Determinism is a thesis about the relations between states (or events) in the universe. A deterministic universe is one in which, holding fixed the past states (or events) and the laws of nature, there is only one possible future set of states (or events). So, it might appear that determinism means that nothing is contingent or could happen otherwise. But that appearance is misleading, because the past or the laws were not necessary and they could have been different. If they had been different than they actually are, then the future events would be different than they actually will be. If determinism meant that everything is necessary, then it would mean that there is only one possible universe. Nothing could be or could have been different than it is. That doesn't fit with the way we think about possibility. There are lots of possible universes--lots of ways things might have been or might be. But if determinism is true, the only way the present or future could be different than they...

Yes! But my answer is based on my metaphysics. I think that your brain is an essential part of you (along with your body) and that the part of you that consciously considers what to do and makes decisions is a part of your brain. So, you have control over your own brain because processes occurring in your brain control other processes in your brain that cause your bodily actions. Conscious self-control is a (very complex) set of brain processes. If this sounds counter-intuitive, it is partly because we simply have no good theory about how physical brain processes could be the basis of conscious experiences and thoughts (though we do have pretty good theories about how the brain carries out many cognitive tasks, such as perception, language, and initiation of movement). And it is partly because we have a competing metaphysical theory, largely based on religion, that says that our selves (our conscious minds) are non-physical entities separate from the brain and body (notice that this...

It's not clear what it would mean (or what it would take) to show that there was an effect without a cause (unless we just define an effect as something that is caused, in which case there'd be nothing to show). We certainly have not shown (proven) that every event has a cause in the sense that we have not, and could not, pick out the causes of every event that has ever happened. Rather, we tend to assume that all events have causes, except perhaps those people who assume that free choices are uncaused or who assume that there is a first event that was not caused by any prior event. It's an assumption that tends to work for us--that is, it helps us explain things in science and our everyday life--and it is an assumption that does not have any clear counterexamples (but again, it's not clear what a counterexample would look like). So, as you suggest, this thesis of Universal Causation (UC) might be the most justifiable. However, one might think that a possible counterexample involves...

There is not a prevailing consensus on the questions of (1) whether free will is compatible with determinism and (2) whether humans have free will. However, I would estimate that close to 2/3 of professional philosophers are compatibilists about free will and determinism (they think determinism poses no threat to free will), with the other 1/3 roughly split between libertarians (who are incompatiblists who believe that we have free will, and hence that determinism is false) and hard incompatiblists or skeptics about free will (who are incompatiblists who believe that we do not have free will because determinism is true and/or indeterminism would not help secure free will). These estimates are based on a large-scale survey I conducted (along with Thomas Nadelhoffer) and on another large-scale survey conducted by David Chalmers and David Bourget (see here ; lots of other interesting results too). These survey results may be slightly off for various reasons (e.g., for these...

Given your question, you may be interested in a discussion of Strawson's NYTimes article at the free will/moral responsibility blog, Flickers of Freedom, here . There's also a discussion on retribution and punishment (and psychopaths) at the blog here . You'll see in these discussions that there are plenty of philosophers (called compatibilists) who think that free will and moral responsibility are possible even if determinism is true, and who reject Strawson's argument against the possibility of freedom and responsibility. These compatibilists will generally say that retributive punishment is justified, though they might also think that punishing (or treating) criminals for consequentialist reasons (such as deterrence and rehabilitation) is also important. My own view is that we can have free will and moral responsibility (determinism is irrelevant to this issue), but that we have less than we think (because the sciences of the mind are showing that we have less self-knowledge and...

Here's one answer I have given to a related question.

This is an important question, since it might be that one of the reasons we worry about whether we have free will is that free will is required for life to be meaningful. If so, then any threat to our free will would also make life meaningless. (Actually, as I write that sentence, it makes me wonder if a person's life can only be meaningless , in the ordinary sense of that word, if it has a possibility of being meaningful--is a worm's life meaningless or does that word simply not apply?) But is free will required for life to have meaning? As usual (with philosophical questions like this), a lot depends on what we mean by 'free will' and 'meaningful life'. My own view is that a theory of free will needs to be about the powers of control that matter to us, so it doesn't make sense to define free will in such a way that losing it would not matter and such that having it would not matter. If, for instance, free will is defined as some magical ability to exist outside of the natural order of...

Well, if "determinism" is defined as "the opposite of free will" or "whatever takes away free will", then they are definitely incompatible, but in a really uninteresting way, one that could not generate so much philosophical debate. Sometimes, people think that's what determinism means (and some dictionaries define it that way), and of course, that makes it very hard to convince people that compatibilism is not crazy. But compatibilism is not crazy. In fact, the majority of philosophers are compatibilists, and my work in experimental philosophy studying ordinary people's intuitions about free will suggests most folk are compatibilists too, once we make sure they understand what determinism means (not that majorities cannot believe crazy things, but if we are trying to figure out how to define "free will" and its relevance to our practices of moral and legal responsibility, then understanding the way people actually understand the issues is surely relevant). So, why isn't compatibilism crazy? ...

Yes, you can and should feel good, feel proud, feel accomplished, regardless of whether or not determinism is true. You worked hard, you made hard choices, you did things rather than just let things happen to you. And all that is true even in a deterministic world. (For some discussion of what determinism means and entails, see my response to question 3004 here .) Of course, I'm a compatibilist about free will and determinism, so I think determinism is irrelevant to these issues. However, some incompatibilists also think that even if determinism ruled out the sort of free will required for genuine moral desert, we could still legitimately feel proud of our accomplishments. My view is that to think determinism rules out our ability to feel proud (or guilty) for what we do is to misunderstand what determinism means. It is to assume that determinism--the view, roughly, that everything that happens is complete caused by prior events--means that we are somehow bypassed ...

Determinism is the thesis that a complete description of the universe at one time and the laws of nature logically entails a complete description of the universe at any later time. Though this definition does not talk about causation, determinism is also often understood to mean that every event in the universe is completely caused by a set of prior events, in accord with the laws of nature. I don't think this definition of determinism should be equated with 'fate' since fate suggests that certain things are going to happen no matter what anyone does and perhaps also that some power, such as God or gods or the Greek Fates, has control over fate (and hence what happens to you)--so, Oedipus was fated to sleep with his mother, no matter what he tried to do to avoid that fate and it looks like the gods imposed that fate upon him. Determinism, on the contrary, does not entail that certain things will happen no matter what. On the contrary, it suggests that what happens on the future depends on what...