|
|
|
|||||||
|
|||||||||
|
What is it to be a person?In this essay I shall be considering the theory that the crucial property of being a person is the capacity to identify with one's will by forming second-order desires regarding it. After distinguishing between "person" and "human" I shall examine Harry Frankfurt's 1971 paper. I shall assess his model of second-order desires and volitions, and consider how his ideas tie in with the concept of free will. I shall consider some objections raised by Gary Watson, and conclude by examining David Lewis' model of second-order desires as values, that may serve to reconcile the two views. I hope to show that, despite some shortfalls, Frankfurt's model is successful. The question "what is a person" is crucial to many areas of philosophy, and ethics in particular. One rarely asks what is ethical behaviour for a dog, or a tree, or a rock - only a person is under any ethical obligations. A person is not simply a human though. For a start, in this context "person" is a philosophical term describing an ethical agent, whereas "human" is a biological term indicating a certain species of animal. Thus the words refer to different classes of entity, and to simply equate persons and humans is to commit a fallacy of type. Additionally, there are many examples of humans who are arguably not persons. These include young or unborn children, the severely mentally impaired and those in persistent vegetative states. Furthermore, we can envisage entities that are not human but could plausibly qualify as persons. These might include intelligent alien races, apes who have fully mastered language, or advanced artificial life forms (Matravers 2005: p37-38; Frankfurt 1971: p1-2). However, while there may be no necessary link between humans and persons, it seems there is at least a contingent relationship. As things stand at present, the only entities we acknowledge as persons are humans, and we generally assume a human to be a person unless stated otherwise. So to answer the question "what is it to be a person?" it is instructive to consider what it is about a human that uniquely makes them a person. When Frankfurt considers this question, he concludes that humans are unique in that they have "the capacity for reflective self-evaluation that is manifested in the formation of second-order desires" (Frankfurt: p2). In other words, only humans can desire to desire. If we assume the definitions of "desire" and "want" are uncontroversial, we know that all creatures with any kind of motivating instincts have desires, if only the basic desires to eat and/or procreate. In this, humans are no different. However, humans - it is proposed - are unique in that they can desire their own desires. They can want to have certain of their desires, and not want others. This is what is meant by a second-order desire. Consider an overweight man who wants to eat less cake and exercise more. His desire for cake is very strong, but he has no real desire for exercise, so weight loss (which he also desires) is unlikely. Therefore he might wish he did not desire cake, and instead wish he had a desire to exercise. These wishes are examples of second-order desires. Frankfurt takes it a stage further, and introduces a category of desire that he calls the will. For a given action, the will is the desire that ultimately motivated the action. He then introduces the idea of a volition. A volition is a second-order desire for a given first-order desire to become the agent's will1. It is the capacity to form volitions that Frankfurt proposes is the key to what it is to be a person (Frankfurt: p5-7) An entity could posses second-order desires, but may never wish for any particular first-order desire to become their will i.e. cannot form volitions. Such an entity is called a wanton, and is not a person (although they could be a human, and could be entirely rational). A person faced with conflicting desires will have a preference over which desire wins out. A wanton will resolve the conflict impartially through practical reasoning. Our overweight man, faced with conflicting desires of cake and weight loss, identifies himself with the desire for weight loss and hope it wins out and becomes his will. If the desire for cake wins he may feel weak and guilty, whereas if the desire to exercise wins he may feel triumphant. A wanton faced with similar desires would identify themselves with neither. They may acknowledge that cake is more desirable while weight loss is more rational, but whichever desire wins out they will feel neither regret nor satisfaction. By highlighting this difference between person and wanton Frankfurt can connect his theory to the concept of free will. Free will is commonly used as the distinguishing feature of persons over animals. Animals may have freedom of action i.e. they may take any action they desire. However, they do not consider their actions, or have reasons for their actions beyond their base desires. Therefore they are only capable of reacting to stimuli, and therefore are not considered to have free will (Matravers: p2; Frankfurt: pp7-8). However, what precisely is meant by free will is often vague. Frankfurt is suggesting that it is identification with the will that makes free will possible. After all, before one can exercise free will one must be aware that one has a will. Just as for an entity incapable of movement (e.g. a tree) freedom of action is meaningless, for an entity incapable of identifying with their will (e.g. a wanton) freedom of will is meaningless. Only for entities that can form desires regarding their will can free will be meaningful, and thus we conclude that only those entities can be persons. Thus in addition to proposing a novel definition of what it is to be a person, Frankfurt is proposing a robust definition of the pre-existing but ill-defined concept of free will. Let's assess Frankfurt's argument, starting with the central claim that humans are unique in having the capacity for volitions. This is an assertion, and hard to prove. We can't claim that only humans possess second-order desires because they are unique in some other way, because second-order desires are meant to be the unique property. Psychological studies could presumably be formulated to test the claim that humans have second-order desires, but if any such studies have been conducted Frankfurt does not cite them. However to prove that only humans possess such desires is much harder. To prove a negative by empirical means is always problematic. We might conduct studies on the 'higher' animals - apes, dolphins, etc. - and simply assume that the 'lower' animals cannot, but this seems to betray an inherent bias. Again though, Frankfurt cites no such studies. This objection is perhaps best countered by simply accepting that it is an assertion, and being prepared to bite the bullet should we ever discover another animal exhibiting a capacity for volitions. After all, we are asking what is unique to being a person, not what is unique about being a human. Let's move on to Frankfurt's conclusion. The conclusion that free will - and thus personhood - depends on volitions rests on two things: his definition of the will, and his claim that to identify with one's will is to have a certain kind of second-order desire regarding it. We shall now examine these two ideas. Frankfurt defines the will as the desire that motivates an action. Can we have actions that we would consider willed yet are not motivated by a desire? Certainly we often take undesirable actions. Our cake lover can choose to exercise even though he has no desire to. As he is not coerced we would say he did it of his own free will. Frankfurt would doubtless argue that the action was ultimately motivated by the desire for weight loss. However, there are many actions that a desire for weight loss might motivate. If he were to instead take a different action then surely we would say he has willed a different thing? Perhaps, but it could then be countered that the action is merely a means to an end and it is the end that is willed not the action. There is obviously room for criticism of Frankfurt's definition, but it seems to stand up adequately. Next we shall consider connecting second-order desires with identification with the will. For an examination of this issue we turn to Gary Watson and his 1975 paper. Watson argues that volitions cannot be the source of identification. If identifying with a first-order desire is to have a second-order desire regarding it, then what is it to identify with a second-order desire? If it is to have a yet higher order desire - a third-order desire - regarding it, we are at risk of creating an infinite hierarchy of desires, each level being identified with using the level above it. Frankfurt himself seems to sidestep the issue by claiming that when a person "identifies himself decisively" with a given first-order desire "this commitment 'resounds' throughout the potentially endless array of higher orders" and all desires higher than the second collapse (Frankfurt: p9). However, this implies that the source of this decisive identification is external to the hierarchy of desires which means that personhood relies on something other than desires and volitions. The alternative is to arbitrarily choose a level in the hierarchy and declare it as the source of identification, but this naturally raises the question of why that level and not another. What's so special about x-order desires that makes them different from y-order desires? After all, they are all just desires (Watson 1975: p3). A possible counter to this is to state that the source of identification is second-order desires (specifically volitions) and that a second-order desire is special because it is a value. We choose values because these are what Watson use for his alternative theory. Very briefly, Watson's theory is as follows. All entities that have desires have a "motivational system" - a set of considerations and beliefs that drive them to action. What makes persons special is that they also have a "valuational system" - a set of considerations and beliefs that tells them that a given action is what they ought to do (Watson: p1). This valuational system is the source of identification that Watson claims is lacking in Frankfurt's account. If Watson says persons uniquely have values, and Frankfurt says persons uniquely have volitions, then we can unite the two positions by saying that values are volitions. In his 1989 paper David Lewis argues just this. What is valuing? It is in no way physical - it exists only in our minds. So it is a mental state. It is about something - the thing being valued. So it is an attitudinal state. One approach therefore is to list all the attitudinal states and ask which one(s) might encompass valuing. Lewis makes an (admittedly very cursory) attempt at this, and arrives at desires (Lewis: p1). However, while something valued is invariably desired (albeit not necessarily for oneself) something desired is not always valued (e.g. cake). Lewis then considers second-order desires, and observes that a desired desire better fits the criteria of a value. If I do not want to desire the thing I desire, I cannot value it. He considers investigating third-order desires and higher, but rules them out to avoid unnecessary complexity and so as not to preclude desires for values. He therefore concludes that "valuing is just desiring to desire" (Lewis: p2). Lewis's argument is not thorough. He restricts his considered attitudinal states to beliefs, feelings and desires, while simultaneously acknowledging a possible "fourth thing" that he ignores (Lewis: p1). However, we can at least see that a counter to Watson's criticism of Frankfurt is possible. In conclusion while Frankfurt's argument needs reinforcement in places, especially against Watson's central criticism, it is essentially sound. Therefore I maintain that the capacity to identify with one's will by forming second-order desires with regard to it is what it is to be a person. Notes:
Bibliography
|
|
Except where stated, this site and its contents are copyright ©2010 Alec Harkness and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 License.