The Oxford Handbook of Reasons and Normativity maps a central terrain of philosophy, and provides an authoritative guide to it. Few concepts have received as much attention in recent philosophy as the concept of a reason to do or believe something. And one of the most contested ideas in philosophy is normativity, the ‘ought’ in claims that we ought to do or believe something. This is the first volume to provide broad coverage of the study of reasons and normativity across multiple philosophical subfields. In addition to focusing on reasons in ethics, epistemology, and the philosophy of mind, action, and language, the Handbook explores philosophical work on the nature of normativity in general.

Topics covered include: the unity of normativity; the fundamentality of reasons; attempts to explain reasons in other terms; the relation of motivational reasons to normative reasons; the internalist constraint; the logic and language of reasons and ‘ought’; connections between reasons, intentions, choices, and actions; connections between reasons, reasoning, and rationality; connections between reasons, knowledge, understanding and evidence; reasons encountered in perception and testimony; moral principles, prudence and reasons; agent-relative reasons; epistemic challenges to our access to reasons; normativity in relation to meaning, concepts, and intentionality; instrumental reasons; pragmatic reasons for belief; aesthetic reasons; and reasons for emotions.