Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site sjuvax.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!bellcore!petrus!scherzo!allegra!princeton!astrovax!sjuvax!tmoody From: tmoody@sjuvax.UUCP (T. Moody) Newsgroups: net.philosophy Subject: Dennett and Indeterminism Message-ID: <2462@sjuvax.UUCP> Date: Sun, 27-Oct-85 21:31:33 EST Article-I.D.: sjuvax.2462 Posted: Sun Oct 27 21:31:33 1985 Date-Received: Thu, 31-Oct-85 23:37:17 EST Distribution: net Organization: St. Joseph's University, Phila. PA. Lines: 16 [] I number of people have argued that indeterminism is at least a necessary condition for free will. That is, one condition of a system's having free will is that its past states are not related to ints present states deterministically. I have recently reread an article by Daniel Dennett in which he develops a fairly straightforward thesis of this sort. I am referring to "On Giving Libertarians What They Say They Want," included in _Brainstorms_ (Bradford, 1978). It's a fairly short piece, and it's very clearly written. Many of the same points are made in his more recent _Elbow_Room_, but personally I think his style has not benefitted by his association with Hofstadter; I can take only so much cuteness. Dennett