FREE WILL BY TIFFANY SHEARER ASHLEY MOLINA FRANCES GARREN

WHAT IS FREE WILL? Webster Dictionary says Free Will is:  freedom of humans to make choices that are not determined by prior causes or by divine intervention. Dictionary.com says Free Will is:  The power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate; the ability to act at one's own discretion.

FREE WILL?? Now these are just a few of the many definitions of free will. If there are so many definitions, how do we know which one is right? Answer: There is no right or wrong answer when it comes to free will because there are so many different ideas and viewpoints of free will.

DIFFERENT OPINIONS OF FREE WILL

HARRY FRANKFURT “Harry Frankfurt (1982) presents an insightful and original way of thinking about free will. He suggests that a central difference between human and merely animal activity is our capacity to reflect on our desires and beliefs and form desires and judgments concerning them. I may want to eat a candy bar (first-order desire), but I also may want not to want this (second-order desire) because of the connection between habitual candy eating and poor health. This difference, he argues, provides the key to understanding both free action and free will” (O’Conner).

DAVID HUME David Hume, for example, defines liberty as “a power of acting or of not acting, according to the determination of the will” (O’Conner).

PYTHAGOREANS, SOCRATES, & PLATO “The Pythagoreans, Socrates, and Plato attempted to reconcile an element of human freedom with material determinism and causal law, in order to hold man responsible for his actions” (History of the Free Will Problem).

ARISTOTLE “He knew that many of our decisions are quite predictable based on habit and character, but they are no less free nor we less responsible if our character itself and predictable habits were developed freely in the past and are changeable in the future” (History of the Free Will Problem).

Free Write Do you think that you have free will? Why/why not? How would someone’s opinion be affected by his/her upbringing or religion?

WORKS CITED "History of the Free Will Problem." The History of the Free Will Problem. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Nov O'Connor, Timothy, "Free Will", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2011 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.),. Schmidt, Mark Ray. Human Nature: Opposing Viewpoints. San Diego, CA: Greenhaven, Print. Thomas, Henry. Understanding the Great Philosophers. Garden City, NY: Doubleday and Company, Inc., Print.