P h i l o s o p h i c a l R e a s o n i n g
4 6 7responsibility. If my actions are produced by random quantum fluctuations
of which I have no awareness or control, then it is hard to see how that kind
of indeterminacy could make me free or responsible for what those random
events cause. For this reason, some philosophers claim that both determin-
ism and also this kind of indeterminism rule out freedom and responsibility.
If they go on to deny freedom and responsibility, they can remain neutral
about whether the universe is deterministic, and then they can end up in
the position that Derk Pereboom calls hard incompatibilism (in the reading
below).
Other philosophers, in contrast, claim that people can choose and act
without being caused or at least determined by any outside influences and
also without those choices being random, because they are based on reasons.
In this view, our choices are not caused by anything other than ourselves as
agents, and then our choices cause our actions. Moreover, we make those
choices (at least sometimes) for reasons that are not reducible to causes. This
view is usually called libertarianism (though it should not be confused with
the political view of the same name).
Both hard determinists and libertarians assume that determinism is in-
compatible with free will or free action. That shared assumption is ques-
tioned by compatibilism, which is the position that we can be both fully
determined and also free and responsible. Compatibilists claim that there
is no real conflict between science and common sense. You can have both,
in their view. Some particular versions of compatibilism are discussed by
Susan Wolf and by Derk Pereboom in their essays reprinted in this chapter.
When compatibilism is combined with determinism, the conjunction is then
called soft determinism.
We end up with three main options: hard determinism (or hard incom-
patibilism), libertarianism, and compatibilism (or soft determinism). Phi-
losophers have recently created variations on each of these options, such
as semi-compatibilism, which claims that determinism is compatible with
responsibility but not with freedom. Still, adding more options does not
resolve these debates. Resolution requires argument.
Although the problem of determinism has been central to traditional
discussions of free will and responsibility, recent philosophers have distin-
guished the problem of determinism from other challenges raised by sci-
ence. One of these new challenges is bypassing or mechanism. The idea is that
freedom and responsibility are challenged not by determinism but by the
purely mechanical or mind-free nature of causation in science. If physics or
neuroscience can explain our bodily movements by citing atoms and neu-
rons without ever mentioning any mental state, such as a desire or choice,
then the causal chain that leads to our actions seems to bypass our minds.
Our mental states, including our desires and choices, seem unnecessary,
impotent, or epiphenomenal (in the sense that physical events cause mental
events, but mental events never cause physical events). The problem is that
it is hard to see how we can be free or responsible for how our bodies move97364_ch22_ptg01_465-494.indd 467 15/11/13 12:14 3M
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