Title: Just Exactly What Is Determinism? | Psychology Today
Headings: Just Exactly What Is Determinism?
Roy F Baumeister
Just Exactly What Is Determinism?
Psychological science does not require determinism.

Content: The universe resembles a giant machine, grinding alone exactly as it must inevitably continue to do, following rigid rules. That is determinism. To a determinist, there are no counterfactuals. Nothing that didn't happen could possibly have happened. Everything that did happen was the only possible thing that could have happened at that point in time and space, given the causes. That is why determinism and free will strike most people as incompatible beliefs (even though in recent decades a growing group of philosophers have embraced some form of ‘compatibilism' that preserves a watered-down notion of free will while also embracing determinism). The essence of free will is that the person really could do more than one possible response to a given situation. To a determinist, that is wrong. Causes, including unconscious causes, are operating to bring the person inevitably to what he or she will eventually do. The appearance of multiple options is an illusion, to a determinist.