1. Introduction
In this paper, I challenge the intuition shared by ‘historical’ rationalists, like G. W. Leibniz and Christian Wolff, and contemporary compatibilists that for freedom to be rational, the relation to reasons cannot be a mere necessary condition for the actualization of that power.
This is a variant of the familiar objection of arbitrariness against the libertarian conception of freedom of indifference which intends to call into question the rationality of freedom: it is the objection that freedom of indifference implies the possibility of acting for no reason, that is, of irrational action (see Frost, Reference Frost2020, p. 1150).
By discussing Crusius as a historical case study, I want to show that freedom (of will) can be conceived as a rational two-way power, although the relation to reasons is only a necessary condition for its actualization. According to Crusius, every choice of an action, as the activity of freedom, requires not only the evaluation of the available options but also something like the ‘active embrace’ of an option as a necessary condition. This ‘active embrace’, however, is not in need of a reason distinct from the reason for the choice.Footnote 1
It should become clear that this conception of freedom is not only plausible but also has the major advantage over rationalist-compatibilist approaches that it is much better suited to account for the case of choosing between equally good options. It is safe to say that from our everyday perspective as rational agents, we all have to face situations in which there is a choice to be made between equally good options, for instance when it comes to the question of what to make of one’s life, what career to choose etc. This choice has a great impact on our lives. In my view then, it strongly speaks in favor of a conception of freedom if it can account for the choice between equally good options, and Crusius’s conception of freedom is able to do just that.
I proceed as follows. I first set the stage by presenting the contemporary conception of freedom as a two-way power and some problems related to it in light of the discussion between compatibilists and incompatibilists (§2). I discuss Crusius’s conception of freedom as a rational two-way power in more detail (§3). Against this backdrop, I then present the rationalist worry of a deficient rationality (§3.1) and Crusius’s defense of his conception of freedom as a rational power (§§4 – 4.2).
2. The Conception of a Two-Way Power: Compatibilist and Incompatibilist Interpretations
To set the stage, I briefly present the contemporary conception of a two-way power and an objection against the incompatibilist interpretation of that power. In contemporary debates on the metaphysics of agency, and particularly in analytic philosophy, some scholars take the conception of a two-way power to be key for the explanation not only of free will but also of free action (see Alvarez, Reference Alvarez2013; Kenny, Reference Kenny1989; Lowe, Reference Lowe2008, Reference Lowe, Gibb, Lowe and Ingthorsson2013a, Reference Lowe, Groff and Greco2013b; Mayr, Reference Mayr2011; Pink, Reference Pink and Veerbek2008; Steward, Reference Steward2012). There are both compatibilist and incompatibilist interpretations of the conception, depending on the underlying conception of the two ‘ways’ and their respective metaphysical requirements for actualization.
According to a prominent incompatibilist approach, a two-way power is the power to act or not to act, that is, refrain from acting, in any given situation (Steward, 2020, pp. 348–349). I show in the next section that this corresponds to Crusius’s conception of ‘freedom of contradiction’, which is the power ‘to either do something or refrain from doing it under the same circumstances’ (Crusius, Anweisung, §38).Footnote 2 Note that Crusius, unlike Steward, further distinguishes ‘freedom of contrariety’, which is the power to perform an action different from the one actually performed in the same situation (see Crusius, Anweisung, §38).
There is a tendency in the contemporary debate about two-way powers, especially among proponents of incompatibilist approaches, to focus on the power to perform an action A or refrain from doing A, while remaining silent on the other power to perform A or another action B (see Alvarez, Reference Alvarez2013; Lowe, 2013b; Steward, Reference Steward2012). It will become clear, however, that the latter power is crucial to Crusius’s robust libertarian notion of freedom. (The following presentation of the contemporary discussion of two-way powers thus focuses on the power that corresponds to freedom of contradiction).
In Steward’s incompatibilist approach, the underlying conception of the two ‘ways’ in which the power to perform a or refrain from performing a is metaphysically rather thin insofar as one of the two ‘ways’ is just the negation or absence of acting.
The idea is that there is just one way of actually exercising the power, i.e. by acting, but that not exercising the power, i.e. not acting, in the same situation, is a real option. The actual exercise of a power is ‘attributable’ to the agent as his ‘true action’ only in light of the real possibility of not exercising the power.Footnote 3
According to a competing contemporary interpretation, the two-way power to perform a or refrain from performing a has two metaphysically different ways of manifestation (see for instance Frost, Reference Frost2020, p. 1151). In this interpretation, refraining from acting requires more than the mere absence of or non-exercise of that power, whereas the exercise of the power manifests itself in a causal way.Footnote 4 In both cases, desire plays a crucial role (see Frost, Reference Frost2020, pp. 1151–1152; Frost, Reference Frost2013, p. 614).Footnote 5 The two ways are consistent with a compatibilist interpretation since it is possible that they are determined (see Frost, Reference Frost2013). Accordingly, in this picture, free action can be distinguished from anything else, including non-free action and mere doings, by means of the conception of a two-way power, since there is a ‘deep metaphysical difference between two-way powers and every other kind of power’ (Frost, Reference Frost2020, p. 1141).
One way to cash out the incompatibilist idea that the non-exercise of a power is a real option in any given situation is to say that the conditions for the actualization of that power are merely necessary, but not sufficient. This might even be the decisive feature by means of which a two-way power can be distinguished from any other kind of power (see Alvarez, Reference Alvarez2013, p. 102; Steward, Reference Steward2013, p. 691).
The problem, however, is that this feature is not sufficient to distinguish this kind of two-way power from any other kind of power, including non-rational powers, since this feature is also applicable to so-called spontaneous powers of inanimate entities (see Frost, Reference Frost2020, p. 1142). A popular example is the power of radioactive atoms to emit radioactive radiation (see Frost, Reference Frost2020, p. 1142; Lowe, 2013b, pp. 176–177). Thus, this conception of a two-way power threatens to be unsuitable to characterize free action. The idea underlying this critique seems to be that for such a power to be rational, the relation of the power to reasons cannot be something that translates into merely necessary conditions for the actualization of the power, but rather, must translate into necessary and sufficient conditions.Footnote 6 This idea can be cashed out in terms of a determining relation of reasons to this power. This relation is conceived as a relation of efficient causality, as for instance in the accounts of Frost (Reference Frost2013, Reference Frost2020) and Buckareff (Reference Buckareff, Brent and Titus2019). In this respect, they are similar to rationalist accounts.Footnote 7 For rationalists like Christian Wolff, the view that for a power to be rational the relation to (and role of) reasons must be necessary and sufficient for its actualization translates into the principle of the best. The principle of the best says that we always choose what we conceive as best (see Wolff, Deutsche Metaphysik §§30, 496;Footnote 8 for discussion, see Schierbaum Reference Schierbaum2022, Reference Schierbaum2024).
Correspondingly, incompatibilist interpretations of two-way powers are similar to historical, voluntarist accounts in that they are susceptible to the same kind of objection calling into question the rationality of the power.Footnote 9 This is the familiar objection of arbitrariness against the libertarian conception of freedom of indifference.Footnote 10 The problem with the latter is that it is difficult to explain why this power should be rational, if the conditions for its actualization are merely necessary, since the relation to reasons thus becomes dangerously loose.Footnote 11 It is striking that the rationalist-compatibilist worry has changed its terminological outfit, but remains the same in substance.
By discussing Crusius’s conception of freedom as a rational power, I want to show that there is a kind of middle path between the two extreme positions of a rationalist-compatibilist position on the one hand and an extreme voluntarist-incompatibilist position on the other that – allegedly – declares total independence from any reason for the actualization of the power. It should become clear that it really depends on what it means that the relation to reasons is a necessary condition for the actualization of that power.
3. Crusius’s Approach: Freedom as a Rational Two-Way Power
For Crusius, freedom is a rational power insofar as it is not possible to actualize the power independently of any reason: there is no use of freedom without a reason.Footnote 12 If a person freely chooses to act in a given situation, then the reason for her choice is that she desires something as an end and thinks that she can achieve it by means of the action. The desire is causally efficient, but not determinant, for the choice. In other words, the desire is only a partial, but not a total efficient cause of choice. In this respect, Crusius’s account differs crucially from contemporary compatibilist interpretations of a two-way power that take their cue from Aristotle (see, for instance, Frost, Reference Frost2013, p. 614).
The point is that we monitor and control our desires with respect to their motivational and action-guiding role by choosing to act in a certain way to get something we desire. For Crusius, the very activity of freedom consists in choice of action.
Crusius takes great pain to distinguish between the power of freedom, its very activity (Thätigkeit), as being ‘internal to the willing mind’ (see Anweisung, §9) and the effect (Effect, Wirckung) of an activity (see Entwurf, §68).Footnote 13 Crusius also calls freedom a ‘perfect, internal activity of the will’ (see Anweisung, §43). Crusius distinguishes three necessary conditions that are jointly sufficient for free action, as the very effect of choice:
the ideas or notions of the intellect, the presence of one or several awakened desires, and the active power implanted in the substance constitute the sufficient cause of any [free] action. (Crusius, Anweisung §48)
To fully understand these conditions, and to see in what sense they are sufficient without being determinant, it is first necessary to note that for Crusius, the will, as the power to strive for things as ends, is not just one power, but a bundle (Inbegriff) of powers (see Crusius, Anweisung, §6). Of these powers, only one is free. Freedom is actualized in the form of choice, or, as Crusius puts it, of decision (Entschluß) or intention (Absicht).Footnote 14 Crucially, choice is action-oriented and action-guiding in that a choice occurs only on the level of possible actions as means for attaining some desired end. Choices are free acts of will, or volitions, as I will say throughout the paper (see Crusius, Anweisung, §22). Choices presuppose the occurrence of desires (Begierden) or drives (Triebe): if we were not to desire things as ends, then we could not make use of our freedom. Crucially, however, we can also desire things without attempting to get what we desire. Desiring things and choosing to attempt to get what one desires are two different kinds of volitions, as Crusius stresses (see Anweisung, §9). Desires are not free, since they are necessarily actualized under certain conditions; their conditions are necessary and sufficient for actualization.Footnote 15 These conditions are cognitive insofar as ‘any volition presupposes the representation (Vorstellung) in our mind of what we want … and in this respect, the possibility to will something always depends on reason’ (Crusius, Anweisung, §5).Footnote 16
To give a simple example, if I have a preference for dark chocolate, then the desire to have some chocolate can be aroused by the mere sight of chocolate. To use some contemporary terminology, unlike freedom as the two-way power to either do A or refrain from doing A, desire is a one-way power, since a desire is actualized in only one specific way when ‘partnered with a specific manifestation partner or constellation of partners’ (Buckareff, Reference Buckareff, Brent and Titus2019, p. 231). The ‘partner’ of desire is the mental representation of its content: A desire for something is actualized by the mental representation of the desire’s content.Footnote 17 We are not free to desire or not to desire at all, since the mental representation of its content is necessary and sufficient for the actualization of the desire.Footnote 18 In Crusius’s words:
You can see from this why a multitude of drives has to be aroused immediately when we wake up in the morning, because the things we perceive (empfinden) partly stimulate us, partly remind us of our purposes and resolutions according to the rules of imagination. (Crusius, Anweisung, §59)
That we have many desires that necessarily arise in us by what we perceive or consider accounts for the first two of the three conditions, namely (1) the ‘ideas or notions of the intellect’ and (2) ‘the presence of several awakened desires’. The upshot of Crusius’s conception of freedom is that we can choose whether to attempt to get what we thus desire or not. The third condition, namely (3) ‘the active power implanted in the substance’, is nothing but the very power of freedom itself. How is this last condition to be interpreted?
The point is that the actualization of freedom is rendered only possible by the first two conditions, but not necessary: if a person actually desires something, she is then in a position to choose whether and what to get of all the things she desires. In this respect, Crusius’s account is similar to incompatibilist conceptions of two-way powers according to which having mere necessary conditions for actualization could be the decisive feature of that power (see Steward, Reference Steward2013). Metaphysically, this implies that the will determines or ‘moves’ itself in the light of the prevailing desires.Footnote 19 In Crusius’s words:
Freedom is the highest degree of activity in a will, by virtue of which it can itself begin, direct and again break off an activity, regardless of the fact that this [activity] has merely been made possible by all the conditions required for it. (Crusius, Anweisung, §41)
Crusius’s idea is that in general, desire, by itself, is not sufficient to lead to action.Footnote 20 Choice, as the activity of freedom, presupposes desire, and even rational desire. Rationally desiring something requires two things, namely to ‘distinctly’ know what it is that one desires, implying the representation of something as an end (see Anweisung, §13) and an evaluative judgement about the desired thing.
The content of desire also provides the norm for judging possible objects of desire. Crucially, there is a kind of desire that is essential to human nature, for instance the desire for perfection. Crusius calls these essential desires also ‘basic desires’ (I discuss basic desires in more detail in §4.1). The desire for perfection provides the norm for evaluative judgements about things as objects of this desire. The content of basic desires is normative insofar as they are grounded in human nature. Crusius emphasizes that the use of freedom is limited by the normative content of essential desires (see Anweisung, §45). We are not free to choose to act in ways that we judge to be inconsistent with our nature.Footnote 21 Thus, to rationally desire something also implies to judge that it is an appropriate object of that desire. (For further discussion of the rationality of desires in Crusius, see Schierbaum, Reference Schierbaum2021).Footnote 22
The idea of freedom is that by controlling the strength of a desire, we can control whether a desire actually leads to an action. Control of the strength of desires presupposes rational desire insofar as it is necessary to know that one desires something as the object of a certain desire in order to control how strongly one desires it. The strength of a desire is proportional to the intensity or ‘liveliness’ of the mental representation of its content. We can increase the liveliness of the mental representation by focusing our attention on it: the livelier the representation, the stronger the desire; the less lively, the weaker the desire.Footnote 23 Using one’s freedom means to decide which of one’s prevailing desires to prefer over the other by attempting to get what one desires.Footnote 24 In Crusius’s words:
Freedom is a power that can choose only one among its many desires; and it chooses to act in accordance with this [desire] or to connect its activity to it. (Crusius, Anweisung, §43)
As indicated earlier, Crusius distinguishes not only the power of doing or refraining from doing something, but also explicitly another power, namely, to do one thing or another:
Two powers of freedom are to be distinguished. The first is the power to do something and to omit it in the same situation. This is also called the “freedom of contradiction.” Second, the power to perform an action different from the one actually performed in the same situation is called “freedom of contrariety”. (Crusius, Anweisung, §38)
The two powers are at least conceptually different.Footnote 25 Crusius’s explicit distinction of and commitment to these two powers of freedom might be explained by the empirical fact that we normally desire more than one thing. We can choose between desires, just as we can choose whether to pursue or not to pursue a particular desire: the actual plurality of desires makes a conceptual distinction between these two powers necessary. As mentioned in §2, the contemporary debate, especially as regards incompatibilist approaches, focuses almost exclusively on the freedom of contradiction. The reason might be that desire does not play a central role in these accounts as it does in Crusius’s account, namely, to explain what it means that there is no choice of an action, without a reason: choosing to act presupposes some actually prevailing desire. If a person were not to desire anything at all, she would not be able to use her freedom. Whenever a person chooses to act in a certain way, her reason is that she thereby attempts to attain some of the things she actually desires as an end. This motivates her choice. In this sense, there is no choice without at least a motivating reason.Footnote 26
In contrast to the compatibilist interpretations of two-way powers by Buckareff and Frost, Crusius thus leaves room for real alternatives. In Crusius’s sense, then, that the relation to a reason is only a necessary condition for the actualization of freedom means that a choice can only be made in the presence of at least one prevailing desire. In this sense, choice is not totally independent of any reason. The relation to reasons, however, is not necessary and sufficient for the actualization of freedom insofar as ‘the active power implanted in the substance itself’ is a necessary condition for a choice. Choosing implies actively embracing one of the presently obtaining desires as action-guiding. This embrace is implied by choice; it does not temporally precede it.Footnote 27
In some cases, choosing to act in a certain way might imply overcoming other strong, prevailing desires, as part of the modification and control of desires. This can be gathered from the following passage:
The effect of [freedom] consists in the direction and modification of one or more drives. The effect of motivating reasons also consists in this. If, therefore, the acting subject does not want to follow the physically strongest motivating reasons, it must overcome and limit the predominant strength of them by the active application of its freedom (thätige Anwendung seiner Freyheit) because otherwise the excitation of a sufficiently strong desire will break out into action by itself. (Crusius, Entwurf, §451)
The point in this passage is that sometimes not giving in to one’s urgent desires and therefore, not to act in a way that one would presumably regret, can also count as a choice to omit an action, that is, as Crusius puts it, to prevent that ‘a sufficiently strong desire will break out into action by itself’. Rationalists and compatibilists will not accept this conception of freedom as a rational power. I now turn to a rationalist objection.
3.1 A rationalist worry: Freedom’s deficient rationality
Rationalists will not be satisfied with this conception of freedom as a two-way power, since in principle, every desire can motivate a choice insofar as the agent could decide to pursue or not pursue what he thus desires. Whenever we choose an action, we do so for the sake of something we desire and thus consider as good, in some respect. In this sense, agents are always guided by the principle of the good (for further discussion, see Schierbaum, Reference Sonja2020, pp. 186–189). The problem is that not every choice is justified, depending on the kind of desire and its content. Crusius’s conception of freedom admits of a potentially deficient rationality insofar as it implies the very possibility of acting for literally any reason. In the rationalist’s eyes, however, one should not act for just any reason, but rather, for the best.
Crusius agrees that one should not act for just any reason, although one could use one’s freedom in this way. This, however, would be a rather bad use, or even a misuse of one’s freedom (see Crusius, Anweisung, §§52–54). He explicitly acknowledges that some ways of using one’s freedom are better than other ways, and that one should use one’s freedom in better ways. In case there is one best option, one should choose that option:
Accordingly, freedom is not necessarily a power to act according to the best representations of the mind, but where one of the imagined actions is actually the best, it should only be a power to be able to choose the best, and according to the divine intention it should be used for the effective attainment of the best. (Crusius, Anweisung, §52)
What is crucial to Crusius’s conception of freedom is that every choice partly depends on the ‘active application of freedom’ (Entwurf, §451), including the choice of the best option. The need to actively embrace an option in making a choice is Crusius’s way of expressing the incompatibilist idea that there is no necessary, that is, determining connection between judgement and choice (for discussion of this aspect, see also Schierbaum, Reference Schierbaum2019, p. 21).
To put the matter more emphatically, one could also say that choice of action requires the agent’s active consent as a necessary condition: whenever an agent freely chooses an action, he ‘puts his agency behind it’ by endorsing it. That is, he ‘gives it his agential stamp of approval’, to borrow some phrases coined by Ruth Chang in her defense of a hybrid form of voluntarism (see Chang, Reference Chang2013).
Crusius would thus have to concede that his conception of freedom implies at least a potential deficit of rationality insofar as it implies the very possibility of choosing whatever one likes. A potential deficit, however, is not the same as an actual deficit of rationality.
One could say that rationality comes in degrees insofar as the rationality of a choice depends on the quality of the reason for the choice: not choosing the best, but only the second or even third best option would thus be less rational than choosing the best option.Footnote 28 In this sense, the degree of rationality depends on how the agent uses his freedom, that is, on the quality of the reasons for his choices.Footnote 29 In the rationalist’s eyes, however, this voluntary ‘embracing’ is not only unnecessary, but even dangerous, insofar as it threatens to loosen the very connection to reasons and thus leaves room for a potential deficit of rationality of freedom.
The rationalist worry can be put in yet another way: if it is necessary for every choice that the agent somehow willingly ‘embraces’ it, even for the choice of the best, then this ‘embrace’ seems to ask for yet another reason. If, however, an agent judges that one option is the best, then what other reason should there be for the agent to ‘actively embrace’ that option?
The problem is that this ‘active embrace’ seems to lack a reason, and thus also seems to lack rationality. The rationalist’s general assumption is that any free, voluntary activity requires a reason to be rational in the sense in which the rationalist asks for reasons.Footnote 30 This idea, however, can be challenged, as I want to argue in the next section.
4. Challenging the Rationalist
My aim in the next two sections is to make plausible Crusius’s idea that any choice of action implies the active embrace of a prevailing desire.Footnote 31 This active embrace required for choice, however, is not in need of a reason distinct from the reason for the choice. More generally, I want to show that freedom is a rational power, although not every choice has a reason in the sense in which the rationalist asks for reasons.
To make this idea more palatable, I discuss a case in which the rationalist principle of the best is not applicable, namely a case with equally good options that rationalists like Leibniz or Wolff exclude as metaphysically impossible (see Leibniz, Theodicy, §303; Wolff, Deutsche Metaphysik, §§496–498). Unsurprisingly, Crusius rejects the rationalist view that an agent must always guide his actions by the principle of the best. In his view, the principle of the best is not universally valid, for the simple, but compelling reason that it is not always the case that there is exactly one best option that the rational agent could also recognize as such. Rather, in some crucial cases, there are equally good options. What is more, it would be worse not to choose at all in these cases, that is, to refrain from choosing, since there is too much at stake.
To understand this, we have to delve deeper into Crusius’s conception of different levels of rational desire and their connection. Arguably, the case I want to draw attention to does not directly concern the level of individual, isolated actions, but rather, the level of desire that could motivate whole patterns of actions. That is, the choice is not whether to have chocolate or not having it, but rather, whether to pursue or not pursue the career of a dancer: it is a choice that has an impact on how to lead one’s life. Therefore, one could blame me for somewhat changing the topic, since the contemporary debate on two-way powers mostly focuses on particular actions. Remarkably, this kind of ‘life choice’ is not very widely discussed in contemporary theories of action, as far as I can see. One of the few exceptions is Ruth Chang’s very interesting and illuminating defense of a view she calls ‘hybrid voluntarism’.Footnote 32 According to this view, it is possible for us to create reasons when the reasons given to us are in equipoise, but where it is important that we make a choice, as in the case of choosing a career.Footnote 33
My point is that if the concept of a two-way power should be relevant to our conception of rational, free action, it should be possible to extend it to also cover these more general and fundamental aspects. Put differently, it should be a reason to abandon this conception of a two-way power if it could not be extended to also account for a crucial aspect of our life as rational agents, namely, to guide our actions in order to achieve long-term, overall goals. It is crucial to Crusius’s approach that on the level of goals or ends that are worth pursuing, from a human standpoint, there can be equally good goals; and yet, we must decide for one or the other. Not acting in light of a more general desire, or in pursuit of a long-term, overall goal is less rational than acting in light of such a desire, although there is no ‘reason’ in the rationalist’s sense of preferring one general goal over the other, if they are of equal quality. In this case, the agent’s actively embracing an option makes the difference.
I now turn to this kind of case to make it more palatable that willingly embracing an option as a necessary condition for any choice does not itself require a reason different from the reason for the choice.
4.1. Basic and derivative desires
To prepare the presentation of the case, it is necessary to briefly present the distinction between basic and derivative desires.Footnote 34 The factual multiplicity of our desires can be reduced to a certain number of basic desires that are essential to us and from which all other desires causally arise. Crusius introduces this distinction in order to avoid an infinite regress of desires (see Crusius, Anweisung, §89). According to his teleological conception of human nature, the content of the basic desires is determined by the main end for which God created human rational agents, namely virtue, as not only the ability, but also the exercise of free, moral action (see Crusius, Entwurf, §§477 & 481). In other words, these basic desires provide human agents with the means to attain this end freely. There are three basic desires, namely (1) the desire for one’s own perfection (Anweisung, §111), (2) the ‘desire for union with things and persons conceived as having some perfection’ (Anweisung, §122), and (3) the ‘drive of conscience’: the moral desire (Anweisung, §132).
These three desires are equally basic: none of them is ‘more basic’ than the other. They differ, however, in other respects. The desire for one’s perfection is self-interested or self-directed, whereas the desire for ‘union with things and persons’ is altruistic or other-directed; this can be gathered from the fact that it gives rise to yet another desire, namely the desire of ‘moral love’. ‘Moral love’ is ‘the tendency to regard the ends of another person as one’s own, …, and to take pleasure in his well-being’ (Anweisung, §125). Most generally, the second basic desire provides the motivational basis for actions promoting the ends of others that are not the agent’s own ends.
The third basic desire, the ‘drive of conscience’, is also other-directed insofar as it is directed at God as our ‘overlord’ whom we owe obedience. It provides the motivational basis for moral actions, in the strict sense, since it is the desire to obey God. Crusius frankly admits that if the moral desire were not essential to us, we could not be motivated to act morally at all, since moral action is not consistent with acting from self-interest (see Anweisung, §176). Moral action is also not consistent with acting ‘out of love’, that is, on the basis of the second basic desire. As indicated earlier (see §3), the content of the desire for perfection provides the norm for evaluative judgements about things as appropriate objects of this desire. The idea is that the first two desires should guide the agent with respect to the object or content of his actions, whereas the third desire provides the agent with the right reason for moral action: together, the three basic desires should build the complete, motivational basis for moral action; yet, they have to be ordered in a certain way.Footnote 35 The point is that an agent should strive for his own perfection or the perfection of others in light of the moral desire to obey God, that is, for the very reason that he has to obey God. Accordingly, Crusius explicates ‘virtue’ as ‘the ability to observe everything that complies with the essential perfection of God, ourselves and all other things, out of obedience to the divine will as the will of our overlord’ (Anweisung, §175). In Crusius’s terms, the first two desires should be ‘subordinated’ to the moral desire to obey God (see Anweisung, §176).
According to Crusius, virtue is not only the main end, but also the state which human perfection essentially consists in (see Entwurf, §182). Crusius stresses that ‘scientific knowledge, beauty, and other excellent features’ only make one perfect if one is also virtuous, since ‘the essential perfection of human beings consists in virtue’ (see Entwurf, §182).Footnote 36 He writes:
I understand by the basic human desires those whose object is something that must be thought in an abstract idea. … The first among the basic human drives is the drive for our own perfection or the demand to see our condition in its proper perfection and to make it always more perfect. (Crusius, Anweisung, §111, my emphasis)
The content of basic desires is neither particular nor concrete, but rather, general or abstract. Recall that the mental representation of its content is necessary and sufficient for the actualization of a desire (see §3). The content of basic desires is represented by abstract or general concepts.Footnote 37 ‘Perfection’, for instance, is an abstract singular term. Human agents must possess the general and abstract concepts in question to be able to control the strength of their basic desires by intentionally focusing on their content (see §3). From these fundamental types of desires, all other desires causally arise and proliferate. As indicated, from the second basic desire arises the desire of ‘moral love’. Crucially, we can desire particular things in light of our desire for something more general: I can desire to write a good paper because I desire my own perfection, that is, insofar as I know that writing a good paper is a way of promoting my perfection.
Every desire (as a volition), therefore, either is a basic desire or is causally derived from some prior desire. If there is a derivative desire, there is also at least one first, basic desire so that if an agent derivatively desires something, he also non-derivatively desires something else. Concerning the actualization of desires, it follows that, strictly speaking, the representation of its content is necessary and sufficient only for basic desires, since these do not derive from any other desire, whereas the actualization of any derivative desire also requires the actualization of at least one basic desire. As noted above, we normally desire more than one thing at the same time in view of the fact that many desires are actualized by the mere perception of things (see §3).Footnote 38
To this, we can add that these actually prevailing desires can also be more or less general regarding their content.Footnote 39 It is not necessary to embrace Crusius’s strong teleological and theological view on basic and derivative desires to find something right in the idea that we desire certain particular things only in light of more general desires, that is, as means to more general ends.Footnote 40 It should be stressed, however, that his strong view implies that there is a single ‘best’ or main end for human agents to pursue, namely virtue, although there can be equally good means to this end.Footnote 41
4.2 The case of equally good options
Against this backdrop, it is now possible to discuss a case of equally good options. As stated above, Crusius admits that if there is one best option, then the agent should embrace that option (see again Anweisung, §52), since not embracing that option would be less than fully rational. That is, although, absolutely speaking, an agent can always choose against the best available option, he can do so only by accepting a deficit in rationality. A rationalist like Leibniz, of course, would deny that it is possible not to choose what one conceives as best.
It is, however, not the rule that there always is one best option. In some cases, the agent has to choose between equally good options. It is a central, metaphysical presupposition of Crusius’s conception of freedom that there is not always one best option, just as it is a central, metaphysical presupposition of Leibniz’s rationalist conception of freedom that there always is one best option. In his discussion and attempted refutation of Leibniz’s view on the best possible world (see Crusius, Entwurf, §§385–389), Crusius argues that insofar as creating a world is a divine action, God must pursue an end in creating the world, since there is no divine action without an end, just as there is no human, rational action without a desired end. As noted earlier, the end of creating a world is the realization of virtue by free, rational agents (see Crusius, Entwurf, §447); there is, however, not one best means, that is, one best world, to this end. At least, it is ‘unprovable’ (unerweislich) that there are not equally good means. Crusius writes:
For it cannot be refuted that many means to certain divine ends are equally suitable or can be made equally suitable by the connection of things, …. It cannot therefore be refuted that, with regard to posited ends of a world, the divine mind can recognize several worlds as equally good, and furthermore that it is also possible that the difference of goodness which is found between some others has no necessary impact on the determined ends, and therefore God is not forced to choose one of them. (Crusius, Entwurf, §387)
According to Crusius, it cannot be denied that there are some equally suitable means, that is, equally good possible worlds for God to achieve his end in creating. The rationalist becomes uneasy, since there seems to be no reason for the choice of a world, if that world is just as good as another world.Footnote 42 Crusius, the voluntarist, however, could answer that it is somewhat beside the point or inappropriate to ask for a reason for choosing one among the available means, if they are equally suitable to the end. The choice of means is made in light of the desired end, namely for the sake of making the realization of virtue possible. The point is that if the agent wants to achieve this end, he has to adopt some means.
In the case of equally suitable means, however, the adoption of some means does not seem to require a distinct reason: adopting some suitable means is just one of the necessary conditions for achieving the desired end. One could therefore say that in some sense, the ‘reason’ for choosing a means is the same as the reason for the action of creating, namely, to achieve the desired end. What matters here is the desired end in light of which a choice is to be made. Note that this case is also a choice between creating (by adopting some suitable means) or not creating at all (because there is no best means).Footnote 43
(Alternatively, one could say that asking for a ‘reason’ for adopting one of several equally suitable means to an end is not appropriate insofar as the choice of means, in this process, does not require a reason, in the sense in which the choice of an action requires a reason, namely that of achieving the desired end.)
What applies to the divine agent also applies at least in some cases, and to some degree, to human agents. Consider a case in which a human agent, say, Peter, desires to make something of his life. This desire is rather general. For the sake of presentation, this desire can be taken to correspond to Crusius’s general desire for one’s own perfection.Footnote 44 It is in light of the general desire to make something of his life, Peter is facing a career choice: the choice of a career is a means to attend the more general end of perfection. Crusius also calls this the ‘subordination of ends’ where one desires an end as a means of attaining a more general end (see Crusius, Anweisung, §17). (For the sake of argument, we can presume that the choice of career is also consistent with the main end of virtue.)
Peter is not only a very gifted singer but also has a strong mathematical talent. He likes singing just as much as he loves to delve into mathematical problems. However, he has to choose between the two options, since his situation does not allow him to pursue both careers which, nevertheless, are equally suitable means to achieve perfection.Footnote 45 From a practical point of view, it would be less rational not to choose any career at all in view of the fact there is not one best option, than embracing one of the two equally suitable options, since by refraining from choosing a suitable career path at all, Peter will fail to make something of his life. The choice of a suitable career also implies the choice between choosing a career or not choosing a career at all.
Thus, if Peter were to choose a musical career in this situation, then the desired end of achieving perfection would provide a reason for this choice. If, however, Peter were to choose to study mathematics, the desired end of achieving perfection would also provide the reason for this choice. In some sense, the two career choices would have the same reason. As in the case of the divine action of creating a world, what matters here is the desired end in light of which a choice is to be made.
At least, it should have become clear that Crusius is able to account for a case that bears great practical relevance, since as rational agents, we are indeed confronted with equally good options among which we sometimes need to choose, since refraining from choosing altogether would be worse than choosing between them. It seems to me that rationalists committed to the Principle of Sufficient Reason would have a hard time plausibly accounting for the like cases, which they carefully exclude from their conception by denying them to be metaphysically possible (see Leibniz, Theodicy, §303).Footnote 46
According to the rationalist, choices are determined, that is, the conditions for the choice, as the actualization of freedom, are necessary and sufficient. If, however, there is nothing in or related to the available options among which to choose that would account for some difference in their quality, then it seems that the agent, in the rationalist picture, would be unable to make up his mind and embrace one of the options.
Put differently, the problem, in the rationalist’s eyes, is that in the case of equally good options, the reason for choosing the one or the other would be the same, namely that of achieving a certain end. A reason that explains different choices, however, does not seem to have much explanatory power, according to the rationalist. In other words, it does not seem sufficient to justify the choice.
I think it becomes clear in the case of equally good options that Crusius’s idea that every choice partly requires to actively embrace an option as a necessary condition bears some plausibility: if we were not able to actively embrace one of the two equally good options in this case, we would not be able to choose at all. This choice, however, is not irrational, since it does have a reason, namely that of being an appropriate means to achieve a certain end, just as the other option. Thus, in this sense, Crusius can maintain that any choice requires a reason, but not every choice requires a distinct reason, at least not a choice between equally good options.Footnote 47
5. Conclusion
My aim in this paper was to show that freedom (of will) can be conceived as a rational two-way power, although the relation to reasons is only a necessary condition for its actualization, another necessary condition being the ‘active embrace’ of an evaluated option. This becomes obvious when the evaluated options are of equal quality. Again, I take this latter condition to be Crusius’s way of expressing the incompatibilist idea that there is no necessary, determining connection between judgement and choice. Against this backdrop, it becomes more plausible that the view that every choice, even the choice of the best, requires the agent’s active embrace of the option as a necessary condition, does not jeopardize the rationality of the power of freedom.
I think there is good reason to question the rationalist assumption that every choice, as the actualization of freedom, requires a distinct reason. The case of equally good options indicates that it might even be the case that sometimes we need to use our freedom, although there is no distinct ‘reason’ to prefer one option to the other, since in this case, the two equally good options might have the same reason, namely that of being an appropriate means to the same end. This, however, does not threaten the rationality of the power of freedom as a whole.
It is to be emphasized that there are other, crucial aspects of freedom. For instance, we should bring the rampant multitude of our desires into a well-ordered system so that we desire certain things in light of general desires that are essential to us, such as our perfection. Our desires build a whole network, and the point of freedom, in Crusius’s view, is that we should use our freedom to create a stable, motivational basis for good, rational action. The fact that freedom can and should be used in this way makes human agents responsible for the very state of their overall motivational basis.Footnote 48
The use of freedom, therefore, should help us in building a steady, motivational basis for our actions. The discussion of the case of choosing a career indicates that whenever there are equally good options, there is no point in asking for a distinct reason; all we need to use our freedom without a lack of rationality in this case is the ability to embrace one of the two options, which is part of our power of freedom.Footnote 49
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