xoc

The most important key to understanding morality, or believing in it, is to presuppose the freedom of the will. As long as we believe we are mere automatons of nature we chose to let our emotions enslave our reason, and we find our beliefs to hold true because we won't follow the course to battle within our souls over our feelings. That people can change, can overcome themselves, is a matter of historical, anecdotal evidence. But if we believe we MUST behave in such and such a way when triggered(the alcoholic running after the alcohol after a miserable day say) we accept the natural slavery of ourselves. As long as we believe that we are not above the processes of nature(when in fact our ego naturally presupposes that we are through the intellect, to even understand it, consider it and form various opinons of it that change over time) we find we are not. But if we believe that we are, we find that we can be- the faith that shapes the world as we shape and interpret our lives through our beliefs.

We may be able to find the chemicals of anger, lust, hatred, etc. and to understand natural reactions and habits of thought that come to us, but finding the highest seat(throne) of consciousness is to find the "Will" of the individual. If this can be found and controlled in the brain by outer means then I would concede we are merely puppets on a string- otherwise we are as free as we are willing to believe we are(as long as we use a creative faith that shapes ourselves/the world instead of merely follow superman fantasies of delusive belief)

Kent Stevens

The choice we made were unavoidable in retrospect. Just as the weather had to have been wet or fine today we had to have made the choices that we did. Both the weather and ourselves are complex physical/chemical systems whose results have to happen in accordance with certain scientific laws. However, this does not make what happens to ourselves or the weather exactly predictable in advance.

I also have knowledge of the external world such as the atmosphere, the oceans, and the land. All these systems are supposed to act in unavoidable ways.

I have not experimented with meditation. Mediation may generate new ideas but it does not necessarily logically validate any of them.

Kent Stevens

The important assumption about morality is that we are an independent system that can act freely from some other system that may compel us otherwise. When someone is holding a gun to our heads we cease to have freedom and may become compelled to act against our will.

I think of myself as a complex biological robot. This does not mean that I let my emotions enslave my reason. Instead, I acknowledge the importance of both my emotions and my reason.

This belief in the unavoidability of physical systems does not mean that we should believe in fatalism. That is to say that things must happen despite our best efforts otherwise. Even a previous alcoholic when he sees others drinking may end up resisting temption and decide not to drink. To say it is unavoidable that they will drink after they see others drink is incorrect. For them to say that they can not help themselves is a cop out. If they choose to drink this was unavoidable in retrospect. If they choose not to drink and join the AA this was also unavoidable in retrospect.

The will of an individual corresponds to a chemical configuration and a neural pattern. This will can be effected by substances such as drugs. When we sleep we lose voluntary action and the will seems to disappear only for it to resurface when we wake.

We are a free system and we are not remote controlled by others. In the same way the weather is a free system and it is also not controlled by others.

Nowhere357

Yes I know you think so. I disagree.

What meditation (of the active type) does is strengthen our ability to apply will. Much like weight lifting strengthens our muscles.

Using our will we can attempt to override our reflexes and impulses.

A perfect example and experiment is to put a hand into a candle flame. The body will react to the pain, and the hand will jerk back. However, through the application of will, we can with effort (mental effort) force our hand to remain in the flame - the stronger the will, the easier this is to do.

This is proof that the will can override the reflex. This is proof that we can use the will to alter our behavior.

It is not the case that we have no ability to make choices and decisions.

Free will and determinism are not in contradiction.

It is the case that we are responsible for our behavior, and that we really can affect the world.

Free will is alive and well!

xoc

Free will is even necessary on the physical level, in an implied sense anyways.

Shoot a single photon at a half-silvered mirror. The probability of it either going through the mirror is 50/50, as is the probability of it reflecting from the mirror. The "choice" cannot by any means be already established, or if it is there's no way we could determine the how or why which would make it irrelevent. The light apparently "decides" which reaction it will follow in the above situation as all the external factors would allow (and in fact demand) one of two responses.

In retrospect everything seems to be what we had to chose, but that is because the past is like a "static" object, crystalised and complete and now it is unchangable, while the present is the place where choices get made, where several strains of possibility collapse into one actuality. There's no way we could possibly say whether we could have chosen differently or not, since it is already too late by the time a choice is made. But the fact that we felt/believed we could chose at the time suggests that the power really was within us at that point.

Kent Stevens

We can starve, give up sex, and hurt ourselves if we really want to. But this might be done to avoid the imagined pain and agony of hell.

All that this demonstrates is that the voluntary parts of our nervous system can override certain involuntary parts of the nervous system. It shows how one thing can control something else. But this does not show that we act independently of the chemicals that we are made of.

For me the concept of free will is dead. To me such terms as free will, soul, and spirituality have gone past their use by date. They traditionally refer to things that do not exist in any physical way. To keep on using a word such as the soul just breeds confusion about what you are trying to say or what you are attempting to prove.

Kent Stevens

Does this mean that coins also have free will? That the weekly lottery demonstrates free will in an implied sense?

What we have is future uncertainty about what things will occur. We have future uncertainty about what the next week's lottery number is. But we can have past certainty about what was last week's lottery number. Future uncertainty is not the same thing as free will. If these meanings were the same then the stock market would have a degree of free will, as the stock market also has a degree of future uncertainty about it.

There are limits to using agent type words such as "choice". We could the word choice to describe what we do or what complex robots do. We could stretch the meaning of the word choice to say that traffic lights choose to go red under certain conditions. But we probably don't what to use terms such as choice and goals when we describe simple dice rolls for example.

xoc

Well these two examples may appear to be equivelent to the photon example, but there is an actual important physical distinction.

The coin actually is determined by angular momentum, gravity, position of whatever the coin will land on etc. With enough knowledge of these, it is totally predictable whether or not the coin will land heads or tails side up- so this is a "determinate" act that just seems random due to our ignorance.

But in the case of the photon reflecting/not reflecting off the "mirror", we can know all there is to know about the external forces/environment and still not be able to predict accurately whether it will bounce back or go through. Then again, maybe it has something to do with the status of the light-wave (as a trough or peak) whether or not it reflects or not... perhaps there still is determination and randomisation is merely ignorance in this case. So I'll leave it for now. I still do not believe reason itself is conceivable as being a mere slave to physical phenomenon, due to the apparent freedom of the will.

To live as a human being means to presuppose the freedom of the will and to take responsibility for our actions as apparently "free agents." We are not that free though, the influence of emotions/beliefs/enculturalisation/etc. on our "selves" is always working to annhilate the "self" as such and make it a servant of the other forces through their influence. The more we are free, the more we are truly "human" rather than merely accidental and incidental systems of consciousness. However we only ever understand things as they are determinate, what is "indeterminate" is by definition mysterious(undetermined), so the free will must remain impossible to prove empirically but still is implicitly assumed by everyone in their normal lives so why deny it philosophically? The more one apparently lacks a free will, or much power of it, the more lthey are probably vegetables, schizophrenic, or at least unfit for society as suffering some severe mental/psychological impairment.

The will always appears variable, indeterminate and "free" in the present... what will I do next, yet once we act it may seem pre-determined as it becomes impossible to realistically conceive of a world where we did x instead of y. Even if the free will exists only in our 'minds", as a factor of consciousness, it's existence is essential to being alive and so attempts to deny it are contradictory to our own sense of being. The illusion of "I have a free will" would be equal to the illusion of "I exist"; personally I'd prefer to accept the apparent existence of my "self" even if this is unfounded, just to avoid a complete nihilism of being. Descartes could have as well said "I will, therefore I exist" instead of "I think". Our will is implicit in all creative or logical thoughts, only pereception of the outer world does not correlate to the will as it is the World imposing it's phenomenon on us, like it or not.

The Buddhists could be right, but I'm not ready to give up this "maya" consciousness yet: I will, I think, I am, and I believe in the first 3 because of how natural it seems to do so and how hard it is to do otherwise.

Nowhere357

"Voluntary" means proceeding from the will or from one's own choice or consent.

You are right, it doesn't. But this is not required for will to exist. Our ability to exercise will is a quality or property of mind. Mind arises deterministically. The concepts are not in opposition.

Which directly contradicts your first statement above. Unless you see some sort of qualitative difference between "will" and "free will"? if so, what exactly is the difference? If not, why hold a contradictory belief?

People use these words, and the words they have valid meanings. Don't trash them yet, please.

Not unlike words like "numbers" and "desire". Which are perfectly good words anyway.

The confusion is caused by assuming meanings to words without clarifying first. "Free will" does not need imply gods, angels, demons, disembodied souls, life after death, or any other nonsensical concept.

The words can simply mean the ability to make choices. And people can make choices. It's not sensible to deny this.

Robots and traffic lights do not have subjective personal mental awareness, afaik.

The existence of quantum indeterminancy means that an identical set of circumstances can lead to a range of outputs. Iow a given chemical state of our body does not of necessity lead to one and only one choice. So there is plenty of room for will to operate.

And operate it does, as the candle experiment proves. We really do make decisions, we really can affect the world, and free will is alive and well.

And every time you make a decision, you have proven my point.

Now, will you DECIDE to respond? Or will you CHOOSE to do something else?


Merriam/Webster
Main Entry: free will
Function: noun
Date: 13th century
1 : voluntary choice or decision <I do this of my own free will>
2 : freedom of humans to make choices that are not determined by prior causes or by divine intervention

Kent Stevens

With Materialism/ Agent duality we are not slaves to the chemicals that we are made of. We are not independent of the chemicals that we are made so we are not masters of our chemical make up. Instead, what we choose and feel corresponds to certain configurations of chemicals. At a higher level of description we talk of thought and will but at a lower level of description we can talk of chemical manifestations.


Maybe you could also argue that the soul, God, and Santa Claus are indeterminate and so are impossible to prove. But since everyone assumes them they should be accepted philosophically. However, I am reluctant to believe in anything that must be assumed and that is beyond the reaches of rational debate.

I believe that I can choose but then so can a computer that can decide which chess move to play in a game of chess. Does the chess playing computer Deep Blue also have free will because it can choose? Do we have to talk of indeterminate forces acting with Deep Blue?

I do not believe in free will, but I believe in freedom. I am free to do things unless compelled to do otherwise. Most other systems also possess freedom. A clock ticking by the second is doing so freely unless an external force interfers with its timing. A leaf that falls from a tree acts freely and independently unless a storm blows the leaf to far away places. Both clocks and falling objects are normally free to act and do not need the magical property of free will.