chisholm piece

Instructor will be teaching normal course material.
Responsible for third class test and final exam.
Mentions possibility of students participating in a student protest next week.
- Participation is student's choice; no comments made by instructor on the event.
- Encourages students to reach out if they have questions regarding readings or lectures before the test.
Extra office hours will be scheduled for the following week to support students before the test.

Discussion of Hume's attempt in the 18th century to reconcile ideas of responsibility and liberty.
Hume posited that to praise or blame someone, their actions must be considered causally determined by their character and dispositions.
Necessary connection between individual character, developed over time, and resultant actions.
Example provided: Praise a student for choosing to study rather than go to the pub, attributing this choice to their character.
Indicates Hume’s deterministic view, presenting a stability in history and politics as actions are not random, but caused by character.
Hume’s duality: supports the idea of both determinism and liberty in human action.

Contrasts Hume’s view with the prevalent idea that free will exists, suggesting a divergence between determinism and liberty.
The debate revolves around whether humans choose their actions or if actions are merely a result of character.
Discussion of common misconceptions around free will, emphasizing that human agency can exist within deterministic frameworks.

Introduction to Chisholm and his views on causation.
Comparison of two types of causation:
- Event causation (traditional, deterministic view)
- Agent causation (where human beings initiate actions).
Example from Aristotle’s writings: A man pushes a stone with a stick.
- Physical properties vs. the agent's role.
- Chisholm advocates for recognizing the uniqueness of human agency amidst general determinism.

Discussion of desires as motivators in human actions.
- Chisholm argues that if one's actions are solely dictated by desires, they lose their agency.
Raises questions about whether individuals truly own their desires or are slaves to them, prompting philosophical and practical implications.
The potential need for reimagining agency beyond mere internal versus external determinism.

Chisholm's analysis asserts that for an individual to be morally responsible, they must be able to choose otherwise.
Discussion of a responsible agent in the context of potential actions.
- Case of a man shooting another: must have been capable of both shooting and refraining from shooting to qualify moral culpability.
Issues around counterfactuals and the inability to run scenarios in real life to discuss free will alternatives.
- The concept of free choice and its interpretation in philosophical discourse.

Key principle introduced: An agent must argue they could have acted differently to establish responsibility.
Chisholm emphasizes that internal desires leading to actions need careful consideration to avoid dismissing agency.
They introduce the sense that desires can dictate actions in a way that removes the individual's sense of responsibility.

Discussion about how Hume's view implies that strong character traits determine actions, thus relegating agency to a minimal role.
Proposes a richer understanding of how desires influence freedom and moral agency.
Concludes that if desires fully determine action, agency ceases to exist, leading to a deterministic model void of personal responsibility.

Introduction of Stoic views on freedom, highlighting a perspective that sees freedom as surviving imprisonment by external circumstances.
Exploration of the differences between Stoic and Humean thoughts on agency and freedom.
Discussion of how one can choose personal characteristics and responses to desires, reaffirming personal agency despite deterministic influences.
- Reference to psychological theories like those of Freud and the concept of the unconscious influencing decisions without awareness.

Establishes groundwork for further discussion on Chisholm and other philosophers' contributions to the questions of freedom, determinism, responsibility, and agency in upcoming classes.