Does the mind have free will?

[27x]

Imagine a clock. No matter how many times it turns, it turns the same way. If you use it too long it might break. But if you used the same clock, under the same conditions, essentially reversing time, wouldn't the same thing happen? Would the same peices wear away, rust, and decay? Wouldn't the lighting on the glass turn it a dim color once again? Wouldn't the dust settle in the same place.

If you reversed time, in a place where there where no concous beings, and only a clock, then supposebly, the wind, and the trees, and the sun, and so on would move the same way, because they are only affected by themselves. In this way, the clock would decay, or change, in the same way.

Think of the mind, as a clock in your head. If A is walking down the street, and he was thinking about B, then he is bound to not notice C who bumps into him, followed by an arguement.

Consider my writing this theory down. If I was to go back to the same place, the sun would still be sunny, and my hamsters would still be sleeping, and my mind would lead me to these scentences again, because that is what the outcome was in my mind.

My mind is just a mass of biological physics, that are bound to have a certin reaction to a certin cause. That cause was a reaction to some other cause from sombody elses mind, who is also doing the same thing.

Assuming this, we can't have free will, since we would react the same way every time.

However, consider a computer programm that generates a random number. This could, for example, alter betting, or lotteries, or a number of other things, changing the outcome. Knowing that simple machines can produce something different in the same scenario, who is to say our brain can't produce something that is very slightly random.

I would very much like to hear your thoughts on this, because I am not sure everything I have said is very valid or not.  

[Niniva]

First I'd like to say I just had this exact conversation two nights ago while slightly intoxicated at a pub. Wonderful place to argue free will.

Second on to your statements as this is actually my current area of study and research.

You theory here is what is known as causality as I'm sure you already know. It is one of the biggest and most prominent debates in philosophy for many hundreds of years.

What we have so far is this:

Causality seems to exist for if I drop something gravity kicks in and it falls. There has not to date ever been a time when that has not happened when anyone anywhere has not dropped something here on earth. We cannot (obviously) say for certain it will always be this way, thanks to David Hume and the problem of induction, but it is a fairly safe bet that if you hold out and object in your hand and let it go that it will probably plumet to the earth at around G, or the gravitational constant (9.8 m/s).

Now causality can be attributed even to human actions. Such and such action in the past caused another action which caused another which in turn caused this one I am doing. A simple example is that your post above triggered and interest that was previously caused by a book I read which was first caused by a teacher's lecture which was caused by me signing up for the class which was caused by my interest in philosophy ad infinitum. Take any single cause out and it's effects are also gone. Take away my interest in philosophy five years ago and I would never have signed up for the class thus I would not be writing this post, or even thinking of this subject most probably.

Some believe in a thing called Indeterminism. That is that there are at least some actions that are taken which have no determining causes and those actions are what allow us to have free will. However, this is a very unpopular viewpoint, though still held by some chaos theorists and what have you. This is most probably what you reffer to by your computer generating a random number.

This is also known as pure chance....totally uncaused action. This...looks like chaos. In other words no action or thought you have or take will ever affect any other and thus if they happen to coincide and appear as though they are related (such as me writing this post) it is purely by accident. The problem here is that this is not free will.

For free will to exist Indeterminism cannot be true as you must "will" the action to take place first in order for it to take place. That would make your will of the action among the causes and thus they are related. If you willed an action to take place but your will did not determine the action then there is no real reason to say that your "willing" of the action actually had anything to do with the action itself. The two are not related and thus your action was chaotic and happened totally at random and happened to (totally by accident) coincide with your will at the time.

This seems absurd, according to this theory me letting go of an object and it falling to the floor are not related, nor is the gravitational constant that actually pulls it to the floor. What pulls it to the floor instead of up or to the side is....random, totally undetermined.

Now, determinism (or causality) doesn't seem to represent acurately the free will aspect either. The biggest thing to keep in mind here is that we could not possibly ever know all of the infinite causes which may have brought this action about (including the creation of the world which would be the very first action which set the causes into motion). That being said, you make an action that is also the an effect of other causes, when faced with an opportunity to act, you think it over, or deliberate. This deliberation process would never have taken place if you were not presented with a few different sets of causes. At least two anyway. Between the two sets of causes it would SEEM that any rational being would choose the "best" or "strongest" set of causes in order to get the desired result.

Now herein lies the crux. After the decision is made, and you are asked why you did what you did rather then something else you say "Because of these reasons" And of course "reasons" are the same as causes in this case. When asked a second question, "if faced with the same decision, would you have done otherwise?" If you answer yes this seems absurd. According to the information you were provided with before the action took place, you chose the best action....if that is true, then it appears as though you were not really given a choice at all since all of those reasons that you made the action you did were set firmly into place before you were ever faced with a decision in the first place.

So it could easily be said that I can predict every action you will take before you take it so long as I am aware of all of the pertinent causes. This is not free will, as it appears your decision was actually made before you were even given the opportunity to make it.

Now, free will is a funny thing because if we do not have it there are horrendously bad moral implications. If we do not have free will, for example, then a serial murderer could not have ever chosen to do anything differently and no matter what he could not have stopped himself from killing all those people. Now....we don't want to punish someone for something they could not have avoided doing. That is hardly justice. That is the same as killing someone for being black...or mentally retarded...or even a philosopher. So we have affectively punished someone for something that they could not control.

There is a solution that some philosophers (my mentor included) that says that since our thoughts are not included in the orriginal causes, we presserve free will because when we deliberated, the action that took place was the one we reasoned was the best one, and even though we could not have stopped ourselves from doing the action (because the causes were already determined before hand) we were still free because we reasoned that the action was right, and then made the action. This is called Compatableism.

This is unsatisfying to me personally because I do not believe that it satisfactorly grants us free will in a metaphysical sense.

The metaphysical definition of free will is as follows:

Metaphysical free will: That one who has acted had, before they acted, the genuine and literal ability to have done other then they did.

In laymans terms I could have NOT taken the action, and, without changing any of the causes, done something else instead.

The problem with this definition is that it doesn't seem like it is possible to have this type of free will. For why WOULDN'T someone choose the stronger set of causes? That seems absurd.

But lets revert to the theory of Compatablism for a moment. It says that if the action we took was ultimately the one we "wanted" to take then we preserve free will. In a moral sense it looks then, like we are punishing someone for "wanting" to murder someone else, even though they could never have avoided it. In that case I myself should also be punished severely for wanting to kill the bully in 5th grade. In both cases the desire remained but the action did not. The bully in 5th grade still lives on to terrorize others and I am not punished because of things outside of my control even though I "wanted" him dead and in my mind I reasoned that the causes pointing toward him being dead seemed to be the one's better for me. This is (of course) irrational, but moments of irrationality are no match for determinism as the causes for my actions are not within my control anyway.

Or are they?

What if, compatablism is half right? What if it is true that your reasoning and deliberation conclusions are what presserves free will, but determinism is also right in that the final cause for your actions, and the one ultimately responsible for the action taking place, is the human ability to reason? If this is true then there are factors within our control that determine our actions. There are actualy moments where it is possible to deliberate that the stronger set of causes is not in fact the "best" set of causes.

In order to prove this we have met at an impass, for we would need an example of a time when someone deliberated over some causes and the weaker set of causes actually won out over the stronger set. The example of the 5th grade bully is out of the question here as it could be argued that the strongest causes was my sense of morality, my knowledge that killing is obviously the worse response and so the set of causes swayed my action.

In any case it is impossible to present proof of such a theory on either front because no one could ever know what 100% of the causes for action are. It is impossible to see everything from every angle, and if we could...it is perfectly sensable to say that we could predict what a person's actions will be before they take them. In that sense we would be a lot like God.

It would presserve free will totally, if whenever we are set with a decision...there is actually a chance (however small) that we quite literally (not figuratively or imaginatively but metaphysically) COULD choose either action.

In this case it seems important to bring up that there may indeed be cases in which, within a decision there are two or more sets of causes which are exactly equal and that the only cause for which action we take is which action we finally decide to take.

Take the religious example for instance:

My desire to sin is exactly equal to my desire to do the right thing. So what makes me sin, or what makes me do the right thing? In the end it boils down to causes that are within your control, within your mind and not the physical world and thus your action is your own fault and morality is presserved.

I suppose it could be argued convincingly that there are no such instances as these...that there is never really a time when the strings of causes that may sway your decision are exactly equal., that even those causes within your mind are outside of your control.

And so I leave it to you. In the case of free will I have discovered that what you wind up with ultimately will be what you need.

I need free will to exist. If it does not then we are puppets on strings and our ideas for justice and the way we view the world is 100% backward and so I choose to believe in free will. As for others....well....if we don't have free will then why is it you are even compelled to think about what I am writing? At the very least your thoughts are free, and if your thoughts are free that is a start at least.


*ps* Sorry about the essay, but this is one of my favorite discussions.  

[27x]

This is also my favorite topic, and I am overjoyed to have been destined to discuss this with you. Or not...

Here are some of my theories about countering, or enjoying the negetive of the two extremes:

First, I find that free will is like the top and bottom of the muffin. If you get the top, then that's great, because we all get the top in theory. If we all get the bottom, then thats not nececarily bad, and we don't nececarily have to eat it if we don't want to.

Combating no will:

This is the only instance which I believe could counter free will, to use it to your advantage. It is very complex.

I do not have free will. Now, even though I don't have free will, nor does anybody else, in this instance of the scenario, we seem to make decisions that have reasonable tolerance to the action. We don't suddenly do random things out of destiny. We kill after we get angry or go crazy. Even though we are destined to do things, we always seem to have a cause.

Now, Lets say right now I am realizing this, or you are reading this and agree with me. I realize, that since I have no free will, I am bound to do everything as a reaction to a certin cause, weather it is known or not. Who is to say then, that my brain doesn't suddenly light up, and create amazing ambitions and goals that shake the world. If I realize this, and make nothign of it, then I am destined to not change because of it. If I realize this, and realign my perception of the world, then I was destined to do that as well.

Since I am destined to do one of the two, I will do what is natural. On one hand, I ignore it and chose to live in free will. On the other hand, I realize that I was obviously destined to do ____, or atleast think that I was, and nothing can prevent me from trying.

For example, if I found a book that said what everyone would be doing, It would be reasonable for me to use it to my advantage, and not only that, but my actions would be in it as well, therefore I could just act it out like a script. With it, I would be destined to be some kind of super hero, or villan
and I would have no objection to that.

Now, here is a more complicated, and achievable form of that example. If I am destined to pick the obviously better and more reasonable of the two, to change my perception, then how would I do that. I would obviously be destined to plan out everythign that I was going to do, and try to achieve my goal. In otherwords I am destined to act out my goals, that where predetermined.

Now heres the important part. It is infact, so important and abstract, that it takes me a few minutes to even figure it out and write it down, even though I already know what it is. Lets say I learned how to change my basic reactions to causes, essentially changing what I WOULD do, to what I CAN do. Of course I would be destined to do this. However, what if I was destined to change my basic personality to what I want it to be like, afterall, if I learned to combat free will, wouldn't I do what I wanted to do? Therefore, if I am destined to change myself to do what I would have wanted to do, then I am destined to change the cause into something new that I was also destined to do. Essentially, I am destined to change myself, and I am destined to do things differently but still unwillingly after the change. However, if I am destined to change my basis for deciding what I will change into, then that gives me free will in a world without it.

This is very hard to understand, and you might have to read it several times.  

[27x]

IF I added much more onto that post, it might be to big, so I am double posting. I am the only active moderator, so I guess its alright if I do...

Accepting no will:

If we do have free will, then that is good. If we don't, then there is nothing we can do, so why not give up? Who cares? If we don't have free will, we atleast make decisions based on what our CHARACTOR would reasonably do in the situatoin. Therefore we obviously have something personalized for us. If not, then it's basically like watching a futuristic matrix type movie.

On the other hand, you can chose to ignore it. In theory, if we do not have free will, then none of us have free will. However people who don't study philosophy usually don't think about it, and live as if they do have free will. Why not live like them. Just think about something else, and eventually you'll stop feeling sad? Besides theres no way we can really know.

God free will paradox:
Most religeons say that god is all knowing, and gives us free will.

IF he gives us free will we have it. If he is all knowing, and can't be wrong, then by knowing what we are going to do, we must do it, or it would prove him wrong, which is impossible.

Free will?
Perhaps there is no such thing as no will. Perhaps there is no such thing as destiny. However, maybe some things have to happen, like gravity. Some things just happen, and sometimes it is in our controll.  

[Niniva]

Quote:

Now heres the important part. It is infact, so important and abstract, that it takes me a few minutes to even figure it out and write it down, even though I already know what it is. Lets say I learned how to change my basic reactions to causes, essentially changing what I WOULD do, to what I CAN do. Of course I would be destined to do this. However, what if I was destined to change my basic personality to what I want it to be like, afterall, if I learned to combat free will, wouldn't I do what I wanted to do? Therefore, if I am destined to change myself to do what I would have wanted to do, then I am destined to change the cause into something new that I was also destined to do. Essentially, I am destined to change myself, and I am destined to do things differently but still unwillingly after the change. However, if I am destined to change my basis for deciding what I will change into, then that gives me free will in a world without it.

I will deal with this first as it seems to be the meat and potatoes of your post. Honestly I understand it, and I think you are making it far more complicated then it needs to be. But I will deal with it by dealing with just this last claim.

Quote:

However, if I am destined to change my basis for deciding what I will change into, then that gives me free will in a world without it.

Which I think is the crux of your arguement here.

This statement made above is a contridiction and is therefore not true. You either....were not destined and had total control over changing the basis for deciding what you will change or change into, OR, you WERE destined to do it and you couldn't control it at all. What you stated above is not controled by you, it is destined and is thus not free unless you are a compatablist. What you have said above is akin to "I was destined to have to decide" Well, thats great....but that doesn't mean the decision itself was free, nor does it mean that the decision itself nor anything about you that has changed or ever will change is a free action.

Quote:

If we do have free will, then that is good. If we don't, then there is nothing we can do, so why not give up? Who cares? If we don't have free will, we atleast make decisions based on what our CHARACTOR would reasonably do in the situatoin. Therefore we obviously have something personalized for us. If not, then it's basically like watching a futuristic matrix type movie.

On the other hand, you can chose to ignore it. In theory, if we do not have free will, then none of us have free will. However people who don't study philosophy usually don't think about it, and live as if they do have free will. Why not live like them. Just think about something else, and eventually you'll stop feeling sad? Besides theres no way we can really know.

Why not give up? Well if there is no free will then you don't have the ability to give up. Nor do you have the ability to "realize" that there even is no free will. If there is no free will you could not commit suicide unless you were destined to commit suicide....you could not realize there was no free will unless you were destined by an unforseen force TO realize there is no free will. You could not "react" to anything that you were not destined to react to....and in the exact manor you reacted.....and NONE OF IT.....can be changed.

If there is no free will then all actions and all reactions are causes and effects of each other WITHOUT outside influence including your thoughts (which are actions and could be considered effects of causes themselves)thus impossible to stand outside of.

What your statements above proves is that it is simply impossible for human beings to live or act as though they do not have free will. That it is an innate sense within us to either be dillusioned into thinking we have free will when we really don't....and thus are destined to be pre-programmed to live as though we are free....or we really are free.

Quote:

God free will paradox:
Most religeons say that god is all knowing, and gives us free will.

IF he gives us free will we have it. If he is all knowing, and can't be wrong, then by knowing what we are going to do, we must do it, or it would prove him wrong, which is impossible.

I actually bring this arguement up to my Christian friends who don't think about what they say before they say it. The question of God's foreknowledge first brought to bear in Boethius in 300ish AD. His conclusions are distastefully unsatisfying to me as they attempt to say that God doesn't know the future as there is no "future" to God and so God doesn't "know" anything in the future....there is only now to him, and so he simply just knows whats happening in any single moment because all moments are happening in the "now" for God.

To which I say, "Fine...but what does that have to do with us here? It matters absolutely none at all how God experiences time, or IF he even does. He promised we had free will and reguardless of how HE experiences time and "knows" things WE experience it the way WE do, NOT the way he does and so therefore free will for US cannot happen on God's timeframe, nor can we say anything meaningful about God's timeframe as we don't experience it. So everything you have said Sir Boethius is either not adressing the problem at had or is totally irrelevant. What we would like to know....is how WE have free will IF God knows the future for US....not how God CAN know the future. One has nothing to do with the other. I don't care HOW God knows it...I just care what the implications are."

With that being said, if God "knows" the future, and the definition of "knowledge" is that it is absolute Truth in the sense that he could not "know" it for certain unless it were true and so if God "knows" the future then it must take place and we cannot avoid it.

So how do we solve this problem if we want both to be a theist and preserve free will?

Simple. Under the rules of omnicience the definition in Philosophical terms is not that God knows literally everything.....it's that God knows everything THAT CAN BE KNOWN. If the future has not happened and is not predetermined then God could not know it. What he can know is "every possible outcome" of every decision and thus can acurately predict which way we will go.

In the sense that a Taxi driver knows every turn and side street in New York City or L.A., if you get in his cab and say "Take me to broadway and 22nd" he will say "Well which way you wanna go? Touristy, fastest, or one step at a time?" (they won't really say that I know but lets just say they did) You say, "Lets just see where we wind up after this light." At the light the taxi driver says "Alright we're at 32nd and Jackson, to the right is 34th, to the left 30th, straight ahead we'll hit 43rd and if you wanna turn around we'll hit France St. Which way?" and you say, well if we turn right what's after 34th?" He says "Well you can turn right there and hit France St again, keep going on down to 36th, turn left and head to 43rd or take the on ramp to the freeway."

So no matter which way you tell him to turn he always knows which choices are in front of you and what their possible outcomes are, but what God does not know, and could not possibly know because it does not exist, is which way you will choose to go. He knows the final destination, and he knows every single decision you could potentially be faced with allong the way but he does not know which streets you will turn down.

That is the advantage of devine knowledge. Are there some things God does not know? Yes, just like there are some actions God cannot take (those which contredict themselves). God cannot possibly know something that cannot be known. Just as God cannot possibly do something that cannot be done. This is St. Thomas Aquinas in the early 14th century. Excellent thinker, perhaps the greatest advancements in philosophy since aristotle came from that man.  

[27x]

I dissagree. The future, by christian religeon, can be known. The book of revelations, for example, says how the world will end.

It seems that you have missed something important.

If you're only going to use my last paragraph, then there is still one paragraph you still need to keep.

When we react, we always have a cause, assuming we don't have free will.

For example. I am a great thinker, just like many other philosophers. I will make great speaches, that is the CAUSE, to influence other people.

Now, we don't have free will. I make some reveloutionary idea, and write it down, and share it with the world. IT is not the choice we have, to believe in those statements. It is the choice we where destined to have, to believe or not believe.

For example. If I made a statment so amazing, and agreable, that most people in the world would agree with it, then that would be destined to cause them to change.

Here is another example. I told you my statement, and you where obviously destined to disagree with it. However, you gave a good reason for your disagreement, you didn't simply say, "I disagree"

My theory, is that if I could make such a statement, similar to the one I made, that is easy to understand, and favorable by most people, then that would make them aggree with it. Afterall. If someone asked you to eat crap, or eat steak, you would chose the steak. IF we don't have free will we haven't had it for a long time, obviously. Therefore, we can study how it works.

The part you are missing is this. We always are destined to make actions that spring from a cause. We don't just make actions without one. Therefore our CHARACTORS have reasonable tolerance actions.

Yes, it is true that I would be destined toread that statement and agree, or disagree. However, I agree with it. And that breaks me away from no will. People start out with destiny, destined to shake destiny off.

Put quite simply, If I am desitned to do what I WOULD do, then I want to change what I WOULD do, to something I like better. Now, If I know, that changing what I WOULD, do, would have the desire effect, I obviously WOULD do it, and therefore it is also a part of destiny.  

[Niniva]

Quote:

I dissagree. The future, by christian religeon, can be known. The book of revelations, for example, says how the world will end.

the book of revelations is hardly an arguement for the literal future. Prophecy, while an act of predicting one's future can also be changed and amended...and while I don't think that one will be.....the book is completely and totally metaphorical and so you cannot say it is a literal depiction of the future......

And again....if the future is known then we have no free will....period. That is not a debateable point.

Quote:

The part you are missing is this. We always are destined to make actions that spring from a cause. We don't just make actions without one. Therefore our CHARACTORS have reasonable tolerance actions.

I didn't miss this point at all, if you think I did then perhaps I didn't express myself well enough but everything you said here mirrors exactly everything I have claimed so I don't see how you are saying I missed anything.

Quote:

Yes, it is true that I would be destined toread that statement and agree, or disagree. However, I agree with it. And that breaks me away from no will. People start out with destiny, destined to shake destiny off.

This statement is nonsensical. You cannot both be destined and not destined....nor can you be destined to not have a destiny...you either have one or you do not, and saying you have one....to not have one...is a contridictory statement. And your action could be said to have been caused by unseen factors which swayed your thinking to agree with it, reguardless of if you are aware of it or not.

Quote:

Put quite simply, If I am desitned to do what I WOULD do, then I want to change what I WOULD do, to something I like better. Now, If I know, that changing what I WOULD, do, would have the desire effect, I obviously WOULD do it, and therefore it is also a part of destiny.

You are starting from the end point here....take the entire picture as a whole. If at first your intention is to make action A, and then later on, say, right before you make action A you discover some factor that makes B look better to you, and instead of doing action A you do action B.....can you say that you could have done A? Was it possible to do A since B was clearly the better choice? Even though your orriginal intention was to do A....B was the destined choice based on the stronger set of causes, and so theoretically you would probably choose option B every single time...and so it appears as though you have no free will....in a metaphysical sense.

So technically, just because it APPEARS like your destiny orriginally was to do action A....at first.....later it was revealed your destiny in the end was to THINK you would do action A, but also to later change your mind and do action B because B was the better action in the end. So "destiny" is a whole concept, not moment by moment.

Here is an example.

Joe, is kidnapped given a sedative and operated on by me. I take a chip that stimulates his brain and place it in his skull and it reprograms his brain so that it makes him wake up every morning at eight o'clock and cook ham and eggs for breakfast, and it also makes him enjoy ham and eggs and makes him WANT ham and eggs. Thats it.

Ten years later Joe still wakes up and makes ham and eggs, eats it and enjoys it. Was Joe free to act all those ten years? Did he have control over his actions even though he WANTED them to happen and ENJOYED them so he THOUGHT they were the best actions for him? Joe was decieved of course, and of course his actions were not free in the slightest.

So in none of these actions did Joe actually have control over what he likes (ham and eggs) as he would still like it even though he knows he is programmed to like it....nor does he have any control over waking up early and making them....so no matter what Joe considered the night before....maybe he thought it over and said to himself that bacon would be better then eggs tomorrow....still...he woke up and in his MIND....he THOUGHT..."Nah...Ham is better!"

So last night he did exactly what you describe, he thought that the action he WOULD do tomorrow morning (make sausage) would be better for but then he woke up and thought it over...the chip kicked in and suddenly the action he WOULD do was replaced by something he thought would be better (making ham) and so he decides to change what he WOULD have done to the seemingly better action, but reguardless of what Joe wanted his destiny.....as both you and I know....was to make ham and not bacon.

Was that Joe's doing? Was it Joe who was ultimately responsible for his actions? Of course not.

So I'm not seeing how Joe's thought process' actually make any difference on destiny. If he was destined...the actions occur...even if the actions are random, he was destined to make no sense.....and even that is not free as we could set the chip to program Joe to say the first word he thought of when asked a question.  

[27x]

You are still missing my pont. I said to read it several times but I guess I'll have to rephraze it in yet a simpler way.

Have you ever thought, that joe already gets up at 8 aclock and makes himself ham and eggs every morning? If so, then you haven't changed anything, and weather he has free will or not, he is still doing what he chose to do origionally.

Also joe has diabetes, fat chance :p

Now, lets look at this. Joe gets up every morning at A, and does B. Then he is forced to do A every morning and do B.

Lets say, that Joe is already forced, and was always forced since he learned how to cook. He was forced to do E, and D, and liked it. However, he found the chip, and altered it so he would do A and B. He would still be forced, but he would be doing what he wanted.

Now reread what I origionally wrote, then maybe you'll see what I mean.  

[Niniva]

Quote:

You are still missing my pont. I said to read it several times but I guess I'll have to rephraze it in yet a simpler way.

Fallacy here, but I digress.....I did read it several times and I will admit that the way you wrote it seems scattered and like you don't even understand what you said.

Quote:

Have you ever thought, that joe already gets up at 8 aclock and makes himself ham and eggs every morning? If so, then you haven't changed anything, and weather he has free will or not, he is still doing what he chose to do origionally.

What Joe did before is irrelevent, think of it like this, no matter what Joe has done or wanted to do in the past....if he is not in control of his actions RIGHT NOW....then he does not have free will RIGHT NOW. It is invalid to take things that are irrelevant and bring them in as making a point. If today, someone held a Gun to Joe and said "Do A and B" it wouldn't be much different since Joe usually does A and B anyway, but this time....he doesn't have a choice and therefore his actions are no free.

Quote:

Lets say, that Joe is already forced, and was always forced since he learned how to cook. He was forced to do E, and D, and liked it. However, he found the chip, and altered it so he would do A and B. He would still be forced, but he would be doing what he wanted.

This is an interesting scenerio....if Joe applies his own chip to himself, then he is knowingly allowing himself to be controlled by a chip that he himself manipulated. In the example you just gave I would say that Joe did in fact exorcise free will. Sounds liek the age old question of can you be a willing slave? Well we call it a servent but of course it seems that way. But it could also be said that it only appeared as though Joe choose to put the chip in his head...in reality it was always his destiny to want to change his actions...and he always would have changed them and so the act of him putting the chip in his head was also controlled by something else. Some cause that Joe didn't know about, or maybe he did know about it. It could be the same thing causing him to do actions E and D every day forced him to put the chip in his head so that he would do A and B from now on.

The problem is you still cannot determine all the causes. So yes, Joe has free will in that situation so long as Joe's desire to change his actions is self causes, and then becomes the cause of him actually changing his actions.  

[27x]

The fact of the matter is, you never said that Joe's chip kept him from altering the chip himself, but now I think you're getting my point.

If we don't have free will, then we are slaves. But if we can get the slave job that we want, it's that much better. Who wants to deal with poo, when you could just be the guy who fills the baths.

Your master is your destiny, and mind, in this no will scenario.

If you can change your basic tolerance, and reasonable action base, then you will act the way you want to. Though you are destined to act this new way, it is the way that you would prefer if you didn't have free will. Therefore even thogh you are still controlled, it becomes better.

For example, if a serial killer changed himself to be a charity worker. He woudl still be forced to make the change, and become a charity worker, but overall maybe he was a person who would have liked chairty better with free will.

If we learned we could change to what we want, then it either cause us to do it or not. Therefore anybody who is destined to believe believes, and anybody who is not does not.

It's not a matter of choice, but simply put, we don't know our destiny. Therefore we can pretend like we are picking either one, and pick the better one, knowing that we are destined to do it.  

[Niniva]

I_27_04

The fact of the matter is, you never said that Joe's chip kept him from altering the chip himself, but now I think you're getting my point.

If we don't have free will, then we are slaves. But if we can get the slave job that we want, it's that much better. Who wants to deal with poo, when you could just be the guy who fills the baths.

Your master is your destiny, and mind, in this no will scenario.

If you can change your basic tolerance, and reasonable action base, then you will act the way you want to. Though you are destined to act this new way, it is the way that you would prefer if you didn't have free will. Therefore even thogh you are still controlled, it becomes better.

For example, if a serial killer changed himself to be a charity worker. He woudl still be forced to make the change, and become a charity worker, but overall maybe he was a person who would have liked chairty better with free will.

If we learned we could change to what we want, then it either cause us to do it or not. Therefore anybody who is destined to believe believes, and anybody who is not does not.

It's not a matter of choice, but simply put, we don't know our destiny. Therefore we can pretend like we are picking either one, and pick the better one, knowing that we are destined to do it.

This sounds very similar to Compatablism to me. But in that sense no matter if we illusion ourselves into believing we have free will by simply thinking that (reguardless of destiny) we get what we want, that does not mean that "what we want" wasn't already pre-determined.

You are forgetting that thoughts are also actions and so are therefore subject also to cause and effect and so no matter what your "desire" you could say you were "destined to desire to change your destiny and therefore did change your destiny" but in the end that is a self defeating statement as all your really did by changing your "percieved" destiny was fullfill your ultimate destiny. There are causes which cause you to think a certain way as well as one's that promote physical action.

Desires are not free from subjigation, just as physical actions are not. When you were 6 months old you can't remember but your mother hummed certain tunes to you or whispered in your ear things of intelligence and so ever since you've been interested in these things....or that music. So your desire to change your current state was not of your own free will, it was predetermined by causes that were beyond your control. So essence "desire" is not a sound arguement as "desires" change based on life experiences and are therefore subjective and not necessarily a proof of free action.  

[27x]

This is the breaking point between us.

The way I see it, if we don't have free will, and we do exactly what we woudl have done with it, then there is no difference.

The way you see it, this is not the case.  

[Niniva]

Quote:

The way I see it, if we don't have free will, and we do exactly what we woudl have done with it, then there is no difference.

This is exactly what my professor says. A very common view among Compatabalists.

But it is still not a metaphysical free will. And you may be right but if this is the case.....then the moral implications are astronomically bad.

Look here in my orriginal post:

Quote:

But lets revert to the theory of Compatablism for a moment. It says that if the action we took was ultimately the one we "wanted" to take then we preserve free will. In a moral sense it looks then, like we are punishing someone for "wanting" to murder someone else, even though they could never have avoided it. In that case I myself should also be punished severely for wanting to kill the bully in 5th grade. In both cases the desire remained but the action did not. The bully in 5th grade still lives on to terrorize others and I am not punished because of things outside of my control even though I "wanted" him dead and in my mind I reasoned that the causes pointing toward him being dead seemed to be the one's better for me. This is (of course) irrational, but moments of irrationality are no match for determinism as the causes for my actions are not within my control anyway.

If the action you take and your desire to take it are not related (which is what essentially is going on here) then it looks like no matter what happens you are punishing someone for an action they couldn't have avoided.....but it's ok....because they "wanted" to do it.

Are you prepared to be ok with jailing someone for life for "wanting" to kill someone? Are you equally prepared to send someone to jail for things they couldn't avoid? So car accidents where someone ends up dead is the same as murder suddenly...not to mention my thoughts on desiring to muder my uncle for devorcing his wife and calling his daughter a piece of s**t in front of me requires I go to prison as well......because if what you are suggesting is truely the case then the "action" itself is not what we punish someone for...it's the desire to do the action.  

[27x]

Niniva

Quote:

The way I see it, if we don't have free will, and we do exactly what we woudl have done with it, then there is no difference.

This is exactly what my professor says. A very common view among Compatabalists.

But it is still not a metaphysical free will. And you may be right but if this is the case.....then the moral implications are astronomically bad.

Look here in my orriginal post:

Quote:

But lets revert to the theory of Compatablism for a moment. It says that if the action we took was ultimately the one we "wanted" to take then we preserve free will. In a moral sense it looks then, like we are punishing someone for "wanting" to murder someone else, even though they could never have avoided it. In that case I myself should also be punished severely for wanting to kill the bully in 5th grade. In both cases the desire remained but the action did not. The bully in 5th grade still lives on to terrorize others and I am not punished because of things outside of my control even though I "wanted" him dead and in my mind I reasoned that the causes pointing toward him being dead seemed to be the one's better for me. This is (of course) irrational, but moments of irrationality are no match for determinism as the causes for my actions are not within my control anyway.

If the action you take and your desire to take it are not related (which is what essentially is going on here) then it looks like no matter what happens you are punishing someone for an action they couldn't have avoided.....but it's ok....because they "wanted" to do it.

Are you prepared to be ok with jailing someone for life for "wanting" to kill someone? Are you equally prepared to send someone to jail for things they couldn't avoid? So car accidents where someone ends up dead is the same as murder suddenly...not to mention my thoughts on desiring to muder my uncle for devorcing his wife and calling his daughter a piece of s**t in front of me requires I go to prison as well......because if what you are suggesting is truely the case then the "action" itself is not what we punish someone for...it's the desire to do the action.

Is is possible though, that we, with no will, are all doing exactly what we would have done with free will anyway? If so how could we know this. We are doing what we want, but we are forced to want it. We could come to so me realization of what we really would want, but that realization is forced.

We could just assume we are doing what we want, but does the fact that that assumtion is forced make it bad, or misguided? I say no.  

[Niniva]

Quote:

Is is possible though, that we, with no will, are all doing exactly what we would have done with free will anyway? If so how could we know this. We are doing what we want, but we are forced to want it. We could come to so me realization of what we really would want, but that realization is forced.

We could just assume we are doing what we want, but does the fact that that assumtion is forced make it bad, or misguided? I say no.

I will say that what you said above is true, OR that free will exists. Both are totally possible and both seem plausable when looked at from the right light.

Thus the reason my Professor and mentor and I will never agree on this subject. Because he can never prove that even if we have no free will we are simply doing the actions we would have chosen if we had it anyway....and I can never prove that we actually have the ability to have acted otherwise.

In his case he's ok with the moral implications of free will being a myth, and I am not. I "need" free will to be true and so that is the theory that I ascribe too, not because it is less or more likely....but because it is equally as likely and quite impossible to prove in both lights.

So if it is just as likely that we have free will as it is that we do not then I will decide to have faith in the idea that we do since it is how we live, and thus I have no changes to make and I also can have faith in other philosophies that make a difference to me, such as human behavior theory and personality theory, not to mention theology and so on.

In the end it boils down to the fact that if we have no free will then no action has meaning. If no action has meaning there is no point in studying them.