Free Will, can it logically exist?

  • Thread starter Thread starter wasmit
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
cranster said:
This makes me wonder what external stimuli would cause a man to choose to be scourged, crowned with thorns, and crucified?
Click to expand...
All people are naturally drawn to,
Perfect Unity = Eternal Life = Perfect Goodness = Perfect Happiness = God
And avoid,
Disunity, Death, Evil, Unhappiness, and Sin

Perfect Unity unites,
side by side…

Perfect Unity and Disunity,
Eternal Life and Death,
Perfect Goodness and Evil,
Perfect Happiness and Unhappiness,
God and Sin.

(Deuteronomy 30:15-20)

And this is physically seen,
As Jesus the Christ on the Cross.

Since,
Jesus the Christ is,
The Principle of Perfect Unity of Perfect Happiness and Humanity (not side by side)
Then,
By choosing to unite to Jesus the Christ,
(whom we are naturally drawn to by Perfect Unity)
Jesus the Christ unites all of our humanity to Perfect Happiness,
Both soul (the will that chooses and intellect that thinks)
And body.

And conquers Sin, Death, Evil, Disunity, Unhappiness, etc.
 
Psychotheosophy said:
All people are naturally drawn to,
Perfect Unity = Eternal Life = Perfect Goodness = Perfect Happiness = God
And avoid,
Disunity, Death, Evil, Unhappiness, and Sin

Perfect Unity unites,
side by side…

Perfect Unity and Disunity,
Eternal Life and Death,
Perfect Goodness and Evil,
Perfect Happiness and Unhappiness,
God and Sin.

(Deuteronomy 30:15-20)

And this is physically seen,
As Jesus the Christ on the Cross.

Since,
Jesus the Christ is,
The Principle of Perfect Unity of Perfect Happiness and Humanity (not side by side)
Then,
By choosing to unite to Jesus the Christ,
(whom we are naturally drawn to by Perfect Unity)
Jesus the Christ unites all of our humanity to Perfect Happiness,
Both soul (the will that chooses and intellect that thinks)
And body.

And conquers Sin, Death, Evil, Disunity, Unhappiness, etc.
Click to expand...
I concur. But, you already know what the opposition is saying: “Religion has been the biggest cause of bloodshed the world has known. So, how can you reconcile ‘Perfect Unity = Eternal Life = Perfect Goodness = Perfect Happiness = God’ with that fact?”

Of course, we know that their premise isn’t quite true.

jd
 
Psychotheosophy said:
Please explain.
Click to expand...
Well, we know that non-religionists have exacted a far, far heavier toll on human life than have real religionists. Often, in the name of religion thus these deaths have been included in those demanded by God.

jd
 
mlchance said:
“Logical” is not a necessary condition for something to exist. Witness the unexplainable return of Bob Saget’s television career.

– Mark L. Chance.
Click to expand...
Who? If I knew who Bob Saget was, I might agree with you.

jd
 
Psychotheosophy said:
This makes me wonder what external stimuli would cause a man to choose to be scourged, crowned with thorns, and crucified?
Click to expand...
So,
The answer is Love.
Which moves us from,
The tree of knowledge to the tree of Life.
JDaniel said:
Well, we know that non-religionists have exacted a far, far heavier toll on human life than have real religionists. Often, in the name of religion thus these deaths have been included in those demanded by God.

jd
Click to expand...
So,
You blame the principles in religion,
For the actions of non-religionists?

How do you define non-religionists?
Click to expand...
 
JDaniel said:
Who? If I knew who Bob Saget was, I might agree with you.
Click to expand...
Well, Bob Saget is supposedly a comedian (even though he’s not funny) and an actor (even though he can’t act). Here’s a link: bobsaget.com/ for the strong of heart.

😃

Just because something is logical doesn’t make it real or true. Just because something is illogical or cannot be explained via logic doesn’t make it unreal or false. “Logic” seems to be a sort of news, overused buzzword.

If free will exists, it’s existence is self-evident every time someone makes a choice (and, indeed, this is the common human experience). If free will doesn’t exist, it would be impossible demonstrate and impossible to convince anyone who holds the contrary view.

– Mark L. Chance.
 
mlchance said:
If free will exists, it’s existence is self-evident every time someone makes a choice (and, indeed, this is the common human experience). If free will doesn’t exist, it would be impossible demonstrate and impossible to convince anyone who holds the contrary view.QUOTE]

Not necessarily. Consider the possibilities that one was determined to make the “choice” he/she made, one was determined to demonstrate free will’s supposed existence and one was determined to be convinced of this demonstration.

Observation of choice does not imply free will unless one can successfully prove that the choice was not made deterministically.
Click to expand...
 
Matthew J;5126992:
Not necessarily. Consider the possibilities that one was determined to make the “choice” he/she made, one was determined to demonstrate free will’s supposed existence and one was determined to be convinced of this demonstration.
Click to expand...
wouldn’t that possibility require that everyone believe that free will exists :confused:
 
Matthew_J said:
mlchance;5126919:
If free will exists, it’s existence is self-evident every time someone makes a choice (and, indeed, this is the common human experience). If free will doesn’t exist, it would be impossible demonstrate and impossible to convince anyone who holds the contrary view.QUOTE]

Not necessarily. Consider the possibilities that one was determined to make the “choice” he/she made, one was determined to demonstrate free will’s supposed existence and one was determined to be convinced of this demonstration.

Observation of choice does not imply free will unless one can successfully prove that the choice was not made deterministically.
Click to expand...
OK. Now I understand your position on the other thread. I hadn’t read this thread before posting my questions to you on the other one. IOW, if there were to exist a huge, humanity-wide deception. Sort of like proving the existence of God.

jd
Click to expand...
 
JDaniel said:
OK. Now I understand your position on the other thread. I hadn’t read this thread before posting my questions to you on the other one. IOW, if there were to exist a huge, humanity-wide deception.
Click to expand...
That’s a cogent point (which one can only meaningfully make if free will exists). The common human experience is that we can freely choose. To deny that we can freely choose is to deny common human experience and replace it with what? Certainly nothing empirical. Talk about person A being predetermined to believe free will exists while person B is predetermined to believe otherwise is basically just silly. This entire conversation presupposes that free will is a reality.

– Mark L. Chance.
 
JimG said:
My own view is that free will cannot logically exist unless there is a non-material component to human beings capable of operating in a self-referent matter. I call that component the soul, and a faculty of the soul is the will, which is able to make decisions freely.

Without a non-material component, it seems to me, free will is not possible, since a material being is strictly governed by physical laws. Some will disagree with that view, taking the position that quantum weirdness can somehow make up for the total materiality of the human being. But I’m not buying it.
Click to expand...
Our sciences have developed some physical theories but there is a vast amount of physical behaviour which has unknown causes. There is no strict governance of anything.

Water for instance exhibits more than twenty anomalous behaviours and there is no verified theory which accounts for all of those behaviours. We have a few cheap principles which help us with a few of its behaviours…
 
wasmit said:
Human beings are either governed by fixed physical rules, or they are not.

If humans are governed by fixed physical rules:

…This choice takes into account many things - my genes, my previous experiences with different beverages, my knowledge of what drinks are available, my knowledge of what food is for dinner, whether I am driving soon(and can’t drink alcohol), etc… Therefore, there is no free will, as we are basically “robots”, made of biological parts, acting on fixed rules.

If humans are not governed by fixed physical rules:

A choice is then based upon some random process, and if someone asks me “Why did you choose a beer”, the honest answer is “I don’t know”… Therefore we have no free will.
Click to expand...
Well, it took me over a month to come up with this 😉

You forgot the third option: Free will happens.

I don’t see a good reason to suppose that if humans are not governed by fixed physical rules, then it must be a random process. Why not free will?
 
glowingembers said:
I’ll restate the OP’s argument simply:

We act for a reason or without a reason (randomly). In both cases we don’t have free will and are not responsible for our actions. Our action is determined by a reason or by chance. And if you’d like to argue “Ok, but I can at least choose a reason…”, well, how do you choose it? Again, either for a reason or randomly.
Click to expand...
What if you’re presented with two equal options?
 
wasmit said:
So, a friend of mine mentioned this argument, and it made sense to me. I am mentally trapped, as I currently accept two opposing facts as true.

The argument goes like this:
Human beings are either governed by fixed physical rules, or they are not.

If humans are governed by fixed physical rules:

I must make a choice, e.g. which type of drink to have with dinner. My ears register the vibrations in the air of my wife asking my which drink I would like, they convert these vibrations to electrical signals which are transmitted to my brain, and my brain then makes a choice. This choice takes into account many things - my genes, my previous experiences with different beverages, my knowledge of what drinks are available, my knowledge of what food is for dinner, whether I am driving soon(and can’t drink alcohol), etc. The decision is made, and my brain makes my mouth/throat move to tell my wife what my choice is. Basically, a choice is a mechanical process inside my body and brain which could be predicted if we had a full understanding of the way the neurons and synapses in my brain work, and the information (name removed by moderator)uts that are used to make the decision. Therefore, there is no free will, as we are basically “robots”, made of biological parts, acting on fixed rules.

If humans are not governed by fixed physical rules:

A choice is then based upon some random process, and if someone asks me “Why did you choose a beer”, the honest answer is “I don’t know”. Even if we had a full knowledge of the decision making process in the brain, the reason for a choice can never be predicted or known. It is like asking a pair of dice “Why did you land on 6?”. We therefore cannot be responsible for our actions, as they are out of our control. Therefore we have no free will.
So, that’s the argument, and I can see no problem with it. It appears sound to me after seriously thinking about it for a while. However, I personally “Feel” that I have free will. So I have two conflicting ideas, and one of them must be wrong. Either my feelings are wrong, or the argument is.

What do you guys think?
Click to expand...
You have free will to reject the ideas you proposed or to accept them, right?
 
Free will is an ability which is a basic part of human nature. It can be used, denied, enhanced, ignored, hindered, and treasured. Its existence does not depend on logic.
 
wasmit said:
So, a friend of mine mentioned this argument, and it made sense to me. I am mentally trapped, as I currently accept two opposing facts as true.

The argument goes like this:
Human beings are either governed by fixed physical rules, or they are not.

If humans are governed by fixed physical rules:

I must make a choice, e.g. which type of drink to have with dinner. My ears register the vibrations in the air of my wife asking my which drink I would like, they convert these vibrations to electrical signals which are transmitted to my brain, and my brain then makes a choice. This choice takes into account many things - my genes, my previous experiences with different beverages, my knowledge of what drinks are available, my knowledge of what food is for dinner, whether I am driving soon(and can’t drink alcohol), etc. The decision is made, and my brain makes my mouth/throat move to tell my wife what my choice is. Basically, a choice is a mechanical process inside my body and brain which could be predicted if we had a full understanding of the way the neurons and synapses in my brain work, and the information (name removed by moderator)uts that are used to make the decision. Therefore, there is no free will, as we are basically “robots”, made of biological parts, acting on fixed rules.

If humans are not governed by fixed physical rules:

A choice is then based upon some random process, and if someone asks me “Why did you choose a beer”, the honest answer is “I don’t know”. Even if we had a full knowledge of the decision making process in the brain, the reason for a choice can never be predicted or known. It is like asking a pair of dice “Why did you land on 6?”. We therefore cannot be responsible for our actions, as they are out of our control. Therefore we have no free will.
So, that’s the argument, and I can see no problem with it. It appears sound to me after seriously thinking about it for a while. However, I personally “Feel” that I have free will. So I have two conflicting ideas, and one of them must be wrong. Either my feelings are wrong, or the argument is.

What do you guys think?
Click to expand...
free will is further proof of the immaterial, we shouldnt be able to have free will in this deterministic universe.

if we are not practicing free will then i am greatly suprised that the trillions of particle interactions per second necessary to fake it, go off without a hitch.

none reaches for a cup, and winds up calling their grandma, you dont throw a ball, and wind up picking grape off a vine.

when you will something it occurs, what possible mechanism could account for that.

we obviously have free will, and we obviously live in a physically determinant universe. two opposing facts.

whats the solution?

the physical determinism is broken by a non-physical mechanism. to be loose with my thinking, one might equate such a non-physical mechanism, the soul.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top