Chapter 5 (From hard determinism to Libertarianism)

1. Causal Determinism (every event has a cause that makes it happen + laws of nature) and Hard determinism the doctrine that there are no free actions. Hard determinism assumes that if CD is true than there are no free actions becasue as our bodies are made up of matter, we must be subject to the same lwas of causation. 

If HD is true, then there is no human responsibility: i.e., if we are not free, we cannot be responsible for our actions (since one is responsible if and only if one can make choices). 

What's good here? Determinism seems a good explanation for the physics of the macro universe. And it's the consensus in the physicalist disciplines: psychiatry, neurophysiology, etc.  

However, the idea that there's no free will presents challenges to other disciplines, like ethics (which conceives a free subject, which is responsible for their actions) and jurisprudence. 

2. Compatibilism is the belief that free will and determinism are not mutually exclusive.

Soft determinism: Determined actions can nevertheless be free. 

Traditional Compatibilism (Free actions have to be 1. caused by one's will and 2. not externally constrained). 

Here's the reasoning:

Principle of alternative possibilities:  one can be held responsible for doing something only if one could have done otherwise. "Could have done otherwise" means "if you had chosen otherwise, then you would have done otherwise." 

Think of our "fork example" of a student being late for class. He chooses ( A) "having coffee with lots of traffic," instead of (B) "not having coffee and no traffic." For Traditional Compatibilism, the student is responsible for being late since "if he had chosen (B) instead of (A), he would have been on time for class. 

Counterexample: "Taylor's Ingenious Physiologist. In class we discussed how TV can "plant" desires. So in a way is a kind of ingenious physiologist.

The advantage of Traditional Compatibilism is that it acknowledges some determinism while making room for free will. It seems plausible that external constraints play a definite role in our lives and restrict our willing from the inside, and therefore our responsibility. 

3. Hierarchical Compatibilism: There are First and Second Order Desires and Second Order Volitions. Remember: A first-order desire is directed (outside) to an object or state of affairs, a second-order desire is a desire about a desire. A second-order volition is a second-order desire on which one decisively acts. 

Harry Frankfurt's three-drug addicts: Let's call a first-order desire: FOD, a second-order desire: SOD, a second-order volition: SOV. So we get the following:  

Wanton addict: FOD, not SOD, not SOV, not free. 
Happy Addict: FOD, SOD, SOV, free.
Unwilling Addict: FOD, SOD (only this desire is against his taking the drug), SOV, but now he cannot act on these SOV, so he's not free). Remember, to be free one has to either formulate a SOV or be able to act on it. 

Lo interesante del experimento es que desde fuera tal parece que tanto the happy and the wanton addict are free, when in fact they are not acting decisively on their second-order desires.  

Now comes the problem. Can there be an SOV caused by forces outside our control? Here is a counterargument:

Slote's Hypnotized patient: Robert is undecided between two desires, X and Y. He is visited by a hypnotist who, unbeknownst to Robert puts him in a trance and induces an SOV in favor of X. Now, as a result of having this SOV planted, he acts to satisfy X, never suspecting that his decisiveness has been induced by the hypnotist.    

Punishment: How do compatibilists see punishment? p. 203. Punishment cannot be retributive (eye-for-an-eye). The only legitimate way of punishment is rehabilitation and deterrence. Criminal actions are dictated by genes and habits (nature and nurture). Retributive punishment makes sense if it's deserved. But nothing people do is up to them.

4. Libertarianism

We have two types of causation event causation and agent causation. When an event causes an event there's a physical causation. Ex: Gravitation. Agent causation is different. Here we have an agent causing an event. Example: free will. 

Libertarianism holds that agents can cause events. How? The mind supervenes the brain. We call this process FREE WILL. 

There are two arguments: 1) Argument from Experience. 2) Argument from deliberation.

1) We experience ourselves willing the action from the inside. 

2) We feel as if we deliberate options and make decisions.  

Libet's Neurophysiological challenge: seems to show that consciousness of a decision arises only after the decision has already been made (the 300 millisecond gap between the decision to press the button and the brain signal). 

Rebuttal by libertarians: There's a difference between making a "conscious decision" and a "meta-conscious decision" (meta-conscious awareness is second order). For the libertarian, the subject in Libet's report is not having a "conscious" but a "meta-conscious" decision. So it's no surprise that it happens "after" the conscious decision was made.
 
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Radical Libertarianism: Jean-Paul Sartre's libertarianism (known as Existentialism) holds that the self is essentially free. His analysis is ontological. Let's begin with this point about essence & existence: 

Existence precedes essence. 

We exist first and are "defined" later. This happens because the self (consciousness) is in a constant state of becoming. 

To cope with our own boundless FREEDOM we come up with a sort of justification for our actions, which Sartre calls "bad faith." However, since not choosing is choosing, in the end, we remain responsible for our actions. 

The only possible constraint to our freedom is our facticity (the stuff we don't choose like being born and having a certain name and parents).

Aquí la conclusión del capítulo.