{"id":46,"date":"2014-10-09T19:10:54","date_gmt":"2014-10-09T19:10:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/boethius101.org\/?page_id=46"},"modified":"2014-12-13T20:08:58","modified_gmt":"2014-12-13T20:08:58","slug":"do-humans-have-free-will","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/boethius101.org\/?page_id=46","title":{"rendered":"Do we have free will?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Oh, there is freedom, for otherwise there could not be any rational nature…Human souls are more free when they persevere in the contemplation of the mind of God, less free when they descend to the corporeal, and even less free when they are entirely imprisoned in earthly flesh and blood. (V, ii, p. 150)<\/em><\/p>\n

If God is the “tiller” that steers everything in the world, are humans capable of controlling their own actions, or are they simply and perpetually under God’s control?<\/p>\n

Free Will.<\/strong> Without the notion of free will, Boethius\u2019 entire dialogue regarding the punishments for evil and the rewards for the good would be rendered null and void. If free will does not exist, then there are no voluntary actions. If there are no voluntary actions, how could one be blamed for committing an evil action or praised for carrying out a good one? Boethius says that if there were no free will, \u201cthere\u00a0[would be]\u00a0no virtues or vices anymore, but only a jumble of rewards and punishments of merits and faults that cannot be distinguished from one another<\/em>\u201d (V, iii, p. 156). \u00a0The absence of free will would render obsolete the rules that supposedly govern society, therefore Boethius is, overall, in favor of the concept of free will; he believes it exists, and he believes humans have it.<\/p>\n

By Boethius\u2019 logic, we\u00a0exercise free will\u00a0only when we use reason and rational thought to come to our decisions. If we are making rational decisions, we are acting in our own best interests\u2014we are pursuing happiness.\u00a0On the contrary, if our decisions are motivated by external factors,\u00a0such as\u00a0the desire for things that are not good for us, then we are not <\/em>exhibiting free will, as we are pursuing the bad instead of the good. No rational, reasonable person would willingly seek the bad. \u00a0Essentially, Boethius is suggesting that we cannot freely seek the bad and that the only time we are exercising our free will is in pursuit of the good.\u00a0\u00a0Consequently, the only people who truly have free will are those who consistently seek happiness, the goodness that is God,\u00a0through rational and reasoned thought.<\/p>\n

Reflection.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

According to Boethius’ explanation,\u00a0we are capable of\u00a0exercising\u00a0the coveted\u00a0free will only when\u00a0we pursue the good.\u00a0 His\u00a0logic\u00a0is ostensibly paradoxical, for it\u00a0dictates that\u00a0if we are only free to choose when we choose good,\u00a0forcing us\u00a0to question whether\u00a0our choices are really free. Under further examination, however,\u00a0we realize that Boethius is operating under a different definition of freedom, which states that\u00a0freedom is not about having the most choices but the best ones.<\/p>\n

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Oh, there is freedom, for otherwise there could not be any rational nature…Human souls are more free when they persevere in the contemplation of the mind of God, less free when they descend to the corporeal, and even less free when they are entirely imprisoned in earthly flesh and blood. (V, ii, p. 150) If […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-46","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","no-featured-image"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/boethius101.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/46","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/boethius101.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/boethius101.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/boethius101.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/boethius101.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/boethius101.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/46\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":207,"href":"https:\/\/boethius101.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/46\/revisions\/207"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/boethius101.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}