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Articles

Human Agency and Natural Necessity

Antony Flew considers some varieties of movement.

Dr. Johnson once remarked, in his characteristically decisive way: “We know our will is free, and there’s an end on’t.” ⁽¹⁾ Although this was much too short a way with dissent, he was nevertheless substantially right. For the truth is that the thesis of universal, necessitating determinism cannot even be understood except by creatures who must be in a position to know that it is false.

To appreciate this we have first to recognize that, properly, the dispute is concerned: not specifically with freewill or with free action; but more generally with the nature and occurrence of action as such.

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