is there free will?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Quite, but why bother to try and prove us wrong if the world is deterministic. Then it doesn't matter either way.

[Andres]

Quite, but why bother to try and prove us wrong if the world is deterministic. Then it doesn't matter either way.

Determinism is just an excuse for hippies and communists to be lazy

"It's not my fault that I'm lazy! I was determined to be so!"

Bah.

[The Stranger]

Quite, but why bother to try and prove us wrong if the world is deterministic. Then it doesn't matter either way.

u make a mistake here. if the world really was determined they have no choice. they just do it and why they do it is something we and they dont understand. i agree with you that if it was divinely determined there would be no sense in this argument, why would a god let his subjects talk possible heresy etc. but if its more bodily determined than there are no reasons only causes for what we do.

With determinism, your actions are merely predictable, not "externally directed"

what kind of determinism is that? they are not merely predictable, they are predictable because everything is cause and effect, so if you know that cause and of everything you can logically determine its effect and so on. so its indeed not neccesarily externally directed... hmm...

[Sasaki Kojiro]

you should google the deciscion inducer thought experiment.

This one?

Jones has resolved to shoot Smith. Black has learned of Jones's plan and wants Jones to shoot Smith. But Black would prefer that Jones shoot Smith on his own. However, concerned that Jones might waver in his resolve to shoot Smith, Black secretly arranges things so that, if Jones should show any sign at all that he will not shoot Smith (something Black has the resources to detect), Black will be able to manipulate Jones in such a way that Jones will shoot Smith. As things transpire, Jones follows through with his plans and shoots Smith for his own reasons. No one else in any way threatened or coerced Jones, offered Jones a bribe, or even suggested that he shoot Smith. Jones shot Smith under his own steam. Black never intervened.

Well, I agree that not having the ability to do otherwise is not a threat to free will. I don't think you need the thought experiment though, although I guess it helps.

what kind of determinism is that? they are not merely predictable, they are predictable because everything is cause and effect, so if you know that cause and of everything you can logically determine its effect and so on. so its indeed not neccesarily externally directed... hmm...

I say "merely" because it's simply not bad thing if our actions are completely predictable by some sort of omniscient thing, even though people present as if it is a bad thing. The fact that you can predict what I'm going to choose, that I was always going to choose it, simply isn't that relevant. It doesn't change the fact that I'm the kind of person who would choose it in that circumstance, just as it doesn't make Jones not a murderer.

[The Stranger]

This one?



Well, I agree that not having the ability to do otherwise is not a threat to free will. I don't think you need the thought experiment though, although I guess it helps.



I say "merely" because it's simply not bad thing if our actions are completely predictable by some sort of omniscient thing, even though people present as if it is a bad thing. The fact that you can predict what I'm going to choose, that I was always going to choose it, simply isn't that relevant. It doesn't change the fact that I'm the kind of person who would choose it in that circumstance, just as it doesn't make Jones not a murderer.

yes that is an example of the experiment. i like it, though its a bit ethically related.

just a note, free will applies to the will of humans so far this discussion is concerned and indeed does allow for other parts of the world to be determined. such as when you drop a stone or when somethning happens on cellular level. there is a difference between that determinism and a determined will, ergo no free will at all.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

u make a mistake here. if the world really was determined they have no choice. they just do it and why they do it is something we and they dont understand. i agree with you that if it was divinely determined there would be no sense in this argument, why would a god let his subjects talk possible heresy etc. but if its more bodily determined than there are no reasons only causes for what we do.

Actually, I made a naughty rhetorical flounce and you caught me . However, if one admits that everyone here actually believes they have free will (otherwise why are the determinists arguing with me, regardless of whether their belief is determined they clearly believe they can argue with me.) then that begs the question of why we should think the world is deterministic. Cause and Effect does work, broadly speaking, but it's not reliable.

Increasingly we find that answers beget more questions, formulae end in curves rather than finite results.....

there's clearly something fishy going on.

[The Stranger]

I think i found a way to say what i want about free will and irrationality. i had to read sartre for it so if things sound familiar thats why. its still unpolished, so spill your thoughts about it.


Rationality is not prerequisite for free will. Because it is the capability of humans to be irrational which is also part of our free will. Animals cannot be rational, but they cannot be irrational either. Their nature coincides entirely with their being, thus they always act optimally for their cause, which is the survival of their being. No animal will starve himself for a noble cause other than its own survival. Human nature however does not entirely coincide with their being, they have the ability or the choice so to speak, to be of another nature. Humans have the possibility, the choice, to be irrational. To not act optimally in regard of their cause, to play games while they should study, or to starve while the body demands food. This is because human nature allows for more causes than the survival of its being. However the survival of its being is the cause from which all other causes derive, so it is the primal cause. If one would (knowingly?) something which would harm this cause, like smoking cigarettes, this would be irrational, even though it is optimally in pursuit of a secondary cause, pleasure.


i also have a whole part about being conscious of these cause and desires but that part needs some more work. it all was very clear untill i started to right it down and got lost in the words...

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Actually, I made a naughty rhetorical flounce and you caught me . However, if one admits that everyone here actually believes they have free will (otherwise why are the determinists arguing with me, regardless of whether their belief is determined they clearly believe they can argue with me.) then that begs the question of why we should think the world is deterministic. Cause and Effect does work, broadly speaking, but it's not reliable.

Increasingly we find that answers beget more questions, formulae end in curves rather than finite results.....

there's clearly something fishy going on.

You keep starting with the assumption that having free will must mean that determinism is false...

Consider:

1) Unless there are special circumstances, people should be held morally responsible for their actions
2) If you can't reasonably foresee the consequences of your action, that would be one such special circumstance (e.g. if I pat you on the back and you die, I should not be called a murderer)
3) In order for you to be able to reasonably foresee the consequences of your action, the world can't be random, it needs to be causally determined

Therefore: Moral responsibility requires causal determinism.

I just don't get why you are intent on dismissing determinism

The more random the world is, the less you can hold people responsible for their actions. If my choices are random, I'm not choosing them.

*****

Our actions being causally determined is no reason to say we don't have free will. Generally the argument goes something like

1) determinism means that under circumstances X, you must do A
2) if you must do A, you have no choice in doing A

Therefore: if determinism is true we have no free will

When really it should go

1) determinism says that under circumstances X, what will happen is that you will do A
2) if you must do A, you have no choice in doing A

Therefore: under circumstances X, you will do A (premise 2 is irrelevant)

So cause and effect doesn't force us to make the choices we will make, it simply describes the choices we will make. For comparison take Greshem's law:

[Gresham's Law is] the theory holding that if two kinds of money in circulation have the same denominational value but different intrinsic values, the money with higher intrinsic value will be hoarded and eventually driven out of circulation by the money with lesser intrinsic value.

So when a government starts printing money like bad, people will hoard gold. Do they do so because of Greshem's law? No. Greshem's law simply describes what people do in that situation.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

1) determinism says that under circumstances X, what will happen is that you will do A
2) if you must do A, you have no choice in doing A

Therefore: under circumstances X, you will do A (premise 2 is irrelevant)

So cause and effect doesn't force us to make the choices we will make, it simply describes the choices we will make. For comparison take Greshem's law:

So when a government starts printing money like bad, people will hoard gold. Do they do so because of Greshem's law? No. Greshem's law simply describes what people do in that situation.

I know, which is why people cannot be held responsible for their actions in a deterministic system. No one ever acts, or chooses they merely react. Further, it goes against what we percieve to be true, that we make choices. To borrow a Calvinistic principle, and thereby undercut Rhy, Free Will should be accepted against determinism because of utility. If we truly believe our choices are pre-determined by our environment we have no reason to act morally, or act at all.

Under a genuinely dterministic philosophy a human being would be unable to make choices and would simply grind to a halt.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

I know, which is why people cannot be held responsible for their actions in a deterministic system.

I just explained why determinism is required to hold people responsible for their actions

No one ever acts, or chooses they merely react. Further, it goes against what we percieve to be true, that we make choices. To borrow a Calvinistic principle, and thereby undercut Rhy, Free Will should be accepted against determinism because of utility.

They can both be accepted because they are compatible with one another.

If we truly believe our choices are pre-determined by our environment we have no reason to act morally, or act at all.

Under a genuinely dterministic philosophy a human being would be unable to make choices and would simply grind to a halt.

That's fatalism, not determinism. They aren't the same thing

[Rhyfelwyr]

To borrow a Calvinistic principle, and thereby undercut Rhy, Free Will should be accepted against determinism because of utility. If we truly believe our choices are pre-determined by our environment we have no reason to act morally, or act at all.

Under a genuinely dterministic philosophy a human being would be unable to make choices and would simply grind to a halt.

I object to the idea that the inevitability of our actions removes personal responsibility. Maybe you could not have done things differently, but that does not change the fact that you are what you are. If you are a sinner, you sin. If regenerated, good works should follow. The notion that in order to be responsible for something, we must make a rational choice to do it, is a very modern one based on the idea of all people being rational agents with free will. If someone gets drunk and kills a guy in a bar fight, he is still held responsible, even if he was unable to use his rational faculties, and acted purely on his animalistic instincts. If a dog bred for fighting mauls a baby, you put it down. It didn't make a reasoned decision, it was just being what it is.

To put a more theological perspective on things, "Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?" (Romans 9:20)

@Sasaki: I think maybe part of the confusion we are all having is due to what we mean by free will. When PVC and myself debate the issue, we always tend to refer to the idea of 'libertarian free will', where freedom is defined as the ability to take more than one path. I get where you are coming from in your arguments, but the issue is that with compatabilitist views, they don't tend to make allowance for the possibility of alternative time lines, or different paths through our lives.

In the reality you describe, everything is inevitable. I was always going to be here typing this post, not one detail of it could be different. This is freedom insofar as we can act according to our nature and our will, but it is not freedom in the sense that the term 'free will' has always been used in philosophical circles, since that suggests a choice. With your view of freedom, everything is inevitable. With libertarian free will, there are countless possible outcomes for the future.

[The Stranger]

I object to the idea that the inevitability of our actions removes personal responsibility. Maybe you could not have done things differently, but that does not change the fact that you are what you are. If you are a sinner, you sin. If regenerated, good works should follow. The notion that in order to be responsible for something, we must make a rational choice to do it, is a very modern one based on the idea of all people being rational agents with free will.

how can you be responsible for something you have no power over? you are not responsible for being a human, nor being a man or a woman, even though that is who you are, in the sense that that is your being. you have responsibility for being born in a certain place and time. and only if you have a choice to change your nature, (eg how you are) than you can be held accountable for that. but you have no choice about how you are, than how you are is similar to who you are. and you cannot ever be held accountable for who you are.

If someone gets drunk and kills a guy in a bar fight, he is still held responsible, even if he was unable to use his rational faculties, and acted purely on his animalistic instincts. If a dog bred for fighting mauls a baby, you put it down. It didn't make a reasoned decision, it was just being what it is.

we hold him accountable for drinking too much in the first place and therefor he knowingly put himself in a situation he could no longer hold himself in check. no one holds a lion accountable for killing a gazelle. we only put down the dog because we reasonably foresee that the dog, who is not rational might kill again because he is not capable of controlling or changing his nature.

im not sure whether that the possibilty or the illusion of free will might be enough to account for responsibility. such a situation as the descision inducer are difficult, and i have to think more about it. in a logically ordered universe with a rational omniscient and omnipotent deity i think the possibility is enough, but in a causal determined system without a rational reason but only cause and effect, i doubt that is enough. however, if that illusion or even the possibility cease to exist than there is no reason to hold people responsible for their actions.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Well, if you are going to use smileys to be rude I could just leave, you know.

I just felt like I was repeating myself.

Causation is required to reasonably determine the outcome of a proposed course of action, but in order for someone to be held responsible they must have a choice, i.e. at least two options.

But this depends on how you define choice and options. If I leave the bar drunk, I do have the option of calling a cab instead of driving home. That's very easy and very doable--I am capable of it, and in fact with a minor change (say, having been told recently about the legal penalties) I might have made the right choice. Doing that is an option for my personality. It may be that, given my personality, I was always going to choose to drive home. But that doesn't mean I didn't have the option not to. I only didn't have the option if you see the laws that "govern" human behavior as proscriptive rather than descriptive.

No.

Do you see why I think they are compatible?

Fatalism is the directing of events by an outside force, i.e. God. Determinism assumes the system directs itself. Your "causal determinism" is absolute and its results are therefore the saem as a fatalistic system.

Fatalism assumes that that, for example, I don't need to wear my seatbelt because the date of my death is already set in stone. But of course, not wearing a seatbelt might be what kills you. Determinism says "I'll wear my seatbelt out of habit".

In the UK there is a defence against murder called "autonomy" where the accused's faculties and decision making are deemed to have been bypassed by an outside agent. In your system:

"determinism says that under circumstances X, what will happen is that you will do A"

So, under the correct circumstance Harry will murder his wife, and under those exact circumstances Harry would always muder his wife. Therefore he cannot be held responsible because he is subject to the external circumstance.

So Free Will in your system merely appears to exist because you cannot accurately measure all the variables and therefore accurately predict the outcome of a situation.

But what I was disputing is that he was "subject" to anything. The laws don't govern us, they describe us. In the Greshem's law example, people aren't forced to hoard gold because of greshem's law, remember?

You can hold him responsible for his character by the way. Someone who has the character to murder someone in an argument or for money etc can be deemed immoral, even with determism, don't you think?

I object to the idea that the inevitability of our actions removes personal responsibility. Maybe you could not have done things differently, but that does not change the fact that you are what you are. If you are a sinner, you sin. If regenerated, good works should follow. The notion that in order to be responsible for something, we must make a rational choice to do it, is a very modern one based on the idea of all people being rational agents with free will. If someone gets drunk and kills a guy in a bar fight, he is still held responsible, even if he was unable to use his rational faculties, and acted purely on his animalistic instincts. If a dog bred for fighting mauls a baby, you put it down. It didn't make a reasoned decision, it was just being what it is.

I agree

That's what I was trying to get at with "holding people responsible for their character".

@Sasaki: I think maybe part of the confusion we are all having is due to what we mean by free will. When PVC and myself debate the issue, we always tend to refer to the idea of 'libertarian free will', where freedom is defined as the ability to take more than one path. I get where you are coming from in your arguments, but the issue is that with compatabilitist views, they don't tend to make allowance for the possibility of alternative time lines, or different paths through our lives.

In the reality you describe, everything is inevitable. I was always going to be here typing this post, not one detail of it could be different. This is freedom insofar as we can act according to our nature and our will, but it is not freedom in the sense that the term 'free will' has always been used in philosophical circles, since that suggests a choice. With your view of freedom, everything is inevitable. With libertarian free will, there are countless possible outcomes for the future.

Thanks, that does indeed seem to be the argument. But, the libertarian view and the compatibilist view can't both be correct, yes? I think the libertarian view has a lot to answer, and that if you can get your head around the compatibilist view you can see that determinism is no threat at all to free will.

In other words, I have my definition of free will, but I can't just claim that it is the correct one. Whether the definition is correct is a viable (and essential) source for argument.

[The Stranger]

You keep starting with the assumption that having free will must mean that determinism is false...

Consider:

1) Unless there are special circumstances, people should be held morally responsible for their actions
2) If you can't reasonably foresee the consequences of your action, that would be one such special circumstance (e.g. if I pat you on the back and you die, I should not be called a murderer)
3) In order for you to be able to reasonably foresee the consequences of your action, the world can't be random, it needs to be causally determined

Therefore: Moral responsibility requires causal determinism.
.

actually that is why that kind of moral responsibility requires causal determinism. because that kind of moral responsibility is based on its consequenses and not on its intentions. moral responsibility based on intentions doesnt require causal determinism.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

actually that is why that kind of moral responsibility requires causal determinism. because that kind of moral responsibility is based on its consequenses and not on its intentions. moral responsibility based on intentions doesnt require causal determinism.

But is having "good intentions" enough? I don't think so. You have to have good reason to back it up. And without causal determinism, you can't be reasonably expected to know what your actions will do.

And even your intentions would change randomly without causal determinism...

The free will you would have without determinism is the type no one would really want.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Well, if you are going to use smileys to be rude I could just leave, you know.

I just explained why determinism is required to hold people responsible for their actions.

Causation is required to reasonably determine the outcome of a proposed course of action, but in order for someone to be held responsible they must have a choice, i.e. at least two options.

They can both be accepted because they are compatible with one another.

No.

That's fatalism, not determinism. They aren't the same thing

Fatalism is the directing of events by an outside force, i.e. God. Determinism assumes the system directs itself. Your "causal determinism" is absolute and its results are therefore the saem as a fatalistic system.

In the UK there is a defence against murder called "autonomy" where the accused's faculties and decision making are deemed to have been bypassed by an outside agent. In your system:

"determinism says that under circumstances X, what will happen is that you will do A"

So, under the correct circumstance Harry will murder his wife, and under those exact circumstances Harry would always muder his wife. Therefore he cannot be held responsible because he is subject to the external circumstance.

So Free Will in your system merely appears to exist because you cannot accurately measure all the variables and therefore accurately predict the outcome of a situation.

actually that is why that kind of moral responsibility requires causal determinism. because that kind of moral responsibility is based on its consequenses and not on its intentions. moral responsibility based on intentions doesnt require causal determinism.

Generally morality accounts for both, so you would need a regular mbut not wholly deterministic system.

[The Stranger]

But is having "good intentions" enough? I don't think so. You have to have good reason to back it up. And without causal determinism, you can't be reasonably expected to know what your actions will do.

And even your intentions would change randomly without causal determinism...

The free will you would have without determinism is the type no one would really want.

i agree with you. i believe free will is causally determined in this way. you get born into a situation, one you dont pick, you get thrown into it. and the descisions that are made for you and you will make later will determine the course of your life. you cannot choose the situation you get into, but you can choose freely from the options your situation presents you. so to speak with sartre, the enviroment (taken very broadly) never limits your freedom, it only situates it. but you never wholly reasonably foresee the outcome of your actions, so even though you can somewhat guide the course of your life you cannot entirely direct it, and its not determined from the moment you are born. i simply dont believe that you can foresee the future (you can definitly not predict it in this system) because time is not constant.