Do Humans Have Free Will? | Episode 910 | Closer To Truth
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 27 ส.ค. 2020
- Free will seems so obvious. Whatever I want to do, I just do. But could "I" be fooled? Some say that free will is an illusion. Others, that it's a mystery. Featuring interviews with Ned Block, David Gross, Stephen Wolfram, J.P. Moreland, Nancey Murphy, and Jaron Lanier.
Season 9, Episode 10 - #CloserToTruth
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Closer To Truth host Robert Lawrence Kuhn takes viewers on an intriguing global journey into cutting-edge labs, magnificent libraries, hidden gardens, and revered sanctuaries in order to discover state-of-the-art ideas and make them real and relevant.
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Closer to Truth presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.
#FreeWill #Philosophy
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I don’ t want to be happy. I want to know truth. - RL Kuhn
YES.
Thank you Robert, you are helping me me...in my lifelong quest for truth. I am grateful sir.
It sounds funny, i always used to have this feeling since i was teenager , does i control myself or someone else control it.Even i have one question if our consiousness vanish does we feel emotion ( pain, happiness etc)
The quest for truth is a noble idea but I find that often many would like the truth to be as they see it, or as they would like to be...
@@sandeep2435 if our consciousness is quantum, as it appears to be, and if there is NOT a quantum soul that continues after death, as it appears to be, then our consciousness is preserved as quantum information. A functioning brain is needed to processes that information, as proven by general anesthesia, which causes total loss of consciousness...Whoever created human brain with quantum consciousness (GOD, Intelligent Designer) should be able to restore our consciousness. Some kind of resurrection makes sense in this context...
Christ is the truth son
@@sandeep2435 You're close, Life controls you.
Beautiful inspiring ending: "when big questions give pleasure, even without answers, one gets closer to Truth." Thanks Robert!
If I had the power to create a universe, and I wanted to be fair, all creatures would be able to create their own universes to suit their own tastes. No strings attached. No judgment on my part. That would be free will.
As a fentanyl addict, i feel i have no free will, control of my life or decisions
You're addicted to.. It's not your own fault, it's not your own responsibility,
You're addicted to everything you can't control yourself to that addiction.
Free will as an illusion begs the question, "Why does this illusion exist?"--what a strange coincidence that our consciousness has no effect on our actions, but exists anyway.
If free will is real, there must be a causal connection between our intentions and our actions, but this is difficult (impossible?) for neuro-scientists to model. Am I wrong?
I think the illusion exists because we still have free will in the compatibilist sense of the word. We act according to our desires, personality, and motivations we’ve built up through our life given us a sense of who we are. We’re able to contrast this to being forced externally by another agent to adopt new and overriding motivations that we wouldn’t otherwise have and so it seems out of character to us and unfree. E.g the man holding a gun at your head forces you to adopt the out of character to desire to rob the bank he tells you to.
Sebastian, I don't understand your reply, but I confess this topic is difficult for me to navigate.
I am quite skeptical that our apparent free will has no causal impact on our decisions. If free will has zero effect on what we do, it is merely an accidental coincidence--unless one believes in a creator who made it thus (I do not), which reminds me of Leibnitz's thinking. I don't trust coincidences to be true if I can find some other explanation. In this case though, I admit it isn't easy to find any easy explanation.
People get confused and conflate two different problems regarding Free Will.
The first "problem" of Free Will is really the pseudo problem which asks: can we really act freely, where "free" means free from all psychological variables that effect our freedom as well as any physical variables. For example, if I eat chocolate out of desire for its sweetness and to satisfy my hunger, am I free, or am I just a slave to my desires and instincts? Personally, I find this philosophical problem of Free Will pretty silly. In this extreme notion of being "free" most would agree we do not have '"free" will.
The second problem of Free Will is more relevant to your question regarding whether Free Will can be explained by neuroscience. The problem here is in establishing what it would mean for a physical system, such as a brain. (or a tree, or a rock etc.) to truly have the freedom in its actions that reflects our first-person sense of Free Will. If we can explain brain behaviour in terms of purely deterministic interactions between neurons then it would seem we cannot explain our first-person sense of Free Will. Perhaps we can throw some randomness into neural activity, maybe through quantum uncertainty, but adding randomness to a physical systems does not seem to explain our first-person sense of Free Will either.
My personal view is that a proper understanding of where the Free Will problem lies is aided by understanding what we mean when we talk about finding a "causal" explanation. Aristotle identified 4 types of causation: efficient, material, formal and final causation.
Physics assumes that the only kinds of causation that exists is efficient and material causation, while our first-person sense of Free Will appears to involve Formal and Final causation. The physics notions of causation and first-person notions of causation appear radically different and yet science needs to somehow breech the gap between the two.
Intention does exist and "works" but the point is, that you don't choose your intentions. This can be realized in meditation. Thoughts (including intentions) are just arising. You don't sit there and "choose" one out of a near infinite number of possible actions.
The question why there is an illusion of free will is very good and valid. I would say the reason is, because ideas have consequences. The idea of "I can shape my future" will be more conducive to survival/gene spreading than "I have no free will".
Danzigssvartre, I agree the first problem is not reasonable--we are not free to desire other than what we desire.
I have forgotten the meaning of Aristotle's four types of causation.
If one imagines, as a thought experiment, that free will (as an illusion) and consciousness were simply removed as phenomena, would all physical actions that we associate with free will still occur, unchanged? This is the definition of causal linking I was focused on.
John xantoro, it seems you are making a case for a causally linked free will that is an illusion (perhaps illusory?).
I've wrestled with the idea of free will for about 40 years. I do not think we have free will and I cannot think of any way we could have free will in any real way. Even adding a soul doesn't get me there because everything we do is either for reasons or it's random. Neither of these gets me to free will soul or not.
But we do have conditions in which we voluntarily choose right? Probably not total free will not hard determinism but a Will of a conditional sort, some things determine our thought process however what we want to do or say etc. is of varying sorts in which we make a voluntary decision?
@@bhavinmehta1490 we are free to do as we want. We aren't free to choose what we want to do.
@@Ray-Angel Sir this is actually somewhat helping me, I have been grappling with this question and I’d say the way you put this makes sense I suppose. We do still voluntarily act on our wants correct? Even if we may or may not choose what it is we want, as determinism has it. I can want to eat chocolate ice cream more than vanilla but just because I want to eat chocolate ice cream does not mean I am obligated to have to eat chocolate ice cream or an desert for that matter right? Correct me if I’m not following along, this has been difficult but it’s also odd the way those who explain determinism state it, as if we are so to speak obligated to eat the ice cream that we want, and that does not make one bit sense to me.
@@bhavinmehta1490 think of it this way. Whatever you do you do for a reason. Therefore the action is determined by the reason. If you want ice cream but choose not to have it there's a reason you make that choice. Maybe you want to lose weight? So no matter what you "choose" it's determined and the ability to choose is an illusion.
@@Ray-AngelI have been fighting against determinism for a long time
I so much love Dr.Robert..Full of sharp intellectual acumen.
pro free will arguments are basically "yes we have free will but it is not really free"
Sir, can you please present more Eastern opinion of these topics?
This is epistemology of a term we call free will, should be universal for all religions. Science is not western or eastern, we are not talking about options here, only facts that can be verified by everybody on a planet.
Only thing western here are Google corporation, English language and catholic humanism, making this program possible and a relevant global project. This means if eastern alternatives exist, they must come from another planet because if those mystical ideas could happen on our planet, we would know about it.
Someone tell us everything is an illusion - but then the illusion is also an illusion.
If that conclusion is right that free will is illusion, wherein we are like a machine, then I think it can be valid to say that you and I or you and someone can be the same in thoughts, feeling and identity, because logically we can think that machines can be operate and function similarly, but contrary in reality we are unique.
Thus, we have no free will but a limited range of options.
The enviroment and the brain make us everywhere and everytime.
I like the approach to discussing this topic by keeping the will and just dropping the "free"
I liked Wolfram’s idea. I don’t know if it’s right but it makes sense. Especially when he describes the “irreducible gap” between the simple deterministic rules at the bottom and the complexity at the top. I’ve often wondered if it’s the case that everything is deterministic but ends up being so complex at the higher levels that you could never have a Laplace’s demon situation where you have perfect knowledge of all parts of the system. If perfect knowledge is impossible even in principle, then we would still perceive it as free will since actions would be unpredictable. Which is what we really mean when we talk about free will, I think.
... But what could a soul be? What is it, what parts does it contain? What attributes does it include? How could something non-physical affect the physical brain? Can a physical brain detect a non-physical stimulus?
I feel as though these questions have been long coming and are finally a step in the right direction. A step.... Closer to Truth.
Let's see if I've got this straight. Everything I do, including the formation of beliefs, is determined. Is that what's being argued? OK. I now have a defeater for all of my beliefs, including belief in determinism. It could still be true but I can't warrant my belief that it is. In other words I cannot know it. That's bad enough. But there's a worse entailment. All of my beliefs depend on my existence as a conscious agent. I now have a defeater for that as well. Again, it could still be true. But I cannot rationally claim to know that it is. That's where I get off the ride. Any model of reality that renders rational belief in my own existence as a conscious agent impossible is literally unbelievable. Who generated the model? So I'm completely within my epistemic rights to reject it a priori. No argument is necessary. Seems to me, and I'm just a guy who makes his living with his hands, that this is a pretty good reason to reject or modify naturalism as now understood. Are we so committed to metaphysical naturalism that we will abandon belief in our own existence rather than admit we've made a mistake?
Amazing!!
What if some human beings have free will while others do not? I never hear discussion about that. Perhaps some beings are bound by determinism & others are not.
I think the Russian Philsopher George Gurjeff (SP?) had a similar idea, that some humans had fate and some were random.
Hey there... that's a very interesting perspective, regarding the idea that " perhaps some beings are bound by determinism and others are not." But for me that idea evokes even more questions.
That's correct. And there seems to be a flash point in lives, and that's where you choose one way or the other, either through action or inaction
Even if we all had equal intellect we wouldn’t necessarily have free will. However, there is the argument that those with higher intellect have more options and therefore a greater freedom of Will. Regardless of higher intellect, neurological and biological variables beyond conscious control, including hormones, can affect decision making at any given moment.
Kuhn insists on a mechanism for free will in order to accept it.
Kuhn doesn't insist on a mechanism for gravity in order to accept it.
i feel like this question is impossible to answer untill we fully understand consciousness
What is consciousness, the spirit, the non dual entity we call brahman.
Maybe to fully understand consciousness we should answer this question
Damn! This may be the best one yet!!
👽👍
With all the knowledge we have today it looks like free will (if it exists in some form) must be not completely free.
This conversation of "Free Will" leads us to the discussion of determinism, indeterminism and materialism in a logical path.
And your point is?
@@patmoran5339 My point is, STFU and go about your day sir
12:32 When Robert says if circumstances where the same I could not make a different decision, doesn't that give quantum mechanics more of a role than just a random smearing? If randomness within the chain of agency adds only a slight lottery component to decisions, those decisions are still constrained by all the deterministic priors that make us who we are, but even the one added feature of choosing randomly from a subset of contextual possibilities then gives us all the unpredictable interdependent immediate complexity of the world around us.
Nancey Murphy comes closest to the truth in this episode. Keyword: neural plasticity... refer Norman Doidge. We become the choices we make. Neural plasticity explains that experience wires the neuroplastic brain. So on the one hand, we have free will to make the choices we want, but on the other hand, what we want is based on the choices we've experienced in the past. Why? Because what we've experienced and habituated in the past impacts on what we habituate and associate in the present (semiotic theory CS Peirce). Nancey is on the right track, with her references to top-down and bottom-up (determinism) and whole-systems thinking.
Free Will means I am free to develop my characteristics through cognition. My acts follow my characteristics. Here "I" is my conscious /soul.
👽👍
Yeah it's just like the movie "shawshank redemption" where Morgan Freeman narrates the story of a bunch of "prisoners" who found a way to be " free" while within the confines of the penitentiary from sheer "WILL" . ..... A VERY uplifting and emotionally charged movie ..... HOWEVER it wasn't until the END of the story that he was actually released and set "FREE" ( metaphor of life and death lol) .... There were SOME who were released too soon and couldn't survive as well as the "hero" who actually escaped and WAS the exception to the "rule" ( THIS was important psychological reinforcement in order for the story to work) ...... It's about ALL in there but WILL be lost on MOST perceptions as they have ALREADY proven to be of a limited perspective from the START .... You ARE FREE just as long as you ARE willing to remain ignorant of the TRUTH ..... "Ignorance is bliss" . .... Humans ARE creatures of habit and thus develop patterns that provide a sense of comfort ( comfort zone) that they DO NOT want to willingly leave or change ....... HOWEVER it is ONLY outside of the perceived "comfort zones" that WE actually grow and evolve as a species ......
Mum: you didn't learn from this video so why watch it? Me: even without answers one gets closer to truth
Anyone who thinks they do not have Free Will please put up your hand?
Can the absence or presence of Free Will really be measured by my hand? ( By the way, my hand is holding a "probabilistic apple").
Is there anything unusual happening in the physical brain at the time of decision, such as matter changing or disappearing, or in the cognition (thought) and language areas of brain?
Dear Mr. Kuhn,
There is no meaning in all these qustions I analyse, viz. "Free will, consciousness, Truth, ... ", so long as I haven't defined "I" as a particular sequence of particles and specify a definite criterion of proof related to satisfaction of my needs to verify the acuracy of the theory I assume as to the origin of those particles.
Free Will is an illusion of determinism much like an Instagram filter is on a photo.
Simple as that. It's the acceptance of it that seems to be the struggle. Interestingly, people argue that determinism removes criminal and personal responsibility. However i differ on that in two ways. Firstly, even in a deterministic system anything harmful that exists in the system must be excluded from the system. Secondly, because we do not know in the determined universe who under the penalties of the legal system will reform and who won't it should be applied to all for the purpose of extracting those who would. Those who would not will be again excluded from society.
I can understand how determinism makes people think that no one should be held responsible for their actions but our belief system, which “free will” is derived from, won’t allow that.
It’s funny how people think choice is actually determined from some blank canvas in their mind when really it’s just a filter to make life feel less restrictive of what has already been determined.
@Twenty Faces Yes I was predetermined to think this way based on biology first then environmental factors as my life progressed. Please explain to me how you can magically determine and choose your own belief system without ever experiencing a prior external cause towards it. I’d really like to know.
I wish I were fated to meet you.
Bs, you are saying a criminal was determined to break the law? Why not let everyone out of jail/prison then... they had no choice but to break the law.
Subjectively, we have free will. Objectively, we do not have free will.
Could it be time delay? Ex: if my brain picks the colour before I know what colour to pick.Can that phenomenal effect be drive by time delay. like we live in the past and our brains live in the future that explains a lot of phenomenal like deja vu
Empiricly we can only recognize determined things, means not that freedom is illusion. We can also not see the subject of knowledge, the self is always invisible, it is always already bigger, already further out. Freedom is something on this level of being, can never be in abstracto!
Robert have you ever investigated whether a will exist and what exactly is a or the will of a person? Break up freewill into will and free as two aspects that should be investigated on their own and I believe you will get closer to the truth. If there is a will, is it free? Before this can be answered, it must be determined whether a will exist or not. Thank you for all your videos on many intriguing subjects. I thoroughly enjoy them.
If we believe without enough evidence, it’s like you doesn’t want to challenge , your belief, and closing the case
Exactly
Exactly, I hope I'll have to challenge my non belief in free will
That last lady doesnt realize she didn't even really make her own argument.
Choice part of determinist chain and happens when person is conscious?
Excellent..... thanks 🙏.
definitely my favorit episode
Other people act like they have free will, or act like they look like have free will?
Interesting videos.Keep it up Robert. :)
👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👽
Having a soul literally has nothing to do with free will.
there's literally no reason to assume the world is solely physical. obviously we are better at understanding the physical. it hardly follows that the physical is all there is. when materialist just say any questions about the nonphysical are nonsensical, they just mean they cant answer them with their model.
We were not asked if we want to be born, therefore we don't have free will.
If a person can do some action by chance (indeterminism), could that demonstrate the presence of quantum field probabilities in the brain?
Maybe but that just means your action is due to chance rather than some predetermined cause of events,and still leaves no place for free will.
Is free will an Illusion? Itachi: the truth is an illusion but even the truth has a weakness
The answer is simple. We have free will and hence G-d judges us by our actions. G-D also knows what the outcome of our actions will be as he sees the future. We only struggle with these ideas because most people only recognise one direction of time, whereas there are actually two arrows of time. Therefore the forward direction of time corresponds with Freewill, and the Backward direction with Determinism.
@Julian
“God shows mercy on whom he has chooses & God hardens whom he chooses to harden.”
I don’t see how u Bible believing Christians can claim free will exists
Delusional liars - that’s Christianity
He's talking about human free will as if we are somehow unique among the animals.
My dog has the same free will that I possess. He could freely choose to bite my hand.
My hand would be a tasty treat for any carnivore. Yet he chooses not the eat it.
So if free will implies we have a soul, then my dog has a soul too !
why does no one ever attack the 'free' in free will? Nothing is free. Do we have will? Does it even mean anything without the 'free'? Why is free in this question not the opposite of cost? What does free mean?
You can choose based on logic so it’s a computation or based on emotion so it’s instinctive or you can choose between logic and emotions but you don’t know why you choose one or another, it just comes to you. Then another argument is the building blocks that determine the evolution of a system and determine the thought, not the thought determining the evolution of a system
Could choice be an element of human consciousness, while free will is an element of general consciousness in nature or universe?
As a general consciousness in nature or universe, free will might be subconscious of human person, and choice conscious part of person?
The sense of free will seems to be a very specific programming by evolution. As such, the purpose of free will must relate to nature's two mandates of survival and reproduction. Since it seems to be a very specific programming, how specifically is it
useful as it relates to survival and reproduction?
Free will is the ability to chose . If you have 4 road you know nothing about which road you are going to chose. You do not have free will in this situation .but if you said the road does not matter, any road I will chose , I will accomplish and and continually pushing new boundaries internally and externally .success is a journey not a destination
We have free will and can be explained by time delay like we live in the past and our brains are few millisec in the future that explains a lot of things
Sorry folks. I was not free to avoid posting.
Even if you had free will you'd still make the same decision you're determined to make.
Human free will is pretty qualified, clouded in emotionality and limited foreknowledge. We have very limited agency to prize out our existence in.
We have free will, laws of physics is physical not psychological, even physical laws are not absolute psychological laws are even more free. What is important is that we need to practice good free will
@verillyan delon then why are some individuals more successful than others why are some communities more successful than others, what about all the inventions And discoveries
The idea that consciousness is an illusion is ridiculous. What is an illusion but something that fools your awareness, your consciousness, your ability to perceive? Just using the word undermines the claim.
It's like saying "The ability to taste is an imitation of flavor." The imitation of flavor is still flavor as it must be perceived as such by the tongue. Thus the perception of the illusion is still perception by a conscious being, as you must be conscious to be aware that you perceive anything at all. The word "awareness" is in the very definition of consciousness.
I agree with Robert, “The only way FREEWILL could exist if something nonphysical exists”.
This has been the area of my study for the last 32 years. Here is what I understood from scriptures;
Tripartite Concept of Human Being
1. The Actual Personality (Soul): This is Spiritual Being which is Non-matter, Non-physical personality / entity / self. These souls were created in the Actual Order of Existence (which is Non-matter and Infinite). There “WE” were taught Moral concepts, Aesthetical concepts and Mathematical concepts. After learning and systematic training we made covenant with God and then we were put to slumber. Now these Souls are brought from Actual Order of Existence (which is Non-matter and Infinite) and attached to the hearts of the physical bodies in the womb of the mothers.
Our test is in moral concepts only, which is same in every human (The basic value is JUSTICE whereas Truthfulness, Honesty, Trustworthiness, Commitment are manifestation of that basic value of JUSTICE). Aesthetical concepts and Mathematical concepts vary with person to person or soul to soul and that is not the area of our test. FREEWILL relates to this spiritual being / soul / self. The soul can only intend, the actions are brought about by the physical bodies. The actions in moral spheres are called DEEDS.
2. Body: Our bodies are created in this material universe, which is FINITE created Ex-Nihilo around 13.8 billion years ago and is continuously expanding within that INFINITE Actual Order of Existence.
These bodies are separate creation of God and are provided to the Actual personalities / souls / selves as Carriers for TEST. The souls are riders; they can use these bodies but cannot misuse them. The bodies act on the principle of “Survival of the self and survival of the species”, just like other animals. For the survival of the self the human being eats, drinks, and makes shelter. For the survival of the species, the male and female mate and procreate.
3. Spirit (Rooh): This is the Divine Spark of God, which is termed as Conscience. It is attached with the body (Carrier) for further guidance of the Actual personality / soul. The function of the Spirit / Divine Spark / Conscience is to rebuke the Actual Personality (Spiritual Being) on the commission of bad deeds.
The Actual personality / soul / self is the driver of the body and its basic test is to keep the body (Carrier) within certain limits through the brain of the body for a specified period (i.e. until the biological death of the physical body), while Rooh is the spirit of God. The brain is the computer while “WE” are computer operators and our seat is the heart of the body.
In Christianity these three aspects of human being are more clearly described as Body, Soul and Spirit. The instincts relate to the physical body (Carrier), whereas, attributes or concepts relate to the rider i.e. Actual Personality / Soul / Self. “Intentions” pertain to souls whereas actions are brought about by physical bodies. The actions in moral spheres (in which we are being tested) are called DEEDS and the Souls have “FREE WILL” in this sphere. God has given general sanction to bodies for action but stops through His angels wherever His wisdom demands.
Free will to create our experience in this reality. The reality of this plane is we are governed mentally, physically, spiritually. I don't believe free will means limitless possibility, rather just simply free to navigate in a plane by the means of your will.
Imagine if we had the power of the universe and ability to impose our free will on it... think it'd be not different than a war zone. So perhaps on this plane, in Spirit, we are learning the nature of free will.
Perhaps there is something in this comment that I am missing? Actually, probably not. It is probably just gibberish.
@@patmoran5339 isn't that what closer to truth is about. Finding the missing link
@@S3RAVA3LM If you mean finding a link to the supernatural, this runs into the same problem with all supernatural explanations. They will never get us one jot closer to the truth. That is because these explanations are recommended to find an ultimate truth. There is no ultimate truth. Also, I suspect you might be misunderstanding the word "plane." There is space-like a flat plane. But you seem to be confusing that with an airplane.
@@patmoran5339 No, navigate your avatar in this governed plane by means of exercising free will.
@@S3RAVA3LM Gibberish.
Ned Block diminished the concept of free will down to absolute zero, and concluded that's all the free will we can possibly have.
Not true friend, he's saying that OTHER than the forced behaviors a critical stimulus might have, our decisions are our own..Our decision ARE a result of free will..i don't necessarily agree..
Whoops I might have gotten the wrong guest.. if so ignore my comment.
22:00 There’s a downside to blindly believing in free will. Our judicial system, punishes people who “deserve it” when no one created themselves:
Yes but those who commit crimes ought to be punished. Do you want child killers free on the streets?
@@rl7012 Of course they need to be punished, but only as so far as it protects society or deters others, not because “they deserve it”.
@@rl7012 And this is where the free will argument matters. If you can’t see that child killers are simply unlucky to be who they are, you’re not looking closely enough. They didn’t make themselves.
Again, 28 year old them was made by 27 year old them, which was made by 26 year old them, all the way back to their birth, which they didn’t author.
When they have a thought, do you think they choose that thought, it did it simply arise in consciousness?
You have exactly as much motivation as you have in any given moment, and not an atom more or less. And you can’t account for why it’s that way.
Everything is as it is in a way that no one can truly take responsibility for.
@@rl7012 Obviously you lock them up because that protects other people from being abused, but it has nothing to do with them. If we had a pill to give them to make them non child abusers we would give it to them, no different than treating someone with a medical condition.
@@epicbehavior So Hitler was some poor innocent was he? Ted Bundy too was not responsible either for his heinous crimes then?
For an action to be a natural choice (modified free will in brain), would there have to be a rational thought in brain behind it?
Do thoughts and language have any physical effect in the brain? How are thoughts and language represented in the brain?
Could the neurons in brain do both conscious choice and subconscious free will? Maybe a single neuron can do subconscious free will, then as a collective network neurons can do conscious choice?
What about separating, initially, Free from will. Initially I want to discover how do I become free? I can not find this in a secular/ psychological sense because people have so many different ideas about how they, as individuals, define freedom, objectively or subjectively. Therefore my search leads me into a spiritual domain to try and discover if there is an ultimate freedom which I could apply to my own will. The answer came clearly for me in a statement made by Jesus Christ. Seek the Truth and the Truth will set you free. This then becomes a journey where I discover that Jesus Christ also claimed for himself to be The Truth. His proclamation is; "I Am The Way, The TRUTH, and The Life. I use the freedom of my will to believe this and pray that God helps me to act upon this reality. Praise God, His Son, The Holy Spirit and Bless God's Holy City Jerusalem. Hallelujah!
Hey John... thanks for sharing your inspiring words.
If there is any free will it occurs in the absence of supernatural beings.
No. It would mean not having to pay for it. But the notary will not agree.
There are many illusions, such as something from nothing or a machine that prints multiple illusions.
No, they don't. Nor does/can anybody in any possible universe.
@Anderson Mendes,
It's more an assertion rather than just an opinion. And yes, It's missing an explanation, indeed. It can be found in Sam Harris' book _Free Will_. And here are some relevant videos for anybody interested:
1) Rationality Rules - Free Will Debunked
th-cam.com/video/j4Oyi1T-HmU/w-d-xo.html
2) CosmicSkeptic - Why Free Will Doesn't Exist
th-cam.com/video/OwaXqep-bpk/w-d-xo.html
3) Sam Harris - Free Will (Festival Of Dangerous Ideas)
th-cam.com/video/_FanhvXO9Pk/w-d-xo.html
4) Jerry Coyne - You Don't Have Free Will (Imagine No Religion 5)
th-cam.com/video/Ca7i-D4ddaw/w-d-xo.html
=====
I don't necessarily disagree with this statement, but since there is a real world out there that isn't completely understood yet by science, isn't possible that you are wrong? Do you at least take that into consideration?
"Freedom" is seldom used in the infinite sense. It is often used in a restricted sense . Eg., freedom of speech does not mean one can scandalize others or instigate people to commit self murder. A will is the product of the mind at work. It is a formulation of intend-to-do. First a number of possibilities are entertained then the more probable ones become options and these are evaluated and the superior option is taken as decision , usually . However the weight of an option is determined by both external factors and internal personal preferences. There is thus some amount of determinism about what decision an individual finally makes irrespective of whether he thinks he is free. There is also a scenario when the two competing options are comparable in weight or value and if pressed for decision one may arbitrarily choose one . If one can go back in time there would be a more or less equal chance that one may choose the other option as final.
Thus it is possible to have alternative versions of history at these bifurcation points and the totality is like a tree which keeps branching and then branching and we happen to be at one of the twigs of the tree while there exist other possible twigs.
Here's a question that could answer free will. Can the future be predicted? If not, then is it bound to happen no matter what you think? You can't change a future unknown. If this is the case then do you really have free will?
Life is about the experience. You aren’t suppose to “know” It says so right in the Bible.
Accurate perception of free will would be helpful, as inaccurate perception of free will can lead to problems?
What is free will but the ability to choose apart from deterministic knowledge? If you make a choice without basing it on an absolute foundational knowledge (which would merely be a deterministic outcome unless you choose to go against what the facts present), then you are exercising the purest form of free will as long as you are not just following a feeling as a matter of course. If you consciously identify your options and recognize your right to choose what you feel or choose a different option, then your free will has been maximized. If you have to fight your nature to make your choice, thereby drawing upon willpower, then your free will has been maximized still more.
If free will is conscious, then both determinism and free will can be within consciousness?
It's rather interesting to see all these people in the video talking very sure as if they knew the Truth. The fact is that we don't know. Nobody really knows. And any given answer that claims to be The True-Answer is always dogmatic. We must ask, we must search, we must doubt, inquire, but we should remain humble to accept and recognize that we actually do not know about any metaphysical concepts.
choice is like an electron, there are probabilities to where it will go .
How could simple rules to complex behavior explain possible transition of random quantum field probabilities totaling 1, rearranging themselves around a particle with an updated determined classic probability / certainty of 1? Might such a rearrangement of quantum probabilities around a classic particle have the property of free will?
Since quantum mechanics is one of the most successful and predictable of sciences, could unconscious or subconscious brain activity be using indeterminacy and randomness of quantum field probabilities?
Are we free in choosing free will as an illusion or a reality?
Are you free to doubt? I would say,yes.
Why is the simplest, most intuitive explanation so difficult to accept? There is an immaterial conscious personality connected to the brain; that is endowed with all the manifestations of consciousness--thinking, feeling, doing, remembering, and *willing* . This conscious personality belongs to a
ontological category separate from and superior to dead, unconscious matter; and is, by nature, "free-willed." Easy, isn't it?
I must learn more
To easy to understand!
Jesus Christ, that Cristian philosopher makes no sense!
Reprobate mind...
Very delusional
@UCaKb6ch5gDyWSBPZ9HkGqYQ Understood. So if I criticize someone that is antivaccine I actually meant "hey everyone, let's go to a crazy crowded awesome new year's eve party at the beach"
The premise in the first minute sort of negates the whole video. If you see determinism as one moment causing the next moment, but you really mean one moment controls the next moment, then you are just projecting a human concept on to nature where it doesn't exist. Causation is a relationship in time between events. One events happens and then another. If this happens the same all the time, we say one causes the other. Control is a human concept that involves volition and intention, so it has no place in nature. Oddly enough, a determinist like Kuhn is almost ascribing free will to mindless cause and effect while taking it away from actual agents. Very strange indeed.
Wouldn't it make sense to say that the laws of thermodynamics are just as deterministic as causation? So how come no one is surprised when living things are consistently warmer than their environment? It's not that living things break the law, they use the regularities to their advantage.
What makes this whole subject even more out there is that there are no "laws of causation" in science. Philosophy has much to say about causation, but not science. Science looks for regularities and assumes causation, so using cause and effect against free will is just fluff.
There is some special bits (in underlying layer) that can change the behavior of system (for exaple : saying yes or no to a question) without changing the macrostate of that enviroment. This is called free will. In two simillar macrostate that have diferent special bits in their microstate it is posible for the system to act differently based on its special bits. I wish this help you all.
it is true that underlying layer can shape uper layers but don't forget that uper layers can shape underlying layers too and it is two way and not one way. So there is down to top effects and there is topdown effects and also there is horizontal effects (horizontal in time for example continueing the ideas over generations)
Demonstrably *No*, machines cannot choose.
Souls or spirits or God are free as not bound by a physical situation or environment. To have a free will to select our experience or situation comes from God or Spirit beyond physical situation or environment. Since political central government is a physical situation / environment, it takes away the free will to select an experience or situation that comes from God or Spirit, even as it allows the free choice to act or react to the political central government situation / environment.
On 15:00 : 'Fine JP, we should't mix the apples of knowing the future with the oranges of determining it.' Determining it? While JP clearly says that we do (or we don't) collaborate in exploring all, what then obviously even god doesn't know (if exploring), if only god created it (I did not personify god)?
nice
"Do Humans have Free Will"
No Human has 100% Free Will.
However if You go Back in Time then Many Humans have had Free Will.
Hence the Loss of Total Free Will is Related to the Rise of Money, Knowledge, Governance, Human Numbers and Religion.
"Assuming only the physical is real...." Er, as compared to what?
A beautiful and engaging show..I noticed that Stevens persuasions closely resemble the block universe theory..At the FRINGE of science is a notion that the "Frozen" information within the block could be dense enough to include countless variations of each event, with some sort quantum interactions that enables path-shifting..Ala free will??
Ouch..That picture sounds uncomfortably close to a video game..
There is a version of free will that gives you real freedom while also being in the bounds of the laws of physics, but it's a strange one: you could be free and also respect the laws of physics if you have a "soul" (or however you want to define it) that can access the quantum mechanical branches and "choose" one of them. In that way, free will is compatible with non-determinism - you're free to choose from the available possible branches. Of course, there's no hint of anything like this going on.
On the other hand, there might be a slight problem with the way we see free will. Suppose I need to choose to go to a movie or stay at home and have dinner. Suppose I choose to go to the movie. We say that, in a deterministic world, I didn't really made a choice - I never had the option to choose to stay at home, therefore I have no free will. But is that really so? Would the version of me that would have hypothetically chose to stay at home still be "me"? Or would it be someone else? If you're careful, you could conclude that "what's it like to be you" is to be you, which includes the choice of going to the movie. You have this tautology that it couldn't be any other way than the choice that you made, or else it wouldn't be "you".
And finally, an escape for free will that is compatible with determinism is if the laws of nature say what "must happen" vs what "will happen". In the "must happen" version there is no free will. In the "will happen" there is free will, and you freely choose to take the action that laws of physics say that you will take.
Can structure of our thoughts enforce quantum reactions? I can't see why not, thoughts are electromagnetic vibrations, so they should work like observers, disturbing quantum randomness and enforcing certain super position that would not occur naturally. Super positioning is a natural process, but not the way energy of our thoughts vibrate when under strict control of a meditative ego. Words are like sounds in our minds, symbols form structures, meaning produce certain type of music quantum realm must dance to.
"Suppose I choose to go to the movie. We say that, in a deterministic world, I didn't really made a choice - "
What if your choice is causally based on your preference, and if your preference is mechanistically determined by the structure of your psyche? To me, this seems like the free will I experience, even if we allow for some randomness or indeterminism.
@@xspotbox4400 Even if wavefunction collapse is happening in a forced way within our brains, who does the "enforcing"? It's like shifting the question. Does the enforcement agent has free will?
Another interesting question is: free from what? Free from the physical laws that govern the material world? Then it must be something immaterial.
Either we have a soul that transcends the material world or we are robots and consciousness is an illusion. I can't fathom anything in-between.
David Brown Yes, that sounds consistent. Basically, you made your choice based on your particular neural network configuration and it felt completely natural.
@@ferdinandkraft857 Wave function cause another wave function that can change how first function is modulated perhaps. This sounds like a nonsense and probably is, but imagine how molecules of stuff look like and how they vibrate in sync, producing larger material structures in a process. It would be fine if atoms would be like tinny balls, but they are also emergent phenomena from quantum fields. There's no balls.
Why would molecules assemble into a large, intelligent organisms like us, molecules do that since the moment we were spawned into living creation in our mother's womb. But they doesn't became self immediately, it takes years before mind can shape self aware consciousness and creative thoughts.
So we have two things i think are important at play here, we have those quantum fields in don't want to even begin reasoning about, and we have this fluid phenomena of systematically growing complexity i also don't want to even begin explaining, because i don't have a clue how all this is possible and what kind of natural magic is responsible for physical nonsense life actually is.
My vest bet is, our sun made us this way, oscillating energies year after year, until something happened to that atomic dust and it began to form patterns, tuned to regular energetic emissions and disturbances.
People are often most interested in border regions where extremes collide and form some sort of a barrier. I would ask somehow different question, why things have limits and borders in a first place, can't they just extend to infinity? Must be because atoms, molecular forces can't extend over certain very short distance, so things brake and lump into some other unstable object. So perhaps same goes with thoughts, like symbols are contained by geometry they describe and can't jump over to another lump of structured energy. That partitioning of a mental flow is a reason we can form meaningful concepts and experiences. What makes molecules organize like that, sometimes we say wind of inspiration is flowing trough our brains, assembling bits of thoughts into a vision.
The greatest magic of all….How can nature produced flesh that has the capability to hear,see,taste smell etc and most of all a flesh that can think and create consciousness,a brains? How How How?
Psalm 139:7-10 Where shall I go from your spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there! If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me. 🙃🙂
Sounds like this is a targeted person.
@@xspotbox4400 Lol... sounds like you're connecting the spots.
free Will!
free John!
free Bill!
free everybody