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    If compatibilism is true, an omnipotent being could arran... — Carmelics
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    Challenges→It is impossible even for an omnipotent being to make it the case that someone freely chooses to do what is right.

    If compatibilism is true, an omnipotent being could arrange the causal history of an agent such that the agent's own character reliably produces right choices, satisfying both freedom and moral goodness.

    ?Rate how convincing each reason is below to see the overall strength.
    1 reason for
    1 reason against

    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
    ?
    • 1.Compatibilism defines freedom as acting according to one's own desires/character without external coercion, not requiring alternative possibilities.
      ?

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    • 2.An omnipotent being can causally shape character formation such that an agent's reliable choices flow from their authentic values and reasoning.
      ?

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    • 3.Moral responsibility requires only that choices stem from the agent's own character, not that character itself be uncaused or self-originated.
      ?

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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
    ?
    • 1.If an omnipotent being arranged the agent's character, the agent didn't ultimately author their own values, undermining genuine moral responsibility.
      ?

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    • 2.Even reliable right-choice production doesn't constitute moral goodness if the agent never could have authentically chosen otherwise at any point.
      ?

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    • 3.Compatibilist freedom may satisfy logical consistency but fails to capture the intuitive sense of moral agency most people ascribe to genuine virtue.
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    Key Terms

    Causal history(what the Inheritance View focuses on)
    The chain of events and causes that led to something happening; in this case, all the things that happened to cause you to have a particular belief.
    Moral goodness(describing God's moral perfection)
    The quality of being perfectly ethical and always choosing what is right and just.
    agent(Economics terminology applied to medical ethics)
    The party in a principal-agent relationship who is instructed to produce the good or service on the principal's behalf — in the medical context, the doctor
    character(Semantic theory of indexical expressions; terminology due to Kaplan (1989))
    A rule which determines the content of an expression given a context of utterance; formally, a function (or something that determines a function) from contexts to contents.
    compatibilism(Offered as a response to the traditional problem of free will)
    The philosophical position that free will and moral responsibility are compatible with determinism being true
    omnipotent(Used in the context of arguing about whether multiple omnipotent beings could coexist.)
    A being whose will is never thwarted; a being capable of bringing about any willed outcome.

    Connections

    1 topic

    Problem of Evil1 linked

    Related

    An omnipotent being can causally shape character formation such that an agent's ...Compatibilism defines freedom as acting according to one's own desires/character...Compatibilist freedom may satisfy logical consistency but fails to capture the i...Even reliable right-choice production doesn't constitute moral goodness if the a...

    Details

    Type
    claim
    Perspectives
    2 (1 for, 1 against)
    Edits
    1 edit
    +3 moreShow less
    If an omnipotent being arranged the agent's character, the agent didn't ultimate...It is impossible even for an omnipotent being to make it the case that someone f...Moral responsibility requires only that choices stem from the agent's own charac...