Two Ways to Frustrate a Desire

Abstract

<p>In this article we evaluate the view that it is in one respect more pro tanto wrong to internally frustrate another person's desire than to externally frustrate it—that is, the view that it is in one respect more pro tanto wrong to prevent another person's desire from being satisfied by altering that desire than to prevent the satisfaction of the desire by altering the environment. We call this view the Internal-External Principle (IEP). We consider whether and how IEP might be modified to accommodate a range of case-based intuitions. This leads us to replace IEP with a more modest variant. We argue that, though this modified variant of IEP is able to contend with a range of cases, the most plausible explanation for its correctness appeals to a dubious thesis concerning the value of autonomous thought. Thus, we suggest, the principle may require further modification. We then show that this final modified version of IEP lacks the most significant practical implications of the original version.</p>