The Dilemma Of Moral Responsibility From A Universe With Causal Law And Freedom

Determinism is a doctrine suggesting that for every event there exist conditions that could cause no alternative event. Free will is a philosophical term describing a particular sort of capacity of rational agents to choose a course of action from among various alternatives. Understandably, the dichotomy between these two concepts is a topic philosophers have debated over for many years. As a result of these debates, a number of alternative philosophical perspectives arguing for the existence of free will, namely libertarianism and compatibilism, have emerged, existing in stark contrast to determinism. In order to ascertain the extent to which free will is compatible with determinism, one must first consider these different approaches to

Suppose that every event or action has a sufficient cause, which brings that event about. Today, in our scientific age, this sounds like a reasonable assumption. After all, can you imagine someone seriously claiming that when it rains, or when a plane crashes, or when a business succeeds, there might be no cause for it? Surely, human behavior is caused. It doesn't just happen for no reason at all. The types of human behavior for which people are held morally accountable are usually said to be caused by the people who engaged in that behavior. People typically cause their own behavior by making choices; thus, this type of behavior might be thought to be caused by your own choice-makings. This freedom to make

The subject of freewill and determinism has been a matter of intense debate in the philosophical community for ages with the topic of compatibilism and incompatibilism. This essay will be reviewing and critiquing the work of a very well-known philosopher Peter Van Inwagen and his article “An Argument For Incompatibilism” and what does he mean by freewill and determinism.

If determinism exist, can free will exist as well? According to determinism, everything is already set up to occur by a past event. This means that there is only one possible future based on the causes beforehand. So, by the laws of nature and our free will, there is a deep connection of understanding. If determinism exist that would mean the past and future are unavoidable. Thus, not giving a choice to be made by free will. Every cause that happens will have an effect and that is not a choice made by free will if everything is already

At the beginning of the article, Van Inwagen describes free will as a fork on the road and you have choices in front of you all you must do is make a choice on which path to choose. That very decision you make of which path to take is free will. Being able to choose between these two paths shows that you have free will to choose which path to go on however your decisions are limited because only two paths are being presented to you. Determinism is the theory that everything we do like choices that we make are completely determined by previously existing causes. I disagree with the notion that free will is incompatible with determinism. This notion is saying that free is not compatible with the fact that things happen for a reason. I disagree

The focus of this essay will be an argument by Peter Van Inwagen known as the “Consequence Argument.” The argument’s main goal is to refute compatibilism, or the idea that free will and determinism are reconcilable. Van Inwagen’s argument can be expressed as follows:

Throughout this section of the class we have talked about free will and the responses through different point of views. In this paper I am going to discuss the problem of free will itself and then describe the determinist, libertarian, and the compatibilist responses to the problem and talk about some benefits and drawbacks from the different positions. Finally I will give you my output on the various responses to the problem and defend why I believe in what. I will make references from the Riddles of Existence by Earl Conee and Theodore Sider and from the lectures.

Frankfurt defines "freedom of will" as an ability to bring one 's will into correspondence with one 's

According to Frankfurt, “there is no more than an innocuous appearance of paradox in the proposition that it is determined, ineluctably and by forces beyond their control, that certain people have free wills and that others do not” (20). Frankfurt’s theory is purely based on the relationship between different orders of desires, instead of the origin of the desires. In other words, so long as one has the freedom to desire a particular first-order desire of his, he has the freedom of will, even though all of his desires are causally determined.

My second notion of free will requires that an actor is able to decide between different possibilities of actions that lead towards different futures. Robert Kane calls this concept ‘a garden of forking paths’; every action leads to other actions that again allow for alternatives of action (Kane, 2005: 7). If an actor could not have done otherwise, he would not have had free choice. Even if he did not choose to do otherwise, he could not have done so. Free will seems to require the power to do otherwise, or our actions would

Some argue that a person is morally responsible for some action only if he could have done otherwise. What was Frankfurt’s argument against this claim?

Inwagen provides clear reasoning why free will, when defined as the ability to choose between different forks in time, is impossible with our current understanding of the world. It is simply not possible for us to truly make decisions about our lives that can not be traced to outside influences, even if those influences are random in nature. Harry Frankfurt also provides a compelling analyses of free will that relies on a different definition of the subject. Frankfurt's work allows for a world where free will can exist in a world that is deterministic or nondeterministic. However, both of these philosophies rely on different definitions of free will and neither definition can be proven superior. Until we can definitively prove what free will is, we can never truly determine whether it exists or not. That being said, we cannot function properly as beings if we do not believe we have control over our lives. It is impossible to live life without having a some sense of agency regarding our choices or will. As Peter Van Inwagen points out “I conclude that there is no position one can take concerning free will that does not confront its adherents with mystery.” The mystery lies in what the true definition of free will is, therefore, for the sake of functionality, we can assume it exists even if there is

The argument about free will continues with the principle of alternate possibilities. It states that you’re only morally responsible for something if you could have chosen otherwise. This is the common justification for free will and moral responsibility and is even the basis of criminal law. Harry Frankfurt did not agree with this argument, however. He criticized the principle of alternate possibilities and challenged the idea that moral responsibility requires free will. He proposes the following example: there are two men, Jones and Black, and Jones has the option of choosing A or B. Black wants Jones to choose A and Jones is unaware that Black exists. If Jones chooses A, Black will not interfere in any way. However, if Jones tries to choose

The idea of free will, as presented by Frankfurt, seems to be completely compatible with the idea of determinism. According to Frankfurt, a person does not need to go for

     Before one can properly evaluate the entire debate that enshrouds the Free Will/Determinism, each term must have a meaning, but before we explore the meaning of each term, we must give a general definition. Determinism is, "Everything that happens is caused to happen. (Clifford Williams. "Free Will and Determinism: A Dialogue" pg 3). This is the position that Daniel, a character in Williams’ dialogue, chooses to believe and defend. David Hume goes a little deeper and explains in his essay, "An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding of Liberty and Necessity," that determinism is this: "It is universally allowed, that matter, in all its operations, is actuated by a necessary force, and