> Does it? You give no reason why.

>Doesn't sound very like the quote you're referencing to me. Do you think Zizek would agree with you here?

I was assuming that you read the article under discussion.

Here, I'll bold the relevant parts for you.

>Compatibilists such as Daniel Dennett have an elegant solution to the incompatibilists’ complaints about determinism: when incompatibilists complain that our freedom cannot be combined with the fact that all our acts are part of the great chain of natural determinism, they secretly make an unwarranted ontological assumption: first, they assume that we (the Self, the free agent) somehow stand outside reality, then they go on to complain about how they feel oppressed by the notion that reality in its determinism controls them totally. This is what is wrong with the notion of us being “imprisoned” by the chains of natural determinism: we thereby obfuscate the fact that we are part of reality, that the (possible, local) conflict between our “free” striving and the external reality that resists it is a conflict inherent in reality itself. That is to say, there is nothing “oppressive” or “constraining” about the fact that our innermost strivings are (pre)determined: when we feel thwarted in our freedom by the pressure of external reality, there must be something in us, some desire or striving, which is thus thwarted, but where do such strivings come from if not this same reality? Our “free will” does not in some mysterious way “disturb the natural course of things,” it is part and parcel of this course.... When a determinist claims that our free choice is “determined,” this does not mean that our free will is somehow constrained, that we are forced to act against our will—what is “determined” is the very thing that we want to do “freely,” that is, without being thwarted by external obstacles.

Do you see the bit about "the fact that all our acts are part of the great chain of natural determinism"? Do you see the bit about Zizek explicitly tying our actions to the inescapable bounds of a deterministic - i.e. "(pre)detetrmined" - universe? How he denies that our Self can be a "free agent" outside of those bounds? How he explicitly links our "strivings" and the reality which - in his proposition - has spawned them? And how about the bit on our free choice being "determined" - by that very same reality?

It's the compatibilists themselves that are happy to claim that determinism removes free choice. They just attempt to decouple choice and "free will" - and do so clumsily and incoherently.

In particular, Zizek's proposition is that a pre-deterimined choice is still consistent with "free will" - because "what is “determined” is the very thing that we want to do “freely,” that is, without being thwarted by external obstacles."

This falls apart in several places - perhaps most obviously in that in Zizek's own framing, there is no possibility of any "external obstacles" - because there is no possibility in his mind of anything "external" to the reality that both governs our "strivings" and determines their success or failure.

>"...that the (possible, local) conflict between our “free” striving and the external reality that resists it is a conflict inherent in reality itself."

In Zizek's proposition (and Burgis' far less able framing) we are simultaneously totally governed by the unshakeable, constant and accidental whims of reality - and also free to choose whatever path we like, provided it aligns exactly with the predetermined path laid out by that same reality.

The ultimate meaninglessness of Zizek's interpretation of determinism is almost breathtaking.