Yes, that is the problem. That is why I don’t believe in materialism. You can start your own chain of causality, as I started to write after I decide, proceed further and stop whenever you want. You are simply uncaused cause/mind.
Thanks for sharing the link. I will listen to it shortly.
One of the reasons there has been so little progress in the free will/determinism debate is the issue of moral responsibility. If will is not free our entire penal system would collapse, for it is based on the idea that a person could have done otherwise (he could have chosen not to shoot that person) and therefore he can be punished for his wrongdoing. It is also assumed that if threats of punishment were not used as a deterrent, there would be more criminal acts. But this is false. As we extend the corollary, Thou Shall Not Blame, it can be clearly seen that responsibility increases with this new understanding, not decreases. This is something that has confused philosophers down through the ages for if will is not free, we cannot hold anyone responsible for what they do. The question then becomes: How is it possible not to blame and punish the terrible acts of crime that have ruined lives? The solution, however, becomes crystal clear as we see how the problem is resolved in the book Decline and Fall of All Evil. If anyone is interested in reading the first three chapters, please let me know. I will post the link again.
outstanding, peacegirl.
this knowledge draws our attention more to the environment in which people are conditioned, rather than casually ignoring it and letting it develop in ‘any ol’ direction’ it wants. but there’s a reason why there is so much opposition to the state and its controlling hand. you say:
believe it or not, most of them aren’t confused about the implications. they (the status quo or ‘ruling ideology’) actually purposely deny the non-existence of freewill because without the belief in freewill, they’d have a more difficult time keeping people in check and under control. that, and the criminal justice system is a multi-billion dollar industry; they need criminals to make money, so they would therefore pay little attention to environmental conditioning and the excessive freedoms of capitalist/consumerist society that create the criminal class.
oh hells yeah, there’s a loooong history involved in the manufactured lie of freewill… and it all began with the bright idea; how do i control someone without having to physically touch them. ah, i create in them a conscience, and teach them that doing the things that threaten my control over them, are ‘immoral’. thus began the revolt of the master class against the working class. priests, kings, capitalists… all of em. the great architects of the lie.
c’mon, man… don’t make me read the book. the last time i read a whole book, i was in solitary confinement, and i don’t plan on going back. besides, nobody reads books today. we get the cliff notes through google. just tell me bro. gimme a synopsis.
Srsly bro, if this knowledge is an actual discovery, wouldn’t it be worth your time to read a few pages in sequence? I mean, I’m sure you had to read the books of well-known philosophers, if that was your major. A cliff note is like a soundbite; it won’t do this knowledge justice. You can skip chapter One (it would be helpful to read it again, especially pages 53 to the end of the chapter). Chapter Two is where the discovery is explained. Chapter Three shows how the principle would work in a real life situation. All I ask is that you take your time and don’t rush to judgment, as many are inclined to do.
my major in school was falling asleep… then after dropping out of the eleventh grade, i majored in hanging drywall.
alright, but it better not be a mile long pdf.
There’s nothing wrong with hanging drywall. It’s an honest living!! 
Some people tell me it’s a little long-winded. It’s not a mile long. It’s a half mile. 
uhhhh… yeah, um… well, that’s not the whole truth, peacegirl.
i’ve done two terrible things in my life which i will never forgive myself for. one is peeing in the shower when i was thirteen, and the other is exploiting workers who i employed as a subcontractor. there. i said it.
i was getting $2 a board and paying my hangers $10 an hour. they could hang 50 boards in an hour… which means i was making $80 for every hour they worked, for free.
so i’ve got a pretty checkered past and have done some bad stuff… stuff i’m not at all proud of, peacegirl. but before you go judging me i want you to know i’ve changed and sworn an oath to never do those things again.
Whether you’re making this up or not, who is judging you?
We’ve got to work on your sense of humor, PG.
Okay, but how is all of this not in turn necessarily subsumed in a determined universe? From my frame of mind, what you seem to be distinguishing in regards to “I” here is the difference between having a compelled “choice” in a determined universe and having a free choice in a universe in which human autonomy exists.
What becomes paramount for you is being able to use the word “choice”.
The same behaviors will unfold only as they were ever able to, but once we “choose” to “find” these new ways, nature will then be in sync with the future as you imagine it. It is still as though our conscious minds are the driving force behind nature’s laws and not the other way around.
Hence:
How then is it not also true of our “finding” those “better ways”? And that’s before we get to the part where, with respect to any particular set of conflicting goods, we arrive at conflicting assessments of what constitutes a better or a worse future.
For example, is the future better under capitalism or socialism? Ask the folks in these camps to explain what it means to “move in the direction of greater satisfaction”.
And this is basically the charge hurled at the determinists by the free will libertarians among us: determinism is just a frame of mind that allows the losers among us to accept their fate as beyond their control.
Again, you assert this as though those who do argue for some measure of autonomy are just plain wrong. They must be wrong because you must be right. But all of this is “proven” only by the assumptions that you make in your arguments. Unlike the physicists and neuroscientists, you [and the author] don’t seem to offer the sort of evidence that is subject [empirically] to experimention, prediction and replication by others.
You “choose” to separate the wheat from the chaff here only as you were compelled to by the laws of nature…and I’m the one who doubts determinism?
Back again to that. My desire.
Perhaps an understanding of that is embedded in this…
“You may notice that there are so to say two levels of free will. On one hand you can do anything you will – and this is undeniably the freedom of mind – on the other hand however you can’t change your will.” Arthur Schopenhauer
If you are not able to desire other than that which the laws of nature compels your brain to propel you to desire then what you “choose” is only free nominally.
The psychological illusion of freedom that is no less inherently embedded in the laws of matter.
But how are the definitions that we “choose”/“desire” not in turn subsumed in nature unfolding autonomically per the laws of matter?
Think about this. Who or what gives us this ability not to make a FREE choice? God? Nature? “I”?
We don’t know. That ever and always goes back to the explanation for existence itself.
This still makes no sense to me. If the human brain is compelled to invent the game of bowling in a wholly determined universe, it seems at best we can point out that the brain reconfigured into “I” had “chose” to invent it unlike the pins that had no “choice” in falling down.
Nothing was ever able to be other than what it must be but at least “I” am not a mindless bowling pin or domino.
If I can’t say it, it was only because I was compelled never to say it. The child will be run over only because the laws of matter set into motion a sequence of cause and effect such that the child was never not going to be run over.
That’s how I imagine determinism working “for all practical purposes” out in the world of human interactions.
But I’m the first to admit my understanding of it may well be wrong.
What options in what context?
Consider:
Jane is pregnant. She doesn’t want to be.
Jean is pregnant. She doesn’t want to be.
Jane lives in a place where abortion is strictly illegal.
Jean lives in a place where under certain circumstances it is legal.
Now, how is his point illustrated in these two contexts?
Both women are faced with the same options: to abort or not to abort. They both share equally the desire to abort.
Then there are those in the pro-life movement who share a desire to argue that the only truly moral option for both women is to give birth. One insist in turn that abortion is a sin against God.
Then there are the legal authorities set up to deal with Jane if she chooses to abort her baby.
Then there are those in the pro choice camp insisting that women must be free to control their own bodies; and that Jane’s unborn embryo is not even really a human being.
Now, in a determined universe how are the individuals in these scenarios not compelled to “choose” only that which is necessarily in sync with the laws of nature?
And, in Bahman’s free-will universe, what is the “right thing to do”?
Indeed, that’s why those more content to exchange intellectual contraptions stay up in the clouds. As soon as they bring their “world of words” down to earth the actual problematic nature of human interactions begins to complicate the extent to which their definitions and meaning can be demonstrated to be the objective truth.
Suppose in a wholly determined universe in sync with the laws of matter, the human brain, in being just more matter, compels any particular “I” to choose one over the other? And then, further, is able to compel “I” to believe that she has actually chosen of her own volition to choose one rather than the other.
How do we determine definitively which is actually the case?
After all, in a dream you could choose one over the other and it is entirely the product of the chemical and neurological interactions in the brain.
Again, in a wholly determined universe, how is anything that you want not only what you are compelled to want? How is the feeling of being “trapped” not in turn wholly in sync with nature’s way?
Then [in my view] it’s straight back up into the clouds:
What on earth does this mean?
As with choosing chocolate or ice cream above, your point is reasonable only to the extent that someone shares the definition and meaning that you give to the words used in the argument.
For all you know a wholly determined universe compelled you to define them only as you ever could have.
Or, sure, maybe not.
But how is this to finally be pinned down? Intellectually in arguments or experimentally in probing brains actually functioning?
How could a penal system either collapse or not collapse other than as it was ever compelled to be given a human history that could never be other then what nature compels it to be as well?
Human morality is just another set of dominoes that came into existence naturally as a result of mindless matter evolving in life on earth evolving into the human brain evolving into human consciousness evolving into “I” compelled to believe that it is choosing freely to distinguish right from wrong so that the penal system compelled into existence can unfold only as it was ever going to.
Determinism either encompasses all matter or human consciousness [encased in the human brain] is demonstrated to be a very different kind of matter.
Unless of course I’m wrong.
Wrong because I had the capacity to choose to think about all this differently but I chose not to instead.
Given some measure of autonomy.
You are back to saying the same thing that you cannot not keep saying obviously. Your comment has been well taken.
Everything came into existence out of necessity. We are instructed, by our nature, to move in the direction of greater satisfaction which is also part of nature’s design.
Determinism does not swallow up choice. It allows for choice, although never free. Everything comes from the brain as part of matter, including our choices. Where does autonomy (or free will) enter into it?
The word ‘choice’ itself indicates there are meaningful differences
otherwise there would be no choice in the matter at all as with A and
A. The reason you are confused is because the word choice is very
misleading for it assumes that man has two or more possibilities, but
in reality this is a delusion because the direction of life, always moving
towards greater satisfaction, compels a person to prefer of differences
what he, not someone else, considers better for himself, and when two
or more alternatives are presented for his consideration he is
compelled by his very nature to prefer not that one which he considers
worse, but what gives every indication of being better or more
satisfying for the particular set of circumstances involved.
You had the capacity to choose to think about all this differently but “capacity” does not mean you could have chosen to think about all this differently. Your mindset took you in a certain direction based on your life experiences and all of the factors that led you to making this particular choice. You had no free will or autonomy to choose other than what you chose.
Both are valid. We decide and then act. We however observe fantastic correlation between what we want and what we get. Therefore we deduce that we are correct with our observation.
Dream is the result of subconscious mind activity. Conscious mind sometimes are informed about a dream.
We are partially free to do what we want in a deterministic world. I can raise my body whenever I want.
I don’t think so. Please let me know if things I said is clear.
I showed that our free decision does not depend what options are. That to me is very definition of free will.
We are sure that world is deterministic. We however are free to move freely in such a deterministic world. We are different from world.
I don’t understand this. What I am thinking here and now, like your thought of a collapsing penal system, like the fate of the penal system itself historically, would seem to be all “at one” with the only possible manner in which existence/reality can unfold in a wholly ordered universe. One entirely in sync with the laws of matter. Of which the human brain itself is entirely “at one” with.
That’s how I describe a determined universe given how I have come to understand it. And all I can do here is to openly and honestly confront the manner in which you and others think about it instead.
After all, if how I think about it is wrong and I do possess some measure of free will, I might come to change my mind. And this is because I believe that, in relationship to questions like this [as to questions revolving around moral and political narratives] “I” is an existential contraption rooted in a world of contingency, chance and change such that new experiences, new relationships and access to new ideas might precipitate a new point of view.
I merely speculate in turn that, in an autonomous universe, this is also applicable to you.
Thus…
Exactly. Nature calls the shots up and down the line. Nothing that is matter, including a particular brain compelling a particular “I” to move in a particular direction of greater satisfaction, is exempt.
And yet somehow time and again I get this sense that to you there are exceptions. It revolves around the fact that unlike dominoes we “choose” our fate. Though, to you, fate is the wrong word.
Thus…
Well, if determinism is as I understand it, it swallowed up your choice to type these words; just as it swallows whole my choice to react to it as I am here and now.
Thus, when you note things like this…
…I think, that is my point!
Which clearly indicates that I am not understanding yours.
Or: The reason I am confused is that I was never able not to be confused. And the author doesn’t choose to point this out to me, he “chooses” to.
Exactly how I would put it! Only instead of choose, I’d be compelled to opt for “choose”.
And, given some measure of free will in the is/ought world, I would also suggest that “your mindset took you in a certain direction based on your life experiences and all of the factors that led you to making this particular choice”.
The part I call dasein. “I” as an existential contraption taking particular subjective/subjunctive leaps to one or another set of moral and political prejudices. Prejudices then rooted in particular historical, cultural and experiential contexts.
In other words, the part that the objectivists here dread thinking might also be applicable to them. 
Either we are free [existentially] to deduce that we are correct with our observation, or we were never able to deduce anything other than that which the laws of matter compel us to. How then do we go beyond deduction here and intertwine the parts “in our head” in actual experiments that would demonstrate definitively which it is?
Ths stuff that neuroscientists are doing right now: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will
Instead, most of us here just “think up” things in our head about determinism and collate particular sets of assumptions into particular conclusions, the truth of which is predicated almost entirely on the initial set of assumptions themselves.
Me included.
Dreaming is the brain making choices while we are asleep. How is that the same or different from the brain making choices while we are awake?
That’s the intriguing part, right?
How is this really an answer to my question? You merely assert it as though that makes it true. You can raise your body in dreams too. Or, on drugs like LSD, believe that you raising it up through the roof. Or plagued by any number of metal illnesses and diseases of the brain, you can come to believe any number of things are true about your body that, in fact, are not true at all.
That is very true. The brain as part of and in sync with the laws of matter, can only move in one direction in this wholly determined universe.
Why is it necessary to make a distinction between a universe that is wholly determined (as we look back in hindsight) and being able to make choices based on contingency, chance and change? Once again, this “I” as part of the brain but also as the self, makes choices based on contingent circumstances. This “I” is not free even though it has the autonomy or freedom to choose one thing over another. The laws of matter do not force on us a particular choice which is what you seem to be implying.
Where does free will enter into any of this? The “I” is oftentimes subjective. There is conflict between people, their beliefs, their upbringing, their cultural and experiential contexts. And… 
Once again, you conclude that we are in agreement about this. And yet clearly we are not in sync regarding the “for all practical purposes” implications of it for human interactions. You stress the part about the human brain/mind making a “choice” while I stress the part where that “choice” [in a determined universe] merely embodies for any particular “I” the psychological illusion of free will. The illusion itself being but one more manifestation of the laws of matter unfolding as they must.
For the same reason it is necessary for you to ask me that: we were never really free not to.
In a wholly determined universe [as I understand it now], contingency, chance and change would be just different sets of dominoes toppling over only as they are compelled to given the physical, material, phenomenological laws embedded in all of nature’s interactions.
It’s just that some components of the universe are mindless and make no “choice” and others are mindful and do.
In fact, there may well be intelligent life in the universe that have advanced far beyond Earthlings in grappling with this. They may well be considerably closer to pinning down the whole truth once and for all. Even closer to grasping a complete understanding of existence itself.
But here and now that ain’t us. Or, rather, to the best of my knowledge that ain’t us.
But: How, in an entirely ordered universe, is everything that “I” think, feel, say and do, not ultimately contingent on the laws of nature themselves? When you keep insisting that, “[t]his ‘I’ is not free even though it has the autonomy or freedom to choose one thing over another”, it makes no sense to me. How, instead, is “I” not “choosing” one thing over another?
The human brain/mind is either an exception here somehow or it’s not.
Either you will succeed one day in getting me to understand this as you do, or I will succeed in getting you to understand it as I do. Or someone else will succeed in changing both our minds. The only question then is this: will this unfold given some measure of autonomy on our part or are the laws of matter set up such that there is only one way in which it can unfold? We “choose” words here that we were never able to actually choose instead. You know, in the manner in which those who embrace human autonomy use the word.
If the human brain as matter is but a force of nature and nature is but a manifestation of immutable laws applicable to all matter, then arguing as you do here is just another instance of that. Right? “I” could never buck nature and choose something out of sync with its laws. My “no” is nature’s [b]no![/b]
Of course our “choices” matter. Robert Mueller’s choice to conclude that Trump did not collude with the Russians [in a criminal context] makes all the difference in world regarding, say, the 2020 presidential election here in America. But if fate is defined as that which is “destined to happen, turn out, in a particular way” to what extent was Mueller and Trump and all the other players here ever able to think, feel, say or do anything other than what they were compelled to do over the past two years?
Were the events of the last two years ever able to be other than what they in fact were in a determined universe?
It would appear [to me] that it is difficult for me to accept this here and now because I was never able to choose – choose freely – to rethink the exchange and to come around to your frame of mind.
Perhaps nature has that in store for me in the future. But the mystery still resides in understanding how that works exactly.
So, around and around we go…
For me it’s “choose” or choose. Being confused in any particular context is either something I am able to rectify by choosing to rethink your points [enabling me to not be confused] or nature is ever and always compelling me to “choose” only that which its very laws demand.
In other words…
You mean however I “want” to frame it. I “want” only what nature compels me to want given my own understanding of determinism.
duplicate