Do you believe in free will?

[Aspergirl4hire]

One interesting compatibilist argument is that free will implies only freedom of mental choice, not freedom of implementation. Say what?

Is that the same as the position that "I can think what I want as long as I do what I'm told?"

Sadly (?) what I think keeps slipping out from behind the mask, shouting, "I'm in HERE." Which leads to entirely predictable outcomes, since I can't protect myself in anarchy, nor will the authority I question protect me.

So...my answer to Madame Catfish's question will have to be a qualified No. I can always choose among three responses: Do nothing; Support what's proposed; Oppose what's proposed. After all, I can do anything I'm willing to accept the consequences of, and therein lies the boundary of my free will. So I think this means that only God has absolute free will.

 

[Madame Catfish]

I have to believe in free will as the alternative of predestination leads to a paradox.

If my choices are not mine and I'm making them because I always was going to doesn't make sense. It
certainly makes a mockery of the justice system.

I could go out and murder someone and then say "I'm not culpable as I didn't choose to kill them, it was always going to happen". Predestination is just an excuse for people's bad choices although I do agree with Slithytoves that environmental / social factors impact as well.

I'm not discounting what you say or even disagreeing with you, but some part of me thinks that justice is still justified in a universe void of freewill. Even if a killer was always destined to murder through their exact neurological makeup, stabbing someone to death is still a repulsive thing. Actions reflect the essence of whatever is performing that action, and a being that does repulsive things is repulsive, is it not? A rabid skunk never consciously chooses to bite, but it still bites. Isn't it morally justified to put it down for not only its own sake, but the sake of everyone that will suffer if it runs loose?

 

[StephF]

I totally agree that murder is repulsive but why punish someone when they cannot help their action.
This kinda leads on to the question "Is Prison to punish or to rehabilitate ?"

I would agree that killing the skunk is necessary to protect the multitude but have you tried putting yourself in the skunk's shoes ?

Pedantic moment: I know skunks don't wear shoes but I was using a figure of speech. If they did, would their feet stink ?

 

[Tom]

IDK, but its curious how close 'Free Willy' is.

 

[Madame Catfish]

I totally agree that murder is repulsive but why punish someone when they cannot help their action.
This kinda leads on to the question "Is Prison to punish or to rehabilitate ?"

I would agree that killing the skunk is necessary to protect the multitude but have you tried putting yourself in the skunk's shoes ?

Pedantic moment: I know skunks don't wear shoes but I was using a figure of speech. If they did, would their feet stink ?

For me at least, the idea of "punishment" has always been a silly one. It reflects an individual indulging in their own moral righteousness and feeling as though they have somehow have a right to dispense suffering. I was going more along the Hindu line of Karma than the idea of punishment for bad behaviour. In classic Hinduism, a person who upsets the law of dharma will later be reincarnated to a less favourable existence to make up for those acts. This isn't meant to punish the individual, as they will likely have no recollections of wrongs in the previous life, be a completely different (and perhaps better) person in the new one, and will not be able to learn from the experience as a result. Kharma is simply a result that attempts to lead to balance- the suffering in the next life as a result of the destructive action doesn't have moral implications- it just is.
While I am not a hindu, I perceive the suffering a murderer might suffer as a result of their actions similarly. Punishment implies you actively want them to suffer for whatever reason- my idea about the skunk is that their suffering is irrelevant once they cross the boundaries of human decency. Some things do more harm than good on this earth, so why keep them around? especially if they inevitably cause harm?
I've put myself in a skunk's shoes more often than is good for my nasal passages, and while I think someone who commits a single murder is not a murderer, and might even be rehabilitated, someone who's existence is characterized by unrepenting violence isn't much of a loss to anybody else. While it is very dangerous to go around pointing "this person does more bad than good" or "this person deserves to live" I think that is why we have law- so that people don't get tossed out due to just being socially awkward or rude, only extremely destructive.

Continuing the pedantic moment: I think that perhaps the feet of a skunk that wears shoes might ironically be the cleanest part of the animal, since the bad smell of a skunk comes from the spray and shoes would protect the feet from that spray, leaving them less smelly.

 

[StephF]

What's a Hindu ? It lays eggs !

 

[DuckRabbit]

I don't believe we have free will but we are only served by acting as though we do.

 

[Peace]

Prison is used not only as a punishment, but to protect those of us that follow the rules. Where else could we put someone who is predestined to murder?

 

[Ishtar]

I don't.

I think free will is pretty much impossible due to the fact that human beings, essentially, are just a collection of ideas formed by others. We start as a blank slate, and our ideas, personality, inclinations and decisions are ultimately determined by our environment, upbringing, makeup and other things which are beyond our control. Although we may appear to be able to make decisions for ourselves, more often than not they're a result of symbiosis, and thus, I feel free will is illusory. Also, by extension, everything that defines us, ultimately is null - we are but a collage, a patchwork. Which is why I've stopped trying to find an identity. The "I" - the ego - is a very clever trick.

 

[zurb]

Punishment implies you actively want them to suffer ...

That's not punishment in my book. That's vengeance or retribution.

 

[zurb]

Since I know that most Christian denominations are big on free will, I naturally asked in both discussions how a person's will can be truly free if they are ever-concerned for the fate of their soul....

I'm struggling to understand this paragraph. Can you explain more?
Maybe we have different perceptions of what 'faith' is. To me, faith is belief or trust in the nature or character of something - its reliableness. The more faith I have in a chair, the more likely I am to trust it, but I am in no way forced to sit on it. But the degree of faith I have does determine how much I can relax in the chair.
Some people mix the words 'faith' and 'religion' (as in 'What is your faith?', 'different faiths'), but that just confuses matters. Faith just means trust.

 

[Judge]

If you make a "contract" to reincarnate to improve and evolve your immortal soul, I believe one has the free will to enter into that agreement- or not. Of course like any contract, there may be caveats involved if the terms of the contract aren't met. Such as having to "repeat" an incarnation.

And I suspect up to a certain point very early in the process, one has the option to "void the contract" under terms that are agreeable to all parties in accordance with the contract. That is, to "back out" of your own reincarnation.

As a mortal, I can amuse myself wondering if there's any "peer pressure" involved with people being pushed into such "contracts". But that's just reflecting my mortal understanding of an immortal social order I can't directly relate to from this plane of existence. I'm guessing that peer pressure simply doesn't exist on the other side.

Yet in the end, I'm inclined to believe that it all reflects free will. Just not in a way that conventional religions may appreciate or agree with. That we are magnanimous eternal beings who have a natural inclination to improve ourselves. But with a certain degree of structure provided in the process.

 

[tree]

 

[Crossbreed]

I believe in free will, with some caveats:

1. Not all options are available at all times. This means that we are only free to choose from the options that are currently available to us. (If there are less than two choices, we have lost free will in that instance.)
2. Every choice we make is bound to a set of one or more consequences. We don't get to choose those consequences independently; they are a package deal.

 

[Mr Allen]

I believe I'm free to make my own choices to do what I want to do, just a shame a lot of the time I mess up.

 

[tachyon]

Yes! I do.

I feel I have no choice

 

[tyko berglund]

Why or why not?

I think it maybe that there are many things that can impinge on consciousness
that we are not necessarily aware of, and that may influence what we think in various
measure. So if this is where free will becomes improbable, then that is what I wish to
offer as answer...

 

[Cali Cat]

I really don't know. Maybe it's a bit free will and a bit of fate, as if you have two or more possible outcomes, but your choices determine the fate/destiny you will experience.

Not everyone has the same abilities and limitations, so your free will is constrained primarily by your own personality and physical condition, not to mention your upbringing and socioeconomic status.

Admittedly, some people overcome great challenges that might otherwise doom them to an ill fate, but I think that ability lies within their own personality too.

At any rate, life is not fair whether you determine your own future, or whether it is determined for you in the stars. You cannot know all the variables that go into making your choices, so all you are doing is gambling on your own interpretation of logic or your instinct to get you by.

 

[tyko berglund]

I found I resonated with your last sentence, after the comma, with "so all"....
I think notions about fate are interesting.

 

[clg114]

I believe that we have free will to a point. That point is the rules and laws that we live with. Since humankind is essentially a bunch of dumb asses, if we did not have rules and laws life would be total chaos. For some it is anyhow.

I am not to big on fate. I think there is a reason for everything.