Freedom Beyond Practical Reason: Duns Scotus on Will-Dependent Relations

Most acts of the will have a complex structure, i.e. wanting A in relation to B (e.g. as a means for an end or as a good for another person or for oneself). Duns Scotus makes the innovative claim that the will itself is responsible for the order of this complex structure. It does this by causing its own will-dependent relations, which he construes as a kind of mind-dependent relations (relationes rationis). By means of these relations, the will can arrange the terms of its will-acts independently of any arrangement proposed by the intellect. This not only allows the structure of one's will-act to diverge from the structure proposed by the intellect's final practical judgement; the structure of the will-act need not even have been considered by the intellect at all. One could, therefore, even will an inconceivable state of affairs. I argue that this theory, which scholars have virtually ignored, is fundamental to Scotus's account of divine, angelic, and human freedom, and that it follows necessarily from his voluntarist understanding of freedom. For Scotus, if the will could not structure its acts independently of the intellect, it would not be free.¹¹Earlier versions of this paper were presented at the Hoger Instituut voor Wijsbegeerte (Leuven), the Cornell Summer Colloquium in Medieval Philosophy, and at UCLA. I am grateful for the discussion with those present on these occasions. Special thanks are due to Joshua Benson, Francis Feingold, Gloria Frost, Michael Gorman, Bonnie Kent, Calvin Normore, and Nick Kahm for helpful comments.     

Freedom of the Will in Plato and Augustine

There has been a recent surge of interest in ancient accounts of free will. It is surprising, then, that there have been virtually no attempts to discuss whether Plato had such an account. Those who have made an attempt quickly deny that such an account is present in the dialogues. I shall argue that if we draw a distinction between two notions of free will, it is plausible that some account of free will is, in fact, present in the dialogues, the Republic in particular. This is the first in depth search into the question and I demonstrate that the defender of a Platonic free will thesis has more resources than she first appears to. It also has the benefit of giving us an obvious source material for Augustine's discussion.     

Consciousness and the self

With his notion of absolute consciousness, Sartre tries to rethink the relation between consciousness and the self. What is the origin of subjectivity in relation to a consciousness that is characterized as impersonal and as a radical lucidity? In this article, I attempt to question that origin and the nature as such of the subject in its relation to a consciousness that in its essence is not yet subjective. On the contrary, it is characterized by a selfpresence that is so radical that it threatens every form of self‐knowledge.     

Subjectivity,Reflection and Freedom in Later Foucault

Abstract

This paper proposes a new reading of the interaction between subjectivity, reflection and freedom within Foucault’s later work. I begin by introducing three approaches to subjectivity, locating these in relation both to Foucault’s texts and to the recent literature. I suggest that Foucault himself operates within what I call the ‘entanglement approach’, and, as such, he faces a potentially serious challenge, a challenge forcefully articulated by Han. Using Kant’s treatment of reflection as a point of comparison, I argue that Foucault possesses the resources to meet this challenge. The key, I contend, is to distinguish two related theses about reflection and freedom: Foucault’s position is distinctive precisely because he accepts one of these theses whilst rejecting the other. I conclude by indicating how this reading might connect to the longstanding question of Foucault’s own right to appeal to normative standards.     

Artificial Intelligence and the New Alienation of Human Beings

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a revolutionary and overwhelming technology that is yet to immature. While profoundly changing and shaping people and society, AI also splits into its own opposites and develops into a new external alien force. As the basic technical support of the entire society, intelligent technology entails the overt or covert domination of human beings, who are becoming the “vassals” and “slaves” of this high-speed intelligent social system. Various intelligent systems are constantly replacing human work, so that the “digital poor” gradually lose the opportunities and values offered by labor and hence are excluded by the global economic and social system, rendering their existence empty and absurd. The rapid development of intelligent robots has blurred the boundary between humans and machines and had a strong impact on the nature of man and his position as a conscious agent, making “What is man?” and the human-machine relationship prominent issues for our times, challenging the commonplaces of philosophy. We must face up to the existing or imminent risk of alienation, expand our theoretical horizons, innovate theories of alienation in the era of intelligence, take constructive action in terms of the construction of an ideal society and the evolution of man himself, build an ecological system for the joint evolution and growth of human beings and intelligent machines, and achieve liberty of man and the all-round and free development.     

The Therapist’s Needs: Beyond Mutual Recognition

Abstract

As early as 1965, Harold Searles argued that therapists’ needs for healing and growth are part and parcel of their work with patients. Since then, the relational movement has corroborated this idea by articulating the healing function of treatment for both patient and clinician. In this article, the authors examine therapists’ needs that have been overlooked or those that have not been considered fully in the literature. Using various ideas related to the concept of what the authors call therapeutic freedom, this article argues that clinicians must strive to adopt a therapeutic vision that aims to loosen their own ties to safe, familiar modes of engaging with patients, particularly in moments of enactment or impasse. The authors elucidate these ideas with case material from their clinical work and show how embracing various forms of therapeutic freedom results in a type of mutual surrender on the part of both patient and therapist, creating opportunistic conditions that generate therapeutic action and new possibilities for the dyad.     

Hume and the phenomenology of agency

Some philosophers argue that Hume, given his theory of causation, is committed to an implausibly thin account of what it is like to act voluntarily. Others suggest, on the basis of his argument against free will, that Hume takes no more than an illusory feature of action to distinguish the experience of performing an act from the experience of merely observing an act. In this paper, I argue that Hume is committed to neither an unduly parsimonious nor a sceptical account of the phenomenology of agency.     

FREEDOM AND DETERMINISM: A CONTEMPORARY DISCUSSION

Abstract. The problem of freedom of the will and determinism is one of the most intriguing and difficult in the whole area of philosophy. It constüutes a paradox. If we look at ourselves, at our ability to deliberate and make moral choices, it seems obvious that we are free. On the other hand, if we look at what we believe about causality (i.e., that every event and thing must have a cause), then it appears that we do not have free wills but are determined. Thus we seem to have inconsistent beliefs. In this paper I set forth and analyze the major contemporary arguments for free will and determinism as well as for compatibilism, the position that tries to combine insights from both theories. I end with a brief conclusion regarding my assessment of the status of the arguments.     

Can Science Help Construct a New Global Ethic? The Development and Implications of Moral Transformation Theory

This paper reports the results of a ten-year search for consensus among scientific findings on the nature of the origin and development of moral sensitivity and morality. Significant agreement on six underlying factors was found. Based on these foundations, a new theory of moral transformation and a scientific "global ethic" relating to the global ethic of Hans Kung and the Parliament of the World's Religions is proposed. Fields surveyed include psychology, sociology, political science, economics, history, and gender and feminist studies in social science; physics and biology in natural science; and brain research, archaeology, and both old and new evolutionary studies and theory, including chaos, self-organizing, and other nonlinear theories, in systems science.