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DUNS SCOTUS ON THE WILL* (I made them) . . . . . . authors to themselves in all, Both what they judge and what they choose; for so I formed them free, and free they must remain TUl they enthrall themselves. Milton, Paradise Lost, III 122—25 For Duns Scotus, the wiU has no example or analogue in the rest of nature. He takes it to be an elementary, simple self-activity, not derivable from anything else, and distinct from every sort of activity that is not the wiU. Its distinctive characteristic is its complete freedom with respect to action of opposite kinds. Since it is unique, it is not capable of being defined; but anyone can obtain an immediate awareness of the will as free. "Whoever makes an act of wiU experiences in himself that he can also not wUl."1 "Anyone can experience this in himself: when someone else presents to him something as good and even shows it as a good to be considered and wiUed, he can turn away from it and refuse to elicit any act of wiU towards it."8 That such extreme contingency , taken as an example of contingency in general, is underivable from any prior principles can be shown by the following argument: Inference is possible from the less perfect, i. e., the contingent, to the more perfect, i. e., the necessary, but the reverse is not possible. "Therefore, it cannot be shown by means of some prior and distinct middle term, that being is necessary or contingent, nor could that part of the disjunction that is contingent be demonstrated, given that something is necessary. Thus, the statement 'Something is contingent', appears primarily true and not deductively demonstrable (demonsirdbilis propter quid)." Scotus concludes at this point with a paraphrase of Avicenna's mUd witticism: "So, those who deny 'something * A paper read before the Southern Society for Philosophy of Religion, Tallahassee, Florida, 5 March 1953. 1 Q. in Met. IX, q. 15, n. 15. Experitur enim qui vult se posse non velle. 8 Op. Ox. IV, d. 45, q. 10, n. 10. Hoc potest quilibet experiri in se ipso: cum quis offert sibi aliquod bonum, et etiam ostendit bonum ut bonum considerandum et volendum, potest se ab hoc avertere, et nullum actum voluntatis circa hoc elicere. 147 148/. R. CRESSWELL is contingent' ought to be exposed to be tormented, until they admit that it is possible not to be tortured."8 "The wül in the act of willing is an immediate datum ... to demand proof (in this connection) is the mark of an Ul-educated man."4 Though the passages on contingency just quoted are concerned with contingent being as such, they obvioulsy provide the basis for his appeal to experience in any attempt to examine the nature of the wUl. Indeed, a chief emphasis in his whole phüosophic exposition is on what is or can be experienced. Let us now proceed to characterize the free will. In the Opus Oxoniense I, dist. 39, article 3, Duns Scotus says that the freedom of our wiU consists of three things: First, the will is free in regard to contrary acts; it can wiU or refrain from wUUng the same objective. Second, the wUl is free in regard to contrary objects; it can tend towards opposite objects. Third, the wiU is free in regard to contrary effects; it can choose among opposite objectives, and to be able to choose thus is to be able to produce opposite effects. Freedom of wül as such is found particularly in the second feature. If this second point is considered, we can see that the wiU can exercise successively two contrary acts. Can it also be true that it has this potentiaUty towards contrary acts simultaneously ? Suppose further that, in this single instant, it exercises a particular voUtion. To aU appearances, its freedom of choice would be exhausted in this single act, so that one could say that the act would fill its whole existence. However, this single voUtion would not be a necessitated one, and here is the proof. If the wül necessarily exercised this voUtion and since it would be a cause only in the single instant...

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