...and now for something completely different: Free Will!

[firedragon]

No, definitely not, hence my reply #33 with "not correct", meaning: "All...Theists" is not correct, as the libertarian view makes no sense to me whatsoever, as a Theist

Why is that Stvdv?

No, definitely not, hence my reply #33 with "not correct", meaning: "All...Theists" is not correct, as the libertarian view makes no sense to me whatsoever, as a Theist


I don't know the Deist kind of view that well

But probably also not Deist view

@Policy shared a link, which covers quite a lot on how I see things. Below link is my reply to his post. I could not have explained it so well and mine would be really short comparatively.

So if you want to know more, that article is quite a start I would say...maybe not easy for others, with all the concepts explained from Hindu POV though. But the Sanskrit words that are used are at least explained. And Free Will is not an easy thing to figure out after all.

...and now for something completely different: Free Will!

Okay. I read that article. I didn't know you follow Ramana Rishi as well. Nevertheless, it seems like a compatibilist model to me. Thanks a lot.

 

[ppp]

"Your will" is a blanket term for anything that you cause. If you ate ice cream, it's because you willed it. Like Nakosis said in post #20, "because I can." Free will is the "I can."

That cannot be correct. Free will is not the determining factor. "I can" with or without free will.

"I can" (I did) puts you in a stance in opposition to anything else being the cause of [whatever the topic is]. It's the position of you taking responsibility, taking ownership for what occurred. Your thoughts and feelings, your intentions, your experiences and memories, human nature, and your environment may have played in part in it, but ultimately, it's your responsibility. Not any of those things.

That is the attitude of free will.

Wait a minute. Are you saying that free will is just an attitude? A state of mind like optimism or enthusiasm?

 

[ppp]

You really aren't understanding. Disease is a result of man's wrong choice.

Even if that were true, your god still created a world where diseases could arise. Telling me that this happened because some people did something they were told not to do does not change that fact.

 

[DKH]

I am curious. If one person were to restrain another, at what point would they no longer have free will?

There seems to be a misunderstanding of what "freewill" is and my position (being a theist) related to it. Simply put: Freewill is the ability to think or act upon doing something good or evil. So, if someone is restrained, this doesn't prevent them from "thinking" something evil against their attacker! Then, when the person becomes unrestrained they can act on their thinking about doing good or doing evil to that attacker, either by themselves or someone else. The idea that the person may have been unwillingly restrained doesn't equate to them losing the ability to have freewill and eventually acting upon their decision. However, there are laws and consequences for our choices and/or actions. So, in a civil society, it is rare that doing something good has consequences (but it does happen). Yet, doing evil surely does have consequences, eventually. If not by the hand of man, it will occur by the hand of God (in my opinion). Therefore, the victim of being restrained still has their freewill to choose good or evil.

I am told by many persons that if their god were to stop someone from acting on their desire to hurt another, that said god would be interfering with the free will of the perpetrator. Protecting the free will of the victim is never presented as a priority. Even in cases of sexual assault.

This position (by the many persons) is ridiculous! The bible is clear that those who have the ability to help others "in need" is a requirement for those who call themselves servants of God. Example: Psalms 82:3-4---Defend the poor and fatherless; do justice to the afflicted and needy. Deliver the poor and needy; rid them out of the hand of the wicked.

Thus, God intervening in the affairs of man is His right and if He decides to take away ones freewill in a certain incident, so be it…

 

[ppp]

Thus, God intervening in the affairs of man is His right and if He decides to take away ones freewill in a certain incident, so be it…

I take it that you do not consider your god to be omnibenevolent?

 

[Truthseeker]

I am told by many persons that if their god were to stop someone from acting on their desire to hurt another, that said god would be interfering with the free will of the perpetrator. Protecting the free will of the victim is never presented as a priority. Even in cases of sexual assault.

I am curious. If one person were to restrain another, at what point would they no longer have free will? Please note the poll above.

Libertarian free will means that our choices are free from the determination or constraints of human nature and free from any predetermination by God. All "free will theists" hold that libertarian freedom is essential for moral responsibility, for if our choice is determined or caused by anything, including our own desires, they reason, it cannot properly be called a free choice. Libertarian freedom is, therefore, the freedom to act contrary to one's nature, predisposition and greatest desires. Responsibility, in this view, always means that one could have done otherwise.

https://www.theopedia.com/libertarian-free-will​

I don't believe in libertarian free will. We are constrained by our how our brain is formed, and how our environment has shaped us. But I believe we have some degree of free will. Free will is choosing our spiritual nature to some degree, or choosing our material nature to some degree. There is always some choice between the two poles of our being.

 

[Nakosis]

You said, "Because I can" which merely speaks to ability, not impetus.

The impetus is the mind.
The mind controls the body. The mind is the source of our choices.

 

[Nakosis]

Many atheists believe in determinism. Determinism is the thesis that "there is at any instant exactly one physically possible future". The principle of sufficient reason states that “a thing cannot come to existence without a cause which produces it. That for everything that happens there must be a reason which determines why it is thus and not otherwise".
The fixing of one aspect of the system fixes some other. Well, some scientists went as far as trying to prove that even our actions are determined and we have no free-will over it. Free-will is only a perspective, but our actions are determined. You see a bird on the road and you think you should stop your car and save it from getting smashed in to pieces. You slow down. You are late for work. You pick work over a life. It's determined based on you and a whole lot of causes that caused it's outcome which causes another outcome that ultimately determined your action. Your thoughts are within your mind and you made a decision, that's right, but that was determined and you only think that you made a decision based on your free-will.

That's determinism from an atheistic perspective.

IMO, that perspective is short sighted.

 

[firedragon]

IMO, that perspective is short sighted.

You are calling one of the most respected atheist philosophers "short sighted". No problem.

Why is that short sighted? What's the reason?

 

[Nakosis]

You are calling one of the most respected atheist philosophers "short sighted". No problem.

Part of critical thinking.
Also, my view, never let someone else do your thinking for you.

Why is that short sighted? What's the reason?

Consciousness awareness is only a small part of the mind. Yet people identify the entirety of the self with it.

I identify with the entire mind. Not just the conscious part. All process of the mind conscious and unconscious are part of the self. Whatever the mind does it is acting as an agent of the self. So I the mind create the feelings/desires which the conscious part of the mind acts on.

 

[firedragon]

Part of critical thinking.
Also, my view, never let someone else do your thinking for you.

Good attitude. I'm just keeping you informed that it's not some arbitrary thing.

Consciousness awareness is only a small part of the mind. Yet people identify the entirety of the self with it.

I identify with the entire mind. Not just the conscious part. All process of the mind conscious and unconscious are part of the self. Whatever the mind does it is acting as an agent of the self. So I the mind create the feelings/desires which the conscious part of the mind acts on.

I was only explaining determinism completely from an atheistic view because you asked for an explanation. Not that it's my belief or not. It was an objective answer to your question.

You have not understood it. The atheists view is that determinism is to what I said in the post. They don't believe in some consciousness being some divine thing or anything of the sort. What ever the conscious parts of your mind as you say is making you get feelings/desires are determined as per the scientists who believe in determinism. The determination mechanism is explained by scientists as I explained. So you make decisions today or tomorrow based on what you inherited and that's what will cause you to make that decision based on your feelings or desires that you brought up.

Hope you can understand. This is what determinism is from an atheistic point of view.

 

[1213]

You think that you have the ability to control what you desire? As opposed to how you act upon it?

I think I can choose freely what I want/desire and it is based on what I think is good and desirable. And I think I can also choose how I act upon it.

Under the hypothetical that free will exists, I would agree. Which is why I reject respecting free will as a valid reason for a tri-omni god to allow suffering, whether the agent of the suffering is human or not.

Perhaps it is wrong explanation for why suffering is allowed. I have understood suffering is allowed, because people wanted to know evil. In the beginning people rejected God, because they wanted to know evil like God knows, which is why they were expelled to this first death that is like Matrix, a virtual reality where we can experience also evil and learn what it truly means, while our soul is still safe and can't be destroyed by anything of this world. So, all though this may be painful at some times, this is only a short lesson.

 

[Balthazzar]

I don't talk to Tamarians.

I don't pee in the swimming pool - If you're not familiar with the clip, it shows a monsignor speaking about a woman who was assaulted and not a single onlooker did anything, complete with two "angels" kissing the feet of a statue of crucified Jesus.

 

[stvdv]

Okay. I read that article. I didn't know you follow Ramana Rishi as well

That's a big jump. More accurate:
"I follow Sai Baba", as in God/Allah
"I value" Ramana and His Teachings

Thanks a lot

You're welcome
@stvdvRF

 

[stvdv]

it seems like a compatibilist model to me

Not to me:
1) Determinism incompatible with Free Will
aa(they are more like opposites)
2) Free Will has everything to do with metaphysics
*) I disagree with all 3 definitions below

Compatibilism.

Compatibilism is the belief that free will and determinism are mutually compatible and that it is possible to believe in both without being logically inconsistent. Compatibilists believe that freedom can be present or absent in situations for reasons that have nothing to do with metaphysics.

freewill

1. the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate; the ability to act at one's own discretion.

determinism

1. the doctrine that all events, including human action, are ultimately determined by causes regarded as external to the will. Some philosophers have taken determinism to imply that individual human beings have no free will and cannot be held morally responsible for their actions.

@stvdvRF

 

[firedragon]

That's a big jump. More accurate:
"I follow Sai Baba", as in God/Allah
"I value" Ramana and His Teachings

Okay okay.

 

[firedragon]

Not to me:
1) Determinism incompatible with Free Will
aa(they are more like opposites)
2) Free Will has everything to do with metaphysics
*) I disagree with all 3 definitions below






@stvdvRF

You disagree with all three models?

Hmm. Okay. no problem. Cheers.

 

[KWED]

No, only if he controls the assaulters mind in such a way to remove his choices.

Not if he doesn't include the capacity for violent sexual assault on children into the original design of humans.
Which raises the question, why did god design humans with the capacity for mindless cruelty?

God often protects people in response to prayer.

Clearly not nearly often enough.
What have all those children who he does not protect from sexual assault done to displease god so much that he will just watch them being raped despite being able to protect them as he does with the ones you mentioned?

God also has free will, but he can't do anything that's not in line with his character.

So his free will is limited by something beyond his control.

We are who and where we are as a result of our choices, and others choices and God's choices.

Whose choices result in a baby dying in agony from cancer? Certainly not the baby's. Can't see how it could be anyone else's choice, so it must be god's choice.

God doesn't choose for us,

You just said his choices do determine who we are and how our lives pan out, to some extent.

but that doesn't mean he isn't involved in our lives.

Indeed. By your argument he clearly is.

So if you think God should control our choices where does that end? Does he only control the bad ones or only a good ones? Or both? Should he just throw away our free will all together?
Free will is a topic that gets progressively more complex the longer you try to understand it.

Think of it like a domestic servant robot with adaptive AI. Does the software designer include code that will prevent the robot from ever killing its owner, or does he allow the possibility simply because to do otherwise might restrict the robot's ability to fully learn and adapt?

God could have designed humans with no innate potential for personal violence. Would that then restrict the free will of people? No more than god not designing us with wings restricts our free will to fly.

 

[KWED]

Why would you say that?
Can God stop everything bad from happening while still allowing freedom of the will?

In a universe where the impulse to harm a child for sexual gratification simply does not exist, not being able to succumb to that non-existent impulse does not restrict free will.

God must have created the potential for that impulse for a reason. As a big fan and defender of god, can you think why he might have done that? (Remember that it can't be "free will" because if the ability to experience that impulse does not exist, then free will is not restricted. Free will only applies to possible choices)

 

[KWED]

In what way is omnipotence not an answer? An omnipotent being can do anything. Therefore, whatever action is under discussion is one that being is necessary capable of doing..

@Wildswanderer is one of those apologists whose god's omnipotence only allows it to do the things that it is able to do. Kinda like our "omnipotence", I guess.