Essays on Anscombe's Intention

by Anton Ford (Editor), Jennifer Hornsby (Editor), Frederick Stoutland (Editor)

Overview

G. E. M. Anscombe's Intention, firmly established the philosophy of action as a distinctive field of inquiry. Donald Davidson called this 94-page book "the most important treatment of action since Aristotle." But until quite recently, few scholars recognized the magnitude of Anscombe's philosophical achievement. This collection of ten essays elucidates some of the more challenging aspects of Anscombe's work and affirms her reputation as one of our most original philosophers.

Born in 1919, Anscombe studied at St. Hugh's College, Oxford, where she later held a research fellowship. In 1941 she married philosopher Peter Geach, with whom she had seven children. A close friend of Wittgenstein, in 1946 she joined Oxford's Somerville College and spent the next twenty-four years there before being appointed to the Chair of Philosophy at Cambridge that Wittgenstein had held. She died in 2001 after her long career as a highly regarded analytic philosopher.

This volume brings together fresh interpretations of Intention written by some of today's leading philosophers of action. It will enlighten Anscombe's readers who struggle with concepts they find puzzling or obscure, while providing a bracing corrective to doubts about Intention's significance and the gravity of what is at stake.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780674284265
Publisher:	Harvard University Press
Publication date:	03/24/2014
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	324
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.20(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Anton Ford is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Chicago.

Jennifer Hornsby is Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London.

Frederick Stoutland was Professor of Philosophy, Emeritus, at St. Olaf College.

Table of Contents

Preface vii

Introduction: Anscombe's Intention in Context Frederick Stoutland 1

Summary of Anscombe's Intention Frederick Stoutland 23

1 Anscombe on Expression of Intention: An Exegesis Richard Moran Martin J. Stone 33

2 Action and Generality Anton Ford 76

3 Actions in Their Circumstances Jennifer Hornsby 105

4 Anscombe on Bodily Self-Knowledge John McDowell 128

5 "The Knowledge That a Man Has of His Intentional Actions" Adrian Haddock 147

6 Knowledge ofIntention Kieran Setlya 170

7 Anscombe's Intention and Practical Knowledge Michael Thompson 198

8 Two Forms of Practical Knowledge and Their Unity Sebastian Rödl 211

9 Backward-Looking Rationality and the Unity of Practical Reason Anselm Winfried Müller 242

10 An Anscombian Approach to Collective Action Ben Laurence 270

Contributors 297

Index to Anscombe's Intention 299

Index 309

Editorial Reviews

One of the many merits of this collection of essays is that no one reading it could be left in much doubt of the work’s significance, nor for that matter of the fecundity of Anscombe’s thought: many of the essays here show her ideas and claims opening up new avenues and taking on a life of their own… Most of the contributors display an understanding of what Anscombe is up to that is both sophisticated and sympathetic.

Analysis Reviews - Roger Teichmann

This volume begins with a superbly crafted introduction by Frederick Stoutland to Anscombe’s work generally and to Intention in particular, furnishing a historical situating of the work that brings much clarity to otherwise difficult passages… This is indispensable reading for specialists in the philosophy of action and for others working in related areas in the philosophy of mind.

Choice - J. C. Swindal

The significance of Anscombe’s book Intention has been taken for granted rather than genuinely understood. This exceptionally fine collection of essays illuminates her thought and brings out its deep differences from much contemporary philosophy of mind and action. The book is outstanding in the kind of dialogue it sets up, the authors responding to Anscombe, to each other and to Donald Davidson and other action theorists. It should be essential reading for anyone with a philosophical interest in human action.

Cora Diamond

Anscombe’s little treatise is known as the foundational text not only for the field of analytic philosophy of action, but also, given its intersections with the analytic philosophy of mind and language, as the inevitable source of so much important and lasting work in the 50 years since its first appearance. This volume offers original texts on Anscombe’s Intention by some of today’s most eminent philosophers of action. They deliver without exception on the purpose of rescuing, sharpening and clarifying the scope and depth of Anscombe’s achievements. The collection manages what many anniversary collections desire but few pull off: to vindicate its subject as still full of promise. It not only provides a renewed motive to reflect on the foundations and basic concepts of a thriving discipline, but also recommends itself as a standard text for students and teachers in courses involving Anscombe’s thought. In all, everyone who dares to quote Anscombe needs to take note of this book as a guide to the current gold standard of scholarship on her thought and in the fields she set in motion.

Anselm Mueller

This publication marks a new stage in the reception of Anscombe’s thought. In the decades following the publication of Intention, readers saw Anscombe’s philosophy of action largely through a Davidsonian lens. Davidson’s selective reconstruction was more accessible and less Wittgensteinian than the original. It also encouraged the hope of absorbing Anscombe’s insights within a comfortable causalism about the mental. This hope could be sustained as long as relatively few philosophers made a serious study of Anscombe’s book. As the present volume shows, those days are over. We now have a critical mass of authors with the scholarly skill and the philosophical acumen to put us in direct contact with Intention. This is a book about what we have missed.

Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews - Philip Clark

One of the many merits of this collection of essays is that no one reading it could be left in much doubt of the work's significance, nor for that matter of the fecundity of Anscombe's thought: many of the essays here show her ideas and claims opening up new avenues and taking on a life of their own... Most of the contributors display an understanding of what Anscombe is up to that is both sophisticated and sympathetic.--Roger Teichmann "Analysis Reviews" (10/1/2012 12:00:00 AM)

This publication marks a new stage in the reception of Anscombe's thought. In the decades following the publication of Intention, readers saw Anscombe's philosophy of action largely through a Davidsonian lens. Davidson's selective reconstruction was more accessible and less Wittgensteinian than the original. It also encouraged the hope of absorbing Anscombe's insights within a comfortable causalism about the mental. This hope could be sustained as long as relatively few philosophers made a serious study of Anscombe's book. As the present volume shows, those days are over. We now have a critical mass of authors with the scholarly skill and the philosophical acumen to put us in direct contact with Intention. This is a book about what we have missed.--Philip Clark "Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews" (2/24/2013 12:00:00 AM)

This volume begins with a superbly crafted introduction by Frederick Stoutland to Anscombe's work generally and to Intention in particular, furnishing a historical situating of the work that brings much clarity to otherwise difficult passages... This is indispensable reading for specialists in the philosophy of action and for others working in related areas in the philosophy of mind.--J. C. Swindal "Choice" (4/1/2012 12:00:00 AM)

Anscombe's little treatise is known as the foundational text not only for the field of analytic philosophy of action, but also, given its intersections with the analytic philosophy of mind and language, as the inevitable source of so much important and lasting work in the 50 years since its first appearance. This volume offers original texts on Anscombe's Intention by some of today's most eminent philosophers of action. They deliver without exception on the purpose of rescuing, sharpening and clarifying the scope and depth of Anscombe's achievements. The collection manages what many anniversary collections desire but few pull off: to vindicate its subject as still full of promise. It not only provides a renewed motive to reflect on the foundations and basic concepts of a thriving discipline, but also recommends itself as a standard text for students and teachers in courses involving Anscombe's thought. In all, everyone who dares to quote Anscombe needs to take note of this book as a guide to the current gold standard of scholarship on her thought and in the fields she set in motion.--Anselm Mueller, Northwestern University

The significance of Anscombe's book Intention has been taken for granted rather than genuinely understood. This exceptionally fine collection of essays illuminates her thought and brings out its deep differences from much contemporary philosophy of mind and action. The book is outstanding in the kind of dialogue it sets up, the authors responding to Anscombe, to each other and to Donald Davidson and other action theorists. It should be essential reading for anyone with a philosophical interest in human action.--Cora Diamond, University of Virginia

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