Free will - Is there such a thing?

[_Alfredo]

Your question could well be worded the other way around.

Does any reason for wanting to make a particular choice preclude free will?

Of course it could, but I asked first. It's not a question of whether free-will is precluded, it's whether we have any good reason to add it to our understanding of how we make decisions.

Also, the precedence already seems to indicate that our desires are the result of natural, biological processes. The study of culture, neurobiology, evolution, and likely other fields all seem to converge on the point that our desires are dependent on factors outside of our experience of a "choice". It doesn't follow that because a choice seems arbitrary and unquantifiable to us, that it is therefore outside the realm of natural explanation. The preference of vanilla over chocolate may be no more significant that the comparison between the length of one blade of grass to another. The lines may be blurred, but the most likely explanation for why we desire certain foods is a natural one, so it follows that our preference of one food over another can also most likely be explained naturally.

I think that free will is being able to opt for a particular choice without having to defer to another's wishes. The internal reason we make a particular choice is not part of the definition.

So, your definition of free-will still holds within a deterministic universe? I'm not sure I understand you correctly.

[_Quasimodo]

Your question could well be worded the other way around.

Does any reason for wanting to make a particular choice preclude free will?

Of course it could, but I asked first. It's not a question of whether free-will is precluded, it's whether we have any good reason to add it to our understanding of how we make decisions.

Also, the precedence already seems to indicate that our desires are the result of natural, biological processes. The study of culture, neurobiology, evolution, and likely other fields all seem to converge on the point that our desires are dependent on factors outside of our experience of a "choice". It doesn't follow that because a choice seems arbitrary and unquantifiable to us, that it is therefore outside the realm of natural explanation. The preference of vanilla over chocolate may be no more significant that the comparison between the length of one blade of grass to another. The lines may be blurred, but the most likely explanation for why we desire certain foods is a natural one, so it follows that our preference of one food over another can also most likely be explained naturally.

I think that free will is being able to opt for a particular choice without having to defer to another's wishes. The internal reason we make a particular choice is not part of the definition.

So, your definition of free-will still holds within a deterministic universe? I'm not sure I understand you correctly.

Maybe I'm opting for a more simplistic definition of free will. Your position, I think, is that any choice one makes is ultimately determined by events or realities that control our internal desires. That may or may not be true.

My definition (for what it's worth) is that free will is the ability to exercise one's choices regardless of their internal origins. Why I want vanilla today has no bearing on my free will to order it.

The only way (in my definition) that free will can not be exercised is if some external condition is making me choose against my desires.

[_Alfredo]

Maybe I'm opting for a more simplistic definition of free will. Your position, I think, is that any choice one makes is ultimately determined by events or realities that control our internal desires. That may or may not be true.

Pretty much. Except I would add the qualifier that this is simply our current understanding, and as you say, may or may not be true. Except you haven't provided any reason to add free-will to the equation.

My definition (for what it's worth) is that free will is the ability to exercise one's choices regardless of their internal origins. Why I want vanilla today has no bearing on my free will to order it.

What does it mean to exercise a choice independent of its origin?

Do you mean that you can choose something other than what deterministic or natural forces may otherwise lead you to choose, or choose something other than what those forces may lead you to desire?

I wish to clarify because one would be independent of a deterministic world, and the other not.

[_malaise]

It depends on what you mean by free will. Your dismissal of the brain chemistry argument is weak

Really? Do you think there would be a strong biochemical preference for vanilla over chocolate since I like them both?

Biochemical preferences, by which I assume you mean biological responses, are far more complex than you seem to understand. Oftentimes people will crave foods that have things there body needs on a particular day and other things on a particular day. While it is not necessarily the case tat you prefer vanilla to chocolate for that kind of reason, it is certainly a possibility. The other possibility is that cultural factors lead you to make your "choice".

I've never heard of that sort of discrimination in biochemical cravings. It's usually something like "we need carbs" or "we need protein".

Exactly- and what your body makes you want when you need those things need not actually contain them; the human body is not a perfect machine.

Even if that were the case, would a craving negate the concept of free will? Does any reason for wanting to make a particular choice preclude free will?

If you want to make all your choices because of external factors, then yes, that would preclude free will.

\

To me, this boarders on sophism. Our choices are ours (regardless of their origins). Making a choice out of desire or whimsy is free will.

To me this borders on absurd. It is silly to say our choices belong to us regardless of their origins. If I hypnotize you into wanting to commit a murder, are you responsible? What if a man puts a pill in my drink to make me "choose" to sleep with him? It's unfortunate, but all of our choices ultimately stem from the same kind of causal chains as the "choices" in those examples.

[_Jason Bourne]

Doesn't follow. Free will does not exist unless there are external factors to entice us one way or the other. No choices to make otherwise. Also, if God merely foretells, that in and of itself is not an external factor nor does prediction equate to predestination.

If God foretells only can God be wrong? If yes then there is agency and free will.



If he can only perfectly foretell but still never be wrong there is no free will.

I like to think God knows all the possible outcomes of all the varying decision trees we can make but just does not know which ones we will make and cannot force such choices.

But really ultimately nobody knows and it is all speculative philosophy.

[_The Nehor]

I dispute Premise 1. This is not how I define free will.

Define free will then. Something akin to my definition is needed for the term to retain its meaning. If we are all cogs in a long chain of events it is quite silly to say that ours will are free n'est pas?

The problem with your premise is that you suggest that having external factors factor into the decision means there was no real decision. In LDS theology the choice requires two opposites both tugging and pulling with equal force to which the person through a combination of reason, moral judgment, instinct, and other things makes the choice.

The cogs you mention create the conditions for the choice.

[_malaise]

The problem with your premise is that you suggest that having external factors factor into the decision means there was no real decision. In LDS theology the choice requires two opposites both tugging and pulling with equal force to which the person through a combination of reason, moral judgment, instinct, and other things makes the choice.

The cogs you mention create the conditions for the choice.

You are not giving my entire argument. I am not just saying that external factors affect the decisions we make. I am saying that ever single aspect of those decisions, from what we want to do to the things that pull us in different direction, is caused by factors beyond our control. So it is not just that premarital sex exists to tempt me. Whether or not I want to give in or not given in is also caused by factors beyond my control.

[_Alfredo]

The problem with your premise is that you suggest that having external factors factor into the decision means there was no real decision. In LDS theology the choice requires two opposites both tugging and pulling with equal force to which the person through a combination of reason, moral judgment, instinct, and other things makes the choice.

The cogs you mention create the conditions for the choice.

Whether or not I want to give in or not given in is also caused by factors beyond my control.

What's relevant about these deterministic forces is that they are the only factors we can reliably verify as the predictors of our choices. While it may be true that some magical mechanism of ours can make choices independent of these factors, there remains no reason to add free-will to the mix.

Everything we've come to learn about the brain indicates that our choices are the result of chains of deterministic events. This doesn't disprove free-will, but this doesn't settle anything. The advocates of free-will fail to point to where this chain breaks down and most importantly, why this gap should be filled with a properly defined free-will... without argument from ignorance.

[_malaise]

[
Everything we've come to learn about the brain indicates that our choices are the result of chains of deterministic events. This doesn't disprove free-will, but this doesn't settle anything. The advocates of free-will fail to point to where this chain breaks down and most importantly, why this gap should be filled with a properly defined free-will... without argument from ignorance.

I am not certain what you mean by a mysterious force. Unless we shape our own personalities in the absence of all external phenomena (which is impossible and makes no sense logically) then free will cannot exist. If this magical force formed our personality then it would have caused our choices.

[_Alfredo]

[
Everything we've come to learn about the brain indicates that our choices are the result of chains of deterministic events. This doesn't disprove free-will, but this doesn't settle anything. The advocates of free-will fail to point to where this chain breaks down and most importantly, why this gap should be filled with a properly defined free-will... without argument from ignorance.

I am not certain what you mean by a mysterious force. Unless we shape our own personalities in the absence of all external phenomena (which is impossible and makes no sense logically) then free will cannot exist. If this magical force formed our personality then it would have caused our choices.

That's what is mysterious about it. Being supernatural, it would violate causality somehow. Free-will advocates can't adequately explain how we can know that this even happens, or why we should believe that it does. (That is, they simply believe free-will because it fits their pre-conceived belief system, which they believe to be justified for reasons unrelated to free-will.)