Research Group
in Analytic Philosophy

Abstract

Following Frost (On the Very Idea of Direction of Fit, Philosophical Review 2014), I sum up reasons to be dissatisfied with extant accounts of the distinction in "direction of fit" between beliefs/assertions and intentions/directives first made in intuitive terms by Anscombe and Searle. I argue that Frost's proposal doesn't fare better. I offer an alternative one, based on a normative, constitutive-rules account of representational acts. I conclude by critically discussing Williamson's ("Acting on Knowledge") arguments against a view like the one I propose.