Free Will, Moral Responsibility, and Reformed Theology - Analytic ...

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Paul L. Manata © 2011
commits murder or is coerced to kill; in either case, he kills and cannot do
otherwise than kill. Therefore, moral responsibility does not require the
ability to do otherwise. 47
But if moral responsibility does not require the ability to do otherwise, what does
it require? Semi-­‐compatibilists say that moral responsibility requires control.
Someone who acts in a morally responsible way must be in control of his or her
action. They then make a further distinction between two kinds of control:
regulative control and guidance control. The former requires the ability to do
otherwise, the latter does not; and it is only the latter, they argue, that is
required for responsibility. To give an example of the latter kind, suppose your
steering wheel is locked and will eventually force your car to the right. You,
however, have planned to turn right in order to go to the gas station. At the
moment the wheel will turn your car right if you were to keep going straight or
maybe turn left, you turn your car to the right and “guide” it into the gas station.
This is to exhibit a certain kind of control over the car, guidance control. And this
kind of control doesn’t require alternative possibilities, it requires being
responsive to reasons. This means you guide your car (in our example) to the
right for reasons or motives rather than, say, out of a compulsive habit to turn
into gas stations and purchase Oreo cookies even if you had reasons to go to the
left.
But guidance control is not enough for responsibility. A compulsive Oreo cookie
addict will also exhibit guidance control in grabbing the tray of double stuffed
Oreos, and she will do so for reasons and motives. So what else do semi-­‐
47 This is my own example, but it is similar to other ones. In another one the relevant
action was “voting,” but oddly enough, some Reformed Christians who refer to
themselves as “two kingdoms” have said that we are not morally responsible for our
voting (!), thus I used an example for which there should be no debate.