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Yes, if I was them I would be them.
And the same things would happen to you. We have the data, it happened. If you were them you would be in the exact same situation. They can't have made other choices, or they would have.
If I was them I wouldn’t be me, as you’ve said, so it’s a pointless statement to say “if you were them”. It’s like sayin “If X was Y, then X would be Y.” Which is tautologically true, but provides us with no new information. If I was a cat I’d be a cat. If I was Hitler I’d be Hitler. If my aunt had balls, she’d be my uncle.
I find this exchange a little amusing in light of your pro-Arminian tendencies that we were just discussing: I would have thought that meant that you thought that choices were not sufficiently determined by one's character and history and circumstances, while here you seem to argue that that does suffice.
If there is anything beyond our character and history and circumstances that informs our choices (personality, perhaps? Ineffable soul?), then it would still be the case that if I was him (in other words, had his character, his history, his circumstances, and his everything else that makes him him) I would be him and not me.
Perhaps what I meant is that I thought that you would think that our choices are not determined, that I thought you would think that there exists no set of things that would ensure that you make the same choices. (sorry, that's wordy)
I mean, yes and no.
I don't think my choices are determined in that I could not have chosen differently, but I will inevitably make one choice. And the choice I make will pretty much be the result of my character, my history, my circumstances, and divine intervention. If I'm set a problem that I agonize over, where I am not sure which way to go, that I waffle back on forth on, I'm still going to end up choosing something and not choosing every other possible thing. And while I would hold that it was still possible for me to choose something else, once I choose it's chosen and that's that. If you could somehow meaningfully "run the simulation again" with all the factors influencing my decision remain the same, I'm going to make the same decision. If I don't have any new information to work with, I'm going to come to the same conclusion.
I suppose one way to put it is that I"m fine with my actions being determined by my history, character, and circumstances because those are all things that make up who I am and any choice determined by who I am is my free will choice. If the choice is determined by something else (the blind movement of atoms, lets say, or a divine plan that determines my actions regardless of my history, character, or circumstances) then I don't see it as free will.
Okay, I'm pretty much on board with that.
A lot of people (not me, nor you) would prefer libertarian free will.
I'm not sure that my view is incompatible with libertarian free will? I believe a summarized definition of libertarian free will is that an agent is able to take more than one possible course. And I agree with that! I think we are able to make multiple choices. I also know that we only ever make one choice: from the perspective of someone looking back from the end of time, all the choices have been made and cannot be changed. And of course the choices we make are informed solely by our character, history, and circumstances (how could they be informed by anything else?). But I don't think the fact that we will make one choice, means we were not able to make another choice, just that we chose not to make those choices.
Honestly, any discussion of free will that goes too deep inevitably makes my head start to spin. I wouldn't consider myself a compatibilist, but then again I never really understood the compatibilist position so it's possible I am one and don't know it.
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