ABSTRACT
The most practical way of approaching the free will problem would seem to be by way of the standard positions of determinism and indeterminism and, in extension, of compatibilism and incompatibilism. Incompatibilism is the position stating that free will and determinism are incompatible and that either determinism is true and free will is false, or determinism is false and free will is true. Unlike indeterminism, determinism holds that all events are brought about by, and may be explained through, antecedent causes. Notable philosophers defending variations of a determinist position include Benedict de Spinoza, Priestley, C. D. Broad, B. F. Skinner and, more recently, Ted Honderich, Derk Pereboom, Galen Strawson and Bruce Waller. The chapter examines the role of free will in educational theory and practice, using Spinoza's counterintuitive conceptions of necessitated freedom and a naturalised will as ways of troubling and interrogating more dominant beliefs in education.
