Freedom/Free Will

[Tommy-K]

Think about it. Even in countries like the US and the UK where we claim to have limited freedom, do we? Do we actually make decisions for ourselves? Like the decision to go to university or college. You think you make it yourself, but you don't. The decision is made by whoever drummed it into your head that you should go to university or college. No one person can be blamed. It's a mixture of parents, government, media, teachers, any of these things. No decisions are made based on one person's free will. Every decision is influenced, as if we are 'brainwashed' into making decisions and thinking that we made them through our own judgement.

[beabuenosaires]

In a way, yes, every decision is influenced....But I do believe that, often, we do make our own individual choices. In reply to your college example, yes, it has been drilled into our minds since we began our educational journey that it is the most successful path to attend college, and a good one at that. But it is truly and ultimately up to the individual where the go are not, depending on what they feel is best for them. My older brother did not attend college, but instead opened his own restaraunt, which was his dream. He made that decision himself, against the norm. My aunt opted to skip college and travel, and now she's a freelance writer. Again, someone who went against the norm. However, I feel that college is the right route for me, as long as I pick the right one. The choice is completely on me, and is of my own free will, as is everything I do. No one is going to influence me to do or accept anything I don't want too.

Bea

[Tommy-K]

Originally posted by [email protected] 6 2006, 07:13 PM
In a way, yes, every decision is influenced....But I do believe that, often, we do make our own individual choices. In reply to your college example, yes, it has been drilled into our minds since we began our educational journey that it is the most successful path to attend college, and a good one at that. But it is truly and ultimately up to the individual where the go are not, depending on what they feel is best for them. My older brother did not attend college, but instead opened his own restaraunt, which was his dream. He made that decision himself, against the norm. My aunt opted to skip college and travel, and now she's a freelance writer. Again, someone who went against the norm. However, I feel that college is the right route for me, as long as I pick the right one. The choice is completely on me, and is of my own free will, as is everything I do. No one is going to influence me to do or accept anything I don't want too.

Bea
But what influenced your brother to open a restaurant? Or your Aunt to travel?

[beabuenosaires]

I don't think anything can influence your true desires. You will want what you want, whether or not your environment tries to influence to you whether or not it's "good" or "bad" or "right" or "wrong" for you. The heart loves what it will.

[apathy maybe]

As materialists I hope we all accept that the physical laws of the universe govern everything. Including what goes on in our heads. As such we don't have free will.

Even if we 'did' genetics and biology would still limit our choices.

And as has been pointed out, society restricts us in our decisions too.

But regardless, We will act the same if we have free will or not. And thus discussions on free will are pointless.

[Everyday Anarchy]

Originally posted by apathy [email protected] 6 2006, 06:50 PM
But regardless, We will act the same if we have free will or not. And thus discussions on free will are pointless.
I concur.
Free will discussions always just end up going in circles. To the people who debate whether we have free will or not... ask yourself, what difference does it make? Sure it kind of sucks thinking that we don't have control over ourselves, but oh well. Nothing you can do about that.

[Marsella]

Free will?
Our choices come from two areas: heredity and environment.
Therefore, everything we 'will' is merely the result of someone else's thoughts etc.
The only way we can have true free will is if we know completely nothing or everything (and therefore are uninfluenced by exterior concerns)
But yeah, I agree its not particularly a practical question (apart from when politicians claim they are fighting for a non-existent freedom of choice).

[adz170]

i personally think free will is a state of mind ... . Every day minor obsessions and inferior practicalities are drilled into our head from various sources such as Tv , Radio , Music and all other branches of goverment which promote media.
therefor to have free will you would have to not watch tv , not listen to music , not listen to the radio , not look around when your outside... . Therefore to have complete free will would be impossible or at least very difficult as the choices we make are determined by the enviroment which we live . There are loads of psychological studies to back this up from the recent "hoodies" arguments to convicted serial killers obsessed with porn... . i think society cannot be to blame but it does determine alot of choices which we make.
so i think theoretically we do not have Free will but you can choose to look at things freely...
:o :huh: ;) :blink:
Adz :D

[beabuenosaires]

Well, everyone is free to their own opinion, at least. And whoever said conversations like this always go in circles was right. So....By my own free will, I'm choosing to exit it. No one influenced me too.

Bea

[Tommy-K]

Originally posted by [email protected] 7 2006, 02:04 PM
Well, everyone is free to their own opinion, at least. And whoever said conversations like this always go in circles was right. So....By my own free will, I'm choosing to exit it. No one influenced me too.

Bea
No one influenced you to, apart from the person who said these discussions always go round in circles.

[RevolutionaryRomanticism]

Despite those, influence, to go a step further...I will say that we are technically products of our processes...which in laymen's terms would state that we only mak the decisions we make, because whether we realize it or not, there is something essentially something predispositional about us. Whether we debate a decision for hours on end...ultimately (most of the time we know it, though sometimes we don't)...our minds have already made themselves up...so ultimately we are of course conditioned..it's impossible to be in an enviroment without being influenced..whether in favor of the enviroment or otherwise...and no they don't go on forever, he stated something and you answered he replied in order of accordance...and there its ended..things only go on forever because you allwo them to, or even drive them to yourself...

-ComandanteAnya

[nikos]

being influenced by the society and going to universities isnt bad...since everybody agrees that education is good,...being influenced by someone that believes in other beliefs isnt bad if wat he suggest is a common good...what is really bad is being limited by the society and dont want to do something because u are afraid of what your neighbors will say...

[rouchambeau]

Some proof or a decent argument would be appreciated.

[Esplin]

It is true. Our actions, our decisions are someway affected by others. Our choices are determined by our personailites, which are in turn determined by the influence of the media, our parents, those who we associate with and our experiences. MEMES. They determine everything. MEMES are the total amount of cultural infomation an individual expresses toward the world. Words, thoughts, beliefs, actions, personal images, even mere presence. Nothing is definite, pure. One person who's mixed up unique MEME is expressed toward another which affects that person's own MEME and changes it, then distributes it toward others. If we are not free, then it is because of everyone around us, in addition to systems of goverment, ideology and religion, who have their own MEMES, but on a greater scale.

Free will....is an illusion.


But regardless, We will act the same if we have free will or not. And thus discussions on free will are pointless.

Indeed. But we have discussions anyway.

To me!

[apathy maybe]

What is the point of having discussions though? Metaphysics is a bullshit.

Yes it might be fun, this is why I call it mental masturbation. Fun for a while, but it achieves nothing. And if you continue the analogy, some people feel dirty and ashamed after.

[Bretty123]

For me, I just feel that determinism and free will are sort of empty and abstract concepts because really it is not black and white. Everyone has a free choice but it is in different colours and degrees.

[UrbanNinja]

Well, think about it. If we weren't influenced at all by anything, free will would be non-exsistant, seeing as it would be the only option. In a way, having the option against using free will, is free will itself. You can choose to use your own thoughts, and make your own opinions, or you can accept those thoughts and opinions that others have made.

[encephalon]

You can only believe in free will if you believe in a world beyond cause and effect.

You can only believe in a world beyond cause and effect if you are not a materialist.

You can only believe in a world beyond cause and effect only if you accept nothing of the technological achievements made in the last century.. like computers, which coincidentally run on only the logical progression of cause and effect.

You can only believe that your computer is working if you are a materialist, and do not believe in a world beyond cause and effect. If a world exists beyond cause and effect, then there is no way to reliably calculate anything. Your computer could stop working merely because god commands it so. Your clock can cease to tell time because it's possessed by a ghost. Ad Nauseum.

So, free will doesn't exist. And it still doesn't matter one bit.

[apathy maybe]

So, free will doesn't exist. And it still doesn't matter one bit.Exactly.

As materialists, we should not think that free will exists. After all, it would require that the physical laws of the universe did not affect the human mind. Because these laws affect everything else and there is no reason to believe that they do not also affect the human mind, to think otherwise (though unavoidable as you do not have free will) is quite stupid.

See also this http://www.revolutionaryleft.com/index.php...47&hl=free+will (http://www.revolutionaryleft.com/index.php?showtopic=55047&hl=free+will) thread that I started only a little while before this thread was started. In it I provided a few reasons on why free will discussions are pointless.

Also http://www.revolutionaryleft.com/index.php...32&hl=free+will (http://www.revolutionaryleft.com/index.php?showtopic=50132&hl=free+will) started a while back.

[Purple]

We have all been through a system of operant conditioning through the social institutions that leads all of us towards certain directions of life. Fortunatly there is a lot more tolerance for alternate views and attitudes in the current society, even though some tabooes are still... taboo...

[Raúl Duke]

I somewhat agree with Bretty123....

In my opinion (but I could be wrong, its just my opinion)

I do believe that our choices are limited by heredity, environment, influences, etc

And that the choices left to us is further influenced and limited by our interests

But basically the idea of having choices is still present, even so we are most likely to chose a certain choice

The prescence of these choices and the ability, no matter how influenced (or limited), to select a choice, in my opinion, is what makes up free will.

(sounds kinda like the philosophy -determinism I think its called- in which an action in the past affects your decision in the present and in the future like a chain reaction, except that I say you sometimes have more than 1 choice, even after many choices are "discarded" (or limited) by the influences, heredity, environment, etc. By sometimes I mean there will be time when your choices are limited to just one, and probably the chain continues until there is another time when there are more than 1 choice.)


Of course I might be wrong, I'm no philosopher (I haven't read that much philosophy)


(Maybe I should read some of apathy maybe's threads about why free will discusions are pointless, always like to see the many different views in philosophy.)

[Ol' Dirty]

The concept of absolute freedom is as irresolute as the concept of absolute zero. It is the same thing as hot ice, or dry water. There has never been a completely free matterial thing, ever.

[Raúl Duke]

Originally posted by [email protected] 28 2006, 04:26 PM
The concept of absolute freedom is as irresolute as the concept of absolute zero. It is the same thing as hot ice, or dry water. There has never been a completely free matterial thing, ever.
I agree that there is no such thing as absolute free will and absolute and complete freedom, yet my opinion is that there is some some degree of free will and some degree of determism and that its probably possible to have a high degree of freedom (as long as it doesn't affects others freedom, etc) that we don't have now.

[Guifes]

No, humans don't actualy have a free will, all choices can be explained by physics and other sciences, but does that really make a difference? It doesn't affect our rights or anything, does it?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Comrades might like to check this thread out, where I was able to show that both determinism and the belief in 'free will' are based on an anthropomorphisation of nature (i.e., they can only be made to work if we are prepared to accept that nature is run by a cosmic will of some sort).

http://www.revolutionaryleft.com/index.php?showtopic=51313

Neither doctrine therefore makes any materialist sense.

[anarchistical]

In the case of absence of free will what happens to the legitimacy of a judicial system? (I acknowledge the differing from the original subject)

Interesting discussion, though.

[apathy maybe]

Well, the judicial system has no free will either. So while they do not have any legitimacy, they can't do anything about it. Neither can we.

That is the problem of discussing free will, if we do not have any, neither does anyone else. Thus any condemnation is not of our own free will. Any act by anyone else is not of their free will.

Therefore we should just ignore the whole stupid question.

See also http://www.revolutionaryleft.com/index.php?showtopic=55047 where I provide three small discussions on the topic.

[DISTURBEDrbl911]

It is most true that free-will does not exist. For every decision and act was affected by someone else, another shaped you into acting a certain way and thus you are not acting alone in your decision but with others' influences as well.