this post was submitted on 08 Jul 2024
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Three possibilities come to mind:

Is there an evolutionary purpose?

Does it arise as a consequence of our mental activities, a sort of side effect of our thinking?

Is it given a priori (something we have to think in order to think at all)?

EDIT: Thanks for all the responses! Just one thing I saw come up a few times I'd like to address: a lot of people are asking 'Why assume this?' The answer is: it's purely rhetorical! That said, I'm happy with a well thought-out 'I dispute the premiss' answer.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago

Things can be true on different levels and false on others. The earth is locally flat, it is as a whole a near sphere.

I don't know if we have free will or not, I strongly suspect that physics can explain our minds fully, but I don't know. At the same time even if physics could fully explain our minds in practice we are so complicated we give the impression that we have a limited amount of free will. So yeah the earth is round but it is easier for us to assume flat most of the time.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

This is the kind of pointless shit that I think of when I smoke too much. If you have a pipe in your hand, SIT IT DOWN 😜

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

No, now I'm old and don't smoke anymore, but my mind still does this stuff to me anyway.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago

Yes, there's an evolutionary purpose for the concept of purpose. If you believe you can do something and show some initiative then you're more likely to get it. The early bird gets the worm, and the bird that anticipated the worm is the early bird. This is true both for humans and cells in a petri dish.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

Look into Kurt GΓΆdel's incompleteness theorem, and the philosophical implications of that.

A lot of times, when we're dealing with the assertion that we don't have free will, we're analyzing that according to rule-based systems. The system that we use to evaluate truth isn't entirely rule-based, and is necessarily a superset of what we can consciously evaluate.

In effect, some less-complex system that is a subset of your larger mind is saying 'you have limits, and they are this.' But your larger mind disagrees, because that more rule-based subset of rights is incapable of knowing the limits of its superset. Though, we just feel like it's 'off'.

If it feels like it's off, there's a good chance that the overall way you're thinking of it isn't right, even if the literal thing you're focused on has some degree of truth.

In short, it's possible to know something that is technically true, but that isn't interpreted correctly internally.

If you accept the model that you have no free will without processing the larger feelings it evokes, then whether or not your internal sense of free will is rule-based, you'll artificially limit the way you think to filter out the internal process you think of as free will. ..and that can have massive consequences for your happiness and viability as an organism, because you've swapped away that which you actually are for labels and concepts of what you are - but your concept is fundamentally less complex and led capable than you are as a whole.

Fortunately, rule-based systems break when faced with reality. It's just that it can be very painful to go through that process with what you identify with.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Help me understand if I am interpreting you correctly:

We have free will in a deterministic universe because feelings?

[–] [email protected] -1 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

I'll help:

You are not interpreting me correctly.

Edit: give a snarky response, get a snarky response.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

If you can reword you initial post, that would be great. I was also having trouble following what you were saying.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

If the concept of the universe being deterministic interferes with one's concept of free will, then one of these must be true:

  • the universe is nondeterministic, or has nondeterministic elements
  • one's concept of determinism is incorrect
  • one's concept of the impact of determinism on one's own free will is incorrect

But of course, that begs:

  • ones concept of free will is incorrect

But that cannot be, because your notion of free will is for you to decide, even if the universe is somehow determinate.

But that doesn't mean the universe is or is not deterministic, it just means one or more of the above three things.

Ultimately, though, I was not making an argument concerning the fundamental nature of free will and determinism, or whether or not the universe is deterministic. I was arguing for completely processing fundamental concepts before you accept them to be true, because often times we accept a lot of false implications alongside the true things we accept.

One's world view holds immense power in one's own life. People do not intentionally act in accordance with things they do not believe to be the case. To accept determinism without fully processing the implications thereof, particularly if it "feels wrong but seems true" is to enter into and sign up for those internal conflicts writ large in one's own life.

I also don't believe that the universe is absolutely deterministic, but that's a different argument that others have made better than I likely would.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Okay, in other words we need to consider our assumptions and definitions of "Free will" and "Determinism" when answering this question?

I really enjoyed this video on Compatibilism, and the view of Patricia Churchland (around 5:50) where she says we should reframe the question away from "what choices we have" to "how much control do we have".

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Close enough. This topic deserves significant care - of course, in the end, though, people buy into whatever they buy into.

Thanks for the link, I'll check it out when YouTube is working for me again

[–] [email protected] 18 points 3 months ago (2 children)

A better question is, is there any difference between the illusion of free will and actual free will. Is there some experiment you could conduct to tell the difference?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

If it's the illusion of free will then whoever constructed it most likely made sure we wouldn't have access to those kinds of experiments, or we wouldn't think of or choose to do them.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago

Why assume that an illusion must have a constructor?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 months ago

Depends, who's choosing the experiment?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago

I think its because we're only just now coming to terms with the fact that we're simply a collection of desires, the culture we were born to and stories we tell ourselves. In keeping, we had to have a story to tell ourselves and free will existing is the more compelling of the two.

I don't think there's an evolutionary purpose. To me, we just became far more self aware than our limited knowledge of the world we find ourself in could cope with and its more of a coping mechanism than anything else.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I have heard somewhere that some people seemed to believe that behind each human's actions, there is some kind of "daemon" that is invisible, but moving the humans like puppets.

This is conceptualized in the theater mask, through which one can speak.

The daemon speaks through the human as a theater actor would speak through a mask. (The latin word for that mask is "persona" (literally "sound-through") and that's why we call a person a person today (because they are controlled by a daemon who speaks through them)).

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago

My deamon is now telling you this theory is convoluted and stupid.

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