the division of deontic labor
DESCRIPTION
Contemporary philosophy of collective agency, as illustrated by the work of Searle, Bratman, Gilbert, Pettit and others, focuses predominantly on small groups of agents sharing common goals. In his groundbreaking paper “Massively Shared Agency” of 2014, Scott Shapiro shows the limits of this approach when dealing with the large groups of agents that form industrial corporations, armies, or systems of law enforcement. Such groups will involve alienated or uncommitted participants pursuing motives of their own. And as Shapiro shows, they can manifest shared agency only when the actions of all participants are coordinated through authority structures organized hierarchically. Here I wish to focus on that dimension of massively shared agency that has to do with the transmission of authority. I will show that while such transmission almost always involves communication through speech (or through the digital counterparts of speech), transmission of this sort is too transient, and falls short of creating the type of enduring intermeshing of plans and intentions that is required for the imposition of hierarchical authority structures across large organizations. To create and maintain the needed hierarchical authority structures what is required are complexes of intermeshed documents. Such documents provide for what we can think of as a division of deontic labor, allowing plans, orders, and obligations to be meshed together over time. Presented at the conference on Truth, Image and Normativity, Cagliari, Sardinia, October 23, 2014TRANSCRIPT
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The Division of Deontic Labour
Truth, Image, NormativityCagliari, October 23, 2014
Barry Smith
the philosophy of the dinner party
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Searle, Tuomela, Gilbert, Bratman deal with simple local interaction of cooperative agents communicating by speech
“Would you like to dance?”“Let’s lift this table”“Waiter, bring me a beer!”“Shall we cook dinner together?”…
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beyond the philosophy of the dinner party
Phase 1: Massively shared agency involving participants who share a common goal – example: a symphony performance
Phase 2: Massively shared agency involving substantial numbers of participants who are alienated from the overarching goal – example: an industrial enterprise, an army, the law, a city planning authority
first main thesis:the meshing of complex actions of large numbers of people is made possible through
1. modularization 2. hierarchically organized authorities
both resting essentially on 3. the meshing of (typically diagrammatic) documents
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Orchestal score with staves
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The Modularity of the Orchestral Score
The actions of the players in an orchestral performance
• are intermeshed through the sets of intermeshed documents we call orchestral scores
These documents are plan specifications (sets of instructions for playing instruments)The conductor provides the authority
– to initiate commitment, thus to create a plan from a mere plan specification
– to resolve disputes which arise along the way, for example as to interpretation, tempo, …
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Scores bring it about that specific obligation series are distributed in coordinated fashion across large groups
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players actions are coordinated and steered through time through conductor’s actions combined with intermeshed sets of instructions
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Massive shared agency presupposes modularity
Modularity of Orchestral Score
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reflects modularity of orchestra
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Authorities involved in maintaining the division of orchestral deontic labor that is involved in a symphony concert:
ConductorOrchestral section leaders (First violin …)Rehearsal (drill) managerOrchestra managerConcert hall manager~ Composer
– exerts authority only as mediated through the score
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Documents involved in maintaining the division of orchestral deontic labor
scores, sub-scorescontracts
orchestra manager and conductor orchestra manager and playersconcert hall manager and orchestra managerconcert hall manager and audience members (tickets)
laws, includingcopyright lawlaws governing public assemblylaws governing employment contractslaws governing sale of tickets
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between
documents hold together the executions of horizontally and vertically meshed subplans
through drilldrill, too, is modularized
based on individual and small group practice all the way up to full orchestra rehearsal
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How to do things with scores1. the author authors the score, thereby creates a possibility
of performance, and thereby creates the work2. conductor and orchestra use the score as the specification
of a plan (with subplans) and commit themselves to its execution,
3. the orchestra members committing themselves to accept the authority of the conductor
4. they use the score in to rehearsing the execution of their plan (develop score-coordinated expertise through drill)
5. they schedule a concert, thereby making a commitment to each other, to their employer, and to a prospective audience to perform that work
6. they perform the work17
Scott J. Shapiro, “Massively Shared Agency”, 2013
[Bratman, Searle …] ‘are unable to account for the existence of massively shared agency.
they ‘have largely concentrated on analyzing shared activities among highly committed participants. The working assumption has been that those who sing duets or paint houses together are all committed to the success of the activity.’
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Shapiro: To adapt standard theory of collective agency to deal with massively shared actions we
need to add authority
Authorities are … “mesh creating” mechanisms. When disputes between participants break out with respect to the proper way to proceed, authorities can create a mesh between the subplans of the participants by demanding that both sides accept a certain solution.
Basis for Shapiro’s theory of the nature of law
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Legal systems are (roughly) • systems of intermeshed obligations
• systems of intermeshed plans
• systems of intermeshed instructions
• system of intermeshed authorities
which allow
• conception of ever more complex intermeshed plans through reliance on shared commitments and on development of intermeshed expertise
• excution of these plans through shared agency
• investment in human and physical capital20
Searle: Directions of fit• world-to-mind: a plan is formulated to
change the world (to make it conform to the mind of the planner …)
• mind-to-world: an assertion is about something in the world
• automatic mind-to-world-and-world-to-mind: I say “I promise to pay you $100 dollars” and thereby make it true that I promise to pay you $100 dollars
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directions of fit for documents
• world-to-mind: a plan is formulated to change the world (to make it conform to the mind of the planner …)
• mind-to-world: a report is published evaluating the success of the execution of the plan
• automatic mind-to-world-and-world-to-mind: Act of Parliament is published declaring that such-and-such is the law and such-and-such is the law
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what begins as a plan, ends as a record
cartographic directions of fit
Blueprint
what begins as a plan
ends as a record • of process• of product
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Blueprint
what begins as a plan
ends as a record • of process• of product
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Blueprint associated with multiple series of documents with deontic powers
chain of commitments from order to blueprint creation to acceptance of
blueprint to process of building
in accordance with blueprint
to acceptance of finished building 26
Plans will be modified along the way
physical changes to the building to meet building codes
changes in materials/suppliers
changes in allowed physical processes
changes in administrative (approval) processes
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Documents with different directions of fit become intermeshed through being
stapled together over time
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second main thesis:there is a division of deontic labor effectuated through the medium of
intermeshed documents, which allow the deontic effects of episodic acts to be
extended through time
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• testaments allow the will of the testatrix to be made effective even after her death
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• mortgage notes attached to title deeds allow the value of your home to be used twice: as shelter and shelter and simultaneously as collateral on a loan
documents attached to building plans create
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• certification from planning authorities as to conformity to building codes of work performed
• insurance against loss as a result of or in the course of building work being performed
• warranty on behalf of architects and builders concerning quality of work performed
• warranty on behalf of suppliers concerning quality of materials• security to architects, builders and suppliers that they will be
paid in pre-specific instalments• all of these in turn create surety in the eyes of
utilities companies when connecting the building to electricity, gas and water supplies
providers of insurance protection for the building when once complete
• potential purchasers thus adding to the monetary value of the building itself
conclusionthe meshing of plans, authorities and groups of agents of the sort that is provided by documents and document acts is an indispensable pre-requisite of all that is valuable in modern civilization
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Role of plan + authority in the industrial enterprise
the cooperation of the wage-laborers … their unification into one single productive body, and the establishment of a connection between their individual functions, ... are not their own act, but the act of the capital that brings them together and maintains them in that situation. … the interconnection between their various labors confronts them in the realm of ideas as a plan drawn up by the capitalist, and in practice as his authority, as the powerful will of a being outside them, who subjects their activity to his purpose. Das Kapital (quoted by Shapiro)
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Deontic drill
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scores and subscores / plans and subplansalso allow training (rehearsal = pretend realization of a plan in advance of actual
realization)
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it takes practice also to understand how to interpret and follow the instructions of the conductor
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we need training (drill) in order to learn how to execute diagrams
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How to do things with documents
• An orchestral work (as something that can be rehearsed, performed and re-performed) – could not exist without a score– could not be rehearsed without scores and
subscores– could not be performed without (either)
scores or rehearsal
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We need training in order to execute traffic signs
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We need training in order to execute the rules of civil procedure
http://www.kibagames.com/Game/Lawyer_Dress_Up
http://www.kibagames.com/Game/Lawyer_Dress_Up
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modularity of command and control in the military alsoFire
Support
LogisticsAir Operatio
ns
Intelligence
Civil-Military
Operations
Targeting
Maneuver &
Blue Force
Tracking
US military operations center in Afghanistan