There is no valid argument that free will, as a choice free of coercion and undue influence, is inconsistent with a world of perfectly reliable cause and effect. We empirically observe reliable causation in everything we think and do. We empirically observe people deciding for themselves what they will do. Neither observation can be denied. Therefore they must be compatible.
Free will is not "freedom from oneself" (freedom from inner necessity).
Free will is not "freedom from one's own brain" (freedom from unconscious processes).
Free will is not "freedom from causal necessity" (freedom from cause and effect).
Free will is an event in which a person decides for themselves what they will do, while free of coercion and other forms of undue influence that can reasonably be said to remove their control of the choice.
Nobody has said that free will must be, or is 'freedom from oneself' - the issue always has been the failure of the Compatibilist definition of free will. Basically, ignoring inner necessity.
What is "inner necessity" other than one's own thoughts and feelings, and the operation of one's own brain? There is no freedom from how our brains work, so compatibilist free will makes no such claim.
Free will is an event in which a person decides for themselves what they will do, while free of coercion and undue influence. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Necessity not being an instance of freedom.
Causal necessity includes all instances of all events. In most cases, it is causally necessary that we find ourselves making choices while free of coercion and undue influence. We are not free of causal necessity, and we never need to be. Free will only requires that we are free of coercion and undue influence.
Causal necessity is not a meaningful constraint, because what we will inevitably do is exactly identical to us just being us, doing what we choose to do. It is not something that anyone can or needs to be free of. The notion that we must be free of causal necessity in order to be "truly" free is a delusion.
That what is necessitated is not freely willed.
That is clearly false. In most cases it is causally necessary that we will be making our choices while free of coercion and undue influence. That is all that is required by compatibilist free will.
Free will is simply a choice we make while free of coercion and undue influence. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Indeed. It is the key premise of compatibilism that free will, as commonly understood and actually used to assess a person's moral and legal responsibility, is nothing more than freedom from coercion and undue influence.
It is a common event that everyone has observed with their own eyes. And it is the event that I showed you when I brought you to the restaurant. There are the people, each deciding for themselves what they will order for dinner, from a literal menu of alternate possibilities.
It's not complicated. Freedom from coercion is a real freedom. Freedom from significant mental illness is a real freedom. Freedom from authoritative command is a real freedom. Freedom from manipulation by hypnosis and other means is a real freedom.
But freedom from causal necessity is not a real freedom. Freedom from one's own brain is not a real freedom. Freedom from logical necessity is not a real freedom. The incompatibilist chooses to define free will in terms of these impossible freedoms, thus making free will impossible.
Whether free will exists or not depends entirely upon whether one chooses a meaningful and relevant definition (compatibilist) or whether one chooses an irrational, paradoxical definition (incompatibilist).
An assertion that ignores inner necessitation.
Again, you claim that compatibilism ignores inner necessitation, when compatibilism asserts that inner necessitation is how choosing what we will order for dinner works. There is no suggestion of freedom from inner necessitation!
Free will requires freedom from coercion and undue influence. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Necessitation is not a matter of choosing because the outcome is fixed by a deterministic interaction of elements that have nothing to do with freedom or will, function is not free will.
One of the outcomes of choosing an irrational definition is that the incompatibilist ends up making some very silly claims, claims that are easily refuted by simple empirical observations. One of these claims is that choosing doesn't "really" happen, which is easily disproved by a simple trip to the restaurant.
It is functionality that determines response. Which means that the decision-making process is a matter of entailment, not free choice or even choice (the no choice principle of determinism).
Right there, for example, in the "no choice principle", it is claimed that choosing doesn't really happen. But anyone who is not deceived by the wordplay can dispel that illusion simply by watching someone make a choice, such as the customers in the restaurant.
The "no choice principle" is a delusion. It is a paradox, a self-induced hoax, created by false but believable suggestions. I suppose it is a bit like hypnosis.
What I am pointing out is directly related to determinism as you define it. No alternate actions. All events fixed by prior states of the system. This, then that, no deviation.
That is correct. That is what is called "causal necessity": each event is reliably caused by prior events, and inevitably will happen, exactly as it does happen.
Among these events we find the people in the restaurant, reading the menu of alternate possibilities, and choosing for themselves what they will order for dinner. And we observe that they are not being forced to order things they do not want by coercion or other forms of undue influence. Thus we conclude that each customer is making a choice of their own free will.
Causal necessity means that it was inevitable that it would happen just so. The restaurant was inevitable, the menu of alternate possibilities was inevitable, the choosing was inevitable, the choice was inevitable, and the choice being free of coercion and undue influence (free will) was inevitable.
Determinism: given the state of the world at any moment in time, there is only one way it can be at the next moment.
That is figuratively correct, but literally false. To make it literally correct, replace the "can" with "will", as in "there is only one way it
will be at the next moment".
There is no getting around this.
There is no need to get around it. Causal determinism has not meaningfully changed anything.
Defining free will as an action performed without force or coercion is not adequate because all determined actions proceed as determined without restriction.
Apparently, what is "adequate" for the compatibilist is "inadequate" for the incompatibilist. But only the compatibilist gives an adequate description of reality. The incompatibilists want us to get lost in their delusion that one must be free of causal necessity in order to be free at all.