This is not a question of philosophy, it’s a question of law, that is, what norms emerge from dispute-resolution.
Clayton -
Not wishing to debate free will again extensively- if you look at my post history I’ve done it quite a lot.
The main point though is, if determinism is true we are screwed. In a way we don’t exist just the atoms which create the illusion of me (see my signature).
I define free will as the ability to choose good or evil, truth or falsehood and beauty or ugliness. I used to say it was the power to choose the contrary- A or non-A. Put as above I think it grounds it more in reality.
The denial of free will is the classic case of a man holding a conclusion which undermines his means of discovering it. It is basic observation that man chooses yet by holding a consistent materialism you have to undermine it. Consequently a non-materialistic worlview better descirbes reality.
Man discovers science, not science man.
Lozterrk,
Presumably, these attackers and expert regulators would have been pre-determined to do so?
Physiocrat, the ability for who to choose? One’s own perspective must be handled differently from those of any “other agents”; if we ignore the difference and just speak of “we” it can only lead to confusion.
From my perspective I certainly have the ability to make choices. By this definition I definitely have free will (and you may find you can say the same of yourself). The only remaining question is whether I (or you) could eventually - in principle - model the movements of other people entirely through physics (determinism), or only ever through teleology. Of course that latter question can only be answered by attaining that level of mastery of physics, if that turns out to be possible.
^ AJ, I agree.
According to what I think is the most useful definition of “exist”, if X is useful for navigating (surviving in) your environment, then X exists.
Entities for whom a bus does not exist, stop existing themselves. They get run over. Deny the existence of agency in others at your own risk.
Twins are physiologically the same people and grow up in virtually the exact same environment and are typically treated exactly the same, except the twins are usually two totally different people. These social “scientists” claim that by augmenting or altering the environment that you can manipulate people’s behavior, yet in this case with twins, how is their environment so drasitcally different that it can form two different people? The truth is it isn’t. They are two different people with different wills.
Not only that, it becomes a matter of how one can “choose” to change the environment or “choose” to inspire someone to change their environment when free will “doesn’t exist” to begin with, as they say. Lots of contradictions amongst the science community. The root of all this behavioral “science” is to promote the idea that we are not individuals; that we do not choose anything, and therefore we are not responsible for our behavior, and thus we must take their drugs in order to be “free.” More like take their drugs to become agents of the state.
Are you being sarcastic?
On the level of pure determinism, individuals don’t exist. Nor does anything else exist apart from the fundamental building blocks of the universe (whatever they turn out to be). Free will therefore doesn’t exist as a separate physical phenomenon.
However, at the level where individuals are perceived to exist, free will is also perceived to exist, because it’s impossible to know what any individual will do at any point in the future.
Simply because we exist and we are phenomena does not exclude the presence of free will. Do you truly maintain that there is no difference between you, me and a rock? The rock is a phenomenon, as with you and I. You may bring up that we have a phenomenon called the brain, and that since the rock doesn’t have free will and is a cause and agent of its physical environment that choice is an illusion.
Before I begin my critique, am I understanding you correctly?
AJ,
I am saying all agents (humans) have the ability as described above. In my mind free will is far more fundemental than prediction. In fact prediction has little to do with it unless you argue that a being a exhaustive foreknoweldge. In that case free will would be redundent since all actions of agents would be settled prior to creation since it that being knew with certitude something would happen then it must. Further I’d argue to know something it must first exist so to know the future would imply that it exists- as such all time must exist concurrently which again implies determinsim and also causes problems for human identity. At which point in time am I me?
EDIT:
As an addenum, with causality there must be a first cause otherwise the chain would never come into existence. Now since that is the case there could be other similar causes to this ultimate first cause which start the chain of causality, not caused by it. This is how I understand real, metaphysical free will- it begins a chain of causality, it does not begin one. It however does not follow from this that it is random since that precludes meaningful choice. Free will is necessary but mysterious since it is basic- it cannot be explained in other terms since it is in fact basic to human existence.
This doesn’t have to be another circle jerk thread. Like AJ said, define free will and you’ll know whether you have it.
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What is will?
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What is it free of?
But think outside the establishment false dichotomy. A person identifies with his conscious brain, not with his unconscious brain. YOU are your consciousness. The question then isn’t is will determined or free, but does the conscious brain orchestrate chioce or experience the choice output by automatic processes of the unconscious brain.
In that vein, I can find in my mental experience only three modes of (nonverbal) thinking: modeling phenomena in terms of mechanical object-on-object interactions, modeling phenomena in terms of agency (by analogy with my own consciousness), and then just trivial noting of patterns. These three are all just types of “seeing movies” (not just visual, but encompassing all five senses - modeling agency, for example, involves bodily sensations like the vicarious pain you feel when seeing a guy get kicked in the nuts). With that, I’d define whatever sets of sensations in those movies that matter to me (are relevant to my pain/pleasure) as being “real” or perhaps as “existing,” though I tend to reserve that latter word for physical objects.
Physiocrat, all agents have the ability to choose, by definition of the word “agent.” The question is whether there are really any other agents besides me (or from your perspective, besides you). No actually, the only question that matters for me (or for you*) is whether it is useful to view others as agents (useful to view others as having free will, as you have defined it). For me it certainly seems to be, and I don’t expect anyone would say otherwise if they understand what I’m getting at. I’m merely trying to tie up all loose ends by allowing the possibility that it could be useful to model people as robots some day in the future. This was not intended as a central point, just an attempt to anticipate all objections so the debate wouldn’t drag on too long.
*This is tautological, because I’m using “matters” and “is useful” as synonyms.
AJ,
See my edit above which might make my positon more clear. Further I think viewing people “as if” they were agents pressuposes a pragmatic approach to knowledge which is IMO the epistemological equivalent of throwing in the towel. I’m not saying it is useful to treat others “as if” they were agents but that the are agents.
Well it sounds like you’re saying that you care about non-pragmatic points, but I can’t make sense of those words. To me, “I care about issue X” and “X is a pragmatic issue (to me)” are synonyms. Please clarify.
I was meaning that you seem to be exhibiting a pragmatic approach to knowledge rather than holding to either correspondance or even coherence theory of knowledge. Not that a correct epistemology wasn’t practical. Did you see my edit above about causilty and freedom of the will?
Re-read your sentence and the answer should be obvious: of course not. But let me ask you this, what is the difference between sufficiently complex phenomena and free will?
Clayton -
I think metaphysical libertarianism is a perfectly fine explanation. Why must everything be “predetermined”? Sure, there are determined “natures,” such as human nature, which are not subject to change. But that doesn’t mean that “fate” or “destiny” exist. Part of the nature of man is to have free will. And I don’t think free will is compatible with this idea that “reality is pre-determined.”
There are two ideas of predetermination: the entire “story” of the universe written as an author writes a book, and a deterministic universe which necessarily means that the future state is not open to change. I think you’re using the first definition, which is counter to free will. The second one is not.
From whose point-of-view?? If we mean from God’s PoV, then of course it’s pre-determined, everything is pre-determined from the PoV of an omniscient being. It is crucial not to reason ourselves into circles.
Clayton -