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Compatibilism is the belief that
free will Free will is the capacity of agents to choose between different possible courses of action unimpeded. Free will is closely linked to the concepts of moral responsibility, praise, culpability, sin, and other judgements which apply only to ac ...
and determinism are mutually compatible and that it is possible to believe in both without being logically inconsistent. Compatibilists believe that freedom can be present or absent in situations for reasons that have nothing to do with
metaphysics Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the fundamental nature of reality, the first principles of being, identity and change, space and time, causality, necessity, and possibility. It includes questions about the nature of conscio ...
. They say that causal determinism does not exclude the truth of possible future outcomes. Similarly, political liberty is a non-metaphysical concept. Statements of political liberty, such as the
United States Bill of Rights The United States Bill of Rights comprises the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution. Proposed following the often bitter 1787–88 debate over the ratification of the Constitution and written to address the objections rai ...
, assume moral liberty: the
ability Abilities are powers an agent has to perform various actions. They include common abilities, like walking, and rare abilities, like performing a double backflip. Abilities are intelligent powers: they are guided by the person's intention and exec ...
to choose to do otherwise than what one does.


History

Compatibilism was mentioned and championed by the ancient Stoics and some medieval
scholastics Scholasticism was a medieval school of philosophy that employed a critical organic method of philosophical analysis predicated upon the Aristotelian 10 Categories. Christian scholasticism emerged within the monastic schools that translate ...
. More specifically, scholastics like Thomas Aquinas and later Thomists (such as Domingo Báñez) are often interpreted as holding that human action can be free, even though an agent in some strong sense could not do otherwise than what they did. Whereas Aquinas is often interpreted to maintain rational compatibilism (i.e., an action can be determined by rational cognition and yet free), later Thomists, such as Báñez, develop a sophisticated theory of theological determinism, according to which actions of free agents, despite being free, are, on a higher level, determined by infallible divine decrees manifested in the form of " physical premotion" (), a deterministic intervention of God into the will of a free agent required to reduce the will from potency to act. A strong incompatibilist view of freedom was, on the other hand, developed in the
Franciscan , image = FrancescoCoA PioM.svg , image_size = 200px , caption = A cross, Christ's arm and Saint Francis's arm, a universal symbol of the Franciscans , abbreviation = OFM , predecessor = , ...
tradition, especially by Duns Scotus, and later upheld and further developed by
Jesuits , image = Ihs-logo.svg , image_size = 175px , caption = ChristogramOfficial seal of the Jesuits , abbreviation = SJ , nickname = Jesuits , formation = , founders = ...
, especially
Luis de Molina Luis de Molina (29 September 1535 – 12 October 1600) was a Spanish Jesuit Catholic priest, priest and Scholasticism, scholastic, a staunch defender of free will in the controversy over human liberty and God's grace. His theology is known ...
and Francisco Suárez. In the early modern era, compatibilism was maintained by Enlightenment philosophers (such as
David Hume David Hume (; born David Home; 7 May 1711 NS (26 April 1711 OS) – 25 August 1776) Cranston, Maurice, and Thomas Edmund Jessop. 2020 999br>David Hume" ''Encyclopædia Britannica''. Retrieved 18 May 2020. was a Scottish Enlightenment phil ...
and
Thomas Hobbes Thomas Hobbes ( ; 5/15 April 1588 – 4/14 December 1679) was an English philosopher, considered to be one of the founders of modern political philosophy. Hobbes is best known for his 1651 book ''Leviathan'', in which he expounds an influ ...
). During the 20th century, compatibilists presented novel arguments that differed from the classical arguments of Hume, Hobbes, and John Stuart Mill. Importantly,
Harry Frankfurt Harry Gordon Frankfurt (born May 29, 1929) is an American philosopher. He is professor emeritus of philosophy at Princeton University, where he taught from 1990 until 2002. Frankfurt has also taught at Yale University, Rockefeller University, and ...
popularized what are now known as Frankfurt counterexamples to argue against incompatibilism, and developed a positive account of compatibilist free will based on higher-order volitions. Other "new compatibilists" include Gary Watson, Susan R. Wolf, P. F. Strawson, and R. Jay Wallace. Contemporary compatibilists range from the philosopher and cognitive scientist Daniel Dennett, particularly in his works '' Elbow Room'' (1984) and '' Freedom Evolves'' (2003), to the existentialist philosopher Frithjof Bergmann. Perhaps the most renowned contemporary defender of compatibilism is John Martin Fischer. A 2020 survey found that 59% of philosophers accept compatibilism.


Defining free will

''Compatibilists'' often define an instance of "free will" as one in which the agent had the freedom to act according to their own '' motivation''. That is, the agent was not coerced or restrained. Arthur Schopenhauer famously said: "Man can do what he wills but he cannot will what he wills." In other words, although an agent may often be free to act according to a ''motive'', the nature of that motive is determined. This definition of free will does not rely on the truth or falsity of
causal determinism Determinism is a philosophical view, where all events are determined completely by previously existing causes. Deterministic theories throughout the history of philosophy have developed from diverse and sometimes overlapping motives and cons ...
. This view also makes ''free will'' close to '' autonomy'', the ability to live according to one's own rules, as opposed to being submitted to external domination.


Alternatives as imaginary

Some compatibilists hold both causal determinism (all effects have causes) and logical determinism (the future is already determined) to be true. Thus statements about the future (e.g., "it will rain tomorrow") are either true or false when spoken today. This compatibilist free will should not be understood as the ability to choose differently in an identical situation. A compatibilist may believe that a person can decide between several choices, but the choice is always determined by external factors. If the compatibilist says "I may visit tomorrow, or I may not", he is saying that he does not know what he will choose—whether he will choose to follow the subconscious urge to go or not.


Non-naturalism

Alternatives to strictly naturalist physics, such as
mind–body dualism In the philosophy of mind, mind–body dualism denotes either the view that mental phenomena are non-physical, Hart, W. D. 1996. "Dualism." pp. 265–267 in ''A Companion to the Philosophy of Mind'', edited by S. Guttenplan. Oxford: Blackwell. ...
positing a mind or soul existing apart from one's body while perceiving, thinking, choosing freely, and as a result acting independently on the body, include both traditional religious metaphysics and less common newer compatibilist concepts. Also consistent with both autonomy and Darwinism, they allow for free personal agency based on practical reasons within the laws of physics. While less popular among 21st-century philosophers, non-naturalist compatibilism is present in most if not almost all religions.


Criticism

A prominent criticism of compatibilism is Peter van Inwagen's consequence argument. Critics of compatibilism often focus on the definitions of free will: incompatibilists may agree that the compatibilists are showing ''something'' to be compatible with determinism, but they think that this ''something'' ought not to be called "free will". Incompatibilists might accept the "freedom to act" as a ''necessary'' criterion for free will, but doubt that it is ''sufficient''. The incompatibilists believe that free will refers to ''genuine'' (i.e., absolute, ultimate, physical) alternate possibilities for beliefs, desires, or actions, rather than merely
counterfactual Counterfactual conditionals (also ''subjunctive'' or ''X-marked'') are conditional sentences which discuss what would have been true under different circumstances, e.g. "If Peter believed in ghosts, he would be afraid to be here." Counterfactual ...
ones. Compatibilism is sometimes called soft determinism ( William James's term) pejoratively. James accused them of creating a "quagmire of evasion" by stealing the name of freedom to mask their underlying determinism.James, William. 1884 "The Dilemma of Determinism", ''Unitarian Review'', September 1884. Reprinted in ''The Will to Believe'', Dover, 1956, p. 149.
Immanuel Kant Immanuel Kant (, , ; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German philosopher and one of the central Enlightenment thinkers. Born in Königsberg, Kant's comprehensive and systematic works in epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and ...
called it a "wretched subterfuge" and "word jugglery".Kant, Immanuel 1788 (1952).''The Critique of Practical Reason'', in ''Great Books of the Western World'', vol. 42, Kant, University of Chicago, p. 332. Kant's argument turns on the view that, while all empirical phenomena must result from determining causes, human thought introduces something seemingly not found elsewhere in nature—the ability to conceive of the world in terms of how it ''ought'' to be, or how it might otherwise be. For Kant, subjective reasoning is necessarily distinct from how the world is empirically. Because of its capacity to distinguish ''is'' from ''ought'', reasoning can "spontaneously" originate new events without being itself determined by what already exists.Kant, Immanuel 1781 (1949). ''The Critique of Pure Reason'', trans. Max Mueller, p. 448. It is on this basis that Kant argues against a version of compatibilism in which, for instance, the actions of the criminal are comprehended as a blend of determining forces and free choice, which Kant regards as misusing the word ''free''. Kant proposes that taking the compatibilist view involves denying the distinctly subjective capacity to re-think an intended course of action in terms of what ''ought'' to happen.


See also

* Ash'ari * Libertarianism (metaphysics) * Semicompatibilism


References


External links


Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry on Compatibilism
{{Determinism Determinism Free will Metaphysical theories