Conclusion

Abstract

Abstract This final chapter considers some more speculative extensions of the theory of basic responsibility. It defends the implication that animals can be responsible for their activities so long as they satisfy the conditions on basic responsibility. It discusses the development of agency and responsibility, from childhood to maturity, and how the evaluative standards governing activities, and thus the nature of such mitigations, should be understood. It also considers a traditional question regarding responsibility: is it compatible with the thesis of determinism? Though the theory of basic responsibility is officially neutral on that question, this chapter considers how the theory might motivate an affirmative answer. To the extent that activities are flexible and overlapping, the chapter discusses how basic responsibility is a promiscuous notion, such that individuals are responsible for far more things than typically acknowledged by extant theories. Finally, the chapter considers the way in which the theory is compatible, and in tension, with various approaches in ethical theory.