| Summary: | This paper proposes a causal-dispositional account of rule-following as it occurs in reasoning and intentional agency. It defends this view against Kripke's (Wittgenstein on rules and private language, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, ) objection to dispositional accounts of rule-following, and it proposes a solution to the problem of deviant causal chains. In the first part, I will outline the causal-dispositional approach. In the second part, I will follow Martin and Heil's (Philos Perspect 12:283-312, ) realist response to Kripke's challenge. I will propose an account that distinguishes between two kinds of rule-conformity and two kinds of rule-following, and I will defend the realist approach against two challenges that have recently been raised by Handfield and Bird (Philos Stud 140:285-298, ). In the third part, I will turn to the problem of deviant causal chains, and I will propose a new solution that is partly based on the realist account of rule-following.
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