Quote:Here's an interesting question that I have been pondering.  

 

Is there anything that happens without a cause?  Is anything literally spontaneous?   Is everything that happens caused by something that happened before?   Like billiard balls on a billiard table.   Action, reaction.  Ad infinitum.   One thing causes another. 

 

Now, assume your answer is, nothing happens that wasn't caused by something else.  What does this say about free will?  It says that free will is an illusion.  

 

Causal Determinism

 

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/determinism-causal/

 

"Causal determinism is, roughly speaking, the idea that every event is necessitated by antecedent events and conditions together with the laws of nature. The idea is ancient, but first became subject to clarification and mathematical analysis in the eighteenth century. Determinism is deeply connected with our understanding of the physical sciences and their explanatory ambitions, on the one hand, and with our views about human free action on the other. In both of these general areas there is no agreement over whether determinism is true (or even whether it can be known true or false), and what the import for human agency would be in either case."

 

Here's another definition from the same article: 

 

"Causal determinism: The world is governed by (or is under the sway of) determinism if and only if, given a specified way things are at a time t, the way things go thereafter is fixed as a matter of natural law."

 

So the underlying question is, if you believe in causal determinism, that everything that happens has a cause, is a person truly responsible for his or her own actions?   If everything you do is caused by a combination of your own experience, your genetics, and your environment, then you cannot be blamed for your own mistakes and you cannot be given credit for your achievements.   It was all determined at the time of the big bang.  It's predestined. 

 

Please discuss.