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/lit/ - Literature

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5585313 No.5585313 [Reply] [Original]

Do you agree with his view of free will? What is /lit/'s view of free will?

>> No.5585326

>>5585313
harris is a silly

pointing out the obvious with regards to metaphysical free will but refusing to engage with the compatibalists, who are probably right

>> No.5585335

>>5585313
Did he write a book on this? Why not read a sentence from schopenhauer? What a hack.

>> No.5585350

>>5585313
Spoiler it already. Does he believe in it or not?

>>5585335
Does Schopenhauer?

>> No.5585384

>>5585350
Not him, but I recall I recall some (Swedish?) university raging at schopenhauer because he said you can do what you will, but you cannot will what you will, or something to that effect.

>> No.5585400

>>5585313
This shit shouldn't be published. I agree with Harris' conclusions (at least the main ones), but he's essentially taking conclusions which can only be argued about in more complex philosophical terms, endorsing a single point of view, and then presenting that view to a public which is incapable of properly engaging it. Pretty much the same basic criticism I have for his new atheist buddies as well.

>> No.5585659

>>5585326
Compatibilist refuse to even address free will. They change the definition to something else that works with determinism.

>> No.5586964

>>5585313
I haven't read the literature on the free-will debate, so I'm not familiar with the arguments.

My intuitions seemed to suggest free will is real, but the more I thought about it, the more I found determinism inevitable in a naturalistic universe. So, I was a determinist for a while.

Then, I thought about it some more, and realized I couldn't come to a coherent definition of "free will." So, now I feel that the argument is sort of moot because we're arguing about the existence of this property that (I don't think) we have clearly delineated or refers to anything that can be affirmed or refuted.

>> No.5587068

>>5585384
This is quoted in Harris's book:

>Man can do what he wills but he cannot will what he wills.
--Schopenhauer

I'll have to re-read Harris's book, because I was fairly convinced by it when I first read it but I've since thought the matter over a bit. If I remember correctly, Harris gives no mention to a mediating mind that can rationalize and sift out individual options according to one's will.

My thinking goes something like this: man cannot will what he wills, but he can mediate and temper and go about his will in a controlled manner. Harris, for example, tells people to think of a city, and then try to account for how they thought of that city. He thinks because people can't account for the origin of their will that they have no free will, but there are several hindering things at play here.

For example, just because our first-thought impulse cannot be accounted for, it does not mean we actually end up enacting or going with that thought. Our mind mediates and judges and justifies the choice and changes accordingly.

>> No.5587091

>>5585350
Schop. was a compatibilist

>> No.5587104
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5587104

The free will debate essentially falls to two main philosophers: Sam Harris and James Franco.

>Picking Harrisian sophistry over Franconism.

>> No.5587251

>>5585659
As a compatibilist, I see it in the exact opposite way you do: people who think there is no free will simply changed the definition of free will.

The only semi-legitimate argument against free will I have seen is that no one is making free decisions since their previous experiences and knowledge leads to their conclusion. Without changing the past, you cannot change the present decision, etc etc.

But it doesn't make any sense to define free will as making decisions based on nothing, because everything is based on other things. Nothing that we know or experience is isolated in any way. If you are saying free will NEEDS to be COMPLETELY independent, that's like saying that nothing has ever been free. Which is ridiculous, because there are obviousl degrees of freedom implied by context whenever you use the word. And in the context of making decisions, it is implied that you are free to make a decision you would like based on your previous experiences.

tl:dr deciding 'free' needs to always mean completely unbounded freedom is ridiculous and nonsensical.

>> No.5587257
File: 25 KB, 400x315, spinoza.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
5587257

>>5587104
Sounds like a purple prose Spinoza.

>> No.5587709

No. Maybe if I was a robot with perfect perception, perfect information, and perfect memory I'd have no free will, but everything in my life is so muddy and vague that I can't imagine anything I do being deterministic.

>> No.5587716

>>5587251
Thank you.

The only meaning of "free" that makes sense if you eliminate determinism is "arbitrary."

But obviously non-compatibilists don't believe they're arguing decisions are 100% arbitrary.

You ARE the being who makes the decisions. But the decisions flow naturally from the the meeting of "person" and "situation."

>> No.5587722

>>5587716
As does every other aspect of self.

It seems to me that this kind of challenge made against free will is equally applicable to any and every aspect of self-hood and identity.

>> No.5587737
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5587737

>>5587104
Franco gets it.

>> No.5587745

>>5587104
James Franco speaks in the third person.

>> No.5587750

Is there a difference between free will and free choice? Or uncoerced choice? What's the opposite of free will (don't say determinism)? Unfree will? Restricted will? Restricted by the present circumstance (including your personality)? What is the meaning of free in this case?

>> No.5587763

>>5587750
I rather think, if you believe in free will in a meaningful sense, then that freedom is operative in all cases, whatever outside coercion is placed on you or what circumstances demand (obviously, I'm not referring to physical necessity here; what I mean is that the goodness or badness of the options available to you to choose from does not in any way impinge on the freedom of will). So I would say, no, coercion is not the opposite of free will.

>> No.5587770

>>5587709
That's the worst argument against determinism I've heard. If you make informed decisions or not does not matter, likewise a coinflip is not truly random since the amount of force applied, air currents etc already have set the outcome in stone.

Your mind is a chemical processor with a simple input and output trough the senses and nerve impulses, to achieve true freedom you'd need an external governing part such as a soul or whatnot.

>> No.5587773

Necessary postulate for practical reason. You can and will act and think (which is just another type of action) AS IF you have free will whether or not you "actually do." Practical reasoning is meaningless without it.

>> No.5587807

The difference between a flower in spring and a man is not that large, but we have the illusion of agency thanks to our ability to abstract.

>> No.5587871

>>5585384
Schopenhauer makes perfect sense if these people had taken the time to read him. The Will is of course the force underlying all life and is not subject to time and space. It is not identifiable to us or subject to physical laws. All life, however, is the "objectification", or visibility, of the Will in all of its grades, humans being the highest grade. We are Will. The Will strives through us, and we seek to satisfy the Will. We can not control our desires, as they flow through us from the Will, but we seek to satisfy these desires as they arise. The Will, therefore, is free, but we can not control what we Will (we are just aware that we will and act accordingly). His position is fully set out in his Prize Essay, On the Freedom of the Will. It is a standalone essay, but a knowledge of WWR makes the reading a richer experience.

Coincidentally, I watched (most of) a YouTube video last week where Sam Harris spoke about free will. He put his arguments forward in a way that a pleb, such as the interviewer, might grasp, but I didn't make it to the end because clearly I'm far beyond that level and felt I could actually teach the kid Harris a trick or two.

>> No.5588075

>>5587745
>James Franco speaks in the third person.

Is that you, Franco?

>> No.5588321

>>5585313
I'm sorry but I try everyday to rationalize free will and I fail. Free will cannot exist.

>> No.5588350

>>5588321
You say 'I' several times in this post. What do you mean by that 'I'?

>> No.5588398

>>5585313

Essentially free will doesn't exist. Functionally our universe is deterministic, although you might start talking shit about Quantom Mechanics and whatnot. That doesn't really change anything though (as far as free will is concerned) because whatever aspect of our universe is not deterministic (if any) is not "non-deterministic" because of our will.

>> No.5588433
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5588433

There IS free will but not the kind of free that you have on your mind. Its free as in freedom.

>> No.5588512

>>5588433
/g/ please go

>> No.5590134

Free will probably doesn't exist, and I don't really see any reason why it should exist, but even still it's a useful illusion to have, if only for the sake of social cohesion.

When we say that someone committed a crime we typically punish them under the assumption that they were in control of their own actions, thoughts, behaviors, etc. We aren't able to simply rewire the brain to control all behaviors towards being more pro-social and non-violent as a mechanic might be able to fix the wiring in a car, etc. We don't just say "This person committed a crime, their brain must be faulty and should be repaired". We don't (hopefully) treat human beings as cogs. Nor am I certain if we as a society would even want to take such a stance on human beings and their behaviors. In a lot of ways it would make it too easy to eradicate the concept of the individual.

>> No.5590487

>>5587251
To me free would mean that "sameness of state at time1 does not necessitate sameness of state at time2". People who want to posit free will need to prove there is such thing as a random event. And even if some quantum events are random, that doesn't necessarily entail that anything is free at the human level.

>> No.5590537

>>5587770
> Eliminative Materialism
>>5588398
>hurr durr I'm a fucking retard

>> No.5590563

>>5585313
The act of choice might be governed by predictable laws, but the experience of free will is real. There is no illusion of free will, there is the unfolding physical law experienced as the act of choosing.

>> No.5590594

>>5585350
he does not

>> No.5590749

>>5585313
The universe is fully causal and deterministic, and free will exists.

>> No.5590788

>>5587770
>Your mind is a chemical processor with a simple input and output trough the senses and nerve impulses

I can tell you've studied neuroscience.

>> No.5590809

If free will doesn't exist, then should I behave differently? What are the implications?
>>5585313

>> No.5592641

>>5585313
Nothing is free, by principle. But you can sure tell yourself it is...ain't it true for everything we think, mankind?

>> No.5592663

>>5590563
That choice that we don't know if it is a choice at all. But yeah, you're right, we still do it. Cause we have to make choices anyway. So most choices are not done because of free will, but because there is no other choice than choice. ;)

>> No.5592699

>>5587251
Yes, exactly. Free-will/determinism is bullshit language games. Even if all human actions are predetermined at the highest level of accuracy (this in and of itself is something to debate about: what is perfect accuracy if events are already determined to begin with? Is "human error" predetermined, resulting in free will (in the sense of there being deviations from the perfect accuracy) already a facet of determinism?) what difference does it make to anything that we do or think about. I pick up a rock because I want to. I pick up a rock because I was determined to. My experience would be no different. My interaction would be no different. Even my thought process leading up to picking up the rock would not have a single change made to it, as any deviation could change the effect. We are arguing about a problem with no solution and no application, if it is even a problem to begin with.

>> No.5592768

>>5587722
I'm not sure what you mean. Could you construct the argument in reference to a different thing?

>> No.5592789

>>5592768
I think he's basically saying that even if everything that defines an individual (or a 'self') is directly influenced or copied from others, it does not take away the individuality of the whole.

>> No.5593136

>>5590809
Free will is an illusion

>> No.5593237

>>5592789
I don't disagree. That's why I'm a compatibilist and not someone who denies free will.

>> No.5593244

If free will is an illusion then should I behave differently? What are the implications?
>>5593136
>>5585313

>> No.5593245

>>5585400

explain, i think his arguments are more than capable of demonstrating why libertarian free will doesn't make sense

>> No.5593247

>>5593244

the implications are there that you should treat morality in behaviorist terms, i.e. terms that make sense, rather than in normative terms, which are just bullshit

>> No.5593318

>>5593247

Why should we prefer one set of behaviors over another?

>> No.5593400

>>5590134
You mean the illusion of the individual.

>> No.5593637

>>5593247
Okay, so is the 'free will' debate, as framed by Sam Harris, more to do with the illusion that we all have 'perfectly' free will?

I think that's a fruitful debate, as opposed to most discussions of free will that take place on /lit/ or /sci/, which generally boil down to whether the universe is deterministic.

>> No.5593810

>>5585326

u post on 4chan

>> No.5593817

>>5588350

This is where philosophy fails, getting hung up on semantics and ignoring the actual thing being talked about.

We all know what he means by "I", let's move on.

There is no free will by the way.

>> No.5593822

>>5587104
Harrisy?