Perhaps we have free will. Perhaps we have the illusion of free will based on microbiological conditions in our body. Perhaps our brains are just biological computers, that are capable of more than just binary.
Does free will exist?
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Now, while I did skim a few of these posts, it seems that we are rather guardedly not discussing the consequences to other philosophies of whether there is free will or not, which is perhaps, as it was for me, a matter of introspection.
Anyway, if not then?
While I firmly believe free will is a happy illusion, so what? Observing that my ability to make a choice is not completely free changes nothing about which choice I make, unless one of the options depends on my belief in free will, in which case it will be looked at askance and muttered at while dirtier and grittier decisions are made elsewhere.
I'm just gonna throw this out there in one big piece and see if anyone else likes the taste. The illusion of free will and the perception of making choices is an evolutionary adaptation, partly as an artifact of certain gradual processes in the cranial vault but selected for in man and in other species to a lesser degree because, even though living beings are elaborate robots, we are comparatively happy ones. We enjoy, in our lives, a spectrum of emotions and feelings that, even if we're just along for the ride, keep us going and in doing so largely propagate our species. I mean, you might imagine a world without free will and emotion and personality as a place in which big hairy man-bots walk up to slightly less hairy woman-bots and automatically shout "HAVE SEX WITH ME", a request which is automatically acquiesced to with haste and abandon as a particularly better place to be than what we have but in case you hadn't noticed, evolution doesn't always make sense, in fact oftentimes it doesn't make any sense at all. But such as it is, what limited choice we have may in fact largely rotate around our opinions of things, and our likes and dislikes. Reward behavior may be both a means and an end in human motivation, I certainly don't see moping about and feeling sad all the time as a selective advantage but hey, if that's what emo chicks are into then go for it, they'll eat it up like a bus load of wolverines in a butcher shop. Ahem.
I think I'm just typing to hear the clicky sounds my keyboard makes at this time.
Anyway, if not then?
While I firmly believe free will is a happy illusion, so what? Observing that my ability to make a choice is not completely free changes nothing about which choice I make, unless one of the options depends on my belief in free will, in which case it will be looked at askance and muttered at while dirtier and grittier decisions are made elsewhere.
I'm just gonna throw this out there in one big piece and see if anyone else likes the taste. The illusion of free will and the perception of making choices is an evolutionary adaptation, partly as an artifact of certain gradual processes in the cranial vault but selected for in man and in other species to a lesser degree because, even though living beings are elaborate robots, we are comparatively happy ones. We enjoy, in our lives, a spectrum of emotions and feelings that, even if we're just along for the ride, keep us going and in doing so largely propagate our species. I mean, you might imagine a world without free will and emotion and personality as a place in which big hairy man-bots walk up to slightly less hairy woman-bots and automatically shout "HAVE SEX WITH ME", a request which is automatically acquiesced to with haste and abandon as a particularly better place to be than what we have but in case you hadn't noticed, evolution doesn't always make sense, in fact oftentimes it doesn't make any sense at all. But such as it is, what limited choice we have may in fact largely rotate around our opinions of things, and our likes and dislikes. Reward behavior may be both a means and an end in human motivation, I certainly don't see moping about and feeling sad all the time as a selective advantage but hey, if that's what emo chicks are into then go for it, they'll eat it up like a bus load of wolverines in a butcher shop. Ahem.
I think I'm just typing to hear the clicky sounds my keyboard makes at this time.
Technically I'm completely with Skinner on this one. You have no free will as you are to only do what you to be the most profitable thing at a certain circumstance. People are self sacrificing because they get more pleasure out of seeing other happy more than themselves, its no overcoming of will.s
- If variable can have any value, why are things in natural balance? Everything ultimately goes through our logic. Even wikipedia says about chaos theory "the behavior of chaotic systems appears to be random." Well that's not much to say? The numbers my calculator gives with random(1,10) command seem to be random, though calculator's programmer knows what kind of deterministic process they're based on. I'd much rather accept that we're deficient in cognitive capabilities than that universe has randomness.mrpenguinismyhomeboy said:
As concept, I would write off the discussion entirely as it serves no practical purpose.JC175 said:
There's been several times in just my recent past where I capitalized on a lucky moment, where my natural procrastination and inaction were overcome by my curiosity to see the alternative, with great results.
In the practical sense, which is all we need to know for living right now, yes you have free will, and yes, routines are fine and dandy, but you still have a choice. A choice, with very real consequences, for better or worse. It's so easy to slip up at just the wrong moment and end up in a car wreck or miss a good job opportunity. Maybe you fall asleep at work, and if you drank that coffee like you had the option to, you'd be awake and your boss wouldn't be riding your ass for the next week or so.
Regardless of the illusion, or the grand scheme of things, we have Free Will, and how well we use it determines our lives just as much as random chance does. Besides, the human race desperately NEEDS the rat race to keep the societal engine running.
We need our Gammas, Deltas, and Epsilons just as much as the Betas and Alphas!
...
Sorry, I've been listening to Brave New World on audiotape on my way to work and back...
Oh, and kids:
Don't get tangled up in debating randomness or chaos theory! You know that chance exists in one form or the other, and to attempt to mathematically calculate existence is to forsake the actual living it. Keep it practical imo. tbh. irl.
I think we both agree on this.DoW Lowen said:
This is where our opinions differ. I agree that the world is deterministic given natural laws that govern the universe. However, that kind of limitation does not indicate that free will does not exist, just that pure randomness does not exist.
Please correct me, if I'm wrong. You're saying that: If free will exists, then no internal or external factors may determine our actions. All actions happen for, essentially, no reason.
Of course, that's just inane.
So, let's go back to this:
Would you agree that, given the current mental capabilities of the human mind and the current state of science and technology, a man cannot know the decision he will make for a choice before he considers the choice? For example, before I consider whether or not I want to go to the movies or go swimming, I do not know that I will decide to go to the movies. And certainly, determinism does not mean that I cannot weigh the options of swimming or going to the movies. Of course, I am determined to go to the movies. However, I do not know that I will go to the movies, prior to actually considering the choice.
Therefore, this brings me to my conception of free will: That, given our incapability of knowing what we are going to do before we actually do it, free will is the exercise of making rational choices, although those choices are already determined by natural laws. Rational choices being decisions I make because I want to do them.
An example of an irrational choice would be OCD behaviors, where one, let's say, obsessively cleans because he would really rather clean than do anything else, but because his compulsion overwhelms all other desires.
Your calculators random numbers are predictable (there is no way a calculator has a true random number generator) - even the computer based ones we have now are theoretically predictable (theoretically predictable in much the same way that you can theoretically brute force a 2042-bit RSA keypair - but practically impossible as we're more likely to suffer the heat death of the universe first with current tech and processing power). The best we have is a site that monitors atmospheric noise and uses that for random numbers - and even that should be theoretically predictable with enough sensors, data, and processing power (based off world I think because of the requirements to work around what the machine does etc.). The concept of chaos theory actually defies the logic of the laws of physics - although it sits nicely with a lot of peoples world and self views so it is not something we've completely ignored yet - it is just that we do not have the technology, power and/or cognitive capabilities to monitor and predict these things. Indeed I doubt if any race ever would or could.Toge111 said:
Oh but it is a very important distinction. A huge number of decisions are made every day, by people at all levels of society, based on OTHER IDEAS that completely hinge on the existence of free will. Take for example, religion. And from religion, take christianity. Or any other major religion, and most of the minor ones, for the most part. Christianity completely hinges on the concept that you have a free will and you can use it to do such and such. Now, regardless of which side of christianity or the free will debates you fall on, the postulate of free will, if false, undermines a great many of ideas that are in many parts of the world central to policy making.Ignignoct said:
Or at least that's how I see it.
Random isn't random. Chaos is false. Everything has order to it if you understand what is happening. What makes something look a certain way is how you perceive it. When you look at something you are always missing a very large chunk. There are lots of parts of the laws of physics we don't understand yet or that are just theory. Quantum mechanics is ridiculous to comprehend. Higgs bosin and dark matter are still unproven, so they are still theory.
Religion can be dangerous thing. When you stop just believing in something and make it a religion it changes. A belief can be changed, a religion cannot so easily. Beliefs are personal, while religion is all the persons. Every one sees parts of religion different ways, its all up to interpretation just like everything else, that is why radicals exist. Beliefs aren't based on free will, they are based on what some one perceives as the right thing. Your frame of reference is always just the tip of the iceburg, there is so much more you don't get to see.
Religion can be dangerous thing. When you stop just believing in something and make it a religion it changes. A belief can be changed, a religion cannot so easily. Beliefs are personal, while religion is all the persons. Every one sees parts of religion different ways, its all up to interpretation just like everything else, that is why radicals exist. Beliefs aren't based on free will, they are based on what some one perceives as the right thing. Your frame of reference is always just the tip of the iceburg, there is so much more you don't get to see.
I'm going to quote myself because on the internet, nobody can see you blush.
"People keep looking at physics and math to give them the answers to the universe. They'll never find it there because that's not where it is. The human brain contains, by sharp contrast, the answers to why we're asking those questions."
"People keep looking at physics and math to give them the answers to the universe. They'll never find it there because that's not where it is. The human brain contains, by sharp contrast, the answers to why we're asking those questions."
Ive proven the idea of free will by simply clicking on this thread unless your definition of free will is different then mine.
to me free will means we have choices and we choose from the avaiable options, I could have left this thread alone or I could of clicked on the title and posted (which im doing now) .
"we dont,t choose the cards were dealt but only how we play them"
to me free will means we have choices and we choose from the avaiable options, I could have left this thread alone or I could of clicked on the title and posted (which im doing now) .
"we dont,t choose the cards were dealt but only how we play them"
Our brain can be understood though. We just don't yet, we look to math and physics to explain how things work. Once we figure out how "we" work we gain a greater understanding of everything. The universe is made up of perceptions and truths, we use math and science to find the truths. But we need to know our perceptions most, because those skew the truths that we find.
Existentialist: Should you be asking those questions as a womanThunderhitler said:To an extent, free will exists, the paths in life are endless, but it not always your choice what path you take.
It all matters on why you do things.
Behavioristo you jack off because it feels good, and you like feeling?
Evolutionist
Cognitive
Sorry, couldn't help myself
Shame you didn't read past that first part, it seems, as I clearly stated that for all practical purposes of existing as a human on the planet earth during our current century, free will does exist and matters very very much. It's just the debate that is so far above the lofty clouds that it serves no PRACTICAL purpose as the minutiae is so... blech... I'm rambling.300ccs of medicine said:
So...
No matter how much someone doesn't believe in free will... He'll still have to choose if he wants to have the McChicken combo meal, or the 10-pc chicken nuggets with honey and BBQ sauce.
Good thing women can't masturbate.Gitsnik said:Existentialist: Should you be asking those questions as a womanThunderhitler said:To an extent, free will exists, the paths in life are endless, but it not always your choice what path you take.
It all matters on why you do things.
Behaviorist
Evolutionist
Cognitive
Sorry, couldn't help myself
They NEED us men to keep em warm at night, AMIRITE?
Edit:
Pragmatist: Because I'll wake up with sticky blankets and get random erections if I go too long without jackin'.