The Delusion of Free Will

Originally posted by R3KR
Free will does not exist.
It is a delusion... Ill prove it.

Do this: Think of a new color, not from RGB or CMYK, a completely NEW color. Cant do it because you can not truly choose. You can only do what you are told or taught. If someone showed you a new color you would forever know it. But the point is everything that is, and everything that you know, is not new.

Well you're already limiting the choices so the question is rigged.

but you're confusing eternal number of options with free will. Free will only exists in the bubble of the Creators free will. That is your free will is only so large..you cant create mountains just by thinking for example. But you CAN determine your own fate with your own choices. And thats what life is about.

Isnt anyone here familiar with the psychology teaching that we deserve %100 whatever we go through in life? Because our own choices bring us there? Anyone?

reply to post by nusnus


But the adult is only masking their pre-determined will by the illusion that they have a choice.

Their choice or will is still based on their experience that pre-determines the choice.

The only way they would have real free-choice(will) is if they were blindfolded and didn’t see the choices.



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Originally posted by inforeal
reply to post by nusnus

 

The only way they would have real free-choice(will) is if they were blindfolded and didn’t see the choices.

Exactly, you don't see ALL your choices unless you think about it real hard. Theyre always hidden, except for the obvious.

reply to post by UmbraSumus


Thank you so much for posting that Sam Harris stuff. I felt that was the best articulated explanation of the nature of free will. I then went on to watch another one of his videos that was great too.

What the reason when someone choose something then?, Is it about right thing to do or about what he/she want to do.
If the first reason behind the what we choose, no matter how many choices it would not be matter cuz we just have to pick the right one.
If the second one is the reason, before claim it just limited choice we should count how many choices we got in out life and all the possibility, and after that we can know the frame of limited choice is. If someone already happy to only few choices, its already enough for them then.

.....i know with all that's in me that everything is predestined. everything that happens is for a reason. this was all planned out before i hit the "go" button. i just fail to see it, most times. but i really do believe that there is no free will. free will is a delusion of the ego to help draw us away from awareness and consciousness......

Actually there is only one case where there is no free will. And that is death. Without free will life can not exist.
If you want to enslave yourself to a fear of life be my guest but ALL functioning life must have an element of free will to continue.

I don't think it's possible at present to prove or disprove free will. However, I do believe it's quite possible that free will is entirely illusory and that the generative psychology and neurology fields have produced significant evidence leaning in that direction.

I wrote a topic about this subject a while back on ATS. It should be in my profile. It has a lot of references to research and arguments made both in favor and in opposition to free will in the classical sense.

Free will exist only when you have in front of you the possibility. Now, what is possibility?
Possibility is the action you have to take when not knowing you have to take it.
When can you choose the possibility?
When you don't know!!!
Must of you wouldn't get this because we are predestined from our culture, race, social statues, and family.

Most posters have presented the "illusion of choice" as being comparative or indicative of "free will".
The flaw IMO is that all postulates begin with "you have to choose between" "you're given a choice" "the availability of choices is limited" - free will doesn't really enter into which or what choice to make.
The buy-in of the reader that there are choices which must be made and those choices are limited already conceeds the loss of free will because in some way the situation or solution sets are either determined or influenced by external forces - the "problem" is already set up to be "solved" - the game is already established.

Your "free will" determines whether you play the predestined game, whether you accept that not only there are certain choices which must be made, or whether you choose not to buy-in, not to accept the predetermined choices. The entire concept that "you are given a choice" denigrates your free will. If you need to choose between A, B and C to accomplish X - know that it is your choice of X that's constraining your options, not the "fact" that you can only choose A, B or C. At a practical level, when presented with multiple choices your acceptance of the choices presented - and even the "fact" that you "have to " make a choice - is when the exercise of your "free will" manifests - do you accept the game? Exercise your free will. Play your own game.
Unconstrain your brain.

ganjoa

reply to post by AlienView


The point we are making is that sure, it appears there is free-will but that is illusory.

Ultimately, there is no such thing as free-will because our choices are already programmed in our entire spectrum of experiences that conditions our desires and choices.

Your own statement, that death is an example of no free-will actually confirms our idea that there is ultimately no such thing as free will.

But its not a negative thing understanding this because as nusnus says: "we don’t even know our choices”

In other words the delusion of free will is a useful thing because we aren’t even conscious of the fact that all our choices are already programmed in us through experience.

So you dont have to worry about being a slave, since you cant percieve it!

The world want you to believe that you have no free will...but you have.
There is a very bad concept which is called determinism. This concept lead you to believe that life is predetermined and no one has choices. Now if you look at the world today and the inequality that prevail in all branches of society then you can research all you want and you will end up with the same concept which is : life is the way it is and you just have to accepted....wake up and see around you that you can make the difference and nothing is predestined or programmed.
You have free will your mission in this life time is to exercise it when you find it.
You are not a number or a software, you are a free man...I am sure this will resonate in your heart...if not don't forget to charge your battery!

Originally posted by Paintshisshieldred
reply to post by Lionhearte

 

Think about your response for a minute. Are you male? Are you human? Did you choose your parents or the geographic location you were born? Maybe planet? How bout' your life experiences with the other people and places you have been limited too? In other words the choices you think you make may not be the "Freewill" choices you believe you are making. If indeed you have freewill, then why aren't you rich with all the trimmings?

Genetics aren't a choice, do you make the decision to breath air? To breathe underwater? This isn't a game, where you can customize everything to your choosing. I'm not rich because of my decisions in life, and because of others' decisions that affected me. My dad could have been rich when he was young, but he personally made the choice of rejecting it, for fear of being overwhelmed by greed.

That's a choice, that's freewill.

Originally posted by R3KR
Free will does not exist.
It is a delusion... Ill prove it.

Do this: Think of a new color, not from RGB or CMYK, a completely NEW color. Cant do it because you can not truly choose. You can only do what you are told or taught. If someone showed you a new color you would forever know it. But the point is everything that is, and everything that you know, is not new.

Not freewill.

Freewill is defined as acting without constraint of necessity or fate, the ability to act at one's own discretion. The very statement "Think of a new color" proves we have freewill, because we have the will to try. We have the will to make the choice.

I have the choice of jumping off a building because I can believe I can fly, will I? No, I'll die. I'll fall to my death.

But it will be my choice.

If every Idea that exists, does so as a result of our exposure to it. Then how do new ideas come into existence? If you say that they don't, than you are clearly a fool because we live in a super massive culture of Ideas that is everchanging. There must be an initiator of ideas. I don't know that I can prove it, but I absolutely know there is a free will.

Obviously there are a whole host of behaviors that are not a result of free will. Such things as scratching an itch, crossing our leg in that way we always do (or not). Making coffee first thing out of bed, pulling out that cigarette as we walk out of the house. Covering our face when something moves fast towards us. All of these things are stimuli response mechanisms, either bred into us, or that we created by choosing those behaviors repetitively enough.

Also such responses as crying when we are upset. Yelling when angry etc... not "usually" willed action.

Without such patterns of behavior (and such patterns are much more numerous, and complex than those touched on here, even relating to things such as personality) we would have no hope of surviving in a world such as this. Nor would we be able to accomplish those things which we truly do will.

As far as experiments where the motor complex is activated before the person actually moves. I would suspect that the person was, in fact, thinking about moving, before he actually moved.

reply to post by Lionhearte

yes this is the free will people should know about. not the coloring intellectual free will which only feed ignorance and deviate you from your true human responsibility .

thank you

And then again if there is no free will there is no crime. no one is guilty on anything. They are simply doing what they had to do - it is pre-determined. Murderers, child molesters, thieves, etc. have done nothing wrong because there is no right or wrong, everything is pre-determined.
If you want to believe in no free will than we must stop supporting so-called democracies and search for the ideal absolute police state where people can be protected from such radical ideas as free will.

It is true that many of us are conditioned by our culture and yet you have to take in consideration personal views; what do you say of the man who has been a devout member of a certain religion all their life and then they make the choice to change? that choice is an example of freewill, if we had no freewill we would all make the exact same choices every time without question.

reply to post by ICEKOHLD


You have free will. You are weak minded if you can only choose within those selections. I understand where you are coming from, but nothing has ever changed without free will. And there have been lots of things that have changed.

Lots.

reply to post by ICEKOHLD


For those who believe in free will, then free will exists.
For those who do not believe in free will, then free will does not exist.

Your free to chose.
And your free to not chose.
But you can not choose to not chose, what is not withing your grasp to chose from.

So the answer like everything else is.
Yes it exists, and does not exist.
So chose.

"To be or not to be" is really not the question, and whoever said it was! missed my miles and light years.

reply to post by Lionhearte

You are correct, genetics aren't a choice, neither is breathing air is it? Nor is breathing underwater. It kinda seems that the more you break it down, we don't have that many choices do we? I'm not being sarcastic, I'm just trying to get you to look at your beliefs a little more closely. You mentioned your Dad rejected being rich due to the fear of overwhelming greed. How can it be free will if Fear is causing you to make the choice you make? We are either driven to make the choices we make or we make them based on our past experiences. That's why we make the choices we make. It seems we make choices but we actually do not. Judging from your Avatar the cross you wear around your neck and your belief in free will tells me you are a christian. If you have free will then choose not to believe in your religion. You cannot and you will not. You have no choice do you? Until you break free of the things influencing your choices you truly have no free will.