Counterfactuals, Chance and Ability

反事实、机会和能力

• 批准号: AH/E003184/1
• 负责人: Antony Eagle
• 金额: $ 2.99万
• 依托单位: University of Oxford
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2007
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2007 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=AH%2FE003184%2F1
• 关键词: Counterfactuals; Chance; Ability

The notion of ability has been the focus of considerable philosophical attention. This is particularly because the question of what it means to have an ability is closely connected to the debate over whether human beings have free will: do we have the ability to act as we choose, or are we determined to act as we in fact do? The meaning and behaviour of the phrase 'is able to do X' in this question has been one of the primary loci of philosophical attention. The current consensus, amongst philosophers and linguists, is that 'A is able to do X' is an indexical claim, dependent on a particular agent, and also dependent on which kinds of background facts are relevant at the time the claim is made. The focus on free will is slightly unfortunate, for many applications of the concept of ability elsewhere in metaphysics and philosophy of language have been overlooked. My research is intended to investigate some of these other connections.The first connection I intend to explore is with the semantics of counterfactual claims involving 'might', like 'If the coin had been tossed, it might have landed heads'. One theory of such counterfactuals suggests that this means 'it is not the case that if the coin had been tossed, it wouldn't have landed heads'. Initially this seems okay, but it appears to follow that if a 'might' counterfactual is true, the dual 'would' counterfactual is false. Since 'might' claims are quite weak, almost all 'would' counterfactuals are false, an unappealing result. The other theory is that these counterfactuals are epistemic, meaning something like 'For all we know, if the coin had been tossed it would have landed heads'. This fits well with other epistemic uses of 'might'. But the coin-tossing counterfactual seems to be true because of how the coin is, not because of what we know! My alternative proposal is that such conditionals are in fact disguised ability ascriptions, meaning 'If the coin had been tossed, it could (would have been able to) land heads'. I will investigate how 'could' counterfactuals work, as well as arguments in favour of the ability interpretation of some, but not all, such conditionals: some are best understood as epistemic.The second connection I intend to investigate is with chance. Many philosophers have observed that chance is a kind of graded possibility, but I think that a better story can be told if we connect chance, not to possibility in general, but to ability. It seems plausible that a coin has some chance of landing heads if, and only if, it is able to land heads. I intend to investigate whether this plausible connection between chance and ability withstands scrutiny. The ways that chances depend on which system one ascribes the chances to, and on background assumptions, are very reminiscent of how ability ascriptions work, but more needs to be done to flesh out the connection. Many have argued that non-trivial chances are incompatible with determinism, and these incompatibilist arguments are variants on similar arguments with respect to free will. In the course of my research I will defend a kind of compatibilism: even under determinism, it can be true to say of a coin that it is able to land heads if tossed, and thus it has a chance of landing heads if tossed.The last connection I intend to explore is the relationship between ability and responsibility. A recent argument due to Harry Frankfurt argues that responsibility does not require that it be POSSIBLE that those responsible do otherwise than they did. But does this lead to the further conclusion that responsibility does not require that those responsible be ABLE to do otherwise? This question will be the focus of my research in this area; I propose that the further conclusion does not follow, securing the connection between responsibility and the ability to do otherwise. This requires that we be able to do that which is impossible; I intend to investigate whether this is as unpalatable as it first appears.

能力的概念一直是哲学界关注的焦点。这尤其是因为，拥有一种能力意味着什么的问题与关于人类是否有自由意志的辩论密切相关：我们是否有能力按照自己的选择行事，或者我们是否决心按照我们实际上所做的那样行事？在这个问题中，短语“能够做X”的含义和行为一直是哲学关注的主要场所之一。哲学家和语言学家目前的共识是，“A能够做X”是一个索引声明，取决于特定的代理人，也取决于哪些类型的背景事实在声明时是相关的。对自由意志的关注有点令人遗憾，因为在形而上学和语言哲学中，能力概念的许多应用都被忽视了。我的研究旨在探讨其他一些联系，我打算探索的第一个联系是与涉及“可能”的反事实主张的语义学有关，比如“如果抛硬币，它可能会落在人头上”。一种关于这种反事实的理论认为，这意味着“并不是说如果抛硬币，就不会有正面朝上的结果”。最初这似乎没问题，但似乎可以得出结论，如果一个“可能”反事实是真的，那么双重的“会”反事实就是假的。由于“可能”的主张是相当弱的，几乎所有“会”的反事实都是假的，这是一个不吸引人的结果。另一种理论是，这些反事实是认识论的，意思是“就我们所知，如果硬币被抛出来，它会落在头上”。这与“might”的其他认知用法非常吻合。但是，抛硬币的反事实似乎是正确的，因为硬币是如何的，而不是因为我们所知道的！我的替代提议是，此类条件实际上是伪装的能力归因，这意味着“如果抛硬币，它可能（本来能够）正面朝上”。我将研究“could”反事实是如何工作的，以及支持某些条件句的能力解释的论点，但不是所有的条件句：有些条件句最好理解为认识论的。许多哲学家都注意到机会是一种分级的可能性，但我认为，如果我们把机会与能力联系起来，而不是与一般的可能性联系起来，就能讲出一个更好的故事。似乎有道理的是，当且仅当一枚硬币能够正面朝上时，它才有机会正面朝上。我打算调查机会和能力之间的这种貌似合理的联系是否经得起推敲。机会取决于人们将机会归因于哪个系统，以及背景假设，这让人想起能力归因是如何工作的，但需要做更多的工作来充实这种联系。许多人认为，非平凡的机会与决定论不相容，这些不相容的论点是关于自由意志的类似论点的变体。在我的研究过程中，我将捍卫一种相容论：即使在决定论下，也可以说一枚硬币在投掷时能够正面朝上，因此在投掷时有机会正面朝上。我打算探讨的最后一个联系是能力和责任之间的关系。哈利法兰克福最近的一个论点认为，责任并不要求那些责任人做了与他们所做的不同的事情。但是，这是否会导致进一步的结论，即责任并不要求那些负有责任的人能够这样做？这个问题将是我在这一领域研究的重点;我建议不得出进一步的结论，确保责任和做其他事情的能力之间的联系。这就要求我们能够做到不可能做到的事情;我打算调查一下，这是否像它最初出现时那样令人不快。