RE: The burden of proof relating to conciousness, free choice and rationality
March 4, 2012 at 1:09 am
(March 4, 2012 at 12:27 am)Rhythm Wrote: Perhaps it's in your nature to listen to the arguments made by others, something about communication being a survival advantage (even if what we are attempting to communicate is complete gibberish). I don't argue free will with anyone who isn't determined to use it as some sort of proof for a god, or against disbelief or causal determinism. Again, choice is not equal to free will. Let's say we allowed such a definition though. You and I both believe we are making choices, it may all be an illusion, but as you have said, it matters very little to us in our day to day lives. In this sense it is a completely sterile argument. One way or the other, it simply does not matter, the effect is the same. This is not the sense or spirit of the argument you see presented before you by the faithful. If my "free will" is what I am to be judged by (and if these judgements are to be "just"), it had damn sure better exist, objectively, and demonstrably. Otherwise what we have is someone arguing capriciousness as an ultimate authority, malevolence as virtue.
You know theists will claim both sides of this debate. They insist we have the free will necessary to allow God to judge us in a meaningful way. At the same time they want to "turn it all over to God". Christians -at least the garden variety we most often see- are looking for abdication of self. They really want to surrender to the infinite. This is very deterministic. However they also want to say that anyone who doesn't surrender to God of their own free will is culpable for that decision. It doesn't make any sense. But not much about free will vs determinism -or- Christianity does.
