Dear Rabbi Miky,

Thank you for your prompt response. I appreciate your clarification.

Please feel free to respond in Hebrew, as I can read it fairly well. I simply find it easier to write in English.

To clarify my previous email, when I mentioned “uniqueness,” I was referring to the uniqueness of the effect (not the reason), meaning that a single cause cannot lead to multiple outcomes.

Allow me to rephrase: A cause has two components:

* Sufficiency: If the cause exists, the effect must occur.
* Uniqueness: There cannot be two different outcomes from the same cause.

I believe this aligns with your view. Please correct me if I am wrong.

Now to my question: My intention is not to argue that free will can be compatible with the “Principle of Causality.” I understand that this is not the case. Rather, I argue that free will is also incompatible with the “Principle of Sufficient Reason.” Since it seems to me that a “sufficient reason” also has the same two components as a cause:

* Sufficiency: If the reason exists, the conclusion must follow.
* Uniqueness: There cannot be two different conclusions from the same reason.

If this is the case, how does the Principle of Sufficient Reason allow for choice, as it seems to imply a deterministic chain of reasons, each leading to a single conclusion?

Sincerely,

Hello,
I still haven’t understood. Do you mean that if a reason is given, it is impossible for it to have two results that always appear together, or that it is impossible that sometimes result A appears and sometimes result B?
The first possibility is certainly possible. For example, whenever wood is in fire, it burns and the air quality is also harmed. Those are two different results.
The second possibility is that you mean there can be two results, but they will always both occur. That too is apparently not correct, because if the wood is in a closed place then only the wood burns and nothing happens to the air, whereas in an open place it affects the air as well. But you are right that being in fire is not the whole reason. Whether the place is closed or open is also part of the reason. That is, if your intention is to argue that given all the circumstances in the world, the next step is unique and cannot be otherwise, then I agree (except in quantum theory). When people talk about a causal relation, they usually mean a specific event that causes another event.
In any case, if you meant the second possibility, then we have simply returned to determinism, which contradicts choice. In other words, the necessity of the condition means that the outcome is unique. Uniqueness is not an additional requirement beyond necessity. Suppose that in some situation only one of two outcomes appears, and in another situation the second appears; that means the reason is not a sufficient condition for the second outcome.

But none of this touches on the discussion.
You are right that a logical relation as well (of sufficiency; uniqueness is the same thing), and a temporal relation without the physical component of causation, as David Hume understood the causal relation, also contradicts free choice. If that is what you meant, I completely agree. Did you see otherwise in my book?

Isn’t that the Principle of Sufficient Reason you use to explain free will (in Chapter 6)? I understand that “cause” differs from “reason,” but even reason is deterministic.

I defined there the concept of causality, and it includes the component of causation. But what contradicts choice is the logical component. Even causality in Hume’s definition contradicts it. When I say that causality contradicts choice, it is because it contains a logical component.
This is on the conceptual plane. But there is another point.

The very assumption that there is a fixed logical relation between cause and effect is itself a speculation with no empirical basis (Hume’s problem of induction). Only if you assume that in the background there is also a component of causation does it make sense to make an induction and say that the cause is always a sufficient condition for the effect. And that is what creates the contradiction with free will. So beyond the conceptual plane, causation is indeed important to the argument.

I believe I haven’t expressed myself clearly enough. My question specifically concerns “The Principle of Sufficient Reason” which you discuss in Chapter Six (not Chapter Five) as an alternative to “The Principle of Causality.” I’m still struggling to understand why this principle isn’t also deterministic.

I appreciate your patience on this matter.

I now saw that in Chapter Six I explicitly wrote what I answered to your first question as well: that Humean causality also contradicts freedom of the will.
Beyond that, I did not understand your question. The Principle of Sufficient Reason was presented there in order to present a different kind of explanation, one that is not causal. A person who acts by virtue of his will performs an act for a purpose, not because of a cause. An act done for a purpose does not contradict freedom of the will. On the contrary, that is the very essence of will. The reason for my act is the future goal that I am striving toward.

But what is the sufficient reason for this desire? Given the same circumstances and the same person’s judgment, what will be the reason for his desire to be one way rather than another?

Free will is a will directed toward the future. It is a decision to act for the sake of some future goal. But in the awakening of my will, I am actually choosing that goal. When you ask why I chose, the answer is: because that is what I want. When you ask why the desire arose, you are looking for causes for an event that has no cause, only a purpose. When I say that I want to attain goal X, there is no point in asking what caused me to want it.

I don’t see why this is not random. If, given the same person and the same circumstances, I could have either desired it or not desired it, why isn’t it random? The purpose exists in both cases.

Here you are missing a fundamental point of the book. The absence of a cause is not necessarily randomness. That is actually my whole claim in the book.
After all, this is exactly how I reject the common argument that purports to prove that we have no choice: either every act has a cause or it does not. If it does, that is determinism, and if it does not, that is randomness. Wrong: if there is no cause, then it is either randomness (when there is no purpose or reason) or choice (when there is a purpose or reason).

Dear Rabbi Miky,

I appreciate your continued response. I understand that this is a central argument of your book. However, I’m still struggling to grasp why “purpose” itself cannot be seen as either random or determined.

Allow me to elaborate: If I desire X for the purpose of Y, the question remains: why do I desire Y? If the answer is for the purpose of Z, then we have an endless chain of reasoning that appears deterministic. Conversely, if the answer is not for the purpose of Z, then the desire for Y seems random.

My claim is that if you act for the sake of a purpose, that is not random. When you ask what caused the desire to arise, you are asking a question that stems from misunderstanding. Nothing caused it to arise. That is the meaning of acting for a purpose and not from a cause. The identification you are making between this and randomness is, in my opinion, incorrect, and in any case it begs the question. You are assuming that everything without a cause is random, but that is precisely what is under dispute. I claim that it is not.
Let me explain more about your wording. You asked why I desire Y. My answer: because that is what I desire. There is no point in asking why I desire it. It is a primary datum, and yet it is not random. I chose Y because that is what seems good to me. You can ask why it is good. Simply because it is good. That is all.
To clarify, I will bring a parallel example from the realm of good and evil. You can ask why murder is forbidden. The answer: because murder is evil. And why is it evil? Just because it is evil. Do you think the claim that murder is evil is arbitrary? There is no further justification here, and yet the claim is not arbitrary. Why is it not arbitrary? Because I am not claiming that murder is evil just because I feel like saying so, but because that is truly what I think.
So too regarding your question: my desire for Y is not just because I happen to feel like Y, but because that is what seems good to me. But the “because” here is not a justification. It is like saying, “that’s just how it is.”
Another example of this kind of “that’s just how it is”: you can ask why I assume that two parallel lines do not meet (one of the assumptions of Euclidean geometry). My answer: that’s just how it is. Does that mean it is an arbitrary claim? Not at all. It is true, even though it does not require an explanation or proof.

I am not saying that something without a cause is random; I accept that something for a purpose is also not random. But I argue that even purpose, at the end of the chain of purposes, is either determined or random.

Let’s take the example of murder. I wouldn’t ask, “Why is it bad?” But if we are to assume that the same person, with the same knowledge, given the same circumstances, could have believed it was not bad, then it’s a proper question to ask, “Why do you believe it’s bad?” You can’t say because it is so, because despite its being so, you could have believed it is not so. And you can’t say because I believe so, since that makes it random.

The same is true in that other example. I would never ask, “Why is it so?” But I would ask, “Why do you believe it is so?” If you could have believed otherwise, then it is just random that you believe so. And if you couldn’t, then you are determined to believe so.

Back to my example. I believe that Y is good, and therefore I want Y. And there is no point in asking, “Why is Y good?” because it is just good. But I ask something different: “Why do I believe Y is good?” If, given the person that I am and the circumstances I am in, it would be possible for me to believe that Y is not good, then what is the reason I believe Y is good? Is it random that I believe so? And if I couldn’t have believed differently, then it’s determinism again.

It seems to me that we are repeating ourselves.
Why do I believe that Y is good? Because that is what I believe. Why do I believe that two parallel lines do not meet? Because that is what seems true to me. And that is the answer even if there were others who thought otherwise, and still it is not random or arbitrary.

I am not concerned with what others believe. But if the same person, in the same circumstances, with the same knowledge, the same judgment, and the same everything, could believe X or not-X without any reason for preferring one over the other, then I think it’s random. Isn’t that the definition of random: something that could happen one way or the other without any reason?

That is exactly the point on which I disagree. Even if the same person does different things in the same circumstances, that is not necessarily randomness. It is a different choice of his. The difference lies in the question whether, when he chooses X or Y, he is exercising judgment or whether he is simply drawing lots. Again and again you assume an identity between the absence of a cause and randomness, and again and again I repeat that I do not accept that identification, and it begs the question.

I agree that this is the point we disagree on, but I want to argue against your view.

You say the difference is between a random lottery and a “judgment.” So I understand that judgment is the key here. But what is judgment? It’s a person taking all the knowledge he has and all the tendencies he has, etc., and weighing one side over the other. How could the same person in the same circumstances arrive at a different conclusion with the same judgment?

Because he chooses differently. You assume that judgment is a deterministic matter (mere calculation). But it is not. A person can change his mind and his values, and that is not necessarily because circumstances changed.

Then what is the reason someone changes his mind given the same circumstances? If there is a reason, then once that reason is there he is determined to change his mind (otherwise it’s not a reason). And if there is no reason, it’s random.

I agree that we are going somewhat in circles, but I am trying to make my point that no matter how you explain it, in the end you will arrive at either randomness or determinism.

You are trying to clarify the point, but not succeeding. Again and again we return to the same point: in your view, if there is no cause then it is random. In my view, it is not.
I suggest we stop here, because we are repeating ourselves.