Free Narrative Essays

Do we really have free will? I thought I knew, but I don’t know for sure anymore. A cursory look at our experiences lead us to believe that it seems our actions, words, and decisions just appear spontaneously, out of nowhere. So much so, in fact, that it sometimes seems to us that we are merely observing what comes out of our mouths, helplessly watching ourselves act, as if it were someone else. But isn’t this just a trick of perspective? An existential sleight of hand? Our conscious selves are more the fruit than the root. This is the reality of all of our existences: We obviously had no say about being brought into it. No free will there. That might sound like a pat truism, but there is more to it. Our DNA, the recipe for making our body and brain what they are, was not of our choosing. But that DNA inheritance sure does dictate our choosing. Interestingly enough, long-term studies of identical twins who were separated at birth to grow up in very different environments reveal shocking correspondences between them decades later. Again and again, it turns out that such men had married similar-looking wives with the same names. They’d wind up driving the same…

everything else. It also shows that it cannot be the case that causes are the reason events occur (uncaused or undetermined by cause). This definition of free will takes into account that in order to be held morally responsible for ones actions, one must be justly punished or rewarded. It also takes into account that one should not punish a man for what he cannot help doing. It begs the important question of “how can you punish a man for what was evident that he would do prior to committing the…

IV of Sartre’s Being and Nothingness and aims to explain how it is that one can be free in the face of the deterministic nature of our existence. This essay aims to explain how Sartre sees that there are aspects of existence which can be seen to restrict one's freedom, but under an ontological freedom these restrictions are nonexistent. These restrictions are referred to by existentialism as ‘facticitcity’ meaning the objective fact about the external world which are outside of one's control,…

Central to Omar’s narrative are the conflicting themes of confinement and freedom. Omar, Amjad, Tarek, and Nadia, all dream of a day when they will be free from the Israeli and Palestinian conflict. Freedom to the Palestinian characters means the ability to lead their lives on their own terms, without intervention from a military-police state, without fear of even minor actions being scrutinized as open aggression. But this freedom is merely a dream, something for each character to escape to in…

Fate, a human’s destiny in life, is a heavily debated concept that ranges from philosophy, to theology, and even to modern science; however, even in this range can be generalized in three simplified schools of thought. One may argue that every move in a person’s life is predestined in some divine way, proceeded by the concept of free will with divine consequences, and ending with the idea of complete free will without any exterior factors. In generalizing these categories of fate, some specific…

part IV of Sartre’s Being and Nothingness and aims to explain how it is that one can be free in the face of the deterministic nature of our existence. This essay aims to explain how Sartre sees that there are aspects of existence which can be seen to restrict one's freedom, but under an ontological freedom these restrictions are nonexistent. These restrictions are referred to by existentialism as ‘facticitcity’ meaning the objective fact about the external world which are outside of one's…

History can be viewed as an utterance of one very long sentence. There is a famous philosophical argument concerning our history and our future; the argument states that if determinism is true, and the past and the laws of the universe determine the future, then individuals do not hold sway over what is to come. In the simpler words of Leucippus, "Nothing occurs at random, but everything for a reason and by necessity".There are two kinds of actions; those that depend on free will and those that…

“We Live in Water,” by Jess Walter, is a dark but brilliantly written twofold narrative short story. On the surface, the story is about a series of bad decisions that lead to a brutal murder of Oren Dessens, a World War II veteran in northern Idaho in 1958; and his son, Michael’s search for his father 34 years later in 1992. After Oren’s wife left him because he cheated on her with Bannen’s wife, Michael, Oren’s son, comes to live with him and the first question he asks his father consistently…

The Human Condition The biblical phrase “thou mayest” expresses how there is a choice and is different than “thou shalt” a King James translation which depicts how men will surely triumph over their sin. As opposed to Timshel (“thou mayest”) which signifies how you — you have a choice upon your individual fate. As described within the Bible when God expresses to Cain whilst exiling him to the land of East of Eden. He then instructs Cain to triumph over sin; in Lee’s discovery, he encounters…

Enjoy freedom? Fear for your control. Beatty, a character in Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, states that "Not everyone [is] born free and equal...but made equal" (Bradbury 55). Beatty likes to burn books because he believes that it levels the playing field for all mankind in the most sufficient method. However, Beatty does not consider that by stating this quote, he is affirming the common theme of another book, titled Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. This autobiography was written by…