(Absence of) free will thread

>>19142084
I don't think it's an illusion, but a matter of degree. Why do YOU refuse to accept that free will very likely does exist, to some degree, when there is no scientific evidence that it doesn't (as if science can be used to study such remote and abstract concepts)?

File: 427644.gif (804KB, 800x600px) Image search: [Google]

804KB, 800x600px

>>19142097
>burden of proof
I shouldn't have to prove a negative, people who claim free will exists need to provide evidence.

>>19142115
That's not how this works. The whole "If I told you there were a teapot" refers to people engaged in actively convincing someone of something. Now, I don't see a single thread on here proselytizing in favor of free-will, but I DO see a thread here proselytizing AGAINST free will. Do you see the difference?

>>19142084
rolling

>>19142084
>Why is it that so many people refuse to accept free will is (most likely) an illusion

Because they have no free will?

If there is no free will then you can't ask why, you can only ask "what caused x"

File: 1453667801795.gif (2MB, 450x253px) Image search: [Google]

2MB, 450x253px

>>19142280
Probably trolling but just in case you were serious: I don't disagree with that, but that's obviously not the point of the thread. I'm looking for scientific evidence, that no one has yet provided. Do you have any?

File: baphomet+funny.jpg (30KB, 215x320px) Image search: [Google]

30KB, 215x320px

>>19142354
Of course there Is no free will. We are all products of our environment. So anyone raised in your exact same position and experiencing everything you experience will take the exact same actions as you as people are merely the sum of their experiences. Free will is a lie. But you can delude yourself if you wish.

We are slaves to money... If we were self sufficient then we'd have free will. But to be fully self sufficient is illegal practically in the us due to taxes and dumb laws. Example : it's illegal to collect rain water

>>19142084
Because it feels like you have a free will and most people will dismiss the idea of being nothing more than a biological machine without any thought because it makes them unconfortable. It also barely makes any practical differences for all intenst and purposes

File: 1461277613888.jpg (28KB, 550x550px) Image search: [Google]

28KB, 550x550px

>>19142084
>can't prove freewill doesn't exist
>asks other people to prove it does
>doesn't try to prove it doesn't
Solid logic, op. You deserve a gold star.

>>19142442
>claim something exists without prove
>it must exist because you cant prove a negative
great logic too. I guess there really is an invisible unicorn in my apartment after all

Hunger is the single biggest evidence proving that free will does not exist.

>>19142084
How would you even prove this? Isnt that more of a philosophical thing and not something for hard science?

>>19142084
What exactly are you unable to do?
Obviously our free will is limited by the society we live in, but this doesn't mean we don't have free will

File: image.jpg (23KB, 320x240px) Image search: [Google]

23KB, 320x240px

It's not real, every thought you have had is just an abstraction of all experiences you've had. That is all.

>>19142598
this isnt about being physically unable to do something or fearing the consequence. I am pretty OP means free will as opposed to being programmed

>>19142250
define free will dumbass

>>19142084
Free will is true enough when talking about how to live life and stuff like that - free will is unlikely when we talk about it in a material sense

>>19142084
What i think we may refer as true free will would be something like being free from our humanity.
we are made of flesh and flesh is matter. We are animals lead by our instincts and biological needs that are echoed in our mind.
But it is a wide spectrum and locally we can say that we are free to do and feel wathever we like.

>>19142578
Explain.

>>19142485
Nope. What I was saying is that both sides are not proveable things. We can delude ourselves into believing whatever we want to, but unless there's proof, there's no proving it's the actual truth.

What I was saying is that I don't know and that with fair certainty, I can assume you don't either. I'm not going to pretend that I do know, because I'm aware of these things. What'll you believe because of them? What comes next is all on you and everything you know unless it's on something else entirely. But if it's on that something else, how would you know? Why assume you know? What purpose does knowing serve, if it's all going to happen the same way anyhow?

Just some things to consider, m8.

>>19142858
I think what they mean is that fate is inescapable; you are born hungry and if you want to live, you must feed the hunger. The flaw in the argument is that people can starve themselves. They'll still be hungry, sure, but acting out against that hunger says the hunger doesn't define them.

An easy counter to this argument is that those actin against hunger were destined to do so. The flaw in that is that you can't prove they were destined for this. You can't prove they weren't, but that doesn't immediately mean they were, either.

In my opinion, which is by no means infallible, the idea for this thread is just a big quasi-philosophical masturbation session. Not something you'll get any solid answers out of, but some might glean a little perspective from toying with this idea.

>>19143043
alright, thats fair enough. Would definitely agree that free will is basically unprovable either way.
Just thought you were making an argument from ignorance, but obv misunderstood your point

>>19143078
>define them
Poor word choice. Should have said
>but acting out against that hunger says the hunger doesn't decide their actions for them.

>>19142084
HOW CAN YOU PROVE FREE WILL DOES OR DOES NOT EXIST?
IT IS A PHILOSOPHICAL ABSTRACTION, NOT A SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY

also have fun being a slave to external forces

Test it yourself:

Think of the next time you have to make a choice, for instance; choosing to eat the apple over the cookie. Pay very close attention to this process as it occurs.

The thought pops up in your conscious experience to eat the apple because it's healthier, but where did that thought come from? did you author it? How could you have authored it, it simply appeared in your brain.

Then you get the feeling you'd prefer the texture of the cookie in your mouth. Why did this sensation present its self to you now? Perhaps it was because you had apples yesterday, and no cookies in a long time..was that your choosing as well?

Does the thought to have a sandwich occur to you in this transaction of thoughts? Were you free to choose that which did not occur to you?

The notion of free will appears because it feels like there is a self or an ego that experience is relating/ referring back to - which apparently is an can be seen to be an illusion if you spend years practising meditation or drop some acid..which ever seems easier to you lol

>>19142858
>>19143078
My point is that if you "exercise free will" and starve yourself you will die. How are you free if you die by choosing not to obey the command to eat?

I don't understand why it matters. The only thing that matters is your belief. Either you don't have free will, and believing you have free will changes nothing, or you do have free will, and you would never know how powerful your will is unless you believe it exists.

>>19143306
You're attributing free-will to total freedom from biology, which while not wrong isn't what is normally contributed to free-will. Just because you will almost always end up dying, unless modern science comes up with immortality, doesn't mean you didn't have the will to choose decisions over what happens in life.

It's kind of like saying how can we have free-will if gravity exists. It's just a very odd way of picturing it that no one does.

Being a product of your environment proves free will is an illusion. You aren't free to decide where you are born and raised. Free will is a forced meme.

>>19143324
I see your point.

And to comment on gravity.
How can it keep everything from flying away from the planet spinning at thousands of mph, but a 5 year old can jump no problem? Gravity makes no sense.

>>19143357
>How can it keep everything from flying away from the planet spinning at thousands of mph, but a 5 year old can jump no problem?
Mass.

>>19143366
I was going to suggest you just gave the government approved answer to my question, but that's not the subject we're discussing here.

>>19143389
Are you serious right now?

Ok. I'll bite. Please explain to me how you think gravity works...or doesn't, I guess.

>>19143389
>government approved answer
Hold up here, though it isn't relevant to the thread topic, it is semi-relevant to a point made in it.

>provide any scientific evidence

Do you not believe in Mass and Gravitational pull when scientific evidence of it exists?

>>19143411
>>provide any scientific evidence

>Implying scientist don't get disgraced or outright killed if they go against the government approved story.

>>19143469
You didn't answer the question.

File: 1495083557374.jpg (12KB, 200x200px) Image search: [Google]

12KB, 200x200px

>>19143469

File: tmp_6446-1449559338065-2068531868.jpg (37KB, 500x382px) Image search: [Google]

37KB, 500x382px

>>19143482
I am Excersing my free will.

>>19143496
Auto correct typo. Exercising** saged

>>19143496
Fair enough

>>19143078

The hunger does define them, they just choose not to play the game. Hunger is the definition of flesh. It consume to replicate. All life is an accumulation of food.

>>19143287

More and more scientists say that your gut bacteria tells you which one too eat. They get addicted to sugar and processed food too.

>>19143551
Source?

>>19143357
>How can it keep everything from flying away from the planet spinning at thousands of mph, but a 5 year old can jump no problem? Gravity makes no sense.
christ you're fucking stupid, it's newton's third law; you discount the fact that when a 5-year-old jumps, he must be standing on solid ground...

>>19143992
U mad bro?

>>19142368
>>19142354

samefag

>>19145029
No.

File: 6a6.jpg (17KB, 491x315px) Image search: [Google]

17KB, 491x315px

>>19145029
I'm to lazy to prove you wrong
>>19142405
USA the land of the imprisoned, home of the cucks
>>19143306
Why can't we drop needs out of the argument, your free to die and your free to live. The hunger matters not. That's a choice. <---- Shortened (
>>19143324
)

File: 1427266817980.png (285KB, 488x7664px) Image search: [Google]

285KB, 488x7664px

>>19142084
Oh yeah, can you prove that this isn't free will OP?

>>19142368
I don't know why people are ignoring me. I think I pretty much wrapped this thread up with this post also this guy>>19143349

>>19143731
Never read the article but thought id google it for you because I fear you might have a mental handicap that inhibits your ability to navigate google

>>19145944
>never read the article
That's all we needed to know

File: 1328-660x714.jpg (116KB, 660x714px) Image search: [Google]

116KB, 660x714px

>>19145957
Ignorance is your free will buddy.

>>19142084
I think you're talking about absurdism. The best way to deal with absurdism is to simply acknowledge it. There's no cure or solution. Just know it exists.

Free will only dissapears if faster than light travel is possible. For now we know it is not

>>19146967
What?

there is no free will everything you do is exultantly an accident

File: circle_limit_iii_in_fractal_circle_by_vladimir_bulatov-d4nxqvz.jpg (333KB, 1095x730px) Image search: [Google]

333KB, 1095x730px

Some things I've learned on my research into free will over 23 years studying the subject with an obsession and general wisdom I've picked up from various sources:

>There is no such thing as free will.

>It is impossible to convince a believer in free will that there is no free will. The reason for this is that the delusion stems from the ego.

>As soon as you prod a subjects ego it becomes inflamed and will reject what it perceives as a threat to its existence.

>Telling someone there is no free will is a deathblow to the ego that accepts it because the ego thrives on feeling in control.

>Think about emotions that are associated with the ego, such as pride. If there's no free will, there's no reason for anyone to feel pride ever.

>Think about the fact that if there's no free will there is a reason to forgive literally everyone. I would wager 99% of the population can't accept this.

>The inability to forgive also stems from the ego. When you condemn someone for something they did you are in effect claiming you are better than them because you would not have done the same thing as them.

tldr; belief in free will means you are an egotistical person

>>19142084
my free will has been usurped by an oppressive government illegalizing things i would like to do

>>19147650
Say that someone murdered a person with a bullet that is faster than light. The bullet will appear to hit and kill the person shot before the person shooting it would hit the trigger. Therefore there would be no justice ever. The person who shot the bullet can say that the person shot was dead before they fired the bullet. You cannot murder someone who is already dead.

>>19148414
Yeah, but desecration of a corpse.

And anyway, it still takes the action of squeezing the trigger to set the timeline in motion, even if it is all fucky

>>19148525
Yes but suppose a picture was taken. There is no proof. And it would not be desecration of a corpse if the person was dead before the trigger was pulled.

>>19142084
I think we should start this kind of threads with "what do you mean by free will" .

Everything we think we know is based on the assumption of free will. Our society is based on the assumption of free will. Since there's no way of knowing one way or another, I don't see a reason to think I don't have free will, because if I don't I can't affect it anyway. It makes life easier to assume you have it.

Free will as the capacity to have chose is as far as I can go with free will. But I can't seem to believe that my actions are as simple as A to B- it doesn't seem all that simple.

The human tendency to want to simplify and rationalize things away is what I often try to step away from. Instead of neatly cutting everything into a specific model, why not deal with the whole contingent entirety, or at least a larger chunk of it? Does the feedback loop of cause and effect not come into play when we chain biology and the concept of freedom of choice together?

I realize that means you have to sit and sift through what might seem imposing, daunting, and tedious. But that's exactly it; why lie, why cheat, why not be thorough? I sit and observe and look at data/models put together by non-human agents of a lower caliber often, with regards to various things, and I'm lead to believe that while we are not able to switch habit "freely" (in general), we certainly seem to have the capacity to have done otherwise, and would do otherwise if the situation was in fact changed right there and then.

In other words.

If you could predict my every move, it would mean predicting my every move if exactly one thing was different, and iteratively up to if everything was completely different. Those are a lot of moves; I should then also be reacting to unpredictable quarks, as I should also be reacting to an object falling off a table. I would constantly be reacting to every possible state of many, many tiny things whose state I also inadvertently determine, and so on and so forth, as much as I am reacting to the more macroscopic scope. I should even be somewhat in flux as well as determined. If my predetermined reaction is a reaction to something uncertain in succession, and the whole quantum decoherence phenomenon is observed and accepted, are my actions not then of "infinite" capacity, or at least "infinitely" likely, and thus possible, even if not "realized"?

Free will does not make sense with the idea of cause and effect. If determinism is true then how can you escape the predetermined chain of cause and effect that exists in your environment and within your own brain?

>>19142084
Our actions are largely affected by our past and our current environment. However there is also a random factor. There are certain physiological micro processes in your head that in a way create a random number generator and sometimes there is a choice which seems like a tie this generator breaks it. You can argue that this random generator is a free will or you can argue that in a sense it is a part of our environment. Then at the end every thought in your head is a derivative of something and any action you choose to make is never yours.

My solution to creating your own free will is the following: you choose a goal that is not derived from you, and commit to following it. That creates a free will. Commitment is an ultimate freedom. There was somewhere a youtube video of a monk that decided to commit his life to drawing letters or something like that. That was his argumentation: "commitment is an ultimate freedom". If you are concerned that your ultimate goal is going to also be derivative then choose it by some random process.

Haha yea thats kinda what I meant by the faster than light bullet paradox. Its all still very relative

>>19148639
still though you see that it isn't possible to have a bullet that does that. I was showing that the person pulling the trigger does not have the free will right before deciding to fire because the person would have already died if they did get fired at. this show's that free will is a abstract concept. You would have to then put the blame on the individual neuron that started the sequence and that is non nonsensical.

So really free will or any sequence of events aren't real phenomenon that exist. If we are talking about morality or the ethics that concern free will then it's relevant. In nature, or anything outside consciousness, free will clearly isn't a real experience.

I've not once ever seen a post about denying free will or proving free will. Then this guy out of the blue shouts "FREE WILL DOES NOT EXIST" and claims that the burden of proof is in those who believe it does? This is backwards tomfoolery.

>>19147958
>Some things I've learned

You haven't learned shit, idiot.

File: 1.jpg (28KB, 400x267px) Image search: [Google]

28KB, 400x267px

>>19142084
free will is a retarded philosophical statement. this thread is like me being stuck hotboxed in a mystery machine van with a bunch of millennial existential potheads.

File: IMG_1780.jpg (30KB, 455x323px) Image search: [Google]

30KB, 455x323px

Free will exists within a deterministic universe. You are using a definition of free will that requires something supernatural by its very definition, which is beyond the realm of science and our knowledge.

Free will would be the subjective experience of being the set of processes in your brain related to your conscious choices. This is you, but only a part of you. So basically free will, like color and morality, does not objectively exist, but rather it exists subjectively.

>>19142084
Can you prove this reply wasn't sent by own choice?

>>19148719
That's the way burden of proof works you idiot.

You are the one positing that something exists. Yet you provide no evidence.

I can't proove santa claus or god doesn't exist either, because you can't prove a negative.

The amount of dumbasses in this thread that dont understand burden of proof is alarming.

The burden of proof IS NOT on the person making a claim that something doesn't exist. IT's ON THE DIPSHITS THAT BELIEVE IN SOMETHING WITH NO EVIDENCE FOR IT.
FFS PEOPLE LEARN 2 SCIENTIFIC METHOD

Again I'm just gonna reiterate:

THE BURDEN OF PROOF IS NOT ON ANYONE MAKING ANY CLAIM WHATSOEVER.

In the case of believing in things. The burden of proof is on the believers to provide evidence for why they believe in them.

If you believe in Santa Claus, God, The Tooth Fairy, Free Will, The Great Juju Up the Mountain, or whatever. YOU have to provide the evidence for why you believe.

You can't just go around saying, "Oh yeah, prove The Great Juju Up The Mountain Doesn't Exist"

How has public education failed you retards so badly.

Atheists don't have to "prove" god doesn't exist.
They simply have to point to the lack of evidence.

People who don't believe in Santa Claus don't have to go to the North Pole to prove he doesn't exist.
They Just have to point to the lack of evidence.

People who don't believe in Free Will don't have to prove it doesn't exist. We just have to point to the lack of evidence that it does exist.

>>19148745
sounds like your ego got it's salt pushed in. You mad?

You can easily disprove free will.
For your will to be free in any profound way, there must be some part that is not determined by any outside factors (because if there's no such thing, all you actions are determined by those factors)
When someone makes a decision there is always a reason (not necessarily rational) to choose one choice over another; since this reason is determined by something out of your control, it's impossible for there to be free will.
For example, if someone insults me, I can find a plethora of things to do: I could insult him back, I could ignore him, I could laugh, I could attack him, I could take off my pants and shit on the floor etc. but in the end I will only choose one thing because I WANT it the most.
You could say that I made that choice, and you would be correct, but I didn't choose to want that particular thing.

>>19150017
so why didn't you choose something different?

I have free will. You can just say I don't. These dubs shall prove

>>19150057
Because the factors for choosing that other thing were not there. How can you do something you don't want?

>>19142084
Free will is an illusion based simply on the fact that we act out on our innate desires. Our conscious decisions make it seemingly apparent that we are somehow in control of our own will and what we do to get where we are but everything we do in life meets an end desirable by nature. We strive to create a better future, earn a good wage, we do everything because we want to survive-survival is all that we want to attain.

We say that we think and do on our own accord but really we are just meeting an end set up for us by nature, a true objective given to both man and animal. Everything you or I do we do to survive, anything and everything we think of is just our evolutionary advantage helping us work towards that point.

And how do we benefit from accepting the idea that we have no free will?

Can we then just relax, knowing that we can't do anything at all?
Your free will is formed depending how much you're able to reflect upon the input you get. Sure you get all the information from your enviroment but you can develope the ability to look beyond the pool of information that is available to you by reflecting upon it.

But I do agree that for most it is hard to even do their true will because they are not self determinated in their thinking and behaviour.
In any case, believing you have no free will gets you nothing, it may just give you a nice reason to not care.

>>19150068
believing in no free will makes you more humane, less proud, more forgiving. It's not for nothing.

>>19150072
Hah not really.

It's just an easy reason to submit to the structure of reality that you know, eliminating the need to strife for more.

>>19150068
Not believing in free will: people have psychological motivation to do something and if we figure those out we might change something.
Believing in free will: people do good things and bad things because they choose to point

>>19150072
All these reasons " more humane, less proud, more forgiving" are linear values.

These things can literally mean anything to anyone. But of course, if you don't believe you have any saying in how you percieve the world and work on your perception how can you develop the ability to do your true will?

To me these values seem more like a schematic of jugdement. A set of values that you associate with certain types of behaviours or archetypes of personality.

If you really think about it this structure of reality is rather rigid and not very allowing for creative action and thought.


But of course, how could you even come to these ideas if you're just a victim of your enviroment.

>>19150085
So it's a choice of believing in free will or not?

You really just denied your entire theory yourself.


If you have to use the idea that you have no free will as a mechanism in order to better the world then that's rather sad.


You could just see it as what it is. In order for us to improve the world we have to change the structures by wich we percieve reality to change the actual objective structures in wich reality is organized.

Besides, if you were to think about it, you perception that there are good and bad things to do is quite limited. People don't do bad things for the sake of being bad. They do these things to achieve something. Be it material survival, psychological survival or to reflect the negativity they percieve from their enviroment back onto their enviroment.

Bad things only really become "bad" by how they are being percieve by their enviroment. It's not helpful at all to percieve them as such as that denies them any creative value. But every impulse is essentially a creative impulse, most are just negated due to the rigid structures of perception and behavior we are subject to due to fear and anger.

>>19150086
Then what does determine 'the free part of your will' ?
Not believing in free will doesn't make you an apathetic blob incapable of doing anything.
Believing in free will is just a way to make you feel good about yourself: wow, I made all these choices all by myself because I'm just that awesome, It was all by my own doing and not in anyway influenced by outside factors!!!

The molecular level seen inside protons or neutrons, quarks is fascinating they are the smallest seen with our technology yet strange and yet mysterious we control them through simple change of though, lets say you changed your opinion on breakfast ate a slice of cold pizza instead of your typical pancake syrup delux with bacon, as you see this pizza would not have caused you to go to the bathroom in the supermarket and met your to be future wife on the exit of the super market, you exchange numbers and everything continues.

Now the question is: did your to be future wife also forget something at home and by the conclusion also ´´got late``?

You see we can not totally know, maybe if nothing had happened they would not meet, me on the other hand believe the universe has a consciousness of it´s own, and he tends to guide us through means of secret Synchronicities, yet in the end who has the last say in our lifes still is us it´s our choice to make the question ´´ Excuse me, Hello my name is................. I think your beautiful.....´´

>>19150099
fucking exactly. It's just egotism at an extreme

>>19150096
It's not a choice, I don't see how what I said implies that in any way.
Believing in free will implies that if people do something that it is ultimately done by that person and that nothing could've been done to change that because it was his own 'free choice'.
Believing that somebody's choice are influence by his/her environment means that we can change something.
I also don't know what 'creative value' has to do with anything. Creative impulses don't come ex nihilo.

>>19150099
Concsiousness is not something mechanic.

You can of course take it apart and create names for abstract ideas of individual parts of concsiosuness but it really remains one whole thing that cannot be explained in a linear manner.


Concsiousness creates itself. Your construct your concsiosuness yourself. You could call it a mental enviroment. There is really no limit to the different structures concsiousness can take. But of course, since you can only think within your own capabilties you may not know that.

What you don't realise is that you're responsible for your concsiouss. When I say that you have free will then I mean that you have free will over your perception. Your objective reality can be percieved in infinite ways depending upon what you belief about it and so forth. You could find endless indiviudal parts that make up your subjective perception.

Free will comes from your discernment. Your concsiousnes has infinite capabilities in regards to discerning information.


You may not have all that much control over your objective reality but you have absolute control over your subjective reality, depending upon your state of concsiousness at least.

If you're bound to the structure in wich you percieve reality due to fear, anger or because you feel the need to stick to intellectual or spiritual authorities then of course you can barely have any control over your subjective percpetion. But the truth is that anything can be see as anything, much like a painting can inspire different people to create different imaginations.

If we wanted to get esoteric I would even dare to say that from your inner subjective realtiy the enterity of your objective reality flows. It works much like any building is based upon ideas.


Besides, what would you say is objectively wrong about feeling good about creating things yourself? Is there any objective reasons people have to feel bad for creating things by themselves? Everything gets inspired from the whole.

>>19150112
Ah, well. Why state that free will doesn't exist when it really is just an acknowlegdment that we're influenced by our enviroment?


Of course someone that feels that he is living in a shitty reality will not care about doing certain things, just as an example.


As we all are a part of the whole the whole will always affect us but we also affect the whole.
I don't see how that negates free will.

It's like a giant clockwork machine. Each part has to move with the whole but when one part changes its pace or place the whole will adjust. But this is rather hard to explain and I suppose its too mystical in your eyes.

>>19150111
Would you feel better if everyone would keep a list of who and what inspired him to create this and that? lol

>>19150127
I'm not denying that interpretation determines how you perceive existence and I'm also not saying that it's not important.
I just don't believe there's a 'you' that is 'free' and not influenced by things.
I also don't see how the inner reality is free. If it's determined by nothing how can it change; if it's determined by other things, how can it be free?

Free will only exists within fixed boundaries outside of which other forces than your own incarnate consciousness are at work, ultimately controling the grand scheme of things.

Yes, you can choose what to do in you everyday life. You can choose what to wear, who to be friends with, what job to apply to, what work to commit your life to and so on. But outside of these minute changes you have power over nothing. It already starts with the fact that you have been born without your own conscious will. Just think about the miriad of enormous incidents which influence you, yet you have no power over them.

Other than the profane and mundane banalities of life, you have no free will.

>>19150134
I get it, but the cog doesn't decide to change it's pace by itself.
You could of course say that, for example, people create new ideologies that can influence other people but that also doesn't just happen by itself.
Like Kant for example changed the way many people view reality, but Kant didn't choose to be Kant; that happened because of factors beyond his control; I also don't believe this diminishes his accomplishments or the depth of his philosophy.

File: unnamed.png (164KB, 300x300px) Image search: [Google]

164KB, 300x300px

I need to make a copy paste of this everytime i come across one of these threads.
Free Will does exist. But you guys are too blind to see it. You are argueing it from a syllogostic analytical standpoint. And no one has so far tbough to talk about the psychology behind free will. Suprising seeing as how /x/ would be all about mindful meditation and stuff.
So here it goes
Consiousness: There are two levels of consiouness , refered to here to just mean waking state. There is low consiouness, which takes care of your routines and schemas. Kinda the stuff you dont really need to concentrate much to think about. This state you produce waves , and this is where advertisers want you so they can appeal to your more automatic desires.
High level of consiouness has to deal with those times you think hard to make a decision, try to solve a difficult problem, or try to learn something new. When people talk of being mindful, this is the high consiouness state. Sometimes manic ,delusional, or panicky mind states represent this as well. Traumatic expierences to incite periods of high consiousness.
The point here is that some people consider "free wont" to be proof of free will. That a person could deny himself food when he ferls hungry must mean we have free will. But this is only part of it.
The big misunderstanding about free will to, an underlying assumtion that most people debating this subject is that if it "FREE" will it must vome easy right?
That where i think they are wrong. To make a free choice takes alot of effort. The will must be exterted, can we choose when we can exert the will? Yes. Take meditation, do dialiectical behavior therapy. All evidenced based practices proven to work and help people deal with anxiety, depression, and even psychosis.
People forget what Nietzche is trying to say with the ubermensch. But essentialy, it is suffering through the obsticles of oppression to become free.
I can paste all the relevant articles or i can let you google.

>>19150153
youre full of shit

like so full of it you think the things you are saying are meaningful or make sense, but it's just shit

>>19150141
>>19150149
You completly dismiss that we have any innate creative abilities and discernment.

You never take any information as it is intended to be conveyed. Depending upon your concsiousness you can percieve anything as anything.


You have free will within the mental frameworks you created for yourself.

Your free will shows in your intentions. If you intend to achieve something you will find ways to percieve things in a manner that allows you to see what you want. Just as you found a way to percieve the world in a manner that negates free will.

The information you percieve from your enviroment are simply symbols. They are signs or designations. But the individual perceptions of a symbol varify. Like for example a childhood toy may be a symbolic for you and for the other its useless trash. Even a ideologie is a symbol and it varies how it is beign percieved depending on the viewers intention.


The thing is, if you really want to have free will you have to cast yourself out of the a mental framework where you constantantly bump into blockades of conflict. If you want to do your true will you will have to be able to rise above the mental framework that most people are in, because most people live in a framework that is not creative but rather based on rigid systems wich don't allow them to use their creative abilities for much more other than mental or even material survival. If you no longer bump into blockades and conflicts all the time and instead transmute the things that bother you then you can truly do what you want. I believe this is what raising your concsiousnes is about. And as I've heard it somewhere a while ago, the higher concsiousness rises above the lower ones and is therefore on a higher plane of cause and effect.

File: 1430752767588.png (420KB, 746x1200px) Image search: [Google]

420KB, 746x1200px

>>19150153
Paste some articles because I'm not convinced by your arguments.
It's not because you do your best that your will is suddenly free.
Yeah, meditation and cognitive-behavioural therapy and whatnot changes how you do things; that still doesn't prove that it's FREE (under your control, not influenced by your environment)

>>19150157
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Awareness
http://nobaproject.com/modules/states-of-consciousness
http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/willpower.aspx

I have more if these dont suffice.

>>19150160
Yeah, I get all that but those mental planes ain't free, bro.
The mental framework aka you is not something you choose because the you is already there before you can make choices to be you. Of course you can make choices but this you that makes choices was not 'created' by you.
Nothing can't create something or maybe it can, I'm not so good at this mysticism.

>>19150168
See what I wrote >>19150145

No one says you have no free will to choose what to eat or to be able to think hard about a decision.

That's not the point of a meaningful, holistic discussion about free will. Especially not on /x/. Fuck off, fag.

>>19150162
The very nature of mindfulness and dialectical behavior therapy means taking your emotions under control.
The whole purpose that Frued saw for psychoanalysis was so that people can maximize their potential selves.

Take a look at the heirarchy of needs. Self actualized people are all the way at the top.and had to take care of other needs before that.

>>19150174
I think you are just butt mad.
Its oka if you want to massage your prostate. Jts healthy for you.

>>19150180
At least take some time to write your nonsensical illiteracy next time.

Jts oka doe koz sum ppl r so butt mad dey rite lyk mrns bekoz of it no prblm

>>19150145
I have the power to idenity these influences on my behavior with mindful awareness.
And i can give it due consideration among my other wants and desires that i choose. And if i have no choices that is either my fault for being helpless of anothers fault for oppressing me.

>>19150186
I like how you choose to find fault with what i am saying.
Just becuase i type like a fag doesnt make what I say any less correct.
And so far you havent said anything to the contrary.

>>19142084
dont care

>>19150187
Yes, I agree with that.
It is possible to transcend into reality's source. Although great illusions may come forth of it and confuse you even more.

>>19150173
They're as free as you make them to be. Any obstacle you percieve just is within your perception.
In many cases there may be an objective obstacle but you can always chose to alter your perception in such a manner that your desire to achieve that wich you can't is transmuted into another desire or something entirely else.


The mental framework is simply your outer self, it's still you of course but it flows from you inner self, wich uses much more vague symbols, so vague that most people hardly recognize them as symbols. Or would you deem a feeling to be a symbol?


The idea that you are somehow bound to anything outside of you is quite human and I guess its natural to assume that based on our current reality. The truth is however that there is nothing that is not within yourself. Everything you percieve, including other personalities are just other versions of yourself. Although they may be deeply camouflaged so that you cannot see yourself within them. I also do believe that there is nothing random about your human experience. You choose where you are born. It's all different when it seems because there is a metaphysical layer of cause and effect to everything happening in this world and there is great harmonoy and "planning" within it. You plan these things within you dream state for example. It's not like a human conference though because there others are seen as other "you's".

As it has been said over and over, perhaps too much to still make an impact.

All is one. You're one piece of all and yet you still make up the whole and it wouldn't be there without you. That is why free will and some sort of determinism can go hand in hand because you are just influencing yourself.

>>19150177
I'm not denying all that, I'm just saying that even if you have control over your emotions that you're still not free.
I also don't see any disconnect between your 'true will' such as self-realization and your 'base will' such as impulsive behaviour.
It's just that some people want more than just impulsively spasm through live, so of course controlling your emotions and perception is a good idea.
But this Idea of something bigger is still not something you choose to have. You could however choose to realize it, because you want it very very much but that still isn't 'free will' in the way that I have defined.
Also, some people are content to just satisfy there simple needs, that doesn't mean they are not exercising their will (note that I didn't say free will)
Also, Maslow's pyramid has never been proven. Even people that had shitty terrible health and no friends have done great things.

>>19150145
As I explained here >>19150194


You can expand your influence by manifesting your will on this metaphysical layer of cause and effect. You are already manifesting your will there. You don't even need to be enlightened to do so. Your intentions but also your fears and worries are going to manifest because of this. To think that you are helpless against these "forces" is to simply prematurely decide that you have no choice.


Besides, there is nothing random, not even your birth.

>>19150191
Typical internet debate BS.

>Write crap
>Cite links without explaining their relation to what you stated
>Respond to counter-argument with "ur butt m4d"
>Be mad if people point out your analphabetism
>Blame others for not stating counter-arguments

Don't bother responding.

>>19150199
I agree with what you said fundamentally, but you picture it as being easier than it really is. >>19150193
I didn't say there is random. I said some things are outside of your plane of influence.

>>19150194
I'm still not convinced, mainly because it's at it's core an irrational believe that can't really be proven (note that I don't have anything against irrationalism).
Still I appreciate what you're trying to do, and I'll certainly look into it but I feel like I can say nothing more than what I've said without repeating myself ad nauseam.

>>19150202
You always work within a framework of illusion if you want to put it that way. The only being that is free from "illusions" is the one "I AM" that is all.

I wouldn't call them illusions however, rather hallucinations. They can be taken simply for joy or to manifest certain things.

It really depends upon yourself how easy it is to work on higher planes of cause and effect and sadly I know little about how things work in other realities although I assume that in higher ones the manifestation of your inner world is much more quicker and probably instantanious in some, in way that negates time even.

>>19150208
It's something one has to experience for himself and it's a neverending learning experience and it can be experienced in as many ways as your creativity allows it.


In any point of existence I believe you will learn to manifest your will and the higher you go the more harmonious it becomes with that wich sourrounds you. I don't believe that there is really an absolute end of this progress but I suppose at some point you and reality are one.

>>19142097
from our moment of origin to death we travel through time and space and form personas from the context and chemical reactions instilled in us to stimulate emotional response, in reaction to other people doing the same thing, ergo cause and effect is a universal constant stretching back to the genesis of the physical realm. It doesn't matter how many dimensions exist, even meta physics cannot defy its own laws. all we are is cause and effect in constant motion

The universe is naturaly deterministic. The underlying structure of reality is mathematical. Whe are confided to a universe of seeming chaos, that is in actuality a perfect equation to produce that effect. Once you realize this, and that by virtue of that same reasoning nothing really matters, you can start living your very short life in peace. Concepts life divinity, the afterlife, the existance of the soul are but mere attempts by humanity to comprehend what cannot be. There is most likely a designer of this universe, but it probably doen't look after us as we are the product of an equation, of an equation, of an equation.

>>19150249
Your comment entirely denies the fact that the reality we percieve is of a subjective nature. Of course, you can use concepts and ideas wich symbolize objectivity to make sense of the framework in wich you live but your entire experience is going to remain a subjective one.

We cannot even be sure that our way of percieving this world is just one of endless. I mean not just regarding our subjective reality but rather how we percieve the world with our senses. Perhaps there are other beings wich have different senses or have different manifesations other than a physical one that see our reality in a way that we cannot .


As I've tried to explain before in my posts, reality is not something entirely mechanical and I personally see quantum physics and other phyiscal discovories as somewhat of a hint for that. But my perception of these matters is of course within my own paradigm of thinking.


Overall all seems to poin in the direction that all physical events are subject to a metaphysical plane of cause and effect, wich I tried to explain earlier.
I would go so far as to say that reality itself is concsiousness and that you are not some being living within it but rather that you are a part of it due to the fact that you are experiencing it with your concsiousness and with your concsiousness you manifest things within your reality. The division between mind and matter is not really there in my view. Matter is just another way of the mind to manifest itself.

File: mystery.png (692KB, 540x752px) Image search: [Google]

692KB, 540x752px

My view is that free will is an attainable mode of being, but requires one to rid themselves of all attachment to the material world as well as their sense of self. This is no easy feat to achieve and I don't expect to ever reach that point in my lifetime.

While I'm not a Buddhist, I agree with a lot of the concepts. People often think that Karma is a reward/punishment system, but it actually translates to "action", or "action bound by the conditioned self." In this state of perception, your life experience is at the mercy of predetermined responses to any stimuli. But every now and then, you catch glimpses of liberation from the determined path. I believe these brief glimpses are the guiding force leading us to a higher truth.

In Buddhist philosophy, the liberation from ego is the liberation from karma. The sage is able to flow with waters of reality, able to gaze upon the environment as it is. Most of us see the world before us and stuff it into a box, giving the illusio that physical reality is a conglomeration of separate parts. We know what a cat is because of what a cat isn't; organic from inorganic, mammals from marsupials, felines from canines, and have separated it from the entire world of non-cats. In other words, we are so fixated on the world of form that we can't notice an absence of form.

I believe everyone has felt this mode of perception before, even if extremely subtle. An example is gazing upon a forest and rather than just seeing the trees, you see the space between them; a mutual balance of form and formless. It's like your peripheral vision merges with your center of focus so that your entire field of vision becomes one unified image. And surely enough, you have to be completely grounded in the present moment to see this, which is the fundamental attribute of the sage who is liberated from material attachment.

I encourage any who disagree to challenge this perspective.

Will is the desire to do something. You may desire whatever you want.

Choices provided to you, however, are not entirely of your on accord. This does not mean you cannot carve out your own path, it just means it's about as safe as swimming in open waters.

>>19142084
>Why is it that so many people refuse to accept free will is (most likely) an illusion

the first line is kind of /thread don't you think?

people having the freedom to refuse and accept things on their own kinda defines free will don't you think?

File: 1466629129453.jpg (23KB, 300x300px) Image search: [Google]

23KB, 300x300px

>>19150323
Making a choice doesn't mean that it's free, brah.

>>19150299
Buddhist liberation is less about attaining free will and more about annihilation of the concept of the self.

>>19150366
lol this

what a scrub fake buddhist

File: tmp_6021-1494993545900-1841770474.jpg (117KB, 587x720px) Image search: [Google]

117KB, 587x720px

Woah, both sides have pretty good arguments.
Valid points that make both sides true.

In conclusion, free will is a paradox.

>>19150346
oh okay. sorry. I thought that having the freedom to choose things on my own volition defined "free will".

what's your definition of free will again?

>>19150366
This is exactly right, wasn't implying otherwise; just dragged the concept of free will into it.

>>19150380
One of the first things I said was that I am NOT a Buddhist. Regardless, nothing I was was contrary to it's philosophy.

The mode of perception I described is yathabhutam. Failure to observe the hindrances to clarity of awareness produces "bad karma", not because karma is a law or moral retribution, but because ALL motivated and purposeful actions, whether conventionally good or bad, are karma in so far they are directed to the grasping of life.

"Higher stages of Buddhist practice are as much concerned with the disentanglement from "good karma" as from bad. Thus complete action is ultimately free, uncontrived, or spontaneous action in exactly the same sense as the Taoist wu-wei."

Unless I'm mistaken, hmm?

>>19150421
You are mistaken. The concept of free will is incompatible with the concept of no self.

>>19150621
oh ok

>>19142368
This

I am LAZY. I thought this was about FREE WILL, like where does it come from, and why dont i have it. Dangit

According to this book series (lawofone.info) fee will is one of the fundamental aspects of creation, with the real illusion being separation as all is one. Free will would be the way the creator experiences and learns about itself, which is why there is no real evil or good in this worldview (although there is polarity which is similar desu ), since it is impossible not to serve the creator, as one's free will would also be the creator, in my understanding, if all is one.

>>19150711
Sounds kinda like Spinoza's conception of god.

>>19150711
Law of One is bullshit dude. Not an argument

The pleasure principle destroys any trace of free will. We can act according to that which we desire, but we do not choose what we desire. In other, everything we do is an expression of our innate and predetermined nature.

>>19150711
>fee will is one of the fundamental aspects of creation, with the real illusion being separation as all is one
How does free will exist if everything is one? Free will REQUIRES a choice. A choice REQUIRES there be some sort of distinction.

If there's no free will, then why does the universe insist I jerk off so much?

>>19150781
because the universe jerks off with you

>>19142084

I have clairvoyance

A simple exercise in critical thinking would show that because I can foresee the future, that it is preordained and everything is orchestrated with an conductor, this free will is an illusion

>>19150770
I think it is considered an illusion, to some extent, but a primal distortion or something like that? I think the view is that the creator desires to experience and learn about itself... that would be the creator's will. The creator then experiences the illusion of separation, through us for example (the cosmology of the law of One is pretty wide, with densities and evolution back into One etc ...). Our free will is simply us learning more about our desires, by our choices and about ourself, in my understanding. This in turn is the creator experiencing itself through an infinite number of individualized "free wills" expressing themselves to the fullest, if possible. This is my understanding. I'm not good at explaining, but the material is pretty interesting imho

>>19150770
>>19150903
>http://www.lawofone.info/synopsis.php
Some quotes:
>The First Distortion
>The first distortion is free will, or finity, or the limit of the viewpoint (13.12, 15.21, 99.5). The created universe that we experience is the Creator’s exploration of Itself through the first distortion, which Ra also calls the Law of Confusion (27.10).
-
>13.12 Questioner: Could you tell me how intelligent infinity became, shall we say (I’m having difficulty with some of the language), how intelligent infinity became individualized from itself?
>Ra: I am Ra. This is an appropriate question.

>The intelligent infinity discerned a concept. This concept was discerned due to freedom of will of awareness. This concept was finity. This was the first and primal paradox or distortion of the Law of One. Thus the one intelligent infinity invested itself in an exploration of many-ness. Due to the infinite possibilities of intelligent infinity there is no ending to many-ness. The exploration, thus, is free to continue infinitely in an eternal present.
-
>15.21 Questioner: Well, in yesterday’s material you stated “we offer the Law of One, the solving of paradoxes.” You also mentioned earlier that the first paradox, or the first distortion I meant, was the distortion of free will. Could you tell me if there’s a sequence? Is there a first, second, third, fourth distortion of the Law of One?
>Ra: I am Ra. Only up to a very short point. After this point, the many-ness of distortions are equal one to another. The first distortion, free will, finds focus. This is the second distortion known to you as Logos, the Creative Principle or Love. This intelligent energy thus creates a distortion known as Light. From these three distortions come many, many hierarchies of distortions, each having its own paradoxes to be synthesized, no one being more important than another.

>>19150739
>Spinoza's
I don't know much about Spinoza but always found him interesting. Will look into this, thanks!

>>19150903
>I think the view is that the creator desires to experience and learn about itself
Desire? If everything is one, where did desire comer from? Desire for what? To learn? To experience? This means there is ALREADY a distinction in the Oneness. Unless there is something you do not know, there is no ability to learn. If there is something the intelligent infinity did not know, then it isn't an intelligent infinity.

>>19151028
There definitely is a lot I don't understand ahah. I think in oneness the desire is experience of itself.
I think there was the idea of the illusion, and evolution, and that all that could happen having already happened, in unity outside of time or something, so in a way there is nothing that is not known, but I'm not sure and that's not very clear to me. I think infinity could also not know (or not express itself fully), in the sense that just because something is infinite doesn't mean it is everything: for example there is an infinite number of odd numbers. It's inifinite, but there are still even numbers, that may not be known about. It's a stupid example, but it's what came to mind.
That's just a view I found interesting, I definitely don't know enough about it to express it properly, or say if it's real or not, but I do like this view.

>>19151071
>I think in oneness the desire is experience of itself.
So experience of itself is not already part of the oneness? So the oneness is incomplete; it is not infinite, or at least not in terms of inclusion. There are things that are outside the oneness.

>I think infinity could also not know (or not express itself fully)
So this intelligent infinite is inferior to the multitude. Seeing as the multitude can easily experience and express itself, and since the oneness had to become the multitude to attain what it desired.

Why are we looking toward oneness, then? Why go backward to an inferior, less-actualized position?

>>19151106
I don't know how to answer those questions except with the numbers example.
>become the multitude
I think this is referred to as an illusion, so not something that actually happens, but ok.
Thank you for the rebuttal, what you say makes sense as well.
What is your view on free will?

>>19149923
You can prove a negative, dipshit. Just see Godel's incompleteness theorem or Arrow's impossibility for examples.
>>19149501
Also this dude makes the most sense, but he also uses a definition of free will that usually is not so fun to defend. I guess one could say free will only exists at the proper level of analysis, as the subjective experience of a neurological correlate and when you break down into smaller components, just as water or ice do not exist when analyzing a single water molecule.

>>19142084
You're like saying the option of reading, not reading, replying or not replying to this post doesn't exist.

>>19142084
>free will is (most likely) an illusion

because, on the grand scale, that recognition is irrelevant.

mathematical chaos cannot be reasonably seen through by humans (and I'd hazard, by finite beings in general) at the grand scale.

So, ideally, the illusion is "complete", and for all functional purposes, we have free will. It is impossible to predict all events on the grand scale to any degree of certainty.

Computing power, though, does put a few kinks in this that I call "godless calvinism". Namely:

>Microcosmic prediction

with enough computing power, an entity could predict the outcomes of a given subset of the "grand scale" (that is, the entire universe).

Following from this

>godless calvinism

the point where all human activity can be predicted by some entity.
Human activity is nothing but a subset of all reality, and so it can hypothetically be predicted with enough computing power.


Ensuring that

a) no one has enough computing power to predict your movements

b) no one has enough computing power to predict all of humanity's movements

are imperative goals for maintaining functional free will.

>ITT OP doesnt realise that free will both exists and doesnt exist at the same time

heh, what a faggot am I right guys

>>19151132
>I don't know how to answer those questions except with the numbers example.
It's a bad example, though. No one accepts the set of odd numbers to be the set of ALL numbers. Yet that is exactly what you are asking us to accept this Oneness as: the sum total, everything as one. That can't be true if there is something outside of Oneness that was desired.

>I think this is referred to as an illusion, so not something that actually happens, but ok.
Whether it truthfully multiplies or not - the "illusion" happens because Oneness WANTED it to. Oneness DESIRED to delude itself. Why are we trying to undo this? We were an infininte viewpoint, and we chose to be (or think we are) lots of limited viewpoints.

How can we - now of a limited viewpoint - think we can second-guess the decision we made as an infinite consciousness?

>What is your view on free will?
We have an infinitesimal amount of free will. We have no actual choice in anything; not our thoughts, not our deeds. The only "choice" we have is of awareness. We can choose to accept and love this position of helplessness and simply along for the ride, or we can delude ourselves into thinking we have some sort of agency and thus suffer or enjoy along with what we witness.

>>19142354
>Looking for scientific evidence

How do you propose one even study the matter? How can the hypothesis (either that there IS or IS NOT free will) possibly be tested in a scientific manner?

Because it does not seem like something even remotely in the realm of possibility, even with all of modern science at our disposal. Just because science cannot *prove* free will, science would STILL need to be able to *disprove* free will in order for your assertion that "science can't prove it so it must not exist" to have even remote validity.

>>19142354
>>19142354
anon, bear with me here...
Why do you care anon?
Do you have to prove something for someone?
It wouldn't change anything, everything would still be just the same.
There are horrible things everywhere, and people just hapily live ignoring them; Even if you could prove it, would it really change something?

File: 1495718866415.jpg (35KB, 398x342px) Image search: [Google]

35KB, 398x342px

>>19150399

>>19143287
You only have the ability to say no. Anything you do or allow to happen was your lack of ability to say no.

Now the tricky part is weather or not the no was influenced by your thoughts or your actual being.

Saying no to desire, a simple thing, is hard for some people because they believe they are the ones with the desire. But in reality, it's the flesh that craves it and sends you the signal. To have free will would require you not needing anything, but that isn't true for anyone on this board.

Now, you do have the ability to say no to yourself, but most people exercise that ability against others instead of themselves.

Feelings come from the flesh, and thought comes from the mental of the flesh.
You are none of these.

>>19143357
General Relativity.

>>19150235
>It doesn't matter how many dimensions exist, even meta physics cannot defy its own laws. all we are is cause and effect in constant motion
You people are misguided, and also probably many other in this thread. But I will admit that I used to think like you, and still in a sense do, because when I look at people (and even myself at times) I mostly see moving meat machines, barely conscious and who never realized that they never chose their personality, genes, childhood events, etc.

First, it's impossible to explain the existence of the universe with causality. Either it has no first cause and simply exists (acausal), or has an infinite chain of first causes (again, defying causality, because there would again be no true first cause).

Secondly, there is no reason causality (the idea of cause and effect) has to always strictly exist or for the world to be understandable by the rationality that we have.

This may seem ridiculous, but consider, for instance, that Newtonian mechanics only works for scales that aren't sufficiently small or sufficiently large, and only at speeds that aren't sufficiently large as well. Einstein's theory of relativity overturned this, so that Newtonian mechanics was revealed to be a simplification only valid in certain circumstances (not only that, but even in these circumstances, it is SLIGHTLY wrong due to the aforementioned theory of relativity --- but the slight difference is so small we don't care about it in calculation, it's probably impossible to calculate).

In the same way, every effect having a cause may be a narrow-minded assumption. Not only is there, again, the existence of the universe, but also consider the well-known idea of the "black swan". All it takes to disprove the idea that there are no black swans is seeing one black swan (and indeed, black swans do exist). Just because everything we see seems to be causal (every swan you've seen is white), is NOT logical proof that causality determines the universe.

>>19151707
>b
Not that anon, but this does not mean that any "thing" can defy its own laws, it just means the way that "laws" are scientifically defined is often innacurate, which we find as our tech and understanding improve. what say you to this: >>19151574
?

>>19142368
what about the difference in brains?

>>19142084

It's not a scientific question. It's a philosophical one.

>>19148639
fight really hard against it and then a little more, just like Guts

>>19150901
set up an experiment where when you see something, you try to alter whatever you saw, sabatoge the future.