Accountability under Compatibilism

In order to argue that determinism can be compatible with freedom, a restricted definition of “freedom” has been introduced. In this view, so long as an agent is free from external physical constraints, or coercion, then they can be said to have freedom of choice. Constraints due to the laws of physics are not considered. This limited kind of freedom leads to so-called “weak accountability”.

This view could be applied to a computer system which makes “decisions” based deterministically on the data provided to it. It is “responsible” for the decisions it makes in the sense that the decision is the result of its internal mechanism. In that case “correction” or “punishment” would amount to the reprogramming or the retraining of that mechanism. Compatibilism makes no distinction between a machine and a human and effectively treats both as machines.

According to this view, there is no inconsistency between a belief in determinism and holding people responsible for their actions (even if they are not in fact responsible) since all that is considered are the pragmatic results of reward and punishment regardless of its fairness. A person’s responsibility for their actions is then defined in terms of whether, or not, their behaviour can be changed by reward or punishment.

Strawson, who describes compatibilists as “optimists”, writes this: “Some optimists about determinism point to the efficacy of the practices of punishment, and of moral condemnation and approval, in regulating behaviour in socially desirable ways. In the fact of their efficacy, they suggest, is an adequate basis for these practices;”[R v Parks, [1992]] This is the same way as we would treat a thermostat and it is tantamount to objectifying or dehumanising people. Moreover, as before, there is often no sure way of knowing whether a punishment will be efficacious in particular cases.

On [Blackburn 1999 page 109], Blackburn describes this position as of not seeing a problem so long as there is no incompatibility between the first person and the third person perspective. Since freedom is something which is only experienced by the agent and can only be indirectly inferred by a third person, the third person stance says nothing about causation or freedom, so it is declared that there is no problem. This can be compared with the statement that “There is nothing left for consciousness to do”. A complete objective description of behaviour is possible without recourse to the idea of consciousness.

These arguments do not so much solve the problem of fundamental determinism, rather it is simply ignored by redefining freedom.

There is no real freedom according to this model, any more than that of Hard Determinism. There is only the appearance of freedom which results by zooming in on local situations and ignoring the elephant in the room which is that, despite appearances, determinism dictates that all choices are fixed ahead of time. For this reason, there cannot be any strong accountability and the implication is that everyone is morally neutral since they do not choose what they do [Smilanski 2001].