Sunday, February 25, 2024

Deontic logic and acts

How do we formalize acts, in particular in the context of deontic logic ? For instance that an agent $x$ wishes to do something $y$ to another agent $z$ ?  Furthermore, how do we formalize that we should do something ? How do we formalize the language of acts in CIL  which does not really distinguish between state-relations and act-relations ? How do we express attitudes with regards to acts, not abstractly considered, but as applied to a given agent ?  But how do we quantify over acts ? If it is not even clear how we could formalize 'Do unto others as you would have them do unto you'  (the Golden Rule) how can we hope to formalize natural language or set up an axiomatic philosophy ?

We have abstract but complete acts, such as John's kissing of Mary, or , the kissing of Mary by John,  which are a kind of object in $D_0$ (i.e. sort 0 CIL terms).   We could distinguish these with a predicate $Act$.  Then there is the actuality or for the act, the state-of-affairs that the abstract act is actually occuring (now, or at a specified time). For this we use a further predicate $\mathcal{A}$.  Furthermore abstract acts can be objects of propositional attitudes, but it seems that it is the actual abstract act, or the actuality of the abstract act that is what is in most cases the object of the propositional attitude. Thus 'Mary wants to be kissed'  is not a relationship between Mary and the abstract complete act of Mary being kissed by somebody, but rather between Mary and the actuality of such an act. Can we consider an actuality operator $act$ which transforms the sense of an abstract act in this way ? 

Let us then try to formalize the Golden Rule, which we parametrize as a predicate $G(p)$ for a person $p$. If $x$ is incomplete abstract act (like 'kissing')  (determined by a predicate $iAct$) then $p.x.q$ denotes the complete abstract act obtained by specification to the agents $p$ and $q$.

\[ G(p) \equiv \forall x, q.  iAct(x) \rightarrow ( Wish (p, act( q.x.p)) \rightarrow Should(p, act(p.x.q)))\]

Of course our deontic 'Should' predicates needs to be clarified. What would it even mean if we said that $p$ should do an act in which $p$ is not even part of the act ? Perhaps we should write rather $Should(p, \lambda v. v.x.q)$.  It is a relationship between an agent $p$ and a semi-complete abstract act which expresses that $p$ is obliged to contribute to the actuality of the concrete act in which $p$ completes the act by becoming its agent. But how can an abstract complete act have a truth-value (as in CIL). Only the actuality of such can have a truth value.This suggests rather that the potentially actual complete act - bearing a truth value according to if such potentiality is actual or not - should be the default. The abstract complete act should be seen as the result of an operator which turns the previous $D_0$ element into something else which is no longer a bearer of truth-values. Cf. 'John is kissing Mary' and 'the kissing of Mary by John'.

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