Mulonas 1

Determinism v. Free Will

Jordan Mulonas

COM 295

Section 3

Prof. Harmsen

September 19th, 2019

 Mulonas 2

Determinism and free will are two different ideas. Both are very important to

consider. One is neither right nor wrong necessarily, but they are different ideas. Depending

on a person’s beliefs, they may favor one idea over the other.

Determinism is the doctrine that all events, including human action, are ultimately

determined by causes external to the will. Hard determinism is the belief that all events are

causes by past events such that nothing other than what does occur could occur.

Free will is the ability to choose between different possible courses of action

unimpeded. Libertarian free will is the belief that humans’ actions are freely chosen. Free

will is an action that is free only if the person making the decision could have chosen another

option.

There are different theories to keep in mind when thinking about determinism verses

free will. Event causation says that no physical event can occur without having been causes

by a previous physical event. Agent causation is the theory that a person can starts a chain

of causality that was not caused by anything else. Reductionism is the theory that all parts

of the world and all experiences can. Be traced back to a singular thing.

Philosophers have taken determinism to imply that individual human beings have

no free will and cannot be held morally responsible for their actions. Free will is closely

linked to the concepts of responsibility, praise, guilt, sin and other judgements which apply

only to actions that are freely chosen.

 Mulonas 3

With these concepts and important theories kept in mind, the earth must revolve

around either determinism or free will. They cannot mutually exist. I believe that the earth

must revolve around determinism, for the reasoning that everything is based off of prior

events.

Thinking about the reductionism theory, everything can be traced back to a single

event. When waking up in the morning and a person thinks “I will have cereal for breakfast

today”, this may seem like a choice of free will but subconsciously this is related back to

prior events. The person may have a tie to cereal, or maybe they dreamed about cereal the

night before, or they saw a commercial that made them crave cereal. The person may not

even notice there are outside forces causing their decision. Therefor free will is an illusion

that humans think that they have, but without knowing or understanding, every event or

choice that they have is traced back and caused by past events.

Although it seems that the earth must revolve around determinism, some people do

not agree. Some people a firm-believers in free will. This is important to keep in mind when

studying communication theory. Throughout communication, we learn of differences and

similarities in people. We learn to respect individualism and the idea that there are many

different ways of thinking and living.

Lastly, there is no right or wrong. Determinism seems to be true to some people, and

free will seems to be true to others. The key to understanding this topic is that we need to

learn to respect each person’s opinion, their choices ,and their beliefs.