This book provides a comprehensive, systematic theory of moral responsibility. The authors explore the conditions under which individuals are morally responsible for actions, omissions, consequences, and emotions. The leading idea in the book is that moral responsibility is based on 'guidance control'. This control has two components: the mechanism that issues in the relevant behavior must be the agent's own mechanism, and it must be appropriately responsive to reasons. The book develops an account of both components. The authors go on (...) to offer a sustained defense of the thesis that moral responsibility is compatible with causal determinism. (shrink)

This work presents an "actual-sequence" model of moral responsibility. In contrast to many traditional views, an "actual-sequence" model holds that ascriptions of moral responsibility do not necessarily depend upon whether agents are free to pursue alternative courses of action; rather what is important is what the agents actually do, and how their actions come to be performed. ;Part One of this work sketches an actual-sequence theory that associates moral responsibility with control. I motivate this approach through a series of "Frankfurt-type" (...) examples which illustrate that even though agents lack alternative possibilities, they still may be held responsible in virtue of freely bringing about an event; such agents are said to exercise "actual causal control." The proposed theory has the important advantage of reconciling responsibility and causal determinism, even if determinism is incompatible with freedom to do otherwise. The next two chapters aim to defend this "semi-compatibilist" view against a variety of objections. Chapter 3 addresses a range of objections which can be raised against the Frankfurt-type examples. Chapter 4 addresses Peter van Inwagen's "direct" argument which purports to show that responsibility and determinism are incompatible. ;Part Two of this work presents a more precise analysis of actual causal control. Through an examination of several approaches , Chapters 5 and 6 develop an analysis of control which is based on the idea that in order to be responsible, agents must act in ways that are responsive to an appropriate pattern of both moral and non-moral reasons. Chapter 7 expands this account by arguing that ascriptions of responsibility depend not only on the current responsiveness of an agent, but also on the history which leads to this pattern of response. To support this point, I sketch an account of the process of taking responsibility which captures one way in which historical considerations play an important role in our ascriptions of moral responsibility. (shrink)

This unique text focuses on ethical puzzles and hypothetical problems to help students at all levels understand and refine their moral principles and see how they apply to various situations. An extensive, thoughtfully written introduction provides the theoretical background and lays out numerous moral puzzle cases that are analyzed and discussed throughout the text. Challenging follow-up articles argue a variety of stances on the ethical puzzles set forth in the introduction.

In this brief concluding chapter we first wish to present the overall argument of the book in a concise, nontechnical way. We hope this will provide a clear view of the argument. We shall then point to some of the distinctive--and attractive--features of our approach. Finally, we shall offer some preliminary thoughts about extending the account of moral responsibility to apply to emotions.

The leading idea of our theory of moral responsibility is that responsibility is associated with control. But we contend that there are two distinct kinds of control. Regulative control involves alternative possibilities: it is a kind of dual power of free action. In contrast, guidance control does not, by its nature, involve alternative possibilities. Whereas typically it might be thought that regulative and guidance control go together, the Frankfurt-type cases show that they are separate and distinct sorts of control. And, (...) whereas typically it is thought that moral responsibility requires regulative control, we claim that moral responsibility—for actions, omissions, and consequences—simply requires guidance control. Thus, although we do not believe that moral responsibility requires alternative possibilities, we preserve the traditional association of moral responsibility with control. (shrink)

I am very grateful to the thoughtful and probing critical discussions by the nine authors who have discussed themes from my two collections, My Way: Essays on Moral Responsibility, and Our Stories: Essays on Life, Death, and Free Will. In this essay I seek to respond to some of the points raised in these essays. I am unable to address all of the critiques, but I have certainly learned a great deal from these extremely insightful and generous papers, and I (...) hope to address more of the issues in future work. (shrink)

This paper offers a critical examination of Fischer and Ravizza's attempt in Responsibility and Control to give a comprehensive account of the kind of control that grounds moral responsibility (RC, 14). The kind of control required for moral responsibility, they argue, is not some form of regulative control that involves alternate possibilities. What is required is guidance control, which is compatible with causal determinism (RC, 34). Guidance control has 'two separate dimensions' that Fischer and Ravizza aim to articulate (...) and defend. The first of these is that the mechanism that actually issues in the relevant conduct must be moderately reasons-responsive. The second is that the mechanism concerned must be the agent's own. The arguments that Fischer and Ravizza provide in defence of this overall position are carefully articu- lated and imaginatively defended. It is impossible not to admire this book. It will receive and deserves to receive a considerable amount of attention and discussion from all those who have an interest in the free will problem. I am confident that this work will prove to be of lasting influence and importance. My own discussion shows that I am not persuaded by the particular arguments that Fischer and Ravizza have given to support the two basic components of guidance control. How- ever, if my own experience is anything to judge by, readers will find this book challenging, stimulating, and highly rewarding. It sets a high standard by which to evaluate and assess other work and theories in the field. (shrink)

The author argued elsewhere that a necessary condition that John Fischer and Mark Ravizza offer for moral responsibility is too strong and that the sufficient conditions they offer are too weak. This article is a critical examination of their reply. Topics discussed include blameworthiness, irresistible desires, moral responsibility, reactive attitudes, and reasons responsiveness.

There is much of significance in John Fischer and Mark Ravizza’s thoughtful book. I will, however, focus primarily on their interesting and suggestive claim that “moral responsibility is an essentially historical notion: someone’s being morally responsible requires that the past be a certain way.” But first some preliminaries.

This paper examines the account of guidance control given in Fischer and Ravizza's book, Responsibility and Control, with the aim of revising it so as to make it a better account of what needs to be added to having alternatives open to yield a specification of the control condition for responsibility that will be acceptable to an adherent of the principle that one is responsible for something only if one could have avoided it.

John Martin Fischer and Mark Ravizza have constructed a theory of moral responsibility according to which agents are responsible only if they take responsibility in a particular way. Crucial to taking responsibility is coming to adopt a certain set of beliefs about oneself, such as the belief that one is a legitimate target of attitudes like gratitude and resentment, praise and blame. Moreover, agents must come to adopt this belief in a way that is ‘appropriately based’ upon their (...) evidence, if they are to be genuinely responsible for what they do. In this paper I argue that agents need not meet these conditions in order to be morally responsible. I offer a case in which the agent thinks of himself as responsible, appears to be responsible, but fails to take responsibility in Fischer and Ravizza’s sense. I then argue that Fischer and Ravizza’s account of responsibility for consequences is in conflict with their contention that individuals who reject the justifiability of responsibility ascriptions fail, thereby, to be morally responsible agents. (shrink)

This essay evaluates John Martin Fischer and Mark Ravizza's mature semi-compatibilist account of moral responsibility, focusingon their new theory of moderate reasons-responsiveness as a model of "moral sanity." This theory, presented in _Responsibility and Control_, solves many of the problems with Fischer's earlier weak reasons-responsiveness model, such as its unwanted implication that agents who are only erratically responsive to bizarre reasons can be responsible for their acts. But I argue that the new model still faces several problems. It (...) does not allow sufficiently for non-psychotic agents (who are largely reasons-responsive) with localized beliefs and desires incompatible with full responsibility. Nor does it take into account that practical "fragmentation of the self" over time may also reduce competence, since moral sanity requires some minimum level of narrative unity in our plans and projects. Finally, I argue that actual-sequence accounts cannot adequately explain sane but weak-willed agency. (shrink)

The manipulation argument poses a significant challenge for any adequate compatibilist theory of agency. The argument maintains that there is no relevant difference between actions or pro‐attitudes that are induced by nefarious neurosurgeons, God, or (and this is the important point) natural causes. Therefore, if manipulation is thought to undermine moral responsibility, then so also ought causal determinism. In this paper, I will attempt to bolster the plausibility of John Martin Fischer and Mark Ravizza's semicompatibilist theory of moral (...) responsibility by demonstrating how their account provides a distinctive line of response to three important types of manipulation. (shrink)