for going to school; that is, something in is S must have provided a reason for him to go to school.


The internalist will say that the reason for Johnny's return to skool is because he had desires in his S that gave him a reason/motivation.  The internalist will say something to the effect that Johnny must consider his family's traditions and legacies as desires capable of motivating action.   After reflection he realized that the best way to manifest those desires was to go to skool.  He's not going to study because he thinks school's important (although he's aware of it), he's going to study because he values his families legacy, and studying is what's going to realize this desire.


The fact that we can point to internal motivations/reasons to explain Johnny's change of heart doesn't mean that external reason statements can't motivate action.  Consider the fact that it's common knowledge that going to university on the whole significantly ameliorates your lifetime salary (well, it used to be true anyway...).


Johnny never doubted the truth of this statement, he knew this.  He parents had been telling him his whole life.  The important take away is that even if an external reason statement is true (or thought to be true by an individual), its truth alone is not sufficient to compel action.


What the externalist has to shew is that simply by virtue of believing an external reason statement to be true (e.g., going to skool is good) that this alone somehow gives rise to motivation.  The externalist has to shew that Johnny went back to skool because going to school is good.  Not because he values family legacy (that's an internal reason) or his father made a very convincing case (he already knew going to skool is a good thing and that would be going because his father persuaded him).


If we extend this model to the moral sphere, telling someone that something is 'right' (and their believing it is) isn't on its own sufficient for the person to act in accordance with it.  Moral action will require internal reasons for there to be any, well...action.

At this point, Williams discusses further intricate arguments against externalism, but I'm really sleepy so, I'm going to pass on them for now.


A Few Final Notes


First is that the externalist has difficulty explaining the all-too-common human peculiarity of acting contrary to what one might think as objectively true (i.e., external reason statements).  The only response an externalist can give is "they're acting irrationally".  But plainly this is not true.  The calculating criminal who devises all sorts of plans to avoid getting caught for his crime, is not acting irrationally.  It's rational not to want to go to jail and to avoid it--despite the ostensibly objective reason statement "stealing is baaaaaaaaaad" which the criminal probably also acknowledges as true.


Second is that when we try to convince people to do things we often encounter greater success when we give them reasons that relate to their internal desires.  Trying to convince someone that they should do something because it is objectively the right and rational thing to do is not often going to be as successful.


If you don't believe me you can do your own applied philosophy experiment the next time you get into an argument.  To bring the other person to see the glorious correctness of your view, just keep repeating, "but my way is right and rational, so I win".


If that doesn't work, go to the worst area of town at night and while you're getting robbed, explain to your assailant that what his is doing is wrong and that he is acting irrationally.  Let me know how it works!