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Desires and Normative Truths: A Holist s

Response to the ScepticsROBERT H . MYERS

York University Torontormyers@ yorku. ca

According to the practicality requirement, there could be truths about what peoplehave reason to do only if people s m otivating states could be, in an appro priatesense, either correct or incorrect. Yet according to the Humean theory of motiv-ation, peop le s m otivating states are a species of desire, and these desires are no t aspecies of belief being neither identical to nor entailed by them; and according tothe s tand ard viewf of desire, P s desire to 9 is, at bo tto m , a dispositio n to act inwhatever ways she believes will increase her chances of ip-ing. As there is no obvioussense in which such disposition are aiming to get P s reasons right, they seemincapable of satisfying the practicality requirement and scepticism about normative

truths seems to follow. I argue, first, that this sceptical conclusion is best avoided,not by rejecting either the practicality requirement or the Humean theory of mo-tivation, but rather by rejecting the standa rd view of desire, and, second, tha t this isbest done by endorsing a holistic view, according to which the contents of people sdesires depend importantly, though not essentially, on the contents of their nor-mative beliefs.

Are there normative truths, truths about what people have reason to

do? Nobody doubts that there are truths about what people would

have reason to do if they had reason to prom ote ends of various sorts,

or i/they had reason to abide by various principles or commitments.

But do people actually have reason to do any of these things? It is

often simply assumed that people must have reason to promote their

own interests or perhaps just the satisfaction of their current desires.

But are even these things that people literally have reason to do?

One important argument against the existence of normative truths

has its roots in two compelling claims about motivation — one con-cerning the bearing that reasons for action would have to have on the



376 Robert H Myers

people's motivating states on their desires. The first of these claims is

often described as the pr ctic lity requirement For now, we might put

it as the claim that there could be truths about what people havereason to do only if people's motivating states could be, in an appro-

priate sense, either correct or incorrect. The second claim is often

described as the Hum ean theory of motivation. For now , we might

put it as the claim that people's motivating states are a species of

desire, and that these desires are not a species of belief being neither

identical to nor entaüed by them.^

Taken together, these two claims entaü that there could be truths

about what people have reason to do only if people's desires could be,in an appropriate sense, either correct or incorrect. But is this pos-

sible? It might seem not, given the standard view of what desires are.

For, according to the standard view of what desires are, one 's desire to

cp is, at bo tto m , just a disposition to act in ways one believes wiü

increase one's cbances of <p-ing.^ And in what sense, the sceptics

wiü demand, could such dispositions be either correct or incorrect?

The standard view of what desires are is often accepted without

question.'' In consequence, many defenders of normative truths take

one of two tacks: either they embr ce the chaüenge of showing that

such simple dispositions to act actually could be, in an appropriate

sense, either correct or incorrect, or they dismiss the need for them to

show any such thing, either on the ground that the Humean theory of

motivation is false, or on the ground that the Humean theory of

motivation is irrelevant, the deeper mistake in the sceptics' argument

lying in the practicality requirement.

As we shaü see, however, there are very serious obstacles in the way

of au such arguments. Defenders of normative truths therefore seem

better advised to reject the standard view of what desires are, in hopes

of uncovering an alternative view more hospitable to their position.

And indeed, in recent years, several proposals to this effect have

emerged. Perhaps the most notable of these is T. M. Scanlon's

^ Compare Smith 1994, Ch. 1. As we shall see, though. Smith understands the practicality

requirement, and so also the basic thrust of the sceptics' concerns, rather differently than I do.



Desires and Norm ative Truths 77

suggestion that desires are typically judgement sensitive attitudes, atti-

tudes that may be said to be correct when the judgements to which

they are sensitive are true.' But the difficulty is to make good on

proposals of these sorts, in particular on their underlying assumption

that desires are generally aiming to get normative matters right.

Scanlon may be pointing us in the right direction, but what we

reaUy need are some more details.

The principal contention of this paper is that we can provide the

requisite details and thus block this important argument against the

existence of normative truths only by embracing a holistic account of

what desires are. What such an account involves will become clearer aswe go along. For now, we might just say that holistic accounts place

less emphasis on isolating essential properties of particular kinds of

propositional a ttitudes and m ore emphasis on understanding systemic

features of propositional attitudes considered as a whole.* But, again,

what this amounts to will become clearer as we proceed.

1. Clarifying the practicality requirement

We should start by getting clearer about the practicality requirement.

For even its proponents often portray it in ways that make it look

considerably less plausible than it really is.

The first point to emphasize in this connection is that the practi-

cality requirement, as I understand it, says nothing about the conse-

quences normative truths must actually have for people's motivations.

It does not claim, for example, that anyone who has reason to try to pmust by virtue of that fact be motivated, at least to some degree, to <p.

If it did, it would almost certainly be mistaken, if only because it seems

inevitable that people could fail to be cognizant of all the reasons for

action they have. As I understand it, however, the practicality require -

ment makes a claim about the motivations people ideally should have

if normative truths exist, not the motivations they necessarily would

have.

But what, precisely, is this claim? Pretty clearly, it would not do atthis point to recast the practicality requirement as a claim about the



378 Robert H Myers

consequences of possessing normative beliefs — s the claim, say, that

anyone who believes she has reason to try to cp must by virtue of that

fact be motivated, at least to some degree, to cp. For one thing, asMichael Smith (1994, pp. 119-21) and many others have contended,

such claims would again almost certainly be m istaken, since people s

normative beliefs sometimes do seem to leave them unmotivated. But

the point here is that such claims would also be of the wrong type,

since they again concern the motivations people would have, not the

motivations they should have.

W ith this mu ch. Smith himself agrees. Thus he takes the practicality

requirement to be claiming only that rationality always calls forpeople s motivating states to accord w ith their norm ative beliefs

(Smith 1994, esp. p. 148). But I think this is still not right. As we

shall see in section 2, it is far fi-om certain that this actually is some-

thing rationality always does call for. So if it is taken this way, the

practicality requirement may again come out false. But, as before, the

deeper worry is that the requirement should not be taken this way.

For, as I understand it, it concerns the motivations people ideally

should have if normative truths exist, no t the motivations they ideallyshould have in light of their normative beliefs

But if the shou ld in question is no t the sho uld of rationality,

what is it? I think it is nothing more—but also nothing less — than

the shou ld of successful accord. If norm ative truth s are to exist,

people s m otiva ting states must be assessable in their Hght; it m ust

be appropriate to inquire whether those states succeed in according

with those truths, and are in this sense correct, or whether they fail,

and are in this sense incorrect. A motivating state could be incorrect in

the sense in question without being irrational, and so in that sense

without being other than it should be. But if normative truths are to

exist there must be this other sense in which that is not so.

Now it might be thought that, in saying this, I must be retreating

too far, since the practicality requirement, understood in this way,

would be much too easy to satisfy. After all, suppose that motivation

does require desire and that a desire to cp is just a disposition to act inways one believes will increase one s chances of 9-ing. Even so, if it



esires and Norm ative Truths 379

I quite agree; no one could. That is why I introduced the require-

ment as claiming peop le s m otivating states must be capable of being

correct or incorrect in an

appropriate sense

It is not enough that theyare capable of according or conflicting with normative truths. They

must in some sense have it as their aim to get normative matters right,

and hence in some sense be capable of either succeeding or failing at

that task. I take this to be a requirement on peop le s motivating states

considered as a whole. So it is also not enough that some special

motivating states could have this aim. As I shall often say, this must

be what people s motivating states generally aim at.

This requirement clearly does pose a threat to the existence of nor-mative truths, for it is far ftom obvious that simple dispositions to act

in ways one believes wül increase one s chances of cp-ing are generaüy

aiming to get normative matters right. It is equally far from obvious

that people, in forming such dispositions, are generally aiming to

achieve that result. So the problem does not lie in the admittedly

stiU-metaphorical talk of motivations possessing aims; it lies rather

in the particular sort of state with which motivations are being iden-

tified. As we shall see in the next section, attempts to work a round thisproblem are undoubtedly possible. The point for now is not that all

such attempts must faü but simply that the practicality requirement,

unde rstood as I am understanding it, is doing what it is reputed to do.

It is creating difficulties for anyone who would defend the existence of

normative truths while simultaneously endorsing the Humean theory

of motivation and the s tandard view of what desires are. So let us now

consider whether the requirement, so understood, is actuaüy correct.

Although it can hardly be said to cut much ice as an argument, Ithink the first point to note in this connection is that the practicality

requirement in fact runs into very little opposition when it is under-

stood in this way. Opposition to the requirement normally focuses on

the claim that people must always be, or must always be rationally

required to be, motivated to act in line with their normative beliefs.

But, again, the practicality requirem ent as I understand it is no t claim-

ing anything even remotely like that. If someone is going to take issue

with the practicality requirement understood as I am understandingit, they must argue that there could be truths about what people



380 Robert H. Myers

generally aiming to get normative matters right. But if people s m oti -

vating states are not generally aiming to get norm ative matters right, it

would seem to follow that people are not capable of acting/or reasons.And how could there be reasons for people to act if people cannot act

for reasons?

Of course, even if peop le s motivating states are no t generally

aiming to get normative matters right, it will still be possible to explain

why they are doing whatever they are doing. So there will still be a

sense in which there are reasons for their actions, and for that matter

even a sense in which they are acting for those reasons. But I trust it is

clear that those are not the sorts of reasons the existence of which isbeing placed in doubt by the sceptical argument we are considering

here. O ur sceptics are not denying that peop le s actions can be ex-

plained; they are denying that there are independent truths in Hght of

which they can be assessed as correct or incorrect.

So, in the sense of reaso n that m atters here, people do not neces-

sarily act for reasons. They act for reasons only if it is their aim to

get normative matters right. The crucial question is therefore what it

takes for this to be their aim. Now it might be suggested that peoplehave this as their aim so long as they have some motivation to

get normative matters right and that motivation carries the day.

On further reflection, however, this suggestion would seem to

have little to recommend it. If the success here is to be not the mo-

tivation s but the agent s, surely the concern to get normative matters

right m ust be m ore thorou ghly integrated within people s motiv-

ational systems.*

We can make the same point from the opposite direction by re-

marking that a truth, in order to be normative, must offer guidance to

agents, not just to particular motivations. It cannot just answer ques-

tions about how some particular motivations might achieve their in-

tended results; it must also answer questions about which particular

motivations agents would be right to have. So it is only if their moti-

vating states are generally aiming to get normative matters right that

people are capable of being guided by normative truths in the properway. And if people are not capable of being guided by normative




truths in the proper way, then nothing could be normative for them

and they could not have any reasons for action.

Now I suppose it might be objected that this cannot be right be-

cause facts about, for example, what would be good for people could

constitute reasons for them to act even if, because their motivating

states are not generally aiming to get normative matters right, people

cannot be properly guided by these considerations and so cannot

reaüy act for these reasons. This, however, would be to conflate the

ev lu tive with the normative If there actuaüy are reasons for people

to act, facts about their good wiü presumably be among them. But

facts about their good could not actuaüy constitute reasons for peopleto act if people are not actuaüy capable of being properly guided by,

and so of really acting for, reasons.

Indeed, I suspect residual opposition to the practicality requirement

can often be traced to a similar m istake — the mistake of taking it to

be a claim about evaluative truths, to the effect that there could be

tru ths about what woiüd be good for people only if peop le s m otivat-

ing states are generaüy aiming to get evaluative matters right. I agree

that any such claim would be mistaken, but as I understand it thepracticality requirem ent claims noth ing of the sort. The claim it makes

concerns only normative truths. And what it claims, once carefuüy

distinguished from the misguided claims about actual or rational mo-

tivation that we set aside earlier, seems to me to be very difficult to

deny.

Let us therefore turn to the question whether the practicality re-

quirement can be reconciled with the existence of normative truths

Vkdthout rejecting the standard view of what desires are. One way to dothis would be to argue that motivations do not require desires and

thus cotüd generally aim to get normative matters right even if desires

rarely do so. Another way to do this would be to argue that desires,

even understood as the standard view understands them, do aim in

the relevant sense to get normative matters right. As we shaü see in the

next section, however, I do not think either of these strategies looks

terribly promising. Hence my concern to replace the standard view of

desire.



382 Robert H Myers

Satisfying the practicality requirement?

Let us begin by looking m ore closely at the suggestion th at motivation

does not require desire. Could it not happen that people are some-times motivated to act by their normative beliefs alone?

If it could, there would no longer be any worries about satisf)^-

ing the practicality requirement, for there is no doubt that people's

normative beliefs aim to accord with normative truths. But

many philosophers do doubt that people's normative beliefs

could suffice to motivate their actions, and some simple reflections

on the nature of action would seem to support their case. For people

never just act; no matter how basic the actions they are performing

are, they must be intending to perform actions of those basic kinds,

and thus monitoring and adjusting their behaviour with a view to

securing that result. In this minimal sense, actions are always moti-

vated by goals; yet can goals be possessed simply by possessing nor-

mative beliefs?'

Smith (1994, Sect. 4.7) claims they cannot, arguing that one has

one's (f>-ing as a goal only if one is ispose to act in ways one believeswill increase one's chances of <p-ing—as one is, he maintains, when

one desires to cp. As several of his critics have po inted ou t, however,

this may not suffice to establish that motivation requires desire. For

even if it is true that all desires are, at bottom, dispositions of t is sort,

it may no t be true that all dispositions of this sort are, in turn, desires.

So why could it not at least sometimes happen that one has one's

(p-ing as a goal simply because one believes cp-ing is something one has

reason to try to do?In response. Smith once again remarks that people som etimes fail to

be even the least bit inclined to act in line with their normative beliefs,

a fact which he takes (1994, pp. 119-21) to demonstrate that, while

their normative beliefs may very often give rise to dispositions of

the sort motivation requires, they never strictly speaking constitute

those motivating dispositions themselves. But his critics challenge

this inference, insisting on the contrary that when people have a

secure grasp of normative matters and are fiiUy rational they infact cannot fail to be disposed to act in line with their normative




beliefs — and hence tha t, in such cases at least, the states motivating

people to act are constituted by these beliefs alone. ^

One worry about this, however, is that it might prove to be trading

more on stipulation than on argument. Of course, if it is stipulated,

first, that people s normative beliefs would have to be perfectly reliable

before they could be said to have a secure grasp of normative matters,

and, second, that rationality would always require such people to be

motivated to act in line with their normative beliefs, then such people,

when fully rational, would be so motivated. But this does not begin to

show that normative beliefs could ever literally constitute motivating

dispositions, even in the case of someone who was lucky enough tosatisf)^ all these stipulations. That requires an argument about the

nature of those beliefs.

The critics claim, therefore, m ust instead be as follows. Even if

normative beliefs do not always constitute motivating dispositions,

this is still something they are inherently capable of doing, and it is

this fact, and not any mere stipulation, that explains why people who

have a secure grasp of normative matters and who are fuUy rational

cannot fail to be disposed to act in line with their normative beliefs.Such people cannot fail to be so disposed because there is nothing

preventing their normative beliefs from constituting those dispos-

itions. But this seems tantamount to saying that normative beliefs

are dispositions to constitute motivating dispositions; and I think

we really must w onder whether any properties oftha t sort are possible.

I will return to this question, and try to win this verdict against the

anti-Humeans, in section 5, after I have introduced the holistic ac-

count of what desires are. Until then, all we need to take from this

discussion is the thought that it may prove unnecessary for defenders

of normative truths to challenge the Humean theory of motivation.

Instead of arguing that normative beliefs can constitute people s moti-

vating dispositions, and thus displace desires, it may suffice to argue

that normative beliefs can shape the dispositions that are desires.

Before developing this thoug ht, however, I should m entio n Sm ith s

attempt to meet the practicality requirement without forsaking eitherthe Humean theory of motivation or the standard view of desire.



384 Robert H Myers

would be in a position to m eet it. So let me briefly explain why I doub t

there is much chance of that happening.

Smith's principal claim is that sound practical reasoning targets thesystematic justification of one's desires, and that beliefs abo ut w hat one

has reason to do should thus be regarded as behefs about what one's

systematically justified self would advise one's currently constituted

self to do. To meet the practicality requirement as he understands it,

therefore, he thinks it suffices to show that rationahty requires people

always to form motivating desires in line with their beliefs about what

their systematically justified selves would advise their currently con-

stituted selves to do.'^As I suggested in section l, however, the prospects of showing any-

thing along these lines seem at best uncertain. On some views of

rationality this probably understates the problem. For example, one

such view is that rationality requires people to form motivating desires

in ways that optimize their chances of acting as they in fact have

reason to act. But given how mistaken people's normative beliefs

can be, even on Smith's account of them, probably their best bet is

not always to form motivating desires in hne with those behefs. *Now of course Smith m ight very weü reply by com plaining tha t this

is not the view of rationality he favours.^^ But even if he could succeed

in scoring this point, I think he would be better advised to understand

the practicality requirement in the way I recommended in section l.

So let us suppose he were to take this advice. Then the qu estion wou ld

be whether his analysis of norm ative beliefs would enable him to argue

that people's desires are aiming in the relevant sense to accord with

normative truths, even though, being simple dispositions to act of the

sort described by the standard view, this is not something that they

seem on the face of it to be doing.

Smith's answer, I take it, would be that his analysis of normative

behefs does enable him to argue this because, by reveahng normative

matters to be matters of internal coherence, it enables him to argue

that, considered as a whole, each person's desires do aim to accord

with normative truths, in as much as they exhibit a systemic tendency

towards greater coherence. Indeed, as Smith himself notes, this



sir s and Norm ative Truths 85

tendency is essential to his explanation of why rationahty always calls

for peop le s m otivating states to accord with the ir no rmative beliefs.

For his thought is that this accord makes for greater coherence, andtha t this greater coherence is what people s desires generally tend to -

wards. If he did no t thin k p eop le s desires had this tendency. Sm ith

would not think rationality required this accord of them.^^

Many defenders of normative truths would look askance at this

answer because it would identify normative truth with internal coher-

ence. This is not where Sm ith s real problem lies, however. Coherence

theories of truth and knowledge could prove to be perfectly benign if

the attitudes am ong which the coherence was to be found were to havetheir contents fixed externally. Sm ith s real problem hes in the fact

that he is not in a position to argue that desires actually do exhibit the

systemic tendency he needs to attribute to them. If desires are just the

simple dispositions to act that the standard view describes, there is no

obvious reason to suppose that they will exhibit any systemic tende n-

cies at all.

Once again, I wiU return to this issue, and try to secure this verdict

against Sm ith, in section 5, after I have introd uced the holistic accountof what desires are. Until then, all we need to take from this discussion

is the tho ught th at the prob lem threatening to scuttle Smith s defence

of normative truths may prove to be fully generalizable. For it is hard

to see how desires could generally aim to accord with normative

truths, however such truths are understood, without exhibiting a sys-

temic tendency of some sort or other; yet it is hard to see how desires

could exhibit a systemic tendency of any sort at all if they are just the

simple dispositions to act the standard view describes.Sketchy though my remarks in this section have admittedly been,

I think they do indicate how hard it might be to reconcile the prac-

ticality requirement with the existence of normative truths without

rejecting the standard view of what desires are. Let us therefore turn,

finally, to the question what an alternative to the standard view of

desires might be. I have said that I would be proposing a holistic

accoun t of what desires are, and tha t such accounts allow peo ple s

normative beliefs to shape the dispositions that are desires. So let us



386 Robert H. Myers

3. Introducing the holistic view

Let us focus our discussion on a concrete example. Is my desire to win

at chess reaüy a disposition to do wh tever I believe wiU increase mychances of winning?

Surely it is at least arguable that it is not. For example, I believe I

could greatly increase my chances of winning by taking care only to

play against op ponents much worse than I am — raw beginners, blind

drunks, etc. Yet, so far as I can tell, I have no correspondingly strong

disposition to play against opponents of that sort. Moreover, this

reticence woiüd not seem difficult to explain. For I do not believe

playing against such comparatively weak opponents would really ad-

dress the re sons that I believe I have for aiming to win at chess in the

first place. Perhaps, then, my disposition is to act in ways that I believe

wiU increase my chances of addressing those reasons?

This might suggest a normative account of what desires are: one s

desire to cp is a disposition to act in ways tha t one believes wiU increase

one s chances of addressing the reasons one believes one has for trying

to (p. But this would entail that one cannot desire to (p unless onebelieves one h s reasons for trying to cp — and of course that is an old

bone of contention. Surely, it will be objected, I coiüd have desired to

win at chess even if did not believe there were any reasons for me to

try to win at it. Even if I believed chess to be a worthless endeavour,

could I not have found myself wanting to win at it? *

If could, then it might seem that the standard view of what desires

are must be correct after all, and hence that, if desire to win at chess,

I m ust be disposed to do w hatever I believe wiü increase m y chances ofwinning, even if my other attitudes make it hard for me to recognize

that I am. For example, my normative beliefs might lead me to have a

further desire to play only against comparatively strong opponents,

and this further desire, especially if it were quite strong, might over-

shadow any inclination I have to play against raw beginners and blind

drunks, but that would not undercut the claim that I must have some

such inclination.

Of course, it is also possible that my original desire is not in fact




way, proponents of the standard view of what desires are will insist

that they are on safe ground here, with ample resources to ex-

plain away any alleged counterexamples. So let us ask whether pro-

ponents of the normative view can say the same thing. Do they have

the resources to explain away any alleged counterexamples to their

view?

Obviously they do have some resources at their disposal here. For

example, they can certainly allow that I could have desired to win at

chess even if I did not believe I had any of the reasons that are nor-

mally given for trying to v«n. And they might then go on to point

out that, because I would in that case be prepared to take stepschess players normally eschew, it might look as if I was disposed

to do absolutely anything I believed would increase my chances

of winning. But they would insist that that appearance would be

misleading. For on their view there would have to be some other,

possibly quite idiosyncratic, reasons that I believed I did have

for trying to win, otherwise winning at chess could not be something

I desired. And my disposition would consequently be shaped by

those beliefs, with the result that there would stiU be some perhapssurprising) actions that I would not be at all inclined to perform

even if I believed that performing them would increase my chances

of vanning.

But can every alleged counterexample be handled in this way?

Proponents of the standard view of what desires are wiU of course

agree that people could conceivably have some pretty strange beliefs

about the reasons they have for trying to win at chess, and that, be-

cause the possibilities here are so varied and so numerous, it may notbe easy in any particular case to p rove tha t a person who desires to win

at chess does not also believe she has at least some reasons for trying to

win. But they will insist tha t th is clearly is a possibility. Could a person

not desire to win at chess only because her father wanted her to win

and even though she no longer believes she has any reason to try to

satisfy this desire of his? Perhaps she now believes he was always

merely exploiting her.) For that matter, could a person not simply

find herself wanting to win at chess for no apparent reason at all, eventhough she has never once believed she had any reason to try to win?



388 Robert H Myers

Thus I think the normative account of desire is mistaken.'^ Taken one

by one, the contents of people's desires are not essentially dependent

on the contents of their normative beliefs. I do not think it followsfrom this, however, that the standard view of desire is correct. For a

weaker connection between desires and normative beliefs still seems

possible.

The thought animating this proposal might be introduced as

follows. Suppose people could not have any beliefs with normative

content unless many of their desires conformed to the normative ac-

count. Then the possibüity that they might also have some desires

conforming to the standard account would not matter. For these'non-normative' desires would be importantly peripheral to the 'nor-

m ative' ones. Thou gh it would n ot be true that, taken one by one, the

contents of people's desires depended essentiaüy on the contents of

their normative beliefs, since there would be these exceptions, the

contents of people's desires as a whole would depend importantly

on the contents of their norm ative beliefs, very mu ch — thou gh not

exactly—as the normative account maintained they would.

This, then, brings us to the /¡o/isiic account of what desires are: one's

desire to cp may occasionally involve a disposition to do whatever one

believes will increase one's chances of cp-ing but typic lly involves a

disposition to act in ways that one believes will increase one's chances

of addressing the reasons one believes one has for trying to cp. As this is

becoming quite a mouthfial, I will, in what follows, often abbreviate

it by saying tha t a desire to cp may occasionally be non -normative

bu t is typically norm ative — by which I mean not that it is entaüedby but only that it is shaped by the behefs that the agent has about her

reasons for trying to cp.

As I have intimated, if this account is successfully to be defended, it

will be on the basis of considerations having to do with how the

contents of normative beliefs are fixed. Given how large and difficult

this question is, I of course do not propose to try to provide anything

like a fiül or fair treatment of it here. My goal in the next two sections

WÜ simply be to show, in rough outline, how the argument might goand how several likely objections to it might be answered. Before




This is in effect how Scanlon (1998, pp. 37-41) defends his very

simüar account of what desires are. After careftiüy examining a

broad array of examples, he concludes that different sorts of thingscan play the role of desire and th us that there are different 'senses' of

desire. He holds that, in the broadest, 'pro-attitude' sense, desires are

typicaüy judgement-sensitive dispositions to act, think, and feel in

various ways, though he aüows that they are also sometimes 'purely

functional' states of the sort the standard view is always insisting on.

This part of his account corresponds almost exactly with the holistic

account I am proposing. He also draws a distinction, which I agree is

important, and so certainly do not dispute, between things that areand things that are not desires in the 'directed-attention' sense. What

he does not do, however, is explain why attitudes that need not always

be sensitive to judgements should typicaüy be sensitive to them. Nor is

it clear how he could explain this without taking a.position on ques-

tions in the theory of mind and content.

Lest it be wondered what this intramural dispute between Scanlon

and me has to do with my earlier claims about the practicality re-

quirement, it is worth noting straight away that one likely explanationof the fact that people's desires are typicaüy sensitive to their norma-

tive judgem ents is the fact th at those desires are generally aiming to get

normative matters right. In looking at how the contents of normative

beliefs are fixed, therefore, I hope to find, not just good grounds for

thinking the holistic account of desire is correct, but also good

grounds for thinking it shows how the practicality requirement can

be met without abandoning the Humean theory of motivation. Thus

my goal in the next two sections is to argue that considerations abouthow the contents of normative beliefs are fixed suggest people's desires

are typicaüy sensitive to their normative judgements, as the hohstic

account requires, because they are generaüy aiming to get normative

matters right, as the practicality requ irement dem ands. W ith au this in

mind, then, let us now turn our attention to these issues.

4. Supporting the view



390 Robert H. Myers

In a recent series of articles, Glaudine Verheggen (2006, 2007a, 2007b)

describes this sort of externalism as interpersonal since it holds that

the con tents of people s propositiona l attitudes are in the first instancefixed by their interactions w ith one an other and with the objects in

their common environment.

The fundamental idea here, as Davidson explains it, is that it must

be at least in part by their causes tha t th e conten ts of peo ple s beliefs

come to be fixed, but that solitary interactions between a person and

her environment could not generate determinate contents, since

objects are incapable of impressing upon people any particular

ways of thinking about them. Walking through the woods, are thebeliefs I form specifically about the trees that stand before me, or just

about some aspects of them, such as their shapes or their textures?

Davidson s idea is that for a solitary person there would be no an-

swering such questions, and as a result no fact abou t what the contents

of her beliefs would be. It is only through their interactions with one

another and with the objects in their common environment that

people start thinking about these objects under some concepts and

not others.^As Verheggen puts it, other people are necessary, not because con-

tents must always be shared (as they would have to be according to

more familiar, communitarian versions of social externalism), but so

that each person, upon being confronted by the often different atti-

tudes of others, will proceed to take whatever steps are necessary to

clarif)^ what her own attitudes are. As I understand the position being

advanced here, other people are required both to encourage and to

facilitate the efforts that must be made if determinate contents are to

exist. A solitary person could not engage in the sorts of activities that

make determinate content possible, in part because, lacking any foils,

nothing would prompt her to engage in those activities, but also, and

ultimately more importantly, because those activities require the par-

ticipation of other people. It is only through interchanges with others

that the contents of propositional attitudes become determinate.^^

The canonical example here is the sort of verbal interaction char-acteristic of early learning situations. The child begins by repeating




due course comes to use her words in a stable and determinate way.

This may not in the end be the same way that her parents used them,

but, again, tbe idea is that content need not be shared in order to bedeterminate.

Although he intended this account of content determination to

apply most centrally to empirical beliefs, Davidson always made it

clear that he thought it applied to evaluative beliefs as well. He main-

tained that people start thinking of certain sorts of outcomes as being

worth promoting, and other sorts of outcomes as being either not

worth promoting or positively worth resisting, as a result of their

interactions with one another and with outcomes of those sorts.People use words in the presence of the evaluative properties they

think they refer to, adjusting their individual usage in light of the

differences they find in o ther people s usage, until everyone com es

to use evaluative language in a determ inate — thou gh no t necessarily

identical — way.̂ ^

What does this account of content determination tell us about the

contents of peop le s desiresl Here I think it must be acknowledged

tha t D avidson s ow n po sition was not very clear. Although he wou ldoccasionally insist that desires are not to be identified vwth evaluative

beliefs, or tha t it would be a disto rtion to regard desires as a species

of belief he very often proceeded as if he thought that desires at least

presuppose evaluative beliefs. He liked to say, for example, that evalu-

ative judgem ents are the na tura l expression of desires, and when

called upon to expand on this would sometimes go so far as to say

that all desires can be expressed by evaluative judgements that are at

least implicit.^ *

There are two problems with this. First, the focus here should not

be on evaluative beliefs; it should be on normative beliefs, which, as I

insisted earlier, are not the same thing. For aU I know, Davidson may

have held the substantive view that reasons to promote good out-

comes and to resist bad outcomes are the only reasons for action

there are. I suspect, however, that he was in fact unclear about the

difference between these things. Either way, though, the point is thatnormative beliefs are the ones relevant to desires. So the claim here



392 Robert H Myers

interpersonally, and then the question should be how closely peop le s

desires are tied to those beliefs.

The second problem with D avidson s position is that he ties desirestoo closely to behefs. It is just not true that desires always presuppose

normative beliefs, let alone evaluative beliefs. The position Davidson

should have endorsed, I think, is not the one I have described as the

normative account but rather the one I have described as the holistic

account—the one according to which desires are typic lly normative

in nature but occ sion lly non-normative. And I say this not simply

because I believe the holistic account to be correct, but also because I

believe it is a better fit with D avidson s own interpersonal externalism.It is the account to which I think his own argum ents, properly under-

stood, tiltimately lead.

As I see things, the crucial poin t to stress here is that people would

not interact in the ways Davidson thinks are necessary to fix the con-

tents of their beliefs if their systemic aim was not bo th to grasp nd to

ct on the tru th . Why would people adjust their usage of descriptive

and normative language in light of the differences they find in other

people s usage if their systemic aim was not to be, as Davidson (1970,p. 222) himself came close to saying, both believers and lovers of the

true? Their systemic interest in fixing the contents of their thoughts

could hardly be purely academic; it must rather be supposed to guide

and give shape to most of their endeavours.

If this is right, then it is only to be expected that people, upon

forming normative beliefs, will typically go on to form what I have

described as normative desires. But it is also to be expected that this

systemic tendency will not always be realized, and hence that peoplewiU sometimes end up forming desires that are quite different— and

sometimes even desires of the very simple sort cham pioned by the

standard view. These will still properly be counted as desires, however,

because they will be the inevitable by-products of the processes

through which desires are formed and their contents fix;ed. Thus we

have here an answer to the question Scanlon left us in section 3.

Of course, this answer depends, not just on the general plausibility

of D avidson s interpersonal externalism, but also on its particular




normative beliefs.^^ A systemic tendency to form desires that accord

with one s descriptive beliefs might indeed be unavoidable, but the

extension of this claim to normative beliefs might seem much moreproblematic.

But this objection is misplaced. Perhaps it would be fair to direct it

toward Davidson, for he did say that pe ople s systemic aim was to be

lovers of the good. But my claim is that people s systemic aim is to be

lovers of the true So if very young chüd ren do not have any no rmative

beliefs, I agree that they also wiü not exhibit a systemic tendency to

form desires that accord with beliefs of th at sort. My claim is just th at,

whenever they do get around to forming normative beliefs, they wiüalso start exhibiting a systemic tendency to form desires that accord

with th em . For people s concern is with tru th quite generally, no t

simply with truths of particular kinds.

An example a bit more to the poin t is M üto n s Satan, in as much as

his general orientation is said to be precisely not towards right action

but rather towards wrong action. But one reaüy has to wonder

whether even Satan could aim generaüy at wrong action. How did

he ever acquire normative beliefs, if not by aiming to love the true?(This is of course what he was initially aiming at, as Müton teüs the

story.) But if that was his initial aim, how far could he subsequently

depart from it?

The consideration to emphasize here is that my account of content

determination cannot be refuted simply by imagining a person sys-

tematicaüy aiming to act wrongly rather than to act rightly, just as

solitary languages are not shown to be possible simply by imagining a

solitaire solüoquizing. * Of course, we can imagine a solitaire uttering

sounds that strike us as being meaningful; the question is whether

there in fact could be anything that such sounds really meant.

Simüarly, we can imagine someone constantly behaving in ways that

strike us as being diabolical; the question is whether this reaüy could

be action if it actuaüy were so perverse. What has to be explained in

each case is how these people could have acquired propositional atti-

tudes possessing determ inate contents without aiming to love the true

or having any interlocutors. And in neither case, I subm it, do we reaüy



394 Robert H Myers

Indeed, it is wo rth pointing out in this connection that pretty mu ch

everyone agrees that people exhibit a systemic tendency to form de-

sires that accord with their descriptive beliefs. But why is that? Whydoes it not happen more often that people, in desiring to ip, are

disposed to do things they believe wiü decre se their chances of

9-ing? This certainly can happen. I want to make money on the

market, and believe market timing is ineffective, but stiü often find

myself inchned to try to time the market.^^ If c ses like this are (thank -

fuüy) rare, that must surely be because my systemic aim is not just to

grasp bu t also to act on the t ru th abou t such m atters. So it wou ld seem

that the burden is squarely on the opponents to explain why somedifferent systemic aim should suddenly be in play when it comes to

normative matters.

As I said earlier, however, my aim here is not to prove that

Dav idson s interpersonal externalism provides the correct account of

how the contents of propositional attitudes are fixed. That would

obviously be an enormous undertaking far beyond the scope of a

single paper. AH my argum ent requires is that Dav idson s interper-

sonal externalism provides a credible account of these matters and tha tit lends its credibility to the holistic account of what desires are. For

that is enough to show how the possibüity of normative truths might

be defended.

5. Defending the flanks

Before returning to that, however, we should consider whether wemight be drawing the wrong conclusions from these Davidsonian re-

flections on how th e con tents of propositiona l attitudes are fixed. Even

if we acknowledge that peop le s systemic aim m ust be to act on the

truth, why should we suppose that this requires that their desires

conform to the holistic account? Gould we not make use of these

Davidsonian reflections in our attempts to rebut the sceptics without

supposing that they cast any doubt on the standard view of what

desires are?Let us first hear from those who argue that normative beliefs can




motivating dispositions is something normative beliefs are inherently

capable of doing even if, as Smith maintains, it is not something such

beliefs always succeed in doing. And it is far from clear how any claim

of this sort could be true.

But now, it might be replied, we are in a position to answer this

worry, for once we have agreed tha t p eop le s systemic aim is to act on

the truth, including whatever truths there happen to be about the

reasons that exist for action, we are in a position to draw the requisite

conclusions about the nature of beHef We can conclude that it is in

the nature of beliefs generally to direct action, and that it is in the

nature of normative beliefs specifically to constitute motivating dis-positions. And if it is really in the nature of these beliefs to do these

things, surely there cannot be any serious worry about whether they in

fact can do them. Even if Smith is right in maintaining that normative

beliefs do not always constitute motivating dispositions, it could still

be that they typically do so because that is in their nature.

Pretty clearly, however, this would simply beg the question that has

been worrying us. From the fact that people m ust tj^ically be disposed

to act on their normative beliefs, it does not foUow that it is theirnormative beliefs that typically constitute those motivating dispos-

itions. How could normative beliefs ever constitute motivating dispos-

itions given that they do not always constitute them? That was ou r

question back in section 2, and it is hard to see how our reflections on

how the contents of propositional attitudes are fixed could provide the

answer.

It might be objected, in response, that this is not a question holists

should be asking, not in any event if holists are properly characterizedas I have been characterizing them — t wit, as being less concerned to

isolate essential features of particular kinds of propositional attitudes

and more concerned to identify systemic features of propositional

attitudes considered as a whole. For is the question not assuming

that constituting motivating dispositions would have to be an essential

feature of normative beliefs in order for it to be even an occasional

feature of them?

But to be less concerned about doing something is not to be un-concerned about doing it. Holists are not giving up on the very idea



396 Robert H Myers

wondering what the essential features of normative beliefs might be,

and whether they could ever actually constitute motivating dispos-

itions if they do not always constitute them. Thus the question weraised for the anti-Humeans in section 2 remains perfectly legitimate.

Rather than pursue this matter any further here, however, perhaps it

wiU suffice to note that no similar question stands in the way of the

holistic account of desire. No one is asking whether desires could ever

be normative if they are not always normative. And since adopting the

holistic account of desire is enough to block the sceptics argum ent, it

has to be wondered w hether this is not what the anti-Hum eans should

be doing. Indeed, although there is probably no good way of estab-lishing a hypothesis like this, it has to be wondered whether they are

not rejecting the Humean theory of motivation only because they have

not recognized that they could just reject the standard view of desire

instead.^^

Let us now turn to our other flank and hear again from those who

argue that even the simplest of dispositions to act do aim to accord

with normative truths. As I noted in section 2, one worry about this

line of argument is that it turns on the thought that such dispositions

exhibit a systemic tendency towards greater coherence, and yet it is far

from obvious what reason we could have for thinking this. But now, it

might be replied, we are in a position to answer this worry, for once

we have agreed tha t people s systemic aim is to act on the tru th, we

can hardly deny that their dispositions will tend to accord with their

normative beliefs. So, for example, even if my desire to win at chess is

a disposition to do whatever I believe will increase my chances ofwinning, as the standard view claims, if I believe I have reason to

try to avoid playing against comparatively weak opponents, I am

likely, in addition, to possess another disposition to do whatever I

believe wiU increase the chances that I will never find myself playing

against opponents of that sort, and so my desires as a whole will tend

to accord with my normative beliefs, even if they are simple dispos-

itions to act of the sort the standard view describes. My arguments for

a holistic account of desires might consequently be dismissed as beingsuperfluous.




towards both grasping and acting on the truth, it is hard to see how we

could stick with this simple view of desire. For normative behefs do

not merely concern the types of actions people should try to perform;they also concern the reasons people have to try to perform actions of

those types. So we should expect that desires will typically display this

sort of complexity as well.

Suppose, for example, that I believe I have reason to try to avoid

playing chess against comparatively weak opponents because I believe

the opportunity it affords for improving my powers of concentration

is the main reason I have for playing chess in the first place. In that

case, if my tendency is to form desires that accord with my beliefs, weshould expect that my disposition will be to act in ways that I believe

v«ll increase my chances of addressing this reason I believe I have for

playing chess.

Now it might be objected that the standard view of desire can still

accommodate this. For is it not possible that this allegedly more com-

plex disposition is really just a disposition to do whatever I believe will

increase my chances of improving my powers of concentration? Why

should we expect the very content of my disposition to be normativein nature? But the problem is that I have many beliefs about my

reasons for playing chess; and they are related to one another and

to my other behefs in many ways. So the question is whether it is

really plausible to expect that I will have simple dispositions to act that

accord vñth all or even a significant percentage of them. Indeed, given

how complicated the relations among all the beliefs I have can be, I

think one has to wonder whether such an expectation would actually

make any sense.

I doubt it would. It thus seems to me that the only plausible ex-

pectation to have here is that I will be disposed to act in ways that I

believe will increase my chances of addressing the reasons I believe I

have for playing chess. Indeed, although there is again probably no

good way of establishing such a hypothesis, I think it has to be won-

dered whether anyone w ould resist this conclusion if they really appre-

ciated th at there is this alternative to the standard view of what desiresare. ^



398 Robert H Myers

need for a holistic account of what desires are, and hence the possi-

büity of rebutting the sceptics argument against the existence of nor-

mative truths by showing that desires are not the sorts of things thatthe sceptics have been assuming, and not as indicating that the prac-

ticality requirement can be reconcüed in one way or another with the

existence of normative truths without in fact rejecting the standard

view of desires.

6. Answering the sceptics

W e have now seen how, by embracing D avidson s interpersonal ex-

ternalism, and the holistic account of desire to which it leads, we can

block sceptical arguments based on the practicality requirement.

Gonsidered as individual states, desires may not aim at anything.

But their systemic aim is to accord with the truth, including whatever

truths happen to exist about reasons for action. And since they wiü

either succeed or faü at this, they are capable of being either correct or

incorrect to normative truths in a manner appropriate to the practi-cality requirement.

Now it might be wondered how important this result is. After au,

arguments based on the practicality requirement are not the only ar-

guments sceptics raise against the existence of normative truths. And

our response seems to leave room for further doubts. Even if desires

are aiming to accord with normative truths, are there any such truths

for them to accord with? Even if, in desiring to do things, people

typicaüy reveal themselves to believe they have reasons to do thosethings, is it not possible that au such beliefs are simply false?

I think it must be conceded that the hohstic account of desire does

not by itself offer much help here. Nor for that matter do simüar

accoun ts, such as Scanlon s. Scanlon (1998, pp . 55-64) has many sens-

ible things to say in response to worries about the metaphysical and

epistemological standing of normative truths, but they do not reaüy

turn on his account of desire. Moreover, his aim in saying these things

is reaüy just to answer arguments for thinking normative truths do not




paper is at stake here. Stiü, given that we are interested in answering

sceptical arguments because we are interested in deciding whether

normative truths exist, a brief discussion of this positive argument

seems in order.

As is weü known, Davidson held that his interpersonal version of

externalism leaves no room for serious doubts about either the exist-

ence or our knowledge of objects and empirical properties. As he saw

things, objects and empirical properties must be assumed to exist in

order to explain how it is that people come to have empirical beliefs

with determinate contents, and these empirical beliefs must in turn be

assumed to be by and large correct, since at least in the first instancethe truth conditions of people's empirical beliefs are fixed by the

actual facts to which they respond in their interactions with one an-

other, leaving no real possibility for a problematic gap to open up

between appearance and reality.-'

Although there is considerable room for dispute about how they

might most effectively be developed, I think anyone who is favourably

disposed towards Davidson's interpersonal version of externalism is

bound to find that these arguments have some real promise againstscepticism about the external world. The question is whether analo-

gous arguments would have simüar promise against scepticism about

normative truths. Even if we grant that in the first instance the con-

tents of people's normative beUefs are fixed by their interactions with

one another and with aspects of their common environment, does this

give us any good reason to conclude that normative properties must

actuaüy exist, let alone that people's beliefs about them must be at

least by and large correctI think it must be acknowledged that the obstacles facing these

arguments are in several respects more serious than those facing the

original arguments against scepticism about the external world. It is

hard to deny, for example, that one finds greater and more basic

differences among people's normative beliefs than one finds among

their beliefs about objects and empirical properties, and that this

raises some additional and difficult questions about the reality of nor -

mative properties. It is also hard to deny that there is a much narrowerrange of things for normative properties to explain tha n there is for



400 Robert H Myers

But the point to stress here is that these obstacles, daunting though

they may be, are of a sort that arise naturally and could also prove to

be answered naturally in the course of trying to explain how the con-tents of normative beliefs are fixed. They do not reveal the very idea of

a normative truth to be flatly incoherent, as we have seen it almost

certainly would be if people s m otivating states were not capable of

being either correct or incorrect in a manner appropriate to the prac-

ticality requirement. They do not bring speculations about the pos-

sible existence of normative truths to a halt, but simply oblige us to

think harder about whether that possibility is actually realized.

Elsewhere, for example, I have argued (Myers 2004) that we can goa long way towards meeting worries about difference by recognizing

the fuU extent to which reasons for action could be agent-relative.

Given the differences in their histories and circumstances, it is only

to be expected that a value such as the value of friendship would

generate different reasons for different people, requiring each person

to privilege her own friends in ways appropriate to their particular

relationships. This by itself does nothing to show that reasons stem-

ming from friendship are not perfectly objective.In a similar spirit, it might be argued that we should not expect

normative properties to explain as wide a range of things as more

familiar sorts of properties do. After all, normative properties are es-

sentially response-demanding and it would seem that only those crea-

tures who are capable of possessing propos itional attitudes are capable

of exhibiting the demanded responses. The properties on which they

supervene could be expected to play a v^dder explanatory role, but

normative properties themselves only aspire to make a differencewithin the propositional realm.

Indeed, some might wonder whether these limitations on their ex-

planatory aspirations would prevent normative properties from play-

ing the realist role Davidson assigns them in his account of content

determ ination. Just for the record, my ovm view here is that th is worry

would be warranted if realism required normative properties to play

an explanatory role that was nomologic l in character, bu t that it again

actually requires this only of the properties on which they supervene.



sir s and Norm ative Truths 4 1

them to be inteüigible. If there are in fact good reasons for me to try to

win at chess, then it makes sense that I should believe this and be

disposed to act accordingly, although that is no guarantee that eitherof these things wiü actuaüy come to pass.

Now it might be objected at this point that I am neglecting the

fundamental question, for I am not saying anything abou t what sort of

property normative properties would be. And no doubt worries on

this score wiü lead some readers to wonder, in retrospect, whether my

purely logical understanding of the practicality requirement can

reaüy be correct after au. Would it not be better to understand the

practicality requirement as saying something about the consequenceswhich normative truths, or even just beliefs about normative truths,

must actually have for people s motivations? That would give us some

indication of what sort of property normative properties would be, so

we could then set about investigating whether there actuaüy are any

properties of that sort.

Admittedly, as we saw in section l, and as these objectors wovild

have to concede, it is difficult to supply a plausible understanding of

the practicality requirement along these lines. It seems just wrong toinsist that a person could not have any reason to try to 9 unless that

fact was certain to give her som e m otivation to cp; nor does it seem any

better to insist that she could not have this reason unless her behef that

she had it would be certain to supply such a motivation. Stiü, these

objectors might insist, instead of abandoning this line of thought, as I

did in section 1, we should have kept on searching untü we found

something that worked.

But this way of thinking about normative truths plays into thehands of the sceptics. The more in ten t we get on specifying favourable

circumstances in which something plausible could be said about the

consequences normative truths or normative beliefs must actuaüy

have for people s motivations, the m ore likely we are to forget tha t

the truths in question are supposed to constitute an independent light

in which those motivations can be assessed as correct or incorrect. Of

course, if we were prepared to say that normative truths need not

enjoy such independence, then there would be notbing stopping usfrom defining them in terms of people s motivations . But why would



402 Robert H. Myers

existence when it is conjoined with the Humean theory of motivation

and the standard view of desire. The way to overcome these doubts is

not by challenging the Humean theory of motivation but by adoptingDavidson s interpersonal externalism and the holistic account of

desire to w hich it leads. But whether Dav idson s interpersonal exter-

nalism can go so far as to supply a positive proof tha t normative truth s

exist is the larger question on which the jury is stiU

Postscript: Korsgaard on Normative Truths

Christine Korsgaard recommends a version of the practicality require-

ment (she calls it the internalism requirement) that resembles the

version I recommend in some respects but differs from it in another.

Like me, she understands the practicality requirement to be making a

claim about the motivations people ideally shoul have, rather than a

claim about the motivations they necessarily would have, and she

understands the claim to concern the motivations people ideally

should have if normative truths

exist, not the motivations they ideallyshould have in light of their normative beliefs. However, whereas I

conclude from this that the sho uld in question is not the sho uld of

rationality, but instead simply what I describe as the shou ld of suc-

cessful accord, Korsgaard insists that nothing could be a normative

truth if people were not required by rationality both to recognize its

truth and to form motivating states in line with it (Korsgaard 1986,

p. 11). On her view, therefore, the practicality requirement is much

stronger than I have allowed, and the doubts it generates about theexistence of normative truths are, accordingly, much deeper. Whereas,

on my view, these doubts have primarily to do with us, with whether

our motivating states would be capable of according with normative

truths if there were such things, the question, for Korsgaard, concerns

normativity. Could any truths be such that rationality would require

people both to recognize their truth and to form motivating states in

line with them? Famously, Korsgaard argues that neither of these con-

ditions has any chance of being met by truths of the realist sort I amtrying to make room for in my paper. In her view, we can meet these



esires and Norm ative Truths 4 3

Now, as other constructivists remind us, this could lead to an ac-

count of norm ative tru ths very different from what Korsgaard in tends ,

since it could transpire that the answers rational deliberation can gen-erate to people s questions about what to do are not necessarüy moral

but always importantly contingent on the normative beliefs or other

practical states from which their deliberations must begin. In my view,

however, this old intramural debate can be avoided because it is based

on a false premiss. There could not be reasons for a creature to act if

that creature were not capable of acting for reasons, which in turn

requires that it be appropriately sensitive to normative questions and

consequently aiming to get normative matters right. I think construct-ivists are right to insist on the im portance of poin ts such as these, bu t I

do not think it foüows firom them that agents are sources of norma-

tivity. It might seem to, because the fact that reasons for action come

into existence for a creature only as it becomes capable of asking what

it has reason to do might seem to suggest that a creature s reasons for

action are products of its reasoning in the sense of being determined

by its best efforts to determine what they are. But that simply does no t

foüow. It is good for my cat to drink lots of water, but he has noreason to do so because he is neither reflecting on norm ative questions

nor aiming to get normative matters right. But if he were doing such

things, we know what he would have reason to do: drink lots of water.

The fact that he would have such reasons only if he were asking nor-

mative questions does not make their potential as reasons dependent

on the answers he would rationaüy give.

Gonstructivists might object that, as realists construe them, truths

about a crea ture s reasons for action could no t depend in this way onthe fact that it is asking normative questions. Are realist truths not

supposed to be there anyway, as Bernard Wiüiams (1978) so succinctly

put it? So should realists not be insisting that my cat has reason to

drink lots of water, even though that reason means nothing to him

because he is not asking normative questions? But my point is that

realists are not obliged to think of things this way. The fact that

drinking lots of water is good for my cat is there anyway, and it

gives me reason to do what I can to get him to drink. But it gives



404 Robert H. Myers

act; but these potential reasons become actual only as creatures

become capable of acting for them. There is nothing in this to suggest

that normative truths must be constructivist in nature.Clearly Korsgaard would not be happy with this, for it leaves an

obvious question unanswered. W hy would the fact that it is good for

him to drink lots of water give my cat reason to do so if he became

capable of acting for reasons? As she sees things, the only satisfactory

answer to such questions is a constructivist one. This fact would

become a reason for my cat to drink lots of water because rational

deliberation about what he has reason to do would lead him to that

conclusion. But whether it is true that realists could not provide sat-isfactory answers to such questions, and whether failure on this score

would in fact be an insurmountable problem for realism, are ex-

tremely complicated questions that call for much more discussion

than I can offer here. My claim here is simply that the practicality

requirement poses no such obstacle to realism. AU it requires is that a

creature s reasons for action must have a bearing on the success of its

motivations because its systemic aim is to get normative m atters right.

Securing that result requires us to give up the standard view of whatdesires are, but the standard view of what desires are is not one to

which realists are wedded — and a much more attractive view of what

desires are is there for the asking.

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