Over at EN he writes:
If determinism is also true, that does not mean that free will is false. It could be simply that there is a problem with the philosophical abstraction called “libertarian free will” (which seems to assert indeterminism as a fundamentalist tenet).
“If determinism is also true, that does not mean that free will is false.” Yes, it absolutely does. “Free” is the opposite of “determined.”
“It could be simply that there is a problem with the philosophical abstraction called “libertarian free will” (which seems to assert indeterminism as a fundamentalist tenet).” Libertarian free will posits “liberty” (i.e., freedom to do otherwise) as a fundamental (not fundamentalist) tenet.
Like so many, Jones believes compatibilism is the answer. Here is the Wiki entry on compatibilism. Briefly compatibilists define “free will” as an agent acting according to their own motivation. That is, the agent was not coerced or restrained. However, the motive itself is not free; it is determined. Arthur Schopenhauer captured the theory as “Man can do what he wills but he cannot will what he wills.”
I have written about compatibilism before, and the problem with this approach is easy to see. It is a semantic dodge, a word game. Words have meaning; we don’t get to impose meaning on words to suit the conclusion we want to reach. The whole issue in the determinism/free will debate is whether we could have done otherwise.
Suppose I ask my friend Joe the following question: “Do I have free will, if by “free will” I mean ‘the ability to have done otherwise?’” It is obviously no answer to that question for Joe to say, “Yes, you have free will if by free will you mean, “the absence of coercion which gave you the ability to act according to an utterly determined motive.” I really do want to explore the question about whether I could have done otherwise, and Joe’s answer is not helpful. You might even say Joe dodged the question.