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    Carmelics

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    LoyalLoyalJusticeJustice
    Made withinDC&Austin
    Statements
    321,452
    Perspectives
    108,905
    Topics
    42
    Home/Original/inverse
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    Inverse View

    It is not the case that Compatibilist freedom requires that an agent's action flows from her own desires and character, not from external compulsion or necessitation by factors outside the agent.

    ?Set your confidence on the premises below to see your aggregate.

    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
    ?
    • 1.If desires and character are themselves determined by prior causes beyond the agent's control, the distinction between 'internal' and 'external' determination becomes merely verbal.
      ?

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    • 2.Compatibilism cannot account for free will in the sense required for ultimate moral desert, since the agent did not author their foundational values or reasons.
      ?

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    • 3.The definition of external compulsion as anything 'outside the agent' is vague; genetic predispositions and childhood environment also originate outside the agent yet shape desires fundamentally.
      ?

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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
    ?
    • 1.Moral responsibility requires that agents could have acted differently under identical circumstances, which compatibilism explains via internal dispositional differences.
      ?

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    • 2.External compulsion (coercion, force) distinctly undermines freedom in ways that causal determinism does not, justifying different treatment of these cases.
      ?

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    • 3.Our ordinary practices of praise, blame, and punishment presuppose agents act from their own desires and character, making compatibilism align with actual moral discourse.
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