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/sci/ - Science & Math

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3276798 No.3276798 [Reply] [Original]

Does free will exist?

If no, does this depress you at all?

>> No.3276800

Not really, takes some pressure off.

>> No.3276803

no and no

>> No.3276806

>>3276798
If you define free will as "the ability to do whatever the fuck you want" then, yes, it exists.

Even if there is no free will, though, we must always go on acting like there is.

>> No.3276808

no and no.

I would like to be depressed by this fact, but I have no choice in the matter.

>> No.3276809

i say yes, not that i'd be able to give a good reason why i think so.

>> No.3276810

it doesn't exist, but its ok

>> No.3276811

Probably not (there is no <span class="math">conclusive[/spoiler] evidence yet), and no, it doesn't.

>> No.3276813

No. Whether the universe is deterministic or non-deterministic is irrelevant, believing in some sort of supernatural form of personal identity is irrational. I accepted this over a decade ago, so it doesn't depress me.

>> No.3276814

The question is, does it matter?
And the answer is "no".

>> No.3276818

>>3276808

i c wut u did thar

>> No.3276823

ever have a really intense moment of deja vu and you recognize it and you think "i've experienced this exactly before, i'm gonna try and change it" and you do something to change it, but what you did is exactly what happened last time aswell

>> No.3276828

I'm not sure.

Even if it didn't, no. That would not depress me. Why would the absence of a manmade construct upset me? I was apparently doing fine with the illusion it was there.

>> No.3276829

>>3276813
>believing in some sort of supernatural form of personal identity is irrational.
I agree fully with this. However, you cannot actively exclude the possibility, because that would place the burden of proof on you. Free will is a superfluous explanation, yes, but is it disproved beyond reasonable doubt? No.

>> No.3276830

no and WOW NO

>> No.3276848

ive had so many moments of manifest destiny that i will never be credible on this one

>> No.3276859

Would it depress radical atheists if it were discovered to exist?

>> No.3276867

radical athiests are probably already depressed

>> No.3276878

I have troubles seeing why it wouldn't.

But let's assume not. This doesn't depress me at all. It's not like I know the difference.

>> No.3276899

if free will doesnt exists, then why can i post whatever i want?

>> No.3276908

>>3276899
because you can't choose what it is you want

>> No.3276916

I tell myself it does. Not that I have any choice in the matter.

>> No.3276917

something with all possible information could theoretically solve for your faggotry

>> No.3276926

>>3276908

You can choose what you do, though. Just because you want something doesn't mean you have to choose it.

>> No.3276927

>>3276908
i even post thing i dont want.

>> No.3276947

two nos.
I can't really explain why It doesn't depress me- I don't know. If I were to try and explain it I'd say that it's because I feel that if free will doesn't exist then my depression due to this is an instinctive response.
also worth thinking about: Your conscious mind doesn't decide anything, it just gets fed the results of what the rest of your mind does.

>> No.3276959

if free will doesnt exist, then why are we responsible for shit?

>> No.3276973

>>3276959
Because we're risks to other people and/or abuse things.

>> No.3276996

>>3276973
well yeah, but even if someone fucks up, then its not really his fault, since he didnt have a choice. Wheres the logic in that?

>> No.3277008

>>3276996
it's his fault [as a human]. Even if he didn't chose to do it of his own free will, the decision to commit the crime was made in his mind.

>> No.3277025

>>3277008
well he didnt make the decision, so following that logic he is the victim here.
also if free will doesnt exist, then why people can go against every primal instint there is. Including the most important of survival?

>> No.3277046

>>3277025
He did make the decision. He made it because of the working of his mind, rather than because he has free will.
People make decisions we see as foolish because to them these things seem the most sensible- due to defect, or philosophy.

>> No.3277054

>>3277046
>People make decisions
i thought you said they dont

>> No.3277059

>>3277054
Nope. I said the conscious mind doesn't decide anything, but that wasn't about this.

>> No.3277063

>>3277054
It is irrespective of who or what makes the decision. Wherever it happens, be it in a person's brain or in their supernatural free will, it is justifiable to put it under control for the sake of the well being of others.

>> No.3277067

No and I don't give a fuck.
It changes nothing.

>> No.3277068

>>3277046
Let's burn all science, just to be safe.

OH WAIT, THAT IDEA IS BOLLOCKS.

>> No.3277071

>>3277068
not_sure_if_troll_or_just_very_ambiguous.jpg

>> No.3277072

Ian, I know you're in here.

>> No.3277107

Free will does exist.
Nothing is pre-determined.
Nothing -is- determinate for that matter [Belle's Inequality]

Our will is surely driven by many things; instinct, societal demands, and our needs for sustenance. But we -choose- which demand, if any, we cater to.

Or, we can create a demand upon ourselves.
The chemical and electrical reactions in our physical mind are the physical manifestation of free will, their purpose being to facilitate it.

Think of it like this too, and meditate on it:
You have a choice in whether or not to believe in free will.

>> No.3277122

If God is omnipotent, then He knows what will happen for forever. If God is a sham, then everything is a single reaction to the big bang. tl;dr no matter what your beliefs are, you have no free will

>> No.3277132

>>3277107
Your perspective is limited and half-baked. You can't acknowledge that decisions are a result of physical reactions and at the same time assert that those reactions aren't entirely caused by the way the universe works.

>> No.3277138

>>3276829
only person to get it right.

You all should really learn2science.

>> No.3277146

If free will exists, then I am ok with this.

If not, then it would mean that our mind could be transfered in a deterministic machine, and I am ok with this too.

>> No.3277147
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3277147

>>3277107
Sorry.

>> No.3277164

>>3277132
Yes, those physical functions of the mind are reliant on the physical/physics interactions involved at all scales of interaction.

But again, the mechanics of the system only facilitate these events.
We, as conscious beings, are the ones to initiate, terminate, and mediate these events.

Granted there are automated functions of the body, there are also functions of the body left to our deciding.

>> No.3277175

>>3277164
So where in the brain should we start looking to find reactions that don't obey to laws of physics ?

>> No.3277185

>>3277164
left to the body's deciding.
Think about it this way: All Decisions you make must either be made using your physical brain and knowledge in it, or you must accept dualism. All knowledge in your brain comes from the external world, which you have no influence over until you have made a decision based on your past knowledge from the exterior world. This means all of your knowledge comes from the outside world you don't have any influence over, or you must accept dualism.
Your brain's physical structure is determined by DNA, and early development. Your DNA comes from your parents and their ancestors, and is not something you choose. Your early development is affected by what your mother decides to do, and what her body decides to do- both of which come from the outside world and her DNA and development. Therefore, you must accept the brain's structure is not something you can choose, or you must accept dualism.

>> No.3277205

>>3277122
The possibility of God's existence does not break down into:sham or omnipotent. Those are only the two possibilities that lend themselves to a deterministic frame of thought.

>>3276813
Not everything is rational as you and I see it. Proof? Can something come from nothing? If yes, then free will can be that thing. If no, then how the fuck is the universe here. Dont give me that "it came from smthn else" bullshit. An infinitely regressing argument is just as bad as a paradox.

My point is that if you want to not believe in free will, do so as a choice, not because your reason dictates it; your reason tells you nothing of the sort. If science knew for sure the nature of the beginning of the universe, I feel confident we would know whether free will is/is not a thing.

That being said, there is a reason you do not believe in free will. What makes you think that you are deterministic is your ability to predict other things that you see. You then extrapolate that you could predict people, then you extrapolate that you could be predicted. It really comes down to a faith in one's predictive power.

>> No.3277216

>>3277205
>If no, then how the fuck is the universe here. Dont give me that "it came from smthn else" bullshit

But, the universe didn't come from nothing.

>> No.3277225
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3277225

>>3277205


TLDR WHAT HAS WE DONE!?!?!?!?

Also, heading to the bank.

>> No.3277259

>>3277185
No, all decisions are left to MY deciding, with information -provided- by the body.

When I get cut, my body tells me I am injured.
If I were a system which had no choice, then my only action would be to care to my injury, to cater to my inherited nature to survive.
But I can put salt in it instead, if I want.
Or, I can open the wound more.
Or I can just ignore it.

All of my knowledge does come from the external world, of which I have no control over.

But I get to decide what knowledge to absorb, and what to ignore.
I get to decide which information is more valuable than other information.
And I can change that information; I can add more to it, remove things from it, whether these elements are true, false, or irrelevant.

It also seems you are using dualism as an out to discount the emergence of consciousness from physical events. There is nothing supernatural about it, it is a common experience among all human beings.

To say that we are just an organic board of bits counting 1's and 0's in reaction to our environment is not correct. Otherwise, we'd act as efficiently and effectively as our programming allowed.

But we don't.
We create demands in our own minds.
We create realities which are different from those we perceive.
We can choose to change things, internally or externally, for cause, or for no cause at all.

Again, the fact that individuals can choose whether or not to believe in free will, demonstrates that free will exists.

>> No.3277263

>>3277216
You're assuming the Universe had a moment where it was created.

It could be that it has been, and has only -ever- been.

But as a creature with a definite beginning, and a definite end, it is hard to conceptualize this.

>> No.3277269

>>3277259
It's evident you didn't read my post. Like I said, the decision making mechanism in your brain is a combination of predetermined genetic information and environmental factors, such as the strength of the mother's immune system. Your decisions are left to your brain's deciding, and your brain decides what makes the most sense given its past experiences with the mechanism built from past experiences and genetic information.

>> No.3277274

>>3277259
also, evolution has no direction, and natural selection only works if humans <span class="math">aren't[/spoiler] capable of making the best decisions in every scenario.

>> No.3277275

>>3277269
I am my brain, though.

Just as I am every other part of myself.

Again, you are discounting consciousness as supernatural phenomena.

>> No.3277282

>>3277275
No, I'm discounting free thought as a supernatural phenomena. I'm discounting consciousness as the equivalent to the output on a computer, doing none of the calculation and recieving the results.
Please suggest some method by which "free" thought could arise in a system such as the human brain.

>> No.3277283

>>3277282
You choose whether or not to believe in free will.

>> No.3277287

>>3277282
you can think about whatever you want. For real, try it.

>> No.3277291

>>3277282
Feedback

>> No.3277292

>>3277283
I'm not saying choices and decisions aren't made, and I haven't at any point. You choose to believe in free will because in your mind you have evidence greater than what I have written, using the (might I add flawed) logical system described earlier.
>>3277287
no, you can't. You can think about things you have encountered in the past, or combinations of them. You cannot create anything that does not consist wholly of what you have taken in in the past.
>>3277291
Ambiguity.

>> No.3277311

>>3277107
>Nothing is pre-determined.
>Nothing -is- determinate for that matter [Belle's Inequality]
Determinism vs non-determinism is a non sequitur in regards to free will. Randomness isn't free will.

>> No.3277313

>>3277292
well my point was, you can choose to think about whatever you want right now, in this very moment. Not that you can think about something completly unknown.

>> No.3277321

>>3277313
Yes, and the choice you make is based upon things you have thought in the past, and experienced in the past.
Nobody has yet explained how free will could emerge from the brain, only given examples that don't really show anything.

>> No.3277328

Free will exists but its pre-determined, and has been since the universe started, the paths were planned by you before the universes creation, and the causality chains were programmed in from the very beginning to accomplish the designed goals.

>> No.3277330

Can anyone explain what free will means? Does it mean acting without regard to previously lived experience and acquired cultural capital?

>> No.3277332

You guys realize that the realization that free will might not be real might change your behavior

>> No.3277342

>>3277330
Pretty much. According to Princeton it's" the power of making free choices unconstrained by external agencies"

>> No.3277349

Don't know.
Don't care.

>> No.3277351

>>3276828
it wouldn't bother you to realize you're a slave, manipulated by external forces, because you were "doing fine with the illusion that it was there"? so learning the truth about a fundamental basis for reality changes nothing? you're not thinking this through clearly, nor is anyone else in this thread who answered negatively.

>> No.3277354
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3277354

>>3277349
weak minded fool.

>> No.3277363

>>3277122
judeo-christianity provides free will

>> No.3277366

>>3277351
>so learning the truth about a fundamental basis for reality changes nothing?
No, why would it?

>> No.3277370

no
no

>> No.3277373

people who say there is no free will.
prove it.

>> No.3277376

>>3277351
>you're not thinking this through clearly, nor is anyone else in this thread who answered negatively.
Hypocrisy on my /sci/?
I've given this a lot of thought. I'm comfortable with free will for several reasons
-The evidence in favour of it (the deterministic nature of the universe on a macroscopic level, the patterns of human behavior, the lack of evidence for dualism) is enough for me to conclude that free will doesn't exist. Because the idea that it does is a positive claim, I'd suggest that I should need no evidence to hold a negative position, and instead that I should be provided with evidence for a positive one.
-Because it seems much more perfect for the universe to not have free will. To accept its existence is to say that the laws of the universe have limited scope, and to deny it doesn't require you to do this
-Because, as the person you reply to says, I survived fine without the knowledge that free will existed.
I find believing in free will despite the evidence impossible, anyway. I would either have to deny it or invent some falsely to be able to continue to believe it does exist- something I am not going to do.
>>3277373
-Read my posts
-Claiming free will exists is at odds with the evidence. We don't need to prove anything.

>> No.3277381
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3277381

>>3277363
Most fairytale stories written by grade schoolers provide free will.

What is your point though? Or is this just a thread about comparing bullshit?

>> No.3277405

>>3277373

Define your terms, first.

This is a lot like the "consciousness" threads, half the problem is that there's no agreement among the posters on what exactly the term signifies.

>> No.3277407

>>3277376
've read them, i dont see no evidence against the possibility of free will. Could you perhaps point it out?

>> No.3277415
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3277415

>>3277381
i was addressing a statement about god and free will, i thought the relevance of judeo-christian concepts were self-evident. sorry i confused you.

>> No.3277421

There is "will" but it is not entirely free. As we receive stimuli the brain does it's stuff, and depending on our experience, preferences and conditioning we form intentions or choices. They don't come out of nowhere.

>> No.3277438
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3277438

>>3277415
KARN is never upset.
KARN HAPPY FOREVER!

>> No.3277442

>>3277407
assuming that double negative was unintentional, I logically explained why all decisions made are made with two elements, the judge and the information. The information comes from the outside; you don't influence it, and the judge comes from DNA and early development; you also don't influence it. I see no possibility of free will, if these conditions hold to be true.

>> No.3277474

You're at a restaurant and looking at the menu, the waiter asks you "what do you want to order?". There are multiple possibilities presented to you, and for a second you feel a gap in the causal chain between the causes that came before you, and the event you are about to cause (choosing what to order). Now determinists claim this experience of possibilities that we experience in this causal "gap" may very well be an illusion and not a gap at all, simply another part of the chain which is inevitable and already predetermined, and the only thing that could of happened is what did happen. A powerful argument.

But I put to you this: Could you reply to the waiter "I do not believe in free will and thus I will simply wait and see what happens."? If free will happens to be an illusion as determinist purport, then it is a required illusion. The refusal to exercise your free will is only intelligible as an exercise of your free will.

>> No.3277480
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3277480

godammit /sci/ why are you so under informed.

this thread should've been like 3 posts long at the mosts. fucking faggots

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6S9OidmNZM

>> No.3277488

>>3277474
Again, you're assuming free will= the ability to make choices. If you replied to the waiter that, it would be because your mind had *already* decided that to be the best thing to do based on past experience and using its logical framework.

>> No.3277501

>>3277488
You didn't understand my argument.

I used that reply just to show you to absurdity of trying to actualise the determinist position. I'm not saying that answer is senseless/baseless I'm just saying it's an absurd position to purport in reality.

>> No.3277518

>>3277501
Nope.
The multiple possibilities are presented to you. Your subconscious processes these outside of your conscious- I would say this is because the conscious is the output of the subconscious, where the subconscious prints messages- weighing up information from the body, such as how hungry you are, with information from the past, such as whether you like chicken over turkey, with information from the environment such as what your friends ordered. Once a decision has been made the answer (or answers) are sent to the conscious while spoken.

>> No.3277580

Bumping for an explanation

>> No.3277603

>>3277518
I still don't think you're understanding my position. I'm not debating the actual mechanics of the determinist point, I'll leave that to the neuroscientists.

My position is as such: The assumption of free will pressupposes any action at all.

My question to you I guess would be something along the lines of: What difference would it make if the determinists were correct?

>> No.3277617

>>3277603
>The assumption of free will pressupposes any action at all.
Why?
>what difference
Well, understanding that crime comes not from free choice but from circumstance would speed up remedies for it, and understanding humans to obey the laws of physics as we know them would bring our views of ourselves to be more scientifically valid. I certainly see no downside to this.

>> No.3277644

*skips entire thread*


The question of free will asks if our will can be free if what makes it up is deterministic. If it is deterministic, than free will is false, but only to the extent that we believe it is. The person I am is still a system, and my personality is that system, wherein free will is the expression of the "desires" of that system.

Or put another way, if you're depressed about free will being deterministic, you might as well discard your feeling of depression. After all, depression is deterministic, and you just discarded free will for that same reason.

An entire religion has been maintained by this principle. I'm amazed that people can say "religion is stupid" and spend hours thinking about such a basic concept.

>> No.3277681

>>3277617
Refer to the waiter case for why free will is supposed in action. Note you have to make accept that in your consciousness there is a causal "gap" (or atleast a percieved one, as the determinist would state) in which you formulate a choice. The perception of this gap, real or not, makes you different from a machine. Accept the determinist position as you may but you still have to exercise your will in some direction, and remember not choosing is still an exercise.

As for your point about crime, how can there be a juridicial system at all, if people are accountable for their acts? Morality is founded on the notion of rational free agents.

>> No.3277697

>>3277681
>The perception of this gap, real or not, makes you different from a machine.
By that logic, my PC excercises its will in some direction when it boots up, my screen goes off, and tapping keys does nothing. Surely you recognise this isn't the case (or alternatively, that it is the case for a purely deterministic intelligence)?

>> No.3277714

>>3277697
Your PC is not a conscious entity, therefore it never had a (illusionary or not) a multiplicity of choices and the exercise of a will towards a particular one.

A better counter-argument would be to ask if animals have free will.

>> No.3277760

>>3277714
I consider consciousness to be an illusion, and that computers are no less conscious than us. The computer could makes choices, but it's knowledge (storage and memory) and logical framework (motherboard/CPU) mean that the choice is already made.

I agree, yours would be more applicable. do they?

>> No.3277781

The "what about a criminal who didn't choose his actions" argument is flawed because even in a world with no free will we still have to act in such a way to protect the populace from freedom.

There are umpteen different theories on the morality of criminal charges, if one doesn't work, we can pick another.

Tl;DR: The world would look the same either way.

>> No.3277787

>>3277781

*From absolute freedom and it's consequences (ie. crime)

>> No.3277803

>>3277760
A strange view of consciousness it seems. If consciousness is not a thing in-and-of itself and is merely a conglomeration of material then would you claim that your state of consciousness (illusionary as you claim) changes everytime you lose a neuron? I don't think that's right.

As for the animal question, that's a hard one to answer as we cannot experience how it is to "be" an animal. Judging from what I have observed (anecdotal I know), they experience free will but their scope of choices that are available to them is smaller. This is linked to the fact that consciousness works as a two part process. It is a binary state initially, in that you are either conscious or not. Man vs Machine. But once you are conscious is it also a scale. Man vs Dog, or Awake Man vs Sleeping Man.

>> No.3277816

>>3277803
Possibly, I don't consider the conscious to be the entire brain.

Would you mind explaining where you think free will fits into an ultimately determinist system?

>> No.3277825

every thing and non-thing exists and doesn't exist at varying degrees all at the same time. this includes the concept and the application of free will.

didn't take long to figure that one out.

>> No.3277851
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3277851

>>3277825

Nope.

One of the basic axioms of logic is that a thing cannot both exist and not exist at the same time.

You literally cannot make that argument without destroying the concept of a logical argument. It's like arguing words do not exist.

>> No.3277912

>>3276829

No it is disproved beyond any reasonable doubt. Free will is not even possible to define. What is it? The ability to make a choice based on no prior experiences to influence you? Some kind of inherent command laid out by a supernatural force? Even if the cause is supernatural, that would mean it is not free will.

>> No.3277923

>>3277851

All Phenomena, be

>> No.3278019

>>3277851

All Phenomena, being the result of objectivisation, are necessarily conditioned and subjected to the chain of causation.
Causation, being subjected to what we conceive as Time and Space, implies Space-Time, and vice versa, so that causation and volition may be regarded as one.
Therefore every possible kin o temporal activity must be conditioned and subjected to the chain of causation.

>> No.3278037

>>3278019

Per Contra whatever is intemporal, or whatever intemporality is, cannot be bound by the chain of causation--since it cannot be subjected to Space-Time.
But whatever we are, whatever sentient-beings may be, is intemporal, and that which appears in Space-Time is phenomenal only.

>> No.3278058

>>3278037

Volition, therefore, in its phenomenal aspect is a manifestation of an I-concept, and it must be an element in the chain of causation whereas "volition" in its noumenal aspect is not in fact such at all, is never manifest as such, and functions as an unidentifiable urge, as spontaneity, independent of deliberation, conceptualisation, and all phenomenal activity.

>> No.3278142

>>3278058

This noumenal volition is neither volition nor non-volition: it is volition that is non-volition, as wei is the action that is wu wei, for all interference on the part of an I-concept is excluded, and action (wei) is the expression of volition.

Ultimately it is what intemporally we are, for it is devoid of objectivity. It is what all sentient beings are, all Nature that comes into manfestation and returns to non-manifestation, that is born or sprouts, grows, matures, reproduces and dies.

Wei Wu Wei aka James Stannus Gray
14 September 1895 – 5 January 1986

>>3277923

this was not a post by me.

>> No.3278164

I dont believe in free will. Anyone who knows me would expect me to say that.

>> No.3278252

Quantum physics, therefor yes.

>> No.3278260

Quantum physics, therefor no.

>> No.3278285

Quantum physics, therefore maybe.

>> No.3278294

How can there be free will if time always moves forward?

>> No.3278297

maybe. could, i guess.

>> No.3278368

Yes, free will exists. If it didn't, that would be cause for depression. Thankfully, that is not the case.