Yes… and yet, the slightest touch of indeterminism does not immediately wipe out the possibility of free will. You said it was absolutely dependent on determinism. That is false. Was that not clear?
If I say that a forest fire is absolutely dependent on the presence of oxygen in the atmosphere, it doesn’t follow that the “slightest touch” of nitrogen would immediately wipe out the possibility of fires.
And yet the fire would still be absolutely dependent on the presence of oxygen.
If “determinism” is taken to mean the theory that the past uniquely and completely determines the future (“hard” determinism?), then the more accurate analogy would be to say that “forest fires are absolutely dependent on an atmosphere of pure oxygen”.
At this point the dispute becomes a linguistic triviality, I think.
My position is as follows: If some elements of a system are deterministic and others non-deterministic, then if free will is expressed anywhere it can only be expressed with the deterministic elements, not with the non-deterministic ones; much as fire is fueled by the oxygen in the atmosphere, not by the nitrogen of the atmosphere.
Yes… and yet, the slightest touch of indeterminism does not immediately wipe out the possibility of free will. You said it was absolutely dependent on determinism. That is false. Was that not clear?
If I say that a forest fire is absolutely dependent on the presence of oxygen in the atmosphere, it doesn’t follow that the “slightest touch” of nitrogen would immediately wipe out the possibility of fires.
And yet the fire would still be absolutely dependent on the presence of oxygen.
If “determinism” is taken to mean the theory that the past uniquely and completely determines the future (“hard” determinism?), then the more accurate analogy would be to say that “forest fires are absolutely dependent on an atmosphere of pure oxygen”.
At this point the dispute becomes a linguistic triviality, I think.
My position is as follows: If some elements of a system are deterministic and others non-deterministic, then if free will is expressed anywhere it can only be expressed with the deterministic elements, not with the non-deterministic ones; much as fire is fueled by the oxygen in the atmosphere, not by the nitrogen of the atmosphere.
(Control requires presence of determinism, doesn’t require absence of randomness. There is no dichotomy in the intended sense.)