Freewill exists

Consciousness is subject to human conditions no doubt, it evolved from the subconscious and unconscious aspects of the mind and reality. A will could be considered as subconscious, one can possess knowledge without being conscious but merely subconscious, animals know things and we did as well when we were in that state of instinctive behavior only.

I would say this is pretty accurate but I try to provide more form to Kant’s/Scho’s argument. You are right Pris and I’m not denying you that, I just am stating that we misinterpreted what the god is, it’s not a being of worship, that was our own misunderstanding and then trying to project such in its form, which we are still today, suffering from such misunderstanding of the texts and contexts of ancient religions/philosophies. I would say the will existed in the form of instinct but it evolved to be more complex and in this becoming complex it inverted and now is in a fight for its own freedom, if that makes sense. Which that is our consciousness coming from subconscious/unconscious evolution, instinctive change on different levels of complexity.

At this present moment in time I would say yeah, it isn’t completely free, but it is a matter of our path that determines how free it may be, I won’t deny or reject the idea of a completely free will that is possible in the future however. It’s a matter of which path we choose, evolution or de-evolution.

i can’t make much sense out of your posts, artimas, because all i see are persistent category mistakes based around certain ways in which you falsely predicate attributes to dispositions as if they are ‘things’ in themselves. read over ryle’s problem (the wiki article is good too) and maybe this’ll make sense. you use the words ‘self’ and ‘mind’ and ‘consciousness’ as if they are additional, superimposed entities onto the dispositions and behaviors we exhibit when we are said to be ‘mindful’ and ‘conscious’.

here’s an example of what ryle is talking about: when we observe artimas laughing and dancing and joking, we observe a series of behaviors which indicate that he is conscious and mindful of what he’s doing. but the consciousness and mindfulness is not to be described with the same predication as those actions which we describe as such. instead, the dancing and laughing and joking is the disposition we describe as ‘conscious’… not that consciousness is doing or being such and such. this is the erroneous cartesian metaphor frequently used in philosophical language. there is no ‘entity’ called ‘mind’ or ‘self’ or ‘consciousness’. these are merely words we use to describe dispositions and behaviors. to talk of them as if they possess qualities and properties like ‘things’ is simply nonsense. unless you are very careful, you’ll do this without even recognizing it. it’s been going on for centuries in philosophy.

I will read it but I am not sure if you are understanding me correctly, I know these things aren’t entities or separate to our being but they also appear in other forms (different entities external to us).

There are entities that are subconscious, there are things that are unconscious (we may not regard them as alive but still instinctual) and there are things conscious, in a result of the unconscious and subconscious experiencing.

we are all three because evolution happened this way, from a point of less complexity to a point of a confinement of vast complexity both past and future.

Unconscious > subconscious > consciousness

Consciousness is doing whatever I personally choose for it, what you observe is Artimas ego or identity in the form of a body, not his conscious mind, the conscious mind is more vast than that one simple action captured in a moment, in that moment I could be thinking of millions of other things for all you know, consciousness is my awareness and not limited to merely an action or expression observable to you, wouldn’t you say the same? It is important to understand this, since you cannot see my conscious mind due to my not being able to portray it in a single moment philosophically, like what art is considered, dancing, expression, etc. the only possible way to understand it is to understand your own conscious mind, you have different values but ultimately, we function similarly if not the same at the root. Make any sense?

Yes, those are conscious things, but they are also based upon valuing. Not merely being conscious. Consciousness is awareness, awareness is expanded through an understanding, is it not? Consciousness evolved out of subconsciousness(lesser capability in understanding) did it not? We are the conscious entities, our nature is timeless awareness.

Self isn’t an entity but it is a collection of ideology or characteristics that an entity is most comfortable with and manifests the ego or body as through understanding it, self is what one may use to create oneself instead of being created by external input, like information and traumas needing to be dissected from ones past due to external input, ancestry and all. The entity is an entity due to a combination of these sections and or past experiences of the mind and what lead up to the mind as a collection, the reason it may sound as if I talk about them as entities is due to the fact that in nature, we can observe it in full effect, animals, reactions, etc. other states of consciousness I mean, the levels or layers of which I try to explain. Unconscious and subconscious, while we may only do such and understand such by being freely aware(conscious).

Chill out, man. I am no “freewillist”, nor do I ever want to type that “word” again :stuck_out_tongue: I’ve been using “Free Will advocate” by the way, seeing as Free Will isn’t a singular term - it’s two terms.
Nor am I a Dualist.

In fact, I’ve made that pretty clear on other threads, though I can’t expect you to have read everything I’ve written. I get that you’re frustrated by people trying to get away with the errors that you’ve pointed out, but everything you said is something I’ve already argued somewhere or other - in fact, I wrote only the other day that Free Will requires Dualism. Are you copying my own points to use against me consciously, unconsciously, or did you come up with that independently? Either way, relax that trigger finger, I’m not your guy.

All I said was that there may be something besides Determinism (alongside it), which is only a nod to models of the quantum realm being so incomplete, but I fully respect the maxim “absence of evidence is not evidence of absence”, and I am certainly against the “God of the gaps” nonsense of ascribing “Free Will” to our gaps in knowledge. The only reason I hedge here is because of the existence of things like Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorems, which may only apply to mathematical axioms, but in the interests of not acting like I completely understand Quantum Mechanics, I’m leaving open the possibility that such logic may apply in physics as well - and even then I only do so extremely tentatively.
My default position until proven otherwise is with Determinism, but I’m not even sure it’s possible to prove otherwise since a requirement of knowledge and proof is logical and/or causal sense, which is Determinism by definition. Epistemologically, this is a much more fundamental objection to “Free Will”. However, with regards to the burden of proof, that is on the proponent of the existence of something. Free Will is more like a lack of something, and causation is a something, putting the burden on the Determinist. However-however, I also agree that “we can never experience causation, therefore it doesn’t exist” is nonsense in the same way that verbs like “to go” don’t “not exist” simply because you can’t experience a “go”. Going, like causing, is a description of ways in which things that exist (nouns) behave, and their existence is in the degree to which the verb matches the behaviour, which causation seemingly does immaculately. However-however-however, if the Free Will advocate is presenting Free Will as a something, or implying of something such as the mind separate from the body/Dualism, and a concrete and precise notion of identity, then I am on your side that the burden of proof is on them in this regard, and they’re running into a dead end.

Does that clear things up?

Easily. Any possibility of indeterminacy in the quantum realm, whose consequences may or may not spill over beyond that realm isn’t “soft Determinism” or “Compatibilism” because there is still no room for Free Will in anything I said in the first part. Indeterminacy might imply “free” but not “will” - if there’s any lack of Determinism between inputs and outputs of decision making, randomness removes from “will”, if anything. It most certainly does not constitute the exact opposite: proof of your will being enhanced or freed.

Soft Determinism/Compatibilism is a position on Free Will and its incorporation with Determinism. This is not what I am doing, therefore no contradiction.

As above, you don’t need an IQ as high as mine to simply read a definition of a term. Compatibilism is a Free Will argument.

I can understand if all you wanted to say was that “for every choice there are restrictions”, but that’s not Compatibilism. If that’s all you wanted to point out then I’d just say yes, obviously, and it’s all completely consistent with hard Determinism.

However, I can’t help but notice the title of your thread “Freewill exists”. So forgive me for thinking “Determinism is better than Free Will” was an appropriate argument…
So to clarify, I apply “Determinism is better than Free Will” to your talk of Free Will, and to “for every choice there are restrictions” I am glad that you agree with me. No straw men here, yes?

I am glad you noticed.

It is a problem in general when one comes up with an argument, and people proceed simply to say what they think instead in response - without even addressing your argument. I would rather set the example of actually engaging with what people set out to discuss.

It seems to be a common instinct in conversation, which irritates me considerably, for people to simply wait for their turn to say what they wanted to say rather than respond to what you just said.

You keep saying that you have all these proofs, but I’m having a lot of trouble finding them, and if I do find something I tend to find it ambiguous. So I look forward to your reply on one hand but on the other hand I hope it’s clear and not more of the same. You also say you have a high IQ, so my expectations are high.

Sillouette:

So here’s the deal.

I’ve shown through a limit proof that absolute determinism is impossible.

I’ve also shown through proof that absolute freewill is impossible.

I’m arguing your point about chaos, which I’m now going to argue fails because of my disproof of absolute creationism, or absolute freewill, that when a person is in an absolute creationism mode (omnipotent), that they are in a random or chaotic system. I’m distinguishing here between chaos and complexity (fractal would be an example of complexity).

So my argument here is that an absolute creative being or cosmos would solve at the limit of as the same as both absolute chaos as well… or just does what it wants without restriction.

I’m basically arguing that because the limits are impossible, that there must be compatabilism.

I used the compatibalism of freewill, and you used the compatibalism of chaos.

This contradicts you saying that compatibalism is a direct contradiction …

Interested in your thoughts.

I defined will as an epiphenomenon of less than 100% determinism … you define that precept as chaos.

The reason I don’t think that argument works is because the aspect of “I exist” (as continuity of consciousness over time) is conceptually inconsistent with the second ingredient being chaos. This argues for a stable will that is less than absolute determinism and greater than chaos.

Is ones present awareness or thinking in and of the present moment not free?

What is not free is more awareness but it does grant more will at ones disposal.

So then in my present moment of not yet choosing, I can choose to pursue a lesser will or a higher will, that choice is not free to me?

An expansion or shrinking of the will is the only truly free choice we get if that makes sense. Due to the free will not being yet confined to a choice. But if we choose a higher will then is that not the freeing of the will itself through choice? Due to expansion of possibilities and choice through a choosing to understand?

Yes and I asked for clarity, and I provided some questions to guide you in the general direction of what I’m asking for. I’m still waiting, if you want to oblige, which you don’t have to.

Was that in the same opening post of this thread? If so, it’s what I’m asking for clarity on. If not, then I’ve missed it - my apologies - perhaps you can link it, or type it out again here as clearly as you can.

Again, can you link to or reiterate this disproof of absolute creationism/absolute Free Will? This is exactly what I’m talking about when you say you have all these proofs and I never see them, or at least if I do they aren’t clear. I seem to remember English isn’t your first language, but your lack of clarity sounds more like imprecise thinking than an issue with the language. “An absolute creative being or cosmos would solve at the limit of as the same as both absolute chaos as well”? What does this mean?? An omnipotent creator doing what it wants without restriction is absolute chaos?

Right, so you’re referring to Compatibilism as a general position, between any thesis and antithesis? All this time I’ve been assuming you were using it according to its normal use in philosophical discussion i.e. as an attempted synthesesis between Free Will and Determinism - especially since that’s what your thread title suggests you want to discuss. The term Compatibilism according with its accepted use in philosophy has nothing to do with chaos, since chaos counters both Free Will and Determinism. So in that sense, I am not talking about Compatibilism when I speak of chaos. But if you want to use the term more generally, please specify - again you’re lacking clarity if this is the case, then sure the notion of “order emerging from chaos” is a kind of “compatibilism” with a lower case “c”. But there is no contradiction between speaking of a relationship between Determinism and Indeterminacy, and speaking against Free Will or Compatibilism with a capital “C”.

Speaking of epiphenonena, Epiphenomenalism is one way in which a sentient being can be intelligent and still 100% subject to Determinism. To be clear, again I am using the term according to its accepted use in Philosophy. Even if there is a non-zero percentage of indeterminacy, that is not will - it is the opposite of will, if anything as I explained in my last post. Also, I wouldn’t be so quick to define the will as a stable concept.

Ok silluoutte,

Here we go, with the proof again.

Determinism as an operational definition is : it could not have happened any other way.

Freewill is operationally defined as: it could happen any other way.

Absent absolute freewill. The argument here for a modicum of freewill is that once we decide, determinism takes over.

So the question then, is “do we decide”?

I gave this proof:

If something happened because of absolute determinism (it couldn’t have gone any other way)

Then the limit for this deterministic argument is that we know every reason why we know what we know, and all of those reasons are EXTERNAL - thus no internal to define or abstract a will (internal)

However, if all of those reasons are internal (absolute freewill) , then there’d be nothing outside to distinguish itself from.

The argument being that at the thought experiment absolute limits allow neither absolute determinism or an absolute creator …

So, then we are stuck with compatibalism.

You then argue that absolute chaos counters both freewill and determinism.

Absolute chaos is a system where refererents are impossible to abstract (not to be confused with complexity)

Since you understand content, and you have given chaos as the defining characteristic of life and the world.

If you want to debate this further…

Define absolute chaos as different than absolute complexity!

They are very different, and you’re confounding the two when debating.

Sure.

The critical word here being “we”, as in a locus of identity.

I will refer you to what promethean wrote on an earlier post in this thread about this:

Identity is an extremely problematic concept. Everyone gains an intuitive understanding of “generally” what it is, but upon examination it’s infamously impossible to pinpoint with any precision.

With the dissolution of identity upon examination, as above re: promethean, neither of these arguments are really a problem.

The “internal” and “external” no longer hold up. Well, I’m assuming they’re relating to identity at least in some sense - I keep asking you to explain these terms, but you still haven’t.

Who is talking about absolute chaos?

I’m not conflating chaos and complexity… where did you get that idea? In fact I wrote just the other day of Determinism that its problem is its complexity, which is harder to apply to simple everyday life, which puts simple-minded people off the idea, and I write of chaos that it’s indeterminate. Chaos: indeterminacy, Complexity: Determinism. I don’t understand how you think I’m doing anything other than the opposite of conflation…

I’ve also said I’m extremely tentative about leaving open room for indeterminacy at all, and even if there is any it’s likely only relevant to the quantum world, and if sensitivity to initial conditions brings these effects above the quantum realm to everyday life, such effects are evidently minor next to the profound success of Determinism pretty much everywhere. That is to say, given indeterminacy, its effects are only going to be extremely marginal - this is the opposite of me speaking of absolute chaos!

The best that chaos can do is to emerge as order in the vast majority of cases, despite originating from chaos. This would still mean that in effect, Determinism reigns in spite of chaos. Still no absolute chaos.

I’m calling straw man.

It’s not as problematic as one would make it seem, the identity, self, the mind in general to be honest.

Do people get an intuitive understanding? Is that why people are lost in society and don’t know themselves and live as complete byproducts of environmentally indoctrinated ideologies that they themselves do not support due to being blinded by satisfaction? Is that why most people don’t educate themselves or seek wisdom? I don’t think most people get an intuitive understanding. I think that may be a projection.

I feel I have given some pretty good points and solutions on how to pin point it, by seeking to understand the self. The hermit is always the “crazy” one though right? He who lives less distracted by isolation and has a great vision from the outside but also inside himself as well.

I did address that post by promethean as well…

Now you are not sure. The problem is you are too arrogant and not acknowledging your limitations.

The more credible proposition is there is no absolute completely free will.

Point is you don’t have a solid grounding in philosophical theories, that is why you are shooting all over. In a way, I think this is good for you if you keep asking questions and hopefully someday you will shoot near the bull eyes rather than everywhere.

Why you are not giving up the idea of a completely free will is due to your internal psychological insecurities. You insist you are well inform of psychology, but you are not, suggest you do more research to ‘Know Thyself.’

Sillouette,

It means squat that identity cannot be found upon closer examination.

That’s true of everything.

If you take a microscope to a tree, it will look nothing like a tree. If you walk 40 miles away, you’ll no longer see a tree.

Our self, like everything that exists is self evidently there as a median of perceptual acuity.

It does not negate the tree when you take a microscope to it, just like it doesn’t negate us of you examine closer or further away.

We exist in a sweet spot, regardless

I never said the Will was completely free, just free but it depends on a choice. The choice is what frees the will or doesn’t free the will, and it is a continuity as well. I know myself and do do psychology. I was never arguing for a completely free will, i can’t say if there is or isn’t an absolute free will because we do not understand everything. The will is as free as one may choose for it to be.

We aren’t talking about god and omniscience here, we’re talking about humans.

Many a times you may think and is so sure you are exercising a free choice, like buying a bar of chocolate at the supermarket counter not knowing the company and advertisers had subliminally compelled you to choose that chocolate via all sort of advertising techniques including subliminal advertising.

One good example is those Muslim ladies who insist they are wearing the hijab or burga [full covering except a slit] based on their free choice, not knowing they are being commanded by some religious zombie parasites within the brain and mind.

In the real world, there are loads of parasites that compel their hosts to act to their commands but in such a way that made the host thinks it is making a ‘conscious’ choice.

There is no completely freewill in whatever sense your expressed it.

Exactly, so I ask again: where. are. the. boundaries. of. internal. versus. external? ? ? ? What are they, why are they? Are they related to identity or not? Why do you keep avoiding all my questions?

Interestingly this whole concept is an issue with fractals, for which a real world example is demonstrated by coastlines. The further away you observe a coastline, the shorter the distance appears to be from one end to the other, or the shorter the perimeter if it’s an island. You might say that to get to the “real” length/perimeter of the coastline you just have to get closer and examine in more detail as is tradition with Euclidean geometry, and the same assumption goes for Newtonian physics. The problem is that the more detail you go into, the longer the coastline… to infinity - like all fractals it diverges, it doesn’t converge like we were all traditionally used to with integer dimensions.

So coastlines are infinitely long? Well how can that be? They bound a finite shape with finite area that does converge to a particular measure, but it takes infinitely long to get around a finite area? Is it then possible to define infinite (i.e… undefinable) edges to real world objects anymore, or is identity relative to the observer like we’ve all now accepted of spacetime in physics since Einstein? In philosophy since postmodernists like Derrida? In quantum mechanics? Even in history, one must be careful not to commit the “Historian’s fallacy”.

Where does this leave us? Well it sure presents problems with identity and any mysterious concepts of “internal” and “external” that I’m still waiting on definitions for… :-"

I am not commanded by religion nor commanded by anyone.

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it - Aristotle.

Just because most people are indoctrinated and do not make choices based on their own free thinking and will does not mean a free will does not exist at all. Education is not a free choice but it does free the will slowly as a reward of choosing to pursue it.

You feel like you aren’t, just like everyone. When you test it or think it through, however, nope - you are.

“It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it” - absolutely. But this has nothing to do with Free Will: the education determines that you are able and going to entertain a thought without accepting it.

This is the normal conclusion of somebody who, ironically, isn’t psychologically “free” enough (willing) to let go of the idea that it’s their “identity” that is in complete control. Of course it’s true that some people are indoctrinated, or unable/unwilling to think/act beyond certain boundaries, and there’s a difference between these people and those who are colloquially termed “free thinkers”. But free thought is just as much determined as indoctrinated or fearful thought, just in different ways.

It’s been extraordinarily difficult to get some people to understand and accept this in my experience, because it’s an emotional attachment and not a rational choice to cling to Free Will. It’s a mental reflex to immediately assume that the person arguing against Free Will is indoctrinated, not a “free thinker” etc. - even if they think they are. “You” know you’re a free thinker, so it must be they who are at fault, right?

I can only say that the last challenge of the “free thinker”, after all free thought is explored, is to be free from the idea that they were ever a free thinker at all.

So you’re saying I follow others ideas without my knowing? What if I told you, I originate my own ideas? you miss the entire meaning of that quote, attachment is what creates a binding of the will, it’s psychologically proven, addicts. So an addict is not less or more free than you given their current predicament of failing to cope normally and not being able to understand themself due to a weak will to desire and value attribution.

Yes, education shows you the possibilities if you make the choice in pursuing it. It is a determined choice that may free the will.

You have a choice, be a slave to others ideas or to be a slave to your own ideas. Which one do you think is more or less valuable to you and why is it valuable? Freedom comes from proper value attribution of ones will. Ignorance being abolished with education. It’s quite literally, a determined choice that grants more will and usually when something becomes /less/ confined, it’s more /freeing/.

At the roots determinism plays a role. But when a will may be expanded by a conscious choice to become less confined how is that not a decision to grant a more free will? Because it was worked for? You reap what you sow and you sow whatever it is you choose to value.

Things have control over people because people place value over things. I’d say there are levels of will like there are levels of consciousness, one is higher than the other, so is this more or less, silhouette? Ones choice is what determines ones will, one can choose to be bound or one can continue to unbind oneself but never being unbound completely until dead.

I wonder why people place /value/ on money, hmmm… maybe because having it is /more/ freeing.

I never stated the identity wasn’t in control, but I may choose my identity based on choosing my environment and letting go of the past, so is that not my choosing to to be my own person, free of others? What is creating ones own environment then?

I do believe in cause and effect and I do subscribe to fate, I do however subscribe to the idea that we may choose our fate. Which is the aspect to our will of which is free.

Overall I think there are layers of determinism and layers of free will within that system. Loopholes if you will.

Besides delving into a Zeno here…

I actually missed that you were asking me to explicitly define internal and external.

My answer is the limit stuff again.

We know for a fact that 100% external is impossible.

So… internal is the remainder.

That simple.

Then we got into a little scrape about whether that remainder was internal or chaos.

I responded that if it was chaos, it wouldn’t be able to hold a stable identity (which is self evident in a very large range - even people with dissociative identity disorder have a stable identity.)

So, I stated that the remainder has to be less than determinism but more than chaos (absolute creationism.

It’s this sweet spot, which is identity, the internal.

It’s a process of elimination here.

Well it was only the 3rd time I asked, so that’s a little worrying when it comes to how much of what I’m saying that you’re reading/retaining.

And this worry is only compounded by your response to my question:

Fine, so internal is “not external” - complex stuff here - but in “answering” half the question, you’ve still not shed any light on the definition of “external” from which to define “internal” as “not that”… - thereby not answering anything at all.

Please do excuse my frustration, but if you could read and try to understand what I’m asking, I would be very grateful.

And the examples I gave of Jupiter’s “red spot” and the Lorenz attractor are examples of a stable identity emerging from chaos…
And the whole point is that identity itself isn’t a stable concept even for people without dissociative identity disorder et al.

Again some things you seem to have either not read, not understood, or not remembered…

If I’m the only one making an effort here then please let me know. Honestly speaking this is why I tend to avoid engaging with you, because the kind of consistent lack of clarity and progress that I tend to get from you is a waste of my time.

And here comes the exact defensive presumptions that I predicted… such a shame.

I know exactly what you’re saying when you say you originate your own ideas, and what you think you mean applies the same to me. But it’s not “free” thought in the sense that it bypasses Determinism, it’s just “free” in that your own effort and inspiration go into it, and any simple repetition is absent. The work and inspiration themselves, however, were determined to occur - so as free as we may be from being told what to think, it’s still not “us” and our wills that are free from everything else.
I’m inviting you to entertain a line of thinking here, you don’t have to oblige me - in that you are “free” in the way you mean it, but whichever way you choose will have been determined by something - even if not directly by other people’s words and actions. This is what closes all these loopholes that you think you see.

I’ve not missed the entire meaning of the quote, and I’m suggesting, as politely as I can that it may be yourself who is “attacted”… just trust me when I say I already understand everything else you argue in this post - you probably aren’t familiar with me as a poster so you probably have little reason to trust me, but it’s true that I already understand your argument.