Free Will or an illusion and how this makes us feel.
Currently there hasn't been a great deal of discussion about free will (or lack of free will) and what this means for us as thinking, feeling entities. With this discussion i want to be able to help explore as broad a variety of outlooks on this and possibly explore some of the problems we face when we scratch under the surface of this thought problem.
Comments (83)
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Quoting AwazawA
Quoting AwazawA
But don't you still feel that, when you deliberately do something, it is you acting on your intentions? Don't you still feel in control and responsible for your actions? Don't you still hold others responsible for theirs?
It is true that, when we learn about all the external factors that influenced or even forced someone's decision, we are apt to feel that they were less in control, that the decision was not fully theirs, and that they are therefore less responsible for it. Likewise, when we contemplate the environment and incidents that formed someone's character, we may blame them less for some offense that they committed, or, in opposite circumstances, tend to take for granted their good deeds. But by and large, that sense of people, ourselves included, being the source of their actions and making choices when there are choices to be made remains strong, no matter what.
Also they aren't making a "choice" if the actions is determined. If it's determined then they couldn't have done otherwise and choice implies their was more than one option.
Their choice was either caused by a prior event or it was not. If the former, it was determined and not free. If the latter, it was spontaneous and not free. How can we say that an occurrence that just happens for no reason was freely made?
Yes it does.
We act in accordance with our beliefs, feelings, dispositions, desires, whims, etc. An act earns public praise or condemnation based on societal values, values that most of us internalize so that they become beliefs (about what is right/wrong) and dispose us to act accordingly.
Quoting GodlessGirl
Specific choices are not predetermined as choices. Rather, a choice is determined by the factors I mentioned (beliefs, feelings, dispositions...). No, you couldn't have chosen different given the set of beliefs, feelings, dispositions you hold. However, you WOULD have chosen differently had those factors differed. If you come to believe in moral nihilism, because "free will" isn't as free as you'd like, this itself will influence your behavior.
In all honesty I feel like I am going through the motions of a well rehearsed play that I dont know the script to, a puppet on strings as it is. With that I feel as though I am unable to go against what could be my fate if thats the correct word, I may believe I can change my fate but in fact even that thought process and where it takes me will end at the same predetermined point. In the same way i'm struggling to find wrongdoers accountable as I once did, of course i still get that flash of anger when there are murderers and rapists etc. but instead now I feel pity more than anything, they are trapped to play out the role of villain and there was no escaping their fate even if they had wished they hadn't been dealt an unfortunate hand. For me it is incredibly difficult to put the rose tinted glasses back on without noticing the frames on said glasses, I laugh at a joke and feel bitter that I had no choice but to find it funny, I find myself angry at a wrongdoer and then a moment later find myself feeling pity for them because they cannot help it same way the person cannot help make the joke I laughed at. At the same with emotions like love, what would be the point in loving another human being if it came in the form of chains, you cannot prevent yourself from seeing them as beautiful or witty, suddenly you feel like some force is making you smile and making you love and the worst thing about it is that it's simply the way things are, it is part of being a self aware entity that comes to realise that free will doesn't or may not exist (you never know, could still be proven wrong). that is why i mentioned daniel dennets version of free will where if we pretend it does exist that we will see actions as though they are the product of a persons will and retain the ability to blame people and hold them accountable for said actions. Unfortunately for I cannot accept this version of a free will because it feels like i'd be burying my head in the sand, I feel uneasy of course about feeling compassion towards those who might harm myself or anyone else but I suppose that is part of the package i'm afraid.
Like I could choose to ignore it. So what would it really amount to?
And it is part of the big questions in life we ask ourselves, is there any purpose in life? technically you could say there is if such a thing as fate exists, as many of the effects from our existence wouldn't be possible later down the line both good and bad (though good and bad are morally subjective as a concept and a whole other kettle of fish)
I was partially joking, partially making a serious point.
Whether strong determinism is true or not, things are just as they are now. As things are now, I can just choose to ignore the idea that strong determinism is true. Part of the joke there is that I'm saying I can choose something, even though if strong determinism is true, then I couldn't really choose anything. But it seems like I can. It sure seems like I can just choose to ignore the idea. So even if strong determinism is true, I can do what seems exactly like choosing to ignore it. So it doesn't really amount to much if it's true. At least not phenomenally.
On my view, purposes are subjective. They're things we construct for ourselves.
when I say purpose i mean it in the sense that if we are acting out this play of life all actions that will be performed to make the whole show as it was always going to be could be seen as fate and following fate regardless of wether we try and kick our fates away (which ironically would be exactly as fate would dictate we behave in the same annoying way a friend might always claim to know what you are thinking but this time it is actually inevitable) it could be considered that we are fulfilling a certain purpose or a role in the full picture no matter how minute that role may be in the grand scale of things. Of course this could be my subjective outlook on it in the broadest sense possible, what is the point of me being in existence for example? there doesn't need to be a purpose or reason for us to exist at all if i'm being blunt, however it could be said that just existing itself and the motions we go through throughout our lives is all in accordance with fate and therefore fulfilling part of the greater picture. If you think about it, you were always going to write your response same as myself in kind and this itself is all part of a greater fate that encompasses everything (again like an annoying friend that claims to know what you are about to do/say/think but in all likelihood can and does on a constant basis)
That's what it would mean for strong determinism to be true.
What I'm pointing out is that it's irrelevant, because phenomenally, it seems like I can make the choice to ignore the idea. Whether I really can is irrelevant. It seems like I can, and that's what I care about.
Quoting AwazawA
Say what? You've got 15-20 prepositional phrases in one run-on sentence. Could you rewrite that?
sorry for the vagueness (i'm not the best at putting my ideas across so try use examples where I can.
I'm trying to say that if hard determinism as you phrase it is true that one of the purpose or "the meaning of life, the universe and everything" is simply that we follow through with our predetermined fates as is the only way things could be. Existence in of itself is the purpose/meaning regardless of how much of a letdown that might be compared to the original answer of 42.
You asked how I'd feel if strong determinism were true. I told you how I'd feel. I'd feel no differently, because I could just choose to ignore it.
Quoting AwazawA
I'm not seeing what you think that would follow from. Why would any fact about the way the world is amount to a purpose?
I suppose it doesn't need a purpose,I was trying to say that if humans can be seen as cogs in a machine and that each individual cog moved things forward regardless of how they behaved that simply existing is the purpose of the cog as it still moves things along.
Please contemplate how your decision making processes if you actually had free will. If the decision were important, you would try to think of all the consequences, some would be good some would be bad. You might weigh these against one another. You might give greater weight to long term consequences, or perhaps you'd be more inclined to receive a sure short term benefit instead of a possible long term detriment that may or may not occur. All of the factors you would consider would come from you, your mind - your knowledge of the world, your hopes, your dreams, your desires as well as your worries and fears.
Now suppose determinism is true, and thus your will is not truly free. What would actually be different? The decision still comes from within, it is still produced by deliberation with all the same factors. Your knowledge of the world would not be any differerent; you'd have the same hopes, dreams, desires, worries, and fears. Would you choose differently? Why? All the factors that lead to a choice are there. If truly free will leads to the same decision, then what is the difference? If truly free will were to lead to a DIFFERENT decision - what would be the reason for that decision - since the factors that lead to the decision are identical?
Don't you make any decisions that seem random, where you have two or more options you like equally, so you do the mental equivalent of "rolling dice" (where we're assuming that dice-rolling gives us random results)?
I was just interested in whether from a phenomenal perspective Relativist doesn't make some choices that seem random rather than always thinking about consequences, weighing them against each other, etc.
It would seem very weird to me to not make a lot of seemingly random decisions, to go through some rational process for every single decision made (again, simply from a phenomenal perspective).
All of that is true REGARDLESS of whether or not we have libertarian free will. What factors lead to a decision BESIDES these things, if libertarian free will is true?
Even if determinism is true you could have chosen differently - if you knew something more, felt more strongly about something, were more (or less) willing to take risks... There are factors in any decision, even if the decision is based purely on whim.
Imagine two identical, possible worlds -with identical versions of you in both worlds. In both worlds, you reach a decision point. In both worlds, you have identical genetics, identical experiences up to the decision point, etc. Wouldn't both versions of you make the same decision, even if free will is true? If not, why not? I can think of no reason to think the decision would be different unless there is some randomness to the decision - and adding randomness hardly seems like something to hope is present.
Rolling dice seems random, but we know the outcome is actually determined by the physical factors involved in the roll. Do you really think that there's some sort of truly random process in our brains (or in our spiritual minds, if you are a dualist)? It may SEEM that way, but there's no way to know if that's the case. But if we do produce randomness, why is that such a wonderful thing to have as part of our decision making?
The whole reason that I wrote "seem random" and "where we're assuming that dice-rolling gives us random results" is so that we wouldn't go off on a tangent about whether anything is really or ontologically random. Because I wasn't interested in that. I was interested in whether you don't make any choices that seem random, rather than rationally deliberating every single choice you make. But you didn't answer that.
Cool. I was just wondering. I know sometimes when Dennett talks about this stuff he also sounds as if he never makes "random" decisions, but that could just be because he's not really interested in discussing those . . . but I think it's misleading to talk about decisions without mentioning them, as if we always go into a rational analysis mode, making lists of pros and cons, etc.
As something empirical, it's not provable either way. Empirical matters have to be decided on factors other than proof.
Any particular reason you suggest that?
The success of science. Empirical evidence shows the world to behave in regular, predictable ways, which supports the hypothesis that there are inviolable laws of nature. Scientific efforts to uncover those laws of nature (or at least approximations of those actual laws) have been extremely successful.
But the standard view in the sciences hasn't been determinism for about 140 years or so.
If you're referring to Quantum Mechanics, it's still (at least) probabilistic determinism - when there is quantum uncertainty.
- I like that I am responsible for my actions whether there is free will or not.
- I like that nobody ultimately has control. I would like to have control, but I'm happy i have an equal amount to how much everyone else has.
- I like being me. Reap the apparent rewards I've earned. Lack of free will puts a little dumper on that.
- as a function of a deterministic universe, I have this gladness feeling that washes all over me, that everything is all right. Transfering control, and just enjoying the ride. Same if I were religious, or believed in a non-deterministic universe.
- lack of free will, a consideration thereof, never stopped me for enjoying a victory in arguing, or in working out a problem, or winning in chess, etc.
- I enjoy having the views I have, and I stick behind them with conviction. This I enjoy as if it were my own doing. What a rube.
- Generally, I ignore the fact that there is no free will, and let it roll out as it may. I take the rewards I did not earn, I suffer the punishment I did not deserve. But it all congeals, to me it feels right, in an apparent illusion that I seem to be living.
Old age has its merits, one being a strange sense of discipline one follows.
The choices you make are still YOUR choices, not someone else's.
You could have made a different choice, for example:
You are accountable for those choices - you made it based on your own beliefs, desires, impulses, etc, and you could have and would have made a better choice if you had been less selfish (accountability encourages everyone to understand there are consequences to ones actions and to weigh this knowledge into their choices).
Quoting god must be atheist
I'm old too. Some of us old folks feel that we make better decisions than we did when we were young, and this is because we know more (and are somewhat less driven by hormones). This too is consistent with a compatibilist account of free will.
Therefore my will would have been predicated by a different set of causes. Determinism stands.
Quite the contrary. Your (and mine and other old folks') decisions are better because we are predicated differently, and you conveniently for me, described the predictors.
Compatibilism is a mere mirage, a new-age addage to the incompatibility to the truth vs the wishfulness of people.
Compatibilism is the notion that our choices are indeed freely willed, because they are OUR choices: all the factors that influence the choice are internal to ourselves: beliefs, feelings, impulses, etc.
Also, not all things that influence your choices are internal. Not that that matters, but still.
Take any example. Describe it to me, and I respond how the choice eventually made was not possible to be different than what it eventually was.
At the ultimate, there is only one possible outcome for any choice, because the timeline of reality does not allow two different AND concurrent outcomes.
It is hard to conceive that of two or more possible choices to choose from, when you have to choose only one, you'd choose one which is lesser caused than the more caused.
You feel thirsty, so you drink. But the thirst was a function of your metabolism and lack of imbibing for a span of time.
You feel like loving a partner. But it's not a random, uncaused feeling; it is predicated by your hormone levels (not yours, personally, but anyone's; I'm using the general you) which are predicated by your health, your momentary state predicated by the length of time since the last release of sexual tension, and how your body and metabolic system replaced the necessary enzymes and such.
You feel like arguing with me. You choose compatibilism as your belief. But that had been predicated by your values and your wishes and desires. And by the lack of some other considerations. Your values tell you that you MUST be accountable for your actions. Your wishes tell you that you must FEEL to be in control. You lack the INSIGHT (sorry, not trying to insinuate lack of intelligence or any other similar insults) prevents you from seeing that will is just another deterministic system among all the other systems in the universe.
Compatibilism is an invention by some peace-maker-to-be, who decided to invent this notion, in order to appease people who would be otherwise on the verge of total ego hull breach if they had to finally concede under tremendous pressure of evidence that there is no free will.
The choice has been determined, and it was predictable - but only in principle. In principle, the shape of the grand canyon was predictable at the big bang, the shaping process still required a long series of prior steps to get there.
The process of making a choice is entirely yours, and the factors that led you to make that choice were entirely within you. Each of those factors was caused - something caused you to hold a belief, or to have a desire or predilection, but the choice itself was a product of you - just like the Grand Canyon was a product of the Colorado river.
This is good enough for me. The predictive factors are so large in numbers, and so diverse, and some are partially, some are totally hidden from humans, and human capacity for combination is small... so all this adds up to my conceding that prediction by humans is not possible.
But it does not deny the principle; and though mere humans can't predict much,the choices we make is still not free. By principle, by logic, by deterministic approach.
Whether humans can do it or not, is not the issue for me. The issue is that will is limited to one choice each time,and the choice will makes is predicated. For me that's where the buck stops.
This is precisely how I see it, too. And because everything in me was caused, it was caused to be one way only, and these one ways make rise to a will that is predicated.
Not at all. We believe we have free will, because it seems like we do. How can we explain that, if determinism is true? It turns out that freely-willed choices are perfectly consistent with determinism: we make choices because of a variety of factors within ourselves, factors that were caused by things outside ourselves (what we're taught, genetics,desires...). Rather, it seems to me that Libertarian Free will is the invention - it's free will with the added assumption that determinism is false. What's so great about libertarian free will? How does this make our choices any better than making a choice that is a product of our own beliefs?
how can you call this freely willed, when it's completely determined previously?
Freedom is the lack of confinement. Yet our choices by our will are confined to those factors that you and I both describe and you and I both believe are causing our decisions.
Where is the freedom there, Relativist? The feeling? That's precisely why I called it what I called it: a mirage. It took mankind to realize the proper context of will, DESPITE the illusion we've had about it.
Yes, but the cause lacked intentionality. The shape of the grand canyon was not chosen, rather - it was a consequence of the conditions being what they were. Same with our choices - the choices (as choices) were not determined at the big bang; rather, the factors that led to those choices were inevitable.
Because the big bang did not decide that I would eat corn flakes for breakfast. I made the choice, based on my own desires at the time. If I do what I want, why wouldn't I consider that a freely willed choice?
What I freely choose was inevitable because there's a long causal chain that leads to it, but don't forget that the causal chain includes the processes internal to our brains that comprise our thought processes.
Quoting Relativist
I am sorry, Relativist, but your own simile or parallel is lame. On one hand you say the Grand Canyon has been predictable by the events in the Big Bang; you equated the development of the Will to the development of the Grand Canyon; then you say that the will was not predictable at the time of the Big Bang.
So you self-contradict yourself.
My position is that both the Will and the Grand Canyon were predictable at the time of the Big Bang.
The Grand Canyon's shape and our choices have this in common: they are inevitable. What is unique about ourselves is that we are complex decision-making machines, while the Colorado River is not. The output of a computer program is inevitable, but the computer is still needed to perform the computing that produces that output. Our choices are inevitable, but the workings of our brains are still necessary to reach that inevitable outcome.
Would you deny any one of the intervening steps of causation as a true step of cause and effect between the Big Bang and your eating Corn Flakes for breakfast? In other words, do you maintain that some of the events in the chain of events between the Big Bang and your eating breakfast was NOT caused?
If your breakfast choice was not predictable by the time of the Big Bang, then there had to be an event that was not caused. Because as long as all causes had effects, and all events had causes, then the choice of your eating breakfast had a direct line of cause-effect chain to the big bang.
Because what you want is a product of causes. Not a product of an unrestricted fancy.
Of course not.
It was predictable, but that doesn't change the fact that the choice was a product of my internal processing - and I ate what I wanted. If you eat what you want, why would you not consider that your own free choice? Sure, your wants were caused, but they're still YOUR wants.
Things of different complexity still obey determinism. It makes no difference how complex one mechanism is and how simple another one is. They both obey the cause-effect chain to be not broken by some supernatural intervention.
Agreed.
here you have to be extremely careful, with the processing of the ideas, Relativist. The choice is yours, but it's not free... it is restricted, and predictable. If it were not restricted, it would not be predictable. Restriction works two ways: it excludes other choices, and makes one choice prevail.
On the other hand you say it's your choice. Your choice, and not of other's. Well, nobody and nothing influences your choice that you make, other than your inner desires and functions. But they are only free from OUTSIDE forces. Your inner world is completely dependent on causal chains, which have outside forces in their formation.
So... there are outside causes that caused your inner choices and wants and desires; and there are outside forces that do not affect your choices.
The trick is to see tha the outside forces have predicated your inner choices; therefore they occurred in the past. Your outside forces in the present have some restricting force (not on your will but on your choice).
You MUST make this distinction between present and past outside forces that on one hand do not restrict your will, and on the other hand, do restrict your will, respectively.
And the main issue that I am trying to drive in, is that your will is CAUSED by your inner world, but it is CAUSED and these causes are themselves caused in turn. Since a cause can have only one effect, or a conglomeration of causes can only have one effect, it follows that the effect is restricted.That is my point. The effect is not free. And the causes that cause that effect are not free, either, they are restricted, by the causes that caused them in turn.
I agree with this, but it ignores moral accountability.
Engaging in bad acts (murder, stealing...) is (and should be) discouraged by holding people accountable for their actions. They are responsible because they COULD have refrained from committing the act - and they WOULD have done so if they better understood the consequences (both the punishment, and the internal feelings of shame and guilt). I want to encourage good behavior, and if my desires are realized - then there will be more good behavior. It will have been inevitable, but my contribution (and that of others who are like minded) will have been important contributors to making this happen.
This is a totally different ball game. You can influence others' behaviour by moral upbringing or by enforcing the law.
Let's focus on the law, and I ask you to do this, because there is no clear definition of morality, there is no absolutes in morality, therefore it is easier to deal with the law, since it is codified, and thus, defined in no ambiguous ways. (Haha. As if. But let's work with law "as if".)
So you insist that people be accountable for their actions. This I support, and indeed, they are. Despite not having a free will.
How can we nail them to their misdeeds if they don't have a free will?
Presumably people are aware of the law. Even if in a rudimentary way. We all know that murder, theft, rape, brutality, abuse, and fraud are all illegal.
They consider the law. If they break the law then simply their choice was to break the law, because they had been predicated to break the law. They had the sum total of the causes that influenced their will to break the law.
If they get caught and convicted and sentenced, then it sends a message to many, many other people: do not break the law because you get into big trouble.
So this will be just one more influencing factor in their behaviour choices. They are going to toy with killing auntie or uncle in the hope of a big inheritance. and therefore they are going to want to kill them, but they will not to kill them, because they are aware of the consequences or with the possible consequences. This will affect their will, and cause their accountability to come into existence.
That's my point: they DO have free will - no one is making them do the wrong thing. Sure, that they would choose to do wrong is a product of outside forces, but encouraging good behavior is also an outside force - so we should engage in it.
This was a rhetorical question which I proceeded to answer. Please read my entire post that contained that. The post answers the rhetorical question, including the causation of encouraging good behaviour and creating accountability. With using the notion of no free will included in the argument.
I would like you to understand that free will is actually consistent with determinism - you too hastily dismissed that. It's as free as it needs to be to hold people accountable (regardless of whether we're talking morality or the law).
I'll add a comment on this:
Quoting god must be atheist
I agree - and therefore we should embrace this process EVEN THOUGH whatever occurs was inevitable. What we do, as a society (in terms of the laws it passes, the enforcement, etc) - are integral to what will occur. Despite the fact that the future is inevitable, we are ignorant of the future and we are part of the process that determines what that future will be.
So my main two points are:
1) the will is sufficiently free to hold people accountable;
2) we are not powerless - we make the future. It's irrelevant that the future that we make is inevitable because what we do (or don't do) will still have contributed to that future.
Yikes! It's only an hour earlier here. I guess we both got carried away. Fun conversation.
The (ontological) probabilities of determinism are 0 and 1.
We choose to walk instead of taking the bus because a condition was created from previous events that made us prefer walking instead of the bus.
And the feeling that decisions give us is simply another condition in the chain, our emotions have been pushed into a particular state, so the feeling works the same way as the decision making.
What if you choose daily and it works out to about 50-50 with no discernible pattern?
If you flick a coin 100 times, the reason why it landed heads so many times and tails so many, is because of the conditions: where it was held in the hand, the energy in the flick, the density of the air, the dirt that kept adding to the coin surface etc. And a lot of those conditions were created because of the conditions of the persons body, their mind, the changing environment, and on it goes.
I think accountability rests on a completely different mechanism. It is not on freedom of will that it rests on; but it rests on the persona who is caused by his internal and external motivating factors to commit an accountable act.
If you name it something else but free, I will buy it. But freedom does not exist in a deterministic world. Freedom is a lack of restrcitions, and as such, everything that happens is restricted to the causes that have been determined already.
It is not consistent to imagine a world where nothing is free (nothign is unrestricted) except the Will.
Sure, so assuming something other than preferences or conscious states in general as the reason then?
You bet. I enjoyed it every bit, too.
We probably agree with this: If a person is forced into performing a crime he is not responsible or accountable. If he was not forced into performing that act, he is responsible and accountable.
Where we differ is that I would label the latter case an act of free will, and you would not. I'm curious: what would free will look like if it existed? Let's say you make decision that is the product of your genetic and environmental dispositions, your beliefs, your impulses, the external conditions (temperature, humidity,...) how you felt, etc. The choice is consistent with determinism because all those factors have been caused. Now describe what must hypothetically be added or replaced to turn this decision into an act of free will -by your definition of free will.
.
Example:
I have no reason to eat spaghetti with red lime sprinkled with arsenic. I am not insane, or an idiot. I like life, and I like good, tasty food, they types most people would like. I would eat spaghetti with red lime sprinkled with arsenic, because my will would be free from restrictions.
RE: your example. I don't agree with your analysis. But this has been going on for too long. i am tired of this subject, and I wish to abandon it.
In closing, if free will is predetermined, why do some people call it free will? Like those people who call themselves free-thinkers. Whoever thought that name up?
These are not questions I need an answer to. Please, let's leave this topic, which we already pounded to death. If we still have differences, so be it, I'm too pooped out to continue.
OK, but then I'll also make a closing statement.
It is logically impossible to make a decision that is an act of "unrestricted will". Every decision is a result of a set of factors (memories, beliefs, genetic dispositions, environmentally conditioned dispositions, learnings, desires, impulses, etc) that are in place at the time of the decision. Given those factors, there is zero chance an alternative decision could have been made in those exact circumstances. This isn't simply because determinism is true, it's because these factors are all inclusive - there are no other factors that could result in a different decision.
To illustrate, let's assume libertarian free will exists and John has a decision to make at time t1. At t1, Johan has a specific set of memories, beliefs, etc, and he makes decision X. If it is indeed possible to for John to make a decision other than X, why is he making it? The stated set of factors includes everything within John that can influence the decision, so if he could actually make a different decision, it would not be because of any of those fixed, internal factors. In that case, what can an "unrestricted" decision entail? Is it a freedom to ignore one's prior beliefs (etc)? No, because that entails an internal urge to ignore those beliefs (etc) - still internal. At t1, that urge is either present or it isn't - and whichever it is, it's a fixed fact. So I contend that alternative decisions are never possible (irrespective of determinism). Therefore the concept of an unrestricted freely willed decision is incoherent, a logical impossibility.
We can still apply the term "free will" to decisions with the understanding that "free will" entails accountability, and the fact that an alternative decision could have been made - if the person had only had some additional belief. If this doesn't seem free enough, bear in mind that it's as free as is logically possible to be.