RELIGION AND MORALITY 321nor compulsed to lie to John, and Jane’s lying to John at T is
not irrational in the sense of resulting from her having
wildly implausible beliefs or reasoning chaotically, and Jane’s
not lying to John at T is logically, naturally, competently, and
counterfactually available to Jane at T, and Jane’s not lying
to John at T would not be irrational.Perhaps there remains something that we must add in order to express
fairly this sort of analysis of the freedom responsibility requires. But
somewhere not too far along the road we have been traveling,
presumably one gets to that point without having gotten to the point
where both Jane’s not lying and Jane’s lying are compatible with the
whole past package. We have come close at least to that point. For a
compatibilist, to reach that point is to have gone too far.
The sort of freedom, if it is such, that we have been describing is a
fairly complete rendering of compatibilist freedom. One could contest
various elements included and perhaps contend for some additions. But
it is a fair account of various elements that compatibilists have included
in their accounts of compatibilist freedom, and that is all that we need.
Is it true that compatibilist freedom is the sort of freedom a moral agent
has if she is responsible for her actions?
The Control Principle says:
(CP) One has no control over anything that is entailed by what
one has no control over.
The corresponding compatibilist claim is:
(CC) One has control over what one has compatibilist freedom
concerning.
The compatibilist will claim that in (CP) “having control of” is given the
sense of “has categorical or libertarian freedom regarding” and is thus a
claim the compatibilist will reject in favor of (CC). Further, the
compatibilist claims, being categorically or libertarianly free is not a
necessary condition of being morally responsible. The libertarian
response is that one can be neither free nor morally responsible
regarding any action that is in fact inevitable. The compatibilist account
of freedom may be fine as far as it goes, but it leaves out a crucial
element – genuine alternatives that cannot coexist with in fact
inevitable actions. The central principle in dispute here has been called