Causation And Free Will

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Causation and Free Will

Carolina Sartorio
Causation and Free Will Book PDF

Author : Carolina Sartorio
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 197 pages
File Size : 45,7 Mb
Release : 2016-03-03
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780191063770

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Causation and Free Will by Carolina Sartorio Pdf

Carolina Sartorio argues that only the actual causes of our behaviour matter to our freedom. Although this simple view of freedom clashes with most theories of responsibility, including the most prominent 'actual sequence' theories currently on offer, Sartorio argues for its truth. The key, she claims, lies in a correct understanding of the role played by causation in a view of that kind. Causation has some important features that make it a responsibility-grounding relation, and this to the success of the view. Also, when agents act freely, the actual causes are richer than they appear to be at first sight; in particular, they reflect the agents' sensitivity to reasons, where this includes both the existence of actual reasons and the absence of other (counterfactual) reasons. So acting freely requires more causes and quite complex causes, as opposed to fewer causes and simpler causes, and is compatible with those causes being deterministic. The book connects two different debates, the one on causation and the one on the problem of free will, in new and illuminating ways.

Causation and Free Will

Carolina Sartorio
Causation and Free Will Book PDF

Author : Carolina Sartorio
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 197 pages
File Size : 48,7 Mb
Release : 2016
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780198746799

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Causation and Free Will by Carolina Sartorio Pdf

Carolina Sartorio argues that only the actual causes of our behaviour matter to our freedom. Although this simple view of freedom clashes with most theories of responsibility, including the most prominent "actual sequence" theories currently on offer, Sartorio argues for its truth. The key,she claims, lies in a correct understanding of the role played by causation in a view of that kind. Causation has some important features that make it a responsibility-grounding relation, and this contributes to the success of the view. Also, when agents act freely, the actual causes are richer thanthey appear to be at first sight; in particular, they reflect the agents' sensitivity to reasons, where this includes both the existence of actual reasons and the absence of other (counterfactual) reasons. So acting freely requires more causes and quite complex causes, as opposed to fewer causes andsimpler causes, and is compatible with those causes being deterministic.The book connects two different debates, the one on causation and the one on the problem of free will, in new and illuminating ways.

Why Free Will Is Real

Christian List
Why Free Will Is Real Book PDF

Author : Christian List
Publisher : Harvard University Press
Page : 225 pages
File Size : 41,8 Mb
Release : 2019-05-06
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780674239814

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Why Free Will Is Real by Christian List Pdf

A crystal-clear, scientifically rigorous argument for the existence of free will, challenging what many scientists and scientifically minded philosophers believe. Philosophers have argued about the nature and the very existence of free will for centuries. Today, many scientists and scientifically minded commentators are skeptical that it exists, especially when it is understood to require the ability to choose between alternative possibilities. If the laws of physics govern everything that happens, they argue, then how can our choices be free? Believers in free will must be misled by habit, sentiment, or religious doctrine. Why Free Will Is Real defies scientific orthodoxy and presents a bold new defense of free will in the same naturalistic terms that are usually deployed against it. Unlike those who defend free will by giving up the idea that it requires alternative possibilities to choose from, Christian List retains this idea as central, resisting the tendency to defend free will by watering it down. He concedes that free will and its prerequisites—intentional agency, alternative possibilities, and causal control over our actions—cannot be found among the fundamental physical features of the natural world. But, he argues, that’s not where we should be looking. Free will is a “higher-level” phenomenon found at the level of psychology. It is like other phenomena that emerge from physical processes but are autonomous from them and not best understood in fundamental physical terms—like an ecosystem or the economy. When we discover it in its proper context, acknowledging that free will is real is not just scientifically respectable; it is indispensable for explaining our world.

Downward Causation and the Neurobiology of Free Will

Nancey Murphy,George F.R. Ellis,Timothy O'Connor
Downward Causation and the Neurobiology of Free Will Book PDF

Author : Nancey Murphy,George F.R. Ellis,Timothy O'Connor
Publisher : Springer
Page : 291 pages
File Size : 40,9 Mb
Release : 2009-09-30
Category : Science
ISBN : 9783642032059

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Downward Causation and the Neurobiology of Free Will by Nancey Murphy,George F.R. Ellis,Timothy O'Connor Pdf

How is free will possible in the light of the physical and chemical underpinnings of brain activity and recent neurobiological experiments? How can the emergence of complexity in hierarchical systems such as the brain, based at the lower levels in physical interactions, lead to something like genuine free will? The nature of our understanding of free will in the light of present-day neuroscience is becoming increasingly important because of remarkable discoveries on the topic being made by neuroscientists at the present time, on the one hand, and its crucial importance for the way we view ourselves as human beings, on the other. A key tool in understanding how free will may arise in this context is the idea of downward causation in complex systems, happening coterminously with bottom up causation, to form an integral whole. Top-down causation is usually neglected, and is therefore emphasized in the other part of the book’s title. The concept is explored in depth, as are the ethical and legal implications of our understanding of free will. This book arises out of a workshop held in California in April of 2007, which was chaired by Dr. Christof Koch. It was unusual in terms of the breadth of people involved: they included physicists, neuroscientists, psychiatrists, philosophers, and theologians. This enabled the meeting, and hence the resulting book, to attain a rather broader perspective on the issue than is often attained at academic symposia. The book includes contributions by Sarah-Jayne Blakemore, George F. R. Ellis , Christopher D. Frith, Mark Hallett, David Hodgson, Owen D. Jones, Alicia Juarrero, J. A. Scott Kelso, Christof Koch, Hans Küng, Hakwan C. Lau, Dean Mobbs, Nancey Murphy, William Newsome, Timothy O’Connor, Sean A.. Spence, and Evan Thompson.

Causes, Laws, and Free Will

Kadri Vihvelin
Causes Laws and Free Will Book PDF

Author : Kadri Vihvelin
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 248 pages
File Size : 40,8 Mb
Release : 2013-05-06
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780199795253

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Causes, Laws, and Free Will by Kadri Vihvelin Pdf

Common sense tells us that we are morally responsible for our actions only if we have free will -- and that we have free will only if we are able to choose among alternative actions. Common sense tells us that we do have free will and are morally responsible for many of the things we do. Common sense also tells us that we are objects in the natural world, governed by its laws. Nevertheless, many contemporary philosophers deny that we have free will or that free will is a necessary prerequisite for moral responsibility. Some hold that we are morally responsible only if we are somehow exempt from the laws of nature. Causes, Laws, and Free Will defends a thesis that has almost disappeared from the contemporary philosophical landscape by arguing that this philosophical flight from common sense is a mistake. We have free will even if everything we do is predictable given the laws of nature and the past, and we are morally responsible whatever the laws of nature turn out to be. The impulses that tempt us into thinking that determinism robs us of free will spring from mistakes -- mistakes about the metaphysics of causation, mistakes about the nature of laws, and mistakes about the logic of counterfactuals.

The Neural Basis of Free Will

Peter Tse
The Neural Basis of Free Will Book PDF

Author : Peter Tse
Publisher : MIT Press
Page : 473 pages
File Size : 54,7 Mb
Release : 2013
Category : Medical
ISBN : 9780262019101

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The Neural Basis of Free Will by Peter Tse Pdf

The issues of mental causation, consciousness, and free will have vexed philosophers since Plato. This book examines these unresolved issues from a neuroscientific perspective. In contrast with philosophers who use logic rather than data to argue whether mental causation or consciousness can exist given unproven first assumptions, Tse proposes that we instead listen to what neurons have to say. Because the brain must already embody a solution to the mind--body problem, why not focus on how the brain actually realizes mental causation? Tse draws on exciting recent neuroscientific data concerning how informational causation is realized in physical causation at the level of NMDA receptors, synapses, dendrites, neurons, and neuronal circuits. He argues that a particular kind of strong free will and downward mental causation are realized in rapid synaptic plasticity. Recent neurophysiological breakthroughs reveal that neurons function as criterial assessors of their inputs, which then change the criteria that will make other neurons fire in the future. Such informational causation cannot change the physical basis of information realized in the present, but it can change the physical basis of information that may be realized in the immediate future. This gets around the standard argument against free will centered on the impossibility of self-causation. Tse explores the ways that mental causation and qualia might be realized in this kind of neuronal and associated information-processing architecture, and considers the psychological and philosophical implications of having such an architecture realized in our brains.

Persons and Causes

Timothy O'Connor
Persons and Causes Book PDF

Author : Timothy O'Connor
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 152 pages
File Size : 51,6 Mb
Release : 2002-11-14
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780198030508

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Persons and Causes by Timothy O'Connor Pdf

This provocative book refurbishes the traditional account of freedom of will as reasons-guided "agent" causation, situating its account within a general metaphysics. O'Connor's discussion of the general concept of causation and of ontological reductionism v. emergence will specially interest metaphysicians and philosophers of mind.

Causes, Laws, and Free Will

Kadri Vihvelin
Causes Laws and Free Will Book PDF

Author : Kadri Vihvelin
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 295 pages
File Size : 46,8 Mb
Release : 2013-06-27
Category : Law
ISBN : 9780199795185

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Causes, Laws, and Free Will by Kadri Vihvelin Pdf

This book rescues compatibilists from the familiar charge of 'quagmire of evasion' by arguing that the problem of free will and determinism is a metaphysical problem with a metaphysical solution. There is no good reason to think that determinism would rob us of the free will we think we have.

Causation, Freedom and Determinism

Mortimer Taube
Causation Freedom and Determinism Book PDF

Author : Mortimer Taube
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
Page : 265 pages
File Size : 46,5 Mb
Release : 2017-07-14
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9781351797542

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Causation, Freedom and Determinism by Mortimer Taube Pdf

This book, first published in 1936, divides into roughly two parts: a re-examination of historical material; and a positive theory of causation suggested by the results of this re-examination. The historical study discloses an ambiguity in the meanings of causation and determinism; it discloses also that this ambiguity is transferred to the meaning of freedom.

Free Will, Causality, and Neuroscience

Bernard Feltz,Marcus Missal,Andrew Cameron Sims
Free Will Causality and Neuroscience Book PDF

Author : Bernard Feltz,Marcus Missal,Andrew Cameron Sims
Publisher : Brill
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 41,9 Mb
Release : 2020
Category : Causation
ISBN : 9004372911

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Free Will, Causality, and Neuroscience by Bernard Feltz,Marcus Missal,Andrew Cameron Sims Pdf

This book aims to show that recent developments in neuroscience permit a defense of free will. Through language, human beings can escape strict biological determinism.

Libertarian Accounts of Free Will

Randolph Clarke
Libertarian Accounts of Free Will Book PDF

Author : Randolph Clarke
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
Page : 276 pages
File Size : 44,6 Mb
Release : 2006-02-23
Category : Free will and determinism
ISBN : 0195306422

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Libertarian Accounts of Free Will by Randolph Clarke Pdf

This text examines free will in the context of determinism on the one hand, and the notion that this choice may in fact be random and arbitrary on the other.

Living Without Free Will

Derk Pereboom
Living Without Free Will Book PDF

Author : Derk Pereboom
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
Page : 257 pages
File Size : 41,6 Mb
Release : 2006-11-02
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780521029964

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Living Without Free Will by Derk Pereboom Pdf

Argues that morality, meaning and value remain intact even if we are not morally responsible for our actions.

Free Will

Laura Ekstrom
Free Will Book PDF

Author : Laura Ekstrom
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 316 pages
File Size : 51,9 Mb
Release : 2018-03-05
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780429979996

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Free Will by Laura Ekstrom Pdf

In this comprehensive new study of human free agency, Laura Waddell Ekstrom critically surveys contemporary philosophical literature and provides a novel account of the conditions for free action. Ekstrom argues that incompatibilism concerning free will and causal determinism is true and thus the right account of the nature of free action must be indeterminist in nature. She examines a variety of libertarian approaches, ultimately defending an account relying on indeterministic causation among events and appealing to agent causation only in a reducible sense. Written in an engaging style and incorporating recent scholarship, this study is critical reading for scholars and students interested in the topics of motivation, causation, responsibility, and freedom. In broadly covering the important positions of others along with its exposition of the author's own view, Free Will provides both a significant scholarly contribution and a valuable text for courses in metaphysics and action theory.

Free Will, Causality and the Self

Atle Ottesen Søvik
Free Will Causality and the Self Book PDF

Author : Atle Ottesen Søvik
Publisher : Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
Page : 190 pages
File Size : 40,6 Mb
Release : 2016-09-12
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9783110474466

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Free Will, Causality and the Self by Atle Ottesen Søvik Pdf

A major goal for compatibilists is to avoid the luck problem and to include all the facts from neuroscience and natural science in general which purportedly show that the brain works in a law-governed and causal way like any other part of nature. Libertarians, for their part, want to avoid the manipulation argument and demonstrate that very common and deep seated convictions about freedom and responsibility are true: it can really be fundamentally up to us as agents to determine that the future should be either A or B. This book presents a theory of free will which integrates the main motivations of compatibilists and libertarians, while at the same time avoiding their problems. The so-called event-causal libertarianism is the libertarian account closest to compatibilitsm, as it claims there is indeterminism in the mind of an agent. The charge of compatibilists, however, is that this position is impaired by the problem of luck. This book is unique in arguing that free will in a strong sense of the term does not require indeterminism in the brain, only indeterminism somewhere in the world which there plausibly is.

A Minimal Libertarianism

Christopher Evan Franklin
A Minimal Libertarianism Book PDF

Author : Christopher Evan Franklin
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 249 pages
File Size : 44,8 Mb
Release : 2018
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780190682781

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A Minimal Libertarianism by Christopher Evan Franklin Pdf

In this book, Christopher Evan Franklin develops and defends a novel version of event-causal libertarianism. This view is a combination of libertarianism--the view that humans sometimes act freely and that those actions are the causal upshots of nondeterministic processes--and agency reductionism--the view that the causal role of the agent in exercises of free will is exhausted by the causal role of mental states and events (e.g., desires and beliefs) involving the agent. Franklin boldly counteracts a dominant theory that has similar aims, put forth by well-known philosopher Robert Kane. Many philosophers contend that event-causal libertarians have no advantage over compatibilists when it comes to securing a distinctively valuable kind of freedom and responsibility. To Franklin, this position is mistaken. Assuming agency reductionism is true, event-causal libertarians need only adopt the most plausible compatibilist theory and add indeterminism at the proper juncture in the genesis of human action. The result is minimal event-causal libertarianism: a model of free will with the metaphysical simplicity of compatibilism and the intuitive power of libertarianism. And yet a worry remains: toward the end of the book, Franklin reconsiders his assumption of agency reductionism, arguing that this picture faces a hitherto unsolved problem. This problem, however, has nothing to do with indeterminism or determinism, or even libertarianism or compatibilism, but with how to understand the nature of the self and its role in the genesis of action. Crucially, if this problem proves unsolvable, then not only is event-causal libertarianism untenable, so also is event-causal compatibilism.