Do you believe in free will?

[tackattack]

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1- Ok. I get now that you see all abstract thoughts as intangible (or not material), part of the causal chain, atemporal, illusory and not real. From your last post this is what I extrapolate. Is this correct? Given this is your position, please define real.

Intangible - yes, though with a definite tangible parallel. Part of causal chain - yes. Atemporal - no. Illusory - no. Not real - no.

2- I believe what we agree on is that they’re intangible yet part of the causal chain. Assuming that let’s go to atemporal. I feel those abstracts discussed (particularly declarative memories) are independent of this current timeline, thus divorced from shared temporal reality. They are effected and degraded by the passage of time, thus they are subject to temporal influence. They can also illicit sensory input while experiencing this shared temporal reality. Do you agree with this. Episodic memories to me is what I’m calling temporal. Semantic memories, which would just be like a factual tablature would be atemporal. If it can effect the shared timeline, regardless of sequence it’s temporal which semantic memories do only after recalled into the conscious mind and filtered into the agent. While by themselves they would be atemporal . Thoughts on my reasoning?

The emphasized statement is incorrect. The content of a memory may be considered atemporal, but the memory itself is not and therefore it is not divorced from shared temporal reality. Further, while the content may be considered independent of passage of time, i.e. it doesn't change with time, it in no way implies that it cannot be a product of temporal reality.

3- To better clarify phenomena and noumena I define math, logic, objective truth, axioms, etc. as noumena and not directly observable from within the bounds of personal perspective. Sensory input (materialistically input) would be phenomena and directly observable and generally objectifiable. I apologize if my definitions are off on this. Apparently I need some brushing up on my Plato and Kant. If they are accurate enough, to which category would you place free will?

So, basically, concepts or abstractions are noumena. Fine. Then I'd place free-will (along with all other philosophy) into the category of noumena.

4- I believe identity does depend on perspective, predominantly because of the mechanisms of recall and introspection. How we perceive we are being perceived affects us. Guys suck in their gut when a hot girl approaches and so forth. The schizo was a valid thought experiment. While 6 people observing a schizo will only see the prevailing personality and identify that as part of the whole, the personality sees the whole as the dominant personality. Consensus of shared reality says that it’s only part of the whole and that’s deemed as real. Perspective (without rationality or external objective cues) of the personality prevents access to that shared reality but doesn’t make that personality agent seem any less real or effective.

The difference between what is deemed to be real and what is real is called the process of perception - a process which can be erroneous. Consider this thought experiment. A normal-sighted and a color-blind person look at the same apple. The former says the apple is red. The latter says the apple is not red. Both are statements about the identity of the apple. If identity is determined by perspective, then the apple is red and not red at the same time. These two are contradictory and mutually exclusive identifications. If both are true at the same time, then the term "truth" loses all meaning.

5-I am saying that coercer and the coerced could be one and the same. While not the exclusive influence people convince themselves they are something they aren’t all the time. Let’s use anorexia as an example. You’ve gone and convinced yourself that you’re fat to the point the string bean in the mirror is visually augmented into that of a chubby buddy. Essentially I’m saying that this person's will is acting against their real sensory output and perhaps even against their own self preservation natural instincts. I believe if we can influence perception enough, it affects the will. That will is part of identity and I believe either externally or internally we can affect the agent with that will. If you want to call it self-medicating or something else fine but that is what I consider coercion.

You don't understand what coercion means, do you? Simply put, coercion requires action against will. Here, the action of manipulating the perception is according to the person's will to consider himself fat. Acting (or believing) against the sensory input does not constitute coercion. Therefore, the consequent changes in the will were according to his will as well. Given this self-consistency, no coercion has taken place.

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1-OK so we can agree that thoughts are part of a causal chain, real and intangible. Please define what qualifies as real for you.
2- I agree that contents of memories don’t change with time, only our ability to recall them. If you want to consider them temporal because the medium they’re housed in fine. I agree that the physical medium is subject to timeline merely by definition of physical. However I don’t consider sequential order the same as being part of the active timeline. The semantic memories have no time correlation and are a sum of the factual knowledge. They may be gathered sequentially, however they are readily recalled out of sequence for reference and are not attached with a “time stamp” if you will. I agree that episodic memories are much more temporal as are the mediums that both are housed on.
3-glad we could reach a consensus on phenomena and noumena. Guess the question now would be are noumena real to you? To follow that, are they reliable?
4-Some argue just that “the apple is” is declarative of its place in reality, regardless of the perception of said apple. Truth then doesn’t lose all meaning, but describing the objective truth of the apple’s existence is purely subjective. If existence is determined only by perspective, it’s only determined by consensus and that truth is relatively useless, no pun intended. However you have to first establish existence, then description, then filter as much bias as you can to get a useful perspective. Only then can you use logic, reason and recall to effectively use the object. While I agree that perception can be erroneous, that still leaves the question from 1 and 3.
5-I do know what coercion means thank you, but I appreciate your concern. Unfortunately you’re only relegating it to a force against will, which I believe is in error. Coercion is the power to use force to gain compliance. You can, in our examples, use (apply force) coercion (of will) to change the agent (the I) against a subset of that agent being innate physical (or genetic, or learned, or programmed) nature.


@NMF - I'll get to yours tonight I ran out of time, mid sentence. Hold me to it.