Responsibility and Good Reasons

I have argued elsewhere that respect for human rights requires a robust notion of responsibility, and that this in turn depends on folk-psychological ideas including free will, and also that such ideas need to be articulated in such a way that they can be used in combination with contemporary science in the development of the criminal law. Stephen J. Morse contends that responsibility is explained by our capacity to grasp and be guided by good reasons, and that this is so despite the truth of determinism. In this article, I consider whether Morse’s criterion is sufficiently robust to support human rights in an era when science is suggesting that behavior is just the causal product of genes and environment, and whether the criterion is such that it can satisfactorily be used together with science in the development of the criminal law. I contend that Morse’s criterion presupposes the ability to reason consciously and informally, using emotional feelings as well as logic, and to bridge a gap that exists between reasons on the one hand and conclusions and actions on the other. I suggest that, on this criterion, we can be responsible because the reasons do not compel conclusions, so that, in the exercise of the capacity Morse refers to, we can either heed and obey the requirements of the law, or not do so, as we choose. So interpreted, I contend, the criterion can be sufficiently robust to support human rights notwithstanding the claims of science that I have mentioned, and to contribute to the development of the criminal law, but I also contend that the criterion itself suggests a possible qualification to those claims and implies that the question of determinism should at least be left open.