Cover

Half-title

Title page

Copyright information

Dedication

Table of contents

Preface

Table of cases

Introduction

Part I The anatomy of attempting

1 Attempts and intention

1.1 Understandings of intention

Intention and reasons for action

Intention and planning

Intention as being on the way to intentional action

1.2 Intentional action as the sole category of intention

Intentional action cannot be identified solely from the reasons for which we act

Intentions are of action and are not something we have

Intending as an epistemic perspective

Constructing intentions

Summary

1.3 Intention and attempts

2 Attempts and action

2.1 Attempting as a species of intentional action

Basic 'actions' are not (intentional) actions and cannot be attempted

Internal actions are intentional actions and can be attempted

(Descriptions of) attempts are narrower than (descriptions of) intentional actions

Intentional action and responsibility

The epistemic perspective in attempting

The fusion of actus reus and mens rea in attempts

2.2 Action in attempts

All 'beings on the way', however inchoate, are attempts

Successful actions as attempts

`Trying to try' is indistinguishable from trying

3 Attempts and subjectivity

3.1 Agent relative subjectivity

Why there might be no truth of the matter

3.2 Third-party subjectivity

Intangibility

Invisibility

Multiple application

Multiple accounts

4 Attempts and Possibility

4.1 The distinction between what is attempted and what happens in an attempt

Meeting objections

Alternatives

Attempting what is known to be impossible

4.2 The need for descriptive accuracy: implications for 'impossibility'

Part II The implications for criminal law

5 Actus reus and mens rea

5.1 Acts are not (mere) physical movements: implications for the mens rea/actus reus distinction

Michael Moore on the validity of the mens rea/actus reus distinction

The epistemic objection

The ontological objections

After Moore: the fusion of actus reus and mens rea

Three objections

Consequences, or potential consequences, matter and it is here that physical movement gets its priority

The role of failure in mere attempts

5.2 Actus reus and mens rea: when is criminal blame warranted?

Liability based on an equivalence between complete offences and attempts

6 Impossibility and extraordinariness in criminal attempts

6.1 Ex post analysis in criminal attempts: practice and scholarship

Various kinds of `impossible attempts´

6.2 Blameworthiness for extraordinary attempts

Harmfulness as a rationale for distinguishing extraordinary attempters

Harmfulness deriving from what could have happened?

Harmfulness deriving from proximity of the attempt to the end sought?

Harmfulness deriving from attempters

6.3 Legal impossibility

7 Criminal attempts and moral luck

7.1 Equivalence theory

What is right about equivalence theory

What may be wrong with equivalence theory

Illicit reasoning from lack of control over outcomes to a dominant place for luck

We do 'control' outcomes

7.2 An alternative basis for the `equal blame´ thesis

7.3 Non-equivalence theory

Argument from risk

Argument from communicative response

7.4 Argument from punishment

8 Reckless attempts?

8.1 Recklessness as a kind of intentional action

Recklessness as a moral term

8.2 If an offence can be committed recklessly, should it also be possible to attempt the offence through recklessness?

(Apparent) attempts that are not attempts to bring about the end set

8.3 Should there be an inchoate form of recklessness?

Attempts and inchoate recklessness compared

Inchoate recklessness and 'complete' recklessness compared

9 Inchoate theft and inchoate rape

9.1 The problems that arise in identifying the objects of attempts

9.2 Attempted theft and appropriation

9.3 Rape and attempting circumstances

9.4 What could the inchoate offences look like?

Bibliography

Index