Attunement and Reason

ABSTRACT

In this essay, I present a theory of attunement, the agent's readiness to attend to a target. I focus on attunement to reasons for action, and in particular, on sensitivity to moral reasons. After noting that many claims regarding moral perception are better construed as claims regarding moral attention, I separate perceptual from attentional sensitivity. The latter includes rational attunement to reason. Drawing on Davidson's argument for the causal theory of action, I establish a causal structure that establishes the necessity of attention to reasons if we are to act on them. Attunement is found within this structure as a biased psychological state. This is then used to explain John McDowell's discussion of silencing and the contrast between virtuous, continent, and incontinent agents. After providing an empirical ground for attunement where knowledge of structure provides a critical bias that sets the agent's readiness to attend, I use the case of skill in medicine where doctors are attuned to the gist of health and disease to account for virtue where practically wise agents are attuned to moral gist. Knowledge of relevant structure, say medical or ethical structure, establishes a distinctive sensitivity to reasons for action.