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Free Will

Do our choices originate with us? Determinism, the case against free will, and what is left of moral responsibility.

01

The question

What is actually being asked when we ask whether the will is free, and why so much rides on the answer.

02

Determinism

The claim that the past plus the laws of nature fix a single future, and whether quantum physics rescues us from it.

03

The case against

The dilemma that says free will is impossible whether or not the world is determined, and the libertarian reply.

04

Compatibilism

The argument that freedom means acting on your own reasons without constraint, which determinism never threatened.

05

The evidence from the brain

Libet's experiment, what later work found, and how much the neuroscience really settles.

06

Moral responsibility

What survives if free will does not: desert, punishment, and the reactive attitudes we cannot give up.