Sentence examples for by a volition from inspiring English sources
Locke assumes (reasonably) that in order for an action A to be voluntary, it must be caused (in the right way) by a volition that A occur (or, as Locke sometimes puts it, by a volition to do A).
Locke's view, then, is that an action is voluntary inasmuch as its performance is caused by a volition.
On this view, volitions are the source of agency: an overt movement is an action just in case it is caused, in the right way, by a volition.
For example, Locke would not count the motion of my left arm as voluntary if it were caused by a volition that my right arm move (or a volition that my left arm remain at rest).
The problem is that if I let go of a climbing rope, not as a direct result of willing to let it go, but as a result of being discomfited/paralyzed/shaken by the volition itself, then my letting go of the rope would not count as voluntary even though it was caused by a volition to let go of the rope.
However, Clarke did not believe that each volition was caused by a previous volition, but rather each volition is caused by the will itself.
Because each volition is active, it must be caused by something active; but every other purported motivation is passive, so each volition is caused by a previous volition, and so on ad infinitum.
In the right circumstances, it is certainly possible to communicate without using signs (and in particular, it is possible to convey a volition, backed by a threat of force, just by saying or writing nothing).
It is "a transgression of a law of nature by a particular volition of the deity, or the interposition of some invisible agent".
As we saw last week, in "Of Miracles", David Hume defined a miracle, rightly in my view, as "a transgression of a law of nature by a particular volition of the deity, or the interposition of some invisible agent".
But of course Piero della Francesca was depicting a miracle, which the Scottish philosopher David Hume described as "a transgression of a law of nature by a particular volition of the Deity, or by the interposition of some invisible agent".
