Reasons for Actions that Make No Difference

Abstract

This dissertation centrally features the inefficacy problem, which arises in situations where a set of actions is required to prevent an unwanted outcome, yet no individual action within that set makes a difference to whether the outcome occurs. Such cases raise a challenge for both morality and rationality, since it is unclear how normative reasons can apply to actions that are, in isolation, instrumentally inefficacious. The chapters address this challenge from different angles, either by assessing existing solutions or developing novel approaches. The first chapter develops a solution to the inefficacy problem in the moral realm by appealing to expressive reasons. It argues that there are expressive reasons to speak out against an injustice, which in turn generate a commitment: subsequently contributing to the very outcome one has condemned can express insincerity and thereby harm its victims. Since there are moral reasons to avoid such harms, individuals have reason to refrain from these actions even when they are instrumentally ineffective. The second chapter focuses on the idea that the inefficacy problem arises both within collectives as well as intrapersonally. It examines Chrisoula Andreou’s proposal that individually innocent actions can be characterized as parts of larger, impermissible doings in progress. In particular, it analyzes the attempted transfer of this approach from the intra- to the interpersonal context. Ultimately, the chapter concludes that this extension fails, since in collective cases the relevant extended doing cannot be attributed to any individual agent in a way that grounds a corresponding reason for action. The third chapter explores the relation between inefficacy and the problem of temptation. Both appear to involve an agent acting in line with her preferences while her behavior nevertheless seems irrational. As such, both phenomena pose a challenge for theories of rationality that demand preferential action. The chapter argues that, as a result, they are often conflated, even though they differ in nature. It further shows that failing to distinguish them can make solutions appear successful while in fact rendering them inapplicable to either problem when considered in isolation. The arguments in this chapter specifically target Michael Bratman’s argument from agential authority. The fourth chapter discusses the alleged phenomenon of self-governed self-defeat in cases of inefficacy. While such cases seem to involve agents acting in accordance with their own preferences at each moment, the chapter rejects the conclusion that their behavior is therefore self-governed by showing that foreign motivations are operative in generating those preferences. The argument draws on Michael Bratman’s account of agential identification with motivating attitudes and introduces an additional condition, namely endorsement of the diachronic functioning of these attitudes. The chapter shows that, given the structure of the relevant preferences in cases of inefficacy, this condition can impossibly be satisfied. As a result, these preferences cannot be free from the influence of foreign motivations, and the resulting self-defeat cannot be genuinely self-governed. The final chapter brings these findings together and reflects on their broader implications. It considers how the rejection of self-governed self-defeat may inform a solution to the inefficacy problem for rationality, assesses the prospects for transferring the proposed solutions across contexts, and clarifies what the findings imply for understanding the relation between inefficacy and temptation.