Free will by Amit Gupta at Bits Pilani

Free Will--

The Perpetual

Problem By:

Amit Kumar Gupta

2010A7PS004G

BITS PILANI

Freedom and Free Will

Surface Freedom/Liberty : being able to do

what you want.

A) Positive Freedom

B) Negative Freedom

Free Will: being free to choose what

you will.

Actions and choices are up to us.

Amit Kumar Gupta(2010A7PS004G) BITS PILANI

Why is Freedom so

important ?

We ‘feel’ that we are free; that we are the

originators of our own actions

We need to be free in order to be

responsible for our actions; our practices

of praise and blame presuppose that we

are free

Any example ?


Determinism

“A metaphysical philosophical position

stating that for everything that happens

there are conditions such that, given

those conditions, nothing else could

happen”.

Human actions result from wants, wishes,

desires, motivations, feelings, etc. which

in turn are caused by specific antecedent

conditions that ensure their occurrence.


…Determinism

The view that the state of the world at a

given time determines the state of the

world at the next moment.

No action is free if it must occur.

Every event that occurs, including human

action, is entirely the result of earlier

causes [event causation].


This raises two big questions

A) The determinist question :Is determinism

true or false?

B) The compatibility question: Is free will

compatible with determinism?

The combination of answers that can be

given form the standard positions in the

debate

So, determinism and free will would appear to be in

tension with one another


Incompatibilism

Freedom is not compatible with

determinism; if determinism is true, then

one cannot be held truly free and

responsible for one’s actions.

Can be divided into two groups:

A) Hard Determinism

B) Libertarianism


Incompatibilism: Hard

Determinism 1) Free will is not compatible with

determinism

2) Determinism is true.

3) So, we do not have free will it is just an illusion.

“If determinism is true, then our acts are the consequences of the laws of nature and events in the remote past. But it is not up to us what went on before we were born, and neither is it up to us what the laws of nature are. Therefore the consequences of these things (including our present acts) are not up to us”.---Peter van Inwagen, An Essay on Free Will (p. 56)


Hard Determinism

Any Problem ?

How can the HD explain our behavior of

praising and blaming agents for their

actions, and ascribing responsibility?

What happens to morality ? If nobody can

ever ‘do otherwise’than they in fact do,

then notions of responsibility, desert,

praise, and blame are redundant.


Incompatibilism :

Libetarianism

1) Free will is not compatible with

determinism

2) Free will exists

3) Determinism is therefore false

Any Problem ?

Our sense of free will is just an illusion:

Schopenhauer’s “On the Freedom of

The Will”


CompatibilismFreedom and responsibility are in every

significant sense compatible with

determinism; thus there is no conflict

between determinism and free will.

If some people see a tension here, it is

because they are misunderstanding the

notions of freedom and determinism, of

‘free-choice’ and ‘causal necessity’

“SOFT DETERMINISTS” are compatibilists

who believe determinism is true


…Compatibilism

1) Determinism is true

2) Free will exists

3) There is no tension between these

claims

Classical Compatibilists: Hobbes,

Hume, Mill

Modern Compatibilists: Ayer, Dennett,

Frankfurt


…CompatibilismAny Problem ?

Incompatibilists say:

For our actions to be free, it must be the case that, when we act, we could do otherwise than we actually do.

This insistence on the ability to do otherwise is often referred to as the “principle of alternate possibilities”

To say one ‘could have done otherwise’ is to say that one would have done otherwise had things been different (given a different set of beliefs, desires, etc.)


…Compatibilism

Compatibilist freedom is only ‘surface’

freedom - it is not free will in the full,

proper sense

Compatibilism is a

“wretched subterfuge” (Kant)

“quagmire of evasion” (William James)


Summary


The Problem –Free Will

If determinism is false, then events are not

subject to chain of cause-and-effect.

So events occur randomly, by chance

(indeterminism).

If events occur by chance, then they are

not under our control.

So, how can we have FREE WILL ?


Amit Kumar Gupta 2010A7PS004G BITS PILANI

Thank You !!!


Free will by Amit Gupta at Bits Pilani

Spiritual

Transcript of Free will by Amit Gupta at Bits Pilani