Reading Quiz

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Reading Quiz

• 1. T or F. St. Augustine denied the existence of
  free human actions.
• 2. T or F. St. Augustine believed in the
  foreknowledge of God.
• 3. T or F. Thomas Hobbes thought necessity and
  chance could be compatible with each other
• 4. Who said we are condemned to be free?
• 5. Where are we meeting on Monday?

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Human Freedom

• The Philosophical Options

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Questions to Answer

• 1.) In what sense and to what extent are humans
  free?
• 2.) In what sense and to what extent are humans
  responsible for their actions?
• 3.) How are these two questions related?

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I. Hard Determinism

• A. Presupposes metaphysical determinism
• B. Denies free will persons may sometimes
  exercise free agency
• C. In order to be morally responsible, you must
  possess both types of freedom.

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Logic of Hard Determinism

• 1.) To be morally responsible, we must possess
  both type of freedom (I.e. free agency and free
  will)
• 2.) We do not possess free will.
• 3.) Therefore we cannot be held morally
  responsible.
• This is the position of Behaviorism.

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Baron Paul dHolbach (1723-1789)

• Mans life is a line that nature commands him to
  describe upon the surface of the earth, without
  his ever being able to swerve from it, even for
  an instant. He is born without his own consent
  his organization does in no wise depend upon
  himself his ideas come to him involuntarily his
  habits are in the power of those who cause him to
  contract them he is unceasingly modified by
  causes, whether visible or concealed, over which
  he has no control, which necessarily regulate his
  mode of existence, give hue to his way of
  thinking, and determine his manner of acting.
• From The Illusion of Free Will (1770)

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II. Libertarianism

• A. Presupposes metaphysical indeterminism
• B. Affirms free will persons sometimes exercise
  free agency.
• C. In order to be morally responsible, we must
  possess both types of freedom. (i.e. free will
  and free agency)

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Logic of Libertarianism

• 1. To be morally responsible, we must possess
  both types of freedom.
• 2. We possess both types of freedom. (i.e. free
  will and free agency)
• 3. Therefore, we can be held morally responsible.

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Quotables on Libertarianism

• Man is born free, and yet everywhere he is in
  chains. Jean Jacques Rousseau
• Man cannot be sometimes slave and sometimes
  free he is wholly and forever free or he is not
  free at all. Man being condemned to be free
  carries the weight of the whole world on his
  shoulders he is responsbile for the world and
  for himself as a way of being. Jean Paul Sartre

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III. Soft Determinism (Compatibilism)

• A. Presupposes metaphysical determinism
• B. Denies free will persons do exercise free
  agency.
• C. In order to be morally responsible, we must
  only possess free agency.

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Logic of Soft Determinism

• 1.) To be morally responsible, we must only
  possess free agency.
• 2.) We do sometimes possess free agency.
• 3.) Therefore, we can be held morally responsible
  for our actions.

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Augustines Compatibilism

• Therefore we are by no means compelled, either,
  retaining the prescience of God, to take away the
  freedom of the will, or, retaining the freedom of
  the will, to deny that God is prescient of future
  things, which is impious. But we embrace both.
  We faithfully and sincerely confesses both. . . .
  For he lives ill who does not believe well
  concerning God. The City of God

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You Might See This Again

• HD LIB SD
• To be morally responsible ____ ____ ____
• we must possess both types
• of freedom.
• We possess both types
  __
• of freedom.
• Humans are morally
• responsible for their actions

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The 1,000,000 question

• Does the foreknowledge of God conflict with
  libertarian free will?