yes i believe you could predict some ones actions but this doesn't mean that they don't choose to do it and it doesn't mean we don't have free will
Does free will exist?
- Thread starter JC175
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There are choices, however you're not always aware you make them, a lot of choices are made unconciously and therefor not really a part free will, and not always aware that the choice even exists, for the same reason. Also don't forget about casuality: you're actions are a reaction on something, and that action (wich sparks a reaction from you) can come from something or someone else. Fact is, we're a lot less in controll then we like to think, and our free will is not as free as we want it to be.
i dont think we should be mistaking pressure applied by society, and our social groups with the negative of free will...
options are forced upon us, but we are not mentally forced to follow them... there may be penalties, such as death... but that doesnt mean it enfringes on free will...
most of our choices revolve our whats best for ourselves, in the eyes of everyone else...
noones stopping you burning your house, and venturing naked to live in the woods...
except for your own belief that it would not be the best for your health, or your social status.
options are forced upon us, but we are not mentally forced to follow them... there may be penalties, such as death... but that doesnt mean it enfringes on free will...
most of our choices revolve our whats best for ourselves, in the eyes of everyone else...
noones stopping you burning your house, and venturing naked to live in the woods...
except for your own belief that it would not be the best for your health, or your social status.
I think that we have free-will in respect to relatively small and insubstantial things which conflate in influence over us and our surroundings overtime. When earth shattering events come or our own lives are in peril all sane people just perform the most apparently logical action.
Hey this thread has totally been done before. Even if free will doesn't exist why does it matter? It wouldn't make us any less free than we are now. Lol.
I believe there's such a thing as free will. Luckily, there's also the concept of self-control.
So you have the capability to do whatever you want, but you also have the capability to decide against doing whatever you want, if you so choose.
So you have the capability to do whatever you want, but you also have the capability to decide against doing whatever you want, if you so choose.
Okay, If free will is the ability to direct your own actions AND it always happens the way YOU would expect, and if it DOES exist, then I could go up to any random person, and say "Punch Me." and because it was ME who said it, and it was MY will, then it should happen.
But it might not. It all depends on the other person. There personalities and will.
So, depending on a role in life, you may or may not have free will.
Flawed logic is still logic, kiddies!
But it might not. It all depends on the other person. There personalities and will.
So, depending on a role in life, you may or may not have free will.
Flawed logic is still logic, kiddies!
This is pretty close to the mark. Sure we can do whatever we want. We just choose to not exercise that right. As for being able to predict my actions... I don't think it' possible. You don't know whether I want Vanilla coke or regular coke with lunch tomorrow, and neither do I. It'll be a snap decision.ThePoodonkis said:
Choose Life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television, choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers. Choose good health, low cholesterol, and dental insurance. Choose fixed interest mortgage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisurewear and matching luggage. Choose a three-piece suite on hire purchase in a range of fucking fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who the fuck you are on Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing, spirit-crushing game shows, stuffing fucking junk food into your mouth. Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pissing your last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked up brats you spawned to replace yourselves. Choose your future. Choose life... But why would I want to do a thing like that? I chose not to choose life. I chose somethin' else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who needs reasons when you've got heroin?
Quoted from trainspotting
Quoted from trainspotting
No. The problem with analyzing and predicting something in that way is that you won't actually know what they're about to do, until right before they actually do it. When they've made the conscious choice to do it.JC175 said:
Predictability does not limit free will in any way. At any point in time after they've prepared and begun to do something, they can change their minds and stop doing it if they wish.
It's what's lovely about being human; you are free to do anything you want to.
The problem there is that's not free will. Free will is the ability to choose. No more, no less.
Your argument really isn't good. Because you can predict something that happens every single day with only slight variations that follow a pattern, you think free will doesn't exist?
"There are no choices. Nothing but a straight line. The illusion comes afterwards, when you ask "Why me?" and "What if?". When you look back and see the branches, like a pruned bonsai tree, or forked lightning. If you had done something differently, it wouldn't be you, it would be someone else looking back, asking a different set of questions." ?Max Payne (in Max Payne 2)
So no...
So no...
No. There is no such thing as free will. Free will would suggest that one is able to do anything without consequences or ramifications. Free will would also suggest that there is no reason for an action. Everything in life is determined, not to be mistaken with pre-determined. This may sound odd but stick with me here, I'm not the best at giving an explanation but hopefully it makes sense...
If you believed in free will you can go up to any random person in the street and stab them. Then you could step away and say, "nope not guilty, it was free will". You would have no reason to stab the man, you just did because you could. Free will suggest you are in control of your actions but you are NOT guided by reasoning and the concept of choice which i will explain shortly.
If you are a determinist, you would stab that man because you had a reason. He had money, it was revenge, you caught him abusing your cat etc. If free will existed than that would mean that everybody is independent of each other and no actions are consequential to another person, because if everyone had free will than another person CANNOT effect the actions and outcomes of other people. A man who does not want to be stabbed can be stabbed against his will. Instead what people have is not free will but reasoning and choice.
One would argue that choice is free will. But it isn't. Free will is the ability to do anything regardless of the circumstance. And if one could do anything regardless of the situation at hand, they would only do it because there are low impact to no consequences. Choice is a product of a situation which limits what a person can do. And we may choose between those choices which are presented to us, we are free to decide whatever one we please, but in the end the decisions we make are not limitless and are not free from consequence.
Here's the kicker.
A person's reasoning makes all people determinist. Everything in the world has a cause and effect. There is nothing in the world that is exempt from the rule. Even if you don't know what the cause is, you know there is a cause. Because of this law, everything a person does creates and adds on to the chain. Every choice a person makes will ultimately directly or indirectly affect another decision in the future. Today you woke up and decided to get out of bed, that's because last night you decided to go to sleep, and you went to sleep because you did something that day to make you tired... keep going back and you'll reach back to the moment you were born.
Now what I'm getting at is, and this may seem like an outrageous concept, but say you are given option A and option B. What a person would normally do is grab all their knowledge, opinions, views and experience in their life and perhaps even others and weigh the two options up. Then let's assume you chose option A, you chose option A because of all those experiences you have so really, option B was never really an option. At every fork in the road, one can say that every path has been determined. Once again not pre-determined, different concept. So in a sense, one does not even really have choice. Don't believe me take this for example -
Have you ever made a choice in life that you regret? If you could go back right now with the knowledge you have you'd choose differently. BUT...
At that exact point in the time you made that choice based on your worldly experiences, and if you traveled back in time and had only the knowledge you knew at that exact moment and had no idea what the future consequences of your actions were, you'd make the exact same decision again and you'd end up exactly where you are right now. Life is determined, and I'm not saying it is because of some cosmic force, that's an entirely different debate, I'm saying there is no free will because humans have reasoning.
We use reasoning to assess a situation, we use reasoning to contemplate a desired outcome and work to make that outcome a reality. We use reasoning because if free will existed we would not need reasoning. And as i stated free will cannot exist if it impacts upon others, and therefore everybody's reasoning is different, people's views and actions may conflict.
There is no free will. Choice is simply an illusion, it is not a choice if the decision would've ready been made.
If you believed in free will you can go up to any random person in the street and stab them. Then you could step away and say, "nope not guilty, it was free will". You would have no reason to stab the man, you just did because you could. Free will suggest you are in control of your actions but you are NOT guided by reasoning and the concept of choice which i will explain shortly.
If you are a determinist, you would stab that man because you had a reason. He had money, it was revenge, you caught him abusing your cat etc. If free will existed than that would mean that everybody is independent of each other and no actions are consequential to another person, because if everyone had free will than another person CANNOT effect the actions and outcomes of other people. A man who does not want to be stabbed can be stabbed against his will. Instead what people have is not free will but reasoning and choice.
One would argue that choice is free will. But it isn't. Free will is the ability to do anything regardless of the circumstance. And if one could do anything regardless of the situation at hand, they would only do it because there are low impact to no consequences. Choice is a product of a situation which limits what a person can do. And we may choose between those choices which are presented to us, we are free to decide whatever one we please, but in the end the decisions we make are not limitless and are not free from consequence.
Here's the kicker.
A person's reasoning makes all people determinist. Everything in the world has a cause and effect. There is nothing in the world that is exempt from the rule. Even if you don't know what the cause is, you know there is a cause. Because of this law, everything a person does creates and adds on to the chain. Every choice a person makes will ultimately directly or indirectly affect another decision in the future. Today you woke up and decided to get out of bed, that's because last night you decided to go to sleep, and you went to sleep because you did something that day to make you tired... keep going back and you'll reach back to the moment you were born.
Now what I'm getting at is, and this may seem like an outrageous concept, but say you are given option A and option B. What a person would normally do is grab all their knowledge, opinions, views and experience in their life and perhaps even others and weigh the two options up. Then let's assume you chose option A, you chose option A because of all those experiences you have so really, option B was never really an option. At every fork in the road, one can say that every path has been determined. Once again not pre-determined, different concept. So in a sense, one does not even really have choice. Don't believe me take this for example -
Have you ever made a choice in life that you regret? If you could go back right now with the knowledge you have you'd choose differently. BUT...
At that exact point in the time you made that choice based on your worldly experiences, and if you traveled back in time and had only the knowledge you knew at that exact moment and had no idea what the future consequences of your actions were, you'd make the exact same decision again and you'd end up exactly where you are right now. Life is determined, and I'm not saying it is because of some cosmic force, that's an entirely different debate, I'm saying there is no free will because humans have reasoning.
We use reasoning to assess a situation, we use reasoning to contemplate a desired outcome and work to make that outcome a reality. We use reasoning because if free will existed we would not need reasoning. And as i stated free will cannot exist if it impacts upon others, and therefore everybody's reasoning is different, people's views and actions may conflict.
There is no free will. Choice is simply an illusion, it is not a choice if the decision would've ready been made.