Existential Comics has nicely illustrated a common line of debate between hard determinists and soft determinists/compatibilists in comic strip form. The whole strip is worth reading. The “compatibilist” in the comic strip represents my own position nicely throughout and is especially effective in the panels excerpted below. The panels below reply to the claim that were we to have immaterial souls that controlled what we did we would be free but that lacking such souls and instead having our brains’ neurology control our actions we are not free.





Did that observation not answer your objection? Click through to the full comic strip to read further twists and turns of the dialectic. Also, if you missed it when I linked to it on Friday, check out Chaos Pet’s ingenious cartoon on the idea of what replacing punishment with “funishment”, as a response to crime in light of considerations about free will, might look like.

Your Thoughts?

Comment here.

For my own posts on free will, check out any or all of the links below. To discuss free will and many more philosophical topics with me directly, join one of my online philosophy classes (first session is free). The topic of freedom and determinism inevitably comes up in each course at some point.

What Does It Mean For Me To Be Free?

Why Bother Blaming People At All? Isn’t That Just Judgmental?

The “Moral Argument” For Free Will Is A Morally Troubling and Hypocritical Faith Position

Free Will and the “Real World”





