Further thoughts on compatibility dualism

Compatibility dualism (henceforth CD) is the idea that, on the compatibility question of the free will problem, a complex position which to some extent encompasses opposing positions is plausible. Under the assumption that there is no libertarian free will, which we shall make, then we should be to some extent both compatibilists and denialists - namely, hold a view which incorporates both compatibilist and denialist elements. I first presented such a pluralist position more than 30 years ago, and have defended it in different ways a number of times since. My CD has been often misunderstood and looked upon as misleading, incoherent or even slightly deceitful. For example, many writers on free will seem to assume that I am "really" a denialist or hard determinist who adds a compatibilist element only pragmatically. The current paper discusses CD in order to better explain it and the motivation behind it. I will try to make CD more plausible and uncover the biases which make people hesitant to accept it (thus providing an "error" theory as to why CD has not been more widely accepted). We shall try to see why one should be a dualist on the compatibility question, and examine why most philosophers have resisted the reasons for beings so.