Are we free?

Moral responsibility seems to require free will — that we could have acted otherwise. But is the will free, or are our choices determined? Three positions:

• Hard determinism — all is determined; there is no free will and no real responsibility.
• Libertarianism — we have genuine free will; determinism is false of human choices.
• Compatibilism (soft determinism) — freedom and determinism are compatible.

Hard determinism

Hard determinism holds that every event, including every human choice, is fully caused by prior conditions, so no one could ever have acted otherwise. Its forms:

• Philosophical/physical — universal causation (Laplace's "demon" could predict everything from present states).
• Psychological — e.g. Freud: behaviour is driven by unconscious forces.
• Biological/genetic — genes and brain chemistry shape action.

John Locke's locked room: a man happily stays in a room, not knowing it is locked; he feels free but is not — suggesting our sense of freedom can be an illusion. Consequence: if hard determinism is true, praise, blame and punishment (as desert) seem unjustified.

What follows?

Libertarianism

Libertarianism insists some choices are genuinely free — not merely uncaused randomness, but caused by the agent (self-determination).

• C. A. Campbell distinguishes the empirical self (personality, shaped by heredity and environment) from the moral self, which in moments of moral effort can resist the strongest desire and choose duty.
• Our strong sense of deliberation and responsibility is taken as evidence of real freedom.

Challenge: if a choice is not determined by prior causes, is it not just random — and how is randomness any more "responsible" than determinism?

Compatibilism (soft determinism)

Compatibilism says determinism and freedom are compatible, because "free" does not mean "uncaused" but "unconstrained".

• Hume: freedom is acting according to one's own desires without external compulsion; a determined action can still be voluntary.
• A. J. Ayer: the opposite of "free" is not "caused" but "constrained/compelled". I am free when I could have done otherwise had I chosen to, and no one is forcing me.

So we can keep moral responsibility even in a causal universe.

Which view?

Predestination and free will

Religion adds the problem of divine foreknowledge and predestination:

• If God is omniscient and knows the future, can our choices be free?
• Augustine and especially Calvin emphasised predestination — God elects who is saved — which appears to limit human freedom.
• Others argue God's foreknowledge does not cause our choices, so freedom survives; or that God stands outside time.

Whose moral self?

Weighing the positions

• Does neuroscience (e.g. brain-state studies) support determinism, or only show influences on choice?
• Is libertarian freedom coherent, or does it collapse into randomness?
• Does compatibilism save responsibility, or just redefine freedom to dodge the problem?
• How much responsibility is fair when heredity and upbringing clearly shape us (cf. Darrow's defence pleas)?

Sort each idea by position

Tap a claim, then drop it under the position it belongs to.

Match the thinker

Tap a description, then the thinker it belongs to.

The big ideas to hold together

You can now distinguish the three positions and evaluate whether responsibility survives determinism. Press Finish to see your score.