this post was submitted on 23 Feb 2024
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I have said how several times already.
Mechanical materialist determinism is a rejection of dialectical materialism. I am not that, and thus you are debated what you assume is my position rather than what actually is. As another user pointed out it is foolish to be so arrogant to think humans are above the rest of the universe to be blessed with a "free will." It is true we have wills, but they are not "free."
In the "free will is incompatible with science" thread you linked early on, the only arguments for that case were overtly deterministic, as in the mechanical materialist determinism you're referring to.
But okay let's say it was a miscommunication. Marxism is very much focused on agency to foment revolution but grounding it a material analysis (and the interplay between both). What is your point? Just that agency exists within the confines of material conditions? I don't think that was communicated at all lol
My point is that if we are materialists there is no reason for us to believe in free will. Some hard determinist arguments make total sense they are just far too optimistic about how easily the world is known. Dialectics complicates things and brings us closer to the truth of how the universe works.
So... not the thing I said? I honestly can't tell. The relevance of this conversation to Marxism is in our part, and agency within, the dialectic.
I agree, the question is whether the word "agency" implies free will or not. I recognize "wills" with agency, but "free" implies it is beyond the material world in part.
Don't get tripped up by etymology! It's of questionable value to semantics.
There have been arguments for free will that depended on the supernatural and I think that's what the critics here are focusing on. To contradict myself, the origins of the term are with the Catholic Church and intended to justify very specific supernatural positions.
But it's not an inherent aspect of the claim, philosophically. Nerds have been arguing about this for millennia and have enumerated a very long list of framings that make their position (pro or con sliced ten different ways) possible (the lowest of philosophical claims). This includes, but is not limited to, hardline atheistic materialists like Daniel Dennett, a compatibilist.
I am skeptical of the possibility of a true materialist free will argument but I will look into it. I’ll look into Dennett. I think we understand each other’s positions better now. Thanks for the interesting, at times annoying, but ultimately relatively fun discussion. Is there anyone else I should look into?