Pope Plagiarizes Wolf?

Well, I doubt it, but I thought we needed a new post with a catchy title to get things going.  Pope Benedict at the World Youth Day said:  "Freedom is not simply about enjoying life in total autonomy, but rather about living by the measure of truth and goodness so that we ourselves can become true and good."  The language is remarkably similar to Susan Wolf's language in her wonderful Freedom Within Reason, where she suggests that free will (of the sort associated with moral responsibility) does not require what she calls "autonomy"--the ability to do otherwise--but rather requires the ability to act in accord with the True and the Good (roughly, so that we ourselves can become true and good).  Just thought I'd point out the coincidence (I'm assuming the Pope has not read Wolf)...but if anyone wants to say what they think is wrong with Wolf's view, if anything, that may start a good discussion.

Comments

[Tamler Sommers]

I have the usual problem with Wolf's (and Pope Benedict's) position. If it's determined that I act in accord with the False and the Bad, then it doesn't seem fair to hold me (strongly) accountable for doing so.

Of course, a lot hangs on how we interpret "ability."

[Paul Torek]

I think Wolf's asymmetry thesis is probably right. That is, a person who acts in accord with the True and the Good ipso facto has the ability to do so and is free; while someone who falls in with the False and the Bad requires further scrutiny before one can judge their freedom.

Disclaimer: I have not actually read Wolf's book yet.

[Neil]

Suppose you think that agents are responsible just in case they act on moderately reasons-responsive mechaninisms of their own. And suppose you think the canonical way of spelling out that view is too demanding, for the reasons Watson pointed out (basically, too permissive on what counterfactuals are relevant in testing reasons responsiveness and receptiveness). So you start to restrict the counterfactuals. You might well end up with something very like Wolf's position: only agents acting in the light of the true and the good have appropriately reasons-responsive mechanisms. I'm not sure that I accept this view, but it is tempting.

[Tamler Sommers]

Can someone clarify Wolf's view on this? Assymetrical freedom doesn't mean that no one can be deserving of blame, does it? You certainly don't get that sense from Freedom Within Reason....

[Neil]

It's a long time since I read Wolf, but I think the view is this: there is a lot less blameworthiness than people typically think. To be appropriately blamed, you have to be capable of controlling your actions in the light of the True and the Good, where this capacity is understood in quite a restrictive manner: you actually have to have the correct moral values, and a true grasp of reality. If you meet these criteria, and you choose to act wrongfully, then you are blameworthy. But if you act in the mistaken belief that your action is permissible - like Jojo, the dictator in an article Wolf published, who doesn't grasp moral values - then you are 'morally insane', and moral insanity, like the regular kind, excuses.

[Tamler Sommers]

OK, that's more or less what I thought. So the only possible candidates for blame are those that have the correct moral values and a good sense of the Truth. That's the attractive feature of her view--according to Frankfurt, Jojo could be appropriately blamed as long as he acted in accordance to a second order volition.

But there remains the question of why someone who possessed the correct moral values chose to do the Bad thing in a particular situation. If determinism is true, or even if it is not, it is hard to see how the agent could be morally responsible for any of the determining factors that resulted in the Bad action. The agent may have the ability to perform the Good act in SOME situations, but in this particular situation he did not. So then how can he appropriately blamed?

[Tom Clark]

Tamler,

I assume “appropriately blamed” gets cashed out as meaning deontologically liable to retributive punishment without necessarily requiring any consequential benefit. Without such blame, it might still be appropriate to invoke certain sanctions (the least punitive as practically possible) in order to change the agent’s attitudes, beliefs and character, keep society safe, instill respect for social norms, deter others, etc. None of these requires the notion of strong accountability that you take to be necessary for being appropriately blamed, and therefore deserving of punishment irrespective of consequences. They only require reasons-responsiveness.

If Neil, Eddy, and perhaps Wolf and other compatibilists buy into retributive punishment (and they may not), I’m wondering why? Why does being reasons-responsive even in this very high-level, restricted sense, what some philosophers consider the essence of compatibilist freedom, entail being punishable independent of outcomes? Isn’t this really what’s at issue when we ask if someone is blameworthy?

[Kip Werking]

As I've mentioned before, I have yet to see an asymmetry theory (in Agency Theory) that I like. Nothing about immoral actions should make them less free than moral actions; and free will should not be divorced from moral responsibility. With respect to Wolf's Asymmetry Thesis, I particularly like F&R's critique in Resp. & Control at p. 60 (thanks to Amazon's Search Inside function!)

I share Clark's strong interest in the question: "are compatibilists also consequentialists?" I think consequentialism and free will denial are intimately related. Suppose that a compatibilist could give a criminal a lashing or painless medicine, and that both would work equally well at preventing future crime. Which would the compatibilist choose? If the compatibilist chooses the medicine (as I think one is morally obligated to do), why say that the criminal is wicked, instead of sick?

I discuss these issues in my new paper "Whose Afraid of Creeping Exculpation?: The Costs of Hard Compatibilism and Benefits of Free Will Denial". The rough draft is at my website:

http://people.wm.edu/~ktwerk/exculpation.htm

[Mark Smeltzer]

In response to Tom and Kip's question, those compatibilists who uphold and defend the concept of deep responsibility will have reason to uphold and defend the concept of retributional punishment.

As one such compatibilist, I believe there is an effective way of answering Tom's question, "Why does ... compatibilist freedom ... entail being punishable independent of outcomes? Isn’t this really what’s at issue when we ask if someone is blameworthy?"

I side with those who ground our ability to blame in the concept of self-expression. We see self-expression as the essense of freedom (RR happens to be very useful way of understanding the mechanics). When an agent is appropriately RR for its actions, the agent's moral character is expressed by its actions. As we see it, the grounds for retributive practices rise and fall with the possibility of self-expression.

[Kip Werking]

Mark,

You've answered Tom's question, but I would be very curious to know how you would answer my (more practical) question:

"Suppose that a compatibilist could give a criminal a lashing or painless medicine, and that both would work equally well at preventing future crime. Which would the compatibilist choose? If the compatibilist chooses the medicine (as I think one is morally obligated to do), why say that the criminal is wicked, instead of sick?"

[Mark Smeltzer]

A lashing -- assuming he deserves retributive punishment, and if not, I suppose the medicine would suffice.

[Tom Clark]

Mark,

The person who expresses his moral character by being appropriately reasons-responsive should, on your retributive view of punishment, be given a well-deserved lashing if he behaves sufficiently badly, whether or not any consequential benefits accrue. What escapes me is the virtue or goodness of having this person suffer even if it results in no self-improvement or any other desirable outcome, as it need not under retributive theories of punishment.

It’s clear that being reasons-responsive – free, according to some compatibilists – functions to make agents capable of change in anticipation of punishment or from its application, yet compatibilist retributivists nevertheless insist that blame, desert, and punishment should *not* be contingent on having that effect, or any other salutary effect, on the agent or others like him. Why define moral agency in this way and then deny its obvious functionality? What’s the point? What drives the compatibilist moral obligation to impose benefit-free suffering? I’ve asked Stephen Morse at UPenn this question at http://www.naturalism.org/morse.htm.

[Mark Smeltzer]

I don't think freedom has anything to do with a capacity to change apart from change that is bound up in a more accurate expression of the agent's character.

The motivation for (retributively) punishing and rewarding agents is to maximize justice. It is just to (retributively) punish and evil person, and unjust to reward them. And conversely, it is unjust to (retributively) punish a good person, and just to reward them.

For those of us who believe in the reality of good and evil, this seems to be a deeply grounded response.

(Silly vocabulary question: do we have a word to fulfill this analogy, "Retribution is to blame as X is to praise"?)

Also, keep in mind that while we can defend the basis for retributive punishment, that is not the same thing as arguing that individuals would be morally justified in taking matters into their own hands to exact justice upon evil doers.

[Neil]

Perhaps a more interesting question - or at least one that pumps a different set of intuitions - is what drives compatibiists to impose benefit-free reward for those who (by compatibilist lights) deserve them. BTW, this compatibilist doesn't believe that benefit-free suffering is justified. I'm more concerned with the question when suffering which *does* bring consequentialist benefits is morally justified (ie, when and only when the person deserves it). Sometimes suffering has to be imposed on those who don't deserve it - those who pose dangers through no fault of their own, for instance - but then we have special obligations to compensate, apologise, and so on, which are absent in the deserving case.

[Tamler Sommers]

Neil,

I've always wondered what the substantive difference was between consequentialist compatibilists (CCs) and hard determinists/free will skeptics. But you just answered my question. Thanks!

So on your view, is the compensation for undeserved suffering a benefit-free reward? And if so, why is that justified in a way that benefit-free suffering is not?

[Tom Clark]

Neil,

Another question for you, sorry to pile on. To get back to Kip’s thought experiment, both the lashing and the medicine have identical benefits (reducing future crime), so the suffering involved in the lashing is unnecessary on consequentialist grounds. Given your compatibilist conception of desert, which should the offender receive?

[Mark Smeltzer]

Tom,

I do not think Kip's thought experiment merits a response. It is far too simplistic to tell us anything of interest.

For example, there are cases where a person should not give the criminal a lashing even though the criminal deserves it (or worse). Consideration of these kinds of cases would incline the compatibilist to respond that it would be morally preferable to give the crimimal the medicine (without any appeal to future consequences).

So, to prompt Neil for a response to a problematic thought experiment seems frivilous... perhaps, you or Kip could refine it first.

[Neil]

I'm not entirely sure why Mark thinks that the th. exp. is frivolous. Some philosophers, notably Scanlon, distinguish between being blameworthy and being the appropriate object of punishment, but this is surely a minority view. The asymmetrical view I'm defending is based on the claim that benefits do not normally require a justification. I can give you money on a whim; benefits are permissible, absent considerations against them, whereas suffering is impermissible, absent considerations in their favor. Now, if you're blameworthy, there is a consideration in favor of your suffering, but only in the sense that imposing suffering is (in my non-retributivist view) permissible. It is not obligatory. The fact that it is suffering remains as an undefeated consideration against it. If you like, being blameworthy lowers the threshold which imposing suffering must meet to be all-things-considered justified. We may impose suffering on an innocent only when doing so is brings a large benefit to multiple others, and then we have an obligation to compensate, apologise, etc. We may impose suffering on the guilty for a less serious reason - because it is, say, likely to produce better consequences than not imposing it - and we do not owe them an apology. But - in my view - the mere fact that some is guilty is not sufficient, all by itself, to justify imposing suffering.

[Tom Clark]

Mark,

You responded to Kip's thought experiment as follows:

"A lashing -- assuming he deserves retributive punishment, and if not, I suppose the medicine would suffice."

Neil's non-retributivist, consequentialist response suits me far better, given that it requires weighing the actual options before inflicting suffering, not bowing to an abstract absolute like "maximizing justice." The guilty "deserve" suffering, consequentially, only to the extent that nothing else will serve to bring about the (presumably beneficent) ends we seek. As non-punitive means of achieving those ends become available, there's no reason to persist in inflicting what has become unnecessary suffering.

[Eddy Nahmias]

I entirely agree that the connection between free will and retributive punishment is important and that it may be the central issue dividing many compatibilists and many "free will skeptics." But I do want to interject a reminder that many, perhaps most, incompatibilists have argued (or suggested) that if determinism is true (or universal causation or lack of agent causation or whatever), then we do not have *free will*--and they mean free will to encompass a lot more than just an extra something (beyond the compatibilist "sham") that would make you an appropriate target for retribution. They mean FREE WILL, the quality we (ordinary people and philosophers alike) care deeply about because it gives our lives meaning and dignity, it allows love and friendship, it justifies the reactive attitudes, etc. (see, e.g., Kane 1996, chapter 6).

If certain free will skeptics (perhaps Pereboom and Tamler are examples) want to suggest that the "free will" at issue is just the bit required for retribution and that we can have everything else, then they really seem closer to compatibilists than incompatibilists, I think. The libertarian freedom most incompatibilists have focused on is supposed to be (a) what we all think we have and (b) what is crucial for all kinds of important human activities, not just resposibility attribution but also deliberation (e.g., PvI), true relationships, meaning and purpose, etc. That is, the idea is that if determinism (or whatever) is true, then we do not have anything close to what we thought we had.

Also, keep in mind, that there may be reasons to reject retributive punishment independent of the free will issue, in which case compatibilists and skeptics would have nothing of interest to separate them.

I'm not trying to recruit anyone to label themselves a compatibilist (I hate that label since it suggests that the free will debate should focus on the question of whether determinism is compatible with free will, and that is a mistake). Rather, I just want to remind us that the free will debate--involving "the varieties of freedom worth caring about" (Dennett)--includes a lot of issues beyond retribution (and even responsibility more broadly construed).

One more way of putting it: Assuming retributive punishment is unjustified (for whatever reason), do the skeptics (or no-free-willists) believe that we lack the variety of free will required for anything else of value (e.g., being appropriate targets of the reactive attitudes--at least, where those attitudes do not entail retribution)?

[Tamler Sommers]

Eddy,

Great post. I think we need to distinguish between two seperate questions though:

(A) Do we have the kind of free will that could make us robustly morally responsible for our actions and characters?

and

(B) What are the implications of denying this sort of free will?

Free will skeptics agree about (A), but differ in their views about (B). On the other hand, Smilansky and Kane agree more or less about (B) but have opposing views on (A). Consider the following analogy. Two atheists: one thinks that a Godless world is Dostoevskian nightmare where everything is permitted and anarchy reigns. He hides in his room and writes angry hysterical notes in his journal. The other finds a Godless world to be a beautiful place, full of wonder, excitement, love etc. Both have substantively identical views on the metaphysical issue in question, but have totally opposing views about theh implications of their metaphysical position.

So I wouldn't want to call myself a compatibilist simply because I'm optimistic about a world with no robust moral responsibility. I agree with free will skeptics that no one deserves praise and blame for anything. I agree with the libertarians that determinism is incompatible with this kind of free will. I just disagree that denying free will rules out friendship, love, meaning etc.

To answer your quesstion more directly, here's a checklist for what the variety of free will I deny does and doesn't rule out.

Deliberation: No. (I've never understood why anyone thinks that deliberation is incompatible with free will skepticism.)

Resentment: Yes. No one is an appropriate target of resentment.

Gratitude: Yes and no. There are aspects of gratitude that free will skepticism rules out and aspects that survive. (We are grateful for many things to which we do not attribute robust moral responsibility.

Love. No. Again, I've never understood why free will skepticism is supposed to rule out love of any kind. No one who owns a dog could ever make that claim.

Forgiveness. Tout comprendre, c'est tout pardonner. But that doesn't mean we want hang out with criminals and wrongdoers and people we don't like.

Guilt and Pride. Yes and No. Details to follow in another post maybe.

Meaning in life. No. The only thing that would strip meaning from my life is Giambi winning the AL MVP.

See Pereboom's Chapter about the reactive attitudes in Living Without Free Will for a similar rundown of what denying free will would and wouldn't rule out. And I hope one day to adapt the Chapter of my dissertation that addresses this question in some detail.

[Mark Smeltzer]

Tom,

My response to Kip's prompt was somewhat of a joke. Though it was intended to reflect my thoughts on the matter, it was by no means comprehensive. Before I can give a proper answer to Kip's question, more information about the case would be required.

Let's assume that the criminal does deserve a lashing. Does that mean that it would be morally permissible for you or I to administer the lashing to him? I'm not so certain.

According to my view of freedom, only a perfect judge has the moral right and the moral obligation to retributively punish evil people. Since we are imperfect judges, as individuals we lack both the moral obligation and the moral right to punish retributively.

That said, I think we do have the moral right to punish (or reward) for consequentialist reasons: we can punish someone in hopes that it would lead them to see the error of their ways, to deter others from commiting similar crimes, etc. We punish in this sense because we see the possibility of a brighter future; which in some cases may be an illusion brought on by the fact that we are not perfect judges.

In the end, you may find that the practical differences between our views are, in some ways, slimmer than you think.

[Kip Werking]

I think Mark was accusing of the thought experiment of being too simple, and it was. For example, it’s not clear how this medicine is supposed to work. After some reflection, I think this medicine would probably have to alter the subject’s values (“value engineering”) in a way that punishment doesn’t. Punishment sends the signals “if you do this again, you will suffer more” and “what you did is bad” but, although the criminal surely appreciates the truth of the former, it’s questionable how much she or he comes to appreciate the latter. A “moral pill” might convince a criminal that what they did is bad without any suffering at all. But, to the extent that punishment doesn’t normally convince a criminal of this, a “moral pill” seems to alter a person’s personal identity more than punishment does. This doesn’t disturb me in the slightest but I think it might disturb those who hold more moderate views.

For another, moral pills have no general deterrence threat. A criminal might say “if I get caught, they’ll give me a moral pill, and I might not like that, but I like it much more than punishment, so now I will go commit a horrible crime” (this is an issue that my paper needs to address).

Ultimately, however, I think the thought experiment can be tweaked to overcome such objections. Despite its simplicity, the current version gets at the heart of the matter. Mark’s response, that the criminal should be lashed instead of treated, testifies that there is a real issue here. The thought expresses tries to capture (and this, it seems to me, is hard to do) the very real difference between consequentialists and retributivists. This is, in my opinion, where Agency Theory ceases to be academic. For example, suppose that moral pills do exist. Suppose further that there are a quasi-infinite number of arrested criminals throughout the universe. Mark’s view results in a quasi-infinitely greater amount of suffering in the world than mine does. To be fair, from the perspective of a retributivist (or compatibilist?), my view may result in a quasi-infinitely greater amount of injustice in the world.

In short, the “moral pill” thought experiment is just another a posteriori argument against the existence of free will. The other major a posteriori argument would be the “designer” thought experiment—the costs of hard compatibilism (an agent might have free will even if a designer designed its entire life) are too great (and distinctions between soft and hard compatibilism are untenable). This seems to be the thrust of Pereboom’s four-step argument. Both of these arguments converge upon the same conclusion: free will and moral responsibility don’t exist.

Also, I’m *very* interested in Tamler’s question: what’s the difference between a consequentialist-compatibilist (CC) and a free will denier? Suppose, for example, that moral pills do exist. CCs would give moral pills instead of lashings. But, in that case, it seems very awkward, at least to me, to say that criminals freely acted, deserve to be punished, and were morally responsible for their actions. Instead, it looks very much like criminals are being treated for an illness which was not their fault. Ultimately, we need to answer the question: whether immoral/criminal behavior is species of disease (or symptom of disease), and if it is, should we stop holding people morally responsible for their actions? Or, alternatively, should we regard immoral/criminal behavior as an exception to the general rule that people are not morally responsible for non-self-inflicted mental illnesses?

[Mark Smeltzer]

Did you read my latest reply to Tom?

It's not clear that my position was accurately depicted in your latest post -- e.g., "Mark’s view results in a quasi-infinitely greater amount of suffering in the world than mine does."

In a nutshell, while I do think it could be true that the criminal deserves the lashing over the pill in a strong sense, there are many, many cases where it would be morally impermissible for you or I to carry out that punishment on retributive grounds. (In fact, I am inclinded to think it would be morally impermissible for us to do so in any case.)

The big different between our positions, as I see it, is the underpinnings. I am not critizing the concept of retribution -- just its application. While I am inclined to think that we do not have the moral right to punish retributively, I believe that a perfect moral judge would. Thus, eternal rewards and punishments are conceptually defensible, which is an important component of the classical conception of what-is-at-stake in the free will debate.

[Paul Torek]

Kip, your last paragraph, it seems to me, is adequately answered in advance by Neil's Aug 30 post.