Freedom of expression, deliberation, autonomy and respect

Autonomy and Agent Deliberation

An important aspect of agent autonomy is the decision making capability of the agents. We discuss several issues that agents need to deliberate about in order to decide which action to perform. We assume that there is no unique (rational or universal) deliberation process and that the deliberation process can be specified in various ways. The deliberation process is investigated from two perspe...

Deliberation and Metaphysical Freedom

Proponents of the “Belief in Ability Thesis” (BAT) maintain that one deliberates about whether to perform a given action only if one believes that one can perform the action in question. In An Essay on Free Will, Peter van Inwagen endorsed BAT and deployed it in an argument for the incompatibility of deliberation and consistent belief in the nonexistence of free will. Van Inwagen’s argument att...

Autonomy and Manipulated Freedom

In recent years, compatibilism has been the target of two powerful challenges. According to the consequence argument, if everything we do and think is a consequence of factors beyond our control (past events and the laws of nature), and the consequences of what is beyond our control are themselves beyond our control, then no one has control over what they do or think and no one is responsible f...

Respect for rational autonomy.

The standard notion of autonomy in medical ethics does not require that autonomous choices not be irrational. The paper gives three examples of seemingly irrational patient choices and discusses how a rational autonomy analysis differs from the standard view. It then considers whether a switch to the rational autonomy view would lead to overriding more patient decisions but concludes that this ...

Autonomy, respect for autonomy and weakness of will.