Is Free Will an Illusion?

Is free will an illusion?

Basically, it comes down to:

A) whether or not you believe in determinism, that is, that every event, including human cognition, behavior, decision, and action, is causally determined by an unbroken chain of prior occurrences

B) Is freedom compatible, or incompatible with determinism.

I believe in determinism. I believe every phenomena, even conscious thought, is the result of chemical interactions that are dictated by the laws of nature. Conscious thought is nothing more than physical processes in the brain....and therefore, thoughts and decisions are the result of an unthinking, mechanistic process. As a result, I believe that free will, is incompatible with determinism, and therefore, free will is an illusion.

A) whether or not you believe in determinism, that is, that every event, including human cognition, behavior, decision, and action, is causally determined by an unbroken chain of prior occurrences

But if you believe in determinism, an unbroken chain of prior occurrences...how does that work exactly? I mean, if every cause has an effect, you should be able to trace the chain of causes and effects backwards to a starting point right? It can't just go on indefinitely, because there was a beginning point wasn't there? What's the beginning?

Wikidbchofthewst said:

A) whether or not you believe in determinism, that is, that every event, including human cognition, behavior, decision, and action, is causally determined by an unbroken chain of prior occurrences

But if you believe in determinism, an unbroken chain of prior occurrences...how does that work exactly? I mean, if every cause has an effect, you should be able to trace the chain of causes and effects backwards to a starting point right? It can't just go on indefinitely, because there was a beginning point wasn't there? What's the beginning?

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The beginning is the big bang I suppose...what was before that? I don't know. But just because we haven't figured it out, doesn't invalidate determinism IMO. There is an answer...we just don't know exactly what it is yet.

Its really a mind numbing thought, because chances are the universe has been around forever. Meaning there would be no beginning, and there is probably no end.

I would argue that determinism is flawed because even if you figured out what came before the big bang you'd have to figure out what came before THAT. If determinism is true then wouldn't there be an endless chain of causes and effects going back into infinity? And that's not possible...is it?

Hmm, its a really good question. I guess, either there was a creation point...or time loops in a circle, and there really is no beginning or end...which seems pretty incomprehensible...but this is what some people theorize.

hom36rown said:

Hmm, its a really good question. I guess either, there was a creation point...or time loops in a circle, and there really is no beginning or end...which seems pretty incomprehensible...but this is what some poeple theorize.

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But if time loops which yeah is pretty incomprehensible, doesn't that mean determinism is flawed? I mean, how can there just be a loop of cause and effects without something putting it into motion to begin with?

And if there was a creation point, what did the creating? (I personally believe in God, but I don't know what you believe)

Wikidbchofthewst said:

But if time loops which yeah is pretty incomprehensible, doesn't that mean determinism is flawed? I mean, how can there just be a loop of cause and effects without something putting it into motion to begin with?

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Well, it sort of makes sense if the "last" event of the loop, causes the "first" event. Say the big bang is the '"first" event, from there the universe expand until it reaches a point where it begins to contract...eventually, all matter condenses to a single point, at which point, the big bang happens all over again. Again it still leaves you wondering what is the beginning, but if you believe in a creation point, it is just as incomprehensible, and leaves you asking the same question. If god created the universe...what created god...There is no real answer, nobody knows. The idea of a "beginning" in it of itself, does not make much sense. So I guess you sort of have to overlook these things. Think of the beginning as the big bang, and just forget about what happened before, or what caused it. Or you can look it as the big bang being the point of creation...in which case you still have to overlook the beginning of the creator.

Wikidbchofthewst said:

And if there was a creation point, what did the creating? (I personally believe in God, but I don't know what you believe)

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I don't believe or disbelieve in god, I am content with not knowing.

The only way I can come to the conclusion that free will exists, is if there is a god, and souls exist. If it is our souls making choices, and not just mechanical processes in our brain...than free will could exist. But that opens a whole new can of worms...what is a soul? How do they function?...etc etc

If you really want to boggle your mind.. read The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins.

Wait..you don't believe there is a soul?

Nope.........

So if there's no soul...how do ghosts or spirits or hauntings or any of those type things happen?

^ Energy, my friend. The human body stores a great deal of it, and seeing as energy can't be destroyed or expire.. Did you know that after death, the electrical charge in the human brain takes up to 6 months to dissipate? Energy in general is a conundrum, as we haven't reached the level of scientific mastery to fully explain what happens to the energy in our bodies once we die, or energy in general for that matter.

Free will? Behaviour is predictable, therefore we're bound by some abstract form of determinism from the word go.

Energy might explain things like...I dunno people just seeing a ghost, or hearing things, or objects moving.

But how does energy explain when someone actually communicates with someone who has passed on? If it's just energy...energy can't retain your memories or even the ability to communicate. How does free floating energy just...spontaneously communicate?

You mean like Psychics? Cos they're full of crap. There are books on Cold Reading pretty much everywhere. I could become a spiritual medium tomorrow if I really wanted to. The only medium I'm interested in is Jennifer Love Hewitt, purely because she's so incredibly hot in Ghost Whisperer. I know it's fiction, but she's still hot.

Here's the wiki on Cold Reading if you're interested http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_reading
In advance, I apologise if I've crapped on any your previous ideas of such things. Unfortunately, when we die it is not as gracious as we're led to believe. Death is a beautiful thing, the energy in our bodies recharges the planet's batteries, while our bones will make fuel for the next generation of bipdeal meglomaniacs that come along.

Everything can be explained. It just takes time to come up with a valid explanation sometimes.

No, I don't mean like psychics. I mean like I've had personal experiences of my own. And I know people who've had experiences of THEIR own, who I'm close enough to to believe.

Wikidbchofthewst said:

So if there's no soul...how do ghosts or spirits or hauntings or any of those type things happen?

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There is no such thing as a ghost or spirit. Some people just have over-active imaginations.

Wikidbchofthewst said:

No, I don't mean like psychics. I mean like I've had personal experiences of my own. And I know people who've had experiences of THEIR own, who I'm close enough to to believe.

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Like what? Theres a rational explanation for everything.

hom36rown said:

There is no such thing as a ghost or spirit. Some people just have over-active imaginations.

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I do have an overactive imagination, but I know for a fact that you're wrong about that. The biggest experience I had involved someone I didn't know, had never met while she was living, had never seen any pictures of her or anything at all. So it's not like I had anything to base my imaginings on.