ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that causation has been systematically misconceived over a long period, especially in its connection with issues of modality, and the error has had a particularly significant and damaging influence on the direction of the free will debate. A tight connection has been drawn between causation and necessity, for instance, and this has been highly problematic to those seeking any kind of credible libertarian stance on free will. If causation entailed necessity, and necessity entailed determinism, then causation would jeopardise freedom. A dilemma afflicts our attempts to form a coherent understanding of free will and it is to resolve this dilemma that we need a better understanding of how causation works; specifically, how it relates to the possibility of its effects. Causes tend or dispose toward their effects with varying degrees of strength in different cases. Causal dispositionalism offers an alternative account of causal production in which it involves a sui generis modality of tendency or dispositionality.
