Danto's rejection of immanent causation

Abstract

Against Danto's recent argument that the causation internal to basic actions is not a special, immanent causation, it is objected that (i) he introduces a notion of truncated action that involves a fallacious use of the Equals‐subtracted‐from‐equals axiom, (ii) his version of the Identity Thesis turns upon a misleading notion of co‐referentiality, and (iii) he falls into what, by his own theory of meaning, amounts to a category mistake concerning intentions as causes within actions. Hence Danto's arguments do not warrant his materialist claim that causation is a univocal concept.