Abstract

For a long time, Daniel Dennett, like many philosophers, has been trying to understand how to make room for free will in a world of ordered causes. A core feature of Dennett's view on these matters is that the world is deterministic and his approach to this project has been to show how determinism really is our friend rather than our enemy . His most recent foray into this arena is the ambitious book, Freedom Evolves, where he once again seeks to make clear that determinism does not threaten any of the freedoms worth wanting' that is, free will is compatible or consistent with determinism and that free will is a capacity that has evolved just as we as a species have evolved. My primary concern in this essay will not be on evolutionary theory and its role in the evolving capacity for free will. Rather, I will focus my attention on two features of Dennett's recent book that seem most closely related to understanding the nature of freedom. The first feature is his view, and accompanying arguments, that a deterministic world is no obstacle to free will. Here, he is at pains to argue two theses crucial to his project: that determinism does not imply inevitability, and that determinism does not imply that there are no genuine options. The second feature is his discussion of incompatibilism { the view that free will is inconsistent with determinism - through what many acknowledge as the best incompatibilist account of free will going these days, that of Robert Kane . Here, Dennett pursues three theses: that Kane's account does not need the indeterminism that inspired itscreation, that Kane cannot harness indeterminism in any way distinguishable from determinism, and that Kane's requirement that decisions be made by agents 'here and now' roughly up to them at the time of choice is unmotivated at best and incoherent at worst. If Dennett were to score a knockout on these three points against Kane, it would indeed look bad for any incompatibilist relying on indeterminism. In discussing Dennett's treatment of Kane, I also will raise some critical questions for Kane. Independent of Dennett's worries, incompatibilism is not home free