Johanna is a well-known politician who has made some enemies during the course of her distinguished career. Her political views have upset the conservatives. One of these enemies is R. J. Reynolds, whose political directives have been opposed by Johanna at every turn. Reynolds hires a hit man to dispose of Johanna quietly. Mr. Morpheus, the hit man, decides to attack Johanna in the park near her home with a knife. Standing behind a tree he prepares to throw the knife. Consider the following possibilities:

1. Mr. Morpheus throws the knife and it hits its mark, killing Johanna;
2. Mr. Morpheus throws the knife, but just as he releases it, Johanna bends over to pick up a lucky penny and the knife misses;
3. Mr. Morpheus throws the knife, but a strong wind deflects the knife from its target;
4. Just as he is about to throw the knife, Mr. Morpheus succumbs to a sneezing fit and the knife is not thrown; and finally,

I propose a puzzle at this point. In examples B & C, Johanna does not die, so intuitively we feel that Mr. Morpheus cannot be blameworthy for killing Johanna. However, we still feel that Mr. Morpheus is blameworthy for something. We do not want to say he is blameworthy for murder for the aforementioned reason. However, we do not want to say, either, that due to coincidences (Johanna bending over and the wind), he gets off free. So for what is Mr. Morpheus blameworthy?

In example D, Mr. Morpheus does not even get the opportunity to throw the knife. His sneezing fit prohibits it. However, it seems wrong to say that he is free of blame merely because there is a little extra pollen in the air. So again, for what is Mr. Morpheus blameworthy?

Further, how are examples B-D relevantly different from example A? Is it merely a matter of luck that the wind doesn’t blow or the air is not filled with pollen in A? Is it merely luck that condemns Mr. Morpheus in A (but not in B-D) for the killing?

In this thesis, I will present an answer to these questions. I believe that Mr. Morpheus is blameworthy in all cases for his intention to kill (which is constant in all the examples). Further, I will advance the idea that he is responsible for his (non-mental) actions indirectly, but this responsibilty is negligable compared to responsibiliy for intentions. Firstly, though, I will summarize relevant things about intentional actions, and then I will explain how an account of the sort of control required for moral responsibility is crucial to the understanding of my thesis.

I will argue that responsibility for actions or consequences is essentially "empty", we can only be "truly" responsible for our intentions. In addition, I propose that when an intetion is formed freely (or when an agent has "responsibility grounding control" over an intention), it is formed for reasons, and its being formed for reasons consists partly in its being caused by the individual’s having those reasons.

Now I will introduce some terminology pertinent to understanding my views on intentional responsiblity and I will outline the salient characteristics of intentional actions. In general, intentional actions exhibit the following features. Let Michelle be the agent and watching television be her intentional action. Michelle has a desire to watch television, she also has a desire to go to the mall. Michelle weighs these desires that conflict with each other (in the sense that both cannot be mutually satisfied), and deciding that watching TV is better. Next, Michelle’s values assert themselves. Michelle realizes that watching TV is irresponsible (she has a paper due), but she makes a judgment, based on her values, to watch TV now because a little extra relaxation will help her write better later. Michelle then forms an intention, on the basis of that judgment, to do the action of watching TV. Michelle ends up watching TV.

The picture of intentional actions that we have appears as the following. Given an individual’s desires, her values casually give rise to a judgment to perform an action. This judgment, in turn, causally generates an intention to perform that action. The agent then acts upon that intention.

Now, let me say a few things about desires, values and judgments:

Desires- At their most basic level, desires are merely a "want" or a "want not" for some state of affairs to obtain. A desire does not need to be acted upon (the desire to eat a chocolate cake, does not necessarily lead to the action of eating the cake). Two desires can also conflict with each other (For example, the desire to be at work on time conflicts directly with the desire to sleep in for an extra two hours).

Values- From birth we are inculcated with the morals and beliefs of those around us (our parents, siblings, friends, etc.). This inculcation gives rise to a set of values. There are many theories regarding how this happens; however, it would detract from the main theme to go into them now. This set of values provides the rules and guidelines by which we live our lives. Values, however, are not desires. They are all an individual’s beliefs about what is right and wrong. An individual can have desires about doing right or wrong, but what is right or wrong is constituted by beliefs about right and wrong. An example of a value is the Judeo/Christian belief that "Thou shalt not kill," which can give rise to the personal value (a personal belief) that killing is wrong.

Judgment- Having weighed one’s desires (given one’s values), a judgment to bring about the object of the desires sanctioned by one’s values is made. The judgment causally gives rise to an intention to do the action. That is, the agent’s making the judgment (an event) causally gives rise to the agent’s forming an intention (another event) to do the pertinent action. The intention may then be translated into action.

With this in mind, I will explain what direct and indirect control are and how an agent is only directly responsible for what the agent has direct control over.

In this section, I will explain what indirect and direct control are and why they are required for moral responsiblility.

There are two commonly accepted guidelines that are used when determining whether an agent is morally responsible for something (be it an omission, action, etc.):

1) The agent must not be ignorant of what is being done; and

2) The agent must have control over what is being done.

Of these two, I will deal only with control, for it has direct bearing on the matter at hand.

What does it mean to have control over something and what sort of control is required for blameworthiness or praiseworthiness? To have control over an action is to have say in the obtaining of said action. The level of control an agent must have to be responsible is an unanswered problem that I will try to answer. I will divide control into two types and, then, explain which type is needed for responsibility.

First, however, I have to say something about reasons and their connection with intentional actions and control. We need to think of reasons as desire/belief pairs. In the last section, I sketched out a picture of intentional actions; in which, I assume that intentional actions are caused by reasons. For example, I have a desire to quench my thirst, together with a belief that drinking a cup of water will accomplish this, cause me to perform the intentional action of drinking the water. I want to develop the idea that when an intention is formed freely (or when an agent exerts the sort of control required for responsibility in forming an intention), that control consists in that intention’s being formed for reasons; and it’s being formed for reasons consists partly in it’s being caused by the agent’s having those reasons.

Now let me address the first type of control: direct control. An agent has direct control over an intention to do an action only if the agent’s intention to do the action is caused in an appropriate way by the agent’s reasons to do the action. That is, the agent’s forming an intention to do the action is caused in an appropriate way by the agent’s having reasons to do that action.

Now, suppose C is a consequence of the agent intentionally doing the action. The agent has no direct control over C. Why? C is not under the control of the agent’s reasons; other factors over which the agent has no control (such as the wind in example B) can influence whether or not C obtains. The same holds true for non-mental actions.

This leads us to the second type of control, which is indirect. We can say that the agent has indirect control over C only if C occurs "smoothly" or non-deviantly as a result of the agent’s intentions. An example of this would be the following: Suppose Steve forms an intention to turn on the light. He has direct control control over his intention as it is caused by appropriate reasons. Steve turns on a light switch, causing the light to go on. Steve has indirect control over the light going on because the result of the light turning on flowed "smoothly" from his intention. It is possible to show that the same scenario can lead to different results. For example, in a similar scenario, Steve not knowing that the power is out, turns on the switch and nothing happens. Steve does not have indirect control over the light not going on. In a third example, Steve gets home at the same time as Stephanie. They both reach for a switch. Stephanie turns on the light, though Steve thinks he did. Steve still does not have indirect control here.

The agent’s direct control over an intention is undermined when there are control or responsibility-undermining factors in the causal pathway from the agent’s desire to do the action to the agent’s intention to do the action. Such factors include things like mind control and "implanted" desires or false beliefs.

The agent’s indirect control over the consequences of the agent intentionally doing the action is undermined if either (a) the agent’s direct control over the agent’s intention to do the action is undermined or (b) some factor over which the agent has no control intervenes between the agent’s intentionally doing the action and the consequence so that the consequence does not obtain at all, or if it does obtain, it would not have without the intervention. An example of the last part is:

If the agent’s direct control over an intention to do an action is undermined, then the agent is not morally responsible for the intention.

If the agent’s indirect control over a consequence of the agent’s intentionally doing the action is undermined, then the agent is not morally responsible for the consequence.

Assuming all other considerations of moral responsibility for the agent’s forming an intention to do the action are satisfied, the agent is morally responsible for such an intention if the agent has direct control over it.

Assuming all other considerations of moral responsible for the agent’s forming an intention to do the action are satisfied, the agent is morally responsible for the consequence of the agent’s doing the action if the agent is morally responsible for the intention and the agent has indirect control over the consequence.

So far, I have been leading up to an account of responsibility based on direct control of our intentions:

An agent is directly responsible for something only if S has direct control over that thing. Since it is possible for us to have direct control only over our intentions, we are only indirectly responsible for our actions or their consequences.

In the following explanations I use the terminology "passes through". This term deserves to be explained. I am referring to the process through which a desire/belief pair is compared to the agent’s values of what are good and bad. If the pairing is compared to the values and found to be against a good value then the pairing is disregarded. Otherwise, it is "passed through".

Going back to the example of Johanna and Mr. Morpheus, in example A, Mr. Morpheus has a desire to kill Johanna for the money he will get. His desire "passes through" his values, but (sadly) being a hired killer, we can assume they do not stop him from forming a judgment to kill Johanna. The judgment causes the intention, for which he is directly responsible, to kill Johanna. The intention to kill Johanna causes Mr. Morpheus to commit the action, that he is only indirectly responsible for, of throwing a knife at her, killing her, a consequence which he is also only indirectly responsible for.

This example shows the normal path from a desire to an action and its consequences.

In example B, Mr. Morpheus has a desire to kill Johanna for the money he will get. His desire "passes through" his values, but they do not stop him from forming a judgment to kill Johanna. The judgment causes the intention to kill Johanna, which he is directly responsible for. The intention to kill Johanna causes Mr. Morpheus to commit the action, for which he is indirectly responsible, of throwing a knife at her. However, Johanna bends over to pick up a lucky penny, thereby saving her own life, a consequence that Mr. Morpheus is not even indirectly responsible for.

Looking at this example, we can see that Mr. Morpheus is blameworthy for something, but it is not the consequence of the action since the consequence, Johanna’s not dying, does not correlate with the intention, which was to kill Johanna. The next example shows this again.

In example C, Mr. Morpheus has a desire to kill Johanna for the money he will get. His desire "passes through" his values, but they do not stop him from forming a judgment to kill Johanna. The judgment causes the intention, for which he is directly responsible, to kill Johanna. The intention to kill Johanna causes Mr. Morpheus to commit the action of throwing a knife at her, which he is indirectly responsible. However, this time a strong wind saves Johanna’s life. Mr. Morpheus is, again, not even indirectly responsible for this consequence.

This example, again, leaves us with the feeling that Mr. Morpheus is responsible for something, but it is not killing Johanna, since that did not happen.

In example D, Mr. Morpheus has a desire to kill Johanna for the money he will get. He examines his morals and values, but they do not stop his desire from causing him to intend to kill Johanna. Now, though, he is interrupted by a sneezing attack that prevents him from throwing the knife.

This example shows that there is a distinct difference between intention and action such that Mr. Morpheus should be directly responsible for his intentions. Intuitively, we can look at this example and see that it is through no fault of Mr. Morpheus that Johanna lives; therefore he is not responsible for her death since she is still living nor for the action of attempting to kill her since that never happened.

Finally, in example E Mr. Morpheus has a desire to kill Johanna for the money. However, this time when his desire passes through his values, he realizes that Johanna is making the world a better place, not R. J. Reynolds. He, then, aquires a new desire that "works" with his values. This new desire leads to a judgment to kill R. J. Reynolds. This judgment leads to an intention to kill R. J. Reynolds, which leads to the action of Mr. Morpheus’s killing him.

This example, while exhibiting a normal chain of events, when looked at with the information we gathered from B-D, shows us that while the chain is unbroken and Mr. Morpheus is causally responsible for the consequence of Reynolds’ death, he is morally responsible because he had indirect control over the action and consequence. This reponsibility, though, is derivative or "empty" as I will soon explain. He is, however, morally responsible for the intention to kill Reynolds that he had direct control over.

Having laid out my account of intentional or volitional responsibility, I would like to address some objections that I anticipate. These objections can best be summed up in these two questions:

1. What about agents who do not have direct control over their intentions?; and
2. Do you want us to believe that we cannot really be responsible for our actions and their consequences?

First, I have stated many times that direct control is the key to my theory. An agent who lacks the type of control that I am talking about also lacks the ability to be responsible for intentions. An example of this type of person would be someone who is mentally handicapped.

On my account, there is a sense in which responsibility for an action and its consequences is "empty"; it is entirely exhausted by responsibility for the relevant intention. Think of this in the following way. If you are responsible (say, blameworthy) for an intention, then a negative mark has been entered into your "ledger of life." Responsibility for an action caused by an intention does not add further negative marks in your ledger. This is because you are directly responsible only for that over which you have direct control. Whether the action follows from your intention to do the action, or the consequence of the action follows from your intention to do the action, is strictly out of your direct control since it is not under the control of your reasons.

While I admit that it is impossible at this point in time for people truly to divine the intentions of another individual, it is feasible to believe that we are responsible for those intentions and not directly for the actions that follow from them. If we decide moral responsibility based solely on an individual’s actions, then terrible people will get off free because someone leaned over to pick up a penny or because the terrible person had a sneezing fit. Wonderful people would be overlooked because, while they intended to do good, luck played its hand and caused their actions not to happen.

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