Do you believe in free will?

[genkaus]

There is still a lack of alternative choices, the other part of free will. If you are unable to choose a different alternative, then you cannot posit any rational description of free will.

The correlation between motivation and its corresponding action is a demonstration of Will, but not Free. You had no alternatives.

No, the alternative choices are available. Which one of the alternative choices you'd choose is determined by your will. It is within the nature of the agent to have alternate wills and it is that difference that makes alternate choices possible.

The correlation of an action with motivation is demonstration of uncoerced will - which by your definition is the same as free-will.

Firstly, incapability of opting for an alternative.

The very existence of alternatives indicates capacity of choice.

Secondly, the motivation and action become inconsistent because the motivation is the rationalisation of the action itself. Based upon our own private perception, it appears that we rationalise then act, which is far more debatable than most people realise, and in regards to minor movements, actively wrong. Whether this applies to large rational decisions rather than instinct is where it gets very fuzzy, its an area which we may never fully understand.

Putting motivation before action is putting cause before its effect - its ignoring the chain of causality. Perhaps you are talking about the difference between conscious and unconscious motivations. But most of meaningful actions undertaken are the result of conscious motivation - otherwise all we'd see would be people acting instinctively and then trying to justify those actions.

If we limit things to the motivation leading to the action, it ignores the reactionary nature of motivation. You are motivated only as result of external or internal stimuli. You are drawing a line where no line need be drawn in order to justify your definition from my perspective.

Firstly, its your definition.

Secondly, the question is simple - how do you differentiate between a coerced and an uncoerced action?

I agree on a certain level, that the apparent correlation between our motivation and the action is strong, and strong enough to make a case that we have a will, but I do not go so far as to call it free because I do not ignore the causations which led to the motivation.

Who's ignoring the causations leading to the motivation? And how are they relevant to your definition of free will? Its not a complicated issue. Coercion means action against will, i.e. action against motivation. The knowledge of these two are all that are required to judge the issue. The cause of the will or the external entity making the action contrary to the will are irrelevant.

On the contrary, that makes the assumption of free will at all. I do not, therefore cannot see free-will starting. Determinism doesn't end, and free will never starts.

Having understood the deterministic position, all you can say is determinism doesn't end - it bears no relevance on whether free-will starts or not. But because you have misunderstood free-will and assumed that it holds a position fundamentally contrary to determinism - you cannot see it starting.

From my position you are mired so deeply in the assumption of free will, that you fail to see it is an irrelevant term for our actions.

On the contrary - I never assumed free-will. I deduced it. And how is the question of whether our actions are uncoerced irrelevant?

I think we can both agree, that any attempt to define the self, is fuzzy and incomplete as to be pointless to reach consensus.

And thus the answer to where free-will begins would be as fuzzy and incomplete - because free-will cannot start before the self does.

You certainly asserted the illusion, and actuality of free will were different, but never coherently backed up the assertion. Which I note you have done once more.

How is the fundamentally different understanding of the principle an incoherent backup for the distinction made?

What you are doing, is asserting something which is compatible with free will, and hijacking the phrase free will to a deterministic causal chain as an explanation via creation of action through motivation to do so.

So, I'm staying true to the definition of free-will, rejecting the irrational and self-contradictory interpretation of it and explaining it as a mechanism which is very real. I don't see a problem here.

So far neuroscience seems to indicate, although only in terms of non-consequential actions, that the activity to commit to an action, occurs before the conscious motivation to do so.
Whether this is also true of larger conscious decisions is open to debate, but it would not surprise me if all actions occur on this level, which are merely rationalised by the conscious mind.

If I recall the cited experiment correctly - the action was not committed to before conscious motivation was available - it was still open to retraction. As suggested by the name of the activity - readiness potential.
Further, in non-consequential actions, this argument might hold, since the time difference between the motivation and the action are minimal. But in goal-directed behaviour, this certainly would not hold, since the motivation and all possible actions leading to it need to be considered before the action is undertaken.