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    A practice of blame and praise that cannot distinguish de... — Carmelics
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    Challenges→A person may be morally responsible for an action despite lacking any ability to do otherwise

    A practice of blame and praise that cannot distinguish determined mechanisms from genuine agents loses the normative foundation that makes moral responsibility coherent.

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    1 reason for
    1 reason against

    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
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    • 1.Moral responsibility requires that agents could have acted otherwise, which presupposes they possess genuine causal agency rather than mechanical determination.
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    • 2.Practices of blame and praise presuppose desert—that individuals deserve consequences—which collapses if their actions were determined by prior causes beyond their control.
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    • 3.Without distinguishing agents from mechanisms, we cannot justify differential treatment, making the normative force of moral judgment arbitrary rather than principled.
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    Reasons Against

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    Reason against
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    • 1.Even if all actions are determined, agents remain the relevant causal nodes whose dispositions and capacities warrant blame/praise, preserving normative coherence.
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    • 2.The distinction between 'determined mechanisms' and 'genuine agents' may be false: agents just are complex physical systems whose deterministic processes constitute genuine agency.
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    • 3.Moral responsibility practices function effectively to shape behavior and reinforce norms regardless of metaphysical facts about determinism, needing no hidden contra-causal foundation.
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    2 topics

    Free Will & Foreknowledge1 linkedMoral Responsibility1 linked

    Related

    A person may be morally responsible for an action despite lacking any ability to...Even if all actions are determined, agents remain the relevant causal nodes whos...Moral responsibility practices function effectively to shape behavior and reinfo...Moral responsibility requires that agents could have acted otherwise, which pres...
    +3 moreShow less
    Practices of blame and praise presuppose desert—that individuals deserve consequ...The distinction between 'determined mechanisms' and 'genuine agents' may be fals...Without distinguishing agents from mechanisms, we cannot justify differential tr...

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    claim
    Perspectives
    2 (1 for, 1 against)
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