Freedom and determinism

1 Freedom and fatalism

Nothing could be more obvious to us than that we make choices. There are various different actions, and courses of action, open to us. Some of these are quite trivial (what shall I have on my toast this morning?), some of them are quite serious (what career shall I pursue?), and over their merits and demerits we deliberate. Such choices, whether trivial or not, we face every day, and at some stage in our deliberations we choose and act. But in this whole process we never seriously doubt that some things are "up to us"; that some things it is both within our power to do, as well as within our power not to do. To say that a person is free with respect to an action is just to say that the person can perform the action and that the person can refrain from performing the action. The thesis of Freedom claims that human beings are free, at least with respect to some actions.

The denial of the thesis of freedom (that we are never free, that nothing is up to us) is the thesis of Fatalism. The Fatalist holds that the only thing one can do is what one will do in fact.

(Note: this is not quite the usual understanding of Fatalism, as characterized, for example, on page 412 of Feinberg. However, I think this way of defining Fatalism is not grossly at odds with ordinary usage. The usual account of fatalism is this doctrine (that the only thing one can ever do is what one will do in fact) together with the doctrine that this is so for purely logical reasons to do with the law of excluded middle:that every proposition is either true or false. However it aids clarity to separate the doctrine, that nothing is up to us, from that particular line of argument for it.)

The thesis of Freedom is of metaphysical interest—we really need to know the truth about this in order to know what kind of beings we are—but it is also of interest in ethics and the theory of value.

Firstly, many philosophers have argued that unless we are free we are not morally responsible for what we do. One can sensibly hold someone morally responsible only if what they do is under their control. You are not responsible for that which is not up to you. Thus one is morally responsible only if one is a free agent.

Secondly, we think of freedom itself as something valuable. We tend to think that the ability to choose options of differing value is itself a valuable thing. If we are free we ourselves are in the business of creating the world. We determine that it develops in one way rather than another. That seems pretty exciting. And it would seem rather unexciting if it turns out that our apparent freedom is just an illusion.

2 Determinism

We usually think that whatever happens is explicable in terms of its causes. We think that what happens is the result of what comes before. Events are explicable, and they are usually explicable in terms of the causes which brought them about. Even if we don’t happen to know the cause of an event we don't seriously entertain the idea that the event might have no cause at all. Considerations like this support the thesis of determinism: that every event that occurs is the causal product of antecedent events. Causal processes are governed by the Laws of Nature. So if determinism is true then every event is a consequence of preceding events and the Laws of Nature: briefly, it is a consequence of the Past and the Laws.

On the face of it, the theses of freedom and determinism seem to be no less incompatible that the theses of freedom and fatalism. They seem to be logically incompatible, because it looks as though determinism entails fatalism. If that is so then we have three theses:

(1) Determinism: every event is a consequnce of the Past and the Laws.
(2) Freedom: human beings are free with at least to some actions;
(3) Determinism entails fatalism: the denial of freedom.

We cannot accept all three: at least one of them has to go. There are three different major responses to this problem:

Hard determinism: accept (1) and (3) and deny (2).
This position is often referred to as hard determinism, because it involves two doctrines: it accepts the incompatibility of freedom and determinism and affirms the truth of the determinism.

Libertarianism: accept (2) and (3) and deny (1).
Like the hard determinist, the libertarian accepts the incompatibility of freedom and determinism, and affirms we are free agents, at least with respect to some of our actions. (Note that the libertarian does not claim that we are free with respect to absolutely all actions. The libertarian does not claim that we are omnipotent.)

Compatibilism: deny (3).
The compatibilist denies there is any logical conflict between (1) and (2): he claims that the two are compatible. Compatibilists usually want to accept both the claims of freedom and determinism, (1) and (2), and this is what motivates their denial of (3). Note that the essence of compatibilism is the denial of (3). Compatibilists need not accept (1) and (2), although they generally do so. (A compatibilist might claim that the universe is undetermined, but that this has nothing to do with our freedom. Or the compatibilist might claim that we are not in fact free, although this has nothing to do with the fact that the universe is determined.) Usually, however, the compatibilist position is combined with the acceptance of (1) and (2) and this total package is sometimes known as soft determinism (because it softens the impact of the thesis of determinism).

It is the conflict between these three theses which we will be investigating over the next few weeks. Are there any good arguments for or against the thesis of determinism? Are there any good arguments for or against the thesis that we are free? Are there any good arguments for or against their compatibility?

3 The consequence argument

If the thesis of determinism is true, does it follow that the thesis of freedom is false? That is, are there any good arguments for incompatibilism (thesis (3))? Here is a version of an argument for that incompatibility as given by the philosopher van Ingwagen:

If determinism is true, then our acts are the consequences of the laws of nature and events in the remote past. But it is not up to us what went on before we were born, and neither is it up to us what the laws of nature are. Therefore, the consequences of these things (including our present acts) are not up to us. (Peter van Inwagen An Essay on Free Will, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983), p. 56.)

The consequence argument is promising precisely because it extracts the general incompatibility of freedom and determinism from premises which almost everybody has to admit.

The first premise of the argument is that, at any given moment, no past action or event or state is up to any agent. (We could call this Fatalism with respect to the Past)

The second premise of the argument is that the laws of nature are not up to us. Again this seems plausible because it seems to be part and parcel of the very notion of a law of nature that it is unalterable, at least by those agents who are subject to the law (God may be able to change the laws of nature, but our ability to change anything at all depends on there being laws of nature, or causal connections, which we can not alter.) (We could call this Fatalism with respect to the Laws of Nature.)

The consequence argument precedes from these two plausible principles to the fully incompatibilist conclusion that in a deterministic universe nothing is under the control of any agent. But to get there we need one further premise

The Consequence Principle: if some event is a consequence of events that are not under my control then that event is also not under my control. (The consequences of whatever is out my control are themselves out of my control.)

If all three premises are acceptable then it follows that if Determinism is true nothing at all is up to us. For if Determinism is true every event is the consequence of the Past and the Laws. Hence every event is a consequence of events over which we had no control. Hence, by the consequence principle, nothing at all is under our control.

If this argument is valid, then determinism is bad news!