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Do You Believe in Free Will?
- Thread starter spiritually inclined
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Dirty Penguin
Master Of Ceremony
Yes. Very serious and it's very true.
Sure we have. Not only can we tell where it's coming from..... we know how fast it's going, in which direction it's headed and what affect, if any, it will have.
I can assure you that when the wind is blowing and it hits me from behind then it isn't blowing in front of me. If I feel the wind on my left cheek then I can say with some certainty it did come from the right of me. If it hits my face then I can be sure it didn't come straight down on top of my head. Just because I feel it brushing past my ankles doesn't mean it mysteriously came out of the ground.
Yep....but most of the time they get them right. I live here on the east coast and when a forecaster says it's going to be cold tomorrow because we're getting some cold air from the north....I don't second guess him the next day, when it actually is cold, and assume this cold air just mysteriously came from nowhere.....The fact is we know where it comes from. We even know the mechanisms that produce air flow. So Yes...I was serious. That bible quote is outdated and just flat out wrong.
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idea
Question Everything
Yes.
Freedom is not free though... Freedom to choose is something that is earned...
(example - are you free to play the piano? Not unless you have studied and practiced and earned your right to do so)
32 ...ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
(New Testament | John 8:32)
complete free will you can decide to do whatever you want. We however like patterns and so limit ourselves so that we don't deviate to much from our comfortable pattern.
Those that learn to be able to see past there comfortable pattern are the truly enlightened.
Those that learn to be able to see past there comfortable pattern are the truly enlightened.
In what way is that an "however"?
Truly enlightened are beyond a set and comfortable pattern?
idea
Question Everything
I don't believe that "nothing" existed initially.
Hebrew Word Studies
The English word "create" is an abstract word and a foriegn concept to the Hebrews. While we see God as one who makes something from nothing (create), the Hebrews saw God like a bird who goes about acquiring and gathering materials to build a nest (qen), the sky and earth.
Should not be "create" in the Bible - it should be "transform".
to have an independent will, part of us has to be independent. The only way for this to be is if we are not created - if we have no beginning. A being with agency cannot be created.
29 Man was also in the beginning with God. Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or made, neither indeed can be.
30 All truth is independent in that sphere in which God has placed it, to act for itself, as all intelligence also; otherwise there is no existence.
31 Behold, here is the agency of man, and here is the condemnation of man; because that which was from the beginning is plainly manifest unto them, and they receive not the light.
(Doctrine and Covenants | Section93:29 - 31)
God is cleaning up a mess He did not create.
He will not violate our agency.
Twilight Hue
Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
Yay for "Numb3rs"!You never were taught about convection causes?
How it works and why future prediction is possible.
I get up in the morning have my coffee, log on to the internet ,watch the news, get dressed, drive to work the same route, same deli to get more coffee, Make the same stops sometimes the same jokes as I make may way to the office, I could go on.
Have you noticed how people repeat the same stories or that you have seen it all before. Could you truly see it all only in your world the world of your pattern that you feel comfortable in. For a test its the weekend now tell yourself that you will stop at a new deli or go a different way to work on monday. I would bet on Monday you do the same thing you do every monday.
Everyone does this even me I constantly try to quit my patterns but they are comfortable and I fall back into them. I'll tell my self today get your coffee at dunkin donuts and before I know it I am at quick check getting my coffee. No one forced me I had free will to go to dunkin donuts but my pattern kept me away. If I consentrate on it I can accomplish a break and in doing so break the predictablilty of the future.
Repetition of experiences... it's all about empiricism? (Note, I'm not about to disagree with that...)
Bravo! But could recognition of this pattern allow us to break free of "free will"? Or is "free will" there in adherence to the pattern, despite our recognition of the pattern?
In other words, do we "break free" of free will to find chaos, or order?
We always have free will. Our adherence to patterns give us the illusion of the hand of fate. Our knowledge of the adherence to patterns gives us back our free will but we are comfortable without it for the most part.
With the knowledge I worry about things less but I still conform for the most part. I do get a thrill when I can purposly break away now and then especially when I find something new and interesting(a rarity)
idea
Question Everything
Are you free to end world hunger? are you free to create peace on Earth? If you are so free to do anything you want, then why are we surrounded by so many things that we do not want? You can talk yourself into thinking that you want what you've currently got - and that is fine - but that is not freedom.
Again, freedom is not free. We have to earn our freedom. The more we work, study, accomplish, the more free we become to do what we want.
Free will requires willpower. No willpower to accomplish anything, no freedom. That is what is wrong with everyone I think... not enough will.
Kungfuzed
Student Nurse
Free will is an illusion created by our ignorance of what will happen. Because we can't see the future, we assume that it is flexible or that there are alternate versions of it. We know the past is fixed and immovable. There is only one present as far as I can tell, I'm only in one place and there is only one of me at any given point in time. So how can a fixed past result in an optional future? It seems to me there can only be one future. There is no way to deviate from it. The past determined the present and the present determines the future. You will choose what you will choose and you can't choose anything else. There is no such thing as "what if" or "what could be" any more than there is "what could have been" or "I should have done". There is only what was, what is, and what will be.
Yes you are you choose not to. Do we need everything we have or do we buy things we don't need. Why don't we end world hunger instead of wasting money. Because you are used to your pattern and it is uncomfortable to leave it. Peace can be created by mankind again we choose not to. People choose not to use their free will. They are comfortable in their life. Leaving the comforts they have is undesirable.
idea
Question Everything
To me, fre will has nothing to do with the flexibility of the future or not. The future could be 100% set in stone, and we can still have free will. The point is not if it is set in stone or not, the point is "who" sets it in stone. If our actions set our own future in stone, then we have free will.
idea
Question Everything
I agree. We have free will, the prob is that most do not use it. Some of us use it. At least some of us use it some of the time. I agree, we all need to use it, and use it more of the time.
Kungfuzed
Student Nurse
The present was already set in stone before you were born. How can you set the future in stone when everything you think, feel, and choose in the present has already been set in stone by previous events? Free will implies that we could do something other than what is set in stone, it is the opposite of fate.
idea
Question Everything
I do not believe that we have a beginning. I think we are self-existent, with no beginning and no end. If the cause/effect web can be traced back to a creator, than the creator controls all… If self-existent, then we are our own cause, if that makes sense. Conservation laws, you don't get seomthing from nothing = everything is eternal, changing form, but eternal. If there is no beginning, then there is no ultimate cause controlling everything, and agency exists.
I keep posting this script.
29 Man was also in the beginning with God. Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or made, neither indeed can be.
(Doctrine and Covenants | Section93:29)
Do you think there is an ultimate beginning? If not, then there is free will.
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Even with wiillpower, we are surrounded by things we do not want. I don't get what this argument is about.