Compatibilism: What's that About?

[Jarhyn]

The fact of prior causes does not cancel the fact of the current cause.

This, more than anything, is what DBT continues to ignore.

I cannot put myself ahead of prior causes, but I can very much potentially get out ahead of current causes and cut them off before they get where they would otherwise be going.

Edit: I can also get out in front of my own current causes and keep the way open before them.

I can even get in front of my currently active causes and stop it out before it gets where it is going. I can even be the cause of my own unfreeness.

 

[fromderinside]

The brain doesn't function according to the principle of free will regardless of how many people refer to it, or for how long.
The brain is a biological mechanism, not a free will generator.

This is really very simple, DBT. One of the brain's functions is to decide what we will do. When it is free from coercion and undue influence then it is a freely chosen will. When it is coerced or unduly influenced, it is not a freely chosen will.

Just as neural networks, architecture and electrochemical information processing is not 'free will.'

And now you're pretending that the brain does not make decisions? Then you're contradicting neuroscience!

Far from destroying anything, I am calling a spade a spade.....in this instance correctly labelling brain activity as 'information processing' rather than 'free will' because will does not run the brain, which is a matter of architecture and function, electrochemical activity and an interaction of information within a deterministic system where will does not perform these functions.

1. Information processing includes decision making.
2. Decision making chooses what we will do.
3. When that choosing is free of coercion and undue influence, it is a freely chosen "I will".
4. The freely chosen "I will" sets the brain's intention upon a specific course of action, which the brain and body then act upon.
5. This is called a "deliberate" act. And people are held responsible for their deliberate acts.

That is what free will is about. It is a simple notion that everyone understands. It requires nothing supernatural. It makes no claims to being an uncaused event. It simply does its job of identifying the meaningful and relevant cause of a given event.

Let's set simple aside since it adds nothing as your analysis demonstrates.

The brain is an evolved thing not a designed thing. So function attribution is inappropriate. Brains aren't designed nor do they design.

“The brain is an evolved thing, not a designed thing.“ Right.

“So function attribution is inappropriatre“ … Wrong! Purpose attribution is inappropriate. The heart pumps blood, but that is not its purpose, because purpose preupposes someone who gave it a purpose: a designer. But clearly the heart functions as a pump — in fact, is a pump. Similarly, while the brain does not have a purpose, it has functions — many of them, as a matter of fact.

”Brains aren’t designed …” Right.

“Nor do they design.”

Excuse me? The Empire State Building designed itself? The Mona LIsa? The Apollo rocket? The (insert here ten trillion other things that brains have designed).

Hard determinist arguments are simply surreal.

Show me a designing brain.

The Empire State Building … the Mona Lisa … The Apollo rockets … The novel The Brothers Karamazov … Michelangelo’s David … The flush toilet … transistors for computers … computers in general … An eight-course meal … clothing of every kind … a Bloody Mary … every movie ever made … every statue every sculpted … every building ever built … the change in our own moods, when we meditate or shift our attention from one thing to another … the sentence, “show me a designing brain.” Among trillions of other examples.

Are you saying these things were not designed by human brains? That they were self-designing? Or that that sprang into existence ex nihilo? Or that they were designed by the big bang, since according to you we are all, I guess, puppets of the Creation? It does indeed sound very faith-based, like the Calvinist doctrine that we are all puppets of God, our fates predestined by him.

I mean, I honestly have no idea what you are talking about when you try to argue that brains don’t design.

I know I posted something yesterday but I didn't see it when I checked around 2:00 AM local time.

So here goes my attempt to post something similar now.

Living things are evolved with all that implies. In particular conditions change and those who survive adapt to where they continue being. As far as design goes humans evolved hands which, with sufficient brain permitted them to fashion things from material at hand for uses such as killing and skinning and fashioning earthen ware and begin fashion larger groupings and shelters.

Fortuitously humans found that fire could be controlled which permitted them to extract metals from material around them so they could fashion more complex things, like tools, trenches, monuments and images. It is here that another fortuitous outcome arose. With larger brains humans used their capabilities for communal learning and planning. Note that both learning and planning are derivative and social resulting from driven adaptations.

So humans didn't evolve planning, agriculture, nor social systems. These arose from what capabilities we evolved to survive. The brain was never designed to plan. We can plan because we were driven to adapt and to take advantage of what we found to survive which lead to migration, toolmaking and language. I'm going to be pretty firm on this.

The above frame permits me to be consequential. We never really adapted to larger groups. Yet we live in them because they provide advantages over middle sized and small groups for which we are much more physiologically attuned. This maladaptation is the source of the main tension in our communities.

Right. So brains design things. You’re retracting what you wrote earlier. I’m good with that.

You all miss the point. We are not designed to design. We are designed to survive. We design because what we developed as result of evolution along with fortuitous acquired information and associations accommodates the ability to do some design.

Jarhyn You use any comment as evidence of capability. Strictly speaking capabilities are the result of evolved adaptations. It takes several evolved adaptations to result in adding capability. It takes several capabilities to achieve the ability to design. That we can design isn't at issue. That we are designed to design is false.

So wave your we design flag as much as you want. We all know that design wasn't an evolved adaptation. There are no set of conditions that would result in the evolution of human design capability. Design, like language, is a many evolutionarily incident driven feature arising from many genetic incidents over many evolutionary adaptations resulting from many changes in human environments over the course of human evolution. Simply put design is a capability resulting from many evolutionarily driven adaption sequences from which changes resulted from the only driver, survival.

No will, no soul, no consciousness, no design. These can be dismissed just as easily as "human are designed to design." They are only rationalizations by humans attempting to explain who and what they are. The science is clear. We are evolved beings arising in a deterministic world.

 

[Jarhyn]

We are not designed to design

Brains have been in the niche of design (fast situational adaptation) for about 500 million years: as long as they have existed.

The brain itself is a cross-linked neural network, and cross-linked neural networks exist and we're adaptive because it is useful to be able to do something different in situations than the behavior we "evolved to do".

That we are designed to design is false.

So, you are using an inverse fallacy of "argument from design". Wonderful.

We design, we plan.

We have wills.

The reason why design is such a capability as is retained and has been for 500m years is specifically that it is useful.

But moreover, there is clearly an element of the human mind that constructs, designs wills "as it's day job", and has for a very very long time through history.

no design

Ok, so, you just spent some long bloviation about how we can design BuT It WaSn'T EvOlVeD To.

Then you switch that to "none at all period."

The fact is, we have evidence directly counter in the fact that LITERALLY EVERY THING YOU DO is arrayed as a plan, designed by SOME part of your brain, of the form of "a list of actions unto a requirement."

That list of actions, like it or not, is there waiting for you to continue through to completion and to be checked for completeness and objectively, that completeness will be satisfied or it will not.

You have a plan, designed by your brain, that will either be "free" unto it's requirements or constrained.

As it is, we have a giant pile of computational technology which indicates that systems's abilities to execute lists of actions unto functional requirements is useful, and that evolutionary pressure would heavily favor the retention of that capability to adapt and generate and design such plans.

 

[DBT]

Causal necessity negates only one freedom, "freedom from causal necessity". It does not negate free will, free speech, freedom of the press, freedom from slavery, free of charge, or any other freedom that we enjoy.

That's assertion. Determinism negates freedom of will because will has no regulative power, cannot make a difference to outcomes or actions.

Freedom of speech, freedom of the press has nothing to do with the free will issue for the given reasons, determined actions must necessarily proceed freely, unimpeded, unrestricted as determined, not willed.

''If the moon, in the act of completing its eternal way around the earth, were gifted with self-consciousness, it would feel thoroughly convinced that it was traveling its way of its own accord on the strength of a resolution taken once and for all. So would a Being, endowed with higher insight and more perfect intelligence, watching man and his doings, smile about man's illusion that he was acting according to his own free will.'' - Albert Einstein

The question is why anyone would be crazy enough to suggest that causal necessity was something that we needed to be free of in the first place?

Because causal necessitation negates the possibility of alternate actions and freedom of will and choice, whatever happens because it is determined by antecedents, neither willed or chosen, a consequence of previous states.

Causal necessity is nothing more than the logical extension of our notion of reliable cause and effect. And, since every freedom we enjoy requires reliable cause and effect, this notion of being "free from that which freedom requires" must be some kind of joke.

To be free from determinism in a determined system is absurd. That is why the notion of free will is false. Free will is impossible within a determined system.

If you have no alternative, are you free? I would say not.

And it is a joke. Every paradox is a joke. It is a self-induced hoax created by one or more false, but believable, suggestions. Suggestions that trap the mind in a puzzle of its own creation.

Incompatibilism argues that free will cannot exist in a deterministic system, the given definition of determinism fixes all actions from the beginning to end, including will.


1. No one has power over the facts of the past and the laws of nature.
2. No one has power over the fact that the facts of the past and the laws of nature entail every fact of the future (i.e., determinism is true).
3. Therefore, no one has power over the facts of the future.

.

As the nature of determinism/necessitation - as defined and accepted - means that all brain/mind events are shaped, formed, determined and fixed, by elements and events beyond the control or regulatory power of will,...

But our intentions are one of the most important parts of the causal landscape. Yet you repeatedly suggest to us that they have no causal power. You must be joking.

Intentions are formed by an interaction of information within the system. It is the prior interaction of information within the system that shapes and forms our intentions and their related actions, which are freely performed as determined.

That only leaves us with a label, semantics, common usage and empty rhetoric.

That's what your rhetoric leaves you, empty of causal power. And yet here you are willfully typing another response. Your own actions contradict your claims.

Nobody is suggesting that the brain as a rational system cannot acquire and process information and respond rationally (or irrationally) according to the state of the system, not free will.

This ability cannot be labelled free will for the given reasons: it is the state of the system that determines actions performed, not will. want or wish.

Response is a reflection of system state, not will.

Freedom requires real alternatives, the possibility of doing otherwise, will with regulatory ability to make a difference.

Have you seen the menus at Ruby Tuesdays? They are filled with real alternate possibilities, every one of which can be realized simply by choosing it. And you have the ability to choose any or all of them.

Hey, there are three of us at the table with you. Why don't you order for everyone? That way you can see what a real possibility is and how it works in real life.

You think you have the ability to choose any or all of them - you don't have conscious access to the means of decision making - so what you do choose is a reflection of the state of the brain in the instance of a decision made, and the only possible choice in that instance in time.

Again, we are talking about determinism. Determinism - by your own definition - does not allow alternate actions.


''Each state of the universe and its events are the necessary result of its prior state and prior events. ("Events" change the state of things.)'' - Marvin Edwards.

All of these are excluded by determinism;

NOTHING THAT EXISTS IS EXCLUDED BY DETERMINISM. In fact, everything that exists was causally necessary from any prior point in time.

Free will doesn't exist within a determined system ----that is the point.

There are no alternatives.

Just look at the damn menu.

''Each state of the universe and its events are the necessary result of its prior state and prior events. ("Events" change the state of things.)'' - Marvin Edwards.

There is no possibility of doing otherwise in any given instance in time.

Have you still not figured out yet that having the possibility of doing otherwise does not actually require that you do otherwise?

There are no alternate possibilities within a determined system.

You literally cannot do otherwise.

''Each state of the universe and its events are the necessary result of its prior state and prior events. ("Events" change the state of things.)'' - Marvin Edwards.

Will, emerging late in the cognitive process, attached to an article of will, to smoke/to quit smoking, etc, has insufficient regulatory power.

You still do not understand the basic psychological components provided through our functioning brain. Choosing is one of those functions. Willing is another one of those functions. Choosing for ourselves what we will do is precisely the regulatory power required.

First information input, then distribution of information, then processing, then the experience of choosing and willing....already determined milliseconds prior to the experience.

Evidence for this has been provided.

So, you attempt to throw a wrench into the works by suggesting that quitting smoking should be a simple choice. A false, but believable suggestion. If we claim that we have sufficient regulatory power, then why is it difficult for people simply choose to end their addiction to a chemical substance like nicotine, or cocaine, or other severely addictive substances? Could it be that these substances are severely addictive and that withdrawal is physically and psychologically painful? An addiction to any chemical that threatens physical and psychological pain would be another fine example of an undue influence.

Fortunately, choosing dinner at Ruby Tuesdays does not require overcoming an addictive substance. At Ruby Tuesdays we are free to choose whatever we think is best.

What I said was that will is attached to an article of will - there is the will to smoke and its opposite, the will to quit smoking. Two opposing sets of will create division and conflict, which makes it difficult to stop smoking through an act of will. Which one overcomes the other? Neither are free, so another strategy or intervention is needed. Some, of course, are not prone to addiction by nature and have little difficulty in dropping bad habits, for others, it's very difficult if not impossible.

Will cannot make a difference to determined outcomes.

Choosing causally determines intention. Intention causally determines action. Without the choosing and the willing there is no action.

Input and processing precede all actions.

Will cannot the defined as being free.

Stop deliberately misconstruing what is being said. Free will is about the freedom of choosing the will, not the freedom of the will itself.

What exactly is ''choosing the will?'' What exactly chooses the will? How does it work?

Choice is not freely chosen, it's determined by information processing, inputs, memory function, then conscious representation.

Free will is incompatible with determinism.

Everything that exists is, by definition, compatible with determinism, because it is necessarily exactly as it is. Determinism changes nothing. Everything remains exactly as it was.

Of course, that doesn't equate to free will.

The only thing that is logically incompatible with determinism is indeterminism. Everything else is necessarily compatible with it.

Depends on the claim being made. Some things simply don't exist.

None of those prior causes could bring me to the restaurant. The only thing that actually brings me to the restaurant is my intention to have dinner at Ruby Tuesdays. You know, that freely chosen* "I will have dinner at Ruby Tuesdays". That's what brings me to the restaurant.

*Freely chosen means free of coercion and undue influence. Nothing more. Nothing less.

You don't just pop out of a vacuum at the restaurant door, there are a whole web of antecedent events that bring you that place and time, you are bored with home cooking, you have guests who suggest eating out, it may be regular outing, etc.

If you look at is from the perspective of your definition of determinism, you cannot be anywhere else. You must necessarily be in that exact place at that exact time selecting that exact option on the menu, as determined.

''Each state of the universe and its events are the necessary result of its prior state and prior events. ("Events" change the state of things.)'' -
''All of these events, including my choices, were causally necessary from any prior point in time. And they all proceeded without deviation from the Big Bang to this moment.'' - Marvin Edwards.

 

[pood]

You all miss the point. We are not designed to design. We are designed to survive. We design because what we developed as result of evolution along with fortuitous acquired information and associations accommodates the ability to do some design.

Golly, I don’t miss the point. I never said that we were “designed to design.” Moreover, when you say, “we were designed to survive,” that’s wrong, too. Why? Because we were not designed to do anything. Why? Because we were not designed. We evolved.

And … so what?

What does any of this have to do with the reality of compatibilist free will?

 

[Jarhyn]

The fact is, there is only and exactly ONE thing you can do to fight past all your assertion fallacies and not-even-wrong:

Pick up our definitions, in the way we have used them, change how they are said without destroying their meaning, and then speak that such that we accept the restatement of their meaning preserved-meaning definition, and then following that definition apply those words in modally correct ways, as to replace any singular use with it's full definition and retain sensibility, and then find a true = false equivalence.

We do not ask to be free of causal necessity. We ask to be left provisionally free, in the pursuit of true freedom, in any moment to meet the requirements of our wills, as may be acceptable to our agencies.

Our agencies have the means to make decision on execution of wills, how and whether. The source of my own will (or at least their requirements) does not dictate in absolute terms what the madness that is "me" actually does. I get some stuff to do, and it comes from some other structure in my head (which I hold oversight and "Authority" over), and I decide whether I like or dislike what I get, and then I take that as a "suggestion".

This means that in a few situations I have personally neglected my hunger to nearly the point of collapse.

I'm just glad I don't have to give positive attention to making my heart beat or to make my lungs breath.

But I don't actually need any of that on the table to discuss "free" and "will" in compatibilism. Urist has very little of that, and yet still has wills, in an environment where they have "contingent freedom".

We can even directly examine when a will has a requirement that came from Urist, and when Urist has a will that came from some other entity.

Some wills are not directly assailable by the rational mind, and are of a mechanism by which the will is "Impose Requirement!"

When it comes from the absurdity that is "the person at the table ordering salad, and only their prior causes" versus any potential immediate cause "the guy threatening him with a weapon", then we say that a specific will, a will which is almost always free, is not: the will to select one's own requirements.

It is this specific will which we reference with the concept of "free will" spoken of as you blithely misuse it and which the common usage butchers quite badly.

Still, that will is not always left free. Sometimes it is constrained by circumstances which have leverage over it in the objective, physical hierarchy of needs.

Sometimes those circumstances involve threats of physical or social leverage.

Sometimes there ought be such circumstances!

I can certainly recognize the utility, to the dwarves, of putting a hammer through the head of any dwarf by whose traits manufactures, successfully, a will which frequently leads to mass-fratricide.

Of course that doesn't dissuade the dwarves from holding such wills except through the wholesale removal of the relevance of all traits they might have had due to a "tendon" in the "skull" breaking, and so rendering them dead.

Our math on what to do about the presence of coercion of requirement can be more complex, owing to more useful regulatory mechanisms to our mental processes and thus neurological behaviors.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

Causal necessity negates only one freedom, "freedom from causal necessity". It does not negate free will, free speech, freedom of the press, freedom from slavery, free of charge, or any other freedom that we enjoy.

That's assertion.

The assertion is backed up by empirical evidence.
We observe people in the restaurant freely deciding for themselves what they will order for dinner. That's free will.
We observe each other posting contrary views on the topic of free will. That's free speech.
We observe the IIDB publishing our posts here. That's freedom of the press.
We observe that Abraham Lincoln published the Emancipation Proclamation freeing all slaves.
We observe various charities sending us free return address stickers, free of charge.
Shall I go on?

Not a single one of these freedoms requires freedom from causal necessity!

Determinism negates freedom of will because will has no regulative power, cannot make a difference to outcomes or actions.

The function of choosing is regulation. Neuroscience tells us repeatedly that our brains perform the decision making that determines what we will do next. The function of will is motivation and direction.

Freedom of speech, freedom of the press has nothing to do with the free will issue for the given reasons, determined actions must necessarily proceed freely, unimpeded, unrestricted as determined, not willed.

Sorry, but your "given reasons" do not hold up under examination. They simply do not mean what you think they mean. Every one of the freedoms listed above is empirically demonstrated within a world of perfectly reliable cause and effect. Not a single one of them requires freedom from causal necessity.

''If the moon, in the act of completing its eternal way around the earth, were gifted with self-consciousness, it would feel thoroughly convinced that it was traveling its way of its own accord on the strength of a resolution taken once and for all. So would a Being, endowed with higher insight and more perfect intelligence, watching man and his doings, smile about man's illusion that he was acting according to his own free will.'' - Albert Einstein

Sorry, Dr. Einstein, but you're just as wrong as all the rest. Free will is not an uncaused event. It is reliably caused by the brain's own decision-making function. The only thing that the choosing need be free of is coercion and undue influence. Nothing more. Nothing less. When you modify this formula for free will to include "freedom from causal necessity" you create a paradox, a paradox that you never inflict upon any other freedom except free will.

This paradox makes people say some really stupid things, like what you said in the Saturday Evening Post interview in 1929:

"In a sense, we can hold no one responsible. I am a determinist. As such, I do not believe in free will. ... Practically, I am, nevertheless, compelled to act as if freedom of the will existed. If I wish to live in a civilized community, I must act as if man is a responsible being."

Page 114 of "The Saturday Evening Post" article "What Life Means to Einstein" "An Interview by George Sylvester Viereck" (Oct 26, 1929)

On the one hand you say there is no free will and thus we can hold no one responsible for their actions.
On the other hand you claim we must act like free will is true and hold people responsible.

Let me set you straight, Albert. Free will does not require freedom from reliable cause and effect. It only requires freedom from coercion and other forms of undue influence. Now you can believe in free will and responsibility without any illusions. And you're very welcome, Dr. Einstein.

Because causal necessitation negates the possibility of alternate actions

It is really hard to negate a possibility.

The only sure way to negate a possibility is to make it an actuality. All other possibilities remain possibilities. But as soon as you actualize a possibility it ceases being called a "possibility" in that time and place and is relabeled an "actuality". The context of meaning is very different between a "possibility" and an "actuality", just like the context of meaning is very different between "can" and "will".

Real possibilities exist solely within the imagination. We cannot drive a car across the possibility of a bridge. We can only drive across an actual bridge. However, a possibility serves a real function in that one cannot build an actual bridge without first imagining a possible bridge.

Something is considered "possible" if we are able to actualize it if we choose to. If we cannot actualize that possibility, even after we choose to do so, then, and only then, is it considered an impossibility.

But choosing not to actualize a possibility does not make it impossible. It only makes it a possibility that we chose not to implement.

Even if we never choose to implement that possibility, it will remain forever something that we could have done if we had chosen to.

Causal necessity never negates any real possibility. In fact, it guarantees that specific possibilities will show up within our imagination exactly when they do. They are the reliable result of prior mental events. A typical example of such a mental event is picking up the menu at Ruby Tuesdays and seeing a list of actual possibilities right there in front of us.

So, no. Causal necessity never negates any possible alternatives, because they are actual physical events in the brain that correspond to the mental events we experience.

Causal necessity never negates anything, other than indeterminism.

and freedom of will and choice, whatever happens because it is determined by antecedents, neither willed or chosen, a consequence of previous states.

We cannot say "neither willed or chosen" because choosing and willing happen to be among those actual antecedent events.

Causal necessity is nothing more than the logical extension of our notion of reliable cause and effect. And, since every freedom we enjoy requires reliable cause and effect, this notion of being "free from that which freedom requires" must be some kind of joke.

To be free from determinism in a determined system is absurd.

Exactly! That's my point. Because it is absurd, it becomes absurd to attach such a necessity to any notion of freedom, whether it be free will, free speech, or free of charge. So, kindly stop doing that.

Free will is a choice free of coercion and undue influence. Nothing more (like freedom from determinism). Nothing less. Get it?

If you have no alternative, are you free? I would say not.

Fortunately, there are always alternatives. Alternatives are things that we can choose, even if it was inevitable that we would not choose them.

Incompatibilism argues that free will cannot exist in a deterministic system

By now it should be obvious that incompatibilism is false, because free will does, in fact, exist within our deterministic system.

... the given definition of determinism fixes all actions from the beginning to end, including will.

If you wish, but please be keenly aware that "determinism fixes all actions" is figurative speech. Determinism is not an actual entity that goes around fixing actions. Getting swept up in that anthropomorphic metaphor is precisely the kind of error that leads us to faulty conclusions.

For example, is it my brain making my choices or is Determinism making my choices?

There is only one correct answer to that question. Empirically, decision making is a localized function performed by individual brains located within individual members of an intelligent species. That is where it is happening. It is not a function being performed by the universe as a whole, or the entire web of causality, but very specifically within each individual human brain.

We are doing the choosing. And that is an incontrovertible empirical fact.

1. No one has power over the facts of the past and the laws of nature.
2. No one has power over the fact that the facts of the past and the laws of nature entail every fact of the future (i.e., determinism is true).
3. Therefore, no one has power over the facts of the future.

And there we have an example of the very problem I just described. The "laws of nature" and "the facts of the past" have just been promoted to causal agents. (1) But the laws of our nature are derived by empirically observing our own behavior. Our behavior is the source of those laws. And (2) the new facts of our past are constantly being created by us, by our choices and actions, right here in the present. Our past is merely the diary of our present as it once was.

Within the domain of human influence (stuff we can make happen if we choose to), the single inevitable future will be chosen by us from among the many possible futures that we will imagine.

And (3) that is our power over the facts of the future.

You think you have the ability to choose any or all of them - you don't have conscious access to the means of decision making

Another paradox. This one is created by the false suggestion that we must have conscious access to our unconscious processes (a logical contradiction) in order to exercise control of our choice. The empirical fact is that it is quite sufficient that we have conscious awareness of our choice and our reasons for that choice. That is all that is required for us to control what we will have for dinner. And it is sufficient justification for the waiter to bring us the bill.

Unfortunately, after dinner, we cannot get from our chair to the restaurant door, because first we must get halfway there. But before we can get halfway there we must first get halfway to that halfway point, and so on, resulting in an infinite number of points to arrive at within a finite lifespan. Paradoxes, anyone? (My original solution to this one was that every time we cut the distance in half we were effectively doubling our speed, such that infinite speed would carry us through infinite points. But such a solution is not really necessary. It is sufficient to point out that people simply walk from the chair to the door, without attempting to walk halfway first. The paradox is created by the false suggestion that we were stopping at each halfway point).

Determinism - by your own definition - does not allow alternate actions.

The argument is not in the definition, but in the implications.

To me, determinism simply means that every event is reliably caused by prior events. Included among these prior events are the events in which we consider alternate courses of actions, things that we can choose to do. These considerations cause our choice, which in turn causes our action.

Determinism is satisfied by this series of events. And, assuming coercion and undue influence were not events in this chain, then free will is also satisfied by the same series of events.

''Each state of the universe and its events are the necessary result of its prior state and prior events. ("Events" change the state of things.)'' - Marvin Edwards.

That guy is still right. Among the causally necessary events is us reading the menu and deciding for ourselves what we will have for dinner. It is a choice we make for ourselves while free of coercion and undue influence, thus free will. And it is right smack in the middle of the causal chain along with all the other inevitable events, thus determinism.

What exactly is ''choosing the will?''

Choosing inputs two or more alternative courses of action, applies some criteria of comparative evaluation, and outputs a single choice. The choice is of the form "I will X", where X is the thing we have chosen to do. Thus "choosing the will".

The chosen will is our intent to accomplish some specific goal, such as having dinner at Ruby Tuesdays. That intention motivates our subsequent actions until we've had that dinner and left the restaurant.

What exactly chooses the will?

Well we do, but more specifically, decision making is a function of our own brains. It performs the choosing that determines our specific will to do something.

How does it work?

We do not know how to model this event in terms of neuronal activity. But we do have a human-level understanding of what is going on. The human model is the choosing operation: multiple options input, then estimating and comparing the likely outcomes, and finally outputting the single intention. Neuroscience will be mapping the neuronal activity to the human-level model.

Choosing occurs when we encounter a problem or issue that requires us to make a choice before we can continue. For example, the menu in the restaurant presents us with multiple possible alternatives and we must choose a specific meal before we can continue carrying out our intention to have dinner.

If we already knew what we were going to order before we walked in, then we would simply order that. But if we were uncertain what we would order, then we would browse the menu to determine our possibilities, and choose one of those possibilities.

When we are uncertain as to what we will do, we imagine what we can do. Switching from "will" to "can" changes our context from what is actually happening to what might possibly happen. When we've decided what we "will" do our uncertainty is resolved and we are ready to act upon that chosen intention. "I will have the Chef Salad, please", we convey to the waiter. The waiter brings us the salad and the bill.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

... No will, no soul, no consciousness, no design. These can be dismissed just as easily as "human are designed to design." They are only rationalizations by humans attempting to explain who and what they are. The science is clear. ...

Science? In the absence of conscious will and design, where did this thing you call "science" come from?

 

[Jarhyn]

When we are uncertain as to what we will do, we imagine what we can do. Switching from "will" to "can" changes our context from what is actually happening to what might possibly happen. When we've decided what we "will" do our uncertainty is resolved and we are ready to act upon that chosen intention. "I will have the Chef Salad, please", we convey to the waiter. The waiter brings us the salad and the bill.

And this is where we jump from real to provisionally free and provisionally unfree wills with provisional freedom scores assuming certain requirements are met.

The fact that these are provisional, part of the process by which one is selected by the will, freely exercised, to select of them, does no injury to the concepts of "free" and "will".

It does make for an interesting and predictable snare on the path to understanding: one can easily see that our imaginings of freedom are not the real actuality of freedom, and make the easy but incorrect leap to thinking there is no real freedom, despite the fact that we can observe the free execution of wills, free to achieve their requirements.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

When we are uncertain as to what we will do, we imagine what we can do. Switching from "will" to "can" changes our context from what is actually happening to what might possibly happen. When we've decided what we "will" do our uncertainty is resolved and we are ready to act upon that chosen intention. "I will have the Chef Salad, please", we convey to the waiter. The waiter brings us the salad and the bill.

And this is where we jump from real to provisionally free and provisionally unfree wills with provisional freedom scores assuming certain requirements are met.

The fact that these are provisional, part of the process by which one is selected by the will, freely exercised, to select of them, does no injury to the concepts of "free" and "will".

It does make for an interesting and predictable snare on the path to understanding: one can easily see that our imaginings of freedom are not the real actuality of freedom, and make the easy but incorrect leap to thinking there is no real freedom, despite the fact that we can observe the free execution of wills, free to achieve their requirements.

For me, freedom is black and white. Either you're in handcuffs or you are free of them. Either you're being unduly influenced or you are deciding for yourself what you will do. They are empirical conditions that either apply or do not apply.

Causal necessity always applies, but it is not something we can or need to be free of.

 

[Jarhyn]

When we are uncertain as to what we will do, we imagine what we can do. Switching from "will" to "can" changes our context from what is actually happening to what might possibly happen. When we've decided what we "will" do our uncertainty is resolved and we are ready to act upon that chosen intention. "I will have the Chef Salad, please", we convey to the waiter. The waiter brings us the salad and the bill.

And this is where we jump from real to provisionally free and provisionally unfree wills with provisional freedom scores assuming certain requirements are met.

The fact that these are provisional, part of the process by which one is selected by the will, freely exercised, to select of them, does no injury to the concepts of "free" and "will".

It does make for an interesting and predictable snare on the path to understanding: one can easily see that our imaginings of freedom are not the real actuality of freedom, and make the easy but incorrect leap to thinking there is no real freedom, despite the fact that we can observe the free execution of wills, free to achieve their requirements.

For me, freedom is black and white. Either you're in handcuffs or you are free of them. Either you're being unduly influenced or you are deciding for yourself what you will do. They are empirical conditions that either apply or do not apply.

Causal necessity always applies, but it is not something we can or need to be free of.

And so again I find myself looking at the requirement that is being failed for the failure of freedom: to select one's own requirements.

Again, one freedom is an imagining of, a precursor to a will calculated for it's likelihood to remain free, for the maintainability of the potential for freedom.

This subtle difference between "what we imagine" and "what is and shall be" is easy to get lost in. Both FDI and DBT get lost in it, the former in their discussions of subjective/objective, and the latter in his discussion of "regulatory control".

There is a reality as to which wills are "free", nonetheless, as to their requirements being satisfied.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

When we are uncertain as to what we will do, we imagine what we can do. Switching from "will" to "can" changes our context from what is actually happening to what might possibly happen. When we've decided what we "will" do our uncertainty is resolved and we are ready to act upon that chosen intention. "I will have the Chef Salad, please", we convey to the waiter. The waiter brings us the salad and the bill.

And this is where we jump from real to provisionally free and provisionally unfree wills with provisional freedom scores assuming certain requirements are met.

The fact that these are provisional, part of the process by which one is selected by the will, freely exercised, to select of them, does no injury to the concepts of "free" and "will".

It does make for an interesting and predictable snare on the path to understanding: one can easily see that our imaginings of freedom are not the real actuality of freedom, and make the easy but incorrect leap to thinking there is no real freedom, despite the fact that we can observe the free execution of wills, free to achieve their requirements.

For me, freedom is black and white. Either you're in handcuffs or you are free of them. Either you're being unduly influenced or you are deciding for yourself what you will do. They are empirical conditions that either apply or do not apply.

Causal necessity always applies, but it is not something we can or need to be free of.

And so again I find myself looking at the requirement that is being failed for the failure of freedom: to select one's own requirements.

Again, one freedom is an imagining of, a precursor to a will calculated for it's likelihood to remain free, for the maintainability of the potential for freedom.

This subtle difference between "what we imagine" and "what is and shall be" is easy to get lost in. Both FDI and DBT get lost in it, the former in their discussions of subjective/objective, and the latter in his discussion of "regulatory control".

There is a reality as to which wills are "free", nonetheless, as to their requirements being satisfied.

I'm sorry but I cannot follow you. There is not one sentence in that paragraph that I can understand.

 

[fromderinside]

... No will, no soul, no consciousness, no design. These can be dismissed just as easily as "human are designed to design." They are only rationalizations by humans attempting to explain who and what they are. The science is clear. ...

Science? In the absence of conscious will and design, where did this thing you call "science" come from?

Observation. Experiments on material things observed. Will, conscious + design are stuff we try to use to explain when we don't experiment.

"Cogito ergo sum" is based on self observation. Its subjective, not objective.

It also comes way after life exists and substantially evolves.

 

[fromderinside]

You all miss the point. We are not designed to design. We are designed to survive. We design because what we developed as result of evolution along with fortuitous acquired information and associations accommodates the ability to do some design.

Golly, I don’t miss the point. I never said that we were “designed to design.” Moreover, when you say, “we were designed to survive,” that’s wrong, too. Why? Because we were not designed to do anything. Why? Because we were not designed. We evolved.

And … so what?

What does any of this have to do with the reality of compatibilist free will?

Actually evolution is the design process since you seem to need to have design tied down. That is the manner through which I see and express design of humans, of all living and near living things. Actually that is true of all things material.

 

[DBT]

Causal necessity negates only one freedom, "freedom from causal necessity". It does not negate free will, free speech, freedom of the press, freedom from slavery, free of charge, or any other freedom that we enjoy.

Nope. It eliminates the possibility of alternate actions and freedom of choice. Freedom of choice entails the possibility of doing otherwise, determinism eliminates any possibility of doing anything that is not determined by antecedents, one state fixing the next, which fixes the next and the next as events unfold as determined, not freely willed or freely chosen, but determined.

Actions are performed as determined, without coercion or force, just as determined, not willed or freely chosen.

Which means that free will is incompatible with determinism....a system where all events unfold without deviation or alternate possibility or probability.

That's assertion.

The assertion is backed up by empirical evidence.
We observe people in the restaurant freely deciding for themselves what they will order for dinner. That's free will.
We observe each other posting contrary views on the topic of free will. That's free speech.
We observe the IIDB publishing our posts here. That's freedom of the press.
We observe that Abraham Lincoln published the Emancipation Proclamation freeing all slaves.
We observe various charities sending us free return address stickers, free of charge.
Shall I go on?

No need to go on. It misses the point. You are referring to actions performed as determined, not freely willed or chosen as if everyone could have done something different if only they so willed.

Nobody is claiming that we can't think or act, or that we can't respond rationally, the issue here being the mechanisms and means of response within a determined system, which has been pointed out time and again.

We are talking determinism, not Libertarian free will. Each and every response has antecedents, your brain first acquires information, processes that information and generates response, the very things you describe, not through free will but information processing.

The state of the system at any given instance in time determining the response in that instance in time, with no possible deviation in any given instance.....you make a mistake, it is done, it can't be undone.

You may have the opportunity to correct the error some time later, or not. A car crash due to poor judgement cannot be undone, for instance.

Not a single one of these freedoms requires freedom from causal necessity!

They are determined by causal necessity, nothing else is possible. Necessitated actions must necessarily proceed without restriction as determined.


''All of these events, including my choices, were causally necessary from any prior point in time. And they all proceeded without deviation from the Big Bang to this moment.'' - Marvin Edwards.


I'll leave it there....posts are getting too long and repetitive. It essentially covers the issue anyway.



Abstract
''If one’s solution to the free will problem is in terms of real causal powers of agents then one ought to be an incompatibilist.

Some premises are contentious but the following new argument for incompatibilism is advanced:

1. If causal determinism is true, all events are necessitated
2. If all events are necessitated, then there are no powers
3. Free will consists in the exercise of an agent’s powers

Therefore, if causal determinism is true, there is no free will; which is to say that free will is incompatible with determinism, so compatibilism is false.''

 

[Jarhyn]

When we are uncertain as to what we will do, we imagine what we can do. Switching from "will" to "can" changes our context from what is actually happening to what might possibly happen. When we've decided what we "will" do our uncertainty is resolved and we are ready to act upon that chosen intention. "I will have the Chef Salad, please", we convey to the waiter. The waiter brings us the salad and the bill.

And this is where we jump from real to provisionally free and provisionally unfree wills with provisional freedom scores assuming certain requirements are met.

The fact that these are provisional, part of the process by which one is selected by the will, freely exercised, to select of them, does no injury to the concepts of "free" and "will".

It does make for an interesting and predictable snare on the path to understanding: one can easily see that our imaginings of freedom are not the real actuality of freedom, and make the easy but incorrect leap to thinking there is no real freedom, despite the fact that we can observe the free execution of wills, free to achieve their requirements.

For me, freedom is black and white. Either you're in handcuffs or you are free of them. Either you're being unduly influenced or you are deciding for yourself what you will do. They are empirical conditions that either apply or do not apply.

Causal necessity always applies, but it is not something we can or need to be free of.

And so again I find myself looking at the requirement that is being failed for the failure of freedom: to select one's own requirements.

Again, one freedom is an imagining of, a precursor to a will calculated for it's likelihood to remain free, for the maintainability of the potential for freedom.

This subtle difference between "what we imagine" and "what is and shall be" is easy to get lost in. Both FDI and DBT get lost in it, the former in their discussions of subjective/objective, and the latter in his discussion of "regulatory control".

There is a reality as to which wills are "free", nonetheless, as to their requirements being satisfied.

I'm sorry but I cannot follow you. There is not one sentence in that paragraph that I can understand.

In my model, "an unfree will" is one of the form "open the door; door did not open"

The requirement of the will "open the door" is "door opens".

When Urist formed the will "open door" they formed it on the provision, on the imagination, that the door could be unlocked.

Such an imagination has no impact on reality. His will does not unlock the door and cannot. He is doomed to fail no matter what he imagines (though this is not the case for all wills, we need an example that shows the principle in action).

Such imaginings may allow the holder of the will to more effectively guide the agent to the satisfaction of the requirement, depending on what is imagined.

But they are not "real": they are the result of a game played in simulation.

This is not the "real freedom value" of the will, because the door is locked, and while the mind says "this will is (probably) free" the actual freedom cannot actually be ascertained until the hand is on the door and it fails to open.

Thus there is a subtle difference between "actual freedom" and "provisional freedom"

This is the trap that FDI keeps falling into: they see that there is this difference and then make the unfounded jump from "our imaginings of freedom are not 'true freedom assessments'" to "there is no such thing as real freedom".

Clearly, even though the imaginings of wills and whether they might be free are simply imaginings, it is also clearly true that the will either meets it's requirement or it does not, in an objective event (in this case "the door opens"), and so the objective freedom value of the will is still a thing, it's just not a thing that we can touch directly.

"Urist's will to open the door was provisionally free, in the condition that the door would be unlocked. The door was not unlocked, and so while provisionally free it was not objectively free"

Had the door been unlocked, his will WOULD be objectively free.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

Observation. Experiments on material things observed. Will, conscious + design are stuff we try to use to explain when we don't experiment.

"Cogito ergo sum" is based on self observation. Its subjective, not objective.

It also comes way after life exists and substantially evolves.

A desire to control ourselves in our environment motivates us to discover the causes of events. This need to exercise control comes built-in by natural selection in intelligent species. It motivates us to design things like scientific method, and extensions to our senses, like telescopes and microscopes and stethoscopes.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

In my model, "an unfree will" is one of the form "open the door; door did not open"

The requirement of the will "open the door" is "door opens".

Ah! The "requirement" of the will is that goal or objective that must be satisfied to fulfill the will. "Requirement" is an excellent word for that.

When Urist formed the will "open door" they formed it on the provision, on the imagination, that the door could be unlocked.

Such an imagination has no impact on reality. His will does not unlock the door and cannot. He is doomed to fail no matter what he imagines (though this is not the case for all wills, we need an example that shows the principle in action).

Such imaginings may allow the holder of the will to more effectively guide the agent to the satisfaction of the requirement, depending on what is imagined.

For example, upon discovering the door was locked, he might have imagined "What if I had the key?", and searching his pockets he may find the key, or not, depending upon the reality being simulated.

But they are not "real": they are the result of a game played in simulation.

This is not the "real freedom value" of the will, because the door is locked, and while the mind says "this will is (probably) free" the actual freedom cannot actually be ascertained until the hand is on the door and it fails to open.

Thus there is a subtle difference between "actual freedom" and "provisional freedom"

So the provisional freedom is the imagined freedom prior to the attempt to open the door. When the door does not open, Urist realizes that they are locked away from whatever is on the other side of the door.

The will, to get to the other side of the door, is not satisfied.

This is the trap that FDI keeps falling into: they see that there is this difference and then make the unfounded jump from "our imaginings of freedom are not 'true freedom assessments'" to "there is no such thing as real freedom".

Clearly, even though the imaginings of wills and whether they might be free are simply imaginings, it is also clearly true that the will either meets it's requirement or it does not, in an objective event (in this case "the door opens"), and so the objective freedom value of the will is still a thing, it's just not a thing that we can touch directly.

"Urist's will to open the door was provisionally free, in the condition that the door would be unlocked. The door was not unlocked, and so while provisionally free it was not objectively free"

Had the door been unlocked, his will WOULD be objectively free.

Okay, that's a different notion of free will. Free will, as I believe most people understand it, is the freedom to choose for oneself what one will do. When Urist chose for themselves to open the door, that will to open the door was freely chosen by themselves, and was not forced upon them by someone else. No one held a gun to Urist's head and said "Open that door or I will shoot you!".

The freedom to make that choice for themselves, according to their own goals and their own reasons, is what free will is about. Whether one is then free to fulfill that will or not is another kind of freedom.

Basically every "ability" we have is a freedom to do something. But each freedom may be uniquely constrained according to its nature. For example: The door being locked eliminates our freedom to walk through the door. But it does not eliminate our freedom to choose to to walk through the door, even though we are not free to walk through it. Until we discover that the door is locked, walking through the door remains a real possibility. But once we discover it is locked, we eliminate that possibility, and may seek other ways of meeting our requirement to get to the other side. Perhaps we'll ask around to see if anyone has the key.

Free will is about the freedom to choose what we will do, and not the freedom to actually do it. They are two different abilities with two different kinds of constraints.

 

[Jarhyn]

In my model, "an unfree will" is one of the form "open the door; door did not open"

The requirement of the will "open the door" is "door opens".

Ah! The "requirement" of the will is that goal or objective that must be satisfied to fulfill the will. "Requirement" is an excellent word for that.

When Urist formed the will "open door" they formed it on the provision, on the imagination, that the door could be unlocked.

Such an imagination has no impact on reality. His will does not unlock the door and cannot. He is doomed to fail no matter what he imagines (though this is not the case for all wills, we need an example that shows the principle in action).

Such imaginings may allow the holder of the will to more effectively guide the agent to the satisfaction of the requirement, depending on what is imagined.

For example, upon discovering the door was locked, he might have imagined "What if I had the key?", and searching his pockets he may find the key, or not, depending upon the reality being simulated.

But they are not "real": they are the result of a game played in simulation.

This is not the "real freedom value" of the will, because the door is locked, and while the mind says "this will is (probably) free" the actual freedom cannot actually be ascertained until the hand is on the door and it fails to open.

Thus there is a subtle difference between "actual freedom" and "provisional freedom"

So the provisional freedom is the imagined freedom prior to the attempt to open the door. When the door does not open, Urist realizes that they are locked away from whatever is on the other side of the door.

The will, to get to the other side of the door, is not satisfied.

This is the trap that FDI keeps falling into: they see that there is this difference and then make the unfounded jump from "our imaginings of freedom are not 'true freedom assessments'" to "there is no such thing as real freedom".

Clearly, even though the imaginings of wills and whether they might be free are simply imaginings, it is also clearly true that the will either meets it's requirement or it does not, in an objective event (in this case "the door opens"), and so the objective freedom value of the will is still a thing, it's just not a thing that we can touch directly.

"Urist's will to open the door was provisionally free, in the condition that the door would be unlocked. The door was not unlocked, and so while provisionally free it was not objectively free"

Had the door been unlocked, his will WOULD be objectively free.

Okay, that's a different notion of free will. Free will, as I believe most people understand it, is the freedom to choose for oneself what one will do. When Urist chose for themselves to open the door, that will to open the door was freely chosen by themselves, and was not forced upon them by someone else. No one held a gun to Urist's head and said "Open that door or I will shoot you!".

The freedom to make that choice for themselves, according to their own goals and their own reasons, is what free will is about. Whether one is then free to fulfill that will or not is another kind of freedom.

Basically every "ability" we have is a freedom to do something. But each freedom may be uniquely constrained according to its nature. For example: The door being locked eliminates our freedom to walk through the door. But it does not eliminate our freedom to choose to to walk through the door, even though we are not free to walk through it. Until we discover that the door is locked, walking through the door remains a real possibility. But once we discover it is locked, we eliminate that possibility, and may seek other ways of meeting our requirement to get to the other side. Perhaps we'll ask around to see if anyone has the key.

Free will is about the freedom to choose what we will do, and not the freedom to actually do it. They are two different abilities with two different kinds of constraints.

Well, that's where things get complicated, in that last section of your post, because it is the same notion of freedom, but specifics are necessary when getting down to that level about which will and which requirement is being discussed.

When coerced, it is ultimately the failure of a requirement of the system's will.

"He lacks free will" unpacks rather unintuitively to "his will to decide for himself upon requirements he himself originated, is not free: it is constrained by 'DO THIS TO LIVE', which is caused by 'gun in face'; his requirement to that specific and important will (to decide for himself) failed."

Of course that's a lot of stuff to say every time and most people who are not hard determinists do not need spelled out for them.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

It eliminates the possibility of alternate actions and freedom of choice. Freedom of choice entails the possibility of doing otherwise, determinism eliminates any possibility of doing anything that is not determined by antecedents, one state fixing the next, which fixes the next and the next as events unfold as determined, not freely willed or freely chosen, but determined.

We agree that causal necessity is a matter of each event being reliably determined by antecedent events. But when I show you examples of causal necessity, in which each event is reliably determined by antecedent events, you claim it must be happening outside of causal necessity or that it must not be really happening.

There is no event that is ever outside of causal necessity. Causal necessity never tells us anything useful about any specific events, because it is a general fact that equally applies to all events.

But all of our real-life human issues happen to be about specific kinds of events. There are pandemic events where people become infected with Covid-19. There are car accidents. There are people hugging each other. There are people making tough decisions, like which car or house to buy, or who they will marry and when.

All of those various events are equally causally necessary, but each is a very different type of event, that we must deal with in different ways.

Free will is an event in which a person decides for themselves what they will do while free of coercion and undue influence. It happens. When it happens it is causally necessary, just like every other kind of event.

Coercion is an event in which a person is forced to act against their will by the threat of harm. It happens. When it happens it is causally necessary, just like every other kind of event.

Choosing is an event in which a person considers several possible options and chooses from these possibilities what they will do. It happens. When it happens it is causally necessary, just like every other kind of event.

There is no reasonable claim that these events are not happening.
There is no reasonable claim that these events are happening outside of causal necessity.

Therefore, it must be the case that these events are all compatible with the notion of causal necessity, and that the notion of causal necessity cannot be taken to exclude a single one of them.

For example, when you say, "Actions are performed as determined, without coercion or force, just as determined, not willed or freely chosen", you are mistaken. Among the actions determined by antecedent events are those actions that are chosen while free of coercion and undue influence. Thus they are "freely chosen".

And when you claim, "Which means that free will is incompatible with determinism....a system where all events unfold without deviation or alternate possibility or probability", you are also mistaken. Free will is a deterministic event within a deterministic universe, just like every other event. And every possibility that comes to mind will be causally necessary from any prior point in time.

Determinism eliminates nothing. Determinism changes nothing.

That's assertion.

The assertion is backed up by empirical evidence.
We observe people in the restaurant freely deciding for themselves what they will order for dinner. That's free will.
We observe each other posting contrary views on the topic of free will. That's free speech.
We observe the IIDB publishing our posts here. That's freedom of the press.
We observe that Abraham Lincoln published the Emancipation Proclamation freeing all slaves.
We observe various charities sending us free return address stickers, free of charge.
Shall I go on?

No need to go on. It misses the point. You are referring to actions performed as determined, not freely willed or chosen as if everyone could have done something different if only they so willed.

Uh, correction: IF they had so willed then they in fact would have done something different. The point of causal necessity is that what they willed was inevitable, that is, they would not have willed otherwise (even though they could).

Nobody is claiming that we can't think or act, or that we can't respond rationally, the issue here being the mechanisms and means of response within a determined system, which has been pointed out time and again.

Actually, you seem to be repeatedly insisting that we must choose between them: Either it was our own thoughts and actions that caused our behavior or it was determinism that caused our behavior. That is the incompatibilist position, is it not?

We are talking determinism, not Libertarian free will. Each and every response has antecedents, your brain first acquires information, processes that information and generates response, the very things you describe, not through free will but information processing.

I am talking determinism and operational free will. Operational free will is an event with antecedent causes in which the person decides for themselves what they will do. Each mental event within the free will event is the reliable result of antecedent causes (most of them being other mental events within the choosing operation).

When I describe "acquiring information" as reading the menu of possible dinners, and the "processing that information" as comparing our options and deciding what we will order, and that "response" as telling the waiter, "I will have the Chef Salad, please", you appear to claim that this is not happening.

You seem to be denying operational free will.

The state of the system at any given instance in time determining the response in that instance in time, with no possible deviation in any given instance.....you make a mistake, it is done, it can't be undone.

You may have the opportunity to correct the error some time later, or not. A car crash due to poor judgement cannot be undone, for instance.

This is understood. However, despite the fact that it cannot be undone, we might be able to learn something from this mistake, to avoid making the same mistake in the future. In order to learn from our mistakes, we usually consider what we could have done otherwise.

The claim that "we could not have done otherwise" prevents the consideration of what we could have done otherwise. However, the claim that "we would not have done otherwise" causes no conflict with considering what we could have done otherwise.

DBT: "They are determined by causal necessity, nothing else is possible. Necessitated actions must necessarily proceed without restriction as determined."

MBE: ''All of these events, including my choices, were causally necessary from any prior point in time. And they all proceeded without deviation from the Big Bang to this moment.'' - Marvin Edwards.

Note the difference in the two formulations.

You assert that the events were "determined by causal necessity", suggesting that causal necessity itself was the causal agent bringing about these events.

But I did not do that. Events are indeed causally necessary, but they are never caused by causal necessity. Only the interactions of the actual objects and forces that make up the physical universe can cause actual events. And we happen to be one of those objects that goes about in the world causing things to happen, and doing so for our own reasons and our own interests.

We are actual causal agents. Causal necessity has no agency. It is only figuratively, metaphorically, or anthropomorphically an agent. But we must not be misled by the metaphor into thinking it replaces our agency. It does not.

All of our thoughts and actions are, of course, causally necessary. That is to say, they follow one from the other as a string of reliable causes and their effects. But the thoughts and actions are actually ours.

Causal necessity has no thoughts and it chooses no actions. Causal necessity changes nothing.