ABSTRACT
An analysis of our commonsense concept of freedom yields two “minimal criteria”: (1) Autonomy distinguishes freedom from compulsion; (2) Authorship distinguishes freedom from chance. Translating freedom into “self-determination” can account for both criteria. Freedom and determinism are therefore compatible; the crucial question is not whether an action is determined at all but, rather, whether it is determined by personal preferences. If these criteria are applied to current empirical work on voluntary action, it turns out that these studies do not disprove the existence of freedom.
