Whether a decision to do A is free and responsible does not depend on anything explanatorily posterior to the decision.
Our consciousness of x is always explanatorily posterior to x.
Hence, whether our decision to do A is free and responsible does not depend on our consciousness of having decided to do A.
If whether our decision to do A is free and responsible does not depend on our consciousness of having decided to do A, then it is possible to have a free and responsible unconscious decision to do A.
So, it is possible to have a free and responsible unconscious decision.
Let me, though, clarify something. This argument does not establish that the deliberation itself can be unconscious. It only establishes that one can be unconscious of the outcome of the deliberation. I suspect the deliberation can be unconscious as well, but I don't have as good an argument.
You could of course *define* "deliberation" to be conscious. Short of that, the proof is easy: just substitute "deliberation" in for "decision."
ReplyDeleteThe way I think about this, we deliberate, and that deliberation leads to a decision to do A (say). The deliberation normally is a multi-step process, even if consciousness of step 1 is explanatorily posterior to step 1, it may be explanatorily prior to step 2. But the decision to do A is a single step, causally dependent on the prior deliberation.
ReplyDeleteOf course, the act of will that constitutes the decision may be extended over time. But as long as one isn't conscious of the last part of the of the decision, one isn't conscious that one has decided.
I think the argument can be adapted to conclude that the last step of deliberation can be unconscious.
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