Hutcheson's Contributions to Action Theory

Abstract

Jonathan Dancy charges that Hutcheson's distinction between justifying reasons and motivating reasons is unimportant: it is simply between moral reasons and other good reasons. I argue that the distinction is between propositions (which, following Locke, are mental states) with different presuppositions and different functions. One identifies qualities of objects that we desire; the other identifies qualities that we approve. I situate Hutcheson in the current debate about the nature of practical reasons. I argue that he avoids problems posed for factivists (those who say that reasons are facts but have trouble explaining the motivation for actions not based on facts) and for Humeans (those who say that reasons consist in belief-desire pairs but have trouble explaining how these psychological states can justify). On Hutcheson's view, motivating and justifying reasons at times refer to the same qualities, which makes it possible for one to serve the function of the other.