文档介绍：Philosophy ofAction
2 ALFRED R. MELE
The basic subject matter of the philosophy of action is a pair of questions:
(1) What are actions? (2) How are actions to be explained? The questions
call, respectively, for a theory of the nature of action and a theory of the
explanation of actions. Donald Davidson has articulated and defended in-
fluential answers to both questions. Those answers are the primary focus
of this chapter.
1. ACTIONS AND INDIVIDUATION
Actions, as Davidson understands them, are analogous to money and sun-
burns in one noteworthy respect. The piece of paper with which I just
purchased a drink is a genuine . dollar bill partly in virtue of its hav-
ing been produced (in the right way) by the . Treasury Department.
The burn on my back is a sunburn partly in virtue of its having been pro-
duced by exposure to the sun’s rays. A duplicate bill produced with plates
and paper stolen from the Treasury Department is a counterfeit dollar
bill, not a genuine one. A burn that looks and feels just like the one on
my back is not a sunburn if it was produced by exposure to a heat lamp
rather than to the sun. Similarly, on Davidson’s view of action, a certain
event is my buying a drink – an action – partly in virtue of its having been
appropriately produced by reasons that I had for buying one, reasons be-
ing understood plexes of beliefs and desires (Davidson 1980 [1963];
1980a [1971]; 1980a [1973]; 1987b). An event that someone else covertly
produces by remote control – one including visually indistinguishable bod-
ily motions not appropriately produced by relevant reasons of mine – is
not a purchasing of a drink by me, even if it feels to me as though I am in
charge.
Toforestall confusion, it should be noted that Davidson does not identify
actions with non-actional events appropriately caused by reasons. That would
be analogous to identifying genuine . dollar bills with pieces of printed
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