Novy Metaphysics SP08

Fate, Freedom, and Determinism

Taylor Chapters 5 & 6

Basic Experiential Data:

1. D₁: I do sometimes deliberate, with the view to making a decision to do this thing or that; and

2. D₂: Whether or not I deliberate about what to do, it is sometimes up to me what I do

3. D₃: We believe, or at least act as if we do, that events – without exception – have causes

Determinism (hard)

4. Claim: For everything that exists, there are antecedent conditions, known or unknown, which, because they are given, mean that things could not be other than they are.

5. \At any given moment things are just as they are and no other way

6. \The world is exactly as it is now because the moment before was precisely as it was then

7. \The world as it is now is the only world that could be

Determinism (soft)

8. Claim: Our behavior is caused and determined, yet voluntary behavior is nonetheless free to the extent that it is not constrained or impeded

a. \The causes of certain voluntary behavior are the agent’s own acts of will

b. But, if determinism is true, the chain of causes and effects is infinite

c. \ Nothing could have been different, given that what preceded

d. \What causes my behavior must arise from something that preceded my existence

Indeterminism (simple)

9. Determinism is your friend!

èèèDeterminism and Indeterminism are not compatible with D₁ and D₂ççç

Theory of Agency

10. Claim: Some causal chains do have beginnings with agents

11. The concept of an agent who is the cause of some activity requires two new notions:

a. Self/person: not merely a collection of things or events, but a self-moving being

b. Causation: an agent – which is a substance – can be the case of an event

12. Compatible with D1, D2, & D3 a. Weirdness of Agency position Fatalism 13. Claim: Whatever is, is inevitable given the causal conditions preceding it Sources of fatalism 14. God as all-knowing and all-powerful means that the future is known (or set) already 15. Causal chains: all that happens is determined by what happened before 16. Truth: there is a body of truths about what the future holds Law of the excluded middle

1. Every meaningful statement, about myself or others, is either true or it is not true

a. That we are ignorant as to which does not change the fact of the matter

Past and future

2. The past contains what has happened, the future contains what will happen

3. Neither contains additional other things that did not or will not happen

Osmo

4. Could he have done otherwise? Could we?