WJEC/Eduqas RS for A2/Yr2: Religion and Ethics (DRAFT)

T4 Determinism and free will

their DNA. There are many empirical scientific studies to support such a conclusion such as Daniel Dennett’s theory of ‘genetic fixity’. Some might appeal to modern quantum mechanics and Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle to argue that modern science is no longer so confident about causation. The general opinion of experts in the field is that there is no causal laws governing subatomic events like radioactive emission or electron transits. They are not, even in principle, predictable. However, this understanding of unpredictability does not explain how the occurrence of unpredictable events in the atoms making up a human brain can account for the brain events which correspond to human choices. Neither does it explain how moral values and responsibility are safeguarded, since it supposes that brain events corresponding to our choices are spontaneous and random rather than regular and law like. A further counter argument could be that science does illustrate humanity has free will. This is because recent developments in neuroscience suggest people do have a free will part of the brain. For example, researcher Dr Sirigu carried out a study and found that free will resides in the parietal cortex of the human brain. Key quotes Free actions, if there are any, are not deterministically caused nor are they caused by random processes of the sort countenanced by quantum physicists or complexity theorists. Free actions need to be caused by me, in a non- determined and non-random manner. (Flanagan) Sir, we know our will is free, and there’s an end on’t. (Samuel Johnson) Another line of argument could be that the psychological concept of hard determinism does clearly illustrate humanity has no free will. The psychologist school of thought of behaviourism is support for hard determinism. Pavlov argued that all our actions are just conditioned reactions to our environment. This argument was supported by several eminent psychologists including John Watson and B. F. Skinner. For example, Skinner argued that people can be conditioned from a young age by a system of rewards and punishments for certain behaviours. However, a challenge to the above argument is that psychology does not illustrate humanity is determined. This is because some psychologists would argue free will is still possible. One such scholar is Humanist psychologist Carl Rogers. Rogers accepts children can be conditioned from an early age. However, he argues, people do have the ability to achieve free will through the process of ‘self-actualisation’. Self-actualisation involves getting in touch with our real feelings and acting on them. Rogers’ theory has gone on to be the foundation of teachings on child psychology. Others have appealed to the experience of emotion. If determinism is true then it is difficult to see why the human brain experiences emotion. It seems that the human brain cannot be fully measured and quantified to the point of predicting behaviour. It could be argued that everyone who deliberates must believe in free will, for it is impossible to deliberate without acting on the conviction that the decision is up to you to resolve. Another line of argument could be that the soft determinism partly illustrates that humanity has no free will. This is because philosophers, such as Hobbes and Ayer, agree that people do not have the free will to make moral decisions because they are completely determined by external factors like causation (philosophical determinism), conditioning (psychological conditioning) and/or biological traits (scientific conditioning). However, this point could be weakened because both Hobbes and Ayer also illustrate that the person does have some freedom, for example, when they are not hindered from carrying out their determined ‘will’.

DRAFT

AO2 Activity List some conclusions that could be drawn from the AO2 reasoning from the above text; try to aim for at least three different possible conclusions. Consider each of the conclusions and collect brief evidence to support each conclusion from the AO1 and AO2 material for this topic. Select the conclusion that you think is most convincing and explain why it is so. Try to contrast this with the weakest conclusion in the list, justifying your argument with clear reasoning and evidence.

89