Taylor, R. (1974). " Freedom and Determinism". In Metaphysics, second edition. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall.
Determinism = metaphysical view concerning Causality that everything that occurs in the world is a result of prior causal conditions
Main points from the reading
Taylor begins by claiming that the world at any given moment is determinate in every detail, and that any indeterminateness resides solely in conceptions and ideas of humans.
In any case, the world as it now is, and every part of it, and every detail of every part, would seem to be the only world that now could be, given just what it has been.
The above account gives the determinist view of how did the world get to be exactly the way it is; answer = previous conditions ensured that it could be no
… in the case of everything that exists, there are antecedent conditions, known or unknown, given which that thing could not be other than it is. That is an exact statement of the metaphysical thesis of determinism. More loosely, it says that everything, including every cause, is the effect of some cause or causes; or that everything is not only determinate but causally determined.
Note: there is a notion of causal necessity built into Taylor’s definition of causal determinism that things could not be other than they are, and relies on Humean-theory-of-causation that associates causality with necessity.
Men believe, or at least act as though they believed, that things have causes, without exception.
Whether we think of such metaphysical principles or not, or are even capable of thinking of them, we believe that all things have causes, without exception.
- e.g. when you hear a noise, you look up to see where it came from. you never suppose that a noise came from nowhere and had no cause Determinism is presupposed in much our common-sense thinking to the point that some philosophers consider it an a priori principle or at least a part of the common sense of mankind
Determinism and Human behavior
If the principle of determinism applies to the physical world, then it also applies to our thoughts, ideas, and behavior. As Taylor puts it:
But what of my thoughts and ideas? And what of my behavior that is supposed to be deliberate, purposeful, and perhaps morally significant? These are all changes of my own being, changes that I undergo, and if these are all but the consequences of the conditions under which they occur, and these conditions are the only ones that could have obtained, given the state of the world just before and when they arose, what now becomes of my responsibility for my behavior and of the control over my conduct that I fancy myself to possess? What am I but a helpless product of nature, destined by her to do whatever I do and to become whatever I become?
The idea is if we accept determinism, then how can we possibly be free, and in control of our conduct?
There are aspects of our self-understanding that already contradicts freedom in a sense: our background, upbringing and experiences have a certain causal influence on how we behave, challenging our unrestrained freedom. It could be proposed then that the determinist thesis is just an extension of this idea to the point that our behavior is fully determined/necessitated by the causal circumstances.
determinism implies giving up the assumption of freedom = if we did give up freedom, could we be held responsible for our actions? what about moral praise or moral blame?
soft-determinism is a view that tries to reconcile determinism as a theory of Causality with the idea of human freedom.
Taylor proposes the agency-theory as a better fit for human freedom (unlike soft-determinism), and is a denial of determinism with respect to human actions.
Considerations that contradict determinism
Taylor gives two considerations (that he calls ‘data’) that seemingly contradict determinism. These are familiar aspects of our daily lives that constitutes important parts of our self-understanding, and should be accommodated by our theories of Causality.
- Deliberation = process in which we weigh options and ultimately decide on what we will do.
Taylor points out in regards to deliberation:
- you can only deliberate on future actions. When an action is in the past, there’s no more opportunity to deliberate
- you can only deliberate if the action isn’t already determined, either by you (your mental state, your disposition, your character) or by necessitating circumstances outside of you. i.e. you can only deliberate over truly “open” options.
- you can only deliberate on matters that are up to you.
If determinism is true, then there are no open options (since all actions are determined by causal antecedents), and so we shouldn’t be able to deliberate
- some actions are up to us If a course of action is up to me, then it must be within my direct control (e.g. pointing my finger right or left).
If determinism is true, then as Taylor puts it:
if it is ever really up to me whether to do this thing or that, then …