What Freedom in a Deterministic World Must Be

Mind 130 (519):863-885 (2021)
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Abstract

Contrary to Lewis and Vihvelin, I argue that free will in a deterministic world is an ability to break a law of nature or to change the remote past. Even if it were true, as Lewis and Vihvelin think, that an agent who is predetermined to perform a particular act might not break a law or change the remote past by doing otherwise, it would nevertheless be true that he is able to do otherwise only if he is able to break a law or to change the remote past.

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Brian Looper
North Carolina Central University

Citations of this work

Arguments for incompatibilism.Kadri Vihvelin - 2003/2017 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Freedom and the open future.Yishai Cohen - 2023 - Analytic Philosophy 64 (3):228-255.

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References found in this work

Counterfactuals.David Lewis - 1973 - Tijdschrift Voor Filosofie 36 (3):602-605.
Counterfactuals.David Lewis - 1973 - Foundations of Language 13 (1):145-151.
Humean Supervenience Debugged.David Lewis - 1994 - Mind 103 (412):473--490.
Counterfactuals.David Lewis - 1973 - Philosophy of Science 42 (3):341-344.

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