Determinism is the doctrine that every event, including every intentional action of a human being, is determined by prior causes. This is usually thought to imply that there are universal, nonstatistical laws of nature covering every aspect of everything that happens. Given the state of the universe at any time, these laws determine everything else that will ever happen. Some philosophers oppose determinism, because they think that the ultimate laws of nature are statistical. Others oppose it because they

believe there are free actions, and that no actions can

be both free and determined.