Following up on what you wrote in ”Stolen Obligations” above, the News desk thought you’d be interested in this Boston Review piece by philosopher of law Barbara Fried:
The reality is that we are all at best compromised agents, whether by biology, social circumstance, or brute luck. The differences among us are differences of degree that do not admit of categorical division into the normal and the abnormal. A morally serious inquiry into the requisite meaning of free will needs to face some basic facts about this society—for starters, that in the United States parental income and education are the most powerful predictors of whether a three-year-old will end up in the boardroom or in prison; that most abusive parents were themselves victims of abuse and neglect; that the norms of one’s peer group when growing up are powerful determinants of behavior; and that traits of emotional reactivity and impulsiveness, which have a large genetic component, are among the more robust predictors of criminal behavior. Such an inquiry would also need to address what evidence would suffice to conclude that Smith could have behaved differently. Is it enough that someone in a similar situation once pulled herself up by her own bootstraps? That the average person does? And how can we be sure that the situations are in fact similar in relevant ways?
Of course, we can’t ever be absolutely sure of anything, only morally certain.* and anything can be attenuated to nothing by degrees.
But when it comes right down to the rubber, people overcome their circumstances when they accept responsibility for what. they. themselves. do, irrespective of the fact that they were more likely to be pushed in that direction than someone else might have been. Not otherwise.
Fried’s is a more eloquent plea to ignore free will than most, because it relies heavily on the plight of the most unfortunate members of our society, but it stumbles on the same rock: We never improve things by saying people aren’t responsible, due to biology or evolution or society or whatever.
* morally certain = certain enough to make a morally defensible decision about the matter.
See also: the importance of directing the will in mindfulness meditation.