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@secularmerlin
Okay.
What do you believe?
Posts
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495
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@secularmerlin
Idle speculation doesn't. But maybe in the end that's all this is, I suppose.
Still, it's better than watching TV - unless Love Island is on.
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@Fallaneze
If I may
Human thoughts and behaviors, as far as we know, are effected by deterministic forces such as chemistry and physics. Agree or disagree?
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@secularmerlin
I agree that our thoughts and behaviors are affected by deterministic forces. I disagree that our thoughts and behaviors are produced by deterministic forces.
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@ArgentTongue
Because consciousness entails a specific awareness and acknowledgment of the universe around the entity which has it. By this measure, free will, which is defined as action carried out within the parameters of discretion, and discretion defined as choice, it is clear conscious perception of options inherently constitutes free will.
Consciousness is a product of the right chemistry and biology coming together to create a brain, a product of the physical universe. When something disrupts the brain, your conscious experience is directly affected by that.
Personally, I've thought of this analogy:
A wing is a collection of stuff shaped in the right way to produce lift.
The brain is a collection of stuff formed in the right way to produce consciousness.
If you bend that wing, your flight performance is reduced or ceases to exist.
If you suffer a stroke, your consciousness is reduced to varying degrees or can cease to exist in the case of death.
Sure, the phenomena that arise from a specific arrangement of chemistry and biology that we know as consciousness is innumerably more complicated than lift/flight, but they both have their origins in the physical universe and are both bound by it.
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@keithprosser
The ability to perceive and understand the options in a choice is the prerequisite to making one. This dictates that some element of consciousness must be present in order for free will to even be a consideration.It's not clear to me!
Idle speculation doesn't. But maybe in the end that's all this is, I suppose.
Ultimately this is all the topic boils down to. While stimulating and entertaining to discuss, neither position - any position, has enough substantial backing to validate its case.
As far as I am concerned, the existential functioning of the universe can be explained by any of three philosophies.
Premise One - The happenings of the universe can be explained by its deterministic mechanisms and the predictable nature of all its base components, which dictates any complex being built from these parts is subject to those same constraints
Premise Two - The universe exists in a state of inherently random events, which in any case, states that our fundamental decisions must also be regulated by a law of randoms.
Premise Three - If free will exists, it can only do so while having an intrinsically unknowable nature to human beings, which is either impossible to understand, or beyond our current capability to do so.
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@Fallaneze
I agree that our thoughts and behaviors are affected by deterministic forces.
Then this is not under contention.
I disagree that our thoughts and behaviors are produced by deterministic forces.
No other force is in evidence. I am not necessarily arguing that determinism is necessary but it is sufficient and independently verifiable. By contrast some extra unexplainable and unobservable thing called freewill may be sufficient but it is not necessarry or independently verifiable and until it is one or the other I see no reason to accept it prima facie
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@Fallaneze
I disagree that our thoughts and behaviors are produced by deterministic forces.
I think mental illness goes a long way in showing that we do not have free will.
Pick a mental illness like schizophrenia... no one who has that wakes up one day and decides that they want to hear voices or to suffer from depression. The actions of one with schizophrenia are manifestations of the illness/when a brain doesn't work right.
They are literal victims of their own biology, with their thoughts and actions being determined by how their brain is structured, etc.
For the rest of us, just because we don't have an issue, doesn't mean we are any more free than them. We are bound by how our brain works, by our hormones, genetics, etc.
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Also, do you know what you are going to think of next?...
No one knows what they are going to think of next. Our thoughts merely pop up into our stream of consciousness. Intrusive thoughts are a clear example of this. No one wills them into existence yet they plague many people.
Just because your thoughts and actions are relatively normal and don't cause you to question whether or not you have authored them, does not mean they a product of free will.
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@secularmerlin
I disagree that no other force is evidenced. People don't feel as though their choices are being forced by something beyond their will. People feel as though their choices are made in accordance with their will. This places control within the individual, not with external deterministic forces. So determinism is not sufficient to explain why we experience control over our will but free will, however, does. Free will is prima facie rather than determinism.
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@Fallaneze
When you say people are effected by deterministic forces you mean forces beyond their control correct?
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@secularmerlin
Yes.
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@Fallaneze
Could you for the sake of argument suggest a force that is necessarily under our control?
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@secularmerlin
Sure, intentionality.
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@Fallaneze
And how do you go about choosing what you will intend?
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@secularmerlin
Your intentions are a product of your character. There's a feedback loop between your innate dispositions and your intentions which then lead to choices.
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@Fallaneze
And how do you go about choosing what your character will be?Your intentions are a product of your character.
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@secularmerlin
Your character forms your intentions and your intentions form your character. We have the ability to direct our intentions away from our natural inclinations. Our intentions become choices and our series of choices helps define our character.
We have the ability to direct our intentions away from our natural inclinations
Why would we do this unless there was a reason (read a cause)?
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@secularmerlin
Reasons don't automatically make us do something. We can consider the reasons for and against something and then make a decision. The cause for doing something is our will, not the reasons.
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@Fallaneze
Are you saying that having a reason is insufficient to explain an action on the part of a human being?
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@secularmerlin
Yes, because the will is what drives the action. The reason is the marker on the map.
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@Fallaneze
A reason is insufficient reason?
I don't know if I agree with that.
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@secularmerlin
A person's motives (reasons) sets their intentions but their will is what drives (or causes) their actions towards that goal.
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@Fallaneze
That would be easier to believe if every human being I've ever observed did not have a reason for everythingb they did. While that is hardly exhaustive or conclusive it does suggest that we need reasons to do things.
Also if your reasons set your intentions then your intentions are not under your control unless your reasons for doing something are and if your will drives towards your goals then the same thing can be said about your will.
Are you claiming to have control over your desires or your circumsrsnces? I'm not sure you have any control over either.
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@SamStevens
@secularmerlin
@TwoMan
@Fallaneze
A person's motives (reasons) sets their intentions but their will is what drives (or causes) their actions towards that goal.
Motivation comes from mo-tion -- to move -- mo-tor -- mo-jo{ magic } --mo-mma --
P1) deterministic forces, such as chemistry and physics, do not possess reason or understanding.
Complemented by metaphysical-1, mind/intellect/concepts ergo rational, logical common sense and eternally inviolate, cosmic laws//principles
P2) deterministic forces, such as chemistry and physics, produce human thoughts and behaviors.
ccess to metaphysical-1, mind/intellect/concepts is onn possible synergetic resultant { 1 + 1 = 4 } but not a gurrantee in every special-case.
P3) Human thoughts and behaviors are rational.
Human thoughts can be rational, logical common sense or not. Most often they are a combination of both rational and irrational. No humans are perfect.
Biological or non-biological stems from the exact same elements of Uni-V-erse. Biologicals do have not some special kind element that all other aspects of Nature//Uni-V-erse //Cosmos does not have.
Access to metaphysical-1, mind/intellect/concepts ergo access to absolute and relative truths as a synergetic resultant, as is biologic life.
Does the truth set us free? No, the truth does not set us free from the inviolate, finite set of cosmic laws//principle.
All free will illusion stems only from cause-and-effects of chemistry, atomic, sub-atomic, gravity ( ) and dark energy )(.
"feelings" are chemistry, that we then the attempt to identify and label, via our access to metaphysical-1, mind/intellect/mind.
1} Spirit-1 { spirit-of-intent }, ergo metaphysical-1, mind/intellect/concepts, ego and any concepts of Space, God, Feeliings, etc
...concepts of Space, not an actual Space, occupied or not..
...concepts of Space, not an actual Space, occupied or not..
...........line of demarcation.............
2} Spirit-2, occupied space fermions, bosons and any aggregate thereof,
3} Spirit-3, occupied Space, ( ) Gravity { mass-attractive } ---contractive Pulling-IN integerative phenomena --female attracter--
4} Spirit-4, occupied Space of )( Dark Energy { repulsive } --- disintegrating phenomena ---male pusher--
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@secularmerlin
You can't observe reasons. How did you determine that reasons always precede will and not vice versa? People are on autopilot all the time. Like walking through a crowd. Getting out of people's way is more of an automated response than deliberately planning it. To say that people don't need reasons to react is more accurate than saying that they don't need will to react. Will causes us to act while our motives set our intentions.
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@Fallaneze
I can only say that in any instance where I took the time to investigate there was a reason. As I said this is far from exhaustive or conclusive but it certainly doesn't leave me with any reason to think that this is not the case.
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@Discipulus_Didicit
Have we stopped the street epistemolgy yet? i said it was rubbish.
I believe this universe may be some sort of simulation. For what purpose I am not sure.
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@WyseGui
And they say theists are wishful thinkers.