Free will : a guide for the perplexed / T.J. Mawson.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Mawson, T. J.

Series:

Guides for the Perplexed

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Free will and determinism.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (205 p.)

Place of Publication:

New York : Continuum, c2011.

Summary:

In everyday life, we often suppose ourselves to be free to choose between several courses of action. But if we examine further, we find that this view seems to rest on metaphysical and meta-ethical presuppositions almost all of which look problematic. How can we be free if everything is determined by factors beyond our control, stretching back in time to the Big Bang and the laws of nature operating then? The only alternative to determinism is indeterminism, but is not indeterminism just there being a certain amount of randomness in the world? Does not randomness hinder you from being the auth

Contents:

Introduction : what is the problem of free will?

Our experience of choice : what our everyday experience suggests about the existence and nature of free will

Incompatibilism : some classic and some modern arguments for and against the view that we can't have free will if we live in a deterministic universe

Indeterminism : whether we have reason to suppose our universe is deterministic, whether we have reason to suppose it is not, or whether we don't have reason either way

Ultimate authorship : how we might be the ultimate authors of our actions

Conclusion : how we are as we supposed ourselves to be.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

1-282-97753-9

9786612977534

0-8264-3122-4

OCLC:

701053861