'Free Will' or Predetermination?

[Lazlo]

Originally Posted by The Purist

So you believe that your mind has sufficient energy to create an entire universe??? Thass a lot of calories!!! You'd best have a Mars bar with yer lunch, or should that be a Milky Way

Not just one but many, at least according to the Many Worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics.



Personally I prefer bounty bars. Mars bars give me toothache

[Mr T.]

Originally Posted by The Purist

OK, as YD seems to be in a philosophical mood at the moment, here's another one to chew over. The grand question of 'is there any such thing as freedom of action'?

Yes, although open to pressure from any number of changeable external factors and influences, there is such a thing as 'freedom of action' - but as Sir Isaac Newton was want to tell us: "For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction" - and it's this bit, the reaction of others, which free-wheeling libertarians sometimes have difficultly coming to terms with.

That said, 'freedom of action' is not open to all for some clinically obvious reasons (the reasons which denote our human differentiators) - depending on where in the world you live (and under what type of regime/gov't), any number of factors can influence one's ability and/or decision to act (regardless of how much one might desire it), e.g. state of mind, imperative, propriety, pragmatism, risk, conscience, morality, guilt, class, courage (or lack of), religion, caste, a society with (to us, at least) an overly developed matriachal/patriachal dictat, social more or sense of 'what's-what' and how to act 'appropriately' given same, a repressed society etc.

Originally Posted by The Purist

For free will to exist we must be able to choose from several viable alternate courses of action with no external mechanism driving that choice.

Alternative! Alternative! ALTERNATIVE!

*cough* Ahem

You speak of More's Utopia, sir! (i.e. that which doesn't exist): there will always be, regarldess of how many "viable alternatives [of choice]" are on offer, some form of "external mechanism driving that choice"; to even have a chance at avoiding them, one would need to have been conceived in vitro and raised without access to, or influence by, any forces currently understood or recognised by Man. Where would we find such a place? Not even in vacuum.

Originally Posted by The Purist

One example of an argument against this is pure physics - our minds and bodies are made up of exactly the same basic particles as the rest of the universe, and there is a set of laws and behaviours governing these. While that may be a very complex set of laws, and impossible for us to model perfectly, the undeniable fact is that every movement of electrical charge within a synapse that leads to a 'thought' is governed by a set of laws from which there is no escape. We are therefore merely observers of an incredible system, following the same basic rules as any other object around us.

Hmmmm...on the whole, I agree, but only to a degree, and only insofar as to where similar (or better still, precisley the same) 'forces' exist - e.g. a lump of interplanetary rick wizzing round the solar system (unlike its earthbound 'made of the same stuff' female) isn't going to have precisely the same outward or inward forces affecting it's decision to buy that new dress she saw last Tuesday in that shop in the High St, is it?

So I guess some understanding of context and an agreement that certain influencers/influences are greater/more immdiate and will have either a greater or lesser influnce on the subject is required. Fair?

Originally Posted by The Purist

There are other more complex 'proofs' in either direction - but are those proofs themselves predetermined?? Discuss!

Bloody good opener mate! Green in-coming. Something here for the specialist and generalist alike

[Mr T.]

Originally Posted by Finless

I disagree with your basic preposition...

And this year's Golden Malapropism Award goes to.... Well-in Finn (that'd be proposition then? )

Originally Posted by Finless

The key thing is "being able to make a free choice DESPITE external ......"

Brevity being an ally here Fin! Nicely summed up.

Originally Posted by Gavin Smith

I don't think the poll is complete.

I tend to agree with this view. I can't vote given the options on offer as there are too many variables (determinants) determining, over and above those on offer, my free will to make a decision.

Originally Posted by The Purist

Ah, there you're heading toward the 'minimal free will thesis' - ie. at least some of the time we have the option to choose between alternative (**) possible course of action even though those course of action may themselves be predetermined. But is that free will, or are you as free as a ball bearing bouncing down a set of dividing chutes?

** = See! You do know the difference!

Again, aren't we back here to any given set of influencing factors having a greater or lesser determinant on the outcome? i.e. the option of which dividing chute to go down is merely one determinant - then we need to ask the angle if the slope for it to roll, the slope's diagonal or axis tilt etc. etc. Then we can see which factor has the greater or lesser influence on the ball's eventual 'choice' of chute. Fair?

Originally Posted by Finless

Although I choose 'free will' in the poll, in essence there is no choice at all, we are born, we live for a while and then we die!

Aye Fin, but we can, frankly, reduce anything to such mudanities - OK in the grand cosmic scheme of things, three-score and ten years (for a chap at least) might not be a bee sting, but it's plenty of time for you and me to make a boat load of 'choices' ('free' or otherwise) based on a raft of external and internal influences, circumstances and factors.

[purple vonny]

my God that is clever thinking

[Finless]

Originally Posted by Mr T.

And this year's Golden Malapropism Award goes to.... Well-in Finn (that'd be proposition then? )

Oh dear, I have suffered from pedantoopsery?

[SoggyFox]

Is Mr.T predetermined to ramble on incessantly or is it free will?

[Finless]

Originally Posted by SoggyFox

Is Mr.T predetermined to ramble on incessantly or is it free will?

One thing I am CERTAIN of is that I can offer free willy to anyone who meets the selection criteria.

[Lazlo]

Originally Posted by Mr T.

Brevity being an ally here Fin! Nicely summed up.

There's a lesson here for all of us.

[SoggyFox]

Originally Posted by Finless

One thing I am CERTAIN of is that I can offer free willy to anyone who meets the selection criteria.

theres selection criteria involved!!

you are picky aren't you.

[Finless]

Originally Posted by SoggyFox

theres selection criteria involved!!

you are picky aren't you.

I'm not noted for it ..... female and at least 'still warm' is usually enough?