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Journal article
Moral Responsibility, Alternative Possibilities, and Acting on One’s Own
The journal of ethics, Vol.26(1), pp.27-40
03/2022
Web of Science ID: WOS:000762282600002
Abstract
Frankfurt-style cases (FSCs) have famously served as counterexamples to the Principle of Alternative Possibilities (PAP). The fine-grained version of the flicker defense has become one of the most popular responses to FSCs. Proponents of this defense argue that there is an alternative available to all agents in FSCs such that the cases do not show that PAP is false. Specifically, the agents could have done otherwise than decide on their own, and this available alternative is robust enough to ground moral responsibility. In this paper, I argue that, when relying on definitions of ‘on one’s own’ within the literature on FSCs, a case can be constructed in which the agent could not have done otherwise than make a decision on his own. Insofar as this new case is successful, it will be able to avoid arguments about robustness while showing that moral responsibility does not require alternative possibilities of the type argued for by proponents of the fine-grained version of the flicker defense.
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Details
- Title
- Moral Responsibility, Alternative Possibilities, and Acting on One’s Own
- Publication Details
- The journal of ethics, Vol.26(1), pp.27-40
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publisher
- Springer Netherlands
- Number of pages
- 14
- Copyright
- © 2021, Springer Nature B.V.
- Identifiers
- WOS:000762282600002; 99381473483506600
- Academic Unit
- History and Philosophy; College of Arts, Social Sciences, and Humanities
- Language
- English