Does Oedipus control his actions, or are they predetermined by the gods? It is this question that puts forth another question unanswered: Is it fate or free will that lies at the heart of the Oedipus myth? Fate and free will are both present in the Oedipus Rex story and Sophocles expresses these ideas through imagery, irony, and many other literary works. According to Peter Voss in the article titled The Nature of Free Will, he believes that free will allows people of society to have control over their choices, and be responsible for them as well. But, we must be able to make these choices with awareness and understanding(Voss, “The Nature of Freewill”).
We act selfishly in order to survive. This idea is often understood as Psychological Egoism, which Kavka defines as “the doctrine that all human action is selfishly motivated”. This idea is central to Hobbes’ idea that in the State of Nature, a hypothetical situation in which there is no form of government, humans will live in a state of universal conflict. Kavka describes this as “the perils of anarchy”. It is not just this universal egoism, however, which results in this conflict, but rather humans’ insatiable desire for power.
This raises problems for Boethius' argument, however he addresses this and creates a counter assertment. As argued above free will is needed for just rewards/punishments, some people say this because it would be unfair to punish people who could not choose to do otherwise. Others such as Augustine believe that free will is necessary because without free will there should be no evil in the world as there is no choice to create evil where as evil does exist, without free will this must have been created by God, contradicting God's omnibenevolence. Irenaeus' view is simelar to Augustine however he adds that human beings could not be perfect, God is all that is perfect so we were given an imperfect world and free will, so that we would be a reflection of God but not perfect. Hick's approach to the necessity of free will grows from the idea that God wants humans to genuinly love him and show faith, without free will we could not make a decision as to whether or not we had faith, belief or even love for God, we would merely be robots designed to love him.
This postulate of God has origin in one’s own reason which would necessarily mean that submitting to will of God is submitting to one’s own reason. The need of God arises because the relationship between moral law and happiness is not guaranteed in this world. So here God comes to the rescue and thus necessitates the compatibility of virtue and realization of highest good. The postulate of immortality is very much interwoven with the postulate of God. Taking into account the sensuous nature of human beings, Kant states that it is very difficult for a man to be righteous without hope.
John Locke believes man is free in the state of nature and according to Jean-Jaques Rousseau civilization has caused man to be self interested. Although all theories have similar views of the state of nature I will discuss their views of mankind without a state or governance. I believe that state of governance puts mankind in the same dilemma as the state of nature because both lead to the state of war, the state in which all these theorists want to escape. Hence why there is a contradiction in some of these studies. Or perhaps, there is nothing wrong with the state of nature; but the real problem is based on the want for absolutism.
This is an idea which is absolute and according to Kant, the way we decide the morality of an action. Kantian ethics explains that for something to be good, the only true motivation behind it would be Good Will, with desire or instinct considered and the only purpose being to fulfil your duty and act morally. These moral principles are thought to be categorical imperatives which everyone should abide by even if they are of no benefit to them, There are three principles of the categorical imperative, the first being the universal law. It was believed that you should only act on a maxim, which is a personal law or rule. If you would not want the rule to be universalised, you should not be completing the action.
Unlike Freud, Kant views this unhappy and self- controlling man as an ideal that is an expression of his moral philosophy. In Kant’s account, man sacrifices his instinctual demands for the sake of a perfectly “good will” that is capable of acting morally in a complete way. In other words, Kant’s “autonomous” and “moral” individual that has a perfectly “good will” is an extreme version of Freud’s self-prohibiting and unhappy man. Kant replaces the superego of Freud with his “categorical imperative” and man engages in perfectly moral actions by following his self-imposed categorical imperatives. More precisely, one can think of Kant’s categorical imperative as the equivalent of the superego in Freud’s account.
When Brustus stuck his mighty dagger into Caesar it was the unkindest cut of them all. Brutus being Caesar's angel, has committed the greatest act of treason and mutiny. The crowd after is enraged and wants to avenge Caesar. "We'll burn his body in the holy place and with the brands of traitors hourses take up the body." But Brutus is an honorable
Compatibilism is based on the philosophical view of causal determinism, which states that even though one event is always determined by a second event, we are morally responsible for our actions and consequently we have the freedom to make these choices. This can also be applied to human nature and cognition which then establishes the way we behave and react to different situations. On the other hand, incompatibilism states that it is impossible to have free will and responsibility if determinism is true and it is more based upon the argument of origination. Origination simply states that you can only have free will if you are the ultimate source or first cause of action when establishing where it all began. Incompatibilists have two arguments.
A tragedy is a story of a person’s demise brought on them by the specific flaws in their character. The “Tragedy of Othello” by William Shakespeare tells a story of deceit and revenge. Othello, the central figure of the play, is a man noble to his country and people. He is an amazing character, a tragic hero, who has befallen to undeserved misfortune and folly. While it may seem, that the tragedy of Othello was caused by the evil villain Iago, I believe that he was not the only one to blame.