The Consequence Argument

Why do some philosophers take the Consequence Argument (CA) seriously, whereas others do not?  This does not correlate (perfectly) with whether a philosopher is a compatibilist (either a traditional compatibilist or a semicompatibilist), incompatibilist, or skeptic.  Also, it does not seem to me that it is a matter of whether a philosopher is primarily interested in "metaphysics" or "ethics".  After all, all of us writing about moral responsibility are concerned with the appropriate conditions for praise, blame, reactive attitudes, punishment, and so forth. 

Some philosophers simply ignore the CA or shunt it quickly to the side, whereas others take it as something that must be dealt with, one way or another.  Why the difference?  Also, is it ok simply to ignore or dismiss the CA?

Comments

[Justin Capes]

Hi John,

My suspicion is that whether one takes the CA seriously has to do with whether one is convinced by Frankfurt-style argument. It seems that most of those who take the CA seriously are those who are not convinced by Frankfurt-style cases. By contrast, it seems that, with a few exceptions perhaps, those who are convinced by Frankfurt-style cases are less inclined to worry about the CA.

If you don't think the ability to do otherwise is relevant to freedom or responsibility, it seems that you have much less reason to worry about the CA. If the argument is sound and if determinism is true, then no one is ever able to do otherwise. This might be significant for a number of reasons, but if what we really care about when it comes to free wil is moral responsibility, and if responsibility doesn't require the ability to do otherwise, then the CA, even if sound, doesn't touch the core of what we care about in the debate. On the other hand, if responsibility does require the ability to do otherwise, the CA seems much more relevant.

[John Fischer]

Justin,

Thanks very much for your post--I was beginning to feel ignored! One quick point, although you say there are exceptions, I am someone who is pretty much convinced by the Frankfurt-style argumentation, and yet I do take the CA very seriously, have written a lot about it, think it matters, etc.

Maybe I'm the exception that proves the rule? This would at least give my life a point...

[Kevin Timpe]

For a while, I've wondered if there are correlations between personality traits and how moved various individuals are by different parts of the debates: the CA, the Frankfurt-cases, the importance of free will, etc.... I think somebody should analyse us to find out.

I think you ask an excellent question, John.

[Kip]

John,

It would help me if you could give some specific examples of who you think gives the CA attention, and who gives it less emphasis.

I can only speculate, but I know that some philosophers have an attitude of "I'm going to develop a very precise argument, with very carefully chosen wording, and then defend it very rigorously." The CA seems to fit that style. Other philosophers seem to pay less attention to precise wording, and instead philosophize in a more general or abstract way. If that's right, then the latter kind of philosophers not might be very impressed by the consequence argument. They might feel that it involves a kind of word trickery. But I really don't know.

[Alan]

John, thanks for the post. The force of the CA depends on a deep sense about whether morally-significant freedom requires ability of either a mono- or dual- type. I think that what determines abilities in this regard often stands beyond the internal power signified by the word "ability"--what I would call as an external generalized "space" for the ability to operate in as an opportunity. Ordinary powers of movement have many opportunites in ordinary space given alternative motives to move or be still, but these are reduced to just one if you're in a form-fitting steel sarcophagus--you can just be still. Frankfurt's arguments get traction from the supposition that one might very well just subjectively want to be still in such a situation, and nothing more. So one might freely lie still in a subjective sense, but that leaves open a question of whether there is an objective sense of freedom that requires another opportunity--to move. And that seems to imply a dual-ability to brust out of the sarcophagus--something Superman has but I lack. So one could in an objective sense rule Superman as freely staying in the sarcophagus if he wants to, but not me--I stay there whether I want to or not.

I see your careful work as showing that reasons-responsiveness can be applied to the subjective perspective to exhibit the same kind of distinction I make about physical freedom. Actual sequences of subjective mental states are sufficiently free and responsible iff they satisfy counterfactual conditions of response to reasons. Thus the "space" required is relevantly modal and no less so epistemically than the modal space of the indeterminist to assess choices otherwise (but of course not with the additional indeterministic emphasis on the actual world's access to distinct possible worlds of future choice). Therefore determinism is consistent with modal dual-ability in the relevant epistemic sense.

So maybe in this indirect way you've worried about the dual-ability touted by the critical force of the CA--but credibly countered it.

[Justin Capes]

John,

I wrote the words "with a few exceptions perhaps" precisely with you in mind! So perhaps you could say more about why you concern yourself with the argument, given that you are convinced by Frankfurt-style argument. After all, if we can be free and responsible without the ability to do otherwise, the CA, even if sound, would not show that determinism and freedom/responsibility are incompatible. It would only show that determinism and freedom to do otherwise are incompatible. But why should that be a big deal, if ability to do otherwise isn't important for responsibility?

I think there are several interesting answers one might give to this last question, but I'd be interested to hear what you think.

[John Fischer]

Justin,

I think it is just interesting in itself whether we have freedom to do otherwise. Intuitively, this is a very powerful idea. I don't think all our worries come from issues pertaining to moral responsibility; we have an independent and natural interest in whether we have freedom in the sense of regulative control. In the end, I don't think this is required for moral responsibility. But that doesn't entail that it is not an important, pervasive, intuitive sense that most of use have (that we are sometimes at least genuinely free to do otherwise).

Of course, IF one's interest is primarily in moral responsiblity, and IF one accepts the Frankfurt-cases as refuting PAP, THEN the CA becomes considerably less interesting. But, in contrast, one might be interested in BOTH moral responsibility and the intuitive, natural view that we are sometimes at least free to do otherwise.

Also, I have never thought it intellectually reputable simply to DISMISS the history of arguments about logical fatalism, God's foreknowledge, and so forth. And those arguments have the same abstract structure as the CA (with perhaps some differences, although these are contentious).

Kip: off the top of my head, here are some Consequence Argument Deniers (Dismissers, Not-Taking-Seriouslyers): Gary Watson, Tim Scanlon, Suan Wolf, Michael Bratman, Daniel Dennett, Angela Smith, Pamela Hieronymi. Here are some CA Addressers (but not necessarily Accepters): Peter Van Inwagen, Carl Ginet, John Fischer, Robert Kane, J. Howard Sobel, Tim O'Connor, John Perry, David Lewis, Keith Lehrer. I guess Jay Wallace is somewhere in between,since he does address the CA but mainly in the Appendix to his book, but I think is heart is with the Deniers. I'm not sure what the principle of differentiation is. It might have something to do with Manuel Vargas' notions about the sociology of philosophy, rather than purely intellectual issues.

It is bizarre, though, isn't it, that some smart, important philosophers think that the CA is central to our cluster of issues, and others think it is absolutely irrelevant! It might be tempting to say that the Deniers tend to be interested primarily in ethical issues, whereas the Addressers are interested in metaphysical issues, but, as I said in my post, I think this is not quite right, and has led many toward various lamentable confusions.

[John Fischer]

Some more deniers: Hilary Bok (mostly, but not entirely), and Al Mele (although he does pause on certain occasions to accuse those of us who engage with it of various blunders!).

Al Mele is a salient counter-example to the contention that the CA Deniers tend to be on the "ethics" side, rather than the "metaphysics" side.

[Justin Coates]

John,

I suspect a philosopher's concern with the CA might have something to do with how concerned she is with skeptical arguments more generally. So I'd be willing to bet that there is a correlation between thinking it's okay to dismiss skepticism in epistemology and thinking it's okay to dismiss the CA. As you point out in TMoFW, there are some deep similarities between closure principles and the transfer principle that many versions of the CA rely on. Similarly, I suspect that those who worry about the CA are more likely to take other skeptical worries more seriously.

With that in mind, I have two hands...

[Justin Capes]

John,

I agree that there are many other interesting and important issues bound up in whether the CA is sound. I think some people tend to forget this.

Like Justin Coates, I too have two hands. I also have the ability to do otherwise (sometimes), but that's partly in virtue of the falsity of determinism!

[R. Clarke]

If the CA shows that, given determinism, it's never up to us whether we do what we do, and if we can hardly shake the conviction that this IS generally up to us, that would be rather important, even if it has no bearing on responsibility.

[Eddy Nahmias]

I count myself as a compatibilist who has taken the CA seriously (alas, my only attempt to do so in print has never made it to print, but I'm trying to say something in my book). But this is mainly because I am convinced that there is something wrong with it and I don't want it to convince anyone otherwise. In the end, I think it is very effective at highlighting two features of the debate:

1. Every incompatibilist argument (including G. Strawson's and manipulation arguments) is going to require a Transfer principle (something like Beta).

2. Determinism clearly precludes the *unconditional* ability to do otherwise (i.e., holding fixed every detail about the state of the universe, including the laws).

What 2 teaches us is that compatibilists should obviously argue that free will does *not* require the *unconditional* ability to do otherwise. While Frankfurt cases are one way to make this point, I think it confuses things to say that F-cases show FW and MR do not require alternative possibilites or the ability to do otherwise. Better to say what all compatibilists should say--that FW and MR *do* require the ability to do (or choose) otherwise (ACO), but not the unconditional ACO. However, compatibilists should *not* then go on to offer *conditional* analyses of ACO, because analyses will generally fail and compatibilists should not feel the need to take on this burden. Rather, they should simply say that, if determinism is true, an agent could have done otherwise only if the past had been different (or the laws). (Saying this is consistent with saying that the relevant ACO can be understood in terms of agents' possessing certain capacities and being in a position to exercise those capacities.) And compatibilists should be happy to say that, since it's entirely plausible to think (as we seem to about most events) that if something had been different at one time, then something would have had to be different at earlier times. Why think there is this one little sliver of the universe (human free actions) that requires a whole different way of understanding (and a whole different metaphysics for) how things might have happened (or might happen) differently than they actually do?

Regarding the transfer principles (point 1 above)--such as Beta or the more generic [If A played no role in bringing about X (is not responsible for X, has no choice about X), and X is all there is that explains Y (deterministically or indeterministically), then A played/plays no role in bringing about Y (is not responsible for Y, has no choice about Y)]--I think the CA helps us see that *if* we accept such a principle, then ain't nothing or nobody gonna have free will or responsibility (not us, not agent causes, not angels, not God), as van Inwagen recognizes in Mystery of Metaphysical Freedom and G. Strawson's BA suggests. And to me that suggests that such a principle has little going for it (what exactly is supposed to motivate it?). In this sense, it may be like closure principles in epistemology--if they are so strong that they make *any* knowledge impossible, why exactly should we accept them?

It is a bit weird to think that people's psychology would influence whether or not they think the unconditional ability to do otherwise is crucial for FW/MR or whether or not transfer principles are plausible, but I actually think some of my data on the folk may suggest this. And we'll keep analyzing our data on the trained philosophers.

[Justin Capes]

Eddy,

Wouldn't the following give us at least some reason to accept the relevant transfer principles: they give us the right result in lots of cases and are not subject to counterexamples?

[John Fischer]

When the Justins gang up on one, one knows one is in trouble.

Right, I also have two hands, which I'm putting to good use right now at the computer. But here's a puzzle: I think it is pretty much equally clear and uncontroversial that I don't now have any control (of the relevant sort) over the laws of nature and the past. So, for example, although I can continue to use those trusty hands to type at my computer, it seems to me pretty clear that I cannot move them in such a way that, if I were to do so, some actual law of nature would not be a law of nature, or some feature of the past (say, that John F. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963) would not have been a fact about the past.

I suppose any good skeptical argument gets its claws in us, if it does at all, by invoking intuitively plausible notions. The CA is no different in this respect.

Eddy:

I do not believe that all versions of the CA require a transfer or transfer-like principle. I've argued for this in various places, including (with Mark Ravizza), "Free Will and the Modal Principle", in Phil. Studies.

[Kip]

John,

Thank you for reminding me about Vargas's ideas about the sociology of philosophy (which you can find here). That is exactly the distinction I was trying to make. I did not mean to imply that the ideas originated with me.

[Kip]

Two comments for Eddy:

Why think there is this one little sliver of the universe (human free actions) that requires a whole different way of understanding (and a whole different metaphysics for) how things might have happened (or might happen) differently than they actually do?

I'm really surprised that you could ask that. About 1/3 of the parties to the debate (libertarians, at least agent-causal libertarians) *do* believe that. And I bet that number is *much* higher once you considered the folk psychology of normal people, uneducated about philosophy, and influenced by religious beliefs (about souls, etc.).

There is a long and distinguished history of thinking that humans are unique and special exceptions to the general scientific understanding of the world. That's why Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake. That's why Darwin's ideas are still met by fervent opposition today, 150 years later.

Why would people want to be exceptions to a deterministic causal order? Because it implies that people cannot change their fates; their fates have been fixed since their birth, since the birth of the universe. And, as is well known in the psychology literature, humans feel an overwhelming need to keep their options open and to control their environments. To the extent that determinism implies that their options are limited to one and that they have no ultimate control, they will find the idea of determinism to be extremely disturbing.

I think the CA helps us see that *if* we accept such a principle, then ain't nothing or nobody gonna have free will or responsibility (not us, not agent causes, not angels, not God), as van Inwagen recognizes in Mystery of Metaphysical Freedom and G. Strawson's BA suggests. And to me that suggests that such a principle has little going for it (what exactly is supposed to motivate it?).

You seem to be evaluating the CA in terms of the desirability, or at least the popularity, of its outcome. That strikes me as outcome bias. Whether the CA leads to a desirable outcome is irrelevant; whether the CA leads to a popular outcome is irrelevant. By that logic, we would still believe that the sun revolves around the earth, and that humans were specially created by God instead of evolving from primate ancestors. Both heliocentricism and evolution were considered extremely undesirable and unpopular. But they were both true. In fact, the reason we are so impressed by Copernicus and Darwin, is that they helped show how our previous view of the world, where everything we desired was kept safe, was actually false. They saw through the wishful thinking that blinded everyone else.

In evaluating the Consequence Argument, or any similar argument (the Basic Argument), we should make room for the possibility that people like Van Inwagen are making a similarly revolution point. We shouldn't prejudice ourselves against their unpopular view simply because it is undesirable or unpopular. Sometimes the undesirable and unpopular view turns out to be right.

[Paul Torek]

Kip, I'd say that accepting or rejecting transfer principles is a matter of conceptual change or clarification, much more than empirical discovery. We can imagine (and have seen) experiments that basically force a conclusion about heliocentrism or evolution, but I can't imagine experiments to decide the transfer principles. Even if analytic/synthetic is a spectrum - it looks like we're near the analytic end here.

So I take Eddy's "such a principle has little going for it" comment to be about a balance of linguistic and/or conceptual intuitions. The principles viewed in their own right, without an eye to their implications, are plausible enough, but many of the intuitions that they contradict are even more plausible. If we are forced to clarify terms like "morally responsible" etc., we should do so with the least overall violence to our conceptual resources.

[James Gibson]

Kip,

Bruno was *not* burned at the stake because "there is a long a distinguished history of thinking that humans are unique and special exceptions to the general scientific understanding of the world." The Wikipedia article linked to, for instance, notes that his burning had nothing to do with his Copernicanism, which is taken from the SEP. I would suggest getting off Wikipedia and opening Francis Yate's book, Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition. Bruno got into trouble because of his Hermeticism.

Another historical blunder: you say that Copernicus was able to see though the wishful thinking that humans are at the center. First, Copernicus, like any good astronomer before Newton, had studied Ptolemy, and had a deep respect for him intellectually. Why did Copernicus disagree? Because he thought, like you, that Ptolemy, Aristotle, and co. believed human beings are at the center because they wanted to think they were special? Hardly. Read Ptolemy's Almagest, even the Preface will do. Copernicus didn't offer his heliocentric view because he was trying to overcome wishful thought. He thought his heliocentric model was mathematically simpler, and thus preferable to Ptolemy's view. He also (contrary to Osiander's introduction) happened to be a realist, which made it hard to accept Ptolemy's models of eccentrics, epicycles, and planets moving around an equant.

Did people disagree with Copernicus because of their deep desire to keep a geocentric/human centered view? Nope. There were a lot of issues Copernicus needed to deal with (e.g. the problem of stellar parallax; the issues concerning relative motion).

Sorry to bring this off the topic of the CA. But as long as people are going to offer historical explanations for how people have held illusory views due to some deep-seated irrationality, let's at least get our history of science correct.

[Justin Capes]

Paul,

You say: "many of the intuitions [the transfer principles] contradict are even more plausible."

Which intuitions are these exactly? Surely you don't mean intuitions people may have that we have free will, the ability to do otherwise or are morally responsible. Because the principles do not contradict those intuitions. Here's proof: lots of us who accept the validity of certain transfer principles also believe in free will, the ability to do otherwise (if PvI is right these are the same thing) and moral responsibility.

Perhaps you meant intuitions about individual cases. But then it just sounds like you're among those who think there are counterexamples to the relevant principles.

Finally, there's this claim, which is perhaps what Eddy has in mind: you might think that there are good reasons in favor of compatibilism, so good, in fact, that they significantly "outweigh" the intuitive plausibility of the transfer principles.

[Dan Speak]

Thanks for raising this John! And thanks also to everyone commenting. I'm trying to write up a sympathetic assessment of the recent work on the CA for the new oxford handbook. This discussion is helping me think through some of the issues.

I'm especially intrigued, Eddy, by your sense that (making strange bedfellows with PvI) all incompatibilist args will depend on a transfer principle (like beta). John has come to his own defense and I'll be interested to hear what you have to say about his Basic Argument. But I'll add that Fritz Warfield has formulated an incompatibilist argument that he also claims depends on no transfer principle (in his 2000 phil perspectives contribution). Of course, I don't expect you to go through all the arguments and show us how each depends on a transfer principle. But I do wonder if you've got some more general intuition or argument that animates your suspicion.

[Kip]

James:

It is entirely possible that I made "blunders" in talking about the history of science.

I'm not yet convinced, though, that the issues are as clear cut as you make them. For example, the Wikipedia article on Bruno says that some people regard Bruno as a martyr for science while "others oppose that view." Similarly, your comments about Copernicus don't persuade me from the view that there was tremendous opposition for heliocentricism because of wishful thinking.

Even if I am wrong about all of that, though, my more general point stands. I was being dramatic to make a point, and maybe I betrayed my ignorance of the history of science in doing so. But the point I was trying to make is simply that there is a long and distinguished tradition of humans believing they are unique and special in the world. I don't need to rely on the details about Bruno and Copernicus to make that point (and I wouldn't have, if I had predicted that it would ruffle feathers).

To support that point, without relying on controversial examples, just consider this quotation from Stephen J. Gould:

"The most important scientific revolutions all include, as their common feature, the dethronement of human arrogance from one pedestal after another of previous convictions about our centrality in the cosmos."

That is the general point I am making, regardless of whether Bruno was burned for his heliocentricism. I am simply suggesting that, like Copernicus and Darwin, perhaps The Consequence Argument and Strawson's Basic Argument are dethroning another aspect of our human arrogance, our belief in free will.

[Kip]

Paul,

The analytic-ness of a proposition doesn't mean it's ok to evaluate it in terms of the undesirability and unpopularity of its outcome.

Consider: Suppose that unstoppable terrorists believe that, if 2+2=4, then they will destroy the entire world. We do the math and realize, damn, 2+2=4. We don't want 2+2=4, because we don't want the world to blow up, and so don't want to agree that 2+2=4. We're tempted to say that the proposition has nothing going for it. We're tempted to redefine "2" or "4." But all of this is wrong, if we are interested in the truth. The truth is that 2+2=4.

The general point is that the undesirability and unpopularity of a proposition's outcome doesn't say anything about the proposition's truth. It certainly shouldn't prejudice us against the proposition. There can be revolutions about analytic matters, just as there can be revolutions about scientific matters. If everyone believes that 2+2=5, eventually someone should be able to say "no, it doesn't."

[Eddy Nahmias]

John and Dan, thanks for the cites. I've read Fritz's article and need to think more about it (it's a doozy). I hadn't read John's and am now trying to think more about what I think of the Conditional Argument. I am inclined to think that, like the Con Arg, it illuminates that compatibilists must, of course, accept this claim
DIF: If determinism is true and A does X at t, then had A done ~X at t, either the past would have been different, the laws would be different, or (what no one seems to mention) indeterminism would have been true.

And so the compatibilist must accept that, if it is possible for A to do ~X at t, then it is possible that the past or the laws are different (or indeterminism is true). I certainly accept this. So, then it looks like everything turns on how one understands claims about the "fixity of the past" and "fixity of the laws". Since determinism clearly does not mean that the past and laws are fixed in the sense that they are necessary--i.e., in deterministic universes, it is still true that the past could have been different and the laws could have been different--these fixity claims must mean something more like NP or NL (i.e., no one can do anything at t such that events prior to t are different or such that the laws are different). But then I wonder what the non-question-begging argument for NP and NL is such that it doesn't bring in a Transfer principle.

If one accepts DIF, one should think NP or NL just mean something like: A could have done ~X and if A had done ~X, then the past would have been different or the laws would have been different, so the past and laws are *not* fixed. In order to make it look crazy that one can do anything about the past and laws, I think you have to bring in a Transfer principle so that it looks like the power to do ~X involves a power to change the actual past or actual laws.

Kip, I certainly think humans are special--we have capacities for envisioning future (and past) possibilities and for considering reasons and for controlling ourselves that, as far as I can tell, are substantially different in degree than anything else in the universe. What I don't see (and don't think the folk are as committed to as you think) is why this specialness requires that we have supra-natural powers (i.e., metaphysical powers above or outside the processes and laws that govern the rest of the universe). The religious issues are complicated, but it's not clear that most people's religious beliefs commit them to metaphysically rich theories about non-physical souls or agent-causal powers.

And I am not suggesting that Transfer principles are false because they lead to an undesirable or unpopular conclusion--i.e., that we lack free will. Rather, I am suggesting that they are false because the only thing I can see that grounds their truth (i.e., their supposed intuitive plausibility and, which I dispute) is weaker than the various grounds for the claim that it is at least *possible* that humans (or some agents) have free will. (Of course, this last claim requires that Transfer principles lead to the conclusion that free will is impossible).

[R. Clarke]

Eddie, are you saying that defense of NL requires appeal to a transfer principle like beta? That doesn't seem right. One might simply appeal to the nature of laws. E.g., if laws simply summarize powers, and each property is essentially certain powers, then it certainly seems that it isn't up to us what the laws are.

[Kip]

Eddy,

I certainly think humans are special--we have capacities for envisioning future (and past) possibilities and for considering reasons and for controlling ourselves that, as far as I can tell, are substantially different in degree than anything else in the universe. What I don't see (and don't think the folk are as committed to as you think) is why this specialness requires that we have supra-natural powers (i.e., metaphysical powers above or outside the processes and laws that govern the rest of the universe). The religious issues are complicated, but it's not clear that most people's religious beliefs commit them to metaphysically rich theories about non-physical souls or agent-causal powers.

Of course, I agree:

1. that humans are special in the way you mention;
2. that there is no need for humans to have magical powers to be special in that way;
3. that it's not clear (there is no hard evidence available) that people are committed to believing in a magical kind of self-creation.

What I took issue with, in your previous comment, is the suggestion that libertarianism is unmotivated. Or that only crazy people would believe in it. You didn't use those words, of course, but that was the implication I got. You wrote:

Why think there is this one little sliver of the universe (human free actions) that requires a whole different way of understanding (and a whole different metaphysics for) how things might have happened (or might happen) differently than they actually do?

Now, we can both agree that libertarianism is wrong. But I think it's important to understand why people believe in libertarianism, why they want it to be true. Your question above is rhetorical: you imply that there is no answer. But I think it's important that we have an answer to the question, that we can empathize with libertarians enough to understand why they believe in libertarian free will.

And I am not suggesting that Transfer principles are false because they lead to an undesirable or unpopular conclusion--i.e., that we lack free will. Rather, I am suggesting that they are false because the only thing I can see that grounds their truth (i.e., their supposed intuitive plausibility and, which I dispute) is weaker than the various grounds for the claim that it is at least *possible* that humans (or some agents) have free will. (Of course, this last claim requires that Transfer principles lead to the conclusion that free will is impossible).

1. What are these various grounds that are stronger than the transfer principles?
2. To be fair, your previous comment did not mention any other grounds. You wrote:

I think the CA helps us see that *if* we accept such a principle, then ain't nothing or nobody gonna have free will or responsibility (not us, not agent causes, not angels, not God), as van Inwagen recognizes in Mystery of Metaphysical Freedom and G. Strawson's BA suggests. And to me that suggests that such a principle has little going for it (what exactly is supposed to motivate it?).

That is:

1. P leads to no-free-will;
2. Therefore, P's got very little going for it.

Which, to me, seems to completely beg the question. By the above logic, arguments that lead to the denial of free will won't ever get a chance with you, because the fact that they lead to the denial of free will itself counts against those arguments. That just seems unfair to me.

[Eddy Nahmias]

Hi Randy (with a y), well, I wrote that last post quickly but I think I meant it (I think I'm just channeling Lewis). Sticking with laws (though, like John Perry, I prefer to think the past is the better way to go), let me suggest ~NL1 = For some act X that A performs, A could have done ~X, such that if A had done ~X, then the laws would have been different than they actually were. I'm suggesting ~NL is not crazy.

What's crazy is ~NL2 = Some law is up to us (or some law is in our control, or A could do something to falsify some law). And then I was thinking that to get from the plausible NL2 to the controversial NL1 would require using a Transfer principle. But let me think more about how to explain why.

Kip, you're quoting me a lot but what I say does not suggest what you say it does. My question about why humans' ability to do otherwise should be understood as different in (metaphysical) kind that other things' abilities to do otherwise was just that--a question for libertarians, not a claim that their view is unmotivated.

And my argument against Transfer principles should look more like this:
1. T entails that free will is *impossible* for any possible being. (controversial claim followed by some unstated premises)
2. Therefore, T requires some serious motivation.
And then the missing premise(s) involve things like it's implausible to think that people regularly employ concepts regarding conceptually impossible things (and, no, I don't think people have a conception of God that is metaphysically robust enough to be conceptually impossible), or it's implausible to think that our concepts of free will or desert (or knowledge) cannot refer to anything when we use them to make so many effective distinctions. Or something along those lines.

[Kip]

Eddy,

Sorry, I don't mean to derail the thread or to attack a straw man. I think it's important to try to empathize with libertarians to understand why they believe what they do.

I'll reply to your other points in an email.

[Dan Speak]

Hi Eddy,

Following up just a bit. I've been thinking of characterizing resistance to the Consequence Argument like this:

Beta Blocking-- efforts to show that the transfer principle leads to invalid inferences.

Finessing Fixity-- efforts to show that one or more of the fixity principles (NL or NP) out to be understood in compatiblist-friendly terms.

What's puzzling me, Eddy, is that your beta blocking intuitions turn on your attraction to finessed fixity principles. At least initially, I've been thinking of these as independent lines of response to the CA. And partly for the following reason: challenges to the transfer principle look like challenges to the validity of the CA. But challenges to NP or NL look to be challenges to the soundness of the CA.

So, I guess I'm wondering if (in your Lewisian mode) you are really resisting the validity of beta or if, instead, you are simple denying one of the fixity principles. I mean, couldn't your point about NL be made while accepting the validity of Transfer?

Your treatment suggests that there is some intimate relationship between transfer(beta) and the fixity principles... and I don't yet see it.

Help me help you help me.

[R. Clarke]

Edd,
ie? y?
Rand

[Philoponus]

Some people reject the CA because they believe the connection it alleges cannot be right. Our ordinary judgments of ability and responsibility cannot be regarded as hostage to recondite issues about the laws of physics. I know I have certain abilities and I know I should be held responsible for (most of) the choices I make. By contrast, I have no idea whether the laws of quantum mechanic allow for meaningfully indeterministic descriptions of macro-events like my choices. I leave this to the physicists to debate, if they care to. I am not competent to make such judgments, but those judgments and that whole debate, I am certain, have nothing to do with my competence here and now to make judgments about our abilities and responsibilities.

An example, if I may. I failed to show up this morning to take my mother to an important medical appointment and that had some serious consequences. The reason I don’t show up is that several hours before I went for bike ride in the desert and got stranded. I got stranded because of a series of improbable mishaps whose joint improbability is unbelievably small. Am I responsible for causing my mother to her important appointment? I don’t want to say that I should have foreseen all the problems in the desert, but there is something else I obviously could have done: I could have arranged with a neighbor to back me up in case something very strange happened. I could have, I was able to, but didn’t. I conclude I have no excuse and I’m responsible.

But wait, I’ve failed to consult physicists about an indeterministic solution to the choices I made this morning. Probably they will tell me that there was no such solution to be had. So I guess everything I did “I had to do” and I was not “able” to do anything else. I’m off the hook and not responsible!

That response is either ludicrous or despicable. There are absolutely no grounds for doubting that I was able to make other arrangements this morning. I conclude that I was responsible because I fail to do something I obviously should have done. I do not, however, draw the further conclusion (via the CS) that my being responsible in cases like this shows the universe is meaningfully indetereministic! The CS would license this inference. I conclude instead that the CS fundamentally misunderstands ability and responsibility.

[Mark Smeltzer]

John,

I wanted to note that there is also a historical/psychological component to the Deniers/Acceptors distinction.

Early on in my philosophical "career", I was very intrigued by the consequence argument and was in the Acceptors camp for two main reasons: 1) I found that I had a tough time accepting the consequence argument (because something didn't seem right about it) and 2) I had a tough time setting it aside (because there was something that seemed right about it).

Later on in my "career", I have very little interest in the CA because I have moved on -- through much effort and study of those who came before me (your own works were very instructive here!), I became satified that I had a reasonable explanation for what the CA got wrong and what it got right. I'd say this was Heidegger-esque experience: a kind of synthesis was born. The internal conflict resolved, the CA itself lost its luster.

Now there are other conflicts that have my attention. This sort of internal struggle may play an overdetermining role on which issues we choose to focus on. It seems entirely plausible that some people never experience the kind of internal turmoil over the CA that I experienced and never find themselves in the Acceptors camp.

Also, I find no further reason to think that residence in either camp is not transitory -- one may find oneself in either camp at any given time. Moreover, if we measure based on the number of published papers/books on the relevant subjects, we may gleen false conclusions: perhaps Al Mele, or Susan Wolf, or Bratman are actually very interested in the CA but choose not to publish on it for various reasons.

[Sofia Jeppsson]

Years ago I thought the consequence argument was really interesting, but since then I've lost the ability to understand what the involved sentences mean. So even if the argument is logically sound, I no longer know what it's about.
Take this formulation that ends up "if determinism is true, nobody ever has a choice about anything". What does the word "choice" mean in this context? I've realized that frankly, I have no idea. Normally a choice is some kind of mental event or perhaps a speech act where you pick something from a number of alternatives you previously thought about or looked at. But clearly these events can happen in a deterministic universe. So "choice" must refer to something else in this context, but what? I can have a TERRIBLY vague intuition of its meaning, but it's impossible to articulate and sort of evaporates when I try to focus on it mentally.
The same goes for formulations like "nobody could have done otherwise". Sure we can use words like "can" or "could" in various tenses in everyday language, and we're pretty much aware of the kind of circumstances that makes it the case that somebody cannot do a certain thing. I can't run as fast as Usain Bolt for example, I don't have his leg muscles etc, but I can run at a more moderate speed as long as no injury, physical obstacle, psychological compulsion or the like stops me. If someone says that if determinism is true I can only run when I actually do run, and when I'm not running then I can't run either, I don't even know what sort of limitation this is supposed to describe.

This fact about me could be analyzed in at least two different ways though. Either I just THOUGHT I understood the consequence argument and similar other arguments years ago, but actually I just hadn't considered them enough, hadn't yet realized that there is a problem in explaining exactly what one MEANS by "if determinism is true nobody ever has a choice about anything" and similar statements. Or I did understand things perfectly back then, but many years of philosophy have somehow eroded some linguistic and/or metaphysical intuitions I once had.

Is there any way at all to EXPLAIN what "...nobody ever has a choice..." and the like means, without just going round in circles by explaining "having a choice" in terms of "can", and "can" in terms of "being ultimately up to me", and "being ultimately up to me" in terms of "having a choice" etc? Or do you need to have a brute intuition about the meaning of these words, and if you don't that's it? I suspect the latter, but in that case I think the consequence argument will forever be hopelessly lost on me.

[Paul Torek]

Justin,

When I referred to intuitions that the transfer principles contradict, I had in mind Eddy's claim (which he's since elaborated) that given those principles, free will is metaphysically impossible. The claim that FW is possible is more intuitive than the transfer principles, I'm thinking.

But the argument sketched by Philoponus (1st paragraph) is nearer and dearer to my heart. In a way, this does amount to my being "among those who think there are counterexamples to the relevant principles." I just think the counterexamples are extremely near to hand.

[Justin Capes]

Paul,

Whether the transfer principles imply that free will is metaphysically impossible is, of course, controversial. Traditional libertarians will dispute the claim, since we accept the transfer principles but also accept that we have free will. Perhaps, then, the disagreement between us comes down to the question of whether indeterminism + transfer principles entails no freedom.

As to the comments in Philoponus's 1st paragraph. I partly agree. I believe, justifiably, I think, that I have the ability to do otherwise and that I am sometimes morally responsible. But, again, belief in free will and responsibility seem consistent with the transfer principles (assuming that, together with indeterminism, they don't imply no free will). Nor are incompatibilists, per se, committed to the view (implicitly attributed to them by philoponus?) that discoveries in physics would force a change in our views about the existence of freedom and responsibility. Just think of van Inwagen. He says if physicists told us determinism is true, then he'd reject the transfer principles and become a compatibilist! But that in itself is no reason to abandon the transfer principles . It's only to say IF there were good evidence of determinism THEN (given the truth of the other premises in the CA) we would have reason to abandon the principles.

[Mark Smeltzer]

Justin (Capes),

Van Inwagen is worried about more than just the possibility of a band of physicists asserting that determinism is true (which is impossible to formally prove/disprove anyway, but I do think it might be possible to present a body of evidence that would render belief in the one or the other hopelessly irrational)... Van Inwagen is also worried about what to make of the Mind argument.

In Van Inwagen's infamous book on the CA, he does make the comment that you attribute to him, but he also goes on to develop an argument that concludes that free choices are impossible if the transfer principles in the CA are true.

When faced with this dilemma, Van Inwagen's personal choice is to choose to accept the CA and ignore the Mind argument. He does ellucidate his reasons, but this is what he is doing. If he finds it intellectually satisfying, then why not? As for the rest of us, there are at least some who don't find the same comfort in that tenuous position.

Moreover, there are ways of making the Mind argument far stronger than the version that troubled Van Inwagen. I am sure that Eddy and Paul have something along those lines in mind when they speak of the impossibility regarding the compatibility of the transfer principles in the CA and free choices.

[R. Clarke]

Sofia,

Here's a self-report: I commonly think that whether I'll do such-and-such at some future time is up to me. While I'd be hard pressed to give you a philosophical analysis of what it is for it to be up to me whether P, I wouldn't say that I have no idea what this comes to.

And now, it seems to me that it isn't up to me whether the things that are the laws of nature are the laws, and it seems that it isn't up to me (now) whether the things that happened in the past happened. A transfer principle stated in terms of 'not up to me whether' also seems rather plausible.

But I grant that there's work to do if we're to settle whether these things are really so.

[John Fischer]

How come I always agree with Randy Clarke? This makes me worry about the truth of Semicompatibilism...

Anyway, Sofia, I agree with Randy that we have a tolerably clear idea of what it it is for it to be up to me whether P. Also, you ask what "choice" means in PvI's phrase, "having a choice about P". You point out that one could presumably make a choice in a causally deterministic context. Right, but the phrase has to be interpreted as a whole. One could presumably make a choice without HAVING a choice. I take it that if one has a choice about P, it is up to one whether P. Further, if one has a choice about P and brings it about that P, then one could have refrained from bringing it about that P. And, as PvI emphasized, even if we don't have a reductive analysis of the "could" in question or the phrase, "has a choice about P", we do have a tolerably clear understanding of these notions.

Hey, Justin Capes, was that a typo--did you mean to say PvI's book is "famous" [rather than infamous]???

[Justin Capes]

John,

I believe that was Paul who made the remark about An Essay on Free Will being infamous.

Question to any and all takers:

What CA-relevant issues still need to be worked out and which have pretty much come to a standstill? Beta-like principles? Laws of nature? Ability?

[John Fischer]

Yikes, Justin, sorry: I wish I could take it back, but ... well,.. er one can't change the past.

I think this has been resolved, but others might not agree (!). I have contended, and Sobel has provided the supporting argumentation, that the CA does not depend on transfer-like or Beta-like modal principles. Of course, as Dan points out that Fritz has recently argued, the CA CAN be formulated with a modal principle. That is not my point; my point is that it NEED NOT be. I have presented what I call the BASIC VERSION of the CA in my [INFAMOUS] book, The Metaphysics of Free Will, and I and Mark Ravizza have further argued for this position in our Phil. Studies article, "Free Will and the Modal Principle".

[Justin Capes]

Mark,

To be sure, van Inwagen is not just worried about determinism, but that doesn't negate anything I said in response to Paul, does it? My point was just this: neither accepting the transfer principles nor being an incompatibilist by itself commits one to the view that empirical discoveries would undermine belief in free will.

By the way, I think van Inwagen does make clear (at least in rough outline) his reasons for accepting the CA and rejecting the Mind argument. We have a set of propositions (the free will thesis, the premises of the CA and the premises of the Mind argument) that all seem true but are jointly inconistent. So we have to reject at least one of them. The least plausible (though still quite plausible) on van Inwagen's view, is a premise of the Mind argument, so he rejects it, even though he can't see just why it is false or how it could be false.

[Sofia Jeppsson]

John and Randy: What you basically say is confirming my worry. One must have some kind of intuition from the start of what the "could" or "up to me" means in this context. And this intuition is something I think I once had, but then lost over the years.

And of course I like to think that this intuition was muddled to start with, and that I lost it because I had started to think more clearly, so good riddance. ;-) But that I like to think so is of course no evidence of it being true. *S*

[Sofia Jeppsson]

I've been given this matter some more thought, some serious thought. If we assume that the consequence argument is sound, I think that I made a mistake when I cared about it years ago, since I don't have reason to. But other people might have. It depends on your intuitions and personal experiences.

I think that when I earlier cared about such arguments, I realised on an intellectual level that determinism in itself cannot stop you from doing otherwise by putting up something like physical obstacles around you, or causing psychological compulsion. Yet I think that on some subconscious level I still had these things mixed up.

Much later I started to carefully scrutinize my intuitions on this point. So, determinism cannot mean that I'm unable to think through various actions, decide on one, and then do it. It cannot mean that I'm unable to decide based on rational judgements. It cannot mean that my "self" (however "self" is defined)lacks the power to influence my actions, since they are INSTEAD determined by the past and the laws of nature. Something being caused by the distant past and the laws of nature is of course compatible with saying that all more immediate causes comes from "myself". And it cannot mean that I am unable to do otherwise because some weird psychological force or some external obstacle would barge in and force me back in line if I tried to make the "wrong" choice.
So exactly what capacity is it that I presumably lack if determinism is true? I realized I have no idea. I can't grasp a notion of "can" that goes beyond anything that can be accounted for in compatibilist terms. So saying that if determinism is true, I lack this particular capacity, is to me just like saying that if determinism is true, I don't have xplr. And then, when I ask what xplr is, just go "Well you know, it's this thing that's incompatible with determinism and that many people think is tied to moral responsibility and is really important. You know, xplr!". No, I don't know. I'm not gonna claim that xplr is objectively unimportant. I'm just gonna make the weaker claim that if I have no idea what it is, and if I have no idea how my life would be different if I had it, or how the world would be different whether people in general had it or not, I can't possibly care about it either.

But other people (John, Randy and presumably many others) might have a clear linguistic intuition as to what this special "can" means. Just because they can't explain it to someone like me, doesn't mean they don't know themselves what it means. And knowing what it means might also make you see what's so important about it.
Some people presumably also have a strong experience of having this capacity. They may experience doing things where they exercise it. I can't say I've had this experience myself... Of course I've experienced choosing things or doing things or causing things on numerous occassions, but I can't say (and I know I echo Mele here) that I've ever experienced choosing or doing in exactly this manner. But if one haven't just got a clear intuition of what "can" means in consequence and transfer style arguments, but also have a personal experience of it, I can see why one would find it important even if one is convinced by Frankfurt style cases that it doesn't matter for moral responsibility. One might simply find it interesting to know whether an experience one often has is about something real or an illusion.

So I conclude that the consequence argument and similar arguments, if sound, are interesting to people who have an intuition about what "can" (or "choice", or "control", or "up to me" etc)means in this context, and perhaps particularly interesting to people who also have a personal experience of this notion. But if one lacks these intuitions and experiences, I don't think there's any convincing argument to the effect that one still ought to care about it.

[Saul Smilansky]

The Consequence Argument is an attractive way of explaining the free will problem to people, but overall I think that it has been harmful to the debate. One can of course explain the FW problem without it (this has been done for some 2000 years): for example, by speaking about determinism in a world understood as a chain of causes, and then including people in it; or by asking what more in the end can there be in us except the results of our heredity and environment (including any urge to change or not to change ourselves); or by asking a person to think about the motivation set that led to some specific act, and then showing how it made the act in a way inevitable; or in other ways. The CA is useful as it sharpens things, and avoids the need to then spend time dealing with often irrelevant replies (e.g. explaining why indeterminism in itself doesn't help, so the fact that physicists have doubts about determinism does not mean that we don't have to take the free will problem seriously). So it is an attractive way of making an argument that is basically familiar.

The price, I think, is that it has made things seem much less messy than they are (this of course depends on how one thinks things are). I suspect that part of the attraction of the CA has been that it made it seem like we could make huge progress - and maybe even solve the damn thing - by doing logic. This has of course been particularly attractive to people who are good in doing logic.

But of course that hasn't worked. (And they don't come any smarter than David Lewis or Peter van Inwagen, so the problem isn't in how the game was played, but in what it was taken to be.) Compatibilists still keep on saying their thing, and incompatibilists theirs.

My view of the free will debate is that it is harmed by the tendency to think that the compatibility question is an either-or thing (hence my proposal of a Fundamental Dualism), and by the related but distinct idea that there is some magic formula. The CA has naturally strengthened these tendencies. I think that progress will be made by a long and difficult process of paying close attention to the complex ways in which (assuming for the sake of simplicity that there is no libertarian free will) both compatibilists and hard determinists are partly correct, and trying to figure out how we might integrate their distinctive insights. This needs to be done piecemeal in the context of the complexities of real life, say, asking about the relationship between control and fairness in economic life, or FW and punishment, or individual self-respect, and so on. So from my point of view the CA, while heuristically helpful in presenting the problem to the uninitiated, has been, overall, a philosophically unimportant but greatly misleading diversion.

[Eddy Nahmias]

Sofia, you nicely capture what I think drives most non-philosophers' supposed incompatibilist intuitions--the worry that determinism means that the self is "bypassed" and can't play the right role in choice and action. Since determinism does not mean that, these intuitions do not actually support incompatibilism, but rather a different worry (e.g., that our *compatibilist* capacities for self-critical rational deliberation and control are bypassed).

Saul, I like your interpretation. One question, though. You say the CA "avoids the need to then spend time dealing with often irrelevant replies (e.g. explaining why indeterminism in itself doesn't help, so the fact that physicists have doubts about determinism does not mean that we don't have to take the free will problem seriously)."

I don't see how the CA alone helps to clarify why indeterminism doesn't help. On the contrary, I think the CA has forced the focus onto determinism in a problematic way. After all, it is an argument specifically for the incompatibility of free will and *determinism*. Now, perhaps indeterminism could be seen to unhelpful if one takes the Mind argument to be sound, or if one believes, as I do, that the Transfer principles can be modified to show indeterminism would rule out free will if determinism does (i.e., Transfer implies free will is impossible). But PvI explicitly rejects these moves and pins his hopes on indeterminism (or some mystery that involves the falsity of determinism).

John, I am not convinced yet that CA works without transfer, but I'll keep thinking about it and looking at your arguments!

[Saul Smilansky]

Eddy,

I was just making a small "marketing" point there. In my experience, trying to explain the free will problem through determinism typically brings up questions about science, indeterminism, and so on. It's still not too difficult to explain the problem, but it takes longer. Indeterminism (like predictability, and other such issues) can be a tiresome red herring that it takes a while to pickle. If one instead askes "You agree that you cannot change the past, right? And the laws of nature? But these together brought us to over here...", then in my experience one can bypass some of the irrelevancies. That's the beauty of the argument. But then of course (as PVI admits) indeterminism needs to come in, otherwise if the CA works one ends up a hard determinist.

[Philoponus]

In a courtroom it not infrequently happens that the issue of someone’s ability to have done otherwise is raised. Likewise, his (legally enforceable) responsibility to have done otherwise. Though there are contentious cases, for the most it can be readily resolved, as an issue of fact, whether he could have and should have (at least tried to) do otherwise. I have never seen this happen, but I can imagine a truly desperate defense counsel standing up and saying something like, “Your honor, the defendant should not be held responsible for butchering the family of eight, and their dog & turtle, because in this deterministic universe it was not up to him…” At this point the counsel would be interrupted and summoned into chambers by the judge, who would firmly instruct him that kind of nonsense would be allowed in his courtroom. How deterministic or indeterministic the laws of physics may ultimately turn out to be has NOTHING to do with whether this defendant could have refrained from mass murder.

It is open to philosophers to argue, if they wish, that moral responsibility is a very different concept, and that its judgments are subject (a la the CS) to uncertain beliefs about the laws of physics, such that in the final analysis maybe I could only do what I did and I am responsible for nothing. I can only say that this view seem falsified on a daily basis by the unproblematic judgments of ability and responsibility we do make. I am certain, for example, that I had the ability to act otherwise this morning when I acted irresponsibly.

This may seem to some of you uncomfortably like GE Moore’s common sense defense of realism, but the point is ultimately about language and meaning of the concepts we employ. Doubts can be raised about my abilities and responsibilities, but it not an open question whether I have no responsibilities, and no abilities beyond what I do.

[Tom Clark]

Sofia says: So exactly what capacity is it that I presumably lack if determinism is true? I realized I have no idea. I can't grasp a notion of "can" that goes beyond anything that can be accounted for in compatibilist terms. So saying that if determinism is true, I lack this particular capacity, is to me just like saying that if determinism is true, I don't have xplr.

Eddy says: Sofia, you nicely capture what I think drives most non-philosophers' supposed incompatibilist intuitions----the worry that determinism means that the self is "bypassed" and can't play the right role in choice and action. Since determinism does not mean that, these intuitions do not actually support incompatibilism, but rather a different worry (e.g., that our *compatibilist* capacities for self-critical rational deliberation and control are bypassed).

Sofia, Eddy,

At least some people think determinism is a problem because it prevents the self from being a first cause that can take ultimate responsibility, not because they think it means the self’s compatibilist capacities are bypassed. For instance, Christian theologians such as J.P. Moreland, Charles Taliaferro and Stuart Goetz (see my reviews of their books here), and many Christian lay folk I daresay, all believe that were determinism true it would sabotage the God-given libertarian free will of the soul. The “can” involved here is contra-causal, of being a first cause independent of determinism. I’ve found this intuition about determinism among non-theists as well. As a secular humanist put it in an online discussion about free will recently:

“I can accept the limitations of my physical world on my physical self. I cannot accept a deterministic limit to my thought/ideas, to my imagination, to my desire for continual improvement, to my efforts for continued independence from the limitations and faults of human nature.

“I might be a product of evolution, of circumstance, of my experiences, but I have to believe all of those things are not setting any limits on me, who I am, what I think, what I believe, and most of all how I act. No, I don’t believe I can do anything I want, but neither do I believe my actions and thoughts are deterministically bound by all those things. Do they have an import? Of course. I just don’t believe the human condition would have improved as much as it has without an ability to transcend the deterministic limit our biological and physical histories are professed to place on our thoughts, and consequently on our actions.”

How many folks share this intuition about having contra-causal powers is an open question of course. But as Thomas Nadelhoffer has pointed out on occasion, it seems to be linked to a kind of dualism, whether explicit or implicit, about the nature of the self. And as Yale psychologist Paul Bloom has suggested, it could be we’re natural born, hard-wired dualists who have to be *taught* that we are not of two fundamentally different substances. That, plus our religious and secular traditions of dualism, helps to generate the contra-causal intuition in at least some proportion of the public I suspect.

[Mark Smeltzer]

Tom,

Not all Christians are libertarians. So, this makes me doubt that dualism is the core issue at play.

For instance, there is a rather ancient stand of thought that flows through the Christian tradition that is alive and well today through the works of Jonathan Edwards, Martin Lurther, John Calvin, St. Augustine, etc. These Christian thinkers advocated a view of the self that is closely aligned with comtemporary Compatiblism. These religious thinkers were also dualists.

[Sofia Jeppsson]

S:t Augustine also wrote lots of stuff about free will that sounds pretty close to modern compatibilists...

Tom, I didn't mean to say that I used to think, explicitly, that determinism meant the self was bypassed. I learnt on my first semester of philosophy what determinism means - on an INTELLECTUAL level. I just wrote that I think, in hindsight, that on some more subconscious or emotional level I had those things mixed up.

And I do think that I'm not unique in this. I'm actually not certain that the idea of determinism meaning that things aren't "up to me" can be explained without relying implicitly on some by-passing idea. If you say that things are controlled by the past and the laws of nature, INSTEAD of controlled by myself, it sounds as if my "self" is something BESIDE the past and the laws of nature, rather than being included in them.

[Tom Clark]

Sofia: "If you say that things are controlled by the past and the laws of nature, INSTEAD of controlled by myself, it sounds as if my "self" is something BESIDE the past and the laws of nature, rather than being included in them."

Yes, I think this is the supernatural contra-causal intuition: that the self stands outside nature in some respect, hence is a first cause like God. A monistic, naturalistic determinism about the self (with some indeterminism thrown in if you like) includes it in nature (past and laws) so it can't be a first cause, which can be initially pretty disconcerting to those who suppose it is. In light of the CA, things are not up to me in the way I thought they were, since the me has changed dramatically, from being a little god to being a fully caused participant in the natural order.

From what I've seen this realization can bring with it some significant shifts in beliefs and attitudes about origination, credit, blame, etc. Then compatibilists come along and say that the shift is unwarranted: all the beliefs and attitudes predicated on the supernatural conception of self are sustainable on the naturalistic conception. This is where I part company from them.

Mark,

Point taken - Christians like the rest of us come in all philosophical shapes and sizes. It's weird though that some believe you deserve to burn in hell forever even though you were fully determined to sin!