That’s funny because most religions preach free will! There is no similarity other than the mention of conscience which is not exclusive to religion. Conscience is an attribute we are born with but often it permits many heinous acts not because it’s not fully developed but only because it permits acts that are justified. This knowledge removes the justification (by removing the hurt) thereby activating conscience to a much higher degree.
Do you have anything that shows that’s how people behave, aside from that’s what is written in your father’s book?
No. His observations pan out. The way conscience works can be seen even in young children. If he was wrong about how conscience works, his discovery would fail. Will it? I don’t think so. Just keep an open mind Phyllo rather than assume he couldn’t be right because you think you found a flaw.
This has been the motive of many dictators and slave owners, that is, to keep those they are oppressing in the dark, but to say that the prey cycle is natural for man has not been borne out, especially in modern times. We are not lions and Giselles; we are humans who have a greater capacity to understand how to create a just environment for all people. Eventually dictators will die out, as will all governmental authority and control not because government is inherently bad, but because there is a better way to achieve peace.
Self-preservation is the first law of nature which justifies doing what one can to survive. I don’t put slave ownership in that category because it doesn’t meet the definition. Slaves were bought and exploited for their labor because it was easy to do and because slaves weren’t seen as human. We have progressed since then but slavery still exists around the world. There is no way I can explain why any kind of exploitation will no longer be possible in the new world. Moreover, if there are no crimes committed then there will be no need for a justice system that has to determine guilt or innocence. “No free will” does not mean no freedom. It is quite the opposite.
Peace girl says:
“There is no way I can explain why any kind of exploitation will no longer be possible in the new world. In addition, if there are no crimes committed, then there will be no need for a justice system to determine guilt or innocence. No free will does not mean no freedom. It is the exact opposite.”
Peace girl You are naive. The reason is the exact opposite: the mere overwhelming strength of unreason, the instinctual cabal of it, that even the most earnest simulation can not unhinge, that is expanding into the te-affirmation of instinct over the it, and artificial intelligence minus the human element may not overcome it’s residual over-the top engorged slavish authority.
While fear has more power then faith in something, worth while, Nature’s left side will always gain upper hand. No doubt about it, for if there was, we wouldn’t be weighing it 2000 years after the first democratic principles were set into place.
The middle aged hermenautics literally point to this alchemy, this sorcery, within the glowing letters of illuminated works still shine through, but so obleauely, so faintly after the twilit terrain.
Check out the caste system in India.I propose that the peaceful non aggressive way to treat outside determination due to various factors like immigration on top of ‘national autonomy’ only put a spin on interpretation on what it means to be free by elective choice.
Freedom appearently is merely a conversion, former ‘cast’ lots suddenly liberated resulted to a state not unlike that of the repressed alcoholic, suddenly going cold turkey, and going crazy with a state of newly found mind that explodes into a far worse course: all the repressed energy expressed in terms of violance and counter casting of the same old same old unto the naive and the hopelessly powerless.
How can such muster the power to will otherwise?
Having no free will does not mean the choice made previous wasn’t their own. It was. Of course the more knowledge and understanding that is acquired when making a choice, the less chance for mistakes, but this, once again, is getting off track. For the purposes of this discussion, I am only establishing that man’s will is not free and the other side of the equation which is: nothing has the power to make man do what he makes up his mind NOT TO DO. Until this is accepted as a proposition (at least tentatively), we can’t move forward.
There will always be external variables that have an effect over said choosing, but as long as no one is hurt by another’s choices, they will be free to do what they want. Let me repeat: Having no free will does not mean less freedom.
The book explains that control of any kind will be removed including anything that tries to stop someone from criminal activity such as putting locks on doors. We won’t need locks because no one will desire to steal under the changed conditions. We will have more freedom than can be imagined. I know this sounds impossible, but that’s because you don’t understand yet why our true nature (no blame) is the solution.
We can only move in the direction of what offers us greater satisfaction. When not to hurt others (than to hurt others) becomes the better alternative, our problem is solved since to hurt others becomes the least preferable choice, which choice is impossible to prefer. Unless you understand why this is so, you will Pooh Pooh anything else I try to convey in a thread that can only give sound bites.
What is needed is a thorough investigation by open minded researchers to determine whether this knowledge is accurate. This cannot be done in a thread like this when the first three chapters haven’t even been read let alone the entire book. This is not giving this knowledge justice. No famous philosopher has been given a cursory review. Their ideas were dissected from every angle. He was an unknown but that does not mean his discovery is not worth anyone’s time.
I’m not naiive. Economic security is the driving force which will wipe out all hierarchies, including India’s caste system. You say people who have been repressed will explode into a far worse course. Repressed energy does not mean violent behavior will automatically manifest as long as they have gainful employment and community support. It’s the same as someone being let out of jail. The recidivism rate goes down as long as the ex-cons have a stable job and aren’t thrown out in the street. If they are ostracized, then they will more than likely do something that will put them back in prison.
This is anything but a stupid debate. The knowledge that man’s will is not free is the solution to many of the world’s problems.
What do you even mean? I don’t think you know what you’re saying otherwise you would be more specific.
This “stupid debate” doesn’t get much more bizarre and surreal than that!!! 
There are levels with currents and crosscurrents.
Man is intrinsically free to choose with the perceived objective in mind but constrained by the subtle intricancies of karmic law.These will get there regardless of illusive sidetracks and hence appearent conflicts tend to pull downward into more genetal criteria of choice which beg for more analysis and tend to reject fate in the true transcendental object.
Reversely we can get confused by the large array of more generally ideal choices and get to places with no exit and one way signs all over. The whole downward path illuminate the mazelike character of proof of faith.
Neoplatonism is such a necessary illusion.
We are able to do all those things you believe requires free will, which it does not. Having autonomy, for example, does not require free will. It just means having the freedom (no external control) to do what you want. Natural law cannot force you to do anything you make up your mind not to do, remember? You can’t use the excuse that the laws of matter made you do something because nothing has that power.
The proof that will is not free is the fact that, under the changed conditions of a no blame environment (remember, many changes have to take place before this principle can effectively operate), no one could desire to choose B (to hurt someone) over A (not to hurt that person) when not to hurt them becomes the preferable choice. That is why will is not free otherwise a person could choose B over A under any condition.
We all know there are psychopaths and sociopaths that may be too far gone, and would need to be contained, but there aren’t as many as you may imagine. Moreover, this behavior will never be able to continue as a new generation is born under these new conditions. Most people would agree that the term “hurt” means doing something to someone that they do not want done to themselves. Most people don’t want to go hungry, be shot at, be stolen from, or be exploited, which is why we can call it an objective standard. To remove all hurt from the environment is a serious challenge, but once it is, there will be no justification to harm anyone with a first blow.
There is no mathematical standard as to
what is right and wrong in human conduct except this hurting of
others, and once this is removed, once it becomes impossible to desire
hurting another human being, then there will be no need for all those
schools, religious or otherwise, that have been teaching us how to cope
with a hostile environment that will no longer be. In fact, since
anyone who tells others how to live or what is wrong with their
conduct blames them in advance for doing otherwise — which is a
judgment of what is right for someone else — all sermonizing and the
giving of unasked for advice are displaced.
Or:
We are “able” to “do” all those things you “believe” requires free will, but you’re “incorrect”.
You know, in my own rendition of a no free will, wholly determined universe in which human brain matter is just more, well, matter.
Back again to this:
For her, people utterly lacking in free will somehow still want some things and not want other things.
And, though, given all of the conflicting goods that have rent the species now for thousands of years, conflicts in which the fact that what some want results in hurting others, the author has taken that into account up in the stratosphere that encompasses his own “world or words” resolutions.
Not that it could ever possibly have been otherwise.
None of the intricacies change the direction we are compelled to go. It’s as basic as that. We are not analyzing the illusive sidetracks and apparent conflicts that beg for more analysis. We are not talking about what appear to be signs with no exit or a large array of more generally ideal choices. I am talking about form. You are talking about content.
There are no world of words resolutions up in the stratosphere that he is using. You are too stuck on this archaic definition of determinism to even consider the possibility that this more accurate definition could be correct. The truth is that natural laws of matter cannot compel you to do anything against your will, which is implied in the very definition you’re using.
Note to nature:
Your call.
If the choice isn’t ever our own, what’s thinking?
This thread is about a discovery even though it is titled determinism. Unfortunately your mind has so much interference from other philosophies there is no way you are able to tease out what the author is saying. I have to thank you because I need to activate to my original thread: New Discovery. A general thread on determinism was a bad idea. This was my error not yours Meno! Please don’t take this personally!!
Very Zen.
More to the point, the part where we think, feel, and intuit [given a truly visceral certainty], that we are doing it because we opted to do so of our own free will.
How can any hard determinist not take pause with that?
On the other hand, here I go back to dreams. Last night I had a truly elaborate “work dream”. Back to the company I worked for for over 25 years. Back to a work context I know like the back of my hand. Back to people I interacted with for years. In the dream I was thinking about what I was doing and exchanging conversations with those who were reacting to what I said and did. People popped up in the dream doing things that were out of the blue. But there I was in the dream thinking about what I was seeing and sharing what I thought about it with others.
Only it was all “just a dream”, right?
But how to explain a world in which from my point of view in the dream I was not dreaming at all. I was “experiencing” instead what I perceived to be the real deal world.
Peacegirl: Dreams can be very realistic but what does this have to do with having free will?