Concept

Action (philosophy)

Overview

In philosophy, an action is something an agent does. Actions contrast with events that merely happen to someone and are typically performed for a purpose and guided by an intention. The first question in the philosophy of action is to determine how actions differ from other forms of behavior, like involuntary reflexes. According to Ludwig Wittgenstein, it involves discovering "What is left over if I subtract the fact that my arm goes up from the fact that I raise my arm". A common response to this question focuses on the agent's intentions. So driving a car is an action since the agent intends to do so, but sneezing is a mere behavior since it happens independent of the agent's intention. The dominant theory of the relation between the intention and the behavior is causalism: driving the car is an action because it is caused by the agent's intention to do so. On this view, actions are distinguished from other events by their causal history. Causalist theories include Donald Davidson's account, which defines actions as bodily movements caused by intentions in the right way, and volitionalist theories, according to which volitions form a core aspect of actions. Non-causalist theories, on the other hand, often see intentions not as the action's cause but as a constituent of it.

An important distinction among actions is between non-basic actions, which are done by doing something else, and basic actions, for which this is not the case. Most philosophical discussions of actions focus on physical actions in the form of bodily movements. But many philosophers consider mental actions to be a distinct type of action that has characteristics quite different from physical actions. Deliberations and decisions are processes that often precede and lead to actions. Actions can be rational or irrational depending on the reason for which they are performed. The problem of responsibility is closely related to the philosophy of actions since people are usually held responsible by others for what they do.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).

In the original texts

Passages from public-domain books where Action (philosophy) is discussed.

On the other hand, the end, the agent, and the form are principles of action, but in a certain order. For the first principle of action is the end which moves the agent; the second is the agent; the third is the form of that which the agent applies to action (although the agent also acts through its own form); as may be clearly seen in things made by art. For the craftsman is moved to action by the end, which is the…
Aquinas Thomas, Summa Theologica, Part I
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If the relation be different then there must necessarily be a created intention otherwise the created result of an action would come from an eternal action, for what is necessary of it in action, is necessary also in intention. If it be said that when the time of its making comes it is found done; it may be asked: is it so by an eternal or a created action? If they say by an eternal action, they admit the existence…
Averroës, The Philosophy and Theology of Averroes
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An action is an aim of the subject, and it is his agency too which executes this aim: unless the subject were in this way in the most disinterested action, i.e. unless he had an interest in it, there would be no action at all.—The impulses and inclinations are sometimes depreciated by being contrasted with the baseless chimera of a happiness, the free gift of nature, where wants are supposed to find their…
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Hegel's Philosophy of Mind
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11. Several Words seeming to signify Action, signify but the effect. POWER being the source from whence all action proceeds, the substances wherein these powers are, when they *[lost line??] exert this power into act, are called CAUSES, and the substances which thereupon are produced, or the simple ideas which are introduced into any subject by the exerting of that power, are called EFFECTS. The EFFICACY whereby the…
John Locke, An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume 1
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These persons thus imagine also the angels as bodies. Some of them, further, believe that God commands an action in words consisting, like ours, of letters and sound, and that thereby the action is done.
Moses Maimonides, The guide for the perplexed
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Action (philosophy)

Overview

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