Abstract
In this chapter we continue the study of intentions began in Chapter 2, §5. Recall that an intention is in this book what a person intends, not a state of intending. We tackle the question raised there whether intentions are actions or propositions. We argue that they are neither. Obviously, they are not prescriptions or mandates. Intentions and prescriptions exhaust the category of practitions. We show that intentions have a two-valued logical structure in a way exactly parallel to that of prescriptions, studied in Chapter 4. We need again Meta-theorem I of Chapter 3, § 14. Similarly we have the problem of elucidating the designated value of intentions involved in implication. Maintaining the principle of the unity of reason, since prescriptions and intentions are complementary basic units of content of practical thinking, we adopt the view that that value is very much the same as the Legitimacy of prescriptions. Thus, we built on Chapter 5 an account of the Legitimacy values of intentions. The causal role of intending is discussed in Chapter 10.
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References
For an examination of quasi-indexical reference and its crucial role in the conception of other minds, see Hector-Neri Castañeda’s papers: (i) ‘He: A Study in the Logic of Self-Consciousness’, Ratio 8 (1966): 130–157; (ii) ‘Indicators and Quasi-indicators’, American Philosophical Quarterly 4 (1967): 85–100; (iii) ‘On the Logic of Attributions of Self-Knowledge to Others’, The Journal of Philosophy 65 (1968): 439–456.
See Annetet C. Baier, ‘Act and Intent’, The Journal of Philosophy 67 (1970): 648–658. Jack W. Meiland in his The Nature of Intention (London: Methuen & Co., Ltd. 1970) also holds that the “objects of intention” are actions (p. 43). This book has some interesting discussions on the nature of intending. Baier’s paper is part of a symposium on intentions. The other papers are: Roderick M. Chisholm, ‘The Structure of Intention’, Ibid.: 633–647; and George Pitcher, ‘“In Intending” and Side Effects’, Ibid.: 659–668. H-N. Castañeda has examined critically the symposium in ‘Intentions and the Structure of Intending’, The Journal of Philosophy 68 (1971): 453–466.
This is from a reply by Annette Baier to Castañeda’s paper mentioned in note 2 above.
This is the view advocated by Alvin Goldman in his comments on H-N. Castañeda’s, ‘Purpose and Action’ presented at the 1974 Oberlin Philosophy Colloquium (forthcoming). It seems to be the view that Bruce Aune advocates in his ‘Sellars’ Theory of Practical Reason’ in H-N. Castañeda, ed., Knowledge, Action, and Reality: Critical Studies in the Philosophy of Wilfrid Sellars (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1975). Sellars also seems to hold that view in Science and Metaphysics (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, New York: Humanities Press, 1967). See H.N Castañeda ‘Some Reflections on Sellars’ Theory of Intentions’, also in Knowledge, Action and Reality. Relevant papers are William Todd, ‘Intentions and Programs’, Philosophy of Science 38 (1971): 530–541;
Robert Audi, ‘Intending’, The Journal of Philosophy 70 (1973): 387–403;
K. W. Rankin, ‘The Non-Causal Selffulfilment of Intentions’, American Philosophical Quarterly 9 (1972): 279–289; Donald Gustafson, ‘The Range of Intentions’, Inquiry (1975), 83–95.
For more detailed argumentation in support of the claim that first-person propositions are different from, and irreducible to, second- and third-person propositions, see Hector-Neri Castañeda, ‘On the Phenomeno-Logic of the I’, Proceedings of the XIVth International Congress of Philosophy, Vol. III (Vienna, Austria: Herder, 1969): 260–266. See also ‘Indicators and Quasi-Indicators’ and ‘On the Logic of Attributions of Self-Knowledge to Others’, mentioned in note 1 above.
Here we come to the border of larger issues in ontology. On the view I prefer primary intentions do not have exactly Fregean first-person senses, but only similar primary individuals called concrete individuals in H-N. Castañeda, ‘Thinking and the Structure of the World’, Philosophia 4 (1974): 3–40, and called ontological guises in Castañeda’s ‘Identity and Sameness’, Philosophia 5 (1975): 121–150. See Chapter 12 §5.
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© 1982 D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht, Holland
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Castañeda, HN. (1982). Intentions and Intending. In: Castañeda, HN. (eds) Thinking and Doing. Philosophical Studies Series in Philosophy, vol 7. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-010-9888-5_6
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