Against Free-Will

[Perplexity]

If the conclusion of your argument happens to be true, it means that I cannot freely reason it to be false or true. Any reasonable person can see that this is a problem; especially in terms of knowing and reasoning to the truth.

Isn’t your argument a bit self defeating?

Well, you’re free to do that in the sense that you’re not constrained from doing that. What I mean by denying free-will is that we’re not the source of actions/decisions in the way we’d need to be for us to be morally responsible for them. But, we’re still a source of our actions/decisions, and are free with respect to them in ways other than moral responsibility.

But, yes if I was using ‘free-will’ in the sense you are above, the argument would be self-defeating.

 

[MindOverMatter2]

Well, you’re free to do that in the sense that you’re not constrained from doing that. What I mean by denying free-will is that we’re not the source of actions/decisions in the way we’d need to be for us to be morally responsible for them. But, we’re still a source of our actions/decisions, and are free with respect to them in ways other than moral responsibility.

But, yes if I was using ‘free-will’ in the sense you are above, the argument would be self-defeating.

If a rock isn’t constrained from falling to the ground all this means is that in the absence of a constraint it will fall to the ground. It does not mean however that its falling is not determined by something else.

If every thought you have had is determined, then you cannot freely reason to the truth, and thus can never know whether the conclusion of an argument is true or not since you merely think what you are caused to think.

Thus how am I to know whether or not anything you say is true or false if I do not have freewill?

 

[Perplexity]

Thank you for that explanation of determinance. Based on your prior definition of “philosopher” I guess I am one. However, one without any formal training. Just common sense. ( I did take an intro Philosophy class in college, but it was more geared towards argumentation)

No worries. Ah, kewl. Aristotle didn’t really have formal training either I think one of the best things about getting into the professional side of philosophy (i.e., reading the journals etc.) is just to keep up with new ideas etc. But, really, it’s all about the attempt to make sense of reality, which doesn’t require training, really.

I’d take up issue with the appropriateness of the domino analogy. It may be quite accurate in explaining to me the difference between the ‘concept’ of determinance and indeterminance, and so for that I thank you.
But I think it does a rather poor job of explaining human intellect/reason and the implications this has on the concept of freewill.

I totally agree. We’re both incompatibilists: we think free-will (regardless of whether it exists or not) is incompatible with determinism. If we’re determined (like dominoes) we’re not free. I just take it one more step and say indeterminacy is likewise problematic.

IF there is no freewill, then none of us can be responsible for anything we do… nor blame anyone for anything they do.

I agree, that’s precisely what I’m arguing for. Of course, we do treat each other as if we were responsible. This is an ingrained belief/attitude. Many including myself consider it a significant cost of hard-incompatibilism that it requires us to let go of this, or fight it. I doubt we’ll ever be able to eradicate it completely, but if you truly believe hard-incompatibilism you can fight the inclinations well. I wouldn’t let go of such a 2nd nature attitude unless I had very serious reasons to.

This effectively amounts to chaos. And renders all of us Cosmic Chumps… Victims.
The rapist as much the victim of cosmic inevitability as the rape victim.
Not much of anything, if anything, matters… since we have no control nor responsibility for firing of our own synapses let alone our thoughts or actions.

The important thing is that we would still regard actions and decisions as morally right or wrong. So, even if I didn’t think rapists were morally responsible, I would still regard rape as morally wrong, and could act appropriately to prevent that action. (i.e., jailing the rapist etc.)

Laws are unjust because they put blame on something which is outside of our control. We should have no expectation or right to security or anything - since nothing has any ability to make a choice, freely

I’d disagree with you here. We’d still make choices, and these would be free in various ways. But, we’d not be the source of these choices in the way we’d need to be for us to be morally responsible for them. Many hard-incompatibilists say the laws should remain the same because of their practical benefits, so I don’t think we’d have to change the laws.

I think the biggest struggle people have with this position is the idea that we have to give up moral anger. We don’t want to give up being angry at the rapist, or murderer etc. I propose that we don’t have to give up that anger, we’d just have to redirect it.

1. Boy! does this seem to scream for a creator, an entity that DOES know the objective truth and can sort out and ascribe responsibility for all the complicated influences, since obviously we can’t. Another wards, if there IS an objective truth… then that screams that something must know what that is. If it is not any of us… then it hints that this may be larger then us.

I can see how you get this, not sure why but I don’t seem to have that intuition.

1. Man!, if nothing else this seems to me to show just how wide reaching our actions are. And how stepping on a butterfly can later on down the road, lead to the eventual extermination of the entire planet. And because we don’t know all the extent effects of our actions… we need to be even MORE careful in what we do and adhere to the highest moral code, not the lowest or even something in between.

Yeah, I totally agree! Makes me wonder about our assessments of moral actions. I mean, we might judge an action morally wrong which, unbeknownst to us, will initiate a chain resulting in an ineffable good some time later. What does that mean? Does that mean we should refrain from moral judgments? Or just be less sure of ourselves? idk

 

[Perplexity]

If a rock isn’t constrained from falling to the ground all this means is that in the absence of a constraint it will fall to the ground. It does not mean however that its falling is not determined by something else.

Good point

I guess the freedom I was trying to describe there is the kind sometimes mentioned in our constitution. We have the right to this that or the other, meaning we’re free from constraint.

If every thought you have had is determined, then you cannot freely reason to the truth, and thus can never know whether the conclusion of an argument is true or not since you merely think what you are caused to think.

I agree.

Thus how am I to know whether or not anything you say is true or false if I do not have freewill?

The same way you are right now. I don’t believe in determinism, and if it’s true, then we’re certainly not able to say what is true or false (an absurdity). I believe like you do in indeterminacy. So, hard-incompatibilism doesn’t effect our phenomenological experiences of choice, deliberation, thoughts etc. it just says we’re not the source of these things that libertarians propose we are.

 

[Eric_Hyom]

Just some thoughts…

The question of free will often seems to cause controversy, but when I search for a greatest purpose for the creation of the universe and life, we have the greatest commandments from a Christian perspective.
We do not seem to be forced to love God and our neighbour, although we are commanded to.

In essence these commands appear to give us free choice, but if we could live by these commandments to the degree of the Good Samaritan, the world would be a wonderful place to live.

Blessings

Eric

 

[jschutzm]

I agree, that’s precisely what I’m arguing for. Of course, we do treat each other as if we were responsible. This is an ingrained belief/attitude. Many including myself consider it a significant cost of hard-incompatibilism that it requires us to let go of this, or fight it. I doubt we’ll ever be able to eradicate it completely, but if you truly believe hard-incompatibilism you can fight the inclinations well. I wouldn’t let go of such a 2nd nature attitude unless I had very serious reasons to.

The important thing is that we would still regard actions and decisions as morally right or wrong. So, even if I didn’t think rapists were morally responsible, I would still regard rape as morally wrong, and could act appropriately to prevent that action. (i.e., jailing the rapist etc.)

I’d disagree with you here. We’d still make choices, and these would be free in various ways. But, we’d not be the source of these choices in the way we’d need to be for us to be morally responsible for them. Many hard-incompatibilists say the laws should remain the same because of their practical benefits, so I don’t think we’d have to change the laws.

I’d disagree. Or at least say that it would effective render justice as we know it a mockery.
Essentially jailing innocent people for actions which they are not responsible for, simply because we don’t “Like” them or are morally angry at them.

I mean, in such a system of no free-will, who CARES if society is angry at that person for what they did. Their anger is misplaced because the person is not responsible for those actions.

This is what I mean by chaos… effectively it would be. Either rules are truly and objectively pointless. OR we risk running a police-state where we round up innocent individuals who aren’t responsible for their actions. - those are your 2 choices if Free-will doesn’t exist yet we keep our laws.

I fail to see how we could draw lines and have it both ways.

I think the biggest struggle people have with this position is the idea that we have to give up moral anger. We don’t want to give up being angry at the rapist, or murderer etc. I propose that we don’t have to give up that anger, we’d just have to redirect it.

And it would be a totally pointless, emotion, even to the point of motivating us to stop rape. Because essentially we would lack the ability to say it is objectively wrong if there is no free-will to chose otherwise. In fact if there were no free-will, HOW would this concept of morality and moral anger even develop in us.

This is what I mean about total chaos. Perhaps not NOW, with the laws we have and the moral right and wrong we have now. But I’m taking it to an even larger extent. Without free-will, the universe would be unable to even come up with the very concept of “right vs. wrong”
So in a type of reverse proof - the fact that we DO have concepts such as justice, right vs. wrong, and moral anger seems to argue strongly FOR free-will because if free-will objectively didn’t exist… then these concepts would have no source, no purpose and be utterly none existent.

Or at least that is what I’m proposing.
I see this all the time in my atheist friends when they argue against the existence of God… they are never prepared to completely re-write history and argue that we’d arrive at the same place without God. They always want to START with a world with right n wrong, morality, justice, a preference towards good, scientific method already developed, societies already in place, etc. They simply want to take God OUT of the existing situation.

It would be easier for me to agree with you IF I PRESUME that everything remains as it is and we merely stop calling it ‘free-will’ but continue to operate society “as-if” Free-will actually existed.
But then that’s not honest and doesn’t reflect reality. We still do the concepts of justice, ethics, and morality a great disservice and risk over time, not teaching them at all.

 

[empther]

Originally Posted by empther

forums.catholic-questions.org/images/buttons_khaki/viewpost.gif
Perplexity gets more ridiculous all the time.

I don’t think this guy has any idea what quibbling means. His use of that word (and its cognates) is almost always awkward and contextually inappropriate. But, putting that aside…the vast majority of his posts are silly ad-hominems. I don’t think he understands the issues. That would explain why he doesn’t interact with them: he can’t if he wanted to. But…the mystery is what he gets out of insulting others…it’s obviously not to convince them of his position. No…I think it’s compensation. He doesn’t understand what’s going on in the thread, but needs to be seen as educated or intellectual. So, he belittles others to compensate.

Those who wander around these forums have seen my posts in countless threads on many subjects. They’ve seen that I usually get to the very heart of a complex issue and give explanations in few words. “Brevity is the soul of wit”.

I have three college degrees in the sciences and my mind is tuned to anyalysis. On my own, I’ve read philosophy for 45 years. I got used to juggling abstract ideas in my head when I was a teenager.

Criticizing Perplexity’s garbage line by line as some people do would be a waste of my time. It would be like searching through a landfill for empty aluminum cans to turn in for the nickel deposits.

BB2, another atheist around here, also likes to waste people’s time with reams and reams of quibbling arguments.
There’s nothing these characters like more than to get people debating with them to make it look like they can be taken seriously. I’m surprised people fall for it.

 

[Perplexity]

Those who wander around these forums have seen my posts in countless threads on many subjects. They’ve seen that I usually get to the very heart of a complex issue and give explanations in few words. “Brevity is the soul of wit”.

I have three college degrees in the sciences and my mind is tuned to anyalysis. On my own, I’ve read philosophy for 45 years. I got used to juggling abstract ideas in my head when I was a teenager.

Criticizing Perplexity’s garbage line by line as some people do would be a waste of my time. It would be like searching through a landfill for empty aluminum cans to turn in for the nickel deposits.

BB2, another atheist around here, also likes to waste people’s time with reams and reams of quibbling arguments.
There’s nothing these characters like more than to get people debating with them to make it look like they can be taken seriously. I’m surprised people fall for it.

This is actually quite humorous…I said empther likes to belittle others and present himself as educated and intelligent…and empther responds to this…by…belittling others and presenting himself as educated and intelligent… methinks empther should consider what he says next very carefully before this gets really embarrassing for him.

 

[Bobber90]

Those who wander around these forums have seen my posts in countless threads on many subjects. They’ve seen that I usually get to the very heart of a complex issue and give explanations in few words. “Brevity is the soul of wit”.

I have three college degrees in the sciences and my mind is tuned to anyalysis. On my own, I’ve read philosophy for 45 years. I got used to juggling abstract ideas in my head when I was a teenager.

Criticizing Perplexity’s garbage line by line as some people do would be a waste of my time. It would be like searching through a landfill for empty aluminum cans to turn in for the nickel deposits.

BB2, another atheist around here, also likes to waste people’s time with reams and reams of quibbling arguments.
There’s nothing these characters like more than to get people debating with them to make it look like they can be taken seriously. I’m surprised people fall for it.

One point which hopefully has been addressed is the tiny matter of the time a decision is made, and the time at which the agent is conscious of the decision. If there is a significant gap, choices can happen without awareness. This is for the benefit of the McInsults hurled at the start of the conversation…

I agree that it makes much more sense that free will happens in the context of causal determinism, but the rest seems riddled with paradox, and I haven’t got a clue.

 

[prodigalson2011]

I’d like to outline a reason for doubting that free-will exists:

There are different kinds of freedoms of the will. The one we’re concerned with is that which is necessary for us to be morally responsible agents. An agent is morally responsible for an action if she’d deserve praise or credit if she understood that it was morally good, or she’d deserve blame if she understood it was morally bad. She’d deserve these moral predications solely in virtue of her performing the action.

Some say this free-will is compatible with us being determined, others don’t. But, what seems fairly uncontroversial (as much as can be in this field) is that an agent must be the appropriate source of the action in order to have been free with respect to performing it. She must exhibit a certain kind of control over the action in order to be morally responsible for it. If the action is produced randomly, we’d be wont to say the agent was responsible for it. etc.

What I want to suggest is that the free-will required for moral responsibility is incompatible with us being determined, or indetermined. This is good reason to doubt we have it.

I will not be providing my reason for thinking free-will is incompatible with determinism since I know of no determinists here. Rather, I’ll focus on indeterminism and its incompatibility with free-will.

So, let’s suppose that there is some agent, S, and some action A. Suppose that S causally influences the obtaining of A; but, that this causal influence is indetermined. That is, S was not causally determined to produce A.

So, we could even say there is some time, t1, at which S exerts her causal influence, and another time, t2, at which A obtains.

In order for S’s causal influence on A to be indeterministic the sum of all of S’s causal influences on A prior to t2 must be insufficient to bring A about. If that sum suffices to bring about A, then A is determined.

Therefore, taking all of S’s causal contributions collectively, prior to t2, it’s literally up in the air whether A will obtain or not. After taking all the causal conditions antecedent to A’s occurring, S plays no further causal role in whether A occurs. So, if A does happen to occur, it’s not because of S. It’s just a matter of luck whether A happens.

It seems, therefore, quite intuitive to me to say that S doesn’t exhibit the kind of control over A needed in order for S to be morally responsible for A. That is, if A happens to occur, it’d seem quite unnatural for us to ascribe praise or blame to S for A.

But, if an undetermined S isn’t morally responsible for A, then S doesn’t have free-will with respect to A.

I feel confident then in concluding that indeterminism is incompatible with free-will.

Thoughts?

My thoughts: This is pure sophistry. If I’m understanding your convoluted verbosity properly, then, in layman’s terms, the incongruity between the intended effect of the subject’s action and the actual effect negates free will. Is that right? If so, that’s completely erroneous, in that the conscious intent was still there. Conscious intent put to action is free will, regardless of outcome.

 

[prodigalson2011]

I would add, in defense of free will against any argument to be made against it, the very fact of the argument proves free will. It takes a special mind to believe that an essentially mechanical being can, by sheer blind chemical processes, even concoct such an idea as free will, to say nothing of developing and refining various philosophies for and against.
It seems to me if you had no free will, you wouldn’t even be aware of the possibility of it. I can’t imagine how someone could believe their every thought was some random generation of electrical impulses, which somehow miraculously convert into an intelligible structure able to be discerned by minds outside of it. Oh wait, that’s right. There are no other minds. Just brain cells exchanging information by means of vibrations and emissions of light. This reductionist worldview is reductive to the point of absurdity.

 

[Bobber90]

My thoughts: This is pure sophistry. If I’m understanding your convoluted verbosity properly, then, in layman’s terms, the incongruity between the intended effect of the subject’s action and the actual effect negates free will. Is that right? If so, that’s completely erroneous, in that the conscious intent was still there. Conscious intent put to action is free will, regardless of outcome.

I don’t think it is sophistry. If there was an incongruity between (every) intention and action, then free will would indeed be negated, because we could not achieve anything by intention, and everything achieved would be accidentally achieved. Indeterminacy or randomness is no port in a storm for free will.

Does the fact that we can imagine free will mean that we must have it? Or does our experience of choice and responsibility mean the same? To be honest, I cannot understand free will or imagine it accurately, and I cannot experience any moment of choosing or decision-making that lives up to the criteria. It is only hindsight which baffles me, as I know I am responsible for the things I do, but I cannot back up that feeling with philosophy.

I cannot imagine self-determinism, because I either act for reasons (they are the causes of my action), or I act with less than full decision-making consciousness. Ah, but was it conscious thought which decided how to value the factors which become reasons for my action? Often, yes. But there are factors which influenced the way I valued those considerations which later gave birth to the reasons for action, if that is clear. I just cannot see how we escape the causal chain, modify it, or act as a first cause within it.

Perhaps it is mistaken to think of ourselves as a unitary little man or woman inside our head, making decisions from on high. As to the mechanism, it takes an even more special mind to link the immaterial soul/mind to the impulses in my nervous system as I freely will myself to type…

 

[Bobber90]

I’d like to outline a reason for doubting that free-will exists:

There are different kinds of freedoms of the will. The one we’re concerned with is that which is necessary for us to be morally responsible agents. An agent is morally responsible for an action if she’d deserve praise or credit if she understood that it was morally good, or she’d deserve blame if she understood it was morally bad. She’d deserve these moral predications solely in virtue of her performing the action.

But to reply (sincerely) as Socrates would to a sophist, I do think some definitions and precision are in order before continuing!

The type of free will we’re concerned with is that which is necessary for us to be moral agents. An agent is morally responsible if he/she deserved credit/blame. That is tautological, no? The real question is: an agent is morally responsible and deserves praise or blame, if …what!?].

I was really interested to see if there is a lesser variety of free will which gives moral responsibility and a higher level which allows for total freedom of the will. Or perhaps there is a lesser one, and it is only the maximum freedom which allows for moral responsibility.

 

[Pieman333272]

I’d like to outline a reason for doubting that free-will exists:

There are different kinds of freedoms of the will. The one we’re concerned with is that which is necessary for us to be morally responsible agents. An agent is morally responsible for an action if she’d deserve praise or credit if she understood that it was morally good, or she’d deserve blame if she understood it was morally bad. She’d deserve these moral predications solely in virtue of her performing the action.

Some say this free-will is compatible with us being determined, others don’t. But, what seems fairly uncontroversial (as much as can be in this field) is that an agent must be the appropriate source of the action in order to have been free with respect to performing it. She must exhibit a certain kind of control over the action in order to be morally responsible for it. If the action is produced randomly, we’d be wont to say the agent was responsible for it. etc.

What I want to suggest is that the free-will required for moral responsibility is incompatible with us being determined, or indetermined. This is good reason to doubt we have it.

I will not be providing my reason for thinking free-will is incompatible with determinism since I know of no determinists here. Rather, I’ll focus on indeterminism and its incompatibility with free-will.

So, let’s suppose that there is some agent, S, and some action A. Suppose that S causally influences the obtaining of A; but, that this causal influence is indetermined. That is, S was not causally determined to produce A.

So, we could even say there is some time, t1, at which S exerts her causal influence, and another time, t2, at which A obtains.

In order for S’s causal influence on A to be indeterministic the sum of all of S’s causal influences on A prior to t2 must be insufficient to bring A about. If that sum suffices to bring about A, then A is determined.

Therefore, taking all of S’s causal contributions collectively, prior to t2, it’s literally up in the air whether A will obtain or not. After taking all the causal conditions antecedent to A’s occurring, S plays no further causal role in whether A occurs. So, if A does happen to occur, it’s not because of S. It’s just a matter of luck whether A happens.

It seems, therefore, quite intuitive to me to say that S doesn’t exhibit the kind of control over A needed in order for S to be morally responsible for A. That is, if A happens to occur, it’d seem quite unnatural for us to ascribe praise or blame to S for A.

But, if an undetermined S isn’t morally responsible for A, then S doesn’t have free-will with respect to A.

I feel confident then in concluding that indeterminism is incompatible with free-will.

Thoughts?

This makes no sense. The idea that something as specific as an action a free-will believer claims one can be morally responsible for is “up to luck” under materialism is asinine. It has to be classical-mechanics certitude - there’s no way quantum randomness would have that kind of effect. Likewise, even if it were up to luck, there are many ways S could still be held morally responsible for that. Finally, this fails to disprove free will, since the claim of free will believers is “some human acts are free” not “all human acts”.

 

[prodigalson2011]

I don’t think it is sophistry. If there was an incongruity between (every) intention and action, then free will would indeed be negated, because we could not achieve anything by intention, and everything achieved would be accidentally achieved. Indeterminacy or randomness is no port in a storm for free will.

Does the fact that we can imagine free will mean that we must have it? Or does our experience of choice and responsibility mean the same? To be honest, I cannot understand free will or imagine it accurately, and I cannot experience any moment of choosing or decision-making that lives up to the criteria. It is only hindsight which baffles me, as I know I am responsible for the things I do, but I cannot back up that feeling with philosophy.

I cannot imagine self-determinism, because I either act for reasons (they are the causes of my action), or I act with less than full decision-making consciousness. Ah, but was it conscious thought which decided how to value the factors which become reasons for my action? Often, yes. But there are factors which influenced the way I valued those considerations which later gave birth to the reasons for action, if that is clear. I just cannot see how we escape the causal chain, modify it, or act as a first cause within it.

Perhaps it is mistaken to think of ourselves as a unitary little man or woman inside our head, making decisions from on high. As to the mechanism, it takes an even more special mind to link the immaterial soul/mind to the impulses in my nervous system as I freely will myself to type…

The bolded statement is self negating and therefore a moot point. That incriminating “if” and the conveniently parenthesized “every” (were you trying to hide it, I wonder? ) give the lie to your argument. Unfortunately for you, congruent intentions, actions and effects occur with alarming frequency to nigh every member of the human race on a daily basis, so we need not even worry about this postulate. I will to go to the kitchen and get a glass of orange juice. I get up. I walk to the kitchen, take a glass from the cabinet, open the fridge and take out the orange juice… I fill the glass. Gasp!
Regardless, even if there were NEVER a congruent outcome, free will would not be negated. WILL is the INTENTION that leads to ACTION for a CONSCIOUS PURPOSE, regardless whether that purpose is achieved. Once again, pure sophistry. Alot of fancy words and technical philosophical jargon that amounts to nought. Quit denying your self!

 

[prodigalson2011]

I don’t think it is sophistry. If there was an incongruity between (every) intention and action, then free will would indeed be negated, because we could not achieve anything by intention, and everything achieved would be accidentally achieved. Indeterminacy or randomness is no port in a storm for free will.

Does the fact that we can imagine free will mean that we must have it? Or does our experience of choice and responsibility mean the same? To be honest, I cannot understand free will or imagine it accurately, and I cannot experience any moment of choosing or decision-making that lives up to the criteria. It is only hindsight which baffles me, as I know I am responsible for the things I do, but I cannot back up that feeling with philosophy.

I cannot imagine self-determinism, because I either act for reasons (they are the causes of my action), or I act with less than full decision-making consciousness. Ah, but was it conscious thought which decided how to value the factors which become reasons for my action? Often, yes. But there are factors which influenced the way I valued those considerations which later gave birth to the reasons for action, if that is clear. I just cannot see how we escape the causal chain, modify it, or act as a first cause within it.

Perhaps it is mistaken to think of ourselves as a unitary little man or woman inside our head, making decisions from on high. As to the mechanism, it takes an even more special mind to link the immaterial soul/mind to the impulses in my nervous system as I freely will myself to type…

Free will does not remove you from the causal chain, nor make you a first cause. There can be only one first cause, and that is God. Free will is the ability to reason and make decisions within your particular link of the causal chain. You cannot deny that in a given situation, several options present themselves to you and you can analyze and decide, to the best of your intelligence, which is best. That is free will. Sure, past experiences and such will influence your particular decision to some degree, but you have the ability to recall and analyze your past actions and experiences and attempt to place your current reality in a more objective light against them. Are you going to make perfectly right choices? No. Free will does not equate to omniscience.

 

[Bobber90]

Free will does not remove you from the causal chain, nor make you a first cause. There can be only one first cause, and that is God. Free will is the ability to reason and make decisions within your particular link of the causal chain. You cannot deny that in a given situation, several options present themselves to you and you can analyze and decide, to the best of your intelligence, which is best. That is free will. Sure, past experiences and such will influence your particular decision to some degree, but you have the ability to recall and analyze your past actions and experiences and attempt to place your current reality in a more objective light against them. Are you going to make perfectly right choices? No. Free will does not equate to omniscience.

Yeah, that’s where I stood when I thought I had rehabilitated free will in my understanding. However, I while I can accept will, I do not think it is really free. My notion of free will originally went something like this: a person is presented with several options. Across two scenarios, if everything else but the ‘free will’ is held constant, could the person decide upon one of the options in the first scenario, and the other in the second? His mood would be the same, his life experiences, his conversations earlier that day, his thoughts before he reached the options, the way the options seemed to him… etc etc. With all those factors (and any others that you can think of), a) where is the free will - is it left over - is it outside of these factors that are held constant, or is it constituted by them? and b) would he think differently, and would he choose differently? c) for what reasons?

I do not think it is possible!

 

[Bobber90]

The bolded statement is self negating and therefore a moot point. That incriminating “if” and the conveniently parenthesized “every” (were you trying to hide it, I wonder? ) give the lie to your argument. Unfortunately for you, congruent intentions, actions and effects occur with alarming frequency to nigh every member of the human race on a daily basis, so we need not even worry about this postulate. I will to go to the kitchen and get a glass of orange juice. I get up. I walk to the kitchen, take a glass from the cabinet, open the fridge and take out the orange juice… I fill the glass. Gasp!
Regardless, even if there were NEVER a congruent outcome, free will would not be negated. WILL is the INTENTION that leads to ACTION for a CONSCIOUS PURPOSE, regardless whether that purpose is achieved. Once again, pure sophistry. Alot of fancy words and technical philosophical jargon that amounts to nought. Quit denying your self!

No, I wasn’t trying to hide it, if I was I would not have used parentheses. I simply couldn’t see the OP whilst typing, so I made it conditional - upon whether that was what the OP had argued. If he/she did, it holds.

If there was never a congruent outcome, then we would not have free will because intention and action would be irreconcilably disjointed and decision-making illusory.

 

[Perplexity]

My thoughts: This is pure sophistry.

The first thing I’d like to say, (or point out), is that you’re clearly not familiar with the philosophy of free-will. The words and concepts I’ve used are quite common in the literature.

Cf. this for the position I’m advocating amazon.com/Living-without-Cambridge-Studies-Philosophy/dp/0521029961/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1326021230&sr=8-4

and this for a general feel for philosophy of free-will: amazon.com/Oxford-Handbook-Free-Will-Handbooks/dp/0195399692/ref=pd_sim_b_6

If I’m understanding your convoluted verbosity properly, then, in layman’s terms, the incongruity between the intended effect of the subject’s action and the actual effect negates free will. Is that right?

I have no idea where you got this. The objection is simply that if an agent’s action is indeterminate, then the agent is not the kind of source of that action she needs to be if she is to be morally responsible for it.

If so, that’s completely erroneous, in that the conscious intent was still there. Conscious intent put to action is free will, regardless of outcome.

I’m not sure I’ve ever heard of this description of free-will. But, putting its quaintness aside, I see no reason to accept it. You object to your understanding of my argument by merely proposing a description of free-will.

Compatibilists might enjoy your definition though as it is quite amenable to the Frankfurt Cases. Given that you’re not a compatibilist, I’d recommend including something in your description which precludes this undesirable result. In any case, it doesn’t seem you’ve caused any problems for my argument here. Let’s see what else you have to say in your other post(s) addressed to me though.

 

[Perplexity]

I would add, in defense of free will against any argument to be made against it, the very fact of the argument proves free will. It takes a special mind to believe that an essentially mechanical being can, by sheer blind chemical processes, even concoct such an idea as free will, to say nothing of developing and refining various philosophies for and against.
It seems to me if you had no free will, you wouldn’t even be aware of the possibility of it. I can’t imagine how someone could believe their every thought was some random generation of electrical impulses, which somehow miraculously convert into an intelligible structure able to be discerned by minds outside of it. Oh wait, that’s right. There are no other minds. Just brain cells exchanging information by means of vibrations and emissions of light. This reductionist worldview is reductive to the point of absurdity.

I don’t know where to begin with this one…there’s just so many things that need addressing.

I suppose for now I’ll content myself with pointing out that the denial of free-will (as I’ve specified) doesn’t entail or even remotely imply the reductionist worldview you describe above. I really have no idea where you’re getting a lot of these ideas. Have you read any books on free-will within contemporary philosophy?