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Pierre-Normand

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You ignored the second part of my comment. Even if human brains can be construed as deterministic systems, that doesn't mean that their functions, let...
July 25, 2017 at 02:52
I am unsure if this is really what "most people" believe free will is. Sam Harris for sure seems to believe that this is the conception of free will t...
July 25, 2017 at 02:46
There are both deterministic and indeterministic systems in the world. From a quantum mechanical perspective, most physical systems are indeterministi...
July 25, 2017 at 02:38
This is precisely what I think is a bit nonsensical. You yourself are not part of the practical situation where you are called to act. That would only...
July 25, 2017 at 02:32
Yes, I think most compatibilists, because of the metaphysical picture that comes bundled up with the uncritically accepted doctrine of universal deter...
July 25, 2017 at 02:25
This claim seems to rest on a misconception regarding the way human beings, qua responsible agents, relate to "the universe". The universe simply is e...
July 25, 2017 at 02:17
Most contemporary compatibilists (I say "most", but I don't actually know of any actual exception) defend a view of compatibilist freedom and responsi...
July 24, 2017 at 23:38
This sounds more like a hard determinist line than a compatibilist line. The sort of thing that a compatibilist might say -- someone like Daniel Denne...
July 23, 2017 at 23:55
We can't choose not to breathe but we can chose not to lie or steal, for instance; at any rate, we can chose not to do those things unless we have som...
July 22, 2017 at 22:46
That's unfortunate. However, if you google the four separate words: "Galen Strawson basic argument "(without quotes), then the top two results are (1)...
July 22, 2017 at 22:07
Thanks for those useful explanations. So, Harris's Buddhism really amounts to Pop Buddhism sprinkled with a fair amount of Cartesian prejudice.
July 22, 2017 at 05:28
I'm not sure why it should be regarded as arrogance to claim your body as your own. (Who else would more rightfully claim ownership over it?) In any c...
July 22, 2017 at 05:04
Harris simply bites the bullet and acknowledges that he can't claim any responsibility for his own intellectual achievements. He is even handed about ...
July 21, 2017 at 21:29
That's right, but Harris isn't arguing that the self is an illusion. It's rather the self's sense of her own freedom that is an illusion according to ...
July 21, 2017 at 18:40
You seem to be connecting, or equating, the very idea of "free will" with libertarian (incompatibilist) free will. This is the ability for agents to s...
July 21, 2017 at 18:00
"What is mind? No matter. What is matter? Never mind." (Attributed to George Berkeley)
July 21, 2017 at 17:52
Your unconscious mind is a part of who you are, for sure. This includes most of your cognitive habits and abilities as well as the source of most of y...
July 21, 2017 at 17:43
According to Harris the very foundation of this right -- the possibility of self-determination -- is illusory. This is why he also is pushing an utili...
July 21, 2017 at 17:25
Incidentally, we had a discussion 10 months ago about this topic and Harris's view also was brought up. Also worth noting, a couple years after Harris...
July 21, 2017 at 05:54
Harris is painting himself into a corner here. In his analogy, Atlantis stands for the crudest from of "contra-causal" libertarianism, which very few ...
July 21, 2017 at 05:31
Short from showing that free will isn't an illusion, you can show that Harris's argument are unsound, inconsistent, and also that his conception of fr...
July 21, 2017 at 05:07
"Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana" -- Confucius (or maybe Buddha or Groucho Marx)
July 20, 2017 at 22:51
“When I came home I expected a surprise and there was no surprise for me, so of course, I was surprised.” -- Ludwig Wittgenstein
July 20, 2017 at 22:00
By the way, I just finished reading a nice short paper by Chris Tucker: Agent Causation and the Alleged Impossibility of Rational Free Action. It's ju...
July 20, 2017 at 21:22
I would rather say that the relevant factors -- in this case: the fact that the agent isn't engaging in the bad habit for the first time in her life b...
July 20, 2017 at 17:15
Well, you had suggested rather more strongly that barn facades are "particularly problematic" for disjunctivist accounts of the fallibility of knowled...
July 20, 2017 at 03:26
Thanks for bringing that up. This is a problem that I have thought long and hard about. I have imagined lots of puzzling scenarios where commandos are...
July 20, 2017 at 00:36
Disjunctivism isn't merely a theory about perception. Disjunctive theories of perception and epistemological disjunctivism are two separate topics, th...
July 19, 2017 at 23:50
I think it does actually, since it provides a conception of indefeasible warrant that can be substituted to the misguided notion of merely "internal" ...
July 19, 2017 at 23:18
Take it both easy, then, and everything's gonna be fine ;-)
July 19, 2017 at 22:10
That's not what "disjunctivism" means in the context of epistemology or philosophical accounts perceptual experience. In the second case, being a disj...
July 19, 2017 at 21:58
Frankly, although I had to read the OP three times before it was clear to me, I am usure if I could much improve on the formulation without producing ...
July 19, 2017 at 21:27
The OP's point seems to be, not that every choice is a moral choice, but rather that the issue of the freedom of choice doesn't arise for choices that...
July 19, 2017 at 21:21
I agree that this a problem that afflicts many traditional libertarian accounts of free will. But I think the main assumption that generates this prob...
July 19, 2017 at 20:40
This new topic of yours is excellent, as is your introductory post. I'll post a comment later today when I have more time on my hands since it merits ...
July 19, 2017 at 18:16
We know that because the radiative-convective mechanism underlying this effect is well understood and, indeed, measurable. We can measure the change i...
July 18, 2017 at 16:56
This paper from WUWT is fairly bad. It simply ignores two fairly well understood and uncontested principles of climate science. First, it fails to men...
July 18, 2017 at 13:27
The CO2 emission targets recommended by the IPCC, and aimed at by the Paris Agreement, aren't unrealistic. Reasonable policy efforts (aided by technol...
July 18, 2017 at 01:49
Let me grant you, for the sake of argument, that libertarian free will isn't required. You are still agreeing with my main point in that case. If the ...
July 17, 2017 at 22:44
Indeed. Not only is it very likely that human activity has been responsible for more than 50% of the warming that occurred since 1950, the central est...
July 17, 2017 at 19:43
Mirrors reverse chirality. Here is Groucho Marx negotiating a common understanding of chirality with his own mirror image. (They're starting to reach ...
July 15, 2017 at 13:58
This experiment has been done before. You could try using a rubber band and a hat.
July 15, 2017 at 01:47
So, in summary, you account of free will is that it's real freedom accompanied with things that obtain. Have you thought about submitting it to a phil...
July 15, 2017 at 00:04
When we characterize an intentional action we often use a verb phrase that doesn't merely describe the bodily motions of the person who is acting but ...
July 14, 2017 at 23:49
What about computers and neutron stars?
July 14, 2017 at 20:54
You don't need to control the intentional action since your being engaged in an intentional action already is your controlling what happens with your ...
July 14, 2017 at 20:35
Yes, indeed, which is why I am agreeing with you that intending to do something (or forming such an intention) does not require a prior act of intendi...
July 14, 2017 at 14:48
It does indeed negate the first point, but not because there is no time for a prior intention to influence the action. It is rather because, on my vie...
July 14, 2017 at 11:35
Are you thinking of substance-sortals, event-types or concepts of natural kinds as reflecting theories? Or are you thinking about something else? Sure...
July 14, 2017 at 02:51
Yes. The idea is that the formation of an intention amounts to the (practical) rational determination of an orientation of the will. It is akin to the...
July 14, 2017 at 00:46