(August 1, 2018 at 9:42 am)Little Rik Wrote:

(July 31, 2018 at 3:39 pm)Aegon Wrote: It's honestly shocking to me how much time some of you are willing to waste arguing with him.

It's honestly shocking to me ............to see people like you coming in a thread that does not interest you and then whining about it.  

Try area 69 maybe there you may find what you are looking for.  

Not enough head banging and lightbulb emojis in Area 69

(August 1, 2018 at 10:57 am)Aegon Wrote:

(August 1, 2018 at 9:42 am)Little Rik Wrote: It's honestly shocking to me ............to see people like you coming in a thread that does not interest you and then whining about it.  

Try area 69 maybe there you may find what you are looking for.  

Not enough head banging and lightbulb emojis in Area 69

That is one way to say.........I LIKE TO READ YOUR POSTS..........without saying.  

This must be the syndrome of the contradiction.

(August 2, 2018 at 10:45 am)Little Rik Wrote:

(August 1, 2018 at 10:57 am)Aegon Wrote: Not enough head banging and lightbulb emojis in Area 69

That is one way to say.........I LIKE TO READ YOUR POSTS..........without saying.  

This must be the syndrome of the contradiction.

Probably in the same way that people like to read the funnies in the Sunday paper.

I've been thinking an awful lot about "free will" recently. My latest conclusion is that it's a pragmatic self-delusion. Now that wasn't supposed to rhyme, but it did, and I won't apologize.

(August 2, 2018 at 1:50 pm)robvalue Wrote: I've been thinking an awful lot about "free will" recently. My latest conclusion is that it's a pragmatic self-delusion.

Could you have rationally chosen another conclusion?  If you had not choice, then can you call that rational?

If he had no other choice..whether it was arrived at rationally or otherwise..there was no free will involved...so it seems like a strange diversion, lol.

@Rob...IDK that I;d even call it a pragmatic self delusion..does anyone actually experience it, in any sense. Do we ever find ourselves in a situation where our brain is actually reporting to us that it has just made the proverbial decision ex nihilo? I ask because I..personally, can't think of any report like that. Theres a narrative of my having chosen this or that..sometimes the impetus of the decision is known..sometimes not...but never anything like a flashing mental neon sign saying "free will experienced here!!".

It may be that the subject of free will is bound up more in the way we speak about our agency in relation to other things/and the environment...and those gaps in our cognitive self surveillance. More that... than any thing out there in the world doing things to be experienced for a fact of a matter -or- a delusion.

Free will is an illusion in the same sense that the self is an illusion, I guess. The self probably isn't much more than a label.

@Benny: I agree, "the self" also seems like a pragmatic delusion. It's abstracting (and simplifying) the whole system to help with complex decision making. I was thinking this is where "self-awareness" comes in: where the system finds indirect ways to self-refer.

(August 2, 2018 at 3:35 pm)Khemikal Wrote: If he had no other choice..whether it was arrived at rationally or otherwise..there was no free will involved...so it seems like a strange diversion, lol.

@Rob...IDK that I;d even call it a pragmatic self delusion..does anyone actually experience it, in any sense.  Do we ever find ourselves in a situation where our brain is actually reporting to us that it has just made the proverbial decision ex nihilo?  I ask because I..personally, can't think of any report like that.  Theres a narrative of my having chosen this or that..sometimes the impetus of the decision is known..sometimes not...but never anything like a flashing mental neon sign saying "free will experienced here!!".

It may be that the subject of free will is bound up more in the way we speak about our agency in relation to other things/and the environment...and those gaps in our cognitive self surveillance.  More that... than any thing out there in the world doing things to be experienced for a fact of a matter -or- a delusion.

The label "free will" is really stupid, I agree. I was really just talking about feeling like having some agency, rather than being a combination of chemical reactions.

I see consciousness as the brain viewing its own model of reality coupled with the access to memory. The brain "feels like" it's experiencing this model, and therefor it is experiencing it. I realized there's no difference between those two statements from philosophical zombie thought experiments.

Oh, well.............  

Of course if you guys do not believe in actions and reactions or the law of karma you shouldn't worry so much about decisions taken with your FW.
Eventually you will have to worry when the reactions will pop up  and when they will do you will even wonder why there is so much suffering in the world which will follow with the usual blaming a God that does not exist according to atheism.
This is total and utter madness.

Personally I do worry because I do believe in karma so I think twice before I do something that eventually will affect my life.

I see no point in engaging in meaningless philosophy BS that suppose to answer your questions.
As far as YOU with your FW decide and do something that's it.
No excuses, no mumbo jumbo BS     will soften the reactions.  

Gotta wonder why you'd ask what the complications of free will are if you aren't really interested, and, in fact, have committed to remaining intentionally ignorant of the subject out of deference for your silly religious beliefs?

It's a thorn in the side of alot of things (particularly contentions that surround the issue while maintaining some sort of fate), and it's nigh impossible to demonstrate...but it's no problem at all for atheism or atheists one way or another. It doesn't matter, to me.. whether or not we have a free will.

Most people, believer or not..are some sort of compatibalist. There are issues with that way of conceptualizing free will, but meh. You..otoh, are a loon..a person who thinks his free will...whatever that's supposed to be to you..might cause an earthquake..if you aren't careful around puppies.