| KrodoNash |
| Hey. *I'm having a very, very good discussion on free will and consciousness with some people on another forum, and this is the kind of stuff that we would talk about on this forum. So I'll link to the discussion. *Any comments, etc. just post here and we can talk about it on this forum. http://www.gamingw.net/forums/index.php?act=STandamp;f=2andamp;t=20968andamp; (WARNING: make sure you have HOURS on hand before reading this ;) ) (Edited by ProbePhage at 10:21 pm on April 23, 2003) |
| WarChild |
| The link is invalid, I'm being redirected to the main forum page. |
| Trisha |
| Doesn't the fact that Angroth from that website decided to write all of that prove that he has some amount of free-will? ;) Unless he was told to do it. In which case he still has creative freedom in how to word it which boils down to style and grammar he learned at a young age (or through formal education, if english isn't his first language). ... but he did say he doesn't know why he thought of it. While I'm sure that statement is an understatement, it does illustrate, to a point, that he had enough free-will to start writing it. These "philosophers" need to get their definitions straight. But I can't stay they're the only ones guilty of it. Angroth later states that everything we do is based on emotions which are fickle and erratic. Wouldn't that go against his previous thesis that there is no such thing as free-will??? ... Here I thought all along that everything we do is based upon chemical signals and processes in our bodies. Which are consistent from context to context, if you are a healthy generic carbon unit like me ;) |
| gregorton |
| Its odd but under hypnosis somone can be told to do something upon waking like crawling around the floor for instance. Now when that person wakes they will tell you why they are about to do what they are about to do, like andquot; Oh, what an interesting floor cover, I was thinking about going into the carpet business myself, let me just have a look at this hereandquot; andnbsp;and down they gaet and crawl around. Now to them they have acted out of their own free will, but seen from our viewpoint thats not the case, maybe we have a deeper part of our conciousness which controls our descicions and we only make up excuses for why we dcided upon that particular course of action. Free will is a wierd thing, i don't think it will ever be solved. |
| BigBecka |
I read a magazine article about studies in voles, where the females were stimulating androgen (hormone) levels in males. Those males with the highest androgen levels were more likely to mate for life. The article speculated that women may be able to "persuade" a man to marry them by adopting certain character traits... |
| AndyBa |
Heh, that's pretty interesting... :) Any specifics? What traits? |
| Trisha |
| Paul, that sounds incredibly fascinating. Anywhere that I can dig into it? - Josh |
| gregorton |
| There is a little bit on it in an interesting book by John Searle called andquot;Minds, brains and scienceandquot; but apart from that its just experience. |
| BigBecka |
I know girls who act like this :D They also refuse to drive on motorways, or refuse to go out without company :roll: It seems to work for them :-? It doesn't work for me :( Sometimes I wish I could be SmallBecka :wink: Then men would find me cute and do stuff for me :evil4: Maybe I could just obtain some androgen pills, and hide them in some cakes... :P However, I'm not sure how the magazine article deduced all this from the scientific report they cited. I read another magazine article that suggested pretending to have a secret admirer, or pretending to have some terrible illness... This sounds like it could backfire quite badly :lol: |
| WarChild |
What about asking him to dig a cave? :P |
| kobus |
| Free will... it really is a good one. Paul, Is that 'deeper part of our conscioussness' contolled by us, or by something else apart from the individual? |
| BigBecka |
Now I am thinking of sweaty muscular men, with shovels and axes and dynamite... :love4: I will have to go and lie down... :toothy10: |
| WarChild |
Actually I was thinking about bearded bandy-legged dwarves with pick axes :laughing6: |
| bratt2z |
| Well, i dont really feel like reading all that, but if i had to say something about free will, i would say that there is no such thing. andnbsp;What we, as humans, define as andquot;free willandquot; is really just chemical responses and stuff programmed into us. andnbsp;We, as humans, have been chemically programmed to believe that we have some sort of control over what we do. andnbsp;I read somewhere ( i forget where) that there is a second consciousness controlling your mind. andnbsp;its like the wizard of oz saying andquot;pay no attention to the man behind the curtainandquot; and actually believing it. |
| BigBecka |
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| bennybcn |
| This philosophy to me sounds a lot like Descatres. This isn't origional. But then again, Descatres had to remind himself that he existed. He's the one that said 'I think, therefore I am'. A very stange and confused man. |
| BigBecka |
What I'm trying to say is, knowledge only liberates you if you have enough of it! A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, especially if that knowledge prevents you from questioning or learning any further knowledge. 8)
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| Trisha |
| So we have limited free-will? If those Enlightenment Period philosophes were correct, then we were born with a clean slate. But we have no knowledge, at birth, to act upon so there really is no will except survival instincts of... suck and go to the bathroom... and sleep. But as we get older we are influenced by language and our personal observed histories. Then we can act upon our knowledge for whatever purpose we desire. But then you can point out the physical laws that define us and prevent us from doing pretty insane things. There was that whole debate over language how we're all just a continuation of our predecessor's words. ... But we can still make some choices. We can change our minds again and again. We can do totally irrelevant things or attempt the most profound. Again, whatever. :-D I don't feel you can reasonably deny having at least /some/ free will in your life. The question is not a matter of how much. The question is a matter of how to get around those limitations. *wink wink* |
| bennybcn |
| Dude, if you want to believe what the enlightenment philosophers had to say, then go for it. I personaly believe that they're crack heads. I was just pointing out that the particular philosophy is not origional. But free will is what makes us human. Every other animal acts on instincts. And I agree with you. |
| WarChild |
This is normal behaviour, unless people _always_ act like that. Most people don't miss a chance to get rid of responsibility which is a consequence of their choices. Or at least they try to push a part of this responsibility to other people, so those ones would share it with them. This is a very controversial fact, but I can see an explanation of this. If we look at the other extreme, there are people with a very high sense of responsibility. Those people don't mind to accept some responsibility of other people, for sharing it with them. But such people are a minority. And even if there are some of them who manage to bear the burden of such a big responsibility http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahatma_Gandhi , other ones just get crumpled by its weight http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Fischer . |
| Trisha |
| Don't agree with alot of what enlightenment period philosophes have to say... But the clean slate ideology... I believe in that. |
| BigBecka |
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| bennybcn |
| Then do you believe in reincarnation? |
| BigBecka |
| Hi Benny: Not sure if that's directed at me or Trisha... :roll: But, yep, I like the idea of God(s)/the Cosmos recycling souls :D I remember thinking when I was very young that Heaven/Valjalla must be getting rather full by now! :lol: But that might just be me trying to rationalise the world... :wink: |
| Trisha |
| Physical reincarnation, of course. Now was that the first or second law of thermodynamics... hmmm |
| WarChild |
Heh, youngsters are idealists, they fail to see the grey and the black parts of life, they usually see only the pink part of it. If you are a sinner, you don't go to Heaven. And most people are sinners nowaday. Same about Valjalla - you can get there if you die on a battelfield, when fighting. Nowadays people use long-ranged missiles instead to kill eachother. That's just plain cowardice. |
| BigBecka |
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| bennybcn |
| Interesting. And uh, no clue. |
| WarChild |
I know it's not wise to generalize, but I was recently told a story by a mid-aged man from US. I'd call it a horror story. When he was a kid, he used to go to a Catholic school. He was getting his left hand beaten with a ruler on a daily basis (because he was left-handed and he was writing with the left hand). There was some law edicted by the Pope that was claiming that left-handed men are not normal, that they are tempted by Satan. That law was abrogated later, but still having such nonsense in the 20-th century just proves to me that Catholicism is a synonym for Hypocrisy. |
| Trisha |
| Matter cannot be created nor destroyed? |
| bennybcn |
| Um, pretty sure that's energy. |
| BigBecka |
Fortunately, the Catholic church was trying to reinvent itself when I was at the school. :wink: We had proper teachers, whereas Nuns had taught at the school up until a few years before! They were a bit like the hippy teacher on Beavis & Butthead... And they had started letting a limited number of non-Catholics into the school. Most of the catholic community were very friendly too. The school was in a town where outsiders were not welcome - some of the local children were not allowed to talk to me becasue their parents branded me a "traveller" :lol: But the Catholic community were Irish, Italian and Polish families, so they were very kind to me. But still rather sexist :-? The boys were allowed to play outside while we hand-stitched these f***ing kneeling cushions :evil: I managed to hit the Headmaster in the nuts with a cricket ball before I left :lol: There are some fascinating Vatican conspiracy theories around. I've heard that the Pope still has a scary amount of power in some countries... |
| Trisha |
| If you're talking about all matter being made up of atoms. Then certainly it is energy. :-D But I guess for all practical application, it is energy that cannot be created or destroyed. The first law... |
| bennybcn |
| I'm glad that you see things my way. |
| Trisha |
| hah! |
| Kellinom |
| I actually couldn't link to the other page, but oh well... I want to say my thing on free will. Wondering on the existence of free will, is something that sometimes induces the more philosophically inclined individual to attempt doing something really dumb just to see if they can get away with it. Almost, say... as an excuse for rebellion? From everything, including what's been done before. Not to say that this is the whole point of the short story, but Graham Greene's andquot;The Destructorsandquot; deals somewhat with free will, and how we can choose to let the systems that we create fall apart. Its almost easier. Entropy (which I think exists in states of mind, as well as in the mere physical,/biological world.) would have a tendency to tear apart all that is created by human beings. In fact... Entropy would have a tendency to delete life, cancelling the universe with its equivalent amount of antimatter (we're not talking star-trek, here). But that's not the case... (unless i don't exist ;) ;) ) So that rules out the (known) laws of the universe being the source of free will because the obvious intent of its will would create a lack of existence for everything. This leaves the mind of the self or the influence of a diety as an influence for one's decisions. (I apologize if my definitions or usage of terms are inadequate, but oh well...) Sanduleak, I think, already mentioned the idea that people could potentially be acting moving only as the result of chemical synapses. I've thought this through to a great extent Here's a comparison to the human mind: Written language is perhaps considered to be one of the greatest inventions (not necessarily discoveries) of mankind. What really takes place with Written language... is the transfer of one idea from the mind of one person to another while putting a suspension on time. E=mc^2 (which I believe is one of the laws of physics, not thermodynamics, but maybe both...) is the (simplified version of the) mathematical equation for the conservation of energy. So... matter can't be created nor destroyed, but can only be converted from one form to another. So what happens when you write down the fruits of your thoughts and experiences in a journal which is lost for a thousand years, then someone else reads it and learns from your writing? Information may not be exactly the same as energy, but it requires energy to store information in any form. From my limited collegiate studies of Physics, every real machine or system (as in, not a theorization of ideal conditions) has a great percentage of lost energy. Similarly... when one person reads something written by another person, they aren't really reading the same thing. They are applying their personal experiences and their backgrounds to this new thing... which has essentially been created in there minds, induced by the written material. Some of the information is lost. Now, back to the chemical control of your head: Everything you know (or might care to remember...) is stored in your brain. You experienced it from the translation of chemical to electrical transmissions in your nervous system, originating from your sensing extremities. Your senses allow you to come into contact with the outside world, transferring information from places, things, and people. So information has been transferred from person to person to person, throughout generations and for all of human existence... And data has been gathered from the world... info about plants and animals and perhaps the weather, eh? Now your various spins have been put on your observations, stemming from the data recieved from other people. Through the transfer, however, some of the data from other people has obviously been lost. Without original thought... and the loss of information, we would necessitate towards entropy. We would be getting stupider, and not smarter. But, civilization has been building up and the human race as a whole, is getting smarter (in theory... but we may have to exclude the president and a few others...) If we are cognitive beings, part of this must be sentient and cognitive choice. Our civilization would not be possible without it. We have to have free will. Besides... you won't get anywhere if you blame someone else for all your problems. You have to do something. (Donnie Darko anyone? almost a comforting thought if we're thinking about Armageddon...) |
| Trisha |
| andgt;Sanduleak, I think, already mentioned the idea that andgt;people could potentially be acting moving only as the andgt;result of chemical synapses. andnbsp;I've thought this through andgt;to a great extent. I'm not too sure if I said that... but I did not intend on sounding like I don't believe in Free Will... if that's how you took it. Or, I'm currently apologizing for the misinterpretation of somebody else's post. *shrugs* However, I really enjoyed this post. I'm going to share this with some friends of mine... I think they'll like it. Is this your own independent thought or are you restating an argument made by somebody previously? |
| Kellinom |
| independant, I like to think... but I may just be interpolating a different shade of blue,... if you know what I mean (Hume) |
| Trisha |
| *nods* |
| mavbv4d |
| BtheDragonman you are talking about anarchy, haveing a freewill is far different from anarchy, there is no need to sterio-type something you dont understand, obviously the programming of todays sociaty has taken a toll on you mind, which is sad because i feel that if one loses any control of their own thoughts or dreams they have lost all possibility of being able achieve true innerpeace, and or greatness. |
| mavbv4d |
| sorry i just wanted to clearafie that i ment no negativity bye what i said in the previous posting, i was mearly sharing my feelings |
| Kellinom |
| hmmm... anarchy? *which bit did you mean? *Where I said that everything has a tendency to move towards chaos but the addition of new ideas defy this entropy: creating new things all the time. *Or the part that free will is necessary for new ideas? I would love to hear why you think what you think. *Its much less fun for me if you merely tell me i'm wrong just because of your feelings. *;) |
| simtravel |
| We have free will in regards to the means but not in regard to the end. It seems that all organisms desire 'happiness' or contentment. That is why I go to work, bathe, eat, etc... even philosophize... because afterwards I will be a little 'happier.' It is the unviersal goal. The freedom to reach that goal makes us kind of a universal adapter. We are able to learn culture, language, etc and try to find a way, within the given paradigm, to reach 'happiness.' Therefore, I see that we have FREE WILL to do whatever it takes to reach an INNATE goal. Thanks for reading. |
| LaroCoppas |
| Now time for me to rant... Free will exists, because we have the ability to choose whatever we wish to do. This ability is limited merely by our imagination, however, there is another factor. This factor is the principle of self. People are predictable. Everyone has a certain tendency towards certain reactions in certain situations, so technically, if one were to know everyone's tendencies, the entire future would be predictable. However, this predictability does not discount free will, but merely points out that people prefer to act certain ways. Under certain circumstances, people can be made to act 'contrary to their nature', but even that is a function of reaction. Hypnosis makes things fun - you can order people to do things, but it has a catch. You can't make someone do something they wouldn't consider doing normally. So you couldn't make me run naked through a crowd, but you could make me crawl on the carpet. However, the mind rationalises these actions in their own individual way - an extension of the free will principle. |
| compsu |
| Oh the youthful thinking. You shouldn't be asking whether free will exists or whether it doesnt but under what conditions does it exist? Free will exists if there is a choice. Big mac or cheeseburger? Long johns or leopard underwear? Expensive car or economic car? Marriage or living together? Whenever starts rambling on about free will, i picture a person in front of a drive through window trying to make a decision on what to eat. There is consumer free will, that is to say you are not forced to buy something. Philosophical free will? Sometimes we do. Obviously our decision making process isn't sometimes as easy as 'to go to school or not to go to school?'. Depending on the psychological state of the person in question and the amount of external influences on the person, then you can say whether or not there really is a choice there. True, Sartre showed that we have innate responsibility for our actions and this counted as free will, but is it always this direct? If an earthquake hit new york today and killed my family and dog, was it ultimately my fault because i had the choice of living there or in chicago? Ofcourse not that is ridiculous to think. The decision to live in new york was not one that you openly weighed against natural disasters. True earthquakes can hit at any time on fault lines, but does this mean that you 'chose' to live there and should take full responsibility for your actions as you are as much responsible for the death of your family and dog as the earthquake? Philosophers have oversimplified the question of free will. Some say we are determined and therefore our actions are already preset. How silly is that? That assumes that a being somewhere already knows all the actions that will ever occur. This is contradictory in itself. If all things that will happen have happened, then there is a record of these things somewhere. Otherwise there would be no point in determenism. So this record already says what will happen in the future, but does it record itself as having recorded itself, as having recorded itself, as having recorded itself...etc.? It goes in circles and therefore their logic is faulty. Lets reconsider this question of free will. Dont romanticize the problem and dont bring in cliches. Be analytic and be skeptic, relative, objective, and subjective in your considerations. |
| BigBecka |
How do you know if something is your free will, or just some irrational instinct that you'll regret later? :confused2: |
| LaroCoppas |
| That's true, sometimes our options are either stupid or biased. |
