Dec 22, 2016 01:29 AM
Free Will & Action Explanation: A Non-Causal, Compatibilist Account
http://metapsychology.mentalhelp.net/poc...786&cn=394
EXCERPT: Scott Sehon's "Free Will and Action Explanation: A Non-Causal, Compatibilist Account" is a well-written, engaging theory of agency, free will, and moral responsibility. In the face of contemporary free will skepticism, Sehon sets out to argue that freedom and responsibility are consistent with our common-sense beliefs and scientific assumptions about the world.
One of the central questions of the contemporary free will debate is whether freedom and responsibility are compatible with universal causal determinism, the theory that there is only one possible future, completely causally necessitated by the laws of nature and the state of affairs at the beginning of time. Scientific theories assume universal causal determinism. However, skeptics ask how anyone can be free if their actions are determined by states of affairs that occurred long before they were born.
Sehon contends this skepticism is largely a byproduct of philosopher's commitment to casual theories of action -- the theory of action that contends that an agent's actions are caused by her reasons. Here, Sehon defends a teleological theory of action -- the theory that actions are best understood as goal-directed, and the goal-directedness of actions cannot be reduced to causal explanations....
http://metapsychology.mentalhelp.net/poc...786&cn=394
EXCERPT: Scott Sehon's "Free Will and Action Explanation: A Non-Causal, Compatibilist Account" is a well-written, engaging theory of agency, free will, and moral responsibility. In the face of contemporary free will skepticism, Sehon sets out to argue that freedom and responsibility are consistent with our common-sense beliefs and scientific assumptions about the world.
One of the central questions of the contemporary free will debate is whether freedom and responsibility are compatible with universal causal determinism, the theory that there is only one possible future, completely causally necessitated by the laws of nature and the state of affairs at the beginning of time. Scientific theories assume universal causal determinism. However, skeptics ask how anyone can be free if their actions are determined by states of affairs that occurred long before they were born.
Sehon contends this skepticism is largely a byproduct of philosopher's commitment to casual theories of action -- the theory of action that contends that an agent's actions are caused by her reasons. Here, Sehon defends a teleological theory of action -- the theory that actions are best understood as goal-directed, and the goal-directedness of actions cannot be reduced to causal explanations....
