If the social environment were arranged so that most people in the West could, with relatively little effort, be morally good to a reasonable degree, would this be a good thing? I claim that it is not entirely obvious that we should say yes. This is no idle question: mainstream Western social morality today seems to be approaching the prospect for a morality that is not taxing. This question has substantial theoretical interest because exploring it will help us understand the paradoxical relationship between morality and moral worth.

In "Smilansky's Baseline Objection to Choice-Egalitarianism" (same issue of SATS), Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen challenged the "paradox of the baseline" I presented previously. I counter his two arguments, and conclude that his suggestions do not save choice-egalitarianism from the paradox. The egalitarian turn to choice and responsibility was indeed a huge boost to egalitarianism because it was thought to be compatible with other central values and fundamental intuitions. Choice-egalitarianism promised a "workable egalitarianism", but once we see how the deeper structure of this theory unfolds, we understand that these hopes are not realizable.

I examine the three most prominent examples of recent terrorism, and conclude that they lack any justification. In extreme instances where justification might be possible, there is no terrorism. I argue (1) that we need to confront the overwhelming force of mass illusions that lead to terrorism and its support; (2) that the belief, encouraged by the international laws of warfare, that terrorism is never justified, might be a "positive illusion"; and (3) of the dangers of the belief that we should permit terrorism in the fight by the weak against oppression.

There is a widespread view according to which deontology can be construed as a flexible, reasonable view, able to incorporate consequentialist considerations when it seems compelling to do so. According to this view, deontologists can be moderate, and their presentation as die-hard fanatics, even if true to some historical figures, is basically a slanderous and misleading philosophical straw man. I argue that deontologists, properly understood, are not moderate. In the way deontology is typically understood, a deontology, as such, conceptually needs to be overriding. The error I point out has pernicious implications, which are noted.

Choice-egalitarianism (or CE) is, broadly, a version of egalitarianism that gives free choice a pivotal role in justifying any inequality. Choice-egalitarianism is a particularly attractive form of egalitarianism, for it ties in with the high value that many put on choice and responsibility. I argue that the very emphasis on choice leads to a paradox, which creates severe principled and pragmatic difficulties for choice-egalitarianism.

The compatibility question lies at the center of the free will problem. Compatibilists think that determinism is compatible with moral responsibility and the concomitant notions, while incompatibilists think that it is not. The topic of this paper is a particular form of charge against compatibilism: that it is 'shallow'. This is not the typical sort of argument against compatibilism: most of the debate has attempted to discredit compatibilism completely. The 'argument from shallowness' maintains that the compatibilists do have a case. However, this case is only partial, and shallow. This limited aim proves itself more powerful against compatibilists than previous all-or-nothing attempts.

In my book 'Free Will and Illusion' (OUP, 2000) I argued for two radical proposals. The first, "fundamental dualism", is that if there is no libertarian free will we need to combine the partial but valid insights of both compatibilism and hard determinism. The second, "illusionism", is that we could not live adequately with a complete awareness of the truth about human freedom: illusion lies at the center of the human condition. In a symposium on my book, Yuval Eylon and Daniel Statman proposed objections to my proposals. After summarizing my arguments, I reply to these objections.

I summarize the main points of my book 'Free Will and Illusion' (Oxford University Press, 2000). In part I of the book I examine the metaphysical and ethical structure of the free-will problem, examining the solutions that have traditionally been offered and formulating my own position. This lays the groundwork for examining the role of illusion, in part II. In the book I offer two radical proposals for understanding the implications of living in a world without libertarian free will (such as a deterministic world): first, the attempt to combine the two central rival alternatives, compatibilism and hard determinism. The partial but valid insights of both positions need to be integrated into a hybrid view, which I call "fundamental dualism." Secondly, I examine in some detail the complex role of illusion in our lives, insofar as they are affected by the issue of free will. (edited)

In the last twenty years much philosophical progress has been made in understanding what can be named the "mystery of modesty": how can an epistemically adequate self-evaluation by the admirable and accomplished nevertheless be both genuinely modest and a virtue? If the admirable and accomplished know their value, how then can they be modest about it? If they do not know their value, how can this be a virtue? Various proposals have been formulated, but after reviewing them I conclude that they do not seem to be successful. I argue, nevertheless, that we can make sense of the virtue of modesty, if only we pay adequate attention to the implications of the problem of free will. This, if properly interpreted, is the key to the mystery of modesty.

I have argued that discussions of distributive justice, and in particular choice-based egalitarian ones, need to take much more seriously than they do the dreaded free will problem. Sung-Hak Kang challenges my views. His two main claims are, first, that putting metaphysical issues such as the free will problem as posterior to ethics are mistaken. Second, that a realistic, moderate egalitarianism has better prospects with John Rawls's "nonmetaphysical" orientation than with any free will-dependent one. I reply.

This article asks whether justice is binary, whether matters are either-or with respect to it. This question has been inexplicably neglected, and the elementary conceptual work has not been done. We consider this question through exploring the implications of free-will-related justice. We see that there are actually two questions of very different scope here, and that two distinct notions of binarity need to be distinguished. In the process, the plausibility of considering justice as a binary notion is evaluated.

In "On the Alleged Shallowness of Compatibilism: A Critical Study of Saul Smilansky: 'Free Will and Illusion'" ('Iyyun' vol. 51, 2002; 63-79) James Lenman mounts a strong attack on the notion of 'ultimate injustice', a mainstay of common dissatisfaction with compatibilism. I survey two broad ways in which we can understand justice. Under the first, the notion of ultimate injustice is indeed questionable, but under the second it makes good sense. Then I show that in the free will issue it is the second type of justice, that allows and indeed affirms ultimate injustice, which is most salient.