Kane, R. (2009). Libertarianism. Philosophical Studies, 144(1), 35-44. doi:10.1007/s11098-009-9365-y.
Key takeaways
- The chaos in the self-forming action is Kane’s own: tension “reflected in appropriate regions of our brains by movement away from thermodynamic equilibrium—in short, a kind of ‘stirring up of chaos’ in the brain that makes it sensitive to micro-indeterminacies at the neuronal level” (p. 39).
- His reply to the luck objection makes the indeterminacy a hindrance inside a goal-directed effort, like noise on a Morse line (p. 42), and moves control from neurons to “macro-control of processes involving many neurons” (p. 43).
- He concedes that indeterminism lessens control and denies that this lessens responsibility, with three assassins of 50, 80 and 100% chance equally guilty (pp. 43–44).
Standing in the record
Registered for CLAIM-533, the owner’s thesis that the sensitivity chaos gives a will is not control over it, and for CLAIM-022’s note on ultimate responsibility. The reading confirms both the claim’s attribution and its defeater: Kane’s reply is the one the defeater names, and it is about responsibility, not control (NOTE-1518).