your description of an indeterminist compatibilism — javra


I didn't describe an indeterminist compatibilism. I described an indeterminist compatibilist - a person who is a compatibilist, who happens to be an indeterminist.

The two positions aren't related. It's just a person who holds both positions at once.. — flannel jesus

Right. Glad you made the correction you made. Still. True. You didn't describe indeterminsit compatibalism, you described a person who upholds the position of indeterminist compatibilism: ergo, you described a indeterminst compatibilist.

All this being a difference that makes absolutely no difference whatsoever in respect to this:

If your description of an indeterminist compatibilism compatibilist does not involve an indeterminst concept of free will, what on earth kind of free will can your description of an "indeterminst compatibilism compatibilist" possibly entail?

(I can so far only assume it then mandates a determinist concept of free will. But then how does one get a determinist concept of free will - i.e., a free will whose doings are causally inevitable in all conceivable cases - to in any way cohere with an indeterminist compatibilism compatibilist's view???) — javra

I don't much like sophistry, considering it a waste of time, and your response sure as fuddle so far seems to me to so be.

So, to get to the point: What the heck is a non-indetermistic notion of free will that can in any coherent way (i.e., any non-double-think or otherwise insane way) apply to an indetermistic compatibilist's views?

what on earth kind of free will can your description of an "indeterminst compatibilism compatibilist" possibly entail? — javra

A compatibilist one. Do you know what a compatibilist kind of free will is?

Let's break this down into two steps for you.

Step one: understand what it means for someone to understand "free will"from a compatibilist perspective.

Step two: understand why it's possible for an indeterminist to understand free will from a compatibilist perspective.

Shall we start with step 1?

A compatibilist one — flannel jesus

And what is "a compatibilist one"?

As best as I so far can tell: Either "compatibilism" is defined thus and is thereby accordant with certain forms of indeterminsim or, else, it is a compatibilism that upholds causal determinism and hence can not at any juncture uphold an indeterminist free will.

If the first, an indeterminist compatibilist can only uphold an indeterminst notion of free will.
If the second, the only logical possiblity is a determinist notion of free will - which is utterly incompatible with the indeterminism upheld by the indeterminist compatibalist.

So what other definition of "compatibiliist" do you have to offer???

Shall we start with step 1? — flannel jesus

Step 1 it is. Yes.

OK. So, first let me say, I'm not interested in convincing you of compatibilism. I can't do that. I don't want to do that, it's beside the point. I'm not even interested in convincing you compatibilism is *coherent*. All I'm interested in is if you're able, after this, to translate someone saying "I'm a compatibilist" into a more broken-down paraphrasing of what they're probably saying.

Luckily that's really simple.

If someone says "I'm a compatibilist", they're saying "I believe we have free will, and the type of free will I believe in wouldn't be undermined by determinism".

That's why it's compatible with determinism - because it wouldn't be undermined if, somehow, we found ourselves in a world where determinism were unambigously confirmed to be the case.

So are we past step one? Step one: understand what it means for someone to understand "free will" from a compatibilist perspective.

OK. So, first let me say, I'm not interested in convincing you of compatibilism. I can't do that. I don't want to do that, it's beside the point. I'm not even interested in convincing you compatibilism is *coherent*. All I'm interested in is if you're able, after this, to translate someone saying "I'm a compatibilist" into a more broken-down paraphrasing of what they're probably saying. — flannel jesus

I'm not interested in you convincing me of squat either. For Goddess's sake, I am a hardcore compatibilist - this of an indeterminsim ilk. Nor am I trying to convince you of anything either.

Re-read what I posted and rationally explain how a compatibilist notion of free will can make sense in the context of "an indeterminist compatibalist that does not uphold an indeterminist free will while upholding compatibilism.".

Because so far its about as irrational an affirmation as I can find.

so step 1 confirmed or not?

:roll: I give up.

Others characterize libertarianism by what it means more generally, — SophistiCat

What does it mean more generally? — flannel jesus

Libertarian free will requires agency, causal control, and most importantly, "genuine" alternative possibilities. The devil, as always, is in exactly how these requirements are cached out. My own view is that a lot of seemingly oppositional views on free will aren't as far from each other as they might present themselves.

interesting, would you say you can square genuine alternative possibilities with determinism? How would you describe a situation where there's genuine alternative possibilities, and yet determinism holds true?

I conceive of compatibilism as quite general, not any specific way of framing the process of choice making. Compatibilism is a classification of a set of beliefs, rather than a specific belief.

A compatibilist belief in free will is one that satisfies this criteria: whatever free will you think we have, you would think we have even if we live in a deterministic extended casual system - regardless of the specifics of how you actually believe our extended casual system works, and also regardless of if the casual system we're in is actually deterministic.

An extended casual system is deterministic if it evolves to the future in a singular way, where given a particular state at t1, you will always arrive at the same t2. Regardless of how that evolution works, regardless of how you choose to frame that evolution - whether you choose to invoke agency or choice or even souls, or you just stick to physics - if t2 will always follow from t1 no matter how many times you replay t1, then it's deterministic.

And I think everything you've laid out fits within that criteria. — flannel jesus

What distinguishes my account from compatibilist accounts is that it shares with most libertarian accounts a commitment to rational causation (as distinguished from Humean event-event causation), which is not merely indeterministic (owing to it appealing to norms of practical rationality and fallible human capabilities rather than to exceptionless laws, and hence violates Davidson's principle of the nomological character of causality) but, more crucially, also is an instance of agent causation. On that view, although actions can be construed as events, their causes are agents (temporally enduring objects, or substances) rather than prior events.

However, my account also shares with compatibilism one important feature that most libertarian accounts lack. Namely, it distinguishes between the 'predetermined' features of an agent, and of their past circumstances, those that are genuinely external constraints on their choices and actions from those that are constitutive of (and hence internal to) what they are, qua rational agents. Hence, upbringing, acculturation and formative experiences, for instance, are not things that merely 'happen' to you and that constrain (let alone settle for you) your actions "from the outside," as it were, but rather can be necessary conditions for the enablement of your abilities to rationally deliberate between alternate courses of action, and determine the outcome yourself (as opposed to the outcome being determined by past events that you have no control over).

Why? Why is mentioning a term that tim wood doesn't know the definition of incoherent? — flannel jesus

Try reading. What did I write? Here:

Which cries out for defining all these terms. I have pointed out above that the article's mention of non-D was at least incomplete/inadequate and either thereby incoherent or itself already incoherent. — tim wood

It's the article I find incoherent. And in it is non-D, which I also find lacks coherence. And what do you reply about? Another article on D. Let's try a simple test. I am thinking of a four-legged animal and it is not a dog. What is it? Do you give up? Does that mean that not being a dog does not tell what animal I am thinking about? Same with non-D. I got D. I know what that is. I don't know what non-D is. Now I have attempted to engage with you on your article and your own thinking about it. Without much success. You believe in free-will, but what does that even mean. Free will is compatible with "soft" D. What does that mean; is it free or isn't it? And so forth. I'm not looking to be told what it is, because I think that is a matter of and dependent on definition.

It's time to be responsive or to give it over. I do appreciate, though, the promptness of reply.

I read what you wrote. It still sounds like you're saying "it's incoherent because I don't know what (in)determinism means".

We talked about it already though. You say there's not even a tentative definition. I gave you one about functions - at least I think that was you. Do you recall how I distinguished deterministic functions from indeterministic ones?

You're acting like you're really trying and I'm responding in bad faith, that's not my experience of this conversation. My experience is, we've actually pretty explicitly gone through what these words mean at least in some context, and then pages later you just conveniently forget and get hostile about it because you're confused again. But we can go through it again.

Here's where I defined the difference between a deterministic and indeterministic function.

Do you want some hands on examples?

What distinguishes my account from compatibilist accounts is that it shares with most libertarian accounts a commitment to rational causation (as distinguished with Humean event causation), which is not merely indeterministic — Pierre-Normand

So, rational causation is indeterministic you say. I'm not really sure why you think that, or why appealing to "norms" would make it indeterministic (as far as I can see there's nothing in the definition of what a norm is that has really anything to do with determinism or indeterminism), but regardless....

If it's indeterministic, that means you think it's possible that Bob2 will do something different from Bob1 at T2, despite being perfectly identical in every way at T1, every way meaning including physically, mentally, spiritually, rationally - every aspect of them is the same at T1. So to engage with the argument in the article fully, I'd like to see what you posit as the explanation for the difference in behaviour between Bob2 and Bob1. They're the same, remember, so why did they behave differently in the exact same circumstance?

So, rational causation is indeterministic you say. I'm not really sure why you think that, or why appealing to "norms" would make it indeterministic (as far as I can see there's nothing in the definition of what a norm is that has really anything to do with determinism or indeterminism), but regardless....

If it's indeterministic, that means you think it's possible that Bob2 will do something different from Bob1 at T2, despite being perfectly identical in every way at T1, every way meaning including physically, mentally, spiritually, rationally - every aspect of them is the same at T1. So to engage with the argument in the article fully, I'd like to see what you posit as the explanation for the difference in behaviour between Bob2 and Bob1. They're the same, remember, so why did they behave differently in the exact same circumstance? — flannel jesus

In my view, it is indeed quite trivial that if Bob1 and Bob2 are identical, atom for atom, and likewise for their environments, and assuming microphysical determinism holds, then their behaviors will be the same. This doesn't entail that their identical pasts is causally responsible for their action being the intelligible action that it is (although it is responsible for those actions being identical).

Libertarians who believe free will require alternate possibilities for agents that share an identical past run into the intelligibility problem that your OP highlights, but so do deterministic views that also fail to distinguish among the predetermined features of agents those that constitute external constraints to them from those that enable their rational abilities (and hence are integral to their cognitive abilities). The exercise of your agentive abilities consist in you deciding and settling, in the present moment, which ones of your opportunities for action are actualized. The indeterminism enters the picture at the level of rational agency rather than physical causation. The past physical state P1 of Bob1 (and also of Bob2) may deterministically entail (and also enable an external observer to predict) that Bob1's action will be realized by the physical motions P2. But physics does not determine that P2 will non accidentally realize the intelligible action M2 since the laws of physics are blind to the teleological/formal organizational features of rational animals. It is those teleological/formal organizational features that account for M2 being intelligibly connected to M1 (the agent's relevant prior desires and beliefs as they bear on their present circumstances). But this intelligible connection isn't a deterministic consequence of the agent's past. It is rather a consequence of the present actualization of their rational deliberative skills.

In my view, it is indeed quite trivial that if Bob1 and Bob2 are identical, atom for atom, and likewise for their environments, and assuming microphysical determinism holds, then their behaviors will be the same — Pierre-Normand

If that's true for every decision in bobs life - that Bob1 and Bob2 and bob3 and... Bob∞ will always do the same given identical everything, then... well, that's what determinism means. There doesn't look to be anything indeterministic about any of bobs decisions. That's the very thing that distinguishes determinism from indeterminism.

If that's true for every decision in bobs life - that Bob1 and Bob2 and bob3 and... Bob∞ will always do the same given identical everything, then... well, that's what determinism means. There doesn't look to be anything indeterministic about any of bobs decisions. That's the very thing that distinguishes determinism from indeterminism. — flannel jesus

That's only physical determinism. Physical determinism is a thesis about the causal closure of the physical and the deterministic evolution of physical systems considered as such. It is generally presupposed to entail universal determinism (or determinism simpliciter) because, under usual monistic naturalistic assumptions (that I endorse), all higher-level multiply realizable properties, such as the mental properties of animals, are assumed to supervene on the physical properties of those animals. There is much truth to that, I think, but the usual inferences from (1) physical determinism and supervenience to (2) universal determinism are fallacious, in my view, since they covertly sneak in reductionistic assumptions that aren't motivated by a naturalistic framework.

You can't infer that when the past physical properties of an agent (that is, the properties of their material constituents) ensure that they will perform a specific action, those past physical features are thereby causally responsible for the action being the kind of action that it is. What is causally responsible for the action being the kind of action that it is (and that this action thereby reflects an intelligible choice or intention by the agent) is something that the past physical properties of this agent (and of its surrounding) are generally irrelevant to determining. Actions aren't mere physical motions anymore than rabbits are mere collections of atoms. Both of those things are individuated by their form (teleological organization) and not just by the physical properties of their material constituents. The actions of human beings often are explained by what it is that those humans are expected to achieve in the future, for instance, and such formal/final causal explanations seldom reduce to "efficient" past-to-future sorts of nomological causal explanations (i.e. that are appealing to laws of nature), let alone to mere physical causation.

That's only physical determinism. Physical determinism is a thesis about the causal closure of the physical and the deterministic evolution of physical systems considered as such — Pierre-Normand

That's not what I'm talking about at all. I'm taking about determinism. Any determinism. Physical or otherwise

That's not what I'm talking about at all. I'm taking about determinism. Any determinism. Physical or otherwise — flannel jesus

I know. And there is not evidence that (unqualified) determinism is true. The only purported evidence for determinism is the fact of the causal closure of the physical (and the neglect of quantum indeterminacies, that I don't think are relevant to the problem of free will anyway) plus some seldom acknowledged reductionistic assumptions. There is no evidence for determinism in biology or psychology, for instance. As I've suggested, the purported grounding of universal determinism on physical determinism—requiring the help of auxiliary premises regarding the material constitution of all higher-level entities and phenomena, and supervenience—is fallacious. So, my position is that physical determinism is (approximately) true, as is the thesis of the causal closure of the physical, but unqualified determinism is false.

I know. And there is not evidence that (unqualified) determinism is true. — Pierre-Normand

This conversation doesn't rely on it being true. It relies only on understanding what it means. What does it mean for something to be deterministic? What does it mean for something to be indeterministic? That's it. (and the meaning has literally nothing to do with any assumptions of physicality)

The article in the OP isn't an argument for determinism. The conclusion of the article isn't "and therefore determinism is true". I think multiple people are getting mixed up on that.

The article in the OP isn't an argument for determinism. The conclusion of the article isn't "and therefore determinism is true". I think multiple people are getting mixed up on that. — flannel jesus

I understand that compatibilists can be determinists or indeterminists. Likewise, incompatibilists can be libertarians (indeterminists) or hard-determinists. Some, like Galen Strawson, believe free will to be impossible regardless of the truth or falsity of determinism. Most of those theses indeed depend for their correctness on a correct understanding of the meaning of the deterministic thesis and of its implications. Which is precisely why I am stressing that the "Intelligibility problem" that you OP signals for libertarianism need not arise if one deems physical determinism not to entail unqualified determinism.

On my view, our psychological makeup, prior beliefs, and prior intentions or desires, don't uniquely determine our courses of actions although they do contribute to make intelligible our decisions after we have made them. And while it is true that, in order for our actual decisions to have been different, something about the physical configuration of the world would have had to be different in the past, this doesn't entail that the physical differences would have been causally responsible for the ensuing actions (unless, maybe, some mad scientist had covertly engineered them with a view to influencing our future decisions, in which case they would have been causally relevant albeit only proximally, while the decision of the mad scientist would have been the distal cause).

need not arise if one deems physical determinism not to entail unqualified determinism. — Pierre-Normand

I don't understand why you keep bringing up physical determinism at all. Even if there isn't a single physical thing in existence, and agents are all purely non physical things, the argument still makes perfect sense. Even if we're all floating spirit orbs, as long as we make choices over time, the argument holds as far as I can tell. It had nothing to do with physical anything, other than for the coincidence that we happen to live in an apparently physical world. That fact is entirely irrelevant to the conversation as far as I can tell.

I don't understand why you keep bringing up physical determinism at all. Even if there isn't a single physical thing in existence, and agents are all purely non physical things, the argument still makes perfect sense. Even if we're all floating spirit orbs, as long as we make choices over time, the argument holds as far as I can tell. It had nothing to do with physical anything, other than for the coincidence that we happen to live in an apparently physical world. That fact is entirely irrelevant to the conversation as far as I can tell. — flannel jesus

It is relevant to vindicating the thesis that, although one can deny determinism and defend a libertarian thesis, one can nevertheless acknowledge that if (counterfactually) an agent's decision had been different than what it actually was, then, owing to the causal closure of physics, something in the past likely would have had to be different. People generally assume that the dependency of actions on past law-governed neurophysiological events (for instance) entails some form of determinism. It does. But it merely entails physical determinism—the existence of regular laws that govern material processes in the brain, for instance. But this low-level determinism doesn't extend to high-level processes such as the exercise of skills of practical deliberation that manifest an agent's sensitivity to norms of rationality. So, those considerations are directly relevant to refuting your suggestion, in the OP, that libertarianism necessarily flounders on Kane's Intelligibility problem.

People generally assume that the dependency of actions on past law-governed neurophysiological events (for instance) entails some form of determinism. It does. But it merely entails physical determinism—the existence of regular laws that govern material processes in the brain, for instance. But this low-level determinism doesn't extend to high-level processes such as the exercise of skills of practical deliberation that manifest an agent's sensitivity to norms of rationality. — Pierre-Normand

You say that, but then you confirm that Bob2 would always do the same thing as Bob1, which is what determinism means. Even when those actions involve high level processes, skills, deliberations, you seem to think Bob2 would do the same as Bob1 given everything is the same.

So you say determinism doesn't extend there, but then you confirm the very thing determinism says.

It seems like there's a semantic reason why you don't want to call it "determinism" - and it looks like that semantic reason revolves all around the word "physical", even though determinism as a concept isn't limited to the physical - and so that's why you're confirming that Bob2 would always do the same as Bob1, but not calling that "determinism".

But we can go through it again.... — flannel jesus

That's just the actual distinction between a deterministic system and an indeterministic one. In a deterministic system, the future states follow from past states, precisely and without variation. In an indeterministic system, they kinda semi loosey goosey follow from past states but with some wiggle room - a sprinkle of randomness. — flannel jesus

I don't think you got that you're describing the apparent behaviours of a system. But I am asking about the system itself.

All you've done is say the non-D system is not a D system. Yours is a categorical statement about something that you apparently know nothing about, except in one negative sense. But that affirms nothing about the non-D system. One problem is that the non-D system may be a D system, but your instruments or science, or whatever, may not be able to detect the D aspects, thus you attribute to the system what is not true of the system, but is true about your understanding of it.

And in describing either system as built either wholly or in part on conditions ante, you have not factored in thinking or knowledge.

Apparently - who knows? - the argument of the article is that free will cannot exist even in a non-D system. Lacking any definition of terms or rigor in use, this is all nonsense. It's your topic; make some sense of it!

Let's try these:
Is free will possible in a D system?
Is free will possible in a non-D system?
I think you will see that both of these can each be answered by either a yes or a no, depending on what is meant by the terms - how they're defined/understood.

You apparently think you understand. If so, it should not be too difficult to make that understanding clear. I happen to think you do not and cannot.

none of what you're saying looks to me to even be an attempt at engaging with the actual logic of the article in the op. None of it relies on instruments or measuring or anything.

The main issue in the free will debate is whether or not and in what sense humans have free will. That is, are human choices or actions free, and if so, in what sense are they free?....
...So under libertarianism, the decision to do one action over the other ends up being arbitrary after all. Thus, libertarianism cannot actually explain or make rational why an agent chooses one course of action over another.

"So under libertarianism, the decision to do one action over the other ends up being arbitrary after all." But only under a condition defined to make it arbitrary, and that moreover is conceded to be impossible. Btw, under at least one interpretation, I would consider that anything that can occur "arbitrarily" is necessarily free wrt its occurrence.

Time for you to tell us what free means and what free will is. My own notions bend back to Kant.

But only under a condition defined to make it arbitrary, — tim wood

Only under a condition that is by design the sort of condition that distinguishes determinism from indeterminism. Which is relevant, because libertarians are of course generally saying that determinism is lethal to free will, and indeterminism aka for it.

and that moreover is conceded to be impossible. — tim wood

It is?

It is? — flannel jesus

I do not wish to continue. I ask repeatedly for clarification, and you reply with non sequiturs.

is "it is?" a non sequitur? I don't see where in the article he concedes that's impossible.