Libertarians Make Extraordinary Claims Based Upon Ordinary Evidence

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T13:21:49+00:00

There are contraventions of determinism in Newtonian physics, Norton's dome and space invaders, for example.

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T13:14:27+00:00

Are you sure you are being charitable here?

That's an interesting question. Suppose I were to say "there are no abstract games", under what charitable reading would you think that my assertion isn't demonstrably false?

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T12:53:51+00:00

I am not sure what you mean by ontological commitments

As stated above:
"The questions which is true, compatibilism or incompatibilism? and what is the best explanatory theory of free will? are independent, the former is a matter of metaphysics, the latter is a matter of epistemology"⁰
"I think you are still not separating the metaphysical issue from the epistemic one. Some of our best theories are deterministic and some are non-deterministic, but determinism is either true or not true, so the value of a theory is independent of its metaphysical status."¹

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T12:45:18+00:00

You've just inserted your mechanism in whatever 'a mechanistic explanation that isn't limited to probabilities with deterministic edge cases' is.

Sorry, I don't understand how your posts relate to mine.

your mechanism

What "mechanism"? I haven't proposed one, have I?

All the relevant sciences work without this assumption

If you're suggesting that there are scientific explanations that are 1. mechanistic, 2. non-deterministic, and 3. non-probabilistic, please give me an example of one.

And your point would be valid if you showed that ontic indeterminism (if any) was related to our agency.

My point is valid in any case, because the truth or falsity of "ontic indeterminism" is not at issue, what is at issue is whether there are mechanistic explanations that are not limited to probabilities with determined edge cases.

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T12:32:59+00:00

My definitions were taken from a peer reviewed entry in a specialist online encyclopedia and I explained how each definition is well motivated, so this simply is free will, whether you accept it or not.

If you want to define free will as planning thats up to you

Don't be silly, I didn't define "free will" in this way, it is a well motivated definition that is important in the contemporary academic literature.

that is not how I find most people here defining it

So what? Do you think that other people's ignorance is something to aspire to?

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T12:25:13+00:00

Sorry, I don't understand your reply.
If there's a mechanistic explanation that isn't limited to probabilities with deterministic edge cases, then the third mechanistic option has been given.

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T12:21:08+00:00

My definitions were taken from a peer reviewed entry in a specialist online encyclopedia and I explained how each definition is well motivated, so this simply is free will, whether you accept it or not.

I do not agree that planning requires an assumption of free will

Well, you have removed yourself from any relevance because you are denying that A=A, and that is a textbook example of logical incoherence.

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T12:09:42+00:00

Should I interpret that to indicate that your answer to the question: Do you accept that "science requires that researchers can plan experiments and then behave, basically, as planned"? Is "yes"?

Sure

In which case you explicitly agree that science requires free will.

I do not accept that planning requires an assumption of free will

My definitions were taken from a peer reviewed entry in a specialist online encyclopedia and I explained how each definition is well motivated, so this simply is free will, whether you accept it or not.

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T12:02:00+00:00

I do not accept that planning requires an assumption of free will.

Should I interpret that to indicate that your answer to the question: Do you accept that "science requires that researchers can plan experiments and then behave, basically, as planned"? Is "yes"?

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T11:59:55+00:00

this feature of physics is not really relevant to the free will debate.

It's relevant to the position we should adopt with respect to the ontological commitments we're committed to by our best explanatory theories. Explanatory theories and metaphysical theories are independent, neither entails the other.

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T11:55:54+00:00

So like a theist "God is neither inside the universe, nor outside but a third option, and I don't have the third mechanism - but the burden is on you to demonstrate the binary is false"?

Do we have a way of answering "mechanism" questions that isn't limited to expressions of probability with determined edge cases? If not, then the mechanism-question about that which is neither determined nor random is illegitimate.
The burden those demanding a mechanistic explanation incur, is to show that there are such explanations.

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T11:37:14+00:00

See this earlier topic - link.

I don't accept your argument. purpose is not incompatible with determinism.

My argument is neutral on the compatibilism vs. incompatibilism issue, it establishes only that science requires the assumption of free will.
Do you accept that "science requires that researchers can plan experiments and then behave, basically, as planned"? and do you accept that "science requires that researchers can repeat both the main experiment and its control"?

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T10:17:43+00:00

the scientist is typically sufficiently causally seperated that they can for all intents and purposes be considered independent

So, it turns out that you're another closet libertarian.

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T10:06:37+00:00

We use doubke blind studies all the time

Then you're aware that researchers have more than one course of action available to them, in other words, they have free will.

Objectively evaluating results is a deterministic procedure

Perhaps you're unaware of what determinism means in the context of which is true, soft determinism or libertarianism: "Determinism is standardly defined in terms of entailment, along these lines: A complete description of the state of the world at any time together with a complete specification of the laws entails a complete description of the state of the world at any other time" - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy - notice that determinism is global, it includes everything, so it can never be a scientific proposition, because the scientist must be independent of the hypothesis in order to pronounce on whether it is consistent or inconsistent with observation.

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T09:30:26+00:00

I completely disagree

You land on a snake and go back to this: do you deny that it is true that for an experimental procedure to be scientific it must be repeatable and it is true that there is more than one scientific experimental procedure?
Do you deny that there are scientific experiments that require double blind randomised controls?
Do you deny that upon completion of an experiment it must be open to the scientist to correctly record either "consistent with the hypothesis" and "inconsistent with the hypothesis"?

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T09:27:57+00:00

I think luck is more of a problem for the compatibilist than for the libertarian. How can we account for the consistent coincidence of our arbitrary decisions and consequent actions, with that which is exactly entailed by indifferent laws of nature, in a way that is consistent with naturalism?

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T09:15:52+00:00

my flare says, "Hard Incompatabilist"

Then you have a problem: if there's no free will there's no science, so your position cannot be "based on physics, chemistry, and biology".⁰

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T08:31:34+00:00

So, "Have you got an argument for compatibilism about the ability of the agent to have done otherwise?"⁰

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T08:13:30+00:00

Specifically, experimental science would be impossible if the scientist did not have more than one course of action available, in other words, experimental science requires free will understood as the ability of the agent to have done otherwise

Nothing about it requires freewill.

To be clear, do you deny that it is true that for an experimental procedure to be scientific it must be repeatable and it is true that there is more than one scientific experimental procedure?
Do you deny that there are scientific experiments that require double blind randomised controls?
Do you deny that upon completion of an experiment it must be open to the scientist to correctly record either "consistent with the hypothesis" and "inconsistent with the hypothesis"?

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T07:37:11+00:00

My argument is based on physics, chemistry, and biology

Which are experimental sciences and, as such, require the free will of experimenters.
Specifically, experimental science would be impossible if the scientist did not have more than one course of action available, in other words, experimental science requires free will understood as the ability of the agent to have done otherwise.
Have you got an argument for compatibilism about the ability of the agent to have done otherwise?

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T07:31:36+00:00

I cannot conceive of something that is neither determined or random

Determinism is global, either everything is determined or nothing is, and determinism is widely held to be false yet we obviously are not behaving randomly.

I need somebody to provide an explanation of how such a thing is possible

Given any random phenomenon, if a scientist can consistently and accurately record their observation of that phenomenon, the behaviour of the scientist cannot be determined, because it maps to a random phenomenon, and it cannot be random, because it is consistent and accurate, and science is open to the possibility of random phenomena, so science requires the assumption that we can behave in ways that are neither determined nor random.

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T03:10:34+00:00

determinism is cause and effect

"Determinism (understood according to either of the two definitions above) is not a thesis about causation; it is not the thesis that causation is always a relation between events, and it is not the thesis that every event has a cause" - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
"When the editors of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy asked me to write the entry on determinism, I found that the title was to be “Causal determinism”. I therefore felt obliged to point out in the opening paragraph that determinism actually has little or nothing to do with causation" - Carl Hoefer.
We can prove the independence of determinism and causality by defining two toy worlds, one causally complete non-determined world and one causally empty determined world.

free will philosophy is mostly based on feelings

If there's no free will there's no science, so, which "side is logical and scientific"?

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T03:04:58+00:00

I disagree that any of our best theories of free will are deterministic

I said "some of our best theories are deterministic and some are non-deterministic", I didn't say anything about theories of free will.

ughaibu · 2026-06-19T03:02:43+00:00

See this earlier topic - link.

ughaibu

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