Free Will -- the "materialist string" pulls both ways.

[ErGingerbreadMandude]

Then I guess it's a good thing I haven't undertaken that surgery so that I still poses my free will.

I didn't post this thread to argue that, rather, my point is that people like you are good people and that you have no choice but to be good.

I can be just as bad as I'm good.
I always have a choice.

[Jehanne]

I didn't post this thread to argue that, rather, my point is that people like you are good people and that you have no choice but to be good.

I can be just as bad as I'm good.
I always have a choice.

I would argue that you don't; rather, I would argue that you are incapable of doing evil things, such as robbing banks, kidnapping little children, torturing animals, etc.  I would cite as evidence the fact that individuals who do such things, without exception, have deficiencies within their brains and/or past environments which has a direct and discernible causal link with their present behavior.  These correlates can be demonstrated using statistical methods.

[brewer]

I believe I have free will. It's limited, not absolute, but I believe I have it.

[RozKek]

Too bad to what? It has made no difference in my life.

It made a huge difference in my life.

Well it was unfortunate for you then.

I don't depend on free will to have a good life.

---

I believe I have free will. It's limited, not absolute, but I believe I have it.

This is what I'm uncertain about. I know for a fact I don't have absolute free will i.e I know I'm not 100% independent on external stimuli. But at the same time I don't know if I'm 100% dependent on external stimuli.

[brewer]

This is what I'm uncertain about. I know for a fact I don't have absolute free will i.e I know I'm not 100% independent on external stimuli. But at the same time I don't know if I'm 100% dependent on external stimuli.

Isn't the amount of your dependence or independence variable on a case by case basis. Mine is. My amount is on a sliding scale depending on the situation.

[Jehanne]

I believe I have free will. It's limited, not absolute, but I believe I have it.

At a minimum it is a useful illusion, kind of like a stationary Earth with respect to a moving Cosmos.

[Phosphorescent Panties]

I dunno what all that rambling about children growing up in loving homes is, I didn't bother reading it. What I do agree with is the part about all human beings basically not having free will, or to what I see it as having the illusion of free will, basically being bound to the laws of nature. I think it's funny to think about how there's nihilistic parts of my brain in particular, which say make me feel depressed about life in general having no meaning. I've gotten over that in general and it's not that I'm bringing it up to say I have a problem with that, what I'm saying is it's funny that our brain works as a computer in a way that will start rebelling against life itself. It says, hey there's something wrong here, I can't seem to find a point to any of this and then it will start making you feel sad and there's not really a way to fix it, except to say hey I'm just gonna live for the "lyricism" of life.

I think to add to what you said, I also believe that there's really no such thing as a good or bad person. Seeing as how we're all products of fundamental physical laws and not some divine highly purposed system, which is a highly flawed way of thinking, nothing really holds anyone accountable except for people realizing that being a good person, astoundingly, increases the quality of their life. Unless they lack empathy or the ability to care about such things, but that's beside the point and has to do with what I said earlier, it's just the nature of human beings which is by extension the laws of nature itself. If you think human beings are bad, well you must think that the whole universe is bad because we're all bound by the continuum of time and space and the laws of physics, inside of our brains as well. That's one of the most disturbing things to me about religion, which is of course endlessly disturbing in just about any way you could possibly imagine, but there always seems to be something leading to some sort of conclusion like that, and rightfully so.

[Jehanne]

I dunno what all that rambling about children growing up in loving homes is, I didn't bother reading it. What I do agree with is the part about all human beings basically not having free will, or to what I see it as having the illusion of free will, basically being bound to the laws of nature. I think it's funny to think about how there's nihilistic parts of my brain in particular, which say make me feel depressed about life in general having no meaning. I've gotten over that in general and it's not that I'm bringing it up to say I have a problem with that, what I'm saying is it's funny that our brain works as a computer in a way that will start rebelling against life itself. It says, hey there's something wrong here, I can't seem to find a point to any of this and then it will start making you feel sad and there's not really a way to fix it, except to say hey I'm just gonna live for the "lyricism" of life.

I think to add to what you said, I also believe that there's really no such thing as a good or bad person. Seeing as how we're all products of fundamental physical laws and not some divine highly purposed system, which is a highly flawed way of thinking, nothing really holds anyone accountable except for people realizing that being a good person, astoundingly, increases the quality of their life. Unless they lack empathy or the ability to care about such things, but that's beside the point and has to do with what I said earlier, it's just the nature of human beings which is by extension the laws of nature itself. If you think human beings are bad, well you must think that the whole universe is bad because we're all bound by the continuum of time and space and the laws of physics, inside of our brains as well. That's one of the most disturbing things to me about religion, which is of course endlessly disturbing in just about any way you could possibly imagine, but there always seems to be something leading to some sort of conclusion like that, and rightfully so.

It was only a paragraph long, hardly what most would call a "rambling".  (I think that you need at least two paragraphs for that!)  Now, if you can read 300 words per minute, you could have read my OP in under a minute, far less time than you took to write your two paragraphs, which, by the way, I read in their entirety.

[Phosphorescent Panties]

I dunno what all that rambling about children growing up in loving homes is, I didn't bother reading it. What I do agree with is the part about all human beings basically not having free will, or to what I see it as having the illusion of free will, basically being bound to the laws of nature. I think it's funny to think about how there's nihilistic parts of my brain in particular, which say make me feel depressed about life in general having no meaning. I've gotten over that in general and it's not that I'm bringing it up to say I have a problem with that, what I'm saying is it's funny that our brain works as a computer in a way that will start rebelling against life itself. It says, hey there's something wrong here, I can't seem to find a point to any of this and then it will start making you feel sad and there's not really a way to fix it, except to say hey I'm just gonna live for the "lyricism" of life.

I think to add to what you said, I also believe that there's really no such thing as a good or bad person. Seeing as how we're all products of fundamental physical laws and not some divine highly purposed system, which is a highly flawed way of thinking, nothing really holds anyone accountable except for people realizing that being a good person, astoundingly, increases the quality of their life. Unless they lack empathy or the ability to care about such things, but that's beside the point and has to do with what I said earlier, it's just the nature of human beings which is by extension the laws of nature itself. If you think human beings are bad, well you must think that the whole universe is bad because we're all bound by the continuum of time and space and the laws of physics, inside of our brains as well. That's one of the most disturbing things to me about religion, which is of course endlessly disturbing in just about any way you could possibly imagine, but there always seems to be something leading to some sort of conclusion like that, and rightfully so.

It was only a paragraph long, hardly what most would call a "rambling".  (I think that you need at least two paragraphs for that!)  Now, if you can read 300 words per minute, you could have read my OP in under a minute, far less time than you took to write your two paragraphs, which, by the way, I read in their entirety.

Calm down dearest, I wasn't meaning to be critical. I'm just lazy and I suppose what I said did sound critical, all I meant was that I didn't really have the patience to read it.

[FebruaryOfReason]

I felt I had to respond to this thread. But I don't know why.