# Lack of Freewill doesn't mean lack of choice

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lack-of-freewill-doesnt-mean-lack-of-choice/954128>\
**Category:** Great Debates\
**Created:** [November 10, 2021, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lack-of-freewill-doesnt-mean-lack-of-choice/954128 "2021-11-10T15:31:47Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 292

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Max\_S](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/46a35a/32.png) [@Max\_S](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_S)\
**Post date:** [February 3, 2022, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lack-of-freewill-doesnt-mean-lack-of-choice/954128/292 "2022-02-03T15:21:12Z")

</div>

> [@Mijin](#):
>
> A person who disagrees with me should either have a definition in mind

In [another topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-libertarian-free-agency-be-distinct-from-deterministic-random-and-semi-random-causation/940472) I strove to define free agency as a category of event causation which is neither deterministic nor random nor a combination of those two. I would personally define free will as possession and direction of free agency.

> [@Mijin](#):
>
> **we don’t even know if it’s an empirical claim or something wholly abstract** , so who’s to say whether there should be **empirical evidence**? Secondly, I would say that most people _do_ in fact lean towards believing **it’s an empirical claim**.

You seem to imply, again, that both a clear definition and evidence are required.

This is either equivocation on the word “empirical”, or a false choice in the first instance. If an empirical claim is one based on empirical evidence, there are other categories of claims besides evidence-based claims and wholly abstract claims. Russell’s teapot comes to mind.

If an empirical claim is any claim concerning something that exists, then even my conception of free will above - which admits no evidence of existence, only evidence of nonexistence by predicting human behavior - qualifies as an empirical claim. And for Platonists such as myself, _every_ abstract concept “exists”, and thus wholly abstract and empirical are not mutually exclusive categories.

~Max

---

_[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lack-of-freewill-doesnt-mean-lack-of-choice/954128)._