Do you believe in free will?

[genkaus]

Then how have you escaped determinism, precisely, as I've already asked. How have you even dented it? You seem to be entrenching yourself within it. You have exactly as much free will as a worm, just a more "complicated" amount of it, capable of expressing a larger number of deterministic things. If this is simply a case of free will being all the things we can't predict due to complexity, what happens if we learn to predict this or that thing. Does free will vanish in a puff of disappointment, and if it exists, just how would it vanish? In with a bang, out with a whimper?

I haven't - nor do I need to since I don't consider it incompatible.

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Surely you must realise that if you argue freewill, then the you refers to the position of free will rather than individual.
We agree on that point, fine, but you are arguing for free will, hence why I asked for your alternative definitions you seem to withhold.

As I have.

More to the point, its not free will as you redefine it.

No, the definition is still "capacity of an agent to make a choice free from certain constraints". You assume I'm redefining it because you do not accept the meaning of the agent of the constraints I consider.

The problem you have is in this "free from some constraints" business. You define constraints only in terms of the external, but define free will as the expression of alternative choice. As was stated many times, that if you define it as free will if you ignore the internal constraints. Its merely the illusion of free will when you factor in the internal ones.
To demand otherwise, is still demanding a "3rd" agent of change beyond external and internal factors, otherwise your definition is illusion of free will and nothing more.
If we talk of the same thing, fair enough, its just a disagreement about what to call it. I say Illusion of Free Will, you say that expression IS free will.

As I've been trying to explain, the internal constraints must be discarded while considering the free-will and no third agent is necessary.

The internal constraints are what an agent is. To say that free-will must be free of internal constraints is to say that it must be free of the agent and his will. Free-will cannot be free of the person doing the wiling and to ask it to be is to ask for a contradiction that cannot be resolved.

Please cite example that I have missed. I do try to address each point which is raised. Not to do so WOULD be intellectually dishonest if intentionally so.

I think I've repeated my argument just above. I'd rather not go back looking for the answer to that.

They may, but that does remove the obligation to show that the initial presumptions as stated and described as pre-assumptions when I made them are either lacking, or false.
If they can do neither, then their argument has problems. As has not been addressed, because its not your position, they would still be in the position to prove magic is possible before you factor it into any assumptive statements.

Let's not make the mistake of thinking we are having an argument, I answered the points you raised, and you are now stating that "a proponent of free will" would say this, and say that. I can only answer the person making the counter-argument.

At this juncture I would like to say I appreciate your efforts to do so.

I think it would be best to drop this line of argument altogether, since I can only go as far as point out places where they might consider your arguments to be lacking, but cannot give their reasons for considering them lacking.

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@ Genk Again, are you generating internal stimuli, or are you one of those things that has been generated? Am I being unclear here?

No, simply asking the wrong question. For either possibility, whether you causing the internal stimuli or vice versa, the implied assumption is that both are separate entities. Since I've maintained that you are your internal stimuli, the question is inapplicable.

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You can't point to specifics, nor can you demonstrate it's existence except by reference to brain size, effect, or complexity(which for some reason or another are sometimes not good enough in some cases, but I would give it to you that considering all of these things together definitely has merit) and yet somehow you are confident in the statement that this thing exists. That doesn't worry you in the least? No worries, lets take a look at the list. Keeping it pretty close to our comfort zone aren't we? Very little on that list that is not very closely related to us has a definite yes. Troubling, bias. Some of these "dunnos" are pretty damned smart... It seems that this list is very much a list of things with big brains, big, deterministic, electrochemical machines....called brains.

I explained how and why more complex brains can give rise to free-will, by developing the higher states of awareness and cognition without which there can be no such thing as a will - free or otherwise.
The thing is, since we have seen that level of awareness and cognition only in things with bigger brains, it is expected that they'd be on my list of things that have free-will.

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Its also a problem if you redefine free will as determined from external causes, but refuse to name any internal causes that it is "free" from. What is "Free" about the free will you consider.

Quite the reverse. It is free from external causes and etermined by internal ones.

Actually, what I've also been arguing is that your nebulous version of free will, has the equal onus of proof as any other definition. Plenty of neurologial evidence behind the changes in the brain upon making decisions, and the electrical activity leading up to it.

Which would be an issue if "I" existed independently of my neurological activity. As I've said, I consider human mind to be the physical representation of the agent and the internal neurological changes taking place as the exercise of free-will.

Is it any wonder we're confused. You're a determinst who believes in free will, but doesn't agree with compatibilism.. wtf is that. Nor have you adequately explained how on earth that can possibly work.

I'm a determinist who believes in free-will because I don't consider them incompatible. I have little knowledge of compatibilism, but as far as I understand, it relies on the idea of a supernatural soul to explain co-existence of determinism and free-will while accepting that they are fundamentally incompatible - but I could be wrong about them.

And once we agree on basic premises, we can start discussing how it might work. Until now, we've only been arguing about my definition of free-will.