Last Update: February 22, 2026
Topics of Interest
Books
Selected Passages
Questions & Notes
자유의지 ｜ Free Will
Ancient & Classical
◼️ Lao Tzu
> Tao Te Ching (Approx. 6th century BCE): Concepts of wu wei (non-action) and harmony with the Tao / effortless will.
◼️ Confucius
> The Analects (Part of Chinese Classics · Approx. 475–221 BCE): On moral cultivation and human agency
◼️ Arjuna, Prince of India & Krishna
> Bhagavad Gita (Approx. 400 BCE–200 CE): on duty, karma, and detached action in Hindu philosophy.
◼️ Buddha
> Dhammapada (Approx. 3rd century BCE): on karma, intention, and the mind’s role in shaping destiny
◼️ Plato
> The Republic (Approx. 380 BCE): Book IV on soul’s parts and self-control.
◼️ Aristotle
> Nicomachean Ethics (Approx. 350 BCE): Books III and VI on voluntary action and choice.
◼️ The Book of Sirach
> Ecclesiasticus 15:11-20 (Approx. 200 BCE)
◼️ St. Paul
> The Epistle to the Romans, Chapters 7-9 (Approx. 57 CE)
Patristic & Medieval
◼️ St. Augustine of Hippo
> De Libero Arbitrio: On the Free Choice of the Will (388–395 CE)
> De Gratia et Libero Arbitrio: On Grace and Free Will (426–427 CE)
◼️ Pelagius
> Letter to Demetrias (Approx. 413 CE)
>> Pelagius’s Expositions of Thirteen Epistles of St. Paul (Volume 1) by Alexander Souter (1922)
◼️ Boethius
> The Consolation of Philosophy (524 CE)
◼️ Anselm of Canterbury
> On Freedom of Choice: De Libertate Arbitrii (1080–1085 CE)
◼️ Al-Ghazali
> The Incoherence of the Philosophers (Approx. 1095 CE): Causality and occasionalism in Islamic thought
◼️ Hildegard of Bingen
> Scivias (1151)
◼️ Maimonides (Moses ben Maimon)
> The Guide for the Perplexed (1190): Chapters on divine knowledge and human free will in Jewish philosophy.
◼️ Thomas Aquinas
> Summa Theologica (1265–1273) Part I, Question 83, & Part I-II, Questions 8–17.
◼️ St. Catherine of Siena
> The Dialogue of Divine Providence (1370s)
◼️ Julian of Norwich
> Revelations of Divine Love (1395)
Reformation & Early Modern
◼️ Desiderius Erasmus
> On Free Will (De libero arbitrio diatribe) (1524)
◼️ Martin Luther
> On the Bondage of the Will (De servo arbitrio) (1525)
◼️ John Calvin
> Institutes of the Christian Religion (1536): Specifically Book II, Chapter 2.
◼️ The Council of Trent
> Decree on Justification (1547)
◼️ St. Teresa of Ávila
> The Interior Castle (1577)
> Translated by Benedictines of Stanbrook
◼️ Jacob Arminius
> Declaration of Sentiments (1608)
◼️ Dolf te Velde
> Synopsis Purioris Theologiae (p.406-431) by Polyander, Walaeus, Thysius, and Rivetus (Leiden professors) (1625)
◼️ Thomas Hobbes
> Of Liberty and Necessity (1654)
◼️ Baruch Spinoza
> Ethics (1677)
◼️ David Hume
> An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748)
18 – 19th Century
◼️ John Wesley
> Predestination Calmly Considered (1752)
◼️ Jonathan Edwards
◼️ Immanuel Kant
> Critique of Practical Reason (1788)
◼️ Arthur Schopenhauer
> On the Freedom of the Will (1839)
◼️ Søren Kierkegaard
◼️ Charles Grandison Finney
> Lectures on Systematic Theology (1846)
◼️ Charles Spurgeon
> Free Will – A Slave (1855)
◼️ John Nelson Darby
> A Letter on Free Will (1861)
◼️ William James
> The Dilemma of Determinism (1884)
◼️ Friedrich Nietzsche
> Beyond Good and Evil (1886): Specifically Part 1, Section 21.
◼️ Pope Leo XIII
> Libertas Praestantissimum (On the Nature of Human Liberty) (1888)
◼️ St. Thérèse of Lisieux
> Story of a soul : the autobiography of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux (1898)
◼️ Edith Stein (St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross)
> Finite and Eternal Being (1936)
20th Century
◼️ C. S. Lewis
> The Problem of Pain (1940)
◼️ Jean-Paul Sartre
> Being and Nothingness (1943)
◼️ Simone Weil
> Gravity and Grace (1947, posthumous)
◼️ Simone de Beauvoir
> The Second Sex (1949)
◼️ Dietrich Bonhoeffer
> Ethics (1949, posthumous)
◼️ Thomas Merton
> New Seeds of Contemplation (1961)
◼️ P. F. Strawson
> Freedom and Resentment (1962)
◼️ Harry Frankfurt
> Alternate Possibilities and Moral Responsibility (1969)
> Freedom of the Will and the Concept of a Person (1971)
◼️ B.F. Skinner
> Beyond Freedom and Dignity (1971)
Contemporary
◼️ Peter van Inwagen
> An Essay on Free Will (1983)
◼️ Daniel Dennett
> Elbow Room: The Varieties of Free Will Worth Wanting (1984)
◼️ St. Silouan the Athonite /Archimandrite Sophrony
> We Shall See Him as He Is (1985)
> Youtube Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3
◼️ Galen Strawson
> Freedom and Belief (1986)
◼️ Pope John Paul II
> Veritatis Splendor (The Splendor of Truth) (1993): Specifically Chapters 2 and 3
◼️ Robert Kane
> The Significance of Free Will (1996)
◼️ Derk Pereboom
> Living Without Free Will (2001)
◼️ Daniel Wegner
> The Illusion of Conscious Will (2002)
◼️ John Martin Fischer, Robert Kane, Derk Pereboom, Manuel Varga
> Four Views on Free Will (2007)
◼️ Björn Brembs
> Towards a Scientific Concept of Free Will as a Biological Trait (2011)
◼️ Jonathan Schooler
> What Science Tells Us about Free Will (2011)
◼️ Sam Harris
> Free Will: A neuroscientific and philosophical case against free will (2012)
> YouTube : What neuroscience reveals about free will and psychopaths | Why you don’t really exist | Free will with Sam Harris Part 1 / Part 2
◼️ Peter Tse
> The Neural Basis of Free Will (2013)
> YouTube: Philosophy of Free Will | Free Will: The Essence and Nature | The Mind, Consciousness & Free Will | Second-Order Free Will and Criterial Causation | Free Will: Where is the Problem | Possible Positions on Free Will
◼️ Christian List
> Why Free Will Is Real (2019)
◼️ Adina Roskies
> Neuroscientific challenges to free will and responsibility (2006)
> Free Will and Neuroscience (co-authored papers, e.g., 2021)
> YouTube: Free Will and Responsibility in the Age of Neuroscience | Free Will and Decision Making | Big Questions in Free Will Project
◼️ Liad Mudrik
> Free Will without Consciousness? (2022)
> YouTube: Consciousness and Free Will | Can AI Become Conscious | What it means to be aware
◼️ Robert M. Sapolsky
> Determined: A Science of Life Without Free Will (2023)
> YouTube: Do we have free will? | Free will is scientifically impossible | Science of Stress, Testosterone & Free Will | Religion vs Atheism, Free Will Emergence
◼️ Federico Faggin
> YouTube: A free will decision of quantum fields
Yvette Yang 