There’s No Such Thing as Free Will
But we’re better off believing in it anyway.
Stephen Cave in The Atlantic
First of all, let’s step back.
Here’s a man writing an article on free will in The Atlantic Magazine. A magazine that I subscribe to. He seems to be convinced that we really don’t have free will. The science, he notes, seems rather certain about it. So somehow billions of years ago a Big Bang resulted in stars exploding…producing all of the heavier elements that somehow configured into living matter that somehow configured into self-conscious thinking matter that created the internet that allows us to communicate about determinism here and now. And all of this is entirely embedded in “immutable laws of matter” such that none of it could never have not happened.
Don’t even pretend to think you know if this is true. Well, unless, of course, one way or the other you can demonstrate that it either is or is not.
Does this?
See the problem? If in fact human autonomy is entirely an illusion wholly subsumed in the only possible reality there can ever be given the immutable laws of matter, it makes no difference what any of them [any of us] think, feel, say or do…they [we] were never able not to think, feel, say and do them.
Same thing:
Or, again, is this all me? Is a point being made here that I keep missing? And how on earth do I go about determining if I am missing it because I am free not to miss it or if I was never able to not miss it until one day I am in fact free not to miss it, get it, and my whole frame of mind here changes.
There’s No Such Thing as Free Will
But we’re better off believing in it anyway.
Stephen Cave in The Atlantic
Again, how surreal this can all become! We don’t have any way to determine if in fact, beyond all possible doubt, we do have free will. But if tomorrow a team of scientists published a paper that caught the attention of the media around the globe…a paper that did claim to establish beyond all doubt that we do not have free will, how might different people react to it? What would change? What could change?
There doesn’t appear to be any definitive way in which to demonstrate such a proof. So one of us might conclude that she is not morally responsible and do what she assumes she could never have not done anyway. But she might do it to someone still convinced that we are morally responsible. And here we are grappling to come to a conclusion about what exactly it all amounts to. For example, for all practical purposes.
Which just takes us back to whether or not Vohs and his colleagues were or were not compelled by nature to measure whether these day laborers were or were not compelled by nature to believe they either did or did not have free will. Based on whether their supervisors were or were not compelled by nature to rate them as they did. Then you just keep going farther and farther back in time until you come to an ontological understanding of existence itself. Or God.
Though sure if we really do have free will but you or others are able to convince you that we don’t, to what extent can we be held responsible for doing things that we honestly and sincerely believe that we had no choice regarding.
Our will is free to the extent of our understandings of knowledge. It only grows in its freedom unless one makes the -choice- not to. Which a lot of people do not choose knowledge and so they remain trapped in cycles of victimizing themselves to context.
Determinism determined itself free through the usage of a staircase that is consciousness and wisdom. It may never be absolute freedom, unless wisdom and consciousness ceases in its infinite expanding. An infinity cannot be both infinite and absolute. But freedom does not have to be one or the other, it may be both or neither. Reality is not black nor white, it is a variety of grey shades and colors.
It is true, that is the fun and beauty in conversation and real discussion, criticism and all. It is the crossing of the language barrier, to achieve understanding, not of only oneself, but to understand another as well. I feel that at the root of things, we all wish to live happy and to free one another, not an easily accomplished task, it begins and ends inside.
There’s No Such Thing as Free Will
But we’re better off believing in it anyway.
Stephen Cave in The Atlantic
Okay but who is going to do the study that pins down once and for all whether the students with a weaker belief in free will were never able to not have a weaker belief in free will. Any more than those primed to hold a deterministic view were in fact wholly primed by the immutable laws of nature themselves.
More to the point [mine] why don’t the authors of articles like this point that part out? Perhaps because the universe was set into motion such that they were never ever free to point it out?
I would imagine just the opposite. Assuming we have the free will to believe that we do not have free will – or a greatly diminished free will – would seem to suggest that we either have no moral responsibility for the things we think, feel, say and do, or very little responsibility. Wouldn’t that tend to make things less stressful in that we could merely note that it wasn’t like anything could ever have been any different. Or that only a very small number of things could have been. Same with relationships.
So, what am I missing here?
Huh?
If they came to conclude that life is essentially meaningless then, in a wholly determined universe, even this is something that they could have not concluded.
Then this whole thing about a “weaker” belief? In what sense? That if someone who believes this gets a cee or a dee on their report cards there is some possibility that they have gotten a higher grade if they could figure out a way to know for sure how much if it either is or is not “beyond their control”?
There’s No Such Thing as Free Will
But we’re better off believing in it anyway.
Stephen Cave in The Atlantic
On the other hand, if I believe that the assumption I make about lies in the is/ought world is merely a manifestation of determinism, than the fractured and fragmented sense of reality that I feel is as well. But what troubles most about the assumption I make that, with regard to moral and political value judgments, truths and lies are merely the embodiment of a particular accumulation of variables encompassed subjectively in political prejudices, is unthinkable and/or profoundly disturbing in a world where we do have free will.
Why? Because you can pat yourself on the back for having freely chosen one set of behaviors rather than another. But than I come along and suggest that this actually resolves nothing. What does it really matter if both sides in the abortion wars are able to select behaviors of their own volition, if that volition is merely entangled in this:
If I am always of the opinion that 1] my own values are rooted in dasein and 2] that there are no objective values “I” can reach, then every time I make one particular moral/political leap, I am admitting that I might have gone in the other direction…or that I might just as well have gone in the other direction. Then “I” begins to fracture and fragment to the point there is nothing able to actually keep it all together. At least not with respect to choosing sides morally and politically.
If what we afford for people is of our own choosing then in regard to what?
I would merely tap him on the shoulder and say, “The truth? Given what set of circumstances”? In a world where, say, it can be established that both the Israelis and the Palestinians possess free will.
There’s No Such Thing as Free Will
But we’re better off believing in it anyway.
Stephen Cave in The Atlantic
Dangerous? Well, if we do live in a wholly determined universe and all of this unfolds, the danger and the individual reactions when encountering it? Well, so what?
On the other hand, if we do actually have the capacity to make autonomous choices and an increasing number of us become convinced that we do not, that would become…what exactly? And that’s before we get to the argument of those like me. I can presume to have free will [and in fact have it] but it doesn’t make this freedom any less subsumed in the arguments I make regarding identity, conflicting goods and political economy.
Yes, it works both ways. We can blame others for committing evil acts but we were never able not to blame them. Anymore than they were ever able to not do those acts. And, in turn, evil itself is subsumed in a universe and everything in it literally at one with itself. Same with praising others for doing good deeds. All super heroes and villains become interchangeable in the only possible reality.
The stakes here could not possibly higher. On par, given human autonomy, with the existence of a loving just and merciful God or an essentially meaningless and purposeless world.
Take your pick.
Ah, but then go on to demonstrate why all rational and virtuous men and women are obligated to pick the same thing.
There’s No Such Thing as Free Will
But we’re better off believing in it anyway.
Stephen Cave in The Atlantic
Don’t get me started, right? In a wholly determined universe, society is compelled to defend free will that some are compelled to believe is true while others are compelled to believe it is not true. So that Smilansky is then compelled to advocate illusionism in an article that I was compelled to read in order to be compelled to post words that you are compelled to read.
Now, suppose this is true. How then is the relationship between the true and the good any different from the relationship between two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom in forming a drop of water?
Over and over and over we can only get stuck [ontologically, teleologically] in the gap between the speculations of mere mortals here on planet Earth and the explanation for existence itself.
We come to conclusions that can only be predicated on assumptions we seemingly have no way in which to confirm either one way or the other. It’s just considerably more maddening to some than to others. But only because [some are compelled to insist] because nature commands it.
But: nature as a manifestation of God? God as a manifestation of nature?
Exactly! Only we cannot seem to pin down just how odd arguments of this sort might be. After all, oddness itself is moot when everything is only as it can ever be. And caring about it is no less included.
Again, this is always what I presumed peacegirl was intent on communicating to us. It seemed important to her to point out that the things we come to think and feel result in very real and undeniable behaviors that change the world around us. Had we not chose those behaviors the world would be different. And unlike the changes that occur when a volcano erupts or an asteroid smashes into earth the changes we bring about are as a result of actual conscious matter. Whereas my reaction was always, “so what?”. If we could never have not chosen the behaviors that the laws of matter compelled our brains to “choose” how, for all practical purposes, are the inevitable consequences of those choices really any different from the consequence brought about by mindless matter?
There’s No Such Thing as Free Will
But we’re better off believing in it anyway.
Stephen Cave in The Atlantic
Necessary because in assuming the existence of free will this allows us to invent new ways in which to interact that evolve over time from the nasty, brutish and short lives embedded in precarious dog eat dog law of the jungle interactions to what we now constantly debate back and forth regarding more civilized relationships.
Or necessary because it really doesn’t matter what he thinks – or what you and I think – because necessity here goes all the way back to the very beginning of whatever it is that the very beginning was.
Thus even a discussion of illusionism itself is no less an illusion in that the discussion was “fated” or “destined” to be what it is. Then the even murkier speculation about whether that is a manifestation of one or another teleological font that can somehow be intertwined in a determined universe.
Again: Naturally in what sense?! It always boggles my mind how points like this can be raised without acknowledging that we seemingly have no capacity to ascertain whether or not we actually have any capacity to not make them instead.
Yes, again, to the extent that we do have some autonomy, convincing particular people in particular contexts that we don’t can result in in all manner of calamities. If you actually believe that those who are pursuing the policies of groups like the Proud Boys and QAnon and Trumpworld are entirely in sync with the only possible political reality unfolding in America today then you are convinced in turn that anything you might do or not do in reaction to it is “beyond your control”.
My name is Janis Rafael. I own the rights to the book entitled, Decline and Fall of All Evil. I am not the author. The author passed away in 1991. Since 1959 Seymour Lessans had been trying to bring a major discovery to light, but to no avail. Unfortunately, he was not a member of a leading university and held no distinguishing titles, which became a stumbling block. I recently compiled 7 of his books all related to the same topic in the hope that these concepts would be made easier to understand. Before he died, he gave me 12 tapes where he read his 6th book, Beyond the Framework of Modern Thought. I recently had these tapes converted to an mp3. People can now hear, for the first time, the first chapter and read along with him as he reads and elaborates on the principles involved. It is my hope that this knowledge will be given a thorough investigation by scientists and stamped with the brevet of truth in the 21st century.
“…but to no avail.”
Meaning what exactly?
That it could have been otherwise in a wholly determined universe? That in a wholly determined universe it was possible that if enough people without free will had chosen to listen to him we would be that much closer to the decline and fall of all evil?
And evil in regard to what particular set of circumstances? The evil that liberals see in Trump more or less than the evil that the conservatives see in Biden?
I did not come to debate you iambiguous. I know your position and I cannot make headway because you repeat the same thing. You have no understanding of the definition he’s bringing to the table which is more accurate. Do you even know what his observations were and why he claimed man’s will is not free?
My hope is that anyone who is interested in this topic will read the first three chapters of Decline and Fall of All Evil with an open mind and with no preconceived ideas. That’s not asking too much, is it? Then can relevant questions be answered. I cannot do justice to this knowledge in sound bites.
Peacegirl: I did not come to debate you iambiguous. I know your position and I cannot make headway because you repeat the same thing. You have no understanding of the definition he’s bringing to the table which is more accurate. Do you even know what his observations were and why he claimed man’s will is not free?
My hope is that anyone who is interested in this topic will read the first three chapters of Decline and Fall of All Evil with an open mind and with no preconceived ideas. That’s not asking too much, is it? Then and then only can any questions be answered in a meaningful way. I cannot do justice to this knowledge in a sound bite.
—————-
Could it be similar to Heidegger’s own dual interpretation of Dasein? ( In relation to intentionality)
Me: No. Stop guessing and please read. Otherwise there can be no productive discussion.
Okay, but my point is still this: how exactly is it demonstrated conclusively by your author that you did not come here to debate me because in a wholly determined universe you were never able to [b]not[/b] not come here and claim that?
Same thing. As though what you know here is something that you freely opted to know instead of freely opting to know something else instead. And, of course, the same thing regarding what “here and now” I either do or do not understand.
Same thing. And on and on and on.
An “open mind”? What on earth does that mean in a universe where the mind itself is just more matter in sync with nature’s immutable laws.
Instead, it is the profound mystery embedded in mindless matter evolving into mind itself that still staggers many. How to explain that?
God, perhaps? Sure for some that need be as far as it goes. Given some level of free will, a leap of more or less blind faith.
What, like Heidegger’s own interpretations are not in turn sucked down into this profound antinomy?
And then this part:
The part that, presuming some measure of free will, preoccupies me the most.
Here you are just another objectivist to me. You have invested years of your life absorbing what your author has “thought up” in regard to both determinism and evil. How they are intertwined in his very own TOE “in his head”.
And the only way others are ever able to sustain a “productive discussion” with you is to first accept that what he thinks is the only rational manner in which these things can be thought about at all.
[quote=“peacegirl”]
Peacegirl: I did not come to debate you iambiguous.
He proves will is not free which means that any claim that you could not have done what was done could have been otherwise.
Peacegirl: I know your position and I cannot make headway because you repeat the same thing. You have no understanding of the definition he’s bringing to the table which is more accurate. Do you even know what his observations were and why he claimed man’s will is not free?
Peacegirl: What do you mean “as though what I know here is what I freely opted to know rather than freely opting to know something else? If will is not free, how can I opt freely?
My hope is that anyone who is interested in this topic will read the first three chapters of Decline and Fall of All Evil with an open mind and with no preconceived ideas. That’s not asking too much, is it? Then and then only can any questions be answered in a meaningful way. I cannot do justice to this knowledge in a sound bite.
Peacegirl: I’ve been through this with you already. An open mind is the choice (yes choice, although not a free one) to listen to someone’s explanation
Peacegirl: Mindless matter evolving into mind is unrelated to my proposition.
[quote]
Could it be similar to Heidegger’s own dual interpretation of Dasein? ( In relation to intentionality)
What, like Heidegger’s own interpretations are not in turn sucked down into this profound antinomy?
And then this part:
We have no free will but that does not mean we are mindless robots.
I don’t mean to be rude but I don’t care what you think.
You didn’t.
I never had a chance to discuss what I came to discuss. You never read the link I posted. I can’t blame you for your taking over the thread. I hope other people ask valid questions after reading the first three chapters or there’s nothing to discuss.
And, once again, we go around and around and around in the spin cycle of nature’s washing machine.
In other words, whatever it actually means to prove or to disprove anything at all in a world where what we think, feel, say and do is only as it ever could be.
You know only what nature compels you to know given my own understanding of determinism. I understand only what nature compels me to understand in turn. And here we get stuck…just as philosophers and scientists have been stuck now for thousands of years.
Only, as an objectivist, given some measure of human autonomy, you insist that only that which the author conveys is the One True Path to understanding all of this. Something that “I” would never insist regarding my own subjective assessment.
That’s my point. It just comes down then to whether or not what we have come to think determinism means here and now was or was not the only option.
Your “hope” from my own frame of mind [in assuming that we live in a wholly determined universe] is no less compelled by nature than the “interest” of those who may or may not be compelled in turn to read those chapters.
Our problem here then is the distance between our understanding of these relationships. But that is only really relevant to me if we do in fact possess some measure of willful volition. Otherwise it’s all but the one and the only possible REALITY
Back again to this: “choice” vs. choice. You “choose” to believe that others have a “choice” to read the author. Though it is not an actual free choice. And then when I say “huh?”, it’s all about me not getting it right. As though somehow I could choose to get it right in a wholly determined universe. If only I would do the right thing and think like you do about “choice” here.
How could it not be? Unless somehow it can be demonstrated that mind existed in the universe prior to the biological evolution of life on earth, how is your proposition not inherently embedded in that? Isn’t that the whole point of inventing God and religion? To anchor human consciousness in something that does transcend evolution itself.
Note to others:
What point here am I missing? And, yes, I certainly acknowledge it might be that I am missing this crucial point that she makes. It only comes down [for me] to whether I was ever able “of my own free will” to get it…but fail to.
Okay, so explain in some detail the difference between human beings inventing mindless robots and nature inventing human beings with minds that possess no free will. Insofar as distinctions are made here and elsewhere between the “evil Trump” and the “evil Biden”.
I don’t mean to belabor the obvious, but, in a wholly determined universe, your “choice” not to care what I think was only “yours” to make because, like me, whatever brought into existence nature itself, created in the human species only the psychological illusion of choice itself.
No, you think that I didn’t. Only, unlike me, how you think about what you think about things like this is very different.
Unless, in a wholly determined universe, we are both inherently interchangeable manifestations of the only possible reality there could ever have been.