The Smart Theory of Moral Responsibility

The "Smart" of my title is J. J. C. Smart. He has proposed an austere version of compatibilism. 1 The generic doctrine of compatibilism holds that the claim-that all human choices are events in the physical world that are caused either deterministically or indeterministically-is compatible with moral responsibility and desert. 2 According to Smart's version, one is morally responsible for a choice one makes just in case praising or blaming, rewarding or punishing one for making the choice would produce good consequences by altering the future behavior of oneself or others. Compatibilism of this ilk does not include the assertion that free will and the causation of choices are compatible, and indeed Smart repudiates the libertarian idea of free will on the ground that it is logically incoherent and does not consider whether some watered-down notion of free will might make sense. If compatibilism plus determinism equals soft determinism, Smart's doctrine merits the label "hard soft determinism." This is the position everyone loves to hate. R. Jay Wallace calls it the "economy of threats" approach to the understanding of moral responsibility. If we consider the case in which one holds oneself responsible for one's own wrongdoing, Wallace urges that we should agree that "the economy of threats account of the reflexive case has an almost comically external aspect." 3 Saul Smilansky has given the economy of threats approach yet another label, "effect compatibilism," but echoes Wallace's negative assessment of it. Smilansky writes, "Effect compatibilism is morally grotesque, contrary to any 2 conceivable set of reflective common moral beliefs, and in light of the case for [Smilansky's alternative account], morally wrong in comparison with the defensible practical alternative." 4 In the same spirit, but more calmly, T. M. Scanlon observes, " The usefulness of administering praise or blame depends on too many factors other than the nature of the act in question for there ever to be a good fit between the idea of influenceability and the idea of responsibility which we now employ. " 5 These objections for the most part issue from a " soft soft determinist " or soft compatibilist perspective (as contrasted with Smart's hard compatibilism). 6 Soft compatibilism asserts that people can be genuinely morally responsible for their conduct in the sense of being truly praiseworthy or blameworthy, deserving or reward or punishment, good fortune or bad fortune, in a world in which all human choices …