Rules as reason-giving facts

a difference-making-based account of the normativity of rules

Peng-Hsiang Wang

Linton Wang

pp. 199-213

in: Michał Araszkiewicz, Paweł Banaś, Tomasz Gizbert-Studnicki, Krzysztof Płeszka (eds), Problems of normativity, rules and rule-following, Berlin, Springer, 2015

Abstract

In his "Reasoning with Rules," Joseph Raz raises a puzzling question about the normativity of rules: "How can it be that rules are reasons when they do not point to a good in the action for which they are reasons?" In this paper, we put forward a difference-making-based theory of reasons to resolve Raz's puzzle. This theory distinguishes between reasons and reason-giving facts, and we argue that rules are not reasons but rather reason-giving facts. Based on this distinction, we recast and criticize some of Raz's theses about the nature of rules, such as their opaqueness, the normative gap, and the breakdown of transitivity in the content-independent justification of rules. Finally, we propose a difference-making-based account of the reason-giving force of rules.

Cited authors

Raz Joseph