Free Will and Causes

If every event has causes, including the events in your brain, can you be free? Determinists say your choices are fixed by earlier causes. Libertarians say some choices are not fixed, so they are up to you. Compatibilists say freedom and causes can fit together.

The compatibilist point is that being free does not mean being uncaused. It means acting from your own reasons and wishes, without force or manipulation, and being able to act otherwise if you had chosen otherwise. A person locked in a room is not free to leave. One who stays because she wants to is free, though her wants have causes.

This matters for responsibility. We treat people differently under threat, illness or deception. Ask whether the act came from the person’s own reasons and was open to their reason. That it was caused is true of everything.

The late arrival

Noor is late to rowing practice for the third time this month. She says she could not help it because she has always been slow to start the day. Her coach wonders whether that is a cause or an excuse.

They look at the case: no one forced her, her alarm worked, and she chose to stay in bed and skip the plan she made. The coach says the reasons behind the choice can be talked about and changed. A cause is not a cage, and this one can respond to a plan.

Try this today Next time you say “I couldn’t help it,” ask whether force stopped you or your own reasons did.