the reasons program, the normativity of rationality, and rationality as coherence
According to a popular position we will call The Reasons Program, what it is to be normative is to be analyzable in terms of reasons. This is a popular position and ‘trendy’ position in ethics. Two theorists who are often cited as card-carrying members of The Reasons Program are Tim Scanlon and Derek Parfit. And although they do explicitly say that they believe The Reasons Program’s main tenet, I don’t see how they can do this without contradicting themselves.
The problem has to do with (1) what rationality consists in and (2) the normative status of rationality. Both Parfit and Scanlon think that rationality just has to do with coherence in a broad sense of coherence. In chapter four of Climbing the Mountain, Parfit holds that one is rational (in most cases–the exceptions won’t help him with my problem) just in case one correctly responds to one’s beliefs. More specifically, one is rational just in case she does things that she would have decisive reasons to do if her beliefs were true. The contents of one’s beliefs are what Parfit calls apparent reasons. Under the right conditions, one’s apparent reasons are real normative reasons. However, Parfit contends, in some cases one’s apparent reasons aren’t real reasons at all. Thus, he writes,
(1) Our desires and acts are rational when they causally depend
on beliefs whose truth would give us sufficient reasons to have
these desires, and to act in these ways.
(2) With a few exceptions, it is irrelevant whether these beliefs are
true, or rational.
Thus, rationality doesn’t have any tight connection with reasons. However, Parfit maintains that rationality is normative (I just did a quick scan of ch. 4 to find him explicitly mention this. He writes on p. 88 that ‘the rationality of our desires and acts normatively depends…’ (my emphasis)).
Scanlon holds a similar position (to simplify, I’m only going to talk about his view in What We Owe to Each Other; note, though, that his view is more sophisticated than this now. See ‘Structural Irrationality’ in this book). In What We Owe to Each Other, Scanlon defines irrationality in the ‘narrow sense.’ Thus, according to the view there, one is irrational just in case one believes that she has decisive reason to 
I think that there is an obvious contradiction between the following three claims, all of which Scanlon and Parfit seem committed to:
(1) The requirements of rationality are normative.
(2) The requirements of rationality are not analyzed in terms of actual reasons.
(3) In order for some concept C to be normative, C must be analyzed in terms of reasons.
So, what’s the deal? Parfit, I think, is in a better position to amend his view so he can deny (2). He can say that apparent reasons aren’t always objective normative reasons, but that they are always subjective normative reasons. This is, in effect, Mark Schroeder’s view (see here, pdf). However, I highly doubt he wants to say that what he calls apparent reasons are always normative. I am partial to this view; so, I think he should. But I doubt that he is sympathetic to it.
Scanlon, on the other hand, seems to flat out reject (3) in this paper. He there distinguishes between normative claims that are structural–i.e. about structural rationality– and substantive–i.e. claims made about reasons. I think that people should stop citing him as an adherent to The Reasons Program.
Of course, one could deny (1). Niko Kolodny, at least the Niko Kolodny of ‘Why Be Rational?,’ seems to want to deny (1). Although in more recent papers (see here) he has cited Schroeder’s view as a view compatible with the type of criticisms he is making against coherence views (I will be posting about that issue eventually).
I would like to vindicate (1) and (3). And so I deny (2). In fact, I deny (2) in two interesting senses. First, I deny that all requirements of rationality are coherence requirements. Thus, some requirements are requirements to respond to objective normative reasons. Second, I deny that coherence requirements aren’t analyzed in terms of reasons. They are analyzed in terms of subjective reasons.
Minor note: On my copy of Parfit’s book (Now titled “On What Matters”), he seems to endorse Kolodny’s approach in Footnote 135, from p117 (Section 16 of Chapter 5). My copy is the April 19th version, and your experience may vary.
Alex,
Are you certain that Climbing the Mountain is not On What Matters? Because my version of CtM is more recent than April 19th.
In any case, what do you mean by endorsing Kolodny’s approach. Kolodny’s approach to wide-scope theories? The only mention to Kolodny in my version of CtM is a cryptic note at the end of chapter five about how Kolodny has shown something, but it’s not clear what Parfit is referring to. In any case, I think Parfit’s problem remains even if he rejects wide-scope views (which its not clear if he does). As long as he doesn’t hold that apparent reasons are normative reasons, he still has the problem.
Alex,
You are right, they are the same book. The footnote that you referenced is the same as the one I was thinking of. I don’t know what that footnote is supposed to mean, though. I’ll talk to Parfit about it and report back.
Sorry, that was very short and not very clear.
I meant endorsing something like Kolodny’s Transparency account, from his “Why Be Rational?”. I understand this to be the claim that there are no reasons to be rational. This is what I understand Parfit to mean when he says on p117: “we are not assuming that rationality matters”. (I understand the remarks on wide-scoping to be one of Kolodny’s arguments against rivals to this view, and not really his central point.)
To bring it back to your three claims, I think that they might both just think that your phrase “The requirements of rationality” is ambiguous:
1) In one sense it means “the reasons to be rational”, and in this sense they deny (1), since there are no such reasons, if there are no such reasons then they cannot be normative.
2) In another sense it means “the reasons the agent takes themselves to have”. In this sense they will accept (1). But they will also certainly reject (2), since agents’ beliefs about reasons are not to be analysed in terms of actual reasons.
I hope that’s clear: I can’t help but feel that the answers here should be very simple but language just gets in the way of stating them.
Alex
(I shouldn’t have numbered my disambiguations, since then they get confused with your propositions. All of my numbers refer to your propositions. Call my claims interpretations “A” and “B” instead.)
After a brief rethink, I think under B they might reject (1) /as well as/ (2). This doesn’t matter, since the problem goes away so long as they reject at least one.
Sorry for the commenting spam, but I’ve just noticed a huge mistake in what I said. My comments on B are completely wrongheaded, for extremely obvious reasons: rejecting (2) would require that we *do* analyse beliefs in terms of actual reasons, not that we *do not*.
I think I should be saying that we should just reject (1), but I need to think about this further. Sorry again for silly mistake, and feel free to delete my last two comments.