Rene Descartes in his ruminations about the nature of the universe came to the conclusion that it was indeed a mechanistic universe except for one thing--man. Actions traceable to man's free will, he concluded, contributed the one nonmechanistic factor which could not be predicted with 100% certainty.

I pretty much agree with that, if it's based on an external influence, it's not free. I see no difference between compatabilism and determinism; compatabilists just say you can choose, but your choices are determined from your experiences and beliefs, determinists say you can't choose, because your choices (eventual actions is a better word) are determined by your experiences and beliefs. Experiences and beliefs are determined externally; when they say under different conditions you would've chosen differently (but predicatably), that's determinism. Combatabilists just change words to make it look different. This can be seen from the second sentence of wikipedia's definition.I think observational evidence would be more reliable than the musings of a philosopher. As I'll say below, there are many things that aren't determined, and science is better at finding them than philosophy. Descartes believed that the only thing you can be sure of was that you exist, and that you think, so just from there it would seem nothing else can be known with 100% certaintity. Of course, I haven't read any of Descartes work, but the main point is that philosophy can't be used well in science; much of it is ipse dixit.

Just as a side note, most (if not all) observational evidence would suggest the universe isn't wholly determined. Quantum mechanics requires that things can happen on chance alone. Some things can spontaneously come into existence, uncaused. Keep in mind random action isn't free will either.

Yeah, just look at the Big Bang. There was nothing predetermined about that was there? Unless of course the notion of predeteminism existed prior to that, right? But how could that be, unless the rules to the Universe were laid out beforehand?

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So when the body dies, and consciousness departs, where do "we" go? ... Off to define another "reality" perhaps?

Here is a long thread about free will:

http://ld4all.com/forum/?http://ld4...b6bb88c94297bf3

The discussion is long, and NDE's is also discussed in that thread. There is many with different viewpoints who has posted in that thread, and I think that thread is interesting.
And, perhaps that thread will lead to more inspiration here at Dionysus, to discuss if we have free will or not.

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The Heavenly Afterlife exist.

Hello to all,

I have recently registered with this board, and this is my very first post. I have great interest on the issue of free will vs. determinism, and I look forward to having myself enlightened by the thoughts of others, as well as contributing my own opinions. I hope I can get to meet all of you in the process.

I've spent a significant amount of time contemplating the meaning of free will ever for quite some time now, and though I am more inclined towards the belief of hard determinism, I am hoping that free will is indeed what seperates us from the physical world. But first, I'd like to get all of your opinions on what this website has to offer on "a proof of free will."

Do you believe that the "proof" is reasonable?

Greetings Imperious825, and welcome aboard!

Might I suggest they sound a bit too deterministic in the absoluteness of their approach? I don't know, it sounds too formal if you ask me, almost as if it were a form of entrapment, you know, of one's free will? But of course this is my opinion.

Or, how about this? Neither the past nor the future exists and, all that we have is the present moment, from which everything begins anew? In other words everything stems from the present moment which, is the point at which we make our decisions. And, since it's not contingent upon the past or the future which, are merely moments which have already occurred or, yet to occur, then it must amount to what we call free will. Of course I may have already mentioned this elsewhere in the thread but, I think it bears repeating ... I guess? Also, are you aware of the other thread called, Free Will, started in the Scientific Research forum?

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So when the body dies, and consciousness departs, where do "we" go? ... Off to define another "reality" perhaps?

Welcome, Impy.

I'm not sure what you mean by "hard determinism", but I assume it means something like "no free will at all". It might even include predestination. However, I'd like you to summarize. I am disinclined to go chasing links all over the internet and then try to guess which parts you find important. I'd rather hear it from you.

Frankly, I don't think anyone can make much of a case for predestination, as it implies the absence of random/chaotic events, which I believe are well established. After all, the lottery depends on them.
Iacchy, are you truly (as it appears) suggesting that nothing in our past has any effect on us? Please tell me that is not the case. I'm trying to see how one could interpret "not contingent on the past" in a different way, but I'm coming up blanks.

I'm merely suggesting that we all have the ability to catch ourselves right in the middle of what we're doing ... i.e., to the extent that we're alive and aware in the moment. Which isn't to say determinism doesn't exist, because it does, in the sense that you can't change what's already happened. And yet since everything is born of the moment, our moment of truth so to speak which, can only be recognized in the moment, then determinism must be born of free will as well or, let's say is moderated by free will. Hmm ... that almost suggests a sense of dualism now doesn't it? In which case yes, we are free to suffer the consequences.

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So when the body dies, and consciousness departs, where do "we" go? ... Off to define another "reality" perhaps?

Then you should go back and change the word "contingent" to something else. (You can do that, you know) because the way you used it is howlingly and hideously incorrect. You prove it by responding to my post. How you reply to me is contingent on on what I have said in the past.

Saying "everything is born of the moment" is either completely wrong, or completely meaningless. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume the latter, guessing that you are just issuing forth words that sound cool to you without considering what you are saying. That would make you look careless, but it is a lot more flattering than the other possibility, that you would say something that would be obviously incorrect to even a trained dog.

Oh, and your definition of determinism is, shall we say, "non-standard" too. Determinism states that the future is determined too, not just the past.

Oh yes, one other thing. If we are free to suffer consequences, are we also free to refuse to suffer consequences?

Today is the first day of the rest of your life. Now, what are you going to do about it? And let us know when you make up your mind, Okay?

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So when the body dies, and consciousness departs, where do "we" go? ... Off to define another "reality" perhaps?

And if you really want to do something about it, and make a real difference, the best way to do it is to jettison those old prescientific ideas of free will, accept that a scientific approach to human behavior is possible (think about it--if free will exists, a science of human behavior is impossible; what if gravity could choose whether or not to exist? There could be no science of physics...), and work to make the world a better place.

If God gives of Himself freely, is this in fact not called determinism? Like a promise perhaps? You know, like the promise of Eternal Life?

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So when the body dies, and consciousness departs, where do "we" go? ... Off to define another "reality" perhaps?

Not by any definition of determinism I have ever heard, no.How does this follow from your last sentence?Ever hear of a broken promise? Tell me why we should believe this one.

If God in fact says He's going to do something (of His own free will mind you), don't you think it would pretty much be etched in stone? Or, don't you God would be capable of being consistent? If that's the case, then hey I want my money back!

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So when the body dies, and consciousness departs, where do "we" go? ... Off to define another "reality" perhaps?

But you yourself said that our human perceptions may be flawed (and we actually agree on this!). How do we know that this belief that god is good is not a flawed perception on our part? How is it even possible to know something that exceeds our ability to perceive it?

Really, if nothing else, whether we can ascertain God is good or, even exists, I'm trying to show how an agent of free will would be compatible with determinism. And this I think clearly demonstrates that. By the way, if God does exist, by virtue of the fact that the Universe holds itself together so well, in a most convincing and, consistent fashion, testifies to the fact of God's goodness. Everything seems to be laid out in a matter-of-fact fashion and there's nothing duplicitous about it. In fact it would be very easy to make a promise when you have things so well arranged.

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So when the body dies, and consciousness departs, where do "we" go? ... Off to define another "reality" perhaps?

But see...this is exactly what I mean--You see a universe held together well, and I see a universe that is chaotic and inhospitable virtually everywhere! Even in this tiny slice of this infinitessimally small corner of the universe where we live, there are storms, floods, volcanoes, earthquakes, mudslides, blizzards...not to mention the stuff we do to each other. We can't live above a certain altitude, we can't live under water...what sort of a good god would trap us in such a situation?!?

So you see, the "consistency" and "goodness" of the universe are patently in the eye of the beholder, which is, as we have agreed, an imperfectly perceiving eye.

To get back to topic a bit...the perception of free will is perfectly compatible with determinism. There is no reason, under determinism, that you should not feel that you are choosing freely. But that is far removed from actual free will. In the same sense that our imperfect perception does not allow us to know anything about qualities of a god that are proposed to transcend our ability to perceive them, our imperfect perception allows us to see free will where there may be none. (I do not say "is none" because my point is that our perceptual systems cannot make this determination. As you saw in Gooze's free will thread, we can go a long way toward inferring that free will is illusory, but it is beyond our capacity to know it certainly. Or to know with certainty that we do have it. The available evidence, in my opinion, points toward determinism, and away from free will.)

Hi again,

I've ready every new post since my post, but I haven't finished reading the Free Will thread linked by Iacchus32, and I would like to finish up on that thread before I continue with the main topic of this thread.

For now, I will just clarify my current understanding of this issue to Goozle:Greetings; very nice to meet you.

"Hard Determinism" is a phrase I picked up while surfing through numerous websites pertaining to Free Will and Determinism, in which it basically means that everything that physically and mentally happens is predetermined, and the reason why I'm inclined to believe this is because of my perception of how the world (including the human mind) seems to be working--that is, you have the laws of physics, which govern all that perceivably happen in the physical world, and you have the mind, which evidently has great correspondence to the specific state of the brain (cells, neurons and whatnot), which--again, links to the laws of physics, because the brain is nothing more than physical matter. In short, I am having difficulty distinguishing between the effects of the physical laws with the effects of the brain.

As for the "proof" of Free Will, the author of that webpage reasons that determinism cannot be self-contradictory, in which (in my opinion) he vaguely demonstrates how determinism would be, if it in fact, exists. He does this by indicating that because some people do believe in a free will, it means that free will must exist, because, under the premise that you disbelieve in "falsehoods" for the benefit of understanding the free will issue, one can still believe that free will is not a falsehood. Again, I've yet to fully understand his reasoning, and as a result, I may have inaccurately described his argument--and this is where I turn to you, the members of this board, to analyse and hopefully understand his logic (or lack thereof) much better than I have, and to explain your views of his argument to me.

Yes, isn't that amazing! And yet all these possibilities had to come about first, with their proclivity to evolve and transform (hence free will?), so that we could be here. I see it as part of the overall design, however, which is necessary.

How can there be good, without something to contrast it to? In fact, there would be no way of knowing. Why? Because it would have no effect on anything. Hence, nothing would evolve.

Well, ultimately, it can only be a matter of perception, even if God did exist, because we would still be subject to that which created us. But then again, if God were the ultimate embodiment of free will, it would stand to reason that everything that proceded from it, should contain similar characteristics as well. Hmm ... While here, I suspect if all we had was determinism from the onset, nothing will have ever changed or evolved which, is a sign of free will. In other words all we would have had was nothing, from which nothing of course, could proceed.

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So when the body dies, and consciousness departs, where do "we" go? ... Off to define another "reality" perhaps?

All that stuff that is hostile to us, and you see it as evidence of a design especially for us? My word...what would it take to...never mind. You have answered that one before.Who said there was nothing to contrast to? Strawman! And we can still know one food tastes better than another, even without tasting poison!It also stands to reason that if we created god, and not vice versa, that god would contain similar characteristics as well.

Um...Evolution by natural selection fits nicely into the determinist world view. Evolution is absolutely not a sign of free will. I do not think you understand natural selection at all, Iacchus.