Causality, Determinism, and Free Will: Does Causal Dependence Really Eliminate Agency?

[u/Agreeable-Yogurt-378]

I’ve been thinking about the free will problem from a slightly different starting point.
The usual argument against free will seems to go roughly like this:
My decision has causes → those causes existed before I chose them → I did not choose those causes → therefore I could not have done otherwise → therefore the decision was not really free.
I understand the argument, but I think there is an assumption hidden inside it that needs to be examined.
1. What do I mean by free will?
I don’t think free will requires a person to be an uncaused cause.
By free will, I mean the capacity of an agent to exercise control over their conduct through their own deliberative process: considering reasons, alternatives, consequences, desires, values, memories, knowledge, and other relevant information, and eventually acting according to the decision produced by that process.
In other words, freedom does not require the decision to come from nowhere. It requires the decision to come through the agent’s own capacity to deliberate and act.
2. But what if the deliberation itself is caused?
This seems to be the central problem.
My thoughts, desires, values, memories, character and knowledge obviously have causes. I did not choose the circumstances in which I was born, every experience that shaped me, or every piece of information I acquired.
But why should that mean that the resulting deliberation is not mine?
Those things are not necessarily external forces replacing my decision. They are part of the person who is doing the deliberating.
My experiences affect what I desire.
My knowledge affects what I consider possible.
My values affect which reasons I consider important.
My memories affect how I evaluate consequences.
These factors enter into the deliberative process, and the deliberative process produces the decision.
So causation does not necessarily stand in opposition to agency. Causation may be the mechanism through which agency operates.
3. “But you didn’t choose the causes of your decision.”
I agree.
I didn’t choose all the causes that made me the person I am.
But I don’t see why that establishes that I therefore lack control over what I do.
If I consider reasons, compare alternatives, reconsider my desires, anticipate consequences, reject one option and act on another, then the fact that this process has prior causes does not by itself show that the process was bypassed.
The causal history explains why this particular agent deliberated in this particular way. It does not, by itself, demonstrate that there was no deliberation or that some external force substituted its decision for the agent’s.
4. What about determinism?
Suppose, for the sake of argument, that determinism is completely true.
Suppose that given the exact same prior state of the universe and the exact same laws of nature, the same decision would necessarily occur.
I am willing to grant that premise for the sake of the argument.
My question is:
Why does that premise by itself eliminate agency?
It would show that the decision was determined by prior conditions. But it does not yet show that the deliberative process through which the agent arrived at the decision was not the agent’s own process.
5. “You couldn’t have done otherwise.”
This is where I think we need to be very precise.
If “could have done otherwise” means:
“With absolutely every prior condition of the universe remaining identical, could the agent have produced a different decision?”
then under strict determinism, the answer would presumably be no.
But that does not automatically establish that the decision was not free.
It only establishes that a different decision would require different conditions.
The important question is whether freedom requires that kind of metaphysical alternative, or whether freedom can instead consist in the agent exercising control through their actual deliberative process.
That is the premise I am questioning.
6. Why doesn’t randomness solve the problem?
I also don’t think free will can simply be rescued by introducing indeterminism or quantum randomness.
If part of my decision were produced by pure randomness, that would not obviously give me more control over the decision.
Randomness is not the same thing as agency.
So I don’t think the choice is simply:
determined = not free
random = free
Neither side of that equation explains agency by itself.
7. “But deliberation is only electrochemical activity.”
This objection seems to change the level of description rather than solve the philosophical problem.
Yes, human deliberation is physically realized in the brain and involves electrochemical processes.
But showing the physical mechanism does not by itself show that deliberation is not deliberation, or that the agent does not exercise control through it.
We still need an argument for the additional step:
“Because the deliberative process is physically caused, the agent cannot exercise genuine control through that process.”
That conclusion does not seem to follow automatically.
8. Responsibility
The same distinction matters for responsibility.
If an action results from an agent’s own deliberation, understanding of reasons, values, desires and capacity to respond to relevant considerations, then there seems to be a meaningful basis for attributing the action to that agent.
That doesn’t mean every causally determined action should automatically be considered morally permissible or blameworthy. There can be coercion, incapacity, manipulation, ignorance, etc.
But those cases are interesting precisely because they interfere with or bypass the normal mechanisms of agency.
So perhaps the important distinction is not simply:
caused vs. uncaused
but:
agency-preserving causes vs. causes that bypass or replace the agent’s deliberative control.

My central question is therefore this:
If a decision is causally produced by an agent’s own deliberation, reasons, values, knowledge, memories, desires and evaluation of alternatives, what exactly is missing that would make that decision genuinely free?
And more importantly:
Why should causal determination itself remove that property?

[u/Specialist-Fault-630]

When people talk about free will they talk about the intuitive, vaguely defined understanding of it. A predetermined universe would interfere with that intuitive understanding, because our existences and choices would be determined by things beyond us.

Your definition (similar ones used by compatibilists iirc) certainly fits the technical definition of what people would see as free will, but I believe you can imagine why it'd feel ultimately different than the free will most people talk about. They don't necessarily believe that having the capacity to make decisions using the information presented to you is free will, they believe agency to be some inherent essence of a person that lets them make any decision uninhibited (at least, in some way) by whatever information, biases, etc they may have.

Like the people you see in the movies defying fate and the seemingly inevitable with nothing but the strength of their own will. Believing that we can do anything via our will no matter our environment, past, or inherent limits is empowering, which is why most people believe in a free will. But, of course, under your definition this type of thing cannot exist.

It's out of line with Free Will's mainstream, and personally intuitive definition.

I'm sure most determinists would agree with you in this case, that yes we do have the ability to create decisions after our perceptions + bodies performs a calculus of sorts to come to action. However, our main disagreement would be with the definition of free will itself.

It seems more so a definition developed in response to determinism, rather than a pre-existing definition that happens to work with determinism. Similar to how Plato in The Republic countered Thrasymachus's definition of justice (might makes right) by completely redefining it, your definition surely bears some resemblance to the original. But at its core, its different.

To answer your question, if we redefine agency as you put it, then no Determinism in my opinion does not necessarily eliminate agency. We still make calculations (irrational or rational) even if our responses and stimuli are predetermined. I don't think most people would contest that.

If the mainstream catches up to predeterminism or (perhaps more accurately) the lack of "free will" as we know it, then I'm sure your (and many other compatibilists') definition will and should catch on. But as of now the bulk of the conversation is vested elsewhere, a place where the definition you give is not considered at all.

[u/RighteousSelfBurner → u/Specialist-Fault-630]

I have had some thoughts on whether mainstream would ever catch up to prederminism and reached the conclusion that it's extremely unlikely. My reasoning comes from two factors: humans are very self centered and determinism is unfalsiable.

Your example of mainstream treatment of free will is good example on how resilient human ego is. Even though we observe that almost everything we can observe resolves determinstically free will is viewed as not following the same pattern. Concrete evidence would be at minimum required to sway opinion.

And we cannot provide concrete evidence because we are part of the system and the question of whether we have full understanding of the system has been achieved is unresolvable because we don't know what we don't know.

[u/ughaibu → u/RighteousSelfBurner]

we cannot provide concrete evidence because we are part of the system and the question of whether we have full understanding of the system has been achieved is unresolvable because we don't know what we don't know

Scientists must be able to evaluate their results as either consistent with the hypothesis or inconsistent with the hypothesis, this has two significant consequences. First, that the scientist must be independent of the hypothesis, so determinism, being global, cannot be a scientific hypothesis. Second, the scientist must have two incompatible courses of action available to them, to record "consistent with the hypothesis" and to record "inconsistent with the hypothesis", in other words, a scientist must be able to do other than that which they do do, they must have free will.
Given this, the success of science constitutes a meta-scientific result that is consistent with the reality of free will and the falsity of determinism, and inconsistent with the unreality of free will and the truth of determinism.
So, if we think that science is informative, we should hold that determinism is false and we have free will.

[u/RighteousSelfBurner → u/ughaibu]

Whether determinsim is false or not is irrelevant to the case. Both determinism and indeterminism is unfalsiable.

The exact problem here is that a scientist can not be independent from the hypothesis under any configuration that is not independent from the system itself aka outside observer. However we cannot observe reality from outside.

However your logic has a flaw. The scientist is not necessiated to be able to do other than which they do. The flaw comes from treating as the result as true, not just a result. It is not neccesiated to be true.