Can Compatibilism be Defended - Essay Example

?Can Compatibilism be defended? Many a philosopher has been trying to negotiate the bends and turns between determinism, free will and compatibilism.This struggle to impose certain lines of argument on compatibilism has eclipsed the actual need for argument. As it stands, both free will and determinism are well defined concepts. Compatibilism stands in the middle in an effort to bridge the gap between free will and determinism. In my humble opinion, compatibilism is merely a way of telling both free will and determinism proponents that they are wrong to a certain extent and right in other respects. However, the reality may not necessarily lie in line with the compatibilist’s line of argument. Most philosophers before this point have attempted to deal with compatibilism using their own customised definitions of free will and determinism. For example, Peter van Inwagen uses his own definitions (Van Inwagen & Zimmerman, 1998) while Narverson accepts them and bends them during his subsequent reply. (Naverson, 1977) Similarly the definitions of Robert Kane, Strawson, and Campbell will differ largely with those of older philosophers such as Humes. (Kane, 1996) (Campbell, 1957) (Bok, 1998) Most of these definitions have only intensified the problem rather than solving it in any form. If the classical definitions of free will and determinism are used, the issue of compatibilism can be solved with much greater ease. I will attempt to define compatibilism using simple definitions of free will and determinism and will then proceed to exposing weaknesses in the compatibilist line of argument. The compatibilist is simply a proponent of the idea that free will and determinism are compatible ideas. This implies that both lines of argument can be conceded to without being logically inconsistent. (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2009) In order to create an association between free will and determinism, certain very “hard to digest” definitions have been provided. For example, Schopenhauer has defined compatibilism as: “Man is free to do what he wills, but he cannot will what he wills.” The resulting limited window of opportunity to act as one wills is what the compatibilist calls “free will”. However the simplest method I see to define free will is simply the authority to do as one pleases. It is not as if this simple definition is not comprehensive enough. Consider for example a very common scenario. I cannot coerce a person to commit any actions against his free will such as I cannot do anything in my power right now to say move your hand unless you wish to move your hand. You will only move your hand when you feel obliged to do so for whatever your free will demands of you. The general view includes coercive behaviour such as rape, imprisonment and the like to define free will which I believe is not totally justified. A person being raped may be coerced to perform under threat but that is merely usurpation of their free will. Such a person always has the choice of fighting back no matter what the outcome. This choice to fight back is again a constitution of free will. In a sense, human free will is like a skill one can master. Certain people have far more control over their actions because they allow their free will to do so. On the other hand most people have little control over their actions especially when they are emotionally charged such as when angry, excited or in pain because they choose not to control their behaviour in these scenarios. Just as human beings possess different characteristics, it cannot be expected of them to possess the same degrees of free will too. Doing so would serve as a major error in dealing with human free will. Hence as per the libertarian’s views, human free will allows each of us to do as we want to do, when we want to do and how we want to do. Others would argue that man is not free to do as he pleases in society and hence society controls or determines man’s free will. However, there is little to support their argument that falls on itself paradoxically. Human beings surrender certain aspects of their free will when they decide to live as part of society. Sociological investigation and theory effectively supports this line of argument with both qualitative and quantitative reasoning. Again the conception of free will’s usurpation comes to light. When man chooses to live in society, he lets society usurp certain regions of his free will. However this usurpation is again a consequence of choosing to do so that is choosing to relinquish personal control over certain areas. This should not and cannot be considered equivalent to determinism. The deterministic view of things holds that all actions are predetermined or determined to a large extent beforehand. However there are certain irregular loop holes in this line of argumentation which preclude it from being an effective component of compatibilism. More or less determinism is the major problem that weakens the compatibilist line of argument. The deterministic line of argument contends for example that if a person sits down then that was the only choice that could have ever been made. This means that all human actions are preordained and that human free will does not really exist at all. However, common observation would easily reveal that every person often makes differing choices given the same circumstances and hence the same stimuli. (Honderich, 1988) This clearly indicates the basic weakness in the deterministic stance. If this stance is now superimposed on the compatibilist line of argument then the same error would creep into the compatibilist line of argument too. Compatibilism is after all nothing more than a combination of free will and determinism. It is not important how far each influences compatibilism. Instead what is more important is that both free will and determinism compose compatibilism and the inclusion of determinism tends to make compatibilism faulty too. Given this approach it is clear that compatibilism cannot be defended if the deterministic stance is include no matter what the extent of the permeation is. Another line of argumentation would emerge if determinism was to be accepted as error free. Certain schools of thought argue that not all human actions can be composed of free will and hence certain actions must be subject to determination. Say for example, the issue of birth is considered. None of us had the prerogative of choosing if we would like to be born or not. Similar to the above, none of us had the choice of where we wanted to be born such as in nobility or amongst literati. Certain theological commentators also argue that human beings have no choice over their death. (Earman, 2007) This is a strong indication therefore that determinism does exist and hence can be included in compatibilism. However if these lines of argument are explored further it will become clear that there are certain fallacies based on assumptions that make these arguments less than credible. Consider the choice of human beings on the matter of birth. As yet it is debatable if the foetus possesses any free will. In order to understand the issue better let’s consider when a person begins to express free will for example as a child, as an adolescent and as an adult. When an individual begins to assert their free will, most of us wish we could be born into more “facilitated” homes that would make our lives easier. Though it is not possible to merely wish and to realise its completion, but it does signify that a person expresses his free will to be born somewhere else. If this is brought back into the consideration for the foetus now, two lines of argument will develop. The first will hold that the foetus did not possess free will just as yet but instead it was developed later as the child matured. The second line of argument will hold that the foetus had a free will but merely by wishing alone the foetus could not be born elsewhere as indicated above. Given both lines of argument, the focus remains on free will and not on determinism. In similar fashion, if death is considered as being deterministic, there are certain problems with it too. Most people die as a result of choices they make throughout their lives. A person dying of lung cancer because of smoking made a conscious choice through life to smoke. The deterministic line of argument will fail to explain why two people within the same circumstances will display one person smoking while the other would abhorrently stay away from smoking. Much similarly if the argument for death is expanded further, one will eventually find free will behind a person’s death even if it is deemed “accidental” by the coroner. For example if a person was driving down a freeway and was accidentally crushed to death by an eighteen wheeler, one would ask if that was the only possible choice. The answer is no, the choice for death could have been as a result of the eighteen wheeler’s driver’s choice. It may not be necessary that death be chosen for others like this but it must be kept in mind that one’s free will has the power to affect other people too. However if the deterministic stance were compared it would be revealed that determinism holds that that was the “only possible choice” which would mean free will at times and deterministic behaviour at other times. This in itself signifies that the deterministic stance is flawed. Moreover people who argue that determinism “explains” irrational decision often fail to consider that irrationality is but a consequence of the choice of having a loose grip on one’s free will. Hence any line of argument that ascertains determinism is true ends up in smoke if scrutinized carefully enough. Those who contend that determinism is a part of compatibilism must then also consider that determinism’s fallacies are also part of compatibilism. As mentioned previously, this is itself the largest stumbling block for compatibilism as determinism makes it weak and susceptible to criticism on more fronts than one. Hence compatibilism is less than defendable due to the inclusion of determinism and its erros. Bibliography Bok, H. (1998). Freedom and Responsibility. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Campbell, C. (1957). On Selfhood and Godhood. London: George Allen and Unwin. Earman, J. (2007). Aspects of Determinism in Modern Physics. North Holland: Adventure Works Pres. Honderich, T. (1988). The Consequences of Determinism. London: Addison Wesley. Kane, R. (1996). The Significance of Free Will. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Naverson, J. (1977). Compatibilism Defended: An International Journal for Philosophy in the Analytic Tradition. Philosophical Studies 32(1) , 83-87. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. (2009, October 5). Compatibilism. Retrieved September 28, 2011, from Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/compatibilism/ Van Inwagen, P., & Zimmerman, D. (1998). Metaphysics: The Big Questions. Oxford: Blackwell. Read More