Argue for Free Will

[zerragonoss]

Well for me its quite simple, my belief in my own consciousness and free will is stronger than my belief in physical reality; Therefore no defense needed. If you asking to defend free will assuming its consistent with the physical world than look to the quantum level, it may be random as far as we can tell but that does not mean it is, or that it is at all times. As far as I know no one has studied quantum fields inside a working brain to see it they act differently. Baring that you have the idea of the pre-geometric or the law that make the law of physics we know work, and that the thing about science it is awesome but its cannot solve infinite regress.

captcha: higgledy piggledy
well I hope my arguments make sense to someone at least, but it does not surprise me that a computer disagrees.

 

[Queen Michael]

Said it before, saying it again, somebody needs to define what this "free will" thing actually is before we discuss if we've got it. If it's not predetermined according to the law of cause and effect, or randomly decided, then what is it? How can our actions be neither predetermined nor random? How's that even supposed to work?

 

[Shadowstar38]

I'm with Queen Michael on this one.

Free will in determinism doesn't use the same definition as compatablism would. So I'm not sure how I'm suppose to go about this.

 

[madwarper]

I would question how many people have willingly starved themselves to death when they had ready access to perfectly fine, moderately healthy food, but I'm sure even that has happened.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunger_strike

It's not because they don't have access to food, it's not because they don't have an instinct for survival, it's not because they're ideologically opposed to the food available to them, and it's not because they're suffering from a delusional state.

They choose not to eat as a non-violent form of protest in order to provoke feeling of guilt in others.

Captcha: do you eat at casual dining restaurants? Yes, I do. Because, I choose to.

 

[Naeo]

Since this has been mentioned, I'll go ahead and state that I'm answering using the definition of "free will" as "we have the ability to make decisions in a non-deterministic way". I.E., if you knew ever variable and had all the right ways to process those variables to predict some outcome, you could not predict human actions with complete accuracy. And I'm working on the assumption that "having free will" does not necessarily mean that NONE of our actions are deterministic, but that a great portion of our decisions are. E.g., automatic reactions to the environment--jerking your foot away when something unexpectedly touches it, etc. Things that are done via automatic, rather than conscious, decisions are not relevant to free will in my view.

There is no hard evidence either way (i.e. nothing experimental, scientific, etc) that would indicate the existence or otherwise of free will. It's not a discussion that can be had in any way except in vague "what ifs" and philosophical terms. At the end of the day, you might as well ask if the moon is made of cheese, but just a really old and stale cheese that seems just like rock.

That being said, in the absence of any hard evidence either way, it seems most reasonable that free will exists in some form based on human experience. We can think and weigh options. We have indecisive moments, where we are unsure of things and must find our way to one option or another. We appear, empirically, to have free will. There is nothing to suggest, except in the realms of "maybe" and "what if" and fanciful interpretations, that free will is completely illusory. Ergo, on the basis of empirical/observational experience and the absence of any form of equivalently meaningful counterevidence, it's a safe assumption that we have free will.

 

[shrekfan246]

I would question how many people have willingly starved themselves to death when they had ready access to perfectly fine, moderately healthy food, but I'm sure even that has happened.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunger_strike

It's not because they don't have access to food, it's not because they don't have an instinct for survival, it's not because they're ideologically opposed to the food available to them, and it's not because they're suffering from a delusional state.

They choose not to eat as a non-violent form of protest in order to provoke feeling of guilt in others.

Captcha: do you eat at casual dining restaurants? Yes, I do. Because, I choose to.

Like I said, I was sure it had happened.

Even that raises the questions other people have asked in this thread though. What is "free will"?

Because when I see or hear about protests, I don't generally think that it's simply people exercising their free will, as it's usually started because of some other event serving, once again, as a catalyst. Either because of their ideological beliefs, morals, or perhaps even simple mob mentality, a great amount of the time these people don't just wake up one day and say "I'm not going to eat any more, because I don't have to and as a human being that's my choice to make."

 

[Xdeser2]

Well, it feels free to me, so I guess that's what matters ^-^

 

[Vladdie93]

I think that we all have free will.

I don't think there's something waiting for us to die to punish us for using that free will.

 

[Toemassa]

because you're either wrong, or the person arguing in favor of compatibilism is the only possible outcome

Can you rephrase this bit? I'm having a hard time understanding what you're trying to say.

Either you're wrong and hard determinism isn't in effect, or you're right and hard determinism is in effect and the other person is wrong. But since hard determinism is in effect, they're not wrong because they're stupid or misguided, they're wrong because there's simply no way for them to be right, as they can't influence their thoughts or change their thought process. So it'd be hypocritical to treat them like "Lol, idiots believing free will exists".

It's funny isn't it...implying that people taking the compatibilist stance are stupid or ignorant, actually implies they have a choice. Which is exactly the implication you shouldn't be making if you argue in favor of hard determinism.

Of course, the hard determinist's thoughts and actions would also be entirely predetermined.

See, the determinist argument isn't necessarily that things are "destined" to be a certain way, so much as it is that everything comes in reaction to something else, so ultimately there can only be one conclusion. Everything we do, right down to the thoughts we think and the emotions we feel, is influenced entirely by our biology and the world around us. You are who you are because of your genetic makeup and because of the experiences you've had. Basically, if you could just keep asking "why" to everything the answers would eventually make it possible to recognize the patterns and determine where everything was ultimately headed.

There's still the question of what put it all in motion in the first place of course. If you're religious then I suppose the answer isn't too hard to come up with, if not then it's a little more mystifying.

 

[Fox12]

The question is a little vague.

From a religious stand point? This is actually a point of great contention, but since I'm a fan of free will myself, I'll give it a shot. Basically, my overall belief is that while God has certain things pre-ordained (the birth of Jesus, the creation of Israel, ect.) he leaves most things open to the individual. We see this biblicaly because God has either changed his mind or offered choices and forgiveness on multiple occasions. For instance, a king of Israel was dying (I don't remember his name and I'm too lazy to look it up) and after a long prayer God gave him longer to live. He also tested his followers, such as Solomon, and I don't see the point of testing someone if you decided what they would do before hand. Predestination also removes any meaning from anyone's decisions, since they are little more than machines fulfilling their role at that point. Free will actually gives meaning to things.

From a political standpoint? I believe everyone has the right to life, liberty, and property, and as long as you don't hurt anyone or infringe on their rights, you should do whatever you want. True freedom is having the freedom to make mistakes. I support the right to own a gun, but I do not own a gun. I support the right to drink alcohol, but I do not drink alcohol. I support gay marriage, but I am not gay. I support your right to speak your mind, even if I don't like what you have to say.

 

[kommando367]

Because chaos deserves a place in this universe like everything else. That will never change.

 

[Vegosiux]

See, the determinist argument isn't necessarily that things are "destined" to be a certain way, so much as it is that everything comes in reaction to something else, so ultimately there can only be one conclusion.

I believe that's how I phrased my own post, yes. I wasn't getting anywhere near any talk of "destiny". Determinism isn't clairvoyance, it claims that what has already happened could not have happened differently; and while some predictions can be made, there's a hard cap on the amount of accurate information we can possess on the quantum level anyway so there will not be a way to predict any future event with complete accuracy.

Everything we do, right down to the thoughts we think and the emotions we feel, is influenced entirely by our biology and the world around us. You are who you are because of your genetic makeup and because of the experiences you've had. Basically, if you could just keep asking "why" to everything the answers would eventually make it possible to recognize the patterns and determine where everything was ultimately headed.

That's one of those statements that are vague enough that, while true, aren't too informative, and it still has a black box in it.

There's still the question of what put it all in motion in the first place of course. If you're religious then I suppose the answer isn't too hard to come up with, if not then it's a little more mystifying.

I don't really see how that question is any more relevant than any other unanswered question about our universe to be honest.

 

[Proto Taco]

Morbo only let you think the idea for this thread was yours so that your brain would grow succulent for the coming harvest!!!!

 

[The_Great_Galendo]

No one really has free will - on a fundamental level, we're all just a bag of particles following the laws of physics, with weird things popping in to existence now and again because of quantum. But that system is complex enough to make a damn good illusion - and that's honestly good enough.

This guy gets it. We cannot change the future any more than we can change the past. All is foreordained, possibly though not necessarily by any higher power, but by the laws of physics.

Don't talk to me of quantum uncertainty -- that may show that we can never predict what will happen, which provides a strong enough illusion of free will for most purposes, including punishment for wrongdoing, but that doesn't mean that we can ever alter the future, either.

 

[CrystalShadow]

There is too much utterly random chaos at the quantum level for matters to be purely predetermined.
There is too much order at our level of existence for matters to be purely random.

Therefore, the truth must lie somewhere in between.

All in all tho, hard determinism destroys the concept of personal responsibility, and killing that one wouldn't bode well for the society.

When encountering people like that, I just argue that I'm hard coded to treat everyone as if they did have personal responsibility. Them attempting to convince me otherwise just undermines their own argument.

Not really. Because the logical inference from it is that if there is no free will, and everything is pre-determined, than you are indeed hard-coded to treat everyone as though they did have personal responsibility, but the person arguing with you about it is also hard-coded to argue with you about it.

Although, in fact, since neither of you can predict the future (even if it is entirely deterministic) it's equally possible that one of you is pre-determined to convince the other of the validity of your point of view.

Determinism only actually states that the outcome of the system as a whole cannot be changed. - It does not imply that a small part of the system (eg. and individual person) cannot change if considered in isolation.
Merely that the change in that individual person is wholly dependent on the state of the system as a whole, and there is no 'individual' factor exclusive to the person themselves that can change how they behave.

In other words, you have no control over your own behaviour, but your behaviour is not fixed in a particular state, but rather entirely dependent on environmental influences.

Thus stating you are hard-coded to behave in a particular way is actually a misunderstanding of the implications of determinism.

But, other than that, I have to agree with the earlier point. Even assuming hard determinism is in fact correct, society as a whole might still function much more effectively under the assumption that free will exists. Even if this were in fact a collective delusion, it might be a nessesary one for the stable functioning of a society.

(And in fact, taken from the point of view of crimes and such, the idea of free will existing may well work out better for criminals ironically. After all, if you have no control over your own actions, then it stands to reason that there's also no reason why you shouldn't be locked up indefinitely. After all, you can't do anything about it, can you? So if you are set free, you'll almost certainly do it again...)

Ahem. Um... Don't you just hate it when you end up arguing about the opposite of the OP? Then again, I guess that's not that surprising for a topic like this. Especially when the definition of 'free will' in the op isn't that well-defined...

 

[Phrozenflame500]

Prior events have determined that I will choose out of my own free will to refuse to argue for free will.

 

[Vegosiux]

This guy gets it. We cannot change the future any more than we can change the past. All is foreordained, possibly though not necessarily by any higher power, but by the laws of physics.

Okay, aside from the fact that the future has not yet happened so there's nothing to change in that regard...

Don't talk to me of quantum uncertainty

Consistency, mate. You just implied choice.

 

[Agayek]

People who starve to death because of some belief they hold, are they really acting under what we might believe to be "free will"?

The rest of your points are very much valid, and I wouldn't call any of that a particularly good example of free will, but this one in particular bugs me. Thinking like this makes this debate an exercise in futility and intellectual masturbation, with no clear answer because there's no clear question. Set the goalposts and debate it, or don't bother asking the question in the first place.

Either Free Will is the ability to make a choice, and therefore it demonstrably exists, or it's some nebulous, ill-defined concept that no one has ever clearly stated, and therefore it's impossible to prove its existence or lack thereof. If you want a definitive answer, the definition of Free Will must be the former. Anything else is, as mentioned, an exercise in intellectual masturbation.

 

[MysticSlayer]

To you believers out there I'm asking: what's your most convincing argument for the existence of free will?

1. Isn't this better suited for R&P? Or does "believers" not necessarily refer to Christians who often use free will as the cop out when posed the question, "Why does evil exist?"

2. Define "free will". One thing I've learned in having this discussion, which is very common in debates on Christianity and Christian philosophy, is that the actual terminology of "free will" varies considerably. Is this absolute free will, where I literally have complete control over my actions? Is it restrained free will, where I have some autonomy but am otherwise completely led by biological and chemical processes (or by some divine being)? Please clarify, because the extent to which we possess free will largely determines which side of the debate we are on.

3. Are you looking for a psychological explanation? A biological one? A religious one? Or do you just want a general overview? There's numerous ways of approaching this, and while we may come to the same conclusion, it helps to determine what grounds we are discussing on.

4. Is there any reason you are wondering about this? Is there something about the ramifications of having or not having free will that interests you?

Yeah, if you can't tell, this is a subject that really interests me (heck, it is the only aspect of psychology I find interesting), and it is dozens of past discussions that makes me want to inquire about the nature of the discussion before delving into it.

 

[shrekfan246]

People who starve to death because of some belief they hold, are they really acting under what we might believe to be "free will"?

The rest of your points are very much valid, and I wouldn't call any of that a particularly good example of free will, but this one in particular bugs me. Thinking like this makes this debate an exercise in futility and intellectual masturbation, with no clear answer because there's no clear question.

Is somebody making their own choice when a belief they hold is what tells them they should fast, even to the detriment of their own health and life?

Either Free Will is the ability to make a choice, and therefore it demonstrably exists, or it's some nebulous, ill-defined concept that no one has ever clearly stated, and therefore it's impossible to prove its existence or lack thereof. If you want a definitive answer, the definition of Free Will must be the former. Anything else is, as mentioned, an exercise in intellectual masturbation.

I'm not so sure "the ability to make a choice" is free will, any more so than our intelligence and beliefs cause us to have "souls".

It's a nebulous thing because the only hard explanation we have for it right now is so simplistic as to be a useless definition anyway.