Philosophical determinsim

• Locke's analogy of a man locked in a room:

  • The man believes he has freely chosen to stay in the room, but in reality, his ignorance of the locked door gives him the illusion of freedom
• Locke's view on voluntary actions:

  • Locke distinguished between voluntary and involuntary actions
  • For an action to be voluntary, it must be caused by a volition to do it
  • Involuntary actions are performed without volition
• Locke's theory on freedom and liberty:

  • Locke believed that people's thoughts on freedom were due to ignorance of past causes
  • He argued that most people do not have the intelligence to see that there are no choices to be made
• Locke's concept of freedom:

  • Locke regarded freedom as the power in a person to do any particular action according to the determination or thought of the mind
  • He believed freedom is not an idea belonging to volition or preference, but to the person having the power of action according to whatever their mind chooses
• Locke's view on the will:

  • Locke noted that voluntary actions make us feel free and we seem to have the power to choose certain thoughts and actions, which he called the power of the will
• Locke's perspective on determinism:

  • Locke developed his theory based on the theory of past causes
  • He believed that all events are determined by an unbreakable chain of past causes that cannot be escaped from
• “Any other future set of outcomes than the one fixed from eternity is impossible”-James
• 
  

  “There is no absolute or free will, the mind is determined to wish this or that by a cause”- Spinoza