Free Will - Yes/No?

[emjay]

Okay, just looking up the definition of that, do you think I come across more as a soft determinist? I see it that from the perspective of the system (ie us) there is free will but that's part of its 'design'... in reality it's all a play, both what's on stage and the audience.

In some ways you seem like a soft determinist but when you speak of the clockwork universe you sound more like a hard determinist. I'm a hard determinist but even if determinism was false I wouldn't believe in free will because I think it's a logically incoherent concept at worst and stating the obvious at best (depending on which version of "free will" we're talking about).

If you believe in a fully deterministic or 'clockwork' universe and you believe that free will is compatible with that universe, then you're a compatabilist/soft determinist. If you believe free will is incompatabile with that, then you're an incompatabilist/hard determinist.

I personally believe any definition of 'free will' compatible with a fully deterministic or 'clockwork' universe isn't anything anyone questioned the existence of anyway. Many people believe that we 'could have done otherwise' that we're not fully determined, and that we have some kind of ultimate freedom to our wills. Then the compatabilists step in and basically say that we are not always fully coerced and we have choices and make decisions and so therefore free will exists. But that was never into question anyway, it's like redefining our will from "will" to "free will", it's like simply adding the "free" part merely because we have normal human freedom that was never to be doubted anyway.

Compatabilists say "So what if our desires are ultimately caused by cause and effect in the universe? They're still our desires. So what if we have no control over making red blood cells, it's still us.".... even though we have no choice over it whatsoever which is kind of the whole point of free will. I agree with Sam Harris that the compatabilist version of free will is basically "a puppet is free so long as it loves its strings".

-Hammy

Basically 'I' have the feeling of making choices, but both the 'I' and the feeling of willing a choice are both parts of a greater illusion which is determined. I can be aware of that illusion at an intellectual level but I live in real time within that illusion so I act according to my nature and think in terms of making choices... but I know they're not real. So from in here it feels like choice but actually the neural networks of my brain do all the processing and that is entirely determined. But everything I've ever done or has ever happened to me in the past, could not have been any other way... every single thought that I have ever experienced could not have been any other way... right down to when I have 'decided' to scratch my arse

All this stuff of compatabilists tbh doesn't make much sense to me and is not what I'm talking about when I'm talking about free will.