What Means This Freedom? John Hospers (1958) Intro to Philosophy Douglas F. Olena Responsibility for Actions 57 Some people are not responsible for their actions. What is the criterion for responsibility? Under precisely what conditions is a person to be held morally responsible for an action? Responsibility for Actions 57-1. Responsibility is determined by the presence or absence of premeditation­the opposite of ³premeditated² being ³unthinking² or ³impulsive.² This will not do because some acts are not premeditated but responsible, and some are premeditated and not responsible. Responsibility for Actions 57 When something done originally from conviction or training becomes habitual, it becomes like a reflex action. (read quote on Aristotle at C) Instinctual, in Hospers¹ terms, becomes ³unthinking² or ³impulsive.² Responsibility for Actions 57 Also there are premeditated acts for which a person is not responsible. These are acts that are done by compulsion of one kind or another that can be described as resulting from a neurosis or emotional block. Responsibility for Actions 58-2. ...[A] person is not responsible for his act unless he can defend it with reasons? One¹s intelligence and reasoning power do not enable one to escape from unconsciously motivated behavior; it only gives one greater facility in rationalizing that behavior. Responsibility for Actions 58-3. ...[A] person is responsible for his action unless it is the result of unconscious forces of which he knows nothing? Much of our behavior has its source in our unconscious life. Responsibility for Actions 59-4. ...[A] person is responsible for his act unless it is compelled? Aristotle suggests that a person is responsible for his act except for reasons of either ignorance or compulsion. external compulsion, internal compulsion or compulsive behavior. Responsibility for Actions 59 The inevitability of actions born out of compulsion is not the same as saying that the event was causally determined, rather, ³it cannot be avoided.² Responsibility for Actions 59-5. A person is responsible to the degree to which that act can be (or could have been) changed by the use of reasons. A man washes his hands because of fear of poisoning by germs: if given reason to stop and does, then the action was not compulsive. Responsibility for Actions 59-60 It is not the use of reasons, but their efficacy in changing behavior that is being made the criterion of responsibility. Responsibility for Actions 60 Are we free at all to be made responsible for our acts, since they are inevitable, based on our character, trained into us by our environment and mandated by our genetic structure? Responsibility for Actions 62 The more thoroughly and in detail we know the causal factors leading a person to behave as he does, the more we tend to exempt him from responsibility. There were court cases in the ¹60s where society was charged with the crimes of certain people. This is the result of the above statement. Responsibility for Actions 62 Bad behavior is the fault of the parents... Responsibility for Actions 65 Overcoming the effects of early environment is likely to turn out to be luck, not effort. We do not contain within ourselves the power to change our motivations, fight compulsion or overthrow bad habit. If we do change it is good fortune, luck. Responsibility for Actions 65 Clarence Darrow in his defense in the Loeb-Leopold case: ³I do not believe people are in jail because they deserve to be. . . .²