Sorry for being vulgar, but you are kind of derailing this thread. If you want to discuss moral indignation as a source of pleasure please make a different thread about that.

My point is that it is possible (and perhaps even preferrable) to hold people morally responsible without having any theory of free will or determinism to back this up, but to instead follow one's "gut feeling". This way, one at least has a definitive answer as to whether the person is guilty as charged or not, as opposed to getting lost in an endless effort to prove/disprove free will/determinism.

I want moral responsibility to be a tangible thing. That would make me happy, — ToothyMaw

Me too, except in my ear is the old wisdom to be careful what you wish for.

All ideas, my best guess, are a kind of bootstrapping. They never touch anything but themselves and relate to nothing but other ideas. To be sure they sometimes are applicable to the world, but that by approximation. That is, they are never tangible.

Some ideas, like arithmetic, in application so comport with the world that seemingly arithmetic, as an arithmetic of the world, cannot be other than it is, though in itself nothing of the world.

Ethics enjoys not even that simplicity of application. It seems to bear here in this circumstance in this way, and there in that circumstance that way, and we left to attempt to find what is in common.

And from this some argue relativity, or its older brother nihilism. In any case essential intangibility. But existence is its own tangibility. And I find in the existence of ethics all the tangibility I, or anyone, needs. And imo, you can find happiness in this. While the book is on the shelf, and nowhere else, the ideas archived in the book are in your and my and our minds, and nowhere else. And in this as substantial and tangible as anything human. That is, you had better be happy!

I’ll begin with the typical incompatibilist argument regarding free will:

1. A person acts of her own free will only if she is its ultimate source.
2. If determinism is true, no one is the ultimate source of her actions.
3.Therefore, if determinism is true, no one acts of her own free will. — ToothyMaw

I am a believer in free will and moral responsibility. I am not confident about whether compatibilism or incompatibilism is the correct view about the matter. But in a way, I do not think it matters, apart from being of intellectual interest. For surely it is more self-evident to reason that we have free will and are morally responsible than that, say, incompatibilism is true? And thus if one were to find evidence that determinism is true, it would be more reasonable upon this discovery to conclude that incompatibilism is false than it would to conclude that we lack free will.
So it seems to me to be rational to believe we have free will and are morally responsible even if we are not sure whether it is, or is not, compatible with determinism.

But anyway, to address your argument above: I think premise 2 is false. Premise 2 would only be true if, in addition to determinism being true, everyone comes into being. For then that person's coming into being would be determined by prior events and circumstances outside of herself. And thus there is no pure origination - she is not any action's ultimate source, as the chain of cause and effect traces in its entirety to causes outside of herself.

But imagine that we have not come into being but exist with aseity. We know already that some things that exist must have this status, else we will find ourselves having to posit an infinity of prior causes. So, that some things exist with aseity is certain. There is no incoherence, then, in supposing that we ourselves might have that status.

If we exist with aseity, then even if determinism turns out to be true, we would still be ultimate sources of all we do, for the causal chain would never trace in its entirety to external causes.

re PAP: it's surely open to both compatibilist and incompatibilist readings. So, although it is highly plausible that free will does involve having alternative possibilities, this leaves open whether the alternatives need to be unconditional or conditional. So I do not think one can get to the incompatibilist conclusion in a non-question begging way by means of PAP.

But imagine that we have not come into being but exist with aseity. We know already that some things that exist must have this status, else we will find ourselves having to posit an infinity of prior causes. So, that some things exist with aseity is certain. There is no incoherence, then, in supposing that we ourselves might have that status. — Bartricks

Supposing that we might have the status of aseity because aseity is possible for some things is different from demonstrating that people do not come into existence, and that they thus are the originators for everything they do. Furthermore, even if people did exist with aseity, external factors would still affect their decisions if determinism is true; perhaps you are the source of your actions insofar as the causes of them cannot be traced to the beginning of the universe, but your will is still subject to the laws of cause and effect. Thus, if determinism is true, you are not the ultimate source of your own actions, even if we ascribe aseity to ourselves.

re PAP: it's surely open to both compatibilist and incompatibilist readings. So, although it is highly plausible that free will does involve having alternative possibilities, this leaves open whether the alternatives need to be unconditional or conditional. So I do not think one can get to the incompatibilist conclusion in a non-question begging way by means of PAP. — Bartricks

It isn't plausible; it is how free will is defined according to an indeterminist view. And I say later in the OP that I am referring to free will in the indeterminist sense with PAP.

Supposing that we might have the status of aseity because aseity is possible for some things is different from demonstrating that people do not come into existence, — ToothyMaw

Yes, but here is the demonstration:

1. If we have free will, we exist with aseity
2. We have free will
3. Therefore we exist with aseity

My case for 1 is this:

1. Unless we exist with aseity everything we do will trace to external causes (a premise I take it you are sympathetic to)
2.If everything we do traces to external causes, we do not have free will
3. Therefore, if we have free will, we exist with aseity

Furthermore, even if people did exist with aseity, external factors would still affect their decisions if determinism is true; — ToothyMaw

Yes, but they will still be the originators of their decisions. Imagine that Tim says something to me that makes me want to hit him, and I hit him. Am I responsible? Of course. Now, I had no control over Tim. So the event of Tim saying whatever he said is not one that I had control over. Nevertheless, I am responsible because 'I' reacted to what he said.

If you hold that to be free and morally responsible you require not to be caused to make your decisions by anything external, then your view is patently implausible.

What is plausible is the claim that if your decisions are 'wholly' the product of external causes, then one is not responsible.

But if we exist with aseity then we are not wholly the product of external causes, because nothing caused us to be as we are.

It isn't plausible; it is how free will is defined according to an indeterminist view. And I say later in the OP that I am referring to free will in the indeterminist sense with PAP. — ToothyMaw

That's question begging. There is a vast literature on how best to understand 'could have done otherwise'. There are conditional and unconditional interpretations. The conditional interpretation is compatible with determinism, the unconditional is not. If you just stipulate that you are assuming the truth of the unconditional reading, then you are just stipulating that compatibilism is false, which is question begging.

@ToothyMaw Physical Determinism and Moral Responsibility are two completely fields of interest.

If you’re basing your moral actions on the belief that ‘you cannot do otherwise’ you are immoral. People all too often use this as an excuse to do what they want to do. It is a pitiful thing to see and something that is meant with contempt by me - aggressive contempt.

Remember if a stream of insults comes your way ‘it was just preordained’. I have ‘no responsibility’ so why should I be berated for insulting someone who actively believes I could’ve said nothing other than what I said?

Combining such a fatalistic view merely allows ANYONE to insult you in any way they can imagine - because you’ve just given them the right to do so.

Complaints against violence and insults are void if they come from the mouth of those who believe everyone lacks moral responsibility.

Determinism: the doctrine that all events, including human action, are ultimately determined by causes external to the will. — ToothyMaw

That's an odd way of defining determinism: it is more like a conclusion or an intermediate result. Determinism in this context is usually assumed to be causal determinism, which means that the state of the world at any given time, together with causal laws, fixes everything that happens at all other times, before or after. Conjoined with the belief that the past is fixed, this implies that the future is fixed by the past.

This should not be confused with epiphenomenalism, which says that if A fully accounts for B, then nothing else accounts for B. Here "accounts for" can mean being a prior cause, but it can also stand for any other type of explanation. For example, an epiphenomenalist might say that brain activity fully accounts for the decisions that we make. This is not a causal account, in the strict sense, because decisions on this account do not occur as a subsequent result of brain activity - they are brain activity. Epiphenomenalism is equally compatible with causal determinism and indeterminism. The epiphenomenalist in the above example would say that human action is not determined by human will (since it is already determined by brain activity), but she may allow that brain activity could be indeterministic.

You’re a complete arsehole.

It may seem I am trying to provoke ... but I lack free will according to you don’t I? Ergo I’m not ‘responsible’ for my words.

This is the KEY point here. If you insist we don’t have any ‘responsibility’ then you can literally have no complaints about what anyone says OR accuse anyone of derailing your thread - at least you cannot and expect anyone here to take you seriously given that you believe we cannot do otherwise.

We act as if we have free will. Whether we do or don’t is irrelevant in terms of ‘responsibility’. We’re merely stuck with temporal perspective as that is what/how ‘existence’ is ‘existence’ for us. Our degree of ‘responsibility’ is what we really can get into rather than suggesting it doesn’t exist.

1. If we have free will, we exist with aseity
2. We have free will
3. Therefore we exist with aseity — Bartricks

It seems to be a circular argument - attempting to prove that we do not come into existence by assuming we have free will, only to claim that because we don't come into existence we have free will.

What is plausible is the claim that if your decisions are 'wholly' the product of external causes, then one is not responsible. — Bartricks

Well, it seems to me that even if someone exists with aseity, and you have not proven that people do indeed exist with aseity without it being contingent on people having free will (you just assumed free will exists), they still have no power over the facts of the future, which includes the external factors that affect their wills. The argument for no one having power over the facts of the future is as follows (taken from the SEP):

1. No one has power over the facts of the past and the laws of nature.
2. No one has power over the fact that the facts of the past and the laws of nature entail every fact of the future (i.e., determinism is true).
3. Therefore, no one has power over the facts of the future.

If you have an issue with me assuming the truth of causal determinism then allow me to quote you:

Unless we exist with aseity everything we do will trace to external causes (a premise I take it you are sympathetic to) — Bartricks

It follows that if no one has power over the facts of the future, which includes one's will, no one has control over any of the factors that affect their decisions and they do not act freely - at least according to how I have defined determinism.

That's question begging. There is a vast literature on how best to understand 'could have done otherwise'. There are conditional and unconditional interpretations. The conditional interpretation is compatible with determinism, the unconditional is not. If you just stipulate that you are assuming the truth of the unconditional reading, then you are just stipulating that compatibilism is false, which is question begging. — Bartricks

It isn't question begging if the only way people can be held morally responsible is nested in an indeterministic view of free will, which many assert is the case. But I see what you mean.

That's question begging. There is a vast literature on how best to understand 'could have done otherwise'. There are conditional and unconditional interpretations. The conditional interpretation is compatible with determinism, the unconditional is not. If you just stipulate that you are assuming the truth of the unconditional reading, then you are just stipulating that compatibilism is false, which is question begging. — Bartricks

To this I would say: if one assumes that no one has power over the facts of the future if determinism is true, then determinism needs to be proven false because if it is true it negates even many compatibilist accounts of moral responsibility; no one could have acted differently in any way, and a number of compatibilists do indeed assume that moral responsibility requires different possibilities. And it seems to me even if some compatibilist doesn't, they need to give an account of how people have the power to choose not to bring about things they could have brought about - even if determinism is true. Unless this can be done, the PAP assumes nothing other than that compatibilism is unsound if determinism isn't false.

You appear to be having having an emotional reaction.

It seems to be a circular argument - attempting to prove that we do not come into existence by assuming we have free will, only to claim that because we don't come into existence we have free will. — ToothyMaw

I don't see that it is circular. For I am not assuming that we exist with aseity, but concluding that we do.

The first premise says this:

1. If we have free will, we exist with aseity.

What's the basis for that claim? Well, this argument:

A) If we have come into existence, then we have been caused to come into existence by events external to ourselves
B) If we have been caused by external events, then we are not morally responsible for our initial character
C) Therefore, if we have come into existence, we are not morally responsible for our initial character

D) we are not morally responsible for our environment or for the laws of nature
E) if everything we do is a product of matters for which we are not morally responsible, then we are not morally responsible for anything we do
F) If we have come into existence, then everything we do is a product of initial character, environment and laws of nature, none of which we are in any way morally responsible for
G)Therefore, if we have come into existence, we are not morally responsible for anything we do

H) If we have free will, we are morally responsible for some of what we do
I) Therefore, if we have come into existence, we do not have free will.

That's not a circular argument. No premise asserts that we exist with aseity. Yet it establishes the truth of this premise:

1. If we have free will, we exist with aseity.

As for this premise:

2. We have free will

Well, that is self-evident to our reason. That doesn't mean it is certainly true, but it means the burden of proof is squarely on the one who denies premise 2. So, premise 1 and premise 2 are prima facie justified. And together they entail that we exist with aseity. An argument that entails its conclusion is not thereby circular.

1. No one has power over the facts of the past and the laws of nature.
2. No one has power over the fact that the facts of the past and the laws of nature entail every fact of the future (i.e., determinism is true).
3. Therefore, no one has power over the facts of the future. — ToothyMaw

That argument is unsound. Premise 1 is false. If we exist with aseity then we did have power over facts of the past, for there was never a time when we did not exist.

Those who think determinism is incompatible with free will typically appeal to a more basic principle, namely that if you are in no way morally responsible for A, and in no way morally responsible for B, and A and B are wholly causally responsible for C, then you are in no way morally responsible for C. That is, one's non-responsibility for A and B transfers to C.

I take it you agree with this, for you appealed to the fact that we are not the ultimate sources of our actions if determinism is true. It is by being an ultimate source - that is, the first link in a causal chain - that one can be morally responsible (and thus have free will of the kind moral responsiblity presupposes). The combination of determinism and the assumption that we have come into existence, entails that the above principle is violated and thus we do not have free will.

However, this does not establish the incompatibility of free will and determinism for the simple fact is you have to assume that we have come into being to establish the incompatibility.

Of course, most will grant you that assumption. But nevertheless, it is false, as the previous argument I made shows.

no one could have acted differently in any way, and a number of compatibilists do indeed assume that moral responsibility requires different possibilities. — ToothyMaw

That's question begging again: even if determinism is true, there's a perfectly intelligible sense in which we could have done otherwise than we did. For, as I say, there are conditional and unconditional interpretations of 'could have done otherwise'. It is the unconditional interpretations that require the kind of alternate possibilities that indeterminism provides.

Of course, perhaps when it comes to moral responsibility/free will it is the unconditional reading of 'could have done otherwise' that is the more plausible one, but nevertheless one would have to argue for this and not simply assume it.

I am myself agnostic on the matter as it seems to me that the more fundamental requirement for free will is some kind of ultimate sourcehood: the causal chains that produce our actions need to terminate with us, or at least have a terminus that includes us (they do not need to be wholly free from external causes, it is just that 'we' need to be in the causal mix from the get-go). And it seems to me that if this condition is not met, then indeterministic alternative possibilities are not going magically to make us morally responsible for what we do. If my initial self is the product of external causes, then I am surely not morally responsible for my initial self. And it doesn't matter from there on in whether the initial self develops thanks to deterministic influences or indeterministic influences, the resulting self will not become a self for which I am morally responsible either way.

Needless to say, much contemporary debate over free will is beside the point. It doesn't really matter whether determinism or indeterminism is true; what matters is whether we exist with aseity or not.

Your point is a silly one. All you're doing is pointing out that those who deny free will are hypocrites if they ever blame or in some other way adopt reactive attitudes towards the behaviour of others.

So what? You can't establish that a proposition is true by showing that its denier is a hypocrite.

1. If we have free will, we exist with aseity. — Bartricks

I have an issue with this; one could not be self-originated yet have free will. They just aren't responsible for their coming into existence. They can still be the ultimate source of their own actions without aseity:

You make these claims:

if everything we do is a product of matters for which we are not morally responsible, then we are not morally responsible for anything we do — Bartricks

If we have been caused by external events, then we are not morally responsible for our initial character — Bartricks

Initial character might constrain one's choices insofar as it limits what choices are available to one, but one could still be free to choose between all of the alternatives available to them in an unconditional sense. And a lack of aseity only means that one is not responsible for their initial character, nothing else.

If we have come into existence, then everything we do is a product of initial character, environment and laws of nature, none of which we are in any way morally responsible for — Bartricks

Whether or not one comes into existence (or lacks aseity) has nothing to do with the laws of nature or the environment, but merely initial character, something you do indeed acknowledge here:

A) If we have come into existence, then we have been caused to come into existence by events external to ourselves
B) If we have been caused by external events, then we are not morally responsible for our initial character — Bartricks

It then follows from what I have written above that having free will does not mean one must exist with aseity. Thus, premise (1) is unsupported.

That argument is unsound. Premise 1 is false. If we exist with aseity then we did have power over facts of the past, for there was never a time when we did not exist. — Bartricks

Maybe you did have power over the facts of the past, but you do not have power over the facts of the past in the present, which is what that means.

I have an issue with this; one could not be self-originated yet have free will. They just aren't responsible for their coming into existence. They can still be the ultimate source of their own actions without aseity: — ToothyMaw

Say you did - per impossible - create yourself. Well, now you are responsible for your own existence (as even you would surely admit). Why, though? Well, surely the only answer we can give to this question is that if you created yourself then nothing external to you would be responsible for your existence. Yet this is also true if you exist with aseity.

So, ultimate sourcehood condition on moral responsibility is a negative one: you need 'not' to have been created by external events or objects. It is not a positive requirement that you have created yourself.

And you must accept this too, if you are an incompatibilist. For at best indeterministic alternative possibilities will only secure a negative condition, not a positive one. For it is patently absurd to maintain that if indeterminism is true we create ourselves, as self-creation is manifestly impossible regardless of whether determinism or indeterminism is true.

Initial character might constrain one's choices insofar as it limits what choices are available to one, but one could still be free to choose between all of the alternatives available to them in an unconditional sense. And a lack of aseity only means that one is not responsible for their initial character, nothing else. — ToothyMaw

I don't see how. So, let's assume that you have been brought into being. Well, you're not morally responsible for your initial character then. Everything you subsequently do is going to be a causal product of that character - for which you are in no way morally responsible - interacting with an environment for which you are in no way morally responsible. How on earth can you be morally responsible for anything you do under those circumstances? Indeterminism is no help at all, for how does indeterminism magically make you morally responsible for what you decide to do? The decision is still caused, yes? Indeterministic causation is still causation. And what caused it? Well, your background character - for which you're not morally responsble - and your environment - for which you are not morally responsible.

Let's say I desire a pie. And I also desire not to eat a pie. So, I am subject to competing desires. And let's now stipulate that it is indeterministic which desire will produce my decision: that is, it is indeterministic whether I decide to eat a pie or not. Well, how does that make me morally responsible for the decision? The desire to eat a pie was not a desire for which I was morally responsible - for it was caused by external factors. Nor was the desire not to eat a pie, for the same reason. How does the fact it was indeterministic which one would win magically mean I am now morally responsible for it? It's not like the indeterministic nature of the whole process was something for which I was morally responsible. So, unless you introduce a new element - a morally responsible me, standing in the wings as it were, who reaches in and makes teh decision (and then I want to know how that new me got to be morally responsible, of course), it looks like we have pure moral responsiblity alchemy here.

It then follows from what I have written above that having free will does not mean one must exist with aseity. Thus, premise (1) is unsupported. — ToothyMaw

I do not follow you. The argument I gave in support of premise 1 was logically valid, so you must deny a premise. Which one do you deny?

Maybe you did have power over the facts of the past, but you do not have power over the facts of the past in the present, which is what that means. — ToothyMaw

No, because if I did have power over a past event, then I can be in principle morally responsible for that event. And thus the fact that at present I lack control over it is irrelevant, given that I am nevertheless morally responsible for that past event. I mean, it is no argument against my current moral responsibility to point out that how I am at present is a product of past decisions I made 'for which I am morally responsible'.

Again, if I have always existed, then premise 1 of that argument is false.

Those who run such arguments are simply ignoring the possibility that we exist with aseity, perhaps because so few take the possibility seriously.

Yet it is quite clear to the reason of virtually everyone who reflects on this matter that if we are wholly the product of external causes then we are not morally responsible. I mean, this is precisely why so many quickly conclude that determinism undermines free will. Yet as I have shown above, if one simply follows reason diligently on this point one will arrive at the conclusion that we exist with aseity. That is an unusual conclusion, to be sure. But it is not incoherent and it is what the evidence implies.

But anyway, there is a more general point to be made against scepticism about free will and the moral responsibility it grounds.

Do you agree that it is irrational to reject a stronger premise on the basis of a weaker one?

I assume so.

Which is more self-evident to reason: that we are morally responsible for what we do, or that moral responsibility requires X? (and make X anything you like - that is 'indeterminism' or 'alternative possibilities' or whatever).

Surely it is more self-evident that we are morally responsible? I mean, we have empirical evidence for this in the fact that there is - and has always been - considerable disagreement among philosophers over what X is, yet despite this the bulk of philosophers agree that we are morally responsible (with notable exceptions, of course).

Manifestly then, it is more powerfully self-evident among those who think most clearly about these matters - professional philosophers - that we are morally responsible, than that moral responsibility requires X, whatever X may be.

Given this, it is irrational to conclude that we lack moral responsibility on the grounds that we do not have X, isn't it?

So, someone who argues that we lack moral responsibility because determinism is true, is guilty of this mistake: for whether moral responsibility really does require determinism or not is clearly less self-evident than the fact we are morally responsible.

I think, then, that it really is irrational - demonstrably so - to conclude that we lack moral responsibility. It is always going to be more rational, if we discover that determinism is true, to conclude that compatibilism is true, than to conclude that we aren't free and responsible.

I apply this to my own view too, of course. If we found out that we do not exist with aseity - and, like I say, to my knowledge there is no such evidence, only evidence that our sensible bodies do not exist with aseity - it would be more reasonable for me to accept that aseity is not, after all, required for moral responsibility than to conclude that we are not morally responsible.

I was making a valid point. Did you get it?

You’re missing the point. The question of ‘free will’ has no weight when it comes to moral responsibility.

It is a null question. No one acts as if they don’t have free will. The rest is simply a matter of physics NOT philosophical musings.

Again, silly and ignorant.

Moral responsibility presupposes free will. They're two sides of the same coin such that they're pretty much used interchangeably in the contemporary debate (a debate you're unfamiliar with, yes?).

It's not a question in physics. Christ! And you can't possibly know what implications a physical theory has for the question of free will until or unless you've clarified just what having free will involves. Which is why, you know, it isn't discussed in physics.

And once again, even if it is true that no one acts as if they do not have free will (which is itself highly questionable and would require clarifying just what having free will involves 'first'), that doesn't tell you anything interesting about whether we have it or not. "I can't help believing X.....therefore X is true" is really stupid reasoning.

@Bartricks Yes, moral responsibility presupposes free will. There you have it.

Is there anything more we can say on this subject worthy of debate?

I did actually say that it is more useful to question the degree of responsibility we have for our actions NOT to outright deny them (such is pointlessly nihilistic).

I was trying to point out to the OP very clearly something that cannot be denied if you hold to the ‘no free will’ position alongside ideas of ‘moral responsibility’.

You’re enjoying the discussion with the OP so just ignore me. I just cared enough to point out something blatantly obvious in what the OP was stating.

@ToothyMaw Can you explain your thinking here:

Thus, the burden of proof is shifted to the compatibilist to prove determinism wrong in order to hold people morally responsible for acts.

It seems nonsensical to me but I’m sure you’ve put a reasonable degree of thought into this so explain in more depth why the burden lies on that side.

Morally it falls on the ‘compatibilist’ to point out the logical flaw of anyone ‘certain’ of this kind of fatalism. They basically have to take up the slack and show that it is a matter of hedging bets NOT rigorously holding to complete denial.

To be clear, I’m talking of this as you are ... from ‘Moral Responsibility’. From this position the ‘burden’ lies with the ‘deterministic’ view BUT they deny it if they’re utterly convinced of it. They deny ‘Morality’ and their own sense of being. Thankfully no one acts as if they have no responsibility even though many find denying responsibility appealing in certain circumstances. Only then does the ‘responsibility’ lie with those who aren’t stuck on one extreme end of the argument.

It boils down to this. To deny ‘Moral Responsibility’ when you actually have it is to wander through life without taking on any burden and suffering the consequences of such denial under the false belief of ‘I couldn’t have done otherwise’. On the other hand, those who accept responsibility for their actions are able to actively improve their decision making skills and choose a more ‘prosperous’ path in life - if they are wrong and they have NO real choice it makes absolutely no difference (for obvious reasons).

Logically it is ridiculous to assume you have no responsibility. The question is then more or less about the degree of choice we have in our lives and to what degree we can change anything. If our influence on the ‘stream of time’ is minimal or of import is yet another avenue for us to either throw-off the burden of responsibility or to take it on as a meaningful challenge.

One thing is for sure. We have a very distinct sensation of authorship to our actions. Such feelings of authorship have been - in certain conditions - a falsehood. So we can say that there is a certain limit to capacity when it comes to connecting 1:1 intent and action.

Thanks for writing that. It was a good read.

This leads to a gray zone in which it is uncertain if people can be held culpable, and it seems to me that until it is proven that determinism is false we should withhold judgement on whether or not people can be held morally responsible for their actions.

We can determine who is responsible for his actions simply by witnessing who acts. The being who acts is responsible for the action because it is he and no other who performed the act. If he is responsible for his actions, he is also morally responsible for his actions. I don’t think I need to prove determinism false when I could simply witness and point to who is responsible.

But surely there must be a distinction between moral acts and other acts? And if there is a distinction, then you must admit that there is a special quality to moral acts that makes them moral, it seems to me, as moral acts are presumably a subset of non-moral acts.

It appears to me you are packing some sort of soft determinism into this conclusion:

Therefore, if we have come into existence, we are not morally responsible for anything we do — Bartricks

The conclusion does not follow because you must specify that external factors such as environment and laws of nature, as you do in an earlier premise, also contribute to a lack of moral responsibility. The conclusion should be: "Therefore, if we have come into existence and our decisions are constrained by both environment and the laws of nature, then we are not morally responsible for anything we do".

It then follows that this conclusion must also be altered:

I) Therefore, if we have come into existence, we do not have free will. — Bartricks

To: "Therefore, if we have come into existence and our decisions are constrained by environment and the laws of nature, we do not have free will." Furthermore, you cannot simply negate "if we have come into existence" to mean "we exist with aseity" if the conclusion in support of

If we have free will, we exist with aseity. — Bartricks

must be altered as above; there are two separate phrases modifying the assertion that we lack free will. If the soft determinism cannot be negated then said doctrine contradicts premise (2) that we have free will, which you use to prove that we have aseity.

The conclusion does not follow because you must specify that external factors such as environment and laws of nature, as you do in an earlier premise, also contribute to a lack of moral responsibility. — ToothyMaw

But the conclusion does follow from those premises. So I am just wondering which premise you are disputing. Here is the argument:

A) If we have come into existence, then we have been caused to come into existence by events external to ourselves
B) If we have been caused by external events, then we are not morally responsible for our initial character
C) Therefore, if we have come into existence, we are not morally responsible for our initial character

That argument above is deductively valid. And presumably you would accept that it is sound (though in case you do not, I will say something about A and B's plausibility below).

D) we are not morally responsible for our environment or for the laws of nature
E) if everything we do is a product of matters for which we are not morally responsible, then we are not morally responsible for anything we do
F) If we have come into existence, then everything we do is a product of initial character, environment and laws of nature, none of which we are in any way morally responsible for
G)Therefore, if we have come into existence, we are not morally responsible for anything we do

This part of the argument is also deductively valid. And it is presumably one of these premises - more specifically, E or F, that you wish to dispute. But I am not yet entirely clear which one.

Let's just go through each one in turn, starting with A. Can you reasonably deny A? I do not think so, for denying A would mean having to maintain that one can create oneself. But that involves a contradiction: to create yourself you would have to exist prior to your own existence. So, A is not open to reasonable doubt.

What about B? Well, if you deny B then I find it hard to conceive of on what basis you think determinism is incompatible with free will. You could not, for instance, say that determinism is incompatible with free will because it deprives us of alternative possibilities of a sort only indeterminism can provide. For clearly denying B would mean you accept that it is possible for someone to be morally responsible for something for which they exercised no control at all, namely their initial character. The compatibilist could simply reply to you that as you're happy enough with people being morally responsible for their initial character despite lacking all control over its acquisition, then you should be happy enough with people being morally responsible for what that character subsequently determines them to do.

So, I don't think you can deny B without making your incompatibilism ad hoc.

C follows as a matter of logic.

What about D? Well, clearly you accept this, as you keep appealing to it (and it is self-evidently true). And indeed, the basis for thinking D is true is really the same basis for thinking that B is true, namely that one was not involved in any way in these matters.

What about E? E says " if everything we do is a product of matters for which we are not morally responsible, then we are not morally responsible for anything we do".

Well, from your comments it seems to me that this is the premise that you wish to deny. For I suppose one could argue that it begs the question against the incompatibilist, as an incompatibilist thinks that if some of what we do is the indeterministic product of matters for which we are in no way morally responsible, then we can - somehow - be morally responsible for that product.

But this is not really question begging as the burden of proof is squarely on the incompatibilist to support that claim. That is, E is not default false, but default true. It is prima facie plausible. By contrast, the claim that somehow the involvement of indeterministic causation could transform us from devoid of moral responsiblity for our decisions to morally responsible for them is prima facie implausible. I provided an argument in support of that: I am (by hypothesis) in no way morally responsible for my desire for a pie. And I am (by hypothesis) in no way morally responsible for my desire not to eat a pie. It is - thanks to laws of nature for which I am also in no way morally responsible - indeterministic which of these desires will cause my decision. Well, how does that make 'me' morally responsible for the decision? That seems like magic. It's not like the decision is any more 'mine' than it would be if it had been determined by whatever desire caused it. And it's not like any more control was exercised over it.

The point can be made another way. Imagine that it was indeterministic that I had the initial character that I did. Well, how would that make me morally responsible for that initial character? How would the fact - if it is a fact - that I genuinely could have had a different character from the one I actually possessed, transform me from not being morally responsible for it to being morally responsible for it? The mind boggles. It is surely about as self-evident as anything that whether or not my initial character was one that was deterministically conferred or indeterministically conferred makes not a tiny bit of difference to my moral responsibility for it.

Well, how would things be any different when it is indeterministic which decisions my initial character causes me to make? Again, it seems clear that this is pure alchemy.

So E is not question begging in any worrying way. For we cannot reject arguments or premises that lead to the negation of our position on the grounds that they beg the question, for that is to have rendered one's own view as the touchstone of credibility, when the correct way to proceed is not to have a view, but simply to see what follows from plausible premises.

To reject E, then, one would need a good independent evidence that indeterministic causation alone can magically make one morally responsible for what it produces. I am sceptical such an argument exists.

What about F? F says "If we have come into existence, then everything we do is a product of initial character, environment and laws of nature, none of which we are in any way morally responsible for"

Well, the previous leg of the argument has established that we are not morally responsible for our initial character. And it is obvious that we are not morally responsible for our environment or the laws of nature. So how can you deny F? Even if you are an incompatibilist, you can't deny F, for you don't think we're morally responsible for indeterminism being true, do you? Whether indeterminism is true or not would be a function of the laws of nature - for which we're not morally responsible. (If you think we are somehow morally responsible for hte laws of nature, why can't a compatibilist say the same?).

So, F doesn't beg the question against the incompatibilist, for no incompatibilist is going to deny it. The incompatibilist doesn't claim that we 'are' morally responsible for any of those elements. Rather they just think that if indeterminism (for which we're not morally responsible) is involved in what the combination of those elements causes, then the results are results for which we can be morally responsible.

As such, then, it seems to me that E is the only premise that you can realistically challenge, but you haven't really challenged it yet as to do that you'd need to make an argument for E's falsity, not simply note that its truth - or apparent truth - is incompatible with incompatibilism.