Instructor:
Prof Hong Yu Wong (Philosophy/CIN)
Cross-listed in:
Philosophy, Cognitive Science
Course website:
https://sites.google.com/site/whywong/teaching/
Pre-requisites:
There are no pre-requisites for taking this Proseminar.
Time and Location:
July 31 - August 2, 2017, Hölderlinzimmer, Alte Burse; exact hours below
Taking the seminar for credit:
Students taking the seminar for credit need to attend all sessions and write a 3000 word essay due two months after the end of the seminar. The topic of the essay should be agreed in advanced with the instructor.
Topics:
Day 1 (July 31, 2017, Monday):
1. The significance of action/ the problem of action (10.15 - 11.45)
2. Causal theory of action (13.15 - 14.45)
3. Anscombe's theory of action (15.00 - 16.30)
Day 2 (August 1, 2017, Tuesday):
4. Intentions and plans (10.15 - 11.45)
5. Choice (13.15 - 14.45)
6. Problem of the disappearing agent (15.00 - 16.30)
Day 3 (August 2, Wednesday):
7. Perception, emotion, and action (10.15 - 11.45)
8. Joint agency (13.15 - 14.45)
9. Free will (15.00 - 16.30)
Readings by Session: (*-ed readings are REQUIRED)
Note: Most of the links to required and other readings are to JSTOR, which the University of Tübingen has a subscription to. If you are not downloading the readings when you are online on campus, you may need to log in so that you can access the readings free of charge.
1. The significance of agency and the problem of action
*Frankfurt ‘The Problem of Action’ American Philosophical Quarterly, 1978
Steward, H. ‘Animal Agency’, Inquiry 52 (2009): 217-31.
Burge, T. (2009) “Primitive Agency and Natural Norms”, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 79: 251-278.
Nussbaum Aristotle's De Motu Animalium (Princeton, 1978)
2. Actions, events, processes and the causal theory of action
*Davidson ‘Actions, Reasons, and Causes’ (JSTOR)
Jaeger, R. A. ‘Action and Subtraction’, The Philosophical Review, Vol. 82, No. 3 (Jul., 1973), pp. 320-329.
Steward, H. ‘Sub-Intentional Actions and the Over-mentalization of Agency’, in Constantine Sandis (ed.) New Essays on the Explanation of Action (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009): 295-312.
3. Anscombe
*Intention, 2nd ed. 1957 : Sections 1-8, 16-18, 20-26.
(we will focus on the following things: the idea of an event being intentional under a description, practical deliberation, and progressives)
4. Intention and planning
*Bratman, M. 1984: Two Faces of Intention. The Philosophical Review, 93, 375-405.
5. Decision and choice
*Holton Willing, Wanting Waiting, chapter 3 ‘Choice’
6. Problem of the disappearing agent
*Velleman 'What Happens When Someone Acts' Mind 1992.
Hornsby ‘Agency and Causal Explanation’, in Mental Causation, eds. J. Heil and A. Mele (Oxford University Press, 1993) 129-153 <HIGHLY RECOMMENDED>
Hornsby 'Agency and Actions' Philosophy, 2004.
7. Perception, emotion, and action
*Clark, A. 2009: Perception, Action, and Experience: Unraveling the Golden Braid. Neuropsychologia, 47, 1460-1468.
*Railton, P. 2017: Conscious rationality prefigured and prepared: the affective system and model-based learning and control. Emotion Review.
8. Joint agency
*Bratman, M. 2014: Shared Agency, chapter 1 ‘Sociality and Planning Agency’
Knoblich, G., Butterfill, S., and Sebanz, N. 2011: Psychological Research on Joint Action: Theory and Data. In Brian Ross, editor: The Psychology of Learning and Motivation, Vol. 54, Burlington: Academic Press, pp. 59-101.
9. Free will
*Strawson, P. F. ‘Freedom and Resentment’ 1962.
Steward, H. ‘Free Will’ in J. Shand (ed.) Central Issues of Philosophy (Wiley-Blackwell, 2009): 152-64.