ABSTRACT

According to the ‘Principle of Alternative Possibilities’ (PAP), an agent is morally responsible for performing some action only if she could have done otherwise. Beginning with Harry Frankfurt nearly fifty years ago, a number of putative counterexamples (‘Frankfurt examples’) have been offered. In this essay, I consider a type of counterexample developed by David Hunt: so-called ‘complete blockage’ Frankfurt examples. The chief objection to these cases is that they presuppose causal determinism, thereby begging the question against incompatibilists. I argue, however, that even if we grant that complete blockage Frankfurt examples assume causal determinism, they can still be successfully deployed as counterexamples to PAP without begging the question.

摘要

根据“替代可能性原则”（PAP），只有在她可以做其他事情的情况下，代理人才在道德上负责执行某些行动。从大约五十年前的哈里·法兰克福开始，已经提供了许多假定的反例（“法兰克福例子”）。在这篇文章中，我考虑了 David Hunt 开发的一种反例：所谓的“完全阻塞”法兰克福例子。对这些案例的主要反对意见是，它们以因果决定论为前提，从而回避了不相容论者的问题。然而，我认为，即使我们承认完全阻塞法兰克福的例子假设因果决定论，它们仍然可以成功地部署为 PAP 的反例，而不会回避问题。