Blanshard's Theory Of Free Will

Free will, is having the ability to act based on our own desires and choosing which desires we would like to act on. In the philosophical field of Metaphysics this definition is the most universal way we discuss free will. When we think of the phrase free will, we think of the choices we make that impact our lives. Are our decisions really our own or are they products of outside forces? Is our destiny predetermined by nature? Can small choices such as raising your hand become an example of free will or is it more intricate than that? What constitutes free will is a continuous argument that consist of various ideas on what acting freely is really defined as. Most arguments on free will attempt to negotiate the relationship between moral

What is unique about Blanshards’s argument is that he insists that the words “event” and “cause” must be defined in a specific way to make sense of the determinist view point. It is important to the theory to make clear that an event can be something that either changes or doesn’t change. It could be the absence of something that causes another event to unfold. The cause is a previous event that shaped the way the next event unfolded, without the cause then the event would have never occurred. These definitions support Blanshard’s theory on determinism as well as his argument against the

The first point he makes is that people want to be free and they believe that to be undetermined is to be free. He states that the most simple way to view determinism is to hold the idea that since it says everything we do is predetermined, then we do not in fact have free will. He claims that people think this way about determinism because they wish to connect decision making with human feelings. When we chose to do simple things like wave our arm, we claim that we did it because we felt like it, not because an outside force caused us to. Blanshard make a good point that we should not rely on human emotion to determine if we have free will or not. He makes the claim that determinist are not arguing if we are free to choose, but if we can chose our own choice. Determinist view dictates that choices are determined by antecedents, so we have the freedom to choose which choice but we never decide what those choices are. This claim is one of the most supportive to the determinist view because it explains a position on free will that is coherent with the idea that we live in a predetermined