hard determinism

Question 1

key terms - determinism, causal determinism, hard determinism

Answer 1

determinism - view all events are necessary consequence of prior state of affairs
causal determinism - cause effect
hard determinism - view that because determinism is true no one has free will

Question 2

epicurus

Answer 2

• epicurean philosophy is idea that philosophy can & should lead to happy lives as free from pain
  -his view in relation to physics, world consisted entirely of atoms within a void & that it was entirely physical and that any event was therefor theoretically predictable given its circumstances

Question 3

why was this problematic

Answer 3

• also believed that one should seek to maximise happiness in life by living simply & peacefully
• when trying to modify his physics to make free will possible he points to fundamnetal issue of obsrvation

Question 4

two views in debate of free will & how they relate

Answer 4

• hard determinism (not free) & libertarians (free)
• relate by incompatibilism (either determined or free) & compatibilism (scientific determinism is compatible with our experience of freedom)

Question 5

hard determinism

Answer 5

• determinism argues all events are necessary consequence of prior state of events
• view of hard determinism in relation to free will is that determinism is true & no one has free will
• all views of hard determinism based on concept of universal causation which suggests every event in universe has cause
• hard determinism governs ethical choices as our moral decisions are as determined as anything else
• means we may think we are free to choose but such freedom is an illusion so a hard determinist would argue since freedom is an illusion we aren’t logically justified in claiming responsibility for our actions

Question 6

hard determinism - reductionism

Answer 6

• reductionism is to understand complex entity one should analyse it to its smallest component
• can be applied to human behaviour as its reduced to biology then chemistry then physics
• means our thoughts are no more than electrical impulses in the brain
• if everything is reduced then the complex whole is determined by those laws