# Does freewill exist?



## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Apr 23, 2019)

Can freewill exist alongside predeterminism/predestination? Like can I have freewill while being predestined to have freewill? Or like can I be predetermined to choose? Does anybody ever recall being given an infinite amount of options to choose from? And before we all were alive, did we have freewill then? If not, how could it make sense that out of nowhere we were suddenly given freewill or that we suddenly found freewill?


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Apr 23, 2019)

I think that if we exist, we cannot choose how we exist. Or that before we were all born, we decided then every thing we would do and are now doing it. But I can see how it could be plausible that we have no more contol over what happens to us than say a plant or our sun chooses what happens to them.


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## Rob Roy (Apr 24, 2019)

In order to know if a person had free will before being alive (as we know it), you would need to determine the status of people before they are alive...are they a separate entity or part of something else that is sentient ? 

Part of something else that isn't sentient? Nonexistent?


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Apr 24, 2019)

Rob Roy said:


> In order to know if a person had free will before being alive (as we know it), you would need to determine the status of people before they are alive...are they a separate entity or part of something else that is sentient ?
> 
> Part of something else that isn't sentient? Nonexistent?


Nonexistent, as in completely dead. I mean I personally never had a single experience prior to my 28 years on this earth. So like I had no freewill. I had nothing.


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## Rob Roy (Apr 24, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> Nonexistent, as in completely dead. I mean I personally never had a single experience prior to my 28 years on this earth. So like I had no freewill. I had nothing.


But how could you be certain of that ? Maybe you don't remember or can't remember ? What do you make of people who claim to remember past lives?


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## New Age United (Apr 25, 2019)

No there is no such thing as freewill, the energy that makes up your body and even your mind will behave and act on the laws of physics, how could awareness possibly affect the material universe. That being said it would make sense that you were given freewill during your conception in the womb as your brain was being developed, if there actually was free will.

The idea that we created are destiny before birth is interesting and one that I've contemplated before, perhaps we are God manifesting the universe at every moment, the effortless creators of the cosmos.


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## New Age United (Apr 25, 2019)

I am not a part of this world nor am I apart from this world, simply a witness


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## Rob Roy (Apr 25, 2019)

If you are forced to put your hand on a hot stove, you might refrain from doing it yourself in the future. While I don't offer that as absolute proof of "free will" it certainly leads to the conclusion that conscious choices are available to people.


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## Roger A. Shrubber (Apr 25, 2019)

who says predestination exists? or predetermination?
it's all theories. no one can prove a fucking bit of it...think weathermen have a cushy job? philosophers bullshit for a living...
free will does exist, we all use it every time we make a decision. we use it every time we come to a fork in the road, every time we're presented with any kind of choice, at all...when i open my door to someone knocking on it, i can be nice to them, or i can tell them to fuck off...my choice...when i do business with someone, i can try to treat them right, or i can try to fuck them over, my choice...when i take a shit, i can wash my hands or not...my choice.....all of life is the practice of freewill...
any talk of predeterminism or predestination is a cowardly attempt to deny responsibility for the consequences of the choices that YOU MADE


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## New Age United (Apr 27, 2019)

Roger A. Shrubber said:


> who says predestination exists? or predetermination?
> it's all theories. no one can prove a fucking bit of it...think weathermen have a cushy job? philosophers bullshit for a living...
> free will does exist, we all use it every time we make a decision. we use it every time we come to a fork in the road, every time we're presented with any kind of choice, at all...when i open my door to someone knocking on it, i can be nice to them, or i can tell them to fuck off...my choice...when i do business with someone, i can try to treat them right, or i can try to fuck them over, my choice...when i take a shit, i can wash my hands or not...my choice.....all of life is the practice of freewill...
> any talk of predeterminism or predestination is a cowardly attempt to deny responsibility for the consequences of the choices that YOU MADE


How do you get so serious about something so trivial Roger. Perhaps the truth is that there is no free will and that is the truth no matter what you want to believe, either way the truth needs no defense, only our egos need defense, if predestination is true then it is simply true and saying so doesn't have anything to do with cowardice.


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## Roger A. Shrubber (Apr 27, 2019)

New Age United said:


> How do you get so serious about something so trivial Roger. Perhaps the truth is that there is no free will and that is the truth no matter what you want to believe, either way the truth needs no defense, only our egos need defense, if predestination is true then it is simply true and saying so doesn't have anything to do with cowardice.


this is a serious question to me...one that's been on my mind a long time.
if there is not a "GOD"...then predestination cannot exist...predestination requires a guiding intelligence.
if there is a guiding intelligence, i still don't believe it would map out our entire existence for us...what would be the point?
perhaps "god" built the entire universe to achieve a particular result....which seems unlikely. "god" can create the universe, why can't "god" just create the situation they desire?
i'd like to think we were created (if we were "created") out of the joy of creation...and that we're a more or less unsupervised experiment...
outside intervention in an experiment usually ruins that experiment. i'm hoping "god" has the same opinion. 
the cowardice part comes in using "predestination" as an excuse to avoid responsibility for your choice..."GOD made me the way i am"....no..."god" made you the same as everyone else, your choices turned you into what you are now...


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## New Age United (Apr 27, 2019)

Roger A. Shrubber said:


> this is a serious question to me...one that's been on my mind a long time.
> if there is not a "GOD"...then predestination cannot exist...predestination requires a guiding intelligence.
> if there is a guiding intelligence, i still don't believe it would map out our entire existence for us...what would be the point?
> perhaps "god" built the entire universe to achieve a particular result....which seems unlikely. "god" can create the universe, why can't "god" just create the situation they desire?
> ...


Yes I do understand what you mean about it being a copout but to speak about the subject from a philosophical stance is not cowardice. And philosophers are not just full of shit they are searching for truth and reason, everything we owe to science we owe to philosophy aswell. Imo predestination does not require intelligent design it just means that every particle of the universe is on a course that cannot possibly be changed, the laws of physics cannot be broken, try not to think of it as a story written out in time but more like a chemical reaction taking place right now, the molecules will behave a certain way once the reaction has begun there is nothing stopping it.


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## Roger A. Shrubber (Apr 27, 2019)

the planet is doomed to whatever fate eventually befalls it...but individual lives are nothing but a series of choices...some choices are gates that lead to other choices, but cut off yet others...how can that be predestined? i don't know myself what i'm going to do yet...because i don't know what going to happen just a few seconds into the future...
and i don't feel much of a debt to philosophers...as far as i'm concerned, they're professional slackers. pay a room full of semi educated pothead college students to do nothing but smoke weed and try to figure out how everything works together...you'll get the complete works of heidegger, kant, bacon, camus, and decarte...if you can read it through the cheeto dust smudges...


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## New Age United (Apr 27, 2019)

Roger A. Shrubber said:


> the planet is doomed to whatever fate eventually befalls it...but individual lives are nothing but a series of choices...some choices are gates that lead to other choices, but cut off yet others...how can that be predestined? i don't know myself what i'm going to do yet...because i don't know what going to happen just a few seconds into the future...
> and i don't feel much of a debt to philosophers...as far as i'm concerned, they're professional slackers. pay a room full of semi educated pothead college students to do nothing but smoke weed and try to figure out how everything works together...you'll get the complete works of heidegger, kant, bacon, camus, and decarte...if you can read it through the cheeto dust smudges...


I guess we will have to agree to disagree Roger, I just can not believe that our minds are anything but the product of our environment, we will behave the way we are conditioned to behave and I honestly don't believe we have a choice, there is the illusion of free will but every action is the effect of a previous cause.


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Apr 27, 2019)

Rob Roy said:


> But how could you be certain of that ? Maybe you don't remember or can't remember ? What do you make of people who claim to remember past lives?


I guess I can't be certain of anything in fact. It could all be an illusion.


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Apr 27, 2019)

Rob Roy said:


> If you are forced to put your hand on a hot stove, you might refrain from doing it yourself in the future. While I don't offer that as absolute proof of "free will" it certainly leads to the conclusion that conscious choices are available to people.


Or I might not. If for instance I am masochistic and/or suicidal. But whatever I do, I do not do freely. I do out of instinct or impulse.


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Apr 27, 2019)

Roger A. Shrubber said:


> who says predestination exists? or predetermination?
> it's all theories. no one can prove a fucking bit of it...think weathermen have a cushy job? philosophers bullshit for a living...
> free will does exist, we all use it every time we make a decision. we use it every time we come to a fork in the road, every time we're presented with any kind of choice, at all...when i open my door to someone knocking on it, i can be nice to them, or i can tell them to fuck off...my choice...when i do business with someone, i can try to treat them right, or i can try to fuck them over, my choice...when i take a shit, i can wash my hands or not...my choice.....all of life is the practice of freewill...
> any talk of predeterminism or predestination is a cowardly attempt to deny responsibility for the consequences of the choices that YOU MADE


How can you prove that "nobody can prove a bit of it"? You said we use freewill everytime we make a decision. How can you prove anybody has ever made a decision? Can you prove that? Can you prove that after opening your door to someone choosing to knock on it, that you can be nice to them or tell them to fuck off? How can you prove that, if you can, and then how you can prove that you can prove that? So you also say that when you "take a shit" that you can either wash your hands or not. Can you prove that? If so, how? In which way can you prove that you can take a shit, and to whom? Yourself? How can you prove that I have ever made a choice, ever? Are you implying that I can do whatever I want because of my "freewill" and have no consquences? If you are not implying that, can you prove that you are not implying that? And if you can prove that, then how can you prove that? Can you prove that I have ever made a choice? If so, how?


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Apr 27, 2019)

Rob Roy said:


> If you are forced to put your hand on a hot stove, you might refrain from doing it yourself in the future. While I don't offer that as absolute proof of "free will" it certainly leads to the conclusion that conscious choices are available to people.


How do you know what I might refrain from doing and what I might not refrain from doing?


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## Rob Roy (Apr 27, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> How do you know what I might refrain from doing and what I might not refrain from doing?


I don't know in totality. 

In the instance of a hand on a hot stove, I think it's likely my example works for most people. You could be an exception I suppose. Are you?

Anyhow people would be exercising free will by refraining from putting their own hand on a hot stove. So, I'm going with the idea free will exists, but I'm open to hearing others ideas of why it doesn't.


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## Rob Roy (Apr 27, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> Or I might not. If for instance I am masochistic and/or suicidal. But whatever I do, I do not do freely. I do out of instinct or impulse.


So because you don't exercise free will, does that mean other people can't or haven't?


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## Bugeye (Apr 27, 2019)

I think it might be a combination of free will and predetermination. Maybe you murder someone in this life and so you have the responsibility to be a murder victim in the next life, but between being born and being murdered you have free will to live your life? I'm quite sure it will all be explained to us, in time. I'm okay with not having it all figured out just yet.


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## Roger A. Shrubber (Apr 27, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> How can you prove that "nobody can prove a bit of it"? You said we use freewill everytime we make a decision. How can you prove anybody has ever made a decision? Can you prove that? Can you prove that after opening your door to someone choosing to knock on it, that you can be nice to them or tell them to fuck off? How can you prove that, if you can, and then how you can prove that you can prove that? So you also say that when you "take a shit" that you can either wash your hands or not. Can you prove that? If so, how? In which way can you prove that you can take a shit, and to whom? Yourself? How can you prove that I have ever made a choice, ever? Are you implying that I can do whatever I want because of my "freewill" and have no consquences? If you are not implying that, can you prove that you are not implying that? And if you can prove that, then how can you prove that? Can you prove that I have ever made a choice? If so, how?


why do i have to prove anything to anyone? why isn't my word enough? why do you have so many trust issues? people tend to see their own personality traits in other people...maybe it's just you that's not trustworthy?


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## DustyDuke (Apr 28, 2019)

free will
_noun_

1. 
the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate; the ability to act at one's own discretion.

Free will was created so the masses had something to dream about. We can comit acts that are of our “own free will” that will inspire, dismay or nobody will give a shit about. I think people are deluded if they think they live there whole life of there own free will. Deluded people are a necessity.


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## Rob Roy (Apr 28, 2019)

DustyDuke said:


> free will
> _noun_
> 
> 1.
> ...


I can decide not to eat today, but I can't exercise free will to prevent some consequences...like not eating for 3 months, I'd probably die from starvation. 

I agree with you, none of us lives in a world where our free will presides over some unavoidable consequences.


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## Rob Roy (Apr 28, 2019)

Bugeye said:


> I think it might be a combination of free will and predetermination. Maybe you murder someone in this life and so you have the responsibility to be a murder victim in the next life, but between being born and being murdered you have free will to live your life? I'm quite sure it will all be explained to us, in time. I'm okay with not having it all figured out just yet.


I sometimes wonder if Karma and reincarnation is a thing. It certainly seems based in justice, very difficult to prove though.


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## Dalek Supreme (Jun 5, 2019)

I believe we have a little bit of freewill. People that are prone to addiction even less. Study neurology over philosophy, and psychology with this subject. Then decide for yourself.


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Jun 6, 2019)

I believe that we are pure awareness. Therefore have no say so in what can happen in the future. Like we perceive, but do not choose what we perceive. I mean if I could choose everything that I experience I would be like. Maybe not, but if I have free will then I know for a fact that I have no more of it then a chimpanzee or even lets say an insect or even a marijuana plant (any plant). Or even a rock. Okay, if I had free will, would I not know it? If so, then maybe I do have free will that I deny having. That would make sense. I'd go with that. But who else has it? Everybody? Lol thats alot of people.


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Jun 8, 2019)

I read a book called Dance of the Four Winds that ends in the author implying that every awareness is comprised of an infinite amount of awarenesses within. Sounds legit..


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## mauricem00 (Jun 8, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> Can freewill exist alongside predeterminism/predestination? Like can I have freewill while being predestined to have freewill? Or like can I be predetermined to choose? Does anybody ever recall being given an infinite amount of options to choose from? And before we all were alive, did we have freewill then? If not, how could it make sense that out of nowhere we were suddenly given freewill or that we suddenly found freewill?


free will exist predestination does not. we choose the road we travel and our destiny. we may not be smart enough to predict all the consequences of our action but we choose those actions


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Jun 8, 2019)

mauricem00 said:


> free will exist predestination does not. we choose the road we travel and our destiny. we may not be smart enough to predict all the consequences of our action but we choose those actions


If I want to be president I cannot choose to become president. I cannot choose to do impossible things.


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## Rob Roy (Jun 9, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> If I want to be president I cannot choose to become president. I cannot choose to do impossible things.


But you can chose to walk your dog or not. 

Or if you don't have a dog, you could chose to get one or not.


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Jun 11, 2019)

Rob Roy said:


> But you can chose to walk your dog or not.
> 
> Or if you don't have a dog, you could chose to get one or not.


If everybody were to refuse to give me a dog, I could not choose to get one or not. If I had no way to, then that would be that.


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Jun 11, 2019)

Does not freewill mean that I get to choose what I get "to" choose?


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## 2WorldsFrog (Jun 11, 2019)

philosophy is a game we play with our egos. I submit that a person who has found certainty has ignored the infinite possibilities of circumstance and perspective. so, while it's a fun game to play, answering your question wouldn't definitely answer your question.


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## Fogdog (Jun 12, 2019)

Dogs freewill exists


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## Obepawn (Jun 12, 2019)

Free will exist. No matter what circumstances you are in, every moment presents new choices. If you make a choice it’s free will. A choice to fuck up or not to fuck up, to go to work or call in sick, pick up the ugly chick at the end of the bar or go home alone. The police confronts you, cooperated or not cooperate. 

The thing about free will is the consequences attached to it, and this sometimes makes free will feel like you only have one choice. That’s why those situations are called hard choices. We all saw that on 9-11. Some people made very hard choices on how they wanted to die and jumped from windows rather than burn to death. A very hard choice indeed.


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## Aussieaceae (Jun 12, 2019)

People have the right to choose to do whatever the fuck they like. Doesn't mean they'll receive their desired outcome though.

Calling ones self a slave, is ignorance in respect to those who actually are.


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## Rob Roy (Jun 12, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> If everybody were to refuse to give me a dog, I could not choose to get one or not. If I had no way to, then that would be that.



You could chose to capture and tame a wild dog. Or not.


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Jun 13, 2019)

Rob Roy said:


> You could chose to capture and tame a wild dog. Or not.


I could also choose to kill myself or not... Sheesh I am not liking this whole idea of having freewill. Lol It's not for me. Can I choose not to have freewill??? LMFAO


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## Aussieaceae (Jun 13, 2019)

Damn i feel sorry for this dog lol. Where's it's free will?

I mean, natural law, rule of the jungle and all.

Oh...wait...


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## Obepawn (Jun 13, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> If everybody were to refuse to give me a dog, I could not choose to get one or not. If I had no way to, then that would be that.


Not realistic. In the context of everyday life, Rob Roy is correct. Any one can get a dog and if you can’t afford one, look in the want ads and plenty of people give away puppies for free all the time.If there’s a will, there’s a way.


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Jun 13, 2019)

Obepawn said:


> Not realistic. In the context of everyday life, Rob Roy is correct. Any one can get a dog and if you can’t afford one, look in the want ads and plenty of people give away puppies for free all the time.If there’s a will, there’s a way.


Dogs are people. lol


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## Obepawn (Jun 13, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> Dogs are people. lol


Most of the time it’s the other way around.


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## hellmutt bones (Jun 13, 2019)

Im in a dream that I can't control. So free will is non existent. Until I decide to kill myself. Wich then I will know the true meaning of freewill. But then it will be too late.


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## Obepawn (Jun 13, 2019)

hellmutt bones said:


> Im in a dream that I can't control. So free will is non existent. Until I decide to kill myself. Wich then I will know the true meaning of freewill. But then it will be too late.


Free will requires conscious thought and reasoning. If you are sleeping, you are not conscious and therefore can’t reason.


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## hellmutt bones (Jun 13, 2019)

Obepawn said:


> Free will requires conscious thought and reasoning. If you are sleeping, you are not conscious and therefore can’t reason.


I beg to differ on that there are many dreams where yes I can reason and it's almost real. I can even wake myself up if I wanted to. But I wake up to another dream wich somehow some call it real life.


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## Aussieaceae (Jun 13, 2019)

Way i look at it, is free will does exist. Imo free will is the decision an individual makes before an action. Nothing / nobody else can rightly know for sure what the decision may be, until there is an action.


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## 2WorldsFrog (Jun 13, 2019)

Free Will Ferrell


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## Rob Roy (Jun 14, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> I could also choose to kill myself or not... Sheesh I am not liking this whole idea of having freewill. Lol It's not for me. Can I choose not to have freewill??? LMFAO


When you make the choice not to have free will, you are exercising free will to 
exorcise free will. Spooky huh?


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Jun 17, 2019)

Rob Roy said:


> When you make the choice not to have free will, you are exercising free will to
> exorcise free will. Spooky huh?


Yes but then I would not have freewill. And that seems better to me. Anybody else? Like I hope there is no such thing as freewill because that would be boring to me.. to be able to choose to be able to choose. lol wow. So lets say freewill exists. What would that mean? And what would be the difference? This whole concept is very strange to me but still very interesting at the same time. I want to get to the bottom of it but it just seems bottomless to me. Like there is no point to having freewill or not having it. It all just seems pointless. Everything...


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## Rob Roy (Jun 18, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> Yes but then I would not have freewill. And that seems better to me. Anybody else? Like I hope there is no such thing as freewill because that would be boring to me.. to be able to choose to be able to choose. lol wow. So lets say freewill exists. What would that mean? And what would be the difference? This whole concept is very strange to me but still very interesting at the same time. I want to get to the bottom of it but it just seems bottomless to me. Like there is no point to having freewill or not having it. It all just seems pointless. Everything...


But when you exercise the choice not to use free will, by continually staying out of a free will situation, you are continually choosing to do so, hence you would still be exercising free will.

Free wills existence means the ability to make choices, but not necessarily the ability to alter every outcome as you'd like.

For instance you could decide to get up off the couch after smoking 12 consecutive bong hits and raid the refrigerator for something delicious, only to find somebody else got their first and the delicious thing has been eaten.


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Jun 18, 2019)

Rob Roy said:


> But when you exercise the choice not to use free will, by continually staying out of a free will situation, you are continually choosing to do so, hence you would still be exercising free will.
> 
> Free wills existence means the ability to make choices, but not necessarily the ability to alter every outcome as you'd like.
> 
> For instance you could decide to get up off the couch after smoking 12 consecutive bong hits and raid the refrigerator for something delicious, only to find somebody else got their first and the delicious thing has been eaten.


So would that constitute people (me) "having" free will, or "being" freewill? The latter seems politically correct, to me. It does not make to me sense that I would "own" anything, including freewill.... Anyways, I have a question. Are either true, that I have all of the freewill, or that I have a freewill? Because when I stop and think about me having awareness and having freewill, I think that it sounds completely untrue. And looks that way too...


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Jun 18, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> So would that constitute people (me) "having" free will, or "being" freewill? The latter seems politically correct, to me. It does not make to me sense that I would "own" anything, including freewill.... Anyways, I have a question. Are either true, that I have all of the freewill, or that I have a freewill? Because when I stop and think about me having awareness and having freewill, I think that it sounds completely untrue. And looks that way too...


So if I would to say that 2+2=5, how could I be proved wrong? I mean how could you prove to me that I am wrong, if I were to choose to not let it be proved to me?


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## Rob Roy (Jun 18, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> So if I would to say that 2+2=5, how could I be proved wrong? I mean how could you prove to me that I am wrong, if I were to choose to not let it be proved to me?



You and 4 friends are out having some beers at a local spot, "The Free Will Tavern". One friend offers to go up to the bar and come back with beers for the gang, but you get to decide what they'll be. 

"Let's see, there's 5 of us here", you say, "maybe we'll go with two dark beers and two lite beers, that way we'll each get one". Upon the return of the beer fetching friend, he hands Joe and Harry each a dark beer. Tom gets one lite beer and Ted, the beer fetcher guy keeps the other lite beer for him. You, get nothing. You have just learned that 2+2 does not equal 5.


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## Rob Roy (Jun 18, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> So would that constitute people (me) "having" free will, or "being" freewill? The latter seems politically correct, to me. It does not make to me sense that I would "own" anything, including freewill.... Anyways, I have a question. Are either true, that I have all of the freewill, or that I have a freewill? Because when I stop and think about me having awareness and having freewill, I think that it sounds completely untrue. And looks that way too...



I'm not sure what you mean, when you say "all of the free will". But I'm going with no person has all of the free will, (for now).

I think you do have a free will. For instance, you could decide to reply to this post or not, each response is an exercise of free will.


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## KoSmIcTRaveLer (Jun 18, 2019)

Rob Roy said:


> I'm not sure what you mean, when you say "all of the free will". But I'm going with no person has all of the free will, (for now).
> 
> I think you do have a free will. For instance, you could decide to reply to this post or not, each response is an exercise of free will.


Thats where I think different. I truly believe that I have no choice. And that all that there will be, is inevitable. I cannot imagine a future that is unpredictable and not determined to be an exact order of events. And it makes sense to me, just like how 1+1=2 makes sense to me. And by the way, I am not saying that I am in anyway okay with the way I think, but rather astonished at my assumed understanding. Lastly, I think it could totally be hypothetically correct that the future is not "set in stone". And that the future is yet to be determined. I always thought that everything happening now was always destined to happen by some supernatural unconscious force.


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## Rob Roy (Jun 18, 2019)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> Thats where I think different. I truly believe that I have no choice. And that all that there will be, is inevitable. I cannot imagine a future that is unpredictable and not determined to be an exact order of events. And it makes sense to me, just like how 1+1=2 makes sense to me. And by the way, I am not saying that I am in anyway okay with the way I think, but rather astonished at my assumed understanding. Lastly, I think it could totally be hypothetically correct that the future is not "set in stone". And that the future is yet to be determined. I always thought that everything happening now was always destined to happen by some supernatural unconscious force.



I bet you wish you had gotten a beer though.


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## eyeballsaul (Jun 24, 2019)

Freewill exists but dont mistake an exact equal opposite reaction will restore equilibrium. Lol.


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## MedicinalMyA$$ (Sep 23, 2021)

Had a three day conversation about this topic once. We were all suffering from shock trauma and needed to work through our grief. At that time we felt the answer was no we do not ultimately have free will, because :

Everything is cause and effect 
Every instance of our experienced reality is cumulative
Reactions, whether mental or physical, are determined by automatic references to prior experiences and information held
Actions are derived from thoughts, thoughts arrive from and are predetermined by prior experiences
If thoughts and actions are predetermined, then you have no choice
If you don't have a choice, you are not to blame
If you don't have a choice and are not to blame, then we can forgive the writers for killing off Carl in Season 8 of The Walking Dead.


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## Roger A. Shrubber (Sep 23, 2021)

MedicinalMyA$$ said:


> Had a three day conversation about this topic once. We were all suffering from shock trauma and needed to work through our grief. At that time we felt the answer was no we do not ultimately have free will, because :
> 
> Everything is cause and effect
> Every instance of our experienced reality is cumulative
> ...


1. the effect sill vary from person to person
2. different people react differently, so the same experience can have vastly different effects on those involved. what may crush some, only makes others more determined
3. not everyone has the same reaction to the same experience, resulting in a myriad of choices being made. if everything were predetermined, we'd all have the same reactions to the same stimuli
4. who says thoughts are predetermined? i may...probably will, react very differently than most people in most situations, if thoughts are predetermined, we'd all be walking in unison, which is definitely not the case
5. you always have a choice. do you take the high road or the low road? that's an ethical question, which wouldn't even exist if our thought were predetermined
6.thats a huge cop out, you are ALWAYS responsible for your actions, no mitigating circumstances. that's why there are "tough decisions"...
7. i don't watch walking dead, i'll have to take your word on that one


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## StonedGardener (Sep 23, 2021)

Roger A. Shrubber said:


> this is a serious question to me...one that's been on my mind a long time.
> if there is not a "GOD"...then predestination cannot exist...predestination requires a guiding intelligence.
> if there is a guiding intelligence, i still don't believe it would map out our entire existence for us...what would be the point?
> perhaps "god" built the entire universe to achieve a particular result....which seems unlikely. "god" can create the universe, why can't "god" just create the situation they desire?
> ...


I wouldn't dwell on it but have some old fart friends a bit preoccupied with the "ever after". I think lost youth lends itself to this conundrum. I picked a "team" many years ago.....very liberating.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Oct 4, 2021)

Roger A. Shrubber said:


> not everyone has the same reaction to the same experience, resulting in a myriad of choices being made. if everything were predetermined, we'd all have the same reactions to the same stimuli


For everyone, it is predetermined _individually_ how they will react to stimuli.

Choices are made, all the time, but they aren't free choices.

Any choosing (action) comes only after a choosing thought. Do you have any control over your thoughts?

Think of something, say, a Cannabis strain. What came to mind? Why? Did you have control?

We have zero control over _anything_. There is only the illusion that we do. And it always comes after the fact. You say: "I COULD have done otherwise," when in fact you could not.


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## JimmyJackCorn (Oct 8, 2021)

Looking into the past, all is determined. Looking into the future, nothing is determined. The all-encompassing present is all we have, and it is rife with cause and effect.

Predetemination and free will are expressions of present perspective. An argument can be made for each, and neither is provable.

It's like the debate over an afterlife. No one has the perspective to definitively determine the truth--like two five-year-olds trying to decide why a sex joke is funny. 

We might as well be standing in between two mirrors that are facing each other.


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## CatHedral (Oct 8, 2021)

JimmyJackCorn said:


> Looking into the past, all is determined. Looking into the future, nothing is determined. The all-encompassing present is all we have, and it is rife with cause and effect.
> 
> Predetemination and free will are expressions of present perspective. An argument can be made for each, and neither is provable.
> 
> ...


Afterlife is an ideologically defining term.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Oct 8, 2021)

JimmyJackCorn said:


> Looking into the past, all is determined. Looking into the future, nothing is determined. The all-encompassing present is all we have, and it is rife with cause and effect.


I like this, but I would even say that "past" and "future" do not exist. Only the "now" exists, as you've said.

Looking into the future means ruminating in the now about possible future events (unless we're talking about actual precognition, if that is a possibility).

Maybe space-time does not exist, or is an illusion. That's not an outrageous claim. In that case all the talk about "past", "future" and "now" would just be our limited way about expressing our experience/existence.

Maybe something like "free will" exists, but in that case it will be radically different in its nature from the illusion of free will that most people adhere to.


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## Nutty sKunK (Oct 10, 2021)

The way I see it is that you have your own personal will and then there’s the will of life.

The Will of life overrides our personal will.

For example anything you want from this physical world has two wills deciding it’s outcome. This is evident in nature.

You Might want a pepperoni pizza so you jump in your car and what not, that is your will. Now. The Will of life will either allow you to get your pizza or throw up an obstacle in exercising your will. Flat tyre, no pizzas, shop has been robbed, aliens invade, you have a heart attack… etc etc…

So it’s pretty simple when you see it. The beautiful thing is is that ultimately the Will of life is in control.

Thank fuck!


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## ComputerSaysNo (Oct 10, 2021)

Nutty sKunK said:


> The beautiful thing is is that ultimately the Will of life is in control.


Well put!

That what needs to happen, will happen, and nothing else. It's very often not "good" or "likeable", but it's always the Right Thing. There is no alternative.

The Will of Life, I like that.



Nutty sKunK said:


> The Will of life overrides our personal will.


I think our personal will is a part of the Will of Life, but we demand from life that our will is fulfilled, so we fight with Reality all the time. The freedom we expect is not actually there, but we keep telling ourselves stories that is has been, and that we've exercised freedom of will all the time. It's always in hindsight ("I could have"), but never there in the Now.


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## Observe & Report (Oct 10, 2021)

Without Free Will you cannot choose to be Good and Santa won't bring your presents. Since Santa does bring presents there must be Free Will. QED.


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## PopAndSonGrows (Oct 11, 2021)

Shit just happens, man.


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## Antidote Man (Dec 1, 2021)

It's a concept we've created in our grand dellusion that anything exists outside of consequence.


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## Observe & Report (Dec 1, 2021)

Sabine Hossenfelder, a physicist at Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Study, demolishes the idea of free will.


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## Rob Roy (Dec 2, 2021)

If a person decides not to watch a video on free will, are they exercising free will?


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## ComputerSaysNo (Dec 2, 2021)

Rob Roy said:


> If a person decides not to watch a video on free will, are they exercising free will?


You tried to be witty, but failed; however it was not by free will, so don't chastize yourself.


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## Rob Roy (Dec 2, 2021)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> You tried to be witty, but failed; however it was not by free will, so don't chastize yourself.


It wasn't me though. I don't have free will. The voices made me do it.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Dec 2, 2021)

Rob Roy said:


> The voices made me do it.


Don't get me started about the voices.

BTW Sabine Hossenfelder is a good ambassador of reason and popularized hard science, always worth listening to in my opinion. She is _very_ German, however; even for a German.


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## Horselover fat (Dec 3, 2021)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> Don't get me started about the voices.
> 
> BTW Sabine Hossenfelder is a good ambassador of reason and popularized hard science, always worth listening to in my opinion. She is _very_ German, however; even for a German.


Sabine is awesome


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## Don't Bogart (Dec 5, 2021)

Free will. Amazon three pack $119.99.
Watch-out for the Chinese knockoffs.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Dec 6, 2021)

Don't Bogart said:


> Free will. Amazon three pack $119.99.


I would love to read the ratings section.


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## Don't Bogart (Dec 6, 2021)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> I would love to read the ratings section.


Not to bad....3.7.
One 5 star: "I got to run naked all over Aruba."
A 1 star: " They arrived all moldy."


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## Don't Bogart (Dec 6, 2021)

Observe & Report said:


> Sabine Hossenfelder, a physicist at Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Study, demolishes the idea of free will.


Of course she would. Germany?? Free will is a bitter taste. Now M.I.T., Cal Tech, well.... Surfs up baby!


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## HGCC (Dec 17, 2021)

Yes, I think you have free will. A whole host of things, both conscious and not, go into whatever decision, but you are still free to make whatever choice. I don't believe in predetermination. Each choice you make changes the future, the culmination of your experiences and character determine how you react and the decisions you make around those choices.

There isn't some guiding force for the universe at large, its random. It changes in relation to human actions. We then, in our infinite variety of individual experiences/personalities, react and change to that, kind of an ongoing feedback loop.


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## rockethoe (Dec 30, 2021)

free will and linear time can not exist simultaneously.


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## CatHedral (Dec 30, 2021)

rockethoe said:


> free will and linear time can not exist simultaneously.


Expound please.


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## rockethoe (Dec 30, 2021)

I have to make a choice in the future. I cannot see which it is because I cannot see the future, but because I will have made a decision, that is the only decision I can make.

I have a decision to make A or B
In the I will have made decision B. This means that in the present I can _only_ make decision B, because otherwise the future does not exist.

Im not sure im explaining it very well because im well oiled. But I will try to return with a more coherent answer at some point.

Edit: we do not have free will because at some point, the future _will_ have happened


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## CatHedral (Dec 30, 2021)

rockethoe said:


> I have to make a choice in the future. I cannot see which it is because I cannot see the future, but because I will have made a decision, that is the only decision I can make.
> 
> I have a decision to make A or B
> In the I will have made decision B. This means that in the present I can _only_ make decision B, because otherwise the future does not exist.
> ...


I do think I understand. But a multiverse interpretation allows me to contradict your earlier statement. In a ramified future I will be choosing A, choosing B, choosing an unknown number of C.


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## rockethoe (Dec 30, 2021)

CatHedral said:


> I do think I understand. But a multiverse interpretation allows me to contradict your earlier statement. In a ramified future I will be choosing A, choosing B, choosing an unknown number of C.


Sure, _if_ we live in a multiverse interpretation of time (and space, I guess) then my theory falls flat on it's face. If we live in a singular universe with linear time, however we do not have free will. Maybe we will never know - but thats where the fun is.


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## CatHedral (Dec 30, 2021)

rockethoe said:


> Sure, _if_ we live in a multiverse interpretation of time (and space, I guess) then my theory falls flat on it's face. If we live in a singular universe with linear time, however we do not have free will. Maybe we will never know - but thats where the fun is.


I also enjoy blue-sky thinking about the underlying nature of things. I have no idea if multiverse is correct, but it has two good qualities. It is useful and entertaining.


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## rockethoe (Dec 30, 2021)

I haven't read through this whole post so not sure if this argument has been posited yet: The argument of sufficient cause

1) Take some arbitrary event, A.

2) If A had no cause sufficient to bring it about, then it wouldn’t have happened.

3) But A _did_ happen.

4) Therefore, A had a cause sufficient to bring it about.

5) Since A is arbitrary, we may safely conclude that _all events have causes sufficient to bring them about._

6) It follows that all of our actions are caused by prior events.

7) It also follows that the prior events leading to our actions were caused by other prior events, and so on…

 Therefore, everything we do is the result of causal chains extending backward in time long before we were born.

9) Therefore, everything we do is caused by forces over which we have no control

10) If our actions are caused by forces over which we have no control, we do not act freely.

11) Therefore, we never act freely.


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## CatHedral (Dec 30, 2021)

rockethoe said:


> I haven't read through this whole post so not sure if this argument has been posited yet: The argument of sufficient cause
> 
> 1) Take some arbitrary event, A.
> 
> ...


My trouble here is circularity rooted in the choice of word “cause”. The philosophy of causality is a bit of a mine field imo.

It’s like whenever I encounter a variation on “the purpose of life” I invariably follow it to a religious credo.


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## Don't Bogart (Dec 30, 2021)

rockethoe said:


> I haven't read through this whole post so not sure if this argument has been posited yet: The argument of sufficient cause
> 
> 1) Take some arbitrary event, A.
> 
> ...


Chaos theory. Butterfly in the forest.


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## StonedGardener (Dec 30, 2021)

Life would be a pile of shit without it , methinks. Denial is trending......what the f is up with that ?


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## ComputerSaysNo (Dec 31, 2021)

rockethoe said:


> Im not sure im explaining it very well because im well oiled. But I will try to return with a more coherent answer at some point.


You're my favourite person for the day.


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## Don't Bogart (Dec 31, 2021)

StonedGardener said:


> Denial is trending......what the f is up with that ?


Misinterpretation of free will.


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## Don't Bogart (Dec 31, 2021)

rockethoe said:


> 11) Therefore, we never act freely.


12) Therefore you are not actually able to reason. Since reasoning would produce a self determined action which you would deem as free will.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Jan 1, 2022)

Don't Bogart said:


> Therefore you are not actually able to reason. Since reasoning would produce a self determined action which you would deem as free will.


I've heard this argument before: "reason implies free will". It's nonsense.

Computers are able to reason, but nobody would suppose free will in that case. Of course "computer reasoning" is within certain bounds, but so is "human reasoning".

In fact, one could even argue that *reasoning implies the opposite of self determined thinking.* This is because sound reasoning does not even leave a room for "choice". If "B follows A according to reason", then there is no choice, there is only "B" (according to reason).

When you reason about something, and your reasoning is correct (or sound), you will have no choice to arrive at your conclusion(s). And everybody else will get the same results. And there will be no room at all for choice or "free will".


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## Just Be (Jan 1, 2022)

To those that think that free will exists: Try traveling to your ideal location (anywhere in the world) by the end of the day and let me know how that works out for you.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Jan 1, 2022)

Just Be said:


> To those that think that free will exists: Try traveling to your ideal location (anywhere in the world) by the end of the day and let me know how that works out for you.


That is not a good example, because "free will" does not mean "I could do anything imaginable", but it does mean "I could have done otherwise than I actually did [in the past]".

But a valid variation of what you suggested would be: "only have happy thoughts for the rest of the day". That should be something that could be "willed", if the will was actually free. Good luck.


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## Just Be (Jan 1, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> That is not a good example, because "free will" does not mean "I could do anything imaginable"


The fact that 'free will' has to have a definition implies that there is no free will. The way I see it, we're all free to think what we want to think yet we cannot do what we think ..I think.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Jan 1, 2022)

Just Be said:


> The fact that 'free will' has to have a definition implies that there is no free will.


All language needs to have a definition. What I've given is just the "folk definition", that is, most people think of "free will" as the possibility to have decided other than they actually have, always regarding _past_ decisions.

In my opinion, defining "free will" in a way that meaningfully deviates from that does not make sense for everyday discussions of the concept. E.g. there are the "compatibilists" who side-step the issue by redefining "free will" in a way that does not make much sense to me.

Looking from the "absolute", nothing really exists, neither free will nor anything else. But our discussions happen in the relative, and within the constraints of language, so we need to settle on some definitions or there will not even be a discussion.


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## Nixs (Jan 1, 2022)

If you don't have a free will, how can you be held accountable for your actions?


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## Just Be (Jan 1, 2022)

Nixs said:


> If you don't have a free will, how can you be held accountable for your actions?


Don't open an account. 



ComputerSaysNo said:


> All language needs to have a definition.
> 
> Looking from the "absolute", nothing really exists, neither free will nor anything else. But our discussions happen in the relative, and within the constraints of language, so we need to settle on some definitions or there will not even be a discussion.


It's interesting to note that when the the word 'define' is dissected we have the prefix 'de' which implies _"to remove from or make the opposite of"_ combined with the Latin root word 'fin' which implies _"a boundary, end or limit"_. Taking that into consideration, words and their definitions are constantly evolving. I'm currently of the opinion that our perceptions should be constantly evolving as well. Anyway, that's all I have to say about 'free will'.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Jan 1, 2022)

Nixs said:


> If you don't have a free will, how can you be held accountable for your actions?


If a bunch of termites sap a building, are you holding them "accountable"?

Why apply different rules to humans?

You are accountable for everything you do, but so is your dog. Nobody has a say in what they do, or don't. _Accountability_ is a construct that we apply from the outside, it's not inherent to the actions of individuals (neither is _morality_).


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## Nixs (Jan 1, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> If a bunch of termites sap a building, are you holding them "accountable"?
> 
> Why apply different rules to humans?


Termites don't have the free will to not do their thing, unlike humans who have the free will to do work or not.
Take the sun for example, it cannot quit or get tardy, it does not have the choice to do that.

Excuse my level of the English language, its not my native tongue.


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## Don't Bogart (Jan 1, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> I've heard this argument before: "reason implies free will". It's nonsense.
> [/QUOTE
> 
> 
> ...


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## thecosmicgoat (Jan 1, 2022)

God's will or self-will, no free will.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Jan 1, 2022)

Nixs said:


> Termites don't have the free will to not do their thing, unlike humans who have the free will to do work or not.


Neither humans nor termites have free will; that is the point here. The example was about "accountability", not free will.



Don't Bogart said:


> Computers are NOT able to reason. Computational calculations. Are you implying your head is full of nand gates, nor gates, and gates, or gates.


Please point out the difference between "computational reasoning" and "human reasoning". Consciousness is not a prerequisite for reasoning.

Of course we are not yet at Strong AI (or General AI), but computers are already quite good at reasoning about a lot of thinks, in many cases far better than humans.

How is your "reasoning" about anything different from a complex calculation?

(Mind you I'm not suggesting that arbitrarily complex calculations are a perfect substitute for human reasoning.)


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## Don't Bogart (Jan 1, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> Please point out the difference between "computational reasoning" and "human reasoning". Consciousness is not a prerequisite for reasoning.


*cogito, ergo sum.*


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## Rob Roy (Jan 11, 2022)

thecosmicgoat said:


> God's will or self-will, no free will.


If actions exist because they are god's will, wouldn't that make god a sinner if he allows a person to commit a sin ?


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## thecosmicgoat (Jan 11, 2022)

Rob Roy said:


> If actions exist because they are god's will, wouldn't that make god a sinner if he allows a person to commit a sin ?


If God as you understand him, has sinners in its universe, than maybe it could apply to him too? 
I don't believe in sins myself, and God as I understand him doesn't have sinners. 
What is a sin? A poor choice, a selfish choice in actions, or decisions?


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## Nixs (Jan 11, 2022)

A sin as I understand it is breaking God's word (commands) with an intention or "own free well".


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## VincenzioVonHook (Jan 12, 2022)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> If everybody were to refuse to give me a dog, I could not choose to get one or not. If I had no way to, then that would be that.


Extension of victim complex. It's a way to take the responsibility off one's self. 

Everyone I know with a victim complex this that exact way.


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## Rob Roy (Jan 12, 2022)

thecosmicgoat said:


> If God as you understand him, has sinners in its universe, than maybe it could apply to him too?
> I don't believe in sins myself, and God as I understand him doesn't have sinners.
> What is a sin? A poor choice, a selfish choice in actions, or decisions?


I don't "understand" god in the sense that I agree with all of the things people have written and attribute to god or their favorite religion / god.

I do understand that it is in my power to direct my own actions, not in every circumstance, but in many. I think of that as my free will, restrained somewhat by my own limited physical and mental capacities. Meaning I can only do what I can do, can't do what I can't do. I might will myself to fly, but it's never happened and unless I grow wings, it won't etc. Albeit. sometimes external circumstances can negate our free will, but it's not a permanent state of being, meaning circumstances change and don't all occur in the same way for every person. Unless...a meteor. Okay, I'm digressing. 

As far as god goes, I was raised as a Christian, but quickly learned to disappear sunday mornings as a kid to avoid going to sunday school etc. . Even as a kid I questioned how people blindly believed and obeyed things they were told without considering alternatives or the unintended consequences and contradictions of their religious beliefs.

Got alot of respect for that Jesus dude though, kind, intelligent, on a mission to help people, balls of steel when faced with a horrible punishment he didn't deserve. I don't think of him as god though, but certainly a fine example of a human being.

God, in the traditional Christian sense, is a contradiction and is likely a sinner, since he tells mankind he loves them, but if they don't love him back, he's gonna smite them. Kind of dickish behavior. So, yes, "god" (the guy from the bible) as I understand him would be a sinner. 

I think it's possible human beings are a created hybrid species and our "god" was an explanation of the actions of other beings with more advanced technology who came to earth and fucked our women, thus creating mankind. We are escaped lab rats in that sense, with free will up to the limits of our individual capacities.


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## Rob Roy (Jan 12, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> If a bunch of termites sap a building, are you holding them "accountable"?
> 
> Why apply different rules to humans?
> 
> You are accountable for everything you do, but so is your dog. Nobody has a say in what they do, or don't. _Accountability_ is a construct that we apply from the outside, it's not inherent to the actions of individuals (neither is _morality_).


It's reasonable to hold beings accountable with respect to their mental and physical capacities. Humans and termites, you may have noticed have different capacities. 

I don't shit on the living room carpet. My dog usually doesn't shit on the living room carpet, trained not to. If I'm someplace and my truck breaks down, don't get home to the next day, despite his training the dog may leave a present. 

Can't blame the dog, he has no opposable thumb and even though he knows he wants to go outside, he can't manage opening the door. How could I hold poor Rex accountable in that case? If I left my house in the care of a human guest, and he shit on the living room rug, rather than using the bathroom or at least a bush out back, I think it would be fair to hold him accountable. My guest does have the capacity NOT to shit on the carpet and doesn't need me to come home and open the door for him.


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## OG-KGP (Jan 12, 2022)

New Age United said:


> No there is no such thing as freewill, the energy that makes up your body and even your mind will behave and act on the laws of physics, how could awareness possibly affect the material universe. That being said it would make sense that you were given freewill during your conception in the womb as your brain was being developed, if there actually was free will.
> 
> The idea that we created are destiny before birth is interesting and one that I've contemplated before, perhaps we are God manifesting the universe at every moment, the effortless creators of the cosmos.


I'm big on the laws of the universe. I read all Bob Proctors books and many other about the laws of attraction but I beg to differ.

The creation of life is a choice made by the two parents (well sometimes not a choice but you get it) Being conceivd is the biggest miracle we will ever witness. A random egg on a cycle that gets fertilized by one of millions of small cells. Its like we all won the lottery just being here.

Many things were done for us by the choice of our parents at a young age but as we grow, we learn. Right from wrong. I'm a firm believer that like attracts like and what we think, we become. 

I have done many terrible things in my past. I lived a terrible life for quite a while. I learned that if I focus on good, good will come. If I choose to help others, blessings will be done or reciprocated. And If I choose to vibrate on a different frequency, by mostly being good, positive thoughts, and acts of kindness, it will all come back.

These are my choices, I choose to do better. I choose to study this. I choose to turn my life around. I don't believe this was all predestined.


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## Rob Roy (Jan 12, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> For everyone, it is predetermined _individually_ how they will react to stimuli.
> 
> Choices are made, all the time, but they aren't free choices.
> 
> ...


Except thoughts are not actions. You could think of something, or it could pop into your head to do something, maybe you didn't will those thoughts, but you DID decide not to do or do the action that corresponds to the thought you had.

"Gee, I'd like to make him shut his mouth" (a person's thought, perhaps occurring spontaneously) 

"I will avoid going to thanksgiving gathering so I don't have to hear my know it all bigfoot wanna be brother-in-law pontificate on philosophy. 
(a persons decided course of action / inaction suggesting free will is present)


As an aside, I'm always thinking of a cannabis strain.


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## Nixs (Jan 12, 2022)

Rob Roy said:


> Can't blame the dog,


This is for Rex


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## Don't Bogart (Jan 12, 2022)

I think G*d's going to need to move to a different universe. We got this one figured out.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Jan 12, 2022)

Rob Roy said:


> It's reasonable to hold beings accountable with respect to their mental and physical capacities. Humans and termites, you may have noticed have different capacities.


Yes, it is, but then it is down to a definition of "accountability".

In a sense, I am accountable for everything I cause. Unfortunately I cause infinitely many things that will happen in the future, and I can predict practically nothing of it. Am I accountable for all of that? Or is it just the things that I could have foreseen to any degree?

What if I run over a cute little child, who then dies, but to no one's knowing the child was a psychopath in the making and would have harmed a lot of people had it lived? Now am I accountable for saving the world from a psychopath?

As I said above, "accountability" is a story that we need to make up _after_ actions were taken and the degree of accountability is almost arbitrarily random. It's a human category that is not inherent to the actions themselves.



Rob Roy said:


> Except thoughts are not actions. You could think of something, or it could pop into your head to do something, maybe you didn't will those thoughts


Not every thought results in something that you might call an "action". Not all thoughts are "choosing thoughts".

Also, not every "action" is preceded by a choosing, conscious thought either. If I throw a tennis ball at you out of the blue, you might catch it (or not), but in any case it will not be due to a conscious thought, it will have been pure reflexes.

However, everything that we would call a determined action, will have a thought (or many) preceding it, that you would name as the "deciding" thought. Where did that thought come from, how did it originate, who "willed" it into being? Nobody.



> but you DID decide not to do or do the action that corresponds to the thought you had.


So there was ultimately a deciding thought. One way or the other.


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## riuTEMPriu (Jan 12, 2022)

Yes, but only for one certain reason - because it encourages us to make moral decisions. It does not matter whether we can or cannot control it, nobody wants to live with the guilt of what humanity is capable of - so if I have to pick one extreme, I go for free will. I don't think any of us ever have it in that we are more hormonally imbalanced than we presume, but I do think we should rely upon it.


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## Rob Roy (Jan 13, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> What if I run over a cute little child, who then dies, but to no one's knowing the child was a psychopath in the making and would have harmed a lot of people had it lived? Now am I accountable for saving the world from a psychopath?



If you didn't know the child was going to be a psycho and you didn't try to kill the child (your brakes failed, didn't see the kid, etc.) it wasn't an action of free will. No points for saving the world in that situation.

Sometimes things happen without our input or forethought. Although it could be argued that you decided to take that particular road that day.

Sometimes things happen_ because of_ our input Maybe the kid chose to wear clothing that day that made it difficult to see him or chose to jump into the road, timing it perfectly to get run over by you? Wouldn't the psycho kid be exercising free will in that instance? 

Did you go the funeral ? Did you choose to, or not? I would call that free will.



ComputerSaysNo said:


> Not every thought results in something that you might call an "action". Not all thoughts are "choosing thoughts".


Exactly. Not all, but_ some _are. To act or not act can be, (may not always be) a choice. Again, that is when I would say a person is exercising free will.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Jan 13, 2022)

riuTEMPriu said:


> nobody wants to live with the guilt of what humanity is capable of - so if I have to pick one extreme, I go for free will


I would think that without free will it's easier to cope with that -- also the concept of "guilt" makes not much sense then. Especially not with guilt towards human behaviour as a whole. None of us chose to be born a human.

(Well according to the Tibetans some of us actually chose to be re-incarnated as a human, but those would be Bodhisatvas who chose the human life in order to liberate others.)



Rob Roy said:


> If you didn't know the child was going to be a psycho and you didn't try to kill the child (your brakes failed, didn't see the kid, etc.) it wasn't an action of free will. No points for saving the world in that situation.


My argument was about "accountability" and not free will.

Even without free will you can still hold yourself accountable for something. I smoke tobacco, so if I get cancer I will hold myself accountable for that in some sense.



Rob Roy said:


> Again, that is when I would say a person is exercising free will.


Maybe you can elaborate what the mechanism of "free will" is, in your eyes. Because either an action is caused by something else (then it's not free), or it isn't. However, how do I have to imagine an "uncaused" action? Is that just randomness?

If "free will" caused the action, then how did the free will interact with the world? It would need to be a cause, without having a cause itself. So it would need to stand outside the world and be part of it at the same time.


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## StonedGardener (Jan 13, 2022)

Is this a dead horse everybody is kicking. I have a solution. Whatever makes you feel better is the correct answer.


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## riuTEMPriu (Jan 17, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> I would think that without free will it's easier to cope with that -- also the concept of "guilt" makes not much sense then. Especially not with guilt towards human behaviour as a whole. None of us chose to be born a human.


This is why I think free will is important. Yes, people feel guilty over stupid things every day, but not everything is one of those things. People _should_ feel guilt over e.g. committing genocide. None of us are what we are by choice, and yet some among us try to leave the world better than we found it, some worse, and some just fritter away their energy apologizing while accomplishing nothing. You can look for a way out of that logic, but... _why?_


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## ComputerSaysNo (Jan 17, 2022)

StonedGardener said:


> Whatever makes you feel better is the correct answer.





riuTEMPriu said:


> This is why I think free will is important.


Free will does not exist because _we_ would _like_ it to exist. Reality does not care much about what we would like it to be.

Maybe humans are just cruel assholes in general, and our fate is ultimately ruled by guilt-free psychos. Tough luck, but I don't see anything in the laws of the universe that would preclude that.


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## Don't Bogart (Jan 18, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> our fate is ultimately ruled by guilt-free psychos


Do they have free will?


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## ComputerSaysNo (Jan 18, 2022)

Don't Bogart said:


> Do they have free will?


No, and they don't even have a conscience.


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## Don't Bogart (Jan 19, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> No, and they don't even have a conscience.


Oh.. O.K. Good 'cause I do and I don't want them to screw it up.


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## Don't Bogart (Feb 4, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> Even without free will you can still hold yourself accountable for something. I smoke tobacco, so if I get cancer I will hold myself accountable for that in some sense.


You know I was going to answer with some smart-ass answer but I've seen the addiction with someone I work with. Even after a close call with lung cancer he still smokes.
Not just your free will but your pure will is being put to the task.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Feb 5, 2022)

Don't Bogart said:


> You know I was going to answer with some smart-ass answer but I've seen the addiction with someone I work with. Even after a close call with lung cancer he still smokes.
> Not just your free will but your pure will is being put to the task.


I know that I can "not smoke". Since when I'm not among smokers, and don't have cigarettes or tobacco available, after a few days the addiction has waned enough for me to stay away from it completely.

Unfortunately it becomes really hard to further resist when I get "enabled" (usually by other smokers making tobacco available). And that is not to blame the other smokers for anything, it is my own addiction.

Obviously you could apply this to a lot of other temptations and addictions, maybe not as dangerous as smoking.

We're really not built to resist temptations, the only good way to deal with them is keep them away. The smoker can't have tobacco at hand, and the junkie needs to stay away from his "friends".


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## Rob Roy (Feb 5, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> Free will does not exist because _we_ would _like_ it to exist. Reality does not care much about what we would like it to be.


Conversely, free will doesn't fail to exist, because we wish it to be so. 

Reality? Which dimension?


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## buckaclark (Feb 5, 2022)

Rob Roy said:


> If





ComputerSaysNo said:


> I know that I can "not smoke". Since when I'm not among smokers, and don't have cigarettes or tobacco available, after a few days the addiction has waned enough for me to stay away from it completely.
> 
> Unfortunately it becomes really hard to further resist when I get "enabled" (usually by other smokers making tobacco available). And that is not to blame the other smokers for anything, it is my own addiction.
> 
> ...


Have you considered reading the book.The cow in the parking lot.it states that you are waiting for a parking spot and the driver backs out and an asshole in a Jeep swerves in and takes your spot.OR you drive onto that parking lot and there is a cow laying in that parking spot.either way you don't get the spot,how you react is up to you.


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## buckaclark (Feb 5, 2022)

On free will ,you are asking the wrong question.How will ultimately knowing effect the outcome?


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## buckaclark (Feb 5, 2022)

It's the same as the Alien question,people want that so they can stop looking out for themselves.


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## buckaclark (Feb 5, 2022)

2 Soon


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## buckaclark (Feb 5, 2022)

I'm a moron


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## HGCC (Feb 6, 2022)

buckaclark said:


> Have you considered reading the book.The cow in the parking lot.it states that you are waiting for a parking spot and the driver backs out and an asshole in a Jeep swerves in and takes your spot.OR you drive onto that parking lot and there is a cow laying in that parking spot.either way you don't get the spot,how you react is up to you.


I think ownership of your reaction is key. You can't control the world, free will isn't bending the world to your whims, but you have free will in the choices you make in reaction to what occurs around you. 

Cigarettes are a great example, love me some cigarettes. Gave them up many years ago. You absolutely have free will, the decision is still yours to make, the addiction just adds some weight to what you are considering.


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## ComputerSaysNo (Feb 6, 2022)

buckaclark said:


> On free will ,you are asking the wrong question.How will ultimately knowing effect the outcome?


This is a good point.

Knowing and understanding that we do not have free will could enable a couple of things:

We could be more forgiving to others and ourselves.
We could understand that a retributive penal system makes no sense.
We could understand that since we are not in control, it possibly puts algorithms (or machines) in control eventually; we will sooner or later get hacked.
The last point is probably the most important one. The illusion of free will suggests to people that at least the "strong willed" are immune to getting "hacked", and that's a dangerous illusion.

Here is a very good article by Yuval Noah Harari about that issue:









Yuval Noah Harari: the myth of freedom


Governments and corporations will soon know you better than you know yourself. Belief in the idea of freedom has become dangerous




www.theguardian.com


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## ComputerSaysNo (Feb 6, 2022)

Rob Roy said:


> Conversely, free will doesn't fail to exist, because we wish it to be so.


Absolutely! You can't have it either way.

It either exists, or not, but that does not depend on what we would prefer. In the same vein, it would be nice if there was a benevolent God-Mother who will ultimately step in and save humanity -- that does not mean that it is the case. It would be nice if there was some form of ultimate justice (or reckoning), but Reality really does not give a fuck.



> Reality? Which dimension?


That's gibberish.


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## Don't Bogart (Feb 6, 2022)

buckaclark said:


> Have you considered reading the book.The cow in the parking lot.it states that you are waiting for a parking spot and the driver backs out and an asshole in a Jeep swerves in and takes your spot.OR you drive onto that parking lot and there is a cow laying in that parking spot.either way you don't get the spot,how you react is up to you.


Or you then hit the cow. Take it home and dress it. Steaks for everyone.


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## Don't Bogart (Feb 6, 2022)

HGCC said:


> Cigarettes are a great example, love me some cigarettes. Gave them up many years ago. You absolutely have free will, the decision is still yours to make, the addiction just adds some weight to what you are considering.


The addiction is brutal for some people. It's arrogant and ignorant to assume all people can quit as easily as the next guy/girl or you.
The tobacco industry is counting on it.


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## Don't Bogart (Feb 6, 2022)

ComputerSaysNo said:


> What if I run over a cute little child, who then dies, but to no one's knowing the child was a psychopath in the making and would have harmed a lot of people had it lived? Now am I accountable for saving the world from a psychopath?


But no one would know. So your only accountable for killing the kid.


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## Don't Bogart (Feb 6, 2022)

Rob Roy said:


> If actions exist because they are god's will, wouldn't that make god a sinner if he allows a person to commit a sin ?


As far as I read in religions around the world. G*d always gets a free pass.


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## Rob Roy (Feb 6, 2022)

Don't Bogart said:


> As far as I read in religions around the world. G*d always gets a free pass.


Yeah it's almost like "GOD" learned it from government, cuz god and government seem to always be exempt from their own horse shit and are so alike, it's hard to tell which is the biggest inhibitor of human free will.


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## HGCC (Feb 6, 2022)

Don't Bogart said:


> The addiction is brutal for some people. It's arrogant and ignorant to assume all people can quit as easily as the next guy/girl or you.
> The tobacco industry is counting on it.


Oh it's absolutely more difficult for some. Each individual will have different stuff weigh on every decision, but that doesn't change that you have freedom of choice/free will.


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## MedicinalMyA$$ (Feb 18, 2022)

This A CLOCKWORK UNIVERSE


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## Rufus T. Firefly (Feb 18, 2022)

The block universe strongly suggests no free will. 

Or maybe some semblance of free will and while it may appear to be free will it's really still accounted for as every conceivable outcome or decision tree has already been accounted for. So is it free will if it's all been done before?

Here is what I'm certain of, it doesn't have anything to do with "God" as defined by human knowledge. Or does it and we are just living in the cosmic decision tree where the exact workings of how a four dimensional universe, "God" or what happened before the big bang.

I don't really know anything.


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## Rufus T. Firefly (Feb 18, 2022)

MedicinalMyA$$ said:


> This A CLOCKWORK UNIVERSE


Nice article


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## Dreaming1 (Mar 18, 2022)

No. Control is an illusion. Temporary state of confusion. We are programs running on a meat machine. Our lives can be pretty much plotted out by economic/social class and personal traumas. All action is reaction. Sure, make choices. Eat this or that, poop here or there, hold your breath or don't, get this in blue or yellow... They don't matter. So, what good is free will if there is any? 
Wake up, go to work, eat, go home, eat, go to sleep, poop, go to work... That is the end result of our free will. The magnificence of human intellect.


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## Saint Jimmy74 (Apr 12, 2022)

Roger A. Shrubber said:


> the planet is doomed to whatever fate eventually befalls it...but individual lives are nothing but a series of choices...some choices are gates that lead to other choices, but cut off yet others...how can that be predestined? i don't know myself what i'm going to do yet...because i don't know what going to happen just a few seconds into the future...
> and i don't feel much of a debt to philosophers...as far as i'm concerned, they're professional slackers. pay a room full of semi educated pothead college students to do nothing but smoke weed and try to figure out how everything works together...you'll get the complete works of heidegger, kant, bacon, camus, and decarte...if you can read it through the cheeto dust smudges...


This is far from actual truth about philosophers. We owe everything to the Greeks. They have brought meaning, answers and hope for a millennia. To talk of these people as "slackers" is ridiculous. Just because your angry life doesn't work the way you want is no reason to shit all over something you clearly do not understand.


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## Roger A. Shrubber (Apr 12, 2022)

Saint Jimmy74 said:


> This is far from actual truth about philosophers. We owe everything to the Greeks. They have brought meaning, answers and hope for a millennia. To talk of these people as "slackers" is ridiculous. Just because your angry life doesn't work the way you want is no reason to shit all over something you clearly do not understand.


i fully understand, but i'm not sure you do.
any semi intelligent person can work out just about everything the "great philosophers" have cursed us with.
i have heard half of their great theories, out of the mouths of high people, who i know have never read a book past doctor Suess or playboy. if you decide to enshrine philosophers, that is your decision, but there isn't a single philosophical theory that any of them thought of that wouldn't have been thought of by a hundred people after them, independently. the only reason you revere Plato and Socrates is that they wrote it down first, so they get the credit for ideas that they half stole from their own students, half stole from other philosophers...
all the "great thoughts" would have been thought of by someone else if they hadn't been claimed by the first philosophers to think of them and write them down, with their name at the top of the page


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## Saint Jimmy74 (Apr 12, 2022)

I hope one day you are 25% as smart as you think you are sir. I make it a point of not wasting my time so......


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## Roger A. Shrubber (Apr 12, 2022)

Saint Jimmy74 said:


> I hope one day you are 25% as smart as you think you are sir. I make it a point of not wasting my time so......


then what the fuck are you doing in this thread, on a weed website? if this isn't a complete and total waste of time, much like the practice of philosophy itself, then there is no such thing.


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## PJ Diaz (Apr 12, 2022)

Saint Jimmy74 said:


> I make it a point of not wasting my time so......


So you've made sure to take the time to let us know? Fascinating.


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## Saint Jimmy74 (Apr 13, 2022)

Roger A. Shrubber said:


> then what the fuck are you doing in this thread, on a weed website? if this isn't a complete and total waste of time, much like the practice of philosophy itself, then there is no such thing.


The difference is in having an actual conversation versus someone who just wants to spew nonsense about how smart they are and can figure all of life's mysteries. It's like saying you can read an article and then go perform brain surgery. 
And this site isn't a waste of time. Learned a lot in the short amount of time I've been here.


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## Saint Jimmy74 (Apr 13, 2022)

PJ Diaz said:


> So you've made sure to take the time to let us know? Fascinating.


Nice. Very welcoming.


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## Roger A. Shrubber (Apr 13, 2022)

Saint Jimmy74 said:


> The difference is in having an actual conversation versus someone who just wants to spew nonsense about how smart they are and can figure all of life's mysteries. It's like saying you can read an article and then go perform brain surgery.
> And this site isn't a waste of time. Learned a lot in the short amount of time I've been here.


you may have learned something about weed, but you don't seem to have learned anything about people...i'm 56, not ancient, but i'm not a kid, and i've had plenty of time to observe other people. everything i say is from that direct observation. i don't sit in a room alone and imagine things, i go out and do things, and interact with people, and that has led to my opinions on what people will say and do in certain situations. life experience, coupled with an education, that i try to further with more reading as i go along. i've read Kant, Heidegger, Nietzsche, Locke, Hume, Sartre, Hobbes, Mill...they're all the same, they have some insights, but they're guessing, supposing, wondering, wandering....not one philosopher has ever provided an immutable truth to the world, they all just imagine, and project, and suppose...


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## Don't Bogart (Apr 13, 2022)

Roger A. Shrubber said:


> Hobbes


Calvin and Hobbes? They're the best.


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## JamieThePainter (Apr 13, 2022)

Roger A. Shrubber said:


> . i've read Kant, Heidegger, Nietzsche, Locke, Hume, Sartre, Hobbes, Mill...they're all the same, they have some insights, but they're guessing, supposing, wondering, wandering....not one philosopher has ever provided an immutable truth to the world, they all just imagine, and project, and suppose...


How fucking pretentious can you get?

@Saint Jimmy74 Aye, they're a right friendly bunch in here


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## Saint Jimmy74 (Apr 13, 2022)

JamieThePainter said:


> How fucking pretentious can you get?
> 
> @Saint Jimmy74 Aye, they're a right friendly bunch in here


For sure my man. Some are smoking more than weed I am afraid!


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## JamieThePainter (Apr 13, 2022)

Saint Jimmy74 said:


> For sure my man. Some are smoking more than weed I am afraid!


Aye sadly. You've got to love the arrogance of a guy who has apparently read all of those philosophical works and can just write them off as slackers who have given no input to the world. That's a serious level of fuckwittery right there. 

Wtf is he doing in a blatant philosophy thread calling philosophers "slackers" if he isn't trolling?


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## Saint Jimmy74 (Apr 13, 2022)

Trolling or really struggling with life. Definitely has an issue with a "god" so to speak as well. Actually hope he is trolling. That level of arrogance won't serve him well in life. I can't imagine his interactions he speaks of generally go very smoothly. He will find direction one day.


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## Roger A. Shrubber (Apr 13, 2022)

Saint Jimmy74 said:


> Trolling or really struggling with life. Definitely has an issue with a "god" so to speak as well. Actually hope he is trolling. That level of arrogance won't serve him well in life. I can't imagine his interactions he speaks of generally go very smoothly. He will find direction one day.


it only seems like arrogance to you, and the guy kissing your ass. i found direction a long time ago. it's to find ignorant people and annoy them as much as they annoy the rest of the world...got two on my hook right now, looks like i'm living in two heads rent free at the same time...but they're both kind of small, may knock out a few walls, add a couple of skylights...


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## JamieThePainter (Apr 13, 2022)

Roger A. Shrubber said:


> it only seems like arrogance to you, and the guy kissing your ass. i found direction a long time ago. it's to find ignorant people and annoy them as much as they annoy the rest of the world...got two on my hook right now, looks like i'm living in two heads rent free at the same time...but they're both kind of small, may knock out a few walls, add a couple of skylights...


Troll elsewhere, champ. You're in a philosophy thread calling philosophers slackers. Awesome how you seem to think you represent the whole world. Delusions of grandeur much?


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## Coldnasty (Apr 13, 2022)

Maybe?


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## Roger A. Shrubber (Apr 14, 2022)

Coldnasty said:


> Maybe?


that's the most honest answer in this thread so far...everything else is philosophical bullshit, no one knows, and no one ever will, you just have to pick a stance and go with it


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## JamieThePainter (Apr 14, 2022)

Hardly a surprise you didn't enjoy those philosophy books if that's your attitude. Why you read them all is what I want to know. 



Roger A. Shrubber said:


> everything else is philosophical bullshit


You're kidding me! Philosophical bullshit in answer to a philosophical question? Who'd have thunk it?


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## Don't Bogart (Apr 17, 2022)

JamieThePainter said:


> Wtf is he doing in a blatant philosophy thread calling philosophers "slackers" if he isn't trolling?


OR.....delivering a counter point.


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## JamieThePainter (Apr 17, 2022)

Don't Bogart said:


> OR.....delivering a counter point.


Bit like walking into a thread about football and telling everyone that it's a pointless thing to talk about, no? 

Not much of a "counter point" imo.


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## Wattzzup (Apr 17, 2022)

JamieThePainter said:


> Wtf is he doing in a blatant philosophy thread calling philosophers "slackers" if he isn't trolling?


Welcome to RIU


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## bam0813 (Apr 18, 2022)

Imo anything a mentally firm person does without a gun pointed at them is free will


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## StonedGardener (Apr 21, 2022)

If no freewill exists , what the Hell is the purpose of having a life. I do realize that are shit-tons of " sick " people and other unfortunate souls that freewill eludes


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## Dreaming1 (Apr 24, 2022)

Free will? About what? I could take my guns to some church today, or a store and open fire. I wouldn't choose to do so. So, is that choice actually available? I could choose to have homosexual sex even though I am heterosexual. I dont want to. Not what I would choose. So, is that choice available to me? Same with stimulants or opiates. Not my bag. I wouldn't choose that. 
So if you have free will, go get loaded on hard drugs and offer sex to some ugly strangers. Otherwise your free will means nothing and you enslaved by your programming. People are Meat machines with no autonomy. Bacterium. Ants. Monkeys. Sorry about it.


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## Dreaming1 (Apr 24, 2022)

StonedGardener said:


> If no freewill exists , what the Hell is the purpose of having a life?


Indeed. We have no choice. Life is something that HAPPENED TO YOU. Not something you chose. You will be plucked from it with zero say also. You are free to breathe, eat, shit, fuck, and die. Same as all other sentient animals here on Earth. Choose your own adventure, Or react to the situations thrust upon you by outside forces?


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## Dreaming1 (Apr 24, 2022)

I am not thrilled with it either @Wattzzup. But,I had no choice.


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## Callisto405 (Apr 24, 2022)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> Can freewill exist alongside predeterminism/predestination? Like can I have freewill while being predestined to have freewill? Or like can I be predetermined to choose? Does anybody ever recall being given an infinite amount of options to choose from? And before we all were alive, did we have freewill then? If not, how could it make sense that out of nowhere we were suddenly given freewill or that we suddenly found freewill?


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## Nixs (Apr 24, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> Free will? About what? I could take my guns to some church today, or a store and open fire. I wouldn't choose to do so. So, is that choice actually available? I could choose to have homosexual sex even though I am heterosexual. I dont want to. Not what I would choose. So, is that choice available to me? Same with stimulants or opiates. Not my bag. I wouldn't choose that.
> So if you have free will, go get loaded on hard drugs and offer sex to some ugly strangers. Otherwise your free will means nothing and you enslaved by your programming. People are Meat machines with no autonomy. Bacterium. Ants. Monkeys. Sorry about it.


Why not have the free will to share some money with a family that needs it bad? I would choose to do so


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## Callisto405 (Apr 24, 2022)

Every time I pick up the pipe and toke, it’s free will. Free will is what brought me here


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## Dreaming1 (Apr 24, 2022)

s said:


> Why not have the free will to share some money with a family that needs it bad? I would choose to do so


If you have the money go for it. If you are in the same position, then you Cant have access to the option. No free energy. No free will. 
You could have chosen not to respond. But your strings were pulled, and you reacted to emotion. I tossed a pebble, waves were formed, you were moved.


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## DrBuzzFarmer (Apr 24, 2022)

KoSmIcTRaveLer said:


> Can freewill exist alongside predeterminism/predestination? Like can I have freewill while being predestined to have freewill? Or like can I be predetermined to choose? Does anybody ever recall being given an infinite amount of options to choose from? And before we all were alive, did we have freewill then? If not, how could it make sense that out of nowhere we were suddenly given freewill or that we suddenly found freewill?


Does the character in a video game have more of a life than the NPCs?
Consciousness exists behind the subject/object split, and is thus the Ground of All Being. 
You exist independent of both the subject and object, and thus must be projecting the split for some reason not yet understood.
The implication science is giving us, is that we live in a simulation, That none of what we see or experience exists outside of our conscious thought.
We are sleepers, daydreaming.
You, as the Subject or Object, will play out the Will of Consciousness, with no understanding of why or how. 
There is no Freedom for you.
Freedom is an illusion you have spun around yourself.


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## Dreaming1 (Apr 24, 2022)

Meat Machines playing their hit song "I am important, God damnit!"


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## DrBuzzFarmer (Apr 24, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> Meat Machines playing their hit song "I am important, God damnit!"


What do you get when you cross a Hindu with a Physicist?
Dr. Amit Goswami


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## Nixs (Apr 26, 2022)

After some deep thinking & a few s, I came to the conclusion that we have a limited "will" due to our limited capacities, only God the creator has a free will.


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## Saint Jimmy74 (Apr 27, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> Meat Machines playing their hit song "I am important, God damnit!"


Live at the Palladium!!


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## JamieThePainter (Apr 27, 2022)

I like to think that we have free will, but I've taken far too many hallucinogens in my life to be happy to take that thought as my final answer. I often think that we are just as vital to the flow of the universe as the circling of a fly or the spinning of a planet. Perhaps in this huge, beautiful dimension of reality every piece of us is just another cog in the machine that is turning as it was supposed to. 

In the depths of my half delusioned state when surfacing back from a break through trip I like to fancy that this is what deja vu is - as the Universe breathes in and out, we are destined (or doomed) to repeat the same cycle and our half remembrance of the last cycle that emerges sometimes, we call deja vu.


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## harrychilds (Apr 27, 2022)

It's a very hard question to answer. But I believe the more money you have, the more choices you can make. Without money, you don't have many options or much free will.


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## Dreaming1 (Apr 27, 2022)

I have dug into some family history. My family and my Wifes family have been following each other around for the last 200+ years. It is like a magnetic attraction more than some choice I have made. Everything fell into place. Serendipity. Lots of synchronicity. I echo their faces. I echo their same damn lives.
Money is good for easing stress, but it allows no more choice than if you are poor. The wheel is in a different phase of its rotation only.
I like to come from a science frame rather than a theosophical frame. But, I can only say that the limits of this universe are very precise. If several math type things that define the universe were off by very minuscule amounts, the whole thing would fall apart. Not to mention that it would be easier for nothing to remain nothing than to become something, much less everything. I dont want to believe in a god. But if that is the Truth, then what I think is meaningless. But, also vice versa.
So...me being either my body making my mind, or my mind experiencing a physical body for shits and grins? If my body creates my mind, then these choices are ephemeral if not illusions. If I am mind, preceding life,and lasting beyond death, then I am some impotent god.
I figure if there is a god, then it is the basis of consciousness. We a shards of that. A bit of the fractal that contains the entire info. If I don't actually exist, if I am a character in a movie being played by god, then my script is written and no free will. If I am making it up as I go along in the movie, then free will exists, but with no meaning...just empty choices echoing across space for the sake of screaming into the void.
Join my cult. $end a $elf adre$$ed $tamped envelope to Dreaming One, OK. Just pop it in the mail. They know me like Santa Claus. If you have no free will, send $5. If you have free will, send $100.


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## Dreaming1 (Apr 28, 2022)

Idk if anyone else said this, but if you have free will, just make your body produce more cannibinoids so you don't have to spend resources on pot or growing it. We already make them, so this should be easy.
Hell, free yourself from having to cannibalize some other life and make all of the proteins you need to live for yourself you lazy bastards. 
Free will yourself to live forever in a perfect physical form that never deteriorates.
You will have to forgive me for not holding my breath waiting on you. I don't have control over my breathe. If held long enough, my brain will shut my will down, and will begin pumping my lungs for me. I Cant even control my own breathing. Much less choose some thing to happen. I only react. 
If you free will stuff, I guess we can blame you for the current state of affairs too. You have willed it. Child molesting, starvation, war, pollution, inequality, fear, pain... Great choices guys. Gods.


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## PadawanWarrior (Apr 28, 2022)

Saint Jimmy74 said:


> Live at the Palladium!!


Hell ya. Most people probably don't know what you're talking about. But I went to Epitaph's Summer Nationals there one year. Still got the shirt. Lot's of real punk rockers. That was the Hollywood palladium though. I know there are a bunch. But for some reason I thought you were talking about the one in Hollywood.


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## Saint Jimmy74 (Apr 30, 2022)

PadawanWarrior said:


> Hell ya. Most people probably don't know what you're talking about. But I went to Epitaph's Summer Nationals there one year. Still got the shirt. Lot's of real punk rockers. That was the Hollywood palladium though. I know there are a bunch. But for some reason I thought you were talking about the one in Hollywood.


Hollywood for sure. I just remember growing up hearing "live at the Palladium" a lot. Never went unfortunately.


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## JamieThePainter (May 1, 2022)

Does freewill exist? 

Only if you want it to.

Otherwise, feel free to blame your mistakes on some cosmic entity.


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## StonedGardener (May 1, 2022)

Free Willy .


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## Dreaming1 (May 2, 2022)

Now we get to decide if we have free will? Awesome. Talking in circles. I decided to have/not have free will. What does that even mean? Word salad.
We are either in control or we are not. It seems we are not. Choice choosers? Yes. Deciding on the choices available to us? No. 
So what is free will if you don't set up the initial conditions? Reaction.
We are in this life like bacteria in its guts. We are not riding this life like some cowboy. It is riding us if anything.


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## Nixs (May 3, 2022)

JamieThePainter said:


> Does freewill exist?
> 
> Only if you want it to.
> 
> Otherwise, feel free to blame your mistakes on some cosmic entity.


Let us see your freewill save someone dying, or you don't want to?


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## JamieThePainter (May 3, 2022)

Nixs said:


> Let us see your freewill save someone dying, or you don't want to?


Eh? Why wouldn't my freewill allow me to save someone from dying? I'm really not seeing your point here.


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## Dreaming1 (May 3, 2022)

JamieThePainter said:


> Eh? Why wouldn't my freewill allow me to save someone from dying? I'm really not seeing your point here.


Most of the time we are helpless with dying. If we were equipped with knowledge and tools to save someone, then would we? Or would we see if they had enough money to pay for life saving treatments? 
Most of those equipped to save a life have an ethical if not moral drive to help. Could they choose to not help? Or will they be obligated to act? 
Some feel obligated to act even though they are helpless. That is a real bummer.


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## JamieThePainter (May 3, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> Most of the time we are helpless with dying. If we were equipped with knowledge and tools to save someone, then would we? *Or would we see if they had enough money to pay for life saving treatments?*
> Most of those equipped to save a life have an ethical if not moral drive to help. Could they choose to not help? Or will they be obligated to act?
> Some feel obligated to act even though they are helpless. That is a real bummer.


I feel I must inform you that I work for the NHS in the UK and I'm also ex-Forces, so I don't believe that question holds much weight with myself.

In context with the thread though I still believe it shows that free will exists. Those who would feel obligated to help I believe would feel that obligation through their own volition. Sure, someone may help (or choose not to help) via enforced obligation, but I don't think that would negate the notion of free will for that person.


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## Dreaming1 (May 3, 2022)

Yeah, my americaness showed there. The shared costs make more sense than what we do, profit for insurance companies. But, dying is still dying whether you do it alone or in a hospital bed surrounded by attendees. No one gets out of here alive.
I still disagree with the free will part. I think the "obligation" could be an internal drive aside from choosing between choices. An internal drive that is not of personal volition. A program running.
I want to have free choice. I dont believe that we do. Not that I am not free to make choices, but that the choices are only between things and not what things I decide to have as choices. It's why I think we choose the choices we do. Not because of free will, but because of probability at least, and determinism at most.
It's one of those things that we can talk about, but can't measure. And without an absolute answer, we are trapped in a loop. Those that want to believe do and those that want to not believe dont. One of these has to be right. But no one will know unless there is some kind of reveal ending.
The whole of my "argument" is we can choose A,B,or C. Free will is being able to choose from any letter, numbers, shapes, animals, automotive parts, or colors. Not limited to simple choices, but free to set up whatever you will.


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## StonedGardener (May 3, 2022)

I think it's time for an update.........a brief, clear definition of " free will " . I sense a multitude of different interpretations .


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## PadawanWarrior (May 3, 2022)

Can't believe nobody's posted this yet.


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## Dreaming1 (May 3, 2022)

StonedGardener said:


> I think it's time for an update.........a brief, clear definition of " free will " . I sense a multitude of different interpretations .


Please, put it out there. 
I say free will is more than choosing between available choices. I say that is reacting.
Free will is being in control of which choices are available.
No one has that for themselves. Outside forces can always derail plans. And some options are not available at the time of choosing. We are bound by life and death. No choice to be here, and no choice to stay beyond our natural time. 

I would like to have other words to say, but I have looked over my script, and all I have to say is I feel this way or that way. I just hope I am delivering my lines at the right moments.


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## JamieThePainter (May 4, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> Please, put it out there.
> I say free will is more than choosing between available choices. I say that is reacting.
> Free will is being in control of which choices are available.
> No one has that for themselves. Outside forces can always derail plans. And some options are not available at the time of choosing. We are bound by life and death. No choice to be here, and no choice to stay beyond our natural time.
> ...


Free will is the ability to choose the direction of your life, regardless of laws or work obligations.

free will

_noun_
noun: *free will*; noun: *freewill*

the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate; the ability to act at one's own discretion.

If an outside force is derailing your plans, then it is acting _against _your freewill. When we talk of freewill in the philosophical sense, we're asking "is it us who choose what we do, or is it fate? Are our lives pre-determined?"


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## Dreaming1 (May 4, 2022)

JamieThePainter said:


> Free will is the ability to choose the direction of your life, regardless of laws or work obligations.
> 
> free will
> 
> ...


We could never know until after our deaths, and then only if there is an afterlife, and we are important enough to be involved in knowing about it. It all comes down to whether or not you believe you do or don't. There can be no answer reached with language. Like is there a god.
And yet we have autonomously controlled bodies. I don't choose my brain function. I don't decide to breathe. I can try, but my body acts against my free will and breathes for me. So my free will is not very good at defending itself. And in this world, that means free will is getting abused. Also, it seems to imply animals have free will, which I am intrigued by. They appear unconstrained by ideas of laws or work obligations. I can get down with we are animals and all animals possess free will. It doesn't seem to matter. 
So your definition has convinced me. I do have free will. I also have free smell,sight,hearing,taste(arguable), and possess free feeling (which I encourage!)


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## Dreaming1 (May 4, 2022)

JamieThePainter said:


> Free will is the ability to choose the direction of your life, regardless of laws or work obligations.
> 
> free will
> 
> ...


Hold up...I may have missed the point again.
We still seem to be fated to live and fated to die. Necessity of fate to have life. And then, the inability to avoid the fate of death or act at our own discretion which is usually to stay alive.
I didn't seem to choose to be, and my self doesn't want to choose to not be. I do have more say in the latter because of advancements in science. 
So maybe the only free will we have that matters is choosing to want to live in spite of bad things that happen. It is easy to enjoy the good stuff in life.


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## Nixs (May 5, 2022)

JamieThePainter said:


> Eh? Why wouldn't my freewill allow me to save someone from dying? I'm really not seeing your point here.


You might be able to save him\her sometimes, but not all the time, say you're watching someone who just died, can you bring him back alive? You want to but can not, your will is very limited.
Suppose you're sitting in a restaurant having a meal, if someone takes your food without your permission you might be able to take it back, but what if a house fly lands on your food and takes some of it, can you take it back? A fly is much weaker than a man, but you "will" never be able to take your food back from it


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## JamieThePainter (May 5, 2022)

Nixs said:


> You might be able to save him\her sometimes, but not all the time, say you're watching someone who just died, can you bring him back alive? You want to but can not, your will is very limited.
> Suppose you're sitting in a restaurant having a meal, if someone takes your food without your permission you might be able to take it back, but what if a house fly lands on your food and takes some of it, can you take it back? A fly is much weaker than a man, but you "will" never be able to take your food back from it


I think you're mistaking the concept of freewill for super powers, bud 

The idea of free will explores the act of decisions we make in our life. If we have free will, then that means we have the agency behind the decisions we make. If we don't have free will, then it means everything is directed by fate. You were designed to make that decision and you couldn't have made any other decision, because fate had already determined that you would. If Fate is real and Freewill is not, then this means the past, the present and future (Time, if you will) is all predetermined to run in an exact way. 

Fate takes away the self agency from our decisions.


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## PadawanWarrior (May 5, 2022)

I'm undecided anymore. I gotta take a piss. Now I'm thinking freewill doesn't exist.


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## JamieThePainter (May 5, 2022)

Nixs said:


> Suppose you're sitting in a restaurant having a meal, if someone takes your food without your permission you might be able to take it back, but what if a house fly lands on your food and takes some of it, can you take it back? A fly is much weaker than a man, but you "will" never be able to take your food back from it


You're asking the wrong questions though. The question you should be asking is "did the person who took your food do so because ultimately _he_ made the decision to do so, or did he do so because the cogs of the Universe/God/Fate made him do it?" If you lack the ability to stop either him or the fly well... that has nothing to do with free will. Whatever you decide your response will be is the subject of concern here. Did _you_ choose to react that way, or are you reacting that way because of Fate?


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## Spiveysrevenge (May 5, 2022)

Not if you plan on making money


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## JamieThePainter (May 5, 2022)

allstuff420mktng said:


> NO. Well, many neuroscientists investigated a specific aspect of the concept of freedom like the conscious control of the action's start. Therefore, the results appeared to show that there is no such conscious control, leading to the conclusion that free will does not exist.


Citation?


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## StonedGardener (May 5, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> Yeah, my americaness showed there. The shared costs make more sense than what we do, profit for insurance companies. But, dying is still dying whether you do it alone or in a hospital bed surrounded by attendees. No one gets out of here alive.
> I still disagree with the free will part. I think the "obligation" could be an internal drive aside from choosing between choices. An internal drive that is not of personal volition. A program running.
> I want to have free choice. I dont believe that we do. Not that I am not free to make choices, but that the choices are only between things and not what things I decide to have as choices. It's why I think we choose the choices we do. Not because of free will, but because of probability at least, and determinism at most.
> It's one of those things that we can talk about, but can't measure. And without an absolute answer, we are trapped in a loop. Those that want to believe do and those that want to not believe dont. One of these has to be right. But no one will know unless there is some kind of reveal ending.
> The whole of my "argument" is we can choose A,B,or C. Free will is being able to choose from any letter, numbers, shapes, animals, automotive parts, or colors. Not limited to simple choices, but free to set up whatever you will.


Oh ! that's what free will is. Nah, that shit ain't going down ! That's a ridiculous notion , I've wasted so many 0's and 1's


Dreaming1 said:


> Please, put it out there.
> I say free will is more than choosing between available choices. I say that is reacting.
> Free will is being in control of which choices are available.
> No one has that for themselves. Outside forces can always derail plans. And some options are not available at the time of choosing. We are bound by life and death. No choice to be here, and no choice to stay beyond our natural time.
> ...


" There's the Rub "........" I SAY free will is...".... your interpretation . I've noticed that you talk a lot about death , no choice in being here ( like you resent it) , trapped in a , loop , bound by life. You're preaching gloom and doom . You need to meet my friends , you'll forget all about that other shit.


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## Dreaming1 (May 6, 2022)

StonedGardener said:


> Oh ! that's what free will is. Nah, that shit ain't going down ! That's a ridiculous notion , I've wasted so many 0's and 1's
> 
> 
> " There's the Rub "........" I SAY free will is...".... your interpretation . I've noticed that you talk a lot about death , no choice in being here ( like you resent it) , trapped in a , loop , bound by life. You're preaching gloom and doom . You need to meet my friends , you'll forget all about that other shit.


Personal observation is all we have. The definition is the original interpretation. We just agree or disagree. Now, did we choose out viewpoint or are we a program? Why would you write in a subroutine that allows a program to query whether it is controlled or in control? Sadism.
It is all a waste of 0's and 1's. What else can we do floating around on a rock waiting to die? 
Yes. We have no choice to have been born. It happened to us. We can choose to leave life. Easier now in the future. And we have no choice but to die until we upload consciousness to a non organic form. 
Doom and gloom. It all depends on what you see and experience. I have seen a lot of life from a lot of different angles. Several friends. Some tragic. And when it is happening to them as well, it affects everyone in their sphere. Friends are temporary. You can sit and watch them die with zero choice on either side. It sucks. Free will rings so hollow in those moments.
This is one of the waste of time questions. We can obviously never know unless we get the answer revealed. And we are probably not important enough to be let in.
Hope you all have a good one. These are words. Don't get your undies bunched up. Ideas are upsetting sometimes. It really doesn't matter. You are just here to carry on until you die. Mostly pointless it appears. Good luck everyone.


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## Dreaming1 (May 6, 2022)

PadawanWarrior said:


> I'm undecided anymore. I gotta take a piss. Now I'm thinking freewill doesn't exist.


this is the only intelligent reply. I don't know. I HAVE to take a piss.


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## JamieThePainter (May 6, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> This is one of the waste of time questions. We can obviously never know unless we get the answer revealed. And we are probably not important enough to be let in.
> yone.


Philosophy is the foundation of modern science. It is the characterisation of wasking "why?" That I would need to explain the importance of philosophy in this day and age if both shocking but expected by this generation of know it alls. 

It's only pointless if you have no understanding of the question. Not a dig so much as it is a suggestion. 

Open your mind, guys. The world is more than you think but it is so very small if you don't.


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## Dreaming1 (May 6, 2022)

Cogito, ergo sum. Even Descartes has to assume something to start his argument. He can not prove he even exists. He just has to go with it that he feels he does. This is the same. (A loop?) We have to assume we have free will or we dont. Without an accurate measurement of the facts, we can't know.
Idk if the kids these days are any worse than the kids of a certain age these days. It is always the same. Probably s bell curve or something related to e.


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## StonedGardener (May 7, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> Personal observation is all we have. The definition is the original interpretation. We just agree or disagree. Now, did we choose out viewpoint or are we a program? Why would you write in a subroutine that allows a program to query whether it is controlled or in control? Sadism.
> It is all a waste of 0's and 1's. What else can we do floating around on a rock waiting to die?
> Yes. We have no choice to have been born. It happened to us. We can choose to leave life. Easier now in the future. And we have no choice but to die until we upload consciousness to a non organic form.
> Doom and gloom. It all depends on what you see and experience. I have seen a lot of life from a lot of different angles. Several friends. Some tragic. And when it is happening to them as well, it affects everyone in their sphere. Friends are temporary. You can sit and watch them die with zero choice on either side. It sucks. Free will rings so hollow in those moments.
> ...


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## Dreaming1 (May 8, 2022)

I agree with this guy above


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## StonedGardener (May 8, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> Personal observation is all we have. The definition is the original interpretation. We just agree or disagree. Now, did we choose out viewpoint or are we a program? Why would you write in a subroutine that allows a program to query whether it is controlled or in control? Sadism.
> It is all a waste of 0's and 1's. What else can we do floating around on a rock waiting to die?
> Yes. We have no choice to have been born. It happened to us. We can choose to leave life. Easier now in the future. And we have no choice but to die until we upload consciousness to a non organic form.
> Doom and gloom. It all depends on what you see and experience. I have seen a lot of life from a lot of different angles. Several friends. Some tragic. And when it is happening to them as well, it affects everyone in their sphere. Friends are temporary. You can sit and watch them die with zero choice on either side. It sucks. Free will rings so hollow in those moments.
> ...


⁸

Oh , my panties aren't bunched up , sorry if I sent the wrong signal.........thought we we're just having a lively , fun debate. Apologies. We won't kick this around anymore.


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## Dreaming1 (May 9, 2022)

StonedGardener said:


> ⁸
> 
> Oh , my panties aren't bunched up , sorry if I sent the wrong signal.........thought we we're just having a lively , fun debate. Apologies. We won't kick this around anymore.


Sorry brother, I wasn't intending that to be directed at you. I should have added more words to make that read like it was to the broader public. That's why I started the new paragraph and said you all. But I had quoted your earlier statement and the flow of it does kind of muddle my intention. 
As far as I can see, this has become a livelier debate than it has been for a long while. I hope someone finds this in the future and our names are credited with starting mind fires.
Idk that we have to kick it around anymore. Seems like those involved either agree that we are making our choices, or that we are either pawns of a god or godlike entity or are that godlike entity pretending to be us. As far as which is correct is yet to be discerned. 
I know nothing. I have never found anyone that knows anything. It seems beyond our reach. We do seem to be a bit of dust in the wind.


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## hillbill (May 9, 2022)

Even wild birds and other animals make decisions constantly, Crows come through the trees leap-frogging and watching as the group advances. Military units move just like em. 

However, Free Will can be relinquished by humans to a cult, religious or psychological or even a political cult of personality.


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## Dreaming1 (May 9, 2022)

hillbill said:


> Even wild birds and other animals make decisions constantly, Crows come through the trees leap-frogging and watching as the group advances. Military units move just like em.
> 
> However, Free Will can be relinquished by humans to a cult, religious or psychological or even a political cult of personality.


Do you think the animals are on automatic without free will? Or more of all things are on more or less equal footing? 
I am unsure as to whether "I" am really making my own path or if it is just on automatic and "I" am just experiencing the ride. I see it as making choices, but unsure if the choice between x and y is anything? And if it is easy enough to act against my free will and shut it down by domination, is it anything to brag about?
If I am free to choose or not choose, I would say is more "free will" than reacting to my situation and choosing between presented options. But, In this thread, we have gone with free will is anti-predeterminism. But, without any way to prove it. So, now we debate if it is worth arguing over. How funny would it be to find out we do not have free will, and see how much time and energy we put into the fantasy of having it. 
My favorite part is what I said earlier, if we are deterministic in thoughts and actions, why would
the maker/programmer include us being able to ask whether we were free or not? Really weird skullfuck stuff.


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## hillbill (May 9, 2022)

I quit hunting in 1988 because of a realization of consciousness, not our own. I was not an indigenous subsistence hunter although we utilized what we could the best we could. Some pretty serious sentience with Birds and Mammals. Still fish and eat more than I did when mostly Bass fishing and did a lot of “Catch And Release”. Still release a lot.


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## JamieThePainter (May 9, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> How funny would it be to find out we do not have free will, and see how much time and energy we put into the fantasy of having it.


If we don't have free will though, we were destined to put that time and energy into the fantasy of having it. 

Overall though, I think as a society we _need_ to believe that we have free will. Otherwise what would be the point in having a system of law? Person A only slaughtered and ate Person B's entire family before dressing up in a costume made from their skins because he was destined to do so, after all. How could we punish Person A for actions that weren't within his control? He was merely a spectator to his own life.


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## Dreaming1 (May 9, 2022)

hillbill said:


> I quit hunting in 1988 because of a realization of consciousness, not our own... Some pretty serious sentience with Birds and Mammals.


I never enjoyed the work behind eating meat. I eat meat though...
It is a strange world where I have to kill and eat another living being to stay alive. Why haven't we been working on making at least 1 more protein for ourselves? 



JamieThePainter said:


> "If we don't have free will though, we were destined to put that time and energy into the fantasy of having it."


Yes. I agree.


JamieThePainter said:


> Overall though, I think as a society we _need_ to believe that we have free will. Otherwise what would be the point in having a system of law? Person A only slaughtered and ate Person B's entire family before dressing up in a costume made from their skins because he was destined to do so, after all. How could we punish Person A for actions that weren't within his control? He was merely a spectator to his own life.


I have had this exact conversation sooo many times before. What if? Wild huh? That doesn't mean that this is not exactly what is happening. It is an unsettling thought. And then, In America, you add kids of low income social class to the equation. Limited brain power, limited opportunity, and unlimited bad choices. Then prosecute them. Then after jail, less opportunity. And probably unable to vote because of felonies. So they get taxed without representation in the govt. Wild. And this happens on the regular here. 
Ever seen the TV show Westworld? What if we are all that kind of thing? How would we ever find out? 
What if we are watching a play where we are predestined? Ok then. 
If we are the same, but improvised? Ok then. 
If we are free? Ok.
If I am in a loooooop living the exact same life over and over until I get it right, I guess that is fine. 
If I am living multiple different lives to get it right, or work of spirit debts, I guess that is fine too. 
I really don't have much say in the thing. Not that important.
I love me some Red Hot Chili Peppers. New song called "white braids and pillow chair" has a lyric in it that resonates with me so hard. "Im a tangled tiger and I want to rip all to shreds so I can ask it why."
Here:



John says he feels he was born to be the guitar player of this band.


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## StonedGardener (May 9, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> I agree with this guy above


Where exactly can I find the original interpretation ? How many interpretations are there ? Hard to debate


Dreaming1 said:


> Sorry brother, I wasn't intending that to be directed at you. I should have added more words to make that read like it was to the broader public. That's why I started the new paragraph and said you all. But I had quoted your earlier statement and the flow of it does kind of muddle my intention.
> As far as I can see, this has become a livelier debate than it has been for a long while. I hope someone finds this in the future and our names are credited with starting mind fires.
> Idk that we have to kick it around anymore. Seems like those involved either agree that we are making our choices, or that we are either pawns of a god or godlike entity or are that godlike entity pretending to be us. As far as which is correct is yet to be discerned.
> I know nothing. I have never found anyone that knows anything. It seems beyond our reach. We do seem to be a bit of dust in the wind.


No sweat , this is a juicy subject , evokes deep feelings , Hell , this topic has been "kicked around " forever . It's one of those things , that you put so aptly, starts "mind fires"....love it !


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## Dreaming1 (May 10, 2022)

StonedGardener said:


> Where exactly can I find the original interpretation ? How many interpretations are there ? Hard to debate.


Idk...back in time here a few pages. Im cool with j the painters definition a page or so back. 
"Free will is the ability to choose the direction of your life, regardless of laws or work obligations.

free will

_noun_
noun: *free will*; noun: *freewill*

the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate; the ability to act at one's own discretion.
If an outside force is derailing your plans, then it is acting _against _your freewill. When we talk of freewill in the philosophical sense, we're asking "is it us who choose what we do, or is it fate? Are our lives pre-determined?""

Idk what to do with quotes inside a quote at the end. That looks weird. 
So, the 1st part is his set up. Idk that it fits with the def he left, but is more into the area I want to look at. Being able to choose the direction of your life. Being in control of the choices available, not just free to choose between options presented/available. I have had a flagrant disrespect for laws and the notion of authority my entire life. Not all of the laws, but the ones I felt like. A lot of lives are confined by economic/social class and work obligations severely limit personal freedoms. And trying to "come up" involves bending or breaking laws to get there.
The 2nd part is Webster's maybe. And boils it down to is it fate/predeterminism or actual volition. But, we have to assume "will" exists free or not. Like the soul. We look inside and it isn't there. The electrochemical machine inside seems to enable or create it and is necessary for it to happen. It projects it from elsewhere onto this place. There was a guy earlier going into that. Where scientist look inside cells and neurons and shit looking for where does decision making start. They Cant find it. It seems to come from outside. Projected onto this experience. 
Thes last part is him explaining the frail,fragile existence of free will, and then wrapping it up succinctly for philosophy speak as predeterminism vs personal volition.
I understand everyone wants to be in control of their existence. Idk that we are. And yes, it evokes strong emotions. My arguments diminish us. And that sucks. I don't fluff our egos and say we are the apex of creation and everything is about us. I say I am nothing. I am no one. I may not even exist. Except as an idea. A character in a play. I know nothing.


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## StonedGardener (May 13, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> Idk...back in time here a few pages. Im cool with j the painters definition a page or so back.
> "Free will is the ability to choose the direction of your life, regardless of laws or work obligations.
> 
> free will
> ...


Who the Hell knows what's going ...I'm thinking since we are unable to "will" things , there can be no free will ......to will something much different than making choices.


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## Dreaming1 (May 13, 2022)

StonedGardener said:


> Who the Hell knows what's going ...I'm thinking since we are unable to "will" things , there can be no free will ......to will something much different than making choices.


And you thought we disagreed. 
I want to be in control. And I think the idea of free will is one of our ways to tack up some walls in the mind to help us feel safe. 
But, if it isn't the Truth with a capitol T, then it is our beLIEf and we have a cult.
The good news is that no one knows. How could we? Mysteries. 
Im floating in space on a rock. What do you want from me?


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## JamieThePainter (May 14, 2022)

I think it's too easy to say we don't have free will, but it's a little sad too. In renouncing free will we don't just pass off all our responsibilities we also pass off all our success and experience. It wasn't us who achieved those things - it was all just part of a script? It writes off the beauty of humanity to me and the beauty of experiencing life. Even if there was a cloud sky daddy hiding up there I'd much prefer to think the experiment of setting a few variables and then watching what life would do with it would be much more rewarding to him than all this just being this great movie he's been writing. Life's much more interesting to me if I view it as a player than as an actor anyway, so who cares what those twisted Gods think?

I'll make my own fate, thanks.


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## Dreaming1 (May 14, 2022)

JamieThePainter said:


> I think it's too easy to say we don't have free will, but it's a little sad too. In renouncing free will we don't just pass off all our responsibilities we also pass off all our success and experience. It wasn't us who achieved those things - it was all just part of a script? It writes of the beauty of humanity to me and the beauty of experiencing life. Even if there was a cloud sky daddy hiding up there I'd much prefer to think the experiment of setting a few variables and then watching what life would do with it would be much more rewarding to him than all this just being this great movie he's been writing. Life's much more interesting to me if I view it as a player than as an actor anyway, so who cares what those twisted Gods think?
> 
> I'll make my own fate, thanks.


It is easy to say we do and it is easy to say we don't. All words are pretty much air over vocal chords or stains on planes.
It only reduces "us" if there is an "us." If there is no "us" it doesn't matter what we think. If we do exist as entities with free will, then what we do to one another, or watch complacently, is worse than if we are just playing out some movie. It writes the horrors of our inhumanity and we could have written anything. 
I get that everyone feels like their life is important. It is to them. But there have been a lot of people before us. Who were they? We don't know. Most of them didn't matter much except to family and friends. Our names will likely be forgotten to the people in the future. Our lives will not matter to them. 
As far as fates go, Maybe I will get what you made next time I'm here.


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## JamieThePainter (May 14, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> As far as fates go, Maybe I will get what you made next time I'm here.


Maybe, but if fates are written for us to enact then there is no you to receive what I made, nor was there an I to make it. We're just actors acting out a play that we can't changfe a thing on. If there is no free will then we are mannequins who wander at a lost... but even then, only because we were told to.


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## Don't Bogart (May 14, 2022)

If you didn't have freewill you wouldn't be able to post here. Or your being told what to type.
But freewill is conditional. Many times being battered around by someone else's freewill.
I'm special though.
I have complete freewill. Which means I freely park right up front. I use the handicap spaces. I tear up tickets left under my wiper. I don't appear in court for the summons. I leave the state. Vacation in Mexico. I'm now heading for Patagonia. I think I'll swim to Antarctica.
Why?? Because I have freewill.


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## Dreaming1 (May 15, 2022)

There is or there is not. I hear you free willers. I hear the free willless. My claim is We do not have free will. An easy exit here is that I Can't prove a negative. I Cant prove we don't have free will. That doesn't prove we have it though either. 
I can see that most lives are defined by timeline, geography,and socioeconomic class. I can see in my personal life a lot of synchronicities and some serendipity. The events that shaped me are more magnetic than intellectual. People I have known that were in the right place at the right time have helped me be where I am more than any choices I ever made. Without this supporting cast, I could never have had the choices that were availed to me at key moments. I merely reacted in predictable ways to choices presented. But, my life shaped my personality and that is what made the choices predictable for me at the times I made a choice. An earlier timeline version of me could not have chosen the choices I made. It was ethically taboo. I would have been too scared. I could not have chosen what I was able to as a later mind. So as don't Bogart states it seems to be conditional if it exists. Maybe it is relative. 
A quantum-schröedingers free will. You have it as a wave, but not as a particle. Or perhaps, you have it until you try to measure it. 
And I would like to say that a lot of the supporting cast of my life have been women. Take some time and thank the supporting cast in your own lives. Free or not, appreciate those who love you.


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## Dreaming1 (May 15, 2022)

Don't Bogart said:


> If you didn't have freewill you wouldn't be able to post here. Or your being told what to type.
> But freewill is conditional. Many times being battered around by someone else's freewill.
> I'm special though.
> I have complete freewill. Which means I freely park right up front. I use the handicap spaces. I tear up tickets left under my wiper. I don't appear in court for the summons. I leave the state. Vacation in Mexico. I'm now heading for Patagonia. I think I'll swim to Antarctica.
> Why?? Because I have freewill.


If free will is subjected to submission by another's dominant free will, why would anyone be out bragging about having it? Seems like it would just be a tease. Trying to get abused. Like "oh no, Im out here with my tight free will exposed and vulnerable...I hope no one takes advantage..."
Who's free will is the strongest? Are they alive today, long dead, or yet to be? If we choose to poison all of the water today, all of it, with no way to remove the poison, and everyone else from now on have no way to get clean water, have we reduced their free will to live healthy lives? Where is their free will? I stopped it. They have no choice but to slowly die or quickly die. Great news, they get to choose. 
All of the travel to amazing places! Sounds like you live a dream.


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## Don't Bogart (May 15, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> My claim is We do not have free will.


So you were forced to post this.


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## Don't Bogart (May 15, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> If free will is subjected to submission by another's dominant free will, why would anyone be out bragging about having it? Seems like it would just be a tease. Trying to get abused. Like "oh no, Im out here with my tight free will exposed and vulnerable...I hope no one takes advantage..."
> Who's free will is the strongest? Are they alive today, long dead, or yet to be? If we choose to poison all of the water today, all of it, with no way to remove the poison, and everyone else from now on have no way to get clean water, have we reduced their free will to live healthy lives? Where is their free will? I stopped it. They have no choice but to slowly die or quickly die. Great news, they get to choose.
> All of the travel to amazing places! Sounds like you live a dream.


Oh boy. No fun at parties me thinks, (with freewill).
I tried to get a free will, but my lawyer said I had to pay.


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## Dreaming1 (May 15, 2022)

Don't Bogart said:


> So you were forced to post this.


I may have been. No telling. If the program says to interact, I would interact. If the program says choose to interact with certain topics and not others, I would comply within those constraints. And I would never question my actions. If the program was to feel feelings about something, I would surely feel something about it when that thing came along.
It doesn't have to be a god. It could be life itself. Biology controlling us. Using us to further its own goals. Like sex being so good you want to do it and procreation sometimes follows. Then you make several things in the environment trigger brains to feel good and want sex more... And the code of the program? Our DNA. Deeply imbedded programing. Firmware.
These ideas discussed here are the only available options. You merely get to choose from amongst them. You could choose correctly. Place your bet and good luck. We are all in this same boat. It is the only boat.
As far as fun at parties... Ya got me. Sometimes not, brother. Depends on the party. A bunch of douchebags? I will tell all to piss off. Another party with people I enjoy, and I could be everyone's favorite guy. Your personal attacks fall short of their intent. I don't care if you like me or not. You and I are blinks in eternity. Inconsequential and pointless. I can trace my family back across the ocean into the fog of time until the 1400's. Who they liked or disliked? Idk. Not on the tombstones. It doesn't matter to anyone now. Mmmm Mmmm Mmmmm Dang Ol' dust in the wind, man...


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## Dreaming1 (May 15, 2022)

Don't Bogart said:


> Oh boy. No fun at parties me thinks, (with freewill).
> I tried to get a free will, but my lawyer said I had to pay.


Idk that we have free will, but I bet you are starting to see that I may have free won't.


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## Bagginski (May 15, 2022)

“Who asks this question?”


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## Bagginski (May 16, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> this is the only intelligent reply. I don't know. I HAVE to take a piss.


Reality speaks: we have to piss…but it’s free will that takes into the bathroom (or to the nearest tree) instead of pissing ourselves while watching TV in the den.

Awareness of self and others - the ability to register and decode reality in real-time - presents us with choices as circumstances and conditions change. This is what gives us free will: we can react impulsively/compulsively, we can respond spontaneously, we can choose a response. We can choose an action, we can choose not to act.

Or, we can just sit there and piss ourselves.


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## Bagginski (May 16, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> A quantum-schröedingers free will. You have it as a wave, but not as a particle. Or perhaps, you have it until you try to measure it.
> And I would like to say that a lot of the supporting cast of my life have been women. Take some time and thank the supporting cast in your own lives. Free or not, appreciate those who love you.


I like this: yes, a wave of infinite potential freedom of action, crystallized into a form determined by conditions & circumstances…where it *feels* less free because of the restraints imposed by the crystallized form; and having precipitated from he needs of the moment, the measurement reads “I felt like I had no choice but to….”

Supporting casts…if there are people in your life who truly trust you, spend some of your free will on *keeping* their trust…and if there are people in your life YOU truly trust, devote some free will to making sure you play fair with them.


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## Bagginski (May 16, 2022)

StonedGardener said:


> Who the Hell knows what's going ...I'm thinking since we are unable to "will" things , there can be no free will ......to will something much different than making choices.


Have you applied your will toward learning HOW to apply your will?
(no, it’s NOT a trick question)

Do you consider the choices you make worth making? Is constraint the only reason you make them?


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## Dreaming1 (May 16, 2022)

Bagginski said:


> “Who asks this question?”


Probably the best question. Gets directly into the juicy center of it all.



Bagginski said:


> Reality speaks: we have to piss…but it’s free will that takes into the bathroom (or to the nearest tree) instead of pissing ourselves while watching TV in the den.
> 
> Awareness of self and others - the ability to register and decode reality in real-time - presents us with choices as circumstances and conditions change. This is what gives us free will: we can react impulsively/compulsively, we can respond spontaneously, we can choose a response. We can choose an action, we can choose not to act.
> 
> Or, we can just sit there and piss ourselves.


These are real good points. The choosing not to act is the part that leads me towards free will having. The ignoring the options presented to choose from and saying "no thank you." Not playing the part. Unless, that is your particular personality traits. Which seems to be my role.


Bagginski said:


> I like this: yes, a wave of infinite potential freedom of action, crystallized into a form determined by conditions & circumstances…where it *feels* less free because of the restraints imposed by the crystallized form; and having precipitated from he needs of the moment, the measurement reads “I felt like I had no choice but to….”
> 
> Supporting casts…if there are people in your life who truly trust you, spend some of your free will on *keeping* their trust…and if there are people in your life YOU truly trust, devote some free will to making sure you play fair with them.


I thought it was my best work as of late. At least it brings the argument into the present mode of science thought. The collapsing wave potentials into a particle of actuality. 
I have only very close friends. I cultivate love and respect inside that garden. Our relationships with the people we want in our lives is the most important aspect of our making choices. 



Bagginski said:


> Have you applied your will toward learning HOW to apply your will?
> (no, it’s NOT a trick question)
> 
> Do you consider the choices you make worth making? Is constraint the only reason you make them?


Not to me, but really applies to us all. Maybe? I have explored different mind/body connecting things. Physical stuff, meditation, psychedelics, depravity of mind and body too. 
I do feel they are worth making for some. But, the majority seem inconsequential. Now, my choices that seem to not affect me may have drastic effects elsewhere on someone else's life. Like, I pour out chemical waste in a stream and it kills animals in the water, some town drinks it and develops cancers or shit that mess up people and their families. So, I am aware that I am not aware of the entire connectedness. And that my decisions effect others. 
Idk if constraints are the only reason we make decisions. Could be. That's one of the things I wonder.
Thank you. These are solid points. You are not a person going through the internet asshole first.


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## Dreaming1 (May 16, 2022)

Bagginski said:


> I like this: yes, a wave of infinite potential freedom of action, crystallized into a form determined by conditions & circumstances…where it *feels* less free because of the restraints imposed by the crystallized form; and having precipitated from he needs of the moment, the measurement reads “I felt like I had no choice but to….”
> .


Smoked some serious herb, drank some tea,and thought about this more. It could still be only our perception of available possibilities. This could all still be driven by an outside force to an inevitable conclusion with the other possible options never actually having any chance of occurring. 
If I am driven by biology and not mind, then it would make sense that I would be compelled to act in certain ways, but my mind would think I act in accordance or not with my cultural indoctrination. And the cultural devices would be there to reinforce the natural flow of doing what the driving force wanted.


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## Bagginski (May 16, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> Probably the best question. Gets directly into the juicy center of it all.


High praise…thank you!




Dreaming1 said:


> “Bagginski” said:
> 
> 
> > Have you applied your will toward learning HOW to apply your will?
> ...


Those questions were in response to another poster, specifically, but I appreciate you considering them.

The point about constraints has to do with the fact that there are *ALWAYS* conditions and considerations that present choices from a finite set, not from the godlike power of infinite *ability*.

Consider a flood: one could do anything in response, but there are limits imposed by reality. One can choose to do nothing and drown; choose to hang on for dear life…and drown (or not drown); choose to climb out of danger and watch others die; choose to save who you can, with death and survival hanging on subsequent choices; choose to try and make to town & see if Waffle House is open; choose to die, screaming how unfair it is.

Free will - in theory and practice - is indelibly bound to available choices (as we can’t (mostly) change conditions & circumstance by simply wanting to change them). Therefore, choice is ALWAYS circumscribed by reality, and it can feel to us humans as if we have no (meaningful) choice when faced w/ exigent/emergent situations: implying that we are not free, or that we want choices/actions that simply are not functionally available to us under the circumstances.

Consequently, the sense of constraint may make us feel forced against our will…and yet, will drives *action* - which is what couples it to *choice*, so…”free will” is in essence simply the freedom to choose what action(s) to take, if any. “Submit or die” is like the worst possible case…yet the choice is plain, and definite…no matter how undesirable, compared to the infinite wave of potential possibilities.

This is all the result of my own 50 years of struggle and contemplation (and parenting) - not from a book or a teacher…yet it seems to hold up durably.

Thanks so much for letting me chime in on your thread!.


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## StonedGardener (May 16, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> There is or there is not. I hear you free willers. I hear the free willless. My claim is We do not have free will. An easy exit here is that I Can't prove a negative. I Cant prove we don't have free will. That doesn't prove we have it though either.
> I can see that most lives are defined by timeline, geography,and socioeconomic class. I can see in my personal life a lot of synchronicities and some serendipity. The events that shaped me are more magnetic than intellectual. People I have known that were in the right place at the right time have helped me be where I am more than any choices I ever made. Without this supporting cast, I could never have had the choices that were availed to me at key moments. I merely reacted in predictable ways to choices presented. But, my life shaped my personality and that is what made the choices predictable for me at the times I made a choice. An earlier timeline version of me could not have chosen the choices I made. It was ethically taboo. I would have been too scared. I could not have chosen what I was able to as a later mind. So as don't Bogart states it seems to be conditional if it exists. Maybe it is relative.
> A quantum-schröedingers free will. You have it as a wave, but not as a particle. Or perhaps, you have it until you try to measure it.
> And I would like to say that a lot of the supporting cast of my life have been women. Take some time and thank the supporting cast in your own lives. Free or not, appreciate those who love you.


" A quantum-Schrodinger's free will " ? That's a new one .............Schrodinger's Equation ......okay.....it " will " make predictions on quantum mechanical systems.
Ya lost me in this morass. Also, I always thought everything is relative. You carry on, you have a real passion for this topic ( must be you're hard-wired for this ). Great volleying with a deep-roller like you but the semantics on this forum give me a migraine.


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## Rob Roy (May 17, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> Now we get to decide if we have free will? Awesome. Talking in circles. I decided to have/not have free will. What does that even mean? Word salad.
> We are either in control or we are not. It seems we are not. Choice choosers? Yes. Deciding on the choices available to us? No.
> So what is free will if you don't set up the initial conditions? Reaction.
> We are in this life like bacteria in its guts. We are not riding this life like some cowboy. It is riding us if anything.


Agreed, we are in control of many of our choices, but not always in control of the outcomes. 

I made the free will choice not to be a cowboy. Not into the cowboy hat and boots thing.


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## hillbill (May 17, 2022)

Me in a cowboy hat is so fucking funny, I’d do better with one of those stove pipe things. I do better in my grandfather’s black wool derby.


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## hillbill (May 17, 2022)

Starched and pressed jeans were the real deal killer.


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## Dreaming1 (May 17, 2022)

Bagginski said:


> High praise…thank you!
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Im in it to find Truth. It could be beyond my comprehension. 
I do agree with what you say, and appreciate the verbosity of it. It helps solidify the idea you're sharing. But, I still see room for the other side even all the way to predestination. I am lazy. But, in times of crisis or need, I am driven to act. Even against my own self preservation. So, I see the constraints of reality making us feel without free will. I am just not able to see how it isn't pre set up through the initial conditions of the choices available. And if the initial conditions are set up at random, it makes the choices seem arbitrary.
Free will as the freedom to choose between available actions is how I would like to define it. Idk how any of us can say for certain what is going on. I would be surprised by the big reveal ending no matter what the "Reality" outcome was.
I do not know.
I also like to say "where there is a will, there is a way." I understand that if one is willing to do unconventional actions, they can accomplish extraordinary acts. If there is a system, there is a way to hack it. So, I proceed through life as if I have free will. But, I can still see that I may just be a program from that vantage point. I just look at ideas and consider them.
We are all individuals doing our own thing and living separate lives. But, back up a little and we disappear into careers, clubs, classes, races, genders. Back up even more and we are all just humans doing the human thing. Like bacteria. They seem to move along and do what they want too. 
Thank you for chiming in. Thanks to the OP. The more, the merrier. We are all here until we are not.


StonedGardener said:


> " A quantum-Schrodinger's free will " ? That's a new one .............Schrodinger's Equation ......okay.....it " will " make predictions on quantum mechanical systems.
> Ya lost me in this morass. Also, I always thought everything is relative. You carry on, you have a real passion for this topic ( must be you're hard-wired for this ). Great volleying with a deep-roller like you but the semantics on this forum give me a migraine.


Im spitballing with that. Thanks for being! I do enjoy the mysteries of living. Language is a poor tool for communicating. But, we haven't improved on it. The words meanings changing through vernacular over time isn't helping. And technical definitions not always being a literal interpretation of the meaning is confusing too. 
Even after we are done with it, some others will have our conversation again. Maybe then there will be some new points to make, or some possible measurement to take, or a new understanding of our existence.
I know nothing.


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## Dreaming1 (May 17, 2022)

Rob Roy said:


> Agreed, we are in control of many of our choices, but not always in control of the outcomes.
> 
> I made the free will choice not to be a cowboy. Not into the cowboy hat and boots thing.


I look like whatever costume I apply. Birthday suit to business suit. I live the character. I am that and I project that. The personal identity is mostly a mask of a social nature.


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## StonedGardener (May 17, 2022)

Rob Roy said:


> Agreed, we are in control of many of our choices, but not always in control of the outcomes.
> 
> I made the free will choice not to be a cowboy. Not into the cowboy hat and boots thing.


You made the " free will choice ", sounds like we have options .What other types of choices are there besides this one ? I just made the " regular" choice not to be a cowboy( that cow-punching isn't for me). I'm just ignorant , " thick as a brick " sometimes. 
What you said..." but not always in control of the outcomes " is what always excited me when I " went out on the town"......walk out the front door with cash In the wallet just wondering what the f will happen that night......no regiment.....the crazier ( in a good way) the better............get home 3 in the afternoon........wake up laying on section of handicap chairs and missing fliight.......hooked up unknowingly with a real siren , girlfriend of biggest drug dealer in area......thrown in jail for a night ........laugh ,and talk with people/person till sunrise..... and on and on. Great memories, great antidotes. Why is it the f'd-up situations we experience ( and come out unscathed) are the funniest ? Earthing humor I think. I'm toasted...I'm gonna shut up. Must be I'm hard wired to raise Hell


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## PadawanWarrior (May 17, 2022)

There is no Freewill. I'm gonna go smoke a bowl. It was meant to be,


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## Don't Bogart (May 31, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> I may have been. No telling. If the program says to interact, I would interact. If the program says choose to interact with certain topics and not others, I would comply within those constraints. And I would never question my actions. If the program was to feel feelings about something, I would surely feel something about it when that thing came along.


This program says send me your check book.


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## DrBuzzFarmer (May 31, 2022)

Free will is an illusion, unless one learns to piece the veil between Consciousness and Supraconsciousness.
Consciousness exists on the other side of the subject/object split, choosing your reality from the Field of Possibility.
The Hindus had it right.


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## StonedGardener (May 31, 2022)

Don't Bogart said:


> This program says send me your check book.


Am I in Crazytown.........took a wrong turn, didn't I. However , my program directed me here. I'm forwarding my check book , overnight mail .


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## Nixs (May 31, 2022)

DrBuzzFarmer said:


> The Hindus had it right.


They worship cows


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## Dreaming1 (Jun 1, 2022)

"The problem with you, is the problem with me. Got two good eyes, and still don't see." Robert Hunter

You can't get there from here.


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## hillbill (Jun 1, 2022)

Hindu, Muslim, Christian. Fundamentalists are a danger to civil society, especially in th US.


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## Don't Bogart (Jun 3, 2022)

StonedGardener said:


> I'm forwarding my check book , overnight mail .


Wow the background of your checks....Is that New Mexico??


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## Don't Bogart (Jun 3, 2022)

Nixs said:


> They worship cows


Every religion hits a snag.


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## Don't Bogart (Jun 3, 2022)

hillbill said:


> Hindu, Muslim, Christian. Fundamentalists are a danger to civil society, especially in th US.


But the rest are O.K. right?


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## Don't Bogart (Jun 3, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> You can't get there from here.


Bert and I.


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## StonedGardener (Jun 3, 2022)

Don't Bogart said:


> Wow the background of your checks....Is that New Mexico??


Close...New York , wine country . That's grapevines growing in the background , the 
" Bully Hill " vineyard .


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## Nixs (Jun 7, 2022)

hillbill said:


> Hindu, Muslim, Christian. Fundamentalists are a danger to civil society, especially in th US.


How about Jews? Read the Talmud.


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## Don't Bogart (Jun 7, 2022)

Nixs said:


> How about Jews? Read the Talmud


Talmud is a commentary.


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## hillbill (Jun 7, 2022)

I chose to check this thread
Done


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## hillbill (Jun 7, 2022)

Choosing to check other threads


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## raggyb (Jun 7, 2022)

I can't get the song out of my head, Geddy Alex and Neil

You can choose a ready guide
In some celestial voice
If you choose not to decide
You still have made a choice
You can choose from phantom fears
And kindness that can kill
I will choose a path that’s clear
I will choose free will.

https://www.rush.com/songs/freewill/


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## GroBud (Jun 7, 2022)

You have free will to do anything the legalities of free will should be in question. Government removes free will and imposes man's law from murder to seat belts to weeds in yard. On the other hand they'll let you kill yourself if it'll be profitable. ( adding chemicals to tobacco, prescription pills etc.)


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## hillbill (Jun 8, 2022)

Tobacco is the killer
All natural even.


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## GroBud (Jun 8, 2022)

hillbill said:


> Tobacco is the killer
> All natural even.


Appreciate that, that's always what I love about these forms. Other people's 2 cents that dont add to the conversation but add to the argumentative conversation. Nice to pick through what people say to pick out a excerpt to correct without adding something to it. My point was we are allowed to do them even tho it kills us, but are restricted form doing other things that dont. Things that cant be tax or attached to a medical bill etc. I said all that you could just respond with tobacco is the killer. Lol what's crazy is you assume all 600 chemicals are found in a plant those 600 chemicals turn into over 7000 when smoked. All that comes from a natural plant youd believe anything.

Acetanisole, Acetic Acid, Acetoin, Acetophenone, 6-Acetoxydihydrotheaspirane, 2-Acetyl-3- Ethylpyrazine, 2-Acetyl-5-Methylfuran, Acetylpyrazine, 2-Acetylpyridine, 3-Acetylpyridine, 2-Acetylthiazole, Aconitic Acid, dl-Alanine, Alfalfa Extract, Allspice Extract,Oleoresin, and Oil, Allyl Hexanoate, Allyl Ionone, Almond Bitter Oil, Ambergris Tincture, Ammonia, Ammonium Bicarbonate, Ammonium Hydroxide, Ammonium Phosphate Dibasic, Ammonium Sulfide, Amyl Alcohol, Amyl Butyrate, Amyl Formate, Amyl Octanoate, alpha-Amylcinnamaldehyde, Amyris Oil, trans-Anethole, Angelica Root Extract, Oil and Seed Oil, Anise, Anise Star, Extract and Oils, Anisyl Acetate, Anisyl Alcohol, Anisyl Formate, Anisyl Phenylacetate, Apple Juice Concentrate, Extract, and Skins, Apricot Extract and Juice Concentrate, 1-Arginine, Asafetida Fluid Extract And Oil, Ascorbic Acid, 1-Asparagine Monohydrate, 1-Aspartic Acid.

Balsam Peru and Oil, Basil Oil, Bay Leaf, Oil and Sweet Oil, Beeswax White, Beet Juice Concentrate, Benzaldehyde, Benzaldehyde Glyceryl Acetal, Benzoic Acid, Benzoin, Benzoin Resin, Benzophenone, Benzyl Alcohol, Benzyl Benzoate, Benzyl Butyrate, Benzyl Cinnamate, Benzyl Propionate, Benzyl Salicylate, Bergamot Oil, Bisabolene, Black Currant Buds Absolute, Borneol, Bornyl Acetate, Buchu Leaf Oil, 1,3-Butanediol, 2,3-Butanedione, 1-Butanol, 2-Butanone, 4(2-Butenylidene)-3,5,5-Trimethyl-2-Cyclohexen-1-One, Butter, Butter Esters, and Butter Oil, Butyl Acetate, Butyl Butyrate, Butyl Butyryl Lactate, Butyl Isovalerate, Butyl Phenylacetate, Butyl Undecylenate, 3-Butylidenephthalide, Butyric Acid.

Cadinene, Caffeine, Calcium Carbonate, Camphene, Cananga Oil, Capsicum Oleoresin, Caramel Color, Caraway Oil, Carbon Dioxide, Cardamom Oleoresin, Extract, Seed Oil, and Powder, Carob Bean and Extract, beta-Carotene, Carrot Oil, Carvacrol, 4-Carvomenthenol, 1-Carvone, beta-Caryophyllene, beta-Caryophyllene Oxide, Cascarilla Oil and Bark Extract, Cassia Bark Oil, Cassie Absolute and Oil, Castoreum Extract, Tincture and Absolute, Cedar Leaf Oil, Cedarwood Oil Terpenes and Virginiana, Cedrol, Celery Seed Extract, Solid, Oil, And Oleoresin, Cellulose Fiber, Chamomile Flower Oil And Extract, Chicory Extract, Chocolate, Cinnamaldehyde, Cinnamic Acid, Cinnamon leaf Oil, Bark Oil, and Extract, Cinnamyl Acetate, Cinnamyl Alcohol, Cinnamyl Cinnamate, Cinnamyl Isovalerate, Cinnamyl Propionate, Citral, Citric Acid, Citronella Oil, dl-Citronellol, Citronellyl Butyrate, Citronellyl Isobutyrate, Civet Absolute, Clary Oil, Clover Tops, Red Solid Extract, Cocoa, Cocoa Shells, Extract, Distillate And Powder, Coconut Oil, Coffee, Cognac White and Green Oil, Copaiba Oil, Coriander Extract and Oil, Corn Oil, Corn Silk, Costus Root Oil, Cubeb Oil, Cuminaldehyde, para-Cymene, 1-Cysteine. 

All natural you say, brilliant observation


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## Dreaming1 (Jun 10, 2022)

Free will is cheap talk. Hot air over vocal chords. We are following our program without exception. You are free to choose from available options. The options are determined by life. It guides us. It makes you think you want to do the things it has you do. Makes its job easier. If you choose to go against the plans life lays, then you will get to do what it wants you to do, but the hard way. You're choice. Might as well do what you think you want to do. It will make things go smoother.


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## Don't Bogart (Jun 11, 2022)

Free Will....? What ever happened to that Orca anyway??


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## Dreaming1 (Jun 11, 2022)

Don't Bogart said:


> Free Will....? What ever happened to that Orca anyway??


He got pneumonia and died.


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## StonedGardener (Jun 12, 2022)

Dreaming1 said:


> Free will is cheap talk. Hot air over vocal chords. We are following our program without exception. You are free to choose from available options. The options are determined by life. It guides us. It makes you think you want to do the things it has you do. Makes its job easier. If you choose to go against the plans life lays, then you will get to do what it wants you to do, but the hard way. You're choice. Might as well do what you think you want to do. It will make things go smoother.


What a f'ing bummer , we all are manipulated by a program......well I did enjoy the " Matrix ".


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## Dreaming1 (Jun 14, 2022)

StonedGardener said:


> What a f'ing bummer , we all are manipulated by a program......well I did enjoy the " Matrix ".


Maybe not a bummer. Depends on mental perspective and physical position. Could be a grand time.
I really liked several parts of the first movie. I just got around to watching M IV last night. It was the same. Good stuff. Cycles, programs, social commentary, free will... I really enjoyed the dialogue where the concept of having a choice was an illusion. I don't watch movies much. I had to watch this one though.


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## StonedGardener (Jun 14, 2022)

Mental perspective vs what other perspective ? How are " physical position " and programming interdependent ? I need some schooling on this subject !


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## Dreaming1 (Jun 14, 2022)

StonedGardener said:


> Mental perspective vs what other perspective ? How are " physical position " and programming interdependent ? I need some schooling on this subject !


Mental perspective as two people doing the same job and one loving it while the other finds it unsatisfying. Physical position being the exact set of circumstances one finds themselves to be in. Like socioeconomic status. 
Set and setting. 
The good news is that there is free will. The bad news is it's not always our own will.


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## hillbill (Jun 15, 2022)

Yes, free will can be predicted and understood to some level which leaves free will vulnerable to attacks and manipulation. I am now choosing to check another thread.


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## eye exaggerate (Jun 20, 2022)

It’s not whether it exists or not, it’s how you approach it. We didn’t, or do not remember having a say in being here, and we don’t have a say in the hereafter. All that there is left is to consider that here in 3D there are laws that all must follow - you can’t choose to skirt gravity, for instance, without mechanical advantage that works within the laws. What is left, then, is the conditioning of our consciousness. Go ahead and run headlong into a wall, that’s up to you, but, do that enough and your consciousness will suffer as a result. That’s cause and effect, a law.


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## Don't Bogart (Jun 25, 2022)

What would be the definitive test?
Knowing I have/have not free will by whether I do/do not defend/not defend free will.
And does/does not it involve chocolate.


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## Thodoph (Jun 26, 2022)

The act of questioning free will proves that you have free will or not.


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## Don't Bogart (Jun 30, 2022)

Thodoph said:


> The act of questioning free will proves that you have free will or not.


Q.E.D.


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## eye exaggerate (Jul 23, 2022)

You can be unconscious and still alive - but with zero conscious will. The more conscious the more will you have, seems simple enough.


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## RetiredToker76 (Aug 2, 2022)

Yes, no, maybe.


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## Chief_Broom (Aug 3, 2022)

Free will is a mental construct. We are all bound by our humanity to do what people do. Go back an look at anyone’s life and you will see that every decision they made was exactly what a human would do in such circumstances.


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## Dreaming1 (Aug 3, 2022)

We want to feel free so we convince ourselves that we could choose anything. But, we only choose the thing we do. There is no proof that we could have chosen otherwise, only the idea that nothing seemed to be stopping us from choosing from the other options. But again, we only make one choice. The other options might as well have been illusionary. Maybe they are...


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## hillbill (Aug 4, 2022)

Free Will can be rendered helpless by indoctrination into a religious or social, political or psychological cult. It can be surrendered and if it can be surrendered, it obviously exists.


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## Dreaming1 (Aug 4, 2022)

It might be obvious from your perspective, but I can't see it from over here. I agree that people can be led around. I just think that that's probably what was going to happen with those people. The more I look at it, the more determinism I seem to find.
We have been talking about free will for the last several thousand years. There are only about 3 opinions to have on the subject. Each is valid in the minds of the beholder. The ultimate Truth is yet to be determined. 
A dollar also exists. But, it is a token. A more concrete place holder for the idea of money. A game we all play in our minds that affects our physical world. Magick. 
I see my life has been magnetically attracted to where/when I am now. There were options, but they were never real contenders for what I would pick. I merely did what was typical for my "type of person." Another type of person could not have lived my life. They would not have been able to choose as I did. And that is good. I have this covered. Anyone needing this can find me. We need the other people to do more of the other stuff that I can't do. All turning the wheel. Think anything, do anything you want. We only have so much time.


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## cannabineer (Aug 9, 2022)

Chief_Broom said:


> Free will is a mental construct. We are all bound by our humanity to do what people do. Go back an look at anyone’s life and you will see that every decision they made was exactly what a human would do in such circumstances.


I do not begin to have enough objective data to test the premise!


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## Dreaming1 (Aug 28, 2022)

I have a buddy that likes to argue with me. He thinks the answer to freewill is yes. He likes to point to Descartes as his argument. I can't wait until next time so I can point to Spinoza. Like philosopher Pokémon battles.


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