Editing Predeterminism (section)

==R. E. Hobart==

R. E. Hobart is the pseudonym of [[Dickinson S. Miller]], a student of [[William James]] who was later one of James' closest personal friends and for some years a colleague in the Harvard philosophy department. Hobart (Miller) criticized the core idea of James' ''The Will to Believe'', namely that it was acceptable to hold religious faith in the absence of evidence for or against that faith. James referred to Miller as "my most penetrating critic and intimate enemy."

Nearly 25 years after James' death, R. E. Hobart published a short article in ''Mind'' in 1934 that is considered one of the definitive statements of [[determinism]] and [[compatibilism]]. It was entitled ''Free Will as Involving Determination and Inconceivable Without It''.<ref name="Hobart">R. E. Hobart "Free Will as Involving Determination and Inconceivable Without It," ''Mind'', Vol XLIII, No. 169, January, 1934</ref>

Hobart's compatibilism was similar to earlier landmark positions by [[Thomas Hobbes]] and [[David Hume]], as refined in the 19th-century compatibilist views of [[John Stuart Mill]], [[Henry Sidgwick]], and [[F. H. Bradley]]. But unlike them Hobart explicitly did not endorse ''strict'' logical or physical determinism, and he explicitly did endorse the existence of [http://www.informationphilosopher.com/freedom/possibilities.html alternative possibilities], which can depend on absolute [[Randomness|chance]].

He was writing just a few years after the discovery of [[quantum mechanics]] and [[Indeterminacy principle|indeterminacy]], and also makes passing mention of the ancient "swerve" of the atoms espoused by [[Epicurus]]:

'I am not maintaining that determinism is true...it is not here affirmed that there are no small exceptions, no slight undetermined swervings, no ingredient of absolute chance.'<ref name="Hobart"/>{{rp|2}}

'"We say," I can will this or I can will that, whichever I choose". Two courses of action present themselves to my mind. I think of their consequences, I look on this picture and on that, one of them commends itself more than the other, and I will an act that brings it about. I knew that I could choose either. That means that I had the power to choose either.'<ref name="Hobart"/>{{rp|8}}

Hobart supports the existence of alternative possibilities for action and the capability to do otherwise.<ref>[http://www.informationphilosopher.com/freedom/possibilities.html Alternative Possibilities]</ref>

And he clearly prefers "determination" to "determinism." Hobart's article is frequently misquoted as "Free Will as Involving Determinism."<ref>E.g., [https://books.google.com/books?id=0ncN3TuDQ7cC&dq=%22Free+Will+As+Involving+Determinism%22&pg=PA11 Fischer and Ravizza, Perspectives on moral responsibility], and even in the [http://www.rep.routledge.com/article-bibliography/V014 Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090731000518/http://www.rep.routledge.com/article-bibliography/V014 |date=2009-07-31 }}</ref>