Suppose that S could not have avoided stealing a cookie. There is no sense in which S could have done otherwise. Yet it may be quite interesting to consider whether S would have resisted the cookie if things had been different. Maybe S would have resisted it if S had been given better examples growing up. And maybe that is some evidence (not to say a proof) that it is really S’s unfortunate upbringing that is the cause of S’s bad behavior. This may soften our negative reaction to S’s theft, even if it does not remove the blame.