Please note: this event has passed
KJuris Seminar with Matthew Silverstein (NYU Abu Dhabi)
Title: The Aim of Practical Reasoning
Abstract: This paper defends two claims. The first is that practical reasoning must be governed by a substantive aim; there must be something substantive we are trying to figure out when we are trying to figure out what to do. The second is that we may not be able to discover the aim of practical reasoning merely by attending to the phenomenology of deliberation; practical reasoning is more opaque than transparent.
Speaker biography
Matthew Silverstein is interested in the foundations of ethics—that is, in the question of what, if anything, we can say on behalf of our most basic ethical commitments. His current work is located at the intersection of metaethics and the philosophy of action. Silverstein hopes that we can use accounts of practical reasoning drawn from the philosophy of action to ground an account of normative reasons for action. Central to the project is a reductive theory of reasons for action, according to which reasons for action are considerations that figure into sound practical reasoning.