Free Will

[ckBejug]

Originally posted by Baron Dants I'm not sure I get the question, and I don't have any studies to base myself on, but here goes.

To soort of reply to what CK was saying (I'm not even sure if I get it), even if you're not living in the Middle East, you cannot always do what you would choose over something else, because of the will of others.

The simplest example would be (yes, very corny and cheesy, I know):
You like a certain girl/guy, but this person hates your best friend and your best friend hates him/her.

While you would rather go out with him/her over aaaaanyone else, you still might not do so, because of the implication on the will of others.

Do I make sense? I don't know....I just didn't want to make a stupid joke about a thread and then not try to be serious about it.

I get what you mean, but that doesn't necessarily present you with a complete inability to make a decision, does it? You still have the free will to choose. That's what I'm talking about. Granted you now have the choice whether to choose the girl, hurt your friend or choose the friend, hurt the girl. Right? Even in this difficult situation, you have the choice between two pretty much equal things. Your friend and the girl you like, if they are both people you like, are pretty much on equal footing. Choosing one over the other would end up causing the same hurt to either one of them. Right? Given that, you still have a CHOICE between the two... Thus, unless someone is standing at your head saying you can't choose, and must go with the one he says, you have FREE WILL.

Thanks for answering. It's nice to talk to people about other things for a change...

[Aphrodit3]

Either our actions are determined, in which case we are not responsible for them, or they are the result of random events, in which case we are not responsible for them. - Hume's fork

[loseyourname]

Re: Re: Free Will

Originally posted by ckBejug We have the free will to do what we desire. What we desire may have been determined beforehand (I believe the whole determinism thing to the extent that I understand were all made up of the tiniest atoms and molecules and their functions, etc are already known/predetermined...), but we still have the ability to desire.

If what we desire is predetermined, and we only have the ability to do as we desire, which is predetermined, please explain how that constitutes free will.

[loseyourname]

Re: Re: Free Will

Originally posted by Anonymouse But as to your question of free will, like you said, what is our belief? Essentially it goes to free will. My belief is that it is God given, to humanity. In order to be free to do good, man is free to do evil. He is free to choose to reject God and believe in God, embrace evolution or, embrace spirituality. Man is free to live in ignorance, and he is free to educate and enlighten himself and see those who rule him and try to deceive him.

It would be nice if somewhere in your little dissertation you would explain why you believe we have free will. Please don't tell me because we desire it, either.

[Arvestaked]

That term, "free will", is a religious, scapegoat, mind-control phrase. Scientists do not size things up that way because it is meaningless and has no bearing on reality; it is tangental to logical thought. It is a term born from misunderstanding and/or denial.

Love is biochemical. Philosophy is biochemical.

[loseyourname]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Free Will

Originally posted by ckBejug But what of the whole predetermination thing? How does the number thing, the rigidity and unchangable structure of things that exist in math, that exists whether or not we know what they are, how do we gebneralize that to apply to predetermination in life, in physical manifestations. Which are, at the end, what we're talking about...

Strict mathematical laws come into play in the interactions of minute particles, as you said. They all behave according to the laws of physics. It would be fallacy to refer to them as predetermined, unless you were able to demonstrate somehow that the laws of physics were determined. Nonetheless, since the English language does not contain any better word that I know of, predetermined will have to do for our purposes.

You're a biologist, so you know as well as the rest of us that biological systems, though almost impossibly complex, still obey the same laws that these minute particles do. They still behave in a way that, determined or not, is entirely predictable given complete enough data. The only way a human system may be said to overcome this is through some manifestation of consciousness that allows us to make a decision that runs contrary somehow to what the laws of physics would have the molecule floating around in our neurons do. I don't think that anybody here knows enough about the nature of consciousness to say whether or not that takes place, so none of us can really answer the question.

Mouse can go on and on about spiritualism, but this one at least is not a spiritual question, unless you can demonstrate a spiritual manifestation in the phenomenon of consciousness. ck can go on saying because we make decisions, we must be free, but even she admits that these decisions reflect desires that we seem to have no control over. In the end, I don't think any of us really has any idea.

[Anonymouse]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Free Will

Originally posted by loseyourname Strict mathematical laws come into play in the interactions of minute particles, as you said. They all behave according to the laws of physics. It would be fallacy to refer to them as predetermined, unless you were able to demonstrate somehow that the laws of physics were determined. Nonetheless, since the English language does not contain any better word that I know of, predetermined will have to do for our purposes.

You're a biologist, so you know as well as the rest of us that biological systems, though almost impossibly complex, still obey the same laws that these minute particles do. They still behave in a way that, determined or not, is entirely predictable given complete enough data. The only way a human system may be said to overcome this is through some manifestation of consciousness that allows us to make a decision that runs contrary somehow to what the laws of physics would have the molecule floating around in our neurons do. I don't think that anybody here knows enough about the nature of consciousness to say whether or not that takes place, so none of us can really answer the question.

Mouse can go on and on about spiritualism, but this one at least is not a spiritual question, unless you can demonstrate a spiritual manifestation in the phenomenon of consciousness. ck can go on saying because we make decisions, we must be free, but even she admits that these decisions reflect desires that we seem to have no control over. In the end, I don't think any of us really has any idea.

So if you say there is no free will, I guess what you just said is in accordance with the prophecy.

[Arvestaked]

Originally posted by Arvestaked That term, "free will", is a religious, scapegoat, mind-control phrase. Scientists do not size things up that way because it is meaningless and has no bearing on reality; it is tangental to logical thought. It is a term born from misunderstanding and/or denial.

Love is biochemical. Philosophy is biochemical.

I agree with Arvestaked.

[Anonymouse]

I guess the adamant position of loseyourname and Arvestaked seems to seal the case for them, no free will. Their thoughts are not a product of them, just some "laws". I think there is alot of confusion as to how we define free will. Will that is free from physical input. When I say is free I mean will free from causality purely random and unpredictable. Even you in your everyday lives, the two of you that deny free will, cannot deny ever using the expression of damn that was random. Random will, is in other words, the ability to choose completely independent of any cause. By this definition a photon has free will. Experimentally, at a slit a photon may choose to go right or left and no one can know which way it will go before it does. Indeed, why do we even bother using "choice" in our vernacular or "volition". If all is hopeless, one wonders why the words exist. But God still loves you. He loves me and I'm missing chromosomes.

[Arvestaked]

Originally posted by Anonymouse I guess the adamant position of loseyourname and Arvestaked seems to seal the case for them, no free will. Their thoughts are not a product of them, just some "laws". I think there is alot of confusion as to how we define free will. Will that is free from physical input. When I say is free I mean will free from causality purely random and unpredictable. Even you in your everyday lives, the two of you that deny free will, cannot deny ever using the expression of damn that was random. Random will, is in other words, the ability to choose completely independent of any cause. By this definition a photon has free will. Experimentally, at a slit a photon may choose to go right or left and no one can know which way it will go before it does. Indeed, why do we even bother using "choice" in our vernacular or "volition". If all is hopeless, one wonders why the words exist. But God still loves you. He loves me and I'm missing chromosomes.

I denied the credibility of defining such a concept.

Entropy is predictable. And free will can exist within the confines of the very credible laws of physics.

It is inconsequential.