Rick Repetti
\nKingsborough Community College
\nCity University of New York <\/p>\n
In \u201cConfessions of a Deluded Westerner,\u201d Michael Brent insists no contributions to Buddhist Perspectives on Free Wil<\/em>l (Repetti) even address<\/em> free will because none deploy the criteria for free will that Western (incompatibilist<\/em>) philosophers identify: the ability to do otherwise<\/em> under identical conditions, and the ability to have one\u2019s choices be up<\/em> to oneself. Brent claims the criteria and abilities in that anthology are criteria for intentional action, but not all intentional actions are free<\/em>. He also insists that Buddhism, ironically, cannot even accept intentional action, because, on his analysis, intentionality requires an agent, which Buddhism rejects. I have four responses: (i) Brent ignores the other half of the debate, compatibilism<\/em>, in both Western and Buddhist philosophy, represented in the anthology by several contributors; (ii) the autonomy of Buddhist meditation virtuosos is titanic<\/em> compared to Brent\u2019s autonomy criteria, which latter are relatively mundane and facile, rather than something Buddhists fail to rise up to; (iii) such titanic Buddhist autonomy challenges, and possibly defeats, all major Western arguments against free will; and (iv) several contributors address the possibility of agentless agency. These responses could have been taken right out of the anthology, not only from my contributions. ISSN 1076-9005 Volume 25, 2018 It Wasn\u2019t Us: Reply to Michael Brent Rick Repetti Kingsborough Community College City University of New York In \u201cConfessions of a Deluded Westerner,\u201d Michael Brent insists no contributions to Buddhist Perspectives on Free Will (Repetti) even address free will because none deploy the criteria for free will that Western (incompatibilist) … Continue reading It Wasn\u2019t Us: Reply to Michael Brent<\/span>
\nRead article<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"