Persons and Bodies: A Constitution View Book

Pereboom does a very clear breakdown of compatibilist theories and their pretensions to establish freedom in the face of determinism. An agent naturalistically determined is not significantly different, in terms of freedom, from an agent that has been manipulated through hypnosis. Contemporary libertarianism, which relies on indeterminism, also strips the agent of control by attributing her actions to chance. Pereboom thinks that agent-causation is coherent but there is no empirical evidence for it.
Pereboom then attempts to offer consolation by arguing that we can still have love and meaning in life even if we are completely determined by our environment. I don't think Pereboom sufficiently explores agent-causation. I think his objection based on empirical evidence is readily addressed through an idealist metaphysics. Instead of depriving people of moral responsibility, and trying to revolutionize our understanding of punishment based on the presumed absence of such responsibility, Pereboom should have further explored agent-causation.