This paper discusses the commitment account of assertion (CAA), according to which two necessary conditions for asserting that p are the speaker's undertaking a commitment to justify her assertion in the face of challenges and the speaker's licensing the audience to defer justificatory challenges back to her. Relying on what I call the "cancellation test," and focusing on Robert Brandom's version of the CAA, I show that the latter is wrong: it is perfectly possible to assert that p even while explicitly disavowing the justificatory commitment and while refusing to issue a deferring license. Then I sketch an alternative to the CAA, the trust account of assertion, according to which speakers necessarily present themselves as trustworthy concerning p's truth whenever they assert p. I explain why this is different from undertaking a justificatory commitment, and offer some reasons for thinking that this is a more promising account.

I. Pro toto reasons. II. Pro tanto reasons. III. Conclusion. IV. References. * Artículo recibido el 8 de agosto de 2017 y aprobado para su publicación el 1o. de noviembre de 2017.

Abstract:In this paper I defend a solution to the moral luck problem based on what I call "a fair opportunity account of control." I focus on Thomas Nagel's claim that moral luck reveals a paradox, and argue that the apparent paradox emerges only because he assumes that attributions of responsibility require agents to have total control over their actions. I argue that a more modest understanding of what it takes for someone to be a responsible agent-i.e., being capable of doing the right thing for the right reasonsdissolves the paradox and shows that responsibility and luck aren't at odds.

No abstract

The first objective of this paper is to present an interpretation of Groundwork III which aims to establish two main points: first, that Kant offers there a theoretically-grounded deduction (in a Kantian sense) of freedom/morality-as-autonomy; second, that Kant also offers a separate deduction of the categorical imperative. Thus, contrary to what several commentators have claimed, Groundwork III contains a theoretically-grounded double deduction. The second objective of the paper is to examine and criticize in detail one crucial step in these deductions, namely, Kant's inference from the speculative spontaneity of reason to the noumenal existence of the subject as a free will. I show that Kant himself came to reject this inference in the B edition of the Critique of Pure Reason, and argue that this explains Kant's rejection, in the Critique of Practical Reason, of the deduction of the moral law he previously offered. Thus, contrary to the "reconciliationist" reading, there is indeed a great reversal in the latter work.