UGADawg wrote:

Callum wrote:

Do you think you can maintain moral responsibility, UD?

I think so. I tend to think the Frankfurt cases demonstrate having the ability to do otherwise isn't necessary for moral responsibility.

 
I myself tend to agree that moral responsibility is compatible with determinism. My problem is that I don't see how determinism could be true in any meaningful sense with regards to free will. We simply have a very particular experience of free will, and the main problem I see is that even if we take such an experience as an illusion -- as most determinists will call it --, there can be no explanation on determinism as to why we would have such an illusion. If our actions are all determined, why do we even have illusory qualia of control over our actions? It is a positive reason that goes beyond merely fitting our ordinary experience with libertarianism; the issue is that even if our experience were illusory, it seems to me that determinism cannot explain the existence of that illusion. The problem gets even bigger, I think, when we can differentiate between the qualitative states of freedom and qualitative states of consciousness that are not associated with qualitative freedom; we can tell when we're "not free", and even tell the difference between voluntary and involutary acts, and I think determinism can't help but blur such lines in its metaphysic.

Moreover, I think determinism becomes even more problematic from a thomistic point of view. I've seen different people in these forums saying that Aquinas's position is compatibilistic, or that the view that follows more clearly from his thought would be some sort of compatibilism, but to me that fails to take into account the crucial difference between finite and infinite goods and their influences on the rational will, which is the cornerstone of a thomistic understanding of free will -- having been emphasized as such by Jacques Maritain, Yves Simon, etc. A finite good, precisely because it is finite, simply cannot determine the will. It is unintelligible how we could be determinately attracted to a good that we perceive as defective and lacking, which is always mixed up with negative aspects which effectively repel the will. Simply put, a finite good could never be sufficient to move a rational will that recognizes the good's limits and is repelled by them, seeking instead a good that is unconditioned and infinite. A finite good can never be sufficient to move a rational will.

I thought the general point compatibilists are emphasizing, though, is that Frankfurt cases show PAP is false, and this can be used to motivate an understanding of free will in terms of being able to act in accord with our preferences, e.g. the different qualitative states Miguel mentions might be explained in terms of our being able to act in accord with our preferences in some situations but not others.

Last edited by UGADawg (1/23/2018 4:01 pm)