Task 8

Question 1

Basic Argument

Answer 1

We cannot be truly or ultimately morally responsible for our actions

1) Nothing can be causa sui - nothing can be the cause of itself
2) In order to be truly morally responsible for one’s actions one would have to be causa sui
3) Therefore, nothing can be truly morally responsible

Question 2

Factors that determine who we are

Answer 2

We cannot be held responsible for these:
- heredity
- previous experience
- (indeterministic or random factors)

–> attempts to change oneself and one’s success will be determined by these factors

Question 3

Heaven and Hell

Answer 3

If we have true moral responsibility, then it could be just to punish some of us with torment in hell and reward others with bliss in heaven

Question 4

Basic Argument: Restated

Answer 4

We are what we are, in such a way that:
- we cannot be held to be free in our actions
- we cannot be held to be morally responsible for our actions
- no punishment or reward for our actions is ultimately just or fair

Question 5

Compatibilism

Answer 5

Compatibilists believe that one can be a free and morally responsible agent even if determinism is true

–> one can have compatibilist responsibility even if the way one is is totally determined by factors entirely outside one’s control

Criticism: Compatibilist responsibility famously failts to amount to any sort of true moral responsibility

Question 6

Incompatibilism

Answer 6

Incompatibilists believe that freedom and moral responsibility are incompatible with determinism

Question 7

Libertarianism

Answer 7

Libertarians believe that we are free and morally responsible agents, and that determinism is therefore false

–> people can have the power to make choices which can only and finally be explained in terms of their own will

Question 8

Indeterminism

Answer 8

True moral responsibility is possible if indeterminism is true

–> we are truly making ourselves in such a way that we are ultimately responsible for the outcome

Question 9

CMP: Character or Personality or Motivational Structure

Answer 9

One can be truly free and morally responsible in spite of the fact that one cannot be held to be ultimately responsible for one’s character or personality or motivational structure

–> one is free and truly morally responsible because one’s self is, in a crucial sense, independent of one’s CPM

Question 10

Philosophical Perspective: Do we have free will?

Answer 10

However self-consciously aware we are, as we deliberate and reason, every act and operation of our mind happens as it does as a result of features for which we are ultimately in no way responsible

Question 11

Readiness Potential (RP)

Answer 11

= a scalp-recorded slow negative shift in electrical potential generated by the brain

–> begins up to a second or more before a self-paced, apparently voluntary motor act

Question 12

Voluntary Act

Answer 12

• arises externally, without imposed restrictions or compulsions that directly or immediately control the initiation and performance of the act
• introspective feeling that an act is performed on the own initiative and being free to start/not start the act

–> initiated by unconscious cerebral processes before conscious intention appears but conscious control over the actual motor performance of the acts remains possible

Question 13

Conscious Volitional Control

Answer 13

It may operate to select and control the volitional process by:
- permitting or triggering the final motor outcome of the unconsciously initiated process
- vetoing the progression to actual motor activation

Question 14

Libet Experiment: Self-Initiated Acts

Answer 14

• external forces were minimized or eliminated
• each trial in an averaging series of 40 trials was initiated as a separate independent event after a flexible delay determined by each subject’s own readiness to proceed
• there was no limit on the time in which subjects were to act

Question 15

Libet Experiment: Self-Initiated Acts - Procedure

Answer 15

• for each trial, subjects were asked to perform a simple quick flexion of the wrist or fingers at any time they felt the urge or desire to do so
• simultaneously, they should look at the spatial position of a revolving spot on a clock face (=clock time)

Question 16

Libet Experiment: Self-Initiated Acts - Results

Answer 16

• subjects reported that they were aware of the urge or intention to move before every act in the series –> unrestricted volition
• the self-initiated, endogenous acts were found to be preceded by RP’s
• the recordable averaged RP generally had an onset of its main negative rise at about -550 (±150) ms before the motor act began (=EMG)

–> type II RP

Question 17

Libet Experiment: Self-Paced Acts

Answer 17

• they have features that may compromise the exercise of free will
• compromise voluntary choice with an external requirement
• may be performed automatically

Question 18

Libet Experiment: Self-Paced Acts - Results

Answer 18

• experiencing some general preplanning or preparation to act in the near future a few seconds before the act
• a ramp-like RP with onset at about -1050 ms (±175) ms

–> type I RP

Question 19

Libet Experiment - W: Time of initial awareness of wanting to move

Answer 19

• the RP onset time was found to be consistently in advance of W
• the average onset of the RP’S precedes the average W by around 345 ms
• the W precedes the actual act by around 200 ms

–> the physical (cerebral process) precedes the mental (conscious intention)
–> each individual RP precedes each conscious urge to move

Question 20

Libet Experiment: Control experiment

Answer 20

A control series was applied in each experimental session to measure the error for timing comparison:
- application of a skin stimulus at irregular times
- skin sensations were commonly reported to occur somewhat in advance of the actual delivery time (-150 ms)

–> reporting the time of awareness of the S-stimulus required the same kind of attention and introspection by the subjects as did the reporting in self-initiated acts

Question 21

Libet Experiment - M: Awareness of actually moving

Answer 21

• may reflect awareness associated with the immediate initiation of cerebral motor outflow

–> endogenous mental event, different from but related to W

Question 22

Libet Experiment: Validity Criteria - Modes of Reporting

Answer 22

To test and improve confidence in the validity of the reported timings, use different and independent but converging models of observing and reporting

–> two quite different modes produced values for W that were essentially indistinguishable (RP and S)

Question 23

Libet: RPs in the Brain

Answer 23

• the initial neural events in all voluntary movements arise in the supplementary motor areas
• RPs associated with spontaneous self-initiated acts are distinctly maximal at the vertex of the head

Question 24

Unconscious Initiation of Voluntary Acts

Answer 24

The brain decides to initiate or, at least, to prepare to initiate the act before there is any reportable subjective awareness that such a decision has taken place

–> the performance of every conscious voluntary act is preceded by special unconscious cerebral processes that begin about 500 ms or so before the act

Question 25

Veto

Answer 25

The volitional process, initiated unconsciously, can either be consciously permitted to proceed to consummation in the motor act or be consciously vetoed

–>in a veto, the later phase of cerebral motor processing would be blocked, so that actual activation of the motorneurons to the muscles would not occur

Question 26

Libet Experiment: Veto Control

Answer 26

During some of the trials, a recallable conscious urge to act appeared but was aborted or somehow suppressed before any actual movement occurred

–> subjects were instructed to veto the developing intention about 100 to 200 ms before the prearranged block time that they were supposed to act
–> in such cases, the subject simply waited for another urge to appear, which, when consummated, constituted the actual event whose RP was recorded

Question 27

Conscious “trigger” versus “veto”

Answer 27

–> conscious control of the volitional outcome, whether by veto or by an activating trigger, is itself initiated unconsciously

Question 28

Free Will and Individual Responsibility

Answer 28

–> processes associated with individual responsibility and free will would “operate” not to initiate a voluntary act but to select and control volitional outcomes

Question 29

Soon Experiment

Answer 29

Subjects performed a freely paced motor-decision task while their brain activity was measured using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)

• the subjects were asked to relax while fixating on the center of the screen where a stream of letters was presented
• when they felt the urge to do so, they were to freely decide between one of two buttons, operated by the left and right index fingers, and press it immediately
• in parallel, they should remember the letter presented when their motor decision was consciously made
• after subjects pressed their freely chosen response button, a ‘response mapping’ screen with four choices appeared
• the subjects indicated when they had made their motor decision by selecting the corresponding letter with a second button press

Question 30

Soon Experiment: Brain Involvement

Answer 30

• two brain regions encoded the outcome of the subject’s motor decision during the execution phase: primary motor cortex and SMA
• two brain regions encoded with high accuracy the subject’s button choice prior to conscious decision: frontopolar cortex (BA10) and parietal cortex (precuneus)

Question 31

Soon Experiment: Role of the Frontopolar Cortex

Answer 31

• predictive during the selection of the response
• the predictive information in the fMRI signals was already present 7-10s before the subject’s motor decision

Question 32

Soon Experiment: Role of the Precuneus

Answer 32

• the predictive information began after the selection during delay
• involved in the storage of the decision until it reached awareness

Question 33

Tentative Causal Model of Information Flow

Answer 33

1) the earliest unconscious precursors of motor decision originated in the frontopolar cortex
2) they influenced the buildup of decision-related information in the precuneus and later in SMA
3) there, the information remained unconscious for up to a few second