Without free will, life is a desert with no possibility of meaning. B. F. Skinner (Beyond Freedom and Dignity) claimed we should give up the idea of free will in the pursuit of a more structured, orderly society. The price is too high. I can’t think of anything worse than the mental slavery of Determinism. I’ve been very critical of the Church on this site but one thing the world can thank the Church for is keeping alive the idea of free will.
The Existentialists have taken up the baton of free will. Sartre does it most effectively. According to Sartre, human consciousness is not in the world. It is separated from the world by nothingness. If you think about it, it can’t be any other way. In order to observe the world, and effect it, you must be separate from it. Otherwise the Determinists have a point. The Anthony Burgess novel, A Clockwork Orange, is about these two conflicting ideas, Free Will and Determinism. To accept Determinism is to think of oneself as no better than a clockwork orange.

The reduction of “reason” to only those things which can be known by the scientific method can do nothing else but immerse us more in determinist thinking. The present mindset of science as evidenced by magazines such as New Scientist, is that nothing exists if it cannot be measured or experimented upon. If this is the case, the only thing which exists is matter. Matter cannot be anything else but determined.
The irony is that while science declares itself to be descriptive not prescriptive, the scientism of writers like Richard Dawkins has become prescriptive. The scientist syllogism goes like this: science says it works like this, therefore it works like this. Ergo, we all ought to start conforming to this way of working.
Proudhon wrote The Poverty of Philosophy. Marx wrote The Philosophy of Poverty. Who is going to write The Poverty of Scientism?
There’s a book in this for you David.

Sorry. I made a blooper in my last offering. It was Proudhon who wrote The Philosophy of Poverty. It was Marx who countered with The Poverty of Philosophy.
It is interesting that Marx thought that philosophy was poor because it only sought to understand the world, not to change it.
It is interesting too that for him and for generations of Marxists, Marxism was scientific. His “science” led straight to the Gulags and the Killing Fields.

Interestingly, the more repressive the society, the more pervasive the corruption of its economic and civic institutions. Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union and its erstwhile satellites, and other dictatorships always “enjoyed” high levels of corruption. People who perceive themselves as having no control over their lives try and reclaim what they believe ought to be “theirs” by being sneaky. Much the same happens in over-controlling families which deny their children legitimate choices. Sadly, in being sneaky we paradoxically disavow ownership and hence responsibility for our actions.

Very perceptive comparison, Wladyslaw.  Perhaps you would also agree that the best place to teach and to learn moral responsibility is the family.

I really like the balance of Dr. Vohs’ comments.  Her comment about having compassion for sinners ("discourage a punitive attitude to offenders") because of appreciating the limits of human free will reminds me of Jesus’ “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

David, perhaps another way of understanding Sartre’s point (about separation by nothingness) is that the proper exercise of free will requires some level of detachment from the siren song of moral challenges.

Martin, you’re undoubtedly right about the prevailing winds in scientific journals.  It’s most regrettable that people are so quickly losing a sense of the transcendent nature of the human person.

David Page gives credit to the Church for upholding free-will, but I doubt if by ‘the Church’ he means the whole of Christianity, can really stand up to scrutiny. My understanding of the conflict between Erasmus, who argued that Man has the will to choose good and evil, and must take responsibility for his actions, and Luther, who held that Man did not have this freedom, but was hardwired against God and could only act evilly, and it was only God’s grace that allowed him to act with goodness, was the theological demarcation between Catholicism and Protestantism.

Father Larry Gearhart said: “David, perhaps another way of understanding Sartre’s point (about separation by nothingness) is that the proper exercise of free will requires some level of detachment from the siren song of moral challenges.”

I’m not sure I’m following you. Could you elaborate? 
The question of free will is so complicated and fraught with emotion. I know very intelligent people who simply deny the possibility of it. And yet their every action implies a belief in it. For me, life without the possibility of free will is just unthinkable.

Denial of free will can be a way of abjuring responsibility. To accept free will is to accept tremendous responsibility and guilt. I would be pleased if you could explain what you mean by ‘the siren song of moral challenges’.

Brian Greaves said: “David Page gives credit to the Church for upholding free-will, but I doubt if by ‘the Church’ he means the whole of Christianity”

Your right Brian, I mean the Catholic Church.

I couldn’t agree more with Fr Larry – indeed “the best place to teach and to learn moral responsibility is the family.” The family is the microcosm of wider society or the “human family” – the Greeks spoke of the “oikos” or “household” whence we derive our concept of the “economy” (literally, “the household laws”). The development of moral responsibility involves a finely tuned balance between protective constraints (“limits” or “boundaries” in today’s psychological jargon) and freedom to choose with acceptance of the consequences of mistakes. No family or society can ever get it completely right (ie, be free of mistakes). Thus, striving for unattainable perfection whether in a family or in wider society involves a covert reluctance to accept the consequences of freedom. Many a dictatorial dystopia has flourished in the quest for a utopia. Interestingly, St Thomas More’s “Utopia” (from Greek “ou” = “no” and “topos” = “place”) closely examined is a rigidly repressive regime rivalled only by Plato’s ideal “Republic.”

Sorry - am I missing something? - I thought it was totally obvious that people/a society more and more under the sway of materialism (AKA “Naturalism"(US)) and the materialist world-view, would be more and more amoral; obvious that amoralism is the necessary product of materialism, and therefore materialism will in the end destroy ethical/moral behaviour. Only moral rules that in some sense have come to us from outside of a purely-human source can in the end command authority (all others, as Nancy Pearcey says, must fall under the “Who Sez?” objection). Materialism/atheism is a “consequence insulator” - awful phrase, but meaningful - it means I can do just what I like, to whoever I like, with no ultimate consequences. Materialism comes from evolutionism; as John Blanchard says, what one animal does to another is ethically irrelevant. And humans can always excuse themselves, of whatever they have done or wish to do with fancy theories; the heart of man - says the Biblical prophet - is deceitful beyond measure.

David, I was referring to the difficulty we almost always have in detaching from everyday temptations.  Our habits accustom us to many layers and varieties of moral and emotional corruption.  Consider the typical dysfunctional family and the carping that seems to lubricate what otherwise might be dialog.  We need to be able to step apart from the matrix of enmeshment we typically find ourselves in to be able to make real moral choices.

We usually achieve such moments of detachment in times of actual grace.  Those moments are very precious to us, because they are real opportunities for growth.

Father Larry Gearhart said: “We usually achieve such moments of detachment in times of actual grace.  Those moments are very precious to us, because they are real opportunities for growth.”

I think the same thing happens to Existentialists. There are moments of absolute calm when the mind seems to expand beyond measure. Always short lived. The world comes crashing back. For me, virtue is in the struggle. The best battles are the ones you win over yourself. But the temptation to inauthenticity is always there. As soon as you win one fight you are in danger of being blind sided and losing the next.

I would go as far as to say that society has reached a tipping point where it must adopt a more “free-will” oriented view of things.  Determinism isn’t completely irrelevant, as environment and chemicals do play a part in our decisions, but socio-psychological reliance on either side breeds a sort of extremism that ignores important parts of the equation.

I think, John Thomas, that you have made the ultimate point. Since I cannot improve upon it, I offer it again it its entirety and defy any atheist/materialist to rebut it: “Sorry - am I missing something? - I thought it was totally obvious that people/a society more and more under the sway of materialism (AKA “Naturalism"(US)) and the materialist world-view, would be more and more amoral; obvious that amoralism is the necessary product of materialism, and therefore materialism will in the end destroy ethical/moral behaviour. Only moral rules that in some sense have come to us from outside of a purely-human source can in the end command authority (all others, as Nancy Pearcey says, must fall under the “Who Sez?” objection). Materialism/atheism is a “consequence insulator” - awful phrase, but meaningful - it means I can do just what I like, to whoever I like, with no ultimate consequences. Materialism comes from evolutionism; as John Blanchard says, what one animal does to another is ethically irrelevant. And humans can always excuse themselves, of whatever they have done or wish to do with fancy theories; the heart of man - says the Biblical prophet - is deceitful beyond measure.” End of discussion?