no offense, but you are simply clueless on compatabalism, astonishingly so.
Compatabalists ARE determinist (you've yet to acknowledge that BTW, wonder why ; - ) )
Compatabalism is simply the position that determiism and free will are compatible, (free will suitably redefined)
Here's the first thing I wrote in this discussion:
"If I had to guess, I'd say that determinism is probably true". You see?
Of course I know what compatibalism is. Unlike you, I've actually read compatibalists... on the topic of compatibalism!
You seem to think that you have found something remarkable by realizing that compatibalists are determinists.
Technically, I don't think you need to be a determinist to be a compatibalist. You could just see determinism and free will as compatible even if you believe some indeterminism to be true.
there is NOTHING on this page that makes the claim that compatabalists acknowledge the ability to freely chose.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/compatibilism/
It's exactly opposite, foundational to the notion of compatabalists "free will" is the notion that "freedom in the expression freedom of will modifies a condition of action and not the agent’s will"
see for example
1. If a person acts of her own free will, then she could have done otherwise (A-C).
2. If determinism is true, no one can do otherwise than one actually does (D-E).
C. Therefore, if determinism is true, no one acts of her own free will (F).
Call this simplified argument the Classical Incompatibilist Argument. According to the argument, if determinism is true, no one has access to alternatives in the way required by the Garden of Forking Paths model of free will.[11]
I'm not going through the most basic arguments for compatibalism. You should know them. Especially if you're going to say that they're false with such confidence.
I have no idea why I kept posting so long in this discussion. I must have been in a weird mood yesterday. Time to stop. Thanks for the discussion Richard. Illuminating as always.
If you are a compatabalist, you believe in determinism, which means you believe that this statement is true:
determinism: the metaphysical thesis that the facts of the past, in conjunction with the laws of nature, entail every truth about the future. According to this characterization, if determinism is true, then, given the actual past, and holding fixed the laws of nature, only one future is possible at any moment in time.
which, remarkably, every atheist on this thread has disagreed with.
I'm still done with the discussion, but I just wanted to say that I agree with this:
determinism: the metaphysical thesis that the facts of the past, in conjunction with the laws of nature, entail every truth about the future. According to this characterization, if determinism is true, then, given the actual past, and holding fixed the laws of nature, only one future is possible at any moment in time.
I think this is a fine definition of determinism and I would say (if I had to guess) that determinism is true.
So, will you acknowledge that this statement:"which, remarkably, every atheist on this thread has disagreed with." is false?
Also, you ignored what I said here:
"Technically, I don't think you need to be a determinist to be a compatibalist. You could just see determinism and free will as compatible even if you believe some indeterminism to be true."
So you're doubly wrong.
If you don't understand how determinism could be compatible with free will, you don't understand what compatibalism is. Don't get me wrong, you don't have to agree with compatibalism, just try to understand the arguments before you decide that they're false.