Abstract
We take ourselves to have reasons to do things for and with our friends: reason to console a friend when she loses her job, for instance, or to help her celebrate when she gets a new one. And we take ourselves to have reasons for emotions centered on our friends: reason to worry when her job prospects are discouraging, and reason for relief when she lands on her feet. These are, we are apt to think, normative reasons: they not only explain our behavior, they make it appropriate. Indeed, in some cases, we think that to fail to respond appropriately to these reasons would be to wrong our friends.’ And we suppose that these reasons depend upon our friendships, so that others, who do not share our friendships, do not face the same normative reasons. I have a reason to critique my friend’s job application so that she can make it stronger, but you do not.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
S. Blackburn (1984) Spreading the Word: Groundings in the Philosophy of Language (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
M. Bratman (1987) Intention, Plans, and Practical Reason (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press).
M. Cords (1989) ‘Friendships, Alliances, Reciprocity and Repair’, in Andrew Whiten and Richard Byrne (eds), Machiavellian Intelligence II: Extensions and Evaluations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 24–49.
G. Evans (1982) The Varieties of Reference (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
A. Kolnai (1961–62) ‘Deliberation Is of Ends’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 62, 195–218.
N. Kolodny (2010a) ‘Which Relationships Justify Partiality? The Case of Parents and Children’, Philosophy and Public Affairs 38, 37–75.
N. Kolodny (2010b) ‘Which Relationships Justify Partiality? General Considerations and Problem Cases’, in Brian Feltham and John Cottingham (eds), Partiality and Impartiality: Morality, Special Relationships, and the Wider World (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 168–93.
J. Massen, E. Sterck and H. deVos (2010) ‘Close Social Associations in Animals and Humans: Functions and Mechanisms of Friendship’, Behavior 147, 1379–412.
J. Mitani (2009) ‘Male Chimpanzees Form Enduring and Equitable Social Bonds’, Animal Behavior 77, 633–40.
D. Parfit (2011) On What Matters, vol. 1 (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
A. Reisner (2009) ‘The Possibility of Pragmatic Reasons for Belief and the Wrong Kind of Reasons Problem’, Philosophical Studies 145, 257–72.
H. Richards (1994) Practical Reasoning about Final Ends (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
T. M. Scanlon (1998) What We Owe to Each Other (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press).
S. Scheffler (1997) ‘Relationships and Responsibilities’, Philosophy and Public Affairs 26, 189–209, reprinted in his (2001) Boundaries and Allegiances (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 97–110.
— (1999) ‘Conceptions of Cosmopolitanism’, Utilitas 11, 255–76, reprinted in Boundaries and Allegiances, 111–30.
— (2004) ‘Projects, Relationships, and Reasons’, in R. Jay Wallace, Philip Pettit, Samuel Scheffler, and Michael Smith (eds), Reason and Value: Themes from the Moral Philosophy of Joseph Raz (Oxford: Clarendon Press), 247–69.
— (2010) ‘Morality and Reasonable Partiality’, in Brian Feltham and John Cottingham (eds), Partiality and Impartiality: Morality, Special Relationships, and the Wider World (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 245–69.
J. Seidman (2004) ‘Two Sides of “Silencing”’, The Philosophical Quarterly 55, 68–77.
— (2009) ‘Valuing and Caring’, Theoria 75, 272–303.
B. Smuts (1985) Sex and Friendship in Baboons (Hawthorne, NY: Aldine Publishing).
G. Watson (1975) ‘Free Agency’, Journal of Philosophy 72, 205–20.
D. Wiggins (1975–76) ‘Deliberation and Practical Reason’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 76, 29–51.
— (2001) Sameness and Substance Renewed (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2013 Jeffrey Seidman
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Seidman, J. (2013). How to Be a Non-Reductionist about Reasons of Friendship. In: Caluori, D. (eds) Thinking about Friendship. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137003997_8
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137003997_8
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-43447-3
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-00399-7
eBook Packages: Palgrave Religion & Philosophy CollectionPhilosophy and Religion (R0)