Understanding Indeterminism: Freedom and Human Existence
Indeterminism: Freedom and Human Existence
Indeterminism is a philosophical position holding that humans are not wholly determined. It posits a radical and fundamental human freedom. It does not claim *absolute* freedom, as that is only possible with God. Humans are free, but various circumstances influence an individual’s choices. Physical laws of chemistry or biology limit human action but do not determine it entirely: we have some leeway within them. Indeterminism acknowledges conditioning but rejects determinism. Influencing circumstances include experiences, gender, environment, and language. Ortega y Gasset stated that a human is a conditioned being whose identity is formed within their circumstances.
Types of Indeterminism
From Biblical Revelation
There is a perceived similarity between God and good, and sin and evil. Goodness aligns with freedom, like God. Paradoxically, sin entails a loss of freedom, representing a failure. Liberation, or resurrection, signifies a different state of existence, a degree of fulfillment, joy, and total freedom for humanity. Serving freedom and love, rather than carnal desires (power, laziness, caprice, selfishness), opposes self-imposed slavery.
Thomism (St. Thomas Aquinas)
St. Thomas Aquinas believed that humans possess complete freedom because they are created by God as rational beings. Faith and reason are theoretical dimensions that allow us to understand and speculate about the nature of things; they are tools to understand the Word of God. If someone cannot comprehend through faith, a rational explanation can suffice. Reason involves some uncertainty in action. Reason allows us to decide and deliberate, which grants us freedom. *Note*: It could be argued that reason drives all rational beings to the same response given the same set of variables.
From the Ethical Necessity of Man
Human rationality leads to morality, prompting the question of what to do. Morality stems from humanity, but not from human nature. Science (heteronomous, dependent on the material world) aims to understand natural phenomena under our moral experience. Morality (autonomous, self-dependent) is not based on past experience and has no fixed law: it is a realm of human freedom where each individual seeks what they *should* do. This necessitates assuming the existence of freedom, an essential human property enabling morality. Without freedom, there would be no morality to judge actions; life would be amoral.
From the New Physical Science
Scientific laws are probabilistic formulas (as supported by the uncertainty principle). Natural laws are not deterministic; they are highly probable but not necessarily absolute. Scientific theories are instruments; they do not dictate the nature of reality but serve as tools to understand its complexity. Theories are statements *about* nature, not nature itself. They cannot definitively determine nature through mathematical rules, which are human inventions. A comparison: a chalk line on a blackboard appears straight from afar, but closer inspection reveals its imperfections. Similarly, theories are our tools for approaching nature from a distance, but they are not nature itself.
From the Psychological Consciousness of Being: Existentialism
Existentialism is a philosophical view that defines humans not by their essence but by their existence. We first exist and then construct our life plan, leaving our lives and end open-ended.