A Critical Analysis of Searle's View on the Rational Explanation of Action: A Comparison with Davidson's Causal Approach

The explanation of action is one of the fundamental topics in the philosophy of action. The central issue in this discussion is answering why a human action has been performed; in other words, what is presented as a reason, cause, or explanatory factor for that action, and how the performance of that action can be explained on its basis. Using an analytical method based on a critical rereading of John Searle's works and the literature on action explanation, the present study aims to examine the essential components of Searle's rational explanation of action from his perspective and, ultimately, to demonstrate the challenges of this approach in the problem of action explanation.
Unlike the explanation of natural phenomena, the explanation of human action is intertwined with rationality and normativity. The background of this discussion goes back to Aristotle and the theory of the four causes, but in contemporary philosophy, it has transformed into an independent topic within the philosophy of action, giving rise to two general traditions: causal and non-causal.
In the causal tradition, action is explained by reference to mental or psychological states. Davidson considers the reason for an action to be a combination of a belief and a pro-attitude, which is both the motive of the action and makes it rational, and he emphasizes that the reason must also be the cause of the action. In the non-causal tradition, action is treated as a meaningful phenomenon that is comprehensible only within a social, cultural, and linguistic context. The approach of rational interpretation, influenced by Ryle and Wittgenstein, explains action by placing it in a rational pattern based on the agent's reasons, without treating these reasons as psychological causes of behavior. In this approach, rationality does not mean normative or ideal rationality, but rather refers to the internal coherence among belief, desire, and action, and the goal is to reconstruct the meaning of the action within the framework of social and linguistic rules, rather than discovering its actual cause.
In this landscape, Searle offers a novel approach that both resembles causal models and departs from them. He emphasizes the distinction between the explanation of natural events and intentional phenomena such as desire, belief, and action. From his perspective, the question of the "why" of an action is a question about justifying reasons, because intentional phenomena are voluntary, replaceable, and subject to rational evaluation. Searle considers rationality to be broader than justification; every justified state is rational, but not every rational state is necessarily justified. Therefore, in explaining action, he focuses on motivating reasons rather than justifying and normative reasons.
To show the link between reason and action, Searle introduces "intentional causation." In this type of causation, a causal relation holds between an intentional state and its conditions of satisfaction. If the mind causes a worldly realization, causation is from mind to world; and if external conditions shape a mental state, causation is from world to mind. Some intentional states, such as sensory perception, memory, and intention, have a self-referential structure; meaning that their condition of satisfaction is that they themselves must cause the realization of their content. My intention to drink water is satisfied only when that very intention causes the performance of the action.
According to Searle, a "full reason" consists of two elements: stimuli or effective facts, and non-stimuli factors such as an instrumental belief. Stimuli are of three kinds: states of affairs, intentional states, and institutional facts. The existence of these various types makes diverse and even unlimited explanations—causal, logical, moral, economic, aesthetic, and so forth—possible for a single action. Drawing inspiration from Wittgenstein's "family resemblance," Searle brings this diversity to a kind of unity. However, stimuli are explanatory only when they have a causal link to the action. This link is necessary, but it does not mean compulsion or the necessity of the action's occurrence, because the agent could still have acted otherwise. Therefore, action explanation, according to Searle, consists of presenting an explanatory speech act that includes effective stimuli having a causal relation to the action, along with an instrumental belief.
Searle bears a striking resemblance to Davidson in his emphasis on belief and pro-attitude, and in the necessity of the reason causing the action. However, his fundamental difference is that he accepts desire-independent reasons. In his view, duties, obligations, and institutional facts can, through their normative structure, be motives for action without being redefined as desires. Furthermore, unlike rational interpretation, Searle does not consider mere comprehensibility of the action to be sufficient; a rational explanation must point to the real, causal reason of the action, rather than merely offering a posteriori and semantic reconstruction.
Ultimately, the conclusion of this study is that Searle's perspective on the problem of action explanation, despite important innovations such as introducing intentional causation and accepting desire-independent reasons, faces several challenges. First, the normativity challenge: Searle's response is that intentional causation itself carries normativity, and the cause of the action has a normative structure. Second, the challenge of actions with multiple reasons: his response is similar to Davidson's—the real reason that causes the action is also the explanatory one. Third, the challenge of the logical connection between reason and action: Searle shows, by relying on the self-referentiality of intentional causation, that conceptual and causal dependency are not two separate descriptions, but rather an integrated structure. Fourth, the challenge of deviance in the causal chain: adding prior intention and intention-in-action is a partial solution, but it does not seem to completely resolve the problem. Fifth, the challenge of epistemic access: because mental states are private and we have access to them only through language, behavior, and context, Searle's causal explanation encounters the problem of epistemic insecurity.