Freedom

Freedom

Is freedom really free? This is the question, which plagued many philosophers' minds for many years. During the last few weeks we have studied three philosophers who had decisive opinions on free will and the role it plays in our lives. The philosophers cover the variety of types of freedom from determinism to complete free will. These philosophers' ideas have enabled me to shape my own personal opinion on freedom and have shaped me into the person I am today.

The idea that our life has been determined played a key role in the development of my opinion on freedom. Searle was one of the first philosophers to come up with the idea of determinism. He believed that all of what we see as free will is actually determined. He feels that although to us it may seem as if we are making the decision we do not know if that decision has already been made. What makes this argument strong is that he says that people will probably not agree with it because what they see is free will, however, we are tricked.

This part of the argument is what I most find compelling because I think that Searle has thought though his argument completely. Although it may seem as though it has a major flaw to others, to him it is through this flaw that his point can be proven. Although I do not completely agree with his argument I find his to be one of the strongest among those which we studied. Before this section I felt as though everything we did was free will, but after Searle's argument I began to question. I soon realized that he is right in that there is no way to determine if the decisions we make are in fact our own decisions. For example, if I choose to take the Highway home and get in an accident, I would never know what would have happened if I had gone home by the side streets. However, Searle would say that the fact that I choose what I did was already determined, due to previous experiences and repetition. This