Freedom and Responsibility

Freedom and Responsibility
Author: Hilary Bok
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 232
Release: 2022-03-08
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1400822734

Can we reconcile the idea that we are free and responsible agents with the idea that what we do is determined according to natural laws? For centuries, philosophers have tried in different ways to show that we can. Hilary Bok takes a fresh approach here, as she seeks to show that the two ideas are compatible by drawing on the distinction between practical and theoretical reasoning. Bok argues that when we engage in practical reasoning--the kind that involves asking "what should I do?" and sifting through alternatives to find the most justifiable course of action--we have reason to hold ourselves responsible for what we do. But when we engage in theoretical reasoning--searching for causal explanations of events--we have no reason to apply concepts like freedom and responsibility. Bok contends that libertarians' arguments against "compatibilist" justifications of moral responsibility fail because they describe human actions only from the standpoint of theoretical reasoning. To establish this claim, she examines which conceptions of freedom of the will and moral responsibility are relevant to practical reasoning and shows that these conceptions are not vulnerable to many objections that libertarians have directed against compatibilists. Bok concludes that the truth or falsity of the claim that we are free and responsible agents in the sense those conceptions spell out is ultimately independent of deterministic accounts of the causes of human actions. Clearly written and powerfully argued, Freedom and Responsibility is a major addition to current debate about some of philosophy's oldest and deepest questions.

Making Sense of Freedom and Responsibility

Making Sense of Freedom and Responsibility
Author: Dana Kay Nelkin
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Total Pages: 207
Release: 2011-08-04
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0199608563

Dana Kay Nelkin presents a new account of freedom and moral responsibility, based on the view that one is responsible for an action if and only if one acts with the ability to recognize and act for good reasons. She responds to various challenges to the idea that we are free and responsible, and reaffirms our notion of ourselves as agents.

Powerful

Powerful
Author: Patty McCord
Publisher: Tom Rath
Total Pages: 159
Release: 2018-01-09
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1939714117

Named by The Washington Post as one of the 11 Leadership Books to Read in 2018 When it comes to recruiting, motivating, and creating great teams, Patty McCord says most companies have it all wrong. McCord helped create the unique and high-performing culture at Netflix, where she was chief talent officer. In her new book, Powerful: Building a Culture of Freedom and Responsibility, she shares what she learned there and elsewhere in Silicon Valley. McCord advocates practicing radical honesty in the workplace, saying good-bye to employees who don’t fit the company’s emerging needs, and motivating with challenging work, not promises, perks, and bonus plans. McCord argues that the old standbys of corporate HR—annual performance reviews, retention plans, employee empowerment and engagement programs—often end up being a colossal waste of time and resources. Her road-tested advice, offered with humor and irreverence, provides readers a different path for creating a culture of high performance and profitability. Powerful will change how you think about work and the way a business should be run.

Freedom and Responsibility in Neoplatonist Thought

Freedom and Responsibility in Neoplatonist Thought
Author: Ursula Coope
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 288
Release: 2020-04-16
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0192558285

The Neoplatonists have a perfectionist view of freedom: an entity is free to the extent that it succeeds in making itself good. Free entities are wholly in control of themselves—they are self-determining, self-constituting, and self-knowing. Neoplatonist philosophers argue that such freedom is only possible for non-bodily things. The human soul is free insofar as it rises above bodily things and engages in intellection, but when it turns its desires to bodily things, it is drawn under the sway of fate and becomes enslaved. Ursula Coope discusses this notion of freedom and its relation to questions about responsibility. She explains the important role of notions of self-reflexivity in Neoplatonist accounts of both freedom and responsibility. In Part I, Coope sets out the puzzles Neoplatonist philosophers face about freedom and responsibility and explains how these puzzles arise from earlier discussions. Part II explores the metaphysical underpinnings of the Neoplatonist notion of freedom (concentrating especially on the views of Plotinus and Proclus). In what sense, if any, is the ultimate first principle of everything (the One) free? If everything else is under this ultimate first principle, how can anything other than the One be free? What is the connection between freedom and nonbodiliness? Finally, Coope considers in Part III questions about responsibility, arising from this perfectionist view of freedom. Why are human beings responsible for their behaviour, in a way that other animals are not? If we are enslaved when we act viciously, how can we be to blame for our vicious actions and choices?

Freedom, Responsibility and Economics of the Person

Freedom, Responsibility and Economics of the Person
Author: Jérôme Ballet
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 192
Release: 2013-07-31
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1135139997

The capability approach has developed significantly since Amartya Sen was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1998. It is now recognised as being highly beneficial in the analysis of poverty and inequality, but also in the redefinition of policies aimed at improving the well-being of individuals. The approach has been applied within numerous sectors, from health and education to sustainable development, but beyond the obvious interest that it represents for the classical economics tradition, it has also encountered certain limitations. While acknowledging the undeniable progress that the approach has made in renewing the thinking on the development and well-being of a population, this book takes a critical stance. It focuses particularly on the approach’s inadequacy vis-à-vis the continental phenomenological tradition and draws conclusions about the economic analysis of development. In a more specific sense, it highlights the fact that the approach is too bound by standard economic logic, which has prevented it from taking account of a key ‘person’ dimension — namely, the ability of an individual to assume responsibility. As a result, this book advocates the notion that if the approach is used carelessly in relation to development policies, it can cause a number of pernicious effects, some of which may lead to disastrous consequences. Due to its multidisciplinary nature, this book will be of interest to those working in the fields of economics, philosophy, development studies and sociology.

Freedom and Responsibility in Context

Freedom and Responsibility in Context
Author: Ann Whittle
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 246
Release: 2021
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0192845608

Freedom and Responsibility in Context argues for a contextualist account of freedom and moral responsibility. It aims to challenge the largely unarticulated orthodoxy of invariantism, by arguing that contextualism is crucial to an understanding of both freedom and moral responsibility. The argument for contextualism regarding freedom and moral responsibility focuses upon their respective control conditions. Abilities are argued to be central to an understanding of the control required for freedom and moral responsibility. A unified, ability analysis of control is developed, which supports the thesis that attributions of freedom and moral responsibility are context dependent. The resulting contextualism offers a rapprochement of compatibilism and incompatibilism. By going beyond the false dichotomy of invariant compatibilism and invariant incompatibilism, it is argued that both positions can be given their due, since there is no 'right' answer to the question of whether or not determinism undermines freedom and moral responsibility.

Freedom, Responsibility, and Determinism

Freedom, Responsibility, and Determinism
Author: John Lemos
Publisher: Hackett Publishing
Total Pages: 122
Release: 2013-01-01
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1603849300

John Lemos "Freedom, Responsibility & Determinism" offers an up-to-date introduction to free will (and associated) debates in an engaging, dialogic format that recommends it for use by beginning students in philosophy as well as by undergraduates in intermediate courses in metaphysics, philosophy of mind, and action theory.

Freedom and Responsibility

Freedom and Responsibility
Author: Kirill (Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia)
Publisher: Darton Longman and Todd
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2011
Genre: Christian sociology
ISBN: 9780232528701

Freedom and Responsibility: A Search for Harmony is a remarkable personal vision of a ‘multi-polar’ future for the world by the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church. Two antagonistic systems are ranged against each other, one liberal, secular and humanistic, the other religious and traditionalist. Patriarch Kirill draws on the bitter experience of the Russian people in the twentieth century to illustrate the dangers of totalitarianism and how grave the break with one’s spiritual roots can be for civilization. Rather than a struggle to the death between competing value systems, he proposes instead the way of co-existence, grounded in mutual respect for moral categories that are common to all. He calls not for liberal values to be abandoned but to be supplemented by other cultural and philosophical systems, and to create a harmony between the two, not just with declarations of mutual friendship and respect but also through the reform of law and global governance. The Patriarch shares the concerns of Pope Benedict XVI for the dangers of moral relativism. ‘The Catholic and the Orthodox Churches are, it seems, the only allies in the tough struggle between secular liberalism infected with the bacillus of self-destruction and bearers of the forward-looking idea of human salvation.’Freedom and Responsibility is an invaluable introduction to the thinking of the Russian Orthodox Church on the relations between the Church and the wider world.

Freedom and Accountability at Work

Freedom and Accountability at Work
Author: Peter Koestenbaum
Publisher: Pfeiffer
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2001-08-01
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780787955946

Peter Koestenbaum and Peter Block offer you a new perspective forviewing the workplace through the lens of philosophy so that youmay have a better understanding of how to reclaim your freedom andaccountability and encourage the same in others. They provide aradical new approach to your work-a-day life that will bring truemeaning and power to your work. Freedom and Accountability at Work offers you the information youneed to: * Gain strength and meaning by transforming your thinking on howyou view anxiety, doubt, death, and guilt * Find new ways to bring spiritual and ethical values into yourworkplace * Engage in profound change that will help you overcome cynicismthat comes from superficial change * Replace your loss of organizational loyalty and safety with asense of freedom and accountability "Both Koestenbaum and Block are such passionate men who bringtogether what we all seek in our work life-meaning, insight, andhumanness. Bless them for this book." --Joyce DeShano, board chair, Ascension Health

Freedom and Moral Responsibility

Freedom and Moral Responsibility
Author: Charles Harry Manekin
Publisher: Eisenbrauns
Total Pages: 296
Release: 1997
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN:

Presents five new perspectives on the free will problem, and six interpretations of what Jewish thinkers of the past had to say about the problem. Topics include the concept of freedom that exists independently of a sense of self, arguments against the principle of alternative possibilities, the denial of free will in Hasidic thought, notions of choice held by Medieval Jewish and Islamic thinkers, and Maimonides' concepts of freedom and the sense of shame. Distributed by CDL Press. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR