FREEDOM OF THE

HUMAN PERSON
Lesson 1: The Will: Its Existence, Nature and Object
DO WE HAVE
FREE WILL?
What is Will?
◦ According to philosophy and psychology, Will is a term used to
describe the faculty of mind that is alleged to stimulate
motivation of purposeful activity.
◦ According to Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Descartes and Kant, Will is a
personal faculty or function.
◦ According to Spinoza, Leibniz, and Huma, Will is an externalized
result of the interaction of conflicting elements.
◦ According to Hobbes, Nietzche, and Schopenhauer, Will is the
manifestation of personality.
Existence of the Will
◦The existence of the will can be demonstrated
philosophically and confirmed by data derived from everyday
experience. It is an act we are conscious of the fact that
some tendency in us is held in check by a higher tendency.
That higher tendency is the will.
◦Example: The Dog and the Meat
Existence of the Will
◦Example: The Dog and the Meat.
◦The Dog does not exemplify the real self-control, or the will.
The response of the Dog is a product of experience: hunger
or fear.
◦Another empirical confirmation of the existence of the will
derives from the fact that we sometimes, will an object which
is repulsive to our body and sense tendencies.
Existence of the Will
◦ Another proof for the existence of the will is the phenomenon
of voluntary attention. Voluntary attention is distinct from
spontaneous attention. Spontaneous attention is present in
animals; it is the concentration of the senses and of the mind on
some object which appeals to one of the lower drives. In
voluntary attention we concentrate our senses and our mind on
some object which does not spontaneously interest us. We
concentrate because we want to concentrate, and we want to
concentrate because our intellect tells us that it is good to
concentrate.
DO WE HAVE
FREE WILL?
HUMAN FREEDOM by John Kavanaugh
◦ The Will is an intellectual tendency, or a tendency toward an
intellectually known good.
◦ The very reason that I find myself having a tendency toward an
object in the first place is because I sense it or know it as having
good things about it. It is the “good” quality of the thing by
which the will is drawn or moved.
◦ I can freely choose a particular good-for-me-now which I
consciously know is not in continuity with my identity and
potentialities.
HUMAN FREEDOM by John Kavanaugh
◦ Reasoning behind the concept “good-for-me-now”
◦ the will is a tendency toward an intellectually known good; thus it is
precisely the ‘good’ aspect of the object which attracts my will,
◦ the only object which could necessitate my will would be a good that is
unconditionally good in an unqualified sense;
◦ in many of my choices, however, the goods from which I select as the
“the good for me in this decision” are all conditioned, limited and
qualified;
◦ therefore freedom of choice can be operative in my behavior.
HUMAN FREEDOM by John Kavanaugh
◦ In conclusion, John might say, first, that I feel free. This is an
important consideration. But feeling free does not necessarily make it
so. The feeling of freedom does not indicate, however, that such
an experience is quite primary and fundamental to our behavior.
Second and more important is that there are levels of human
behavior which, upon reflection and analysis, indicate freedom
as self-possession and freedom of choice. These levels of
behavior, moreover, are not just feelings. They are the
incontrovertible evidence of questioning, self-reflection,
distance, and the awareness of goods-precisely as conditional. If
these actions did not exist, I could not be doing what I am doing right
now.
Thomas Aquinas’ Ideas About the Will and
Human Freedom by Eleonore Stump
◦Aquinas' ideas about the will are a complex of three powers
of the human soul:
◦ the intellect (perceptive, apprehensive, cognitive)
◦ the will (motive, appetitive, conative)
◦ the passions or feelings (sensitive, emotive)
Five stages of a human act according to Aquinas
Stage 1. Intellect - apprehends a situation and determines that a particular end is
appropriate (good) for the given circumstances.
Will - approves a simple volition for that end (or can reject, change the subject,
etc.)
Stage 2. Intellect - determines that the end can be achieved, is within the power of the
agent.
Will - Intention: to achieve the end through some means
Stage 3. Intellect - Counsel: determines various means to achieve the end.
Will - accepts these means (or can ask for more means)
Stage 4. Intellect - determines the best means for the given circumstances.
Will - Electio (choice): selects the means the intellect proposes as best.
Stage 5. Intellect - Command: says "Do the best means!"
Will - Use: exercises control over the body or mind as needed.
Five stages of a human act according to Aquinas
One of these five stages, the electio, is most often identified with the
liberum arbitrium - free decision or judgment. Aquinas used this term
rather than free will (libera voluntas).
DO WE HAVE
FREE WILL?
Human Acts and Acts of Man
 WHAT IS THE
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN
HUMAN ACTS AND
ACTS OF MAN?
Human Acts and Acts of Man

Human acts are those acts that man does as a man,

that is, of which he is properly master because he does
them with full knowledge and of his own will. Human
acts are therefore those acts that proceed from a
deliberate will.
Human Acts and Acts of Man
Acts of man are those acts that man performs without being
master of them through his intellect and will. In principle, acts of
man are not the concern of morals, since they are not voluntary.
These include:
1. The natural acts of vegetative and sense faculties (digestion, beating of the
heart, growth, corporal reactions, and visual or auditive perceptions)
2. Acts of persons who lack the use of reason. (children or insane persons)
3. Acts of people who are asleep or under the influence of hypnosis, alcohol,
or other drugs.
4. Quick, nearly automatic reactions (reflex reactions)
5. Acts performed under violence or threat of violence.
Modifiers of Human Acts
1. IGNORANCE. Lack or absence of knowledge in a person capable
of knowing a certain thing or things.
a. Invincible Ignorance. The type of ignorance which cannot be
dispelled by ordinary diligence. It may be impossible for the individual to
remove his ignorance because he has no way of suspecting that he is
ignorant. (a waiter who is not aware of the poison on the food that he
serves). No objectively wrong act is culpable if it is performed in
invincible ignorance in as much as the element of knowledge is not due
to the fault of the agent.
b. Vincible ignorance. The type of ignorance which can and should be
dispelled. The agent could know and should know can be cleared up if
one is diligent enough. A manila resident who violates traffic laws due to
his ignorance of such laws is still responsible.
Modifiers of Human Acts

INVINCIBLE IGNORANCE eliminates moral

responsibility or culpability. VINCIBLE IGNORANCE
does not eliminates culpability but lessens it. “ignorance of
the law excuses no one” When one is invincibly ignorant,
the act one does would be without knowledge, without
knowledge, there can be no voluntariness, hence no
culpability.
Modifiers of Human Acts
2. FEAR. A mental agitation of disturbance brought about by the
apprehension of some present or imminent danger. The danger may be real
or imaginary, for as long as something apprehended as a danger, it can cause
fear.
a. GRAVE FEAR – aroused by the presence of a danger That is regarded by
most people as serious e.g. death, loss of leg, loss of a loved one) That is
judged to be serious by the one concerned
b. SLIGHT FEAR – aroused by a danger that is not serious A grave danger
that is not very probable.
Modifiers of Human Acts
3. CONCUPISCENCE/PASSION. A movement of the sensitive appetite
which is produced by good or evil as apprehended by the mind. Strong
tendencies towards the possession of something good or towards the
avoidance of something evil. Movements of passions are usually called
feelings.
a. ANTECEDENT Arises spontaneously before the will controls the
situation. Sudden feelings of joy, hatred, pity, grief, anger, as reactions to news,
objects, etc.
b. CONSEQUENT Deliberately aroused by the will to ensure a more
prompt and willing operation
Modifiers of Human Acts
4. VIOLENCE An external force applied by someone on another
in order to compel him to perform an action against his will. If one
resists the violence as much as possible, the evil act to which one is
forced is not culpable.

5. HABITS Are inclination to perform some particular action

acquired by repetition, and characterized by a decrease power of
resistance and an increase facility of performance.
Determinants of Moral Action
1. The OBJECT of the human act is that which is actually
done. From this, we get the character of the objective
morality. There are actions that are objectively in
conformity or not in conformity with the created human
person, and thus, actions in conformity with them or against
them are objectively good or evil as such.
Determinants of Moral Action
2. The second moral determinate is the INTENTION, and
this is the purpose or motive for which the agent acts. While
a wrong intention can make a morally good act subjectively
wrong and cause culpability in the agent, a good intention
can never make an objectively evil act to be good. The end
does not justify the means.
Determinants of Moral Action
3. The CIRCUMTANCES of an action are individual
conditions of specific acts in time and place that are not of
themselves part of the nature of the action. They do,
however, modify the moral quality of the action. The who,
what, when, and where of actions are bearing on the
goodness or otherwise of specific actions. These
circumstances cannot, of course, make an objectively evil
action to be good, but they can increase or decrease both
moral culpability and the degree of goodness or evil in the act.
 FREE WILL &
DETERMINISM
Freedom of the Will
o Freedom in general means the absence of resistant.
o 3 kinds of Freedom:
o Physical freedom is the absence of physical restraint.
o Moral freedom is the absence of moral restraint, of
an obligation, of a law.
o Psychological freedom is the absence of
psychological restraint. It is also called freedom of
choice, since it allows the free subject to choose between
different courses of action.
ARGUMENT FROM COMMON CONSENT
The great majority of men believe that their will is free.
This conviction is of the utmost practical importance
for the whole of human life. Therefore, if there is order
in the world, the majority of mankind cannot be wrong
in this belief. Hence, the will is free.
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL ARGUMENT
1. DIRECT AWARENESS OF THE FREEDOM
OF OUR DECISIONS: In this argument we claim that
at the very moment in which we are exercising our
freedom we are aware of it. We do not claim, on the
other hand, that we are directly aware of being able to
choose freely before the choices is made or after it has
been made.
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL ARGUMENT
2. INDIRECT AWARENESS OF THE FREEDOM OF
WILL : Many facts of our daily life, of which we are clearly
aware, can be explained only if we are free. We deliberated
before taking a decision, we weigh the reasons for or against
it, and we regret some of our past choices. This surely
implies that we should, and by inference could, have acted
differently. We admire, praise and reward virtuous actions
and manifest through our attitude the implicit belief that the
person who performed them was not forced to do so.
THE ETHICAL ARGUMENT
If there is no freedom, there is no moral responsibility
no virtue, no merit, no moral obligation, no duty, no
morality. The necessary connection between freedom
and the spiritual realities is quite obvious and is
demonstrated in Ethics.
WHY SOME PEOPLE
BELIEVED THAT WE
ARE NOT FREE?
Determinism
It is the philosophical concept that every event,
including human cognition and behavior, decision and
action, is causally to an external site. determined by an
unbroken chain of prior occurrences or by number of
forces which compel us to act as we do. If something
occurred, there must be a reason for it and such reason
itself is the argument being emphasized and
highlighted by the determinism.
Hard Determinism is the theory that because
Determinism is true, no one is free; no one has free will
(or choice) and no one truly acts freely. Determinism
asserts that “there is no free will, that we do things, not
because we decide to do these, but because these were
determined to us by a number of forces which
compelled us to act as we do.”
THE ARGUMENT FROM BIOLOGY
Biological determinism maintains that physiological
factors exert a compelling influence in man’s life. We do
what we do because of the kind of body we have
inherited from our parents, because we are born that
way. We may sometimes wonder that we act in a certain
manner but we end up realizing that hereditary factors
have something to do with it.
THE ARGUMENT FROM PSYCHO-SOCIAL.
Psycho-social determinists emphasize a combination of
psychological and social factors as explaining human
conduct. On the psychological side, they point to the
different drives and tendencies which impel the individual;
on the social side, to the continual pressure of the
environment – words, customs, fashions, propaganda, but
most of all in education, in particular, education during the
first few years of life “. Man as part of the social group is
not freely deciding but merely following.
DO WE HAVE
FREE WILL?