Integrative Studies 250 Philosophy of Human Nature Fall Quarter 2001   Andrew Mills'  Homepage Course Resources Homepage  Dept. of Religion and Philosophy

Stoicism on Fatalism and Power (Ch. 2 of Pereboom)

1. What is the Stoic thesis of fatalism?
   
   
2. What is the "Lazy Argument"? How is Chrysippus' doctrine of co-fated events supposed to reply to it?  Do you think that it is an adequate reply?
   
   
3. Explain why, if ‘fatalism' is true, it may look as if people are never blameable for any vicious thing they do nor praiseworthy for any good thing they do.  Chrysippus' distinction between perfect and principal causes on the one hand and auxiliary and proximate causes on the other is supposed to be a response to this problem. How?  Explain how the analogy with rolling cylinders and cones is supposed to allow an advocate of fatalism to make room for praise and blame (and, in general, the idea that some actions are within our power).  Is this response an adequate one?

1. What is the doctrine of necessity?  (Subsidiary question: Is Hume's doctrine of necessity different from the Stoics' thesis of fatalism?)
   
   
2. Where does Hume think we derive our idea of necessity from?  What two ‘circumstances' have to be the case for us to say of some situation that one event causes (or determines, or necessitates) another?
   
   
3. Does the doctrine of necessity apply to the voluntary actions of people? How so?  That is, explain how the two ‘circumstances' fit the case of human action.
   
   
4. On p. 73 Hume contrasts the attitude of the ‘vulgar' with that of the philosophers concerning the ‘contrariety' of events.  What is this issue?  How do the philosophers differ from the vulgar on this topic?  Which of these views preserves the doctrine of necessity?
   
   
5. On p. 74, Hume turns to an examination of inferences that we draw concerning human action.  What sort of inferences is he talking about?  Inferences from what to what?  Why is it important for him to address this issue?
   
   
6. What is the point of the discussion of the prisoner on p. 75?  (Hint: It's the same as the point of the cases--on p. 76--of the houseguest and the man who leaves his gold in the train station.)
   
   
7. The paragraph which spans pp. 76-7 is an important one.  What is Hume up to there?  What issue is he dealing with?  What is his point?  (The same topic is continued in the following paragraph.)
   
   
8. Why is it that an act of mine still falls under the doctrine of necessity even though it seems to me that my act is free?
   
   
9. What is the doctrine of liberty?  Why is it consistent with the doctrine of necessity?
   
   
10. Liberty is opposed to constraint; it is not opposed to necessity.  What does this mean?
    
    
11. According to Hume, the doctrine of necessity does not threaten morality or our ability to praise and blame (remember this problem from the Stoics), but rather morality--including our practices of praising and blaming--presuppose the truth of the doctrine of necessity.  Explain how this is so.
    
    
12. How is it that liberty is essential to morality?
    
    
13. Hume considers a powerful objection on p. 82.  (It should remind you of things you encountered in reading the Stoics).  What is his response to this objection?  Is it a good one?

1. Ayer distinguishes between the feeling of freedom and actually being free.  Do you think there is such a distinction?  Note that Hume describes this same distinction in the long footnote on p. 78.
   
   
2. Why would denying that a person's actions are caused not be much of a help to the ‘moralist', according to Ayer?  (The relevant text is p. 112.)
   
   
3. On pp. 112-13 Ayer tries to show that the moralist is committed to and cannot avoid determinism. How does this bit of argumentation go?  (I.e., what problem for the moralist does Ayer raise?  How does the moralist reply?  How does Ayer show that reply to be problematic?)
   
   
4. Why is it that, if we want to say that people are responsible only for acts they perform freely, we need to reconcile determinism with the freedom of the will?
   
   
5. Ayer describes freedom as the absence of constraint.  How is it possible for an act to be caused but not constrained?  (The discussion from p. 115 to the end of the article the meat of Ayer's argument, and you should work to make sure you understand what's going on here.)
   
   
6. A man puts a gun to my head and threatens me into doing something.  He does not move my limbs for me or hypnotize me.  I can disobey him (and suffer the consequences) if I want to.  Why is this a case of constraint, according to Ayer?
   
   
7. What does Ayer mean by the ‘power of choice'?  In the gun-to-the-head case I'm constrained even though I have the power of choice, Ayer says, but in the habitual ascendancy case it is because I lack the power of choice that I'm constrained.  How can we make sense of all this?
   
   
8. "For it is not when my action has any cause at all, but only when it has a special sort of cause, that it is reckoned not to be free."  (p. 116)  Can you characterize the special sort of cause Ayer has in mind here?
   
   
9. Ayer attempts to diagnose why endorsing determinism seems so strongly to suggest that I cannot act freely if determinism is true. Explain Ayer's diagnosis.
   
   
10. Compare Ayer's conception of determinism to Hume's conception of the doctrine of necessity.
    
    
11. Compare Ayer's remarks in the last two paragraphs to Chrysippus' reply to the Lazy Argument.

1. Chisholm says the following two things on p. 144:
   
   (a) "...if a man is responsible for a certain event or a certain state of affairs (in our example, the shooting of another man), then that event or state of affairs was brought about by some act of his, and the act was something that was in his power either to perform or not to perform."
   
   (b) "...if the act which he did perform was an act that was also in his power not to perform, then it could not have been caused or determined by any event that was not itself within his power either to bring about or not to bring about."
   
   Which of these two claims would a compatibilist like Hume or Ayer agree with?  Which would they disagree with?
   
   
2. In the paragraph which spans pp. 144-5, Chishom is claiming that compatibilism is false.  Do you see how?  What are his reasons for thinking this?
   
   
3. Reconstruct the argument at the beginning of Section 3 (p. 146) for the compatibility of freedom and determinism.  Note that Chisholm doesn't endorse this argument--he's not a compatibilist--he is just setting it out in order to criticize it.
   
   
4. What is Chisholm's objection to the pro-compatibilist argument?  Try as much as possible to put it in your own words or to use your own example.  Do you agree with Chisholm?
   
   
5. In Section 5, Chisholm sets out his alternative.  In what respect is it an alternative to a compatibilist picture?
   
   
6. What is the difference between transeunt causation and immanent causation?
   
   
7. Chisholm makes use of a distinction between doing something and making something happen. What objection does that distinction help him respond to?
   
   
8. Chisholm believes that in the case of actions for which we're responsible, agents cause events.  What sort of events does Chisholm think agents cause?  Why does he think that agents cause those sorts of events and not some other sort of event?
   
   
9. On p. 150, Chisholm raises what he takes to be a very serious problem for his view.  What is it?  What's his response to this problem?  Is it satisfactory?
   
   
10. Compare what Chisholm says on p. 151 about the genesis of our notion of causation to what Hume (and, to a lesser extent, Ayer) say about the origin of our notion of causation.  It is notable that a central argumentative plank both in Hume's compatibilist position and in Chisholm's libertarian position is a claim about the origin of (and content of) our idea of causation.  If their different positions on the free will question turn on their different views about the orgin and content of our idea of causation, this suggests that the next stage in the debate should be on that topic--i.e., who is right about where our idea of causation comes from?
    
    
11. Chisholm, at the bottom of p. 151, claims that the "metaphysical problem of freedom" concerns the "actus elicitus" not the "actus imperatus".  Which of these two "acti" were Hume and Ayer addressing?  (Try to put this distinction into your own, non-Latin, words.)
    
    
12. Why does Chisholm think there can be no "science of man"?  What does he mean by a science of man, anyway?
    
    
13. Is Chisholm committed to a version of Cartesian dualism?  That is, does his view committ him to thinking that agents are non-physical substances?  Why or why not?

1. Locate in Hume, Ayer, and Chisholm evidence that they ascribe to the principle of alternate possibilities.
   
   
2. What is the argument that the principle of alternate possibilities implies that compatibilism is false (this is not explicitly in Frankfurt, but try to formulate it on your own)?
   
   
3. At the beginning of Section II Frankfurt claims that coerced acts are acts for which the agent is not morally responsible.  We called this into question in our discussion of Ayer.  If we are right, does this undermine Frankfurt's argument?
   
   
4. Do you agree that someone who is coerced into doing something could not have done otherwise?
   
   
5. What is going on in the first full paragraph on p. 158?
   
   
6. Why does Jones₃ count as a case which helps Frankfurt prove that the principle of alternate possibilities is false?  Do you agree with Frankfurt's analysis of Jones₃'s situation?
   
   
7. "...the doctrine that coercion excludes moral responsibility is not a particularized version of the principle of alternate possibilities." (p. 160)  What does this mean?  Why does Frankfurt believe it to be true?
   
   
8. If the reason we hold Jones₃ morally responsible for his act is not that he couldn't have done otherwise, what is the reason, according to Frankfurt?
   
   
9. In Section IV Frankfurt considers the objection that perhaps one who is coerced can do otherwise.  If you were worred about this (from the earlier questions above) you'll want to pay close attention to what Frankfurt says in response to this objection.
   
   
10. Why, in brief, is the principle of alternate possibilities mistaken?
    
    
11. What's the revised version of the principle of alternate possibilities?  How does it differ from the original version?
    
    
12. Why does Frankfurt think that the revised version of the principle of alternate possibilities is false?
    
    
13. How does Frankfurt's position--especially as spelled out in the last 2 paragraphs--constitute a response to Chisholm's anti-compatibilist position?  (Which step in Chisholm's argument does Frankfurt show to be false?)