(October 12, 2015 at 10:31 pm)Rhythm Wrote: It's unlikely that such a belief actually -has- implications for free will, or is even remotely related. Not that this will stop people from referencing their beliefs when considering the issue, of course. If there were fairies working an ethereal treadmill inside of our heads, that might be a problem fro materialism....but that wouldn't tell us whether or not we had any free will.
Yes. Many times, people confuse materialism with determinism, as if materialism required determinism (it does not, as is obvious from modern physics regarding the behavior of some subatomic particles; ask Alex K about this in his "ask a particle physicist" thread), and as if substance dualism or idealism required that determinism is false (which is also wrong; normally, one regards one's desire to raise one's arm as a cause of it raising, whether the arm is material or not). Determinism is a separate idea from the question about what substance or substances the universe is made of, and it is good if people do not muddle together separate ideas.
Fairies working an ethereal treadmill inside our heads, as you say, does not tell us that determinism is false, or that we have any kind of freedom that we would not have as purely material beings.
I am reminded of the words of Oscar Wilde:
"Ah! that is clearly a metaphysical speculation, and like most metaphysical speculations has very little reference at all to the actual facts of real life, as we know them."
- Gwendolen, The Importance of Being Earnest, Oscar Wilde.
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/844/844-h/844-h.htm
"A wise man ... proportions his belief to the evidence."
— David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Section X, Part I.
