Argumentative Essay On Free Will

The subject of philosophy comes with many dizzying topics that will stretch even the most seasoned of minds to the very limit. Among one of the oldest and most widely debated topics of philosophy is free will, and defining what exactly “free will” means is in no way an easy task. Fundamentally, free will is generally considered to be metaphysical property needed for moral responsibility. Beyond this, free will is also widely considered to be a prerequisite for praise and blame, as well as for personal dignity. Furthermore, for one to exercise free will over any given situation means, at the very least, that the individual exhibited some control over the situation or action in question. By the end of this essay it is the hope that one should have a clearer interpretation of what exactly it means to have free will.
As previously stated the topic of free will has long been a debated issue of which philosophers have disagreed on. This is due in part to the three positions that philosophers take on, which are the—libertarianism, skepticism, and hard determinism views. Libertarianism (not political) holds the view that everyone no matter who the individual is has free will, and that casual determinism or the idea that every state of the universe is caused by prior states is completely false. The main question that surrounds the libertarian view then is how exactly free actions arise, which is drawn from the premise that the libertarian not only refutes the notion of casual determinism, but would also seem that free actions could in no way be uncaused let alone be a product of chance. Within libertarianism, philosophers have long debated the question of how free actions arise, this is because the libertarian not only rejects casual det...

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... determinism is true. In Kai Nielsen’s “The Compatibility of Freedom and Determinism” Nielsen examines the meaning of freedom and argues that it contrasts not with “exemption from causal law,” but rather with “compulsion” or “coercion.” In other words sometimes our actions are compelled or coerced, and sometimes they are not. Compatibilists in the latter part of the twentieth century and on are completely displeased on the distinction between free and unfree actions. More recent compatibilist views have preserved the view that one can have free will even if causal determinism is true, thus giving more insight of what free will requires. Compatibilists have worked tirelessly to try to dismiss the concern that determinism compromises control over one’s actions that so many feel necessary for free will, but have been unsuccessful with the libertarians and skeptics.