AQA ESSAY. MISS JONES 2011
Although libertarianism and determinism, regardless of hard or soft, have very different views on life, one concept that interests all parties is free will. The question whether we have free will and are therefore morally responsible for our actions provokes very different arguments and points of view. Liberations, such as Mill and
Kant, are incompatiblist’s who believe we do have free will and are therefore responsible, opposing this is hard determinism including Christians who believe in predestination, which strongly disagrees with both claims due to causation, where as soft determinism being a compatiblist approach tries to meet both these views in the middle. They believe that our lives are affected by an element of causation but the final decision is down to us, therefore we are morally responsible for our actions.
The debate about free will can be linked back to the human condition, because human beings in their nature ask ultimate questions, why am I here? What is the purpose of life? And obviously, am I am free thinking agent or is my future predestined?
Religion is a good tool to answer such questions, especially Christianity because within this one religion, all three theories can be self satisfied.
Libertarianism can go right to be beginning of the Bible, Genesis where Adam and
Eve are told not to eat from the tree; Eve is miss guided through two vices, temptation and curiosity portrayed by the slippery serpent. God did not stop Adam and Eve from committing a sin, he gave them the free will and they disobeyed God, and to show they had moral responsibility for their actions, they suffered the consequence of being thrown out of the Garden of Eden.
For Kant, such an example would back up his main philosophical thoughts, ‘ought to implies can’ meaning if Eve ought not to eat the apple, then it is possible for her not to. Having free will is what separates human beings from the animal kingdom.
For Christians the fact there is a God and a heaven and hell shows we have free will and more importantly moral responsibility because if there was no God or rewards or sanctions, what would be the point of being moral/virtuous person and doing the
‘right’ thing in the first place? God is also Omni benevolent and through his love for us, he would want us to be free moral agents and also show him and his creation
Agape by freely following his teachings.
For Christians God made us unique, Mill would argue that if we weren’t free and puppets on a string, what was the point of giving us different personalities? If God made us within his own image, and he is also omnipotent then he must also have free will along with man, otherwise He is also limited and therefore it contradicts the
Christian concept of God. We know how to make the right decision through our conscience, which for many like St Paul is the voice of God within us.
A group of Christians called Calvinists believe in something called predestination.
They believe that God maps out our life for us from the minute we are born; he decides who is going to heaven and who is going to hell. Our life is just one large butterfly effect governed by internal and external causation. For example, my DNA

AQA ESSAY. MISS JONES 2011
(internal) and where I live (external) could effect how well I do at school, because if I live in a nice area I will go to a better school and if I have genes from academic people I am more likely to do better at school. I should therefore not be upset and feel
I had any responsibility in the fact that I failed all my exams and got thrown out of school and have turned to crime. God decided I am going to hell for being a ‘bad’ person and how I become a ‘bad’ person is because everything around me and within me caused me to do things; I therefore should never be punished for my actions.
Soft determinists would argue that yes internal and external factors may have not helped in how well I shall do at school, but I had the choice to go and ask for extra help so I wouldn’t fail my exams. I therefore cannot deny I had no part to play, just like Eve couldn’t tell God, ‘but the serpent told me to eat it’, she had the free will to say no but she chose otherwise and had to live with the consequences like it is well documented in the Bible.
For Hard determinists God must control our actions because he is omnipresent, omniscient and omnipotent, beings everywhere, knowing everything and being all powerful would give such a supreme creator the opportunity to govern all creation.
Along with this people might use science to further prove their Christian belief because a scientist can predict an outcome based on a previous pattern and then use empirical evidence to back up his predictions along with an experiment, for example quantum physics.
Over all it is clear to see how Christianity can self satisfy both libertarianism and determinism through the Bible and the empirical world in which we live in.