Arbitrary Decisions and the Problem of Present Luck

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alfred R. Mele
Keyword(s):  
Positive Element ◽  
Agent Causation ◽  
Libertarian View

This chapter focuses on a positive element of a typical libertarian view: namely, the thesis (LFT) that there are indeterministic agents who sometimes act freely when their actions—and decisions in particular—are not deterministically caused by proximal causes. LFT is the target of the problem of present luck—indeterministic luck at the time of decision. The bearing of such luck on LFT is explored, and two control-featuring arguments against event-causal libertarianism are rebutted: the same-control argument and the more-control argument. In addition, the freedom of some arbitrary decisions is explored, a mistaken reading of Alfred Mele’s work on luck is corrected, and skepticism about agent causation is discussed.

Two Libertarian Theories: or Why Event-causal Libertarians Should Prefer My Daring Libertarian View to Robert Kane's View

2017 ◽  
Vol 80 ◽  
pp. 49-68
Author(s):  
Alfred R. Mele
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
The Other ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Agent Causation ◽  
Indeterministic Causation ◽  
Free Actions ◽  
Libertarian View

AbstractLibertarianism about free will is the conjunction of two theses: the existence of free will is incompatible with the truth of determinism, and at least some human beings sometimes exercise free will (or act freely, for short).1 Some libertarian views feature agent causation, others maintain that free actions are uncaused, and yet others – event-causal libertarian views – reject all views of these two kinds and appeal to indeterministic causation by events and states.2 This article explores the relative merits of two different views of this third kind. One is Robert Kane's prominent view, and the other is the ‘daring libertarian’ view that I floated in Free Will and Luck.3 (I labeled the view ‘daring’ to distinguish it from a more modest libertarian view that I floated a decade earlier.)4 I say ‘floated’ because I am not a libertarian. I do not endorse incompatibilism; instead, I am agnostic about it. But if I were a libertarian, I would embrace my daring libertarian view (or DLV, for short). This article's thesis is that event-causal libertarians should prefer DLV to Kane's ‘dual or multiple efforts’ view.5

Introduction

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Evan Franklin
Keyword(s):  
Moral Responsibility ◽  
Free Will ◽  
Human Agency ◽  
Causal Role ◽  
Central Question ◽  
Agent Causation ◽  
The Right

This chapter lays out the book’s central question: Assuming agency reductionism—that is, the thesis that the causal role of the agent in all agential activities is reducible to the causal role of states and events involving the agent—is it possible to construct a defensible model of libertarianism? It is explained that most think the answer is negative and this is because they think libertarians must embrace some form of agent-causation in order to address the problems of luck and enhanced control. The thesis of the book is that these philosophers are mistaken: it is possible to construct a libertarian model of free will and moral responsibility within an agency reductionist framework that silences that central objections to libertarianism by simply taking the best compatibilist model of freedom and adding indeterminism in the right junctures of human agency. A brief summary of the chapters to follow is given.

scholarly journals Innovation, Innovativeness And Gender - Approaching Innovative Gender

2015 ◽  
Vol 62 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Ewa Okoń-Horodyńska ◽  
Anna Zachorowska-Mazurkiewicz
Keyword(s):  
Major Part ◽  
Positive Element ◽  
The State ◽  
Broad Sense ◽  
Institutional Framework ◽  
Creative Solutions ◽  
And Gender

Abstract This paper deals with the attempt to search for the sources of creativity in the broad sense in solving problems. These creative solutions become innovations. The ability to develop innovation depends on the multi-dimensional predispositions to solve problems – those found in people, inspired by the market, organised or spontaneous, as well as facilitated or hampered by the state. Yet, the aforementioned factors should be supplemented with one more – gender. In the chapter attention is paid to the multi-dimensional differences stemming from gender, which should be perceived as a positive element, because they are the source of synergy resulting from collaboration among research or business teams in the process of innovation. The chapter introduces the concept of ‘innovative gender’ and its institutional framework. The methodological inspiration is the model known in the literature as the Innovation Genome, the conceptualization of which constitutes a major part of the study.

Actions

1975 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 129-144
Author(s):  
Lawrence H. Davis
Keyword(s):  
Agent Causation ◽  
Common View ◽  
Mental Events ◽  
Causal Concept

What distinguishes actions of persons from other events? Too big a question; we make a customary substitution: what distinguishes a person's raising his arm from a person's arm rising? In each case, the arm rises. But in the former, we have something in addition. Let us say that in the former case, the person causes the arm's rising. Our problem then is to interpret this notion of causation by an agent.It can be done, I believe, in terms of the notion of causation of events by other events-events which may not be “mental,” contrary to one common view. My account of agent causation is presented in the concluding section of this paper. I set the stage (or clear it) for this account by first examining rivals of three types: one asserting that agent causation is or involves a causal concept which cannot be interpreted further, but which we all understand well enough; one which invokes causation by mental events of certain kinds; and one which avoids all reference to causation.

Overlapping positive and negative regulatory elements determine lens-specific activity of the delta 1-crystallin enhancer

1993 ◽  
Vol 13 (9) ◽  
pp. 5206-5215 ◽  
Author(s):  
Y Kamachi ◽  
H Kondoh
Keyword(s):  
Mutational Analysis ◽  
Specific Activity ◽  
Regulatory Elements ◽  
Positive Element ◽  
Specific Expression ◽  
Enhancer Activity ◽  
Negative Element ◽  
Positive Elements ◽  
Lens Cells ◽  
Specific Regulation

Lens-specific expression of the delta 1-crystallin gene is governed by an enhancer in the third intron, and the 30-bp-long DC5 fragment was found to be responsible for eliciting the lens-specific activity. Mutational analysis of the DC5 fragment identified two contiguous, interdependent positive elements and a negative element which overlaps the 3'-located positive element. Previously identified ubiquitous factors delta EF1 bound to the negative element and repressed the enhancer activity in nonlens cells. Mutation and cotransfection analyses indicated the existence of an activator which counteracts the action of delta EF1 in lens cells, probably through binding site competition. We also found a group of nuclear factors, collectively called delta EF2, which bound to the 5'-located positive element. delta EF2a and -b were the major species in lens cells, whereas delta EF2c and -d predominated in nonlens cells. These delta EF2 proteins probably cooperate with factors bound to the 3'-located element in activation in lens cells and repression in nonlens cells. delta EF2 proteins also bound to a promoter sequence of the gamma F-crystallin gene, suggesting that delta EF2 proteins are involved in lens-specific regulation of various crystallin classes.

scholarly journals Compact Subsets of the Glimm Space of a C*-algebra

2014 ◽  
Vol 57 (1) ◽  
pp. 90-96
Author(s):  
Aldo J. Lazar
Keyword(s):  
Compact Subset ◽  
Positive Element ◽  
C Algebra ◽  
Compact Subsets

AbstractIf A is a σ-unital C*-algebra and a is a strictly positive element of A, then for every compact subset K of the complete regularization Glimm(A) of Prim(A) there exists α > 0 such that K ⊂ {G ∊ Glimm(A) | ||a + G|| ≥ α: This extends a result of J. Dauns to all σ-unital C*-algebras. However, there exist a C*-algebra A and a compact subset of Glimm(A) that is not contained in any set of the form {G ∊ Glimm(A) | ||a + G|| ≥}, a ∊ A and α > 0.

scholarly journals Agent-Causation and Control

2005 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-98 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Widerker ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Agent Causation ◽  
And Control

The model theory of ordered differential fields

1978 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 82-91 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael F. Singer
Keyword(s):  
Meromorphic Functions ◽  
Analytic Solutions ◽  
Positive Element ◽  
Real Closed Field ◽  
Real Field ◽  
Closed Field ◽  
Ordered Field ◽  
Positive Elements ◽  
Odd Degree ◽  
Differential Fields

In this paper, we show that the theory of ordered differential fields has a model completion. We also show that any real differential field, finitely generated over the rational numbers, is isomorphic to some field of real meromorphic functions. In the last section of this paper, we combine these two results and discuss the problem of deciding if a system of differential equations has real analytic solutions. The author wishes to thank G. Stengle for some stimulating and helpful conversations and for drawing our attention to fields of real meromorphic functions.§ 1. Real and ordered fields. A real field is a field in which −1 is not a sum of squares. An ordered field is a field F together with a binary relation < which totally orders F and satisfies the two properties: (1) If 0 < x and 0 < y then 0 < xy. (2) If x < y then, for all z in F, x + z < y + z. An element x of an ordered field is positive if x > 0. One can see that the square of any element is positive and that the sum of positive elements is positive. Since −1 is not positive, an ordered field is a real field. Conversely, given a real field F, it is known that one can define an ordering (not necessarily uniquely) on F [2, p. 274]. An ordered field F is a real closed field if: (1) every positive element is a square, and (2) every polynomial of odd degree with coefficients in F has a root in F. For example, the real numbers form a real closed field. Every ordered field can be embedded in a real closed field. It is also known that, in a real closed field K, polynomials satisfy the intermediate value property, i.e. if f(x) ∈ K[x] and a, b ∈ K, a < b, and f(a)f(b) < 0 then there is a c in K such that f(c) = 0.

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