On Tue, Jul 8, 2025 at 7:56 PM Brent Meeker <[email protected]> wrote:
*> You must know that is meant by someone's will.* *I know that just like everything else, someone's will is the way it is for a reason and is therefore deterministic OR is the way it is for no reason and is therefore random. * *>Your pretend confusion is an example of sophistry.* *In a philosophical argument if your opponent starts waving his hands and running around screaming "sophistry" and "you know what I mean" then you have won the argument. Your feeling that you only need to look at the surface everyday meaning of words to make profound philosophical discoveries is naïve. * > *You can look it up in the dictionary.* *Ah** the dictionary, the wonderful wonderful dictionary, that fount of all knowledge containing the definitions of words, that are made of words, which also have definitions that are also made of words that are also in the dictionary which [...]. * *What is the definition of coerce? To compel. What is the definition of compel? To coerce. And round and round we go. * *> The point of the word "compatibilist" is it modifies the "free" to mean > "free of coercion"* > *If** somebody in Oklahoma is killed in a tornado while they are hiding in their basement was he "free of coercion"? I don't think so, I don't think he wanted to go into that basement, I think he was coerced by circumstances to do so. And somebody in Kyiv killed in a bombing attack while hiding in his basement was also not free of coercion. And both are now equally dead. * *> it makes the freedom compatibile with determinism. * > *Compatibilism is just a silly word game played by people who don't like saying the word "determinism" but do you like saying the words "free will". It's the same mindset that causes people to say "he passed away" rather than "he died". * *>> Coercion is just something that stops me from doing what I would >> otherwise want to do. * > > *> No it's something that motivates you to do something you would otherwise > consider very undesirable.* > *H**iding in your basement is very undesirable but you'd do it if a tornado was approaching or if your house was about to be bombed by Russia. And I note that neither the tornado nor Vladimir Putin has anything personally against you, he's never even heard of you. And the pilots of those bombers know just as much about you as the tornado does, which is nothing. * * John K Clark See what's on my new list at Extropolis <https://groups.google.com/g/extropolis>* dv5 -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/CAJPayv259DQwoXk%3DedhSZvT6AOoeTE1tm4dM4t5zBAGkFYC-5Q%40mail.gmail.com.
