Introduction to Philosophy of the Human Person
Module 5: The Nature of Freedom
Lesson 1: Existentialism
Existentialism
A philosophical movement known for its inquiry on
human existence.
Existentialism is opposed to the idea that man has a
fixed nature. Instead, it asserts that to understand
man's nature, one has to go beyond the claims of
biology, physics, and psychology.
Remember that a human person is characterized as a
consciousness; as a being-for-itself, who has the task of
appropriating a goal because the nothingness reveals
that the being-for-itself is a deficiency,
Aside from the concept of nothingness, freedom is
viewed as something that arises from the self-
understanding, accompanied by the mood of anxiety.
Why anxiety?
In the same context as the notion of nothingness, the
self in threatened and is revealed as vulnerable because
anxiety pulls the being-for-itself from the projects which
it has appropriated itself with.
Martin Heidegger a German philosopher and
phenomenologist, disclosed that the mood of anxiety
reveals nothing. Anxiety teaches the being-for-itself that
it does not coincide with all the self-identification it has
immersed itself into.
Lesson 2: Determinism: Undermining Free
Choice
Determinism: Undermining Free Choice
Determinism opposes the notion of free will. This view
states that the world is governed by (or is under the
sway of) determinism if and only if, given a specified
way thing are at a time, the way things go thereafter is
fixed as a matter of natural law.
This view suggests that a determinate set of conditions
can produce only one possible outcome given the fixed
laws of nature.
Through the principle of Universal Causation, every
physical event falling under the laws of nature is caused
in accordance with these laws.
Hence, the idea that every physical event has a cause
logically determines that there may be an explanation
for an event because it has a necessary cause.
Determinism has a direct implication in human actions.
The human action as an event that was caused by
something implies that free choices is impossible
because the regularity of actions means that the cause
of an action, given a determinate set of conditions, will
result in one possible outcome.
This is the same with choices, as events will imply that
no other choice is possible except for that one choice a
person is determined to choose.
CLASSIFICATION OF DETERMINISMS
Causal Determinism
Incompatible with the notion of freewill because it
undermines free choice if past events will be revealed
as the cause of future actions and not really chosen by
the individual as a free agent.
Physical Determinism
Claims that since the body is physical, every event
involving the body is determined. According to this
view, given a set of determinate conditions in the brain
and the laws of nature, bodily movements are causally
determined. The state of the brain acts immediately
before a decision is made is what makes a person do a
certain act, and that decision is the only possible
outcome at the particular moment when the action is
being done.
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Lesson 3: The Value of Choices in Relation to
Freedom
The Value of Choices in Relation to Freedom
Freedom involves choice. It is a man's capacity to do
otherwise. As Sartre said, it is through choice that a
man lives an authentic human life.
However, the concept of determinism under cuts the
human action of choosing because an action always has
one possible outcome.
Humanity without the capacity to choose is a pawn to
whoever or whatever nature allows to happen.
As implied, when man cannot choose, he tends to
believe that he cannot be made responsible for the
choices he makes because his actions are not from a
deliberate act of choosing but a causal connection
between events beyond his control.
If human beings are determined, life seem to be futile
or even absurd, because they live to simply go with the
flow, with what the law of nature dictates. Whatever
action they choose is not really a choice but is what
nature dictates.
Fatalism - a view that states that one is powerless to do
anything than what he actually wants to do.
The act of choosing is valuable because it gives the
human person the reason to make deliberate actions
out of motives that reveal his autonomy as an
individual.
If a person has the capacity to choose, then that person
can be held responsible over the consequences of his
actions. If the choice lies in his own hands, he would
take considerable time before acting on something
because he knows that if the consequences is not what
he intends to happen, he gets the blame. Hence, the
person becomes prudent with the choices he makes.
Lesson 4: The Nature of the Choices We Make
The Act of Making a Choice
The act of making a choice involves evaluating the
reasons and giving weight to reasons. One alternative is
chosen because the reasons behind such alternative
have more weight than the other.
Robert Nozick explains in his 1981 book, Philosophical
Explanations, that making a choice seems to feel like
there are various reasons for and against doing the
alternative actions or courses of actions one is
considering, and it seems and feels like one could do
anyone of these alternatives.
Nozick introduced the concept of weighing the reasons.
He explained that when you are choosing, the act
involves not only the reasons but giving weight to
reasons. After you have chosen each alternative, you
will realize that some considerations carry more weight
than the others.
That is why you choose one alternative and discard the
other. What is interesting in this act of making choices is
that the consideration was not previously defined. The
reasons do not come with precisely given weights; the
decision-making process is not done to discover such
weights but to assign them.
Nozick further suggests a theory of values in the act of
giving weights. These values are intrinsic, instrumental,
originative, and contributory.
INTRINSIC VALUE - the value it has for itself apart from
or independent of its consequences. If intrinsic value is
applied for each alternative, you choose this alternative
by the weight you give to the alternative because the
alternative itself is valuable for its own right.
INSTRUMENTAL VALUE - Instrumental is the function
and measure of intrinsic value that it leads to. It may be
the sum of intrinsic value of different things it actually
leads to or some measure of the intrinsic values it might
lead to as weighted by probabilities such as the
expected intrinsic values.
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ORIGINATIVE VALUE -Introduces new values to the

world. It may be newly intrinsic values or newly
instrumental values. Through this third value, you may
have all three values combined. That is why a person
with originative value can make a difference in this
world. His or her actions can affect change and different
valuable consequences can happen. However, the
originative value can be denied by causal determination

CONTRIBUTORY VALUE - Focuses on the value

contribution that a human action effect. Most human
beings want their actions to have contributory values.
At the very least, even if the contributory value is not an
original one, the contributory factor helps in
differentiating the existing case without the factors
effected by the contributory value if it did exist.

When you make a choice, the act of choosing is

intentional or purposeful. It is a free choice that you
made among the alternatives, and such choice was
based on the weight of the reasons you put on the
choices.

In the act of giving weights to the alternatives, you may

find that some of these alternatives and their reasons
may have more weight or are more important to you, so
you choose that alternative and act on it.

The reasons you made for those particular alternatives

satisfied the requirements you have set and is,
therefore, satisfactory. Though caused, the act is free of
causal determinism because the reasons are an effect of
a deliberate, autonomous decision-making process.

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