Posted: Aug 26, 2017 4:55 pm
romansh wrote:GrahamH wrote:
Scotts definition raises an interesting point. Does it mean that any act is performed without a clear idea of outcome can't be a free will act? I should think that it is enough to intend the act, even if you don't know how it will turn out. If you merely hope with no greta confidence or you do something to try and see can't that be free will? Hoe does that work for responsibility? Can you do what you like in ignorance or are you accountable for knowingly taking a risk?
I quite like Scott's definition ... I don't think he is claiming an infallible outcome of the evaluation. But it does raise questions about really crappy evaluations and how they might be distinguished from cursory evaluations.
Intend to act? Simply having a will makes it free? I don't think you are saying this. Hope the consequence is what I want? Again it seems to be defining my will/want as free.
It seems to me it is enough for free will to have the thought that I may do X and then do X. If I have the capacity to realise I don't know what the outcome of X may be that surely doesn't rob me of free will. Why would it?
Conversely there is a sense in which knowing the outcome reduced freedom. Outcomes are constraints. In particular people can be too afraid to act for fear of what might happen. There is some freedom in not being bound by such constraints. Some may do what they hope may happen rather than what they may reasonably expect to happen.
The total focus on deliberation seems to me to about rational agents rather than free will agents. These are surely not the same thing in all cases. Rational agents need not be free and free will agents need not be rational.