More on the Consequence Argument

A howler in Harry Potter is an abusive letter that reads itself aloud, embarrassing the recipient. A howler in philosophy is a really bad mistake. If I'm about to commit a howler, don't send me any howlers.

Why don't I think that the Consequence Argument  (in the kind of context in which Fischer is moved by it, ie, a context in which what is in question is alternative possibilities, and not sourcehood) is a problem for compatibilism? One reason is that it seems to be to be over-general: it doesn't tell us anything about determinism and alternative possibilities. Here's one way of getting at the point. Suppose you think the following argument, or some suitable refined version of it, is sound

P

(P ⊃ Q)

Therefore, Q

Then it seems to be that you should also find the following argument sound:

P

(P ⊃ Q v R)

Therefore, Q v R

But the second argument is just a simple version of the Consequence Argument for indeterministic worlds, and therefore allowing for alternative possibilities. In other words, the 'no choice' operator does not depend upon the assumption of determinism for any force it has.

The Essence of Freedom

Manuel’s last post generated a brief exchange about whether free will can be localized. This exchange motivated me to post a quote from John Fischer, which I find puzzling. Here’s the quote (from Four Views on Free Will, but I think John has made the same point elsewhere):

It can be one thing to articulate a meaning or concept, and quite another to specify the nature or “real essence” of something. The meaning of the term, “water,” and the ordinary concept, “water,” presumably do not contain anything about “H2O.” But arguably the nature or real essence of water is H2O. Similarly, the ordinary meaning of the term “can,” and the ordinary concept of “freedom,” may not contain anything about the possibility of extending the actual past, holding the natural laws fixed; but arguably the nature or real essence of our freedom includes these features.
    I have for many years been puzzled at how some philosophers find the Consequence Argument (in some form or another) absolutely and uncontroversially sound, whereas others dismiss it entirely [...] One possible explanation of this puzzling phenomenon is that some philosophers are thoroughly focused on the issues about meaning and concepts, whereas others are attuned to the nature of or real essence of freedom.

Now I understand the distinction between concepts and essences when it comes to natural kinds, like “water”. But I don’t understand it when it comes to something like freedom, which is neither a natural kind like “water” or a historical kind like “species”. How do we go about investigating the essence of “freedom”? We might claim that the concept “freedom” picks out a certain class of actions, and then investigate the nature of those actions. But applying this Kripke-Putnam style move will require us first to settle the extension of the concept “freedom”, and once we have done that the controversy is over. (Or so it seems to me). That is, the philosophical issues will have been resolved, and it will be time to hand the matter on to the scientists.

What am I missing?

YAFWSA

Yet another free will science alert . . .

Just thought you should know that once again scientists have found the location of free will in the brain. It seems to have moved a bit from last time. In all fairness, the article only claims to have found free will's "center" in two places (neat trick, that).

Request for info

Jonathan Matheson just wrote me an email requesting that I ask the Garden community for help finding publications on the epistemic condition on moral responsibility.  So here I am.  Garden, what've you got?

Three off the top of my head -- Carl Ginet has a Nous article called "The Epistemic Requirements for Moral Responsibility", Manual Vargas has his paper on tracing and the epistemic requirement in Midwest Studies, and I believe Eddy Nahmias's dissertation was on this topic, though I'm not sure whether there are any associated publications.

Deaths in the greater free will community

Benjamin Libet recently passed away. An obituary can be found here.

And, if you didn't already hear the very sad news, Susan Hurley recently passed away as well. No obituaries seem to be up yet, but here's a link to the announcement on the Leiter Reports.

Morality without responsibility

I have posted a draft of a piece on morality without responsibility on the SSRN site (--the abstract-and-download site recently described by Brian Leiter).   Comments and suggestions would be deeply appreciated.

Freegulls, Unfree 16-year-olds, Free Robots?

First, you must all take note that one of our own, Tamler (one-m) Sommers, is now one of the "world's leading thinkers" (along with 39 others who argue for The Myth of Free Will).  Tom Clark is there too!  Unlike humans, but like fruit flies, I think the seagulls on the cover are supposed to have free will.

Second, here's the the Allstate ad I mentioned:  "Even bright, mature teenagers sometimes do things that are “stupid.” But when that happens, it’s not really their fault. It’s because their brain hasn’t finished developing. The underdeveloped area is called the dorsal lateral prefrontal cortex. It plays a critical role in decision making, problem solving and understanding future consequences of today’s actions. Problem is, it won’t be fully mature until they’re into their 20s."  I am currently trying to use this quote to illustrate everything that is both right and wrong about discussions of free will and responsibility.

Third, I'm looking for help finding a good reading (preferably a short story) about a robot being put on trial for a crime (does it have free will?).  I use trials in my intro class (e.g., Trial of God for suffering, Trial of rich American, using Singer's arguments), and this semester I want to add a Trial of the Robot (is it responsible or his creator or both for a murder or something, etc.).  Any suggestions?

More on science and free will

Some empirical evidence that the belief in free will affects behavior:

    Belief in free will can be manipulated with methods developed by Vohs and Schooler (2007). These researchers had some participants read an essay by a well known scientist (Francis Crick, a Nobel laureate) rejecting and indeed mocking the notion of free will. Others read a neutral essay. Another manipulation involved a procedure in which participants read aloud a series of statements emphasizing either freedom of action or lack of freedom and determinism. In those studies, participants who had been induced to disbelieve in free will were later more willing than controls to cheat on a test.
    Likewise, manipulations of belief in free will have been shown by Baumeister, Masicampo, and DeWall (2006) to affect other social behaviors. Participants who had been led to disbelieve in free will were significantly more aggressive and less helpful toward others.
    We are not suggesting that these studies be taken as proof of the existence of free will. Nevertheless, taken together, these findings indicate that not only is the belief in free will normative, but it is also socially beneficial. Undermining that belief leads to an increase in antisocial actions (cheating and aggression) and a reduction in socially desirable behavior (helping).
    Also, in these studies, manipulations aimed at promoting belief in free will typically yielded results identical to neutral controls, which suggests that encouraging people to believe in free will simply reaffirms their ordinary state. That is, people normally believe in free will, and getting them to disbelieve in it is the departure from normal. This pattern indicates that belief in free will is woven into the fabric of everyday social life and the assumptions according to which people perceive and interact with each other.

[from Baumeister, Sparks, Stillman and Vohs (forthcoming) Free Will in Consumer Behavior: Rational Choice and Self-Control. Journal of Consumer Psychology]

Some necessary caveats: the notion of free will that was manipulated was almost certainly some kind of contracausal notion (it’s hard to be sure; both the studies cited are unpublished). The authors of this paper note that many philosophers are compatibilists, but having noted it they seem immediately to forget it. Second, we need to distinguish the following two situations: shaking belief in free will affects behavior (for the worse) and shaking belief in a cherished notion affects behavior (for the worse). Still, some very interesting results for optimistic disbelievers in free will to mull over.

Physics, Free Will, Nobel Prizes

Check out this article for physicists, free will, and fun for everyone. It starts in an extremely promising fashion- you will have to excuse me while wait by my phone for the big news, though maybe Jack Smart already got the call- but then it deteriorates from that splendid beginning.