The topic of free will continues to be a hotbed for discussion and disagreement. The most pressing questions remain: What is free will? And how does it affect the notion of moral responsibility? Here, Derk Pereboom and Dana Nelkin tussle over this issue, and disagree on whether we possess sufficient free will to hold us morally responsible. In spite of this, however, they both assert that we can maintain a stable criminal justice system in which punishment plays a prominent role.

I believe that at least much of the time we act freely and in such a way that we are morally responsible for our actions and their consequences.  This means that we are eligible to be blameworthy or praiseworthy.  When you decided to read this article, you likely did so freely.  When you expended some effort to help someone else just for their sake, you were likely morally responsible for it, and in a way that makes you praiseworthy; when you didn’t take as much care as you should have and thereby wronged someone else, you might also have been morally responsible, and blameworthy, for it.  While we tend to simply take for granted that we are free and responsible in these ways, questions naturally arise, including whether we are simply under an illusion in assuming we are generally free and responsible for what we do.  In answering these questions, I will need to say more about what I take moral responsibility to be, how skeptical arguments can be answered, despite their initially surprising strength, and what is at stake.