Sunday, November 2, 2014

Free Will Debate


The Free Will Debate

            The free will debate is the disagreement about the ultimate causes of our actions. On the libertarianism side, human beings have moral responsibility because they have spontaneous free will- the ability to control their actions and alter the course of their lives. On the determinism side, humans lack free will because all of our actions are caused by earlier psychological or physical events. The libertarianism side seems more plausible to me.

            I believe that I am more of a libertarian than a determinist because I really do believe human beings have to ability to control and change our actions. We have spontaneous free will, which is the second source of causation, in addition to mechanical causation. It can alter to course of the natural world. Being liberationist, means we believe in having moral responsibility, which is a radical implication. I do not believe that the universe is already mechanically determined by earlier events.

(A)Libertarianism has more explanatory breadth than determinism. Libertarianism explains more types of human behavior. Unlike determinists, libertarians believe in spontaneity. Determinists fail to explain just to let things be done. They believe that the ability to control or change our actions does not occur, and that all of our actions are caused by earlier events.
  (B)Libertarianism has more explanatory depth than determinism. Libertarianism states more causes of human behavior in more detail than determinism. Determinism talks about all the actions being caused by earlier psychological or physical events makes humans lack free will. Libertarianism talks about the spontaneous free will, in which we have the ability to control our world. Libertarianism also supports more than one reason for why humans behave the way they do. The outside world and their own free will.
  (C)Simplicity is found more in libertarianism than in determinism. Determinism states that human behavior is caused by the external causes, for example, by earlier psychological or physical events. It in itself is pretty complicated. Not everyone has grown up the same way. Some people have worse lives than others. There cannot really be a set cause of human behavior because everyone is different in their own way. In that case, every human would be separated in a different category. Libertarianism on the other hand says that human behavior is caused by "spontaneous free will,” meaning humans have the ability to alter the course of our lives. This is a much simpler explanation.
  (D)Both libertarianism and determinism are equally conservative because of the fact that there is no hard proof whether human behavior is caused by free will or by earlier psychological or physical events.
                     1.  Libertarianism and Determinism are the most plausible explanations of the free will         

        debate.

2. Libertarianism has much more explanatory breadth, explanatory depth, and simplicity, whereas Libertarianism and Determinism are equally conservative.

3. Therefore, Libertarianism is the best explanation of the free will debate.

2 comments:

  1. I agree with your view point that not everyone with predisposed actions will grow up the same way, however I believe that spontaneous free will creates so many different human behaviors and life paths that theres no way to argue that libertarianism has some simplicity than determinism.

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  2. I do agree with all your arguments except Conservatism. You didn't go into much depth about it so that may be why i do no understand it. In my opinion libertarianism is more consistent with our current and common beliefs. I think today people act and believe like that have the power to do anything which they know they have free will. I don't think that determinism and libertarianism can both be current and common beliefs today.

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