[tjoff]

The free will equivalent of that rock solid excuse also exist: "Because I wanted to".

The the incentives are identical and the consequences are identical, why can't we hold one of the scenarios responsible?

Now if you subscribe to the lack of free will idea, you might come to the conclusion that. Okay, it isn't this individual that performed this action, it is the history led up to this point. But in the end nothing has changed. Given that belief you might adjust and realize that hey, maybe we could have prevented this. And we probably could.

But nothing in this reasoning is any different with or without free will. Our societies would most likely be much better if we had good techniques for detecting signs for bad behavior early and encouraging change (no force required), and I'm positive that would be the case both in a free will and in a lack of free will scenario.

[foldr]

I don't see how "because I wanted to" is an excuse at all. If you shouldn't have, and you needn't have, then it doesn't matter if you wanted to.

I mean, I am just talking about excuses as we ordinarily understand them here. Try using "because I wanted to" as an excuse in your daily life and see how that goes.

[tjoff]

> Try using "because I wanted to" as an excuse in your daily life and see how that goes.

Try using "I could not have done otherwise" as an excuse in your daily life and see how that goes.

The consequences will be equally bad, thus with or without free will you will be equally motivated to avoid it. And even if it doesn't hold up to some definition of being "held responsible" the outcomes are identical.

EDIT: Nothing stops you from, even in a free-will world, believing that free will doesn't exist (as many do). But I bet you don't see them using that excuse.

[foldr]

"I could not have done otherwise" is a great excuse when people agree that you could, indeed, not have done otherwise. Conversely, "because I wanted to" is a terrible excuse, even if people agree that you did indeed want to.

[tjoff]

I'm not meaning the excuse to be interpreted literally with all the social context it implies. I'm saying that whether the action is performed because of free will or not doesn't matter.

We as a society has come up with ways to direct the responsibility and the answer will be different depending on the viewpoint of who is asking it. But this is arbitrary, just something we as a society has decided is "fair", you have responsibility for your actions and the consequences you face should be in proportion to that responsibility.

You can argue that this reasoning is all based on the assumption that everyone has free will, because if you don't then the blame should be directed further up the chain (the hammer isn't responsible for the actions performed with it).

We still do this plenty today though, even with humans. If a rocket crashes because of one person installing a gyro the wrong way you don't necessarily put the blame squarely on him/her, the processes involved should have prevented that from being undetected and thus the responsibility and blame goes further.

(EDIT: the gyro example was a bad example as the person installed it didn't want to do it in the wrong direction. A better example would be the engineer implementing the code to cheat emission tests. But that is also a point, we do still blame people even when there is no intent (or will) to base it on)

But the reasoning is still arbitraty. A human would, free will or not, still react to the consequences (direct as well as risk assesment) of its actions. The concept of responsibility still works and doesn't need to change.

[foldr]

We don't as a society respond the same way when someone involuntarily does something harmful and when someone voluntarily does someone harmful. If all acts are in fact involuntary, it's hard to justify that. (We could of course keep acting as we do now but without the justification.)

[tjoff]

No we don't, and neither would a society without free will.

Whether something was done by accident or intent has nothing to do with free will or not. An entity without free will can still compare two options, realize the consequence for both and choose an action.

If that action is illegal in the eyes of society that signifies intent. But if the action was a mistake (perhaps the entity miscalculated or didn't have enough information to do it correctly) it will then be treated as a mistake or carelessness.