Colin Blakemore (1988) claims that the human brain is a machine and that all our actions are the products of brain activity. In consequence, he says, it makes no sense (in scientific terms) to distinguish sharply between acts that result from conscious intention and those that are pure reflexes or the outcome of disease or damage to the brain. It may appear to us that some actions are self-willed while others are beyond our control, but in reality that is not the case. All brain activity is physical, and so determined by physical laws, and therefore it makes no sense to distinguish between one set of acts for which someone is personally responsible and another set for which they are not. This being so, it is — according to Blakemore and those determinists who think like him — inappropriate to make personal responsibility the basis of a system of retributive justice. We may need to restrain criminals to prevent them doing harm to themselves and others, but we should not punish them, i.e. exact retribution, for actions they did not freely will.

There are two regular kinds of response to this argument. On the one hand there are libertarians, like David Hodgson (1991). They agree that there can be no responsibility in a deterministic universe, and are then driven by a belief in the reality of moral and legal responsibility to argue that the universe cannot be deterministic. On the other hand there are compatibilists, such as Daniel Dennett, who agree that all human actions are subject to physical determinism, but are still able to declare that ‘holding people responsible is the best game in town’ (Dennett, 1984, p. 162).  My response is a version of compatibilism, but one that turns Blakemore’s logic on its head. I accept his contention that actions cannot be divided into some for which we are responsible and some for which we are not, but I draw the opposite conclusion from him. He argues that, since our brains set in train at least some actions for which we cannot possibly be held responsible, therefore we cannot be held responsible for any of our actions. I say that, since there are at least some actions for which we most certainly hold ourselves and others responsible, therefore we must be prepared to accept responsibility for all our actions.

I do not approach the question as a scientist, like Blakemore, or a lawyer, like Hodgson, or philosopher, like Dennett, but as a priest — someone who feels responsible for my own actions and who is called upon to counsel and absolve such as come to me with their shame and their guilt. Should I say that their sense of responsibility is illusory? Or should I encourage them to accept responsibility, and then to deal with it in the various ways — religious, psychological and practical — that are open to them?

I find myself taking the latter course. I do not say that I choose it, but that I find myself taking it. That is crucial to my approach, which entails distinguishing between responsibility (which I accept) and voluntary choice (which I do not).

Imagine a sliding scale of degrees of choice in the actions that I take. At one end are subconscious actions such as the working of my liver and the production of bone marrow; and at the other, consciously intended actions such as lifting my arm or writing this sentence. The vast majority of the things that I do fall somewhere in between. I pass someone and murmur ‘Good day’, or I chat inconsequentially with a colleague over coffee, and I am hardly aware of what I am saying — certainly I do not carefully plan my words. It would be too much to say in any strong sense that I ‘willed’ them. Nonetheless they are voluntary in the sense that I could choose not to say them. Many of my physical movements also fall into this category of semi-automatic actions. Others are completely deliberate, but not totally voluntary. For instance, much of my time is spent editing the Journal of Consciousness Studies. I enjoy this and am grateful enough to be employed when many are not, but it is not necessarily what I would do with my time had I no need to earn a living.

Now consider that small number of actions which I think of as being completely voluntary — actions that I carry out with full deliberate desire and intention. Such an action might commonly be supposed to consist of three steps: (A) a decision to act, (B) putting the decision into effect and (C) the consequent action. I shall argue that this model is wrong, that the moment of decision is in fact the moment of action.

The evidence for this claim is partly from third-person science and partly from first- person introspection, both my own and the reports of others. The neuroscientific evidence comes from Benjamin Libet’s experimental work (described and referenced in his contribution to this volume). Libet’s results suggest that my step (C) above — the physical action, represented by the onset of electrical activity in the brain — occurs before step (A), the mental decision to act, as reported by the subject. In other words, the conscious decision to act follows rather than precedes the action in question, and cannot therefore be its cause. Consequently, it is argued, our impression that we voluntarily will our actions is false; what we experience as a decision is in fact no more than a monitoring of an automatic and physically determined act already under way.

Libet himself accepts the first part of this interpretation, but not the negative consequences for freewill. He draws the conclusion that, while our mental decisions do not initiate actions, that the speed of monitoring leaves open the possibility of a veto being applied. That is, there is enough time between the initiating brain activity and the physical movement for the incipient action to be detected and countermanded. So, according to Libet, while I may not consciously initiate an action, I always have the option of stopping it coming about. By not to stopping it, I freely will it and may properly be taken to be responsible for it. This interpretation has not been fully accepted, but for my purposes it is sufficient that Libet and his critics agree that his results dispose of the simple three-step model of voluntary action with which I started.

Now for the evidence from introspection. It is commonly held to be the strongest card in the hand of those arguing for free will that every one of us has the experience of making free choices. We all make decisions all the time, from little ones like which sock to put on first to momentous ones like whom to marry or whether to run for President. Well, I am not so sure. In fact I do not believe I have ever taken a positive free-choice decision in my life.¹ By that I mean that I have not carried out a fully voluntary action in the strong sense of being at the far end of the range I set out at the beginning of this paper. Let me illustrate this with the two biggest ‘decisions’ that I made in my life, and one trivial one.

First, my ordination to the priesthood. My memory of childhood is quite vague, but I can distinctly remember, at the age of eleven, telling the headmaster of my junior school that I wanted to be a priest. I certainly cannot remember deciding it; but I can remember saying it. Over the years I never wavered in my desire for the priesthood. There was a kind of inevitability about it that I did nothing to stop. There is good biblical support for interpreting the matter in this way. In St John’s Gospel, Jesus says to his twelve disciples, ‘Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you’ (John 15.16) and those words are routinely taken as being applicable to all Christians and especially to ministers. That is why it is known as a vocation — a calling — and not something initiated by the individual from the human end.

Secondly, my marriage. Because from an early age I felt called to the priesthood, and also had strong leanings to the monastic life, I never seriously considered that I should ever marry. But it was inconvenient as a student not to have a girlfriend to take to dances and other social events. I had such a friend, who lived happily with her elder sister and never intended tying herself down to a mere man (as she would put it). But she also wanted a partner for dances. So we both felt safe. Six years on we were aware of a growing love and mutual dependence and it somehow became accepted that we should be married. We were never formally engaged, our two second-hand gold wedding rings cost less than £10 the pair, Jacqueline has never taken my surname . . . but twenty-seven years later our married life together seems to be happier and more stable than that of many contemporary couples, a significant number of whom are no longer together. A satisfying outcome for us, but no major choice, no great decision.

Finally, a trivial example. If you offered me a plate of biscuits with three kinds — chocolate, coconut and plain — and politeness dictated that I only took one, surely then I should have to make a choice? Again, I would say not, at least not in the strong sense of the three-step path to voluntary action. In the first place I do not like coconut. So I would not take one of those. But that is not a free choice. I never chose to dislike coconut, I just don’t. That leaves the plain and the chocolate. I enjoy both. Sometimes I feel in the mood for one, and sometimes the other. As the plate comes towards me I might think, ‘Yes, a chocolate one today’, but I might still end up taking a plain one. Maybe they are closer to me and I am embarrassed to stretch over. Maybe I just change my mind. Or maybe I don’t. My point is that it is only when I have the biscuit in my hand that even I will know for certain which one I have chosen.

Being ordained, marrying, taking a biscuit: three examples of what I call decisive action, because it is the action that makes the decision. Until the action is taken, no decision is finally made. Once the action is taken, there is no going back. But — and this is the crucial point — they are my actions and I own them. Determinists argue that because all actions are determined, none is our responsibility. I argue in the opposite direction and extend the scope of responsibility much further in the ‘nonvoluntary’ direction than is normal in legal circles.

I start with certain actions at the extreme positive end of my ‘sliding scale’ which I cannot help but claim as my own actions willingly undertaken. Yet it appears that even those actions that feel most obviously like ‘free choices’ can be shown, on both physiological and introspective grounds, to have been initiated other than by conscious choice, and to have been decided upon only in the act of doing them. Do I react by disowning my actions? Not at all. I disown the three-step model, but not my decisive actions. This means taking the actions themselves, rather than the alleged intentions with which they are carried out, as the crucial factor. It means taking the whole embodied person — not some abstracted theoretical mind or soul — as the responsible agent. And that in turn carries the concept of responsibility back along the scale. Not only my fully volitional actions, but my semi-automatic ones, my imposed ones, and even my non-conscious ones, all of them — on this view — become the responsible actions of the embodied person.

Ben Libet remarks — half jokingly — that his experimental results could provide a physiological basis for the doctrine of ‘original sin’ (this volume, p. 54). My argument here also ties in with Christian understandings of sin, and more importantly of forgiveness, for which accepting of responsibility — repenting — is the necessary first step. Traditionally absolution would have been thought of as God’s doing, but as a Christian humanist I interpret the concept of divine forgiveness at the practical level in terms of acceptance within the human community. And therefore I see no problem in principle — indeed I see every advantage — to extending this approach from the religious to the legal sphere as well.

I believe this approach could provide a way out of the impasse between the Hodgsons and the Blakemores. Determinists dislike retribution and believe that showing that people are not responsible for their actions is a necessary gateway to a more compassionate justice. Libertarians fear that a loss of personal responsibility will inevitably lead to a loss of personal rights and eventually of all justice. My approach offers a way to avoid both fears. First, it keeps the concept of responsibility and — if rights and responsibilities go hand in hand — then responsibility ‘all the way down’ will safeguard human rights ‘all the way down’ as well. Secondly, by taking such a wide view of responsibility, and severing it from the idea of unfettered choice, this approach (like the doctrine of original sin) will not permit anyone to adopt an attitude of moral superiority. When everyone accepts a share in the responsibility for the state of the world, then justice will surely be tempered with mercy (if not forgiveness, but why not?) and this will be a guard against vengeance.²

[2] An earlier version of this article was delivered as a seminar paper at Elizabethtown College, PA, in April 1999. I am grateful to Michael Silberstein for the invitation to speak and for helpful comments from the seminar’s participants, especially David Hodgson.