Contribution
A survey of moral responsibility as a question partly independent of free will. It separates responsibility from obligation and from causal responsibility, then covers the free-will background (§1), three approaches (forward-looking, Strawsonian, reasons-responsiveness, §2) and ten contemporary debates (§3). For this record it is the lawful report with the most page references of Fischer and Ravizza’s book, and the only report the record holds of Wolf’s JoJo case and of her case against Real Self views.
Key insight
The conditions of responsibility have come apart into families that can each be held without the others. These are a control condition (Frankfurt cases moved it from alternatives to the actual sequence), a competence condition (the ability to recognise and respond to moral considerations, Wolf’s JoJo), a historical condition (manipulation) and an epistemic condition. Fischer and Ravizza and Wolf both appear under more than one of them.
Assumptions
- “Responsibility” means moral responsibility in the accountability sense: “whether a person bears the right relation to their actions to be properly held accountable for them” (preamble).
- The entry focuses on blame and says so, because blameworthiness is often taken to involve liability to sanction (preamble).
Key results
As a survey it reports and does not prove. The reports this record uses:
- §1, Frankfurt cases. The Black and Jones case in one paragraph. The dilemma objection (Ginet 1996, Widerker 1995), defences (Fischer 2002, 2010) and refined cases (Mele and Robb 1998, Hunt 2000, Pereboom 2000, 2001) are named. Frankfurt’s later gloss is quoted: “making an action unavoidable is not the same thing as bringing it about that the action is performed” (2006, 340). Even without the ability to do otherwise, determinism “might threaten responsibility in other ways”, citing Fischer and Ravizza 1998, 151–168, the Direct Argument chapter.
- §2.2, Strawson. Reactive attitudes respond to the quality of will. Excuses differ from exemptions, a distinction due to Watson. The response-dependence worry is that practices would be beyond criticism “simply because they are that group’s practices”, citing Fischer and Ravizza 1993, 18. Wallace’s fairness-based reply is reported.
- §2.3, Fischer and Ravizza. Frankfurt cases show alternatives are not necessary, and what is required is guidance control (1998, 29–34). The hypnotised or compelled agent “is not responsive to reasons—his behavior would be the same, no matter what reasons there were” (37). Because the Frankfurt agent would also act the same whatever the reasons, responsiveness is put in the mechanism, “the process that leads to the relevant upshot” (38). Guidance control: “the mechanism that actually issues in the action is his own, reasons-responsive mechanism” (39). Moderate responsiveness (69–85): “an understandable pattern of (actual and hypothetical) reasons-receptivity” (71); understanding “how reasons fit together”, so that “acceptance of one reason as sufficient implies that a stronger reason must also be sufficient” (71); a pattern of regular receptivity including moral considerations (77). Criticism is named: of the receptivity/reactivity contrast (McKenna 2005, Mele 2006a, Watson 2001), and of the focus on mechanisms (Brink and Nelkin 2013, McKenna 2013, Sartorio 2016).
- §3.1.1, Wolf and Watson. A Real Self view, quoted from Wolf (1990, 33): behaviour is attributable to the real self “if she is at liberty (or able) both to govern her behavior on the basis of her will and to govern her will on the basis of her valuational system”. Wolf’s central example of the view is Watson 1975; her 1987 paper calls Watson 1975, Frankfurt 1971 and Taylor 1976 “deep self views”. Against them: they are silent on how the agent came to be so, and a real self from a traumatic upbringing makes the agent responsible “only in a superficial sense” (1990, 37–40). Deeper assessment requires that “she is able to form her values on the basis of what is True and Good” (1990, 75). Watson’s reply (1996) splits responsibility into attributability and accountability.
- §3.2, moral competence. JoJo, raised by an evil dictator, becomes a sadistic tyrant, is “happy to be the sort of person that he is”, and is moved by the desires he wants to be moved by. He meets structural conditions, but his upbringing left him “unable to appreciate the wrongfulness of his behavior”, and it is this impaired competence “that does the real excusing work”, which extends to those who “could not help but be mistaken about their [bad] values” (Wolf 1987, 57). Joining Wolf: Benson 2001, Fischer and Ravizza 1998, Fricker 2010, Levy 2003, Russell 1995 and 2004, Wallace 1994, Watson 1987.
- §3.8, ultimate responsibility. Galen Strawson’s Basic Argument and Kane’s undetermined self-forming choices. Fischer (2006) is cited for the reply that the argument sets the bar too high.
- §3.9, history and manipulation. Real Self views are non-historical. Fischer and Ravizza (1998, 196–201) object that a mesh produced by “brainwashing or subliminal advertising” would not make the agent responsible, because the mechanism would not be “the agent’s own” (197); “taking responsibility” (207–239) is their historical answer. Mele’s Beth/Ann case, Pereboom’s four-case argument and the replies follow.
- §3.10, the epistemic condition. Tracing (Fischer and Ravizza 1998, 49–51, among others), and the regress argument for skepticism from culpable ignorance (Rosen, Zimmerman, Levy).
Claims
| # | Claim | Evidence type | Where |
|---|---|---|---|
| C1 | Fischer and Ravizza: responsibility requires guidance control, not access to alternatives | second-hand report, page-referenced | §2.3; 1998, 29–34 |
| C2 | Guidance control is acting from one’s own, moderately reasons-responsive mechanism; moderate responsiveness needs an understandable pattern of regular receptivity including moral reasons | second-hand report, quoted | §2.3; 1998, 38–39, 69–85, 71, 77 |
| C3 | Ownership is historical, through taking responsibility | second-hand report | §§2.3, 3.9; 1998, 196–201, 207–239 |
| C4 | Wolf: Real Self (deep self) views are insufficient because they ignore how the self arose; responsibility requires the ability to form one’s values on the basis of the True and the Good | second-hand report, quoted | §3.1.1; Wolf 1990, 33, 37–41, 75 |
| C5 | JoJo meets structural conditions but is not responsible because his moral competence is impaired; many, including Fischer and Ravizza, agree that impaired moral competence undermines responsibility | second-hand report | §3.2; Wolf 1987, 57 |
| C6 | Wolf (with Nelkin) questions that praise and blame require the same capacities | second-hand mention | preamble |
Concepts
- guidance control (Fischer and Ravizza): control manifested when an agent guides behaviour in a direction, whether or not she could have guided it otherwise.
- moderate reasons-responsiveness: an understandable pattern of regular reasons-receptivity, with some moral receptivity.
- Real Self / deep self views (Wolf’s label): responsibility as the attributability of behaviour to the agent’s valuational system or higher-order desires.
- moral competence: the ability to recognise and respond to moral considerations.
- attributability / accountability (Watson): responsibility as disclosure of the agent’s evaluative orientation, and as liability to moral demands and blame.
Connections
- McKenna and Coates, Compatibilism (LIT-291, NOTE-270). The two agree on Fischer and Ravizza. LIT-291 adds the receptivity/reactivity distinction and the irony objection (supplement §B.1). This entry adds page numbers and the moral-competence framing. On Wolf, LIT-291 gives the asymmetry (§4.3) and this entry gives the Real Self critique and JoJo, so each covers what the other lacks.
- Robb’s PAP entry (LIT-294, NOTE-269) is the detailed source for Frankfurt cases. This entry’s §1 is a short version of it with the same objections.
- Buss and Westlund (LIT-296, NOTE-267) list Wolf and Fischer and Ravizza together as reasons-responsive views of autonomy. This entry does the same for responsibility.
- THEORY-040. §3.9 reports the manipulation dialectic as LIT-291 does, with less detail.
Bearing on the record
It is a lawful, read source for the THEORY documents on Wolf’s Reason View and on Fischer and Ravizza filed in the same batch. It gives page references for guidance control, the JoJo case for the Reason View, and the moral-competence agreement between the two accounts, which is why the record does not treat them as rivals on that point.
Limitations
- A survey. Its quotations of Fischer and Ravizza and of Wolf are second-hand, and their page numbers are the entry’s.
- It says almost nothing about Wolf’s asymmetry. For that the record depends on LIT-291 §4.3.
- It does not use “weak reactivity”. The receptivity/reactivity contrast is named only as a target of criticism.