Does Free Will actually exist? Is there a way to tell?

[robvalue]

The problem with humans is we know that we know a lot about what we don't know, but we know just enough not to know that the things we don't know about what we know are the thing we don't know if we know.

[Godscreated]

[quote='Godschild' pid='857007' dateline='1422332267']
Just because a moral system dictates the way one should act doesn't mean one has to responded to it. If one is commanded to be a suicide bomber, commanding one first of all says the one has a choice, the choice can be accepted or rejected.

Can it, I think you've assumed something that is precisely the point of contention.

I've assumed nothing, by necessity a commandment for/to someone means we have a choice, if we did not then there would be no need for said commandment/s.

God commands through the scriptures one should not practice homosexual acts, that doesn't mean there are no homosexuals, to the contrary, a commandment wouldn't be necessary if there were none. One has the right to accept this command or reject it.

Does one?

Of coarse, why give one if there was no need to make a decision, a commandment necessitates a choice.

The law of this country and the law in scriptures say do not murder, one has the choice to or not murder,

Oh?

Oh, what?

people are not destined to be murders, if they were why would there be a command not to murder.

Because the people who wrote your fairy tale didn't understand much about the dirt under their feet, let alone the human mind?

Those people were some of the most successful farmers then and now, Europeans depend on and desire the good crops they grow. Now what about the laws of all the civilized world that have murder laws written, are they stupid in your opinion also.

If we knew people were predestined to murder or not there would be no need for the command. Commandments and law says free will exists.

Wow........that was fucking idiotic.

Seems the idiotic statements are coming from you, you're babbling on with no real intelligent though going on, losing your logic are you.

I could command you not to engage the warpdrive on your Honda......but that doesn't mean that your Honda actually has a warp drive.

Murder exists and people have a choice whether they commit murder or not. So since you come up with such a stupid reply I'm assuming your intellectual thought process warped out.

He sees all things and that by no stretch of the imagination means predestination.

Actually...that's exactly what it means...unless, of course...god can be wrong, that some of the things god can see aren't actually real or will never happen. What do you think?

I think you've lost any sense you had. God is never wrong. Please explain how you have arrived at such a conclusion, so far you've had nothing but baseless statements.

I can see if certain people stay on the path they are according to the scriptures they will go to hell,

Are you god? Can you see all things? Or, are you just guessing.....

No guessing here, I can read what God says and from that easily make a intelligent determination. I never said I can see all things, nor the future, I said, I could see what would happen to certain people if they stayed on the path they are traveling. Misdirection is a game suited for those who understand it.

does that mean I have predestined them to go to hell.

Nope...but do you want me to compare you to god...and draw similarities between you...because I can do that all day long. You clearly are "god", or, at least you clearly are the god that you describe.

Then by your statement I'm correct in saying I can not predestine anything and by saying this you admit I can predetermine where one is bound according to what the scriptures say, thank you. Actually God calls for me to be more like Him in the ways that are possible for man, and if this is the conclusion you've drawn, then good. However if it's anything else you are failing miserably.

if that's my desire then how much more is it God's desire,

Yeah.........my point exactly.

You've already stated that I can't predestine anyone, so what exactly is your point? You should go to the dictionary and look up the word desire, you seem to have a misunderstanding of it's meaning.

because He loves everyone.

Because "god" is a proxy for your thoughts and desires, but also, all of the things you might feel a hint of shame for if you owned up to as being all your own.

No, that would eliminate free will and I believe I've established we have free will, the only reason you have taken the opposite stance is because most Christians believe in free will. If you're looking for a Christian to agree with you argue with a Calvinist.

GC

---

It doesn't stop there though. An omnipotent omniscient being designing the universe knows the exact outcome of any design he comes up with.

God would have known the exact state of the universe and the human beings in it for all of eternity. So he wanted the Fall to happen. He wanted to have to drown almost the entire human race. And he wanted to have to sacrifice himself to himself, because he had designed humans in a way that they would sin.

A persons mother goes out for a drive, she was never taught how to drive, that person desires for the mother to be killed, not just killed but mangled beyond recognition, then that person desires to kill himself because she decided to go for a drive, this what you're trying to say.

No matter how much Theists try and get around this, normally by just ignoring it, they cannot.

You see me ignoring anything, I jumped in and stated what should be obvious to any intelligent person.

Any omnipotent being that punishes its own designs for their faults is just ridiculous, free will or not.

God did not design man in his present condition, man chose to be in this condition. Man lived in a sinless state until he chose differently.

GC

[Godscreated]

Stop deflecting the OP is about man's free will.

GC

It's not deflecting. If you lack the ability to comprehend the relevancy, that's not my problem.

Think about what it means. Give it some thought.

It didn't and still doesn't take much thought, you want to deflect from my answer to the OP's question about man's free will. If there had been relevancy I would have answered, I found none and see none.

GC

---

---

Hey guys. I know I've chosen to post this question, but how do I know if whether or not I have been preprogrammed to post this? It's not like I can go back in time to rethink my decision and choose another option. Does free will actually exist? Are all our actions just a product of time? Is there a way to actually test if whether or not we have free will? Thanks a bunch.

This is probably a stereotypical question (maybe even viewed as dumb by some), however I want to know what your thoughts are on the subject anyway.

---

Depends. If you believe in pre-determination, then no, free will doesn't exist.

What one believes is not relevant to the truth, the truth is no matter what one believes.

If you believe in self-determination, then...no, free will doesn't exist.

Really, a person can just believe away the truth, how in anyone's book does that even make sense.

That second one may throw you for a loop, but bear with me. We're not exactly rational creatures. We're KIND of rational, to the extent that, at least, we can rationalize. But we cannot be purely rational. We are slaves to our hormones, the glands that surround our bran and fill our body; the stuff that gives us emotion clouds our judgment and makes us act in ways that are self-contradictory, illogical, harmful...

But at the same time, they also drive us to do the opposite, to act in self-confirming, reasonable, and beneficial ways. The problem is, it's never one or the other; it's always some mix of both.

That would be a good description of the sin nature man chose for himself, but you left out choice, man had choice from the beginning and he still does. The second quoted above couldn't possibly have evolutionary benefits, that kind of confusion would cause man to self destruct, we would have never survived as a species, if evolution was true that is. This is only your way of rationalizing God and free will out of the picture, your way of placing the blame somewhere else.

What we call "self-awareness" is cluttered by our subconscious always directing what we do and how we do it, and worse, we can't really excise that subconscious. We are aware of its existence but we are unaware of its effect on us because...well, it's our subconscious.

What's this, you're saying it is because you say it is, how does that make what you're saying true. How is what you just stated any different than saying and I quote the famous atheist saying, "it's true because the Bible says it's true." Your statement is self defeating through that famous saying.

It's the rear-most part of the brain, the most primitive part of our brain, the same general region that keeps our hearts pumping. You can no more mentally will your heart to stop than you can will your mid-and-rear brain to stop sending chemical impulses to interfere with your frontal lobe's processes.

Well I do not know of anyone who has willed their brain to stop, that would go against our desire to live, self preservation if you will. However, there are those who can slow down the beats per minute and thus being able to control the amount of oxygen (breathing) one needs to sustain life, this is choice over the natural rhythm of the body. Just as we have choice to act upon a situation, that would be why we have laws, right. I'll ask this again, if we can't choose why do we have laws, are we so pitiful we need to live an illusion of choice.

We are slaves to ourselves.

This is our sin nature and God has provided a way for us to free ourselves from it.

GC

---

Your description of God falls short....

And so does yours. A god with limitations is not a god. A god with no limitations is illogical and impossible.

You're right no man can possibly describe God completely, He says that in scripture.
I disagree with your conclusion and you need to give some reasons why what you say might be true.
I have reasons, they are stated in scripture, God says He can't lie, of coarse one could take that either way. Those being God's so powerful nothing can cause Him to lie or He's so weak he can only tell the truth, the later being contradictory at the least.
The truth about it, God is completely just and that being who He is, He can't lie, meaning his omnipotent nature prevents lying.

GC

---

Jesus christ...now it's ownership? See, I said this to Prof...but it applies to you as well. Is there some point at which you're going to make free will a reality on it's own merits or will it be an endless list of -but what about this other thing?- At some point a person could just say "So what about that other thing?"

Do you no longer own a car because you decide, with your "free will" to leave it on the side of the highway? Or will you get a fine, and a bill, for leaving the car that you still own...on the side of the highway? You don't "freely will" your heart to beat..is it not your heart? You didn't choose your body...is it not your own? Are the thoughts that just pop into your mind, un-chosen...somehow someone else's..or no ones?

You're going to have to go long and hard to find something that truly hinges on free will, in order to make this sidestepping conclusion business work, and if you ever get there I'll just say "So what...guess we'd have to rethink that one." eh?

That's exactly what you're handing out, but this and but that, you have laid down a load of crap and expect us to buy it. Where are your reasons there can be no free will, seems to me plenty has been given and you reject them in favor of your opinion. By the way your rejection of what has been said about free will, well it's a choice and you of your own free will chose to reject what has been stated.

GC

[Creed of Heresy]

Long story short, GC; if god knows how our lives will go, then that means everything has been pre-determined. If god is all-powerful, then that means he has absolute power over our lives. If he has absolute power, that means everything we do is by his influence, as if he does not, then he is not all-powerful. In order to be omnipotent, he would have to have power over us. If he has power over us, then that means we have no power over ourselves. If he is all-knowing, then he knows ahead of time how we will act. If that is the case, that means he knows how his actions will affect us. If he is always present, then that means he always exerts control, because that would mean he is present in everything...including our actions. If he is present in our actions, then that means he is affecting our actions. And if he is affecting our actions, then we do not have free will. The rest of the poem's meaning is just gravy.

That enough for you?

---

Oh, and additionally, if he was all-knowing and yet also allowing us our free will, why did he throw such temper tantrums about the idol-worship and the thing with Sodom and Gomorrah and everything? Also, don't his actions in destroying those cities and people and sending his son to tell people about him count as being DIRECT intervention in our lives? I think the inhabitants of those two cities would certainly think so, given they were terminated by him quite violently and against their free will...

And if you believe in miracles, that means he is influencing us outside of our own free will. In short, if he affects us in any way, he is influencing us as an outside source; he is intervening and doing things that we did not choose to do.

Basically, if you believe in god via the bible, you cannot sit here with a straight face and tell me you also believe in the concept of free will. The bronze age mythmakers of yestermillenia weren't intelligent enough to grasp the concept of freedom of will, all they knew was we had the ability to make choices, and they figured since no other animals could do that, that it must be a gift from god, and left it at that without further thought, and in so doing, left a big giant gap in the chain of logic that ends up contradicting itself as the bible is wont to do.

[Tonus]

@Tonus...Trouble is this...we've actually found that it's -not- at all impossible to determine that. Some clearly are. Even worse, some surprising things can be -reprogrammed-, even when we think we've chosen them....essentially on a whim...takes very little.

I'm thinking in the pragmatic sense, where we might wonder if it would make a difference if we knew for certain one way or another. If the decisions and choices that brought me to this point were or were not unavoidable, I still got this far. Essentially the next step is to recognize that if it had been different, then it would... be different... probably. Not worth the concern, in my opinion.

I think the argument only matters to theists who want to use it as a way of getting god off the hook, and I think that's the only reason it's ever up for consideration.

[h4ym4n]

Nice! CoH

So simple even a xian without god glass can get it.

[IATIA]

@Rhythm

For sake of argument, I have two questions to establish your definition of ownership. We both know the dictionary definition, but I am more interested in the subtle nuance of individual interpretation.

Does a tree own it's leaves?

Does an amoeba own it's nucleus?

[Faith No More]

I'm thinking in the pragmatic sense, where we might wonder if it would make a difference if we knew for certain one way or another. If the decisions and choices that brought me to this point were or were not unavoidable, I still got this far. Essentially the next step is to recognize that if it had been different, then it would... be different... probably. Not worth the concern, in my opinion.

I think the argument only matters to theists who want to use it as a way of getting god off the hook, and I think that's the only reason it's ever up for consideration.

See, I think the argument does matter, at least scientifically, because the more we try to understand if free will exists, the more we learn about how our brains function.

I have a pet theory that much of the world's problems are due to people's inability to understand their own brain's functions and what role their conscious mind actually plays in their decision making, but regardless, I think that attempting to understand how our consciousness operates can only be beneficial.

[Tonus]

I have a pet theory that much of the world's problems are due to people's inability to understand their own brain's functions and what role their conscious mind actually plays in their decision making, but regardless, I think that attempting to understand how our consciousness operates can only be beneficial.

I understand and agree with that. I just think that the issue can keep a person going in circles. Over the course of our lives we change in many ways. It may be a big change (switching ideological sides, for example) or a small change (deciding to change the flavor of coffee you buy). These are almost certainly influenced by something. Does that mean that we have free will (we are able to make changes based on new input) or that we do not (we are guided by that input and don't really have a choice)? Without the ability to go back and replay those moments, we end up with a solipsism, IMO.

Everything we learn about how our minds work can be fitted into that framework so that we can either easily answer the question or not answer it at all. I suppose we could assign a percent chance to any decisions we make, but to me any percentage higher than zero would mean that we have free will. Or it could be argued that we have "30% free will" and "70% external influence" affecting our decisions, which might be a valid approach in the end, though I think it would prove that we do have the freedom to make our own decisions.

[The Grand Nudger]

I've assumed nothing, by necessity a commandment for/to someone means we have a choice, if we did not then there would be no need for said commandment/s.

"Under no circumstances shalt thou engage the warpdrive of thine Honda Accord"

Murder exists

agreed

and people have a choice whether they commit murder or not.

Not so sure of that myself, and you've certainly failed to make a compelling case as to why I should believe your claim.

I think you've lost any sense you had. God is never wrong.
[/

Meh, fine by me, then if god sees our futures, and he is never wrong..our futures are predetermined. End of.

No guessing here, I can read what God says and from that easily make a intelligent determination.

I doubt that you have to read anything to know "what god says"......

Then by your statement I'm correct in saying I can not predestine anything and by saying this you admit I can predetermine where one is bound according to what the scriptures say, thank you.

I never thought you could, but if you can indeed "predetermine" where one is bound..then the skeins of our lives are woven, we have no choice.

Actually God calls for me to be more like Him in the ways that are possible for man, and if this is the conclusion you've drawn, then good.

I can see why you'd find that to be an easily accomplished task.

You've already stated that I can't predestine anyone, so what exactly is your point? You should go to the dictionary and look up the word desire, you seem to have a misunderstanding of it's meaning.

Or, my comment went right over your shoulderstumps.

No, that would eliminate free will and I believe I've established we have free will, the only reason you have taken the opposite stance is because most Christians believe in free will.

You being a nutball would eliminate free will? I doubt it. If you'd like to believe that you've established that we have free will go right ahead..I can't stop you...can you stop yourself from believing that? Try using your free will? I don't give a shit what you morons think GC, I really don't. I'd rather have this conversation with Benny.. like I always do, I disagree because I'm uncoinvinced that this "free will" business is legitimate, that your god isn;t legitimate at all makes it a moot point. At least with free will...we're discussing something that's actually there, even if we've made a few mistakes in describing what it is and what it can do.

You're in the god fan club, not me, the things you do or don't do you chalk up to god, not me. Project less, demonstrate more.

@Rhythm

For sake of argument, I have two questions to establish your definition of ownership. We both know the dictionary definition, but I am more interested in the subtle nuance of individual interpretation.

Does a tree own it's leaves?

In the same way that you own your heart, yes.

Does an amoeba own it's nucleus?

In the same way that you own your heart, yes.