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Cleanup needed due to excess information (since September 2010)

I arrive at this featured article greeted by a {{Cleanup}} template. In my eight years (!) of contributing as an an IP this is a milestone: the first time I've ever encountered a featured article with an apparently substantive cleanup template on it. What I mean by "apparently substantive" is that the cleanup challenge has lasted 5227 days and counting. The template was placed in September 2010 by Tesseract2 (talk · contribs), citing the reason now worded as "There is excess information - links and briefer summaries are needed."

In spite of this situation, a review of the current talk page provides little evidence of any attempt to either dispute this issue or address it. Back in December 2010, Dana boomer (talk · contribs) wrote "Cleanup work needs to be completed on this article, or a featured article review may be in order." I am about to remind Dana boomer of that comment but wanted to prod interested editors into working to address this issue. I would do so if I could, but I have only a lay person's knowledge of the topic. 67.101.7.21 (talk) 18:33, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

It's true that there hasn't been much discussion on it- and actually at this point I don't think there's so much out of place stuff to warrant the tag. I just took the tag down.-Tesseract2(talk) 20:29, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

Changes in section Experimental Psychology

I changed a sentence that "framed" the information to a misleading idea. Since it read (later, in the same section) that Wegner has asserted that his work only speaks about perceptions of control and not control itself, and since it can be read in the same section (before my changes were included- still can be seen-) that Wegner has, in a particular experiment, led an individual to believe that the individual (the subject) has not caused an action that he did in fact caused (or produced somehow), then it is not fair to write the initial sentence as if Wegner had "proved" that conscious control is an illusion. There is a difference between the notion that someone can manipulate our perceptions of control and the notion that sometimes, or under normal circumstances of non-directed effect, our perceptions of control do match the control of behavior or are in accordance with the expectations of the effect we consciously anticipated within the mechanism of a behavior. the initial sentence that I modify did not led between this distinction, so it was not completely objective and it may have been misleading (and it was implicitly contradicted by later sentence in the same section). The new sentences does indeed still address the experiments made by Wegner, and does not contradict the findings of Wegner but they do make some distinctions between Wegner findings and some important aspects of the issue of Free Will that these experiments doesn't address or answer. Also, the new sentences does indeed seem more in accordance with all other sentences in the section that address the same topic of the Wegner experiments and the perceptions of control. Without making conclusion, the new sentences does invite the reader to see Dr. Wegner positions and claims. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.213.86.132 (talk) 01:57, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

unusual theories

what if we are immortal souls, uncreated and without origin... our uncreated self interest would be something other than cause or chance, no? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jiohdi (talk • contribs) 14:32, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Text in "Experimental" section - advice requested (Part 2)

This issue has come up previously in 'Text in "Experimental" section - advice requested' (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Free_will/Archive_8#Text_in_.22Experimental.22_section_-_advice_requested)

The New Scientist article "The Free Will Delusion" (16 April 2011) quotes a number of psychological studies regarding free will belief.

It is important to note that this article implicitly assumes an incompatabilist view of free will, although it mentions possibility of compatabilist free will briefly in its conclusion (free will being dependent upon feeling in control of one's actions). This assumption has been discussed here already, with respect to the reasonableness of taking a similar starting/introductory position in the free will wiki article.

I have created a summary of this research here;

Kathleen Vohs has found that those whose belief in free will had been eroded were more likely to cheat.[1] Roy Baumeister has observed that disbelief in free will increases aggression and reduces helpfulness.[2] Tyler Stillman has found that belief in free will predicts better job performance.[3] Emily Pronin and Matthew Kugler have found that people believe they have more free will than others.[4] Eddy Nahmias has found that incompatibilism is not intuitive - it was not adhered to, in that determinism does not negate belief in moral responsibility (based on an empirical study of people's responses to moral dilemmas under a deterministic model of reality).[5] Edward Cokely has found that incompatibilism is intuitive - it was naturally adhered to, in that determinism does indeed negate belief in moral responsibility in general.[6] Joshua Knobe and Shaun Nichols have determined that incompatibilism may or may not be intuitive, and that it is dependent to some large degree upon the circumstances. It depends upon the circumstances (whether or not the crime incites an emotional response - i.e. if it involves harming another human being).[7] They found that belief in free will is a cultural universal, and that the majority of participants said that (a) our universe is indeterministic and (b) moral responsibility is not compatible with determinism.[8] Adam Feltz and Edward Cokely have found that people of an extrovert personality type are more likely to dissociate belief in determinism from belief in moral responsibility.[9] Eddy Nahmias has noted that when peoples actions are framed with respect to their beliefs and desires (rather than their neurological underpinnings) they are more likely to dissociate determinism from moral responsibility.[10]

I suggest that an additional section is created under Science called "Social consequences of free will perspectives"

Richardbrucebaxter (talk) 20:02, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Domino image in lead

Im not a big fan of images whose captions are not literal descriptions of the image, with a direct tie in to the article. i would suggest: "upright dominoes set to demonstrate the domino effect, an illustration of the apparent lack of free will in the world outside of a person, and a demonstration of the argument for the lack of free will." Or something like this.Mercurywoodrose (talk) 04:20, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

I agree somewhat, and I just made an edit attempting to tie the image more to the article.-Tesseract2(talk) 17:05, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

Edition on the Physics sub-section of the article: Unfair appeal to authority avoidance

I eliminated the last sentence of the Physics sub-section. I believe it was an unfair appeal to authority because it could be read only as "According to modern physics"... and had no citations, and it was only after the commentary on a statement by Stephen Hawkings... I believe is unfair and unjustified to say "according to modern physics"... Physics is what Physicist practices and they need not to be in agreement when it comes to free-will discussions, one that is not completely in their domain. Since no citation was given directly, the sentence could be cause of bias... No other change was made on the article... I suspect of some bias towards the idea that free-will do not exist, but I have refrained to do all changes myself. Please. objectivity is part of any real encyclopedia. Let's foster it. The free-will debate is a genuine and on-going one, it hasn't be resolved. — Preceding unsigned comment added by MLearry (talk • contribs) 03:07, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Excellent catch: you are absolutely correct that we should not represent Hawking's views as "modern physics". That was surely too sweeping a claim. I was surprised, however, to see that you deleted the entire reference to Hawking instead of making the relevant change. Accordingly, I have brought back those details, but made it more clear that Wikipedia is summarizing the views of this one man - without claiming he represents all of physics.
Actually it would be very interesting if there were any data on what physicists think of the plausibility of the different types of free will. I know of no such research, unfortunately.-Tesseract2(talk) 04:24, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Schrodinger on Free Will

I changed the possibly ambiguous word "consensus" (because "scientific consensus" would not fit there) with "unanimity".

Besides that, I mostly just brought back the clarifying details about Schrodinger's position. Before those edits, the article called his book an essay, but also had no link to the actual book for those who want to read more. Not just those two small improvements were lost in a recent global undoing, however.

If we are going to mention Schrodinger on the topic of free will, we must clarify that he believed in a sort of universally pervasive, singular consciousness. The article missed this main belief of Schrodinger's by only alluding to "certain convictions of conscious experience". I have therefore mentioned this collective unconscious, and made it clear that - in his book - Shrodinger is explicit about why he is opting away from certain alternatives (e.g. souls). Perhaps most importantly, I made it more clear that Shrodinger's belief in libertarian free will is founded on what he calls "incontrovertible direct experience". That is very important and relevant.

Now that we have this section for that paragraph, perhaps we could discuss any further overhauls to it here? -Tesseract2(talk) 13:40, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi Tesseract2,

1) The essay, "What is Life" was originally composed and delivered as a lecture, and not in book form. It is frequently published in collected works volumes, or along with a second essay by Schrödinger "Mind and Matter." Sometimes it's published on its own, and it's a trivial matter, really, what we call it, but technically it was not written as a book, just an essay.
2) I've read this essay many times, and we seem to have taken away partially different impressions. To limit OR / individual interpretation, perhaps we could agree on a version that maximizes Schrödinger's own words and minimizes interpretation. As a note, I find your interpretation interesting, and it may well be right about Schrödinger, but his full metaphysical views are quite complex and difficult to distill in summary, so I would also favor limiting the discussion to free will specifically, as that is the topic of the article.

Jj1236 (talk) 22:27, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm glad we are talking. I agree that we should minimize our own interpretation (worst case I would be open to secondary sources pointing out anywhere I may have missed the mark - or you can just show me text that I didn't give due weight).

I suppose I will see where we diverge in interpretation. My most recent edit, I believe, reflects a bit more of the flow of logic Schrödinger seemed to present. I grant that his rejection of souls may not be crucial in the article here, but I think the following is also of dubious relevance: "he concludes "...'I' -am the person, if any, who controls the 'motion of the atoms' according to the Laws of Nature." He explains this position on free will by appealing to a notion of self that is emergent from the entire collection of atoms in his body, along with certain convictions of conscious experience. " This is confusing because his use of the word "I" in this passage is very nuanced. I do not think that is the best quote. I think we could really just get rid of all that. Especially considering he has started brainstorming on consciousness not, as you say should be our focus, free will. Free will itself is intuitively and obviously real to him as the article mentions just before that part.-Tesseract2(talk) 03:05, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

Teseract2, From my perspective, it seems like we agree about the most important details and have some minor differences about surrounding context.
Oversimplifying the relevance of Schrödinger's quote in question would be, "I control my body," which might be the clearest endorsement of free will. But you are right that the meanings in the actual quote are very nuanced. I favor putting the original text in the article as a quotation because it is carefully worded in a way that implies this nuance. For example, Schrödinger put "I" in quotes himself to alert the reader that there is more in the background, and that seems fine and fair to me.
On a very different topic, do you think the section on Hawking should discuss his various positions about time travel? At one point, he endorsed the possibility, and more recently retracted it. This could impact directly on questions of free will, or it could just be ungrounded speculation by Hawking. There's a curious meta-point about questioning whether physicists are authorities on philosophical topics, but that full discussion would be too much here. Perhaps highlighting the lack of unanimity safeguards against attributing too much authority to any one physicist, and that seems useful to me, even if going into all the details about each physicists' views could weigh down the discussion with too much detail.

Jj1236 (talk) 05:15, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

The article presently discusses Hawking's more explicit lines of reasoning about free will. I really do not think we should mention Hawking's views on time travel unless he was explaining how they have implications for free will. Even then, however, that would be especially "speculative" - not to mention the fact that you say he retracted those views. I think the Hawking part is good for now. It can get too easy to weight down an article.

I see your point, that the quotes around "I" alluding to nuance. But actually I think the article still goes too much into Schrodinger's general views. To keep directly on the topic of free will, I think the article could afford to say simply:
Erwin Schrödinger, a nobel laureate in physics and one of the founders of quantum mechanics, came to a different conclusion than Hawking. Near the end of his essay titled "What Is Life?" he says that there is "incontrovertible direct experience" that we have free will. Contrasting the views of Hawking and Schrödinger, it is clear that even among eminent physicists there is not unanimity regarding free will.

Let me know what you think.-Tesseract2(talk) 03:37, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

emphasize how the agent is known in metaphysical libertarianism

It now says under metaphysical libertarianism:

" An extra-physical will is believed to play a part in the decision making process. According to a somewhat related theological explanation, an independent soul is said to make decisions and override physical causality."

I would like to see added to that something like:

"The extra-physical will, or soul making the decisions is only known to exist by believing it is there. It can only be decided to exist, and not measured."

It already says in the first sentence that the extra-physical will is "believed" to play a part, but I think this needs to be clarified more directly, that in metaphysical libertarianism "believing" is itself an act of free will, and is required in referring to what makes a decision.

So for example a person chooses left or right, the person chooses left, what was it that made that person go left instead of right? For the metaphysical libertarian this question must be answered with a belief, so with a decision. For instance they might choose between the alternatives love and hate as to what they believe it was that made the person go left instead of right.

This is basically in reference to the creationist tradition of libertarianism, where God decides things, and God is known to exist through faith, which faith is an exercise of free will. So you see the logic repeated all the time in metaphysical libertarianism, what makes the decision is only known by deciding it is there. When people decide things, then you must "look into their heart" subjectively to find out what it was that realised one alternative over another. That is the sort of thing libertarians say. The general modus operandi with people, the beginning and end of the universe, the weather, the origin of species etc., it's all the same procedure, you see alternatives and a decision made, and then you make a decision in turn to find out about the spirit in which the decision was made.

This is also in general reference to the well known tradition in metaphysical libertarianism where goodness and evil are 1) things which are said to make a decision, which means they do the job of realizing an alternative, and 2) they are categorically not treated as matters of fact, but are instead held to be matters of judgement ie decision, belief etc. I think this is a very significant point of difference between libertarianism and the other theories, that in libertarianism good and evil are handled subjectively. --Syamsu (talk) 00:39, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

Can you cite any sources to support your interpretation here? It seems dubious to me, although perhaps I am failing to understand it. Looie496 (talk) 00:42, 31 July 2011 (UTC)
well it doesn't really matter much when you don't understand, because the procedure can be followed regardless if you understand it or not. I mean you can choose right? I will look for some references which emphasize God is known through faith ;) and some more general comments of libertarians similar to what I am saying. It says in the rest of the article that libertarians posit a duality. This is ofcourse the duality of what makes the decision, and was being decided over. A duality also of subjectivity and objectivity, a duality of worth and fact etc. --Syamsu (talk) 01:21, 31 July 2011 (UTC)
well I did some looking but I can't find it easily, but otoh obviously I am not the inventor of a doctrine which says love and such is what makes a decision turn out one way instead of another, and that love is known subjectively and can't be measured. Common knowledge is full of such explanations. It already says "believe" in the article, so I am merely emphasizing that what makes the decision is a matter of belief. How about not adding, but rewording the existing phrase into, "What makes the decision is said to be a matter of belief, not a matter of fact. On faith an extra-physical will or soul is decided to be there doing the job of deciding." Something like that. --Syamsu (talk) 02:51, 31 July 2011 (UTC)
Can you clarify for me: are you talking about the truth of metaphysical-libertarianism being a matter of faith (i.e. "Metaphysical libertarians believe, on faith alone, that uncaused agents are involved in decision-making"), or about faith being a part of metaphysical-libertarian doctrine (i.e. "According to metaphysical libertarians, faith plays a role in the decision-making process...")? --Pfhorrest (talk) 18:53, 1 August 2011 (UTC)
The first basically, in ML the agent can only be known by deciding what it is. This still leaves the decision and the alternatives as matters of fact. I read that generally all medieval monks are assumed to be metaphysical libertarians. I've also read general opnion of many intellectuals arguing against ML that this believing about the agent is mainly what they object to. So both inside and outside ML, the agent in ML is regarded as a matter of belief.
So what about changing it, like I said it is just a shift of emphasis in the present text. The text says ML "believe" there is an agent, what the text should say is ML treat the existence of the agent as a matter of belief. The rewording would make room for "atheist" metaphysical libertarians, people who believe there is nothing there doing the job of deciding. Now the wording is slanted toward believing there *is* an agent, or so to say, the spiritual domain is not empty. But ofcourse when you say something is a matter of belief, then also the negative alternative result must be allowed, that there is nothing there. --Syamsu (talk) 13:02, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
I would appreciate if you stopped edit warring on the page; citing sources from the literature may assist your changes. I am even quite sympathetic to your interpretation, but there is no reason to be so abrasive while arguing for it. elle vécut heureuse à jamais (be free) 20:35, 9 August 2011 (UTC)
Obviously I think it already is sufficiently backed up that this is an accurate representation of libertarianism, it is mainly just a shift of emphasis not content. Your objection that no soul was mentioned was simply a mistake on your part, it was still mentioned. With the change I made the paragraph becomes more cohesive. The duality mentioned in the paragraph previously, more clearly flows to a duality of matters of objective fact and subjective belief. Any further rewording should make this distinction clear, your second rewording was not clear on this point. Do you really feel the need to have a reference that the existence of the soul in libertarianism is treated as a matter of belief, not a matter of fact? I refer you to William of Ockham's writings --Syamsu (talk) 21:00, 9 August 2011 (UTC)
"we can have no knowledge of an immaterial soul; nor can we prove its existence philosophically. Instead we must rely on revealed truth and faith" http://www.philosophos.com/philosophical_connections/profile_050.html#ockconn2e --Syamsu (talk) 22:02, 9 August 2011 (UTC)
I prefer the original wording FWIW. 1Z (talk) 23:34, 9 August 2011 (UTC)
I also prefer the old wording, and don't quite see the point Syamsu is trying to emphasize about it being a matter of "belief" vs "fact". This is a philosophical article and like all philosophical articles most of what we are doing is reporting the beliefs of various people. Those people usually believe the things they believe to be facts; to believe something is to hold it to be a fact. That doesn't say anything about whether the thing believed is proven or provable, empirically or otherwise.
If we were to emphasize "metaphysical libertarians believe that there is a nonphysical agent that makes people's choices, but that's just their belief and isn't proven", then we'd likewise need to emphasize "hard determinists believe that every event is necessitated by the events which preceded it, but that's just their belief and isn't proven" for consistency (see problem of induction). And we'd have to do that for every report of what anybody believes on every philosophy article on the whole wiki. If you (Syamsu) are not arguing for that, then why the special emphasis on the agent of metaphyisical libertarianism being an unproven belief?
Also, though I suspect there is strong correlation, not all metaphysical libertarians are religious and rely on "revealed truth and faith". There are those who take it as a brute fact observable by simple introspection that they have free will; combined with conviction in some argument for incompatibilism, this makes such people metaphysical libertarians. In other words, some people think metaphysical libertarianism can be and has been proven, and that others are irrationally unpersuaded by those proofs. Your emphasis on "that's just their belief" diminishes the validity of that belief as the wiki presents it. For neutrality we also can't assert that the belief is correct, but we should simply state "these people believe that such-and-such", without any emphasis on the proof or provability (or lack thereof) of said belief. --Pfhorrest (talk) 00:43, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Can you reference any metaphysical libertarians who takes the existence of an extra-physical will, which is the original wording, to be a "proven" matter of fact?

I find that highly unlikely you could provide such a reference, in that the whole point in calling it "extra" physical seems to be that it is not measurable like all the physical things are.

Most people don't "usually believe the things they believe to be facts", most people usually make a distinction between matter of facts and matters of belief. For instance there was a movie last year or so, about a character who believed love was not real. As a movie is to a large audience, it seems many people are acquainted with the idea that some things are matters of belief. It seems bizarre to me a metaphysical libertarian would say something like love, or an extra-physical will is a matter of fact. I heared a radio show some time ago where a hard determinist, denying free will, said he could measure what a person likes with an mri brain scanner. That squarely belongs with hard determinism that you can measure the agent doing the deciding, it would be a mistake to put that in as an option with metaphysical libertarianism. As shown also by the reference to Ockham I provided, in metaphysical libertarianism some things are categorically not matters of fact.

You are also quite mistaken that saying it is a belief diminishes the validity. When a belief is arrived at in freedom this way, then that obviously has more validity than a belief forced by facts. For example somebody forced to believe in God, is less valid then somebody freely believing in God.

Pending any reference on your part, I think you only demonstrate a lack of understanding of metaphysical libertarianism, which illustrates how important it is to emphasise this particular point in clear way. This particular point of how the agent is known in metaphysical libertarianism is not understood well by many people who are conditioned by school and university to rely on evidence for coming to a conclusion.--213.247.122.26 (talk) 09:03, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Thomas Reid and C.A. Campbell are the first two libertarians who come to mind who appeal to introspection for evidence of the existence of free will. They're not saying "I can prove to you that I have free will" in a 3rd-person, scientific, physical sense, but "we can each prove to ourselves that we have free will; I introspect and see plainly that I do, and if you really have free will you can do likewise and see for yourself." They're not appealing to faith or divine revelation to tell them that they have free will; they can just see it for themselves, in themselves, and say everyone else should introspect and see so about themselves, too.
As for "proven fact", something doesn't have to be proven to be a fact. There are facts about things that we don't know yet. Is there life in the seas of Europa? We don't know, we have no proof either way, but it's either a fact that there is or a fact that there's not, even though we don't yet know which of those is a fact.
Similarly, of course people make a distinction between facts and beliefs: I might believe that there is no life on Europa and turn out to be wrong about that fact. But I believe it is a fact that there is no life on Europa; that just means the same thing as "I believe there is no life on Europa". Adding "it is a fact that..." to the beginning of a sentence doesn't add any content to it, it just emphasizes the speaker's conviction about it, like saying "it is true that...".
So emphasizing that something is just a belief implies doubt about the thing believed. But everything in philosophy articles here is dubious; you can always find a notable source who will disagree with something. That means we can't state anything as a fact in the wiki's voice, and have to simply state that people believe certain things; but putting special emphasis on how something is "just a belief and not proven" unduly takes weight away from that position, unless we did it to all positions, which would be ridiculous.
In short, we have to say just "P believes that X. Q believes that Y." We can't say "It is a fact that X. But Q believes that Y." Nor can we say "P believes that X. Q holds, as a matter of belief, that Y, but that isn't proven." Those would both by biased against Q; the latter less so, but still some, as it states P's belief without implications on its truthfulness, while it states Q's beliefs in a manner that casts doubt on it. It would be unbiased to say "P holds as a matter of belief that X, but that isn't proven. Q holds as a matter of belief that Y, but that isn't proven." But that would be ridiculously verbose and redundant and cast unnecessary doubt everywhere when the lack of consensus on facts speaks for itself, and we can just say "P believes that X. Q believes that Y."
That's probably all tangential though, as I get the feeling that the point you're pushing for is to have the article claim that all metaphysical libertarians believe the only way to know we have free will is through faith and divine revelation. That's clearly not the opinion of them all though, as Reid and Campbell provide counterexamples, and there are undoubtedly others out there too.
Maybe it would make a useful addition to the article, however, to have an additional paragraph about metaphysical libertarians and the differences within their ranks on how we know we have free will? The introspection camp vs the divine revelation camp. If you want to write up something about that, we can hash out the details there and maybe make some progress. --Pfhorrest (talk) 21:42, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

The article does not say "free will" there, it says an "extra"-physical will or soul. When Thomas Reid says he can prove free will with introspection, he likely is referring to the alternatives, and decisions he sees in himself. These are matters of fact in principle for all metaphysical libertarians because of the way it is formulated, only what makes the decision is categorically considered not a matter of fact. As per example Reid talking about what makes the decision he turns into a mystic:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/reid/ "Reid staunchly refuses to speculate on the substance of the self, however. Despite the fact that Reid is a substance dualist who believes that selves are eternal souls, he does not defend that view in the work that he published. In manuscript lectures, he describes souls as “beings of a quite different Nature” than material bodies and says that the death of the body does not imply the death of the soul (Animate Creation 617-618). As Reid spells out his metaphysics of the self and soul here, his arguments become theological and appeal to God's existence, love and justice."

I haven't looked at Campbell yet, I think the point is already proven. There is a very wide agreement among metaphysical libertarians. To be sure you may find some exception, but it is this point about the way in which what makes the decision is treated, what makes metaphysical libertarianism stand out much. Metaphysical libertarianism is often criticized for involving an unevidenced soul or extra-physical will. So metaphysical libertarianism is commonly identified with this particular aspect of it.

Your talk about "belief", is generic talk about belief, and not belief as it is understood in metaphysical libertarianism as distinctly applying to what makes the decision. In my rewrite I explained belief in the metaphysical libertarianism sense, which is like "decided to exist". Again, this is what sets apart metaphysical libertarianism much, which is why it should be formulated sharply and emphasized.

What I am pushing for is that the only way to know about what makes the decision in metaphysical libertarianism, is through deciding what it is. I think this is quite secular and common, as well as religious. It validates subjectivity in general. --Syamsu (talk) 22:54, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Please folks, libertarianism just treats freedom as real, therefore they have a way of knowing (believing) which is based on just choosing what is there. Please do not edit it on the grounds that supposedly libertarians do not use choosing in their philosophy! There are loads of references for it, above are a couple from mainstream libertarians such as Ockham and Reid, please be reasonable thank you.--Syamsu (talk) 11:38, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Whatever point you are trying to make is still completely opaque and seems to be shifting. First you seemed to be arguing that libertarians freely choose to believe that free will exists, which begs the question and is thus biased. Then you seemed to emphasize that belief in libertarian free will was just a belief and not proven, but that has undue weight issues. From there you seemed to be arguing that libertarians rely on faith and divine revelation to know that free will exists; I gave Reid and Campbell as counterexamples of libertarians who rely on introspection to tell that free will exists, not divine revelation. Now you seem to be arguing that libertarians "know" free will exists because they just decide that it does? That doesn't even make any sense, deciding to believe something doesn't pass muster as knowledge by any epistemic standard I've ever seen put forward, unless you want to go back to question-begging that "I decided free will exists, and that ability to make that decision proves that it does". Maybe if some libertarians actually use that argument it deserves a mention, but the way you're phrasing your edits in the article comes off as nonsense - it's not even clear what you're trying to say, or why you're trying to say it in the part of the article you keep editing. --Pfhorrest (talk) 19:52, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
I agree with Pfhorrest that Syamsu's edits are incomprehensbile -- and the lack of any sort of reference is a further problem. Looie496 (talk) 20:20, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
All your points are already answered within this talk in a clear way, please just reread. For example I said Reid takes the alternatives and decisions as matters of fact, but "the self" he treats as a matter of faith. You must simply read what I write, this is bad faith of you to ignore what I wrote. I see that more people don't understand what I wrote, and true there may be lots who don't understand, but then this is not such a problem if that means that those people simply do not understand metaphysical libertarianism. Then you must simply try harder to understand what I wrote. I think you do not understand Reid's "staunch refusal" to evidence "the self", and Ockham's insistence that the "soul" cannot be proven even philosophically, let alone with measurement. Talk to me, and show me that you understand Reid and Ockham on this basically similar point. Otherwise again, when you don't understand, then the edit is right, and you must simply try harder to understand my edit, in order to understand metaphysical libertarianism. The same goes for looie, show me that you understand Reid and Ockham on this point --Syamsu (talk) 09:53, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
Syamsu, it's not a problem of not understanding metaphysical libertarianism or what particular metaphysical libertarians say, it's a problem of not understanding what you're trying to say about that, or issues with the way you're saying whatever you're trying to say.
If I read you above correctly now, I think the point you're trying to add to the article is that some metaphysical libertarians believe not only that free will is incompatible with determinism, not only that people have free will, not only that the self or agent which does the choosing is an immaterial substance or soul -- all of which are already stated in the article -- but that, consequential to its immateriality, nothing can be known about that self or agent, and consequential to that, that all beliefs about it must be formed on the basis of faith or revelation?
If that is a correct understanding, then please add your preferred citation(s) to this edit I just made (adding the sentence "Some philosophers, such as William of Ockham and Thomas Reid, argue that this mind, will, or soul, being nonphysical, cannot be known to empirical science, and that all beliefs about it are thus grounded in faith or revelation."), and maybe we'll have settled this? --Pfhorrest (talk) 02:58, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
Yes that is basically a correct understanding, thank you very much. I still think the paragraph would be incorrectly interpreted though. It says:
"Non-physical theories hold that a non-physical mind, will, or soul overrides physical causality"
This is not really true in that you can be a metaphysical libertarian like Ockham or Reid, and not believe in God or a soul, and believe there is nothing there doing the deciding, so to say the spiritual domain is empty. The point is only the way that it is known, that it is known through faith that there is nothing there. So it should say something like: metaphysical libertarianism divides into non-physical and physical theories, the non-physical theories emphasise the way the agent doing the choosing is known, rather than what the agent consists of, be there any agent at all. The agent or soul is said to be only known, or rather felt, through free belief (faith / revelation) and not evidence. I don't think you need to be so careful to say "some", because I read that the late medieval monks are generally all regarded to be metaphysical libertarians. I don't believe Ockham and Reid are exceptions to the monks generally then.--Syamsu (talk) 08:58, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I regret that it has been changed back. I think I have written a clear and correct representation of metahysical libertarianism. Now the passage seems to say again that metaphysical libertarians require a belief in a soul. This is a falsehood of such magnitude which cannot pass. To require a belief in a soul and implicitly require belief in God is anti-democratic, anti-freedom, anti-emotion, anti-religion. Very clearly in metaphysical libertarianism the way to arrive at a conclusion about an agent is by free belief. I have quoted 2 metaphysical libertarian philosophers previously going out of their way saying that they are opposed to evidence, even against philosophical evidence in coming to a conclusion about the agent. But really ALL late medieval monks are generally considered to be metaphysical libertarians. It is also quite obvious that religion centers around FAITH, not around evidence gathering. So I think I have made a fair and correct representation of common metaphysical libertarianism.

But on the other side I do feel I need more support from people here on wiki that what I wrote is a correct and fair representation of common metaphysical libertarian position. Think this through, is the way in which metaphysical libertarianists reach a conclusion about an agent a free way, or a way forced by evidence? Syamsu — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.57.25.110 (talk) 01:12, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

I did not simply revert your edit; I reverted it and then made my own edits to make the same point you seem to be trying to make with less collateral damage. Your edits implied that all non-physicalist metaphysical libertarians believe that there can be no evidence that there is any mind, soul, or agent doing the intervention in physical causality. That is very clearly not the case, as the example I added of Rene Descartes, the archetypical interactionist dualist, shows. I don't know how you can possibly claim that Descarte wasn't a metaphysical libertarian: he believed in immaterial minds independent from the material world which intervene in the otherwise-deterministic events of that world by causally affecting the physical brain, through the pineal gland of all things, and his entire philosophy was ultimately grounded in his supposed proof of the existence of such a mind (the cogito). I trust you don't need quotations to show that Descarte believed he had proven there to be immaterial minds independent of bodies, as that's pretty much his big thing, but here's a quick quote demonstrating Descarte's strong insistence on metaphysical liberty, courtesy of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article on the subject:

René Descartes, for example, identifies the faculty of will with freedom of choice, “the ability to do or not do something” (Meditation IV), and even goes so far as to declare that “the will is by its nature so free that it can never be constrained” (Passions of the Soul, I, art. 41). In taking this strong polar position on the nature of will, Descartes is reflecting a tradition running through certain late Scholastics (most prominently, Suarez) back to John Duns Scotus.

You've shown that some metaphysical libertarians take an epistemological position on the demonstrability of the existence of any such mind / soul / will, and that has been included in the article already. I might even be willing to give you the benefit of the doubt that they are representative of a whole school or period, although the quote about about Descartes' position reflecting late Scholastic opinion would cast that into doubt. But it's a far leap from there to saying that all metaphysical agree with them, especially when one of the most famous philosophers of all time (Descartes) is a glaring counter-example.
I'd also say that, even if Reid et al opine that the it cannot be known whether "the spiritual domain is empty", as a matter of our encyclopedic categorization those who hold (even on faith) that it is empty would by definition not count as the non-physical variety of metaphysical libertarian, as that variety is defined by the belief that there is something non-physical (if that is what you mean by "spiritual") intervening in the causal affairs of the physical world. Otherwise, if you believe that determinism is incompatible with free will, and that free will exist, but that there is nothing non-physical ("the spiritual domain is empty"), then you are by definition a metaphysical libertarian of the physicalist variety. Nevertheless, when I made my edits to the article I moved the mention of mind, soul, or will to be specifically an interactionist dualist view, making room for the position you seem to be pushing for that maybe there are non-physicalist metaphysical libertarians who not only say that belief in that mind/soul/etc is a matter of faith, but that it is not required to be a non-physicalist metaphysical libertarians, even though as far as I can see that position is incoherent.
The positions, narrowing down to yours, are:
  • Is determinism compatible with free will?
    • Yes - Compatibilism.
    • No - Incompatibilism.
      • Does free will exist?
        • No - Hard determinism.
        • Yes - Metaphysical libertarianism.
          • Is the universe entirely physical?
            • Yes - Physicalist metaphysical libertarianism.
            • No - Non-physicalist metaphysical libertarianism.
              • Can we know or prove anything about the non-physical realm?
                • Yes - Descartes et al.
                • No - Reid, Ockham, et al.
The wording of the article as it stands now, after my revision and re-edits of you, say that:
  • Some metaphysical libertarians are physicalists and others aren't.
  • The ones that aren't physicalists believe that something external to the physical world intervenes in determinism.
  • Interactionist dualists believe that a mind/soul/etc intervenes in the physical world's determinism. (This should be strictly redundant with the above as far as I can see, but I made it separate in charity to you).
  • Some philosophers believe that any belief in a mind/soul/etc is a matter of faith beyond reason or science.
Tell me what valid point is still missing from that? --Pfhorrest (talk) 05:13, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
Ockham and Reid make practical use of their philosophy in arriving at a conclusion about an agent. It must be made abundantly clear that the belief in a soul is arrived at in a free way, in the metaphysical libertarian sense of freedom, of there being alternatives available. Without that being made clear it seems that the belief in the soul is some arbitrary add on having nothing much to do with their belief in free will.
Descartes is a seperate issue. His meditations don't neccessarily portray his points of view directly. In the meditations Descartes posits confusion, and then tries to find a way out of the confusion, which makes it a bit unclear what Descartes true position is. Unless you can show anywhere that Descartes says he can prove the existence of a soul, then the safe side is to say he does not think he can prove a soul existing. And even if Descartes would have said that he could prove that the soul exists, I think that is a highly unusual position to take, for 99.99 percent religion centers around faith not repetition of proven facts!
--Syamsu (talk) 10:58, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
And aren't you just making the same mistake with Descartes as you did with Reid? Aren't you just mistaking Descartes objective assertions of fact about the results of decisions showing up in the pineal gland first, from his SUBJECTIVE OPINION that these results, as the case may be, signify love or hate as what did the choosing? I think very clearly you are making this mistake, because Descartes talks about the soul being tied to the pineal gland, and not the soul as what constitutes the pineal gland. I think you simply fail to understand metaphysical libertarianism. Obviously it would be ridiculous to forbid practical use of metaphhysical libertarianism in an article devoted to metaphysical libertarianism. So as to say it may not be entered into the explanation that Ockham choses to believe in a soul containing love, over alternatively chosing not to believe it, which is simply to deny metaphysical libertarianism.--Syamsu (talk) 16:30, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
Descartes showed that the "soul could by no means be educed from the power of matter" How is that really establishing the existence of the soul as a matter of fact? Again this can be read as saying the soul choses, and the results show up in the pineal gland, and should be read as such. It is simply describing how the body is organized in terms of making decisions in a libertarian sense of turning out alternative ways. If we answer the question would Descartes have opined that an mri image showing electric current when somebody says they are experiencing love, is love, or would Descartes say that the electric activity showing up is reasonably an expression of love by free will? I think it must be the last.
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/59/59-h/59-h.htm
"I had after this described the reasonable soul, and shown that it could by no means be educed from the power of matter, as the other things of which I had spoken, but that it must be expressly created; and that it is not sufficient that it be lodged in the human body exactly like a pilot in a ship, unless perhaps to move its members, but that it is necessary for it to be joined and united more closely to the body, in order to have sensations and appetites similar to ours, and thus constitute a real man" — Preceding unsigned comment added by Syamsu (talk • contribs) 17:03, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
I'm having difficulty reading you again, but I think you are misreading me about Descartes, especially the throw-away comment about the pineal gland. The point I was making about Descartes is this: his meditations, as you say, begin by positing confusion, and then try to find a way out of it; on the way "down", he comes to the conclusion that he may be entirely mistaken about the existence of a physical world, and yet his mind still exist, proving (to his satisfaction) that minds are not dependent upon matter but exist (if they exist at all) independently of it; and then, at the "bottom", he concludes that he cannot doubt that his mind exists, proving (to his satisfaction) that there really are such things as immaterial minds, at least one, his; and then he builds back up to a full set of beliefs from that first indubitable fact, which is what I meant when I said his entire philosophy was "ultimately grounded" in it. Then elsewhere, he discusses the way in which these immaterial minds may interact with material bodies, identifying the pineal gland as the place where the immaterial soul and material body "meet", where the soul pushes the buttons on the brain, so to speak; I did not at all mean to imply that Descartes believes the soul to exist in the pineal gland or anything like that, as he clearly believes that souls/minds are completely independent from matter. But he also clearly believes that they can be known to exist by reason and not merely faith, as he gives a rational argument for their existence in the Meditations; and he clearly believes that they directly interact with material bodies and aren't just epiphenomena or something, as he identifies the pineal gland as the place where that interaction occurs.
You write that "99.99 percent religion centers around faith not repetition of proven facts". That betrays your bias toward this article: this is not an article solely about religion, but about free will in general, which is discussed in contexts of religion, philosophy, science, etc, as the lede clearly states. Religion may be all about faith, but philosophy is all about reason, and there are metaphysical libertarian philosophers who present well-known arguments purporting to show by reason that there are immaterial minds nondeterministically interacting with the material world. If there are notable people who believe that that is a futile venture and anything about the mind or soul can only be known via faith, then that's a notable opinion worth mentioning here; but we cannot state it as fact in the wiki's own voice, we have to identify it as the opinion of specific thinkers, and we cannot attribute that opinion as a defining characteristic of a given position so long as as there is any dissent about the matter within adherents to that position. Obviously not all metaphysical libertarians believe in a soul at all, as there is the physicalist variety; and even within the non-physicalist variety, there are some obvious examples like Descarte who think it's not just a matter of faith, but that reason can show it to be true.
You write that "Obviously it would be ridiculous to forbid practical use of metaphhysical libertarianism in an article devoted to metaphysical libertarianism." That is not obvious at all, and in fact would go against wikipedia policy. The methodology we are to use here is very clearly spelled out: we are to state what different notable thinkers believe, and explain their stated reasons for believing such, in the third person, not in the article's own voice, and clearly identifying it as their opinion, with sources to back that up. Also, once again you betray your bias toward this article: it is not an article devoted to metaphysical libertarianism, it is an article about free will in general, including all the different positions on it. But even in the article on metaphysical libertarianism, the view you are pushing is not defining of that entire position but is one sub-variety of it, and in either case, "practical use of metaphysical libertarian" as an editing methodology would be just as clearly against wiki policy; just as in an article about Christianity we cannot have the article state "God exists" and cite the Bible, even though that's what practicing Christians do when asked about God's existence. Because the article on Christianity must be written from a neutral point of view, not a solely Christian point of view; and even more so, the article on Religion in general must be written likewise. Similarly, the article on Metaphysical libertarianism must be written from a neutral point of view, not solely a metaphysical libertarian point of view; and even more so, this article on Free will must be written likewise.
I concur with your earlier comment that we need outside opinions on this again, by the way. --Pfhorrest (talk) 02:10, 10 December 2011 (UTC)
You set a peculiar limit to freedom of expression to exclude people who come to the conclusion that the spiritual domain is empty. Remember this is not really about the conclusion people arrive at, but about the way the conclusion is arrived at(by choice), and to what the conclusion applies (the agent / what does the choosing). The exclusion is kind of insulting to both those who believe in God, and those who don't believe in God. To the believers it implies, well you didn't have the alternative to say that the spiritual domain is empty, so you didn't really choose to believe in God, because you had no alternative. And the disbelievers are excluded altogether.
You can't say I am being prejudiced simply because I take account of religion. It is in the nature of metaphysical libertarianism that the conclusion about the agent is arrived at by free will, this is not a religious add on, it's just used a lot in religion.
I don't much have an objection to another category in which there are people like Descartes who believe they can make statements of objective fact about what's in the spiritual domain. --Syamsu (talk) 09:51, 12 December 2011 (UTC)
I don't see how I am "limiting expression" here; it's a simple matter of definition and categorization. If you take "spiritual" things and "non-physical" things to be the same (as you seem to), then someone who concludes that "the spiritual domain is empty" necessarily cannot be categorized as a non-physicalist metaphysical libertarian, because those by definition believe that something non-physical (i.e. spiritual) is involved. They might still be a physicalist metaphysical libertarian, but the paragraph we're debating is the one about non-physicalists. Even if I were saying that they weren't metaphysical libertarians, that wouldn't be the same as saying they weren't free: a metaphysical libertarian presumably believes that even the determinist freely chooses to believe in determinism. This is strictly about our third-person categorization of different kinds of belief; I'm saying nothing about whether or not any of these beliefs are held freely or not, but only things about what categories various beliefs fall into, regardless of how people end up holding them.
Either way, if you don't object to Descarte et al, then I think our dispute is settled? Unless you're saying that you're fine mentioning Descarte somewhere, but you don't want him called a metaphysical libertarian? Because he very clearly is, specifically of the non-physicalist kind. He may disagree with some other people in that category about the epistemological access to facts about minds/souls/whatever, but that just sub-divides the non-physicalist metaphysical libertarian category, which is how the article reads now. --Pfhorrest (talk) 18:07, 12 December 2011 (UTC)
I see no argument on your part with any merit, it remains bizarre that you limit freedom of expression to exclude feelings of emptiness. The sub-category in question here is really subjectivist and objectivist. Since metaphysical libertarians believe freedom is real, then not using freedom in coming to a conclusion about the agent makes Descartes less of a metaphysical libertarianist yes. I think my explanation focusing on the way the agent is known, rather than focusing on what the agent consists of (physical / non physical), is very much clearer to explain metaphysical libertarianism. --212.121.106.109 (talk) 09:06, 13 December 2011 (UTC)
Well.. let's just change it. It's really just a more clear explanation of metaphysical libertarianism. Noticeably you yourself did not get this free belief aspect of metaphysical libertarianism, so there seems to be good reason to explain it, because people don't get it.--Syamsu (talk) 08:57, 15 December 2011 (UTC)
I changed it. I intended it to be generically worded, so as to make more clear the logical structure. That freedom is first posited as real, and then the posited freedom is used to choose a belief about the agent. I think this is a fair, and clear enough representation of mainstream metaphysical libertarianism. I don't know where to place Descartes, I've seen him identified as a compatibilist. Cogito ergo sum could be interpreted as a subjective expression of self-identity as a thinker. Like a baker could say I bake therefore I am. In that case Descartes would fall into the category of subjective metaphysical libertarianism. To decide in which category Descartes falls it should be looked at how much emphasis he lays on faith in regards to God, and how much on evidence. I think Descartes lays most emphasis on evidence, and belongs in an objectivist category, not subjectivist. --Syamsu (talk) 17:16, 16 December 2011 (UTC)
I think you continue to be confused about where and how the appropriate place to make your point (which still needs citations I remind you, and you don't get to change the citation-needed date like that!). The paragraph you keep editing is talking about how some metaphysical libertarians believe that a non-physical agent nondeterministically intervenes in physical affairs, and others believe that the physical universe is just nondeterministic. This is solely a matter of categorizing the resultant beliefs by whether or not they believe there to be a non-physical agent. You are making a completely different point about why or how belief or disbelief in a non-physical agent is arrived at, and categorically claiming that everyone who believes there to be a non-physical agent arrives at that belief through faith or revelation, when that is clearly not the case.
To put it shortly in your own terms: the paragraph you keep editing is about physicalist vs non-physicalist, while you are talking about (in your terms) "objectivist vs subjectivist, and that is not the same distinction. Add another paragraph talking about that distinction if you want, but stop destroying the paragraph about non-physicalist view in your attempt to push this point.
--Pfhorrest (talk) 02:31, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
Ok, I will try to phrase it in terms of objective subjective, that is more clear indeed. The "agent" is a part in every definition of free will. For example in determinist theories the agent is the brain. So the agent must also be entered into a description of metaphysical libertarianism.--Syamsu (talk) 15:20, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
Yes, I agree that some sort of agency is involved in any theory of free will. The distinction in question (in the paragraph we've been fighting over) is between whether that agent is a physical thing or process, or a non-physical thing or process. You are then discussing another distinction about how and whether we can know if there is anything non-physical involved. The technical language for the difference between that distinction and this one is that the existing paragraph is discussing an ontological issue, and you're discussing an epistemological issue. If you want to develop that further, go right ahead; I left most of what you wrote in there, just separated it from what you had overwritten and reinstated that, so you can work on what you're trying to say all you want; but do note that it needs to be neutral and well-sourced.
(An aside: "Objective" vs "subjective" aren't very good terms for you to use either, unless you mean to say that Reid et al think that beliefs like "I have a soul" aren't things which are really, universally true or false, but that they're just "true for you" or "true for me"; so that, say, if you introspect or use your faith or whatever and find that you have a soul, and I do the same and find that you do not have a soul, we're both equally right. That's what a 'subjective fact' would be. If you believe that you have a soul, and that you are correct in that belief, even if you can't prove it, but if I think you have no soul then I am wrong, because you really do -- then you believe it is an objective fact, albeit maybe an unprovable one, that you have a soul).
(I also want to check for clarity here: you recognize that this physical/non-physical distinction is also a different one from the determinist/libertarian one, right? There are libertarians who believe that free will is a product of physical indeterminacy, e.g. quantum mechanical effects, and do not believe in non-physical substances being the seat of agency; and these people are not compatibilists either, because they think that if the physical universe was determinate, free will would be impossible. They are physicalists but not determinists. You get that, right? I just want to be sure.) --Pfhorrest (talk) 17:12, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
I aim to use the word subjective broadly as in choosing what the agent is, creating informtion in the process, and objectivity as basicly meaning transferring or copying information. But then I will state it in a generic way that covers both Reid and Ockhams view. Obviously one may still contest different subjective opinions. One who subjectively comes to a conclusion of emptiness may be subjectively accused of being hateful, so to say the spirit in which they arrived at the conclusion of emptiness was hateful. And then in turn this judgement on a judgement may be judged, and so on, until the final judgement :)--Syamsu (talk) 20:00, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

Material on free will and Epiphenominalism should be added to this article.

Material on free will and Epiphenominalism should be added to this article. Since its a featured article, I don't want to be WP:BOLD without talk page discussion first. Here is the upshot on the late metaphysician Yost of UCLA's discussion of free will in the context of discussing epiphenomenalism. Free will is an illusion because the mental world is an epiphenomenon of the physical world. If the mental world is an epiphenomenon of the physical world, then events in the physical world, such as brain events, can cause effects in both the physical world and the mental world, such as brain events and mental effects, but events in the mental world cannot cause events in the physical world. Therefore, under epiphenomenalism, free will is just an illusion. If something like this is acceptable by consensus to add to this featured article, then I will go track sources for it an write it in plainer English. PPdd (talk) 20:54, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Sounds noteworthy to me. I'd probably add it as a subsection of "Other views". I think the "...as a pragmatically useful concept" section should be moved there too, and I will do so in a moment. --Pfhorrest (talk) 22:22, 25 December 2011 (UTC)
There is now a section on "Free will as an illusion" as a result of my organization of the "Other views" section. I think your suggested addition would fit well there. --Pfhorrest (talk) 23:06, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Work needed

Hello everyone! This article currently appears near the top of the cleanup listing for featured articles, with several cleanup tags. Cleanup work needs to be completed on this article, or a featured article review may be in order. Please contact me on my talk page if you have any questions. Thank you! Dana boomer (talk) 16:20, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

I deeply wonder who made it a featured article in the first hand, since from a Pragmatic perspective the article lacks viable contexts and examples. Reading the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy "Existentialism" I get quite a different definition of "free will", illuminating the fact that there is no section Definitions and just one pretty vague definition in the intro, that pragmatically levitates in the blue. The article then cannot be called comprehensive per WP:FACR. Rursus dixit. (mbork3!) 10:15, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
Sorry, I made a personal reinterpretation of existentialist "freedom" to free will. Better synthetize the links from Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy really about "free will": Free Will O'Connor (2002+2010), Foreknowledge and Free Will Zagzebski (2004+2008), Hume on Free Will Russell (2007) and Incompatibilist (Nondeterministic) Theories of Free Will Clarke (2000+2008).
The pragmatic image of Free Will is that it arose to explain why omnipotent creator God had the right to smite evildoers, while still carrying the label "good". It seems the main area of applicability is in justice, where the degree of freedom of will is determined in order to measure out a judgement and a suitable punishment for the criminal. A pragmatic assessment of the area of applicability is somehow missing. As a freefloating philosophical concept, a Wittgensteinian plain language adherent might not unlikely label Free Will as a "superstition". Rursus dixit. (mbork3!) 10:41, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
I'm unclear what point you are attempting to make here. The great majority of the "Western Philosophy" section here is about different definitions of free will and arguments for or against them. The rest of your comments appear to be reflections on what different philosophical schools might say about one definition or another, or speculation about how certain concepts of free will came into being. What are you suggesting be done about the article exactly? --Pfhorrest (talk) 19:21, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
The definition is not really the problem. The first sentences of SEP and REP are just as evasive. Still, the article might benefit from a review, and it may be worth comparing with earlier versions. The clean-up tag is presumably there because someone thinks the article is bloated. Vesal (talk) 22:24, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
I have made simplifications to the free will concepts diagram - removing all variations not discussed in the article. I do not mind the introduction as stands (after generalising quite an interesting expression of free will). I would suggest people propose specific alternative introductions, as they have already been doing. I think that the common complaints coming to this talk page are product of the content distribution across compatibilist/incompatibilist theories. This appears to be a direct product of the scholarly work to date regarding free will conception, and while the history is interesting this is probably irrelevant (unless of course references can be found). Despite this, I feel that it would still be useful to slightly shorten (/fork off) some content while lengthening other content on this page. Richardbrucebaxter (talk) 00:55, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
I have doubts over whether it is accurate to say that compatabilists are "Those who deny that determinism is relevant". Would it not be more true to say something like that compatibilists accept determinism and believe it to have varying degrees of relevance to various definitions of free will? I don't have the expertise to say this correctly, but the main point is that denying all relevance of determinism seems to be a suspect description of the compatibilist view. Jeffj900 (talk) 15:35, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
Compatibilists don't necessarily accept determinism, though; they just say that determinism wouldn't rule out free will. They don't necessarily accept free will, either. Compatibilism is just the view that free will and determinism are not incompatible with each other, that they could co-exist. Within compatibilism, different camps then argue about under what conditions would or could someone have free will: Is it just freedom from physical restraint? Freedom from the threat of punishment? Freedom from psychological compulsion? Etc. Incompatibilists, on the other hand, all focus on one condition: freedom from determination. Compatibilists are distinguished from incompatibilists by not being so concerned about freedom from determination, but instead about those others sorts of things, which is what the phrase you quote is supposed to mean.
Perhaps you can help think of a clearer way to state that? --Pfhorrest (talk) 03:26, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Post to prevent bot archiving. Brad (talk) 02:10, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Just as a note, in response to my post above (of a little over a year ago), there was some cleanup done on the article, and the number of cleanup tags was reduced to just a couple of minor fact tags. However, since then the number of tags has climbed again, and now includes at least one banner (an expansion tag). The tags should be addressed and either the issues fixed or the tags removed if they are not justified. Dana boomer (talk) 15:42, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

The Joke

Since Libet's findings started to trickle out --- there was a lot of nonsense about our free will...

What?!? My free will is useless??? Here my friend - take it and tell me what to do...

Now, how could I give up something I did not have???? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 125.255.7.10 (talk) 06:41, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

More of a riddle than a joke, no? And the talk page is not really the place for either...
Still, I would say you can't. You can't give something you do not have. One scenario is where you could be falling for an illusion, and you don't have free will, and so you're giving your friend nothing. Or, at least not what you think you're giving her. One more scenario I can think of is where you are actually giving something up.
Actually the neuroscience of free will page talks about these issues. Philosophers use 'free will' to mean something like "a decision made free of coercion". Laypeople tend to use 'free will' to imagine something like a dualistic, magical, contra-causal, first-cause sort of thing. That is the one that Libet's experiments challenge - but most philosophers don't talk about free will that way anymore (apparently).-Tesseract2(talk) 20:04, 14 January 2012 (UTC)
I don't think it's accurate to say that most philosophers categorically take free will to be anything in particular. There was a time in most of the Modern era when most philosophers agreed that free will was not the dualist-magical-contra-causal-first-cause sort of thing, but even then they disagreed amongst each other about what it actually was. Some would have your will free so long as you are not physically restrained (e.g. in chains). Others would, as you say, have your will free so long as you are not socially coerced (e.g. at gunpoint). More recently, some would have your will free so long as you are not psychologically compelled (e.g. phobic). But also recently, some have rehabilitated the dualist-magical-contra-causal-first-cause sort of thing in philosophical circles, too. So there's not really, and hasn't ever been, any real consensus on the matter. --Pfhorrest (talk) 20:50, 14 January 2012 (UTC)
Philosophers disagree over these words "free will", as always. I am referring to Professor Al Mele in the nature article saying that most philosophers talking about these matters are at least materialistic; that using free will to mean something magical would indeed be a "revival" because most philosophers don't use it that way - the way laypeople might tend to. I am saying yes, we agree.-Tesseract2(talk) 15:27, 24 January 2012 (UTC)
Let me add a note that this section was started by an indef-blocked editor, and additional material was added to it that looked totally incomprehensible to me, so I removed it. The IP is currently under a 72-hour block. Looie496 (talk) 18:27, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

Free Will and the Law?

I ask for a new item to be added. Criminal law and free will.

From the free will article " In ethics, it may hold implications for whether individuals can be held morally accountable for their actions." Morally accountable and Legally accountable are two different things.

The "mentally ill" do not have free will according to psychiatry, and as such are not Legally responsible for their actions . Greyhound bus killer found not criminally responsible--Mark v1.0 (talk) 13:50, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

FAR?

Hi everyone - Per my post above, this article needs some work to bring it back to FA standards. I wanted to post again down here just to make sure that my earlier comment hadn't been missed, since it was near the top of the page. As the article currently stands, there are quite a few cleanup tags and one cleanup banner on the article. In a quick look I also see other issues, such as book references lacking page numbers, several additional un-tagged areas that lack references, the see also section is quite long and could use a trim, and the prose could use a cleanup (contractions should not be used in encyclopedic writing, for example, unless they are in a direct quote). If there is no response on these issues, I plan to put the article up for FAR in the next few days. Please let me know if you have any questions, Dana boomer (talk) 15:54, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

File:Thomas Hobbes (portrait).jpg Nominated for Deletion

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Revising the entire mess for it to be more of a critical understanding of free will

This discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

I think people coming to the free will page should be able to see what versions of free will there are, and then choose what versions they like. So it should provide for critical understanding of free will.

This means that

- the various concepts of free will should be standardized as far as possible, so that they are easier to compare.

+ for example each concept should give definitions for:

agent

choice

alternatives

+ each concept should show how it is evidenced, if evidenced at all

- pragmatic examples of usefulness should be made. Like with a sentence "Mary could have chosen to go to the fair, but stayed home instead". And then to explain such a sentence for each concept.

Like that, a clear overview on equal terms.

There should be MUCH MORE practical knowledge about free will. Now there is a pragmatic section which says somebody believed in free will because of practical reasons... That is not very practical.--Syamsu (talk) 15:59, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Syamsu (aka nando_ronteltap) has a long history of posting his thoughts on free will at talk.origins on usenet. His ideas are his alone and (at minimum) fall afoul of the "original research" guideline. I'm reverting his edits for the moment. If there's a consensus that his contribution is valuable then I'm happy to stand aside. Garamond Lethe (talk) 06:18, 23 March 2012 (UTC)
My entry has already been extensively discussed with a philosphy expert on this talk page who let it stand. Neither Garamond, nor the other evololutionist who reverted my entry has made any comment to that talk before changing it, showing they have no genuine will at all to discuss matters. It is a matter of uncontested fact that the newsgroup talk.origins and it's associate website does not contain any theory about origins based on a concept of free will. This newsgroup is overwhelmingly dominated by evolutionists, who conceive of the origin of organisms in terms of their descendency, not in terms of creation by an act of will. The behaviour of organisms is described by these evolutionists in terms of force, choosing of organisms is conceived of as the organism following a path that is most likely to result in survival, without the organism having the capability to go any alternative way in the moment. Evolutionists also promote all kinds of social darwinist political ideology in which freedom plays no role. So to say, these people who remove my entry are entirely prejudiced against any knowledge about freedom, to the point where they consider freedom irrelevant for origins. My entry was a correct interpretation of Occam and Reid, who both emphasized that there is a difference between HOW we attain "knowledge" about an agent. Occam calls how we attain knowledge about an agent, is through revealed truth, and faith. This I interpreted as "subjectivity", and interpreted that subjectivity involves a way of choosing, which is an interpretation in line with contemporary vocabulary.

My citation can only be called invalid, if an act of faith is not considered to involve a choice, which is an entirely ridiculous argument. Again, these social darwinists are systemically surpressing and destroying all knowledge about freedom everywhere on the internet. They are the true activists who seek to subvert common knowledge. No expert on free will would deny that the dualistic categorization into spiritual and material, and the dualistic way of knowing that goes with it, subjective and objective, is anything more than the standard common interpretation of free will. I invite your opinion Pfhorrest, that my interpretation of Occam and Reid is correct, and also that this is the common interpretation of free will which everybody uses. Garamond Lethe and others try to make love and hate into objective matters of fact that they can measure, but this is by no means a majority opinion, it only represent the opinion of a tiny minority who is intellectually violent in the extreme. Unlike social darwinists, the overwhelming majority of people use free will in identifying people as loving or hateful, and do not consider that measurable by some machine. --Syamsu (talk) 13:18, 25 March 2012 (UTC)

See WP:OR and or WP:SYN and provide a valid WP:RS for your edits. And cease with the name-calling bit. My entry was a correct interpretation of Occam and Reid as you say above requires a reliable source. Vsmith (talk) 14:00, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
You yourself violate wiki rules. My entry has essentalliy already been discussed months ago with an expert philosopher on this talk page. You must contribute to that talk before any deletion. I will change it back again, untill you give some argument that "faith" is not reasonably explained as involving choice. Untill such time the default situation is the agreement between Pfhorrest and me that the entry is valid--Syamsu (talk) 14:30, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
What I was looking for was a citation in support of the disputed content regardless of any months old discussion here. Thank you for supplying those reference links, now the problem may be WP:SYN. Vsmith (talk) 15:13, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
WPSYN does not apply, and the allegation constitutes a prejudicial effort on your part to find fault. The 2 references say the same thing, they are not used to combine argument, they are only used to support that "some" as in more then one metaphysical libertarians make a distinction between matters of fact and matters of subjective opinion in this way. The "staunch refusal" of Reid to speculate is in essence the same, as Occam's denial that we can have any knowledge of the soul. etc. they are the same.--Syamsu (talk) 15:25, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
Syamsu [Nando], as best I can tell you're advancing your own position here. That's fine for talk.origins and USENET in general but it's not appropriate for wikipedia. If you can establish a consensus here that your additions are appropriate, then I'll stand aside. Until such a consensus exists, or until you can convince me that your are summarizing the positions of others instead of advancing your own, I'm going to be reverting your edits. Garamond Lethe (talk) 20:41, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
Since my name has come up, I'll weigh in with my opinion. It has been very difficult to pin down exactly what point Syamsu has wanted to add to the article, and it seems to have shifted and diminished as good reasons not to add a previous version of it have been given. The last version of it -- that people like Reid and Ockham believe that any evidence about an agent which makes free choices would undermine the ability to make free choices about said agent -- is at least a somewhat comprehensible position and not obviously biased, so I just tagged it for citation and let it stand instead of reverting it and continuing to argue just by myself. I wouldn't call the result anything like a consensus though, so Syamsu's citation of our previous discussion as though it established consensus is incorrect.
From his unabashedly biased style of discussion I am also very suspicious that the material may be WP:OR / WP:SYN, but I don't have the time or energy to confirm or deny that. I am also concerned about WP:UNDUE issues even if this is verifiable material, as I have never heard this position even briefly mentioned in any of my studies, and so doubt its prominence in the field. One or two sentences might be due, if other issues can be resolved; but that new table he added (which also has similar problems with being largely incomprehensible like earlier edits) seems almost certainly undue weight. --Pfhorrest (talk) 22:10, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
Addendum: I do however like some of the organizational ideas Syamsu puts forth at the start of this talk section: repeating a standard set of information for each theory of free will, and explaining how that standard would flesh out the meaning of an example sentence (the same example sentence for each theory). --Pfhorrest (talk) 22:15, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
The argument in the article stood there for months, that is reasonably interpreted as consensus of a sort. Garamond is well known to me as a evolutionist activist who posts on talk.origins. Vsmith is a geologist, and probably an evolutionist activist also. The sole objection to the entry seems to be aimed at: to arrive at a conclusion about what exists through chosing what is there. Supposedly Reid and Occam do not say this, and also it is argued that this argument is supposedly incomprehensible. In essense it seems to be an objection to the metaphysical libertarian conception of choice as defined in the opening paragraph of metaphysical libertarianism.--Syamsu (talk) 22:35, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
And to cut this all short, Pfhorrest does the identifying of an agent in a choice involve making a choice according to Occam and Reid, yes or no? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.57.25.110 (talk) 22:46, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
As I said, I don't recall ever coming across that position; but that doesn't mean it's not their position; I just don't have the time or energy to thoroughly research it and find out. I make no judgement on the fact of the matter, just its presentation and encyclopedic weight; if that is their opinion, it could deserve a sentence or two in the article, if neutrally phrased and properly cited as their opinion. If others doubt its encyclopedic value, truth, or verifiability, I don't object to them removing it.
Also, you call these folks "evolutionists" and cite their scientific professions as if that should bias me against them. If anything it does the opposite, and makes me more wary of your obvious bias. --Pfhorrest (talk) 08:55, 26 March 2012 (UTC)
Scientists generally, and evolutionists especially, commonly have a pathology to treat everything as a matter of objective fact, including beauty, love and hate. This pathological tendency is widely acknowledged in society and very often made fun off. As said Garamond Lethe is an evolutionist activist well known to me, who has systematically opposed all theories about origins in which free will plays a role (creationism) for years. Your (Pfhorrest) writings also shows this pathology to make everything into a matter of objective fact. You fail to practically apply the metaphysical libertarian logic of choosing in trying to do so.
1 Metaphysical libertarianism holds that an “individual may be able to take more than one possible course of action under a set of circumstances” (copied from the existing wiki on free will)
2 Q According to a metaphysical libertarianism, is it possible for someone to alternatively reach the conclusion a person is loving, or reach the conclusion a person is hateful, under a set of circumstances?
A Yes this is credible because it uses the logic of choosing of metaphysical libertarianism
I think the direction of argument shown is already sufficient to validate my entry in the metaphysical libertarian section. You failed to understand metaphysical libertarianism altogether, as it is expressed in the article that has stood there for years(?). I request that you and people generally acknowledge the obvious fact that my entry uses correct logic of metaphysical libertarianism, and should be entered into metaphysical libertarianism section.
And I maintain that the status quo is that the entry I provided is valid, the argument in it having stood there for months, and that people cannot delete the entry without trying to reach a consensus first. I fully realize i haven't made all arguments, and provided all evidence I could have to defend this entry. I invite anybody responding to think of the arguments that support the entry themselves, and to not prejudicially conceive of only arguments against this entry. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Syamsu (talk • contribs) 21:44, 27 March 2012 (UTC)
You're making an argument that your conclusion is correct. I'm making an argument that your conclusion is yours. Because it's yours, regardless as to whether or not it is correct, it falls into the WP:OR and WP:SYN categories and thus is not appropriate for wikipedia. If you can cite someone else who held your opinion, and you can make an argument why that someone else deserves mention in an encyclopedia article, then I think you can justify adding a couple of sentences. Garamond Lethe (talk) 22:43, 27 March 2012 (UTC)
Like I said, I did not provide all evidence I could have. You are now at fault for acting in a prejudical way for not trying to look for evidence already in this talk. It is very obvious that both Reid and Ockham use the exactsame argument I make, who have already been cited. Reid staunchly refuses the speculate about the substance of the soul, Ockham insists that the soul is a matter of faith. Faith very obviously involves chosing. Very, very, very obviously the dualism (already positided in the existing article) corresponds with 2 different ways in coming to a conclusion about what exists of Ockham and Reid. Again for you to have any credibility you must make argument about Occam insisting on faith, and Reid's staunch refusal to speculate on the substance of the soul. Otherwise the status quo is that the entry is valid, and you are obviously one of a flood of prejudiced scientists and evolutionist activists who insist on treating every issue as a matter of objective fact. Note also that the evolutionist position that love and hate are matters of objective fact is already fairly represented on this wiki about free will by Dennet's concept of choosing--Syamsu (talk) 23:00, 27 March 2012 (UTC)
Syamsu, I'm trying very very hard to give the benefit of a doubt here that there is something of merit to be added to the article from your position, but you're making it very difficult. You need to realize that you are arguing a very controversial position; that doesn't mean that you are arguing a minority position or an indefensible position or anything like that, but that it is a position regarding a question about which many people are continuously arguing and have been for centuries with no consensus or obvious victor in the debate. Given that, it is very inappropriate tone, for a neutral venue like Wikipedia, to talk like your position is the obviously correct one, that everyone but some fringe obscure minority agrees with you, and especially that people who disagree do so "pathologically".
In another venue, I would be quite prepared to argue why it is those who deny objectivity in any matter who exhibit a "pathology", but Wikipedia is not the appropriate venue for that, and in either case I would still not make such people out to be a fringe minority; there are quite obviously a sizeable number of people on both sides of the issue, otherwise there would be consensus and it would not be a controversial topic.
But because it is a controversial topic, we have to treat it neutrally in how we write about it on Wikipedia, and when other editors are expressing concern about the verifiability and neutrality of your contributions, exhibiting such obvious bias on the talk page, while not against the rules per se, is very bad for your case. You need to show not only that you are reporting on a notable position (not merely a correct or plausible or credible one, but a notable one that someone of note has made before); but also, for your own credibility, that you recognize that the other side is a notable position too; and especially that you understand the difference between arguing your personal position, and an unbiased reporting of different notable positions.
As well, neutrality and objectivity are closely related matters, and I sense a lot of resistance from you to treat things neutrally because (it seems to you) to do so would run counter to your position. For example, you exhort us to "practically apply the metaphysical libertarian logic of choosing", which would assume metaphysical libertarianism true, and thus be non-neutral. Similar, perhaps, to some religious objection to critical literary analysis of the Bible on the grounds of it countervening some edicts about faith contained within; to critically analyze those edicts, some might claim, is inherently to violate them, and so too perhaps, to treat your position neutrally is inherently to disagree with it?
But enough of my analyzing you, and back to the matter of what you'd like to add to the article. If I understand correctly, you want to add a claim that metaphysical libertarians, or at least some metaphysical libertarians (e.g. Ockham and Reid), believe that metaphysical libertarianism cannot be proven, even if it is true (as they hold), because to do so would remove any choice about the matter of its truth, undermining its truth, and contradicting the proof thereof.
In support of this position, you cite two passages:
From Ockham: "we can have no knowledge of an immaterial soul; nor can we prove its existence philosophically. Instead we must rely on revealed truth and faith".
And regarding Reid: "Reid staunchly refuses to speculate on the substance of the self,...he describes souls as beings of a quite different Nature than material bodies".
These might be plausible to support something like the first half of my paraphrase of your position above: perhaps something like "some metaphysical libertarians believe that the nature of the soul cannot be known; that any belief about it must be taken on faith." However, I would question the relevance of that statement alone to an article about free will; it seems more at place in an article about the soul per se. It is the kind of reductio ad absurdum argument from free will to that position would make it relevant here: that proof of a free-willed soul would undermine free will, and thus contradict that very proof, therefore proof of it must not be possible, even if it is true.
However, I do not see how these passages espouse that argument (rather than just its conclusion, which may be arrived at in other ways, and is in itself not relevant to this article per se). It is an interesting argument, with shades of Godel's Incompleteness Theorem actually, but it's not one that I've ever heard before, so I would want to see a passage where someone notable makes that argument before letting it into the article.
On a last note, connecting to the earlier subject about neutrality, I would want to make sure that that argument, if properly verified as notable and citable to a reputable source, is phrased neutrally; particularly, that it is phrased as an argument that existence of a hypothetical proof of metaphysical libertarian would contradict its conclusion, even if metaphysical libertarianism is true, and NOT that the truth of metaphysical libertarianism implies that proof of itself is not possible. (As the latter assumes metaphysical libertarianism is true and then argues from there that it cannot be proven so, while the former merely argues that its truth cannot be proven, whether or not it is true).
--Pfhorrest (talk) 04:22, 28 March 2012 (UTC)


The practical use of metaphysical libertarianism, within the metaphysical libertarian section, does not constitute making an argument from true belief in metaphysical libertarianism. I have no problem in using for instance Dennet's concept of choosing, and in fact I do use that concept when convenient, but it is not metaphysical libertarianism. The sentence about "evidence destroying freedom in reaching a conclusion about an agent" could be left out, it is merely there for clarification, and not of critical import. But it is well shown that much clarification is required, which is because of the pathology mentioned.
The main argument is connecting the dualism already posited in the article, with 2 different ways of arriving at a conclusion about what exists.
And this main argument is obviously very well evidenced with Ockham and Reid, and obviously Reid and Ockham attach much importance to it. The qualification "Staunch refusal" indicates Reid attaches much importance to the WAY agency in a choice is addressed. That you still do not see this obvious connection of the dualism already posited in the article, and the 2 ways of arriving at a conclusion about what exists, indicates that much clarification is required. This includes the table, as well as some other sentences which make clear that questions about agency must be answered with a choice. --80.57.25.110 (talk) 07:05, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
Pfhorrest told you: I would want to see a passage where someone notable makes that argument before letting it into the article. Pfhorrest also explained why your Reid and Ockham cites did not suffice. I concur with both of these points. What else do you have? Garamond Lethe (talk) 07:29, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
He seems to be saying now that the argument we've been discussing (which I asked for a passage about above) is not so important him as its conclusion (which by itself I don't think is relevant here), and something about "dualism" now. He has been shifting goalposts like this the entire time this has been going on.
Syamsu, if you're shifting to that now, then we're back to it not being clear what exactly you want to add again. The dualism discussed in the article so far is substance dualism: some metaphysical libertarians are physicalists, who believe the only substances that exist are physical substances, and that whatever constitutes the agent is a physical thing, even if it is not causally determined; and other metaphysical libertarians are dualists, who believe that there are two kinds of substance, physical and mental, and that the agent is of the mental kind of substance. You seem to be wanting to talk about some kind of "epistemological dualism", some division between "matters of fact" and "matters of faith", which does not have any obvious or uncontroversial connection to substance dualism, and which doesn't seem to have much relevance here in an article about free will, but would rather belong in the article about substance dualism. But maybe I'm not understanding what you want again.
Either way, once you clarify what exactly you want to add, again, then we're back to needing a verifiable passage from a reputable source to demonstrate that this is a notable position. --Pfhorrest (talk) 09:01, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
More reasonably I never shifted goalposts, and you continue to fail to understand the practical application of metaphysical libertarianism. The argument has ALWAYS been about the way the agent is identified, which is the header title of the talk.
- The dualism substance is already established in the article now posted, you cannot doubt it.
- That the soul is what the dualist other substance consists of is already in the article, you cannot doubt it.
- That Ockham and Reid identify the soul in a faith way you have already concurred is a correct interpretation of Ockham and Reid
- Therefore I have added nothing of my own to say that the dual substance, corresponds with dual ways of reaching a conclusion, in reference to Ockham and Reid.
- The validity of the entry is established.
And all your misunderstanding makes the case for the section to be very large requiring much demonstration of pragmatic use. The distinction of matters of objective fact and matters of subjective opinion is very broadly accepted among philosophers, for example beauty is often noted as categorically not a matter of fact, or matters of what is good or evil etc, it is a highly notable position. --Syamsu (talk) 10:43, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
You've missed the point. Reid and Ockham don't say anything about "dual ways of reaching a conclusion". Based on what you've presented here that is wholly your own line of thinking. Because it's your own line of thinking your edit is inappropriate. Garamond Lethe (talk) 17:48, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
I realize that perhaps you are now making the argument that Ockham and Reid are not substance dualists? That is also established in the reference that they are. I hope you can now leave off, and leave your personal opinion about free will to other sections of the article. --Syamsu (talk) 10:57, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
No one raised the objection that Ockham and Reid are not substance dualists. Garamond Lethe (talk) 17:48, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
Your argument about it not being much relevant in the article about free will I find not worth addressing. You can think for yourself why this would be of high importance here, it is obvious. --Syamsu (talk) 12:24, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
If you're not willing to make an argument for relevance then perhaps your time would be better spent elsewhere. Garamond Lethe (talk) 17:48, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
That some metaphysical libertarians are dualists is uncontroversial and already covered in the article, and is relevant.
That some dualists, like Ockham and Reid, think nothing can be (or at least, is) definitively known about the soul/self is well established by your quoted passages; but by itself that does not have anything to do with free will, it has to do with substance dualism. Likewise, the table you are trying to add, including the how-it-is-known-about part, does not by itself have anything to do specifically with free will, but with substance dualism. For analogy, imagine if the section about a Hobbesian notion of free will (that a man is free so long as he is not in chains or prison) went on a tangent about how to avoid going to jail. The tangential connection is obvious, but nevertheless "how not to do to jail" is no more the subject of an article on free will than "how we can (not) know about immaterial souls", which is an equally tangential topic.
The argument you had previously included, that the unprovability of souls can be proven FROM free will, would have been relevant; but then, we need to verify its notability, and now you deny its importance. --Pfhorrest (talk) 17:50, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
My patience has run out, the matter is obvious, the entry is valid. Please desist from any further sabotage. In conclusion it is established that both Ockham and Reid were substance dualists, and that they both also had dual ways in approaching each matter. The issue has obvious relevance in explaining the agency in free will in a metaphysical libertarian context. And not only is this a correct explanation of free will as Ockham and Reid understood it, I also maintain this is the most commonplace pragmatic definition of free will. The table I provided looks to me a generic representation of commonly accepted self-evident truths. Most everybody regards love and hate as an inherently subjective issue like beauty, and most everybody regards love and hate as what choses. It would be easy for me to show thousands of practical uses in which an event is described with alternative possible results, and love and hate are described as deciding the outcome, and further that love and hate are treated subjectively, while the outcome is treated as a matter of objective fact. It is patently ridiculous to claim this is an original thought, even to ascribe the idea to Ockham is already ridiculous. --Syamsu (talk) 19:45, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
Your patience is not the issue here, ours is. Wikipedia operates by consensus. You are claiming things to be "obviously" true and "obviously" relevant, and repeatedly just flatly stating that "the entry is valid" and such. Other people disagree with you. The burden is on you to establish agreement. It sounds like you're saying "damn the consensus, damn verification, I'm gonna do what I want because I'm obviously right". That's a good way to get yourself banned from Wikipedia, so proceed at your own risk. --Pfhorrest (talk) 20:01, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
Remember, you previously wrongly referenced Reid as one philosopher who according to you was of the opinion that the agent was a matter of fact. I then looked him up and found the quote where Reid staunchly refused to speculate on the substance of the soul. That is how the reference to Reid was arrived at, through your error. The entry will stop people repeating the same error you made. I take it is enough consensus that you have concurred that I accurately reflected the opinion of Ockham and Reid. Garamond is Garamond, already discussed with him for 10 years basically, he has said absolutely nothing why the entry might be valid.--Syamsu (talk) 20:52, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
I referenced Reid as someone who takes the existence of free will as a brute fact (he can introspect and plainly see that sometimes he makes choices freely), before you clarified (giving you the benefit of the doubt here about goalpost-shifting) that you were not talking about the unprovability of free will, but the unprovability of dualism from free will (which you still haven't shown; you've shown only that Reid refuses to comment on the nature of the soul, other than to say it is nothing like the body). Or, as you seem to be saying now, the just the provability of dualism... which is not the subject of this article, and thus not appropriate here.
To repeat:
  • The point which I let stand (but didn't endorse) before was the claim Reid and Ockham had made some argument to the effect that metaphysical libertarianism entails that nothing can be known about the soul.
  • I let that claim stand as it was neutrally phrased, relevant, and I didn't know it to be false. That is to say: it was not bad enough for me to remove. That does not mean it was good enough to stay.
  • I tagged it for citation, to give you a chance to make it good enough to stay. You added some citations which didn't really support it fully, but I didn't care enough to complain about it then because it was no worse than the uncited but plausible statement I let stand.
  • Now others have contested it; so now you have to support that claim.
  • When I pointed out that the citations you've provided only support a fraction of that claim, you claimed the rest was not important.
  • The fraction that remains well-supported is not directly relevant to this article. It is merely the claim that Ockham thinks nothing can be known about souls, and that Reid refuses to speak about them other than to say they are not like bodies. That would be relevant to the article on Substance dualism. The fact that some metaphysical libertarians are substance dualists (and others are not) is relevant to this article on free will, and is already noted; but further details about substance dualism belong on that page, not here, unless they have some specific bearing on or other relation to free will besides "some people who believe in some kinds of free will also believe these things".
So what you need to do now is:
  1. Confirm or clarify what it is that you want to add.
  2. Show how it is relevant to this article in more than a tangential way.
  3. Show that it is a notable opinion verifiable from a reliable source.
  4. Mention it neutrally in the article, properly attributed and cited.
So lets start with #1 there. Can you please confirm or clarify that what you want to add is something to the effect of: "Some metaphysical libertarians, such as Ockham and Reid, believe that there can be no knowledge of the soul, and that any beliefs about it must be made on faith." ?
--Pfhorrest (talk) 03:58, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

I changed it, look up the change in the history. Connely seems to think you and Garamond are against it.

1. Pfhorrest and Garamond have accepted this entry is correct in respect to Ockham and Reid, that they identify the agent in a free will construct through choosing.

2. the agent in free will is relevant to the wiki on free will

3. Ockham and Reid are notable

4. Ockham and Reid place high importance on this distinction. Staunchly refusing of Reid is indicative of placing high importance, and the emphatic way in which Ockham excludes both empirical and philosophical evidence indicates an issue of central import.

5. You and Garamond have attested you would include it if it was from a notable philosopher, and of high significance.

6. The requirements are met, the entry is valid

Please acknowledge these facts for Connely, and desist from any further obstruction. --Syamsu (talk) 10:44, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Again: your references support that Ockham and Reid do independently hold those views, but do not support your edit which combines the two. What you need is a WP:RS supporting your desired edit. What noted philosopher has made those connections?
Please, if you refer to other users at least make an attempt to spell their usernames correctly. Such careless misspellings reflect poorly on you. Vsmith (talk) 11:51, 29 March 2012 (UTC)
That has already been addressed, Reid and Ockham say the same thing, there is no combining of Reid and Ockham taking place.--Syamsu (talk) 12:00, 29 March 2012 (UTC)
You've not understood the objections that have been raised, nor have you addressed them. The consensus is that your edits are not appropriate. So far they've been reverted four times today. Garamond Lethe (talk) 14:29, 29 March 2012 (UTC)


Did I not say why your edits were invalid? Let me check:
* "His ideas are his alone and (at minimum) fall afoul of the "original research" guideline."
* "[A]s best I can tell you're advancing your own position here."
* "You're making an argument that your conclusion is correct. I'm making an argument that your conclusion is yours. Because it's yours, regardless as to whether or not it is correct, it falls into the WP:OR and WP:SYN categories and thus is not appropriate for wikipedia."
* " I would want to see a passage where someone notable makes that argument before letting it into the article. ... I concur with both of these points."
* "Based on what you've presented here that is wholly your own line of thinking. Because it's your own line of thinking your edit is inappropriate."
I don't expect you to be able to understand this objection. So far as you're concerned, a citation to wikipedia carries a certain amount of heft, you want your idea to be associated with that heft, and thus your idea deserved to be in wikipedia --- and you'll repeat the word "obvious" until your edit gets in and stays in. That doesn't answer my objection. Because you can't point to any notable thinker who "regards love and hate as what choses" it doesn't matter whether or not you're right (you aren't) or whether or not you're making sense (you aren't). Garamond Lethe (talk) 22:09, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
That was my point, you only make comments how the entry is invalid, no comments about how the entry may be valid. Ockham says the soul cannot be evidenced, and that establishing it's existence is a matter of revealed truth and faith, as concurred in majority is a correct reading of Ockham, the entry will go through.--Syamsu (talk) 00:04, 29 March 2012 (UTC)
I don't believe we share a common language. Garamond Lethe (talk) 03:46, 29 March 2012 (UTC)


Is 80.57.25.110 == Syamsu? If so, Syamsu is well over 3RR William M. Connolley (talk) 23:11, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
I believe so, he often posts under his IP (which, IIRC, does change over time). I don't think there's any malicious intent to it though (the IP-posting), the pattern looks to me more like "forgot to log in", since he posts pretty obviously as himself when not logged in. Good catch about 3RR. --Pfhorrest (talk) 08:55, 26 March 2012 (UTC)
Again ridiculous, nobody in the world except the tiny minority of social darwinists identifies people as being loving or hateful as a matter of fact. It is the same as with identifying somebody as beautiful or ugly, the identification requires a choice on the part of the one doing the identifying--Syamsu (talk) 07:54, 26 March 2012 (UTC)
Again Garamond Lethe is an evolutionist activist, he has no intention whatever in reaching a consensus here, we have discussed this for more than 10 years on talk.origins. Noticeably he did not address any issue of argument, and just discarded it offhand.--Syamsu (talk) 08:41, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

As flattering as it is, I'd appreciate if people would not refer to me as "Syamsu's expert". I'm no expert in any sense that should be relevant to Wikipedia proceedings, I'm just a guy with a philosophy degree; and I've been largely opposed to Syamsu's edits, I'm just willing to give a properly cited and neutrally worded version of them a chance. My function here is largely just watching against obvious bias and undue weight, I don't have the time to research and verify every bit of content anybody wants to add here. --Pfhorrest (talk) 08:55, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Apologies - that was me in an edit comment aimed at S, but I should have framed it better William M. Connolley (talk) 09:08, 26 March 2012 (UTC)
No worries, my comment was directed more at him (for citing my "expertise" in his favor) than at you. --Pfhorrest (talk) 09:11, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

The ordering of the above is getting very confusing. So starting again: S is again reverting his changes back in. He still claims "Status quo is that it stood there for months already" as apparently his sole argument for its validity, and is completely ignoring that everyone else thinks it shouldn't be in. As far as I can see nothing has changed - there are no new arguments, the same consensus against including it still exists William M. Connolley (talk) 11:29, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

The citations have been found valid by Pfhorrest, that was the original reason for removing the entry. Thereby the original research and WPSYN objections were shown invalid. Garamond has indicated to follow Pfhorrest's opinion. Then Pfhorrest raised some concerns, he thought the agent in free will might be better addressed in the wiki on substance dualism, and that a table would draw too much attention to the entry. These concerns have not been resolved, nor ever will be resolved in my estimation, but are minor. --Syamsu (talk) 11:41, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

No, WP:OR and WP:SYN are not minor and you need to achieve consensus prior to re-inserting the disputed content. Vsmith (talk) 12:05, 29 March 2012 (UTC)
Read it, wpor and wpsyn have been shown to be invalid, by the citations having been shown valid. And all this reference to technicalities is besides the point. Anybody can see that the entry presents clichee thoughts which are commonplace. Am I Syamsu the first to distinghuish subjective opinion from objective measurement? Patently ridiculous. Will everybody pathologically inclined to make everything into a matter of objective fact please go away, thank you. That's what's really going on here, an episode of the bigbang theory. --Syamsu (talk) 12:13, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

What exactly is it that all the people here find to be original research on my part, that they never heared before? Be very precise on what you find to be original of me. Otherwise desist from changing a status quo --Syamsu (talk) 12:24, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

That was the question you should have asked a few days ago. The WP:OR and WP:SYN are:
1 "In the dualistic categorization the physical is established to exist by objective measurement,"
You're using "objective measurement" as a term of art. I'm not aware of any published literature that uses this as a diagnostic criteria for the physical side of a dualist system. What's your citation for "objective measurement" in this context?
2 "and the non-physical agency is identified through subjective opinion,"
You're using "subjective opinion" as a term of art. What is your cite for the term "subjective opinion" with regard to "non-physical agency" identification?
3 "requiring a choice on the part of the observer."
What is your cite for "subjective opinions" "requiring" "choice"?
It's not enough for you to assemble those three citations. If you find three disparate sources then you're squarely in WP:SYN. You need one philosopher who has pulled these three threads together, and you need that philosopher's work to be of sufficient note that it's worth putting into an encyclopedia. Garamond Lethe (talk) 14:05, 29 March 2012 (UTC)
1. Garamond is already well acquainted with the idea from many people other than myself, that the material, physical and the results of a choice can be objectively measured resulting in matter of facts about those things. It is commonplace. I can not be made to respond to ridiculous accusations of original research.
2. Garamond is already well acquainted with the idea from many people other than myself that the spiritual, soul, creator, and the agency in a choice, are subjectively identified resulting in personal opinions. It is commonplace. I can not be made to respond to ridiculous accusations of original research.
3. Garamond is already well acquainted with the idea from many people other than myself that a subjective opinion involves a choice. I can not be made to respond to ridiculous accusations of original research.
The combination of all of these besides in the work of Ockham and Reid, can be found ad nauseum in creationist literature, and throughout society at large. --Syamsu (talk) 14:47, 29 March 2012 (UTC)
If these ideas are as commonplace as you think it should be straightforward to track down a unifying citation to that effect --- after all, philosophers are famous for stating the obvious at great length, no? But if these ideas are original with you then it's going to be a waste of your time trying to find them in the peer-reviewed literature. I think you have a pretty fair idea what the results of that search are going to be.
And no, I can't compel you to answer these objections. Neither can you compel me to allow your changes to be committed. So let's compromise: you answer my objections to my satisfaction and I'll let your edits go through. Garamond Lethe (talk) 15:36, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

The part of Syamsu's edits that I currently find objectionable (aside from his method of editing, which is most objectionable) is that the quoted passages say nothing about free will or agents or anything like that. They speak entirely of souls, which are a much broader topic than just something to do with free will.

Certainly some people attribute the agency of free will to a nonphysical soul; and that is noted. The details of what souls are like and how we can know about them isn't a topic for this article though, unless it is in some way specifically relevant to free will (like how its nonphysical nature allows for free will, or how we can or cannot know about it because of free will, or something).

I might be willing to accept the two passages together as sufficient evidence that "some philosophers" (with two examples cited) believe something or another about souls; but that material would need to be added to a more appropriate article unless it has direct bearing on the subject of free will.

A previous version of Syamsu's edits did purport to have bearing on free will, but are not supported by the provided passages, and he has purportedly waived his desire for the relevant parts, which would leave (but is not what he's still reverting to) a sufficiently well-cited passage... that's not at all relevant to this article. --Pfhorrest (talk) 16:55, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

  1. ^ Vohs, Kathleen D. (2008-01-01). "The Value of Believing in Free Will". Psychological Science. 19 (1): 49–54. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9280.2008.02045.x. Retrieved 2011-04-29. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  2. ^ Baumeister, Roy F. (2009-02-01). "Prosocial Benefits of Feeling Free: Disbelief in Free Will Increases Aggression and Reduces Helpfulness". Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. 35 (2): 260–268. doi:10.1177/0146167208327217. Retrieved 2011-04-29. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  3. ^ Stillman, Tyler F. (2010-01-01). "Personal Philosophy and Personnel Achievement: Belief in Free Will Predicts Better Job Performance". Social Psychological and Personality Science. 1 (1): 43–50. doi:10.1177/1948550609351600. Retrieved 2011-04-29. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  4. ^ Pronin, Emily (2010-12-28). "People believe they have more free will than others". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 107 (52): 22469–22474. doi:10.1073/pnas.1012046108. Retrieved 2011-04-29. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  5. ^ NAHMIAS, Eddy (2006-07-01). "Is Incompatibilism Intuitive?". Philosophy and Phenomenological Research. 73 (1): 28–53. doi:10.1111/j.1933-1592.2006.tb00603.x. ISSN 1933-1592. Retrieved 2011-04-29. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  6. ^ FELTZ, ADAM (2009-02-01). "Natural Compatibilism versus Natural Incompatibilism: Back to the Drawing Board". Mind & Language. 24 (1): 1–23. doi:10.1111/j.1468-0017.2008.01351.x. ISSN 1468-0017. Retrieved 2011-04-29. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  7. ^ Nichols, Shaun (2007-12-01). "Moral Responsibility and Determinism: The Cognitive Science of Folk Intuitions". Noûs. 41 (4): 663–685. doi:10.1111/j.1468-0068.2007.00666.x. ISSN 1468-0068. Retrieved 2011-04-29. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  8. ^ SARKISSIAN, HAGOP (2010-06-01). "Is Belief in Free Will a Cultural Universal?". Mind & Language. 25 (3): 346–358. doi:10.1111/j.1468-0017.2010.01393.x. ISSN 1468-0017. Retrieved 2011-04-29. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  9. ^ Feltz, Adam (2009-03). "Do judgments about freedom and responsibility depend on who you are? Personality differences in intuitions about compatibilism and incompatibilism". Consciousness and Cognition. 18 (1): 342–350. doi:10.1016/j.concog.2008.08.001. ISSN 1053-8100. Retrieved 2011-04-29. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  10. ^ NAHMIAS, EDDY (2007-09-01). "Free Will, Moral Responsibility, and Mechanism: Experiments on Folk Intuitions". Midwest Studies In Philosophy. 31 (1): 214–242. doi:10.1111/j.1475-4975.2007.00158.x. ISSN 1475-4975. Retrieved 2011-04-29. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
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