The Hard Determinist Does Not Exist

Nancy Holmstrom’s account of soft determinism makes it simple to understand how free will and determinism can be compatible due to an individual’s experiences and decisions. Combining the environmental factors that influenced my decision to attend the University of Kansas, my decision would fall the middle of Holmstrom’s continuum but slightly to the side of free

The argument against free will states that; what you do is always determined by what you have the strongest desire to do, but you have no control over what you desire. If what you do is always determined by something that you have no control over then you can never actually act freely. It follows from what has been said that one does not have free will.

Many Philosophers, such as Hoderich and John Calvin, believe that humans do not have free will to act in moral situations and that all moral actions have uncontrollable prior causes. Hard determinists, therefore, follow the belief that humans can not be morally blameworthy for their actions, evil or not, because their actions are predetermined. However, this is a ridiculous stance to take as humans are free to make moral choices, meaning they are entirely responsible for their evil actions.

Hard determinism is the belief that every event has one cause and one outcome. Blatchford agrees with this idea that everything is predestined. He believes that to freely choose, one has to be able to choose alternative paths. According to Blatchford, in his essay “Not Guilty,” human behavior is compelled by heredity and environment. He believes that every event in human behavior is caused because of a person’s heredity and environment. Blatchford does admit though that our thoughts, desires,

First, let’s take a look at Hard determinism. Hard determinists believe that humans do not have free will. They believe that all events are created by events that happened prior. You can think of this as the "butterfly effect". The ripple of the butterflies’ wings causes one thing to happen, which then leads to another

Do I have free will, or is every action I make predetermined? This question has concerned me for a long while. It has been the topic of many family dinner conversations, a topic of research, and a question in many prayers. I believe that this question concerns many people, since finding an answer has been the source of much literature, thinking, and religion. I have, after much thought, arrived at the conclusion of Soft Determinism - the Principle of Universal Causality, that for everything that exists or happens there is a cause, is true, but this principle is compatible with the Condition of Free Action. By Condition of Free Action I mean that a person is in control of his own actions (is the source of them) and

As soft determinism only allows for negative freedom, it presents a sort of "underprivileged" type of freedom. According to this theory, the inner state of an agent determines at what choices the agent arrives. (Here it is possible to question what causes the inner state of the agent). The deterministic nature of soft determinism requires the answer to be that the inner state is determined. The result of the inner state, therefore, could not have been any different than what occurred. Had the cause of the inner state been different, the result would have been different accordingly. This can lead, however, to an indefinite regression of the causes of inner states, each being causally determined. A further threat of the theory is that the inner state of a person could be externally imposed, negating the freedom of soft determinism.

Determinism approaches all behavior and its purpose behind it. All behavior has a cause and effect to it, and is likely pre-determined before it is acted on. Hard determinism is the principle of deterministic casualties. Meaning that every event that happens has consequences of past events and the laws of nature. Hard determinists are considered to be incompatiblists because they believe that casual determinism is incompatible with free will and moral responsibility.

Even thought the idea that everyone has free will is widely accepted and appreciated, it is obvious that by the very definition of the word “free” no such thing can exist. The idea that free will exists has been supported by several arguments against the idea that the everything in the world has been previously determined rather than arguments that are actually for the existence of free will. This is a very key point in the argument that free will has never and can never exist. If free will is not actually free then it cannot be considered free will. If free will isn’t free will then it has never been free will and can never be free will. If there has never been and will never be free will, then we cannot have free will. Thus, we do not have free will.

Hard determinists are those who says everything is determined, and it follows from that that we are not free, that we do not have morally significance freedom (Chaffee). For example: If a person chooses salt over sugar, that choice was not his or her choice because it was pre-determined, and was caused by something. The problem of free will comes down to the notion of moral responsibility. On the contrary, someone that thinks that free will is incompatible with determinism, that we do have free will and that therefore determinism is false, is called a Libertarian. Nothing forces a libertarian to do what he/she wants to do freely. For example, imagine a person is at the supermarket and has in front of him the potato section and the sweet potato section. He chooses to grab a potato instead of a sweet potato. At that very moment, when he is grabbing the potato, he has chosen to grab the potato.

Free will does not exist because if it did then all the knowledge we have accumulated from our past experiences wouldn’t affect the choices we make in the present. The existence of free will also means that the destiny which God has chosen for us doesn’t exist because we would be free to create our own destiny. On the contrary hard determinism dose exist as it is supported by more theories in psychology than free will and because we constantly make decisions to live the lifestyle that has been chosen for us.

Initial answer: My initial answer to the question of whether or not we have free will is yes, we do indeed have free will.

The belief that all events have causes and if there ever is an equivalent origin, the same outcome will occur is called determinism. Almost meaning that every event is certain and that there really isn’t such thing as “free will”. We have the debut of free will, it is an unmitigated appearance that simply holds that there is a case about anything that happens in the near future, nevertheless how it comes about. Which leads to the question, do we have free will? Or are our actions governed? Well if you look at free will it is the concept that you believe that it is ultimately your choice and even if you were given alternative choices you could have chosen differently. Free will is a botheration by cause and reason, which leads to libertarianism – whatever free action is, it involves reason and causes. Do I buy I new pair of shoes for no reason or do I act upon it due to a preceding idea? We can’t talk about free will when there is a reason why we do the acts behind it. Things and choices impose our other choices, so are we really free?

My perspective of free will takes after that of the logician Daniel Dennett. Dennett is in some cases excessively sharp for his own particular great. You feel as though he's attempting to pull a quick one on you, as when he contends, in his 1991 book, Consciousness Explained, that awareness has been, very much, clarified, which I question even he truly accepts. Yet, in his 2003 book, Freedom Evolves, Dennett lays out a sensible, rational perspective of free will. He notes, initially, that free will is "not what convention proclaims it to be: a Godlike energy to absolved oneself from the causal fabric of the physical world." Free will is just our capacity to see, think about, and follow up on decisions; truth be told, decision, or even freedom,

Determinism means that humans do not have any control over their lives or the circumstances around them. Everything is predetermined right from the moment they are born. On the other hand, agency is using their own free will to go against their fate and their limitation of their circumstance to create their own destiny.