this is not the last word on freewill
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Random thoughts 
I’ll definitely give this a look later.
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You should
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I have a very limited attention span when it comes to online videos so I only watched this one for the first few minutes and what I’m about to write may have been addressed in the video.
My personal opinion is that “free will” isn’t a given. Sometimes it comes into play, sometimes it doesn’t. I tend to think much of our actions/reactions are simply related to events that happened to us in our early life. Certain patterns in our brains were formed based on these events and so when similar things happen later in life, our reactions are “automatic” (no free will).
However, as we progress through life, we also experience new events forcing our brains to react to something original and unique. Thus, the decisions we make based on these NEW experiences bring forth “free will.”
So bottom line, we have both.
Make sense?
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Me likes this. It feels like what I know. Or what I think I know.
I just can’t shake the notion I had no alternative to have chosen chocolate ice cream over strawberry. I like both. Have no rational reason to choose one or the other, it just depends on a whim. Or maybe I had strawberry yesterday and want something different.
It just goes against the grain of my sensibilities to assume I had no choice in the matter.
Even knowing, there are studies showing our minds were made up before we knew it was. I appreciate the argument for determinism, but just cannot embrace it. At least not yet.
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I sometimes think that the big things in our lives are driven by genetics, early childhood that make most of our life choices pre determined. But little things like which ice cream flavor you chose or what item on a large menu you pick, are totally random and have nothing to do with what I call “the larger pieces of choice”. Whether you go to college, who you marry, what job you take, where you might move to etc. are those larger pieces that could have a predetermined factor, but not the little stuff.
It’s an interesting topic and I will watch the video…later..
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It is especially the little stuff that should be of the greatest interest. Coz, if in these domains we have no choice why would think we have choice in subjects much greater
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That you chose vanilla over strawberry could be determined by several antecedents; maybe the company you have all want strawberry or you had strawberry yesterday or something else.
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Chocolate Mak. Chocolate!
Nobody wants vanilla… 🙂
There’s lots of reasons one can choose an anything. Sometimes on a whim, sometimes after some careful thought or investigation. Sometimes because of the influence of others.
There are 1000 diffent ways to make a decision. Very few ways, to fix some of our bad decisions.
If we are paying attention as we go, we try to limit our mistakes.
But full blown determinism, I suppose, does not allow for that. The illusion is a strong one. If that be the case.
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I love vanilla. Swear by it, sometimes.
If we are paying attention, we learn and improve on our decision making processes.
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I’m mortified! One of those vanilla lovers, I suppose your one of them vinegar slaw types too? 😉
There’s only one type of cole slaw worth eating and it’s mayo based!
Actually, I can tolerate a good vanilla. But it’s not my pick if anything else is available. Except sherbet, no sherbet. Absolutely non flexible on the slaw though…
I’m also a tube amp snob, and have a taste for quality optics. Just not the wallet for quality optics. (telescopes/binoculars)
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No. Mayo based cole slaw. Nothing beats a good vanilla. All other things; mint, blue berry, caramel have nothing on it.
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Well, it does but unless we can agree on a definition for free will, it seems you will find yourself in a bind, believing both that our behaviour is determined- through past events etc – and we have freewill.
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OK, here’s a definition that seems to fit the way I see it: The power of making free choices unconstrained by external agencies.
I do think past events influence our decisions/actions in life, but I don’t think they are the determining factor. (SD’s example of ice cream flavor illustrates this. 😊)
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This definition limits our action or inaction only to external events which is very small. Our desires, motives determine a lot what we do or don’t do than external pressures
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Yes, I think “both are true” is often true.
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This does not often move discussion forward
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Man is enslaved by passion and lacks the ability to avoid their influence on the self; rationality on the other hand enables man to master the self. As the will to power is essentially the instinct of freedom it can find fulfilment only through rationality. Reason is the ultimate manifestation of free will, though it can realise the objective to its most excellent satisfaction.
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It is only in phenomena that the question of freedom of the will can be answered. I think reason is determined by our experience and breadth of vocabulary
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Just as situations change, so do our “taste buds!” We may prefer one over the other for a short while, then revert back later! Naked hugs! 🙂
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in deed, our palette improves with the size of our wallet
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True that! 🙂
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Watched the video…personally I believe we have free will. We may lean in certain directions, in choices in life, but that’s due to DNA, genetics, early childhood events, beliefs even as a young child and the old nature and nurture. But it’s just a propensity…not predetermined…that’s my view anyway.
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I, on the other hand, think that we don’t and all the things you mention play a part in our decision making. They are who we are, in a sense and our decisions or rather actions because that to me is the real manifestation of the will is determined by them.
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I still think these early life events, DNA, genetics etc. play a part for sure..perhaps a large part, but at bottom line you have free will to do otherwise and these things influence your life for sure, but I don’t believe it’s pure absolute determinism. And we’ll never know for sure. We could also just be in someone’s computer game and none of it is real.
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We can never know for sure, that is true and that is why the debate will stay open.
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So it seems from your various comments that you lean towards us NOT having free will …
It’s true we can’t know FOR SURE … but IMO, to say we don’t have free will smacks of some kind of “authority” directing our lives. 😣
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I am persuaded by the words of Tolstoy from War and Peace, where he writes
‘It was necessary to renounce the consciousness of an unreal immobility in space and to recognize a motion we did not feel; in the present case it is similarly necessary to renounce a freedom that does not exist and to recognize a dependence of which we are not conscious’
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