Repository | Book | Chapter

Plan, rationality, and self-orientation (Selbstorientierung)

Cheng Yuan

pp. 1-22

One of the merits of practical rationality is to organize our practical tasks effectively and to put practical activities in order, such as plan-making, which includes prioritizing, instrumental calculation, strategy-adapting, etc. In this chapter, starting from the B. Williams' critique to John Rawls' notion—taking life plans as "an external view of one's own life," the author establishes the external view of rationality and internal view of rationality in contrast. The author holds that practical rationality not only means pros-cons weighing or strategical manipulation, but also is one kind of internal power, which can hold oneself as whole and go through our inner emotions, perceptions, desires, and even the deepest dimensions of our structure. With internal rationality, the agent could reconstruct personal beliefs and be oriented again in the absence of orientation.

Publication details

DOI: 10.1007/978-981-10-8651-9_1

Full citation:

Yuan, C. (2018). Plan, rationality, and self-orientation (Selbstorientierung), in Practical intellect and substantial deliberation, Dordrecht, Springer, pp. 1-22.

This document is unfortunately not available for download at the moment.