Galen Strawson - Mysteries of Free Will

[@Rhea303]

Marvelous .. 🤩 "Man can do what he wills .. but he cannot will what he wills." - A. Schopenhauer

[@pierrebeckmann4785]

"Who would want to want according to some formula?" - dostoyevsky, notes from the underground.

[@gigikan0809]

Who is A.Schopenhauer

[@Joseph-un8jk]

Is that even necessarily true, though? Imagine in the future, we learn enough about the brain, that we can replace/affect the neurons that play a role in certain desires with some sort of microchip/computer interface. If somebody has a desire to cheat for example, maybe they could choose to undergo a procedure that gets rid of that desire. Would something like that count, or would it be argued that he didn't choose to want to change that desire and so on ad nauseam?

[@dogsdomain8458]

@@Joseph-un8jk yes, the latter. That in-itself would be determined

[@neoepicurean3772]

@@Joseph-un8jk YES - exactly the same point I raised in regards to PF Strawson's account of free will/moral responsibility. Not so much to escape he free will problem, but to change the way we react to it. What do you do, if you don't mind me asking?

[@michaelferketic3540]

Free will is the ability to control the focus of your attention. I watch all the brilliant minds talk about this and everyone keeps it so abstract and dances around any specificity. That's why I wrote a book called The Definition of Free Will - & a model of attention. Free will is the ability to control focal energy distribution patterns

[@25hvghfgetr6]

P1 - The way you are (all things considered) will determine how you will act in any situation (being -> doing) P2 - To be truly responsible for the way you act, you have to be responsible for the way you are C - Freedom is impossible because one cannot step outside of the P1 (being -> doing) paradigm.

[@wolfbenson]

Isn't that conclusion true only if you had no free will at the time of making you who you are? If your choices made you the way you are, then you, the agent determined it. Or no?

[@25hvghfgetr6]

​@@wolfbenson But your actions are still stemming from the way you already are. When you made those choices you made them on the basis of how you already were. If you would've acted differently than you in fact did, then you would've to have been different in some way.

[@stephencarlsbad]

@@25hvghfgetr6 They're asking an invalid question. The valid question is, "Do we have absolute or relative free will?" The answer then becomes clear. Absolute free will, can not exist in a vacuum absent of 'space, time, matter or other consciousness.' Free will is always in relation to something and therefore is always relative to something i.e. space, time, matter, and other consciousness. So then the question is does relative free will exist or are our choices based on which ever program is the most dominant at any moment that we are confronted with what appears to be "choice". It seems that we likely confuse choice for 'two or more near equally dominant, competing programs' that create some interference and internal struggle with the natural flow of consciousness and that choice really is the sorting out which program is most dominant or beneficial relative to other more dominant innate programs ie the need to survive and desire to thrive. Sometimes we choose incorrectly and that is when the dominant, correct, program isn't chosen which would have led us to a better place in the future. P1 and P2 are equally true, but the conclusion is false because it does not account for time. Through time, we can be responsible for the way we are in the future if we adapt and evolve. This is what society expects from its members. And the difficulty of adapting in any society is in relation to how rapidly that society is evolving or isn't. So the phrase "being responsible for our actions" is likely valid if the member of society is both adaptable and evolves. Adaptability and evolution are relative to intellect. So it seems obvious that the duller segments of society will not adapt and evolve at the level society expects. And this is a challenge for society, especially when it comes to the issue of 'inequality compared to fairness for all.'

[@amorfati1990]

Brilliant man - he gets it - but then again, you can't really give him credit for it, because he didn't chose to be that way=)

[@Ryanthebrobdingnagian]

Sure you can. The same way a person could give an asteroid credit for destroying the dinosaurs, or a virus credit for killing a percentage of the population.

[@Ryanthebrobdingnagian]

@@EarlOSandwich I disagree. I hold responsibility as an inescapable repercussion of existence. Like everything else, we have no choice but to accept it.

[@jonahsd1818]

@@Ryanthebrobdingnagian yes although free will is an illusion we have no choice but to live inside of it and by it if we stopped holding people responsible for things good or bad the world would be a worse place if we just let a person get away with murder just because he didn’t choose to choose to be a murderer than he would just continue to murder people if we didn’t reward people for there achievements because they didn’t choose to be who they are that person might lose their meaning and their inspiration

[@anthonycraig274]

@@jonahsd1818 Sweden doesn’t hold children responsible for murder, and “let them off”. In Sweden, they nurture them and integrating them back into society. Where as Britain with its Christian punishment roots, locks up children into their adulthood and releases them as criminals, with the notion that the murderous event being their fault. I used Britain as I know of the cases but can could have used any Christian rooted country or Muslim for that matter. Anyway, my point is, Sweden is a better place than the Britain regarding this matter.

[@MarioMancinelli82]

Lol good point dude

[@MultiAdamowski]

absolutely agree. no matter what you have inside (material particles or eternal soul) your decision is based on just that and you cannot escape yourself.

[@francoismorin8721]

I disagree with Galen Strawson about free will. Free will is inherent to creation as infinitesimal as it is. Like physicist Michio Kaku, I believe that quantum physics have closed the debate about free will, it exist as shown by the two slit experiment... even photons have free will in a way. Free will is what would be a real choice. So we are not often in face of real choices as there is so much that determines our actions, but one in a while we do choose for real between this or that. Chaos, randomness and free will are what allow creation of new shapes, new worlds, maybe even many universe according to the many universe theory.

[@MultiAdamowski]

photons in the double slit experiment have as much free will as water flowing down the drain when you pull the plug in a bathtub :)

[@francoismorin8721]

You may be overrating free will in your own conception as something complicated. The brain intelligence as a material support but also have biochemistry and electrical signal that have physical properties like electrons, and maybe even biophotons! Go read this article titles : "There Are Biophotons in the Brain. Is Something Light-Based Going On?" bigthink.com/robby-berman/there-are-biophotons-in-the-brain-is-something-light-based-going-on So that being said. The basis of free-will may be a natural continuity of physical principles and consciousness may have something to do with quantic entanglement. And what implies the double-split experiment is a photon that reacts to the presence of an observer which is way more odd that the physical laws between water going downs a drain. Although I see in the fractals created in the spirale of water as a presence of a creative order within chaos. Free will to me is that chaos that creates within order.

[@MultiAdamowski]

an observer in the double slit experiment is not human. it's just a detector. and as every kind of detector it affects the thing observed. talkin about consciousness and free will here is too far fetched.

[@wilsonw.t.6878]

@NeverFinished 3Digits You have to assume that the ability cannot be causa sui in order to come to the conclusion that it isn't causa sui. Yet many atheists claim the universe is causa sui. As a theist, I reject that. I also reject that free will itself is causa sui, God is the cause of free will, but that doesn't mean He influences or determines the outcome of the free will.

[@benadam6697]

We are informed by our past selves when we call on our memories to guide the present, but we also inform our past selves when we reflect on our past errors and so change ourselves in the present.

[@br41nb0x7]

It's a slippery thing to square one's *feeling/experience* of free will with what reason reveals to be a complicated but (seemingly?) deterministic process surrounding them. What does it mean to be conscious without free will? Why be aware if it plays no causal factor among all the other processes (including one's own) that are being undertaken? The one thing that might be a worthwhile analogy to consider is that of a character in a story. Any book you might read is, obviously, already written before you read it. However, when you read it you are (as any other time and place in life) doing it in the present, "now". (Let's not bring up any notions of relativity, yet, heh.) This is the slice of time and space we're ever consciously aware of (setting aside any illusory construct it might *actually* be for now, too). So, as you read about this character, you are reading about them in the story as it were "now". You can feel how they feel, follow their thoughts and actions (plus all the antecedent events that the character might not even be aware of, either). However, all of it was written prior to your experience of reading it as your "now". What does that make for our personal significance, and so on? I don't know. However, instead of removing responsibility or a feeling of causal efficacy in life, it in fact widens the scope. You are part of the vast unfolding of not only your life and actions, but everyone else's past, present, and future. We would have to start thinking of ourselves as a unit, a whole, part of an entire universe of unfolding actualization. You get to experience it. A KZbin commentary is probably not the best place to expound on things that probably deserve way more space and consideration, but I guess I was compelled to say this for whatever reason, because the Big Bang, right?

[@christophermcevoy6995]

I don't think this comment has received anywhere near enough attention. Without free will you aren't in the universe responsible and isolated but instead part of the whole wash.

[@kennethboykins264]

Very astute.

[@mattsigl1426]

With every CHOICE I more and more determine what I am, and what I Am is a thing that makes choices. If I am not wholly predictable to myself and if there is no ultimate explanation for what my choices are outside of my choosing them (including to myself) than my choices are truly free.

[@epicbehavior]

You don’t determine what you are, therefor you can’t be responsible for what you choose. You WERE before you ever made a choice also. And that which you were determined all of the choices which followed.

[@rovosher8708]

Pleasantly surprised that this renowned Hume scholar talks about “who we are.” To a great extent this is more a neurological theme than a question of identity. We may becoming the added connections of the various neutrons that are integrated into our brain as we live on to experience. From that point of view the freedom of the will is pretty much a daily re-evaluation of our views about who we are.

[@joachim73]

I really don't see how we could've free will. When I walk and I have a random thought coming to my mind I didn't have any choice in the matter. Don't think there's much differences when I have a choice to make. It's still just a thought coming to my mind.

[@piotrkupka2575]

The thoughts are like wild horses grazing on a large meadow of creativity, but you can tame them and ride them in the direction of your choice - it happens due to the power of concentration. When I play music in a concert no other thought comes to my consciousness except those which are connected to the piece. You can also be the judge of the thoughts emerging in your brain and you can decide which one to dismiss and which one to cheerish. If the free will wouldn't egsist, we should make always the same decisions facing the same kinds of situations and we would never be able to "learn" from our own mistakes. There would be also no single smoker who quitted smoking. What we do on every day's basis is to 98% unconscious and it's like a program of a computer or a tape - the consciousness occupies the remaining 2%, but combined with the willpower in a given amount of time it has the ability to rewrite the tape and to change the program.

[@AnoNymous-dh2sv]

It's more basic that that. To put it bluntly you are a robot of chemicals and a product of purely genetics and experience and randomness. It's by definition impossible to have true free will.

[@subplantant]

@@piotrkupka2575 This is exactly what he means at 8:30

[@ericswidler8743]

What this really traces back to it that there is no such thing as the impermanent self. Choices, decisions, willing happens. It's just that there is no chooser, decider or willer, or little person inside your head that is the cause of all of it. It's all just a happening.

[@levimark548]

@@ericswidler8743Yes. Everything just happens. I‘m happening. The ability of controlling random thoughts also just ’happens‘ .

[@paulsapourn3240]

I think a meaningful interpretation of Strawson’s argument here is as follows: Any decision you make is entirely based off of who/how you are at a fundamental level, and you are not responsible for being who/how you are at a fundamental level because you are not the cause of yourself (causa sui). Therefore, it follows that you are not fundamentally responsible for any of the decisions you make because they all stem from who/how you fundamentally are, which is not up to you. For example, if I have a simple decision to make between A and B, it doesn’t matter whether I choose A or B - I am not responsible for choosing either A or B because whether I choose A or B stems from who/how I am, which I am not responsible for.

[@wolfbenson]

The argument is dependent on whether a person can be causa sui or not. Strawson says no and therefore, his argument follows. But what if, yes...Then it falls.

[@treemustach]

The issue I have with this is that, yes, we do not have free will in what we definitely want to will and be (in terms of being and that we are humans) but we are sentient beings within a set parameter of choice, the choices that we get to choose from in that we are humans. As human beings there will be certain factors that we "must" follow because of our makeup and how we are "structured" but within those parameters we have free will. For example, becoming an addict means that we can't seem to not do drugs/drink alcohol, but the reality is that we can stop doing those things if we truly wanted to. There are boundaries to stop us from doing drugs and drinking, but the structure has become a lot more difficult because we are humans and how the human body reacts to the structure that we are given. Despite that, within our structure, that means we have free will within it. So we don't have have ultimate free will, but we have free will within the parameters given to us.

[@fercontreras8]

Incorrect. As explained in the video, your ultimate decision is based on your current nature (all factors considered) plus perhaps some randomness. You literally have ZERO control of any decision. “Free will is impossible” is the best kept secret in humanity. The info is out there, but most people don’t understand it

[@stephenlawrence4821]

Yes we can if... But if the "if" is not predetermined it will not happen. Those who get free of addiction are lucky to be predetermined to do so. Those who don't are unfortunate that they are not predetermined to. This is a much kinder way of viewing it and is correct.

[@treemustach]

@@stephenlawrence4821 Thinking of the actions happening to us as predetermined I feel is a false belief and reduces the human experience. Since our actions are reflective of what we can and cannot do and how those choices change our future, stopping doing drugs is within our abilities. Obviously it depends how you are looking at it, if you think our actions are never free will due to the fact that our thoughts come to us from a seemingly unknown place in our minds, a thought can be seen as a placed idea rather than an act of free will. But I still believe that the "ifs" in our lives are "ifs" and not predetermined results because their existence effectively defines variance of outcome. The options we are given are still ours to be taken, and the available options can be increased. Those new choices might not appear immediately but they will appear given effort. Just because someone decides to start or stop an activity does not mean they had to, that alone is an exercise of free will (regardless of factors working for or against them).

[@stephenlawrence4821]

@@treemustach I think the experience is as it seems. The mistake is over what it is to have options we can select. Abilities are general abilities. I can walk, I can swim and so on. But that does not mean I can do any one of my general abilities in the actual circumstances with exactly the same past. Yes thinking about the ifs and working out which would get us to better or worse futures is how we decide. But it's right to assume all of this is predetermined. We're predetermined to consider which of our general abilities we could use. We're predetermined to weigh up the options as we do. To have made a different choice we'd have needed a different past prior to the choice so that we'd have been predetermined to do so. This is the correct way to look at it and the fairest and kindest. We should acknowledge that the drug addict who stopped was lucky to be predetermined to stop. We should acknowledge that the one who didn't was unfortunate to be predetermined not to.

[@epicbehavior]

@@stephenlawrence4821 yep

[@BrianSDare]

Could an illustration be helpful here? We are all in a river. We cannot help but be influenced by the currents. But we could be in a log just floating along, or we can be in a boat with a paddle. All of us have that paddle, and we can choose to use it or not. No matter what we cannot escape the currents river, but we can indeed influence how we navigate the river, and every responsible human does.

[@dogsdomain8458]

This is by far the best argument agains free will

[@amirhesamnoroozi3741]

Wow, I did not know an argument as such.... Amongst all the scientific controversy and quarrel around the subject, this is quite a new approach.

[@eddieking2976]

"Can we become conscious of an unconscious thought? ~Sam Harris

[@cube2fox]

Possible definition of free will, the principle of alternate possibilities: You are free in respect to action A iff you can do A and you can do not-A. Now the above uses the concept "can". I think the right definition for it is this: You can do A iff the following is true: If you want to do A, you do A. Thus the above definition of free will becomes this: You are free in respect to A iff the following is the case: - If you want to do A, you do A, and - If you want to do not-A, you do not-A. Now this is of course compatible with determinism. Even if you are determined to do not-A, it may still be true that, if you want to do A, you do A. For example, my freedom to go outside consists in the fact that if I wanted to go outside I would do so and if I didn't want to go outside I would not go outside. Whether I want to go outside or not is irrelevant for the truth of these conditionals.

[@dogsdomain8458]

i actually agree with this definition of free will. However, i would say that, while a person is responsible for their actions in a sense, this campatibalistic form of responsibility would be reduced compared to the libertarian notion. You are responsible only in the sense that your actions correlated with a process of deliberation followed by a conscious intentional state (even if the intentional state is only epiphenominal and doesnt cause the action).

[@cube2fox]

@@dogsdomain8458 Which is maybe good, because being responsible for an action is often thought as having it done intentionally. Both Harry G. Frankfurt ("Alternate possibilities and moral responsibility") and Peter F. Strawson ("Freedom and resentment") have written famous papers on this. See also "Moral responsibility" in the Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online).

[@dogsdomain8458]

@@cube2fox The battle of the Strawsons. I think P F Strawson really just uses the term responsibility to real mean some sort of fictional construct that humans make, or a disposition of a person to blame another for their actions.

[@cube2fox]

@@dogsdomain8458 And Frankfurt?

[@wolfbenson]

This is a quote from Strawson, no? Pretty sure I read this somewhere. Still this would seem to go counter to what's in the clip above.

[@magnedale3320]

This was a good one!

[@tripp8833]

I know, right!?

[@neverbeenoutside4963]

Yeh purely luck that it was good

[@zthechainz]

We should raise our consciousness and not be bound by our past or our traumatic experiences. We should contemplate we are truly citizens of the universe and live our lives with compassion and living for each other.

[@ivanleon6164]

this man continues asking the question until he hears what he wants to hear. accept it.

[@landonech]

"We do what we do because of the way we are...all things considered." Alright. An aspect of "the way we are" is freedom of the will.

[@chikiwiki0807]

So this "free will" that you have it must have some nature to it. In it it's nature must be good in that it's more likely to choose the good choices, or it can be a bad nature or a neutral nature or a random nature in which you choose your options based on randomness. The point is that your decision will be based on the nature of your "free will" and you do not choose the nature of your "free will" therefore you are not responsible. Let me know what you think ☺️

[@dfpolis]

Strawson's argument is unsound. Here are the difficulties with it, point by point: 1. It is true that we do what we do because we have the power to do it, but to say that "the way we are" prior to the choice predetermines what we choose, requires one to assume determinism. As Strawson admits, experience tells us that being a free agent is part of "the way we are." To be a free agent is to be the radical source of new lines of action, where "radical source" means that the new line of action is not fully immanent (pre-determined) before the agent chooses. Clearly, Strawson is begging the question. 2. If A is responsible for how B is, and B is a free-will agent, that does not mean that A is responsible for what B chooses in the sense of implicitly determining what B chooses. A is only responsible for making B a free-will being. There is also an equivocation on "responsible" here. In premise 1 it means responsible for what is chosen by B, but in premise 2, it means responsible for making B a free-will agent. While one might argue when A makes B free, A assumes responsibility for B's free acts, that is a separate argument. It is precisely a separate argument because the meaning of "responsible" in 1 and 2 is different. 3. Of course, A cannot be responsible for how A is made, but that is irrelevant if A is made a free-will agent. In sum, the argument is unsound because it begs the question and has an undistributed middle (because of the equivocation).

[@ivanoliveira8932]

The problem is with P1. He smuggles in an assumption that the way we are ENTAILS one action rather than another.

[@Dystisis]

This ideal of "fundamental, ultimate responsibility" is not the same as action, though. We say something has the responsibility if it is the most salient and sensitive factor in a system giving rise to some phenomenon. Obviously there will always be underlying factors that are necessary for that system in the first place, but that's not what we mean by "action".

[@Robinson8491]

As Galen Strawson mentions in this arguments, perhaps it is true you are not responsible for what you are, but I contend you can táke responsibility. Maybe here you can break the cycle in this argument and start to accept that you have free will, as that is the basis of free will (akin to choosing to have free will: maybe ironically free will is to choose to have free will). The starting point or inception of free will doesn't matter all that much, whether you're born with it or it's made: it's that you accept it's there. And maybe leave the mystery of the inception of free will where it is, just as we only speculate about things before the Big Bang. Also, we need to reason this way, as otherwise our law could never function: and I think the functioning of the law trumps speculations over whether we have real free will or not in a society and therefore humankind! I do recommend researching and investigating the phenomena of course, as this is highly interesting; but I doubt the progress that will be made on the matter in the near future.

[@AliJorani]

Great interview.. btw no one mentioned that he looks like Liam Nesson

[@blackbaggerlolol1]

I thought he looked like Gordon Ramsay.

[@levimark548]

@@blackbaggerlolol1Same. I had the feeling that he looks like someone I know😂 Without your comment I wouldn’t know

[@senjinomukae8991]

This guy has got it right.

[@dannyvalastro2974]

Can you pick and choose who we are born ??????

[@davidhunt7427]

As a Daoist I believe in partial free will,.. and I believe that is enough to give us moral responsibility for our actions. While I don't believe in absolute Libertarian Free Will,.. I do believe at least partial free will does exist in fact. Consider that Chaos theory teaches us that even purely deterministic systems will yield wildly varying results depending entirely upon what numerical precision is used to perform the computations,... and no one knows what is the most _correct_ numerical precision to use, nor how it could ever be determined even in principle. If there is necessarily that much 'freedom' in running purely deterministic simulations of reality,.. there must be at least as much looseness in how the brain comes to it's decisions also. The mind is a muscle,.. and like any muscle, it's anti-fragile in that the more environmental chaos that's thrown at it,.. the stronger potentially it can become. Much of reality is more like transcendental numbers than it is like integers in that we can compute an transcendental number to any degree of precision we choose to arrive at,.. but we will never ever arrive at most transcendental numbers true value as each transcendental number is the sum of an infinite series of numbers which can only ever be approximated,.. and never known exactly and completely. To say then that free will does not exist makes no more sense than to say no transcendental number exists because we are forever chasing after it's true value with no hope of ever arriving at a final last destination. As a Daoist who tends to see that all categories tend to bleed at the borders, I see no problem with saying free will partially exists,.. and being fully satisfied by that.

[@BrianSDare]

This is what frustrates me about these conversations. He keeps saying "ultimate." Sure, my freedom isn't ultimate. How can it be? I'm not even control of the mechanisms that keep me alive right now. But my will doesn't need to be "ultimate" to both be meaningful, real and influential.

[@AlexHop1]

Dr. Strawson's argument is circular. He says that the way that you (as a consciousness) try to change the way that you are is a function of how you already are. However, this assumes no Free Will. Free Will is the non-caused capacity to make a choice and put intention behind it. It's acausal. It springs from the very nature of consciousness. Consciousness is creative. We call this creativity "Free Will."

[@alleyway]

Free Will != Reason or non-inferential knowledge. That aspect of ourselves is inherited. One would need to know they are responsible for their inherited qualities that make up the conscious experience but fall right into the problem of criterion in doing so.

[@AlexHop1]

I don't agree that "reason or non-inferential knowledge" are the same as Free Will. Here is a Merriam-Webster dictionary definition of Free Will: "freedom of humans to make choices that are not determined by prior causes or by divine intervention." One can assume that inheritance working with experience drive choices (no Free Will). Or one can assume that consciousness working with inheritance and experience drive choices (Free Will). Consciousness introduces the possibility of a choice unconstrained by prior cause--a spontaneous decision due to the spirit's intentions. The point is both the assumption of no consciousness and the assumption of consciousness are assumptions. Neither can be defended with logic. However, I believe that experimental evidence will one day stack up on one side or the other.

[@alleyway]

​@@AlexHop1 Sorry for the confusion, I said free will != reason or non-inferential knowledge. "!=" means does not. My main point is that whatever quality contributes to the a priori, is what would need to be controlled for to output free will. Even in a situation of a "spirits intention", you did not control for the quality of the soul nor were responsible for it's propagation therefore you can never claim ultimate responsibility for it.

[@AlexHop1]

@@alleywayThank you for clarifying, and now I've learned a new symbol. I see it this way: The "I" feeling that I have IS myself as a spiritual being. I don't know about the body and that part of it which is the brain--do they have Free Will? They are physical and follow Newton's Laws. But due to the possibility of true randomness in quantum mechanics and the Conway-Kochen Free Will Theorem, maybe the body does have free will. But that's not my focus. As a spiritual being, which is a unit of consciousness, I have Free Will. Like neuroscientist, Donald Hoffman, and other panpsychists (and idealists and some dualists), I don't assume that consciousness arises from the material. Nor is it material. I assume that consciousness has the property of perceiving and the property of spontaneously causing intentions. These are assumptions. But I think these assumptions account for the feeling that I think we all have that we have Free Will. And these assumptions could account for creativity (which scientists find hard to explain), genius, miraculous-seeming achievements (like a mother lifting a car off her baby), out-of-body experiences, near death experiences, parapsychological experimental results of the last 100 years, and a large number of other anomalies which materialists dismiss or simply have no explanation for. I think that materialism is dismissing and failing to explain so much of what many people have experienced. I think it's time to try something new.

[@kennethboykins264]

If free-will springs from the nature of conciousness then it is not acausal. His argument would be that since you are not ultimately responsible for the nature of conciousness you are not responsible for the intentional acts caused by said conciousness . You are correct that his reasoning was circular. I think your acausality argument fails to refute his argument. acausality = random or acausality = unrelated, no connection. I think free-will is compatible with determinism.

[@osks]

You may not have noticed, but this is a very interesting argument for the fact that it happens to correspond very closely to the Biblical narrative: One: God created man in His image (which He decreed to be marred (for very good theological reasons)), resulting in man becoming a sinner (ie no longer reflecting the proper image of God); Two: As a sinner, man is thus inclined towards sin (acts of evil and error that fail to reflect the image of God); Three: As a sinner who commits acts of sin, man (contrary to the popular (mis)understanding of things), is not judged for the things he does (or does not) - rather, God sovereignly redeems (some of) man in spite of his acts (ie while man is held morally responsible, he is not held morally accountable (for very good theological reasons)); Four: Theregore, man is not ‘free’ (in the Libertarian sense) - rather, it is God who sovereignly determines all things after the council of His will (Eph 1:11)

[@010767]

I think the point is rather minute. Is there anyone that will argue that, at any given moment a series of events outside of your influence, did not effect your current situation? The fact remains that the will is still capable of choosing that which is conceivable to choose. The understanding that we are not able to get behind ourselves to preset the conditions is not a revelation.

[@samuelstephens6904]

Kim Boschmann But it does seem to vitiate the free will entirely. It’s not just that there are outside influence. There is no part of who you are that you can claim ownership over. None at all.

[@paulaustinmurphy]

The obvious point is that when two (or more) people discuss free will they may be talking about different things. Or they may define the words "free will" differently. Thus to one person a commitment to free will may be a commitment to *x*. To another person it may be a commitment to not-*x*. This is bad enough because both people "believe in free will". The situation is even worse when you have a defender and a rejector of free will having a debate. Thus the second Galen Strawson opens his mouth there will be many people who automatically reject what he says - simply because his overall position is against the existence of free will. For example, if "feeling that one has free will" is the same thing as *having free will*, then the debate won't even get off the ground. This is like the strong Artificial Intelligence position on intelligence (or even mind): if a computer/robot acts/speaks in a way that intelligent human being acts/speak, then, by definition, it is intelligent (or it even has a mind). There's no reality-appearance dichotomy in the AI intelligence case; just as in the case with free will. If we "feel like we have free will", and also "believe we have free will", then what more do we want? Well, some people may want a lot more than that. Another major problem is that some people people believe that free will is compatible with complete causal determinism and others don't. That is, if there's a chain of causes leading up to an act of will (or a physical self, as Strawson puts it), then it can't be a genuine free volition. Other people think that this causal chain (or physical self) is irrelevant to the question of free will. That is, causation alone doesn't rule out free will. After all, if free acts were truly causally independent then they'd be both spontaneous and random... wouldn't they? Similarly with references to quantum mechanics. How do quantum phenomena alone guarantee us free will?

[@Ryanthebrobdingnagian]

Oh Jeff Goldblum. You're a national treasure.

[@ApexMark2002]

"I wish I had a soul. I don't think I do, but I wish I did." How is the completely material able to possess an intuition to wish for something it doesn't believe exists?

[@zulucharlie5244]

Because the material wishes for eternal existence -- when it knows its existence is finite and all too brief.

[@WindWordSword]

Zulu Charlie that assumes souls are ”eternal” so that still doesn't really answer the question.

[@terje1228]

"The material" can wish for many things that don't exist, so what?

[@MarioMancinelli82]

I wish for hair :(

[@Pietrosavr]

You can be the cause of yourself, it's the prime mover principle. Deterministic causation cannot recede back into an infinite regress thus it must have a beginning, that beginning must by definition freely choose it's action since there is nothing that comes before it. There is no reason why we can't be such an entity, and there are plenty of reasons why we probably are, namely consciousness, which cannot be reduced to material processes and thus must be fundamental which is the necessary condition for being a prime mover.

[@stephencarlsbad]

They seem to be asking the wrong question. The valid question should be, "Do we have absolute or relative free will?" The answer then becomes clear. Absolute free will, can not exist in a vacuum absent of 'space, time, matter or other consciousness.' Free will is always in relation to something and therefore is always relative to something i.e. space, time, matter, and other consciousness. So then the question is does relative free will exist or are our choices based on which ever program is the most dominant at any moment that we are confronted with what appears to be "choice". It seems that we likely confuse choice for 'two or more near equally dominant, competing programs' that create some interference(internal struggle) with the natural flow of consciousness and that choice really is the sorting out which program is most dominant or beneficial relative to other more dominant innate programs ie the need to survive and desire to thrive. Sometimes we choose incorrectly and that is when the dominant, correct, program isn't chosen which would have led us to a better place in the future. Where free will does seem to exist is in our choosing of which program to replace with a more effective one, ie the addition program can be changed to one of abstinence and balance. But this may even be a subordination of a higher program expressing itself.

[@thetruthoutside8423]

Agree, how would escape this closed system?

[@lamegalectora]

His is not an argument but a tautology based on the unwarranted assumption that we cannot be the cause of ourselves ('we cannot be ultimately responsible for the way we are'). He is basically saying that 'We cannot be the cause of ourselves BECAUSE we cannot be the cause of ourselves'. Premise 2 of his argument (to be truly responsible for what we do we have to be responsible for the way we are) is what Buddhism refers to as Karma. I wish the interviewer had let Strawson speak more

[@alleyway]

You can deduce that non-inferential knowledge is inherited and come to the same conclusion.

[@hn6187]

But complexity / emergence means that who you are and what you will become is fundamentally unknowable ( beyond measurements / calculation ) so in another sense, there's only free will

[@jamesruscheinski8602]

Everything moves in universe by God free will. Human being goes where God free will has determined, whether wants to go there or not. Wherever a person goes has in some way been worked out by God free will.

[@hannahsandbrook5695]

does anyone know the name of the man speaking with Galen?

[@senjinomukae8991]

fuck this is so right and blew my mind. this guy is right.

[@JohnHarmer]

Galen Strawson is the dude

[@jamesruscheinski8602]

God free will is unity of the universe. God has determined free will to be the unity for universe.

[@neilcreamer8207]

Robert has been talking about this for years and still confuses consciousness with the contents of experience.

[@JustAnswers359]

upbringing, genetics and even when you factor in everything, things still dont dictate 100% of our actions. So we still have limited degree of freedom

[@shayson1357]

They actually do... even the difference between 1 or 2 spoons of sugar today can be the difference between your brain choosing my left or right hand in a game 10 years from now... everything you watch or read or hear or feel alters your brain structure changing the way you think a little bit.

[@hermansohier7643]

If there's no such thing as a self who would have that free will ?That's the basic question,what or where is that self ?

[@cchang2771]

The reason Strawson thinks his arguments is right regardless can be illustrated by the following. Jenifer and Alice are sisters who need to select a color for their dress to attend a party. Jenifer is color blinded so their mother made the choice for her. Alice is not color blinded but finds it difficult to decide on a color, so she asks their mother to also choose for her. The mother told Alice no, you are fully able to make a free choice and I will not take that choice away from you. You have to decide yourself. So Alice could not to not make a choice herself. If god gives me the capability of free will, Strawson would say that since I cannot reject this capability, I do not have free will. Namely, I do not have the free will to not have free will. So he is always right.

[@alecdamitz8851]

The strangest thing is that so many intelligent people wave free will away like it's nothing. Doing so implies that the self, or the conscious mind, is illusory. But if the self is an illusion, who is it an illusion to? Decartes had his shortcomings, but "I think therefore I am" is particularly relevant in this time of doubting even the most self-evident truths. Once you take the simple first step of acknowledging that you yourself aren't an illusion, you can embrace the reality of choice and the freedom that comes with it. Metaphysically there are clearly difficulties explaining consciousness and free will, but let's not do away with our most immediate experiences because we have yet to understand the nature of them.

[@samuelstephens6904]

Alec Damitz I think there is an important distinction to be made between consciousness and the self. The former can’t be an illusion, the the latter can and I would argue is. Things are happening for sure. But there doesn’t seem to be a “center” to it so to speak. Where does one’s self begin and end with respect to the rest of the world? So while I agree that free will and the self are two sides of the same coin, rejecting free will is not to reject an experiential reality.

[@PhatLvis]

Strawson's syllogism is casuistic in the manner of Zeno's paradoxes.

[@SteveRayDarrell]

but couldn't your "soul" or whatever it is that causes consciousness work differently than our physical world and hence somehow have the ability to choose without having any preferences? To somehow be actually causa sui?

[@nemanjasaric9052]

One man believes he has free will and another knows he doesn't. These two men are not on the same intellectual level

[@joshwalker2644]

Seems like the argument that "you can't be the cause of yourself," is based on a specific conception of temporarily that needs to be justified. If my being extends beyond the linear time that I current perceive, why can't I simultaneously be the cause and consequence of myself?

[@joshwalker2644]

In the video he has stated that he is happy to allow me a soul. And we know from physics that our common-sense linear perception of time does not correspond to time as it exists as an objective physical phenomenon. So how can we know that my soul does not experience time in some unfamiliar way that allows it to be the cause of myself? I don't think this is such a ridiculous objection; retrocausality is a concept that has attracted considerable attention in both philosophy and physics.

[@samuelstephens6904]

This still gets you caught in the regress. What is the “I” that is causing something? What defines it? What responsibility do you have for it to be the way it is?

[@epicbehavior]

We can’t help but believing in it except for those of us who don’t, but not because we chose not to. 😂

[@irrelevant2235]

The title of "Mysteries of Free Will" may as well be "Mysteries of Unicorns" because both Free Will and Unicorns do not exist.

[@bozo5632]

I think the problem is with the understanding of what "you" is.

[@colinjava8447]

Yes, in a sense of "you is your entire body" then you are making decisions freely. But then again, if you look at it deeper you are not, as your body is just a machine acting accordingly within the laws of physics, not independent of them. Also, it's not just your brain that is causing you to do stuff, it's the whole universe (or a bit of it) that affects what you do. So in some sense you aren't just your body/brain but the entire universe.

[@bozo5632]

@@colinjava8447 I think the only important "you" is your entire body, which includes brains and brain by-products. If you lose a limb, there's less of you. Your brain doesn't have a body - your body has a brain. And it's part of a larger context outside your body, as you said. And in regard to free will, I think we confuse our sense of self, our thoughts, our minds and our whole minds (including unconscious stuff), and then we confuse that with our whole selves, which includes kidneys and skin and stuff. We have as much free will as any mammal. We sometimes have more options to choose from, but I think our reptile brains and mammal brains make most of the big decisions.

[@caricue]

@@colinjava8447 Now Colin, you know very well that you are not a machine. A machine is an apparatus constructed by humans to do a specific task. A human is an evolved organism with no programmer or designer, that is a unified whole, and not made up of parts. I maintain that living is the key word. You are made up of living matter which does many things that dead matter doesn't. As a living creature, you are able to make choices from the available options, based on biology, instinct, experience, perception, interpretations, morals, predictions of future events, extrapolations and so much more than the cause and effect of dead matter. Most of us are happy to call this ability to choose Free Will. If you want some cosmic freedom, stick with religion.

[@colinjava8447]

@@caricue Well that's just semantics as to what you wanna define as a machine. Course humans are made of parts, it goes all the way down to chromosomes, molecules, atoms and beyond to subatomic particles. On a practical level you feel like you are making choices but in an absolute sense you are not. It depends what you define you to be, but even if you is your whole body, then it maybe making decisions but it's only responding to the laws of physics ultimately, your body isn't acting outside of nature, it is nature. So everything else, like instinct, perception... It's just down to the laws of physics again. The notion of free will makes no sense.

[@caricue]

@@colinjava8447 No, my friend, YOUR notion of free will makes no sense. MY notion of free will makes perfect sense. You even acknowledged that in your response. On a practical level you are making choices (your words). In an absolute sense, you are not (your words again). My free will exists in the real world of physical beings, your concept of "ultimate" free will cannot exist because it would require acting outside of nature (your words). You seem to be fixated on the old religious idea of ultimate or metaphysical free will. That's something that you need to work out between you and sky daddy.

[@cheshirekershaw]

This "logic" relies on supposing that our will (free or not) can only be judged retrospectively. Well, if you look at it that way, of course it seems like there was no freedom at all. It happened how it happened because of the way you were. But right now -- in this very moment -- the will is alive and well. Strawson is wrong.

[@jonahsd1818]

But even in the very moment you don’t have free will every thought every decision is still a product of the way you are which you did not choose we have no control over anything in the very moment or not and thinking about it retrospectively is the only possible way to think about it and the only way to analyze free will at all

[@lisadabbs2181]

If we don't have free will, why not just sit by the side of the road and watch the grass grow, but that is a choice too.

[@theophilus749]

Galen's case rests upon his premise that we cannot help being the way we are. This is not obviously altogether true. The way we are could (I would say does) include a capacity for making rational decisions that, in turn, can affect the way we become. We are simply not as helpless as Strawson seems to think. We just _can_ be held responsible - to some extent - for the way we are. The big question left dangling is whether we could have a free capacity for such self-making if the world were entirely deterministic. I don't see that we could. But since we have every reason to suppose we _do_ have such a capacity, it follows that the world cannot be entirely deterministic.

[@әәә-ч4б]

.

[@caricue]

What an inane premise. "You do what you do because of who and what you are." So therefore you can't choose. Would he like it better if I do things because of who he is, or someone else? Of course I do what I do because of who I am, and most of who I am is based on the choices I've made in life, good or bad. None of that negates the natural phenomena of living creatures being able to choose from the available options based on local conditions. How you feel about the effect on moral responsibility does not negate the actual reality of living organisms moving through the world with intention and goals.

[@aldenchan8324]

I agree that experiences make up who you are. However, I don't agree on Galen's definition of an experience. He says that you can't change an experience therefore you can't change who you are. However, this premise assumes that we know we had an experience in the first place. I don't think we would know if we've had an experience or not because all we have left of the experience is a memory. If this is true, then experiences can be defined as memories, not something that definitively happened in the physical world. Now based on this definition, Galen's first premise would be wrong because not only can you change memories, they might not even be right in the first place. It has actually been proven [citation needed] that our brain can (mis)remember memories up to half the time. This is why eye witness testimonies aren't always a reliable source in a court of law. If his Galen's first premise is false, then you can change who you are, meaning you do have free will.

[@theswank3847]

But you do not have control over misremembering a memory. You cannot choose to forget about or change a memory. If you do forget a memory, it is due to circumstances out of your control.

[@subplantant]

"having a memory" "misremembering something" "forgetting something" are all experiences too.

[@maikus422]

@@subplantant everything is experience

[@subplantant]

@@maikus422 Well, only if it is experienced!

[@piotrkupka2575]

The thoughts are like wild horses grazing on a large meadow of creativity, but you can tame them and ride them in the direction of your choice - it happens due to the power of concentration. When I play music in a concert no other thought comes to my consciousness except those which are connected to the piece. You can also be the judge of the thoughts emerging in your brain and you can decide which one to dismiss and which one to cheerish. If the free will wouldn't egsist, we should make always the same decisions facing the same kinds of situations and we would never be able to "learn" from our own mistakes. There would be also no single smoker who quitted smoking. What we do on every day's basis is to 98% unconscious and it's like a program of a computer or a tape - the consciousness occupies the remaining 2%, but combined with the willpower in a given amount of time it has the ability to rewrite the tape and to change the program.

[@theswank3847]

But the thoughts you choose to tame are because of your previous experiences, of which, you have no control over

[@piotrkupka2575]

@@theswank3847 Yes. That's why you cannot change the past. Dealing with your thoughts however anables you to change your future, whatever origin they may have. Your present state is the result of your past - also of all your choices you have made in the past. Your future is the result of the decisions you are making now. Your 2%, that tiny but effective weapon are conscious thoughts. They empower you to change the "program". To concentrate, to use conscious thinking costs energy and can be exhosting. No wonder many people choose too often not to think or not to think enough. This is also a kind of decision - with a potential to influence the future.

[@theswank3847]

@@piotrkupka2575 Yes but the way you deal with those thoughts are from past experiences and variables out of an individual's control. A person born in the slums of Somalia is unlikely to be a UFC champion who is able to compete with Connor McGregor - no matter how hard they work. Thus, they are less likely to think about that.

[@piotrkupka2575]

@@theswank3847 That's true! Also you starting thinking from today on cannot compete with you starting using the power of consciousness since the elementary school time. With every single decision you change your future self just a little bit but a totality of many similar decisions makes a big difference over time.

[@hadesflames]

It's actually pretty obvious when you give it any thought at all. If people truly had free will, addiction would be impossible.

[@infov0y]

I'm not sure Strawson's "the way you are" has to be the kind of essential thing I think he needs it to be for this argument to work. It could just be how you define yourself - an impression of how you are - based on what you always or most often have done in the past, from habit, or biological & cultural influences. But those choices still could have been free ones, and you could still be free to act differently in the future, contra "what you are" now, becoming something different. In other words, 'the way you are' are could be nothing more than a statistical aggregate of the results of your previous free decisions.

[@terje1228]

How, exactly, does that undermine the argument?

[@piehound]

I would tend to accept this (Galen Strawson) view of free will. Compare this with what Alan Watts says about self - improvement.

[@LukaszStafiniak]

Free will is an algorithmic abstraction, it's a property of the decision algorithm of a self-modeling autonomous agent. It's approximated to various degrees by human minds.

[@giannidematteo2596]

Galen Strawson's argument conflates libertarian free will with freedom from outside influence. Libertarian free will is the ability to choose between real options without being compelled by outside forces, such that you could have chosen otherwise should you have so decided. It does not mean being free to make a decision without being influenced at all by internal or external factors. Arguing that either our decisions must be completely uninfluenced by outside factors to be free or completely determined seems to be an either/or fallacy. Advocates of libertarian free will recognize that humans are influenced by many factors outside their control and have limited choices available to them in any given circumstance. In other words, libertarian free will does not require a universe without causal relationships or non-contingent beings to be logically coherent. Deductive arguments, such as Strawson's, have a type of intuitive appeal; however, their relationship to our actual world and our empirically observable decision-making processes is unclear. When a modern advocate of Libertarian free will suggests we can make a free-will decision, they are arguing for a more modest proposition. Put simply, humans can make decisions free from fate or natural laws that preordain their decisions. That still allows for many decisions humans cannot make. In other words, we agree that we may not be completely free, but we disagree that we need to be completely free to make a genuine decision between limited options.

[@cabellocorto5586]

>Put simply, humans can make decisions free from fate or natural laws that preordain their decisions. This really is just an assertion without any form of plausible argumentation. How do you figure? We're a part of nature. Wouldn't anything we do be a part of nature? How does any decision we make not have a causal element behind it when everything else does? What makes us exempt in this sphere? >In other words, we agree that we may not be completely free, but we disagree that we need to be completely free to make a genuine decision between limited options. Then you're not free. There's no half-measures here. Either you're free or you're not. You're conflating making a decision with freedom. Decisions are made by animals all the time, do animals have free will? We typically do not talk about animals as though they do. But even if they did, a decision being made doesn't have to be an expression of freedom. Computers make decisions all the time based on algorithms and heuristics.

[@preasidium13]

There is still a fear of determinism from internal factors. Depending upon one’s theory of action, Intellectual determinism can be a serious concern. Additionally, even if one is constrained to a certain end but free in regards to a certain set of choices we can still genuinely question whether this freedom is meaningful enough to be what we call “free decision” (such as being determined to eat cereal but free to choose which cereal one eats). From these considerations, I wouldn’t say modest variants of libertarian free will get off so easily.

[@stephenlawrence4821]

Mystery? Or just a mistake over what it is to have options we can select? I'm quite sure it's the latter and philosophers should be making this quite obvious for people to see.

[@matthewteal7134]

Freewill is choice..

[@jamesgraham4242]

That's quite Hegelian. If you were going to attempt to provide a causal explanation for your existence then you would have to include and begin with your existence. That is, not a collection of particular properties you may or may not possess...but the fact that you exist. But that is the cause...because it cannot be any external, other, outside or alien agency. To be responsible means you cannot owe your existence to another. It's you and no one else to blame. But that's you. What happens when you enter into relations with others is something else.

[@morphixnm]

So a few things: 1. As pointed out several times in various ways in the many comments below, if there is no free will then Strawson and Kuhn are like billiard brains, and nothing they think or say has any more truth or utility to it than anything anyone else has said or will ever say on this or any other topic. 2. Any attempt on their or anyones part to say otherwise, whether based on Darwinian ideas about how some thoughts and activities in fact are superior by virtue of their greater survival value, or that some brain algorithms are more direct or functionally "effective" than others, etc. would of course all be nothing but further billiard brain outputs. In other words, if we are just billiard brains then all ideas are inescapably nothing but bouncing billiard brain balls. 3. Given the above two epistemological points, all apparent progress, good and evil, life in total is pointless in terms of our "knowing" a better or worse direction. Even the pursuit of pleasure and avoidance of pain, as a chosen way to operate, would be determined, so no point trying to justify that approach even as an escape or last resort. No first, no last, just billiard brain balls rolling around all the way down and all the way up, and no one has a cue. So to Kuhn's credit, he tries to find a way that consciousness could somehow introduce a novel element into mentality, but Strawson discounts the attempt by granting any such element and saying that whatever you wish to add into the soup, the soup is whatever it is, and what it does is the result of what it is. But this is clearly wrong, as Strawson wants to impose the idea that there can be no ingredient that is categorically different from all others in the soup (dualism). Or that every ingredient in the soup has a categorically free-wheeling aspect (maybe panpsychism). If for the sake of argument we adopt the billiard brains premise, then Strawson's insistence that there cannot be a categorically different free will ingredient we can just ascribe to his inherent billiard brain mental output. But if we do not accept the billiard brain premise for ourselve and choose to seek a further answer, Strawson must (as always) take our position to be another billiard brain statement like all others. However, as non-subscribers to his premise, we reman free (in our own minds) to believe he is not actually a billiard brain, but just thinks he is and has made a choice to continue believing it, regardless of possible paths to the contrary. Conclusion: When up against a mind that thinks itself to be a billiard brain, grant him or her their premise and let them know that you are going to treat them accordingly, taking everything they feel, think, say and do as just so many grains of mental salt, forming simple or complex patterns as the deterministic winds may blow them, with none having more or less import or meaning then then other billiard brains deterministically ascribe to them. If you, on the other hand, do not think you are a billiard brain, then also freely understand that we know very little about the true nature of ourselves or the universe, but trust your gut and your mind that there is something in us beyond the tenets of physicalism. That is the only sense of things that has a prayer of answering questions about free will, not to mention many of the others. It is also the only hope we have to someday advance beyond crass materialism and the endless justifications given for destructive behavior. Never surrender, and let billiard brains be.

[@hn6187]

Most can be responsible for who they are... "not murdering" doesn't require much finesse. This discussion about free will needs honing to specific contexts. As in I can't be responsible for precise positioning of ions on microtubules in the brain but can lift a breaker of water to my face when sober. Strawson is slippery,

[@MOHNAKHAN]

Well explaination in terms of science...👍👍👍

[@jamesruscheinski8602]

Humans are conscious through free will from God. Humans are responsible through consciousness from free will, not through political central government. Free will is from God, and only worked out with God.

[@sebastianbaezacontreras9365]

The only random thing in the universe is the quantum randomness but, to the human scale, the quantum randomness act stadisticly in normal way (gaussian curve), so all the things are predictible in the macroscale, ergo free will is just an ilusion, but the best thing about that is doesn't change nothing in our common day (by now). The problem is, that the human can't estimate the future with all the variables in the open sistem that the universe is. Everything is written, you like or not, al least in macroscale.

[@konnektlive]

Well, it seems these guys did not have the free will to choose to have this conversation either ^^ This conversation was just a brute force of the nature and had to happen exactly between these two guys on this specific 'topic' (which is also picked up by nature!). The very fact that you are talking about the so-called impossibility of freewill is the very (seemingly) paradoxical indication that there exists a kind of freewill, period. In fact, if this is true, then the nature should by definition be absolutely conscious, hence everything is conscious, kind of a so-called panpsychic view is not it? ... BTW, discussing about freewill and knowing its nature, requires knowing the nature of mind, consciousness and brain; so far though based on many well known neuroscientific researches and many studies done in the consciousness studies, we know that we barely know anything about the brain and how it truly works. We also don't know what's the nature of consciousness and there is a huge debate on such topics in the scientific and philosophical communities. In my opinion though, free will is just another anthropomorphic concept and only has meaning where there is language, by which one can express one's thought on the topic which is also limited by the language. In a way the topic of free will is a glitch caused by the problem of language which then leaked to all other philosophical fields as well. Free-will means having the will to imagine, think and act freely; but what is the nature of 'will'? What is the nature of the sense of 'freedom'? Intuitively we exemplify freedom when a prisoner gets out of the prison or when a bird escapes of a bird cage, or when someone is 'free' so criticise the society's norms, but is our definition of freedom is really correct? What if I say, real freedom is when one consciously realizes that one's self-conscious sensory experiences, one's canonical point of view of the 'external world' (which is limited in time and space), and one's sense of identity only imitate and simulate the sense of freewill as again 'language' defines for us individual self-conscious entities? That the true free-will is the will to realize that fact and wilfully try to be awakened of such illusion of individuality by realizing one absolute eternal consciousness (which is the very antithesis of freewill as it is normally defined)? I'm not saying I necessarily believe this is true but see my point? In other words, one's definition of freedom maybe the other's definition of slavery. For instance, in many mystical traditions in both East and the West, we have the esoteric tradition of some very difficult meditation methods with which one eventually realizes (not just theoretically but also experimentally) that one's seemingly solid sense of personal identity is although relatively real, but is ultimately fake and unreal in compare to the absolute nature of consciousness which stands beyond personhood, individuality, identities and attributes. And in many of those traditions they try to both experimentally, practically and intellectually realize the true nature of consciousness by first negating the reality of their own ego, and then being awakened 'as the true absolute consciousness'. In this sense, real freedom is simply defined as giving up the merely sense of freedom to acquire the 'true freedom', which can be interpreted by many as a kind of religious slavery! ...

[@tripp8833]

You clearly don't understand their argument.

[@konnektlive]

Well thanks for your very constructive response. Anymore free assertions to throw around? Teenage behaviour at its best ^^

[@TheFrygar]

No. It is not a "paradox" that free will doesn't exist and yet people talk about free will. It's quite simple: you *feel* like you have free will to talk about free will, but in reality you don't, it is determined.

[@konnektlive]

Well, wish everything was as simple as you want it to be. Really, wish I also could see the world as only black and white sometimes, but unfortunately I can't. If anything, in describing the definitions and to try explaining the nature of freewill is anything but simple. Of course for many people such as most theologians, religious and ideological thinkers, some simple minded scientists, the answer is easy, there either IS a freewill or IS not. My approach though is different as I explained earlier, the challenge is not even about the existence of freewill, before everything we need to make sure what do we really mean by saying 'freewill', we need to be able to accurately explain what do we mean by that when we use such a term in language. There are many variables in between though, cultures, society, environment, history, politics, philosophical traditions, subjective experiences, objective scientific advancements and developments when it comes to neurosciences and consciousness studies and so on and so forth... I already explained in a bit more details what I meant by that. But I also recommend people to read more about the fundamental challenges when it comes to defining the nature of what is being defined as 'chance' or seemingly 'chaos' in language. What do we mean by it? Does randomness exist the way we define it? Then why generating random numbers is eventually an impossible task by human being? What do we mean by determinism? What to we mean by time? Is the nature of time really linear? Does time exists even where/when there is no conscious observer existing, to observe the duration of change and movement? Can we equate the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle and the pre-measured/pre-observed status of wave-function before collapse in QM as a random state? How? And many many other related questions... I think to really understand the problems fundamentally we need to tackle the roots of it, Wittgenstein's language theory, Derrida's deconstruction, Heidegger's critique of science, Chomsky's hard materialistic ideas, Chalmers's unique ideas and approach for the nature of consciousness and its consequences for concepts such as freewill and action and many others... are perhaps a good beginning when it comes to understanding the nature of language, mind and conscious/subconscious behaviours.

[@Earthad23]

konnektlive you don’t get it

[@eddieking2976]

I cannot will myself to not like chocolate, therefore no freewill.😎👍

[@dannyvalastro2974]

The music we like is determined if you hate a certain singer you cant change your mind and like him you cant make yourself like chocolate ice cream if you hate it we all like certain things in order too have a free will you must be able too choose differently you cant like chocolate if you dont like it

[@chrisbennett6260]

that it explains it crap

[@totalfreedom45]

What is the *ego?* It’s a bundle of memories in an empty shell, the *twisted* product of our evolutionary animal heritage where self-preservation is essential for survival: all animals pursue pleasure, avoid pain, and avoid being killed by another animal owing to the instinct of self-preservation. *We all* have that unnecessary product reinforced by heavy societal conditioning except for one known case-Gautama Buddha. The ego has created beliefs like soul, spirit, God, the hereafter, and so on. Moreover it looks like scientific determinism, the basis of all modern science, governs not only physical processes but also our brain/mind: _For example, a study of patients undergoing awake brain surgery found that by electrically stimulating the appropriate regions of the brain, one could create in the patient the desire to move the hand, arm, or foot, or to move the lips and talk. It is hard to imagine how free will can operate if our behavior is determined by physical law, so it seems that we are no more than biological machines and that free will is just an illusion._ -Stephen Hawking, _The Grand Design,_ 32, 2010

[@dannyvalastro2974]

In order too have a free will we must choose who we are born we cant I certainly would not choose too ge a Hitler or serial killer but if you were born Hitler you would have made the same choices he made

[@mawrak]

He is correct about everything.

[@senjinomukae8991]

Holy shit this guy fucked me up. Holy shit.

[@Pietrosavr]

Premise 1: We do what we do because of the way we are Premise 2: To be truly responsible for what we do when we act, we need to be truly responsible for how we are Conclusion: We cannot be ultimately responsible for the way we are, therefore we cannot be free I disagree with the first premise, we do what we do because we want to, not because of the way we are. The first premise assumes that we are in a determined state a priori, it does not consider that we can be in a superposition, and thus have the possibility of choice, which makes it a circular argument. I say that the self is that which chooses between the possible states. I disagree with the concept that indeterminism doesn't help, you automatically assume that there is some indeterministic event that is not you that manipulates you. I say no, you are that event, it is you, it is your self, you control you, in an indeterministic way, based on how you want to be not on how you are.

[@DestroManiak]

Premise 1: I disagree with the first premise, we do what we do because we want to, not because of the way we are. Premise 2: You want what you want, because of the way that you are.

[@Pietrosavr]

@@DestroManiak I don't agree with your second point. You don't want what you want because of the way you are, there is no 'because' no further reason why you want what you want, the desire is fundamental and hence unexplainable.

[@magnumopus8202]

I disagree with the first premise... the free will he's talking about is literally the free will to do anything without limits ... meaning since we are not all knowing, powerful and self creating we have no free will ... there is no other conclusion you can draw from this and then you say I take into account genetic make up , the survival imperatives like you have no choice but to eventually eat, sleep and drink etc if you want to survive or nature doesnt let you live, and aslo your environment and how that shapes your decision making process which is all based on what you had no free will in determining in the first place ( family, status, location, environment) because you would be totally different if you were raised and brought up/formed from a different set of people and circumstances... but because only 95% and not 100% of our decisions are subconsciously made, that leaves us with the ability to change our habits and our life in general ... and yes, we have very little free will, but fore whatever circumstance we are in, we always get to choose A or B ... now one may say, the fact that you don't get to choose C through Z, you don't have a real free will because any option you determine to be right for you can only be the ones already in existence... but you can always invent new options ... which may be sourced and inspired by a "closed system" (what exist due to cause and effect of any kind) but still you can fasion that new option to your liking... and yes, you maybe limited to the materials that already exist ( your mind included) to form your new physical or mental ideas (yet another limit on your free will )...but with all this in mind, maybe we don't have a will that's necessarily "free", but maybe one that's free to use what has been made available to it ... and I'll take a little freedom over none any day #peace

[@sunbear3324]

You said "you can fashion that option to your liking", however that very "liking" of yours won't be chosen by you in any meaningful way, we don't decide what we like or want. And yes, there might be hard, conflicting choices but the strongest desire will come out on top in the end, if it didn't, it wouldn't be the strongest desire and something else would instead.

[@Salv-lj8kj]

Very weak. We all act as though we have free will, including guys like Sam Harris, because we in fact do have free will. Everyday we reason and conduct conversations both of which require the ability to direct our thoughts. If the ability to direct our thoughts is not an act of free will I do not know what is. When we reason or analyze something or engage in problem solving it is nearly always the case that there is an intention to achieve an end that occurs first. And then, following this intention, the thoughts arise sequentially to achieve that end...the end precedes the means...Aristotle's Final Causes. This is the definitive proof that we have free will...and fools who deny free will ironically make use of this facility of mind everyday yet are too blinded by Ideology to recognize and accept it.

[@jrodtriathlete]

He's functioning on the strongest sense of the PSR. He's presuming that there are no contingent objects. In my humble opinion, this is the same mistake Spinoza made. If you don't make the assumption that all truths are necessary then you can posit that perhaps some minds have contigent agency. And if agency by nature is contingent then you don't need to explain why A rather than B. A is explained by the agent's choice and B is explained by the fact that there can be no good explanation due to the nature of contingent agency. In other words, the infinite regress terminates in a source that is *essentially* open to possibilities. It's not arbitrary because the continent agent has a reason for 'A' and it's not brute because you have an explanation for why there can be no explanation for not 'B'. This is only theory, of course, but if supported it means free will is definitely not impossible as Strawson suggests.

[@hn6187]

In a large number of contexts we absolutely do have a stochastic free will

[@JimJWalker]

5:25 let the interviewer's word salad begin!

[@DestroManiak]

None of this channel would have existed if the interviewer couldnt prime these people to say this stuff in the first place...

[@dannyvalastro2974]

You cant pick and choose who we are born if we were created Hitler we would have made the same choices he made and that is a scary thought how many would choose too ge a serial killer

[@earthjustice01]

This is really a reducto ad absurdum argument. Something is wrong with the premises. Two big standouts: the concept of free will, and the concept of cause. Obviously we are responsible - that's what it means to be an adult, after all. Obviously, we can freely choose what we want. This doesn't change if everything is caused. There is a difference between choosing to act and acting because a voice in our heads told us to. There is a difference between human behavior and animal behavior. To oversimplify in a Kantian fashion - animals act according to the dictates of nature, whereas humans create their own nature. The concept of cause is problematic, because using it consistently implies that there is no room for free will. The concept of free will is problematic, because it seems absurd to think that each one of us can somehow initiate the whole causal process by ourselves, absent of external causes. It's basically a clash between two intuitions about reality, not between two realities.

[@cabellocorto5586]

>Obviously we are responsible - that's what it means to be an adult, after all. Responsibility doesn't really exist. You can be held responsible for something you didn't do if enough people agree to hold you responsible. We used to hold people responsible for epileptic fits because we believed that people had control over it and brought it about due to satanic worship. People hold themselves responsible for things they didn't do if they suffer from paranoia or depression. Whether or not you're responsible for something is ephemeral. >To oversimplify in a Kantian fashion - animals act according to the dictates of nature, whereas humans create their own nature. This really comes from the egotistical reading of the Bible quote that God "made man in his own image". We believe ourselves separate and above nature, but we are consistently subject to all the same laws as every other creature. If everything is caused by something, there is no "free" there. "Free" implies a break from the causal chain of events, and there doesn't seem to be anything in the universe that is exempt from this, only our belief that we are exempt from this. We might *feel* that we are free, which is something that Galen said. The feeling of freedom there exists, but it is not an actual freedom. The more information we have on a subject, the less free we are in it. In lieu of information about the future, we consider ourselves free actors in its presence.

[@earthjustice01]

@@cabellocorto5586 , you have to admit that humans have infinitely more choices than animals have. Physically, that means something. We call it "freedom" and we believe that we have it. We contrast that with the presupposition that everything is caused. Actually believing in determinism can lead to a more inhibited life, as we simply forgo possibilities in our minds. This expansion of potential compared to animals corresponds to a different reality for humans. It transcends both the metaphysical doctrine of determinism and the physical and mental limitations of animal kinds. This is not some kind of magical transformation, it is a different kind of reality due to the expansion of social and mental capacity.

[@rub3n410]

dude sounds and kinda looks like Liam Neeson

[@epicbehavior]

There is no mystery.

[@levimark548]

3:28 - 3:40 what people often miss

[@sebastianverney7851]

.. We are the recipients of everything that happens to us, not its author. To my mind the belief which many hold, especially in the west, that we make our lives, is a complete delusion. We make nothing, nothing physical, nothing mental. We are merely the experiencer, as the red hot iron on the anvil is the experiencer of the hammer. Nietzsche ("God is dead") got it so wrong, and so do all those Aries people who believe that they make their worlds. They have received that belief, but they think it's their own. I would challenge Nietzsche and all these Aries people to name one single thing that they have created themselves. Of course they can't name anything because there isn't anything. Not even our will is ours. Listen to Galen Strawson talking here, he talks quietly and clearly.

[@charlesbrightman4237]

I don't have total freewill otherwise I could choose to consciously live throughout all of future eternity or not. Currently, it appears that I am destined to die, forget everything I ever knew and experienced, and will most probably be forgotten one day in future eternity as if I never ever existed at all in the first place. And this was apparently how it was to be before I even ever was. If that is not pre-destiny, then what else would it be called? It currently seems that no matter what my unconscious, sub-conscious, or conscious mind decides, nature seems to have the last say in it all.

[@charlesbrightman4237]

mebe84 But, was it your conscious mind deciding that or your sub-conscious and/or even unconscious mind deciding that before your conscious mind registered it and thinks it decided that? But consciously choose to have an actual eternal conscious existence and see how that works out. As to your second comment, I believe energy interacting with energy causes things to occur. With that said, while energy interacting with energy at it's basic level would be our unconscious mind and even maybe our sub-conscious mind, the interaction of all those energies takes on a life so to speak of it's own. That what we would call 'consciousness'. Then, this 'higher consciousness' of our own could also possibly interact with the very energy that allows it to exist and do what it does, and basically 'pushes back' or 'redirects' the flow of energy within our physical brain. If anything at all, that would be the only way how I currently could see where we could have any 'freewill' at all. But, as I don't know what I don't know, I will be the first to admit that I could be wrong. But, it makes sense to me, or at least how my unconscious and/or sub-conscious mind wants me to think.

[@charlesbrightman4237]

mebe84 I guess I would have to utilize science to describe myself: Modern science states that energy cannot be created nor destroyed. So, either energy is eternally existent, or modern science is wrong. Modern science states that we have new cells that come into existence inside of our body on a daily basis. This appears to be really true. So, since I currently have a body with energy and cells in it: A part of me is eternally existent and a part of me is being born anew on a daily basis. My current body extends from eternity past until now. Rising to a higher level of thought, the 'now' that I currently exist in is 'eternal'. I am currently existing in the 'eternal now'. I am currently an actual eternally consciously existent entity existing in the eternal now. Now also, 'if' my latest TOE idea is correct, that what is called 'gravity' is a part of the 'em' photon and that the 'gem' photon is the energy unit of this universe, (everything in existence are photons and interacting photons), then: I am currently an actual eternally consciously existent being of light existing in an environment entirely made up of light, all existing in the eternal now. Continuing on: 'if' I am correct that the 'gem' photon makes up space and time itself, ('space' being energy itself and 'time' being the flow of energy), then I am a very part of space and time itself. All things in existence are energy and interacting energy, including what is referred to as 'my consciousness'. 'I' am energy existing in energy. 'I' am the net interactions of 'gem' photons all interacting in a coherent manner. As energy is eternally existent, so would I be 'if' I choose to remain so. But I don't want to remain so throughout all of future eternity, so I will decompose the coherency of my being into 'non-existence' for me throughout all of future eternity as if I never ever existed at all in the first place. So when you ask, 'What are you?' 'I' am coherent interacting energy that will one day no longer be coherently interacting. I will go back to from whence 'I' came.

[@jamesgraham4242]

It's false. There's only one word for freedom the rest are in order. Without denying the existence of what's known, in order, that doesn't mean we have to comply, agree with or be constrained by what also exists in time and place. Freedom means you're not stopped by what's in order from moving away from it or leaving it, historically. Also, knowledge comes with implicit or explicit set standards. We can't stop at that either, if we intend to raise the standard. Freedom doesn't mean doing anything in order and you don't have to invoke it at every turn and reject every order all of the time. Does the sun stop shining and cease to exist when you invoke your freedom from it? Yes it does. With respect to the order of knowledge you had about the sun, if you thought that was inadequate and untrue likely you thought to be free of it in favour of discovering a true and better or higher standard form or order of words. Also, because things are on the move you don't want to stop at an out of date definition about what's happening with the sun...that was last year. Limitations are limited. There is no 100% perfect, fail safe, foolproof order or control. But freedom is no excuse to be stupid and silly or unreasonable.

[@gsilcoful]

Explain responsibility to me. I feel lost here.

[@Earthad23]

gsilcoful everything you do you’ve done, you can’t describe a universe in which you didn’t do the things you’ve done, essentially the best way to break this down is this, you have a will it’s just not free.

[@gsilcoful]

I have a will, it's just not free. Okay. Thanks. Never heard it put like that before. I will be thinking about that. Thanks Jules.

[@MarioMancinelli82]

I wish i had hair

[@ItsDeanDavis]

Free. Will. Is. An. Oxymoron