| | Joel wrote, The position of Ayn Rand & orthodox Objectivists is considering free will as genuinely "free." But that point of them is contradictory with their position with causation, in where they are 100% determinist.
For more information on this Objectivist contradiction, you may check this link. Since I can't duplicate the link, given my Safari browser, please refer to Joel's post, #188. Let me say here that I am a compatibilist and therefore not an advocate of libertarian free will, so I think that Keikeben raises some important questions that Objectivists need to address. I do, however, think that he gives short shrift to the idea of an entity's nature as being necessary to causality. Without any connection to an entity's nature, causality quite literally goes out the window, because then anything is possible a la Hume, and we have no basis on which to identify a "law" of nature. An entity's action to be understood at all must be understood as governed by its nature - by the kind of entity it is - otherwise, there is no way to make sense out of the concept of causality. To say that an entity's action is governed by something other than its nature makes no sense, because then who or what governs the governing agent, if not its nature? And so on.
But if an action is determined by the nature of the acting entity, then only one action is possible to it under a given set of conditions. To say that more than one action is possible implies that the same thing acting under the same conditions can yet perform a different action, which is like saying that the same thing existing under the same conditions can yet possess a different attribute, which is a contradiction. If it is the same thing under the same conditions, then it must have the same attributes. This may be easier to see if one imagines something existing at a particular point in time, say yesterday at 12 Noon. If one were to turn back the clock to exactly that point in time, one would duplicate the thing and the conditions under which it existed exactly. Given the thing's character and the conditions at that time (12 Noon), it would then have to possess the same attributes, including the same action. Its action is no less a part of its identity than its size, shape or color. Just as its size, shape or color could not be different, so neither could its action. And since time is irrelevant to a thing's attributes if the conditions under which it exists are the same, it follows that given exactly the same conditions, exactly the same entity must possess exactly the same attributes.
Does that mean that man does not choose his actions and therefore is not responsible for them? No, but it does mean that the choice he makes is necessitated by his values at the time he chooses it. In other words, it means that his choices are the product of what Aristotle referred to as "final causation." A choice presupposes an end for the sake of which one makes the choice. There must be something motivating the choice - something that one is seeking to gain or keep and for the sake of which one chooses it.
The argument typically made against determinism assumes that the determining factor (or factors) is what Aristotle termed "efficient causation," which refers to a causal agent that "makes" us act a certain way, in lieu of our own choices. Given this view of determinism, as one of efficient causation, it follows that man is not responsible for his actions or for his beliefs. He cannot be praised or blamed for his actions, nor can he have confidence in the accuracy of his judgment, since he has no control over it. "Efficient" determinism is thus self-refuting, because if one has no control over one's beliefs - if they are determined by a causal agent other than one's own knowledge and understanding - then one cannot know whether any of one's beliefs is true or false, including the belief that one is (efficiently) determined.
In contrast to the advocate of libertarian free will, the compatibilist holds that what governs human action is final causation, which is perfectly compatible with causal necessity. By the same token, the concept of final causation is also compatible with self-responsibility and self-direction, because it implies that a person's choices are determined by his knowledge and values. He can be held responsible for his choices if they are determined by his knowledge and values, but not if they are determined by something other than his knowledge and values, because in that case, his choices would not reflect his true intentions - what he is truly seeking to accomplish. We hold a person responsible for actions done intentionally, but not for those done accidentally, unless the accident was itself the result of negligence, which was due to actions involving prior intent, e.g., the refusal to take adequate precautions or to acquire the relevant knowledge.
So causal necessity in human action is not incompatible with moral responsibility, nor is it incompatible with praise and blame or with rewards and punishment.
- Bill
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