Do you have reasons for your reasons? An attempt to make nihilism an attractive alternative to theories of practical reason

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Publication Type thesis
School or College College of Humanities
Department Philosophy
Author Stoehr, Tyler Steven
Title Do you have reasons for your reasons? An attempt to make nihilism an attractive alternative to theories of practical reason
Date 2009-05-06
Description During the latter half of the 20th century the number of theories being defended in the field of practical reason has proliferated dramatically. This proliferation, however, threatens to undermine the justificatory aim of practical reason, for if these different theories yield different practical inferences, then we seem to be in a dilemma: we have to either give reasons for our reasons, or accept that there aren't any such reasons, which would render our actions (even if they were made after some sort of rational deliberation) completely arbitrary. This thesis argues that currently in the field of practical reason there isn't any method or set form of argumentation aimed at providing reasons for our reasons, and that therefore nihilism, or the view that we don't have good reasons for doing what we do, seems to be the best attitude to take regarding theories of practical reason and human agency. This conclusion is then defended against three objections that stem from the views of J. David Velleman, Christine M. Korsgaard, and John McDowell.
Type Text
Publisher University of Utah
Subject Practical reason; Nihilism
Dissertation Institution University of Utah
Dissertation Name MA
Language eng
Relation is Version of Digital reproduction of "Do you have reasons for your reasons? An attempt to make nihilism an attractive alternative to theories of practical reason" J. Willard Marriott Library Special Collections BF21.5 2009 .S76
Rights Management © Tyler Steven Stoehr
Format Medium application/pdf
Format Extent 14,279,403 bytes
Identifier us-etd2,111654
Source Original: University of Utah J. Willard Marriott Library Special Collections
Conversion Specifications Original scanned on Epson GT-3000 as 400 dpi to pdf using ABBYY FineReader 9.0 Professional Edition
ARK ark:/87278/s6ns18dd
Setname ir_etd
ID 192459
Reference URL https://collections.lib.utah.edu/ark:/87278/s6ns18dd
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