Attributability, weakness of will, and the importance of just having the capacity

• Autores: Jada Twedt Strabbing
• Localización: Philosophical Studies, ISSN-e 1573-0883, Vol. 173, Nº. 2, 2016, págs. 289-307
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • A common objection to particular views of attributability is that they fail to account for weakness of will. In this paper, I show that the problem of weakness of will is much deeper than has been recognized, extending to all views of attributability on offer because of the general form that these views take. The fundamental problem is this: current views claim that being attributionally responsible is a matter of exercising whatever capacity that they take to be relevant to attributability; however, weakness of will cases show that we can be attributionally responsible for actions that result from failing to exercise that capacity. I propose a novel solution that any view of attributability can and must take on board in order to be viable. The solution is to recognize that being attributionally responsible is not fundamentally a matter of exercising the attributability-relevant capacity (whatever a particular view identifies that capacity to be) but is rather a matter of having that capacity, so long as that capacity figures in the explanation of the action.