Baron d'Holbach and William James
Determinism and Indeterminism

d'Holbach was a mechanistic materialist (so was Thomas Hobbes, whose political theory we will address later in the semester).  As such, he held the position that everything in the universe is matter and ONLY matter.  All matter follows determinate physical laws, and these are laws that have no exceptions in the physical world.  It follows that if matter is subject to laws, and laws determine the actions of things, and if it is further true that literally EVERYTHING in the universe is MATTER, then everything in the universe is subject to and determined by universal physical laws.


    NOTE:  The position that everything in the universe must happen the way that it does, that there is no choice, that there is no freedom of the will, is called HARD DETERMINISM.
    There are basically two types of hard determinism - one of them is the mechanistic materialist kind.  The other is a theological kind.
        The distinction between the two is a distinction between there being impersonal physical laws that apply to all things regardless of any being's wishes and the purposiveness of some sort of being guiding or creating the universe in some way that is unchangeable.
        Hobbes and d'Holbach were mechanistic materialists
        Leibniz was a theologically inclined hard determinist who happened also to hold that all things in the universe subject to physical or natural laws must follow those laws.  An influential American Philosopher who was also a theological determinist (and who, incidentally, was also a theodicist) was Jonathan Edwards.

    Soft Determinism (also called Compatibilism) is a position held by A.J. Ayer, John Stuart Mill, and John Hospers (among many others).  Those who hold this position believe that determinism (that everything has a cause) is compatible with free will.

    There is a radical sort of theory which we can call "radical free will theory" that implies that nothing has any cause at all.

    Then there is the position of William James (Indeterminism) which is discussed, below.


    Some key points from d'Holbach
        We are born without our own consent; our likes and dislikes are produced from external sources.
        The will is nothing more than a "modification" of the brain.
        We always act according to our strongest desire and one desire may be replaced by another just so long as the one that is replaced is NOT the strongest of the two.  The desire that "wins" is, by definition, the strongest one.
        The simple fact that we deliberate about things does not prove that we have free will.    "...Deliberation is necessary; that uncertainty is necessary; that whatever part he takes, in consequence of this deliberation, it will always necessarily be that which he has judged, whether well or ill, is most probably to turn to his advantage. . . "
        It is absurd to insist that we are free.  To be free would be to act from no motive at all.  And THAT is impossible.
        If you persist in saying that you are free, that you move or do things without a cause, that simply means that you are ignorant of the cause of your motion or action.  We invoke the use of the term 'free' when we don't know what the cause(s) is/are that determine our will.

William James, from "The Dilemma of Determinism"
    See James' definitions of Hard Determinism (Fatalism) and Soft Determinism (Necessity Understood).

    What the determinist believes:  there is only one course of events possible in the universe - the parts of the universe are already laid down in an absolute way - nothing occurs by chance or in a manner different from one that is already prescribed to happen.  "Any other future complement than the one fixed from eternity is impossible."

    What the indeterminist holds:  "Possibilities may be in excess of actualities" and "of two alternative futures . . ., both may now be really possible; and the one only become(s) impossible at the very moment when the other excludes it by becoming real itself."

    For the determinist, if there's a possibility that was never actualized, that means it was never really a possibility at all.

    Who is right?  The determinist or the indeterminist?  Science cannot provide an answer.  Science concerns facts - and "facts can only prove facts".  The argument between determinists and indeterminists concerns possibilities, NOT FACTS, and so science can have nothing to do with the argument.

    For the determinist, "chance" means something like "crazy unreason."  For the indeterminist, chance simply means that something "is not guaranteed, that it may also (turn out) otherwise."

    WJ does not claim that he can PROVE that this is a world of chance.  "At most, we have agreed that it seems so.  . . . From any strict theoretical point of view, the question is insoluble.  To deepen our theoretic sense of the difference between a world with chances in it and a deterministic world is the most I can hope to do."

    What is the status of judgments of regret?  How do these inform the dilemma of determinism?
        Determinism implies pessimism
    "Murder and treachery can't be good without regret being bad; regret can't be good without treachery being and murder being bad.  Both, however, are supposed (by the determinist) to have been foredoomed, so something must be bad in the world.  It must be a place of which either sin or error forms a necessary part. . . ."

    "What interest, zest, or excitement can there be in achieving the right way, unless we are enabled to feel that the wrong way is also a possible and natural way -- nay, more, a menacing and an imminent way?"  How can we condemn ourselves or others for doing something "wrong" unless there was a right way also open to us to choose?