(October 2, 2009 at 5:52 am)Tiberius Wrote: Used to believe in free will. Science has recently shown that it is unlikely. Our subconscious mind makes decisions before our conscious apparently thinks about it.
Yeah, you mentioned an article on it ages ago. Do you still have the link, or no where it is? I've lost it.
I know the Quantum universe is indeterministic. I don't know whether this necessarily means the whole of our reality is. I don't know if it's randomness, or just determined physics we haven't figured out yet.
From what I hear, quantum mechanics supports an indeterministic universe. But I don't really know on that matter. I don't know if the universe is determined or not.
I don't believe in free will though. Whether our conscious mind makes decisions first or not (and it apparently doesn't), simply because I think whether our actions are determined or undetermined, I don't see how we can force our actions to be different than how they are - I don't see how we're any more free than a fish, a fly, or a rock in that sense. Whether determined or undetermined, stuff is happening, and in any given moment I don't see how we can change that. If it can be another way, because it's undetermined, how can we make it so exactly? Where's the evidence for that?
I'd accept a compatibilist sense of 'Free Will', but like the incompatabilists, I don't think simply being able to do things uncoherced, is worthy of the term 'free will'. I think the fact we can do things, and that people who aren't imprisoned - for example - are less free than those who aren't: I don't see that as worthy as the label 'free will'.
We have wills, some of us are more 'free' than others, in the sense we have external freedom. But our wills themselves, as far as I know are completely automated and mechanical, whether determined or not...they're not free - our wills themselves aren't free, so we don't have 'Free Will'.
That's my view.
EvF
