Hello Flickerers, and thanks for having me on board! Thanks especially to Thomas for extending the invitation. I won’t be starting my substantive posting for another week or so, but I wanted to take the opportunity to introduce myself, and say just a little about what I’m working on.
Autonomy is one of those tricky concepts that is both widely used and deeply contested. It’s taken as central in debates on the nature of paternalism, consent, political legitimacy, weakness of will, and adaptive preferences, to name just a few. Yet it’s not always clear that participants in those debates are using the term in the same way. For instance, it’s common to assume that people suffering from weakness of will are less autonomous (at least with respect to those actions). But it’s almost never assumed that weakness of will is sufficient to undermine consent, even though consent is typically thought to require autonomy. Similarly, a number of theories of autonomy claim that actions motivated by oppressive norms are non- (or less) autonomous. And yet, I think very few people would agree that it is OK to intervene in the actions of someone, just because they are motivated by oppressive norms, even though paternalism is only meant to be wrong insofar as it offends against autonomy.
One way we might respond to this predicament is to declare autonomy a useless concept, too hopelessly muddled to be salvageable. Another way we might respond is to develop distinct accounts of autonomy for distinct purposes (autonomy means something different if we’re talking about weakness of will than it does if we’re talking about consent, and so forth).
My goal over the last few years – hopefully not a fool’s errand! – has been to see if it’s possible to develop a theory of autonomy that can make sense of these seeming inconsistencies, and hence offer some common ground across the range of debates within which autonomy is a key concept. I’ll be sharing the core features of this theory, and showing how they can be brought to bear on the relevant debates, in the weeks to come. I very much look forward to hearing your thoughts!
My own inclination is to "declare autonomy a useless concept," so I very much look forward to hearing what you have to say, Suzy!
Posted by: David Shoemaker | 08/05/2016 at 10:23 AM
My inclination is to seek to distinguish autonomy from moral responsibility. I have argued that keeping these two notions distinct can help to illuminate various debates and issues in agency theory. It think that autonomy entails responsibility but that you can be responsible without being autonomous.
Posted by: John Fischer | 08/09/2016 at 02:09 PM
John - I completely agree that we need to keep autonomy and moral responsibility distinct. For one thing, I don't think tracing typically applies to autonomous actions (just because I autonomously get drunk, it doesn't mean what I do when I'm drunk is autonomous!)
I do think it's a desideratum for a theory of autonomy that it can explain what the connection is supposed to be between autonomy and moral responsibility, though. Ditto for the connection between autonomy and paternalism; autonomy and consent; autonomy and political legitimacy; and so on. Where I think I differ from most is in my optimism that a single theory of autonomy can do all this work.
Posted by: Suzy Killmister | 08/09/2016 at 03:54 PM
Hi Suzy,
Would - I don't know if there's already another term - autonomous accomplishment be included in your single concept? Around 18-24 months of age, a child will often start saying "No! *I* do it!" when a parent "helpfully" contributes to making a tower of blocks. From then on, most people attribute a personal value to autonomy. This seems like an important dimension to try to capture.
Posted by: Paul Torek | 08/11/2016 at 07:43 PM
Hi Paul,
I agree this is really important. I don't have much to say about the acquisition of autonomy per se, but I do think your example draws attention to a very important aspect of autonomy that's frequently overlooked.
When philosophers of action attend to the relationship between intentions and actions, its typically in the context of grappling with the problem of deviant causal chains. I think this focus creates a tendency to assume that (autonomous) action requires a direct causal route between the agent's intention and her action, ruling out external assistance. But I claim in my manuscript that this is an over-generalization.
Certainly, there are cases in which external intervention between the intention and the action mean the action isn't the agent's own, and hence not autonomous: if I'm trying to shoot a hoop, and some benevolent genie intervenes to make sure the ball goes in, I haven't actually shot a hoop. But there are also plenty of cases in which this isn't the case. If I'm trying to pick up a glass that's placed too high, and someone sees what's going on and moves the glass to within my reach, I'm tempted to say I've (autonomously) picked up the glass.
The difference, I think, can be explained by the fact that different intentions have different success conditions. Sometimes it matters that I perform an action entirely under my own steam (the baseball example, and the toddler example, would fit into this category). Sometimes it only matters that the action gets done, no matter what the causal route (I think the glass example is like this). And other times, I think the success conditions are more fine-grained - some kinds of intervention, or interventions by some people, are OK, but others are ruled out (older children might consider an action successful if a friend has assisted, but not if a parent has, for instance).
Posted by: Suzy Killmister | 08/13/2016 at 09:37 AM