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  • Essay / Free Will and Determinism - 1633

    The problem of free will and determinism is a mystery about what human beings are capable of doing. The best way to describe it is to consider the alternatives considered when someone decides what to do, as part of various "alternative characteristics" (Van-Inwagen). Robert Kane argues for a new version of libertarianism with an indeterminist element. He believes that deeper freedom is not an illusion. Derk Pereboom takes an agnostic approach to causal determinism and considers himself a staunch incompatibilist. I will argue against Kane and for Pereboom, because I believe that Kane has difficulty presenting an argument consistent with the latest scientific worldviews. Robert Kane begins by explaining that there are two types of freedom; superficial freedoms and free will. Superficial freedoms include the ability to choose which movie to watch or which mayoral candidate to vote for in an election, while free will is much deeper and very limited. Kane is referring to the characters in Walden Two and the fact that they can have anything they want because they have been conditioned and manipulated to not want anything that is not available to them. The characters have maximum superficial freedom, but they lack deeper freedom of will because their desires are created by someone else (Kane). Kane believes that Walden Two is missing something and that deeper freedom is not an illusion. He argues that if we are ultimately responsible for being who we are, there must have been various factors, including actions in society and our genetic makeup, that did not completely determine how we we acted and which left us with a certain responsibility. . Kane also talks about self-forming acts (SFA), which are “choices or...... in the middle of a sheet...... this thing applies to our example with Sara. These gaps in Kane's argument can be filled with points from Pereboom's argument, which is why I believe Pereboom has the better argument. Works Cited Kane, Robert. “Free Will: Old Disputes, New Themes.” Feinberg, Joel and Russ Safer-Landau. Reason and responsibility: readings of some fundamental problems of philosophy. Boston: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, 2013. 425-437. Print.Pereboom, Derk. “Why we have no will and can live without it.” Feinberg, Joel and Russ Shafer-Landau. Reason and responsibility: readings of some fundamental problems of philosophy. Boston: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, 2013. 443-455. Print.Van-Inwagen, Peter. “Freedom of will”. Feinberg, Joel and Russ Shafer-Landau. Reason and responsibility: readings of some fundamental problems of philosophy. Boston: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, 2013. 409-418. Print.