In the United States of America the second amendment listed in the Bill of Rights is the freedom of speech. This meaning you may express yourself, as well as come upright about anything you believe in without the fear of punishment or being penalized. “Actions speak louder than words” a wise man once said, however, neither freedom of action nor freedom of will is listed within those Bill of Rights. You may conclude that the reasoning behind that would be self-explanatory; if actions and will were completely free and people were not held accountable, the perpetrators of rape, murder, abuse, etc., would not be held liable. Although we do possess the freedom of speech, we are still are not allowed to discriminate nor bully with our words and the same laws could potentially be put into place in the case of actions and will. Could it possibly be concluded that the reason why our talked about “freedom of will” or “freedom of action” isn't a legislated concept because it is nonexistent?

“Free Will” is a philosophical term used for a particular sort of capacity of rational agents to choose a course of action from among various alternatives. To believe we do have free will would mean we believe our futures are not fixed at all, giving us the natural inclination to do any given task at any given time without reasoning. In addition to that, we would also have to believe that there is no sense of order in our world and our past had not much to contrast with our future. These ideologies put much questioning on the idea of free will. This being a very controversial topic, I will conclude to state as citizens in America we are free to many things, however will isn't one of them. We are not free. Some philosophical standpoints may beg to differ. As a people we could not make any conclusions with one hundred percent certainty to either side of the argument but with evidence we can develop our own ideology. Although there are many standpoints that may make it seem as if we have free will, ultimately we do not.

As stated prior, free will is the doctrine that the conduct of human beings expresses personal choice and is not simply determined by physical or divine forces. Within the questionable idea of “free will” many presented ideas are brought up to help put into perspective what free will really underlies as well as contribute to helping us as skeptic people create our own theories and opinions. The first of these theories is determinism which states that the future is fixed by the past. Usually when people think about their freedom of will they will only contemplate the future, maybe even deliberate about how they plan on living within their future. However, in order to grasp the concept of determinism we must also equally consider the past too.

“The first thing we must look at is this: how much power does the past have over the future? If the link between the past and the future is strong, and if there is only one past, then the possibility of there only being one future arises” (Niles Rahut). With that being said, concluding that our future is fixed by the past does not necessarily mean that we will in essence feel compelled do something, however in a deterministic world we still make choices and deliberate. For example, picture a girl named Mary, a high school student who is contemplating how to go about her life following graduation. For Mary in specific, she always took the honors classes route and never cared much for athletics and for her whole life has wanted to be a doctor. After graduating, Mary could potentially do anything but what is most attractive to her is namely going to college. Other options may not even open to her for her past has been fixed on being a doctor and her route to achieving that is college.

The German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer illustrated the effects of determinism as follows: “Let us imagine a man who while standing on the street would say to himself, it is six o’clock in the evening, the working day is over. Now I can go for a walk, or I can go to the club ext. All of this is strictly up to me, in this I have complete freedom. But still I shall do none of these things now, but with just as free will I will go home to my wife” (Ultimate Question). What Schopenhauer depicts nicely here is although through determinism our futures may be fixed this does not mean we lose sight with our freedom. We still have the presented freedom within the choices we make. While the man stood on the street he kept in regard all the things he could possibly do after the working day was over, however he was determined to go home to his wife. Another way we can look at determinism is through the lens of capability.

Let us consider the case of a young man who decides, after watching an episode of Law and Order, he wants to be a police officer. However, this young man has been convicted of a felony, and convicted felons are not allowed to have any sort of gun in their possession, which would result in him being disqualified immediately from any chance of being a police officer. In this instance, the past fixed this man’s future for even though we may think the future is open to anything, the reality is many things we might potentially want to do are ruled out by events that occurred in our past. I could hypothesize that in the future I will be a mass murderer, however due to the inclinations from my past, how I was brought up, and the knowledge I possess, it is unlikely. The truth of the matter is our past may or may not limit our future far more greater than we may acknowledge.

Following determinism is another ideology known as hard determinism. Hard determinists agree that future is firmly fixed by the past, however they also conclude that a fully determined future is incompatible with freedom. (“On the one hand, there is compatibilism which believes that freedom and determinism can coexist. On the other there is incompatibilism which believes that freedom and determinism cannot coexist.”) (Ultimate Question). Hard determinists have been known to argue that true freedom requires control over the future. Since we lack this control, there is then no other explanation then to conclude we are just not free. Another conclusion hard determinism states is that our belief in free will is as outlandish as our belief in Santa Claus. Through determinism, we now understand how the past can fix the future, however with hard determinism this view is much more radical. How is the past capable of exercising a force this immense over the future? A hard determinist would reiterate this question by means of causality. The past causes the future and this causal link determines what the future looks like. Another concept that may help to understand determinism is causation. Just like if you were to have a line of dominoes and you were to push one of them, it doesn't take a scientist to infer that one after another these dominoes will descend and fall. This shows us that the cause of an event happens prior to the effect and once it has happened the effect must also happen. “These two conditions explain how the past can shape the future” (Ultimate Question).

With examples put in place determinism may seem like it has answered the question and left us with the answer of no, we do not have free will. However, there are some arguments against it. Looking at our first one, if hard determinism is true, then we have no free will. If we have no free will, then we are not held responsible for our actions. We are held responsible for our actions, therefore hard determinism is false. This leaves us in a difficult position for the arguments for and against determinism where both are plausible. Determinism is an attractive theory as long as we agree with the principle of sufficient reason, which states anything that happens has a definite reason of happening. Unfortunately, that provokes another argument, for if everything is definite, that concludes that we have no state of chance in the world. However simultaneously, if our actions are caused by chance, we lack control. We cannot call that free will because we could not be held morally responsible for random actions. Since we are responsible for all our actions this argument is able to be countered.

Next we have the ideology of Indeterminism. Indeterminism holds that our future is not fixed by our past. This theory challenges the idea that our pasts could lead to alternate future states and that not a singular one is fixed upon us. Indeterminism is also closely related to the ideas ofuncertainty andindeterminacy. Uncertainty is best known fromWerner Heisenberg's principle in quantum mechanics. It states that the exact position and momentum of an atomic particle can only be known within certain limits. Indeterminism is important for the question of free will because strict determinism implies just one possible future. Indeterminism means that the future is unpredictable. For example, suppose that my leg is free. According to Indeterminism regardless of the way my arm moves, those motions are uncaused. I have nothing to do with these motions; they are just random and happen with no causes at all. This example is closely related to the contemporary philosopher Richard Taylor’s example with his analysis being that according to indeterminism his actions become random events and nobody should be held responsible for something that is random.

An additional example from the text “Ultimate Question” written by Niles Rahut states the following: “Suppose Beth and John have been dating for several years. Beth is eager to get married, but John is undecided on whether or not they should tie the knot. In order to pacify Beth, John comes up with this idea: Each morning he will throw a coin twenty times, and if it comes up as heads twenty times in a row he’ll marry Beth. Years go by and every morning John throws the coin, but heads never came up. Six years later, the unlikely event finally happens, and he marries Beth. It seems as if the decision wasn't his decision at all. Was John’s decision to marry Beth free and responsible choice? John did not have any control or choice” (page 88). Through this example as well as the previous one, it is fairly simple to draw that indeterminism takes much of its focus and puts it on the element of chance. Much like determinism there is also much fault within indeterminism. Although as briefly stated, an element of indeterminism is randomness or chance that may be the biggest problem. Even if we were to conclude events are not causally determined, this does not mean they are random. Nothing in the universe is random, not even the absence of causality. Randomness means lack of order, while nature is the opposite. If we think our actions happen by chance or randomly then it becomes very difficult to explain how we can control them. Therefore, we cannot claim indeterminism to be any more suitable than determinism.

Finally, we have the ideology of libertarianism, which is a branch of indeterminism and which states that the future is open and that we have the power to shape it. If we were to imagine two people coming from identical backgrounds and pasts, libertarians believe these people could never the less make different decisions in the future. Libertarianism believes there is something extraordinary about human beings that separates them from rocks and trees. However, in order to understand this stance we must first grasp the difference between event causation and agent causation. Event causation is the process of one event causing another; the same example we used for the dominoes for determinism is applicable here. The first event causes the second and so on, however what is true for dominoes is also true for physical events in this instance. Physical events are necessitated by other physical events meaning physical events are determined to take place. However, libertarians see things differently when it comes to human beings. They hypothesize that when a person commits an action, it does not necessarily have to be rooted from a prior action. Meaning, when you perform an action, your past may have had nothing to do with it. Similar to this concept, there is agent causation which is the power to cause something without being subject to causal determination. This means that a person may act without prior events necessitating the person’s actions; the person may act spontaneously in order for something to happen. A way to make agent causation clearer is to think about a godlike being prior to the creation of the physical universe. Assume this being decides to make the physical universe. Two things are made apparent in this instance. First, the creation of the universe is caused by this “god’s” actions. Second, this “god’s” actions are not causally determined to take place by prior physical events. Since there was no universe prior, the actions of this god therefore are self caused accumulated from inside of him. Libertarianism concludes that all of us are similar to this god in a sense when it comes to preforming actions. We are the cause of our actions, however we are not causally determined by prior events to perform these actions. If all of this was true then it would result in us having genuine free will. “If we are responsible, then we have prerogative which some would attribute only to God: each of us, when we act is a prime mover unmoved. In doing what we do, we cause certain events to happen and nothing or no one causes those events to happen.” (Roderick Chisholm) This philosopher firmly agrees with the stance that in certain instances we could be possessed with genuine free will.

If the scenario libertarianism is true, we all have the power to act contrary to the impacts of our past, our families and our genetics. Our decisions are solely made from ourselves since as substances we are the originators of our actions. This becomes problematic when we oversee whether or not this will lead to a distorted image of moral responsibility. As libertarianism states, we are the authors of our own lives and decisions which also results in us being equally responsible for our lives and decisions. However, this may be hard to reconcile with how we assign moral responsibility in everyday life.

In order to present this idea correctly let us consider the example of Claire who suffers from depression. She constantly finds herself in bed, with zero motivation to get up. Meanwhile, her mother is a firm believer in libertarianism. She constantly encourages her to get out of bed and make use of her granted and naturally inclined free will. At the same time doesn't it almost seem that her mother is not understanding the position she is in? Also, isn't it clear that there are events that have taken place throughout Claire’s life that are actively thought about in her head that are preventing her from getting out of bed? Whatever taking place, Claire’s head is nothing less than an event, but according to libertarianism, even causation cannot undermine their freedom to choose. In this specific scenario, the libertarianism point of view may come across as dogmatic for scientific research suggests that biochemical events take place in our brain which make it close to impossible to perform certain actions. The only way for someone believing in libertarianism to rebuttal this would be to make a clear account of how and when events can undermine freedom, however even then any account could potentially undermine the necessary clear distinction between event and agent causation. This puts libertarianism in a rough position, and quite clearly concludes us to the understanding, that as attractive as this branch of indeterminism may have once seemed, the faults in it cannot conclude any sort of definite answer.

The question still standing is whether or not as people we obtain the right to free will. Unfortunately, we cannot reach a definite answer, and unfortunately that is the case with most conceptual things. Regardless, we can find a specific theory to be more persuasive in comparison to others. While pertaining to free will, the theory that I identify as the most plausible is determinism. The truth of the matter is, at least to my life in specific, the choices I made today did have a lot to do with what happened yesterday. Meanwhile, the choices I make tomorrow will be a result of what happens today. For example, I found out I aced my math test therefore I will spend less time dwelling on math and more time studying for my English exams. However, on a large scale, determinism is still very much feasible. I love singing, and if I truly had “free will” I would drop everything and chase this so called dream I have.

I know I have been preconditioned by the past for despite singing being my goal, I was raised by the saying “education first” and the fear of not being successful is far more intimidating for me then the possible gratification that could essentially come from a career in music. Even in the scenario that for some outlandish reason I made the decision to go forth and pursue my dream doesn't mean that it is necessarily even an option. For in order for me to be considered for any professional singing career I would have to have had prior vocal lessons or at least more knowledge in music. This instance, along with many instances, shows me that my past has single handedly fixed my future.

Much like many concepts in philosophy, the question of whether or not we obtain free will can push you to the edge of your seats and force you to question things you once sought out to be a natural fact. How many times have you heard someone say the phrases “it’s your choice” or “at the end of the day it’s your decision”? The truth is that could very much not be the case. In my opinion, the theory that we have free will is false. I do not believe that it is even slightly possible for this claim to be true. However, ultimately, to each their own.