Evaluation

Evaluation

Anselm of Canterbury On Free Will

The evaluation is best read after the overview. So if you are interested and still haven't read the overview, please begin there.

On Free Will:

Anselm’'s goal here is to bring free will into accordance with faith in God. His position is that the will isn’'t free unless beginning from a framework of faith, in which case the will is free to do or not do whatever it chooses. There are some logical problems here, mostly involving circular argument: faith in God allows for freedom of the will, so a free will must believe in God. This is evident when Anselm argues for free will not as a way the human body must work, but as a moral necessity (and a moral necessity propelled into existence by the force of God). “They had free will for the sake of rectitude of will” (Anselm, Ch. 3, 339).

The flip side, then, is that it is easy to prove that lacking rectitude of will (good moral character or, similarly, having an absence of faith) means that the agent isn’t as free at all (because no longer free to have faith or sin. Free will is later said given to rational nature to self-perpetuate and preserve good will (Ch. 3, 340). To have free will is to be capable of seeing the good. An agent has to will not having good will. Having good will becomes the whole point or goal of having free will (Ch. 4, 340). “There is nothing freer than a right will because nothing can cause it to cheat itself” (Ch. 9, 345). Because the will does not do evil, it is capable of doing anything, whereas a will that promotes evil is incapable of good.

If Anselm is to be taken seriously, he should be taken seriously as a Christian theologian first and as a philosopher second. He begins his essay by explaining that “it is no less doubtful that to sin is always indecent and harmful…therefore a will that cannot fall from rectitude into sin is more free than one that can desert it” (Ch. 1, 338). According to this logic, the agent with less choice about what to do with his life somehow has more choice than a sinner because sin is harmful and limiting.

I am going to accept that premise for the rest of his argument, because he talks about the willpower of angels and I cannot accept that unless we allow his argument to be religious in nature.

Anselm also computes certain powers to anthropomorphized forces that threaten free will, such as Sin. He ultimately determines that the will is free to sin in that it chooses to or not to sin and is not dominated by aforementioned anthropomorphic force. This seems an accurate depiction of human agency, given that there is no proof of anthropomorphic Sin forces at large.

To make better sense of Anselm, let us consider his as an argument for free will simply against determinism: if a person is forced to lie to save a life, it is not a causally binding action, because the person could choose not to lie and let his or her object of safety die (Ch. 5, 342). “"The will is stronger than temptation…even when conquered by it"” (Ch. 6, 344). What Anselm means is that one cannot blame circumstance or the devil for doing wrong, but the agent has causal and morally blameworthy character.

Other arguments are harder to evaluate because they make claims grounded in supposition. Anselm compares the will to sight, as if it is a sense organ (perhaps the sensing of God?). The will occurs strongly or weakly, but has no limits defined for its strength. Unlike sight, no glasses are necessary (Ch. 7, 344). This very well may be true: we can consider any number of scenarios or possible worlds where people of varying characters are tested and have an unto-infinitely large reserve for willpower. There is little to say of this claim, except that it is fantastical and impossible to prove. So the will might have no limits, so what? Effectively, Anselm is arguing a tautology: free will is free (unlimited) because it is free. This might be technically true, somehow, but it is seems to have more linguistic than moral interest.

Anselm also deals with the objection of God interfering with free will. His argument is sound, although again circular.
Even God cannot take away rectitude from will because a just will only wills what God wants it to will. Therefore, God’'s hypothetical anti-willing would only be shadowed or mirrored by the agent’'s new bad faith (Ch. 8. 345). This seemingly paradoxical statement echoes the pop religion question ‘"could God make a hamburger so big that even God couldn't eat it?" Anselm seems to be saying here, metaphorically, that the values God's positive powers over his negative powers, so God could create a hamburger of any size, but he is incapable of failure (except perhaps failing at failing).

Only rectitude (good will) as God wills, so a person cannot have rectitude unless God restores it to the agent. A dead person takes nothing away from self that he would not already lose, so better to die before sinning and go on to an eternal reward (Ch. 10, 346).

Free will needs no further definition. It is not free will for preserving rectitude and nothing else—thought it still does that (Ch. 12, 347), Anselm means this all having to do with the definition of liberty (Ch. 14, 348). Perhaps, but even if it is so, it is meaningless liberty for the atheist or happy sinner.

Henry of Ghent on The Primacy of the Will

On the primacy of the will

Henry, like Anselm, focuses on the power of the will. Both were scholastic philosophers, which as I point out in the overview, means that they accepted judgment before facts and authority over reason (Marenbon). This conception of free will as limitless and more powerful even than thought itself (rather than a manifestation of thought itself) is useful only as an epistemological project. Because they are not grounding their researches, then it is more important to have a compelling argument than some evidence in facts. Henry has the more compelling argument, because he focuses entirely on a matter of opinion, really another tautology. Henry of Ghent poses the question ‘"does will direct intellect or intellect direct will?" Intellect being reason and contemplation and will being decision making (Henry, 349). We can make will and intellect two sides of the same thinking organism, though, if we are not accepting will as a pure instrument of faith. His argument stands, though, if his premises are allowed.

He proceeds by trying to find the soul through what he calls its secondaries: power is defined by habit, act and object (350). These are arbitrary distinctions: his own personal imaginings of the soul's character.

Henry argues that will is superior to intellect because the will is universal where the intellect is particular. For example, the will's habits include the love of God or charity (Ibid.). Its acts manifest as will being the first mover in the soul (Ibid.). Its object is being good without qualification (351). This assumes the will can be good, first. Then it is assuming that good will is the natural character of all god-fearing individuals.

Intellect's habits include: wisdom (350). Its acts include likening itself to the reality known, whereas the will transfers itself to the object willed for its own sake, so that it might enjoy it (Ibid.). Its object being the true, which is good only for the intellect. This is a nice picture of what the intellect might strive for, but why must the intellect have a goal? Why not have the intellect merely be the thinking process of a rational agent?

Henry qualifies the universal as greater than the particular (352). This is as arbitrary as Anselm's ontological proof of God, that positive is greater than negative and big better than small. This will lead in to his evaluation that will is superior to intellect, because intellect is used at the direction of willing (so the will wills itself, another tautology). There's nothing wrong with the thrust of his argument, only his arbitrary choice of premises.

Henry claims that intellect always moves for the will. The will commands the intellect. Here Henry uses the example of the master and servant: the master can direct the servant to do his bidding. The servant can direct the master within his bidding, for instance, walking before him with a light (Ibid.). This argument is uninteresting because he is defining intellect and will in arbitrary ways: either way the person is directing his or her self.

Sources:

Anselm of Canterbury. "On Free Will." Medieval Philosophy, Essential Readings with Commentary. Blackwell Readings in the History of Philosophy. Ed. Gyula Klima with Fritz Allhoff and Anand Jayprakash Vaidya.

Henry of Ghent. "Quodlibetal Questions (on the primacy of the will)" Medieval Philosophy, Essential Readings with Commentary. Blackwell Readings in the History of Philosophy. Ed. Gyula Klima with Fritz Allhoff and Anand Jayprakash Vaidya.

Marenbon, John. “Early Medieval Philosophy (480-1150): An Introduction.” London and Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1983.

jsgottliebmiller@smcm.edu

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