Is Free Will Possible?

[Daden]

The degrees of understanding (from least to greatest)

I believe that I have free will.
I doubt that I have free will.
I know that I have free will.

You fall in the middle OP. You're doubting free will because you know that our thoughts and desires are shaped by forces beyond our control. I know that this truth doesn't matter, because free will is the ability to do what you want. Why you want to do something is irrelevant.

Herein lies the problem, I think. You've changed the definition of free will to fit your philosophy. Many people do this when posed this question, though not to the same degree of complexity.

Also, I don't think the question lacks utility. If people's actions are subject to natural law, they can ultimately be understood using the scientific method, which is the only reliable tool I know of.

Oh god not this bullshit again.

Look, just because we are the product of our experiences DOES NOT mean we do not have free will.

You can still decide and choose, you always have and that is also what has shaped you into what you are today.

This.
But obviously you can't (physically) rocket off into space by sheer epic willpower and disco moves. You're constrained in any circumstance, but you always have a choice of what to do.

But I will say that the future isn't some kind of big cloud of unknown; the future is certain, it's just that nobody knows what that future is, and are free to make whatever decisions they want because that's what they're supposed to do. So... STOP BEING SHEEP, PEOPLE!

This makes no sense to me. If the future is certain, then people aren't free to make their own decisions. The decisions would be predetermined, no?

I am not saying people don't make decisions, which seems to be a common misunderstanding when this question is posed.

 

[blazearmoru]

I don't believe free will is possibl. We really don't do things outside of our character. Human actions are a result of wants, wishes, desires, motivations, feels, etc. These are caused in turn by specific antecedent conditions ensuring their occurrence. This means human actions are not of free will.

How many people here can say that they can CONTROL what they want and what they don't want? Is anyone here capable of controling what they love and don't love? What they believe and don't believe? It's not possible to have free will because ultimately you arn't even in control of your own wants, needs, and beliefs, so how can you control your choices when your choices are COMPLETELY dependent on those things?

Suppose your will were free. This would mean that your actions were not determined by causal laws. If no causal laws governed your actions, then it would be impossible to predict what you are going to do. But in fact people who know you can predict what you will do, with a fair amount of accuracy. And if they couldn't ? if your actions were completely unpredictable ? they'd probably say NOT that you were free, but that you were crazy. So your actions must be controlled by causal law.

Ok, even if you don't agree with the stuff up there, I know most people believes that everything that happens has to have a cause.

 

[Blue_vision]

But I will say that the future isn't some kind of big cloud of unknown; the future is certain, it's just that nobody knows what that future is, and are free to make whatever decisions they want because that's what they're supposed to do. So... STOP BEING SHEEP, PEOPLE!

This makes no sense to me. If the future is certain, then people aren't free to make their own decisions. The decisions would be predetermined, no?

I am not saying people don't make decisions, which seems to be a common misunderstanding when this question is posed.

The future is certain, based off of the decisions of what people do. You can't "change the future" by making a different decision, but you've still made that decision, and it leads to a certain consequence based off of what you've decided.

Not that prophecies and fates aren't totally awesome and acceptable in forms of literature and belief, that's just the personal view that I hold.

 

[tomtom94]

You have the ability to DO whatever you want but you will ACT according to past experiences, moralities etc.

 

[More Fun To Compute]

Free will is a sort of religious belief. A more modern philosophical and scientific concept is the intentional stance. We have the ability to hold a model in our head of how the world and other people work and make decisions based on that. It's possible that man made systems like computers could do the same thing or already are to some degree. That doesn't require anything like a soul to explain how we make complex choices that a fish or a bicycle can't.

 

[Dr_Steve_Brule]

To quote Andrew Ryan-
"We all make choices. But in the end, our choices make us."

 

[HentMas]

Ok...
let me state this

I come from a country where the most important thing in everybodies lifes is "soccer"(futbol for us Méxicans)

where everybody expects to win a lot of money without doing any kind of work (beggers, narcs, policemen, gov, everybody to be precise)

where if a guy makes her girl pregnant he will probably leave her without child care, support or even a proper "abortion", the guys just dont care

where more than halve the population cant speak english, and from that, more than a thirth cant speak spanish (the last bit is an exageration, but still, there are a lot of indigenous communities with their own dialect)

here the norm of music is either "cumbia, racheras, banda" for the most part, and "pop, electronic, clasic rock" for the other people

if the "experiences" part is right, i should be at least one of those kind of people (there aremore examples but those are the most common) because the media and my surroundings are "imprinting" those things in me... but I am neither of those guys

why? well... that is more complex than i can explain in simple word, so i´m just going to say "because i want"

so, do i believe in "free will"? yes i do, after all, i am choosing what i want in my life, and even thought everything around me tells me to be "someone else" i choose my own path... and i´m happy

i dont know if you will get my point, i am not really explaining my self, but i believe it none the less.

 

[Joshroom]

I personally would side with the "of course we have free-will" side of the argument. I might choose to answer maturally to this thread. Or I might type "omg, what the hell, you are stupid, lol". Its my own personally choice to how I respond; with no true constraints to my decision other than my own desire of how I want to be percieved by others. Yes, maybe my choice is affected by outside influences. Yes, maybe it is all a product of the person I am now due the influences that have affected me up to this point in my life.
But ultimatly, every decision I make is my own choice. My own free will.

 

[Tarcin]

It's a long thread, so I cba to read it all, but the jist of the initial argument presented here was that we might not have free will because of a simple little thing called cause and effect (or fate if you have a desperate need to cling to something a little more divine).

That is a way of thinking which I myself have been through and there is some logical merit to it. I mean; it causes some serious problems for the arguments for "free will" seeing as all actions or "choices" are caused by an extremely long chain of events which is impossible to retrace for the human mind. Unless you belive that there is no connection between cause and effect and that anything that happens in the world happens in a vacuum you will be forced to accept that everything around you has been inevitable from the very first moment of existence. That is in the big picture. If you want something more retraceable; essentially a mixture of your genetic disposition and your experiences in life cause your every action and by default are inevitable.

That's a logical conclusion I hope we can all agree is true, but is it really all that relevant? Even if my actions are "destined" to occur I have still made a concious choice to follow through with it.

I'm sorry if what I'm writing is confusing. English is not my native language and as such I might not be capable of making a complete philosophical and logically correct argument. Feel free to ask me to expand on anything if it's unclear.

 

[Aiden_the-Joker1]

Free will is possible, you can do anything you want at any point. Just because there are punishments does not mean you can't, just that you won't. Anyone can do anything they just won't, people can kill someone randomly ... with SCIENCE but things persuade them otherwise.

 

[AnOriginalConcept]

We don't have free will nor is free will possible. We are a product of our genetics and our environment.

If there were an infinite number of identical parallel universes, everyone would act the same in each of them. Therefore, our actions are already set.

(It's my (uneducated) opinion that particle decay is not random, we just don't understand it.)

 

[Nieroshai]

I'm going to leave it at this. I'm not going to ask "Why are you asking?" I'm going to ask "How are you asking?" Were you predestined to question predestination? So many paradoxes come from predestination. Such as, why bother fooling us into thinking that we're thinking in the first place?

 

[Nieroshai]

We don't have free will nor is free will possible. We are a product of our genetics and our environment.

If there were an infinite number of identical parallel universes, everyone would act the same in each of them. Therefore, our actions are already set.

(It's my (uneducated) opinion that particle decay is not random, we just don't understand it.)

Then either I'm truly incapable of believing otherwise or my belief otherwise is a genetic glitch? My disbelief in macroevolution is a glitch in my brain? Or did I choose to disagree with you? And I'm not free to seek or deny knowledge, but meant from birth to want to do science?

 

[Yarkaz]

I find lulz in how you're taking one of the biggest questions in the history of philosophy and asking about it on a video game forum. But hey, I guess it is kinda interesting to see everyone else's opinions.

OT: I'm more of a free will guy, myself. If we assume that people's actions are not their own fault, then we can't fully justify punishing their crimes. If we can't punish people for their crimes, then the world will fall into crime and anarchy, and that just won't be good. So unless you think that the world is predestined to fall into complete chaos and there's nothing we can do about it...

 

[Daden]

I find lulz in how you're taking one of the biggest questions in the history of philosophy and asking about it on a video game forum. But hey, I guess it is kinda interesting to see everyone else's opinions.

OT: I'm more of a free will guy, myself. If we assume that people's actions are not their own fault, then we can't fully justify punishing their crimes. If we can't punish people for their crimes, then the world will fall into crime and anarchy, and that just won't be good. So unless you think that the world is predestined to fall into complete chaos and there's nothing we can do about it...

This is a slippery slope line of thinking that I could employ as well:

If no one believed in free will, there would be less blame and more understanding. The gap between the rich and poor would narrow, and peace and prosperity would sweep the Earth.

 

[TheScottishFella]

An extremely common theme in film/literature/videogames/etc. is that destiny is not set because human beings have "free will," the power of making choices that are unconstrained by external circumstances or by an agency such as fate or divine will.

The problem is, I cannot understand how free will can exist. Human beings cannot live free of external circumstances because we do not exist in some sort of vacuum, removed from influence. There are always forces acting on us, and all of our thoughts and actions are the sum total of our previous experiences and genetics coupled with the forces acting upon us presently.

When I try to make this argument with almost anyone, they look at me like I have grown a second head. "No," they say, "but you always have a choice one way or another." Another common line of thought is that metacognition (thinking about thinking) somehow uniquely frees humans from cause and effect. Some will even go as far as to state that the seemingly random movement of subatomic particles proves that there is no cause and effect in the universe, but, to me, this seems like a cop-out excuse for systems we do not yet (or, perhaps, cannot) understand.

So, I pose the following questions to you fellow escapists: Is free will possible? Why or why not?

Note: This is not a religious debate, but if anyone claims a supernatural orgin to free will, please be respectful.

I think we do have free will, but influences makes us not use it if that makes sense. If I said to you "kill someone." you would look at me like a fucking maniac. You wouldn't do it. You could do it but the main argument is, it is against the law. Ask a killer to do it, they might just do it. You see just because you didn't do it and he did doesn't mean you don't have free will, you just conform to society and he conforms to being a killer, and that's what they do if that makes sense.

 

[Yarkaz]

I find lulz in how you're taking one of the biggest questions in the history of philosophy and asking about it on a video game forum. But hey, I guess it is kinda interesting to see everyone else's opinions.

OT: I'm more of a free will guy, myself. If we assume that people's actions are not their own fault, then we can't fully justify punishing their crimes. If we can't punish people for their crimes, then the world will fall into crime and anarchy, and that just won't be good. So unless you think that the world is predestined to fall into complete chaos and there's nothing we can do about it...

This is a slippery slope line of thinking that I could employ as well:

If no one believed in free will, there would be less blame and more understanding. The gap between the rich and poor would narrow, and peace and prosperity would sweep the Earth.

In an ideal world, that'd be true. The problem is that understanding usually divulges into two paths: those who abuse it and those who don't. Humans tend to have a natural disposition towards general badness, and while some may see things your way, too many more would abuse the "understanding" they're given and decide that since it was predestined, and harm they dole out and the pain they cause is A-okay. Essentially we're both right, but since those who choose "right" would be forced to "understand" those who don't, they'd be nearly powerless to stop them.

 

[GLo Jones]

I completely agree with the OP, and (while I hate to admit it) I lose some respect for everyone that disagrees.

 

[Irony's Acolyte]

Free will =/= Free from influences

If you have free will that means that you are not being directly controlled by someone else. For intance if someone was utterly controlling my mind (I couldn't even resist), I would have no free will. If someone told me to do something (just told me through words), then I would have free will even if I did what they asked.

The question of whether we have free will or not is usually linked to whether there is a god (or several) or whether fate and destiny exist. If a god controlled your every action then you would have no free will. If your life was fated to turn out a certain then you would be without free will. On the other hand if you don't believe in dieties, fate, or destiny (like me) then you will probably believe that everything you do is ultimately your choice. You may be heavily influenced to do it but it was still your choice. I believe that no matter what the situation there is always more than one choice you can take.

Of course for those that believe that our life is already predetermined, I'd be wrong. But that would be due to a difference in beliefs.

I want to make it clear though that I agree with the OP that we are heavily influenced by our surroundings. How we act in any given situation can be changed dramtically by changing part of the context. But we still are the ones that allow the change to alter our actions. It is unlikely that I will just kill someone in cold-blood due to the fact that most likely I will suffer greatly from it. But I am allowing the law to influencing me. If I really wanted to I could just go out and attempt to kill someone. There is very actually stopping me from doing so (these being purely physical restrictions: I'm not in the best of shape, I don't easy access to any very good weapons). But if I put my mind to it I could just go and kill someone.

 

[GLo Jones]

Oh god not this bullshit again.

Look, just because we are the product of our experiences DOES NOT mean we do not have free will.

You can still decide and choose, you always have and that is also what has shaped you into what you are today.

Flawless victory delusion..

Fixed that for you.

Free will is an illusion (sorry, I'm a hopeless determinist). Our responses (everything we do) are shaped by inside and outside influences. Our outside influences consist of everything out body senses. Our inside influences consist of our mental reactions to that sensory input. Those reactions are shaped by our upbringing, both nature (our genes) and nurture (our past experiences).

Free will is an almost perfect illusion, and I would say it's practically impossible to live without acknowledging that illusion, but still we are all hopeless automatons reacting to our environment. And I like it that way.

This sums up my view nicely. There is no situation/example where this cannot be accurately applied.