ABSTRACT
Among all of the actual and possible outcomes of a purposive action, some are outcomes to which the action is directed. These outcomes are the goals of that action. Note that goals are not intentions, nor mental states of any kind. This chapter considers research showing that infants, from 3 months of age or earlier, can track the goals of actions. Whether this tracking involves knowledge of goals is a further question. To know simple facts about the goals of an action is to know something about to which outcomes that action is directed. Also, it is theoretically coherent to conjecture that infants would be able to first track the goals of very small actions and learn about the structure of larger sequences of actions, so as eventually to use information in ascribing intentions to agents.
