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From: esk@wucs.UUCP (Eric Kaylor)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: New book on Free Will....
Message-ID: <689@wucs.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 1-Feb-85 19:39:12 EST
Article-I.D.: wucs.689
Posted: Fri Feb  1 19:39:12 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 2-Feb-85 14:47:42 EST
References: <325@cybvax0.UUCP>
Organization: Washington U. in St. Louis, CS Dept.
Lines: 15

Yes!  I've read (most of) _Elbow Room_, and it is great.  After
all, Dennett (the author) agrees with me -- he *must* be brilliant!
:-)  The thesis of the book is that "we can have our science and
free will too;" in particular, free will can be made perfect sense
of within a scientific understanding of the universe and ourselves.
Dennett notes the importance of rational evaluation of prospective
actions in accounting for free will, though he underemphasizes it 
in my opinion.  And he destroys the myth that determinism (i.e. the
thesis that all our actions can be explained by non-probabilistic
causes) is incompatible with free will.  Excellent book for 
uncovering the fallacies of religious and "humanistic" critics of
science on the one hand, and overzealous "debunkers" like Rosen
on the other.
			--Paul V. Torek, ihnp4!wucs!wucec1!pvt1047
Don't hit that 'r' key!  Send mail to this address, not Eric's.