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This works as an assumption, and is rather useless in practice, because we cannot determine the deterministic state to its full extent, even in thought experime

This works as an assumption, and is rather useless in practice, because we cannot determine the deterministic state to its full extent, even in thought experiment, without limiting the degrees of freedom converging to zero, to then say, well I had free will after all, when I didn't know any better. I really don't get it. I mean, support for Compatibalism is in effect not the support of determinism that it claims to be. It's just an effort of philosophers to safe free will, out of free will, which means, to me, out of ignorance. So the only real insight is that we are sufficiently ignorant. How is that still sold as a positive thing? That still didn't come out right. I was trying to say, that Compatibilism is a meta argument. If it isn't then because it determined free will as a deterministic fact. I understand that philosophy is rather complicated, and at the very least I doubt that, if Compatibilism is true, that many people understand it sufficiently to be in the position to support it, other than as an educated guess.

naasking 8y ago
I think the problem is that most people misunderstand philosophical inquiry. The free will debate is about defining what free will means such that it can serve as one factor to ground moral responsibility and how we employ our moral reasoning. Long ago, some philosophers suggested that we cannot be held morally responsible for factors that our outside of our control, and further, that any effects that follow from factors outside of our control, are thus also outside of our control. Determinism is the quintessential example. Numerous arguments have since been presented that debunk this need for control, the ability to do otherwise, etc. These properties simply aren't necessary for moral responsibility. Furthermore, studies in experimental philosophy have shown that lay people actually employ Compatibilist moral reasoning, debunking the long held assumption that people are incompatibilists because of religious upbringing. So I disagree that Compatibilism is some sort of meta-argument, as it fits squarely in the expected domain of discourse for free will. It is precisely fulfilling the philosophical research program of identifying that which is necessary to make sense of choice in our moral language.
- pault 8y ago
  Now I know what other people feel like when they listen to programmers talk. :D Do you know of any materials that present the debate in a form that a ten year old could understand?

naasking 8y ago

I think the problem is that most people misunderstand philosophical inquiry. The free will debate is about defining what free will means such that it can serve as one factor to ground moral responsibility and how we employ our moral reasoning. Long ago, some philosophers suggested that we cannot be held morally responsible for factors that our outside of our control, and further, that any effects that follow from factors outside of our control, are thus also outside of our control. Determinism is the quintessential example. Numerous arguments have since been presented that debunk this need for control, the ability to do otherwise, etc. These properties simply aren't necessary for moral responsibility. Furthermore, studies in experimental philosophy have shown that lay people actually employ Compatibilist moral reasoning, debunking the long held assumption that people are incompatibilists because of religious upbringing. So I disagree that Compatibilism is some sort of meta-argument, as it fits squarely in the expected domain of discourse for free will. It is precisely fulfilling the philosophical research program of identifying that which is necessary to make sense of choice in our moral language.

pault 8y ago
Now I know what other people feel like when they listen to programmers talk. :D Do you know of any materials that present the debate in a form that a ten year old could understand?