IB Philosophy 1.6.1 Freedom and Determinism Notes

The Problem of Free Will

1. The sub-theme of Freedom (1.6) brings Unit 1 to its culminating questions. Having explored identity (1.1), the self and others (1.2), consciousness (1.3), personhood (1.4), and human nature (1.5), we now ask whether human beings are genuinely free or whether our actions are determined by forces beyond our control.
2. The IB syllabus poses three interconnected questions: "Is there such a thing as free will?" and "Are freedom and determinism compatible?"
3. It also asks: "Is autonomy necessary for personhood?" These questions connect directly to the discussion of moral responsibility in 1.4.3, where we noted that responsibility seems to require the ability to have done otherwise.
4. Determinism is the view that every event in the universe, including every human thought and action, is the inevitable result of prior causes operating according to natural laws. If determinism is true, then the choices you make today were fixed by the state of the universe billions of years ago.
5. Your feeling of choosing freely would be an illusion.
6. The scientific case for determinism draws on classical physics. Pierre-Simon Laplace famously imagined a demon who, knowing the position and momentum of every particle in the universe, could predict every future event with certainty.
7. If the universe operates according to strict causal laws, then human actions are as determined as the orbits of planets.
8. Modern neuroscience has strengthened the case for determinism. The Libet experiments (discussed in 1.4.3) found that the brain shows electrical activity associated with a movement about 300 milliseconds before the person is consciously aware of deciding to move. This suggests our sense of 'choosing' may be a post-hoc rationalisation (a story we tell ourselves after the brain has already decided), not the actual cause of the action.
9. However, these findings are disputed. Subjects could still 'veto' a movement at the last moment, and later research has questioned whether the 'readiness potential' (the brain signal Libet measured) actually marks a firm decision or just a general buildup of neural activity.

Quantum Indeterminacy, Neuroscience, and the Stakes of the Debate

1. However, quantum mechanics has challenged strict physical determinism. At the subatomic level, events appear to be genuinely indeterminate: the behaviour of individual particles cannot be predicted with certainty.
2. Critics note that quantum indeterminacy does not obviously support free will, because random events are no more "free" than determined ones. Libertarians respond that indeterminacy at the neural level creates a genuine opening for agent causation: the idea that a person, rather than a prior event, can originate a new causal chain.
3. The free will debate connects to the overarching Unit 1 question, "What does it mean to be human?"
4. If human actions are determined, then the self-conscious, choosing, morally responsible being described in earlier topics may be a philosophical fiction. If free will is real, then humans possess a capacity that sets them apart from the rest of the natural world.
5. The question also connects to 1.5.2 (Nature versus Nurture): if our behaviour is shaped by genes and environment, as the interactionist view suggests, then the space for genuinely free choice may be much smaller than we assume.
6. The debate about freedom is therefore not purely abstract. It has implications for how we understand personal responsibility, criminal justice, and social policy.
7. Three main positions dominate the philosophical landscape: hard determinism (free will is an illusion), compatibilism (free will and determinism are compatible), and libertarianism (free will requires indeterminism). The sections that follow examine each position through the required IB philosophers, Daniel Dennett and Peter Van Inwagen.
8. Understanding these positions is essential for IB Philosophy students, as the freedom-determinism debate underpins questions across multiple units: moral responsibility (1.4.3), social conditioning (1.6.2), existential authenticity (1.6.3), causality in science (6.2.3), and the foundations of ethical theory (4.1.1).

Compatibilism: Dennett and the Defence of Free Will

1. Compatibilism (also called soft determinism) holds that free will and determinism are not mutually exclusive. A person can act freely even if their actions are causally determined, provided they act according to their own desires and values without external coercion.
2. This position was introduced in 1.4.3 in the context of moral responsibility. Here we examine it in depth.
3. Daniel Dennett is the most prominent contemporary defender of compatibilism. In Elbow Room and Freedom Evolves, Dennett argues that the kind of free will worth wanting is not the ability to defy the laws of physics, but the ability to act in ways that are responsive to reasons.
4. A free agent is one who can consider alternatives, weigh consequences, and act on the basis of rational deliberation.