Compare And Contrast Determinism And Free Will Libertarianism

Merriam Webster defines free will as the ability to make choices that are not controlled by fate or God. For years, philosophers have been contemplating whether or not free will exists. In An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, David Hume presents two opposing views to this debate: determinism and free will libertarianism. Determinism is the philosophical concept that every human decision and action is the result of previous states of affairs (Libet Experiments). This view suggests that there is no such thing as free will. Free will libertarianism is the opposing view which suggests that our actions are not determined. The libertarianism approach claims that we have the power to choose action A over action B or vice versa. These two approaches are contrasted with new experimental philosophy, most notably the experiments conducted by neuroscientist Benjamin Libet in the 1980's. His experiments, rooted in science, support the idea that we possess free will.

Hume contrasts this view with libertarianism which suggests that we have the will to select one action over another. However, Hume claims that both of these views are indeed false. He supports what is known as soft determinism. Soft determinism states that a subject acts freely when it acts by determination of will. Paul Russell's article from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy summarizes Hume's main conclusions regarding free will. For one, Hume states that morally free actions are brought about by our own conscious will (Russell). Hume asserts that liberty is a power of acting or not acting according to determinations of the