If free will was not real

[The Grand Nudger]

Uh, no? It's useful as a discussion of free will, different descriptions or definitions of free will, and arguments in support of free will by those descriptions and definitions.

[Kitan Etos]

Uh, why not?

[The Grand Nudger]

I -just- told you why the thread isn't useless, according to me.  I'm really not sure how you arrived at that in the first place.

[Edwardo Piet]

He's jumping to conclusions. So I assume that means he has eaten 72 boiled eggs today.

[Gemini]

[Gemini]

It would probably be better to just repeat myself, since reason does not change.

Free will exists due to choice.  That cannot and never will change.

Choice is the very epitome of free will, for it allows a choice to be made.

If free will does not exist, as atheists claim, then one is clearly unable to make a choice.

Think of it this way. What you experience when you make a choice is the phenomology of decision making. In other words, it's the conscious experience of what it's like to make a decision.

Phenomenology and physical/metaphysical models are two completely different perspectives. I'm sure you'll agree that neuroscience explains a great deal about the brain, and this explains a great deal about our conscious experience. An example would be learning skills. According to neuroscience, when we practice solving math problems, we're forming new connections between neurons. As we establish these connections, we get better at math.

But we would never know this from the experience of solving math problems. The physical model that explains what's going on (connections between neurons) and the experience of solving a math problem are two different perspectives.

What I'm arguing is that "free will" is meaningful as a concept that refers to our experience of making decisions. Whether the physical/metaphysical model that explains our experience is deterministic or not is completely irrelevant to this concept (or should be, IMHO).

[The Grand Nudger]

[Gemini]

I'm under pressure from people, but the pressure (usually) falls short of duress.

I think , again, it's a semantic switch rather than a meaningful distinction.  

Pressure leans on factors that are already present in my decision making (such as the desire for social approval) while duress obliterates my autonomy with violent threats or actual violence. It's not just a pedantic distinction.

I'm referring more to your compulsion to eat chocolate when I say duress, just as a heroin addict is under duress regardless of whether or not any external force or agent is turning the screw.

I read an article that said eating chocolate cake for breakfast can help you lose weight, and decided to try it out. Having a "compulsion to eat chocolate" means something specific about my state of mind which is quite different than the decision I made; a compulsion would be more like an eating disorder.

Excellent, so in what way, then..does a nest thermostat -not- have free-in-context will?  It;s a learning thermostat that requires no duress or coercion from an exterior agent in order to make selections as regards microclimates within a given structure. This is why I don't see much utility in the concept.  

The concept compatibilists define as "free will" has plenty of utility, once you get all the philosophizing about causality out of the way. It's a particular cognitive process that humans with healthy frontal lobes engage in, which we experience as decision making. Which is why your reductio fails--nest thermostats don't have frontal lobes.

Well, I don;t believe in spirits, but I do acknowledge the existence of a mind.  If the mind has, as an ability, the power to be the initiator of events which are not themselves programmed -into- it by..say, our biology and environment.  If our minds arent just elaborate computers....for example, then I;d be willing to consider them as free in some meaningful context - magical spirit powers are a non-issue to me.  This is obviously what "free-will" is angling for...but compatibalist free will ends up being the business of calling red green, rather than discovering or establishing that something -is- green.  It;s a redifinition of a term in the face of evidence to the contrary, and dearth of evidence or explanation in support of...rather than the abandonment of a failed idea.  To me, that would be like deciding that zues really did exist, except that the term zues refers to a cumulonimbus cloud.  Well, I'll just keep calling it a cloud - just as i refer to my will.  There's no use for the prefix "free".  It describes nothing.

(Bold added)

You're defining via negative. Which leaves my question on the table. Is there a coherent definition of incompatibilist free will?

Bob didn't make you do something, but your sugar junky brain -did-. Compulsion, coercion, duress....it applies to either case, and seeing as how your internal compulsions have, at their very heart, external value setting mechanisms (why do you like sugar so much?) then the difference is superficial and, imo, uninformative.

My sugar junky brain didn't make me do something. My sugar junky brain (which is identical to me) did something.

You've got to agree there's a distinction between the two. It isn't relevant to the metaphysics of causality, but it's a distinction nonetheless. And it's not obvious to me why concerns over specious metaphysics should supersede a useful definition of an actual measurable cognitive process.

[The Grand Nudger]

Pressure leans on factors that are already present in my decision making (such as the desire for social approval) while duress obliterates my autonomy with violent threats or actual violence. It's not just a pedantic distinction.

It doesn't obliterate it.  You -could- tell the man holding a gun to your head, demanding your purse...to just go ahead and shoot you because you're not going to give it to him.  Or, in another context, you could tell the enemy joe on the other side that he;s going to have to gnaw his way through you with his teeth before you ever let him cross the line you've drawn in the sand.  Degrees of compulsion...and here an additional layer, their efficacy, not the presence or absence of it.  

I read an article that said eating chocolate cake for breakfast can help you lose weight, and decided to try it out. Having a "compulsion to eat chocolate" means something specific about my state of mind which is quite different than the decision I made; a compulsion would be more like an eating disorder.

Having a compulsion to eat chocolate, but more in context sugar..in the way I'm using it, is the demonstrable chemical seeking habit of your brain.  Sugar does something pleasurable to us and so we seek it out, it's not even a conscious thing.  It becomes a weighted value in our decision making that we do not, ourselves, decide to set.  

The concept compatibilists define as "free will" has plenty of utility, once you get all the philosophizing about causality out of the way. It's a particular cognitive process that humans with healthy frontal lobes engage in, which we experience as decision making. Which is why your reductio fails--nest thermostats don't have frontal lobes.

It also appears to be compatible with a nest thermostat having free will..since it satisfies your criteria.  They don;t -need- frontal lobes to satisfy your -previously stated- criteria..and why do you keep adding and modifying the criteria anyway?  

(Bold added)

You're defining via negative. Which leaves my question on the table. Is there a coherent definition of incompatibilist free will?

I'm not -defining- anything, only presenting one example in which it would not be free...to give you an idea of the criteria -I- would use.  As to your question..ish, I don't think there is if we limit ourselves to sound evidentiary propositions...which is why I just call it -my will-.  That doesn't mean there can't be, or that it's impossible.  There's no shortage of examples, in this world, of things which..as a system, have abilities or properties that none of their constituent parts have.  The brain is one such system...so it's at least -plausible- that even though it;s made of "deterministic stuff" and worlks in a "deterministic way" that it's product, and it's abilities...are themselves something other than deterministic.  In that sense there -could- be a coherent "incompatibilist free will"...but it's a bit of a misapplication of terms.  That, to me, would be a legitimate -compatibilist- free will...rather than a game of semantic hide and seek.

Metaphorically, the ghost in the machine.

My sugar junky brain didn't make me do something. My sugar junky brain (which is identical to me) did something.

For reasons it does not control, by parameters it did not set.  In this case, it's not only not free...you don't even have ownership.  It just happens "in you".  

You've got to agree there's a distinction between the two. It isn't relevant to the metaphysics of causality, but it's a distinction nonetheless. And it's not obvious to me why concerns over specious metaphysics should supersede a useful definition of an actual measurable cognitive process.

No, I don;t have to agree...because even whatever compulsion bob puts you through is...as you yourself noted above...going to manifest itself via the same internal processes.  Those internal processes are themselves, capable of coercing you and producing the same effect as bob can.  Bob could, in fact, coerce you in such a subtle way as you don't even notice - far in advance-, and the decision at the end of this process in the distant future would seem to be, and in many important ways -is- your own but entirely in accordance with the will of bob (that's how we train people to kill people). It's not a question of metaphysics...we're not having a metaphysical discussion, and I;m not presenting metaphysical objections......so?

[Gemini]