What was this board's consensus on free will again? I forgot.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joanVUoXY0s

>inb4 compatibilists come in with their smoke and mirrors. Half you guys don't even understand that what you're defending is basically the OPPOSITE of what other people mean by "free will"

Does free will even have a falsifiable definition that can be tested?

The free will discussion is irrelevant to r9k. It only serves to be misinterpreted in a direction that promotes poor choices.

Still no free will is the correct argument.

Basic logic and all the evidence from neuroscience clearly show that free will is indeed an illusion.

The only people who want to defend this notion are:
-religious folks who believe their silly myths (among thousands of similar myths) and need to defend them.
-"muh freedom" libertardians who have to defend their ideology.

"Compatibilism" is just changing the subject.

>>38470703

Sure.


Definition of free will

1
: voluntary choice or decision I do this of my own free will

2
: freedom of humans to make choices that are not determined by prior causes or by divine intervention

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/free%20will

Both of them are demonstrably false. Choices are not determined "voluntarily", by the conscious mind, because the conscious mind experiences nothing in the present. It lives in the past and is essentially experiencing a recording. We never experience reality as it is, only the brain's imperfect impression of how it was.

http://www.salk.edu/news-release/we-live-in-the-past-salk-scientists-discover/

If our conscious minds lived 10 years in the past, no one would try to argue that they could do things in the present. If they lived 10 seconds in the past, maybe a few people would try to argue that, but they would be wrong. It's no different than how it is, with us living 80 milliseconds in the past.

Things that happened 80 milliseconds in the past are every bit as unchangeable and absolutely fixed as things that happened 10 million years ago.

Because our conscious mind doesn't even exist in the present, it can't do anything in the present.

>brainlets attempting to formulate a binary answer for a phenomena which exists on a spectrum

>>38470708

Or, it could be interpreted in ways that promote good choices.

I've seen repeatedly belief in "free will" used to justify child abuse, drug abuse, and recklessness.

>It doesn't matter if I get fucked up on drugs. I'll just use free will to "control myself".

>The harms of child abuse are exaggerated. Abused kids can just take responsibility by using free will.

>Why does it matter how I behave? If others feel bad about it, that's their choice.

Free will belief isn't all sunshine and rainbows. There are a lot of dark corollaries involved.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFJPtVRlI64

>>38470627
Hardcore imperialist (((neocon))) that wants to firebomb Muslim children then gets upset when Muslims punch back.

>>38471107
oh comon he is not a neocon, and he doesn't support first nuclear strike right now on the muslim world.
He was just discussing hypotheticals imagining a scenario in which a first nuclear strike could be taken into consideration.

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>>38470627
It probably doesn't exist

but hey who knows

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Free will is a kike spook for cucking people with (((sins))).

>>38471107
I dunno if he's a neocon. He supports universal healthcare.

He does lack self awareness though. In a recent podcast he calls himself a free speech absolutist and then in the next breath criticises British authorities for not rounding up muslim hate preachers who are literally screaming about jihad on the street corner.

>>38471229

His position on circumcision is also extremely culturally biased and based on massive ignorance of its history, the lack of standardization, and the death toll it inflicts on boys all over the world, particularly in Africa.

>>38470627
What determines how an organism behaves
>cells reacting to stimuli
What we have power over
>not that

Therefor no free will. The end.

>>38471229
Not sure about this, in his recent podcast with Sarah Haider they both agreed that Isis propaganda should be protected by free speech.

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>>38471294

but muh pineal gland

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>>38471294
Hypocrite that you are, for you trust the chemicals in your brain to tell you that they are chemicals. Will fight like a man, or die like a dog!?

>>38471359

If we didn't trust the chemicals in our brain to "tell us that they were chemicals" then we may as well just drink bleach. Hey, after all, we can't trust that it's bleach, and even if it is, why should I trust that my mind can be harmed by chemicals, if it isn't the product of chemicals itself?

Disclaimer: Don't actually drink bleach.

>>38471215
>tfw no stirner video game

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>>38471581

Something couId be done with this...

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Free will is an immanent feature of consciousness.

Everyone knows free will isn't real, but they don't want to give up feeling superior to you because chance has favored them, so they pretend otherwise.

>>38471267
no his view on circumcision is practical as opposed to the ant semetic conspiracy theorists here. Circumcision in third world reduces rates of HIV and AIDS

>>38471636

Conscious experience is based on a reconstruction of reality as it was in the past. It doesn't exist in the present.

Our conscious experience reflects our brain's interpretation of reality as it was 80 milliseconds ago.

If it reflected that interpretation as it was 80 years ago, obviously we couldn't act in the present, consciously. We'd be on an 80 year lag, and what we were experiencing consciously would already have happened.

But that which is of 80 years ago and that which is of 80 milliseconds ago are both equally fixed and unchangeable. The past event of a fraction of a second ago is every bit as fixed as any other event in the past.

>>38471728
Experience is instantaneous for consciousness. Reality is never reconstructed. If anything is illusory here it is time.

>>38471691

HIV infection in most of the "third world" is lower than it is in the USA. It's pretty much only an issue in Sub Saharan Africa, not the rest of the "third world".

India for example has a much lower rate of HIV infection than the USA, despite the fact that aside from Muslims, almost no one in India is circumcised. Same for Honduras, Guatemala, Laos, Sri Lanka.

HIV is extremely rare in most of the third world, even compared to the USA. It's only such a major issue in certain parts of Sub-Saharan Africa, where a lot of people still believe that raping a white woman will cure HIV and a lot of people practice things like "dry sex" which cause bleeding during intercourse.

And the RCTs that purported to show that circumcision was a good way to prevent HIV were loaded with massive methodological flaws.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22320006

If someone as stupid as Sam Harris believes there is no free will we definitely have free will.

>>38471820
Where HIV is prevalent it reduces the rate. For example it hasn't spread as much in the horn of Africa because of circumcision practices

>>38470789
>broscience

>>38470627
Most people here are lazy and feel like their lives are out of their hands due to too much tv/YouTube so they hardly ever get the sensation of free will. the thought experiment is that if everything is determined, then nothing is determined. You can make a valid argument for how much we can control and where to draw the line for "conscious" behavior, but determinism is for high school children who are barely functioning as a model. Determinism to the universe is like a drawing of a square with two holes in it representing a computer.

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>>38472008

There's no evidence that's due to the prevalence of male circumcision. Additionally, there are quite a few African countries where intact males have lower HIV prevalence as a group than circumcised males do.

A protective effect is also not seen in the US. We are similarly developed as the UK and yet their HIV rate is much lower than ours, and their circumcision rate is much lower than ours too.

>>38472051
>the thought experiment is that if everything is determined, then nothing is determined

Elaborate?

>>38472093
>>38472051
Also would like to know what he meant by this.

>>38472051
>free will is real because I want it to be real

>>38472093
If there's no frame of reference for what "determined" relates to, then there is no meaning to the concept. You just enter a conversation where everything may be a simulation in a simulation ad infinitum. There's no more value to the claim then saying that gravity is caused by gravity.

>>38472220
We are humans with human perceptions. You can't escape them in any way. What we call free will is a real part of our experience. If you can't trust your experiences/perceptions, you can't claim the "truth" while using them. People argue what we can control, but only fucking morons dismiss control entirely.

>>38472282

>What we call free will is a real part of our experience

It's not a part of my experience. I don't experience anything like "free will" and never have.

>>38472282
>>38472323

I also have never seen anyone give me the impression they're "experiencing free will" either.

Other people seem to function like me--in response to stimuli, with the responses being based on their conditioning and genetics.

I have never felt anything like what people say when they talk about "free will", and I have never seen anyone else behave in a way that would suggest anything like "free will" to me, either.

>>38472335
Yes you do a real time evaluation of their gene expression to understand their behavior and you can predict it perfectly.

You dont understand it because you're a dummy who spends too much time watching and not acting. It's easier to just watch.

>>38472282
You seem to be refering to free will rather than determinism, there are various versions of each concepts, but determinism in general has rather easy frame of reference and meaning that is easy to achieve. You can easily define determinism and deterministic universe among the lines of "universe in which everything is material and abides by material laws" With imlication of no material laws existing that allows for absolute randomness or brains to bypass the physical laws that limit them.

On the free will is the worldview is less comprehensible, since it usually revolves around the same lines as deterministic ones, except with the unwarrented addition of free will, which is granting unexplained magical power to human's brain (it usually doesn't even involve other animals for some reason) to bypass these established rules.

Granted we really cannot answer the question of free will properly, since our understanding of universe is still extremely limited, however, framework of no free will is way more solid and straightforward and doesn't rely on special pleading.

Your argument seems to be among the lines of "I think I experience free will and don't understand what having no free will would mean, so I don't need to account for it.", which is probably agreeable and possible true, however, it's nothing more than personal experience and anecdotal evidence that is meaningless for anyone else apart from you.

>>38472395

>Yes you do a real time evaluation of their gene expression to understand their behavior and you can predict it perfectly.

Strawman.

I don't need to be able to perfectly predict how a person's genetic code will influence them to understand that it is influencing them.

>You dont understand it because you're a dummy who spends too much time watching and not acting. It's easier to just watch.

Bullshit shaming tactics. Typical.

>>38472416
You "understand" by your own biases and perceptions. You choose to believe a degree of influence is attributed to certain behavior, but you conveniently cannot prove anything by predicting it. Congratulations, you described free will.

>>38472415
You seem to think humans are separate from the rest of the universe. Also, your experience isn't more true or valid, I just talk shit when someone has their heads up their asses. Determinism is a model, it is not an explanation. Behavior at the molecular level cannot be compared to behavior at the intergalactic level. If you are so convinced that it can, including all human/social phenomena, then I'm convinced you are in this conversation only to pretend to be smart. Guess who else "explains everything," the word of God.

>>38472522

>You "understand" by your own biases and perceptions.

I understand that human movements are the product of chemicals and energy reacting in space and time. A person's genetic code is a major determinant of the arrangement of the matter and energy in their body. The rest is determined by other physical factors.

>You choose to believe a degree of influence is attributed to certain behavior, but you conveniently cannot prove anything by predicting it.

We could easily prove that if the balance of neurotransmitters in your brain were sufficiently different, your behavior would be radically altered from the norm, and you could not use "free will" to subvert the effects of these chemical reactions.

WHO GIVES A FRICK
THERE MIGHT BE SOME GOD BEHIND IT ALL
WHO CARES

>>38472574

It matters because free will belief contributes to the marginalization of those suffering from mental illnesses. This endangers not only the mentally ill but the whole of society.

Steve Stankevius did a good brief lecture on this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffi2zKJ58og

>>38472556
That's just lazy reductionism, it has nothing to do with free will. Our scope is not neurotransmitters in your dense brain. What does that bullshit tell you any better than how people used to say you were made of clay? if you can't accept your biases, then you are just as bad as people who blindly claim they have power over everything.

>>38472591
lol steve stinks

>>38472591
>doesn't believe in free will
>believes in suffering
Pick one

>>38472602
>I just want people to believe in this nonsensical argument so that mentally ill people can be treated better
>oh yeah and my argument treats everyone who feels fulfilled or proud of their actions like worthless shit
>yes, I'm retarded

>>38472602

It has everything to do with free will.

With what we know about science to this point, among the educated, free will belief rests on the idea that there is a "you" that can subvert the chemical reactions occurring in your brain and the rest of your nervous system.

This is exactly the kind of thinking when people abuse drugs and give the excuse "I'll just control myself"--without understanding that the drug is going to fundamentally alter their actions and there is no "other me" who can stop that from happening.

It's also the exact same idea that contributes to mental illness stigma. People who are having serious mental health issues are told to just free will them away, which endangers both them and society as a whole. If you don't think this happens, you were conditioned by a very sheltered environment.

And a major reason neurotransmitters don't factor into the way most people think of their experiences is conditioning. Up until recently almost nobody even knew what they were, and probably even today most people haven't ever heard of them.

As more people learn about neurotransmitters (i.e., they are conditioned to think about them by experience) they will play a larger role in our conception of will.

>>38472644

>I believe the laws of physics are just guidelines and I am really a ghost who interacts with physical matter, even though I myself am not physical

>>38472628
What do these have to do with each other? Suffering is a qualia, an experience - one what almost everyone has experienced at some point in their life. It clearly exists. Free will is a claim about physical reality.

>>38472522
The whole point is that humans are part of the universe, that's why they need to abide by the same exact laws that rest of the universe abides, that's that whole reason why the inclusion of free will doesn't make sense. You're giving humans properties that doesn't apparently manifest anywhere else. What's the difference between a model and an explanation? Model is a way to explain how things operate, if you create a proper model of how something works, you don't need to explain why it works, there are only models, you don't need to explain why universe exists, only how it came to existence, explanations like these are human-inflicted requirements that actually don't make any sense in real world. What's your distinction between behaviour on molecular and universal level and how exactly does it relate to question of free will? Human/social phenomena are generally from bottom to above I'd say, but it depends upon what you're asking about, you could be refering to myriad of phenomena which has its own distinctive models to explain it. I have yet to see a case in which god helps to create a model of free will, since all I've heard so far are just basically "because god did it", you'd still need to go further than that and elaborate on how exactly he achieved it and how it operates in real world enviroment, it's just adding additional redundant layer of explanations that don't add anything, it's completely redundant.

Also I have yet to see the thought experiment of how if everything is determined then nothing is determined.

>>38472628

What did he mean by this?

seriousIy, what? Do you think that you have to "freely will" to suffer or else you can't?

Let's not confuse "will power" with "free will".

Will power is a feature of the brain, some people have it more than others, and in certain conditions more than others.

Free will being an illusion doesn't mean that a person can't exercise will power and change his life, like losing weight for example.
It just means that whatever you will end up doing (starting to exercise to lose weight, or sitting on your ass) is not something you can truly take responsability of. It was determined by variables that you cannot claim responsability over.
It's just a predetermined mechanism.

>>38472917

That's a good point. In a way, at least to some extent, it seems like "will power" is the ability to refrain from claiming small rewards immediately in return for larger rewards later.

>>38472628
What do you mean "believes in suffering"?

"Suffering" is a state of the brain subjectively experienced by the sentient individual as aversive, as "bad".

There is not believing in it or not believing in it. It's like saying "I don't believe in plants".

What do you mean?

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>>38470627
As with most things, if not everything.
There's more than just one influential factor.

>>38472952

Do you want to get into a very tangential devil's advocate debate? Because I'm itching to try to argue that there is no such thing as a plant.

>>38472644
>oh yeah and my argument treats everyone who feels fulfilled or proud of their actions like worthless shit
facts don't care about your feelings

>>38473038
>he thinks he'll sound oh so clever
>"but PROVE plants are real! Prove it to me, right here, objectively"
>smugface.jpeg
>"I guess nothing is real huh anon? Sure showed you the destructive power of logic!"

>>38473149

Nah, I was going to go more for a "where do you draw the line between plant and non-plant" and then try to argue that the line is fuzzy and therefore doesn't represent a barrier between two discrete categories.

>>38473083
There is nothing wrong with being fulfilled and proud of your actions. These feelings motivate you and make you feel good, they are good in themselves.
It doesn't mean they refer to something that is true though.
Just know that deep down (once you sit own and rationally think about it) you cannot truly take responsability for these actions.

>>38470789
The timeframe isn't arbitrary, though. If I am choosing to walk to school or take a bike, it makes a difference which choice I take and when I do it because signals have a speed limit, so to speak, and can be determined based on the bodily limitations I have set. So if my brain decides to walk to school and the signal travels all around, just because the Earth and environment has changed in the split second while the signal travels cannot be equated to millions of years in the past: the two are different conclusions.
If the point is that the conclusion was pre-determined and my decision was already in the past (again, pre-determined), then there must be some form of that knowledge somewhere in the Universe for it to manifest itself and be 'known'.
There is no absolute free will, as in the world and everything stands still while I decide to walk to school or bike to school, but occasionally a combination of both. One may already know the conclusion one will reach, but choose another.
However, if the claim is that all decisions and conclusions have already been determined, then you're really making an unfalsifiable claim because I cannot locate the information you are appealing to, yet you claim it must exist for all to be known. I can make a decision that is completely uninspired and without external influence, yet you can always just say, without substantiation, that the conclusion has been known and it wasn't really you that made the choice.
If the point is that all decisions we make are delayed because light and information doesn't travel instantaneously, then that is simply referencing a quality of our bodies and the natural world around us. The lag in-between is inconsequential because we only receive information at a set speed. That's why when you ride in a Ferrari travelling at top speed, the information literally flies in your face faster than your brain can process it. It cannot actually influence us if we do not experience it.

Looks like OP got his answer, the vast majority of people who responded on this thread think free will is an illusion.

And they are right.