I say Free Will is no more than an illusion. I haven't come across any good arguments that suggest it isn't any more than an illusion. Please try and persuade me that we do have Free Will or alternatively post some arguments that will convince me even more.
One of my arguments on this is that based on that we are bound by the laws of physics we cannot possibly have absolute free will. Now, what do you think?
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"I say Free Will is no more than an illusion. I haven't come across any good arguments that suggest it isn't any more than an illusion."
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I do think that the free will is an illusion, indeed. No matter how free we may feel, we still are a subject to the chemical reactions in our bodies which we cannot control, and which define our mental processes entirely.
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It has been argued by some in the past that Free Will does exist due to the fact that the Universe is indeterministic. However, this still doesn't work because the indeterminism is still based on deterministic probabilities. Regardless, of this, however, neither determinism or indeterminsim equates to free will.
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Free will may indeed be illusory but if this were to be determined beyond a doubt why should we hold anyone responsible for their actions no matter how despicable and why punish them?
We are are not responsible for where we are born nor to who we are born nor indeed for our genetic make up, so how can we be responsible for how we act or behave?
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Good question indeed. However, I am talking about absolutely free will that I think many people tend to be thinking that they have. In some sense, I agree that we have humans do have some free will but it's not absolute.
Furthermore, I can't remember who said this but a good saying by someone that I like was the following:
With probably a few rare exceptions at least most of us have the freedom to choose our actions and should be held accountable to them as well. By the time we are making decisions that point at which we are at then was still influenced by preceding factors and it's the very root that leads to all those influences in the first place that we have no control over. We cannot freely will things, but we can freely choose things. If that makes sense?  Considerate: 92%  
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I tend to look at it in a pretty abstract manner: our bodies and brains are merely vessels, while "we" are something deeper, something resulting in consciousness - which, again, is a vessel of our will. Our will is not free because it is completely determined by the chemical reactions happening inside these entities, but the entire complex of us and our vessels can be seen as having free will.
In simplified terms, there is an entity that has free will, but that entity is not us, and we are merely a part of it. And when we say that someone is responsible for something, we really mean that entity. That entity, in turn, is not free from the laws of physics and its environment, but we need to draw the line somewhere, and we do it there.
When someone murders someone else, you could say, "They did it because their organism decided to do it, not because they freely chose to do it". But you could also say, "They did it because their organism decided to do it, and they are responsible for what their organism decides, because that organism is a part of them". It is kind of like having a pet dog and being sued when that pet dog attacks a neighbor: you obviously cannot control what the dog does, when you are not around, but the dog is still your property, and you are responsible for misuse of that property - even if that property misuses itself.
The difference from who we are born and what our genetic make up is is that these traits are decided before "we" even exist. Once we have emerged in this world, however, and once we have reached a certain degree of adulthood that gives us a relatively mature consciousness - we become responsible for our actions.
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Can you expand on what this means, please?
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Good response , the topic fascinates me and I like to ask various questions regarding the different position people state on the topic , I like Galen Strawson take on free will of which you’re possibly familiar with in which he puts forward his view on moral responsibility please let me know your thoughts ........
Strawson's Basic Argument
Galen Strawson has a post on moral responsibility at The Stone. One of the arguments he gives is:
(a) It’s undeniable that the way you are initially is a result of your genetic inheritance and early experience.
(b) It’s undeniable that these are things for which you can’t be held to be in any way responsible (morally or otherwise).
(c) But you can’t at any later stage of life hope to acquire true or ultimate moral responsibility for the way you are by trying to change the way you already are as a result of genetic inheritance and previous experience.
(d) Why not? Because both the particular ways in which you try to change yourself, and the amount of success you have when trying to change yourself, will be determined by how you already are as a result of your genetic inheritance and previous experience.
(e) And any further changes that you may become able to bring about after you have brought about certain initial changes will in turn be determined, via the initial changes, by your genetic inheritance and previous experience.
This isn't an idle exercise; it really is Strawson's view that there is no such thing as moral responsibility, unless we use the phrase in an exceptionally weak sense. The argument above is part of a larger argument ("the Basic Argument") to this end.
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Could you clarify the difference between "free will" and " absolute free will"?
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Oh. That's a world of difference. Are you arguing that because absolute free will doesn't exist, then no free will exists?
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It looks like there's not really much of a debate to be had here then.
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There are however people that might disagree and so there be debate.
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As this may at first glance make relatively little sense, I will explain through example.
Suppose you host a party for time travellers. You have the resources to send out a huge number of invitations. To make sure that only time travellers come, you send out the invitations only after the party. If people turn up at your party, that means you did send out the invitations. Because cause always precedes effect, but this is reversed where time travel is concerned, that means you must have sent out the invitations. So you have no free will to choose not to send the invitations. The only other option would be collapse of chronology. It seems the more likely option is loss of free will. As time travel hasn't been invented yet (and probably never will be, as we never have encountered any time-traveller visitors) this scenario won't occur. But anyhow, it's a thought worth thinking.
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Here's my argument against free will, in simple form:
(1) Ultimately, to control your actions you have to control your fundamental nature.
(2) But you can't control your fundamental nature.
(3) So, ultimately, you can't control your actions.
2. But we're not the Ultimate Cause of Ourselves.
3. Therefore, Libertarian Free Will does not exist.
1. If Consciousness is real then illusionism is false.
2. Consciousness is real.
3. Therefore, illusionism is false.
1. With regards to consciousness, either (a) Radical emergence is true, (b) Dualism is true or (c) Panpsychism is true.
3. (a) and (b) are false.
4. Therefore, Panpsychism is true.
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The Galen Strawson argument that you posted here is amazing. He's the greatest philosopher of our time. My username comes from one of his books.
2. But we're not the Ultimate Cause of Ourselves.
3. Therefore, Libertarian Free Will does not exist.
1. If Consciousness is real then illusionism is false.
2. Consciousness is real.
3. Therefore, illusionism is false.
1. With regards to consciousness, either (a) Radical emergence is true, (b) Dualism is true or (c) Panpsychism is true.
3. (a) and (b) are false.
4. Therefore, Panpsychism is true.
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Thats great and I like you am a big fan of Strawsons way of thinking
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(1) Ultimately, to control your actions you have to originate your original nature.
(2) But you can't originate your original nature because you can't be causa sui.
(3) So, ultimately, you can't control your actions.
2. But we're not the Ultimate Cause of Ourselves.
3. Therefore, Libertarian Free Will does not exist.
1. If Consciousness is real then illusionism is false.
2. Consciousness is real.
3. Therefore, illusionism is false.
1. With regards to consciousness, either (a) Radical emergence is true, (b) Dualism is true or (c) Panpsychism is true.
3. (a) and (b) are false.
4. Therefore, Panpsychism is true.
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Here is a simple argument to show that it is impossible to change anything by time-travelling.
Suppose you build a time travel machine and decide to travel 10 years into the past. That means that everything will change into how it was 10 years ago, including you and your brain. So you will find yourself with the same brain and the same memories as you had 10 years ago. Meaning, you will not even know that you have time travelled, as all of your memories for the next 10 years have been erased.
In other words, time travel effectively equals reliving everything once again. And since in 10 years you will develop a time travel machine and go back to the past again, you will be stuck reliving those 10 years again and again forever - without ever being aware that this is what is happening!
That is assuming our universe is deterministic, that is the absence of free will. In case true free will exists, resulting in divergence of "timelines", you may theoretically arrive at a different world in 10 years, than the previous time. But, again, you will not be aware of it, since your memories of the previous timeline are gone.
The counter-intuitive conclusion here is that, whether free will exists or not, the actual outcome from our perspective is the same as if it did not exist, and there is no experimental way to prove that it exists, even if it does. And that means that it effectively does not exist: if both possibilities lead to the same experimental results, then the null hypothesis of non-existence of free will should be adopted.
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Jesus is Lord.
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TIME TRAVEL?!?!?! REALLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If time travel can exist at all, it would have already happened because if someone traveled to the past, then time travel would have existed in the past. The reason nobody has ever witnessed a time traveler from the future, is because it is impossible. Plus, the idea of time travel is only a fantasy because all time happens simultaneously. The idea that time is linear is an illusion. The future, present, and past are happening simultaneously. If you don't believe that, you'll need to take your gripe up with the entire community of physicists.
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Yes, I know that past, present and future are an illusion. In fact, I recently wrote a paper on the subject called "The Paradox of Time - Does it really exist?" I can send it to you if you want. But situations still occur as if time were linear, and so my argument still stands.
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God’s Omniscience v. Free Will
Atheists insists that free will and our Creator’s omniscience are antithetical. The Atheist is incorrect.
The Atheist strives/struggles with free will and the Omniscience of our Creator believing that foreknowledge negates one’s ability to choose. This is incorrect. I know my children and my wife with intimacy and I know the decisions they will make in almost every scenario in life. My knowledge of their decision before they actually make that decision does not negate or interfere with their free will to choose that particular decision.
Our Omniscient Creator, Jesus Christ-Yeshua, knows our every thought before we think them but He does not deter us from choosing right v. wrong, good v. evil, life v. death, but allows free will to reign supreme so that love and relationship with Him and our fellowman can manifest in purity and authenticity. Our God does employ the Holy Spirit residing within His faithful on Earth to urge them, point them, direct them in the ways of righteousness but even in the lives of a believer, they remain agents of free will and this is of necessity in order that love and relationship with our Creator can manifest in purity and authenticity; otherwise, man becomes robotic and love-relationship become impotent.
Our God simply works through and maneuvers around our choices to accomplish His perfect will for Time and Eternity. I have no doubt that our Creator has employed His omniscience to place certain men and women in strategic positions of authority or decision-making in order that these men would maneuver history toward God’s ultimate goal for Time and Eternity e.g. Noah, Abraham, Moses, the Pharaoh, King David, King Saul, the Prophets, the Apostles, Judas Iscariot, Hitler…and it’s not that our Creator negated the free will of these historical figures but that He placed them in a strategic position where their volitional propensities would be realized.
Again, free will is absolutely essential for love and relationship to manifest in purity and authenticity. The supreme ethic given mankind by our Creator is the ethic of “LOVE” and in order for love to manifest in purity, one must possess the free will to choose hate, disobedience, disloyalty.
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Atheists insists that free will and our Creator’s omniscience are antithetical. The Atheist is incorrect.
The Atheist strives/struggles with free will and the Omniscience of our Creator believing that foreknowledge negates one’s ability to choose. This is incorrect. I know my children and my wife with intimacy and I know the decisions they will make in almost every scenario in life. My knowledge of their decision before they actually make that decision does not negate or interfere with their free will to choose that particular decision.
Our Omniscient Creator, Jesus Christ-Yeshua, knows our every thought before we think them but He does not deter us from choosing right v. wrong, good v. evil, life v. death, but allows free will to reign supreme so that love and relationship with Him and our fellowman can manifest in purity and authenticity. Our God does employ the Holy Spirit residing within His faithful on Earth to urge them, point them, direct them in the ways of righteousness but even in the lives of a believer, they remain agents of free will and this is of necessity in order that love and relationship with our Creator can manifest in purity and authenticity; otherwise, man becomes robotic and love-relationship become impotent.
Our God simply works through and maneuvers around our choices to accomplish His perfect will for Time and Eternity. I have no doubt that our Creator has employed His omniscience to place certain men and women in strategic positions of authority or decision-making in order that these men would maneuver history toward God’s ultimate goal for Time and Eternity e.g. Noah, Abraham, Moses, the Pharaoh, King David, King Saul, the Prophets, the Apostles, Judas Iscariot, Hitler…and it’s not that our Creator negated the free will of these historical figures but that He placed them in a strategic position where their volitional propensities would be realized.
Again, free will is absolutely essential for love and relationship to manifest in purity and authenticity. The supreme ethic given mankind by our Creator is the ethic of “LOVE” and in order for love to manifest in purity, one must possess the free will to choose hate, disobedience, disloyalty.
Enjoy your cake of words @RickeyD
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