Is free-will an illusion?

@Krumple,

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There are no infinite possibilities when it comes down to how someone will respond or act in a situation or moment of choice.

Perhaps Krump you misunderstand. While we have a limited number of choices, the number of determinants influencing our choice or combinations thereof might be astronomical if not infinite

The question before the house is this: Given exactly the same determinants every time, can we always expect exactly the same results

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@dalehileman,

dalehileman wrote:

Quote:
There are no infinite possibilities when it comes down to how someone will respond or act in a situation or moment of choice.
Perhaps Krump you misunderstand. While we have a limited number of choices, the number of determinants influencing our choice or combinations thereof might be astronomical if not infinite

It seems as though people are wanting to mix world phenomena with that of human choice making. The function of a car is separate to that of a person's will to act. So if a person wanted to use their car to get to work, you can't say they made the choice successfully if their car functions to get them there.

There is a limit to human choice. Just like you can't step out your front door and fly off without the need of any contraption or tools. Under your own power. So circumstances and conditions for actions or thoughts are irrelevant to choice. Just like in a chose-your-own-adventure novel all the previous words do not force the results. It is up to the experiencer on how to precede. All previous events are irrelevant. Although an event might prevent an option to the experience it in no way impacts the selecting of the choice.

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@Krumple,

Quote:

All previous events are irrelevant. Although an event might prevent an option to the experience it in no way impacts the selecting of the choice.

Krump, sepoctillions of events before and during your choice can affect the outcome, anything happening within limitations imposed by the speed of light. Just as you’re on the verge of a choice a particle, perhaps some remnant of the Big Bang, striking a brain cell changes it

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@dalehileman,

dalehileman wrote:

Krump, sepoctillions of events before and during your choice can affect the outcome, anything happening within limitations imposed by the speed of light. Just as you’re on the verge of a choice a particle, perhaps some remnant of the Big Bang, striking a brain cell changes it

I do not agree. Silly rather. Sure environment could influence decision making. Sure brain cancer could influence decision making. It doesn't make infinite choices though. You still have a limit to the amount of choices you can select from. So it doesn't matter if your synapse gets hit by a cosmic ray and alters your choice, there still is a limit to what choice gets picked.

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@Krumple,

Quote:

You still have a limit to the amount of choices you can select from.

Krump I still think you misunderstand me else we’re in some kind of semantic jumble. Of course as I agreed our choices are limited but which one prevails might be up for grabs until the last millisecond

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I think the proper question to consider is:

Can "free-will" be defined in a way that precludes the possibility of there being any such thing?

The answer to that, of course, is...yes.

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@dalehileman,

dalehileman wrote:

Krump I still think you misunderstand me else we’re in some kind of semantic jumble. Of course as I agreed our choices are limited but which one prevails might be up for grabs until the last millisecond

Perhaps maybe you were referring to the aspect of not actually having control over what is selected. Perhaps a chemical imbalance influence, a disease, a cosmic ray, an electric shock. Is this why you wouldn't consider it free will because a force external to that of what makes up decision making could have an effect that was not intended which caused a result that would have otherwise not been chosen?

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@Frank Apisa,

Frank Apisa wrote:

I think the proper question to consider is:

Can "free-will" be defined in a way that precludes the possibility of there being any such thing?

The answer to that, of course, is...yes.

by what though ?

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@Frank Apisa,

Keep in mind the Catholic Church tortured left handed people; and murdered Galileo, for claiming the world was round. My own priest shot himself in the head after being accused of child molesting. I am Catholic, I was an altar boy, my cousin is a monk in a Spanish Mission in Arizona. Let us not confuse the Catholic Church, or any church for ( GOD).

Genius and insight will never make you popular with a Church, especially if the average priest got a C average in English, and did not take Physics, because lets face it he was kind of ... stupid. Yet I love priests, and church is a cheap date, I recommend it if you have a tight budget. There is one awesome priest on the Catholic TV Channel who expresses racing thoughts on the physics of the Universe.

Isn't it clear, God is everywhere, and has mass and velocity, but we just can't expect a typical dysfunctional nun to have any understanding of algebra, physics, or microbiology, so when proofing that GOD has mass and velocity, we may be labelled a hairy tick, because the Pope may not even know what a neutrino or a quark is.

Theories exist on the physical nature of the soul, on the physical form God assumes, and the various frequencies and wavelengths of energy used by God in his tools the Holy spirit, and the Queue ( Qi). But these theories threaten existing powerful institutions. As to make controlling people easier, Church and state have been separated, so to has the Church and science been separated; reducing the stress in theological societies and schools, so C, D, and F students can be accommodated easier, to fill a shortage of clergy.

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@Krumple,

In a case of incertitude the unexpected could tip the balance, yes. But I don’t claim this denies control or confirms free will

The difficulty defining free will suggests its incompatibility with determinism might be a purely semantic issue

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@north,

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by what though ?

I do not understand your question.

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@Frank Apisa,

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by what though ?

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I do not understand your question.

what precludes free-will ?

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Can "free-will" be defined in a way that precludes the possibility of there being any such thing?

The answer to that, of course, is...yes.

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@TimeTravel ,

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Re: Frank Apisa (Post 5090836)
Keep in mind the Catholic Church tortured left handed people; and murdered Galileo, for claiming the world was round. My own priest shot himself in the head after being accused of child molesting. I am Catholic, I was an altar boy...

I have served Mass in St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican. I have served as an acolyte to a cardinal...the Catholic Primate in England. I had an audience with Pius XII.

I am an agnostic.

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Let us not confuse the Catholic Church, or any church for ( GOD).

I have never done that...and I do not understand you directing this comment to me.

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Genius and insight will never make you popular with a Church, especially if the average priest got a C average in English, and did not take Physics, because lets face it he was kind of ... stupid. Yet I love priests, and church is a cheap date, I recommend it if you have a tight budget. There is one awesome priest on the Catholic TV Channel who expresses racing thoughts on the physics of the Universe.

Isn't it clear, God is everywhere, and has mass and velocity...

With all the respect in the world, TimeTravel, it is not clear to me at all. Fact is, anyone asserting such a thing, in my opinion, is asserting a guess.

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@north,

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what precludes free-will ?

Read my comment again. I think you did not understand what I was saying.

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@Frank Apisa,

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what precludes free-will ?

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Read my comment again. I think you did not understand what I was saying.

your right , I did not understand what you were saying

I appologize for my misunderstanding

river

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@Frank Apisa,

Frank, I was making that statement about not confusing any church for God to anyone, and much of what I say while based on truth is satire or sarcasm; sorry for not making that clear. As for theories that attempt to describe the physical nature of God, and the reality of God, and the proof that God exists, would end up being a hypothesis. My passion is mapping patterns in language. As for asserting guesses, or being lucky, those are agnostic terms. I believe there is an all powerful God, who not only controls Good, but also evil. If he controls Yin, he also controls yang. If he controls ID, he also controls Ego, sometimes. When anyone believes in guessing, then they do not believe God is responsible for sourcing knowledge, or doling it out. I think God is in control of inspiration, and that we are just here training, and being tested, that we cannot possibly die, that death is not the end. Similarly, if anyone admits a belief in luck, or randomness, then I label them agnostic, because either God is in control, or luck is possible. Luck and fortunate may be similar, but one assumes God is not in control of probability. I have many expansive thoughts, all the time. I am abnormal, a non-conforming person, who has won 300 awards, scholarships, mostly small, some big, in Scouts, School, the Military, etc. That is only possible because I am not normal, but I assign the glory to God, because I did not win 12 scholarships without inspiration from God, nor poetry, art, or sports events. I do not limit God to any parameters assigned by any definitions of God shared or individual. This allows me to believe that there is only a conflict between Evolution and Creation theory if a person lacks random access memory, or an understanding of one or both, or if they are a true agnostic pretending to believe in an all powerful God, yet ready to limit his power in saying he cannot change Physics constants, or by saying that he cannot alter time or warp space and time. I have met priests who do not really believe in an all powerful God, some are deists, admitting God exists, but painting him as being absent or unavailable. I have lots of alternate theories of many things. I am left handed, bipolar, and have studied 35 languages, and 7 subjects in college. I am a manic writer, who once wrote 10,000 poems in 6 months, and they ranged from 3 lines to hundreds of lines.

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@dalehileman,

dalehileman wrote:

Quote:
and there is no reason, beyond the psychological, to doubt the reality of free will.
There is, Ugh, and it’s called Cause and Effect

..and it’s very persuasive because as far as we know there aren’t any exceptions

"Cause and effect" is a phrase with no clear or consistent meaning. As such, it is neither a threat to free will nor something that can be meaningfully said to be exceptionless.

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@TimeTravel ,

TimeTravel wrote:

The assumption of free will based on only observation and not logic is like a man moving in one direction, completely unaware that he is being followed, because he has not yet looked behind himself.

It is an essential principle of science that observation outranks theory. If your theory conflicts with observation, you have a choice, discard that theory or lose recourse to science. Sacrificing science would be a hell of a price to pay for the dubious pleasure of denying the reality of that which you yourself unavoidably assume to be real and can demonstrate to be observable.

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@ughaibu,

I often wonder what part of a predetermined brain allows it to contemplate whether or not it is predetermined.

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I don't have free will.
I have will. But it's not free. It's bound to all these conditions. The only illusion is that choice means the absence of restrictions when it is in fact the presence of restrictions and conditions in which the choice presents itself that gives meaning to the idea of a choice in the first place.
"Free will" vs determinism is plain wrong.
Expressed in these terms, will is merely the first person view of determinism.

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Is free-will an illusion?

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