In Search of a Weak Good Will

It is widely accepted that wrongdoers are sometimes excused because of their ignorance. Attributionist (quality-of-will) views and reasonable expectation (or akrasia- requiring) views disagree as to why ignorance excuses. Sometimes these views yield conflicting verdicts regarding a wrongdoer’s blameworthiness. This paper discusses the possibility of cases, in which the wrongdoer is blameworthy on akrasia- requiring views, but blameless on quality-of-will views. I call these the cases of “weak good will.” The question about their possibility has so far been largely neglected. I argue that such cases are possible only if we accept that having good will sometimes involves caring too much about morally significant facts. Furthermore, I argue that these cases are possible regardless of one’s view on akrasia. I distinguish cases of the relevant kind from cases of inverse akrasia and argue that the latter do not count as weak good will cases. Finally, I discuss the implications of both the possibility and impossibility of cases weak good will and argue that their possibility poses problems for the quality of will views.