Barry Smith - Do We Really Have Free Will?

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Personal agency is a state, the capacity of individuals to affect things. Free will is a mental faculty of various strengths. What’s the relationship between free will and personal agency? It would seem that strong personal agency depends on a robust kind of free will, which makes an analysis of how they articulate especially important.
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Barry C. Smith is a British philosopher and director of the Institute of Philosophy at the School of Advanced Study at University of London. He also co-directs the Centre for the Study of the Senses.
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Closer To Truth, hosted by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and directed by Peter Getzels, presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.

[@catherinemoore9534]

Agency kicks in when we're dealing with values rather than day-to-day actions.

[@simonhibbs887]

Isn't saying that someone took an action as a result of their values, which are presumably a stable fact about them, also a deterministic account?

[@michaelmckinney7240]

@@simonhibbs887 No it isn't, because the process of an individual having values or ethical standards is purely volitional, not deterministic. Free will and determinism are antithetical and irreconcilable.

[@dr_shrinker]

@@michaelmckinney7240 Could you change the events that shaped your values? I think not. In what universe could you “just” decide to become Hannibal Lecter due to your own volition?

[@michaelmckinney7240]

@@dr_shrinker Events may be unchangeable but how we interpret those events lies completely within our free will. We're influenced by our experiences but not determined by them. Two people with the same upbringing can hold very different values and belief systems. To your second point; there is no universe where I can "become" Hannibal Lecter because I will always, and can only be a separate entity, but if I want to be like Hannibal Lecter, and copy as far as possible the way this fictional character lived and behaved, I am free to do so, and I can do it in this universe. All of us are free (within normal restraints) to become the person we want to be. It doesn't happen overnight but the choice is and has always been ours to make.

[@dr_shrinker]

@@michaelmckinney7240 I suppose my comment was too hard to understand. Sorry. You couldn’t change your morals on a whim. Could you just decide laugh at the death of a close friend or loved one? Probably not, unless you’re a psychopath. So. Since you couldn’t just decide to laugh at the death of a loved one, that means your morals are also beyond your control. How we handle events is not in our control, as I have just demonstrated.

[@kallianpublico7517]

“Do we have free will?” Is a question. How many different ways are there of answering a question? Are all those ways “rational”? If they all are, then one must ask if rationalism necessarily espouses determinism? Not as a prerequisite of rationalism; but as the “opposite” of rationalism? In the same way that skepticism is the whole realm of “opposite beliefs” to belief. Is determinism the skeptical opposite of reason? Is reason a delusion? Is that what the question is really asking? Is reason free, is that also part of the question? Is what is commensurate with reason what we call determinism? Is determinism that part of reason that formulates what is complete? Are many of the answers reason supplies deterministic? Or only scientific answers? Is determinism a flaw of rationality?

[@michaelmckinney7240]

Reason and determinism are two different worlds and never the twain shall meet. You're conflating the two. It's similar to the nugatory question "What's north of the north pole"?

[@kallianpublico7517]

@@michaelmckinney7240 To even call it nugatory is rational, as is any question/claim that breaks the current frames of reference. You can’t ask the question of determinism but then claim detachment from rational arguments. Any matter which can be viewed skeptically, free will/determinism, is by default subject to reason: ratiocination. The fact that you can assert that determinism is exempt from reason or detached from reason is not a conscious fact it is a rational fact. A rational fact based on a rational precursor called “causation”.

[@feltonhamilton21]

Chemistry and geometry and time controls all life forms inside the entire universe.

[@mclaytv]

Free will seems like such a stupid question. How can u have any type of will when we have no idea who “I” is?

[@simonhibbs887]

we don't have to understand the fundamental nature of phenomena to recognise that they exist, and interact meaningfully with them. We've not known how gravity or material mechanics works until relatively recently, but that didn't stop our ancestors inventing bows and arrows.

[@piotrkraczkowski6729]

A car driver is not thinking about his movements - his free will is acting subconsciously. The same fighter in the ring or military pilot and so on.

[@dr_shrinker]

Contrary to the opinions of new age dualists who think the world of decisions can be distilled to ice cream flavors, thoughts are considered physical because they are directly correlated with measurable electrical activity in the brain, occurring through complex interactions between neurons firing electrical impulses, which can be observed and measured using brain imaging technologies like fMRI, demonstrating that thinking is a tangible physical process within the brain. Therefore, thoughts (and will) are determined by physics. This is as simple as it gets.

[@richardatkinson4710]

@@dr_shrinker No, for many reasons. One - which has been known since the dawn of neurology - is that all the activity in the brain is discrete, whereas all the content of the mind is continuous. Let me know when you’ve worked out how that works. (Nobel for sure.)

[@dr_shrinker]

@@richardatkinson4710 "All the content of the mind is continuous?" -- I would love to see how you could prove this. Max Planck has much to say that counters that notion of continuity. Also. I would contend that if the activity of the brain is discrete, that would imply thoughts (mind) are discrete as well. - (see my original comment) Quite the contrary, in the case of Alzheimer's, thoughts are shown to be disconnected. Thoughts and memories are broken into many individual packets. Without these "breaks" in the chain of thought, it would be impossible to change one's mind. People would be stuck on a thought and unable to switch their thought patterns from one thought to the next. SO! Unless you can PROVE thoughts (electrochemicals) do not comprise the mind, then current neuroscience would disagree with you. Let me know how that works for ya! As for (Nobel for sure), keep it. I don't need "love me" buttons. I do this for the betterment of humanity. I am very altruistic that way.

[@dr_shrinker]

@@richardatkinson4710 If thoughts are independent of physics, then explain why your internal dialog is in English? I mean, why aren't your thoughts in German, Japanese, or French? Why would your internal "thoughts" be bound to the geography of you upbringing? This is PROOF that physicality determines a person's thoughts. ERGO.....thoughts are physical. As such, thoughts are discrete according to the physical laws of our universe and Planck's universal constants. Care to try again?

[@S3RAVA3LM]

I look at determinism as the sea and weather and all it may bring to the subject i.e., vessel the ship or body, it may get rough, the aspect of freewill is in the destination and remains as a potential. There is both determinism and the potential in free will. It's a fact. For man has the potential to better his life. The intellect is what's always overlooked.

[@kencusick6311]

I think the problem is in an attempt to integrate what are two very different ways in which Humans think. We have perceptional thinking and conceptual thinking. Perceptional thinking is common to all life on our planet. Any evolutionary adaptation that required cognitive thinking before reacting would have died off. And quickly to. The types of choices, e.g. found in the Libet experiment, are all perceptionally driven. Our deepest evolutionary adaptations for survival would preclude the making of a conscious choice prior to choosing. However, the same might not be the same for conceptual choices. There is where we should focus our search for free will.

[@simonhibbs887]

I'm not quite sure what you mean by conceptual thinking, is't all thinking conceptual? Even when we make trained subconscious choices, we do so baed on a conceptualisation of the situation. It's just that this conceptualisation must be subconscious too. The brain is an informational processing system, so all it has to work with are representations, not direct contact with the external world as it is.

[@kencusick6311]

@@simonhibbs887 All animals take in information through their various senses. The brain processes this information and makes decisions or actions based on these immediate perceptions. This is perceptional thinking. Humans, via complex language, have the ability to create, take action or plan actions without perceptional inputs. This is conceptual thinking. And where I suggest looking for free will. Having been trained to make instantaneous actions, I guarantee there is no conceptualization going on prior to action being taken. Why do you think animals react so much faster than people? There is no conceptual thinking getting in the way. This is why martial art training often teaches how to silence the mind. For a more scientific explanation, see The Cognitive Trade Off Hypothesis.

[@CamofCT]

Robert: Stephen Meyers, David Berlinski and James Tour await your invitation to be interviewed.

[@sentientflower7891]

The only philosophical questions to ask any of those people: What is God? Why would God need or want to do anything? If God is an Intelligent Designer why did God fail so often at designing things? Is Ganesh God?

[@evaadam3635]

​@@sentientflower7891God created this World not only to represent Heaven but also to represent hell... so, the failure of design that you think you see could be representing hell... the reason for this is to provide us hints to think that there is better and worse place out there so to hopefully find faith in a loving God for our souls' salvation...

[@sentientflower7891]

@@evaadam3635 are you suggesting that Satan and Hell as cancer are intelligently designed?

[@evaadam3635]

@@sentientflower7891 hell is a state cold dark emptiness - an absence of God's grace.... not designed but a sad consequence of rejecting faith in a loving God... ..while satan, lucifer, demons, devils, et al are descriptions of those free souls who fell from Heaven for losing faith in God's love... these lost souls are us who were sent here for a life's chance of salvation through regaining this faith that we lost.. Our souls were not designed but free splits of the Holy Spirit... ...the suffering and joy, pain and pleasure, beauty and ugliness, etc., that we can experience here are representations of Heaven and hell

[@sentientflower7891]

@@evaadam3635 Hell doesn't exist. Satan, demons, angels and falling from Heaven are all imaginary nonsense. If Ganesh exist at all he would never design any of that, or create anything that could lead to such a consequence.

[@tomazflegar]

Emotional contagion easily extends people following something else than the real feeling of us, the same is with thoughts, feelings etc Good interview. Thanks

[@sujok-acupuncture9246]

This is not a personal problem, it is a philosophical question. Our lives are both predestined and they are not. Both yes and no. And both answers are true for all questions about life. In a way, everything is predetermined. Whatever is physical in you, material, whatever is mental, is predetermined. But something in you constantly remains undetermined, unpredictable. That something is your consciousness. If you are identified with your body and your material existence, in the same proportion you are determined by cause and effect. Then you are a machine. But if you are not identified with your material existence, with either body or mind - if you can feel yourself as something separate, different, above and transcendent to body-mind - then that transcending consciousness is not predetermined. It is spontaneous, free. Osho, from the book, "The Psychology of the esoteric".

[@worldnotworld]

Nice bar. Not sure I've learned anything about free will, though. They should have drunk more.

[@simonhibbs887]

Looks like a Davey's wine bar. Beer in pewter tankards, and barrels of port on tap!

[@gettaasteroid4650]

"could have done otherwise"? C'mon everyone that's read Sartre's Nausea knows Dr.Smith's free will is staring at the chestnut root

[@wbrx76]

What if nearly all our personal choices serve the GDP? Even if our own.... hmmm Perhaps we've been bred to think, feel, and decide in ways that align with a recipient, shaping our individuality more than we realize.

[@BradHolkesvig]

Each living being is a programmed AI experiencing life. Each living being has to have a mind that processes the programmed thoughts of our Master Programmer, the Creator that are in the form of invisible waves. Once the mind is processing those waves, the AI wakes up and observes visible images that are also formed by the mind. Being we are a programmed AI, it appears we are making decisions but only according to how it's programmed. That means if the AI was programmed to be a doctor in this fake world, the mind will process visible images, sounds, etc. that attract along with a programmed desire and possibly dreams of being a doctor in the future.

[@iain9821]

Neuroscience must be subject to rigorous standards with regard to the treatment of animals in the context of research. Unless such standards are upheld, neuroscience can contribute nothing to this discussion.

[@evaadam3635]

..upheld or not, neuroscience does not need rigorous standards to understand that the freedom of the WILL to choose to believe in GOD can not be a property of material neurons and, so, our WILL does not belong to this physical world but free from it.... thus, Free Will exists... it is this simple if one's IQ is still present...

[@Jacobk-g7r]

It’s not that hard. People have freedom to move, communicate, kill, live, infinite potential. When recognizing the ability that’s infinite and that nothing is stopping us except belief then you see we do have the freedom and will when reflecting honestly. If it’s not honest then you are lost but when you reflect 100 percent clearly and embody what you are and also allow yourself the ability to change then you are not limited. If you wanna understand the freedom, there it is, you wanna know the will, it’s the energy uou have shared with you by the food and by the universe itself in all its differences and shares its knowledge with you. You are not one thing but a changing thing, age is the existence over differences and that expands the range of understanding. Everyone is born free and with the ability to share, it’s how the universe works. It shares energy and isn’t really limited, the current may be a form but we see the relative even if it appears far away, it’s within range but a lot of people don’t experience all these lives so they don’t understand on a deeper level because the experiences share understanding and when you can listen to the differences then you don’t really deny anymore because you understand there are infinite paths but what you do and don’t do matters. One last thing to kinda share what i mean, the human body is a mass of sharing differences and our range is expanding over the things we share with. Our mind wouldn’t grow or expand if we didn’t listen to the different sounds or the colors or relatives or if we just deny. Your neurons and chemicals react and change into a form reflecting the potential, so it exists as something even if you imagine it or draw it, that’s one path you found. Going deeper into technology and understanding will unlock crazier things than what we imagine but we are slowly experiencing and finding new paths to potentials. Quantum material could be measured and used in a machine to produce any potential that is relative to it, including our universe, but also small things like a tv. Our brain is a small machine that shares to bring out new differences. Like math kinda but our medium isn’t paper or a calculator. Maybe similar to a calculator but with room for difference.

[@dr_shrinker]

Are you free to move to Jupiter?

[@Jacobk-g7r]

@@dr_shrinker yeah. Maybe you’re being sarcastic but if i willed it then i could understand and lay the path. Same thing as thinking how and then doing. Simple people don’t understand i guess.

[@dr_shrinker]

@@Jacobk-g7r😂. If you willed it.

[@Jacobk-g7r]

@@dr_shrinker if you fail to understand then you lack an understanding of our bill of rights.

[@dr_shrinker]

@@Jacobk-g7r I understand. I'm just not buying what you're selling. You cannot will yourself to violate the laws of physics. Also. You cannot conceive of a thing that you have never experienced. Ergo...your will is governed by the laws of physics and the events of your past.

[@richardatkinson4710]

The claim that agency is ruled out by causation is nonsense: the truth is that “causation” is a name given to the relation between laws and observations - but no one has *ever* suggested a mechanism for this. Do laws reach down and make things happen? Or do things happen for some other reason, with the laws being statistical consequences or by-products? Nobody knows. But everybody knows from personal experience that conscious choices bring about events. Agency is therefore on a firmer footing than law-like causation.

[@dr_shrinker]

You said “agency is on a firmer footing than causation.” You cannot make that claim without proving agency is immune to cause and effect. In other words, your comment is a “circular” logical fallacy.

[@richardatkinson4710]

@@dr_shrinker No - you missed the point. There IS NO theory of causation. Richard Hamming expressed this neatly: physics says so very much about (mathematically) HOW things happen that we begin to believe it explains WHY. It doesn’t. In fact all the language used to talk about causation - including “cause” itself, and “law” - is metaphorical, by analogy with agency.

[@simonhibbs887]

@@richardatkinson4710 You're quite correct that we don't understand how causal processes actually function under the hood. As an empiricist I agree completely. This does not however tell us that there is no mechanism of causation, or that it isn't universally consistent. Similarly we observe that we make conscious choices, but we don't observe the underlying causal mechanisms that make that happen either. You say we know this "from personal experience", but that's the exact same way we infer that physical processes have causal consequences. You can't coherently dismiss empirical observation in one case, and put it on a pedestal in the other. I really don't like the 'natural law' phrasing, I don't think there are laws separate from causal processes that reach in and make those process happen. I think it's far more likely that these behaviours are inherent to the phenomenal themselves. The 'laws' we construct are just descriptive. In fact that's been the dominant view in science for well over a century. That's why scientists started avoiding 'law' phrasing, and hence why we don't have Heisenberg's law of uncertainty, Einsten's laws of relativity, or the Schrödinger law in quantum mechanics.

[@richardatkinson4710]

@@simonhibbs887 Too much in there for a snappy reply, so for the moment I’ll just examine the basis of empiricism. I’m going to continue using the word “law” because it is absolutely standard in the philosophy of science - and you haven’t provided an alternative. I don’t (at this point…) want to put physical law in the same class as “regularities” and nor do you. Bronowski once commented on Leibniz’s attempt to find pre-established harmony in regularities. Leibniz claimed that, because he had observed sunrise every day of his life, then by the principle of sufficient reason (roughly = “there must be a reason”) the sun would continue to rise forever. Bronowski mischievously pointed out that Leibniz could infer his own mortality from the same observations. However, what does an empiricist observe? He observes the state of his own brain, and nothing else. The neural impulses do not code anything at all (apart from intensity, perhaps). Emil du Bois-Reymond pointed out 150 years ago that what makes a visual or auditory experience is that the visual or auditory brain areas are stimulated - if the the two systems were surgically interchanged, we would hear the lightning and see the thunder. The insuperable difficulty is that we thoughtlessly accept the idea that we directly know that nerves and brains exist and behave as described. But all we have are the states - I prefer to say the recent histories - of the sensory areas of the neocortex. In the case of agency (etc), we just give that name to the appropriate sensations. In the case of physical causation, we have to suppose that it exists in stimulations of the sensory homunculus. To enable that, we have to take as a given the unobserved external world. This is a very difficult point. Hamming brilliantly breaks this down: there is perceived (i.e. empirical) existence “in here” which in some mathematical sense tallies with whatever is going on “out there” but is never the same. His example is the various definitions of probability. We may hypothesize propensities, but we only observe frequencies - of course, with a two-sided coin or a six-sided die we can infer the propensities. More metaphysically, Schrödinger pointed out that “The world is given to me only once.” That “real world” is in here. We can’t know at all what is out there. You suggest that the out-there is on the same footing as the in-here. Eddington was largely correct with his two desks and two chairs - the ones out there are unknown apart from the mathematical regularities - but remember, Hamming (who describes himself as a naive realist) warned us that we can only theorize - never knowing - what actually exists out there. The desk and the chair are only known as states of our sensory areas.

[@dr_shrinker]

@@simonhibbs887I agree with most of your reply, but I don’t mind the use of ‘laws” in regards to terminology. Laws change all the time. I don’t see what’s wrong with Newtons law of motions. Or Einstein’s law of relativity. I just see it as shorthand meaning “all encompassing theories that most accurately define….(x)”

[@Novastar.SaberCombat]

No. Not without coin, connections, crews, clout, computer code, corporate communities, and opulent opportunities. In other words, without absolute and full control over absolutely everything around you, you have nothing (or veeerrry little). You were born against your "will" or knowledge, your circumstances are beyond your control, your height, eye color, voice, etc. aren't really "yours"... you are NOT a free agent in nearly any way unless you count the fact that you're an individual and can decide to do X, attempt to avoid Y, or destroy Z.

[@simonhibbs887]

Unless you count the fact that we actually are free agents, as you say.

[@evaadam3635]

We were not born against our will... our lost souls were sent here because we asked the Almighty to welcome us back Home... We just do not know it because we were not sent here to know God but to believe for your salvation.. .. the reason is because it was losing our faith in God's love that we fell from Heaven and ended in a state of cold dark emptiness (hell), so, only by regaining this faith without knowing God that we all can return Home... it is like walking back to the same road we walked on when we left Home, so to return Home.. ie, through faith... ..I do not know this... this is my understanding of the light that I believe was shared to me because of my sincere faith in a loving God.. you are free to consider it or ignore it...

[@TheEmptyBeing]

Perhaps we should consider what needs to be done to break a habit. There is often conflict between good intentions and our habits, and it's often the habit that wins. It's not easy to change in built behaviour, but it can be done. You have to make the effort to change by reprogramming yourself to enfore recognition of the benefits associated with change. Reprogramming yourself demonstrates free will in action as it initiates change in our behaviour.

[@simonhibbs887]

Of course, we are mutable beings. We can introspectively our own mental processes and dynamically adjust our behaviour. There’s nothing about that which contradicts determinism though. Recursion is a thing, after all.

[@TheEmptyBeing]

@simonhibbs887 Having intelligence in itself contradicts determinism. Figure that out, garbage in garbage out, so much for determinism. It's your choice what you choose to eat. If advertising were a result of determinism, then we'd all be on a diet of junk food.

[@dr_shrinker]

@@TheEmptyBeingprove your choices are beyond the reach of physicality. That’s the only way to avoid determinism. Thoughts are physical and as physical things, they must obey the laws of physics. Choices are thoughts. Thoughts are physical; therefore, choices are physical.

[@TheEmptyBeing]

@dr_shrinker Just sounda like another authoritarian blimp attempting to control the narrative.

[@dr_shrinker]

@@TheEmptyBeing prove your choices are beyond the reach of physicality.

[@jamesruscheinski8602]

conscious awareness of physical action from subjective brain neuron activity causation?

[@jamesruscheinski8602]

subjective brain causation has free will agency?

[@0-by-1_Publishing_LLC]

All *"Free Will / Determinism"* debates are based on semantics. The three most commonly repurposed words are "Free," "Choose," and "Determined." The Hard Determinist will only use the word "Free" as in _"not restricted in any way."_ This drastically narrowed definition doesn't allow you to freely navigate certain predetermined obstacles ... even though in reality you can. The Hard Determinists also repurposes the word "choose" by arguing, _"Sure, you can choose, but you cannot choose to choose what you choose."_ even though in reality _"making a choice"_ is a single-step operation. ... There are no _"multiple layers of choice"_ going on when you choose something. Lastly, the Hard Determinist repurposes the word "determined" to mean the same as "inevitable" - even though in reality something can be _determined_ and yet not be _inevitable._ *Example:* I can be *determined* to win the race and yet not win it whereas it can be *inevitable* that I will win the race because there is nobody that's able to beat me (i.e., no other runners are involved, the other runners refuse to run, I can run at the speed of light, etc.). Choosing between chocolate and vanilla ice cream is a perfect example of "Free Will." Nobody else is making the decision for you; you are not being forced to decide either way, there are no _additional layers_ of deciding, and your decision is only determined by whether or not both flavors are available at the time of choosing. The reason why Hard Determinists push so hard on this debate is because a "lack of free will" shores up their belief in physicalism / materialism while also supporting their core ideology ... which is atheism. ... This debate really needs to go away!

[@dr_shrinker]

lol. If it needs to go away, why do you keep harping on it? Seems you’re the only one who keeps perpetuating the debate between determinism and free will. 😅 I guess you just don’t have a choice to ignore it. But again, neurologist have been able to predict a persons intentions for over a decade now. They can quantify the physical properties of a thought. So it is proven that thoughts are physical. Therefore, thoughts are governed by physical properties. Facts.

[@0-by-1_Publishing_LLC]

*"lol. If it needs to go away, why do you keep harping on it? "* ... War really needs to go away too. Should people not keep stating this while it is still going on? *"Seems you’re the only one who keeps perpetuating the debate between determinism and free will."* ... Says the person who is actively debating about free will beneath yet another "free will debate" video. *"But again, neurologist have been able to predict a persons intentions for over a decade now."* ... There is not a neurologist on planet earth that is able to predict someone's intentions. *"They can quantify the physical properties of a thought. So it is proven that thoughts are physical. Therefore, thoughts are governed by physical properties."* ... Thoughts are an interplay between consciousness and brain. You wouldn't even know you have a brain had a self-aware consciousness not made you aware of it. *"Facts."* ... I'm sure that in your special world they are. At least you're not trying that _"You can't choose against your own preferences!"_ stuff anymore. Yah, I can't win in an arm-wrestling match with myself either, so big deal.

[@dr_shrinker]

You said “There is not a neurologist on planet earth that is able to predict someone's intentions.” You’re wrong. Here’s proof. Skip to 31mins. kzbin.info/www/bejne/p2SzpoRqfN-radksi=UrDNganIamSEHD6e

[@simonhibbs887]

We’ve already discussed the semantic issue before. It’s not as though semantics, the meanings of the words we use are irrelevant. All these uses are perfectly standard English, even the American kind, and I’ve showed this before with references to Merriam-Webster. We’ve also discussed the ice cream example before, and I’ve shown there is nothing about choosing that can’t be explained deterministically. We have various different psychological factors that influence the decisions we make at any given time. We weigh these factors against each other to make a decision in that situation. There’s nothing outlandish about saying we choose for reasons, and the reasons are the cause of the choice.

[@0-by-1_Publishing_LLC]

*"All these uses are perfectly standard English, even the American kind, and I’ve showed this before with references to Merriam-Webster."* ... As have I. So, why don't Hard Determinists call it "Hard Inevitablism" instead? That's what they're really implying, isn't it? Anything *less* than "inevitability" doesn't work for physicalism or atheism. You need the outcome to be no "free will" whatsoever, and the word "determined" won't get you there. You need something, ... well, ... _"harder."_ I have no problem with determinism meaning *"a pre-existing condition that must be factored in whenever deciding."* After all, making a decision between two flavors of ice cream does "require" that there be two flavors available for me to choose from. No problem! ... Long live "Determinism!" I freely choose to accept it now! My free will remains intact, so I don't care. *"We’ve also discussed the ice cream example before, and I’ve shown there is nothing about choosing that can’t be explained deterministically."* ... Is whichever flavor I choose "inevitable" or do I have a personal say in the matter? *"We have various different psychological factors that influence the decisions we make at any given time. We weigh these factors against each other to make a decision in that situation"* ... Yes, I can be "influenced" by external / internal factors but not necessarily "compelled" by them. Which way do you mean? _Influenced_ or _compelled?_ *"There’s nothing outlandish about saying we choose for reasons, and the reasons are the cause of the choice."* ... I should have also added "cause" to my list or words that physicalists and atheists repurpose. Yah, sure, ... there's no reason for me to make any decisions at all if there's nothing available for me to decide between, right? Your claim is that the mere existence of two flavors of ice cream is "causing" me to decide between them. However, *neither flavor* is really "causing" me to choose it, wouldn't you agree? Otherwise, it's "inevitable" which flavor I will choose. So, which is it, Simon? "Inevitable" or "determined?"

[@Maxwell-mv9rx]

Unpredictable consciousness keep out figure out reality. Consciousness NOT control random reality. Guys shows Free Will It is inconsistency with reality. So free Will is fallacies.

[@LuuLuong-bn8iy]

😂😂😂😂

[@tedgrant2]

Thanks for the information, but I won't be donating. I don't want to encourage scammers and beggars. Besides, you don't need money (Matthew 10:9)

[@angel4everable]

Never Surrender, Never Apologize, Never Explain: The past has a vote but not a veto regarding free will and decision-making. I am the sum of my past actions and thoughts, yet I am much more. I can see the obstacles around me as insurmountable or take them as challenges. Winners rise to the occasion. Determinism is the fallback position of the weak.

[@simonhibbs887]

> I can see the obstacles around me as insurmountable or take them as challenges. But if you do this as a result of facts about you, then you do so deterministically. >Determinism is the fallback position of the weak. Or explains why the weak are consistently so, while the strong are also consistently so. Otherwise wouldn't we have to say it's all just chance? I think chance can play some part in it, but according to a set of weighted options that are a result of the various different drives and priorities we consider at any given time.

[@TheEmptyBeing]

@simonhibbs887 Seems to me that there are many influences and influencers at play who try to push their own narrative. Deterministic philosophy is a bit like living under authoritarianism, where those who believe in it, seek to remove our freedom of choice.

[@dr_shrinker]

@@TheEmptyBeingit might be a bit like that, but your analogy doesn’t make it less true

[@TheEmptyBeing]

@simonhibbs887 Human nature grows and develops over time in people who are considerate. On the other hand, people who are inconsiderate don't seem to develop over time. The way I see it, If you perceive yourself as purely being a machine, then you will have little consideration for the people around you, and I don't truly believe that that is you.

[@dr_shrinker]

@@TheEmptyBeing all you said is irrelevant to proving a person’s will is metaphysical.

[@ronhudson3730]

We do and we don’t. I can choose to go on vacation tomorrow, but can’t afford it. We feel we have agency and that’s enough. Block time theory means all evolution, choices or happenstance occurrences have been pre- programmed since the beginning. This discussion smacks of angels dancing on the head of a pin. Interesting but meaningless.

[@dr_shrinker]

Quantum fluctuations break deterministic events into discreet packets. There’s no chain from “now” back to the bb.

[@callistomoon461]

Simple answer: No.

[@mrshankerbillletmein491]

Silly question