Maria Gamman

This thesis is an investigation into the free will debate and the problem of free will. Is free will and moral responsibility possible in a determinate universe? As old as this problem is, philosophers are still grappling with it and the debate on this issue is still very much alive. How we address this problem depends on what definition of freedom we use, and it depends on whether we relate the concept of moral responsibility to freedom or not. I argue that the position called hard incompatibilism is the position that coheres best with naturalism given the definition of freedom I support. By naturalism, it is meant a view that doesn`t contradict natural sciences. I aim for an understanding of action and morality that doesn`t introduce any phenomena that isn`t natural. Many arguments in favor of hard determinism when it comes to human agency are also satisfactory coherent with naturalism, but has weaknesses hard incompatibilism avoids. Indeterminism poses just as much of a threat to free will as determinism does, thus the best solution is to deny freedom all together and rather focus on control as a means to achieve our goals etc.. I attempt to show that with the most reasonable understanding of the concept of freedom", determinism is not - as compatibilists argue - compatible with free will. My main question is can hard incompatibilism offer a solution to the free will and moral responsibility problem that does not require a revolution of our reactive attitudes?" The relationship between free will and moral responsibility is what stands in the way of the compatibilist solution; it seems unfair and unreasonable to hold someone morally responsible for something they could not have done differently and for being someone they have not designed. In this thesis I show that one needs to accept a strong concept of freedom in order to argue that an agent is morally responsible for his actions. I will, however, distinguish between ultimate moral responsibility - which requires true free will, and the ability to respond to moral situations as a moral agent; practical moral responsibility- which I claim doesn`t require free will. By trying to give a naturalistic account of what morality might be- or at least by arguing in favor of seeing morality as something natural, I will try to show that the ability to act morally responsible has nothing to do with the ability to do otherwise" or design oneself, and that human agents can therefore be practically morally responsible even if hard incompatibilism is true. However, they cannot justifiably be subject to condemnation for their actions because they lack ultimate moral responsibility. This way, I end up denying the need for a revolution of our reactive attitudes as a result of believing in hard incompatibilism. And, possibly also calming the fear of those who think that denying free will can lead to chaos, when it comes to moral conduct. I end up concluding that a belief in hard incompatibilism would leave us pretty much with status quo when it comes to moral demeanor. The hard incompatibilist solution I`m suggesting allows us to keep our reactive attitude patterns the way they are described by Strawson and to judge when we feel like someone could have done better. However, the difference between this and the compatibilist solution is that the grounds for condemnation disappear because of its dependence on free will.