Essay On Hard Determinism

Determinism is the philosophical position that suggests for every event there exist conditions that could cause no other event. Free will is a philosophical term for a particular sort of capacity of rational agents to choose a course of action from among various alternatives. Understandably, the dichotomy between these two concepts is a topic philosophers have debated over for many years. In this essay, I will argue how, despite the appeal of believing in free will and its compatible philosophical viewpoints, such as libertarianism or compatibilism, hard determinism proves to be the most compelling theory. To assess the extent to which free will is compatible with determinism, one must first consider other approaches to the concept of free will and whether or not it is something humans possess. A hard determinist, such as d’Holbach, would claim that individuals are not free to initiate actions or make moral decisions, thereby making the concept of moral responsibility redundant. Any moral decisions humans make occur solely due to uncontrollable prior causes. Moreover, hard determinism holds that humans do not have free will and that all seemingly ‘moral’ actions are the consequences of past events that are out of their control. The incompatibility between …show more content…
Assuming that the entirety of one’s life is controlled by outside forces, human life is most certainly incompatible with the concept of free will. While both libertarianism and compatibilism are both reasonable philosophical viewpoints with their own merits, such as compatibility with the concept of free will they lack the support of empirical evidence. Contrastingly, the theory that people’s lives, including their thoughts and behaviours are caused by external forces — also known as hard determinism — is testable, refutable and most notably,