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Hypothetically, science proves free will isn't real
#59
RE: Hypothetically, science proves free will isn't real
(July 6, 2016 at 9:47 am)Alasdair Ham Wrote: If different circumstances were present then things would be different so WE would do things for different reasons. [1] Under determinism there is only one physically possible future at any given moment. [2]

1) If so, then 'we' are things with the ability to do different things (either self-determined or not). In other words, consider two actions (a) and (b). If both actions (a) and (b) are capable of obtaining through the agency of a human person (whether or not that agency is self-determined), then a human person 'could have done' (a) or (b) in the sense that human agency (whatever nature that agency may have) 'is able' to bring them about. People have the ability to bring about the existence of (a) or (b). 

In what manner do people bring them about? Do people 'self-determine' either (a) or (b), or does some other non-personal agency determine, through the persons natural and unintentional/impersonal operations that (a) or (b) obtains? <= Do you see how this last question is irrelevant to the question regarding the capacity for (a) or (b) to come about through human agency?

Two buttons, one red, one blue, one green. Is a red button the sort of thing that can be pushed by a human action? Yes. Is the blue button the sort of thing that can be pushed by a human action? Yes. Is the green button the sort of thing that can be pushed by a human action? Yes. Human action is able to push either the red, blue or green button. Which one will the human push, and how is that action determined? <= DIFFERENT question than the "If 'determinism' is true, and a human pushes the red button, then could that human have push the blue or green button?" <= depending on the sense of "could have" you can have two different answers, one being more fundamental and described above.

2) Yes, that is true, the present must actually have the potential conditions actually obtain so as to determine just that one future. However, as described above, if hypothetically removed from all external conditions and circumstances, a person has the intrinsic capacity to bring about either (a) or (b) given certain conditions, a person has the requisite powers required for pushing either a red, blue or green button. The intrinsic human potential for different action is real, and it is governed by many factors which contribute to the determination of which potential action will be the actual one. No action can be a future actual one unless it is presently a potential one (in the sense that the action can actual occur through human agency). 

Quote:Compatabilsm says our choices are free if they are voluntary or not coerced. You know what those words mean.

Of course I know what those words mean, but I don't know what YOU mean by them. I asked what makes a choice free and you said if they are voluntary or not coerced. For me, not-coerced and voluntary are not identical, although not-coerced is certainly a part of voluntary. Because you seem to identify them with the other, I would like to know what you mean by them if this discussion will be in any way fruitful.

Quote:An example of a choice being voluntary is a choice that we do intentionally. For example, someone can step on someone's foot intentionally to hurt them as opposed to by accident. 

I get the example, so allow me to help out and turn your example into a working definition. An action is voluntary when that action is done according to how it is known and according to the known purpose for which it is done. In this case, what separates a voluntary action from an accidental action is synchronous knowledge of the done action and knowledge of the reason for which that known action is done. So... knowledge of the action and the action's purpose makes a choice free?

Quote:Any definition of free will that merely talks about that kind of choice is a kind of free will that no one deines anyway. [1] Hence why that definition doesn't address the question of whether we can do otherwise. [2]

1) We may not deny it, but we don't seem to be able to carefully explain or understand it. See above. Rather than put it in a descriptive proposition, you used an example everyone can agree with, but not many people can explain exactly what is intentional or voluntary.

2) Maybe this is because that question does not have anything to do with the choice-as-made, but rather with the intrinsic potential for different sorts of actions.

Quote: It's because this kind of freedom is perfectly compataible with determinism. It's trivially true and undeniable.

Remember those philosophers you said were strangely interrupted by the compatibilists? Do you ever wonder which philosophical discussion those philosophers strangely interrupted? What do you know about William of Ockham?

Quote:Choice that is not coerced.

What would constitute coercion?

Quote:It's only to those unfamiliar with it. I'm trying to introduce you to it.

Let me restate that. "This terminology is lazy and imprecise"

Quote:It would be if it was a coherent concept. We cannot determine otherwise because we ourselves would have to be determined in that case. If we're not, that's because indeterminism is true.

^ Here is an example of the imprecision I was referring to. Something as simple as saying "we cannot" is being equivocated. Suppose (a) obtained through human agency in the deterministic sense. I ask, "Could (b) have obtained instead?". I might mean two different things: 1) Is (b) the sort of thing, in general, which can come about through human agency in those circumstances (e.g. given a different person)? or 2) Can (b) have come about at all in those particular circumstances given that particular human and its causal history?

If (b) is the sort of thing which IS able, in general, to come about through human agency in the same circumstances in which (a) came about, then (a) came about in a determined but contingent way. In other words, if (a) occurs in a contingent but determined way, then determinism cannot be equivocated with 'necessity', and we begin to see the imprecision lurking in this often strange discussion.

Contingency does not equal choice or freedom

Determined actions do not equal necessary actions

Quote:If we do the determining then ultimately we have to be determined too and so ultimately we don't do the determining.

Can you elaborate?
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Messages In This Thread
RE: Hypothetically, science proves free will isn't real - by Ignorant - July 6, 2016 at 1:18 pm

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