Human Beings and Free Will

I am interested in comments on human free will.
I for one do not believe we have free will at all. I believe that we are nothing but a complex organic program designed to pilot and plan the actions of the body.
I believe that based on the inputs entering the brain, the outputs are predetermined depending on the brain.
Though it appears that we have free will, and our program has us act as if we have free will, I do not believe that one can actually "choose".
One always does what he "wants" but cannot control what he wants.

[runner4life7]

What is free will other than the ability to do what you want? is that not the definition. I dont even think its fair to say one always does what he wants either therefore exercises some control on what he wants by going against any such urges or things that tell him what he "wants"

[mike4bmp]

I think the problem that you run into with this is the idea of Beingness...we exist and we are conscious of this...
Although the concept of existence (or consciousness of) does not refute what you have said...as I could say that Descartes was right and you have a plausible argument...but from an Existentialists point of you...you have no basis. We are the "is"...or in the state of being. Like I AM the writing of this reply...even though I can negate myself from the computer...I am presently ALL ABOUT writing this. We can not deny beingness...and from it Sartre states that we have Freedom....nothing stops you from doing anything in life except for the stories you tell about yourself to yourself. Like I couldn't just move to Costa Rica because I have family obligations or I go to school...blah blah blah...but the truth of the matter is nothing is stopping you except the Anguish that you feel...the stories that you tell.
With Existence...we get consciousness of Being...with that we get Freedom...with Freedom we get a myriad of choices.

Anyone better versed in Existentialism can correct me here...but I think I've got the gist of it.
Mike...out

[Jordan Olsommer]

I find it is very helpful to make a distinction between "technical" free will and "practical" free will.

Technical free will I define as having the ability to do what one wants in any circumstance, completely separate and independent from the inputs or states of various parts of the brain, and practical free will I define as whether or not anyone can predict what we are going to do next with a great deal of certainty, no matter what the circumstance (ie, not limited to laboratory situations where you can safely say, "if i light a firecracker under his ass I predict he will jump.")

So the question of "do we have technical free will?" is trivial if you accept two assumptions: 1) all matter in the universe operates according to descriptive physical laws; and 2) human beings are made up of matter. QED.

However, based on doing time in college (I got tattooed tears which means I killed a T.A.) and hearing this debate over and over and over again, I am convinced that 99.999% of the time someone asks "do we have free will?" they mean free will in the practical sense, not the technical. This, of course, is why these pointless debates go on for so long; because the people at either side of the debate are arguing about fundamentally different things.

So do we have practical free will? Absolutely. There is no way as of yet and will be no way in the near future for you to predict what a reasonably intelligent adult human being is going to do in all circumstances with any degree of certainty. There are just way too many variables involved (not to mention the fact that unless you get constant feedback, due to the nature of nonlinear systems, if you're wrong about what the person does at decision n then you're probably not even going to be in the same zipcode on decision n+5)

So, in conclusion, live as though you have free will and don't worry that someone is going to be able to point some kind of palmpilot in your direction and know that you're going to pick your nose in three seconds, but strictly speaking, we're all just playing out the ballet.

[Eidal]

My thoughts on free will can be summed up by a thought experiment:

Could I, or anyone else, tell the difference between the reality we live in now and a different reality in which we have no free will?

No.

Therefore, the question is meaningless to me because it falls under the category of "silly metaphysical squabbling with little to no practical value".

[Scotch78]

[ QUOTE ]
Could I, or anyone else, tell the difference between the reality we live in now and a different reality in which we have no free will?

No.


[/ QUOTE ]

Prove it. As it's currently phrased, your argument will end up being circular.

Scott

[Cooker]

I actually believe something one step further than you is most likely the case. I believe humans are almost complete automatons and that our brains give reasons to our actions after the fact for the most part (maybe quickly after, but after). Obviously, the brain has some ability to preplan actions, but once started in motion, I believe most actions and thought processes are fairly automatic.

Specifically, I think we gained the ability to develop theories of the mind with respect to other creatures which gave as a huge evolutionary edge and we simply apply this same machinary to ourselves and we call this "consciousness". Most of my reason for this belief is mostly anecdotal, but there are some recent experiments that are at least consistent with this idea.

I believe that the laws of nature leave no room for free will, only unpredictability (through chaos and perhaps some QM mechanisms might create statistical fluctuations but certainly no allowance for free will).

[tek]

Serial killers (for example) have free will.

The rest of us have freedom of choice within a certain range.

[PLOlover]

One category that is consistently ignored in this debate is the case where an individual has no choice but to do what he wants.

In other words, mutual exclusivenss is assumed where it does not necessarily exist.

[Go Blue]

One definition of free will that I came across which I find to be particularly good goes something like this: If a certain circumstance were to repeat itself with everything being the same, would one make the same decision everytime? For example, if you are deciding what to watch on TV at a given point in time and you choose option A and you had to make that choice again (without knowing that you're making it again), would you still choose option A?

I believe that the answer to this is no, you would still choose the same thing. Why? Because any action is a result of a previous action and the consiousness only comes from a combination of electrical and chemical impulses in the brain and body. If we had a system or formula so advanced that we could see everything on a molecular level, and could predict where everything would go, then we would konw the future. This is similar to a weather system, which is so complex, yet if we knew the trajectory of every single particle within it, we would know for sure what would happen next.

How does this relate to choosing what to watch on TV? Well, if we could see and analyze everything that goes on inside the body particle by particle, we would know what choice one would take because that choice is a result of this combination of particles moving about in a predictable path. Therefore, one would make the same decision everytime.

I can ask you to tell me any one letter in the alphabet and when you would tell me that letter, I would say that that's not random and you were bound to say that particular letter. You can argue that that's ridiculous, but I would say it's not, because you chose that particular letter for a reason. The path of the particles in your brain went such that you wound up saying that exact letter and if that situation were to repeat, you would say the same thing everytime. Why wouldn't you?

So hence, as a result of all this, my opinion is that there is no free will on a scientific level. One can say something like "if there's no free will, what's to stop me from going and murdering someone?" to which I would respond that if you went and murdered someone, you only took that action because of the discussion we just had and as a result of that, some chemical processes went about inside you that told you to go and kill someone; it was bound to happen.

Just like we can use simple formulas like F=ma to predict simpler actions, we can *theoretically* come up with formulas that would predict what every single particle in the universe is going to do and that would tell us the future and thus eliminate free will.

[Jim T]

"I believe that the answer to this is no, you would still choose the same thing. Why? Because any action is a result of a previous action and the consiousness only comes from a combination of electrical and chemical impulses in the brain and body. If we had a system or formula so advanced that we could see everything on a molecular level, and could predict where everything would go, then we would konw the future."

If it wasn't for quantum mechanics, you might have something there ...

[Go Blue]

[ QUOTE ]
If it wasn't for quantum mechanics, you might have something there ...

[/ QUOTE ]

How so?

[bholdr]

[ QUOTE ]
So the question of "do we have technical free will?" is trivial if you accept two assumptions: 1) all matter in the universe operates according to descriptive physical laws; and 2) human beings are made up of matter. QED.

[/ QUOTE ]

nice point, made in a more succinct and understandable form than i was about to post it in. who cares if we actually have free will or not? for all intents and purposes we do, and it can be shown to be impossible to prove otherwise. so why bother worrying about it... it's a metaphysical question that should be debated when nicely toasted, and ignored when one is sober.

i believe that quantum mechanicanical unpredictability may play a role in 'technical' free will, if it does exist. also, Kant's nomenual/ phenomenal dichotomy may also offer a fun little discussion starter on the subject.