----- Original Message ----- From: "Jim Farmelant" <farmelantj at juno.com>
B.F. Skinner in his book, "Beyond Freedom & Dignity" proposed replacing the notion of responsibility with the concept of controllability. He also argued that the literatures of "freedom and dignity" helped to reinforce reliance upon punitive forms of behavioral control, even when such forms of behavior control could be demonstrated to be ineffective or counterproductive.
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To displace the issues related to responsibility, and here one need not reduce responsibility to moral behaviors whatever those are, with the elaboration and operationalizing of a theory of control would not resolve the issue of authoritarianism with respect to the imposition of norms. In short it is better to be a minimalist with respect to the deployment of responsibility in discourses/arguments/explanations than to be an eliminativist. No responsibility, no accountability and thus the problems of controllability would proliferate. Such are just some of the problems with "de-facing" power.
Ian