Free will today

When we go out into the world are our actions really a result of our free will or were they predetermined by conditions in our past? The determinist and the fatalist believe these fixed conditions in our past transcend any notion that agents have the power to act otherwise than they in fact do. Determinists follow the idea that at any given moment, there is one and only one future state of affairs that is …

…cosmos. It seems as though this is why people, in general, believe that they cause the actions they take and that they are free to do otherwise. What would be the point of living if we were not responsible for our actions? Even if determinism and fatalism are, in fact, the law of the land, people will always need to hold onto the idea that they have free will and they produce their own volitions.