Moral responsibility for actions: epistemic and freedom conditions

Abstract

Two questions guide this article. First, according to Fischer and Ravizza (jointly and otherwise), what epistemic requirements for being morally responsible for performing an action A are not also requirements for freely performing A? Second, how much progress have they made on this front? The article's main moral is for philosophers who believe that there are epistemic requirements for being morally responsible for A-ing that are not requirements for freely A-ing because they assume that Fischer (on his own or otherwise) has shown that this is so. In showing that this assumption is false, I reopen an important question for these philosophers: How are epistemic requirements for being morally responsible for A-ing related to requirements for freely A-ing? This is an interesting question in its own right, of course.

Keywords:

• action
• action theory
• free will
• moral responsibility

Acknowledgements

For comments on a draft of this paper, I am grateful to John Fischer, Michael McKenna and Neal Tognazzini.

Notes

Davidson expresses the point differently: ‘a person is the agent of an event if and only if there is a description of what he did that makes true a sentence that says he did it intentionally’ (1980, 46).

A comment on ‘reasonable to expect’ is in order. In another story, Kit has often seen the kitten sleeping under one of the rear tires of his car and he regularly looks under the car for the kitten before he backs his car out of his garage. This time, however, Kit is extremely drunk – so drunk as to ensure that he will not think about the kitten. Knowing what we do, is it ‘reasonable [for us] to expect’ Kit to believe that the kitten's death ‘will (or may) result from’ his backing out of his garage. No certainly seems to be a plausible answer. After all, we are extremely confident that he will not think about the kitten at all on this occasion and therefore will have no such belief. Even so, in the original case, Kit is sober and his not satisfying the epistemic condition is, as I put it, ‘an obstacle’ to his being morally responsible for the kitten's death.

Whether A-ing intentionally is identical with A-ing for a reason is an interesting question that I will not take up here. For a case in which an agent seems to A freely even though he does not A intentionally – as I understand intentional action – see Mele 2006, 25. Some readers will find it plausible that this agent A-s for a reason (in which case he A-s intentionally, as Fischer and Ravizza understand intentional action).

Obviously, this is compatible with the requirements being too strong in some other respect.

Recall that receptivity to reasons is articulated in terms of recognizing reasons (Fischer and Ravizza 1998, 243–4; quoted above).

Someone might take the position that there is a nonepistemic freedom requirement for being morally responsible for A-ing and that all epistemic requirements for being morally responsible for A-ing are also requirements for freely A-ing.

Pertinent work includes Haji (2002, ch. 10) and Zimmerman (2008, ch. 4).