[b]Moral Responsibility in a Deterministic Universe
by Ray Bradford
Dennett turned to the idea of the prisoner’s dilemma, well-known to economists for its relevance to self-interest models. In the prisoner’s dilemma, two individuals suspected of committing a crime are caught, but there is not enough evidence to convict either unless one confesses. If neither confesses (they cooperate with each other), both will be set free. If one confesses (the defector) but the other does not, the individual who confesses will be set free while the other (the cooperator) receives a long jail sentence. If both confess, they will both go to jail for a shorter, but still significant amount of time (two defectors). Under this scenario, an efficacious and low-risk, short-term policy for a self-interested individual would entail confession. The individual would either receive no jail term or a short jail term (defecting) as opposed to the alternative of a no jail term or long jail term scenario (cooperating). An even more beneficial short-run strategy for the self-interested individual would involve convincing the other prisoner of your intentions to cooperate, but confessing instead (bluffing for self-interest). While these policies may have short-run benefits to the self-interested individual, they are obviously not optimal for the “society” (both individuals). Over the long haul, if the prisoners could develop a way to know they could count on one another to avoid confessing (by obtaining an ability to accurately distinguish other cooperators from bluffing defectors), they both stand to benefit significantly more than they would by pursuing their own short-sighted self-interests as defectors. [/b]
How, in a determined world, could any of this be “calculated” other than in accordance with that which each prisoner is compelled to calculate in order to be in sync with the only possible world? Thus it’s not a question of doing either what is moral or what is expedient – only in doing what is always necessary.
How [realistically] can there be a distinction made doing what is or is not in your own self-interest when the “self” itself is just one more inherent component of the only possible reality?
Always I come back here to this: What in the world am I missing when I can only ever miss that which I am compelled to miss?
Then it all becomes entangled [for me] in the, at times, exasperating relationship between words and worlds. The limitations of language in grappling with things like this. Back perhaps to Wittgenstein’s,“Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.”