Is free will really an illusion?

[Etritonakin]

You are likely to eat tomorrow -but you can decide what you will eat (from available options), etc.
It's not rocket science (unless you decide to do some rocket science).

 

[EtuMalku]

You are likely to eat tomorrow -but you can decide what you will eat (from available options), etc.
It's not rocket science (unless you decide to do some rocket science).

So, free will is simply the ability to make a decision . . . I completely disagree

 

[Willamena]

You are likely to eat tomorrow -but you can decide what you will eat (from available options), etc.
It's not rocket science (unless you decide to do some rocket science).

Or unless family suddenly drops in and decides they want to take you out to a restaurant. Then "free will" be damned, eh?

 

[JustWondering]

Let's be honest, to some theists freewill NEEDS to exist to support their religious beliefs. People need to be able to make decisions/make choices free of ANY outside influence to justify the claims of their religion. To these people no argument or evidence will ever convince them otherwise because evidence and reason wasn't how they arrived at their belief in freewill in the first place. Evidence and reason wasn't how they arrived at their belief in a supernatural religion in the first place. Just like creationists will ignore evidence and sound arguments for evolution all day long.

 

[Skwim]

It's not "up his alley". They're exactly his words. Glad you pointed it out though... you almost wasted a good opportunity to contribute something meaningful.

So you plagiarized him! Just so you know, plagiarism is against RF rules.

Control can't do anything but arise? So we're not actually pre-initialising control, it just fabricates itself?

"Pre-initialising control"!! What's that supposed to be?

Sounds like you're agreeing but then you fall back into the whole "he did it so he's responsible" thing.

Then read my words carefully. If my sentence still puzzles you I can certainly parse it a bit if necessary.

 

[jeager106]

• parse1
  /pärs/
  
  
  verb
  1. analyze (a sentence) into its parts and describe their syntactic roles.
  noun
  1. an act of or the result obtained by parsing a string or a text.
• I had to look that word up. Nice word.

 

[Etritonakin]

Or unless family suddenly drops in and decides they want to take you out to a restaurant. Then "free will" be damned, eh?

Actually... that is when your will to affect the future is at its greatest.....

 

[Etritonakin]

So, free will is simply the ability to make a decision . . . I completely disagree

You have the right to be wrong -experience the consequences -and eventually accept the truth.

Then -assuming you have not destroyed yourself and everything else -you have the ability to create new truths.

Fortunately, the free will of the original supersedes all others -and governs the infinite rearrangement.

 

[EtuMalku]

You have the right to be wrong -experience the consequences -and eventually accept the truth.

Then -assuming you have not destroyed yourself and everything else -you have the ability to create new truths.

Fortunately, the free will of the original supersedes all others -and governs the infinite rearrangement.

Huh

 

[ryanam]

So you plagiarized him! Just so you know, plagiarism is against RF rules.

"Pre-initialising control"!! What's that supposed to be?

Then read my words carefully. If my sentence still puzzles you I can certainly parse it a bit if necessary.

I made it perfectly clear that the point wasn't my own. How can you even need that explaining? Pre-initialised?... to begin before. Looks like you didn't read anything I wrote anywhere near as carefully as you should. Again though... you're a credit to the community.

 

[sandy whitelinger]

For some, thought is foundational.

I'm not sure what that means.

 

[Willamena]

I'm not sure what that means.

Foundational, in this instance, means the substance that everything reduces to.

 

[Skwim]

I made it perfectly clear that the point wasn't my own.

The purpose of my post wasn't to clarify what you said, but, to let you know you've violated one of RF's posting rules, as well as the universally recognized rule of proper attribution. But hey, if you don't care, so be it. I'll let the moderators take care of it.

How can you even need that explaining? Pre-initialised?... to begin before.

So when you said

"Control can't do anything but arise? So we're not actually pre-initialising control, it just fabricates itself?"​

you meant. . . .

"Control can't do anything but arise? So we're not actually beginning before to control, it just fabricates itself?​

I hope you realize what an odd construction this is, although I assume it means something like:" We don't do anything before we control . . . ." That about it? If it is, it's missing the point. It isn't the who, but the how of the matter.


.

 

[paarsurrey]

Is free will really an illusion?
We can have free will within the limits fixed by G-d.

Free will has been endowed to humans so that if they do virtuous deeds and they are rewarded accordingly, they attain nearness to G-d.
Regards

 

[Etritonakin]

Huh

Not simply..... But certainly it is independent decision-making and all that goes with it. At its core, it is the ability of an individual to make decisions based on anything or nothing.

 

[Henja]

To me, free will doesn't make any logical sense.
If you make a "choice", and then time winds back and you still make the same choice, and no matter how many times..time...rewinds...you still make the same choice, that's of course not free will.
On the other hand, if you make a different choice the 2nd time around or whatever, that's still not free will; rather, it's...arbitrariness. It would prove that your choices are just randomly determined.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

By "your 'choice' " I was referring to the choosing you established in your phrase "that we chose to examine the system in . . . ." rather than a choosing ("choice") unrelated to the examination of the system.

There is no "choice" that exists unrelated to the examination of the system in that our particular "choice" of examination is what determines the outcome.

I would ask why, but I don't want to take us off track here. QM doesn't depend on free choice---choice being the supposed act of a conscious agent.

According to the founders of quantum mechanics (Bohr, Heisenberg, Wigner (!), etc.) and subscribers to the orthodox interpretation of quantum mechanics, it does. But, since I don't like this view and think is it wrong, I'll let it go (at least for now ).

You mean if everyone on earth died there would be no reality? Sorry but I don't buy your necessary reality.

Not at all. Simply that the reality that would exist would be radically different. If there were no "observers"/experimenters to interfere with quantum systems there wouldn't be any reason for the projection postulate to exist. That is, the entire reason for quantum collapse is written into the framework of the theory itself: how we CHOOSE to look determines the outcome. Normally, the effect of such choices is insignificant at best. However, the fact that "free choice" is an inescapable component of quantum theory makes any attempt to deal with causality, free will, consciousness, etc., necessarily a FAILED one unless it is able to explain how any reality emerges from our most successful theory ever when that theory REQUIRES we be able to freely choose.

Right, but in the collapse of the superposition, which will have a cause, there is no cause that determines its end state. Hence utter randomness. The cause of collapse and what it collapses to are two different things.

If I flip a fair coin, what causes it to be heads or tails and nothing else? My fair toss. The outcome is random (it is quintessentially random, in fact, and practically the default example). You have assumed a flawed, linear causal model in which outcomes have specific, unique causes (but have provided neither evidence nor logic for such a causal model). You have given no reason for electing from probabilistic to causally efficacious the role of chance (i.e., you assert that, given an inherently probabilistic system, what causes it to HAVE an outcome MUST be distinguished it from any PARTICULAR outcome, despite the fact that this would make it a system that isn't inherently probabilistic OR inherently random). What "causes" a system to collapse IS what causes it to assume the value it does or the state it does because THAT is what causes it to assume ANY state whatsoever. The fact that the transition is probabilistic rather than linear isn't a causal issue: CAUSING it to assume a state is what causes it to assume the state it does out of those possible. Of course, if you argue that the probability distribution of possible states is somehow causally efficacious, than you must explain how the distribution of infinitely many functions (i.e., random variables) that has no physical existence whatsoever is somehow a causal force despite having no physical existence, instantiation, or reality.

So it would seem; however, the consequence of the superposition collapse says otherwise.

The consequence of collapse is simply that: collapse. It is the outcome of interaction of a particular type with a system that FORCES it into one of a number of possible states. If you assert that the function which determines WHICH of the possible states it assumes is the cause, than immaterial, non-physical, dualistic forces are clearly at play. You are rendering as causally efficacious that which is utterly beyond anything remotely related to the material/physical realm.

Why?

Because quantum physics is useful only because it is predictable, not "utterly random".

Because we've taken the subject of the OP off the topic long enough, consider my"why" here rhetorical. This will be my last word on QM randomness.
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No, because "will" and "thought" don't carry the same kind of meaning as "free."

No. All thoughts have causes.

I wish I had read the red earlier. Fair enough: if it's your last word, I won't bother responding to the last parts and apologize for wasting my time and others' with those parts I have responded to!