problems

1. what we are able to do

We have considered what it means to claim that an agent can do something other than what they do. David Lewis argues that ability attributions are context-sensitive: whether an agent can do something depends on which facts are being held fixed in a given context.

A

Consider the cases described below and explain what the contextualist account of ability predicts in each case. For each case, identity the relevant context and specify which facts are supposed to be fixed. Please justify your answer.

1. Maria is an experienced pianist. She is performing a concert and plays a particular passage flawlessly. It is now true that she played that passage exactly as she did. Could she have played it differently?

2. John is a kleptomaniac whose condition is so severe that, whenever he enters a store, a compulsion takes over and steals a watch. Could he have refrained from stealing?

3. Sarah is a neuroscientist’s subject in a Frankfurt-style case. Unknown to her, a device has been implanted in her brain that would cause her to raise her hand if she showed any sign of deciding not to. She raises her hand entirely on her own. Could she have done otherwise?

4. In a deterministic world, Anna deliberates carefully between two offers of employment and chooses one. The state of the world one billion years ago, together with the laws of nature, entailed that she would make exactly this choice. Could she have chosen the other position?

2. the transfer of powerlessness

The Consequence Argument claims that if determinism is true, no one ever has control over anything they do. The initial formulation of the argument by Peter van Inwagen deploys two rules of inference governing the operator \(N\), where \(N \varphi\) is read as: \(\varphi\), and no one has, or has ever had any choice over \(\varphi\). A later formulation deployed the Necessary Conditional Rule.

A

Assess the following inferences and say whether they are valid according to the \(\alpha\)-Rule and the \(\beta\)-Rule, the Necessary Conditional Rule, or none of the above. For each inference you find invalid, explain why.

1. It is a necessary truth that if the laws of nature and the state of the world in the Jurassic period obtained, then the dinosaurs went eventually extinct. The laws of nature remained beyond control. The state of the world in the Jurassic period remained beyond control. Therefore, the extinction of the dinosaurs remained beyond control as well.

2. It is beyond control that a fair coin will not land heads on this toss. It is beyond control that the coin will not land tails on this toss. Therefore, it is beyond control that the coin will land neither heads nor tails on this toss.

3. It is beyond control whether it will rain tomorrow. It is beyond control whether I will carry an umbrella tomorrow, since my carrying an umbrella is determined by whether it rains. Therefore, it is beyond control whether I stay dry tomorrow.

4. It is a necessary truth that if I do not set time aside for writing, and I will write a book over the summer, then I will write a book over the summer. It is not beyond control that I will write a book over the summer. Therefore it is not beyond control that if I do not set time aside for writing, I will write a book over the summer.

B

Lewis argues that his reformulation of the Consequence Argument equivocates between a strong and a weak interpretation of ‘could have been rendered false’, and that compatibilism requires only the weak interpretation. Consider the following incompatibilist responses to Lewis and assess each one:

1. The only genuine interpretation of ability is the strong one: the ability to produce a different outcome in this world given this history and the actual laws of nature. What would Lewis reply?

2. Lewis argues that in the nearby worlds in which the agent does something else from what they did, the laws of nature are marginally different. But that is a world, the incompatibilist argues, in which a local violation of the laws of this world, a miracle, in the past produces a different outcome. This, they suggest, is not the actual world, and the fact that the agent can do something else in that world is irrelevant to their freedom in this one.

3. Both the weak and strong interpretation of ability are perfectly coherent, and van Inwagen and Lewis are simply talking past each other since they each focus on a different sense of ability. So, the debate over free will is simply a verbal dispute.

3. responsibility without alternatives

Harry Franfurt argues that the Principle of Alternative Possibilities is false:

Principle of Alternative Possibilities. A person is morally responsible for what they have done only if they could have done otherwise.

A

Consider the Frankfurt-style cases below and assess the extent to which they succeed as refutations of PAP. For each case, identify whether the agent could have done otherwise, whether they are morally responsible, and whether the case therefore constitutes a counterexample to PAP. If the case fails to refute PAP, explain why.

1. Black wants Jones to vote for candidate A. Black has implanted a device that monitors Jones’s deliberation and will cause Jones to vote for A if it finds a sign he may decide otherwise. Jones decides entirely on his own to vote for A and he subsequently does. The device never activates.

   • Could Jones have done otherwise?

   • Is Jones responsible for his vote for A?

   • Does the case refute PAP?

2. Same setup as above, but now the device has 5% chance to malfunction in which case it would not activate even if Jones had shown signs of deciding otherwise. Does this change your earlier verdict?

   • Could Jones have done otherwise?

   • Is Jones responsible for his vote for A?

   • Does the case refute PAP?

3. Nora is a recovering alcoholic attending a party. Unknown to her, her host has resolved to slip alcohol into her water if he finds a sign she may resist a drink. As it happens, Nora decides entirely on her own to have a drink and does not resist. The host does nothing.

   • Could Nora have done otherwise?

   • Is Nora responsible for the lapse of recovery?

   • Does the case refute PAP?

4. Consider the flicker of freedom response. In the original scenario, Jones must have produced some prior neural sign that triggered the device’s dormancy, and that prior sign is itself something he could have avoided producing. Does this response successfully defend PAP? How might Frankfurt reply?

B

Frankfurt argues that what grounds moral responsibility is not the presence of alternative possibilities but whether the action flows from the agent’s own will by which he means a first-order desire that they endorse at the second-order level.

Consider the following cases and assess what Frankfurt’s hierarchical account predicts. Do you find the predictions plausible?

1. An unwilling addict takes heroin. She has a first-order desire for the drug but a second-order desire to be rid of that desire. She takes the drug because the addiction overwhelms her. Is she morally responsible?

2. A willing addict takes heroin. He has a first-order desire for the drug and no second-order desire to be rid of it. Instead, he identifies with his desire and endorses it. He takes the drug freely and with no external compulsion. Is he morally responsible?

3. A person raised in an abusive household has developed a first-order desire for violence and, through a lifetime of conditioning, has come to endorse that desire at the second-order level. That is, they identify with it and want to be the type of person who has it. They act violently. Is this person morally responsible?

4. In a deterministic world, an agent’s second-order desires, which include their reflective endorsements and their sense of who they are, are themselves completely determined by the past and the laws of nature. Does the Consequence Argument therefore apply not just to the agent’s actions but to the agent’s will itself? If so, does Frankfurt’s account escape the incompatibilist challenge or merely relocate it?