Hi dmb,
> Steve answered: > From the quote you provided from the Stanford encyclopedia... “Free Will” is > a philosophical term of art for a PARTICULAR SORT of capacity of rational > agents to choose a course of action from among various alternatives. WHICH > SORT is the free will sort is what all the fuss is about." Again, it is not > merely the capacity to choose, it is the capacity of a RATIONAL agent to > choose. And not even merely that capacity but a PARTICULAR SORT of that > capacity. > > > dmb says: > I don't see how this even begins to answer the question. Let's strike > "rationality" as an essential feature. We all know that following DQ and > following rationality aren't the same thing. Steve: Right, so we agree that Pirsig's conception of freedom differs from the Stanford definition of free will in at least this way. Ad the Stanford article says. "One reason to deem this [minimalist conception of free will as] insufficient is that it is consistent with the goal-directed behavior of some animals whom we do not suppose to be morally responsible agents. Such animals lack not only an awareness of the moral implications of their actions but also any capacity to reflect on their alternatives and their long-term consequences. Indeed, it is plausible that they have little by way of a self-conception as an agent with a past and with projects and purposes for the future." Animals make choices, they engage in "goal directed behavior," but they are not typically viewed as free in the requisite sense implied by "free will." dmb: So then the most basic definition - from the first paragraph of Stanford's article - says that free will is a particular sort of capacity to choose. That's exactly my dictionary says too. Free will is "the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate; the ability to act at one's own discretion." I still don't see how it answers my question to emphasize the word "particular". The Stanford quote doesn't say anything at all about free will being agency "plus something else". Since my question is about this "something else", the quote does nothing to answer it. Steve: That something else is some way of defining freedom in this context. I didn't intend to answer that question definitively. Neither does the Stanford article. It says, "which sort is the free will sort is what all the fuss is about." What exactly is required above and beyond the the fact that we make choices to say that we make _free_ choices is not a settled matter. The article continues..."And what a fuss it has been: philosophers have debated this question for over two millennia, and just about every major philosopher has had something to say about it." We've _only_ been debating it for a few months. dmb: > My question still stands. What are you talking about? Why can't free will > just be some kind of capacity to choose, an ability to act at one's > discretion? Steve: But it _is_ "SOME KIND of capacity to choose." There is no question there. The question is, which kind is the free kind? You asked previously, "What if I said, for example, that free will and determinism are not about the presence or absence of choice?" The question of free will versus determinism is _not_ about the presence or absence of choice. We know that we have the experience of willing certain of our acts. The presence of choices (of willings) is a given. The question is whether choices (or willings) are free or determined. The Stanford article agrees on this point..."I have implied that free willings are but a subset of willings, at least as a conceptual matter. But not every philosopher accepts this...The majority view, however, is that we can readily conceive willings that are not free. Indeed, much of the debate about free will centers around whether we human beings have it, yet virtually no one doubts that we will to do this and that." You see? Far from being "wildly incoherent" on the matter, I am rather taking the majority view. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
