Posts by Onenski

Hi, everybody! Thank you so much for the birthday wishes. I'm glad I share birthday with Dave (Happy Birtday, Dave!)

I've finally turned 30, so I'm officially no longer one of the younger members of this garden.

I haven't been able to be very active or attend the meetings, but please know that I miss being able to join you all. I hope everyone is doing well. Receive a warm hug and my best wishes for this year.

Let me tell you that I've been practicing and reading Epicurus (and Lucretius, Diogenes of Oenoanda, and even Seneca, who make frequent quotes of Epicurus). Perhaps at this stage in my life, and after a very painful breakup, I've come to understand epicurean philosophy in a new way.

Despite its simplicity, the distinction between types of desires has been particularly helpful to me, as has the pursuit of a dynamic serenity. One of the Vatican Sayings (55) also stays in my memory, reminding me that the good things I've experienced remain with me as joyful memories and they're source of joy in my present.

I also found great peace in rereading Frances Wright. Her Epicurus makes me feel good (I know is a literary character, probably different from the historical Epicurus, but it's a great character if you ask me).

Once again, I hope you're all doing very well. Even though I don't know if I'll be able to participate more, be sure that I'll try. I hope I can see you all soon.

With affection,

Onenski.

Hi, I think Don has brought up a very important point. I’ll try to explain why.

Dear Kalosyni, I believe we can distinguish at least two types of descriptions of an 'Epicurean person'. On one hand, we can attempt to give a description of what an ideal Epicurean would be like—that is, a description of the Epicurean sage. This was more or less already done by Diogenes Laertius in Book X. We could also try to give our own description with slightly more modernized traits or attempt to reconstruct it from the texts we have available (as I’m sure Cassius would agree to do). This would be the 'true Scotsman' description in the fallacy Don mentioned. This description has a prescriptive function—it guides us toward what we should do to live more happily.

On the other hand, we have the description of people who try to be Epicurean. This description is much looser than the previous one because it doesn’t aim to say how we ought to be, but rather how we actually are (or at least those of us who strive to live more Epicurean lives). Here, you’ll find a wide range of people, some of whom you might filter out.

For example, there are people who consider themselves Epicurean simply because they enjoy eating delicious, even luxurious, food. You might filter out those descriptions if you think they’re missing something essential to being truly Epicurean (like knowing at least who Epicurus was).

Here, it’s worth mentioning something I myself have said in my own interpretation of Epicurus (and which perhaps has been somewhat inappropiate, or careless). I’ve said before that we are all Epicureans (meaning that we are all psychological hedonists), and the only thing we lack to be happy is recognizing it and acting in accordance with a calculus of pleasure and pain. It’s possible that Epicurus also thought that we all act in pursuit of pleasure (i.e., hedonistically), and if we acknowledged this, we’d avoid many mistakes and sufferings by directly seeking what brings us the most long-term pleasure.

What I mean is that we can even give a loose description under which we are all, in some way, Epicureans and, likewise, we can give descriptions that require greater commitment to be considered Epicurean. The important point of this kind of description is that it simply tells how people are.

From this simple distinction, follows that if you want to define a group of people committed to this philosophy to some degree, then the second type of description would be appropriate. If, instead, you’d like to use the description to guide your actions, then the first type would be preferable.

Based on what you write in your post, it seems to me that you want to establish certain criteria to define a group of epicurean people. I suggest some to you, ranging from the loosest to the strictest:

1. “We are all Epicureans, insofar as we act in pursuit of pleasure.”
2. “Those who say they are Epicureans, in fact, are, because by applying the label to themselves, they suggest they know what they’re talking about, and we can take them at their word.”
3. “Those who have read (at least) Epicurus and agree with his ideas but aren’t very interested in putting them into practice.”
4. “Those who have read (at least) Epicurus, agree with his ideas, and want to put them into practice—even if they don’t fully succeed.”
5. “Those who have read (at least) Epicurus, agree with his ideas, want to put them into practice, and actually succeed in doing so.”

For the last three criteria, I leave open how much they’ve read and how they’ve interpreted it. We already know there are more ascetic readings and less ascetic ones. We could also establish criteria regarding the type of reading.

As you can see, the choice of criteria isn’t something set in stone—it’s perhaps somewhat arbitrary. In any case, one can argue in favor of any of them, with greater or lesser success.

I hope I haven’t just stated the obvious and that this distinction is somewhat useful. Likewise, I hope you’re all doing well—I haven’t been able to meet up with you, but I hope to do so soon.

Thanks a lot for your congrats, guys! I really appreciate it and feel so lucky to have you all in my life.

Happy Birthday, Kalosyni and Joshua!, I wish you have a great day!

Hi, Don!

Just in order to clarify why it is considered a fallacy, think about this exaggerated example. Imagine that, in a community, people believe that men should work and women should stay at home. They might say: "for generations things have been like this, it's the natural order, it must be like this". Philosophers say that this reasoning is wrong, because they are infering a normative proposition from factual propositions. They're infering an ought from an is.

Curiously, the recognition of this kind of problematic reasonings is found first in David Hume. Moore took it and developed it in order to defend his idealistic theory of the Good.

Now, for more clarification, the paragraph you quote form Wikipedia takes the metaethical sense of the naturalistic fallacy. The basic idea is that in a naturalistic ethical project (like the Epicurean one, for example), holding that pleasure (or any other natural entity) is good, implies that there's something in pleasure that makes it good. The question is, which property is that and why pleasure has it? For them, it implies that pleasure is a privileged entity, because it has the property of being ethically good. Here, people like Pigliucci may say that pleasure has an evolutionary and instrumental origin, so it can't have the privilege of being the entity with the property of THE Good.

As you may see, this approach looks suspicious, because is taking the naturalistic Epicurean theory in a kind of platonic terms. And then, for surprise of no one, falsify it.

Hi guys, I share my point of view:

In philosophy there's something called the "naturalistic fallacy" which consists in affirming that you can't derive a normative proposition from factual ones. Naturalistic fallacy establishes a categorical distinction between the Good and how the world is. All platonic, stoic and kantian positions need this distinction to establish that the Form of the Good, Virtue or Duty are intrinsic values.

All naturalistic projects (including Utilitarianism, Epicureanism and other hedonisms) are the object of accusations of naturalistic fallacy. Now, curiosly, Pigliucci is committing a form of the fallacy by trying to reject ethical (normative) hedonism by using evolutionary biology arguments.
Let me say it clearly: science can falsify Epicurus' psychological hedonism, but not his ethical hedonism. The arguments against ethical hedonism must be philosophical (presumably ethical and metaethical).

Epicurus thought that ethical hedonism can be derived form psychological hedonism (and I consider that this is more or less clear in Torquatus' reasonings in On Ends). How well this works is an open question. A better argument for Pigliucci's position would be to attack this derivation, but even if it works, ethical hedonism can have more arguments on its base.

Dear, Kalosyni, in my case, I've been memorizing it, naturally, in Spanish. I like these parts from the first verses of Book I:

Quote

te, dea, te fugiunt venti, te nubila caeli adventumque tuum (I, 5-6)

(Eng.) Before thee, Goddess, and thy coming on, Flee stormy wind and massy cloud away

(Span.) De ti diosa, huyen los vientos, tu ahuyentas los nubarrones

Quote

Nam tu sola potes tranquilla pace iuvare mortalis (I, 31-2)

(Eng.) For thou alone hast power with public peace To aid mortality.

(Span.) Pues sola eres tú la que puede de paz serena a los hombres alivio mandar

I like to repeat them, because I think Lucretius may be talking not only about Venus, but, in a free interpretation, about pleasure itself.

When pleasure is present, the stormy clouds of pain and suffering go away (like in verses 5-6). And when we are in trouble, the only thing that can helps us is pleasure (only pleasure brings peace to us, mortals, like in verses 31-2).

Hi guys.

I'd like to say that I prefer not going beyond this point. I feel it has become in some moments a kind of ideological exchange of opinions. According to my hedonistic calculus, is better for me to stop commenting on this and move forward.

Martin, thanks for your comments. I disagree with them, but I'll attribute my disagreement to a flaw in my understanding of your ideas.

At least, I think we've advanced in the shared understanding of this aspect of Epicurean philosophy, that means that we no longer take just for granted that the swerve gives us the capacity to make choices. We have reflected on this and now we can form a more refined idea of it. If you let me, I'll do a reconstruction of the positions:

From one side, Martin saves the swerve. He speculates that we live in an almost deterministic scenario. We are already accountable, but the swerve gives us more options (and, it seems that, more options is better for agency and accountability).

For him, the swerve is a sufficient but not a necessary condition for agency and accountability. So, even if we were in a deterministic scenario in the macroscopic level (and Martin speculates we aren't), that wouldn't posit a thread for agency. Therefore, determinism is not a thread at all (first, because he has defined agency in a compatibilist way and, second, because he thinks that the world is not deterministic anyway).

For another side, Don considers (just like me) that we can abandon the idea of the swerve and stay with the core ideas of Epicurus.

For another last side, Cassius considers that we can abandon the swerve, because the feeling of free will/agency is prior to any other consideration in the epicurean system, as part of the canonics (possibly, it can be another prolepsis). This means that that feeling doesn't need any argument, basis or proof. It is on the base of the epicurean system.

See you, guys.

Cassius, I perfectly understand your reasons and the change to a private forum. I'm sorry if my comments have been annoying or impertinent. I don't pretend to be against Epicurean philosophy, nor just discuss for winning an argument or something like that. I'm aware of the importance of frank criticism: the importance of words, arguments, and the fact that we must separate friendship from any discussion.

At the same time, I wouldn't say what I say if I wasn't convinced that my position on free will is at least reasonable and that a connexion with epicurean philosophy can be made, or that Epicurean philosophy can be developed with the arguments I share.

In any case, I respect your considerations as a moderator (which I imagine is not an easy work at all), and I'm really really thankful for your work maintaining the group and spreading epicurean philosophy. My admiration for you and our friendship are superior to my desire to keep talking about this topic. If you want we stop talking about this and talk about something else, it would be ok.

Don, Mischel was not a determinist, he was just a psychologist, he worked specially on personality, but he has a study on self-control in children. He followed these children for years to see if the self-control showed in infancy was correlated to later choices in life. His discoverings are very interesting.

Martin, thank you very much for your analysis, I appreciate it. I hope the next comments make sense to you.

Quote from Martin

Anyone trying to reproduce a chemical reaction can tell you that it is sometimnes not like that because in addition to the known A, B, C, there may be unknown events D, E, F, which combined with A, B, C give a different result because D, E, F have changed while A, B, C have not.

In this observation, I'd like to point out that the premise is not about what we know, but about what it is. I'd appreciate if you tell us if the premise is correct by doing this observation.

Probably we don't know D, E, F, but they are part of the circumstances to make that A, B and C cause the phenomenon. Do you agree that if we had different circumstances or different causes we have a distinct phenomenon or, even, we don't have that phenomenon at all. (For example, if we don't have B either the phenomenon doesn't occur or occur another one.)

Quote from Martin

"16. The swerve doesn't permit to explain regularities in nature (for 14 and 15). (From this we can conclude that human behavior is impossible, but let's consider more things.)"

This statement is wrong. We can arrange apparent irregularities in a systematic way and find and explain regularities. In the quantum physical analog, this is expressed in the Ehrenfest theorem: The laws of classical physics for classical quantities are usually valid for expectation values of the corresponding quantum mechanical quantities. (This is my dumbed down version.)

I forgot to make explicit that 16 is about regularities in macroscopic nature (for 8, if I remember well). According to the argument, we have new events and new circumstances all the time (we don't have the same phenomena because for this we need the same causes (if I'm ok with the last observation), but new causes (the swerves) produce different phenomena). So regularities in the macroscopic level should be less, much less, that those we see. Irregularities should be more than regularities.

Quote from Martin

The argument in 17 is mixing und blurring different perspectives. Free will and moral responsibility are words of idealism meant for an I identified as a supernatural soul different from the body with which it is only temporarily associated. In Epicurus' philosophy, the soul is not an independent entity on its own but an organ of the living being. In the materialistic context, the meaning of free will and moral responsibility is different. If we do not change the words, we hide the change in definition. With the change in definition, the logic becomes invalid.
We can try to reformulate 17 with the analog words. For free will, agency is an established choice. For moral responsibility, we might choose accountability. With the new words, we might state:
17'. Agency is the basis for accountability (if a person acts, she's responsible for her action). A person can't be responsible for something beyond her control.
E.g., I usually do not cause outbreaks of volcanoes. An outbreak of a volcano will not give me remorse, and no one can reasonably hold me accountable for it.
However, an action which I carry out and which results in unpleasant consequences may give me remorse, and I may be held accountable for it, irrespective of how much leeway I had to do otherwise.

Possibly you missed one of the comments in which I made a difference between leeway freedom (the capacity to do otherwise) and source freedom (the capacity to act intentionally) in the free will debate. By reading your analysis of the argument I observed that you took the source sense instead of the leeway sense. The argument is directed to the second one (as I stated in the assumption, 1).

Agency and accountability are compatibilist concepts (this means, that they are compatible with a deterministic scenario, even if we are not in a deterministic scenario). I understand why if we take them, the argument gets invalid and your observations are precise in this aspect. But there would be a change in terms in the middle of the argument, because I started with the incompatibilist free will (leeway sense). (I hope you see that if we introduce the swerve as the basis for free will we are trying to defend the leeway sense, not the source sense.)

I don't see a problem if we take the compatibilist approach for epicurean philosophy, I even suggested it. However, that would do the swerve an unnecessary concept for free will basis. It would be a concept just to talk about the formation of compounds, as you pointed out.

Quote from Martin

The swerve may increase the options James has to choose from. It is his choice which option he chooses and not merely a random outcome.

Another observation is that if we part from agency and accountability, more options (introduced by a very limited and specific swerve) don't add something relevant for moral evaluation. That is, the swerve is unnecessary and irrelevant for accountability. (If this part sounds obscure I can explain more.)

But let's think, as the argument goes in this part, that the swerve occur (and it has macroscopic effects and occurs continually) and we want leeway freedom. The idea is that we need a lot of luck to be successful in our purposes. First, we may have intentions that were formed by uncaused causes; intentions that have nothing to do with you and your life. We will need luck to have the intentions that are according to our personal identity, that is, we need luck in order to the swerves don't produce random intentions.

Second, we may have an intention and not being able to put them in practice in circumstances that permit to do it (because there are new intentions formed by uncaused causes). We need luck in order to the swerves don't produce something that precludes the intentions that are according to you.

Third, we may have an intention to act, do the action and have outcomes (because there are new events caused by the swerves) that would be unreasonable to attribute to the person. We need luck, so that our actions have the intended outcomes.

With these observations in mind, do you think the argument is valid?

Again, thanks for your observations!

Hi, Don, thank you very much for your comments and for being caritative in your interpretation of my comments.

Quote from Don

The word Metaphysical

I'm sorry for using the word without explain what I meant. Metaphysics, in effect, is a branch of philosophy that goes beyond physics. The idea is that its theses cannot be proven or falsified by empirical data. Empirical information is consistent with two opposite theses. Some examples of metaphyisical objects of study are God (whether exist a supernatural entity with certain properties or not), soul, time (what is its nature or even if it exists), free will, universals, personal identity, the existence of a self, etc.

Everyone has an assumption on any of these objects. Some people believe that a God exists, that they have a soul, that time exists and has certain properties and so on. If they reflect about these assumptions they may find arguments to sustain them, or to change their minds.

You may think that no matter what people assume, they will live their lifes anyway. But I've insisted that these assumptions give form to our practices. People who believe in a God usually prey, those who believe in soul are afraid of their luck after death (or they trust in a Paradise), people who believe that humans have a telos will try to improve their virtue in order to be excellent human beings.

Some people change their metaphysical commitments in a moment of their lives: they discover that a God is not necessary for their lives, or they think that humans don't have a telos and they don't need to be virtuous just by itself.

So this debate is metaphysical, all the empirical information works for both conclusions, the arguments need to be metaphysical and reasonable. Sometimes people use a reduction to absurd (like in the argument I've just posted), for example.

Ontology, in other hand, can be thought as a list of things a theory or a person consider that exist. Metaphysical commitments use to have implications in ontology. For example, Epicurus considered that gods exist, but his metaphysical commitment with materialism implied that those gods should be material. This commitment also implies that ghosts don't exist.

Now, on the issue of control. You think that free will skepticism imply that we lack control over our actions. Not exactly, we lack leeway freedom, but we have control over our actions. The capacity, for example, for self control can be explained as the outcome of your personal history under certain circumstances, I invite you to read Walter Mischel's "The Marshmallow Test" to have an idea of what I mean, or Sapolsky's "Behave".

In other words, the notion of agency (as source freedom) is compatible with determinism. But, as you found in the characterisation of free will skepticism, that notion is not the one that permit to attribute moral responsibility (for these skeptics).

If you also take the conclusion that we can't have to much indeterminism (or not having it at all), almost all the time we are not free. If we need leeway freedom to exercise epicurean philosophy, then the libertarians would have just a little degree of freedom to exercise epicurean philosophy. Their situation wouldn't be so different that the one of the free will skeptic.

In order to improve the account on the swerve I thought about the following argument. It is important to identify the flaws in it, possibly Martin or DavidN can help us.

1. Assumption: The swerve is the basis for sustaining free will (leeway freedom a.k.a. the capacity to have done otherwise).

2. Definition: the swerve is a random deviance of the movement of atoms. Is an uncaused cause.

3. Definition: determinism is the affirmation that every event in the Universe is caused by prior events. Indeterminism can be defined as the falsity of determinism: the affirmation that not all events are caused by prior events.

4. The swerve works indeterministically; introduces indeterminism (for 2 and 3)

5. Incompatibilist premise: leeway freedom is incompatible with determinism.

6. The swerve can have effects only on the microscopic level or both in the microscopic and macroscopic level.

7. If the swerve has effects only in microscopic level, the indeterminism (for 4) occurs only in this level, so that the macroscopic level operates in a deterministic way. (This is actually Sapolsky's point of view defended in "Determined"). If this is the case, then the swerve is not the basis for leeway freedom (For 1 and 5)

8. If the swerve has effects on both the microscopic and macroscopic levels, then there is indeterminism (for 4) in both levels. This means that there are events that weren't caused by prior events (that is, the swerves). (For 6 and 7)

9. The swerves either occurred only in one moment in the past and the rest of the time the world worked and works deterministically or they occur continually.

10. If the swerves occured only once, or just in the past and the rest of the time the world worked deterministically, then the swerve is not the basis for leeway freedom (for 1, 5 and 9).

11. The swerves happen continually (for 9 and 10, and the affirmation of Lucretius (Book ii) that the very existence of bodies need the swerve).

12. Events can have multiple effects and be caused by multiple events (as pointed out by DavidN). Besides, scientific reasoning tell us that the same event has the same cause(s): if a phenomenon happens in certain circumstances by events A, B, C, we will expect that in the same circumstances under the same events A, B, C, we will have the same phenomenon.

13. The swerves are unpredictable and their effects are unpredictable as well (for 2 and 4)

14. If the swerve occurs continually and unpredictably (for 11 and 13), it would be less probable that the same circumstances for a phenomenon repeat (Considering 12). It seems that there will be new circumstances continually and there would be new and different events continually.

15. The basis for regularities and laws in nature is the repetition of phenomena.

16. The swerve doesn't permit to explain regularities in nature (for 14 and 15). (From this we can conclude that human behavior is impossible, but let's consider more things.)

17. Free Will is the basis for moral responsibility (if a person acts freely, she's responsible for her action). A person can't be responsible for something beyond her control (in a strong sense, as the capacity to have done otherwise, the leeway sense). (For 1)

18. Human behavior is under the unpredictable effects of the swerves (for 8 and 13), so we can imagine at least the following scenario: James intends to do A in order to have certain effects. The swerve can produce events between the intention to do A and the action A, and between the action A and its intended effects. So, sometimes he has success in his intention (he does A), sometimes the action doesn't ocur (because there are unpredictable events that produce other events different to James intention), and sometimes the action A has different effects than those intended by James.

He needs lucky to act and to have the effects he wants.

19. If human choices are not the outcome of their will, their behavior is beyond their control and they're not responsible of it. If the outcomes of actions are beyond reasonable control of the agents, then they're not morally responsible for them (for 17 and 18).

20. If agents are not responsible of their actions, then they don't have free will (for 17).

21. Agents don't have free will (for Modus tollens of 19 and 20) [Modus tollens is an inference that say that if we have the conditional "If A then B", it is equivalent to "if not B then not A". So if we have "Not B". Then we infer "not A"]

22. Given that 21 is the product of assuming 1 and leads to it's negation, there's a contradiction.

23. If an assumption leads to a contradiction, then we should conclude that it's false. So, the swerve is not the basis for free will.

If the argument is valid, then the swerve will need revision. So far I inferred that the swerve occurs continually and its effects are on the macroscopic level, but these characteristics are problematic.

Contemporary libertarians tend to restrict the scope of indeterminism, but one needs to be careful, because there's the risk of ad hoc explanation.

Another option is to take a compatibilist account of free will, but that would make the swerve an useless concept.

Probably you have the impression that determinism is one of the "Four Horsemen", but if you think carefully on a strong indeterminism, you may want to include it as well.

Hi, Godfrey, thanks for commenting.

Quote from Godfrey

Onenski I'd like to "swerve" away from theory and metaphysics for a moment and ask: Can, and how can, one find eudaimonia in their life if they believes in hard determinism?

As Bryan notes, determinism is counter to lived experience. This implies that in order to live pleasantly with a deterministic philosophy one must negate one's perceptions, which seems to me to be problematic.

The possible practical problems that one may find in a metaphysical or physical conclusion are not reasons to deny that conclusion. The story says, for example, that certain pythagorean was killed when he revealed that the square root of 2 was irrational. The, seemingly, practical inconveniences were not a reason to deny that. Pythagoreans believed that it was very bad for their lives that there were irrational numbers.

Some philosophers (like Saul Smilansky), however, have concluded that effectively free will skepticism leads to immoral behavior or meaningless lives. In their opinion, we should maintain free will illusion.

For others (Strawson) , even if we recognize that we're not free, we can't resist having certain reactive attitudes. For them, we can't feel resentment when someone hurts us, or gratitude when someone benefits us.

Other philosophers (Derk Pereboom, Greg Caruso) think that free will skepticism imply a modification of several of our practices, but they're optimistic that these changes can enhance our lives and make them more just.

Finally, how do an epicurean find eudaimonia?: recognizing his place in the universe, studying nature, moderating desires, looking for pleasures, avoiding pain/suffering, feeling satisfied, enjoying time with friends. Is that contradictory with free will skepticism? If you think so, you can help me in developing my understanding both of free will skepticism and of epicureanism by pointing out those contradictions.

I insist that I'm not an expert, I don't think I have the last word. I recognize I may be wrong. But I know as well that having a divergent opinion can improve discussion.

Cassius, I'd like to point out something so that the arguments, again, become stronger.

Quote from Cassius

The burden of proof on the issues is not on Epicureans, who are living as nature provided using the faculties nature provided. The burden of proof is on the religionists, skeptics, and determinists, and Epicurus' arguments provide real-world observations that contradict their assertions. Nothing comes from nothing - the supernatural gods are refuted. Those who allege nothing can be known contradict themselves - skepticism is refuted. You can cite the swerve or simply say that it is not necessary to "live with necessity" because at the very least we can exit life when it ceases to please us - determinism is refuted. Each issue comes down to having confidence in the faculties that nature gave us vs imagining that there are "logical" proofs that can invalidate our practical experience. Epicurus says to go with practical experience.

It's necessary to say that every metaphysical conclusion has the burden of proof in order to be solid, otherwise is only assumed. Both, free will and free will skepticism have the burden of proof to sustain their conclusions. No matter if it's an automatic or an extended belief among people, that doesn't make it true.

Quote from Cassius

The religionists and the radical skeptics and the hard determinists don't have the evidence to establish their conclusions with certainty either, but they happily insist on superficially persuasive arguments which have real impact on real people who swallow them.

If any metaphysical conclusion is on the same level, we can read this paragraph like this:

The atheist and the dogmatics and free will defenders don't have the evidence to establish their conclusions with certainty either, but they happily insist on superficially persuasive arguments which have real impact on real people who swallow them [e. g. blaming, punishments, meritocracy, revictimization, resentment, guilt].

I don't mean to be ironic, or something like that. I just pretend to point out certain aspects of arguments in order to make enhance them. It's not so easy to refute a position, and it's worthy to develop the most solid interpretation of Epicurus.

I guess the best role I can have is to be a healthy critic of arguments in this debate. Instead of being a defender of Free Will Skepticism.

Pacatus, Mitchell is a libertarian. In philosophical community, there are just a few libertarians just like there are a few free will skeptics (compatibilism is the established position for majority). Contemporary libertarians don't say that everytime we take decisions that event is an uncaused cause. Sophisticated libertarians think that it's enough to affirm that sometimes human beings make free choices (for example, in very important moments in your life, or for others when you are in the best circumstances, so that you take the more informed and rational choice).

So far as I know, Mitchell thinks that the brain can be modeled as a quantum computer that evolved to take choices the best as possible, evaluating complex information of environment. The best way this can be done, for him, it's by developing free will (taken in the leeway sense).

If I'm wrong in this interpretation, then Mitchell would be a compatibilist. I suggest to discuss how the Epicurean notion of Free Will should be understood (as a libertarian or as a compatibilist account). For compatibilist, determinism and free will are compatible. I guess that may be in contradiction with the common passages on the topic.

Quote from Cassius

By providing how small is the degree of the swerve you have a theory that allows both for the swerve of the atom giving rise to "choice" while also allowing the rest of the universe to proceed in a uniformly mechanistic way.

( Cassius, surely your interpretation is stronger than what I'm going to critic.)

This fragment imply an ad hoc explanation (that is, a very specific solution to explain a phenomenon, but without more general application in the theory). If the swerve only explains free will but doesn't have any other consequence, then it's ad hoc.

And the critic can be worse, there could be a vicious circle.

1. The swerve explains free will.

2. Free Will is the only reason for arguing in favor of the existence of the swerve.

If this is true, neither of them have a real basis. I'm sure this is not what you mean, but I write this to nudge you, so that we can develop a better argument.

I'd like to add this:

So far as I understand, the swerve is a mechanism to introduce indeterminism to the world. By definition is an uncaused cause (a slightly deviance from the direction the atoms have, that deviance is uncaused by any prior event). If the swerve is not indeterministic, then Epicurean position becomes a compatibilism (because the world would be deterministic and there would be free will, just like Epicurus affirms).

If the indeterminism stays in the level of the microscopic, it would be useless to explain free choices of the agents. Indeterminism should extend to macroscopic events. And for not being an ad hoc explanation, we need more instances of free (random) events.

I hope this comment can be useful to develop and strength your ideas.

Quote from DavidN

Being that I am professionally trained in root cause analysis I can tell you that the first rule is that if you get the root cause wrong all attempts to fix the problem will fail at best and more likely spider out into new problems confusing the original issue.

You're right. We can't know all the prior causes nor the future event caused by them. But we can do the best we can. Think about addictions. We don't have complete information of its causes, but there are information that psychology, neurochemistry, social work, and so on, that can be used to design a better strategy and public policies to help people in addiction, and to reduce new cases. That sounds like a better strategy than trying to deter people with higher sentences or blaming people for their choices ("choice" taking in the source freedom/agency sense).
One can do that without discarding free will (I hope more governments do it), but it makes so more sense from Free Will Skepticism.

Again, David, thanks for taking the time to comment.

Hi, DavidN. Thanks for taking the time to comment.

Quote from DavidN

The fact that Causes exist does not necessitate determinism, this is a False Dichotomy fallacy. A cause could lead to multiple outcomes and in reverse any given event can have multiple causes, as Epicurus already theorizes. In reality A does not necessitate B.

I gave the characterisation of determinist. They believe that the common assumption that "every event in the universe is caused by prior events" is true and the belief in free will is false. Determinism is false if there is at least one event that wasn't caused by any prior event: an uncaused cause. The majority of philosophers prefer to admit that although determinism can be true, free will it's compatible with it.
Metaphysical determinism is independent of epistemological determinism (the idea that we can predict deterministically any o some events). Epistemological determinism is, effectively falsified thanks to chaos theory. Sapolsky agrees with it.

Quote from DavidN

The reason determinism requires proof rather than the other way around, atleast on this thread, is because the question at hand is not whether or not the universe is deterministic but is epicureanism deterministic or even compatible with determinism.

Conceded.

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As for Sapolsky's science, his version of quantum mechanics requires that we eliminate singularities, alter the currently accepted notion of the big bang and accept new theories in there place, of quantum gravity, and of multiple quantum universes that removes variables rather than adding variables. In all of this I find his math to be at the very least overly convenient if not simplistic. Like Planck's Blackbody, instead of dealing with the variables he simply finds ways to eliminate them. Which is what I had suspected in my previous comment before even diving into his work.

Did you read the chapter of the book or you're speculating about he implications of his determinism? He doesn't talk about any of those things.

Quote from DavidN

Back to the matter at hand, Epicurus. I don't believe hard determinism can be reconciled with Epicureanism, but to be fair lets say it can. You would need to tackle the swerve, because as long as the swerve exists a cause or set of causes can lead to a number of effects or none at all, thus determinism cannot exist. Without the swerve you effectively render epicurean physics Democritean. You would then have to go through all the material and reconcile every instance were choice is required, because concept of choice would require a non-deterministic universe. In deterministic terms choice simply becomes effect. Effectively rendering the philosophy pointless, IMHO.

In strict sense, you're right. I used a flexible notion of reconciliation. My opinion is that the swerve has only one function in epicurean theory: sustaining free will. But it's not clear if it can be defended independently of the reason of defend that we feel we are free. In the case of the atoms, we have the inferences by analogy. How he arrives to the swerve and which phenomena help to explain besides our feeling?

I think the scientific spirit, the hedonism and the materialism can be reconciled with Free Will Skepticism.

Quote from DavidN

Two fallacies here, one Persuasive definition, choice is improperly used or defined here. If a choice is completely constrained, as your trying to prove, it's not a choice it becomes effect following cause.

The notion of agency, as I said up, is consistent with determinism. An agent can choose intentionally in a deterministic scenario without contradiction. If choice requires necessarily free will (leeway freedom), then you're right and, probably, I'm not using the language competently.

I'd agree with the fact that choices are events following causes, why not? Human beings are natural beings like other animals and other living beings.
I take the opportuniy to ask you something. In your point of view, who has free will and where is its origin? Do non-human animals, or other beings, have free will? Can they be morally responsible?
I didn't understand the last paragraph, I'm sorry.

Hi, Pacatus, thanks for comment.

Quote from Pacatus

Following TauPhi , I would suggest that any "answers" to that question would, perforce, remain thoroughly speculative, even if intellectually interesting.

That's correct, it's a speculative issue. However, behind our practical life there are a bunch of metaphysical assumptions: there are people who, for example, believe in God and their behaviours and beliefs take certain direction. The same happen with belief in free will.

I hope it's evident that I don't pretend to have the last word, and of course I don't intend to change the viewpoints of anybody. I just think that I could add something to this thread with my understanding of this debate in order to make it richer.

Quote from Cassius

how does believing that everything you do is predetermined enhance a person's happiness?

It's a belief about how the world is. It is what it is. Besides, Sapolsky believes, for example, that many people can feel liberated from regrets and guilts (I guess specially the belief that their circumstance it's their fault).

I think it can contribute to certain amount of individual serenity, and if more people agree with it, it can lead to a society more just. Imagine how happily can people live if the practical political, social and economic problems are solved in their roots instead of just blaming and punishing.

But, again, this is a metaphysical question. One can ask the same for this than for other questions: "how does believing that there isn't a God enhance a person's happiness?", "how does believing that the stars don't influence behavior enhance a person's happiness?", "how does believing that human beings are not special in the universe enhance a person's happiness?".

We have motives to investigate which metaphysical conclusion has the best arguments. The next part is to reasoning how that conclusion influence our ethical commitments. It can't go backwards (begin with ethical commitments and argue in favor of metaphysical conclusions, unless we want to conclude whatever people like).

Quote from Cassius

1. Well then Onenski what is your definition of "free will?"

There two main ways to understand free will on the debate: leeway freedom (for incompatibilism: deterministic and libertarian) and source freedom (for compatibilists).

Leeway freedom: it's the capacity to have acted otherwise. Suppose, for a moment, that there are a chain of events caused by other events. That chain leads to the event that I will choose a strawberry ice cream. If I had leeway freedom, I'd be able to choose strawberry, chocolate, vanilla or any other, or doing something else. That is, prior events don't determine what I'm going to do.

Source freedom. I think it's more related to agency. The idea is that from the fact that people is the source of their intentional actions, we can attribute responsibility to them. The best way to understand it is with the famous Frankfurt cases.

Imagine that there's a scientific who implants a chip in my brain. He knows that I want to kill James, but to be sure the chip will activate if I stop in the last moment. So if I don't shoot, the chip will activate and I will shoot anyway. It results that I kill James, so the chip wasn't activated. The argument is that I couldn't do otherwise, but I'm responsible for my action, because I intentionally did it.

The majority of philosophers think that leeway freedom is very hard to defend, so they prefer compatibilism and a kind of source freedom.

Sapolsky's book, by the way, doesn't touch compatibilism. That's why so many philosophers think it's not a serious objection to moral responsibility.

Is I said, Epicurus is usually considered a libertarian, so it can be interpreted that he was in favor of leeway freedom.

Quote from Cassius

2. What is your view of the word "agency?"

I share a very broad concept from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

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In very general terms, an agent is a being with the capacity to act, and ‘agency’ denotes the exercise or manifestation of this capacity. The philosophy of action provides us with a standard conception and a standard theory of action. The former construes action in terms of intentionality, the latter explains the intentionality of action in terms of causation by the agent’s mental states and events.

So, I understand that an agent is a subject who can act intentionally. There's not a contradiction with Free Will Skepticism.

Quote from Cassius

3. Though it appears to be a scholium, what is your view of the passage "with us lies the chief power in determining events, some of which happen by necessity and some by chance, and some are within our control..."?

I think that, as TauPhi sometimes recalls, there are aspects of the ancient thought that we can, and will never be able to, understand. We don't know exactly how Epicurus understood the debate and arguments on determinism and freedom. Possibly he thought it in terms of Fate (like in ancient tragedies). Fatalism is not the same that determinism and if he thought they were the same, I'd understand why he was so against it. (I doubt about this possibility because, supposedly, he knew very well Democritus' philosophy.)

In any case, my personal opinion on that passage of the Letter to Menoeceus, is that he's talking superficially (because is just a letter and it's about ethics).

He recognizes the distinction that it's present in other philosophers, including the Stoics: there are things in my control, and things beyond my control. Those beyond my control include necessity and chance (this one make sense with the introduction of the swerve).

I hope I answered clearly. Free will Skepticism can be a very sofisticated and interesting point of view, and I'm thankful that there's a thread on how epicureanism can be reconciled with it. I wish I can make a better contribution later.

Thanks for your answer, Cassius.

Quote from Cassius

So why do you not consider your position to be hard determinism? (I see you called it "hard incompatibilism.")

"Hard incompatibilism" is Derk Pereboom's position and it means that whether the world is deterministic of indeterministic, we don't have free will. Another possible term is "Skeptic of free will".

Quote from Cassius

it seems to me that Epicurus thought that "reality' is what we perceive (or experience might be better word). And as I think has already been mentioned by several people in several ways, we perceive that we have the ability to make choices.

Well, reality is more than what we perceive, because, as you usually recall, Epicurus thought that we can infer the existence of things that we can't perceive.

That, I hope, also means that we can be wrong in our experiences. Think about Müller-Lyer illusions: we can't stop "perceiving" two equal lines with opposing arrows as if they were different in magnitude. The same happens with other illusions, like that of the Sun going around the Earth because we see it rising every morning. Or the size of the Sun or the Moon. Indeed, we can infer the real nature of the world and see that we were wrong with those illusions.

Psychological facts can also be explained and criticize in that way. Beliefs are the product of a complex net of personal experience, culture, and a lot of other factors. Belief in free will can be an illusion too (we don't know it, but we can't assume it isn't just because).

Quote from Cassius

Of course the meaning of "appropriately" is going to be entirely contextual, but I would not consider it helpful to my own or to other people's lives to consider myself or them to be unable to make choices

The idea of Free Will Skepticism it's not that people don't make choices. The idea is that those choices are not independent of prior causes (in fact, that they are constrained totally, even if we don't see it). People will keep making choices, the difference will be how independent they think they are.