Free Will?...

[NeoGreen]

...can you answer this man's question?

[Fullduplexxx]

1. To Which question are you refering

[cyclonefence]

2. God doesn't enter into the question of free will

None of us has free will. Our choices are set by who we are, what color our skin is, how much money our parents had, what country we are born in--no such thing as free will, god-given or not.

If you mean simply the choice to do good or evil, the same answer applies. We do not have free will, and cannot possibly have free will. And btw, there is no god.

[in2herbs]

4. Facing alternatives that require choice humans admit that their choice (free will) is

influenced by factors external to himself and by his past and his/her hopes for the future. Yet, each of our decisions rest within us, not outside us.

Deny that man has free will and immediately you have denied man's very being as humans are the only thing on this earth that has free will.

[cyclonefence]

5. Are you seriously suggesting

that a person born with a severe disability, facial disfigurement and a low IQ born to a (choose your oppressed minority) family who do not have any income or education, who live in a hut in a swamp in Louisiana and eat alligators when they can catch them has the same choice of hopes for the future as a healthy, intelligent, attractive, athletic, friendly, self-confident child of immense wealth has?

Not to mention the choice of cheating and stealing in order to survive.

Free will is clearly not the determining quality for being human.

Every "choice" we make is limited and determined by our environment.

[Croney]

27. Hey why pick on Louisiana!

It's shacks or camps, not huts. Alligator tastes like chicken. 😄 I agree with you that environment is important, but environments can be temporary, and we can move somewhere else and aspire to the same achievements as people we meet who were to the manor born.

[cyclonefence]

30. I'm from WV

and LA just seemed like WV but with more mosquitoes I'm actually not talking about environment so much as inborn handicaps (not limited to disabilities)--if your parents and their parents don't value reading, for example, your environment could be rich with readers from outside your family, but I believe you'd be less likely to read if it's not a valued pursuit in your family.

If you don't mind my asking, are you a believer in god? Does the idea of god-given free will form any kind of core belief?

It's just so hard for me to imagine that the kids I taught in N. Philly, who still didn't know how to read by the time I got them in third grade, have the same choices in life as I had, or that you probably had. And if you don't realistically have the same choices, either through environment or genetics, as everyone else, I don't understand how you can be said to have free will. I think every choice we make is essentially dictated by who we are.

[Croney]

32. But who we are changes.

I've been an atheist for 50 of my 73 years. I was brought up poor, Southern Baptist, in a racist place. (And, of course, Louisiana is still a racist place.) To me, free will is my education and experience and wisdom of age, combined. Am I still that Louisiana girl? Yes and no. I remember who I was, but I'm different now. The choices that got me here, some good and some bad, were made by my free will.

Edit to add: living in Cambridge for 45 years will change a person a lot, lol.

[Voltaire2]

10. The evidence currently supports the theory that

free will is an illusion. Our conscious minds appear to invent a narrative of intent after the fact.

[Act_of_Reparation]

3. No, they can't.

Free will was a stupid theodicy a thousand years ago and it hasn't gotten any better with age. If there is an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent deity out there, it could very easily solve the problem of evil without so much as disturbing free will.

Free will is about choice. The nazis chose to break down the doors to the temple; their ability to carry out that choice is immaterial to the choice itself. God could have turned the doors to steel. He could turned the nazis' bones to Jell-o. He could have given the entire SS a biblical case of explosive diarrhea. Any of these could have stopped the evil without denying the decision to commit to it.

But, no. This deity, assuming he exists, sat on his high throne with his thumb rammed securely up his divine hindquarters while a gang of despicable thugs he created brought untold misery upon the people he supposedly loves.

[MineralMan]

7. Assuming? One has to do a great deal of that, it seems to me,

to put any faith in religious mythology. Free Will has more than one definition. I don't buy the religious one.

[guillaumeb]

6. If free will is an illusion, can anyone be guilty of anything? eom

[marylandblue]

8. Yes, because the possibility of punishment affects your decision

Even if that decision was not "free will."

[guillaumeb]

12. So one would be punished for something

that one could not avoid doing?

[marylandblue]

13. Yes, because the punishment helps you avoid doing it

Which is why we send people to jail for theft, rather than reward them with more stuff.

[guillaumeb]

14. But with no free will,

there is no avoiding things.

[marylandblue]

15. Every living thing responds to stimuli

Even bacteria will move away from harmful chemicals and towards nutrients. No free will required.

[guillaumeb]

16. Are you comparing bacteria to sentient beings?

Bacteria respond reflexively to their environment.

[marylandblue]

17. You said that "without free will, there is no avoiding things"

Bacteria avoid things, so they are a counter example to that proposition.

[guillaumeb]

18. Ther is a difference between behaving in an anti-social manner

and responding reflexively to external stimuli. Showing 2 different meanings for the word avoid.

[marylandblue]

19. Then state your case more clearly.

What do you mean by "avoid?" "Behaving in an antisocial manner" also has multiple meanings. What do you mean by that?

[muriel_volestrangler]

20. The full argument is that all behaviour is just responses to external stimuli

and that includes behaviour such as creating laws, and convicting people under them, as well as behaving in an anti-social manner.

It's not a viewpoint I adhere to myself - I think it is worth continuing to behave as "me", an entity capable of making decisions, including calling others "guilty" of a crime.

[guillaumeb]

22. Agreed.

If we are unable to do other than reflexively respond, there can be no guilt.

[marylandblue]

23. We may also be unable to avoid assigning and feeling guilt

[guillaumeb]

24. Agreed.

Guilt assumes a violation of group norms.

[marylandblue]

26. So the answer to the question in 6 is yes.

[guillaumeb]

34. But if guilt requires intent,

absent free will, can there be intent?

[marylandblue]

35. We just established that guilt is unavoidable, so the consequences are unavoidable too

So this question becomes irrelevant to establishing guilt.

[muriel_volestrangler]

25. No, I think there's still "guilt"

It's no longer some cosmic judgement with metaphysical significance. It's just another concept of how people think, like "hope", "trepidation" or "regret".

[Lordquinton]

29. Avoid is full of nuances and multiple meanings

But say believe and Bam! Only religious and gotcha atheists!

[Voltaire2]

9. Not in the classic sense.

We would still have to isolate people who harm others, but we should stop with the punishment aspect of that isolation.

[NeoGreen]

11. (taps hand on table) Here! Here!...

...I, for one, have had heard my fill of "guilt" and "punishment".

We need to expand the narrative of identify and rehabilitate.

Care and compassion.

[Lordquinton]

28. Punishment is very much rooted in religion

God's are always punishing people for violating vague rules or whims.

[Voltaire2]

31. and of course everyone is exercising their free will

whenever they act. See upthread. No wonder when government was Christian horrendous punishment for even the most trivial crime was the norm.

[Lordquinton]

33. Aren't the people in government exercising their free will when they punish others?

Do agencies have free will? Don't the people in a religion have free will to interpret their texts in their own ways? If there is a true interpretation of, for example, the Bible, then there should be one group of people who good likes, and the rest will be punished for improper use of free will.

[edhopper]

21. How does the free will argument

Last edited Sat Jul 21, 2018, 01:29 PM - Edit history (1)

reconcile with "God will provide"?

If God intervenes to help people, then they do not face the consequences of their choices.