Premium
The Folk Psychology of Free Will: Fits and Starts
Author(s) -
Nichols Shaun
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
mind and language
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.905
H-Index - 68
eISSN - 1468-0017
pISSN - 0268-1064
DOI - 10.1111/j.0268-1064.2004.00269.x
Subject(s) - causation , folk psychology , action (physics) , epistemology , free will , obligation , cognitive science , psychology , computer science , philosophy , law , political science , physics , quantum mechanics
According to agent‐causal accounts of free will, agents have the capacity to cause actions, and for a given action, an agent could have done otherwise . This paper uses existing results and presents experimental evidence to argue that young children deploy a notion of agent‐causation. If young children do have such a notion, however, it remains quite unclear how they acquire it. Several possible acquisition stories are canvassed, including the possibility that the notion of agent‐causation develops from a prior notion of obligation. Finally, the paper sets out how this work might illuminate the philosophical problem of free will.