Putting Things Into (Rational) Perspective: Normative Reasons and Their Rational Accessibility

Abstract Perspectivism about reasons is commonly understood as the view that normative reasons depend on an agent’s epistemic perspective: a fact counts as a reason only if it is epistemically accessible to the agent. This paper argues that perspectivists’ near-exclusive focus on an agent’s epistemic perspective obscures another important dimension of perspective dependence – namely, that reasons can also depend on an agent’s rational perspective. Specifically, I propose that, in addition to epistemic accessibility, a further necessary condition for a fact to qualify as a reason is its rational accessibility – that is, the agent must have decisive reason to access the fact. Recognizing the rational accessibility of reasons offers considerable theoretical leverage: it substantially improves the two leading perspectivist accounts, with notable implications for the broader dialectic, and it promises to illuminate central normative phenomena, such as key instances of normative latitude.