Can we be intellectually honest and believe in the freedom of man?

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tafan2 said:
It’s not just how we feel. It is what we experience, each and every day of our lives. To claim it is not true takes some serious mental gymnastics.
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Indeed it does.

Now tell me that you are sitting perfectly still. Which of course you are not. But it would take some serious mental gymnastics to imagine yourself spinning at 40,000 kph on the surface of a globe.

Just because you can’t imagine something doesn’t mean it’s not true.
 
Aquinas11 said:
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Freddy:
But we naturally feel that we should be autonomous individuals so that’s an entirely natural conclusion. But just because that’s how we feel is a very poor basis for claiming it being true.
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But what is the null hypothesis? Can you explain the circumstance by which you’d agree we would be autonomous? And how our current situation doesn’t mean that criteria?
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Our current position is that we know with certainty that our subconscious makes decisions ‘on our behalf’. The question is not: Are we autonomous? The question is: To what extent, if any, are we autonomous?
 
Your analogy utterly fails. I have absolutely no problem imaging that we are on a planet that is spinning. None. There is plenty of convincing evidence and it fits our everyday experience.

There is no evidence that I did not choose to write this post via my free will.
 
Freddy said:
Our current position is that we know with certainty that our subconscious makes decisions ‘on our behalf’.
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What type of decisions? That our heart will beat, or that we we will take a breadth? Reaction to touching a hot fire? Sure, much beyond that is speculation. We do not know it at all. Show me the evidence.
 
tafan2 said:
Your analogy utterly fails. I have absolutely no problem imaging that we are on a planet that is spinning. None. There is plenty of convincing evidence and it fits our everyday experience.
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OK, I put that a little clumsily. Let me clarify it.

You have zero sensation of movement. You have zero sensation of the rate at which the world is spinning. You are physically and mentally incapable of sensing any inkling of velocity.

Another example would be if you were space walking. You would swear you were floating. But you’re not. You’re falling. But your mind is not capable of registering that fact.

Just because something seems obvious doesn’t mean it’s true. It’s not a valid argument.
 
tafan2 said:
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Freddy:
Our current position is that we know with certainty that our subconscious makes decisions ‘on our behalf’.
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What type of decisions? That our heart will beat, or that we we will take a breadth? Reaction to touching a hot fire? Sure, much beyond that is speculation. We do not know it at all. Show me the evidence.
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Simple example? You’re driving to work thinking about an important meeting. If nothing untoward happens on the journey you can often do it with no conscious thought. The meeting takes up your conscious thinking. The driving is being done by your subconscious.

Which deals with a lot more than people realise. So the question is not ‘Does it control us?’ The question is: ‘To what extent?’
 
Most evidence shows that we have free will. There is evidence that in large numbers people can behave in a predictable way, but ultimately we are free willed individuals
 
tafan2 said:
Why must we deny our basic human experience? simply because it does not fit into a deterministic world viewpoint?
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Because denying we have free will allows people to ignore the conscience which calls on them to repent of their evil choices. It’s easy, and it makes people living apart from God feel better. If I’m not responsible for my choices then I have nothing to feel guilty about.
 
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ProdglArchitect said:
Because denying we have free will allows people to ignore the conscience which calls on them to repent of their evil choices. It’s easy, and it makes people living apart from God feel better. If I’m not responsible for my choices then I have nothing to feel guilty about.
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So you presume to know what other people are thinking. It couldn’t just be that there’s no objective evidence of free will.
 
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goout said:
That’s deep man. Real deep.
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It is actually. There’s no more reason to assume that people have the ability to reason, than there is to assume that they have free will. They certainly don’t appear to have either.
 
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