You discussed Spinoza and his belief in a deterministic view of our freedom, and Leibniz’s soft determinism. Spinoza believes in hard determinism, where we have no free will. You argue that since we are controlled by God, we make no mistakes, and thus all our beliefs are true (Marcus, U5 Notes, 3). Further, our ideas only come from God’s perspective, meaning that we should just accept things for how they are, and focus our efforts into ideas that have no source of confusion, rather than address questions on less straight-forward concepts. You argue that freedom, therefore, is based on how much of what you believe is considered adequate. Does this really define freedom though? According to Leibniz, there is another way to approach this. What we think is us believing that we desire something is just a collection of external factors …show more content…
Doesn’t this distort the idea of freedom? Clearly, we do not have complete control of our actions, and external factors do play a role in our decision-making. However, saying we have no free will, or even Leibniz’s “soft determinism”, takes away any concept of personality development. While you could respond that God predetermines your personality, this removes the concept of morality from society. If I murder someone, in both Spinoza and Leibniz’s mind, I wouldn’t be morally responsible. Regardless if I was morally responsible or not, I am legally responsible, and would likely be incarcerated for life. How is this fair, considering I’m not really at fault? God created my personality, and either directed me to murder this person, or the external factors around me gave me no choice but to. This seems to contradict a fundamental premise of both philosopher’s work; that God is creating a perfect world. Spinoza says that our world must be the best of all possible worlds that God could create (Marcus, U5 Notes,
Spinoza was an excommunicated Jew. He viewed aspects from the “perspective of eternity”. He states that we must be free. Additionally, humans will achieve free will because we are constrained by our desires. This philosophy
There is much debate over the issue of whether we have complete freedom of the will or if our will caused by something other than our own choosing. There are three positions adopted by philosophers regarding this dispute: determinism, libertarianism, and compatibilism. Determinists believe that freedom of the will does not exist. Since actions are events that have some predetermined cause, no actions can be chosen and thus there is no will to choose. The compatibilist argues that you can have both freedom of the will and determinism. If the causes which led to our actions were different, then we could have acted in another way which is compatible with freedom of the will. Libertarians believe that freedom of the will does exist.
As a philosophical theory, determinism itself lays claim to truth, which therewith presupposes freedom, in accordance with what I have just said.
3. Discuss the issue between Baron d'Holbach and William James on free will and determinism?
God has given us as human beings free will. Although if we make choices based on our own free will we must be willing to take the responsibility for the effects that our decisions have on ourselves, on the people around us, and on society itself. Freedom, I believe, is the way in which people live or behave without others annoying or interfering in his or her affairs. People should benefit from freedom, equality and justice. Absolute freedom is sometimes very dangerous and may destroy the basic principles of the society. A lot of people believe that freedom means doing whatever you want, whenever you want.
All in all, each view of the philosophy of free will and determinism has many propositions, objects and counter-objections. In this essay, I have shown the best propositions for Libertarianism, as well as one opposition for which I gave a counter-objection. Additionally, I have explained the Compatabalistic and Hard Deterministic views to which I gave objections. In the end, whether it is determinism or indeterminism, both are loaded with difficulties; however, I have provided the best explanation to free will and determinism and to an agent being morally responsible.
Imagine starting your day and not having a clue of what to do, but you begin to list the different options and routes you can take to eventually get from point A to point B. In choosing from that list, there coins the term “free will”. Free will is our ability to make decisions not caused by external factors or any other impediments that can stop us to do so. Being part of the human species, we would like to believe that we have “freedom from causation” because it is part of our human nature to believe that we are independent entities and our thoughts are produced from inside of us, on our own. At the other end of the spectrum, there is determinism. Determinism explains that all of our actions are already determined by certain external causes
Neither soft determinism nor hard determinism successfully reconciles freedom and determinism. Soft determinism fails as it presents a limited type freedom, and it can be argued that the inner state of the agent is causally determined. Hard determinism presents a causally sound argument, whilst ignoring the moral bases of our society. Due to the failure of these theories to harmonize the data, the metaphysical problem of freedom and determinism persists.
“There is a continuum between free and unfree, with many or most acts lying somewhere in between.” (Abel, 322) This statement is a good summation of how Nancy Holmstrom’s view of free will allows for degrees of freedom depending on the agent’s control over the situation. Holmstrom’s main purpose in her Firming Up Soft Determinism essay was to show that people can have control over the source of their actions, meaning that people can have control over their desires and beliefs, and because of this they have free will. She also tried to show that her view of soft determinism was compatible with free will and moral responsibility. While Holmstrom’s theory about the self’s being in control, willingness to participate, and awareness of an act causes the act to be free, has some merit, her choice to incorporate soft determinism ultimately proved to invalidate her theory.
In life we are constantly questioning why people act the way they do. A determinist would say that freedom of choice couldn’t always be possible because our actions are determined by things that are way beyond our control. This view is known as the most extreme form of determinism; hard determinism. A hard determinist would believe there is no free will it’s an illusion everything is determined. Everything happens because of physical laws, which govern the universe. Whether or not we do well in life is far beyond our control. We may seem to have a choice but in reality we don’t. We shouldn’t blame people or praise people it wasn’t their choice. We are helpless and blind from start to finish. We don’t have any moral responsibilities. Some causes that are put forth by determinist are human nature; which means people are born with basic instincts that influence how they act. Another is environmental influence, which simply means people are shaped by their environment conditioned by their experience to be the kind of people they are. Also, social dynamics, which mean’s social creatures that are influenced by social force around them and psychological forces, which is people, are governed by psychological forces.
The problem of free will and determinism is a mystery about what human beings are able to do. The best way to describe it is to think of the alternatives taken into consideration when someone is deciding what to do, as being parts of various “alternative features” (Van-Inwagen). Robert Kane argues for a new version of libertarianism with an indeterminist element. He believes that deeper freedom is not an illusion. Derk Pereboom takes an agnostic approach about causal determinism and sees himself as a hard incompatibilist. I will argue against Kane and for Pereboom, because I believe that Kane struggles to present an argument that is compatible with the latest scientific views of the world.
In his book on ethics, Spinoza spends some time focusing on the nature of emotions. The emotions that Spinoza first focused on were passive emotions that were not based on adequate ideas but on inadequate ideas. Explaining how easy it is for humans to be driven into certain directions governed by certain passions, showing the inability of humans to sometimes control their own passions. Spinoza did not just only want to describe these emotions but also wanted to show the strengths in human emotions. Setting up preparation into discussing exactly how the human mind can gain control over the emotions by acknowledging and understanding the difficulty it is for one to overcome them. It is known that Spinoza’s has rejected the idea of free will. The base of human freedom is not free will, it is reason. When one is governed by adequate ideas one is capable to governing ones passions. Spinoza shows why reason itself is capable of controlling ones emotions because, for Spinoza, reason itself is an emotive force, as an emotional power, explaining why it is so profoundly difficult to overcome ones passion and why truth itself can not liberate from one passion.
Nonetheless, she uses this feeling of betrayal to motivate her. She questions Newton, and looks toward the scientist Leibniz.. But what Emilie studied and agreed with Leibneiz, was some of his philosopher's ideas and his idea of squaring mass and volume instead of timing This idea of relative time, space, and motion, something the inspired some of Emilie corrections to Newton work and later Einstein. Emilie debates love and philosopher throughout the whole play.
Therefore we are not free to act as we wish due to our actions being
Freedom, or the concept of free will seems to be an elusive theory, yet many of us believe in it implicitly. On the opposite end of the spectrum of philosophical theories regarding freedom is determinism, which poses a direct threat to human free will. If outside forces of which I have no control over influence everything I do throughout my life, I cannot say I am a free agent and the author of my own actions. Since I have neither the power to change the laws of nature, nor to change the past, I am unable to attribute freedom of choice to myself. However, understanding the meaning of free will is necessary in order to decide whether or not it exists (Orloff, 2002).