On the Rationality of Vow‐making

Abstract

I offer a philosophical account of vowing and the rationality of vow‐making. I argue that vows are most productively understood as exceptionless resolutions that do not have any excusing conditions. I then articulate an apparent problem for exceptionless vow‐making: how can it be rational to bind yourself unconditionally, when circumstances might change unexpectedly and make it the case that vow‐keeping no longer makes sense for you? As a solution, I propose that vows can be rational to make only if they are implicitly conditional on a personal identification or social role that is itself escapable.

Divine command theory and the (supposed) incoherence of self-commanding

“…See Habib (2009), Rosati (2011), andDannenberg (2015) for accounts on self-promising. For discussions of criticism to self-promising and responses to them see Liberman (2019) and Schaab (2021). 15.…”

Promises and all of the people who rely on them

“…Vows differ from promises in that they do not have excusing conditions. For instance, as Alida Liberman (2019) points out, if you take a vow to give up alcohol, then even if I offer you a beer and tell you that I don't mind if you have a drink, you still have a vow‐based obligation to stay on the wagon. But when Pam says to Felix, “I promise to take you to the big game,” Felix can dissolve Pam's obligation to do so by saying, “Actually, I don't want to go anymore.” Thus, because Felix can release Pam from the obligation in question, Pam's obligation cannot be explained in terms of a vow 21…”