Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

No

Only Judeism

Only Islam

Yes to both Judeism and Islam

[Graknorke]

How do you guys define "free will", anyway?

I don't think we have free will. I think our minds have reached such complexity that it's not easy to predict our actions, giving the illusion of free will. The same way a dice tossed exactly the same way will always land on the same side, but the physics involved in throwing one are too complex to predict the result or to perfectly replicate the original throw.

This is what I believed to be true, until i started to learn quantum mechanics and all things went to shit

Brains are far too big for quantum mechanics to be something worth noting.
It all averages out in the end.

[miljan]

I really wish I never read anything about quantum mechanics  as it all made perfect sense before, everything was logical.... Now its all chaos...  blood for the the blood god

[penguinofhonor]

Best explained this way: a stray gamma ray could inspire you to murder someone, but you still get life in prison.

I don't know what you mean by this.

[Frumple]

I really wish I never read anything about quantum mechanics  as it all made perfect sense before, everything was logical.... Now its all chaos...  blood for the the blood god

... considering christianity is a religion that has blood sacrifice as a central theme, you might be in the right place. Probably want to stick to the sects that give heavy emphasis on transubstantiation, though.

[freeformschooler]

Best explained this way: a stray gamma ray could inspire you to murder someone, but you still get life in prison.

I don't know what you mean by this.

The argument from materialism against "free will" is often taken to mean: since free will doesn't exist, and all our actions are just a result of environmental factors and the chemical reactions inside our body, we can't really be responsible for anything we do as those neurons were going to fire that way no matter what based on their configuration before the murder, and before that, and...

example of this interpretation

[Phmcw]

Best explained this way: a stray gamma ray could inspire you to murder someone, but you still get life in prison.

I don't know what you mean by this.

The argument from materialism against "free will" is often taken to mean: since free will doesn't exist, and all our actions are just a result of environmental factors and the chemical reactions inside our body, we can't really be responsible for anything we do as those neurons were going to fire that way no matter what based on their configuration before the murder, and before that, and...

example of this interpretation

I find this interpretation funny, because there is no relation between its premisces and its conclusion.

A faulty computer chip is faulty, and you must remove it because it's dangerous/bad. Likewise a bad individual is bad because he do things we deem bad therefore we give him invectives not to be bad, try to correct him or remove him from society.

The only case where absence of free will absove you from responability is when you're judge by an omniscient, omnipotent creator, since he created you that way, knew it, and could have corrected you. For human justice it doesn't matter at all.

Free will to an omniscient, omnipotent being is easily disprovable by the way : logically, any of your decisions is influenced by three things

A) Initial conditions (genetics, soul if you believe in it, ...)

B) living experiences (whatever happen to you)

C) Hazard

You are responsible for none, hence you cannot have free will.

[Baffler]

To claim that we don't have free will just because our brains are chemically and electrically wired, as in A), or because we have to respond to events around us as in B) and C) is utter lunacy. Is your brain not part of you? Are its decisions somehow separate from yours? And do we not choose our own way in life? Sure we get pushed one way or the other, sometimes pretty stongly, but there's nothing to really stop me from just dropping out of school right now to, say, become a professional car thief. Other than knowing it' probably won't be as rewarding an investment as staying in school, of course.

[Graknorke]

The point is that those choices were only ever going to turn out what way. Causal determinism. The reason you're (probably) not going to become a car thief is because the necessary outputs will not come from your brain, given the inputs it will get.

[DeKaFu]

To claim that we don't have free will just because our brains are chemically and electrically wired, as in A), or because we have to respond to events around us as in B) and C) is utter lunacy. Is your brain not part of you? Are its decisions somehow separate from yours? And do we not choose our own way in life? Sure we get pushed one way or the other, sometimes pretty stongly, but there's nothing to really stop me from just dropping out of school right now to, say, become a professional car thief. Other than knowing it' probably won't be as rewarding an investment as staying in school, of course.

No, see... I think the idea is that you, in your current state, are a sum product of your inherent genetics + the experiences in your life since you were born (nature+nurture=you). But neither of those were things you generated via free will, but rather just results of the universe unfolding as it does.

So the decisions that you make, you make because you are the way you are. If you decided to drop out of school and become a car thief to prove a point, it would be because these initial conditions + the events in your life deterministically resulted in a person who, at this point in time and particular circumstances, wanted to (and could only want to) choose that path. Regardless of how many times you second-guess your decisions, the one you arrive at will always be the only one you could have arrived at. Therefore, it could be said that your "choice" was only an illusion.

It is an awfully good illusion, though, so I don't see any reason to let it bother you one way or the other.

[Phmcw]

Yeah, as I said, it would only matter if an omniscient omnipotent creator existed. To an human, it doesn't.

[Baffler]

Yeah, as I said, it would only matter if an omniscient omnipotent creator existed. To an human, it doesn't.

We're clearly operating using pretty different basic assumptions. I think I'll withdraw.

I can't let it sit. To take the idea to its logical conclusion: does that mean that nobody is truly responsible for their actions? Everyone is nothing more than the product of various environmental factors out of their control. To reject free will is to reject the most basic premises of morality and ethics. It isn't the fault of a paper bag floating in the breeze when it hits the side of a building, so why do we hold people who commit crimes responsible for their actions? Both are equally powerless, after all. As you say, they could only ever make that one choice.

[Graknorke]

Yeah, as I said, it would only matter if an omniscient omnipotent creator existed. To an human, it doesn't.

We're clearly operating using pretty different basic assumptions. I think I'll withdraw.

I can't let it sit. To take the idea to its logical conclusion: does that mean that nobody is truly responsible for their actions? Everyone is nothing more than the product of various environmental factors out of their control. To reject free will is to reject the most basic premises of morality and ethics. It isn't the fault of a paper bag floating in the breeze when it hits the side of a building, so why do we hold people who commit crimes responsible for their actions? Both are equally powerless, after all. As you say, they could only ever make that one choice.

A faulty computer chip is faulty, and you must remove it because it's dangerous/bad. Likewise a bad individual is bad because he do things we deem bad therefore we give him invectives not to be bad, try to correct him or remove him from society.

Besides your attempts at arguing against whatever it is you think people are saying, how do you propose free will does exist when it would (with the assumption of being able to know all the factors that could affect it) be possible to predict every decision a person will make?

[Phmcw]

Don't you trash the paper bag? Do you wonder if the program that is hanging your processor is personally responsible for its failure before clausing it?

Everyone is responsible for his actions even if they were cause by exterior factors.

Even if prediction are faulty, your decision can ever only be the product of A) Your nature B) Your nuture C) randomness. You have control over neither.

But you are what your are. After all it's the thing you are now that I judge? Why the hell would I care about why you became what you are.

Edit : this is an oversimplification but I think it got my point across. Of course you can be the victim of circustances, take by temporary madness, or otherwise have your judgment temporarly impeared. There's reasons why the law is several big books.

[Graknorke]

I was using your post as an answer, not making a dig at you.
Though I'm not really sure what you're getting at with that second sentence with the computer program, seeing as you're giving an example of a thing that cannot be held responsible in any meaningful way, while going on to say that everyone should be responsible for what they do.

[Cthulhu]

It is an awfully good illusion, though, so I don't see any reason to let it bother you one way or the other.

This.  There is no perceivable difference between a choice made by free will and one invisibly predetermined by forces we cannot influence, access, or even perceive, and since the only thing that really matters is perception who gives a shit?