Talk:Free will/Archive 6

= Missing Sections == Hi. Why is there no mention of the libertarian view in the Incompatiblism section, only of hard determinism. Second, why is there is no mention of panpsychism as the basis of a theory of libertarian free will? For example, see here here. Comments are reqeusted. Otherwise I'll add to the contents myself. Thanks.  Amit @  Talk  13:13, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Libertarianism certainly seems to be an omission. 1Z 15:05, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
 * I added a small para on libertarian free will in the Incompatiblism section. Needs more content, like philosophers (like chalmers and dawkins) who support this viewpoint.  Amit @  Talk  15:32, 16 September 2007 (UTC)


 * I never has Dawkins down as a libertarian. The last paragraph of this interview  sounds like compatibilism to me.1Z 16:41, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
 * OK I stand corrected, Dawkins' view tilts more towards determinism somewhat. But there are some other philosophers who espouse liberariansim who could be mentioned. I'll try to get the names. Also I see that more content on libertarian incompatiblism has been added ... it looks much better and more balanced now. Thanks!  Amit @  Talk  02:54, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Still on physics
I still find the section on physics worringly biased. It has more philosphy than established physics. The culmination was the quote from Einstein, that I removed as a form of argument from authority. This has been already touched upon here. Einstein never discussed at length the issue of free will, so he cannot be considered an expert. He is an expert on physics, of course. However, on the question of indeterminacy is precisely where he was more unsuccessful than anything as a scientist. He struggled twenty years to reconcile gravitation with electro-magnetism and never went any far away even theoretically, precisely because he avoided absorbing the precepts of indeterminacy, To make a comparison, to have that quote is as if at the end of a section on Einstein's general relativity one put the quote of Newton explaining that God provided the force he seeked out for. As if that quote, because it was Newton's, the greatest genius in physics, was worth mentioning in a scientific context, to have the last word on theories that have clearly surpassed Newton. In physics, differently from phiilosphy, many quotes oftten become obsolete, even those by the greatest scientists who have ever lived. They're all obsolete, it's their legacy that matters, not their overall knowledge about reality. I don't like that much the rest of the section either. A position held by <0.5% of physicists is put on a par with one held by >99.5% physicists. I'm talking about hidden order. I understand that it is so dear to philosophers. But science has no grace with personal tastes, and the section is called "physics", not philosophy. I find the conclusion from the random number generators to be immensely mind buffling. It is, to me, a proof of the opposite of what this article purportes to show. It is the very fact that there hasn't been any classical (non-quantum) device that has ever produced random numbers a proof that, as of today, quantum effects are both indeterminate and also (in some specific situations) macroscopically relevant. This has been turned upside down in the section. What the section is now saying is more or less: because quantum devices produce random numbers in macorscopic machines, that's proof that there's no quantum randomness at the micro level because I believe there shouldn't be any at the macro. --Gibbzmann 03:57, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Quantum number generators
If someone doesn't modify the following passage I'm going to elide it or completely change it. First of all, it's blatant OR. Second of all, it's just ridicolous. What it is saying is that the experimental proof the quantum effects can be amplified from the micro to the macro is a proof that indeterminacy doesn't exist. Why? Because we can see it. What on earth is going on here? Can we get any professional serious person around here? "It is claimed by some that quantum indeterminism is confined to microscopic phenomena. The claim that events at the atomic or particulate level are unknowable can be challenged experimentally and even technologically: for instance, some hardware random number generators work by amplifying quantum effects into practically usable signals. However, this only amounts to macroscopic indeterminism if it can be shown that microscopic events really are indeterministic." Gibbzmann (talk) 13:11, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Your paraphrase is inaccurate. There is no implication that microscopic events are not in fact indeterministic, as asserted in standard QM. There may be a clarity issue, but there is not an issue of accuracy. 1Z 19:16, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

THe passage you object to is followed by a passage stating the Hidden Variable case, and *that* concludes with a sentence stating that HV's are unlikely. So the overall message is that the microscopic world is probably indeterministic, and macrsocopic events that depend on microscopic ones are probably indeterministic too.1Z 19:27, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Jo(h)an Baez??
"Good 'eavens", as you British folk say. I just took a quick scan though the refs and thought I saw the words "Joan Baez (link for you younger folks) discusses Bell's theorem". HAHAA!!!!! It lightened up the day a bit.--Francesco Franco 14:36, 30 October 2007 (UTC)


 * I wonder if it was a Bell's theorem or a Bells' theorem. --Gibbzmann 18:38, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

John and Joan B. are cousins. While we're on the subject Mark "E" Everett of The Eels is the son of Hugh Everett or Many worlds fame... 1Z 21:32, 31 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Ha!! Interesting. I wasn't poking fun at Joan Baez's intelligence, BTW. It just sounded funny. Doesn't seem like the geeky, mathematical type. --Francesco Franco 11:38, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Lead
The lead of this article is too short given its length. One of the functions of a good lead is to provide a reasonably detailed summary of the article, which should be proportional to length. This article, being 75kb at present, should have a lead of 4 solid paragraphs, as should virtually anything over 30kb (cf. the SEP article, which has one page of opening and 7 pages of text. That would be a bit much here, but something in between would be better than the present version). Few seem to appreciate the value of a good lead, such that even FA class articles are often inadequate. I would suggest doubling the current lead length. Richard001 07:38, 3 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Seriously guys, I'm going to have to FAR this if it doesn't get fixed. Richard001 (talk) 06:40, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Chalmers
I aedded mention of Chalmers' name in the libertarianism section. Hope it fits right.  Amit @  Talk  16:12, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Dennett - Freedom Evolves
The page states: ''The basic reasoning is that, if one excludes God, an infinitely powerful demon, and other such possibilities, then because of chaos and quantum randomness, the future is ill-defined for all finite beings. The only well-defined things are "expectations". The ability to do "otherwise" only makes sense when dealing with these expectations, and not with some unknown and unknowable future. Since individuals have the ability to act differently from what anyone expects, free will can exist.''

There are many things I think are very wrong about this statement. I've read the book in question and that is not the reasoning I derived from it at all. Doesn't mean I'm right but I can point out very definite reasons why the statement above is just plain false. To start, though Dennett devoted a chapter to uncertainty, this was to our uncertainty; because we don't know what comes next we needed to evolve methods of solving this issue...of predicting outcomes and effecting changes. He also was, perhaps, countering the agency of fate. But just because there's no fate does not make free will exist, it just means we're not being interfeared with.

The basic reasoning that I got from that book was that we, as brains, are not distinct from the mechanism at work in those brains. Incompatibilism seems to expect a dualism..."It was the brain that did it...not me." Dennett explains that this is a fallacy and spends a great deal of time explaining how it is a fallacy of thought, created perhaps by our language, that generates this seeming conflict between determinism and free will. He states that we just plain don't understand what free will IS, and sets about to explain what it is in a deterministic setting. Along the way he explains why materialistic indeterminism doesn't change the story. He never does answer dualism, but this is because he seems to feel it has been adiquately countered as a reasonable philosophy.

I think I'm right but that's not proof. The statement above contains, "...then because of chaos and quantum randomness..." First of all, Dennett said quite explicitly that QM does NOT solve the free will problem! Second of all, and more to the point...this would make his philosophy libertarianism. The statement in wiki says that Dennett thinks the universe is NOT deterministic and that we have free will. This is NOT compatibilism and Dennett most assuredly IS a Determinist as far as I can tell from ANY of his writings I have read.

-- Noah Roberts —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.165.53.242 (talk) 17:24, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

OK, I spoke with Dennett through email. I think this part of the article needs to change. It's just plain innaccurate and the summary in this article does not reflect his philosophy.

-- NR —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.165.53.242 (talk) 22:07, 22 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Hi Noah (you should get yourself an account, or log in). You may well be right about Dennett and Freedom Evolves.  I admit that I sort of skimmed it when I read it a few years ago, and found that the best ideas in it had been presented in bits and pieces in Elbow Room and Darwin's Dangerous Idea.  I didn't write that section, so I take neither credit nor blame for it, but more importantly, I remember clearly that for Dennett, QM was not a way out in Elbow Room either, so I can agree that the particular point you raise is valid.  As for your e-mail conversation with Dennett, this is not a verifiable source (although we can assume that Dennett is a reliable source on his own views).  If you can either find specific passages in Freedom Evolves that make this clearer, or even better yet, third party commentaries, especially from another recognized reliable source (did one of the Churchlands have a review of this?) that would help to get this right.  Let's bear in mind, too, that this is not an article on Dennett in particular, but on free will, so let's try not to let any discussion of Dennett overwhelm the rest of the article.  Cheers, Edhubbard (talk) 22:21, 22 January 2008 (UTC)


 * More... I did a little digging through the archives, and it seems that this passage in very nearly its current form has been in the article since at least July 3, 2006 (1000 edits ago).
 * In Elbow Room, Dennett presents an argument for a compatibilist theory of free will. He elaborated further in the 2003 book Freedom Evolves. The basic reasoning is that, if individuals do not consider God, or an infinitely powerful demon, or time travel, then through chaos and pseudo-randomness or quantum randomness, the future is ill-defined for all finite beings. The only well-defined concepts are "expectations". Thus, the ability to do "otherwise" only makes sense when dealing with expectations, and not with some unknown and unknowable future. Since individuals certainly have the ability to do differently from what anyone expects, free will can exist. Incompatibilists claim that the problem with this idea is that heredity and environment amount to irresistible coertion, and all of our actions are controlled by forces outside ourselves, or by random chance.
 * This is relevant because between then and now, the article underwent a massive upgrade and reorganzation (so, you'll see that the layout for example is quite differen in the link I sent). The people who were involved in that rewrite were working under some time pressure as the article was up for "Featured Article Review", but several of the editors are either PhD students User:Lacatosias, or even professors of philosophy User:Bmorton3 (I worked mostly on the neuroscience section, which is my area of expertise).  This does not mean that they are infallible (even Searle can't seem to understand Dennett). It may be that this was simply missed in the rush, but perhaps someone with a better understanding of this than me will have thought that it was accurate. We will certainly want to get some other people's input on this section.


 * My memory of Elbow Room, though, like your understanding, is that Dennett specifically disavows QM as a way of getting us to the "could have done otherwise" principle. Rather, my memory of his argument is that without recourse to QM, non-linear dynamics and chaos theory get us all manner of unpredictability in behavior since even very small (too small to be measured) differences can lead to very different dynamics (read, choices), and that all we really have a right to expect from a theory of free-will is that our actions not be "forced" in some sense.  I'm going to make a small edit along those lines now, but we should certainly wait for other editors to see what they think, too  Edhubbard (talk) 22:50, 22 January 2008 (UTC)


 * One more... from the discussion page above: "This is all wrong. Chaotic phenomenona are both perfectly deterministic and unavoidably unpredicatable. The unpredictability is an epistemological deficiency which can't be overcome, even in principle, by humans and their ridiculously fallible creations (MRIs, etc), while determinism is an ontological property. Category error.--Francesco Franco 13:04, 31 October 2007 (UTC)" So, it would seem that Lacatosis (aka Francesco Franco) is saying something quite like what I understood Dennett to be saying. Edhubbard (talk) 23:01, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

I haven't read Elbow Room. I also haven't really spent a lot of time on his critics. Freedom Evolves was the first Dennett book I read. I've since watched many of his lectures and read other books. Unfortunately I lent this particular book to someone or I could certainly find the passage that directly counters the statement about QM; I'm fairly certain that he comes right out and says, "Indeterminacy doesn't solve the free will problem." However, I think you can go to his website and ( http://ase.tufts.edu/cogstud/incpages/publctns.shtml ) publications, for more information. Specifically the one under 2007 entitled, "Some observations on the psychology of thinking about free will."

I posted the correspondence we had on my myspace. It's mostly me talking, he just told me, (paraphrasing) "Your on the right path. The wiki page is wrong." I wouldn't consider that a scholarly source but his reply does indicate that he probably finds his philosophy misrepresented. I can't post a direct link apparently so you'll just have to follow my friend id "nmroberts" and go to the blog posted on 1/22/08.

His compatibilism can be summed up more in a disagreement about the meaning of "free will" than anything else from my reading. "Observations on psychology..." make this point clearer I think.

Page 8 of that article contains


 * Free will in the sense that matters, in the sense that makes you responsible for your actions and that gives meaning to both your strivings and your regrets, is determined by how your brain deals with the reasons it finds for acting..Philosophers have established that you can still have free will and moral responsibility when the decisions your brain arrives at are your decisions, based on your very own reasoning and experience, not on any brainwashing or manipulation by others. If your brain is normal, it enables you to consider and reconsider your options and values indefinitely, and to reflect on what kind of a person you want to be, and since these

reflections can lead to decisions and the decisions can lead to actions, you can be the author of your deeds, and hence have free will in a very important sense.

Page 3 contains


 * Once again, however, a chief source of resistence came from those who were reluctant to let go of a traditional, absolutistic variety of free will.

I'd agree that a lot of time on Dennett particularly for this one wiki page would be unreasonable. There's a page devoted to Dennett elsewhere and, in fact, one on Freedom Evolves (which I thought was a decent and accurate page btw). I just think that he's being represented here in error and that should be corrected.

24.18.91.126 (talk) 01:25, 23 January 2008 (UTC) NR

Wikiquote page
Is anyone interested in creating a Wikiquote page for this topic? I was thinking something along the lines of 'free will and determinism' - no need for a page on both. One I quite like is "because determinism is true, thermostats don't control temperature". Richard001 (talk) 06:43, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Swami Vivekananda on free will
Swami Vivekananda's position on free will as described in the article seems dubious at best. This source clearly seems to indicate that he preached absolute determinism without any shred of free will. Take this sentence for instance: "Everything that I do or think or feel, every part of my conduct or behaviour, my every movement - all this is caused and therefore not free." ReluctantPhilosopher (talk) 14:52, 21 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Nobody is replying, so should I go ahead and change the content? ReluctantPhilosopher (talk) 08:30, 22 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm being awfully nice here, fellas. This is the last warning. Comment or my current mental state under external influences will make me edit... Muahahahaha !! ReluctantPhilosopher (talk) 13:35, 25 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Go for it, and cite your sources. I support being bold. -FrankTobia (talk) 14:39, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

'Bold text'

Satre
I think Satre should be in here. His philosophy is centered around freedom, enormously so, although I don't know if he's had much effect beyond existential circles. What is the requirement to make the page? Larklight (talk) 20:43, 2 March 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm not familiar with the philosophical arguments for and against, but I had a few issues with your edit on stylistic grounds. I thought the tone was lacking a certain encyclopedic rigor, and the second paragraph used 2nd person and was much too informal. Calling him a "fierce advocate" of free will seemed somewhat NPOV, and there were no references or sources for any of the information you added.


 * So in answer to your question, here are what I consider to be "requirements" to make the page (though of course this is all my opinion): address the above issues. If you don't consider writing to be one of your strong points, I am more than willing to help you out. The biggest deal-breaker for me, though, is sourcing. If you can find a few works where either he discusses free will, or someone critiques his work on free will, or both, that would go pretty much all the way to being included. Of course, I'm sure there could be other issues, like overall article quality (we can't have everyone's position on free will in this article), but I'll leave that for someone else to worry about. -FrankTobia (talk) 00:27, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * In this case, I would suggest that the requirement is not merely that Sartre talks about free will, but rather that his views on free will have engendered substantial discussion in the philosophical literature. As far as I can tell, Sartre did not develop any new position on free will, nor did he provide a substantial, in depth critique of notions of free will.  Bear in mind that this page is a featured article, and so merely being referenced is not enough.  With a mature article, additions not only have to be encyclopedic in tone and verifiable (these are minimum considerations for additions), but also need to make a substantive contribution to the page.  That is, any addition should need to address some important aspect of the major views on free will that has been left out. Edhubbard (talk) 00:58, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Determinism
Is determinism not the idea that all things have causes, is it not? If so determinism can be scientifically disproved. Very quickly and easily. LoveMonkey (talk)
 * How does this question improve the article? Edhubbard (talk) 21:20, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

What other category or group represents opposition to free will? None. N O Lossky presented some years ago the logical defense of free will. Philosophically. Scientifically. It is akin to libertarian socialism or free will equality, socialism (also see sobornost and Ayn Rand Russian Radical by Professor Chris Matthew Sciabarra). You are inappropriate and uninformed and are engaged in edit warring. Your conduct does not exhibit good faith. If you know what Lossky's defense is post it. Let me guess though you have and will decide what is appropriate for this article. Rather then the policies of wikipedia. Before I could even include the section into this article the template I added was removed. I think that this is an abuse and that you are warring against editors before they can even start to contribute to the article. I have much to source and add and you have effectively engaged in attrition. This is unacceptable. But it was expected. LoveMonkey (talk) 23:34, 6 March 2008 (UTC)


 * As for why determinism is a fallacy. Scientifically it denies the core of what science is. By the standard of determinism there is no such thing as energy. Specifically self-energy. N O Lossky places the argument below in philosophical terms, see also Degrees of freedom (physics and chemistry).

Philosophically by the standard of determinism there is no such thing as Beauty (God), Love, or Free will. N. O. Lossky addressed this directly. As he also at the same time responded to Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism and or Individualism. Lossky appears to say that socialism and capitalism are the same thing. Formulas for economics. Or capitalism is good for small businesses but that large business should not be corporations but rather syndicates or co-operatives. Means of productions should owned by the workers or producers of said company and not the state. I think that Milovan Djilas stated the same thing. Anyway N O Lossky believed this was inevitable hence he is a Fabian Socialist. Lossky is was also an anti-communist and was exiled from Russia for his anti-communist activities. I would like to post his philosophical response in this article (not his political or economic one per se). This argument is Eastern. The first established form of this debate in this form was between the Gnostic groups (cults started by charismatic leaders) of the time who taught that fate or Destiny (see also Uroborus) was how one received salvation and that one is not accountable to the concept of free will. Neoplatonism is the direct argument against this, though defending time are repetitive and cyclical reality (hence uroborus). Orthodox Christianity stating free will is critical but not absolute, and that God in essence was not energy but beyond energy (energy as a kataphatic immanence of God), God being infinite, but not cyclical (not uroborus but truly infinite akin to Real analysis, forever original, unending, uncreated in essence). LoveMonkey (talk) 13:35, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Important note: both Losskys are famous for translating the word dynamic as the word energy when dealing with philosophical dialects (in order to reconcile themselves with Aristotle). N O Lossky in his adaptation of monadology and or his famous take on Leibniz and Leibniz' Optimism, and V Lossky when speaking in and of Neoplatonic concepts in contrast and adaptation to Christianity. LoveMonkey (talk) 21:05, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

 ReluctantPhilosopher (talk) 15:56, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

What is energy? It can not be created or destroyed it has no cause, no generation. Types of energy that disprove determinism statistical mechanics, chemical kinetics, and the higher math of biochemistry, ecology, medicine, sociology, dynamics of human populations, determinism can not show a connection to scientific verification. It works as an approximation on simple mechanics. The issue is that the real world is infinite. Not infinite in repeatability, but actually infinite. This is akin to scientific realism

During a 1961 lecture for undergraduate students at the California Institute of Technology, Richard Feynman, a celebrated physics teacher and Nobel Laureate, said this about the concept of energy:

There is a fact, or if you wish, a law, governing natural phenomena that are known to date. There is no known exception to this law &mdash; it is exact so far we know. The law is called conservation of energy; it states that there is a certain quantity, which we call energy that does not change in manifold changes which nature undergoes. That is a most abstract idea, because it is a mathematical principle; it says that there is a numerical quantity, which does not change when something happens. It is not a description of a mechanism, or anything concrete; it is just a strange fact that we can calculate some number, and when we finish watching nature go through her tricks and calculate the number again, it is the same. (talk) 04:06, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

The same argument (being deterministic akin to uroborus) is made philosophically by Nietzsche in The Will to Power on the last page. And do you know what "the world" is to me? Shall I show it to you in my mirror? This world :a monster of energy, without beginning, without end; a firm, iron magnitude of force that does not grow bigger or smaller, that does not expend itself but only transforms itself: as a whole, of unalterable size, a household without expenses or losses, but likewise without increase or income; enclosed by "nothingness" as by a boundary; not something blurry or wasted, not something endlessly extended, but set in a definite space as a definite force, and not a space that might be "empty" here or there, but rather as force throughout, as a play of forces and waves of forces, at the same time one and many, increasing here or there, but rather as force throughout, as a play of forces and waves of forces, at the same time one and many, Later in the same segment. this, my Dionysian world of the eternally self-creating, the eternally self-destroying, this mystery world of the twofold voluptuous delight, my "beyond good and evil," without goal, unless the joy of the circle is itself a goal: without will, unless a ring feels good will toward itself-do you want a name for this world?

N.O. Losskys published defense of libertarianism titled sobornost
Of the potential position of philosophical. History of Russian Philosophy section on "N O Lossky the Intuitivists" pg 260

Determinists deny freedom of the will on the ground that every event has a cause. They mean by causality the order of temporal sequence of one event after other events and the uniformity of that sequence. Causation, generation, creation and all other dynamic aspects of causality are ruled out. Lossky proves that the will is free, taking as his starting point the law of causality but defending a dynamistic interpretation of it. Every event arises not out of itself, but is created by someone: it cannot be created by other events: having a temporal form events fall away every instant into the realm of the past and have no creative power to generate the future. Only supertemporal substantival agents-i.e., actual and potential personalities- are bearers of creative power: they create events as their own vital manifestations. According to the dynamistic interpretation of causality it is necessary to distinguish among the conditions under which an event takes place the cause from the occasion of its happening. The cause is always the substantival agent himself as the bearer of creative power, and the other circumstances are merely occasions for its manifestations, which are neither forced nor predetermined by them. The agents' creative power is superqualitative and does not therefore predetermine which particular values an agent will select as his final end. LoveMonkey (talk) 19:13, 7 March 2008 (UTC) Please note the importants of the meaning of the word event. Since the word currently has no defined definition. Also note that there is chemical energy which can not be used to define and or confirm the theory of determinism. Section II

That selection is the agent's free act. Consequently, the temporal order of events is not uniform even in the inorganic nature. It is quite possible that although some two electrons have millions of time repulsed each other, they will not do so the next time. But functional connections between ideal forms conditioning the existence of the world as a system-e.g. mathematical principles and the laws of the hierarchy of values and their significance for conduct conditioning the presence of meaning in the world-are independent of the agents' will. Violation of these laws is unthinkable, but they do not destroy the agent's freedom: they merely create the possibility of activity as such and of its value. Those laws condition the cosmic structure within the frame work of which there is freedom for an infinite variety of activities. The system of spatiotemporal and numerical forms provides room for activities that are opposed to one another in direction, value, and significance for the world. The absence of rigidly uniform connection between events does not make science impossible. It is sufficient for science that there should be more or less regular connection between events in time. The lower the agent's stage of development, the more uniform are their manifestations. In those cases there may be statistical laws. Many misunderstandings of the doctrine of free will are disposed of by distinguishing between formal and material freedom. Formal freedom means that in each given case an agent may refrain from some particular manifestation and replace it by another. That freedom is absolute and cannot be lost under any circumstance. Material freedom means the degree of creative power possessed by an agent, and finds expression in what he is capable of creating. It is unlimited in the Kingdom of God, the members of which unanimously combine their forces for communal creativeness and even derive help from God's omnipotence. But agents outside the Kingdom of God are in a state of spiritual deterioration and have very little material freedom, though their formal freedom is unimpaired. Life outside the Kingdom of God is the result of the wrong use of free will.

Lossky continues here with his refutation of Ayn Rand's Objectivism (Rand his former student) which he expressed as a system of selfishness. LoveMonkey (talk) 17:27, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Types of libertarian (free will) arguments
Eastern Types of determinisms and cultural libertarian (free will) responses to them Dostoevsky's Notes from the Underground and Demons, Dostoevsky's argument (via Ivan) that even no choice is a choice in The Brothers Karamazov (ontological and or existential arguments), Kierkegaard's Unscientific Postscript, Zamyatin's We reflected in 2+2=5, dialetheia e.g. "I had no choice but to choose.", Taoism as a response to Chinese determinism, indeterminism as a response to determinism's denial of sumbebekos (i.e. what causes certain people to met certain people). LoveMonkey (talk) 21:06, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

FAR
This article would currently fail even the GA criteria
 * Lead is too short (fails GA)
 * No citations for experimental psychology section

I'll start an FAR shortly should the issues persist. Richard001 (talk) 23:26, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

"History of the Concept of Free Will" section needs rewriting
There are many sentence fragments, bad English. . . but I am loathe to correct them because the entire paragraph is sketchy. First, Stephen Wolfram is hardly a modern expert on Free Will and he's referenced twice. There's no reference to indicate why Christianity ushered in an era of Free Will. The part about Aristotle is difficult to follow. I think that this entire section should be deleted. Philosophygeek (talk) 06:09, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree that Wolfram is not a notable source on free will, and I think that this whole section, and other additions by LoveMonkey should be looked at carefully. Edhubbard (talk) 07:44, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Who are either of you to claim the source invalid? If you are basing your statements on a scholar (or two) who specifically points to where the sections that are used are wrong please post their work here. I am not interested in your opinion. As for Stephen Wolfram, he holds a degree in theorical physics from Caltech. What he covers is part of what he has a degree in i.e. mathematical probablity. As for the section. I based it on the book an "Introduction to Aristotle" and many articles as such, heres one for example and this one of course too. Tell me where I went wrong with what I posted in contrast to the article? What source do you have to counter my sources. Does the source specifically address what you are saying it addresses? If so please post it here so that I can validate it. Again please reframe from edit warring. My opinion and your opinion do not count. Sourcing is what counts. If it is your opinion that Stephen Wolfram hardly accounts for anything. That is still your opinion. If you wish to state that he hold degrees and is somewhat controversial post that rather then blanket delete. Please try to collaborate rather then edit war. As for your statements about Christianity. None of my sources elaborate as such. Having stated that they do indeed state that Christianity took the stance of free will in the face of determinism. Your question does nothing to undo the ink on the page. Your question does not justify the removal of anything. LoveMonkey (talk) 13:16, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

PS also please mark sections to be copyedited as such. If a section needs to be rewritten please use the service rather then censor or blanket delete. Again wikipedia is not about opinion so don't waste my time with it. If you don't like Stephan show where what I quote is wrong or invalid. He has a degree in the subject as discussed.LoveMonkey (talk) 13:36, 21 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Let's take each of your comments in turn.
 * You say "Who are either of you to claim the source invalid?" First of all, my opinion is no more important, and no less important than yours on whether the source is good, bad, or anything else. You're right opinions don't matter, sources do.  But, as one of the editors who has worked dilligently on this page for over a year now, adding references and improving the text, to help bring it back to featured article status when it was in featured article review, I think that I have contributed enough hard work to merit at least having an opinion on the matter. Wikipedia works, not by a battle of the wills, which is clearly your MO, but rather by concensus.   Of course, if you are not interested in other editor's opinions, then we will quickly lose any interest in yours, and this will devolve into a simple revert war.  It's a great way to waste your time, if that's your goal, but it's not a very good way to work to create an encyclopedia.
 * As for my specific concerns about Wolfram as a source, yes, he has a degree in theoretical physics from Caltech. And I have a degree in Cognitive Neurosicence from UC San Diego.  So what?!  What I care about is whether Wolfram's comments are discussed by the majority of the philosophical community, whether he is felt to be a knowledgable commentator, and whether his ideas have engendered discussion.  Aside from his own book, has anyone else discussed his ideas *about free will*.  If not, then this is not a part of the mainstream debate on free will, and it has no place being here, as it is not notable.  And, again, I reiterate that this is/was a featured article before your edits, so it is up to you to explain why your edits should be here, with rational arguments and sources, not up to us to argue why your additions should not be here.  I will not be able to find a source that says it is not notable (how can you *prove* that something doesn't exist?) but unless you can provide additional sources about the appropriateness of Wolfram as a source, then the default assumption that it is not notable *as a source about free will* stands.
 * Finally, concerning large additions related to free will in Christianity, one of the things that we had to do to this page to bring it up to FA status was move much of the discussion of free will in religion to a daughter page. The discussion is very long and rich in theology, and we can only summarize it here.  Many of the things that you want to add here, on the main page, should be added to that page, not here.
 * As for copyediting, if you want to make an addition, please 1) Try to make it clean to begin with; Don't leave a jumble of text for other editors to deal with and 2) Please learn to use the preview button so that you don't make ten edits for one paragraph of badly edited text! Or, better yet, compose your text offline in Word, and then cut and paste it.  Your numerous edits clutter up the page history and make it hard to follow changes.
 * Edhubbard (talk) 15:45, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Free Will is a Featured Article page, which means that the article should adhere to certain standards of quality. The "History" section is very prominent at the top of the page, edited entirely by you, links to sketchy sources, and has a lot of typos.  That's not Featured Article quality.  I'm not opposed to having a "History" section, but please iterate on the Talk page before you post it to the main article.  I'd be happy to review and help you with this section.  On another note, Stephan Wolfram is not a noted source on Free Will.  Also, please try not to do so many separate edits, as it's really hard to go through them.  Philosophygeek (talk) 18:44, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Both of you gentlemen please post here the set of policies from Wikipedia that you are quoting. I do not see where in any of the policies it states that sourced information from reputable Universities (controversial or not) are now not to be allowed. Remember your activities (not mine) have been to censure or blanket delete again not me. I am trying to contribute. Also post the standard for the introduction you are referring to. I wrote my based on several already written encyclopedia articles. I even have already linked to those articles. You are both blanket deleting and edit warring and then trying to justify your disruptive behavior. As for Feature Article was that not 4 years ago? Also you state the sources are sketchy thats plural what other sources do you have a problem with? Be specific? LoveMonkey (talk) 19:17, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Hi LoveMonkey, Let's go through some particular policies:
 * First, Citing sources: The whole paragraph that begins with "The first such libertarian appears be the Greek philosopher Epicurus with his concept of the unpredictable movements of atoms in his theory of Atomism..." does not contain any references.  Certain aspects, like that Epicurus talked about atoms, are probably not contentious, and would not require a reference.  However, the idea that Epicurus' theory of atomism relates to free will in some way probably should be referenced.
 * Similarly, the sentence "With the emergence of quantum mechanics in the early 20th century, it showed that even determinism could not be validated by physics in it entirety." violates citing sources, as noted above, and Neutral point of view (NPOV) since as it is written is a statement of fact, rather than something that someone argued for. Who argued this? In what published, reliable source?  When?  Again, as you correctly noted above, your opinion does not count, neither does mine, but without a reference, how do we distinguish your opinion from mine?
 * The paragraph at the beginning, with Wolfram as your main source, violates a slightly more subtle aspect of NPOV, the Undue weight sub-paragraph, since you basing a fairly large portion of your addition on what is, as far as the editors here can tell, a non-notable position in the freewill debate. Bear in mind that "NPOV is absolute and non-negotiable." according to the page on this policy (right at the very top).  What is open to discussion is whether citing Wolfram violates undue weight.  I think that it does, and my understanding of Philosophygeek's comments makes me believe that he feels the same way, but if you can cite sources that show that this is an important point that has been included in the mainstream academic debate on free will, you can convince us.
 * Another source of problems with your edits is that they contain weasel words, such as "seems to have" (who says it seems that way?) and "appears be the" (who says it appears that way? If they say that, then you can say "X argues that" or "Y suggets that"). In that way, you make explicit your sources, and you also are then making simple declarative sentences about what someone says.
 * Finally, the sum of your contributions run close to running afoul of the No original research (NOR) policy, in particular as these edits seem to be a synethesis of material to advance a position.
 * As for the FAR, it was August 26, 2006. I was not on wikipedia when the article was first promoted, but was around for the drive to keep it a featured article in 2006.  Sometimes, editors feel that an article that was once Featured status no longer lives up to those standards, and then they launch a featured article review (FAR). If you expand the box at the top of the talk page, you will see the "article milestones" and FAR in August 26, 2006.  Looking at the edit history from those times may give you more insight into the things that we had to do to keep this as a Featured Article.
 * Also, as I have noted several times, this is a Featured Article, and therefore the additions need to not only conform to these minimal policies, but any additions need to continue to meet Featured article criteria. This is a higher standard, but given that the article has attained the coveted gold star, any changes must be improvements to the article.  Any changes must meet all of the above, and then some, or else you will be undermining all of the hard work that other editors have done to make this article a featured article.  So... how would we go about doing that? Let's take one example and see how we would go about making it conform to these policies.  You wrote:
 * In modern times it was the works of Karl Popper that used both quantum mechanics and validation based on sensory perception of initial conditions (see empirical validation) to argue on behalf of indeterminism.
 * Here, if we change these two sentences to read:
 * Karl Popper used both quantum mechanics and validation based on sensory perception of initial conditions (see empirical validation) to argue on behalf of indeterminism.
 * or perhaps better yet:
 * Karl Popper argued in favor of indeterminism using both quantum mechanics and validation based on sensory perception of initial conditions (see empirical validation).
 * then you would have an NPOV sentence, since you state who said it, you state that he "argued" for a particular position, and you cite at least one source. Karl Popper is clearly an appopriate source on philosophy, and so you are also ok on that policy.  I've taken a fairly easy example to clean up, but each of your sentences would need this kind of careful going over to make sure that you really meet the policies of wikipedia.  I would say that you would probably have to explain some of the the jargon in lay-terms so that you explain what Popper meant when he referred to "sensory perception of initial conditions."  And bear in mind, this is all just for one sentence of what you added.
 * Edhubbard (talk) 21:53, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Between the harassment of Richard001 on my talkpage and you deleting my sourced content again I am quote skeptical of your sincerity. This is a collaborative project why are you peer reviewing something as you stated that is outside your expertise? And not simply rewriting it? I have given sources to it word for word and you deleted it wholesale even though it had multiple sources. I can say that when I have spoken to Professors that they want nothing to do with wikipedia for this exact reason I have sourced my contribution and it was deleted. If I object you delete that too. If I make a point you delete that. You have a history of that behavior here on this talkpage with other editors as well. Anyone outside your click is treated with petty heavy handed brow beating pedantic behavior that is disruptive and frustrating. Your deleting and censorship conduct is not inline withe the proper wikipedia ideal of cooperation. LoveMonkey (talk) 01:38, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure how much clearer Edhubbard and I can be. Your inserted paragraph was inserted without any dialog on the Talk page, was edited entirely by you, contained links to non-authoritative sources, didn't cite many your sources, wasn't written from a NPOV, and contained many many copy-editing errors.  I am more than happy to help you rewrite it.  Try posting a new version here and I'll help.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Philosophygeek (talk • contribs) 02:55, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Any clearer? he dodged policy. The entire sections that I authoried on the talkpage here above are me posting the content on the talkpage before the article. You obviously have no desire to listen to reason. Your engaging in political games to frustrate. You are asking me to do things I have already done. You can at any time restore my edits and correct them in the article. Nothing but you is stopping you. But that would be collaborating rather the edit warring while trying to look like you are actually doing something positive. Being pedantic while trying to use an ever changing set of criteria to justify your disruptive behavior. You deleted sourced content. You deleted sourced content that had multiple sources while calling into question only one. You and editor Edhubbard keep pulling from a article and policies that does not exist and neither has obviously written here while claiming some outrageous high standard that neither of you and any of your other fellow cohorts could ever possibly achieve. Nor have any of you already achieved. Nothing is stopping you from writing a much needed history section for this article. Nothing. You are asking for something you yourselves can not deliver or the article would have already been there before I got here. Your just edit warring and if you where not, you won't be changing the rules and criteria at every turn. You won't be deleting you would be writing.

LoveMonkey (talk) 12:31, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
 * LoveMonkey
 * First, not one word of your reply above responded to my point by point, reasoned complaint about your additions. Please either discuss the issues directly, or quit your disruptive editing.  If you want to help make the article better, then let's discuss that.  If you want to just have a debate, please go somewhere else.
 * Second, your complaint about Richard001's "harassment" was a simple request to use the preview button on talk pages, which other editors have also asked you to do, and which you promptly removed.
 * Third, wikipedia does not require credentials. But, since you asked about my area of expertise, my PhD is in Cognitive science, which includes Philosophy of mind along with Neuroscience, Psychology, Linguistics and other sciences.  I took philosophy of mind with John Searle when I was an undergrad at UC Berkeley and Patricia Churchland was on my PhD committee.  So, I certainly have some degree of expertise through traditional academic channels.  This is, however, irrelevant (see Expert editors).  If I had merely spent a long time reading, and teaching myself (had been an autodidact) I would still be able to make contributions to this page and others as long as I respected the above policies, regarding NPOV, citing sources, and so on. Indeed, if you examine the edit history of the article, especially back in 2006 when we all worked to save this article from FAR, you will see that I have a long history of having made useful NPOV well-referenced additions to the page, in collaboration with other editors.  That is the most important measure of my expertise, not the degrees that I hold.
 * Finally, a look at your edit history shows that you have been on wikipedia for over two years. You cannot expect us to actually believe that you are really that unaware that what you are doing here is disruptive and that your additions are inappropriate.  If you care to deal with the substance of our concerns, we would love to discuss that with you.
 * Edhubbard (talk) 12:20, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Mr Hubbard I have repeatedly tried to reason with you. You have repeatedly rebuffed me and deleted my points and my complaints(engaging in the 3rr as a matter of fact) and now also my edits to the article. Why is that both you and Philosophygeek are so quickly on the same page and in agreement on just my contributions to the article when it is quite obvious that other things need and could be addressed in the article outside of what I posted. How convenient that a whole set of editors come out of the wood work and start harrassing me with pedantic complaints. All the while doing nothing to improve the article and or adding content and sources to it. Why is that? Why have you not answered my questions specifically about how I took and provided examples (that are accessible online) examples of like articles from at least one online encyclopedia. You have ignored this. Like I stated from the beginning I can be nice too. I also have no reason to believe anything you state considering your crews treatment of me and the other posters (whos history is obvious on this talkpage and the article history). You have blanket deleted my responses to you here on the talkpage and my contributions to the article. What you say does not change what you do. You have an obvious history of editorial abuses documented in the article history. Where you have deleted content by other people volunteering their freetime long before you stating browbeating me. As for your talking out of both sides of your mouth and stating opinions don't matter but then stating that somehow yours Mr Hubbard does. I have yet to find where you have ever written any content for the article ever. The article history shows only where you have deleted other people content. If I have not gone far enough back to find where you have contributed, then what does that tell you about your contributions to the article? How many years does one need to go back in order to find where you actually create and posted content to the article? The article history clearly shows that you have repeatedly engaging in running off editors and deleting content, which is against the very spirit of Wikipedia as a collaborative effort. Harrassing and deleting, edit warring, attemptig to frustrating people and censuring them is not collaborating. Any editor can rewrite what I contributed without blanket deleting it. Again I used another encyclopeidas article so you can't legatamately state that the article was unencyclopediac. As for typos and the lot you can fix them they are not an excuse for your disruptive behavor. Now again for the millionth time, please stop obfuscating and step up and address the critisms I have posted. It appears you like to be critical but don't like to be criticized. LoveMonkey (talk) 12:31, 23 March 2008 (UTC) Sorry LoveMonkey... all of this is irrelevant to the point by point substantive complaints I have made above. If you care to work on making the article better, we would be happy to work with you. If not, I am done with this conversation with you. In general, the most important policy, governing my repeated removal of your content is this: "The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material. See Burden of Evidence. In this, I am merely following policy.  In discussing with you, point by point above, I am engaging in good faith editing. If you do not wish to discuss content, please stop trolling here. Edhubbard (talk) 13:26, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

No personal attacks
Calling fellow editors trolls is a personal attack. Refrain from personal attacks. Stop edit warring. Stop blanket deleting content. Stop attempting to frustrate fellow editors with obstructive smear tactics. LoveMonkey (talk) 13:27, 23 March 2008 (UTC)


 * When it comes to featured articles, you should be very careful about making edits, and the burden of evidence is heavily on you. You should hardly feel surprised if they get removed. Your inability to learn from people's advice, including my own, is frustrating for us all. Richard001 (talk) 23:41, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

What needs to be done to avoid FAReview?
Anyone care to comment about a to do list for this article to avoid FAR? I'm happy to work on anything, but I need a list. Philosophygeek (talk) 19:05, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Hi PhilosophyGeek, Richard001 rightly noted that the lead is too short. In addition, Richard has complained, again, rightly so, that there were no references for the Experimental Psychology section.  I added those references about two weeks ago, and removed the tag that the section needed references .  So, as far as I can tell, the only thing on Richard’s list is the lead. If you have a chance to go through and just do a thorough copy-edit, fixing up any English errors, any typos, and things that just appear awkward due to edit creep, that would be great.  One other thing we should do is to archive conversations on the talk page older than, say 90 days.  It's long overdue. Cheers, Edhubbard (talk) 21:11, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Hi PhilosophyGeek, looking at the to-do list, one other thing that you might look into is trying to clean up the religion section. When the article was up for FAR in 2006, we moved a huge amount of material to Free will in theology.  Since then, the sections on religion have grown again.  Some of this material is necessary, since we still need to have a minimal amount of discussion (see WP:Summary style) but not as much as is there. Edhubbard (talk) 21:53, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
 * There seems to have been a divergence in section headings. I removed the redundant ' free will (in...)' from headings, but some have come back, while others haven't. For example 'Free will in hinduism' vs. 'In theology'. Free will in theology also discusses Hinduism, so I think that should be merged with the theology section. I initially merged Hinduism and Buddhism into the theology section, but others said they weren't 'religions'. I don't know enough about either to say much on this but I think if the article summarized includes Hinduism, it shouldn't have its own section. It also seems a case of undue weight - why are we giving so much attention to these two religions (or quasi-religions) and not others (Christianity and Islam being the two main ones). Richard001 (talk) 23:58, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Using author-date referencing
I've noticed that many of the references on this page reference books as a whole rather than page numbers. But that makes it difficult to find the assertions, and it's not really all that acceptable in scholarly literature. There aren't that many references -- why don't we just use anchored author-date referencing? This page seems perfect for it. Especially since we mention the authors' names anyway, we would in effect just be saying things like Dennett (1984:163) says this. Luckily, I was able to find one of Dennett's quotes (morality is "metaphysical hankering") easily with his index, but I can imagine quotes which aren't easy to find in the index. So what you guys say? OptimistBen (talk) 18:01, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Hi Ben, I personally like the author-date format, and have used it on a couple of the pages that I have worked on extensively, like the synesthesia page. However, some editors who have spent considerable time on this page (some of them now more or less retired) preferred the other system. One reason to not go with author-date is that it seems like all of the featured articles use the current format.  Although the guidelines state that any consistent format is acceptable, it does seem to be the de facto standard that featured articles use the format we are currently using here.  Indeed, one of the FA editors, SandyGeorgia, has explicitly suggested that the synesthesia page be converted to the other format if we ever wanted to get it to FA status.  Personally, I am in favor of getting the page numbers right on all of these quotes, if you can, but think that changing the whole reference format to author-date is probably too much work for too little pay-off, and indeed, is something that might lead to difficulties down the road if/when this article comes up for periodic review. Edhubbard (talk) 07:33, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Interesting. One editor does not decide Wikipedia policy; personally, the lack of proper in-text citations suggests to me that this should not be a Featured Article. Anyway, maybe I'll drop a note to SandyGeorgia about it, and maybe the "Featured Article Review" committee. I can't do the work, but it is something to consider. OptimistBen | talk - contribs 18:13, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Hi Ben, This isn't one editor who is setting the policy, but one editor who advised me on how an article can reach Featured Article status. Sandy is part of the Featured Article Review committee, which is why her advice is so important on this.  On the subject of "proper in-text citations" this article has 99 citations, so it is clearly not lacking in references.  If what you want is a single page number for each statement, you are probably going to be disappointed, since some of these statements summarize in lay language 10-20 pages of an article, book, or section.  Direct quotes need exact page numbers, and in other places where something is directly paraphrased, a page number is useful, but in situations where arguments are summarized, then page numbers are neither needed nor desirable.  As you will see, Richard001 has taken this article to FAR, basically over the lead, but I cannot dedicate the time to making the article better these days... you'll see that the other users who have worked on it intensely over time have all left wikipedia (see boxes at top of talk page).  Edhubbard (talk) 19:10, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Are you saying that I shouldn't disagree with SandyGeorgia? I'm not saying her opinion doesn't count, but let's not delude ourselves into thinking that she makes the rules. As long as author-date referencing is included in WP:REF, then I don't see how it could possibly invalidate a FA. Could you clear that up for me? I don't want direct page numbers for everything, but things like Dennett saying that that moral responsibility is "metaphysical hankering" need direct pages. Further, I don't think referencing the 10-20 pages when you're summarizing is a bad thing; it should be highly encouraged, and it is required in my papers. I'm doing my undergraduate senior thesis (which is nearly complete) on free will and determinism, arguing for hard incompatibilism (with a limited view of freedom focused around self-control, similar to Dennett). I'm reluctant to touch this page; it's fairly good and covers most of the arguments, plus I'm not so good at organization myself. I'm pretty burnt out on the topic as well; the only section I might be interested in working on is the History of it, after I graduate. OptimistBen | talk - contribs 19:53, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Hi Ben, in the case of the synesthesia page, which is what Sandy was referring to (see also the comment I provided on the talk page there) it should fall under the scope of the Medicine project, and Sandy said that it should therefore follow the medical manual of style (MEDMOS). MEDMOS specifically states that they want the other format, in part because they encourage very heavy citations, and many papers have ten or more authors, which could become cumbersome for the author-date format.  So, in the particular case where Sandy was advising me, she is indeed correct. Unlike in philosophy, where we are often summarizing large passages, they want references to peer-reviewed articles, in part because medical stuff is much more life-and-death (literally) than philosophy. I agree that something like "metaphysical hankering" should include a page number... I don't think we disagree there, but I am not sure how many of those sorts of things are unreferenced.  Check out the diff from the promoted version that I included on the FAR page.  In a practical sense, the use of the numbered system is somewhat easier for a quick scan, because the references are clearly numbered you know how many (quality and relevance is another question... remember, FA is assessed on verifiability, not accuracy or truth... it's the weakest part of wikipedia and FA in my opinion) and just reading along you can see which statements are referenced.  I see from your user page that you have a particular dislike of the currently preferred format on wikipedia.  In my real-world life (see my user page), I aspire to journals that use the current wiki-style, like Science and Nature because they are the most prestigious journals in all of science, but I mostly end up in journals that use the author-date format. Edhubbard (talk) 21:52, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * According to the Featured article critera page, either format is accectable, but the meta:cite format is recommended for articles with endnotes or footnotes. So, I still vote to leave it as is.  Besides,wouldn't you rather put your time into adding content that changing the whole referencing style on a page that is already a featured article (or at least, is for now)? Edhubbard (talk) 22:08, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I just emailed the Chicago Manual of Style and they say that a hybrid system is perfectly fine, which is what I prefer -- author-date for things which are cited repeatedly to make it easier to cite different pages. Also, I don't see why multiple authors would be a problem; surely ([lead-author] et al) in-text with more authors in the reference is more helpful than a simple number. Also, I glanced at the MEDMOS and I think SandyGeorgia must have misread it. Note that it says this:"Multiple references to the same paper can be achieved by ensuring the reference is named uniquely. Diberri's tool can format a reference with the PMID or ISBN as the name. An alternative is to use a Harvard-style reference, for example: name=Hedley2004."With a footnote system, the only way to cite different pages from single book is to create different footnotes -- terribly confusing. OptimistBen | talk - contribs 23:39, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

This article is so long... it needs much time and packs much words into one's head... but am I really wrong in what I stated on my user page? And on my article Nietzsche and Freedom? I think it would be honest to say that from the rational standpoint the problem is already solved by philosophy (of course I understand if someone rejects it). – TheUgliest (talk) 09:10, 29 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Solved by philosophy? Jesis Christoforo Colombo. I'm pretty sure that's an oxymoron, Ug. BTW, are you associated in any way with the actress from the TV series Ugly Betty??


 * Let me just make something perfectly clear: I'm tired of free will, unfree will and all other aspects of decision making behavior. I would like to be placed into an iatrogenic (isn't that cool, IATROGENIC!! HOOOOHHOOOOOOOOO!! I'm KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEWL, baby, I memorized a whole bunch of big words back in my 20s because I had nothing else to do with my time, lying in bed sick for years on end!! Then I realized later it was piointless nonsense, like most everything else in this world), that is a medically-induced coma and listen to John Coltrane until I can no longer feel the distinction between the self and the non-self. Thereafter I shall be as full of wisdom (i.e. BULLSHIT) and self-contradictaory as Sam Harris. But I might actually get rich or something.--Francesco Franco (talk) 13:12, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

To add maybe under Experimental psychology
http://www.kurzweilai.net/mindx/show_thread.php?rootID=120966

I know is not something notable or other rules you have but is very interesting and I hope someday we will have it on the main page. What will be the chances of that? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.121.172.59 (talk • contribs) 19:19, 26 May 2008


 * The chances of this getting on free will are zero, unless you get it published in a notable source for a start. Given a choice, I would probably pick a coin at random, which doesn't say that much for the experiment. Richard001 (talk) 03:22, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
 * you mean the experiment is wrong? how is that? why you think you will behave different from all the other people? Now that you know the experiment you sure will. But you could try it on some friends and see if it works.Raffethefirst (talk) 06:19, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
 * This isn't the place for original research or a forum. Try doing it on more people yourself; I'm sure someone will prove you wrong. Richard001 (talk) 08:22, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I always forgot those rules. No forum, no original research. ok sorry.Raffethefirst (talk) 10:38, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Argument from free will
Shouldn't this also be mentioned in the article somewhere? I note it isn't even mentioned in free will in theology, which seems an even more significant omission. Richard001 (talk) 08:23, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Figure/Libertarianism
Very odd figure "simplified taxonomy", indeed! Citation needed, or a figure remake. My own opinion is missing, which denies determinism and free will both. That is deeply illogical, since "taxonomies" (or rather flow-schemata) containing choices shall contain all choices, and lead to the correct box. As now, it is straight out lying into our faces, and should ASAP be fixed or removed. I prefer either a non-lopsided figure or one stemming from an academic source (however faulty). I prefer fixing before removing, since a similar but correct taxonomy is enlightening.  Said: Rursus   ☻   12:26, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The figure represents those positions that have been defended in reliable sources. If you want your personal opinion counted, then you need to first get it published, in a reliable source, and then we will be happy to include it.  Otherwise, it is just so much original research and as such does not belong here.  Edhubbard (talk) 07:30, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
 * What you appear to be describing might be the position of Pyrrhonism. It means that one has not yet found an acceptible answer and therefore goes on searching unsatisfied with what is in place (skepticism). Good luck on adding anything to this article. There appears to be a group of article squaters on this article who are allowed in engage in personal attacks and revert warring with complete immunity. Claiming that they know more then head of philosophy departments of major universities (AKA N. O. Lossky). And engage in pedantic nitpicking over how something can't be both political and philosophical at the same time. God Bless you, best of luck and I hope all is well. LoveMonkey (talk) 13:19, 7 June 2008 (UTC)


 * It sounds to me more like Rursus believes the universe is indeterministic and doesn't believe in free will (which probably also excludes belief in God). I don't like the figure also, though I have not brought it up before because I thought it was being a bit too nitpicky. I kind of agree though (I wouldn't exactly call myself a determinist either, and I don't believe in any supernatural/metaphysical free will), and will add a mention of this to the to do list. Richard001 (talk) 02:54, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The figure represents the positions that have actually been defended in the literature, not every possible logical (and illogical) combination of responses. Edhubbard (talk) 07:30, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
 * As regards to my belief, it's a very-very weird belief indeed. I believe the universe is indeterministic, and that all will is bonded up to a dependence into that universe, all will is a consequence of that universe, so that all other humans demands for personal responsibility is immoral unless those demands are moderated according to in what situation the bonded-will-person was. And, oddly enough, God may exist in such a will-universe-symbiosis-system, but that God would then not be almighty, nor allknowing, nor have any can-do-everything-even-the-illogical quality, unless heavily reinterpreted and reformulated. But does such a standing point not exist anywhere else? Have I got the concept of "free will" entirely wrong, since I believe it to be some independent factor not dependent on anything else than the person?  Said: Rursus   ☻   18:05, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Reading the article carefully, about 25% discusses non-deterministic, no-free-will positions in relation to libertarian positions, so it seems my opinion is rather common, and not too weird. Mostly those psychological parts, and Locke and Shopenhauer. Does those positions have a name?  Said: Rursus   ☻   19:18, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Edhubbard! No need to antagonize! I was just asking, since the figure lacks a source. Then add the source, if you can find one, please! That was one of the options. And WP:OR shouldn't be used as an argument of martial defence of anything, it should be used as a goal for consensus making. It might actually exist alternative figures out there, and the image is by my opinion still lopsided and logically weird.  Said:  Rursus   ☻   17:51, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Nitpicking nonsense. It's only a damned diagram But, if someone really wants to include the indeterminist/incompatibilist alternative (which I happen to share in the form of a subjunctive analysis), they can go right ahead and design a better one. I am graphically handicapped myself and don't see the big deal. We might even go an to subdivide it into the 50,000 varieties of deterministic compatibilism and indeterminist/intelligibilism,eh?? --Francesco Franco (talk) 08:50, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

No mention of Zoroastrianism?
In the West, the concept of free will essentially dates back to Zoroaster -- it's clearly present in the Yasnas (and implicitly supported with their assertion of the efficacy of "good thoughts, good words, and good deeds"), but is basically absent in the Greek intellectual tradition (as the example regarding Aristotle shows) and is very imperfectly developed in pre-Exilic Judaism. I'm surprised that there's no mention of Zoroastrianism at all in this article -- and that the history of free will, as opposed to the concept itself, gets so little play in general here. An article "history of the concept of free will" would be nice -- though I, at least, don't have the time or knowledge to create it. ExOttoyuhr (talk) 14:56, 4 August 2008 (UTC)