Will, Voluntary, Retribution

'Voluntary', as distinguished from 'involuntary', is primarily a category in a system of Retributive Justice, i. e. the drawing of the distinction functions as a determination of class of culpability, and, hence, of the type of punishment to be meted out. In contrast, 'voluntary', as admitting degrees of variation, is an element in Ethical evaluation, with Ethics understood as a program of self-cultivation. Self-cultivation produces what has previously here been termed Evolvement, i. e. personal growth, which entails the exercise of Will, the principle of Excession in Experience. Since one can evolve to a greater or lesser degree in a specific experience, Will can be exercised to a greater or lesser extent in it. So, since 'voluntary' pertains to the exercise of Will, an act can, for purposes of Ethical evaluation, be characterized as more or less voluntary. Thus, insofar as jurisprudential assessment recognizes the possibility of mitigating circumstances in the performance of an act, its use of 'voluntary' acknowledges its Ethical sense, but simplifies it for the convenience of retributive processes.

Will, Voluntary, Variation

According to the traditional concept of 'free will', any exercise of 'will' is ex nihilo, and, hence, the sufficient cause of any ensuing act. In contrast, here, Will is the Material Principle of Experience, i. e. its principle of Diversification, and, hence, effects a variation of given circumstances. In other words, an act that ensues from an exercise of Will incorporates the variation into those circumstances. So, unlike a 'free' act, a 'voluntary' act does not preclude the contribution to it of preceding conditions, which might complicate an attempt to attribute responsibility, but accurately reflects the details of Experience.

Will, Voluntary, Spinozism

According to Spinoza, Reason is volitional, and is free of external influence. Hence, the standard characterization of him as denying the existence of Free Will is inaccurate. What he does reject is the possibility of Will qua Motility, as well as that of the voluntariness of any apparent spontaneity of locomotion. However, he does allow that a Mode can, via an Adequate Idea, cause not only the maintaining of its strength, but of its increase of strength, as well. Hence, God/Nature must possess the capacity to increase strength. But, an increase entails a novelty in relation to what precedes it, while Reason can only derive what is implicit in its antecedents. Now, one source of such novelty is Modal Motility. So, in the absence of a better explanation, Spinoza's system can be interpreted as entailing personal non-rational voluntary processes.

Will, Voluntary, Imperative

Central to Kant's doctrine is the distinction between a 'categorical' and a 'hypothetical' imperative--the adoption of the former can be only 'free', while that of the latter can be only 'unfree'. The unfreedom of the adoption of a hypothetical imperative derives, according to Kant, from the predetermination of the purpose that motivates it. In contrast, according to the Formaterial model of Experience, and the definition of 'voluntary', the acting on the basis of an adopted imperative is always voluntary, for a variety of reasons that have been previously discussed, starting with its thesis that Will, i. e. Motility is a principle that is independent of any other experiential factors. The contrast also illustrates the unwieldiness of the strict 'freedom-unfreedom' dichotomy that Kant inherits from Hume, if not from tradition, in general. Even granting that one is unfree to resist the drives that are the sources of one's purposes, as Kant seemingly agrees, the choice of means to those ends is free, so, to that extent, the adoption of a hypothetical imperative is also free. Thus, that adoption, on Kant's own interpretation of it, combines free and unfree elements, with the reductionism of the dichotomy forcing him to ultimately classify it as unfree, as a reflection of which element is the predominant one. In contrast, the 'more voluntary'-less voluntary' spectrum that has been proposed here more flexibly characterizes the adoption of a hypothetical imperative as simply 'less voluntary' than that of a categorical imperative.

Will, Voluntary, Habit

Habitual behavior, as occurring automatically, might, therefore, be classified as 'involuntary'. However, 'automatic' does not clearly distinguish between rapidity of response and mechanical causality--while the latter might be involuntary, habitual behavior consists in the former. More important, the determining characteristic of Habit cannot be an aspect of a current actual process alone, but must lie in the relation of that process to previous sequences. In other words, Habit is defined by Repetition of behavior. But, as has been previously argued, following Deleuze, Repetition is a special case of Differentiation, i. e. it is minimal differentiation. Now, a voluntary act is an exercise of Will, and Will is the principle of Diversification in Experience. Hence, habitual behavior is not involuntary, but minimally voluntary.

Will, Voluntary, Compulsion

According to Aristotle, a 'voluntary' act is one performed without 'compulsion', with 'compulsion' defined as movement originating outside the agent. However, he seems unwilling to, accordingly, deny that the tossing of goods from a ship, to lighten its load during a storm, has an involuntary dimension. In contrast, the unequivocal application of his classification distinguishes between pulling a trigger while another gun is pointed at one's head, and pulling it during sneezing as an allergic reaction to pollen. At bottom, Aristotle definition of 'compulsion' fails to distinguish between the perception of some external phenomenon and an external efficient cause of a physiological event. Even the direst of circumstances does not transform an exercise of Will into an involuntary act. Thus, any response to compulsion e. g. qua perceived threat is voluntary.

Will, Voluntary, Knowledge

According to Aristotle, a 'voluntary' act is one in which the agent has knowledge of its consequences. On that formulation, if A serves B a dish that includes peanuts, and unbeknownst to A, B is allergic to peanuts, then the act is 'involuntary' if it is characterized as 'harming B', but 'voluntary' if it is characterized as 'feeding B'. Thus, Aristotle's definition leads to one and the same sequence of movements being both voluntary and involuntary. Plainly, his formulation conflates a volitional component, Will, with a cognitive one, Knowledge, thereby muddling the kinship of 'voluntary' with the former alone. In contrast, 'deliberate' or 'intentional' more appropriately characterizes the cognitive dimension of such acts.

Will, Voluntary, Somnambulism

The traditional identification of 'voluntary' with 'deliberate' or 'intentional' reflects a conflation of two distinct types of mental process--volitional and cognitive, e. g. Sartre's 'Consciousness'. Rarely explored evidence of that distinction is somnambulism, which entails Motility with minimal awareness. Since Motility is Will, somnambulism is volition with minimal cognition. Furthermore, since 'voluntary' denotes volition, somnambulism is, therefore, voluntary, though not deliberate or intentional. Similarly, dreams sometimes seem to be 'unconscious expressions of a wish', because what they actually express is Motility that occurs during sleep, and Motility is Volition, i. e. it is wishing in general, not some specific wish, that a dream expresses.

Will, Voluntary, Matter

The standard association of 'voluntary' with 'deliberate' or 'intentional' reflects the combined legacy of two theses--that Matter is inert, and that Consciousness is immaterial. Accordingly, only a perception, image, or thought can set one's body in motion, and can, therefore, be the source of voluntary action. In contrast, in Formaterialism, 'Matter' is an hypostasization of the Material Principle, and Will is the Material Principle of Experience. On that model, the self-activation that qualifies an action as 'voluntary' is independent of either a preceding perception, or a concomitant image or thought that guides its execution. As has been previously discussed, examples of one's formulating a goal simply to facilitate the exercise of Motility validate that model. They, therefore, also justify the distinction of 'voluntary' from 'deliberate' or 'intentional'.

Will, Voluntary, Deliberate

A 'voluntary' act is often characterized as one the consequences of which are considered in advance, by the performer, as possibly eventuating. That notion presupposes another--the forethought of there being any consequences at all. The latter entails a process of externalization beyond any thought of the imminent performance itself, i. e. it entails Will. Hence, what is primarily 'voluntary' in some consequential act is not the anticipation of one or another specific consequence, but in the recognition of consequentiality, in general. In contrast, an act performed with a specific outcome in mind is, more accurately, a 'deliberate' one. Thus, a deliberate act is a species of voluntary act.

Will, Voluntary, Volunteer

'Voluntary' behavior is typically characterized as one or more of the following: 1. 'Intentional', i. e. the outcome corresponds to some mental image that guided the performance; 2. 'Self-controlled', e. g. one was not intoxicated; 3. 'Chosen', i. e. the course of action was preferred to some feasible alternative; 4. 'Uncompelled', i. e. one was not forced to act by some external influence. Common to these concepts is that each is a retrospective characterization, and, hence, each is subtly teleological. In contrast, the related term, 'to volunteer', better expresses the essence of Will--self-activation, without ulterior motive. So, to formulate a 'voluntary' action as that for which one 'volunteers', while not suitable as a formal definition, still accurately emphasizes that the most focal feature of such a process is at its initiation, not at its termination.

Will, Voluntary Action, Dualism

'Voluntary' is most commonly used in jurisprudential contexts, in opposition to 'involuntary'. However, the sharpness of that categorial polarity belies the indefiniteness of at least most of the cases under consideration, nor of behavior, in general, which is often similarly subjected to traditional 'Freedom-Determinism' dualism. Efficiency of classification might be justified in legal procedures, but the oversimplification of Philosophical issues is at least sometimes intellectually lazy. A theory of Experience that fails to recognize that actions can be more or less voluntary reflects a greater fidelity to some conceptual scheme, perhaps Manichean, than to the facts themselves--especially the plain fact that Experience is comprised of a combination of factors, including Will.

Will, Volition, Voluntary

Just as the exercise of Will is 'volitional', it can also be characterized as 'voluntary'. Similarly, since, as has been previously discussed, Will can be quantified, and, thus, vary in degree of volition, an act can be more or less voluntary. The use of 'voluntary' thus has at least one advantage over that of a term such as 'free', the considerable baggage of which includes limitation to only two values.

Will, Utilitarianism, Common Good

Berkeley's divergence from Locke's Epistemological theory has potential implications for the latter's Political Philosophy that have seemingly rarely been explored. For, Phenomenalism, by conceiving externality as irreal, completely privatizes Experience, thereby rendering as specious any concept of Commonality that Lockeian Democracy entails. Similarly, Utilitarianism privatizes the Good--evaluations are all private feelings, of which the 'greatest happiness of the greatest number' is an aggregate. In other words, Mill, like Berkeley, recognizes no Common Good, nor can he. For, the recognition of Commonality requires Will, i. e. the principle of self-exteriorization, which, as the moment of the origination of action, has no value in a teleological doctrine such as Utilitarianism.

Will, Utilitarianism, Phenomenalism

The similarity of Mill's thesis 'To be valuable is to be valued' to Berkeley's 'To be is to be perceived' suggests that Utilitarianism involves an application of Phenomenalism. Accordingly, just as a Coherence Theory of Truth is the criterion of a non-representational cognition, such as a Phenomenon, the Utilitarian 'greatest happiness of the greatest number' principle is a Coherence Theory of the Good for non-representational valuation. In particular, just as Berkeley denies the Lockeian thesis that primary qualities exist in nature independently of a percipient, Mill denies the Lockeian thesis that Freedom is an intrinsic natural Good, i. e. that it has value independent of a valuer. Hence, the Utilitarian valuelessness of Will, the experiential source of Freedom, is, at least in part, a reflection of Mill's Phenomenalist orientation.

Will, Utilitarianism, Economics

It is generally recognized that Mill's Utilitarianism diverges from Bentham's by asserting that the 'good' consists in collective, and not personal, happiness. However, if, as is commonly accepted, Bentham conceives the doctrine on the model of Capitalist economic behavior, then Mill is revealed as also grounding it. On the economic interpretation, Bentham conceives 'happiness' as analogous to 'profit'. In contrast, on that interpretation, Mill is offering a theory of Evaluation that the notion 'profit' presupposes, namely, that the value of a product is determined by what one would pay for it, i. e. its 'exchange' value. Hence, the Marxist critique of Utilitarianism is analogous to the Ethical one that has been presented here--the Utilitarian suppression of 'intrinsic' value. Now, according to Marxism, the intrinsic value of a product is a function of the processes that transform its raw materials. Furthermore, according to the model of Experience being proposed here, Will is the basis of any variation of the given, and, hence, of the transformation of raw materials. Thus, contrary to pervasive stereotypes, a notion usually classified as 'individualistic', Will, is aligned with one usually classified as 'collectivistic', in opposition to an economic model usually associated with 'individualism'.

Will, Utilitarianism, Prejudice

Utilitarianism entails uncritical respect for the face-value authority of expressions of like or dislike. It thus is incapable of recognizing prejudice, i. e. it cannot distinguish judgment from pre-judgment. More generally, it cannot distinguish conditioned responses from spontaneous ones. Hence, 'the greatest happiness of the greatest number' can amount to a reinforcement of prejudices, possibly harmful ones. Since prejudice, and pre-conditioned behavior in general, is a species of Heteronomy, the corrective requires appreciation of the Moral significance of Autonomy, entailing the cultivation of Will, the principle of spontaneity in conduct. However, such appreciation requires the jettisoning any commitment to Teleology, which Mill seems unwilling to do.

Will and the Refutation of Utilitarianism

An Ethics of Empowerment not only presents an alternative to Utilitarianism, it refutes it. For, the self-activation process that the former proposes to cultivate, as the initiation of action, is irreducible to the end states which, according to Utilitarianism, are the bearers of Moral value. Hence, it stands as a counter-example to the Utilitarian claim that all Morality is fundamentally end-oriented. Furthermore, the implication that only the results of action are praiseworthy tends to stifle the liberation of Will from its subordination to Purposiveness. Thus, the refutation of Utilitarianism serves not merely to defend one rival doctrine from it, it is a substantive phase within that alternative doctrine.

Will, Teleology, Freedom

The effectiveness of Utilitarianism derives from the continued predominance of Teleology in Moral doctrines, and the Psychological models that they presuppose. The best evidence of that predominance is the pervasiveness of, as the standard focal problem of Morality, the coordination of the ends of subjects. That pervasiveness thus entails a concept of Subjectivity as constituted exclusively by the pursuit of ends. Hence, those doctrines ignore the volitional facet of Subjectivity, i. e. Will, the process of self-activation, which, as has been previously discussed, is independent of Purposiveness. Kant's Rational principle offers a brief glimpse of a non-teleological Moral doctrine, i. e. as the formulation of the cultivation of personal Freedom, before he eventually compromises it with concerns about Ends and Happiness. Similarly, the promotion of Creativity is another possible non-teleological Ethical program. Furthermore, insofar as the pursuit of ends compromises self-activation, anti-teleological arguments are part of the content of the promotion of Rationality, Freedom, Creativity, etc., and not merely an aspect of its validation.

Will, Freedom, Consequentialism

According to Atomistic Empiricism, to which Mill subscribes, 'B is the consequence of A' is an example of Efficient Causality. Thus, Mill's teleological formulation 'The value of A is determined by B' presupposes Consequentialism, but supervenes on it. So, one difficulty for a Utilitarian interpretation of interpersonal interaction is when 'A' is an exhortation to someone to act freely, and B is free action', because a reduction of the sequence to Efficient Causality requires a question-begging abstraction from its entailed 'freedom'. Thus, insofar as Kant's Rational Principle is such an exhortation to act freely, his doctrine, minus its teleological elements--that a rational being is an 'end-in-itself' whose Happiness is a 'good'--eludes reduction to Utilitarianism. However, it remains susceptible to the latter insofar as it continues to classify its exhortation as either Efficient or Teleological Causality. Now, an alternative has been proposed here--Material Causality, i. e. the process of Becoming-Diverse, the instance in personal experience of which is Will, the process of self-activation. Thus, the promotion of the Freedom of another can be Causal without being reducible to Utilitarianism.

Will and Swerve

'Swerve', for Lucretius, is a principle of Variation in Nature. Hence, Swerve is a manifestation of what has here been introduced as the 'Material Principle', i. e. the process of Becoming-Diverse. One important distinction between Swerve and the Material Principle is that while the former is an exception to the rule of regular motion, the latter, following Deleuze's demonstration that Repetition is a special case of Differentiation, conceives all motion as varying what precedes it, to a greater or lesser degree of similitude. Aside from that distinction, the two principles agree that spontaneity is not to be confused with unconditionality--an occurrence of Variation can be spontaneous, and, yet, its effects are conditioned by what precedes them, i. e. Difference is always relative to some given. Now, since Will is the Material Principle of Experience, it can be characterized as 'self-Swerve'. In contrast, most traditional concepts of 'freedom', notably Sartre's, fail to appreciate Swerve, since they equate spontaneity with unconditionality, and, hence, are processes more of escape than of variation.

Will, Utilitarianism, Asceticism

A significant limitation of Utilitarianism is exposed in a comparison with Nietzsche's criticism of Asceticism. While Nietzsche can argue that an incorporeal ideal is the product of merely minimal Will to Power, Mill has no response to Asceticists who assert that a 'kingdom of heaven' is the unique realization of the 'greatest happiness for the greatest number' Utilitarian principle, nor, seemingly, is any Consequentialist doctrine capable of such a response. In contrast, a Eudaimonism based on the concept of Pleasure proposed here, i. e. that it is the feeling of Will, is irreducible to the a priori supernaturalistic Morality that Mill seems keen to challenge.

Will, Utilitarianism, Emotivism

While Mill contends that the value of an action is a function of its consequences, the only consequence that, for his Utilitarianism, is ultimately decisive in the determination of the value of an action, is whether or not it is liked. Hence, the more accurate classification of his doctrine is 'Emotivist', rather than 'Consequentialist'. If it were the latter, he would further question the consequences of liking or disliking an action, which might lead him to the discovery that like and dislike, are, in turn, prompts to either a repetition of or an alternative to, respectively, the object of those feelings. In other words, it would reveal that Will, the activation of any subsequent behavior, is the ground of Emotivist evaluation, which even Stevenson does not seem to consider.

Will and Quantifying Pleasure

As previously demonstrated here, Will can be heuristically quantified, i. e. in terms of volitional units, or 'Vols'. So, insofar as Pleasure is a feeling of Will, as has been proposed, it, too, is quantifiable. Now, Will is also the principle of Diversification in Experience, and Diversification ranges from bare repetition and replication, to indefinitely extensive novelty and creation. Accordingly, one measure of Pleasure is the degree of creativity of the felt act along the range of Diversification. One application of that criterion is to a problem that vexes Mill--how to quantify the distinction between 'higher' and 'lower' pleasures. For, 'lower' pleasure can, accordingly, be analyzed as the feeling of an effort to merely continue its ephemeral occasion, e. g. the savoriness of food, while it is characteristic of a higher one that it is the feeling of an irresistible creative impulse. However, even if such an explanation improves on Mill's factually questionable observation--that everyone who has enjoyed both types prefers the higher ones--its non-Consequentialist interpretation of Pleasure is not one that Mill is likely to embrace.

Will, Pleasure, Happiness

Mill's attempt to reduce Kantianism--primarily its thesis that a rational being is an end-in-itself who deserves Happiness--to Utilitarianism suffers from an equivocation. For, what Kant means by 'Happiness' is a 'totality of satisfactions of need', whereas Mill's equation of 'happiness' and 'pleasure' implies that the former, like the latter, can obtain as a discrete localized experience. Furthermore, the distinction is not merely quantificational, for, while Happiness arrives as the moment of closure of a process, Pleasure, which, as previously argued here, is the feeling of Will, or, in Kant's system, of Freedom, occurs at a moment of experiential destabilization, i. e. at the moment of self-activation. So, sharpening the distinction between Pleasure and Happiness does not eliminate Consequentialism from Kant's doctrine, but it helps demonstrate that the latter is not Hedonist.

Will, Pleasure, Teleology

The traditional concept of Pleasure, to which Mill subscribes, is teleological, i. e. it understands Pleasure to occur subsequent to some process. Spinoza, in contrast, suggests a non-teleological alternative, which Nietzsche develops--that Pleasure is the feeling of an increase in strength. On that basis, Pleasure is distinct from the feeling of a replenishment of strength, or from relief from discomfort, each of which can be more accurately characterized as 'Satisfaction'. Now, while the replenishment of strength and the relief from discomfort, as completions of what precedes them, are plainly teleological, an upsurge in strength occurs, to the contrary, at the outset of a process, i. e. it is the moment of self-activation. In other words, Pleasure is the feeling of Will. Furthermore, the thought of Pleasure is a powerful motivator not as an anticipation of some eventuality, as it is usually conceived to be, but as itself a sufficient enough replication of the feeling of an upsurge of strength to initiate Motility.

Will and the Hedonistic Fallacy

Moore's charge that Utilitarianism commits a 'naturalistic fallacy' is perhaps fatally compromised by his question-beggingly positing a distinction between 'natural' and 'non-natural', one that Mill can easily reject. It also obscures a converse issue, one that can be called the 'Hedonistic Fallacy'. For, Mill's equation of 'pleasant' and 'good', rather than reducing the latter to the former, can be interpreted as reducing the former to the latter, thereby ascribing to 'x is pleasant' an evaluative connotation lacking in mere Hedonism. Entailed in that ascription is a denial of the teleological concept of Pleasure--for, an evaluation is at least partly prescriptive, and, hence, is preparatory to subsequent behavior, i, e, is no mere End. That denial, in turn, opens Pleasure to the analysis, following Spinoza, that it is a surplus of strength, and, thus, is incipient Motility, i. e. Will. So, the 'Hedonistic Fallacy' is the interpretation of Pleasure as a mere End, a fallacy which Mill partly exposes when he presents 'pleasant' as equivalent to an evaluative term.

Will, Utilitarianism, Descriptive Ethics

The claim that a Moral principle is descriptive is vulnerable to two challenges. First, it does not suffice to defend against the assertion that such a principle ought to be prescriptive. Second, it presupposes the objectivity of the Good, absent which, it is susceptible to the charge that it is an expression of 'bad faith', i. e. of a disowning of one's own creation. On the other hand, the exhortation 'Act!' is ironic--to fulfill it involves the self-activation of Will, for which any antecedent, including an exhortative utterance, can be no more than a describable phenomenon. Thus, it is unclear whether Mill's insistence that his Utilitarian principle merely describes the Good is an expression of naivety, of irresponsibility, or of an appreciation of the irony entailed in the alternative.

Will and Promoting Greater Happiness

Mill often seems to insist that his Utilitarianism is a descriptive theory, not a prescriptive doctrine. Nevertheless, implicit in his efforts to explain that the 'Good' is the 'greatest happiness for the 'greatest number, is the presumption that awareness of the correct thesis of the true nature of the Good conduces to the promotion of that Good. Now, it seems unlikely that he believes that such knowledge qua merely theoretical suffices to that end. Hence, he must project that the value of his thesis is practical, i. e. that it consists in its potential influence on behavior. Furthermore, insofar as his concept of Utilitarianism rivals that of Bentham, i. e. the thesis that one must promote one's own happiness, the influence on behavior that Mill projects must entail extending oneself, beyond one's self-interest, to that of others. But, Will is the other-oriented principle of Experience. Hence, Mill's Utilitarianism formulates a cultivation of Will.