freedom and determinism Flashcards
○ This harm cannot be avoided, it is inevitable. Harm is a determination of a deterministic point of view.
Daniel Dennet’s Harm Avoidance
■ Freedom allows us to
make ethical choices in our life and be responsible for our actions. Because of our freedom, we are responsible for our own actions. This is where our questions come in.
Moral autonomy:
■ Allows us to pursue
our goals and aspirations in life. We speak of the respect we give to other people and the respect we receive from other people.
Human dignity:
Physical freedom:
○ You can make decisions for
your body. You have the freedom to choose what to do with your body.
Personal Autonomy
Physical freedom:
○ you are free to explore your
surroundings, you are free to
move and be mobile.
Freedom of Movement
Physical freedom:
○ You have the freedom not to
be encased in jail.
Freedom from imprisonment
Psychological freedom:
○ you are free to think,
imagine, and form your own
opinions independently.
Freedom of thought
Psychological freedom
○ you can let out your
emotions and showcase how you feel.
Emotional freedom
Psychological freedom:
○ you are free to engage in
any intellectual activity or activity that feeds your mind. You are free to interact with other people in the hopes of putting awareness in yourself.
Intellectual freedom
moral freedom:
○ you are free to make ethical
choices in life
Freedom of conscience
moral freedom
○ you are free to choose what
you want to believe in.
Freedom of Religion
moral freedom:
○ you are free to make moral
decisions
Moral decision making
Social freedom
○ You are free to join groups
and associate with other
people.
Freedom of association
Political freedom
○ You are free to protest as a
group.
Freedom of assembly
Social freedom
○ you are free to express
yourself through speech without censorship. You have the freedom to express your thoughts without feeling censored.
Freedom of speech
Social freedom
you are free to practice the
culture you belong to. You are free to practice the ways of living that are manifested by your culture.
● Cultural freedom
Political freedom
○ You are free to choose your
leaders, you are free to vote
and participate in elections
Democratic participation
Political freedom
○ you are free to provide
information and express wihtout censor
Freedom of the press
Existential freedom
○ you are free to be authentic
or to be true to yourself.
Authenticity
Existential freedom
○ You are free to create or find
your own purpose and
meaning in life.
Freedom of meaning
Existential freedom
you are free to be responsible for you are responsible for your own actions in life.
Freedom of responsibility
● entails the notion of acting freely in alignment with one’s subjective wishes.
SUBJECTIVISTIC
Emphasizes individual desire without conside
pOPULIST
● Use of freedom in excessive reliance on faith.
TRANSCENDENTAL
Implies that freedom can be quantified or measured
scientific
Emphasizes individual desire without consideration for broader societal context
POPULIST
● A philosophical position believing that all events, including human actions and choices, are determined by causal laws.
DETERMINISM
Every event has a cause and this cause determines future events.
DETERMINISM
○ Since all events are already
determined and inevitable,
free will is an illusion.
○ It says that we as human
persons cannot do anything because our path has already been planned out.
○ There is already a designated path for you to take.
Hard or incompatibilism
○ Even though external
factors are present, we humans still have a degree of free will.
○ You also have that designated path to take but how you’re going to take that path depends on you, this is where free will comes in.
Soft or compatibilism
● Proposed atomism
LEUCIPPUS and DEMOCRITUS
The theory of —– says
that everything in the world is made up of atoms and these atoms cause the events around us.
Atomism
● Proposed demon thought experiment.
PIERRE-SIMON LAPLACE
○ There is an entity called the demon who knows or has been in the past and knows the future.
○ This is an entity that knows what is happening in the present.
demon thought experiment.
○ provides a sense of order
and predictability, everything is consistent
Causal consistency
○ theories such as Newtonian
physics.
Scientific basis
○ Natural laws govern the
behavior of all things.
Compatibility with natural laws
○ Unmeasurable subatomic levels, challenging strict determinism. If they cannot be measured, it proposes the idea that determinism is a false idea.
Quantum indeterminacy
○ Individuals might not be genuinely responsible for their actions.
Human agency
● An individual‘s capacity to make moral decisions and be morally responsible based on their own values, principles, and conscience.
Moral Agency
● A set of good moral qualities, habits, and character traits that enable individuals to act morally and virtuously.
Moral Virtue
