The Hi, I'm Peter Adamson, and you're listening to the History of Philosophy podcast, brought to you with the support of the philosophy department at King's College London

and the LMU in Munich. Online at www.

History of Philosophy.net.

Today's episode will be an interview about the will in medieval philosophy with

Tom Pink who is professor of philosophy at Kings College London. Hi Tom.

Hi Peter. Thanks for coming on the podcast.

Not at all.

The first thing I'm going to ask you is a pretty basic question.

Why should we posit the will at all as most medieval philosophers do.

There are two reasons.

The first is that there seems to be, if we talk about our motivations as the psychological states that move us into action.

They can include desires, emotions, decisions, intentions.

There are certain motivations that seem quite special.

The first way they seem to be special is that they seem particularly responsive

to reasons for action

and serve to determine how we finally act.

And these aren't just ordinary desires,

or ordinary emotions, but our decisions and intentions

to act.

We deliberate about what to do, and then on the basis of that deliberation we take a decision which seems to be an event whereby we form an intention,

outright determination to act, which persists until the time for action comes and then we act.

And these decisions and intentions seem very, very closely

...