Free Will: A Philosophical Study (Focus Series) [Paperback]

Laura Waddell Ekstrom (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1999 | ISBN-10: 0813390931 | ISBN-13: 978-0813390932

In this comprehensive new study of human free agency, Laura Waddell Ekstrom critically surveys contemporary philosophical literature and provides a novel account of the conditions for free action. Ekstrom argues that incompatibilism concerning free will and causal determinism is true and thus the right account of the nature of free action must be indeterminist in nature. She examines a variety of libertarian approaches, ultimately defending an account relying on indeterministic causation among events and appealing to agent causation only in a reducible sense. Written in an engaging style and incorporating recent scholarship, this study is critical reading for scholars and students interested in the topics of motivation, causation, responsibility, and freedom. In broadly covering the important positions of others along with its exposition of the author’s own view, Free Will provides both a significant scholarly contribution and a valuable text for courses in metaphysics and action theory.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A significant, much discussed book..." -- Eleonore Stump, Saint Louis University

"Both stimulating and informative, it is a pleasure to read." -- Susan Wolf, Johns Hopkins University

"Ekstrom shows good judgment about the issues, arguments, and authors that require attention." -- Alfred Mele, Davidson College

"This is an excellent, well-conceived text." -- Timothy O'Connor, Indiana University

About the Author

Laura Waddell Ekstrom is associate professor of philosophy at The College of William and Mary.

Product Details

• Paperback: 248 pages
• Publisher: Westview Press (December 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0813390931
• ISBN-13: 978-0813390932
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11 ounces
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #616,106 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Laura W. Ekstrom is a teaching professor and Chair of the Department of Philosophy at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. She is a graduate of Stanford University (B.A. in Philosophy) and the University of Arizona (M.A., Ph.D. in Philosophy). She is the author of Free Will: A Philosophical Study and the editor of Agency and Responsibility: Essays on the Metaphysics of Freedom. Her essays on autonomy, moral responsibility, causation, chance, free will and the self have been published in the academic journals Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Australasian Journal of Philosophy, Synthese, American Philosophical Quarterly, Philosophical Studies, and Midwest Studies in Philosophy, as well as in edited collections published by Oxford University Press, Blackwell Press, and Cambridge University Press.

Professor Ekstrom is the recipient of the William & Mary Alumni Society Fellowship Award for Excellence in Teaching (2001). She has held the Robert F. and Sara M. Boyd Distinguished Term Associate Professorship (2001-2004), and has won stipend awards from the Templeton Foundation, Pew Charitable Trust, and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Her forthcoming academic articles include "Liars, Medicine, and Compassion" (in The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy), "Volition and the Will" (in The Blackwell Companion to the Philosophy of Action), "Ambivalence and Authentic Agency" (in Agents and Their Actions, Blackwell), and "Free Will Is Not a Mystery," in the second edition of The Oxford Handbook of Free Will. She is currently working on a new book on agency and luck.