Does free will exist?

Gustav said:
why not? are you drawing arbitrary lines in the sand for aesthetic reasons?
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No. Brain in a vat doesn't seem to cover what I meant. We could be puppets/ characters in a book is what I meant.

i suppose one has to figure out the nuances for themselves, it is a measure of one's intellect to successfully adduce causation from correlation to some degree or another.
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Since everything I use to "reason" is internal how would I establish that my reason actually IS independent and not a pre-set "programme"? The programme itself may be (is in this scenario) set up to give me the illusion of free will and my thoughts being mine and contingent upon my surroundings, actions, events. And any thoughts I have are also set up to lead to whatever conclusion I make, while at the same time "letting" me think that I actually thought it.

what about you? can you form an intention that translates to an action that you can then tentatively attribute to an act of free will rather than to a conditioned response to some prior instance(s)?
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No, you misunderstand. It's not conditioned response I'm talking about.

does non-physical equate to massless? somewhat? not at all?
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Short answer: beats the f*ck out of me.
But isn't mass a physical property? :shrug:
 
Gustav said:
i suppose one has to figure out the nuances for themselves, it is a measure of one's intellect to successfully adduce causation from correlation to some degree or another.
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This is a truism.


what about you? can you form an intention that translates to an action that you can then tentatively attribute to an act of free will rather than to a conditioned response to some prior instance(s)?
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Lori once called me a "fucking idiot" for introducing this level of doubt. :p


Since we are beings who are capable of meta-analysis, meta-awareness, I think there will always necessarily be a level of doubt, at least until we become enlightened.

We could first be sure that we completed an action in free will, but later on doubt ourselves.
This doubt can occur for a number of reasons, some may have nothing to do with our original cognition about our action. For example, a skilled manipulator could change our mind and convince us that we didn't do something in free will even though we though we did; or that we did it in free will when we first thought we didn't.
 
Dywyddyr said:
No. Brain in a vat doesn't seem to cover what I meant. We could be puppets/ characters in a book is what I meant.

Since everything I use to "reason" is internal how would I establish that my reason actually IS independent and not a pre-set "programme"? The programme itself may be (is in this scenario) set up to give me the illusion of free will and my thoughts being mine and contingent upon my surroundings, actions, events. And any thoughts I have are also set up to lead to whatever conclusion I make, while at the same time "letting" me think that I actually thought it.
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The BIV scenario is a way to formalize this kind of problem.

One of the ways to resolve it is to go back and clarify who we really are, and what our thoughts and actions are in relation to our selves.

BIV-scenarios become scary when we posit that we are our thoughts, feelings and actions, but lose their appeal if we consider that there is more to us than merely our thoughts, feelings and actions.


If we are indeed merely puppets or characters in a book, then we need to answer what that book is, who wrote it, why, who is reading etc.


Here's an interesting take on why the BIV scenario doesn't work.
 
Still not convinced that the BIV is what I'm talking about.
That rebuttal doesn't work since, in my scenario, the only things we can think are those things that are "programmed" into us.
Can a character in a book (the "actual" character) realise he's in a book if the author hasn't written that realisation into the plot?

And to answer your other questions: can that character work out, or come to know, anything of things not there in the book with him?
 
free will exists we just have to figure out how to capture and use free will to the best of are capabilities and work in capturing and omitting the evil that lurks around:)
 
Dywyddyr said:
Still not convinced that the BIV is what I'm talking about.
That rebuttal doesn't work since, in my scenario, the only things we can think are those things that are "programmed" into us.
Can a character in a book (the "actual" character) realise he's in a book if the author hasn't written that realisation into the plot?

And to answer your other questions: can that character work out, or come to know, anything of things not there in the book with him?
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In psychology, the general approach when facing a double bind is to look at the context, and by contextualizing, surpass the double bind.

We're here facing a double bind.

So, to turn to the context: Why are we worried whether we are merely characters in a book?
Why are we trying to demonstrate we aren't merely characters in a book?
 
Why are we worried whether we are merely characters in a book?
Why are we trying to demonstrate we aren't merely characters in a book?

Morpheus: I imagine that right now, you're feeling a bit like Alice. Hmm? Tumbling down the rabbit hole?
Neo: You could say that.
Morpheus: I see it in your eyes. You have the look of a man who accepts what he sees because he is expecting to wake up. Ironically, that's not far from the truth. Do you believe in fate, Neo?
Neo: No.
Morpheus: Why not?
Neo: Because I don't like the idea that I'm not in control of my life.
Morpheus: I know *exactly* what you mean. Let me tell you why you're here. You're here because you know something. What you know you can't explain, but you feel it. You've felt it your entire life, that there's something wrong with the world. You don't know what it is, but it's there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad. It is this feeling that has brought you to me. Do you know what I'm talking about?
Neo: The Matrix.
Morpheus: Do you want to know what it is?
Neo: Yes.
Morpheus: The Matrix is everywhere. It is all around us. Even now, in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work... when you go to church... when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.
Neo: What truth?
Morpheus: That you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else you were born into bondage. Into a prison that you cannot taste or see or touch. A prison for your mind.

Except that in this case the "feeling" is ALSO part of the plot.
:runaway:
 
Dywyddyr said:
Morpheus: The Matrix is everywhere. It is all around us. Even now, in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work... when you go to church... when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.
Neo: What truth?
Morpheus: That you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else you were born into bondage. Into a prison that you cannot taste or see or touch. A prison for your mind.
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Supposition.
 
THAT bit is (along with the entire scenario).
But how/ what could we know if it were true?

Maybe I should have cut the quote just after:
Neo: Because I don't like the idea that I'm not in control of my life.
 
Dywyddyr said:
THAT bit is (along with the entire scenario).
But how/ what could we know if it were true?
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The world can be a scary place, loveless too, so it seems feasible sometimes to maintain a low-grade depression, a moderate pessimism, so as to not feel disappointed later on.

Just as it is natural to give in, it is also natural to fight.
 
I'm not even sure it's a "depression-wrought" scenario.
Just something that's occurred to me on and off over the years. And raised again by comments in this thread.
 
Wider learning makes for wider choices.

If one can't learn too well, then I guess that would be a kind of doom.
 
Dywyddyr said:
I'm not even sure it's a "depression-wrought" scenario.
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No, I didn't mean that that line of reasoning was due to depression.

I mean that sometimes, we deliberately try to keep ourselves moderately depressed, because we think that if we would ever be cheerful, we couldn't bear the disappointment that will eventually occur.

Similar like why we don't wear a fancy thing that we like, but instead keep it in the closet - for fear that we will tear it, get it dirty, or that we will stumble and then we'll look really stupid in that fancy outfit.
 
Basically, if the will is not determined by some brain analysis, then the other horrible shoe that then drops is that the will is undetermined, being 'random', whatever that is, but it doesn't sound workable at all.
 
Signal said:
if we would ever be cheerful,
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Yet, "cheerful" always seems to give results, if not directly from the person addressed, but of those others noting it, and, at the least, to one's increasing mood; whereas, not cheerful (neutral), or, a step in the other direction, of depressive actions, might not seem to go anywhere, or even go backwards.

As for there being no free will, the knowing of it brings to us greater tolerance of others continuing actions, even the poor recipes of life that ever get them into trouble.
 
Signal said:
No, I didn't mean that that line of reasoning was due to depression.

I mean that sometimes, we deliberately try to keep ourselves moderately depressed, because we think that if we would ever be cheerful, we couldn't bear the disappointment that will eventually occur.
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Ah,
Sentient should be an anagram of transient ;)

Similar like why we don't wear a fancy thing that we like, but instead keep it in the closet - for fear that we will tear it, get it dirty, or that we will stumble and then we'll look really stupid in that fancy outfit.
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The inevitable concomitant of hope is disappointment.
 
SciWriter said:
Basically, if the will is not determined by some brain analysis, then the other horrible shoe that then drops is that the will is undetermined, being 'random', whatever that is, but it doesn't sound workable at all.
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Or that it's all preset and just running through the programme, feeding the tape out slowly.

As for there being no free will, the knowing of it brings to us greater tolerance of others continuing actions
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Only if the "greater tolerance" was preset from the start. :p
 
I don't know whether to surprised or not (no clues) that I haven't been asked the source of those quotes...
 
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