> Randomness destroys the ghost in the machine as effectively as determinism. I totally agree, and yet my encounter with academic philosophy was that most peop

> Randomness destroys the ghost in the machine as effectively as determinism. I totally agree, and yet my encounter with academic philosophy was that most people with a free-will orientation see that randomness as precisely the origin of free will. Personally, the only notion of free will that makes sense (and the one to which I personally hold) is the notion of agent-causation[1]. > it seemed to me that there might possibly be some way to get out of trouble by arguing that I wasn't responsible for my actions The philosophical notion of free will is actually completely irrelevant here. The relevant questions are a) "Is social accountability psychologically effective and altering someone's behavior?" and b) "what sorts of behavior modifications are morally permissble?" [1] https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/incompatibilism-theories/#3 https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/incompatibilism-theories/...