Do we have free will or is everything predestined?

Discussion in 'General Philosophy' started by joepistole, Dec 10, 2007.

  1. Gustav Banned Banned

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    what/who initiated that thought/statement? a thingamajig or an electrochemical whatnot?

    /curious
     
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  3. Gustav Banned Banned

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    now
    as it stands.....

    Benjamin Libet (2002) conducted experiments designed to determine the timing of conscious willings or decisions to act in relation to brain activity associated with the physical initiation of behavior. Interpretation of the results is highly controversial. Libet himself concludes that the studies provide strong evidence that actions are already underway shortly before the agent wills to do it. As a result, we do not consciously initiate our actions, though he suggests that we might nonetheless retain the ability to veto actions that are initiated by unconscious psychological structures. Wegner (2002) masses a much range of studies (including those of Libet) to argue that the notion that human actions are ever initiated by their own conscious willings is simply a deeply-entrenched illusion and proceeds to offer an hypothesis concerning the reason this illusion is generated within our cognitive systems. O'Connor (forthcoming) argues that the data adduced by Libet and Wegner wholly fail to support their revisionary conclusion

    the zombies will no doubt recognize this cue and hasten to defend libet and wegner.
    i, (as distinct from this revolting mass of flesh i appear to inhabit) shall stand on the sidelines taking potshots
     
    Last edited: Dec 15, 2007
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  5. Gustav Banned Banned

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    oh
    hey occam
     
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  7. greenberg until the end of the world Registered Senior Member

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    Libet seems to have presumed that a person's selfhood, the "I" is only that which is conscious or aware of itself. While the things that the "I" is not conscious or aware of, are not part of the "I".

    Which flies straight into the face of especially Freudian, but also many other theories of self ...


    Now - this is such a simple objection that I'm afraid it couldn't possibly apply!
    Yet it seems such an obvious objection.
     
  8. greenberg until the end of the world Registered Senior Member

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    Yes, the dangers of hindsight bias.
     
  9. kmguru Staff Member

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    Did not we discuss this several years ago? I think the conclusion was, the Universe is predetermined based on the initial conditions.

    Imagine you had a car accident. If you would have started 5 minutes early, you could have avoided the accident. Now since you do not have that peek into the future, you did exactly what you should do. Even if you had a so called free will, you have done exactly what you are supposed to do.

    Since you do not have the future knowledge, you will continue to do what you think is your free will tells you to. And even if you had a peek to the future, that technology could be part of the initial condition of the Universe.

    The entire ecosystem is governed by that and you are a part of....
     
  10. ScottMana Registered Senior Member

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    Grow some *****! Just believe for a sec that you can be the source of your own destiny. You are free to make choices. You are NOT limited by DNA, brain activity or anything else. People that get hangup on this subject have simply lost their ability to see sources.

    You are living the life others set for you. Are these the acts of God, or fate? The people that put work into the life you now live would laugh at you for the very idea. Many had to work their will until it bled and then some.

    To get the idea you now have you need to be living the life others created for you and do very little of your own will until you forget you can do things to make your own life.

    Back behind that car is a person that worked day and night to defy what the world had been telling him and his ansectors for thousands of years. That he had to walk or ride an animal. But he said @#$% that! and burned the midnight oil.

    If you have never determined your own fate then you will never know what I am talking about.
     
  11. sowhatifit'sdark Valued Senior Member

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    And if a determinist says you don't, it seems to me you would have good reason to doubt how a determined entity could make judgements about the qualities other entities must have.
     
  12. ScottMana Registered Senior Member

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    ZZZzzz...zzzZZZzzz...zzzZZZzzz
     
  13. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    Just the opposite: the structures of the patterns of the universe provide and maintain degrees of freedom for these patterns, explicitly, as is visible in the shorthand "laws" humans have invented to partially describe them.

    The (human made, imperfect) laws of the universe do not predetermine the path of a single electron anywhere - let alone the reaction patterns of events at the level of human thought.
     
  14. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Probably no genuine free will exists and definitely predestination is false. Free will is at least possible. (Can be consistent with physics/chemistry laws determining when every nerve in your body, especially in the brain, "fires" an electro-chemical discharge down its axion.) These discharges initiate your every thought and slightest volentary movement. In view of that, it is hard to see how free will could exist, but it is possible that it does. See:

    http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1294496&postcount=52
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 15, 2007
  15. greenberg until the end of the world Registered Senior Member

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    Yes - to the bolded parts.

    There definitely seem to be some laws in this Universe.
    The question is though, which laws should we take into consideration when it comes to issues of human free will?
     
  16. Frud11 Banned Banned

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    There's the thing, we do this. The universe may 'decide' somehow (selection and availability), or we do, about what we 'see', or what information we assimilate.

    Something along the lines of: we don't have to believe a thing, it doesn't matter what we believe (we see); or if we end up with a 'wrong' belief (observation and interpretation), since it's all compulsion.
    We 'listen' to it and sort of resonate, or hear the notes that are available, that form a stable pattern (harmony), so to speak. We notice all kinds of obvious and regular events.
     
  17. francois Schwat? Registered Senior Member

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    I'm afraid you're losing me here, or I'm going to need more explanation. How do the structures of the patterns of the universe (which must abide by the laws of physic) effect any leniency at all? And from precisely what do patterns of life free exhibit "degrees of freedom" from? Free from the laws of physics?

    I'm not saying that our perceived laws of the universe predetermine anything. Maybe the universe is predetermined, maybe it's not. Whether it is or not is not relevant, anyway. If the universe is predetermined, then there definitely is no free will. If it is not predetermined, then there isn't necessarily free will. But if
     
  18. kmguru Staff Member

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    But we are allowed to believe in such thing, are not we? Do physical laws exist if there are no humans to observe them?

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  19. Cyperium I'm always me Valued Senior Member

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    If everything is a function of the physical universe what is the physical universe a function of?

    What if free will was as real as the universe? Even if not physical.

    And why is it that it's only the physical that gives rise to something? Just because it seems more concrete?
     
  20. draqon Banned Banned

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    Everything is predetermined in an infinite possibilities of futures that match that which we would do if we had truly free will.

    The future is tuned to our free will, all that we want and decide to wish for is already predetermined and tuned to our desires in the future...illusion of free will bearing results as though it was free will all along.
     
  21. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Yes. Don't be so egotistical. The Earth went around the sun under the same dynamics (laws if you like) long before any life existed on it. Every atom in the universe had its motion controlled by the forces acting on it long before there even was an Earth and sun. Whether or not there is any intelligent life anywhere in the universe has nothing to do with the fact all atoms, electrons etc. behave as the forces acting on them dictate. ("Follow the laws of nature.")

    Your slightest movement is controlled by these same natural forces acting on the atoms of your body. At a larger scale by the collective effect of the neuro-transmitter molecules diffusing (in accordance with the laws of diffusion) across the synaptic clefts between nerves, etc. At still higher level, that collective action of neural discharges must stimulate your mussels before you can do anything. - Even move your tongue to speak. - It is all a chain of progressive higher levels of motions (atoms, molecules, neural impulses, muscle contractions, and finally movements of body parts, which are under the direct control of the forces acting in accordance with laws, known or unknown by man.)

    That is why it is so difficult to see how "free will" can be compatible with these laws that control the entire process eventually resulting in some movement of some part of your body (or all of it). But it is at least possible that free will can be compatible with these natural laws - See link given in post 51.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 16, 2007
  22. kmguru Staff Member

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    Here you go again...it is a joke that you could not get? Like does the tree make a sound when it falls in a forest when no one is there to hear it? Get it? You are getting too old...

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  23. kmguru Staff Member

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    Free will is as real as your scatching an itch. You may decide to scratch or not...that would not change the outcome of the universe... because you are inside.
     

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