JAY JIAN
I am a tenure-track research fellow (assistant professor level) at Academia Sinica, the National Academy of Taiwan. Before taking up this research-only post, I was a tenure-track assistant professor at National Tsing Hua University (2021-22), where I still teach courses as an affiliated faculty member. I hold a DPhil (2020) and a BPhil (2015) degree in philosophy from the University of Oxford.
I work on agency, rationality, and normativity. My research examines how we can uncover new principles of practical rationality through studying defective agency, and how we can revise some leading approaches to rationality in light of these new rational principles. You can find my CV here.
RESEARCH
Rational Norms for Degreed Intention (and the Discrepancy between Theoretical and Practical Reason)
Australasian Journal of Philosophy (forthcoming) (link)
Given the success of the formal approach to degreed belief in contemporary epistemology, some philosophers have recently considered its extension to intention. According to them, (1) intentions can also come in degrees as beliefs do, and (2) these degreed states are all governed by the norms of the probability calculus, such that the rational norms for belief and for intention exhibit certain structural similarity. This paper, however, raises some worries about (2). It considers two schemes for representing degreed intention and casts some doubt on applying probabilistic norms to degreed intention on each scheme. And it argues that the norms of Intention–Belief Consistency and Enkrasia cannot be plausibly turned into norms prescribing a simple correspondence relation between one’s degrees of belief and intention. The results suggest a potential structural discrepancy between the norms of theoretical and practical rationality—at least when it comes to degreed belief and intention. This potential discrepancy not only raises interesting questions about intention–belief relation and the rational norms for degreed intention. It also poses a new challenge for intention-based expressivism about normative judgment and cognitivism about practical rationality.
Preference- or Desire-First Psychology?
Joint Winner of the 12th Annual Essay Prize by the Antwerp Centre for Philosophical Psychology
Some philosophers take preference to be the most fundamental conative attitude, while others grant this status to desire. But I argue that some recent empirical studies on comparative and non-comparative evaluations either challenge the standard reductionist approach to preference–desire relation, or they call for a revision to the received notions of preference and desire. Either way, these studies suggest that an agent’s favorability ordering can actually vary, depending on whether we measure it through their comparative or non-comparative evaluations.
Intention (in Chinese)
The Chinese Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2022) (link)
This encyclopedia entry first introduces two broad approaches to understanding intention (Section 1): One starts with the theorization about intentional action and the intention with which one acts, while the other starts with an inquiry on prospective intention that precedes one’s intentional action. It then examines in more detail reductionist and anti-reductionist accounts of intention (Section 2), which analyze intention respectively in terms of belief-desire pair or the distinctive functional role of intention. This entry in turn elaborates on the relationship between intention and other types of intentional states. It first examines the factual and rational relations between intention and normative judgment (Section 3) by covering contemporary discussions on akrasia and the rational requirement of Enkrasia. It then considers the factual and rational relations between intention and the belief about one’s future action (Section 4) by spelling out recent debates over cognitivism about intention and the rational requirement of Intention–Belief Consistency. The entry then focuses on intentional action. It considers whether an action is intentional in virtue of its connections with prospective intentions or other types of motivating states, and whether an action is judged by people to be intentional on the basis of moral considerations (Sections 5-6). This entry concludes by highlighting why intention figures centrally in contemporary discussions on practical rationality and normativity (Section 7).
Misinformation, Subjectivism, and the Rational Criticizability of Desire
Philosophical Studies (2021) 178(3): 845-66 (link)
Orthodox Humeans about normative reasons for action believe that there are no rational principles governing the substantive content of desire. But they also believe that desires with misinformed content should be rejected and cannot be the proper subjective sources of normative reasons for action. These two ideas, I argue, in fact stand in tension with each other: The Humean rejection of misinformed desire actually has to invoke a feasibility principle for desire, a semi-substantive rational principle that is already built into the very conceptions of rationality and desire that underlie orthodox Humeanism. This rational principle then provides a new account of the substantive rationality of desire, which in turn has some interesting implications in metaethics and first-order normative theories.
TALKS
1. “Self-Defeat and Means-End Incoherence”
01/2024 The 10th Workshop on Normativity and Reasoning, NYU Abu Dhabi (invited)
2. “Putting Things in Order”
12/2023 The 5th Taiwan Philosophical Logic Colloquium, National Taiwan University (invited)
12/2023 Faculty Colloquium, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (invited)
3. “Instrumental Rationality and Reasons”
07/2023 Workshop on Raz’s Theory of Reasons, National Chung Cheng University (invited)
4. “Rational Choice Beyond the Comparative Frame”
04/2023 The 30th Inter-University Workshop on Philosophy and Cognitive Science, University of Valencia
5. ”Do Reasons Transmit to the Pre-conditions of Reasons?”
04/2023 2023 Pacific Division Meeting (Colloquium), American Philosophical Association
05/2022 Workshop on Reasons, Ought, and Normative Transmission, Humboldt University
6. “Can Epistemic Defects Provide Practical Defeaters?”
03/2023 Workshop on Knowledge, Rationality, and Defeat, Hiroshima University (invited)
7. ”Distorted Perception and Irrational Evaluation,”
09/2022 Conference on Apprehending Value, PThU Amsterdam
8. “Comparative Judgment and Evaluation”
08/2022 Work-in-Progress Seminar, Academia Sinica (invited)
04/2022 Workshop on Mind and Judgment, National Taiwan University (invited)
9. “Some Rational Problems with Comparative Valuing”
01/2022 2022 Eastern Division Meeting (Colloquium), American Philosophical Association
08/2021 The 14th Annual Rocky Mountain Ethics Congress, University of Colorado
07/2021 The 95th Joint Session, Aristotelian Society & the Mind Association
04/2021 Faculty Colloquium, National Chung Cheng University (invited)
10. “The Constitutive Norms and Justification for Commitment”
09/2021 Conference on Preferences, Commitments and Choice, University of Zurich
11. “The Internalist Connection between Intention and All-Things-Considered Judgment”
02/2021 2021 Central Division Meeting (Colloquium), American Philosophical Association
12. ”Re-motivating the Internalist Constraint”
11/2020 Workshop on Metaethics and Metaepistemology, University of Vienna
13. “Do We Have a Reason to Do What We Desire to Do?”
11/2020 Faculty Colloquium, Soochow University (invited)
14. “Value and Reason in the Face of Misinformation”
08/2020 Faculty Colloquium, National Tsing Hua University (invited)
15. “In Defense of the Executive Conception of Instrumental Rationality”
03/2020 Slippery Slope Normativity Summit, Inland Norway University
07/2019 The 5th Annual Southern Normativity Group Conference, Cardiff University
16. “Why Intention Presupposes Mental Unity”
10/2019 Action and Ethics: How, Why, Ought, University of Utah
08/2019 New Horizons in Action and Agency, University of Helsinki
17. “An Analysis of the Structure of Instrumental Irrationality and Executive Vice”
07/2019 The 93rd Joint Session, Aristotelian Society & the Mind Association, University of Durham
03/2019 Tennessee Value and Agency Conference, University of Tennessee
18. “Subjectivism and Two Kinds of Authenticity”
12/2018 Lake Geneva Graduate Conference, University of Neuchâtel
19. “The Rational Irrelevance of Desire Strength”
11/2018 Ockham Society, University of Oxford
20. “Misinformed Desire and the Foundations of Subjectivism”
03/2018 Connecticut Graduate Conference in Philosophy, University of Connecticut
04/2017 Stockholm Philosophy Graduate Conference, University of Stockholm
21. “Davidson’s Constitutivist Picture of Practical Rationality”
11/2017 Workshop on Donald Davidson's Philosophy, National Taiwan University
22. “Agency, Instrumental Rationality, and the Hierarchy of Desires”
09/2017 Salzburg Conference for Young Analytic Philosophy, University of Salzburg
23. “How Can Ends Be Rationally Criticized under Instrumental Rationality?”
02/2017 DPhil Seminar, University of Oxford
24. “Instrumental Rationality and the Cognitive Grounding of Desire”
01/2017 Ockham Society, University of Oxford
25. “Two Constraints on Subjectivist Theories of Normative Reason”
07/2016 The 5th Understanding Value Conference, University of Sheffield
26. “Moral Motivation, Goal, and Background Beliefs”
06/2014 Ockham Society, University of Oxford
TEACHING
AS PRIMARY INSTRUCTOR
1. Rationality in Philosophy and Economics, National Tsing Hua University, 2022
2. Rationality and Time, National Tsing Hua University, 2022
3. Introduction to Value Theory, National Tsing Hua University, 2021
4. Graduate Seminar on Intention, National Tsing Hua University, 2021
5. Ethics (Advanced ethics), St Catherine's College, University of Oxford, 2020
6. Lectures on Key Topics in Normativity (Key topics in meta-ethics, agency, and rationality), Faculty of Philosophy, University of Oxford, 2019
7. Philosophy of Mind and Personal Identity, Jesus College, University of Oxford, 2018
AS TA AND TUTORIAL TUTOR
1. General Philosophy (Introduction to metaphysics and epistemology), Corpus Christi College, University of Oxford, 2020
2. Moral Philosophy (Introduction to ethics), St John’s College, University of Oxford, 2017
3. Moral Philosophy (Introduction to ethics), St John’s College, University of Oxford, 2016
4. Epistemology, Department of Philosophy, National Taiwan University, 2012-2013
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