Preview of Free Will and Luck, by Al Mele

Here is something you will definitely want to take a look at. Al Mele is currently working on a monograph called Free Will and Luck and he has generously provided us with an excerpt from the manuscript that can be found on the Papers on Agency blog here. Following is a message from the man himself.

Bloggers,

John Fischer asked for some information on a book MS of mine that’s in progress, Free Will and Luck. I’d be interested in reactions to the following excerpt from it. I am not an incompatibilist, but it is a sketch of what I’m suggesting is the strongest kind of argument for incompatibilism – stronger than the consequence argument and than the manipulation arguments I’ve seen. Feel free to discuss the excerpt in print, if you like, but please indicate that it is from a MS in progress. I would not be surprised if the excerpt were to change significantly before the book is published.

Thanks,
Al Mele

Comments

[robert allen]

Professor Mele:

Premise 2 of the “zygote argument” is false: a normal zygote is not produced so as to carry out another person’s aims. “Blind forces” cannot impair a person’s will; for “they” cannot “deliberately cause (someone) to behave in a certain way.” Ernie lacks autonomy, not because he lives in a deterministic universe, but because he is being controlled by someone else. The desire for a free will is not tantamount to the desire to be undetermined. Rather, it is the desire to be able to transcend the influence of others.
Building on your idea of a “sheddable” value, I would define this notion as follows:

Necessarily, for all persons, it is (physically) possible for a person P to transcend the attitudinal influence of another person P* iff there are values v and v* and advantage a such that v was instilled in P by P*, v* is not consistent with v, it is (physically) possible that P adopt v* in order to secure a and P* does not intend that P value both v and v*

This definition is meant to address Professor Kapitan’s assertion that an agent is still being controlled by someone else if she can shed the values that the latter intends her to have only to adopt replacements that also suit the latter’s purposes. It also includes Professor Fisher’s notion of “reasons-responsiveness.”

[Al Mele]

Thanks for the reaction, Robert. For an argument against your claim that “‘Blind forces’ cannot impair a person’s will” see *Autonomous Agents*, pp. 168-69. BTW, how should I understand “(physically) possible” in your post? –Al