Proof of nonexistence of free will

@kennethamy,

Quote:

Does that mean that you could not help posting?
Sounds like Tourette's syndrome to me. Have you seen a physician?

Ironically none of us appear to be able to refrain from posting, especially you ! Smile

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@fresco,

Quote:

"affects the outcome" does not seem to be equivalent to "cause".

The weather affects the outcome of a golf competition It does not cause it.

The weather is one of the factors that cause the outcome of the golf competition. It contributes to the outcome. The setup of a quantum mechanical experiment contributes to the outcome of measurement by causing (determining) the probability distribution of outcomes.

1 Reply

@kennethamy,

Quote:

Does that mean that you could not help posting?
Sounds like Tourette's syndrome to me. Have you seen a physician?

Under the circumstances I was in, I indeed couldn't help posting. Not being able to help posting to an internet forum under certain circumstances does not necessarily require a visit to a physician.

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@litewave,

litewave wrote:

The setup of a quantum mechanical experiment contributes to the outcome of measurement by causing (determining) the probability distribution of outcomes.

1) cause and determinism are independent notions
2) please provide a link that explains the notion of cause in fundamental physics
3) experimental set-ups are not fundamental physics.

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@kennethamy,

...but you are missing the point.... that "free will" is only discussed vis-a-vis "Tourettes" in the context of "culpability" for social transgressions. We simply don't normally talk about "free will" in the context of "posting", and philosophy seminar mode is not a normal social situation.*

And litewave, nor do we normally use "cause" as equivalent to "affect".

*(Ref: Wittgenstein: "philosophical problems" arise when "language goes on holiday")

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@fresco,

fresco wrote:

...but you are missing the point.... that "free will" is only discussed vis-a-vis "Tourettes" in the context of "culpability" for social transgressions. We simply don't normally talk about "free will" in the context of "posting", and philosophy seminar mode is not a normal social situation.*

And litewave, nor do we normally use "cause" as equivalent to "affect".

*(Ref: Wittgenstein: "philosophical problems" arise when "language goes on holiday")

Why should it be true that we are not in control of what we do, but an exception is made in the case of moral actions? That is highly implausible, and is ad hoc. The belief that we are never in control of what we do is equivalent to the belief that we are always suffering from Tourette's or from obsessive compulsive disorder, even when we are acting normally. As I already pointed out, such a view is like the view that even ordinary money is counterfeit money, and that there is no genuine money. But for there to be counterfeit money there has to be genuine money, else what would counterfeit money be a counterfeit of? And similarly, for there to be abnormal behavior, there must be such a thing as normal behavior, else what would abnormal behavior be contrasted with?

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@kennethamy,

because truth is contextualnot absolute....it is "what works" and that is socially negotiated.

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@fresco,

fresco wrote:

because truth is contextualnot absolute....it is "what works" and that is socially negotiated.

But if truth were "what works" then in order to determine whether some statement is true, we would have to determine whether it is true that the statement works. But, in order to determine whether it is true that the statement works, we would have to determine whether it is true that the statement that works, works. But in order to determine whether it is true that the statement that works, works, we would have to determine whether it works that the statement that works, works. But to determine....well, I am sure you see how absurd the view that what it means to say of a statement that it is true is that it works. For the question that keeps arising is whether it is true that some statement works. And this is without even asking the obvious question, what does it even mean to say of a statement that "it works", which is obscure even for philosophy.

I will simply point out that your reply to my post is utterly irrelevant and does not even touch on the question I asked, which is why we should decide arbitrarily to make an exception of moral statements when it comes to whether we are ever in control of what we do. And please, don't come back with another cliche' about truth being the result of social negotiation just as if that were uncontroversially true, or even if it were clear what that even meant. Try to reply as if the reply comes from you, and not something you have imbibed from some book you happen to favor without giving it any thought. It would lend some credence to what you write.

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@kennethamy,

Philosophy is to social negotiation as as acoustics is to the Beethoven' 5th.

You can play with your infinite regresses about "formal truth" until the cows come home. Meanwhile, "criminals" i.e. those acting sociopathically "of their own free will" will continue to be jailed on the "balance of evidence" thereby enabling the dynamics of our social systems to continue to "work". And the Azande will continue to endorse court decisions of otherwise by examining the entrails of a chicken,in order for their social systems to continue to work.

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@fresco,

fresco wrote:

Philosophy is to social negotiation as as acoustics is to the Beethoven' 5th.

You can play with your infinite regresses about "formal truth" until the cows come home. Meanwhile, "criminals" i.e. those acting sociopathically "of their own free will" will continue to be jailed on the "balance of evidence" thereby enabling the dynamics of our social systems to continue to "work". And the Azande will continue to endorse court decisions of otherwise by examining the entrails of a chicken,in order for their social systems to continue to work.

Well, I worry about logic. You don't seem to do so. That is why you have so much trouble trying to philosophize. You simply believe whatever you want to believe whatever the objections are to it. And if you are able to, you fit the objections into what you believe. But if you are unable to deal with the objections, you simply dismiss them, with a bumper-sticker slogan. I don't think Socrates or Wittgenstein would have approved. In fact, what you do is exactly the kind of thing that Wittgenstein had contempt for and ridiculed. Wittgenstein writes (in the Investigations) that philosophy is an activity, it is not a theory. For you, on the other hand, philosophy is a theory (and ill thought out, at that) and not an activity. You would have dismissed Aristotle's famous "third man" refutation of Plato's theory of Forms, which was an infinite regress argument, simply because you would have preferred to accept Plato's theory. This attitude is something or other, but it is certainly not philosophy. It is, if anything, anti-philosophy, since it despises and dismisses argument, in favor of believing whatever you want to believe is true. What does it matter what the Azande do if their view of the world is false? Animals get along in the world too, and they have no view of the world at all. So what? But the Azande will die without antibiotics whatever they believe.

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@kennethamy,

Calling the Azande view of the world "false" merely underscores your entrenchment in naive realism. No doubt I have said it before "traditional logic" is a sub-field of general semantics which models reality in terms of static set theory. You are a philosophical "flat earthist" refusing to acknowledge that the very frontiers of what we mean by "reality" have shifted., to a large extent because of the failure of traditional logic in physics.

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@ughaibu,

Quote:

1) cause and determinism are independent notions
2) please provide a link that explains the notion of cause in fundamental physics
3) experimental set-ups are not fundamental physics.

Both "cause" and "determine" express that one thing necessitates another thing.
What do you mean by "fundamental physics"?

1 Reply

@fresco,

Quote:

And litewave, nor do we normally use "cause" as equivalent to "affect".

To "partially cause" can well be used instead of to "affect".

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@litewave,

litewave wrote:

Both "cause" and "determine" express that one thing necessitates another thing.

My guess is that you're talking about determinism. Cause and determinism are incompatible notions.

litewave wrote:

What do you mean by "fundamental physics"?

You disputed the fact that there is no notion of cause in fundamental physics, if you dont know what fundamental physics is, can you offer me any reason to take you seriously, about this matter?

1 Reply

@litewave,

litewave wrote:

There are only 3 possible ways your action can originate:

1) When you have reasons for your action - then the action is the result of those reasons.

2) When you don't have reasons for your action - then the action is unintentional.

3) Your action can be the result of a combination of 1) and 2).

None of those possibilities allow for free will because you are always compelled to your action and never in control of your action.

you left out instinct though

any thought or thinking beyond instinct is a case of free-will

1 Reply

@fresco,

fresco wrote:

Philosophy is to social negotiation as as acoustics is to the Beethoven' 5th.

You can play with your infinite regresses about "formal truth" until the cows come home. Meanwhile, "criminals" i.e. those acting sociopathically "of their own free will" will continue to be jailed on the "balance of evidence" thereby enabling the dynamics of our social systems to continue to "work". And the Azande will continue to endorse court decisions of otherwise by examining the entrails of a chicken,in order for their social systems to continue to work.

Going about justice and criminals to address this issue is not the best way to show your impartiality in this subject...

I by far do not believe in free will, or free anything...everything is a trade, energy/matter, money/work and so on...
Free because I do what I want when possible, which is by the way rarely ???
But why in the first place do I want such and such ? ...of course, there are reasons...and reasons that do by far stretch beyond my scope of comprehension , conscience, or will...is it cause ? maybe...is it correlation ? it can be...is it free ? hell no !

1 Reply

@Fil Albuquerque,

Fil Albuquerque wrote:

fresco wrote:

Philosophy is to social negotiation as as acoustics is to the Beethoven' 5th.

You can play with your infinite regresses about "formal truth" until the cows come home. Meanwhile, "criminals" i.e. those acting sociopathically "of their own free will" will continue to be jailed on the "balance of evidence" thereby enabling the dynamics of our social systems to continue to "work". And the Azande will continue to endorse court decisions of otherwise by examining the entrails of a chicken,in order for their social systems to continue to work.

Going about justice and criminals to address this issue is not the best way to show your impartiality in this subject...

I by far do not believe in free will, or free anything...everything is a trade, energy/matter, money/work and so on...
Free because I do what I want when possible, which is by the way rarely ???
But why in the first place do I want such and such ? ...of course, there are reasons...and reasons that do by far stretch beyond my scope of comprehension , conscience, or will...is it cause ? maybe...is it correlation ? it can be...is it free ? hell no !

you have though the free-will to think of things beyond just instinct

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I guess beyond instinct I think in what I need at other, more complex, more elevated levels...is it Will ? yeah, something like that, call it whatever you want...is it mine ? to the extent of my knowledge and belief, I am its formal trigger/operator...so, maybe. Is it free ? without reasons ? of course not !
(...other sense of freedom is not only really not worth, given false, but delusional...this one is merely false.)

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@Fil Albuquerque,

Fil Albuquerque wrote:

I guess beyond instinct I think in what I need at other, more complex, more elevated levels...is it Will ? yeah, something like that, call it whatever you want...is it mine ? to the extent of my knowledge and belief, I am its formal trigger/operator...so, maybe. Is it free ? without reasons ? of course not !
(...other sense of freedom is not only really not worth, given false, but delusional...this one is merely false.)

all of what you just expressed is beyond instinct

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@north,

If it is not in the cerebellum...no food, no sex, no anger...

...The need, the "urge", arises with the Thread and mostly in the reply section... Very Happy

1 Reply

Proof of nonexistence of free will

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