 The first extended treatment of moral responsibility is Aristotle’s in NE 3.1–5. Voluntary actions, says Aristotle, are subject to praise and blame, whereas involuntary ones are excused (NE 3.1 1109b30–32). Voluntary actions are ones with their origin in the agent themself, where they know the particular circumstances of the action (NE 3.1 1111a23–24). To say that the origin of an action is the agent simply means that the cause or explanation of an action is the person’s own beliefs, desires, states of character, and other psychological states. If I decide to poison my mother for the sake of getting my inheritance, the action of putting cyanide into a mug of chamomile and almond tea can be explained by my greed and callousness, by my resulting desire for the inheritance and disregard for the welfare of my mother, and by my belief that poisoning my mother would be an effective means to obtaining the inheritance. On the other hand, forced actions are involuntary—for instance, the movement of a sea voyager who is blown astray by a wind or carried away by kidnappers. In such cases, the person’s movements have an external origin, and they themself don’t contribute anything to their movements.