Abstract: Attempts to answer the question of whether it is possible to understand agency as realized within a world construed ‘naturalistically’, that is, in terms of causal relations among events and states of affairs, or whether an adequate ontology requires sui generis acts that are essentially voluntary, such as volitions or agent-causation. Berent Enç defends the possibility of naturalizing agency via a causal theory of action (CTA). In doing that, he develops his key notion of basic action (Chs 2 and 3); he offers a ‘general and original’ solution to the problem of causal deviance (Ch. 4); and, he attempts to answer the objection that CTA removes the agent from the picture altogether by offering a purely causal model for the deliberative process that underlies practical reasoning (Ch. 5). Furthermore, the book discusses objections to volitional theories (Ch. 1), intentions and intentional action (Ch. 6), and the compatibility of Enç’s CTA with attractive accounts of autonomy and freedom (Ch. 7).

Keywords: agency, agent-causation, autonomy, basic action, causality, causal deviance, causal theory of action, deliberation, Enç, freedom, intentions, naturalism, ontology, practical reasoning, volitions