Desire, Practical Reason, and the Good * Edited by SERGIO TENENBAUM

Abstract

The papers in this edited volume are all centred on the guise of the good thesis (GGT), which in its most general and unqualified form says that our practical attitudes aim at the good. To get a firmer grip on this thesis, we have three notions to make more precise: practical attitude, aiming at and the good. This book does a good job of making these notions more precise, so we can see more clearly what is at stake in the debate about GGT. The book also provides a good score table for the main versions of GGT by discussing the main arguments for and against each version. Another virtue of the book is that it is not just concerned with the contemporary debate about GGT. It also engages critically with GGT as it was understood and defended by Socrates, Aristotle and Plato. Socrates favours a version of GGT that states that we cannot act against our better judgement. More precisely, the idea is that an agent cannot perform an action that he knows to be worse than another action available to him. On the face of it, this is an astonishing thesis, since it seems to rule out weakness of will. Matthew Evans provides a thorough reconstruction of Socrates's argument for this controversial thesis. Even though he concedes that Socrates's argument, under the most charitable interpretation, is still far from watertight, he shows that it is worth taking seriously.