ABSTRACT
Understanding human action from the perspective of Rationalist Teleology (see Chapter 2) focuses attention in a particular way. First, the human individual is taken as primary and that individual is understood as autonomous. This means that it is the individual who autonomously chooses goals and actions. The motivation for such choice arises in the individual and the choice comes before action, which is directed toward other humans and the non-human world. Second, this autonomous individual chooses goals, and the actions to achieve them, in a rational manner. In other words, individuals think about what they should, or want to, achieve in a given situation and then use reason to work out how to achieve the goal in that situation. The reasoning individual need not be, and usually is not, fully aware of the process of choice, especially when the action is highly skilled. Then individuals may choose on the basis of implicit or tacit knowledge.
