scholarly journals To Be Able To, or To Be Able Not To? That is The Question

2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 13-32
Author(s):  
Nadine Elzein ◽  
Tuomas K. Pernu
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Alternative Possibilities ◽  
Transcendental Argument ◽  
Ought Implies Can ◽  
Libertarian Free Will

A type of transcendental argument for libertarian free will maintains that if acting freely requires the availability of alternative possibilities, and determinism holds, then one is not justified in asserting that there is no free will. More precisely: if an agent A is to be justified in asserting a proposition P (e.g. "there is no free will"), then A must also be able to assert not-P. Thus, if A is unable to assert not-P, due to determinism, then A is not justified in asserting P. While such arguments often appeal to principles with wide appeal, such as the principle that ‘ought’ implies ‘can’, they also require a commitment to principles that seem far less compelling, e.g. the principle that ‘ought’ implies ‘able not to’ or the principle that having an obligation entails being responsible. It is argued here that these further principles are dubious, and that it will be difficult to construct a valid transcendental argument without them.

Compatibilist Alternatives

2005 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 387-406 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Keim Campbell
Keyword(s):  
Moral Responsibility ◽  
Free Will ◽  
Alternative Possibilities ◽  
Traditional Theory ◽  
Van Inwagen ◽  
Source Theory

This paper is a defense of traditional compatibilism. Traditional compatibilism is, roughly, the view that (a) free will is essential to moral responsibility, (b) free will requires alternative possibilities of action, or alternatives for short, and (c) moral responsibility is compatible with determinism. Traditional compatibilism is a version of the traditional theory of free will. According to the traditional theory, a person S performed an action a freely only if S could have done otherwise, that is, only if S had alternatives. The traditional theory is often contrasted with the source theory: S performed a freely only if S was the source of a (McKenna 2001; Pereboom 2003). One may adopt a combined view of free will that sanctions both the traditional and source theories (Kane 1996, 72-3; van Inwagen 1983). As I use the terms ‘source theorist’ and ‘traditional theorist,’ the former refers to folks who accept the source theory and reject the traditional theory; the latter refers to folks who accept the traditional theory whether or not they accept the source theory.

A New Argument Against Libertarian Free Will?

Analysis ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 76 (3) ◽  
pp. 296-306 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Widerker
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Libertarian Free Will

Causation and Free Will in Early Buddhist Philosophy

2020 ◽  
Vol 36 (2) ◽  
pp. 191-220
Author(s):  
Paul Bernier
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Buddhist Philosophy ◽  
Alternative Possibilities ◽  
Causal Determinism ◽  
Principle Of Alternative Possibilities ◽  
Early Buddhism

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 (A I 173–175) 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.

Providence, Freedom, and Human Destiny

1990 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 227-245 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Talbott
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Moral Evil ◽  
Specific Region ◽  
Universal Love ◽  
The Gift ◽  
Good For ◽  
Love Of God ◽  
Libertarian Free Will ◽  
Traditional Doctrine ◽  
Human Destiny

According to some theists, God will never completely destroy moral evil or banish it from his creation entirely; instead, he will eventually confine moral evil to a specific region of his creation, a region known as hell, and those condemned to hell, having no hope of escape from it, will live out eternity in a state of estrangement from God as well as from each other. Let us call that the traditional doctrine of hell. Elsewhere I have argued that any form of theism which includes such a doctrine, even one that tries to preserve consistency by denying the universal love of God, is in fact logically inconsistent. But moderately conservative theists, as I have called them, have an argument for the traditional doctrine that some have found convincing, one that emphasizes libertarian free will. The argument is this. Because God is perfectly loving, he wills the good for every created person and wills the redemption of all who have fallen into evil; but because he has also given his loved ones the gift of freedom and some of them in fact exercise their freedom to reject him forever, it is simply not within his power, even as an omnipotent being, to redeem all of those who fall into evil. According to moderately conservative theists, therefore, the following hypothesis, which I shall call the Rejection Hypothesis (RH), is at least possibly true:(RH) Some persons will, despite God's best efforts to save them, freely and irrevocably reject God and thus separate themselves from God forever.

Free Will and Open Alternatives

Disputatio ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 9 (45) ◽  
pp. 167-191 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos J. Moya
Keyword(s):  
Moral Responsibility ◽  
Free Will ◽  
Alternative Possibilities ◽  
Recent Book ◽  
Test Cases ◽  
Frankfurt Cases ◽  
Causal History ◽  
Van Inwagen ◽  
History Of ◽  
Actual Sequence

Abstract In her recent book Causation and Free Will, Carolina Sartorio develops a distinctive version of an actual-sequence account of free will, according to which, when agents choose and act freely, their freedom is exclusively grounded in, and supervenes on, the actual causal history of such choices or actions. Against this proposal, I argue for an alternative- possibilities account, according to which agents’ freedom is partly grounded in their ability to choose or act otherwise. Actual-sequence accounts of freedom (and moral responsibility) are motivated by a reflection on so-called Frankfurt cases. Instead, other cases, such as two pairs of examples originally designed by van Inwagen, threaten actual-sequence accounts, including Sartorio’s. On the basis of her (rather complex) view of causation, Sartorio contends, however, that the two members of each pair have different causal histories, so that her view is not undermined by those cases after all. I discuss these test cases further and defend my alternative-possibilities account of freedom.

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