Under causal determinism, all human actions are fully determined before birth
the verdict
CONTESTED PARTIAL
refutedsupported
the weight of evidence
6 sources for · 3 against
The retrieved philosophical and scientific literature partially discusses causal determinism and whether human actions are necessitated by prior causes or the distant past, but does not explicitly establish that all actions are fully determined before birth, with competing sources arguing for or against complete determinism in human behavior.
Abstract Voluntary acts are preceded by electrophysiological “readiness potentials” (RPs). With spontaneous acts involving no preplanning, the main negative RP shift begins at about—550 ms. Such RPs were used to indicate the minimum onset times for the cerebral activity that precedes a fully endogenous voluntary act. The time of conscious intention to act was obtained from the subject's recall of the spatial clock position of a revolving spot at the time of his initial awareness of intending or wanting to move (W). W occurred at about—200 ms. Control experiments, in which a skin stimulus was timed (S), helped evaluate each subject's error in reporting the clock times for awareness of any perceived event. For spontaneous voluntary acts, RP onset preceded the uncorrected Ws by about 350 ms and the Ws corrected for S by about 400 ms. The direction of this difference was consistent and significant throughout, regardless of which of several measures of RP onset or W were used. It was concluded that cerebral initiation of a spontaneous voluntary act begins unconsciously. However, it was found that the final decision to act could still be consciously controlled during the 150 ms or so remaining after the specific conscious intention appears. Subjects can in fact “veto” motor performance during a 100–200-ms period before a prearranged time to act. The role of conscious will would be not to initiate a specific voluntary act but rather to select and control volitional outcome. It is proposed that conscious will can function in a permissive fashion, either to permit or to prevent the motor implementation of the intention to act that arises unconsciously. Alternatively, there may be the need for a conscious activation or triggering, without which the final motor output would not follow the unconscious cerebral initiating and preparatory processes.
The aim of this paper is to establish that free agency, which is a capacity of many animals including human beings, is compatible with indeterminism: an indeterministic world allows for the existence of free agency. The question of the compatibility of free agency and indeterminism is less discussed than its mirror image, the question of the compatibility of free agency and determinism. It is, however, of great importance for our self-conception as free agents in our (arguably) indeterministic world. We begin by explicating the notions of indeterminism and free agency and by clarifying the interrelation of free agency and the human-specific notion of free will. We then situate our claim of the compatibility of free agency and indeterminism precisely in the landscape of the current debate on freedom and determinism, exposing an unhappy asymmetry in that debate. Then we proceed to make our case by describing the mathematically precise, physically motivated model of projective simulation, which employs indeterminism as a central resource for agency modeling. We argue that an indeterministic process of deliberation modeled by the dynamics of projective simulation can exemplify free agency under indeterminism, thereby establishing our compatibility claim: Free agency can develop and thrive in an indeterministic world.
Abstract Psychological research and investigation rest on an assumption that human thoughts, feelings, and actions are susceptible to the same processes of cause and effect that apply to other events in the world. This is clearly incompatible with our subjective sense of libertarian free will and may be seen as a threat to an important part of our self-concept. As discussed elsewhere, free will in this sense is a very difficult concept to pin down. If we have to relinquish libertarian free will, it is hard to say what, if anything, we have lost. In contrast, the ability to understand ourselves in objective terms holds out practical possibilities for enhanced autonomy and positive change. Understanding our feelings and thoughts is a first step to acquiring a sense of control over them. Once we attain understanding and control we have greater opportunities to live in the ways that we desire. This expansion of understanding and autonomy is not threatened by causal determinism. In contrast, it is only by understanding the various causal factors that impinge upon us that we can expand our capacities to live in the ways that we choose. There is an important moral dimension to the problems that patients bring to therapy that is not always fully recognized. These problems very often have their origins in violations of rights and entitlements. The emotional states that disturb patients in such cases are those that have been characterized as the moral emotions. There is a whole psychop
In ethics the term necessitarianism is applied to that view of human action which regards all action as dictated by external causes (cf. Determinism). The sense in which, if at all, the human mind can cognize necessity, i.e. causal connexion between events or states, has been the subject of vigorous discussion among philosophers. By sceptics and empiricists it is held that a law is merely a crystallized summary of observed phenomena. Thus J. S. Mill denies that a general proposition is more than an enumeration of particulars, and hence that syllogistic reasoning cannot amplify knowledge (see Syllogism). It is clear that the senses cannot apprehend causal connexion, and this impossibility gives rise to a prior conception according to which the conception of necessity is purely intellectual (see Metaphysics).
conclusion that nothing is contingent; that all things, human actions as well as natural events, are causally determined . He says: “It is in the nature of reason
Causal Determinism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
# Causal Determinism
First published Thu Jan 23, 2003; substantive revision Thu Sep 21, 2023
Causal determinism is, roughly speaking, the idea that every event is necessitated by antecedent events and conditions together with the laws of nature. The idea is ancient, but first became subject to clarification and mathematical analysis in the eighteenth century. Determinism is deeply connected with our understanding of the physical sciences and their explanatory ambitions, on the one hand, and with our views about human free action on the other. In both of these general areas there is no agreement over whether determinism is true (or even whether it can be known true or false), and what the import for human agency would be in either case.
## 1. Introduction
In most of what follows, I will speak simply of determinism, rather than of causal determinism. This follows philosophical practice of sharply distinguishing views and theories of what causation is from any conclusions about the success or failure of determinism (cf. Earman, 1986; an exception is Mellor 1995).
Traditionally determini
Compatibilism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
# Compatibilism
First published Mon Apr 26, 2004; substantive revision Tue Apr 16, 2024
Compatibilism offers a solution to the free will problem, which concerns a disputed incompatibility between free will and determinism. Compatibilism is the thesis that free will is compatible with determinism. Because free will is typically taken to be a necessary condition of moral responsibility, compatibilism is sometimes expressed as a thesis about the compatibility between moral responsibility and determinism.
## 1. Free Will and the Problem of Causal Determinism
Compatibilism emerges as a response to a problem posed by causal determinism. But what problem is that? Well, suppose, as the thesis of causal determinism tells us, that everything that occurs is the inevitable result of the laws of nature and the state of the world in the distant past. If this is the case, then everything human agents do flows from the laws of nature and the way the world was in the distant past. But if what we do is simply the consequence of the laws of nature and the state of the world in the distant past—then we cannot
This essay argues that the concept of strict causal determinism (or "clockwork determinism"), while being a powerful doctrine to reduce uncertainty, is not compatible with the way psychology does science. Specifically, we argue that psychological explanations are necessarily incomplete, that the specification and measurement of variables will always contain variance, and that psychological experiments cannot guarantee the degree of control necessary for strict deterministic relationships. Further, we argue that typical psychological causes do not fit the scale of clockwork-deterministic explanations. It is important to note that these arguments are agnostic to the question of whether clockwork determinism exists or not. Even if the universe works strictly deterministically, psychological explanations and paradigms would remain incompatible with the requirements posed by clockwork determinism. We judge this not to be of any problem for a thriving psychological science, unless (young) scientists see clockwork determinism as their primary epistemological foundation.
In the reductionist view, humans are considered entirely physical beings, and therefore, their behaviors must be subject to the laws of nature. Consequently, this perspective concludes that humans cannot be free, autonomous, or morally responsible. The issue of free will, according to reductionists, is primarily based on neurobiology, and their approach is grounded in bottom-up causation. However, are human behaviors truly fully determined by the laws of physics or neurobiology? This study aims to examine and critique bottom-up causation in the interpretation of free will through a descriptive-analytical approach and from the perspective of a non-reductionist approach. The goal of this analysis is to demonstrate the insufficiency of this theory in explaining free will and to offer a path to affirming human free will through a holistic view of humans, top-down causation, and the emergent self-governance theory. With this approach, it can be argued that humans, as complex beings with multiple dimensions, are capable of making free choices and acting autonomously, and this freedom cannot be simply reduced to the laws of physics and biology.Keywords: Non-reductionism, Free Will, Reductionism, Bottom-up Causation, Top-down Causation, Emergentism. IntroductionThe text delves into the philosophical debate surrounding reductionism and free will, tracing the origins of reductionist thought to ancient Greek philosophers, notably Leucippus and Democritus, who proposed that matter is com
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