Moral Responsibility
The purpose of this post is to encourage some sort of discussion about moral responsibility and free will, two topics that interest me quite a bit. I argue that people cannot be held accountable morally - at least not reliably. I will begin with some definitions and an introduction to some of the most prominent views on free will and moral responsibility.
Compatibilism: a solution to the problem between free will and determinism; it is the thesis that free will is compatible with determinism.
Incompatibilism: the doctrine that free will and determinism are incompatible.
Determinism: the doctrine that all events, including human action, are ultimately determined by causes external to the will. Some philosophers have taken determinism to imply that individual human beings have no free will and cannot be held morally responsible for their actions.
Free will: the ability to choose between different courses of action unaffected by causes external to the will, or, according to Hobbes, the ability to act without external impediments to the will.
I’ll begin with the typical incompatibilist argument regarding free will:
1. A person acts of her own free will only if she is its ultimate source.
2. If determinism is true, no one is the ultimate source of her actions.
3.Therefore, if determinism is true, no one acts of her own free will.
This argument has heavy implications for moral responsibility: if determinism is true, it is difficult to see how people can be held morally responsible for their decisions; the conditions necessary for anyone’s decisions have already occurred long before said decisions happened; our brains are bound by the laws of cause and effect like any other observable physical process.
A compatibilist reply to the incompatibilist argument might be that all that is required to hold one responsible for one’s actions is the ability to act freely in accordance with one’s will. It remains that even if causal determinism is true and one is not the ultimate source of one’s actions, one is still acting in accordance with their will much of the time, a fact that is compatible with causal determinism. Furthermore, Hobbes asserts that freedom is merely the ability to do what one will in the absence of external impediments. With this new understanding of what it means to act freely it appears that perhaps people can be held morally responsible for their actions.
The compatibilist argument put formally for an instance in which one acts in accordance with an unimpeded will:
1. An agent, x, can be held responsible for an action, a, iff said agent acts in accordance with an unimpeded will.
2. X commits act a in accordance with an unimpeded will.
3. X can be held responsible for act a.
While this might allow for a certain form of moral responsibility, it doesn’t address the fundamental argument raised by the incompatibilist argument - one is still not the ultimate source of one’s actions. That being said, one might argue that it doesn’t need to; it redefines what it means for an act to be free and then establishes a new model for moral responsibility compatible with determinism - not to mention the burden of proof is on the incompatibilist to demonstrate that causal determinism is true to negate said argument. I would argue, however, that the previous argument is not sufficient for establishing moral responsibility for any acts because of the principle of alternate possibilities (PAP), which is as follows:
1. An agent is only responsible for an act if said agent could have done otherwise.
2. An agent could have done otherwise only if causal determinism is false.
3. Therefore, an agent is responsible for an action only if causal determinism is false.
Implicit in (2) of this argument is the assumption that no one has power over the facts of the future if determinism is true. This seems to me to be a reasonable claim, but if someone can offer a compelling counterargument I would be receptive.
When the PAP is applied to the compatibilist argument for free will one is left with the mere assertion that people act in accordance with their wills (which is itself compatible with determinism); how can one act freely if they must be able to have chosen otherwise to be held morally responsible for an act, even if they acted free of external impediments? Thus, the burden of proof is shifted to the compatibilist to prove determinism wrong in order to hold people morally responsible for acts. This leads to a gray zone in which it is uncertain if people can be held culpable, and it seems to me that until it is proven that determinism is false we should withhold judgement on whether or not people can be held morally responsible for their actions.
I am aware that there are more contemporary forms of compatibilism but I thought this would be a good place to start a discussion.
Compatibilism: a solution to the problem between free will and determinism; it is the thesis that free will is compatible with determinism.
Incompatibilism: the doctrine that free will and determinism are incompatible.
Determinism: the doctrine that all events, including human action, are ultimately determined by causes external to the will. Some philosophers have taken determinism to imply that individual human beings have no free will and cannot be held morally responsible for their actions.
Free will: the ability to choose between different courses of action unaffected by causes external to the will, or, according to Hobbes, the ability to act without external impediments to the will.
I’ll begin with the typical incompatibilist argument regarding free will:
1. A person acts of her own free will only if she is its ultimate source.
2. If determinism is true, no one is the ultimate source of her actions.
3.Therefore, if determinism is true, no one acts of her own free will.
This argument has heavy implications for moral responsibility: if determinism is true, it is difficult to see how people can be held morally responsible for their decisions; the conditions necessary for anyone’s decisions have already occurred long before said decisions happened; our brains are bound by the laws of cause and effect like any other observable physical process.
A compatibilist reply to the incompatibilist argument might be that all that is required to hold one responsible for one’s actions is the ability to act freely in accordance with one’s will. It remains that even if causal determinism is true and one is not the ultimate source of one’s actions, one is still acting in accordance with their will much of the time, a fact that is compatible with causal determinism. Furthermore, Hobbes asserts that freedom is merely the ability to do what one will in the absence of external impediments. With this new understanding of what it means to act freely it appears that perhaps people can be held morally responsible for their actions.
The compatibilist argument put formally for an instance in which one acts in accordance with an unimpeded will:
1. An agent, x, can be held responsible for an action, a, iff said agent acts in accordance with an unimpeded will.
2. X commits act a in accordance with an unimpeded will.
3. X can be held responsible for act a.
While this might allow for a certain form of moral responsibility, it doesn’t address the fundamental argument raised by the incompatibilist argument - one is still not the ultimate source of one’s actions. That being said, one might argue that it doesn’t need to; it redefines what it means for an act to be free and then establishes a new model for moral responsibility compatible with determinism - not to mention the burden of proof is on the incompatibilist to demonstrate that causal determinism is true to negate said argument. I would argue, however, that the previous argument is not sufficient for establishing moral responsibility for any acts because of the principle of alternate possibilities (PAP), which is as follows:
1. An agent is only responsible for an act if said agent could have done otherwise.
2. An agent could have done otherwise only if causal determinism is false.
3. Therefore, an agent is responsible for an action only if causal determinism is false.
Implicit in (2) of this argument is the assumption that no one has power over the facts of the future if determinism is true. This seems to me to be a reasonable claim, but if someone can offer a compelling counterargument I would be receptive.
When the PAP is applied to the compatibilist argument for free will one is left with the mere assertion that people act in accordance with their wills (which is itself compatible with determinism); how can one act freely if they must be able to have chosen otherwise to be held morally responsible for an act, even if they acted free of external impediments? Thus, the burden of proof is shifted to the compatibilist to prove determinism wrong in order to hold people morally responsible for acts. This leads to a gray zone in which it is uncertain if people can be held culpable, and it seems to me that until it is proven that determinism is false we should withhold judgement on whether or not people can be held morally responsible for their actions.
I am aware that there are more contemporary forms of compatibilism but I thought this would be a good place to start a discussion.
Comments (122)
The concept 'could have done otherwise' means something different depending on whether one has a foundation of indeterminism or not, and if not whether compatibilist or not.
Basically, if a compatibilist, 'could have done otherwise', just means 'other people in roughly the same circumstances have chosen differently'.
To argue that 'could have done otherwise' literally means to change the course of events from those which were determined begs the question. Indeterminism must be assumed before such a notion can be coherently spoken of.
I don't see how this is the case. If one could have acted in a different way, altering the present, then this means that said person could have chosen between a number of possible alternatives, i.e. free will exists. However, if one assumes that no one has power over the facts of the future, then determinism must be proved false because if it is true it negates any sort of indeterministic account of moral responsibility. No where is indeterminism assumed except insofar as it is implied that if determinism were false and people could choose from different alternatives free will would exist and people could be held morally responsible.
I think the idea of free will is internally coherent, but it doesn't exist.
I've been around the forum for a while, and I generally avoid free will discussions. By "generally" I mean "always." A new one shows up every couple of weeks. They're usually poorly laid out and sloppily argued. I wanted to post this to acknowledge that you've done a very good job setting up this discussion. You've given definitions and stated your assumptions clearly. You've laid out the arguments clearly and even-handedly. You've defined the question narrowly in a way that should be easy to keep on track. I wish all of the discussions started on the forum could be this good. It was a pleasure to read your opening post.
I especially like that you acknowledged the distinction between the free will/determinism argument and the question of whether or not there is moral responsibility. People usually don't address the distinction and just assume without stating it that determinism means no moral responsibility.
All that being said, I don't have much to offer to the discussion. It's your own fault. You've laid out your arguments so clearly and defined the question so well, I can see my way of seeing things does not fit in. That's a real accomplishment. Thank you.
Thank you!
By determinism I mean that if one had knowledge of every state of the universe one could predict the actions of any being in it. Also, yes, on a more human level, the knowledge that some specific event will happen ahead of time.
Quoting tim wood
Quoting tim wood
If you had free will it would be undetermined what you would do it seems to me; you have the capacity to choose between multiple alternative actions unconstrained. You might say god could know all of the actions available to you, but he wouldn't know which one you would choose, otherwise your decisions would be constrained and/or predetermined; the only way god could predict every action of every being is if the universe is deterministic itself; the existence of the knowledge of the actions of every being would imply this. And while the knowledge might not be causative it does mean your actions would be predetermined.
Or maybe god isn't omniscient and is a bungler.
I don't see what the issue is with this assertion. If the universe is deterministic everything is predetermined. What you seem to be getting at is that the laws of physics could be determined and static, but people could generate new outcomes via their free choices. Is that what you are saying?
Unless I'm mistaken we can model things like projectile motion or the elliptical orbit of moons with an accuracy that is sufficient to be in agreement with other models such that they are also accurate within certain (perhaps arbitrary) parameters. It seems to me that this is good enough to predict most of the events relevant to humans. Why wouldn't some ultimate knower be able to do things like that even better and predict the actions of people?
I don't think I need to prove that you cannot wiggle your finger freely, but rather you need to show why the laws of physics do not obtain wrt the choices made by humans.
Alright, to be honest I'm very confused by your line of argumentation. Are you saying that no ultimate knower is possible, and thus determinism is false? I still don't see why you brought up god.
If you could clearly lay out your argument and address the OP directly I would be able to clarify what my own argument is; I'm not sure what I'm arguing against.
I mean you didn't even quote the OP in your first post.
But the point I made is that determinism must be proven false to justify moral accountability. I don't contend that it is true in the OP; my point is that judgement should be withheld until we find out if it is indeed false. No ultimate knower is even required, and your examples in favor of an ultimate knower not knowing anything specific assume the existence of free will, as far as I can tell.
How could an ultimate knower not know the outcome of someone's decisions unless free will exists? Even if they change their mind all of that would be known to the ultimate knower, unless they have free will. Your contention that the ultimate knower wouldn't know the outcomes of people's decisions rests on the assumption that they have free will, so to say that the ultimate knower wouldn't have knowledge because people have free will assumes the lack of existence of an ultimate knower. You are assuming that the ultimate knower does not exist by assuming that people have free will. I am contending that an ultimate knower, if people don't have free will, would know every action of every being.
Judgement is about exerting power, not about truth.
Maybe for an authoritarian regime that murders people for speaking their minds.
I still don't understand what your argument is; you've barely even addressed the OP directly.
No, it's how ordinary people are: they love to judge others, in matters big and small. It's how they exert power.
Then I suppose most people live a pretty sad existence. Maybe our government should just exert its power and put them out of their misery.
Not at all. They get pleasure when judging others. This pleasure, the gratification of moral indignation is a motivation for judging others. To withold judgment would be to deny oneself this pleasure.
If you are referring to my own indignation I think it was justified. Seriously, though? Judgement is about power, not truth? What kind of shitty philosophy is that? Did you just read 1984 for the first time?
The one that pretty much everyone I know lives by. And they are doing well!
Actually it totally is where I am. I want moral responsibility to be a tangible thing. That would make me happy, but I try not to just work backwards to justify the assumptions and conclusions that make me happy. .
Sorry for being vulgar, but you are kind of derailing this thread. If you want to discuss moral indignation as a source of pleasure please make a different thread about that.
I am a believer in free will and moral responsibility. I am not confident about whether compatibilism or incompatibilism is the correct view about the matter. But in a way, I do not think it matters, apart from being of intellectual interest. For surely it is more self-evident to reason that we have free will and are morally responsible than that, say, incompatibilism is true? And thus if one were to find evidence that determinism is true, it would be more reasonable upon this discovery to conclude that incompatibilism is false than it would to conclude that we lack free will.
So it seems to me to be rational to believe we have free will and are morally responsible even if we are not sure whether it is, or is not, compatible with determinism.
But anyway, to address your argument above: I think premise 2 is false. Premise 2 would only be true if, in addition to determinism being true, everyone comes into being. For then that person's coming into being would be determined by prior events and circumstances outside of herself. And thus there is no pure origination - she is not any action's ultimate source, as the chain of cause and effect traces in its entirety to causes outside of herself.
But imagine that we have not come into being but exist with aseity. We know already that some things that exist must have this status, else we will find ourselves having to posit an infinity of prior causes. So, that some things exist with aseity is certain. There is no incoherence, then, in supposing that we ourselves might have that status.
If we exist with aseity, then even if determinism turns out to be true, we would still be ultimate sources of all we do, for the causal chain would never trace in its entirety to external causes.
re PAP: it's surely open to both compatibilist and incompatibilist readings. So, although it is highly plausible that free will does involve having alternative possibilities, this leaves open whether the alternatives need to be unconditional or conditional. So I do not think one can get to the incompatibilist conclusion in a non-question begging way by means of PAP.
Supposing that we might have the status of aseity because aseity is possible for some things is different from demonstrating that people do not come into existence, and that they thus are the originators for everything they do. Furthermore, even if people did exist with aseity, external factors would still affect their decisions if determinism is true; perhaps you are the source of your actions insofar as the causes of them cannot be traced to the beginning of the universe, but your will is still subject to the laws of cause and effect. Thus, if determinism is true, you are not the ultimate source of your own actions, even if we ascribe aseity to ourselves.
Quoting Bartricks
It isn't plausible; it is how free will is defined according to an indeterminist view. And I say later in the OP that I am referring to free will in the indeterminist sense with PAP.
Yes, but here is the demonstration:
1. If we have free will, we exist with aseity
2. We have free will
3. Therefore we exist with aseity
My case for 1 is this:
1. Unless we exist with aseity everything we do will trace to external causes (a premise I take it you are sympathetic to)
2.If everything we do traces to external causes, we do not have free will
3. Therefore, if we have free will, we exist with aseity
Quoting ToothyMaw
Yes, but they will still be the originators of their decisions. Imagine that Tim says something to me that makes me want to hit him, and I hit him. Am I responsible? Of course. Now, I had no control over Tim. So the event of Tim saying whatever he said is not one that I had control over. Nevertheless, I am responsible because 'I' reacted to what he said.
If you hold that to be free and morally responsible you require not to be caused to make your decisions by anything external, then your view is patently implausible.
What is plausible is the claim that if your decisions are 'wholly' the product of external causes, then one is not responsible.
But if we exist with aseity then we are not wholly the product of external causes, because nothing caused us to be as we are.
Quoting ToothyMaw
That's question begging. There is a vast literature on how best to understand 'could have done otherwise'. There are conditional and unconditional interpretations. The conditional interpretation is compatible with determinism, the unconditional is not. If you just stipulate that you are assuming the truth of the unconditional reading, then you are just stipulating that compatibilism is false, which is question begging.
If you’re basing your moral actions on the belief that ‘you cannot do otherwise’ you are immoral. People all too often use this as an excuse to do what they want to do. It is a pitiful thing to see and something that is meant with contempt by me - aggressive contempt.
Remember if a stream of insults comes your way ‘it was just preordained’. I have ‘no responsibility’ so why should I be berated for insulting someone who actively believes I could’ve said nothing other than what I said?
Combining such a fatalistic view merely allows ANYONE to insult you in any way they can imagine - because you’ve just given them the right to do so.
Complaints against violence and insults are void if they come from the mouth of those who believe everyone lacks moral responsibility.
That's an odd way of defining determinism: it is more like a conclusion or an intermediate result. Determinism in this context is usually assumed to be causal determinism, which means that the state of the world at any given time, together with causal laws, fixes everything that happens at all other times, before or after. Conjoined with the belief that the past is fixed, this implies that the future is fixed by the past.
This should not be confused with epiphenomenalism, which says that if A fully accounts for B, then nothing else accounts for B. Here "accounts for" can mean being a prior cause, but it can also stand for any other type of explanation. For example, an epiphenomenalist might say that brain activity fully accounts for the decisions that we make. This is not a causal account, in the strict sense, because decisions on this account do not occur as a subsequent result of brain activity - they are brain activity. Epiphenomenalism is equally compatible with causal determinism and indeterminism. The epiphenomenalist in the above example would say that human action is not determined by human will (since it is already determined by brain activity), but she may allow that brain activity could be indeterministic.
It may seem I am trying to provoke ... but I lack free will according to you don’t I? Ergo I’m not ‘responsible’ for my words.
This is the KEY point here. If you insist we don’t have any ‘responsibility’ then you can literally have no complaints about what anyone says OR accuse anyone of derailing your thread - at least you cannot and expect anyone here to take you seriously given that you believe we cannot do otherwise.
We act as if we have free will. Whether we do or don’t is irrelevant in terms of ‘responsibility’. We’re merely stuck with temporal perspective as that is what/how ‘existence’ is ‘existence’ for us. Our degree of ‘responsibility’ is what we really can get into rather than suggesting it doesn’t exist.
It seems to be a circular argument - attempting to prove that we do not come into existence by assuming we have free will, only to claim that because we don't come into existence we have free will.
Quoting Bartricks
Well, it seems to me that even if someone exists with aseity, and you have not proven that people do indeed exist with aseity without it being contingent on people having free will (you just assumed free will exists), they still have no power over the facts of the future, which includes the external factors that affect their wills. The argument for no one having power over the facts of the future is as follows (taken from the SEP):
1. No one has power over the facts of the past and the laws of nature.
2. No one has power over the fact that the facts of the past and the laws of nature entail every fact of the future (i.e., determinism is true).
3. Therefore, no one has power over the facts of the future.
If you have an issue with me assuming the truth of causal determinism then allow me to quote you:
Quoting Bartricks
It follows that if no one has power over the facts of the future, which includes one's will, no one has control over any of the factors that affect their decisions and they do not act freely - at least according to how I have defined determinism.
It isn't question begging if the only way people can be held morally responsible is nested in an indeterministic view of free will, which many assert is the case. But I see what you mean.
To this I would say: if one assumes that no one has power over the facts of the future if determinism is true, then determinism needs to be proven false because if it is true it negates even many compatibilist accounts of moral responsibility; no one could have acted differently in any way, and a number of compatibilists do indeed assume that moral responsibility requires different possibilities. And it seems to me even if some compatibilist doesn't, they need to give an account of how people have the power to choose not to bring about things they could have brought about - even if determinism is true. Unless this can be done, the PAP assumes nothing other than that compatibilism is unsound if determinism isn't false.
I don't see that it is circular. For I am not assuming that we exist with aseity, but concluding that we do.
The first premise says this:
1. If we have free will, we exist with aseity.
What's the basis for that claim? Well, this argument:
A) If we have come into existence, then we have been caused to come into existence by events external to ourselves
B) If we have been caused by external events, then we are not morally responsible for our initial character
C) Therefore, if we have come into existence, we are not morally responsible for our initial character
D) we are not morally responsible for our environment or for the laws of nature
E) if everything we do is a product of matters for which we are not morally responsible, then we are not morally responsible for anything we do
F) If we have come into existence, then everything we do is a product of initial character, environment and laws of nature, none of which we are in any way morally responsible for
G)Therefore, if we have come into existence, we are not morally responsible for anything we do
H) If we have free will, we are morally responsible for some of what we do
I) Therefore, if we have come into existence, we do not have free will.
That's not a circular argument. No premise asserts that we exist with aseity. Yet it establishes the truth of this premise:
1. If we have free will, we exist with aseity.
As for this premise:
2. We have free will
Well, that is self-evident to our reason. That doesn't mean it is certainly true, but it means the burden of proof is squarely on the one who denies premise 2. So, premise 1 and premise 2 are prima facie justified. And together they entail that we exist with aseity. An argument that entails its conclusion is not thereby circular.
That argument is unsound. Premise 1 is false. If we exist with aseity then we did have power over facts of the past, for there was never a time when we did not exist.
Those who think determinism is incompatible with free will typically appeal to a more basic principle, namely that if you are in no way morally responsible for A, and in no way morally responsible for B, and A and B are wholly causally responsible for C, then you are in no way morally responsible for C. That is, one's non-responsibility for A and B transfers to C.
I take it you agree with this, for you appealed to the fact that we are not the ultimate sources of our actions if determinism is true. It is by being an ultimate source - that is, the first link in a causal chain - that one can be morally responsible (and thus have free will of the kind moral responsiblity presupposes). The combination of determinism and the assumption that we have come into existence, entails that the above principle is violated and thus we do not have free will.
However, this does not establish the incompatibility of free will and determinism for the simple fact is you have to assume that we have come into being to establish the incompatibility.
Of course, most will grant you that assumption. But nevertheless, it is false, as the previous argument I made shows.
That's question begging again: even if determinism is true, there's a perfectly intelligible sense in which we could have done otherwise than we did. For, as I say, there are conditional and unconditional interpretations of 'could have done otherwise'. It is the unconditional interpretations that require the kind of alternate possibilities that indeterminism provides.
Of course, perhaps when it comes to moral responsibility/free will it is the unconditional reading of 'could have done otherwise' that is the more plausible one, but nevertheless one would have to argue for this and not simply assume it.
I am myself agnostic on the matter as it seems to me that the more fundamental requirement for free will is some kind of ultimate sourcehood: the causal chains that produce our actions need to terminate with us, or at least have a terminus that includes us (they do not need to be wholly free from external causes, it is just that 'we' need to be in the causal mix from the get-go). And it seems to me that if this condition is not met, then indeterministic alternative possibilities are not going magically to make us morally responsible for what we do. If my initial self is the product of external causes, then I am surely not morally responsible for my initial self. And it doesn't matter from there on in whether the initial self develops thanks to deterministic influences or indeterministic influences, the resulting self will not become a self for which I am morally responsible either way.
Needless to say, much contemporary debate over free will is beside the point. It doesn't really matter whether determinism or indeterminism is true; what matters is whether we exist with aseity or not.
So what? You can't establish that a proposition is true by showing that its denier is a hypocrite.
I have an issue with this; one could not be self-originated yet have free will. They just aren't responsible for their coming into existence. They can still be the ultimate source of their own actions without aseity:
You make these claims:
Quoting Bartricks
Quoting Bartricks
Initial character might constrain one's choices insofar as it limits what choices are available to one, but one could still be free to choose between all of the alternatives available to them in an unconditional sense. And a lack of aseity only means that one is not responsible for their initial character, nothing else.
Quoting Bartricks
Whether or not one comes into existence (or lacks aseity) has nothing to do with the laws of nature or the environment, but merely initial character, something you do indeed acknowledge here:
Quoting Bartricks
It then follows from what I have written above that having free will does not mean one must exist with aseity. Thus, premise (1) is unsupported.
Quoting Bartricks
Maybe you did have power over the facts of the past, but you do not have power over the facts of the past in the present, which is what that means.
Say you did - per impossible - create yourself. Well, now you are responsible for your own existence (as even you would surely admit). Why, though? Well, surely the only answer we can give to this question is that if you created yourself then nothing external to you would be responsible for your existence. Yet this is also true if you exist with aseity.
So, ultimate sourcehood condition on moral responsibility is a negative one: you need 'not' to have been created by external events or objects. It is not a positive requirement that you have created yourself.
And you must accept this too, if you are an incompatibilist. For at best indeterministic alternative possibilities will only secure a negative condition, not a positive one. For it is patently absurd to maintain that if indeterminism is true we create ourselves, as self-creation is manifestly impossible regardless of whether determinism or indeterminism is true.
Quoting ToothyMaw
I don't see how. So, let's assume that you have been brought into being. Well, you're not morally responsible for your initial character then. Everything you subsequently do is going to be a causal product of that character - for which you are in no way morally responsible - interacting with an environment for which you are in no way morally responsible. How on earth can you be morally responsible for anything you do under those circumstances? Indeterminism is no help at all, for how does indeterminism magically make you morally responsible for what you decide to do? The decision is still caused, yes? Indeterministic causation is still causation. And what caused it? Well, your background character - for which you're not morally responsble - and your environment - for which you are not morally responsible.
Let's say I desire a pie. And I also desire not to eat a pie. So, I am subject to competing desires. And let's now stipulate that it is indeterministic which desire will produce my decision: that is, it is indeterministic whether I decide to eat a pie or not. Well, how does that make me morally responsible for the decision? The desire to eat a pie was not a desire for which I was morally responsible - for it was caused by external factors. Nor was the desire not to eat a pie, for the same reason. How does the fact it was indeterministic which one would win magically mean I am now morally responsible for it? It's not like the indeterministic nature of the whole process was something for which I was morally responsible. So, unless you introduce a new element - a morally responsible me, standing in the wings as it were, who reaches in and makes teh decision (and then I want to know how that new me got to be morally responsible, of course), it looks like we have pure moral responsiblity alchemy here.
I do not follow you. The argument I gave in support of premise 1 was logically valid, so you must deny a premise. Which one do you deny?
No, because if I did have power over a past event, then I can be in principle morally responsible for that event. And thus the fact that at present I lack control over it is irrelevant, given that I am nevertheless morally responsible for that past event. I mean, it is no argument against my current moral responsibility to point out that how I am at present is a product of past decisions I made 'for which I am morally responsible'.
Again, if I have always existed, then premise 1 of that argument is false.
Those who run such arguments are simply ignoring the possibility that we exist with aseity, perhaps because so few take the possibility seriously.
Yet it is quite clear to the reason of virtually everyone who reflects on this matter that if we are wholly the product of external causes then we are not morally responsible. I mean, this is precisely why so many quickly conclude that determinism undermines free will. Yet as I have shown above, if one simply follows reason diligently on this point one will arrive at the conclusion that we exist with aseity. That is an unusual conclusion, to be sure. But it is not incoherent and it is what the evidence implies.
But anyway, there is a more general point to be made against scepticism about free will and the moral responsibility it grounds.
Do you agree that it is irrational to reject a stronger premise on the basis of a weaker one?
I assume so.
Which is more self-evident to reason: that we are morally responsible for what we do, or that moral responsibility requires X? (and make X anything you like - that is 'indeterminism' or 'alternative possibilities' or whatever).
Surely it is more self-evident that we are morally responsible? I mean, we have empirical evidence for this in the fact that there is - and has always been - considerable disagreement among philosophers over what X is, yet despite this the bulk of philosophers agree that we are morally responsible (with notable exceptions, of course).
Manifestly then, it is more powerfully self-evident among those who think most clearly about these matters - professional philosophers - that we are morally responsible, than that moral responsibility requires X, whatever X may be.
Given this, it is irrational to conclude that we lack moral responsibility on the grounds that we do not have X, isn't it?
So, someone who argues that we lack moral responsibility because determinism is true, is guilty of this mistake: for whether moral responsibility really does require determinism or not is clearly less self-evident than the fact we are morally responsible.
I think, then, that it really is irrational - demonstrably so - to conclude that we lack moral responsibility. It is always going to be more rational, if we discover that determinism is true, to conclude that compatibilism is true, than to conclude that we aren't free and responsible.
I apply this to my own view too, of course. If we found out that we do not exist with aseity - and, like I say, to my knowledge there is no such evidence, only evidence that our sensible bodies do not exist with aseity - it would be more reasonable for me to accept that aseity is not, after all, required for moral responsibility than to conclude that we are not morally responsible.
It is a null question. No one acts as if they don’t have free will. The rest is simply a matter of physics NOT philosophical musings.
Moral responsibility presupposes free will. They're two sides of the same coin such that they're pretty much used interchangeably in the contemporary debate (a debate you're unfamiliar with, yes?).
It's not a question in physics. Christ! And you can't possibly know what implications a physical theory has for the question of free will until or unless you've clarified just what having free will involves. Which is why, you know, it isn't discussed in physics.
And once again, even if it is true that no one acts as if they do not have free will (which is itself highly questionable and would require clarifying just what having free will involves 'first'), that doesn't tell you anything interesting about whether we have it or not. "I can't help believing X.....therefore X is true" is really stupid reasoning.
Is there anything more we can say on this subject worthy of debate?
I did actually say that it is more useful to question the degree of responsibility we have for our actions NOT to outright deny them (such is pointlessly nihilistic).
I was trying to point out to the OP very clearly something that cannot be denied if you hold to the ‘no free will’ position alongside ideas of ‘moral responsibility’.
You’re enjoying the discussion with the OP so just ignore me. I just cared enough to point out something blatantly obvious in what the OP was stating.
It seems nonsensical to me but I’m sure you’ve put a reasonable degree of thought into this so explain in more depth why the burden lies on that side.
Morally it falls on the ‘compatibilist’ to point out the logical flaw of anyone ‘certain’ of this kind of fatalism. They basically have to take up the slack and show that it is a matter of hedging bets NOT rigorously holding to complete denial.
To be clear, I’m talking of this as you are ... from ‘Moral Responsibility’. From this position the ‘burden’ lies with the ‘deterministic’ view BUT they deny it if they’re utterly convinced of it. They deny ‘Morality’ and their own sense of being. Thankfully no one acts as if they have no responsibility even though many find denying responsibility appealing in certain circumstances. Only then does the ‘responsibility’ lie with those who aren’t stuck on one extreme end of the argument.
It boils down to this. To deny ‘Moral Responsibility’ when you actually have it is to wander through life without taking on any burden and suffering the consequences of such denial under the false belief of ‘I couldn’t have done otherwise’. On the other hand, those who accept responsibility for their actions are able to actively improve their decision making skills and choose a more ‘prosperous’ path in life - if they are wrong and they have NO real choice it makes absolutely no difference (for obvious reasons).
Logically it is ridiculous to assume you have no responsibility. The question is then more or less about the degree of choice we have in our lives and to what degree we can change anything. If our influence on the ‘stream of time’ is minimal or of import is yet another avenue for us to either throw-off the burden of responsibility or to take it on as a meaningful challenge.
One thing is for sure. We have a very distinct sensation of authorship to our actions. Such feelings of authorship have been - in certain conditions - a falsehood. So we can say that there is a certain limit to capacity when it comes to connecting 1:1 intent and action.
Thanks for writing that. It was a good read.
We can determine who is responsible for his actions simply by witnessing who acts. The being who acts is responsible for the action because it is he and no other who performed the act. If he is responsible for his actions, he is also morally responsible for his actions. I don’t think I need to prove determinism false when I could simply witness and point to who is responsible.
But surely there must be a distinction between moral acts and other acts? And if there is a distinction, then you must admit that there is a special quality to moral acts that makes them moral, it seems to me, as moral acts are presumably a subset of non-moral acts.
It appears to me you are packing some sort of soft determinism into this conclusion:
Quoting Bartricks
The conclusion does not follow because you must specify that external factors such as environment and laws of nature, as you do in an earlier premise, also contribute to a lack of moral responsibility. The conclusion should be: "Therefore, if we have come into existence and our decisions are constrained by both environment and the laws of nature, then we are not morally responsible for anything we do".
It then follows that this conclusion must also be altered:
Quoting Bartricks
To: "Therefore, if we have come into existence and our decisions are constrained by environment and the laws of nature, we do not have free will." Furthermore, you cannot simply negate "if we have come into existence" to mean "we exist with aseity" if the conclusion in support of
Quoting Bartricks
must be altered as above; there are two separate phrases modifying the assertion that we lack free will. If the soft determinism cannot be negated then said doctrine contradicts premise (2) that we have free will, which you use to prove that we have aseity.
But the conclusion does follow from those premises. So I am just wondering which premise you are disputing. Here is the argument:
A) If we have come into existence, then we have been caused to come into existence by events external to ourselves
B) If we have been caused by external events, then we are not morally responsible for our initial character
C) Therefore, if we have come into existence, we are not morally responsible for our initial character
That argument above is deductively valid. And presumably you would accept that it is sound (though in case you do not, I will say something about A and B's plausibility below).
D) we are not morally responsible for our environment or for the laws of nature
E) if everything we do is a product of matters for which we are not morally responsible, then we are not morally responsible for anything we do
F) If we have come into existence, then everything we do is a product of initial character, environment and laws of nature, none of which we are in any way morally responsible for
G)Therefore, if we have come into existence, we are not morally responsible for anything we do
This part of the argument is also deductively valid. And it is presumably one of these premises - more specifically, E or F, that you wish to dispute. But I am not yet entirely clear which one.
Let's just go through each one in turn, starting with A. Can you reasonably deny A? I do not think so, for denying A would mean having to maintain that one can create oneself. But that involves a contradiction: to create yourself you would have to exist prior to your own existence. So, A is not open to reasonable doubt.
What about B? Well, if you deny B then I find it hard to conceive of on what basis you think determinism is incompatible with free will. You could not, for instance, say that determinism is incompatible with free will because it deprives us of alternative possibilities of a sort only indeterminism can provide. For clearly denying B would mean you accept that it is possible for someone to be morally responsible for something for which they exercised no control at all, namely their initial character. The compatibilist could simply reply to you that as you're happy enough with people being morally responsible for their initial character despite lacking all control over its acquisition, then you should be happy enough with people being morally responsible for what that character subsequently determines them to do.
So, I don't think you can deny B without making your incompatibilism ad hoc.
C follows as a matter of logic.
What about D? Well, clearly you accept this, as you keep appealing to it (and it is self-evidently true). And indeed, the basis for thinking D is true is really the same basis for thinking that B is true, namely that one was not involved in any way in these matters.
What about E? E says " if everything we do is a product of matters for which we are not morally responsible, then we are not morally responsible for anything we do".
Well, from your comments it seems to me that this is the premise that you wish to deny. For I suppose one could argue that it begs the question against the incompatibilist, as an incompatibilist thinks that if some of what we do is the indeterministic product of matters for which we are in no way morally responsible, then we can - somehow - be morally responsible for that product.
But this is not really question begging as the burden of proof is squarely on the incompatibilist to support that claim. That is, E is not default false, but default true. It is prima facie plausible. By contrast, the claim that somehow the involvement of indeterministic causation could transform us from devoid of moral responsiblity for our decisions to morally responsible for them is prima facie implausible. I provided an argument in support of that: I am (by hypothesis) in no way morally responsible for my desire for a pie. And I am (by hypothesis) in no way morally responsible for my desire not to eat a pie. It is - thanks to laws of nature for which I am also in no way morally responsible - indeterministic which of these desires will cause my decision. Well, how does that make 'me' morally responsible for the decision? That seems like magic. It's not like the decision is any more 'mine' than it would be if it had been determined by whatever desire caused it. And it's not like any more control was exercised over it.
The point can be made another way. Imagine that it was indeterministic that I had the initial character that I did. Well, how would that make me morally responsible for that initial character? How would the fact - if it is a fact - that I genuinely could have had a different character from the one I actually possessed, transform me from not being morally responsible for it to being morally responsible for it? The mind boggles. It is surely about as self-evident as anything that whether or not my initial character was one that was deterministically conferred or indeterministically conferred makes not a tiny bit of difference to my moral responsibility for it.
Well, how would things be any different when it is indeterministic which decisions my initial character causes me to make? Again, it seems clear that this is pure alchemy.
So E is not question begging in any worrying way. For we cannot reject arguments or premises that lead to the negation of our position on the grounds that they beg the question, for that is to have rendered one's own view as the touchstone of credibility, when the correct way to proceed is not to have a view, but simply to see what follows from plausible premises.
To reject E, then, one would need a good independent evidence that indeterministic causation alone can magically make one morally responsible for what it produces. I am sceptical such an argument exists.
What about F? F says "If we have come into existence, then everything we do is a product of initial character, environment and laws of nature, none of which we are in any way morally responsible for"
Well, the previous leg of the argument has established that we are not morally responsible for our initial character. And it is obvious that we are not morally responsible for our environment or the laws of nature. So how can you deny F? Even if you are an incompatibilist, you can't deny F, for you don't think we're morally responsible for indeterminism being true, do you? Whether indeterminism is true or not would be a function of the laws of nature - for which we're not morally responsible. (If you think we are somehow morally responsible for hte laws of nature, why can't a compatibilist say the same?).
So, F doesn't beg the question against the incompatibilist, for no incompatibilist is going to deny it. The incompatibilist doesn't claim that we 'are' morally responsible for any of those elements. Rather they just think that if indeterminism (for which we're not morally responsible) is involved in what the combination of those elements causes, then the results are results for which we can be morally responsible.
As such, then, it seems to me that E is the only premise that you can realistically challenge, but you haven't really challenged it yet as to do that you'd need to make an argument for E's falsity, not simply note that its truth - or apparent truth - is incompatible with incompatibilism.
Quoting Bartricks
To support the premise:
Quoting Bartricks
The "if we have free will, we have aseity" is presumably arrived at by this argument (I'll call it the "aseity argument"):
1. If we have come into existence, we do not have free will.
2. We have free will. (premise (2))
3. Therefore we have not come into existence (we exist with aseity).
This argument only applies if you leave out the constraints to free will you acknowledge in this premise:
Quoting Bartricks
Furthermore, coming into existence only affects initial character you claim here:
Quoting Bartricks
You add the environmental constraints and the constraints due to the laws of nature and then promptly discard them so as to have a premise that can be used as the basis for the aseity argument:
Quoting Bartricks
This should be: "Therefore, if we have come into existence, and we are the products of our environment and the laws of nature, then we are not morally responsible for anything we do."
*see correction
Unless you are making a distinction between "caused by external events" and "come into existence", which could be two separate things, but when applied to the beginning of a life I don't see how.
Correction: the aseity argument conclusion changes because "if we have come into existence we do not have free will" becomes: "Therefore, if we have come into existence, and we are the products of our environment and the laws of nature, then we do not have free will."
The conclusion becomes: "Therefore we have not come into existence and and we are not the products of our environment or the laws of nature."
This contradicts your earlier premises that we are the products of our environments and the laws of nature.
Actually, upon thinking about it, even if you have aseity you are still constrained by the laws of nature - you cannot perform actions that are physically impossible according to the laws of physics. Thus, the conclusion to the aseity argument is not an argument for aseity.
My argument was valid, so you need to dispute a premise. Are you denying that the argument was valid?
The argument was valid and it gives us the conclusion that if I have come into existence, I do not have free will.
As I do have free will, I can conclude that I have not come into existence.
To deny this you would need to deny a premise in the argument.
It seems to me that you are now disputing the truth of D, yes? For you seem to be suggesting that there is another way in which I could be morally responsible without existing with aseity, and that is if I am morally responsible for the environment in which I am caused to exist in, and/or am morally responsible for the laws of nature that prevail in it. But that's simply false unless you think D is false. So you're disputing D, yes? I just want to be clear.
Note, D asserts that I am not morally responsible for my environment or the laws of nature. It is not a conditional: it does not say 'if'. You seem to be reading it as a conditional.
That makes no sense to me. Yes, of course one is subject to the laws of nature, and of course they are not laws for which one is morally responsible. The point, though, is that if I am morally responsible for my initial character, then although I am not morally responsible for the nature of my environment (including the nature of the laws that prevail in it), I am still morally responsible for how I behave, because how I behave is a function of two elements - me and my environment - and one of those elements is an element I am morally responsible for.
Nobody in their right mind thinks that to be morally responsible for an action you need to be morally responsible for 'all' of its causes. After all, imagine John says something that makes me decide to punch him. Am I morally responsible for punching John? Of course. Yet I did not cause John to say what he said - that was completely out of my control. Yet obviously that does not get me off the hook for how I reacted to it.
Similarly then, I am not morally responsible for the wider John that is my environment. But that doesn't prevent me from being morally responsible for how I react to it.
Aseity is needed to stop it from being the case that everything I am and do is a product of external causes. It is needed, in other words, to ensure that one of the ingredients in what I do is an ingredient I am morally responsible for.
I'll make this reply more coherent, as you seemed to have misunderstood my points. I'm saying that you pack "we are the products of our environment and the laws of nature" into a premise when coming into existence really only dictates that we are not responsible for our initial character. The argument you outlined in your third to last post seems to be deductively valid, but it is not the argument you seem to think it is because it leads to the conclusion to the aseity argument including the claim that we are not bound by the laws of nature and our environment. The important one is the "laws of nature" bit because even if we exist with aseity we are bound by the laws of nature. I'm not making this claim to absolutely disprove moral responsibility but rather to show that we don't exist with aseity, which is the crux of your argument.
To start, you make the following argument, I presume, to prove we exist with aseity:
1. If we have come into existence, we do not have free will.
2. We have free will. (premise (2))
3. Therefore we have not come into existence (we exist with aseity).
The first premise must be modified because of the argument you outlined in support of it. I will show why this is the case.
You make this argument:
Quoting Bartricks
I totally agree with this and acknowledge that it is deductively valid. However, later you write:
Quoting Bartricks
The reasoning here seems faulty to me; the premise C) merely dictates that coming into existence means not being responsible for one's initial character. To say that coming into existence means that we are also products of the environment and laws of nature does not follow. I agree that we are not morally responsible for any of those things, but, given the fact that our moral responsibility is contingent upon both coming into existence and other factors not related to coming into existence, one cannot make the claim that coming into existence accounts for all the factors - factors that you appear to account for in F).
One could modify the premise to be: "if we have come into existence and are the products of our environment and the laws of nature, then everything we do is the product of initial character, environment, and the laws of nature, none of which are we morally responsible for."
G) Then becomes: "Therefore, if we have come into existence and are the products of our environment and the laws of nature, we are not morally responsible for anything we do."
The aseity argument then becomes:
1. If we have come into existence, and are the products of our environment and the laws of nature, then we do not have free will.
2. We have free will.
3. We have not come into existence and are not the products of our environment or the laws of nature.
I'm not totally certain what it means to not be the product of the laws of nature, but I do know that even a person with aseity cannot do things that defy the laws of physics (except self-originate). If this is the case it seems your argument is more in favor of godhood then aseity.
This probably doesn't need to be said, but since we obviously can't do things that violate the laws of nature, your conclusion doesn't follow.
Are you going to address my post? Or just assert that you are correct? What would it mean not to be a product of the laws of nature? I pointed out your faulty reasoning and you need to address it. Maybe you missed the longer post above the last one?
Right, good - so this argument establishes not that we exist with aseity, but that aseity is required for us to be morally responsible for our initial character.
Quoting ToothyMaw
I do not follow you. There's what I do - my actions. Now, what causes them? Presumably a mix of me and my environment. What more could there possibly be? You can't say 'indeterminism' as that's part of my environment. So I do not see on what grounds you deny F. What extra ingredient is missing?
No, there's me with my initial character. If that has been created by factors external to me - which it will have been if I don't exist with aseity - then I am not morally responsible for being the me that I am with the character that I have, yes? You've agreed with that.
Note, no mention of environment or laws of nature.
Then there's what i subsequently do - my actions - and what those actions may transform me into - my subsequent character.
Now it is 'that' which is - must be - the product of a combination of my initial character and my environment. Which is what F expresses.
The fact that you are saying "if" means that the assertion that we are the products of our environment and the laws of nature follows from the condition that we have come into existence. Those things do not follow from the condition that we have come into existence. You must also specify that we are the products of our environment and the laws of nature.
You're the one who isn't addressing the argument I made: you need explicitly to deny a premise in it. It seems you are now denying F. But if you want to deny F, that's fine - but I want an argument that has the negation of F as a conclusion so that I can see on what basis you're rejecting it.
If I have not come into being, then I am 'not' the product of my environment and laws of nature. I will still have an environment and be subject to the laws of nature, but I myself am not the product of them.
Now, if Tim says something and I punch him becasue of it, does the fact I had no control whaever over what Tim said mean that I am not morally responsible for punching him? No, obviously not. For although I did indeed lack entirely any control over what Tim said, I am morally responsible for being the kind of person who reacts as I did.
Apply that to my environment and laws of nature: I am not morally responsible for them. And it is thanks to them that I do what I do, just as it was thanks to Tim saying what he did that led me to punch him. But that doesn't mean that I am not morally responsible for what my enviornment and laws of nature make me do, does it? That's as bonkers as concluding that I am not morally responsible for punching Tim because I lacked control over Tim saying what he said.
1. If a, then b.
(If I have come into being, then my initial character is the product of external events)
2. If b, then c.
(If my initial character is the product of external events, then I am not MR for my initial character)
3. Therefore, if a, then c.
(Therefore, if my initial character is the product of external events, then I am not MR for my initial character)
4. d.
(I am not MR for my environment or the laws of nature)
5. If c and d then e.
(If I am not morally responsible for my initial character or for my environment or the laws of nature, then I am not morally responsible for anything)
6. Therefore if a, then e.
(Therefore, if I have come into being, then I am not morally responsible for anything).
Now, which premise do you deny or do you think it is invalid?
Quoting Bartricks
Then why did you use the term "product of the laws of nature" earlier if it only governs what goes on?
Quoting Bartricks
I don't need to deny a premise but rather carry out your argument to its conclusion: the conclusion is that we we have aseity and are not bound by the laws of nature. As you said, aseity negates being a product of external causes but doesn't negate the fact that we are still bound by the laws of nature, which, as you admit, dictate only what goes on. The conclusion to the aseity argument must be rejected because it is blatantly false; we cannot violate the laws of nature with our actions.
Quoting Bartricks
I only agreed that if one comes into existence one is only not morally responsible for their initial character.
Quoting Bartricks
But you are presupposing that none of your actions have a moral element without explaining why. You need to include the claim that we are bound by the laws of nature and are products of our environment. Your character may change, but only because you are interacting with an environment that affects you and that is constrained by the laws of nature.
Er, no. Now you're just being bad at logic. The conclusion of my argument is that if we are morally responsible, we exist with aseity. That follows from the premises.
I keep laying the argument out for you. Here it is again:
1. If a, then b
2. if b, then c
3. therefore, if a then c
4. d
5. If c and d, then e
6. Therefore, if a, then e.
Do you think that's invalid?
I'm referring to this argument:
Quoting ToothyMaw
Do you deny that you use this argument? Am I straw manning you?
Yes, I use that argument. The argument you need to challenge is the one I gave in support of 1.
This one:
1. If a, then b
2. if b, then c
3. therefore, if a then c
4. d
5. If c and d, then e
6. Therefore, if a, then e.
The argument you just mentioned above just continues it:
7. if a, then e
8. not e
9. Therefore not a.
Again, do you think the above is invalid?
My argument is that you need to change a premise in support of (1) (something I have already explained that you have not addressed well), and that if this premise is changed, it leads to the conclusion that we both have aseity and are not bound by the laws of nature. If this is true, we do not have free will, which I will demonstrate.
After changing the premise the continuation of your argument becomes:
1. If we have come into existence, are the product of our environment, and are bound by the laws of nature, then we do not have free will.
2. We have free will.
3. Therefore, we have not come into existence, are not the product of our environment, and are not bound by the laws of nature.
While this might seem sufficient for establishing that we have aseity and therefore free will, there is the following counterargument:
1. (following from (3) of the previous argument) If we have not come into existence, are not the product of our environment, and are not bound by the laws of nature, we have free will.
2. We are bound by the laws of nature.
3. Therefore, we do not have free will.
Dispute one of my premises. They all follow from your argument when it is modified to make sense.
Just edited this post to make it more clear; sorry.
There seems to be a confusion of "product of the laws of nature" and what I mean by "bound by the laws of nature". We should agree on which of those terms to use, as you say product, but then imply that nature only constrains actions.
1. If a, then b
2. if b, then c
3. therefore, if a then c
4. d
5. If c and d, then e
6. Therefore, if a, then e.
7. not e
8. Therefore not a.
When you acknowledge that it is valid (and it is), I will then express it again substituting the letters for the claims of my argument, and then I'll ask you which one you deny. I predict that you will never do this - you will never say which premise you deny - because you do not really have a coherent objection to anything I am saying. But we'll see.....
No, the confusion is that you either don't understand that the argument I made was valid, or you don't understand that this means you need to challenge a premise (rather than, say, substitute one of my premises with one of your own)
Of course it's valid, but you are being a slippery eel, drawing attention away from the flaw in your argument by demanding I accept its logical validity. The premise:
Quoting Bartricks
Allows your argument to be logically valid, but it is not logically valid itself.
You write:
C) If we have come into existence, we are not morally responsible for our initial character.
And also:
D) We are not morally responsible for our environment or for the laws of nature.
These two claims are obviously true, but you need to specify in a premise that we are the product of environment and the laws of nature, otherwise the premise:
Quoting Bartricks
Just assumes that we are products of environment and the laws of nature contingent merely upon having come into existence. That presupposes that there are no moral elements to our decisions if we have come into existence without specifying the conditions under which we exist; you can say that if we are the products of initial character, environment, and the laws of nature that we must not have moral responsibility, but you do not make the conditional claim that we are the products of our environment and the laws of nature before saying that that is all we are a product of, when you need to for your premise to make sense, otherwise, once again, you are assuming that just because you have come into existence you are the product of your environment and the laws of nature.
Even if you argue that our initial character and our actions causally result in our future character, and, thus, the actions that flow from our character, we are still interacting with an environment that affects us and are bound by the laws of nature. Furthermore, you must specify that our actions are the product of our environment and the laws of nature in addition to initial character before saying that our actions are only the product of initial character, our environment, and the laws of nature. Thus, to support this assertion you must make an additional claim that we are the product of our environment and the laws of nature.
If you do that the argument I gave contradicting the existence of free will earlier applies.
You ask me to confirm the validity of your argument so that I have to deny a premise, when, really, your argument is indeed logically valid but the following premise of yours suffers from a category error:
F) If we have come into existence, then everything we do is a product of initial character, environment and laws of nature, none of which we are in any way morally responsible for.
I have explained why this is the case. Please address this issue.
Right, so you need to deny a premise! I think you don't really understand what a deductively valid argument is. A deductively valid argument - such as mine - is one whose conclusion is true if the premises are. So unless or until you provide some grounds for thinking one of its premises is false, you have no grounds for rejecting its conclusion. Thus you need to dispute a premise. Which one?
Don't keep insisting I replace one of my premises with a different premise - I mean, think about it, why on earth would I do that given that my argument is deductively valid and has premises you don't seem to be able to dispute??
So again: which premise do you deny and why? Stop telling me about different premises of your own invention. Why do you keep doing that?? Address one of my premises and tell me why it is false. You need to deny the truth of one of my premises. Which one? This isn't going anywhere until you do this.
For your convenience, here is the argument that you agree is valid and thus agree that its conclusion must be true if is premises are:
1. If a, then b
2. if b, then c
3. therefore, if a then c
4. d
5. If c and d, then e
6. Therefore, if a, then e.
7. not e
8. Therefore not a.
Here it is again, with the letters replaced for my claims:
1. If I have come into existence, then I have been caused to come into existence by external events that I had nothing to do with.
2. If I have been caused to come into existence by external events that I had nothing to do with, then I am not morally responsible for my initial character
3. Therefore, if I have come into existence, I am not morally responsible for my initial character
4. I am not morally responsible for my environment or the laws of nature that prevail in it.
5. If I am not morally responsible for my initial character and not morally responsible for my environment and the laws of nature that prevail in it, then I am not morally responsible for anything
6. Therefore, if I have come into existence, I am not morally responsible for anything
7. I am morally responsible for some things
8. Therefore I have not come into existence.
Resist the urge to tell me to replace one of those premises with a different one of your own invention. That's no more or less than to ignore my argument and ask me to defend a different one that you've come up with. Why on earth would I do that?!?
You agree that the above argument is deductively valid, so you agree that 8 is true if 1-7 are. So which of 1-7 do you dispute? And note: 3 and 6 are interim conclusions, so you can't deny either of those without denying some other premise.
Address the category error. Or does that not matter for some reason? I'm being serious; I'm claiming that one of your premises is not logically valid. That seems to me to mean that there is something wrong with your argument.
Premises can be true or false. Which premise is false? You need to say, otherwise you're just not addressing anything I have argued.
Quoting Bartricks
What I meant was that it was semantically invalid. It now appears to be totally valid.
I'll have to take a look at your argument now that you have modified it. I'll see if I can deny a premise, but if not, I will conclude that we exist with aseity and thus have free will (until I can come up with a good counterargument or come across a better argument). This might take some time and a new thread if this one is abandoned because I'm not quick enough.
Quoting Bartricks
Otherwise there could be a moral element to our actions. However, if we are the product of only those things, there is no moral element to any of our actions, so your premise:
Quoting Bartricks
Is false.
5 says "If I am not morally responsible for my initial character and not morally responsible for my environment and the laws of nature that prevail in it, then I am not morally responsible for anything"
Because you are not denying 1 or 2, you accept that if I have come into being, then I am not morally responsible for my initial character.
Because you have not denied 4, you accept as well that I am not morally responsible for my environment and the laws of nature that prevail in it.
So what you deny is that it follows from my lack of moral responsibility for those things that I am lacking in moral responsibility for what they produce, yes? I mean, what else is left? I am not responsible for my initial character, and not responsible for the environment and laws of nature in which my initial character finds itself, then what else is left for me to be morally responsible for save what those things produce?
In other words you think this principle - if I am not in any way morally responsible for A, and not in any way morally responsible for B, and A and B are wholly causally responsible for C, I am not morally responsible for C - is false, yes?
You think you can be morally responsible for an event - X - even when X was caused by matters for which you are in no way morally responsible. How?
You accept that I am not morally responsible for my initial character. But why do you accept that, given that you think one can be morally responsible for things that are the product of things for which I am in no way morally responsible?
I mean, I am in no way morally responsible for my own production - I didn't create myself, but am the product of alien forces. But that shouldn't trouble you, given that as far as you're concerned the fact I was in no way morally responsible for my own production and was instead the product of alien forces doesn't, in and of itself, suffice to establish my non-responsiblity for my initial self.
So your own position seems inconsistent. If you reject 5, it is odd to me why you accept 2 or 4. For the only reason, surely, for accepting 2 and 4 is the principle expressed in 5?
You write:
Quoting Bartricks
I actually agree with this. However, implicit in 5 is the assumption that the only things that affect us are our environment, initial character, and the laws of nature. I also agree that these are almost the only things we could be morally responsible for.
But what about other people's potentially free choices? Wouldn't you have to address those? You are presupposing that all that affects us are external factors that can, presumably, be traced back indefinitely. But you must also specify, so as to guarantee that we are not morally responsible for anything, that we are not morally responsible for other people's (potentially free) choices, as you admitted that one can come into existence yet still have the freedom to choose between alternative courses of action (even if it doesn't magically make people morally responsible).
If you specify that we are not responsible for other people's choices, then a large swathe of what is considered abhorrent behavior is excused.
Do you deny that you have to take into account other people's choices?
And if you say we are sometimes responsible for other people's choices, then there is something we are morally responsible for and thus 5 is false.
I'll make it formal:
1) I am not morally responsible for anything iff I am not morally responsible for my initial character, the environment, the laws of nature that prevail in it, and other people's choices.
2) I am morally responsible for some of other people's choices.
3) Therefore, I am morally responsible for some things.
4) I am not morally responsible for my initial character, environment, or the laws of nature that prevail in it.
5) Thus, even though I am not morally responsible for my initial character or for my environment and the laws of nature that prevail in it, I am morally responsible for some things.
Unless I'm mistaken 5 is the negation of 5. If there is a flaw in my logic please point it out.
I fixed it a little I think.
1) I am not morally responsible for anything iff I am not morally responsible for my initial character, the environment, the laws of nature that prevail in it, and other people's choices.
2) I am morally responsible for some of other people's choices.
3) Therefore, I am morally responsible for some things.
4) I am not morally responsible for my initial character, environment, or the laws of nature that prevail in it.
5) Even if I am not morally responsible for my initial character, environment, and the laws of nature that prevail in it, I still am morally responsible for some things.
6) Thus, even though I am not morally responsible for my initial character or for my environment and the laws of nature that prevail in it, I am morally responsible for some things.
1. Do you believe that moral responsibility exists?
If so where do you lay this moral responsibility.
If not then do you believe in morality. I cannot see a way in which morality could exist if moral responsibility doesn't, but I would be interested to hear any arguments against my belief if they are out there.
If you do not believe morality exists then why do you care if people are held morally responsible? You seem to be implying that it would be better for us to not hold people morally responsible for their actions. If this is the case then could you please define what you mean by better. If not morally then what?
2. Do you hold the same beliefs about intellectual responsibility?
If our moral actions are determined externally of us, could the same argument not be made for what knowledge we have? If I refuse to learn to spend money wisely, wouldn't I be responsible for running out of money? Essentially what I'm asking is are we held responsible for our own knowledge? If not then so be it but if so, how is it different than morality?
P.S. I tried hard to keep this from sounding combative, I hope I have. I do not want to attack your beliefs.
It wouldn't bother me in the least if you did.
Quoting Fides Quaerens Intellectum
Perhaps. I'm formulating some new views on the matter.
Quoting Fides Quaerens Intellectum
I think that even if we don't have moral culpability, we are morally responsible for reducing suffering. So in a way, I think that there are moral responsibilities.
Quoting Fides Quaerens Intellectum
I think we are obligated to be intellectually honest, and not shy away from the truth, even if it is unpleasant. I think it is somewhat tied into reducing suffering, but that it also exists independently in some ways. For instance, even if an argument has horrible implications ethically, we should probably just look for counter-arguments instead of stifling said argument. That would be stupid. Free speech is paramount.
BTW you can link people into your posts so that they get a notification.
I mean if someone makes such a damaging argument that people want to murder them, then that's a reflection of how emotionally vulnerable people are, not a reflection of the character of the person who made said argument.
Sorry I'm new to forums
How does one reduce suffering in a world that is predetermined. Wouldn't the amount of suffering on earth merely be the amount that was always going to exist no matter what?
Try squaring that with religions that believe in karma, because karma is only generated by the intentional action of agents, and it’s impossible to determine in advance how that will play out.
Agency still exists even if determinism is true. It is (usually) fallacious to say something like that we cannot affect the future, and thus the amount of suffering in the world, even if all of the suffering that will occur is predetermined.
Yes but that is a different philosophy to determinism. Which is what ToothyMaw is arguing. The determinist would just say that Karmic religions are wrong.
Quoting Fides Quaerens Intellectum
I didn't argue for determinism. I argued that unless determinism is proven false, we would have no basis for moral responsibility. It turns out I was begging the question, because I was only attacking an indeterministic view of free will, when really there are compatibilist accounts I was not addressing.
Quoting Fides Quaerens Intellectum
We are able to affect the future through our actions regardless of whether these actions are predetermined; If one had acted differently, and one undoubtedly could've in almost any situation if something about them, their environment, or initial character were different, then they could've brought about a different future - unless one externalizes one's will, but that leads to implausible accounts of agency.
So the future really does depend on our choices.
I will look into some of his philosophy. I would never have expected to sound like a theologian.
Maybe if you ground it in god?
Quoting Fides Quaerens Intellectum
I don't know. I'll have to think about it.
btw, I'm not a philosopher, nor even experienced in writing philosophy. I've written a couple of essays, but that's it. And I usually am wrong, it seems.
Actually after I looked closer it seems you have almost the opposite belief as him. He believes that we cannot affect the future yet we still have moral responsibility. According to him our actions are predetermined by God in order to show his glory. However we are still morally responsible for our sins, not God. I must admit it doesn't make sense to me and even Calvinists that I've talked to say it only makes sense from God's perspective.
Quoting ToothyMaw
I think Calvin would agree with this statement, but he would come to an opposite-ish conclusion. It might still be worth checking out.
I no longer stick to the arguments I made in the opening post. I think that moral responsibility is plausible.
That is my belief.
Quoting ToothyMaw
same here.
You took your name from that one lecture, right? I watched a little bit of it.