Why is debate over the free will problem so intractable? In this broad and stimulating look at the philosophical enterprise, Richard Double uses the free will controversy to build on the subjectivist conclusion he developed in The Non-Reality of Free Will (OUP 1991). Double argues that various views about free will--e.g., compatibilism, incompatibilism, and even subjectivism--are compelling if, and only if, we adopt supporting metaphilosophical views. Because metaphilosophical considerations are not provable, we (...) cannot show any free will theory to be most reasonable. Metaphilosophy and Free Will deconstructs the free will problem and, by example, challenges philosophers in other areas to show how their philosophical argumentation can succeed. (shrink)

In Metaphilosophy and Free Will, Richard Double seeks to establish two theses: Disputes over free will are in principle unsolvable, since they stem from incommensurable metaphilosophical views and principles. Given a metaphilosophy which takes philosophy to be continuous with science, free will is not an objective feature of reality. Double defines free choices as "choices that, unless some excusing condition obtains, are sufficient to qualify their agents as morally responsible for the actions those (...) choices produce and as warranting reactive attitudes". This definition, he claims, has the advantage of being neutral between competing theories of what a free choice is. At the same time it is particularly relevant to his defense of thesis. (shrink)

This book explains, in simple but accurate terms, how orthodox quantum mechanics works. The author, a distinguished theoretical physicist, shows how this theory, realistically interpreted, assigns an important role to our conscious free choices. Stapp claims that mainstream biology and neuroscience, despite nearly a century of quantum physics, still stick essentially to failed classical precepts in which mental intentions have no effect upon our bodily actions. He shows how quantum mechanics provides a rational basis for a better understanding (...) of this connection, even allowing an explanation of certain phenomena currently held to be "paranormal". These ideas have major implications for our understanding of ourselves and our mental processes, and thus also for the meaningfulness of our lives. (shrink)

This is my response to the criticisms of Gregg Caruso, David Cummiskey, and Karin Meyers, in their roles as members of the “Author Meets Critics” panel devoted to my book, Buddhism, Meditation, and Free Will: A Theory of Mental Freedom at the 2019 annual meeting of the Eastern Division of the American Philosophical Association, organized by Christian Coseru. Caruso's main objection is that I am not sufficiently attentive to details of opposing arguments in Western philosophy, and Cummiskey's (...) and Meyers’ objections, similarly, are that I am insufficiently attentive to details of Buddhism. I argue that all such objections, however putatively correct, do not rise to the level of objections that actually undermine my account of mental freedom. (shrink)

Goswami proposes to replace the current scientific paradigm of physical realism with that of a quantum-based monistic idealism and, in the process, accomplish the following goals: establish a basis for explaining consciousness, reintegrate spirituality, mysticism, morality, a sense that the universe is meaningful, etc., with scientific discoveries and the scientific enterprise, and support the assumption that humans possess free will - i.e., that they are not controlled by the apparently inexorable causality of the physical laws that govern the (...) functioning of their brains. Here, we critically examine this approach, from an artificial intelligence and neural network perspective, and point out what appear to be some inherent weaknesses in Goswami's arguments. (shrink)

Traditionally, Buddhist philosophy has seemingly rejected the autonomous self. In Western philosophy, free will and the philosophy of action are established areas of research. This book presents a comprehensive analytical review of extant scholarship on perspectives on free will. It studies and refutes the most powerful Western and Buddhist philosophical objections to free will and explores the possibility that a form of agency may in fact exist within Buddhism. Providing a detailed explanation of how (...) Buddhist meditation increases self-regulative mind-control abilities, the author argues that the Buddhist path is designed to produce meditation virtuosos exhibiting mind-control abilities far exceeding the free-will advocate's ability to 'do otherwise' or have their choices be 'up to' them. Based on the empirically-supported mind-control cultivated by these meditation virtuosos, the book proposes the principle of, 'Buddhist Soft Compatibilism', a theory of 'freedom of the mind' that entails freedoms of the will, attention, emotion and action, compatible with both determinism and indeterminism. Buddhism, Meditation and Free Will will be of interest to Buddhist and Western philosophers and academics interested in comparative philosophy, free will, philosophy of action, metaphysics, ethics and Religious Studies. (shrink)

Laws, Mind, and Free Will is a highly valuable book for anyone interested in philosophy of science, philosophy of mind, or in the problem of free will and moral responsibility. The book has three distinct but related parts. The first presents an anti-empiricist position on the laws of nature, according to which the point of the laws is not primarily to predict kinematic outcomes, but rather to characterize dynamics. One upshot of the account is that the (...) laws have an attenuated role in determining and prediction of actual motion, and this has an important consequence for the relevance of the laws to the prospects for libertarian free will. This consequence is developed in detail in the second part of the book. A further feature of the account is that proposed laws and the theories in which they are embedded are models in a sense that reflects our interests and involves idealization. In Horst’s view, this is true for theories and laws across the sciences—from physics to psychology. The l .. (shrink)

Alfred Mele develops a conceptual analysis of some of the concepts that inform the recent experimental studies of intentional action. Based on a distinction between unconscious urge and conscious decision, he suggests that the neural activity described by Libet’s experiments may represent an urge to move rather than a decision to do so, and that the decision to move might be made only when the subject becomes conscious of the urge. If this is the case, then Libet’s experiments do not (...) threaten freewill. (shrink)

Many philosophers are persuaded by familiar arguments that free will is incompatible with causal determinism. Yet, notoriously, past attempts to articulate how the right type of indeterminism might secure the capacity for autonomous action have generally been regarded as either demonstrably inadequate or irremediably obscure. This volume gathers together the most significant recent discussions concerning the prospects for devising a satisfactory indeterministic account of freedom of action. These essays give greater precision to traditional formulations of the problems associated (...) with indeterministic accounts and to the range of theoretical avenues for pursuing resolutions. The first four essays set out different challenges (from both compatibilists and those skeptical of the possibility of free will) to the adequacy of standard indeterministic theories. The next seven essays meet one or more of these challenges. Each of the fundamental types of approach--simple indeterminism, causal indeterminism, and agent causation--is represented in these novel and sophisticated proposals. The collection finishes with two essays that debate whether compatibilism entails that freedom of choice is a comparatively rare phenomenon within an individual's life. Eloquently presenting some of the most compelling and accessible arguments surrounding this central philosophical issue, Agents, Causes, and Events makes a valuable contribution to courses in free will/action theory and metaphysics. (shrink)

The Theory of Important Criteria is used to argue that the age?old problem of the compatibility of free will and determinism turns on the question of the importance of causal indeterminacy of choice as a criterion of being able to do otherwise. One's answer to this question depends in turn on one's evaluation of certain moral issues and of the force and significance of certain similes, analogies and diagrams in terms of which one can ?depict? a deterministic (...) universe. It is further argued that the problem of free will and determinism is not a pseudo?problem, but a genuine problem that is hard to solve because of the depth and complexity of the evaluative issues on which it hangs. (shrink)

Both libertarian and compatibilist approaches have been unsuccessful in providing an acceptable account of free will. Recent developments in cognitive neuroscience, including the connectionist theory of mind and empirical findings regarding modularity and integration of brain functions, provide the basis for a new approach: neural holism. This approach locates free will in fully integrated behavior in which all of a person's beliefs and desires, implicitly represented in the brain, automatically contribute to an act. Deliberation, the (...) experience of volition, and cognitive and behavioral shortcomings are easily understood under this model. Assigning moral praise and blame, often seen as grounded in the notion that a person has the ability to have done otherwise, will be shown to reflect instead important aspects of signaling in social interactions. Thus, important aspects of the traditional notion of free will can be accounted for within the proposed model, which has interesting implications for lifelong cognitive development. (shrink)

Libertarians claim that human behaviour is undetermined and cannot be predicted from knowledge of past history even in principle since it is based on the random movements of quantum mechanics. Determinists on the other hand deny thatmacroscopic phenomena can be activated bysub-microscopic events, and assert that if human action is unpredictable in the way claimed by libertarians, it must be aimless and irrational. This is not true of some types of random behaviour described in this paper. Random behaviour may make (...) one unpredictable to opponents and may therefore be rational. Similarly, playing a game with a mixed strategy may have an unpredictable outcome in every single play, but the strategy is rational, in that it is meant to maximize the expected value of an objective, be it private or social. As to whether the outcome of such behaviour is genuinely unpredictable as in quantum mechanics, or predictable by a hypothetical outside observer knowing all natural laws, it is argued that it makes no difference in practice, as long as it is not humanly predictable. Thus we have a new version of libertarianism which is compatible with determinism. (shrink)

I argue for a possible Buddhist theory of free will that combines Frankfurt's hierarchical analysis of meta-volitional/volitional accord with elements of the Buddhist eightfold path that prescribe that Buddhist aspirants cultivate meta-volitional wills that promote the mental freedom that culminates in enlightenment, as well as a causal/functional analysis of how Buddhist meditative methodology not only plausibly makes that possible, but in ways that may be applied to undermine Galen Strawson's impossibility argument, along with most of the other (...) major arguments for free will skepticism. (shrink)

William Hasker and I disagree over whether or not appealing to a particular understanding of divine eternity can reconcile divine foreknowledge with libertarian human freedom. Hasker argues that if God had foreknowledge of a particular future choice, that choice cannot be free with libertarian freedom. I hold, to the contrary, that, given a certain theory of time—the view that all times exist equally—it is possible to reconcile divine foreknowledge with libertarian freedom. In a recent article, “Can Eternity be (...) Saved? A Comment on Stump and Rogers”, Hasker makes it clear that one of the fundamental disagreements between us lies in what each of us takes to be required for libertarian free will. In the present paper I outline the version of libertarianism that I find plausible, then explain how a libertarian free choice can be foreknown by God. Then I will explain why Hasker finds this reconciliation unacceptable since it fails to do justice to what he takes to be required for libertarian freedom. Finally, I will argue that Hasker is wrong to insist upon his analysis of free will. (shrink)

This paper explores the possibility that chaos theory might be helpful in explaining free will. I will argue that chaos has little to offer if we construe its role as to resolve the apparent conflict between determinism and freedom. However, I contend that the fundamental problem of freedom is to find a way to preserve intuitions about rational action in a physical brain. New work on dynamic computation provides a framework for viewing free choice as (...) a process that is sensitive and unpredictable, while at the same time organized and intelligent. I conclude that this vision of a chaotic brain may make a modest contribution to an intuitively acceptable physicalist account of free will. (shrink)

I argue that the empirical literature on priming effects does not warrant nor suggest the conclusion, drawn by prominent psychologists such as J. A. Bargh, that we have no free will or less free will than we might think. I focus on a particular experiment by Bargh – the ‘elderly’ stereotype case in which subjects that have been primed with words that remind them of the stereotype of the elderly walk on average slower out of the (...) experiment’s room than control subjects – and I show that we cannot say that subjects cannot help walking slower or that they are not free in doing do. I then illustrate how these cases can be reconciled and normalized within a Davidsonian theory of action to show that, in walking slower, subjects are acting intentionally. My argument applies across various experiments, including those of goal priming. In the final section I argue that the only cases in which priming effects are efficacious are so-called Buridan cases. (shrink)

This article shows that the concept of choice is central to Isaiah Berlin’s liberalism. It argues that his valuing of choice is anchored in a particular conception of human nature, one that assumes and presupposes free will. Berlin’s works sketch a metaphysics of choice, and his reluctance to situate himself openly in the debate on free will is unconvincing. By introducing the theory of autopoiesis, this article further suggests that there is a way to take (...) Berlin’s value pluralism seriously, by considering sets of values as autopoietic conscious systems. Drawing on the works of Maturana and Varela in biology and Luhmann in sociology, autopoiesis strengthens value pluralism and acts as a critique of liberalism. By putting objectivity in parenthesis, autopoiesis finally allows for value systems to coexist side by side in a stronger sense than Berlin’s liberalism ever could. (shrink)

The second part of Richard Double’s Metaphilosophy and Free Will restates arguments first given in his The Non-Reality of Free Will and answers some objections to them. The first, and longer, part of the book sets these arguments in a wider context. Since writing his previous book, Double has come to believe that no theory about free will can be shown to be more worthy of acceptance than others. The reason for this is (...) that different theories are supported by different metaphilosophical views, views that cannot be “shown to be objectively best, because their plausibility [depends] on subjective facts about us,” namely on our “non-truth-valued desires”. (shrink)

In his book, philosopher and law professor Ken Levy explains why he agrees with most people, but not with most other philosophers, about free will and responsibility. Most people believe that we have both - that is, that our choices, decisions, and actions are neither determined nor undetermined but rather fully self-determined. By contrast, most philosophers understand just how difficult it is to defend this "metaphysical libertarian" position. So they tend to opt for two other theories: "responsibility skepticism" (...) and "compatibilism". In opposition to both of these theories, Levy explains how free will and responsibility are indeed metaphysically possible. But he also cautions against the dogma that metaphysical libertarianism is actually true, a widespread belief that continues to cause serious social, political, and legal harms. Levy's book presents a crisp, tight, historically informed discussion, with fresh clarity, insight, and originality. It will become one of the definitive resources for students, academics, and general readers in this critical intersection among metaphysics, ethics, and criminal law. Key features: Presents a unique, qualified defense of "metaphysical libertarianism," the idea that our choices, decisions, and actions can be fully self-determined. Written clearly, accessibly, and with minimal jargon - rare for a book on the very difficult issues of free will and responsibility. Seamlessly connects philosophical, legal, psychological, and political issues. Will be provocative and insightful for professional philosophers, students, and non-philosophers. (shrink)

Determinism seems incompatible with free will. However, even indeterminism seems incompatible with free will, since it seems to make free actions random. Popper contends that free agents are not bound by physical laws, even indeterministic ones, and that undetermined actions are not random if they are influenced by abstract entities. I argue that Popper could strengthen his account by drawing upon his theories of propensities and of limited rationality; but that even then his account (...) would not fully explain why free actions are not random. I offer a solution to this problem which draws on Hornsby’s analysis of action. I then borrow an idea of Kant about self-consciousness to distinguish free agents from sub-human animals. I make a brief evaluation of Popper ’s contribution. (shrink)

Free will and determinism have recently attracted the attention of Buddhist scholars who have defended conflicting views on this issue. I argue that there is no reason to think that this problem cannot arise in Buddhist philosophy, since there are two senses of ‘free will’ that are compatible with the doctrine of non-self. I propose a reconstruction of a problem of free will and determinism in Early Buddhism, given a) the assumption that Buddhist causation (...) entails universal causal determinism, and b) a crucial passage suggesting that Early Buddhism is committed to the principle of alternative possibilities which is arguably incompatible with a determinist interpretation of causation. This passage suggests that Early Buddhism must leave room for a robust, incompatibilist form of free will, and that a conception of indeterminist free will in the spirit of Robert Kane’s theory allows us to make sense of that notion. (shrink)

In the libertarian ``agent causation'' view of free will, free choices are attributable only to the choosing agent, as opposed to a specific cause or causes outside the agent. An often-repeated claim in the philosophical literature on free will is that agent causation necessarily implies lawlessness, and is therefore ``antiscientific." That claim is critiqued and it is argued, on the contrary, that the volitional powers of a free agent need not be viewed as anomic, (...) specifically with regard to the quantum statistical law. Assumptions about the role and nature of causation, taken as bearing on volitional agency, are examined and found inadequate to the task. Finally, it is suggested that quantum theory may constitute precisely the sort of theory required for a nomic grounding of libertarian free will. (shrink)

Many moral theories incorporate the idea that when an action is wrong, it is wrong because that there was something else that the agent could and should have done instead. Most notable among these are consequentialist theories. According to consequentialism an action A is wrong if and only if there was another action B that the agent could have performed such that, if the agent had performed B instead of A, the consequences would have been better. Relatively little attention has (...) been given to the question of how to understand the meaning of ‘could have’ in this specific context. However, without an answer to this question, consequentialist theories fail to yield determinate verdicts about the deontic status of actions in real scenarios. It is here argued that the following conditional analysis provides the required answer and gives us the most plausible version of consequentialism: the agent could have done B instead of A if and only if, there is a decision such that had the agent made this decision, then she would have done B, and not A. Such a conditional analysis has been universally rejected as an analysis of the general meaning of ‘could have’, but we show that in the specific context of specifying the meaning of ‘could have’ in a consequentialist criterion of right and wrong action, all the standard objections to it fail. (shrink)

In his recent book The Natural Selection of Autonomy, Bruce Waller defends a view that he calls “natural autonomy.” This view holds that human beings possess a kind of autonomy that we share with nonhuman animals, a capacity to explore alternative courses of action, but an autonomy that cannot support moral responsibility. He also argues that this natural autonomy can provide support for the ethical principle of noninterference. I argue that to support the ethical principle of noninterference Waller needs either (...) a libertarian or a compatibilist theory of autonomy. I then go on to argue that, contra Waller, the libertarian view is both compatible with Darwinism and able to make sense of how autonomous acts belong to the agents who perform them. Thus, I conclude that the libertarian position is a live option for Darwinians. If however, naturalism is taken to include a deterministic view of the universe (at least at the nonquantum level), as is often the case, then my article takes some strides in defending “Darwinian non–naturalism.”. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Amazing Grace: Fortune, God, and Free Will in Machiavelli’s ThoughtCary J. Nederman*Machiavelli and ReligionSurely there is no political theorist about whom scholarly opinion is more divided than Niccolò Machiavelli. The subject of intense and continuous examination almost from the time of his death, Machiavelli has become if anything more enigmatic with the passage of time and the proliferation of interpretations. Although one might argue that this fact (...) reflects the highly unsystematic and context-bound nature of his thought, the now well-established consistencies in his linguistic usage and narrative style suggest that certain principles inform his writings across genre and circumstance. 1One of the most contentious aspects of Machiavelli’s writing has been his attitude towards religion, in particular, Christianity. 2 To be sure, Machiavelli [End Page 617] was no friend of the institutionalized Christian Church as he knew it. The Discourses makes clear that conventional Christianity saps from human beings the vigor required for active civil life. 3 And the Prince speaks with equal parts disdain and admiration about the contemporary condition of the Church and its Pope. 4 Many scholars have taken such evidence to indicate that Machiavelli was himself profoundly anti-Christian, preferring the pagan civil religions of ancient societies such as Rome, which he regarded to be more suitable for a city endowed with virtù. 5 At best Machiavelli has been described as a man of conventional, if unenthusiastic, piety, prepared to bow to the externalities of worship but not deeply devoted in either soul or mind to the tenets of Christian faith. 6In recent times, the only dissenting voice of note has been Sebastian de Grazia, whose Pulitzer Prize-winning intellectual biography, Machiavelli in Hell, attempts to rescue Machiavelli’s reputation from those who view him as deeply hostile to Christianity. 7 De Grazia argues that not only do central biblical themes run throughout Machiavelli’s writings but that these works reveal a coherent conception of a divinely-centered and ordered cosmos in which other forces (“the heavens,” “fortune,” and the like) are subsumed under a divine will and plan. Machiavelli in Hell points to evidence from throughout the Machiavellian corpus supporting an idea of divine ordination of earthly events, especially in the case of the accomplishments of extraordinary individuals. For de Grazia’s Machiavelli success in human affairs depends primarily upon the friendship of God.De Grazia’s interpretation of Machiavelli’s religious faith has, of course, proven controversial, not least because he introduces his case in a fairly unsystematic and speculative way. 8 But while de Grazia’s presentation may be somewhat haphazard, the general reading he defends has important merits that ought [End Page 618] not to be overlooked. Machiavelli does make reference to a monotheistic divinity, as well as to central elements of Christianity theology, rather more often in his corpus than most scholarship might lead one to believe. Moreover, the passages in which these references occur are often among the most important and troubling sections of his work. De Grazia would seem, then, to be correct in asserting that we must grasp Machiavelli’s idea of God and the divine role in earthly affairs if we are to understand the basic principles of Machiavellian political theory.If de Grazia’s basic observation is indeed persuasive, why have Machiavelli’s religious ideas been so widely overlooked (or indeed dismissed) by recent scholars? To explain this we have to take into account Machiavelli’s own exaggerated statements regarding the originality of his teachings, as well as his already mentioned antipathy towards the institutions and officials of the Roman Church. But perhaps more important has been the reluctance to read Machiavelli in conjunction with many central cultural and intellectual features of his time, especially in terms of persisting patterns and traditions of medieval Latin thought. One of the most striking developments in the study of Western intellectual history in recent years has been the recognition of important continuities between the ideas of the late medieval and the early modern periods. Scholars have come to realize that many of the supposed innovations of the Renaissance, the Reformation, and even the early Enlightenment had clear roots or antecedents in... (shrink)

Hobbes’s views on free will and action were radically revisionary of a well-established scholastic theory of the ethical significance of freedom and of freedom’s relation to law. At the heart of this scholastic theory was an account of freedom as a multiway power to determine alternatives and of human action as a distinctively practical mode of exercising reason. The chapter explains this theory as developed by Suarez and, following Suarez, by Bramhall, and examines Hobbes’s attack (...) on the theory’s basis—the theory of freedom as a metaphysical power and of action as a distinctively practical mode of exercising reason. (shrink)

This book defends an event-causal theory of libertarian free will and argues that the belief in such free will plays an important, if not essential, role in supporting certain important values. In the first part of the book, the author argues that possession of libertarian free will is necessary for deserved praise and blame and reward and punishment. He contends that his version of libertarian free will-the indeterministic weightings view- is coherent (...) and can fit with a scientific, naturalistic understanding of human nature. However, the author also notes that we don't have sufficient evidentiary grounds to believe that human beings have this kind of free will. Despite this, he argues there are sufficiently strong value-based/axiological reasons to believe we have such free will and to live an act as if we have it. In the second part of the book, the author makes the case that the belief in such libertarian, desert-grounding free will is very important to defending human dignity in the context of criminal justice, making sense of justified pride and its value, and adding value to our relationships. Free Will's Value will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working in metaphysics, philosophy of mind, action theory, ethics, and the philosophy of law. (shrink)

Theory and language: locating agency between free will and discursive marionettesThis article outlines a research methodology that embraces individual narratives, yet recognizes that individual narratives are nested within a backdrop of broader social and cultural understandings of who we are and how we come to understand our world. This dialectical move requires an epistemological shift, focusing on the utility of reconceptualizing the ‘environment’, not only as the social, political, or economic conditions in society, but also as language. (...) Reconceptualizing the environment as language makes it epistemologically possible to construct a bridge between varying levels of analysis, namely, between individual accounts and life stories and the cultural, social, and historical worlds from which those accounts emerge. (shrink)

If George Eliot is a determinist, how can she justify judging her characters on moral grounds? The most influential discussion of her determinism concludes that she believed one overcomes its depressing effects by understanding it. But this view is contradicted by her assertion that free will is a “practical” necessity, even a necessary fiction. Kantian moral theory is strongly present in her work as is shown by her use of Kantian terms, but it is grounded nonmetaphysically. Rationality (...) and the will are essential if one is to feel free to choose. Her concept of whole self in relation to moral choice has links with Bergsonian theory. (shrink)

Robert Kane's event-causal libertarian theory of free will has been subjected to a variety of criticisms. In response to the luck objection, he has provided an ambiguous answer which results in additional criticisms that are avoidable. I explain Kane's theory, the luck objection and Kane's reply to the problem of luck. I note that in some places he suggests that the dual wantings of agents engaged in self-forming actions (SFAs) provides the key to answering the luck (...) objection, whereas in other places he suggests that the dual willings or tryings of agents is the key. Various philosophers criticize Kane's view by focusing on his concept of the dual willings/tryings involved in SFAs. I argue that despite Kane's efforts to answer these criticisms, they still hold; but I also go on to argue that Kane can avoid these criticisms and also answer the luck objection by just focusing on the important role of the dual wantings in SFAs. (shrink)

Mele's ultimate purpose in this book is to help readers think more clearly about free will. He identifies and makes vivid the most important conceptual obstacles to justified belief in the existence of free will and meets them head on. Mele clarifies the central issues in the philosophical debate about free will and moral responsibility, criticizes various influential contemporary theories about free will, and develops two overlapping conceptions of free will--one (...) for readers who are convinced that free will is incompatible with determinism (incompatibilists), and the other for readers who are convinced of the opposite (compatibilists). Luck poses problems for all believers in free will, and Mele offers novel solutions to those problems--one for incompatibilist believers in free will and the other for compatibilists. An early chapter of this empirically well-informed book clearly explains influential neuroscientific studies of free will and debunks some extravagant interpretations of the data. Other featured topics include abilities and alternative possibilities, control and decision-making, the bearing of manipulation on free will, and the development of human infants into free agents. Mele's theory offers an original perspective on an important problem and will garner the attention of anyone interested in the debate on free will. (shrink)

Led by Buddhists and the yoga traditions of Hinduism and Jainism, Indian thinkers have long engaged in a rigorous analysis and reconceptualization of our common notion of self. Less understood is the way in which such theories of self intersect with issues involving agency and free will; yet such intersections are profoundly important, as all major schools of Indian thought recognize that moral goodness and religious fulfillment depend on the proper understanding of personal agency. Moreover, their individual conceptions (...) of agency and freedom are typically nodes by which an entire school's epistemological, ethical, and metaphysical perspectives come together as a systematic whole. Free Will, Agency, and Selfhood in Indian Philosophy explores the contours of this issue, from the perspectives of the major schools of Indian thought. With new essays by leading specialists in each field, this volume provides rigorous analysis of the network of issues surrounding agency and freedom as developed within Indian thought. (shrink)

Our self-conception derives mostly from our own experience. We believe ourselves to be conscious, rational, social, ethical, language-using, political agents who possess free will. Yet we know we exist in a universe that consists of mindless, meaningless, unfree, nonrational, brute physical particles. How can we resolve the conflict between these two visions? In _Freedom and Neurobiology_, the philosopher John Searle discusses the possibility of free will within the context of contemporary neurobiology. He begins by explaining the (...) relationship between human reality and the more fundamental reality as described by physics and chemistry. Then he proposes a neurobiological resolution to the problem by demonstrating how various conceptions of free will have different consequences for the neurobiology of consciousness. In the second half of the book, Searle applies his theory of social reality to the problem of political power, explaining the role of language in the formation of our political reality. The institutional structures that organize, empower, and regulate our lives-money, property, marriage, government-consist in the assignment and collective acceptance of certain statuses to objects and people. Whether it is the president of the United States, a twenty-dollar bill, or private property, these entities perform functions as determined by their status in our institutional reality. Searle focuses on the political powers that exist within these systems of status functions and the way in which language constitutes them. Searle argues that consciousness and rationality are crucial to our existence and that they are the result of the biological evolution of our species. He addresses the problem of free will within the context of a neurobiological conception of consciousness and rationality, and he addresses the problem of political power within the context of this analysis. A clear and concise contribution to the free-will debate and the study of cognition, _Freedom and Neurobiology_ is essential reading for students and scholars of the philosophy of mind. (shrink)

In this book Tobias Hoffmann studies the medieval free will debate during its liveliest period, from the 1220s to the 1320s, and clarifies its background in Aristotle, Augustine, and earlier medieval thinkers. Among the wide range of authors he examines are not only well-known thinkers such as Thomas Aquinas, Duns Scotus, and William of Ockham, but also a number of authors who were just as important in their time and deserve to be rediscovered today. To shed further light (...) on their theories of free will, Hoffmann also explores their competing philosophical explanations of the fall of the angels, that is, the hypothesis of an evil choice made by rational beings under optimal psychological conditions. As he shows, this test case imposed limits on tracing free choices to cognition. His book provides a comprehensive account of a debate that was central to medieval philosophy and continues to occupy philosophers today. (shrink)

Many prominent accounts of free will and moral responsibility make use of the idea that agents can be responsive to reasons. Call such theories Reasons accounts. In what follows, I consider the tenability of Reasons accounts in light of situationist social psychology and, to a lesser extent, the automaticity literature. In the first half of this chapter, I argue that Reasons accounts are genuinely threatened by contemporary psychology. In the second half of the paper I consider whether such (...) threats can be met, and at what cost. Ultimately, I argue that Reasons accounts can abandon some familiar assumptions, and that doing so permits us to build a more empirically plausible picture of our agency. (shrink)

The chapter begins by introducing the problem of free will and moral responsibility and the standard terminology used to frame it in the philosophical context. It turns to the contributions of experimental philosophy and the prospects for the use of this methodology in the area. People believe that experimental philosophy is relevant to the traditional debates. The chapter discusses an error theory for incompatibilist intuitions proposed by Eddy nahmias and colleagues, and the role that empirical studies might (...) have in the assessment of manipulation arguments for incompatibilism. It also presents the suggestion that empirical studies reveal that core criteria for moral responsibility ought not to be applied invariantly across different sorts of cases. A number of philosophers argue that the results of surveys provide confirming evidence for a meta‐view about moral theories, variantism. (shrink)

A major goal for compatibilists is to avoid the luck problem and to include all the facts from neuroscience and natural science in general which purportedly show that the brain works in a law-governed and causal way like any other part of nature. Libertarians, for their part, want to avoid the manipulation argument and demonstrate that very common and deep seated convictions about freedom and responsibility are true: it can really be fundamentally up to us as agents to determine that (...) the future should be either A or B. This book presents a theory of free will which integrates the main motivations of compatibilists and libertarians, while at the same time avoiding their problems. The so-called event-causal libertarianism is the libertarian account closest to compatibilitsm, as it claims there is indeterminism in the mind of an agent. The charge of compatibilists, however, is that this position is impaired by the problem of luck. This book is unique in arguing that free will in a strong sense of the term does not require indeterminism in the brain, only indeterminism somewhere in the world which there plausibly is. (shrink)

This book consists of eleven new essays that provide new insights into classical and contemporary issues surrounding free will and human agency. They investigate topics such as the nature of practical knowledge and its role in intentional action; mental content and explanations of action; recent arguments for libertarianism; the situationist challenge to free will; freedom and a theory of narrative configuration; the moral responsibility of the psychopath; and free will and the indeterminism of (...) quantum mechanics. Also tackling some historical precursors of contemporary debates, taken together these essays demonstrate the need for an approach that recognizes the multifaceted nature of free will. This book provides essential reading for anyone interested in the current scholarship on free will. (shrink)

Richard Swinburne presents a powerful new case for substance dualism and for libertarian free will. He argues that pure mental events are distinct from physical events and interact with them, and claims that no result from neuroscience or any other science could show that interaction does not take place. Swinburne goes on to argue for agent causation, and claims that it is we, and not our intentions, that cause our brain events. It is metaphysically possible that each of (...) us could acquire a new brain or continue to exist without a brain; and so we are essentially souls. Brain events and conscious events are so different from each other that it would not be possible to establish a scientific theory which would predict what each of us would do in situations of moral conflict. Hence, we should believe that things are as they seem to be: that we make choices independently of the causes which influence us. It follows that we are morally responsible for our actions. (shrink)

A critical review of Mark Siderits's arguments in support of a compatibilist Buddhist theory of free will based on early Abhidharma reductionism and the two-truths distinction between conventional and ultimate truths or reality, which theory he terms 'paleo-compatibilism'. The Buddhist two-truths doctrine is basically analogous to Sellers' distinction between the manifest and scientific images, in which case the argument is that determinism is a claim about ultimate reality, whereas personhood and agency are about conventional reality, both (...) discourse domains are semantically insulated, and thus there cannot be any issue of the incompatibility. (shrink)

There is a fact of the matter about the nature of the human will and whether it can be considered ‘free’. To investigate this fact is attempting to answer what can be termed the metaphysical question of free will. The M-question is not identical to the problem of free will. ‘The problem of free will’ is often presented as one of two distinct problems. The first problem is whether free will (...) is possible given determinism or indeterminism. The second problem is whether free will is necessary for responsibility and morals. I argue that in providing an answer to the M-question, one should disregard both of these problems. The two ‘problems of free will’ need not- and should not- yield any influence on the answer to the M-question. The normative claim, ‘that they should not’ is based on considerations of prudence recommending that care should be taken to avoid introducing elements that create arbitrary biases on subjects with which they may have no necessary connection. Traditionally theories of free will have taken either determinism or indeterminism as a precondition. However, we can do without a definite answer to the D/I-issue, if the answer provided to the Mquestion needs no precondition. This would make it compatible in a certain overarching way i.e. ‘supercompatible’. Do not confuse this idea with compatibilism. Rather supercompatibilism is a constraint, not a theory. Supercompatibilism is the doctrine that theories of free will should be broadly compatible with regard to the D/I-issue. Broad compatibility thus entails a threshold to the severity of the consequences any definite answer to the D/I-issue can have. A strong supercompatibilist accepts no consequences, and thus set the threshold at zero. In contrast, a weak supercompatibilist will have a higher threshold. She can accept that different outcomes of the D/I-issue prompt changes in her theory, as long as those changes are non-critical. Naturally one cannot be a supercompatibilist if any outcome on the D/I-issue makes one’s theory unfeasible. Prudency recommends supercompatibilism because presently the relation between either determinism or indeterminism and the M-question can at best be contingent. It can at best be contingent because either of the theses may eventually be discovered to be false. Since the matter is scientifically and theoretically unsettled, taking any outcome of the D/I-issue as a precondition will be the result of arbitrary convictions and preferences of the theorizer. I submit that the most prudent way to deal with this contingency is adopting supercompatibilism. Like with the D/I-issue, prudency recommends keeping the R/M-issue apart from the M-question. This prudency is based on asymmetrical influence between the R/M-issue and the M-question. It is possible to both pose and answer the question “do humans have any sort of free will?” without any reference to the R/M-issue. Therefore the answer to the M-question must be essentially independent of any conclusions regarding the R/M-issue. So, since the M-question is independent of whatever is the case on the R/M-issue, this cannot be allowed to influence the M-question. The independency the M-question from the R/M-issue is often overlooked, one reason for which might be because the reverse is not obviously the case. At least some theories on the R/M-issue could be affected by some answers to the M-question, but this is irrelevant to work on the M-question. What matters is that no theories from the R/M-issue can influence the answer to the M-question therefore the prudent scientist should avoid mention of the former from discussion of the latter. (shrink)

Two components of lay observers’ calculus of moral judgment are proximal intent (the actor’s mind is focused on performing the action) and distal intent (the actor’s mind is focused on the broader goal). What causes observers to prioritize one form of intent over the other? The authors observed whether construal level (Studies 1-2) and beliefs about free will (Studies 3-4) would influence participants’ sensitivity to the actor’s proximal versus distal intent. In four studies, participants read scenarios in which (...) the actor’s proximal and distal intent were independently manipulated. In Study 1, when only distal intent was present in the actor’s mind, participants rated the psychologically distant actor more responsible than the psychologically near actor. In Study 2, when only distal intent was in the actor’s mind, participants with a chronic high level of action identification rated the actor more responsible than did those with a low level of action identification. In both studies, when only proximal intent was in the actor’s mind, construal level did not predict judgments of responsibility. In Study 3, when only proximal intent was present in the actor’s mind, the more participants believed in free will, the more they rated the actor responsible. When only distal intent was in the actor’s mind, free will belief did not influence ratings of responsibility. In Study 4, the same pattern emerged when free will / determinism beliefs were manipulated and the actor performed a positive (life-saving) act. The authors discuss how these results shed new light on the literatures on moral reasoning and psycho-legal theory. (shrink)

During the period 1860-1880, a number of physicists and mathematicians, including Maxwell, Stewart, Cournot and Boussinesq, used theories formulated in terms of physics to argue that the mind, the soul or a vital principle could have an impact on the body. This paper shows that what was primarily at stake for these authors was a concern about the irreducibility of life and the mind to physics, and that their theories can be regarded primarily as reactions to the law of conservation (...) of energy, which was used among others by Helmholtz and Du Bois-Reymond as an argument against the possibility of vital and mental causes in physiology. In light of this development, Maxwell, Stewart, Cournot and Boussinesq showed that it was still possible to argue for the irreducibility of life and the mind to physics, through an appeal to instability or indeterminism in physics: if the body is an unstable or physically indeterministic system, an immaterial principle can act through triggering or directing motions in the body, without violating the laws of physics. (shrink)

This volume brings together many of the world¿s leading theorists of free will and philosophers of law to critically discuss the ground-breaking contribution of David Hodgson¿s libertarianism and its application to philosophy of law. The book begins with a comprehensive introduction, providing an overview of the intersection of theories of free will and philosophy of law over the last fifty years. The eleven chapters collected together divide into two groups: the first five address libertarianism within the (...) free will debate, with particular attention to Hodgson¿s theory, and in Part II, six contributors discuss Hodgson¿s libertarianism in relation to issues not often pursued by free will scholars, such as mitigation of punishment, the responsibility of judges, the nature of judicial reasoning and the criminal law process more generally. Thus the volume¿s importance lies not only in examining Hodgson¿s distinctive libertarian theory from within the free will literature, but also in considering new directions for research in applying that theory to enduring questions about legal responsibility and punishment.¿. (shrink)

The most common taxonomy of free will theories of free will hinges on the distinction between compatibilism and incompatibilism, which respectively assert and deny the compatibility of free will with causal determinism. This is a useful distinction, but it does not throw light on a fundamental aspect of the debate, regarding how the different views conceive of the role that philosophy and science should play in tackling with the free will issue. In (...) this perspective, another taxonomy will be presented and three families of theories will be distinguished: scientific isolationism, interactionism, and philosophical isolationism. In conclusion, it will be argued that interactionism is the right approach. (shrink)