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Recommended: Human free will philosophy essays

Human beings always believe that what they want to do is ‘up to them,' and on this account, they take the assumption that they have free will. Perhaps that is the case, but people should investigate the situation and find a real case. Most of the intuitions may be correct, but still many of them can be incorrect. There are those who are sceptical and believe that free will is a false illusion and that it only exists in the back of people’s minds, but society should be able to distinguish feelings from beliefs in order to arrive at reality and truth.

The issue of free will has been a contentious one for a long time now between philosophers. Many have debated over the issue and ended up taking different stances. In this essay paper, I will argue the viewpoints of two great individuals in the field of philosophy; Pereboom and J. Coates whereby it is understood that they took completely different positions regarding this combative matter. An inquiry into the works of the two will enable us to answer these two imperative questions: Does denial of unregulated factors hinder the value and meaning of life? Also, is their need to defend free will rationally?
What is free will?
In his book, Thomas Hobbes argued that freedom is comprised when there are no outer impediments towards a person when engaging in what he desires to do: “Unregulated agent is that one can engage in what he wills and bear as per desire that liberty is absenteeism of outer impediments.” According to this definition, free will is the ability of a person to make a decision without being prevented or obstructed by any part. Another philosopher (Hume) defined freedom- liberty, as power of doing or of not doing, as per the d...

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...on between the two. Here, yes an agent will be free to make a decision,for example, to go outdoors or not to but the action can be limited or hindered by some factor such as a heavy downpour. Nonetheless, some argue that a free will is a prerequisite for a free action (compatibilists); depending on how the choice of the agent will turn out after selecting one of the preferred choices. On the other hand, another group argue that free will and action are incompatible (incompatibilists).
Furthermore, free will has been closely connected to the moral responsibility, in that one acts knowing they will be res for their own actions. There should be philosophical conditions regarding responsibility such like the alternatives that one has for action and moral significance of those alternatives. Nevertheless, moral responsibility does not exhaust the implication of free will.

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