The document discusses examples of situations where two individuals are equally at fault for a situation but experience different consequences due to luck. It explores questions around whether differing outcomes should impact moral and legal culpability when intentions and actions were the same. The author analyzes arguments that culpability depends more on intentions and actions rather than consequences due to luck, but also that consequences cannot be entirely divorced from responsibility.

2. 1. Is A’s action any worse than B’s?
2. Is A more responsible for the death than B?
3. Can we judge A to be a worse person than B?
4. Should the law hold A and B equally responsible?
Examples: 2 guys, equally at fault, but varying consequences.
Ex: 2 drunk guys drive, unlucky driver A hits & kills a child, is arrested, charged
w/drunk driving & manslaughter. Lucky driver B hit nobody, but was stopped &
given a DUI.
Ex: 2 hitmen aim at respective targets. Hitman A hits target, but B’s target is
wearing a bullet proof vest & survives. Both arrested, A charged w/murder, B
charged only w/attempted murder.
Ex: 2 switchmen work for different railroads. Both were to throw a switch at 10am
& both got lazy, failed to do so. Unlucky man A’s train was running & the failure to
switch tracks  train wreck. Lucky man B’s train had engine problems. (Acts of
omission, w/consequences.)
Ex: 2 firemen trying to save kids through a burning apartment windows. Man A’s
child steps on window ledge which collapses due to poor construction & child
dies, fireman feels guilty. Man B successfully saved the other child & is
celebrated on newspaper as hero.
In all 4 cases, A is unlucky & B is lucky.  What makes one morally responsible
& what does it have to do with luck?

3. Culpability = the degree to which one can be held legally or morally responsible
1. When you actually cause overall bad
consequences to happen
• Worse consequences = greater culpability
2. When you perform a wrong action
• Worse action = greater culpability
3. When you act out of wicked intentions
• Worse intentions = greater culpability

4. I DIDN’T KNOW! IT WAS OUT OF MY CONTROL!
Ex. hidden stop sign Ex. sleepwalking, or crimes of passion

5. “we’re only responsible for our intentions”
 Circumstances external to a person
should NOT influence our moral
judgments of his or her character,
action, blameworthiness etc.
 The only thing that we have complete
voluntary control over are our
intentions
 Culpability depends on our intentions.
(view 2)

6.  When are your actions morally
blameworthy or praiseworthy?
• When you are morally responsible for
your actions.
• When you exercise control over your
actions
 Kant’s ethics assume that we are all
equal rational agents participating in
Thomas Nagel morality with an equal opportunity to
do and be morally praiseworthy and
blameworthy. This is wrong!

7. ① Luck in the way your actions and
projects turn out
② Luck in how you have been
determined by previous
circumstances
③ Luck in the temperament, emotions
and personality you have
④ Luck in the circumstances you find
yourself in
“If you’re not in control, how can you be responsible for your luck?”
“The things we’re proud of & also want to blame others for are largely b/c of luck.”

8.  From the external (objective) view we take
of the world: our lives are just a series of
events occurring in a world we have little or
no control over.
 From the internal (subjective) view we take
of the world: are beings who makes choices
and whose lives could never be reduced to a
series of events.
 Both of these views seem right, but
incomplete. They also contradict one
another and can not both be true. Together,
they’re paradoxical.

9.  Case type 1:
• Harm is caused, but the agent is not
at fault
 Case type 2:
• Agent causes benefit, but does not
deserve any merit for doing so.
 Case type 3:
• The agent act negligently or
recklessly (at fault), but no harm is
caused.

10. Variables: brakes checked & kid in street
 Unlucky No Fault Driver
 Lucky Fault Driver
 Unlucky Fault Driver
Thomson:
 No fault driver did not act badly
 Lucky fault driver acted badly
 Unlucky fault driver acted worse
because he’s to blame for the death
that he caused.

11. General principle: Bad consequence of an action makes
that action worse only where the agent is to blame for
that bad consequence which his action causes
Objection from “Kantian moral sophisticate”: You can’t blame
someone for something caused merely out of bad luck.
Reply:
• Unlucky No Fault Driver was unlucky in two ways : (1) that the child ran
into his path; (2) that he couldn’t stop his truck on time.
• Unlucky Fault Driver was only unlucky (1). The bad breaks were his fault.
Objection: You can’t blame someone for something that
involved any luck – for anything out of their control
Reply: That goes too far. Sure we can!

12. ACTUAL CASE THOMSON’S REVISED VERSION
 Both Tice and Simonson fire their  During the trial evidence is
rifles in Summer’s direction with presented that shows Summers’
equal negligence injury came from Tice’s gun.
 Summers is struck in the eye and
sues his two friends for damages
 It’s impossible to know which one
harmed Summers
 Court decides they should split the
damages equally
 Simonson acted badly, but is not to legally blame for the injury and should
not have to pay damages
 Morally, however, we do not think Tice’s action worse than Simonson’s

13.  Unlucky fault driver did something
worse than lucky fault driver
 Tice did not do something worse than
Simonson, but he is the one that must
pay for the damages
 The difference is that
Simonson nearly caused the
same exact harm as Tice, but
the same can not be said for
the lucky fault driver

14.  Ignore it?
 Embrace it?
 Split the difference somehow?