Freewill exists

I feel the point of wisdom is to understand that compelling and bypass it when such is possible, as something ‘compelling’ could appear as instinctual or a falling for such.

What say you or anyone?

I just got frustrated with silhouette here.

When silhouette argues that identity doesn’t exist in any way, but then uses identity to make his arguments, that’s pretty much it for me.

Silhouette, there isn’t a difference between contradiction and a logical fallacy. Logical fallacies are inference contradictions, not explicit.

You hit upon the contradiction of your fallacy at the convergence point of the fallacy by stating you don’t exist. In this way, you are a direct contradiction (not implicit) of your fallacy.

If they want to confine themselves to limitation, then let them.

To say one is bound to determinism is to say we are confined, let’s just say there is no confinement within determinism itself because it has already determined itself free, by there being an infinity of options and change within its “confines” itself.

I can do just about whatever I want to do within the universal laws in terms of inventing and being whom I want, I’m not going to let slaves tell me those options aren’t available to my selection just because they don’t appear to them. The limits one has are the limits one creates.

I can be an astronaut, can be a musician, a writer… but I have chosen psychology in school and am merely waiting. Options are limitless.

The conflation of possibility with actuality.

You “could have been” an astronaut, a musician, a writer - and yet you weren’t. Why not?
There will have been reasons that determined you not to choose them.
If you choose them in future, there will be a reason that determines it.

Options are “theoretically” limitless, but in practice some things will simply never occur to you. Would an Ancient Greek have been considering what social media apps to use? Would the first humans be considering the fluid dynamics that are necessary to successfully propel a rocket to the moon? They didn’t even know what the moon was. Even today we won’t in our wildest dreams be considering the everyday options available to people far enough into the future.
The “freest” of people do not have infinite options available to them in reality whether I “tell you” this is the case or not - the most basic reason being that we are finite beings with finite brains and memories with finite (although huge numbers of) connections, thoughts take finite time to flit recognisably in our consciousness, and we have a finite life span - mathematically options are limited.

Are you under the impression that anyone is a slave to mathematics? Are you suggesting that 2+2 could equal 5 to the non-slave?

You already make the concession “I can do just about whatever I want to do within the universal laws”, which in themselves are limits. Are you saying that if you remove those limits, free any slavelike tendencies in your mind, the effects described by gravity can cease to apply to you and things around you? Magnets could cease to operate to one who frees their mind from Determinism? By your admission I don’t think you are, and yet in the same sentence you argue that you are. This is your contradiction. Funnily enough the stability of your entire being would cease in an instant if you freed yourself from universal laws.

By all means, be in awe of the large number of options that do occur to you, the uncommon ideas that do occur to you, and the unique paths that you actually do choose as a result of these things, but in reality there are limits you simply can’t shake whether I “tell you” or not. It’s not like I’m ordering you to reduce your thinking, you’re reduced whether I say anything or not… I’m sorry you don’t like this, but by the above arguments and all the other ones I’ve said, and more no doubt, life is a limit and this is reality. I feel like a parent telling their kid Santa isn’t real. I’ve already pointed out the irony that it’s quite possible that my mind is “more free” than yours for being able to abandon the romance of unlimited Free Will - I wonder if you’ve given this any serious thought yet - and by serious I don’t mean assuming it’s wrong before you even consider it. You have all your free thinking ahead of you - call me a slave all you like and it’s still psychological projection.

From what I can tell, Free Will advocates can’t square the fact that they have a large imagination that seems not to be contained, with the reality that it all can be and is contained. Funnily enough, your concession of “I can do just about whatever I want to do within the universal laws” sums up every single limit there is on both action and thought. Outer space, the earth, animals - even the human brain operates exactly how it does exactly because of these universal laws alone. Nothing more is needed, which is why the “four fundamental forces” are so named. Saying this is actually an admission that you are an entirely deterministic being whether you can accept this or not.

Add it to the pile of made up wishful thinking if you want…

Formal fallacies are the most explicit of fallacies, e.g. (P->Q, Q) → P
Contrast this with a contradiction: ¬P ^ P where there is mutual exclusivity.

A clear difference. Now, the way you think is to reduce things to very specific circumstances where the difference is no longer clear, in order to justify False Equivalence - this is a logical fallacy.
You don’t like logical fallacies since your arguments rely on them, so you try to explain them away by the same means.

And you get frustrated with people who call you out on your bullshit…
I appreciate the effort to try and create, but it doesn’t mean you’ll be any good at it. Sure, keep trying, learn from the mistakes people teach you and move on to new things but you’re obsessed with a small number of terrible, flawed ideas that you just won’t move on from - like a song-writer insisting they have written the greatest song of all time and trying to perform it better and better their whole life, without anyone else liking it. There’s clearly something psychologically amiss with you, which is my greatest worry - it feels like your entire identity and emotional sense of self-worth is grounded in bad ideas. Fortunately one of humanity’s greatest strengths is denial, but that just makes me sad for you. Not your problem, I guess - religious fanatics can spend their whole lives in echo chambers without ever admitting fault in their nonsense, I’m sure you can do it too.

FYI, I said identity has existence in terms of utility, just not in terms of truth. You say I argue “that identity doesn’t exist in any way”.
Continue to misunderstand and misrepresent me to yourself and others if it makes you feel better, but you’re a liar if you do.
You complain that I use identity, when I plainly said I do and why, and it’s still a Tu Quoque fallacy to criticise this. The fact that you don’t understand fallacies doesn’t excuse you here (which ironically is the personal incredulity fallacy).

You know, it’s funny. You try and equate logical fallacy and logical contradiction, whilst also saying logical fallacies always have holes where proofs using logical contradiction never have holes.
I mean… come on :laughing: Have your cake or eat it - you can’t have both.
Consider for the first time in your life that you might be wrong.

Silhouette,

You’re really going to argue that Tu Quoque doesn’t have a convergence point, that doesn’t make it a false equivalency in the special case of stating that identity is false (with the exception that it’s utile)?

It’s ultimately utile, yet ultimately false.

Which is it?

I need to say this about silhouette additionally,

You are a very nasty person silhouette!

What I actually mean by this, after having read through all of your posts again, is that it would take a very terse person like myself easily 30 pages to go through all those disproofs.

Your posts are not intellectual work, they just create busy work for intellectuals.

So here’s the deal, I decided only to focus on the Tu Qouque, because if you’re wrong on that, you have to backpedal on all your arguments in this thread about freewill, you have to return to the corner that I put you in.

That’s called intelligence.

I found your contradiction here:

So what is it?

Utility is ultimate

or

Utility is ultimately false

There is no abandoning the future and infinity of possibilities within law. How far ahead can you think in the future? You can’t dictate what is imagination and what is not if you do not think in the future, which is “imagination” it’s an estimation of most probable effects/causes.

I can be whatever I want, what if I do all of them? I pick psychology because in order to do what we want externally, people need to understand themselves internally. It is the best or most effective to be spread and taught, how to use and deal with mind. So we can be an organized and functioning society and species, aimed at the future, a higher aim than what is aimed for now, currently, unless you think right now is sufficient?

No one said there wasn’t a reason but I get to pick that reason or it’s pursuit, in any given present moment, I could also experience such non directly. The subconscious may actively pick for the (conscious) identity. I determine the future by the present identity not being confined solely to the past in certain aspects/facets.

I can’t estimate what an Ancient Greek would be thinking but Star Trek certainly may have been and I’ll take it as a sign that yes, we can estimate the future. So tell me, what is imagination? Something you don’t understand? I never said some cannot be exaggeration but there is still truth to be taken in/from exaggeration. Which is what we do and have constantly been doing, if not, then why aren’t we still Ancient Greeks right now? Where did the internet and social apps come from?

Self projection? That’s funny, we’re all slaves but the one who understands how to control his environment and “confinement” in being a slave to better suit the slaves needs and wants, then is the slave still a slave?

Do you enjoy being a slave? If so then how are you a slave? Because you can’t go faster than speed light? Because you can’t float off the ground without some form of an invention to make such a reality?
Because you can’t shoot lightning out of your fingers? Again without some form of invention.

There is no limit of possibilities for what we can do within the laws themselves, it’s an expansion and we can’t say these laws will always apply everywhere either.

Separate the truth from the noise, same concept with imagination, there are always elements of truth hidden in imagery. This is a fact.

It’s plainly obvious that you’re trying to use the same terminology that I’m using to nullify your points “back at me”, but just the same as I’ve seen before with another Free Will advocate who also knew nothing about the subject, you’re using it incorrectly.

You’re also making up this weird terminology like “convergence point” that really says nothing without proper explanation - but I daren’t ask you for one, because every explanation you make seems to be in terms of evermore unclear language. Your points rarely make enough sense, it’s really frustrating when all I’m trying to do is understand what you’re saying but you’re making it as hard as possible.

Or rather you’re assuming that because you think it makes sense to you, other people should know what you mean. We don’t - and I say “we” because I see others struggling all the time too.

There are tons of useful lies, not just identity. Language itself is one - a signifier isn’t the signified, and yet it’s the only way we know to communicate about the world. Humans tell each other fictional stories in order to create meaning, but the value taken from them doesn’t make them any less fictional.
There’s this assumption I see everywhere that useful means true. No it very much does not lol. And there you go trying to invalidly throw back the contradiction I validly identified in your points… Yes identity is ultimately utile and ultimately false.

I also made a post distinguishing between two common interpretations of truth - one as objective, the other as subjective i.e. what is useful. Some people who fall in the latter category literally seem to treat the useful as truth, and disregard the actual truth as an inconvenience. The “wishful thinkers” of the world who are out to tip power in their favour, lie, cheat and steal whenever they can justify it and get away with it to attain an unfair advantage to the cost of everyone - but to others more than them. These types are the very ones you wish to denounce with your “consent” tautology, yet on this subject here you are willing to conflate use with truth?

A lot of the problems people here are having with you are solely down to your attitude - you dictate, you don’t ask questions. You show zero humility or self-critical sense checking. Come down a few pegs to where you really are and work your way back up legitimately. Make sure you make sense before insisting you do.

Artimas,

Not to take away from your post, through no fault of your own, you started a new page right after I posted this! I want to make sure silhouette gets this message:

viewtopic.php?p=2728572#p2728572

It’s about moving the tread on its topic against th choir!

Silhouette, read the post above this as well, if you are so inclined.

Silhouette,

That debate about the tautology of consent was resolved when I used the truth tables to prove that when a statement acts upon itself it changes both context and meaning, which makes it non tautological.

You bury your head in scholastics so far, like a robot, that you are shocked by any form of contradiction of them.

The Tu Quoque logical fallacy is very simple:

If someone does other than what they say, and you point it out, it is a logical fallacy.

Definitional.

So if someone says that they don’t exist (except for utility (which isn’t ultimately true (which means it isn’t true))), then it’s a logical fallacy to point out that they do exist.

I’m not being weird here like you claim. I’m using your own definitions to show that in the case of denying identity that this fallacy hits a convergence point where it is both a fallacy and a contradiction at the same time.

Oh, here’s a logical fallacy for you!

You think I’m a mistaken person about being a genius.

I’m one of two people in tens of thousands of years of human history to find a unique way to order the rational numbers. You won’t find my technique or proof on Wikipedia, but I’ll post it for you if you ask.

That’s argument from authority for being a logically sound person. Is that a logical fallacy as well?

You keep digging at me as if I have absolutely no clue what you’re talking about in your rarified air of logic.

You’re wrong.

Committing the Tu Quoque fallacy is to use someone’s actions as grounds to dismiss their words.

It is a fallacy because an argument can be perfectly true, even if the person making the argument isn’t abiding by it in their life. The argument might even be false, and potentially this is why the proponent acts differently to their words, but to assume this, or to use it as the reason for the argument’s falsity - this is fallacious, logically. The reason the argument might be false is not because of actions, it can only be because of any logical contradictions or logical fallacies that the proponent used. An opponent using the Tu Quoque in this situation just makes them equally guilty of logical error in the form of their fallacy and thus disproves nothing, even though in this case the argument might be disprovable by other means.

I can’t tell if you understand this or not because again your wording is so unclear.

Are you suggesting that it’s a contradiction to use the fallacy or that the fallacy itself is a contradiction? It sounds like probably you mean the latter, in which case no, it’s not a contradiction to act differently to how you say - because “acting on what you say” and “saying what you say” are not the same thing. That’s why it’s a fallacy to imply it is a contradiction. So it’s necessarily not a fallacy and a contradiction at the same time… - the literal opposite of what you’re trying to pull.

It just sounds to someone like me, who knows what things mean, as though you’re just committing the fallacy over and over and over because you don’t understand it and just think you do…
They aren’t “my” definitions that I’m using either - they’re “the” definitions and I’m using them as intended in order to aid in clarity. If you want to use standard terminology differently - say so, and preferably why, but if you don’t understand what standard terminology means, don’t use it!

I don’t want to believe you’re dim, but the only alternative I have is to believe you’re an extraordinarily bad explainer, and unfortunately this is usually a reflection of being an extraordinarily bad thinker - but like I said, I’m doing my best to not assume.
What I do know is that you’re a hysteric, reactionary and impulsive - responding to your posts is like fighting the mythological hydra: every time I finish a response to a thread, two more have taken its place - often straight after one another, emotionally charged and just an addendum to your previous post.
As for me, I put a great deal of time and thought into my posts, trying my best to find any reason why each thing I’m saying might be wrong, and if I find a thought of mine to be incomplete I make sure it is complete by the time I resume writing. I re-read and correct things I say several times, making sure I’m as clear as I can be and that I’ve covered everything. But trying to wade through your words and decipher any clear meaning there may or may not be - this just adds to the chore. And there you are, on this forum 24/7 writing post after post - in these respects we are opposites. I’ve been a member of this forum just less than twice as long as you, and you’ve written more than twice as many posts as me - what does that say about our respective attention to detail and care?

However, with my previous post and this one I’ve decided to post to one of your posts at a time, because getting through a response to you, only to find you’ve said more than needs correcting is just demoralising. I can already see there’s more to deal with since I started writing this post…

What I’m clearly stating, and have been for many posts now, is that if someone says the opposite of what they do, the argument states that what they state may still be correct, HOWEVER!!! If they state that they don’t exist, the fallacy falls apart at a zero point convergence for the fallacy itself, which means that the fallacy does not hold for all situations. I’m not saying it’s not a fallacy, I’m stating that it needs to take into account the logical refutations of it (which you are committing) in order to be understood at a deeper level as not a blanket law of non contradiction.

Determinism falls apart easily with a single question:

Determined by who?

So are you trying to posit an infinity that stretches out in the temporal dimension? Even given the finite human mind, limited capacity for memory and exposure to experience, and the non-zero time that it takes for thoughts to cross the mind etc., given enough time, these things will tend towards an infinity?

Even in the temporal dimension, according to the 2nd law of thermodynamics, entropy will increase to the point where life cannot exist. Before then, of course, our sun will die. Even time is finite, moreso for us as humans. All metrics you can think of, along which to “claim” an infinity, are finite. Infinity is something you can try and will fail to imagine no matter who you are.

I’m not sure if you’re appealing to the conception of future as “in the present imagination” like I prefer to do. If so, the finite human mind etc. as I listed above makes the finite nature even more clear. Do you really think you could think an infinity of thoughts? If you do, then obviously you don’t understand infinity. This is even clearer if, as I mentioned, you don’t conflate possibility with actuality. In actuality, you won’t think an infinity of thoughts. So even if there were an infinity of possible thoughts, nobody will ever think them “all”. This isn’t because I told them they couldn’t, it’s because of reality. And reality, as I explained above, with its finitude in all respects doesn’t even allow an infinity of possible thoughts - regardless of whether you or I think differently.

Let’s even grant, for the sake of argument, that all possibilities could be chosen even if you don’t choose them - how do you test that? Do we just believe you? Knowledge requires testing, repetition, trying to disprove it, peer review, careful controls and the avoidance of determining Questionable Cause. If other people have chosen them, it proves they were possibilities for them - not for you. They don’t defy the laws of physics? But neither does your decision making - each electromagnetic interaction between your neurons conforms to the electromagnetic force acting on the arrangement that just so happens to be “you right now” - or at any time, as part of the vast web of causation that is reality, which isn’t limited to just “you” - it extends beyond to the wider world with forces permeating throughout.

You do understand this, right? “You” isn’t a closed system, and the way you interact with the world, choices and imagination alike is all a result of the electromagnetic force, with a little bit of gravity, and the strong + weak nuclear forces acting uniformly regardless of you or not, with no differentiation between your body and your brain - complex or simple, the interactions of neurons that map your thoughts and choices are just doing what electricity and magnets do. Is it a lack of scientific appreciation that prevents you from letting go of the “woo-woo” of Free Will? I’m trying to find exactly what’s in your way - ironically what’s limiting you.

And yet you didn’t. There was a reason that determined this, which you gave me yourself. But you still want to conflate possibility of “could have been” with actually “didn’t”.

Even if you did all of them, there would have been a reason that determined it. None of this free open world of possibilities is free from reasons determining choices. Understanding yourself internally is gonna happen if there’s a reason, and it won’t happen if there’s reason preventing it. Aiming high will either be determined or it will be determined that you think right now is sufficient - Determinism covers both.

What is this misunderstanding you have that makes you think Determinism only causes one to think the “right now is sufficient”? It determines aiming at the future, organising and functioning society and species just the same. Again, it sounds like you don’t quite understand what Determinism is. It covers the conscious just as much as the subconscious.

“You” getting to pick the reason or its pursuit likewise happens for a reason, or not. Reasons precede reasons precede reasons - all the way back to before you were born, and back a lot more than that. They continue though the present and will continue into the future.

Of course we can estimate the future, if so determined to do so. Predictions are notoriously bad if you look at all the Sci-Fi about times that we’ve now reached, but that doesn’t stop us trying to envisage them. Determinism causes you to try or not, and Determinism causes you do it well or badly, and Determinism causes it to turn out how it really does. Of course I understand imagination - I am a particularly creative person, imagining all sorts, from original melodies and harmonies that I then work out and play/record - to a game that I imagined and am currently programming slowly but quite successfully, with many other things besides. And always there was a reason for me imagining one thing or another that was determined by prior reasons etc. I am imagining what it is that I think you think, I am imagining what it is that is getting in the way of you understanding and appreciating the scope of Determinism… imagination is how people progress - of course! And it’s all determined that reasons will cause one to imagine successfully or otherwise, it’s determined that you will either understand my points or not at any given time, it’s determined that I already understand everything you’re saying, and it was determined that someone thought up the internet, and determined how and when they brought it to life. Not out of “fate”, there was just reasons why someone imagined it when they did, and reasons that enabled them to bring it to life.

What I enjoy doesn’t matter, I’m not taking my own biases or wishes into account when I evaluate how the world is independently of these things. The cosmic speed limit, at which light travels, limits me just like all the other limits of nature. The most prevalent one, as I mentioned, is the electromagnetic force. I don’t think you quite understand its extent. Provided the strong and weak nuclear forces which keep atoms together at all, which has no immediate affect on our lives, and with gravity having some effect but not a huge amount, the electromagnetic force literally governs how all atoms will interact with each other - neurons included. If they could act in any other way perhaps they would, but they can’t - the neurons will only fire if the electromagnetic force is acting on them in the way it has to, and original thoughts, or any thoughts will only be had if that happens.

There’s still some weird things you keep coming out with that make me think you still don’t quite understand what Determinism is. I hope I’m clearing them up, but I don’t seem to be getting anywhere - you keep talking about being restricted in imagination by Determinism when this is not the case at all - it’s Determinism that will just as much cause you to not be restricted in imagination. To a point, obviously… I already explained finitude in all metrics. That’s not to say imagination can’t be absolutely vast, it’s just that the Deterministic mechanism will cause it to be, if it is.

The 4 fundamental forces: The strong and weak nuclear forces, the electromagnetic force and gravity.

What is this fixation that everyone has about “other people” determining what you do like some kind of master/slave social interaction? That’s not what Determinism is.

Determinism is ubiquitous natural law acting the only way it does on whatever arrangement of things that exist at any given time, across time.

Indirectly it will determine the relationships between people, seeing as it directly determines the firing of neurons to create thought, attitude and behaviour, all the way up in terms of complexity to these relationships.

But it’s like people here think Determinism is a synonym with obedience…

You don’t choose whether or not to obey the 4 fundamental forces, you can’t freely will your way out of that one however much you try, however free your thinking from social convention and common or traditional thinking, however vast and creative your imagination. It was, is and will be Determinism that caused these traits to become as they are and function as they do, or otherwise, in the first place!

[ a hush falls over the audience ]

Let’s work with an operative definition of fallacy here.

It’s when the argument is impossible to prove the thesis it’s arguing against, wrong. This doesn’t mean the argument is not wrong! Only that the argument against, as form, cannot prove the thesis wrong.

So, for example, an ad hom, cannot possibly prove any thesis wrong.

I’m strongly suspecting at this point that the Free Will advocates here are simply suffering from an insufficient education (whether from school or autodidactic - so no excuses concerning indoctrination, please).

Are you saying that a logical fallacy might be applicable to an argument, but the conclusion of the argument might still be correct?

This is obviously true (though claiming clarity doesn’t make it so - I’m still not certain if this is what you mean).

But if the conclusion of an argument is true, but it’s argued fallaciously, then the argument still fails and needs revision and correction!

That’s all I’ve been asking of you: revise and correct. Stop claiming proof when it’s fallacious. Admit when a premise is unsound. Be willing to explore avenues that might weaken your conclusion or even make it wrong outright.

But it’s never been clear whether or not any of your conclusions are correct because your argumentation itself is so bad.