The denial of choosing as a real event makes your determinism invalid. Choosing is just as real as walking, adding numbers, or brushing your teeth. These are all real events that actually happen in the real world. And every one of these events is as deterministically entailed as any other.
... There is no mention of 'choosing' in determinism except when it slipped in by compatibilists seeking to support their contention of free will.....
There is no mention of 'brushing your teeth' in determinism either. But, just like choosing, it is a deterministic event. Would you deny that 'teeth brushing' is a real event, claiming it is slipped in by the American Dental Association, to support their contention that the 'teeth brushing' event is a true causal mechanism that reduces cavities?
The definition of determinism does not require a list of all of the events that it encompasses. Determinism simply asserts that ALL events are reliably caused by prior events. This includes the events of walking, talking, chewing gum, calculating sums, and choosing what we will have for dinner.
... which is not actually based on choosing between options because there are no alternate actions within the system.
And yet there is the menu, filled with alternate actions, and we must choose one of them if we are to have our dinner. And if you smile in a mirror, you can see the multiple teeth that you need to brush. And you had best hope that if you ever get a cavity, that your dentist will choose the correct tooth to drill!
Choosing is a real event that takes place in the real world. Determinism, to be valid, may not erase any real events, because if it does, the causal chains collapse. So, choosing not only will happen, it necessarily must happen in a deterministic world.
Events don't alter because they are chosen. They alter according to prior states of the system where all events progress and evolve as they are determined, not chosen, and proceed without deviation.
Nothing is being altered. Choosing causally determines what we will have for dinner. And it was always going to happen that we would be making that choice from the restaurant menu, according to our own goals and reasons, exactly as we did.
Determinism doesn't change anything that happens. Determinism doesn't change why anything happens. It simply asserts that all events will be reliably caused by prior events. Choosing is the prior event that causes our dinner order. And, because it was actually us doing the choosing, the waiter will bring the meal, and the bill for it, to us, and to no one else.
You know that your definition does not permit deviations or choosing alternate actions.
My definition permits everything that actually does happen to happen. Choosing happens, and determinism does not prevent it from happening, but rather necessitates that it will happen, exactly as it does happen.
The incompatibilist cripples their determinism, by asserting that events that obviously are happening are not "really" happening. It is a delusion caused by figurative thinking.
So insisting that real choices are being made is to ignore the very terms and conditions that compatibilists describe.
I have explicitly given you the very terms and conditions that my compatibilism describes. Everything that happens is reliably caused by prior events. We, ourselves, in nearly all cases, happen to be the most meaningful and relevant prior causes of our deliberate actions. The act of deliberation is normally the most meaningful and relevant cause of the deliberate act (exceptions would include things like a significant mental illness, in which case the illness is held responsible).
If all events must necessarily happen as determined, there is no choice involved.
Clearly false, as easily demonstrated in any restaurant.
A singular action that has no alternatives is hardly a matter of choice.
The alternatives are there on the restaurant menu. We have no alternative but to consider the alternatives. The series of events that takes us through the choosing process are deterministic, of course. But that series of events, that proceed without deviation, constitute the choosing operation itself.
Choosing is a deterministic event. And free will is likewise a deterministic event.
Free will does not require freedom from deterministic causal necessity, it only requires freedom from coercion and undue influence. Nothing more. Nothing less.
We may be tempted into figurative thinking, such as picturing causal necessity AS IF it were someone holding a gun to our head or otherwise forcing us to do something against our will. But that is never the case with causal necessity. What we will inevitably do by causal necessity is exactly identical to us just being us, doing what we choose to do. It is not a meaningful constraint. It is never something that we can or need to be "free of". It is nothing more than ordinary cause and effect, something that we all take for granted.
The determinism I'm using is fleshed out with all the causal mechanisms in play. It can be safely embraced by science without becoming entrapped by all of the nonsensical statements that result from figurative thinking. Scientists are empiricists.
The figurative thinking lies at the feet of compatibilism, with those who insist on inserting the word 'choosing' within the definition of a system that has none because there are no alternate actions.
The
test for figurative thinking is simple: compare what is said to what is actually observed to be happening. Are the people in the restaurant actually choosing from the menu what they will order for dinner? Yes. Choosing is a logical operation that inputs multiple options, applies some criteria of comparative evaluation, and outputs a single choice. There is the literal menu containing multiple options, there is the literal dinner order given to the waiter. The criteria of evaluation is not directly observable to us, but we can ask any customer how they went about deciding to order that meal, and most of them will be able to tell us.
So, choosing literally (actually, objectively, really and truly) happened. The compatibilist's claim is literal. Only the incompatibilist's claim is figurative.