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tonyrey
Guest
I have already pointed out you are making an artificial distinction between a person and a person’s intention. The cause of the action or omission is the person. Intentions don’t exist in a vacuum!
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glowingembers
Guest
That’s ok, I am just saying that the person cannot prevent the intention from resulting in the action (or inaction) without simultaneously preventing intentional action (or inaction). If the person prevents the intention from resulting in the action/inaction then there is no intentional action/inaction. If the person doesn’t prevent the intention from resulting in the action/inaction then there can be intentional action/inaction (unless prevented by factors that are outside the person) and this intentional action/inaction is the necessary result of the intention (unless prevented by factors that are outside the person).
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tonyrey
Guest
That doesn’t prove we don’t have free will. We work out how to achieve our goals, formulate our intentions accordingly and then try to implement them.
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glowingembers
Guest
So review my argument against free will again. I added references to inaction, since you insist that it differs from action:
Free will as it is usually understood is the ability of an agent to do an intentional action (or intentionally refrain from action) that is at least to some extent independent of influences affecting the agent. This independence is supposed to make the agent the ultimate controller of his actions (or inaction), which guarantees that the agent is morally responsible for his actions (or inaction) and deserves rewards or punishments for them.
However, an agent that does an intentional action (or intentionally refrain from action) can never be the ultimate controller of this action (or inaction), because the action (or inaction) is determined by an intention (and possibly also by some influences affecting the agent). For example, if raising of my left arm is my intentional action, then it must be determined by my intention to raise my left arm. But how does the determination of an action (or inaction) by the agent’s intention rule out the agent’s ultimate control over the action (or inaction)?
To answer that question let us first look at what an intention is. Here we may help ourselves with some definitions in a dictionary, such as the Merriam-Webster dictionary (www.m-w.com). The first definition of the word “intention” in this dictionary is “a determination to act in a certain way”, which indicates that an intention is A STATE OF MIND. Another relevant definition of this word is “what one intends to do or bring about”, which indicates that an intention is a goal or purpose, AN IDEA one has in mind.
So A STATE OF MIND or AN IDEA determines an intentional action (or inaction). Then for an agent to be in control of his intentional action (or inaction) it seems that he must determine his state of mind or the idea he has in mind, and through these he can determine the action (or inaction). However, determining a state of mind or an idea in mind is an action too! It is an action of creating the state of mind or the idea and if THIS action is not intentional then obviously the agent is not in control of it and consequently not in control of the final action (or inaction) determined by the state of mind/idea. On the other hand, if the determining of the state of mind/idea is an intentional action, then it must be determined by an intention to create that state of mind/idea, and this intention is just another state of mind/idea. So we get an infinite regress of states of mind/ideas determining other states of mind/ideas, in which there is no place for an agent’s ultimate control of his actions. Or assuming (as we usually do) that the agent’s mind has a finite history, we arrive at the first state of the agent’s mind or the first idea in his mind, which is not determined by his preceding states of mind/ideas, and therefore it is not intentional, he doesn’t have control over it and consequently he doesn’t have control of actions (or inaction) determined by it.
And moreover, it seems doubtful that it is possible to even have an intention to form an intention. Just try to imagine it - if you have an intention A to form an intention B, you actually already have the intention B in your mind, so the intention A is a fiction. If we cannot have intentions to form an intention that makes any regress of intentions impossible, and thus all of our intentions emerge unintentionally in our minds. And then they determine our intentional actions (or inaction).
What happens if we have divergent intentions at the same time (similar to divergent desires)? Isn’t this the point where free will could choose one intention over another? Well, this choosing would have to be an intentional action, which would bring us to the problems described above. In general, our intentional action (or inaction) will be determined by the joint influence of all our intentions, and stronger intentions will weigh more heavily in the result than weaker ones.
In conclusion, intentionality is regarded as a necessary component of free will, but at the same time it rules out free will. That’s why free will, as it is usually understood, is impossible.
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tonyrey
Guest
You are still a making a false distinction between the agent and the intention as if the latter exists
It is determined by you!
An agent is responsible for his or her state of mind because we are not cogs in machine but responsible persons. Can’t you ever control your state of mind?
“determined by an intention” is the same fallacy.
It is not possible nor is it necessary. “You actually already have the intention B in your mind” gives the same away! You are the agent, not your intention.
There is never any conflict of intentions. There are often conflicting reasons, desires and instincts from which we choose our course of action or inaction - which amounts to being reasonable or unreasonable.
You will choose to be unreasonable if you choose to keep ignoring the false distinction between a person and that person’s intention! You might as well say - and you probably do - that we don’t make any decisions. So why bother to discuss free will at all? Just admit you believe we are biological robots without a jot of responsibility for what we think, feel or do.
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glowingembers
Guest
But it proves that an intentional action (or inaction) is determined by an intention.
The person cannot prevent the intention from resulting in the action (or inaction) without simultaneously preventing intentional action (or inaction). If the person prevents the intention from resulting in the action/inaction then there is no intentional action/inaction. If the person doesn’t prevent the intention from resulting in the action/inaction then there can be intentional action/inaction (unless prevented by factors that are outside the person).
Are you saying that there is no distinction between the agent and the intention? Or that the intention doesn’t exist?
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tonyrey
Guest
I am saying that the intention is - like a thought - an aspect of the agent’s activity and doesn’t exist independently. We don’t have to think in order to think nor do we have to intend in order to intend.
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glowingembers
Guest
We should differentiate the intention from the agent’s intended activity. The intention to do an activity can exist even without this activity. The intention is a precursor of the intended activity. If we cannot intend to make an intention then our intention itself, or the activity of making our intention, is not intended because it doesn’t have the precursor. The activity of making an intention simply happens in the agent without the agent intending for it to happen. It happens automatically, unintended. And then this intention can serve as a precursor of an intended activity (or inactivity).
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tonyrey
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I shall leave you to your semantic permutations! Perhaps some one else will join you.
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Alberto_Q_CM
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Thank you very much for the correction.Welcome to the forum!
Your thoughts are more important than linguistic mistakes.
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tonyrey
Guest
I’m looking forward to your future posts, Alberto.
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sandomenico
Guest
Bobber90,
It appears to me that you might be confusing influences with causes. You gave an example several years ago now, that if you helped a person in need on the street, that action would have been determined because you would have remembered this conversation.
At the moment you see the person in need, wouldn’t two options primarily pop into your head: 1) to help, and 2) not to offer help? And in each of those, there are two manners under which you choose to act: A) without remembering this conversation, and B) remembering it.
Let us take 1-A) Is it really necessary that you remember this conversation in order to offer help? Could you not act out of kindness without ever remembering what took place on this blog?
1-B) And even if you did remember, wouldn’t that memory influence your decision more than it would decide it for you? What would make it absolutely impossible for you to still choose the negative option?
2-A) Is it not possible that you could simply walk past the person in need without once thinking of this conversation?
2-B) And is it not equally possible that you could remember every word of this conversation, every moral detail, every lesson you ever learned in Charity and kindness to others, and still choose to walk past that needy person?
To sum up, is it not more accurate to say that this conversation, and any other number of things, act merely as influences (to a greater or lesser degree) on individuals who make choices? There are choosers. Why should there not be a choice?
God love you,
sandomenico
It appears to me that you might be confusing influences with causes. You gave an example several years ago now, that if you helped a person in need on the street, that action would have been determined because you would have remembered this conversation.
At the moment you see the person in need, wouldn’t two options primarily pop into your head: 1) to help, and 2) not to offer help? And in each of those, there are two manners under which you choose to act: A) without remembering this conversation, and B) remembering it.
Let us take 1-A) Is it really necessary that you remember this conversation in order to offer help? Could you not act out of kindness without ever remembering what took place on this blog?
1-B) And even if you did remember, wouldn’t that memory influence your decision more than it would decide it for you? What would make it absolutely impossible for you to still choose the negative option?
2-A) Is it not possible that you could simply walk past the person in need without once thinking of this conversation?
2-B) And is it not equally possible that you could remember every word of this conversation, every moral detail, every lesson you ever learned in Charity and kindness to others, and still choose to walk past that needy person?
To sum up, is it not more accurate to say that this conversation, and any other number of things, act merely as influences (to a greater or lesser degree) on individuals who make choices? There are choosers. Why should there not be a choice?
God love you,
sandomenico
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The_GreyPilgrim
Guest
Do you want proof that free will is not only possible but actual?
You can chose to continue arguing about free will, or you can chose not to.
Thus the assertion of the impossibility of free will is refuted.
You can chose to continue arguing about free will, or you can chose not to.
Thus the assertion of the impossibility of free will is refuted.
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tonyrey
Guest
That is an excellent example of begging the question!
How do you know we can choose?
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The_GreyPilgrim
Guest
“How do we know we can choose?”
How do we know anything?
tonyrey, all premises eventually back up to foundational assumptions-things that we know. Your question amounts to a tautology(e.g. X=X). We can choose because we can.
I could have chosen not to repond to your post at all. But I chose to respond. Both are acts of the will, and in no way was I compelled by some outside force to choose one thing or the other.
IOW, to not have responded would have been just as powerful as an argument than responding to your question.
Either way the impossibility of free will is still refuted.
How do we know anything?
tonyrey, all premises eventually back up to foundational assumptions-things that we know. Your question amounts to a tautology(e.g. X=X). We can choose because we can.
I could have chosen not to repond to your post at all. But I chose to respond. Both are acts of the will, and in no way was I compelled by some outside force to choose one thing or the other.
IOW, to not have responded would have been just as powerful as an argument than responding to your question.
Either way the impossibility of free will is still refuted.
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Charlemagne_II
Guest
**Everyone believes he exercises free will in the ordinary circumstances of life. Even the determinist feels in his gut that he chooses to be a determinist. And when the determinist is offended by someone, he blames the someone who offended him as if he might have chosen not to offend him, instead of just accepting the offense as the inevitably preordained act over which the offender had no control.
The strongest case for determinism is that we feel we are free. If we are not really free, we have to explain why this illusion of freedom in us is so strong; and we have to explain why the only time we feel we are not free is when someone has deprived us of our freedom, or when we have deprived ourselves of it by self destructive behavior.
Nobody really believes he is a robot. And the best evidence of this is that we are free to invent robots, but they are not free to invent us.**
The strongest case for determinism is that we feel we are free. If we are not really free, we have to explain why this illusion of freedom in us is so strong; and we have to explain why the only time we feel we are not free is when someone has deprived us of our freedom, or when we have deprived ourselves of it by self destructive behavior.
Nobody really believes he is a robot. And the best evidence of this is that we are free to invent robots, but they are not free to invent us.**
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Sair
Guest
A neuroscientist would probably respond that we feel we are free because we are no more aware, consciously, of the causal web of events in our brains that result in our decisions than we are of the constant, minute functioning of our digestive tracts, the circulation of our blood or of the continuation of our heartbeat and breathing whilst we sleep. It seems odd to suppose (and, if you take the time to consider it, actually quite absurd) that whilst so many of the physical processes of our bodies go on without any requirement for us to think about or consider them, the physical processes in our brains (which are, after all, part of our bodies) should somehow all be accessible to conscious thought. Increasingly, the question is not, “What is the essence of consciousness?” but, “Why - and how - does consciousness arise from particular physical processes such as those found in complex brains?”
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Charlemagne_II
Guest
Sair
**
A neuroscientist would probably respond that we feel we are free because we are no more aware, consciously, of the causal web of events in our brains that result in our decisions than we are of the constant, minute functioning of our digestive tracts, the circulation of our blood or of the continuation of our heartbeat and breathing whilst we sleep.**
But we are aware of all of the above as facts, not as illusions. Free will also appears to be a fact, not an illusion. But that fact is of the mental realm rather than the physical. One can apply all the determinism one wants to one’s physical body, but determinism of the mind is only believable if you postulate the mind is subject to the same determinism as the body.
Yes, the mind is chained to the body, yet we speak constantly and admiringly of free spirits. We never speak constantly and admiringly of free bodies.
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A neuroscientist would probably respond that we feel we are free because we are no more aware, consciously, of the causal web of events in our brains that result in our decisions than we are of the constant, minute functioning of our digestive tracts, the circulation of our blood or of the continuation of our heartbeat and breathing whilst we sleep.**
But we are aware of all of the above as facts, not as illusions. Free will also appears to be a fact, not an illusion. But that fact is of the mental realm rather than the physical. One can apply all the determinism one wants to one’s physical body, but determinism of the mind is only believable if you postulate the mind is subject to the same determinism as the body.
Yes, the mind is chained to the body, yet we speak constantly and admiringly of free spirits. We never speak constantly and admiringly of free bodies.
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tonyrey
Guest
If you read the other posts on this forum you will notice that materialists believe we are compelled by** inside** forces to choose one thing rather than another, e.g. our genes, habits, instincts and our desires. They don’t believe in “acts of will”.
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tonyrey
Guest
It only seems odd for materialists who ignore the power of thoughts and suggestions to control and influence the body. The real questions are:
- Why you do believe any of your conclusions are true if you have no control over your thoughts?"
- Are you compelled to believe your conclusions are true even when they are mistaken?
- Are you compelled to believe **all **your conclusions are true?
- If not why do you believe this particular conclusion is true?
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