Joined: 11/4/2007
Posts: 1772
Location: Australia, Victoria
Cue debate in 3... 2... 1...
I reckon it doesn't, even if you did do whatever the heck you wanted, you'd still get consequences for it or just be plumb unable to do it. You can't just fly at a flick of a finger.
Granted, I'm stretching the barrier a bit here... but essentially, I doubt free thought exists. I'm not saying it's impossible, but to me, everything happens due to the consequences of something else happening, like a random number generator.
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
It does, actually. My consciousness is a result of the laws of physics.
Edit: Knowing this, I still consider my will as free as my brain is. Although I can't change what I choose, I did choose those things with my will, as determined by the laws of physics. As a result, my avatar in this universe ("I") feels free to do as he chooses.
Life is deterministic, you react exactly to stimuli and the current state of your brain.
But there's no way to predict what's going to happen, so as long as you pretend that you have free will, you basically do.
Life is deterministic, you react exactly to stimuli and the current state of your brain.
But there's no way to predict what's going to happen, so as long as you pretend that you have free will, you basically do.
People usually don't come out and explicitly state what they mean by free will, but the idea seems to be that people have some sort of "spirit" that decides their actions, but is independent from reality. I guess people who believe in this think the brain is some sort of interface device for this thing (implying that brain matter would not follow the laws of physics, since they don't include a mechanism for interacting with a "spirit").
So free will fits natrually in with religion and somethingism, but it isn't really something you would think atheists would believe in. Which is why it is so strange that perhaps a majority of the atheists I have discussed this with seem to believe in it.
Typical arguments in favor of free will appeal to the inconvenience that would follow if it did not exist: "If there is no free will, people cannot be held responsible for their actions, and all punishment will be unjust!", for example. Or put a bit differently, they are saying that "I subscribe to a system of ethics that depends on free will. It would be inconvenient if I had to find another system, so therefore free will must be true." Not very convincing.
I have to disagree. Many quantum effects are definitely and absolutely non-deterministic and unpredictable, and do not follow cause-and-effect. Quantum effects can escalate to macroscopic levels.
Whether we have "free will" depends on its definition.
The (mostly) religious definition implies, basically, that our consciousness transcends the physical world, and thus we are able to make decisions independently and regardless of what happens in it. In other words, our thinking process is (at least in part) not bound to the physical world.
(The religious view stumbles on a minor problem when deciding whether animals have free will or not. Are they completely bound to physical laws, or do their consciousnesses also transcend the physical reality? Many people have differing opinions.)
From a naturalistic point of view there are only two things that can affect decisions: Deterministic cause-and-effect, and quantum randomness (which is real non-deterministic randomness, not just apparent one). Whatever decisions we make are always a result of either of those, or a combination of both. Thus there's no real free will from a naturalistic point of view.
However, there's the practical philosophical definition too: Basically, since it's not possible for one person to predict with absolute precision what decisions another person will do, that other person has effectively free will from the first person's point of view. Most decisions also show a logical chain of deductions, which at least gives the impression of it not being completely random.
Also, more importantly, the first person cannot force the second one to form an opinion or make a certain decision (not inside his mind at least) under normal circumstances. He can affect to a certain degree what the other person thinks, but he cannot force him to form a certain opinion. Thus in practice the other person has free will from his point of view. His opinions are his own, not forced by someone else.
I think I was pretty concise, considering this is a subject you could write an entire book about.
In summary, I presented three points of view, two naturalistic and one supernaturalistic.
There's no real free will as long as this board has moderators, right?
The bad news is, there is no scientific way to prove or disprove the concept of free will. The good news is, it doesn't matter. The assumption that we do have a free will is a good approximation to use in our day-to-day-lives. Assuming the converse will just lead to bad poetry and awful haircuts.
'Natural laws' don't exist, only will exists, which can express itself more or less freely depending on how advanced the body it inhabits is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animism
Things like rocks are one of the least free things in the world, so they pretty much always do the same thing, so materialists say that they are controlled by laws, unlike other creatures who are controlled by will. Humans are somewhat free. Gods are even more free to do what they want.
Typical arguments in favor of free will appeal to the inconvenience that would follow if it did not exist: "If there is no free will, people cannot be held responsible for their actions, and all punishment will be unjust!"
Even if people have no free will, punishment would still work the same way it does. It would still teach people to not do things that are "wrong". There are of course better ways to teach people than punishing them.
Believing in free will can sometimes be a bad thing, because it can justify punishment, prisons and murder. Nobody is responsible for the things they do because nobody ultimately chooses to exist. Even though we have free will to some degree, we are also shaped by our environment and experiences.
Both free will and determinism have positive and negative sides, so in some cases we should believe in determinism, like in the "justice system", which is sometimes the injustice system because criminals are often assumed to do crimes out of mere free will, so they are punished instead of trying to understand them, so that we could prevent bad things from happening in the future again and again.
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Warp wrote:
I think I was pretty concise, considering this is a subject you could write an entire book about.
You could, but that book would be very boring and repetitive. This topic doesn't merit much discussion. It's pretty obvious how we perceive things to work in the universe. Things we're sure we'll never be able to perceive can be simply ignored as futile wastes of thought. More examples of such things are: the existence of deities, the origins of the laws of physics, the events preceding or following the existence of the natural universe as we know it. Speculation on such matters is useless.
Joined: 11/22/2004
Posts: 1468
Location: Rotterdam, The Netherlands
There's actually no scientific evidence whatsoever that the universe is deterministic. It seems logical that it would be, but things that seem logical aren't always true.
Quantum physics is a great example. One relatively popular theory right now is called the many-worlds interpretation, which states that there are actually an uncountable number of universes—one for every possible outcome of all quantum states. "Prior to many-worlds, reality had been viewed as a single unfolding history. Many-worlds, rather, views reality as a many-branched tree, wherein every possible quantum outcome is realised."
So maybe the universe is deterministic specifically because randomness is resolved by allowing both possibilities to exist alongside one another, yet in a local sense (inside of our local universe) the quantum random bit would still, for all intents and purposes, be completely random and nondeterministic.
But thinking at an even more local level, it would seem preposterous that quantum effects could have such a major impact on our conscious actions. Could there be an alternative universe in which Hitler got accepted into art school and thus the Holocaust was averted? Maybe, but that means the intake examinator would have to have consciously decided to accept him. It's a stretch to say that some random strain of quantum outcomes could have made him or her make that specific decision. Unless he or she consulted Schrödinger's cat.
Personally, I don't have a clue as to whether the universe is deterministic or not. I'd like to think it is, but thinking is rarely a good idea. It's more likely, however, that on a local level—our daily thoughts, actions, decisions, et cetera—are deterministic.
Joined: 8/26/2006
Posts: 1139
Location: United Kingdom
Lex wrote:
You could, but that book would be very boring and repetitive. This topic doesn't merit much discussion.
I beg to differ there have been many great books written on this throughout history. For one Daniel Dennett has compiled a fascinating book on this and similar issues.
My own opinion is that the universe is probably largely deterministic (though, having read Dada's interesting post, I may need to reinvestigate the evidence, if any) and I agree that quantum fluctuations would not affect the implications of this in regards to an individual's thought process.
However, I believe that I make my own decisions, therefore I could be said to have an illusion of free will. This illusion, however, is my only frame of reference as to the definition of free will, and so is indistinguishable from true free will from my own perspective. The way in which I interact with the world will not differ if this perception is actually free will or merely an illusion and so, for practical purposes, I proceed on the basis that I am wholly responsible for my actions, though this assumption may be erroneous.
Joined: 6/25/2007
Posts: 732
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Mukki wrote:
My own opinion is that the universe is probably largely deterministic (though, having read Dada's interesting post, I may need to reinvestigate the evidence, if any) and I agree that quantum fluctuations would not affect the implications of this in regards to an individual's thought process.
However, I believe that I make my own decisions, therefore I could be said to have an illusion of free will. This illusion, however, is my only frame of reference as to the definition of free will, and so is indistinguishable from true free will from my own perspective. The way in which I interact with the world will not differ if this perception is actually free will or merely an illusion and so, for practical purposes, I proceed on the basis that I am wholly responsible for my actions, though this assumption may be erroneous.
We share this opinion, and it's all that needs to be said on the topic. :P
Edit: This was supposed to have been just below Dada's post, not in another page; so here is the relevant quote:
Dada wrote:
Quantum physics is a great example. One relatively popular theory right now is called the many-worlds interpretation,
Just a quibble, the "many worlds interpretation" is not a theory -- it is an interpretation, while Quantum theory is a theory. The difference is this: a theory is supported by evidence, while there is no way to differentiate between the many interpretations of Quantum theory based on the evidence -- they are all equal in terms of predictive power. This effectively makes all interpretations of Quantum theory pseudo-science at the present time.
Back to the topic of free will: there is no such thing. Your brain processes information and decides how to act. It then sends a signal that creates the conscious experience of making the decision and delays any signals to the limbs/mouth/eyes/whatever in order to reinforce the illusion that the conscience decided what to do. Since you aren't aware of all of this processing, the notion of free will seem plausible ideas -- you just "decided" what to do, after all. [1]
One example that uses this is a button pushing experiment that was first performed the 1960s: people were told that they would be watching a series of slides, and that pushing a button would to advance to the next slide. There were several sensors attached that measured neural activity in areas related to hand motion; the participants weren't told that it was the output of these sensors, and not their button presses, which was what actually advancing the slides. The result: the participants were amazed to discover that the slide-show was able to predict their decisions. [2]
[1] D. Wegner (2002). The Illusion of Conscious Will. The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA.
[2] For a more thorough description of this experiment, see "Time and the Observer" by D. C. Dennett and M. Kinsbourne, in The Nature of Consciousness: Philosophical debates, (Ned Block, Owen Flanigan, et al., eds., 1997), The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, page 168.
Joined: 5/1/2004
Posts: 4096
Location: Rio, Brazil
What is the point of this question? There is only one life and one timeline that we can observe, so how do we know if what we do could have been done some other way? It never does, the only thing that happens is what happens, so, in practice, it is a determined path. There are no ramifications. You do what you want with your life, but you can only move in one path, not two.
My point is that it can't be checked, there's no way to know if we could have chosen another action.
There's actually no scientific evidence whatsoever that the universe is deterministic.
I think you mean "there's evidence that it's not deterministic", which is not the same thing.
Of course there is evidence for a deterministic universe if you pick and choose. Newtonian laws are but just one example. However, this evidence alone is not enough.
I don't even understand why this is a question. Unless someone here is seriously claiming that quantum randomness is deterministic (and hence predictable).
Unless someone here is seriously claiming that quantum randomness is deterministic (and hence predictable).
It could be that things at quantum level are as deterministic as macroscopic objects like planets, but because our tools at present aren't efficient enough, they appear to be random. If we have better microscopes (or something) some day and can film things at a few septillion FPS, we might see order there.
I was confused because i read "free willi"
However, everything that happens underlies the law of physiscs. if you know the exact state and direction of every smallest part you could calculate the future, so there is no free will and its determined that you ask yourself this question
How should I know what I think before I read what I post?
