 However we explain their normativity, normative reasons should be capable of motivating agents to act—though of course they may often fail to do so. Therefore, any account of normative reasons must offer a plausible explanation of the relationship between the normativity of reasons and the capacity that reasons have to motivate agents to act. An account must explain how thinking that there is a reason for me to do something can motivate me to act, and to act for that reason. Desire-based accounts of reasons might seem to have the edge here. If the reasons that apply to me depend on my antecedent motivations (desires, plans), then it is plausible that I shall be motivated to do what I believe will contribute to the satisfaction or furthering of those motivations. But desire-based accounts fare less well in accommodating another central claim about normative reasons. For it seems equally plausible that there are reasons (for instance, moral reasons) that apply to agents regardless of their motivations. Arguably, we all have reason to do what morality dictates, whether or not we are (or would be, if we reasoned consistently from our current motivations), motivated by those reasons. (For a detailed discussion of these issues, see the entry on  reasons for action: internal vs. external.)