Title: Compatibilism and Incompatibilism are compatible. : philosophy
Headings: Compatibilism and Incompatibilism are compatible.
Compatibilism and Incompatibilism are compatible.
Compatibilism and Incompatibilism are compatible.
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Content: However I would still include among those who accept compatibilism, because it is using a different sense of the phrase 'free will'
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slickwombat
24 points · 6 years ago
I will try to clearly give my reasoning as to why compatibilism and incompatibilism can both coherently be believed simultaneously. Compatibilism is the view that free will and determinism are compatible; incompatibilism is the view that they are not. So unless one is equivocating on "free will", there is literally no way they can coherently be held simultaneously. I suspect what you're getting at here -- and to be clear, I'm not getting the thrust of your argument at all, so this is a guess -- is that compatibilism and incompatibilism lead to different and incommensurable notions of free will. So a more accurate statement (on this view) would be that compatibilism is the view that "free will A" is compatible with determinism, and incompatibilism is the view that "free will B" is not. This is a common view these days, undoubtedly thanks to Mr. Harris. However, it is thoroughly mistaken. The basic error here is in thinking that the free will debate is simply about stipulating some definition of how our will actually works and what freedom actually means, and done deal. This may seem plausible in one sense, in that what exactly free will is is itself within the scope of the free will debate.