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4 It is not difficult to give an account of how open alternatives contribute to natural free will, but it has proved very difficult indeed to develop a naturalistic account of open alternatives that supports moral responsibility (though Robert Kane, Carl Ginet, and Randolph Clarke—among others— have made heroic efforts). Those difficulties have pushed many philosophers toward a new account of free will: an account that does not require choices among open alternatives, but focuses instead on choices that are one’s own choices. In this approach, the focus moves from alternatives to authenticity. The question is not whether I could have chosen differently, but whether my choice is genuine, reflects my true commitments, and is authentically my own. In contemporary philosophy, Harry Frankfurt is one of the most inventive and influential advocates of the authenticity approach to free will and moral responsibility. In Frankfurt’s account, the question is not whether I could have made a different choice, but whether the choice I made is one that I approve and endorse at a higher reflective level. Frankfurt’s Hierarchical Authenticity This “hierarchical authenticity” approach to free will offers important insights, which are celebrated in later pages. But it fails as a justification for moral responsibility, and its failed struggle to support moral responsibility results in a distorted model of free will. The problem is evident in one of Frankfurt’s most provocative and creative examples (1971): the willing addict, who has no alternative to taking drugs but is nonetheless free and morally responsible because he reflectively approves and endorses his drug desire and drug addiction. The case of the willing addict has prompted new scrutiny of our approach to freedom and responsibility, but close Hierarchical Free Will and Natural Authenticity 60 Chapter 4 examination of the case reveals the fatal flaws in this hierarchical reflection model. Instead of the abstract philosophical entity of a willing addict who carefully reflects and deeply approves his life of addiction, consider the actual psychological state of a deeply committed willing addict. The unwilling addict is easy enough to understand; indeed, almost all of us have experienced strong—perhaps even addictive—desires that we deeply disapprove: for tobacco or alcohol, perhaps, or for sweets or video games. The unwilling addict toys with drugs, believing himself fully in control of their use (“I can stop anytime I wish”), but then finds himself trapped in an addiction that he despises: an addiction that is wrecking his health, his career, and his family life. This unwilling addict is not free, as Frankfurt clearly notes. But although the path to unwilling addiction is obvious, the path to willing addiction has tricky turns. Consider the psychological process of embracing addiction—becoming a willing addict. The unwilling addict continues to slide into deeper difficulties, losing his family and friends, destroying his career, and suffering physical and psychological problems. At some point, he has nothing left except his addiction, his only desire is for drugs, and at that point he deeply approves of his addiction, clinging to it desperately. He has now become a willing addict, and when he reflects on his situation, he is glad to be an addict (any other pleasures or satisfactions are now unimaginable). But having lost the desire to escape his addiction, has he now gained freedom and moral responsibility? Consider Jamal, a fiercely independent warrior who is captured by slavers, painfully shackled, locked in the dark stench of a slave ship for months, and transported in chains to a plantation, where he is whipped, branded, and abused. Through this horrific process, Jamal keeps his commitment to freedom, striking back at his captors at every opportunity and seizing every remote chance of escape. Jamal is an unwilling slave, and—as Frankfurt would rightly acknowledge—Jamal is not free, nor is he morally responsible for his condition of servitude. But eventually even Jamal’s spirit is broken: every attempt at escape results in heavier chains and greater suffering, every act of defiance is severely punished, every element of control is lost, every hope extinguished. After a long struggle, Jamal “accepts his fate,” embraces his life of slavery, and loses any desire for freedom: now he wishes only to serve his master faithfully, is glad that he is a slave, and reflectively approves of his enslavement. And now Jamal is [3.133.79.70] Project MUSE (2024-04-23 17:16 GMT...

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