Abstract

Aquinas maintains that when we succumb to temptation our actions are wholly voluntary. When we give up a good in the face of a threat our actions are partly involuntary, but they are more voluntary than involuntary. I argue that when we succumb to temptation our actions can also be partly involuntary. I also defend my intuition that in some mixed cases our action is more involuntary than voluntary, and I show how Aquinas’s psychological theory can explain this. Finally, I explain why it matters that actions fully in accordance with our reasonsresponsive choices might not be fully voluntary.