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Why Free Will Is Real

✍ Scribed by Christian List


Publisher
Harvard University Press
Year
2019
Tongue
English
Leaves
225
Category
Library

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✦ Synopsis


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 β€œhigher-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.

✦ Table of Contents


Cover......Page 1
Title Page......Page 4
Copyright......Page 5
Dedication......Page 6
Contents......Page 8
Introduction......Page 10
1. Free Will......Page 24
2. Three Challenges......Page 40
3. In Defence of Intentional Agency......Page 58
4. In Defence of Alternative Possibilities......Page 88
5. In Defence of Causal Control......Page 122
Conclusion......Page 158
Notes......Page 170
References......Page 196
Acknowledgments......Page 212
Index......Page 216

✦ Subjects


Free Will And Determinism, Physical Laws, Physics: Religious Aspects, Religion And Science


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