Free will and the Asymmetrical Justifiability of Holding Morally Responsible

Vilhauer, Benjamin

doi:10.1093/pq/pqv041

Cited by 13 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 16 publications

(5 reference statements)

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“…The literature on the ethics of praise is scarce, unlike its abundant blame counterpart. It has long been assumed by philosophers that whereas it is important not to wrongly blame since blame is unpleasant to receive, praise is pleasant and therefore unproblematic (Coates and Tognazzini 2013;Vilhauer 2015;Telech forthcoming). We concur with Stout (2020) and Holroyd (2021) that praise warrants more careful philosophical analysis.…”

Section: Patronizing Praisementioning

confidence: 99%

Patronizing Praise

Jeppsson

Brandenburg

2022

J Ethics

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Praise, unlike blame, is generally considered well intended and beneficial, and therefore in less need of scrutiny. In line with recent developments, we argue that praise merits more thorough philosophical analysis. We show that, just like blame, praise can be problematic by expressing a failure to respect a person’s equal value or worth as a person. Such patronizing praise, however, is often more insidious, because praise tends to be regarded as well intended and beneficial, which renders it harder to recognize and object to. Among other things, a philosophical analysis of patronizing praise helps people on the receiving end articulate why they feel uncomfortable or offended by it, shows patronizing praisers how their praise is problematic, and provides input for further philosophical analysis of blame.In the first section of the paper, we discuss how hypocritical praise, just like hypocritical blame, can fail to respect the equality of persons by expressing that the praiser applies more demanding moral standards to the praisee than to themself. We further discuss obstructionist praise, which loosely corresponds to complicit blame, and can similarly express that certain moral standards apply to others but not to the praiser. In the second part of the paper, we discuss another variety of patronizing praise. Praise can be an inaccurate appraisal of a person based on irrelevant considerations – like race, gender, or class – and thereby constitute a failure to recognize their equal worth as a person. We identify three ways in which such praise can manifest.

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Section: Patronizing Praisementioning

confidence: 99%

Patronizing Praise

Jeppsson

Brandenburg

2022

J Ethics

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“…Offenders receive long prison sentences in an environment designed to be punitive rather than rehabilitative; some crimes might even be punishable by death. Should we have Harsh Retributivism? Ben Vilhauer, Gregg Caruso, Michael Louis Corrado and Elizabeth Shaw have all advanced versions of an epistemic argument against Harsh Retributivism [1][2][3][4][5][6]. I will primarily focus on Vilhauer and Caruso; they have full arguments that I believe are on the right track.…”

Section: The Epistemic Argument Against Harsh Retributivismmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…One could even object to Harsh Retributivism on the grounds that criminals often grew up under harsh circumstances, and arguably ended up in the criminal justice system through events largely beyond their control, without embracing the view that moral responsibility is metaphysically impossible and does not exist at all. 6 Harsh Retributivism needs both the existence of desert-entailing moral responsibility and the truth of retributivism for its moral justificationand, finally, that people can find out how much punishment offenders deserve for their crimes.…”

Section: Three Necessary Conditionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Retributivism, Justification and Credence: The Epistemic Argument Revisited

Jeppsson

2020

Neuroethics

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Harming other people is prima facie wrong. Unless we can be very certain that doing so is justified under the circumstances, we ought not to do it. In this paper, I argue that we ought to dismantle harsh retributivist criminal justice systems for this reason; we cannot be sufficiently certain that the harm is justified. Gregg Caruso, Ben Vilhauer and others have previously argued for the same conclusion; however, my own version sidesteps certain controversial premises of theirs. Harsh retributivist criminal justice can only be morally right if the following three propositions are true: Moral responsibility exists, retributivism is right, and we can find out how much punishment offenders deserve for their crimes. Suppose that we initially assign a high credence to each of the three propositions; I assume for the sake of argument that there are good arguments in support of each. Nevertheless, these arguments ultimately depend on intuitions. Since we have philosophical peers whose intuitions differ from ours, we ought to downgrade our credence in each. However, even slightly less credence in each proposition means far less credence in a conjunction of all three. Since the stakes are high and there are morally safer options for a criminal justice system, we ought to dismantle harsh retributivist ones.

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“…For contrasting the case with that of her malevolent agemate reminds of an asymmetry moral considerations are commonly seen to involve. Vilhauer's [50], for instance, describes the asymmetry as follows:…”

Section: Morality Is Primarily About Benefiting and Avoiding To Harm ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Correspondingly, even when harm is defined as deprivation of benefit, harming a person can nevertheless be seen to oppose the primary orientation of morality. It is still coherent to maintain that "[j]ustice demands that arguments for harming people be held to a higher standard than arguments for refraining from harming them or benefiting them" ( [50], 774). Accordingly, the conception of the asymmetry of moral considerations the argument of this article presupposes is not incoherent in the way this possible objection suggests.…”

Section: Morality Is Primarily About Benefiting and Avoiding To Harm ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Autism Spectrum Condition, Good and Bad Motives of Offending, and Sentencing

Varelius

2020

Neuroethics

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It has been proposed that the ways in which the criminal justice system treats offenders with Autism spectrum condition (ASC) should duly account for how the condition influences the offenders’ behavior. While the recommendation appears plausible, what adhering to it means in practice remains unclear. A central feature of ASC is seen to be that people with the condition have difficulties with understanding and reacting to the mental states of others in what are commonly considered as adequate ways. This article aims to clarify how the difficulties affect the moral weight to be given to the good and bad motives of offending in sentencing offenders with ASC. I start by explicating the main points of departure of the endeavor. After that I assess the moral significance of the good and bad motives of offenders with ASC in view of four cases and a comparison with how we commonly treat people who are not as able to understand and react to the mental states of others as neurotypical adults. I suggest that considerations pertaining to what has been called the primary orientation of morality provide grounds for deeming the good motives of offenders with ASC as morally significant as those of otherwise similar neurotypical offenders and the bad motives of offenders with ASC as less morally significant than those of otherwise similar neurotypical offenders. After considering three possible objections to the suggestion, I conclude by briefly elucidating its purported import.

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Free will and the Asymmetrical Justifiability of Holding Morally Responsible

Cited by 13 publications

References 16 publications

Patronizing Praise

Patronizing Praise

Retributivism, Justification and Credence: The Epistemic Argument Revisited

Autism Spectrum Condition, Good and Bad Motives of Offending, and Sentencing

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