Free will

[Shadow_Man]

IATIA,

Robots.

So then God's foreknowledge is irrelevant. Correct?

L e t - m e - t r y - t h i s - r e a l - s l o w.  T o - s e e - i n t o - t h e - f u t u r e - r e q u i r e s - t h e - f u t u r e - t o - e x i s t.  I f - t h e - f u t u r e - e x i s t s, - t h e n - w e - a r e - i n - t h e - p a s t - a n d - e v e r y - d e c i s i o n - t h a t - w e - w i l l - e v e r - m a k e - h a s - a l r e a d y - h a p p e n e d - a n d - w e - h a v e - n o - c h o i c e - b u t - t o - f o l l o w - t h e - p r o g r a m - t h a t - h a s - a l r e a d y - h a p p e n e d.

So, having said it so slowly, do you see your logical error now? I thought not.

You see, simple repetition doesn't bring enlightenment, or make your statement true. Insults don't, either. Try a new perspective, or a new analogy. I know it is frustrating when someone fails to see what appears to you to be totally logical. I feel the same frustration. If you can't continue the discussion without resorting to insult, then just withdraw from the discussion. If you have nothing new to add, then just say so. Trading insults produces nothing but bad blood. You should have learned that by now.

Let's try a different tack.

You say that if God has foreknowledge then you are the past. Was there ever a time when what you are thinking and doing right now was actually you thinking and doing things in the present? In other words, if you are the recording, was there ever a you that was being recorded? If so, was the you that was being recorded operating with free will? If so, then you are a recording of free will in action. Are you an exact recording, in every detail? If so, then the pertinent detail is your free will, which has been retained intact, because that is the nature of recordings. So, if a recording can in any way be seen to actually exist at all, then you retain all characteristics of the you that was recorded, including free will. God knows exactly what you will do, and that you will do it entirely of your own free will, just as you did when you actually did it in the present that was recorded.

The other option is that you don't exist at all. The only you that ever existed had free will and enacted that free will during the course of your life in the true present, whenever in the time line that happened to be.

No. Free will does not by definition force a random variable into the universe. Randomness is not freedom. Will is not random. A robot has no will at all. A robot with a random number generator in its controller is still a robot. It has not suddenly gained free will.

Did you actually read what you just wrote?

Certainly. Does what follows directly address what you think was so inherently illogical about those statements? If not, please say it plainly and address it more directly. Otherwise, see below.

Free will is unpredictable.

That is an unsupported assertion.

If I knew you well enough, I could undoubtedly "push your buttons." Your entirely predictable reaction would not be an example of me robbing you of your free will, but rather an exact expression of your free will in the matter. Free will only demands that you "can" do otherwise, not that you "will." Free will only demands that you think your own thoughts and make your own choices within your ability to enact them. It does not demand that your thoughts be so mysterious that they cannot be known.

There are two red glasses before you on the table.  Both are exactly the same.  Which one will you pick?  The choice is 50/50.  There is no way to determine which you will pick (under a free will scenario).

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Whether you pick the one on the left or the one on the right will change the air currents, photon paths, gravitational field, etc. and that change will continue on for the life of the universe.

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That is a random variable.  

The observed nature of our free will is that it is not at all random. Quite to the contrary, it is thoughtful and purposeful. That was my point. You seem to be saying that there are only two things in operation in the universe - specific determinism or randomness. I am saying that there is at least a third thing - human cognition and the free will it engenders. The observed nature of our free will is that it is neither specifically determined nor random.

Whether you pick the one on the left or the one on the right will change the air currents, photon paths, gravitational field, etc. and that change will continue on for the life of the universe.  

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That is a random variable.

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 From the perspective of the universe, eventually every part of the universe will be touched by your choice.

I believe that your statement is incorrect, but more importantly I do not see the relevance. Please explain what touching the universe has to do with free will.

Regards,
Shadow_Man

[IATIA]

Whether you pick the one on the left or the one on the right will change the air currents, photon paths, gravitational field, etc. and that change will continue on for the life of the universe.  

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That is a random variable.

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 From the perspective of the universe, eventually every part of the universe will be touched by your choice.

I believe that your statement is incorrect, but more importantly I do not see the relevance.

Which is your whole problem.

Please explain what touching the universe has to do with free will.

Butterfly effect. Why would you pick the left or the right glass over the other? Because a neuron fired. It could have been the neuron that gave you the desire to choose the left or a different neuron that gave you the desire to choose the right. Why did any neuron fire? Subatomic reactions. These subatomic reactions are effected by other forces. Someone on the other side of the world made a choice that effected gravity, photons, air, etc.. These effects proliferated throughout the universe and different things will happen under different conditions. If you roll some dice and pick them up, you cannot replicate the same conditions. Gravity, air, photons, temperature, humidity, grip, position, stance, blood pressure, breathing, etc. have all been changed and have induced change.


One last time on the future thing. If god can see the future, then the future must exist. This means everything already exists and we never made any choices, ergo, no free will. Either god can see into the future because it already exists (and I guess created by it) or god cannot see into the future. An alternative is Laplace's Demon which does not allow for free will either.

What makes this so tough is that there is no god and the incongruities in trying to allow for one present an abundance of significant contradictions. Just make your life simple and step into the light.

[Shadow_Man]

Jörmungandr,

Few people reject heaven and embrace hell. The majority simply believe the threat, heaven and hell, isn't real. You're conflating not believing with believing but rejecting.

No. Many of your fellows have declared unequivocally that if Christianity was true then they would still choose hell rather than Heaven. By now you have surely seen it many times. Those "few" are all that are needed to disprove your claim that God's carrot and stick preclude free will.

If I truly believed I was bound for hell, you can bet that would be a strong influence on my behavior.

Free will does not demand the absence of influences.

This isn't the carrot and stick of law but rather a terroristic threat designed to cow the believer into submission.

The carrot and stick of law are every bit about submission to that law. God's carrot and stick are no different.

... but rather a terroristic threat ...

No. Terrorism is "The unlawful use of force and violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives." God is not a terrorist.

And that I have seen in my five years. It's the very foundation of Pascal's wager.

Pascal notwithstanding, it still fails to contravene our free will.

No matter how you try to minimize it, it still remains a powerful, behavior modifying threat to the believer.

I minimize nothing. I merely point out that your logic is proven wrong on the very message board upon which you record your thoughts.

It's a form of duress, plain and simple.

No. That is not the definition of duress, as I have already pointed out.

The proof that the carrot and stick do not contravene free will is still in the pudding.

Regards,
Shadow_Man

[IATIA]

No. Many of your fellows have declared unequivocally that if Christianity was true then they would still choose hell rather than Heaven.

What do you mean "if Christianity was true"?  Of course it is true.  Now whether or not christ ever lived is a different story.  He certainly was not the 'son' of a non-existent deity.  If he lived, he was nothing more than a wandering preacher.

As to christianity, at the 'pure' level, it is just as good or bad as any other 'prophet' in attempting to teach goodness.  This information is nothing new.  The teaching of goodness shows up in the early writings of Mesopotamia, Babylon, Sumeria, etc. and continues throughout the ages to present day writings, be it fiction, nonfiction, myth or legend.  There is nothing special about christ, just a cog in the wheel.

It is once the tyrannical, warmongering god comes into the picture that one chooses hell.  Heaven offers nothing but servitude.  The opposition of god offers true freedom.  It was god's opposition that helped free Adam and Eve.  No killings can be directly attributed to god's opposition.  One can bring up Job's story, but firstly, there is nothing that says god's opposition did the actual killing, only that it participated in a bet which resulted in killing.  It may be the opposition did not really expect god to kill just to make a point or god's opposition may never have participated in the bet in the first place.

Am I against christianity?  Not in and of itself, but I am strongly against religion, any religion.

Would I choose Hell over heaven?  I do not believe in either, but for sake of argument, I would absolutely choose Hell over heaven.

And remember, if heaven is supposed to be the shit, then why did one third of the angels rebel?

[dyresand]

No. Many of your fellows have declared unequivocally that if Christianity was true then they would still choose hell rather than Heaven.

What do you mean "if Christianity was true"?  Of course it is true.  Now whether or not christ ever lived is a different story.  He certainly was not the 'son' of a non-existent deity.  If he lived, he was nothing more than a wandering preacher.

As to christianity, at the 'pure' level, it is just as good or bad as any other 'prophet' in attempting to teach goodness.  This information is nothing new.  The teaching of goodness shows up in the early writings of Mesopotamia, Babylon, Sumeria, etc. and continues throughout the ages to present day writings, be it fiction, nonfiction, myth or legend.  There is nothing special about christ, just a cog in the wheel.

It is once the tyrannical, warmongering god comes into the picture that one chooses hell.  Heaven offers nothing but servitude.  The opposition of god offers true freedom.  It was god's opposition that helped free Adam and Eve.  No killings can be directly attributed to god's opposition.  One can bring up Job's story, but firstly, there is nothing that says god's opposition did the actual killing, only that it participated in a bet which resulted in killing.  It may be the opposition did not really expect god to kill just to make a point or god's opposition may never have participated in the bet in the first place.

Am I against christianity?  Not in and of itself, but I am strongly against religion, any religion.

Would I choose Hell over heaven?  I do not believe in either, but for sake of argument, I would absolutely choose Hell over heaven.

And remember, if heaven is supposed to be the shit, then why did one third of the angels rebel?

Remember though god gave some angels and lucifer free will they knew how god was and wanted nothing to do with him which isn't shocking at all
because it paints a one sided view of god this perfect all loving being despite being a monster is "all loving" and kills people for the hell of it. The devil
did no wrong, did not lie and he told the truth. There are times when god lied in the bible through proxy to get people killed. There is times in the bible
were the devil showed that he/she/it cares about human life when it came down to jesus he warned the guy to eat and drink in the desert and warned him
that he was going to die. That is saying a lot of a being was so evil why would it bother showing empathy to a person who is going down the road of self
destruction and meaningless sacrifice, that itself says a lot the devil cares about people if the devil didn't he wouldn't have warned jesus. Now god on the other hand
ask some guy to kill his own son on a mountain and has a angel come down to stop him at the last moment. Out of all the biblical stories the devil shown more kindness
and compassion and empathy than god has in whole and the rest is just ass kissing god. 

The devil is actually good but no one want's to accept that as fact

god of the bible is evil and no one want's to accept that.

[Edwardo Piet]

If there is an illusion of free will, what would the illusion of the absence of free will look like?

"Free will" is such an incoherent concept that it doesn't even exist as an illusion. There is no illusion of free will. There is a cognitive illusion of a perceptual illusion of free will that doesn't even exist by itself as a perceptual illusion, that's what there is.

Hammy

[The Grand Nudger]

@shadow. If the future can be known, then the future is set.  Your future "choices" - are set.  Nothing between this moment and those moments can change the outcomes, or your mind.

10 minutes from now, you will be presented with two options.  Option A, and Option B.  I have foreknowledge of the result of this scenario.  You will choose B.  If I actually possess such knowledge, you must..in ten minutes, "choose" b, and you have absolutely no leverage in the matter. You will not and -could not- "choose a" - this is a requirement of the truth of my claim to foreknowledge (rather than an educated guess, for example).

If that relationship between claims and subjects and future states seems, to you, a description of a "choice" or being able to "choose"...then perhaps we're simply not talking about the same thing when we use the word.

[Shadow_Man]

IATIA,

Please explain what touching the universe has to do with free will.

Butterfly effect. Why would you pick the left or the right glass over the other? Because a neuron fired. It could have been the neuron that gave you the desire to choose the left or a different neuron that gave you the desire to choose the right. Why did any neuron fire? Subatomic reactions. These subatomic reactions are effected by other forces. Someone on the other side of the world made a choice that effected gravity, photons, air, etc.. These effects proliferated throughout the universe and different things will happen under different conditions. If you roll some dice and pick them up, you cannot replicate the same conditions. Gravity, air, photons, temperature, humidity, grip, position, stance, blood pressure, breathing, etc. have all been changed and have induced change.

I believe that your statement is incorrect, but more importantly I do not see the relevance.

Which is your whole problem.

No. I entirely understand your "Butterfly Effect." You have been espousing specific determinism, and in that concept whether the cause(s) are nearby or far away is irrelevant, and you have done nothing to show relevance.

One last time on the future thing. If god can see the future, then the future must exist. This means everything already exists and we never made any choices, ergo, no free will.

And that is your problem. You are so entwined with the future and the past that you entirely ignore the present. You seem to forget that if the future exists, and if the past exists, then it is necessary that at one time the present existed. As I pointed out previously, even if you exist in the past, at one point what you are doing was done in the present, and it was at that time that your free will expressed itself. You are the exact evidence that you were operating in accordance with your own free will in those moments.

This means that if everything already exists, then we absolutely made all of our choices in accordance with our own free will in a present moment that once existed, and we are the proof of it, ergo your argument fails, and free will is not precluded.

Either god can see into the future because it already exists (and I guess created by it) or god cannot see into the future. An alternative is Laplace's Demon which does not allow for free will either.

Laplace's Demon is a statement of determinism. I have already addressed determinism. I agree with you that if determinism is correct then we are robots, but in that case God's foreknowledge is irrelevant.

What makes this so tough is that there is no god and the incongruities in trying to allow for one present an abundance of significant contradictions.

What makes this so tough is that you cannot see the fallacies in your own logic.

You seem to believe that I am trying to "allow for" the existence of God. Not at all. I am pointing out the flaws in your logic. Posit God. Posit foreknowledge. Would foreknowledge contradict free will? No. Whether God does or does not exist is irrelevant. It is a logic puzzle, and you have failed to solve it.

Just make your life simple and step into the light.

My life would not be enlightened by embracing your faulty logic. Quite the opposite.

Regards,
Shadow_Man

[IATIA]

And that is your problem. You are so entwined with the future and the past that you entirely ignore the present. You seem to forget that if the future exists, and if the past exists, then it is necessary that at one time the present existed. As I pointed out previously, even if you exist in the past, at one point what you are doing was done in the present, and it was at that time that your free will expressed itself. You are the exact evidence that you were operating in accordance with your own free will in those moments.

Wrong! You are still missing the point. If the future exists, then we are the past. There is no present. There is no moment when free will can be or has been expressed. Every moment of your existence has already happened (or been created). If you are expressing free will right now, then there is no future. The future cannot exist under a free will scenario until the choice is made. If the future exists, then right now you are obligated to follow that path, i.e., no free will. If the future exists then there is no choice to make and no free will. You cannot have free will and a future any more than god making a rock so heavy it cannot be moved by god.

[IATIA]

God is not a terrorist.

Rather god is worse than any terrorist. "Love me and worship me or BURN IN HELL forever" and relative to the eternal realm of all space-time, we get 1-0.999... seconds to make this choice. What part of that is not terrorism?