Freewill?

Hyde Parke
Hyde Parke Members Posts: 2,573 ✭✭✭
edited January 2011 in R & R (Religion and Race)
Is freewill really free? Does it truly involve freedom?

I choose to live by the ocean, I choose what music I listen to, I choose what I want to believe in.

all of this involves my freedom to do so, while simultaneously I am building a wall of confinement, my choices create limitation in the process.

agree/disagree?

while it is true, I am free to change what I choose at any given point, that change still involves choice which is limitation? yes? no?
show me the err of my thinking.

Comments

  • BiblicalAtheist
    BiblicalAtheist Members Posts: 15,668 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited January 2011
    The freewill that is thought of is the fuel that allows choice to be made. So freewill isn't the choosing itself, it what allows you to be able to make a choice in the first place. People lose their will to live, their "fuel" is running low. There are no restrictions to that freewill nor conditions. It cannot be captured, killed, beaten etc. It's given to all equally. That's my understanding of "freewill" anyhow.
  • KTULU IS BACK
    KTULU IS BACK Banned Users Posts: 6,617 ✭✭
    edited January 2011
    determinism makes more sense but it bothers people
  • Huruma
    Huruma Members Posts: 2,284 ✭✭✭
    edited January 2011
    The brain is a physical object, it reacts to external stimuli like every other physical object in the universe does. Even quantum randomness (which I'm skeptical about) still wouldn't be 'free will' or 'choice', it would be randomness. Clearly we don't live in a random universe which is why we can predict and study the behavior of the brain and the world in general. How any physician or neuroscientist in this day and age can take the idea of 'free will' seriously is beyond me.


    determinism makes more sense but it bothers people

    It doesn't bother me. At first, it was liberating. It gives you an excuse not to dwell on what could have been or to justify people's behavior. Regret makes no sense if everything that happens had to occur and resentment makes no sense since nobody chooses to behave the way that they do. Now, the fact that free will is an illusion just seems like an abstract and vague technicality to me. It makes no difference whether or not free will exists because it's impossible to live your life as though you didn't have free will and emotions like pride, guilt, anger etc are too strong to be rationalized away, we have to view other people as though they behave with intention and purpose.
  • KTULU IS BACK
    KTULU IS BACK Banned Users Posts: 6,617 ✭✭
    edited January 2011
    Huruma wrote: »
    Even quantum randomness (which I'm skeptical about)
    dont be that ? who pretends he understands quantum stuff
  • Huruma
    Huruma Members Posts: 2,284 ✭✭✭
    edited January 2011
    dont be that ? who pretends he understands quantum stuff

    I won't pretend to but just because there are practical limitations on our ability to determine the behavior of subatomic particles doesn't necessarily mean that those particles behave randomly, just like not knowing the origin of the universe means that we don't know the origin of the universe and not necessarily that a ? is responsible for it. The fact that quantum physicians can even predict the behavior of quantum particles suggests pattern which suggests causality.
  • alissowack
    alissowack Members Posts: 1,930 ✭✭✭
    edited January 2011
    I believe that free will is both free and determined. It just depends on whether we can find freedom in what is determined. Someone may determine something and it ends up being oppressive.
  • Hyde Parke
    Hyde Parke Members Posts: 2,573 ✭✭✭
    edited January 2011
    The freewill that is thought of is the fuel that allows choice to be made. So freewill isn't the choosing itself, it what allows you to be able to make a choice in the first place. People lose their will to live, their "fuel" is running low. There are no restrictions to that freewill nor conditions. It cannot be captured, killed, beaten etc. It's given to all equally. That's my understanding of "freewill" anyhow.


    If it is the "allowance", that indicates "permission", If I give you permission, or "allow" you to act/do, that isnt total freedom, by allowing infers restriction, no?
  • Hyde Parke
    Hyde Parke Members Posts: 2,573 ✭✭✭
    edited January 2011
    determinism makes more sense but it bothers people


    makes sense, but what is the driving force of determinism?
  • Hyde Parke
    Hyde Parke Members Posts: 2,573 ✭✭✭
    edited January 2011
    Huruma wrote: »
    The brain is a physical object, it reacts to external stimuli like every other physical object in the universe does. Even quantum randomness (which I'm skeptical about) still wouldn't be 'free will' or 'choice', it would be randomness. Clearly we don't live in a random universe which is why we can predict and study the behavior of the brain and the world in general. How any physician or neuroscientist in this day and age can take the idea of 'free will' seriously is beyond me.



    .


    so would you say there is nothing new/original in man's actions? That brain is a tool that can act independently of human manipulation in some instances, like say, breathing?
  • BiblicalAtheist
    BiblicalAtheist Members Posts: 15,668 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited January 2011
    Hyde Parke wrote: »
    If it is the "allowance", that indicates "permission", If I give you permission, or "allow" you to act/do, that isnt total freedom, by allowing infers restriction, no?

    Not allow in the sense 'oh my will says I can't do this'.