Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-s2hrs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-02T21:09:14.509Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Collaborating agents: Values, sociality, and moral responsibility

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 March 2018

John M. Doris*
Affiliation:
Philosophy-Neuroscience-Psychology Program, Philosophy Department, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO [email protected]://www.moralpsychology.net/jdoris/

Abstract

I respond to the Behavioral and Brain Sciences commentaries on my book, Talking to Our Selves: Reflection, Ignorance, and Agency. I defend and amend both the skeptical challenge to morally responsible agency, that is, the book's impetus, and the anti-skeptical theory I develop to address that challenge. Regarding the skeptical challenge, I argue that it must be taken more seriously than some of my sanguine commentators assert, and consider some ways its impact might be blunted, such as by appeal to individual differences and the practical efficacy of human behavior. Regarding my positive theory, I defend the role of values in morally responsible agency against numerous criticisms, and consider various suggestions for elaborating my social, “collaborativist” account of morally responsible agency. In closing, I comment on the appropriate aspirations for theorizing about moral responsibility and agency.

Type
Author's Response
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alfano, M. (2013a) Character as moral fiction. Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Amaya, S. & Doris, J. M. (2015) No excuses: Performance mistakes in morality. In: Handbook of neuroethics, ed. Clausen, J. & Levy, N., pp. 352–71. Springer.Google Scholar
Arpaly, N. (forthcoming) Comments on Talking to Our Selves by Doris, John. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research.Google Scholar
Bollich, K. L., Doris, J. M., Vazire, S., Raison, C. L., Jackson, J. J. & Mehl, M. R. (2016) Eavesdropping on character: Testing the stability of naturalistically observed daily moral behavior. Journal of Research in Personality 61:1521.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brink, D. O. & Nelkin, D. (2013) Fairness and the architecture of responsibility. Oxford Studies in Agency and Responsibility 1:284313.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cameron, C. D., Payne, B. K. & Doris, J. M. (2013) Morality in high definition: Emotion differentiation calibrates the influence of incidental disgust on moral judgments. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 49(4):719–25. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2013.02.014.Google Scholar
Chi, M. T. (2006) Two approaches to the study of experts' characteristics. In: The Cambridge handbook of expertise and expert performance, ed. Ericsson, K. A., Charness, N., Feltovich, P. J. & Hoffman, R. R., pp. 2130. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Christensen, W., Sutton, J. & McIlwain, D. J. (2016) Cognition in skilled action: Meshed control and the varieties of skill experience. Mind & Language 31(1):3766.Google Scholar
Cohen, J. (1988) Statistical power analysis for the behavioral sciences, 2nd edition. Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Collins, J. (2006) Crime and parenthood: The uneasy case of prosecuting negligent parents. Northwestern University Law Review 100:807–56.Google Scholar
Cramer, R. E., McMaster, M. R., Bartell, P. A. & Dragna, M. (1988) Subject competence and minimization of the bystander effect. Journal of Applied Social Psychology 18:1133–48.Google Scholar
Daly, M. & Wilson, M. (1996) Violence against stepchildren. Current Directions in Psychological Science 5:7781.Google Scholar
Daly, M. & Wilson, M. (2007) Is the “Cinderella effect” controversial? A case study of evolution-minded research and critiques thereof. In: Foundations of evolutionary psychology, ed. Crawford, C. & Krebs, D., pp. 383400. Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Dennett, D. C. (1984) Elbow room: The varieties of free will worth wanting. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Descartes, R. (1641/2008) Meditations on first philosophy: With selections from the objections and replies. Oxford University Press. (Original work published in 1641.)Google Scholar
Doris, J. M. (2002) Lack of character: Personality and moral behavior. Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Doris, J. M. (2005) Replies: Evidence and sensibility. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 72:656–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Doris, J. M. (2015b). Talking to our selves: Reflection, ignorance, and agency. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Doris, J. M. (forthcoming). Character trouble: Undisciplined essays on agency and personality. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Doris, J. M. (in preparation) Making good: In search of moral expertise.Google Scholar
Doris, J. M. & Murphy, D. (2007) From My Lai to Abu Ghraib: The moral psychology of atrocity. Midwest Studies in Philosophy 31(1):2555.Google Scholar
Doris, J. M. & Plakias, A. (2007) How to argue about disagreement: Evaluative diversity and moral realism. In: Moral psychology, vol. 2, The cognitive science of morality, ed. Sinnott-Armstrong, W., pp. 303–31. MIT Press.Google Scholar
Duff, A. (2009) Legal and moral responsibility. Philosophy Compass 4(6):978–86.Google Scholar
Ericsson, K. A. (2014) Why expert performance is special and cannot be extrapolated from studies of performance in the general population: A response to criticisms. Intelligence 45:81103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fischer, J. M. (forthcoming). On Doris's, John Talking to Our Selves. Social Theory and Practice.Google Scholar
Frost, P., Nussbaum, G., Loconto, T., Syke, R., Warren, C. & Muise, C. (2013) An individual differences approach to the suggestibility of memory over time. Memory 21(3):408–16.Google Scholar
Gobet, F. & Campitelli, G. (2007) The role of domain-specific practice, handedness, and starting age in chess. Developmental Psychology 43(1):159.Google Scholar
Graham, J., Haidt, J. & Nosek, B. A. (2009) Liberals and conservatives rely on different sets of moral foundations. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 96:1029–46.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Graham, J., Nosek, B. A., Haidt, J., Iyer, R., Koleva, S. & Ditto, P. H. (2011) Mapping the moral domain. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 101:366–85.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Harman, G. H. (1965) The inference to the best explanation. The Philosophical Review 74(1):8895.Google Scholar
Henrich, J., Heine, S. J. & Norenzayan, A. (2010) The weirdest people in the world? Behavioral and Brain Sciences 33:61135.Google Scholar
Howe, M. J., Davidson, J. W. & Sloboda, J. A. (1998) Innate talents: Reality or myth?. Behavioral and brain sciences 21(3):399407.Google Scholar
Kane, R. (forthcoming). Selfhood, Agency and Responsibility: Reflections on John Doris' Talking to Our Selves: Reflection, Ignorance, and Agency. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research.Google Scholar
Keijzer, F. (2013) The Sphex story: How the cognitive sciences kept repeating an old and questionable anecdote. Philosophical Psychology 26(4):502–19.Google Scholar
Kiehl, K. (2014) The psychopath whisperer. Oneworld.Google Scholar
Machery, E. & Doris, J. M. (2017) An open letter to our students: Doing interdisciplinary moral psychology. In: Moral psychology: A multidisciplinary guide, ed. Voyer, B. G. & Tarantola, T., pp. 119–43. Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Machery, E. & Mallon, R. (2010) Evolution of morality. In: The moral psychology handbook, ed. Doris, J. M. andthe Moral Psychology Research Group, pp. 346. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Marotta, A., Tinazzi, M., Cavedini, C., Zampini, M. & Fiorio, M. (2016) Individual differences in the rubber hand illusion are related to sensory suggestibility. PLoS One 11(12):e0168489.Google Scholar
Mercier, H. & Sperber, D. (2009) Intuitive and reflective inferences. In: In two minds: Dual processes and beyond, ed. Evans, J. St. B. T. & Frankish, K., pp. 149–70. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Mercier, H. & Sperber, D. (2017) The enigma of reason. Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Mooijman, M., Meindl, P., Oyserman, D., Dehghani, M., Monteresso, J., Doris, J. M. & Graham, J. (forthcoming) Resisting temptation for the good of the group: Binding moral values and the moralization of self-control. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.Google Scholar
Morse, S. J. (2008) Psychopathy and criminal responsibility. Neuroethics 1(3):205–12.Google Scholar
Nahmias, E. (2011) Intuitions about free will, determinism, and bypassing. In: Oxford handbook of free will, 2nd edition, ed. Kane, R., pp. 555–76. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Nelkin, D. K. (forthcoming). Responsibility and ignorance of the self: Comments on John Doris' Talking to Our Selves: Reflection, Ignorance, and Agency . Social Theory and Practice.Google Scholar
Niemi, L. & Young, L. (2016) When and why we see victims as responsible: The impact of ideology on attitudes toward victims. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 42(9):1227–42.Google Scholar
Nizzi, M-C. & Niemi, L. (in preparation) The sense of self predicts suicidal thoughts and behaviors in survivors of sexual assault.Google Scholar
Pereboom, D. (2014) Free will, agency, and meaning in life. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Piaget, J. (1974/1976) The grasp of consciousness: Action and concept in the young child. Harvard University Press. (Original work published in 1974.)Google Scholar
Roediger, H. L. & Butler, A. C. (2011) Paradoxes of learning and memory. In: The paradoxical brain, ed. Kapur, N., pp. 151–76. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Shimizu, Y., Lee, H. & Uleman, J. S. (2017) Culture as automatic processes for making meaning: Spontaneous trait inferences. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 69(1):7985. doi: 10.1016/j.jesp.2016.08.003.Google Scholar
Shoemaker, D. (2015). Review of Talking to Our Selves: Reflection, Ignorance, and Agency, by Doris, John M.. Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, 2015.11.17. Available at: http://ndpr.nd.edu/news/62138-talking-to-our-selves-reflection-ignorance-and-agency/.Google Scholar
Smart, J. J. C. (1961) Free will, praise, and blame. Mind 70:291306.Google Scholar
Sosa, E. (1991) Knowledge and intellectual virtue. In: Knowledge in perspective: Essays in epistemology, ed. Sosa, E., pp. 225–44. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Sripada, C. & Stich, S. (2006) A framework for the psychology of norms. In: The innate mind, vol. 2: Culture and cognition, ed. Carruthers, P., Laurence, S. & Stich, S. P., pp. 280301. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Strawson, P. F. (1962) Freedom and resentment. Proceedings of the British Academy 48:125.Google Scholar
Tiberius, V. (forthcoming) Comments on Doris, John, Talking to ourselves: Reflection, ignorance, and agency. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research.Google Scholar
Uleman, J. S., Rim, S., Saribay, S. A. & Kressel, L. M. (2012) Controversies, questions, and prospects for spontaneous social inferences. Social and Personality Psychology Compass 6:657–73.Google Scholar
Vargas, M. R. (forthcoming-a) Reflectivism, skepticism, and values. Social Theory and Practice.Google Scholar
von Hippel, W. & Trivers, R. (2011) The evolution and psychology of self-deception. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 34:116.Google Scholar
Westlund, A. C. (2003) Selflessness and responsibility for self: Is deference compatible with autonomy? The Philosophical Review 112(4):483523.Google Scholar
Zinken, J. (2016) Requesting responsibility: The morality of grammar in Polish and English family interaction. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Zinken, J. & Ogiermann, E. (2013) Responsibility and action: Invariants and diversity in requests for objects in British English and Polish interaction. Research on Language & Social Interaction 46(3):256–76.Google Scholar