Empirical evidence for more than one concept of freedom (and responsibility)?

The following was sent in by Garden reader Zac Cogley.  Comments encouraged.

"In this article from the New York Times Magazine, three psychologists suggest that Americans have differing concepts of freedom.

From the article: 'As behavioral scientists, we have found that the people who frame freedom in terms of choice are usually the ones who get to make a lot of choices — that is, middle- and upper-class white Americans (most of our study participants are white; we can't make any claims about other racial and ethnic groups). The education, income and upbringing of these Americans grant them choices about how to live their lives and also encourage them to express their preferences and personalities through the choices they make. Most Americans, however, are not from the college-educated middle and upper classes. Working- class Americans often have fewer resources and experience greater uncertainty and insecurity. For them, being free is less about making choices that reflect their uniqueness and mastery and more about being left alone, with their personality, integrity and well-being intact.'

Connecting freedom with choice is very close to connecting freedom with the availability of alternative possibilities (since one has to choose between them). On the other hand, equating freedom with being left alone resonates with a classical compatibilist conception of freedom as absence of constraint.

If this research is correct, maybe we won’t be able to settle what the *real* concept of responsibility is by doing empirical studies. I’m interested to know what other Gardeners think about this possibility, especially those who do experimental philosophy."

Comments

[Clark Goble]

An other interesting question might be how the culture in which philosophy is done correlates with these economic factors of viewing freedom. That is does the history of philosophical perspectives on free will also relate to economic factors in the philosopher's environment?

[tnadelhoffer]

I don't find these results surprising at all. Indeed, it is precisely what one should expect if she has already looked at the stuff done by Weinberg, Nichols, and Stich on ethno-epistemology. There is ample data that intuitions about moral responsibility similarly vary according to one's socio-economic status--Haidt's research on intuitions concerning disgust and chicken sexing comes to mind. That one finds similar differences when it comes to people's intuitions about free will is perhaps par for the intuitional course.

I nevertheless think that Neal's suggestion that, "If this research is correct, maybe we won’t be able to settle what the *real* concept of responsibility is by doing empirical studies" is misleading as it makes it sound like those of us doing empirical work on folk intuitions concerning free will and moral responsibility have been trying to get at the "real" concepts (whatever that is supposed to mean). All we have been trying to do is see whether the claims philosophers--especially incompatibilists--have made about these intuitions settle with the salient data. If it turns out that intuitions vary both cross-culturally and socio-economically and that these intuitions are often affected by factors that otherwise seem irrelavant to the issue at hand, then perhaps we should follow the line take by Weinberg et al in their work on epistemology--i.e., maybe we ought to dispense with what they call intuition-driven romanticism when we are thinking and writing about free will and moral responsibility. For an interesting discussion of the view that our intuitions about free will and/or moral responsibility are not monolithic, see the new paper by Nichols and Knobe where they suggest that one and the same person often has both compatibilist and incompatibilist intuitions. If one and the same person can have conflicting intuitions, it would not be surprising that people of different socio-economic classes have conflicting intuitions.

As far as I know, no one doing experimental work on these issues would then want to try and ascertain which of these intuitions reflect the "real" concepts of free will or moral responsibility--rather they would probably take this as evidence that intuitions about these matters have very little evidentiary weight. But I am only speaking for myself here. I leave it up to other experimental types to put their own two cents in the mix. Nevertheless, I appreciate the post and I look forward to reading the relevant papers. So, thanks for the head's up Neal.

P.S. The Nichols and Knobe paper can be found here:
http://www.unc.edu/%7Eknobe/

[Neal]

Just a clarification -- the substance of the post, including the comments that follow the link to the article, are from Zac Cogley. Nothing other than the first two sentences of the post are from me.

[Robert Allen]

Neil,

I'm pretty sure that the study's subjects were not equating having choices with the ability to do otherwise. My sense is that they mean by having choices being able to afford all sorts of goodies other consumers must do without: 'So Marcia where are we going for dinner tonite? Chinese sounds good to me; anything but Mexican again. And by the way, have you given any more thought to which college we are going send Gerald to? Berkeley? You know, I've been leaning towards Harvard lately- I think that will open more doors for him. ... Hon, after dinner why don't we take in a movie? I'm getting kinda tired of Karaoke.'

[Zac Cogley]

Apologies to Thomas Nadelhoffer; I certainly didn't mean to suggest that everyone doing empirical work on people's intuitions was aiming to uncover one single real essence to responsibility. I meant for the post to be provocative to anyone who did think such a thing (in order to spur discussion); if no one thinks that then there's apparently no one to provoke.

I agree with Robert Allen that the people in the study are presumably not *directly* equating an abundance of choice with the ability to do otherwise. But it's very plausible to suppose, I think, that the people would think that a lack of choices (options?) would makes someone unfree, especially since they seem to find lack of choice itself objectionable.

Why do they find various and sundry goodies desirable? Surely not because they can (or would) buy each and every digital camera, say, but because they are attracted to the idea that one's life goes better when one has more options to select from. Of course, "being free" and "having one's life go better" aren't the
same concept, and so more needs to be said. But the intutive pull is there, at least for me.

Guess I'll read the Nichols and Knobe paper now...

[tnadelhoffer]

Neal,
Sorry, I was in a bit of a rush earlier and did not pay close enough attention to the post.

Zac,
Absolutely no reason to apologize. Regardless of what we experimental types have or have not been up to (and it differs from person to person), I was thankful for being made aware of the research you brought to everyone's attention. Indeed, now that Neal has correctly pointed out that I did not read the original post all that carefully, it turns out I should have thanked you earlier for the head's up. So, thanks!

[Robert Allen]

"But it's very plausible to suppose, I think, that the people would think that a lack of choices (options?) would makes someone unfree, especially since they seem to find lack of choice itself objectionable." Zac

Right, having to eat the same foods everyday, putting aside every spare cent so that you can send your child to a community college, sitting in front of the TV night after night- a life of making do- appears as a significant diminishment of liberty to them. (These are folks who, not realizing that freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose, are trying to buy a stairway to heaven.) But there's nothing metaphysical going on here.

[Robert Allen]

The upper class folks in the study are not afraid of Determinism, but the inability to keep up with the Jones. They are (for the most part) the capitalists and their lackeys, resisting any attempt on the part of workers to limit their ability to subjugate others. Their concern with having choices is grounded in their desire to exploit labor- that is the ultimate option for them. If you explained to them the implications of Determinism, (which you would have to do VERY patiently, because, for all their education, they are incredibly slow when it comes to thinking about anything besides money, the news, and the latest episode of Dancing on Ice with the Idol of America) they probably wouldn't lose any sleep. Emission standards or attempts to unionize Wal-Mart- now those are the sorts of things that will get them worked up.

The noble workers, on the other hand, victimized day after miserable day by these parasites, long to be out from under their control. When I was a cook, I used to wait for the restaurant owner to go to the bank so that I could eat more than I could afford with the measly stipend the niggardly SOB gave us (that is, until the waitresses ratted me out, no solidarity there). I was a Marxist before I'd read a word of Marx.

[Andrew W.]

It looks like this train has left the station, but I'll chime in all the same.

Based on that NYT article -- as opposed to the studies it cites -- my overriding impression was that the attitudes expressed by the middle-class subjects tended to be less rational than those of their working-class counterparts. So what if you just chose a pen or a CD? And just how does it injure you if your neighbour buys a similar car? The cult of consumerism as self-expression is so banal it's frightening.

That said, I would *firmly* deny any suggestion that country music should be preferred over rock :)