Page:Philosophical Review Volume 1.djvu/389

No. 4.] But as this assumption is denied, the conflict is supposed to be between "motives" of unequal efficiency, and the dominant influence is asserted to prevail. But nothing is gained by this assumption. For according to the law of mechanical causation prevalent "motives" must act as promptly as those which act alone, only the resultant will be different in amount. If they did so, a conflict involving deliberation would be impossible. Hence the Necessitarian may choose between affirming the mechanical law of causation in "motives," or denying the fact of deliberation. The only other alternative is the denial of the application of mechanical laws to "motives," and this is the position of the Freedomist. The fact of deliberation, however, is against the Necessitarian, and he may justly be called upon to explain it. He must show either that it does not really take place and that its supposed existence is an illusion, precisely in the same manner as he impeaches the testimony of consciousness regarding freedom, or that it is perfectly compatible with the mechanical theory of volition. The latter we have shown to be impossible, and we may safely leave him to the consequences of sustaining the former thesis. On the other hand, the Freedomist, assuming the fact of deliberation, has only to explain its implications and to show how it is possible, or how the series of phenomena which finally issue in volition is arrested at a certain point and opportunity afforded for the autonomy or self-initiative of the will.

The case against the Necessitarian, however, would seem too easily won by this method of treatment. Besides, the argument does not reach the question whether a man "can or cannot help doing" what he does. In fact the discussion is never carried on with a view to determining the relation between deliberation and the law of causation. The Necessitarian, while constantly implying in the argument that the "motives" are the causes of volition, although probably using his language on this point loosely, nevertheless concentrates the force of his position upon the claim that the agent cannot do otherwise than he actually does, and he assumes the relation of motives to conduct as a proof of this claim. He simply ignores the implication in the