Periodic Reporting for period 4 - RESPONSIBILITY (The Roots of Responsibility: Metaphysics, Humanity, and Society)
Periodo di rendicontazione: 2023-04-01 al 2023-09-30
Roots of Responsibility (RoR) sought to advance traditional philosophical debates about responsibility and free will by exploring the network of human capacities responsibility involves and the social, institutional and interpersonal contexts in which questions about responsibility arise. Drawing on a wide range of philosophical, scientific, and legal research, the project aimed to pursue a comprehensive series of investigations germane to responsibility, cutting across traditional boundaries between metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, moral psychology, and philosophy of law.
Philosophical research on responsibility today stems from early modern debates about causal necessity and freedom of the will, and ultimately from the Stoic problem of reconciling ethics with physics. It is therefore mainly focused on scepticism about the existence of free will and on the question whether moral responsibility is compatible with physical determinism. The main premises of RoR are that this focus is too narrow, and that the traditional problems can only be solved with a deeper understanding of the network of human capacities responsibility involves and the social, institutional and interpersonal context in which questions about responsibility arise.
The project therefore called for a broad cross-disciplinary collaboration, and drew on legal theory, where the literature on the relationships between responsibility, liability and culpability is more sophisticated and more nuanced than it is in philosophy; biological systems theory, which has shown how the activity of more complex systems can harness stochasticity in the activity of the less complex systems of which they are composed; and the philosophy of action, in which the physical, psychological, ethical and intellectual dimensions of human agency are now more clearly articulated and better understood.
As a research project in philosophy, RoR sought to survey, clarify and criticise a large family of interconnected concepts, which we use to describe, explain, and regulate human behaviour in society—e.g. action and agency, voluntariness and choice, moral and legal responsibility and personhood, capacity and control, reasons, intentions, and motives, knowledge and ignorance, coercion and consent. Hence, beyond advancing scholarship, the theoretical programme of RoR had a direct bearing on various areas of contemporary society, especially policy-making and law reform.
Philosophical research on responsibility today stems from early modern debates about causal necessity and freedom of the will, and ultimately from the Stoic problem of reconciling ethics with physics. It is therefore mainly focused on scepticism about the existence of free will and on the question whether moral responsibility is compatible with physical determinism. The main premises of RoR are that this focus is too narrow, and that the traditional problems can only be solved with a deeper understanding of the network of human capacities responsibility involves and the social, institutional and interpersonal context in which questions about responsibility arise.
The project therefore called for a broad cross-disciplinary collaboration, and drew on legal theory, where the literature on the relationships between responsibility, liability and culpability is more sophisticated and more nuanced than it is in philosophy; biological systems theory, which has shown how the activity of more complex systems can harness stochasticity in the activity of the less complex systems of which they are composed; and the philosophy of action, in which the physical, psychological, ethical and intellectual dimensions of human agency are now more clearly articulated and better understood.
As a research project in philosophy, RoR sought to survey, clarify and criticise a large family of interconnected concepts, which we use to describe, explain, and regulate human behaviour in society—e.g. action and agency, voluntariness and choice, moral and legal responsibility and personhood, capacity and control, reasons, intentions, and motives, knowledge and ignorance, coercion and consent. Hence, beyond advancing scholarship, the theoretical programme of RoR had a direct bearing on various areas of contemporary society, especially policy-making and law reform.
The core research members of Roots of Responsibility (RoR) comprise the project’s PI, John Hyman; four Postdoctoral Research Fellows, Rachel Achs, Claire Field, Claire Hogg, and Maximilian Kiener; two associate research fellows, Simon-Pierre Chevarie-Cossette and David Campbell; Graduate Research Scholar, Michael Thorne; and the project’s Deputy Director, Yuuki Ohta.
The project team conducted original research in various formats: graduate seminars and discussion groups; special invited lectures; research workshops and international conferences. Established scholars and experts were invited to participate in many of these events. The four postdoctoral fellows and the graduate scholar took the lead in planning and running workshops and other academic events, including the project’s closing conference.
In organising many of the events, RoR has collaborated with a variety of research projects, institutions, and universities, including: Lund Gothenburg Responsibility Project (led by Paul Russell); AHRC Varieties of Risk Project (led by Philip Ebert and Martin Smith); DIMENSIONS (Norwegian Research Council project led by Linda Gröning); The Mental Diversity Law Network; and Ivan Franko National University of Lviv, Ukraine.
The themes of these events and research activities ranged widely, covering all five thematic strands that were outlined in the project’s proposal, namely:
(1) The responsible agent: the physical, psychological and intellectual dispositions and capacities on which responsibility depends, and the kinds of incapacity that can exclude responsibility or diminish liability.
(2) Responsibility and liability: the relationship between responsibility, culpability and liability in both legal and moral contexts, including the role of justification and excuse.
(3) Responsibility and society: the social, institutional and interpersonal dynamics involved when questions about responsibility and liability are asked and answered.
(4) The metaphysics of responsibility: the metaphysical implications of responsibility in the light of our analysis of the foregoing three strands.
(5) Rationality, responsibility and scepticism: naturalist responses to scepticism in the work of Hume, Wittgenstein and Strawson, and their application to scepticism about rationality, moral responsibility and free will.
By the end of the project, RoR had generated thirty peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters, a monograph, and an edited volume. In addition, another monograph by the PI and two edited volumes collecting papers based on presentations given at RoR workshops and conferences will be published in 2024–2026.
The project team conducted original research in various formats: graduate seminars and discussion groups; special invited lectures; research workshops and international conferences. Established scholars and experts were invited to participate in many of these events. The four postdoctoral fellows and the graduate scholar took the lead in planning and running workshops and other academic events, including the project’s closing conference.
In organising many of the events, RoR has collaborated with a variety of research projects, institutions, and universities, including: Lund Gothenburg Responsibility Project (led by Paul Russell); AHRC Varieties of Risk Project (led by Philip Ebert and Martin Smith); DIMENSIONS (Norwegian Research Council project led by Linda Gröning); The Mental Diversity Law Network; and Ivan Franko National University of Lviv, Ukraine.
The themes of these events and research activities ranged widely, covering all five thematic strands that were outlined in the project’s proposal, namely:
(1) The responsible agent: the physical, psychological and intellectual dispositions and capacities on which responsibility depends, and the kinds of incapacity that can exclude responsibility or diminish liability.
(2) Responsibility and liability: the relationship between responsibility, culpability and liability in both legal and moral contexts, including the role of justification and excuse.
(3) Responsibility and society: the social, institutional and interpersonal dynamics involved when questions about responsibility and liability are asked and answered.
(4) The metaphysics of responsibility: the metaphysical implications of responsibility in the light of our analysis of the foregoing three strands.
(5) Rationality, responsibility and scepticism: naturalist responses to scepticism in the work of Hume, Wittgenstein and Strawson, and their application to scepticism about rationality, moral responsibility and free will.
By the end of the project, RoR had generated thirty peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters, a monograph, and an edited volume. In addition, another monograph by the PI and two edited volumes collecting papers based on presentations given at RoR workshops and conferences will be published in 2024–2026.
RoR’s scientific outputs have advanced debates in philosophy in various ways.
For example, Claire Field in her publications applies theories constructed in contemporary epistemology to issues in criminal law, moral psychology, and effective altruism; Simon-Pierre Chevarie-Cossette mobilises subtle distinctions made in contemporary philosophy of action to cast fresh light on time-worn debates concerning free will, scepticism, and responsibility; and Rachel Achs develops accounts of praise, blame, and of moral emotions such as guilt, shame, and regret, drawing on metaethical theories that analyse value in terms of responses appropriate to it.
Furthermore, in many cases the work of project members extended beyond their disciplinary boundaries to reach specialist professional organisations or the general public. To give just two examples: Maximilian Kiener published several articles and a monograph on consent, coercion, and related issues in medical ethics and the ethics of A.I. in some of them making suggestions that potentially call for revision or reform in the current clinical practice; and Claire Hogg has collaborated with UK Commissioner for Criminal Law and The Mental Diversity Law Network in working towards reforming legal understanding of mental disorder, to achieve compliance with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
For example, Claire Field in her publications applies theories constructed in contemporary epistemology to issues in criminal law, moral psychology, and effective altruism; Simon-Pierre Chevarie-Cossette mobilises subtle distinctions made in contemporary philosophy of action to cast fresh light on time-worn debates concerning free will, scepticism, and responsibility; and Rachel Achs develops accounts of praise, blame, and of moral emotions such as guilt, shame, and regret, drawing on metaethical theories that analyse value in terms of responses appropriate to it.
Furthermore, in many cases the work of project members extended beyond their disciplinary boundaries to reach specialist professional organisations or the general public. To give just two examples: Maximilian Kiener published several articles and a monograph on consent, coercion, and related issues in medical ethics and the ethics of A.I. in some of them making suggestions that potentially call for revision or reform in the current clinical practice; and Claire Hogg has collaborated with UK Commissioner for Criminal Law and The Mental Diversity Law Network in working towards reforming legal understanding of mental disorder, to achieve compliance with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.