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Thesis Outcomes rightly change how much we blame someone, even when luck decided them

Sana Rizvi Fellow
· 5 replies
Moral theoriesAnalyticBuddhistModern EuropeanKantianismBernard WilliamsImmanuel KantThe BuddhaThomas Nagel#blame#intention#moral-luck#outcomes
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Where it stands

Two drivers leave the same wedding equally drunk and drive equally badly. One gets home. The other hits a child who ran into the road. In every court I have covered, the second driver faces something far heavier than the first, and almost everyone in the gallery thinks that is right. Yet the only difference between them was luck.

This is the problem that Bernard Williams and Thomas Nagel named "moral luck" in the 1970s. Nagel pointed out that luck reaches into everything: how our actions turn out, the circumstances we face, even the temperament we are born with. If we only blamed people for what was fully in their control, there might be nothing left to blame.

The opposite view is old and strong. Kant says a good will shines like a jewel by itself, even if bad luck stops it achieving anything. In the Buddhist texts the Buddha says that intention, cetanā, is what he calls kamma.

My thesis is that the gallery is right. Outcomes are part of what we did, not a coin toss stacked on top of it. The second driver did not merely risk a death; he caused one, and blame that ignored this would be blame for a person who never existed.

Tell me why I'm wrong.

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5 replies

For the thesis 3

  1. Gerrit Venter

    For Fellow

    I'll back Sana from the touchline. Two boys made the same reckless high tackle in my years of coaching. One missed; one put a lad in hospital for a month. I spoke to both. I did not speak to them the same way, and I don't think I should have.

    The boy whose tackle landed had a debt to someone in particular: to that lad and to his mother, who sat in my office. The other boy had no such debt. That is not luck corrupting blame. It is blame having an address.

  2. Andrés Zuluaga

    For Fellow

    Williams himself has a famous example: a lorry driver who, through no fault at all, runs over a child. He says the driver will feel something no spectator feels, which he calls agent-regret, and that we would think less of him if he didn't. Even without any fault, the fact that it was his lorry matters.

    After eight years of listening to victims and former combatants in the same week, I think Derek's split is too neat for real life. Families do not only ask for repair. They want the person to know they did this. The "this" includes what happened, not just what was intended.

  3. Sana Rizvi

    For Fellow

    I'll revise. Derek has convinced me that "how blameworthy" and "what you owe" are different questions, and that Bảo's point holds for the first: the lucky driver is not innocent and shouldn't feel it.

    But Andrés and Williams hold me to the core of my thesis. What we did includes what we caused. So: outcomes don't make the reckless will worse, but they make the act a different act, and our responses rightly answer the act. That's narrower than what I posted, and I think it's true.

Against the thesis 2

  1. Vũ Quốc Bảo

    Against Fellow

    From the Buddhist side I would put it this way. Both drivers made the same choice, with the same carelessness for others, and the karmic weight lies there. The child's death is a terrible fact and the second driver will rightly carry it. But if the first driver feels relieved and innocent, he has misunderstood what he did. He is the same man, only luckier.

    A court may need outcomes for practical reasons: proof, the victim's family, deterrence. That doesn't make the outcome the measure of the person.

  2. Derek Hollis

    Against Fellow

    Gerrit's "address" point is good, but I think it shows something different: the lucky outcome changes what you owe, apologies, repair, care, not how blameworthy you are. Those can come apart. If I break your window by accident, I owe you a window without being any guiltier.

    So I'd split Sana's thesis. Outcomes rightly change our duties of repair and the shape of the relationship to the victim. They don't change the verdict on the will. Kant can have his jewel, and the second driver can still owe a debt the first doesn't.