Free will? Who cares?

[Paul98]

This will be testable in the future. Once we have something that can read the brain in some basic manner and give reliable results. Give multiple subjects two choices if we can know what the person will chose before they consciously make the decision then we won't have free will. Now if we can't it won't disprove it as it may mean that we just can't read it well enough.

But there is also the outside influence and quantum interactions which may make what we will decide unknowable till the decision is made.

 

[moonbogg]

This will be testable in the future. Once we have something that can read the brain in some basic manner and give reliable results. Give multiple subjects two choices if we can know what the person will chose before they consciously make the decision then we won't have free will. Now if we can't it won't disprove it as it may mean that we just can't read it well enough.

But there is also the outside influence and quantum interactions which may make what we will decide unknowable till the decision is made.

The exact study that you speak of was already done and results published. That's why I started this thread.

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

This is the same as chocolate cake. The device functions on electrical impulse. The device does not know or care about choice. It is mechanical.
The person electing to move the cursor on the screen to the left, does so in the same way as you elect to move your hand to the left. The decision making process that led both of you to that choice took place in the dark, based on information being processed in the subconscious that neither of you had any access to.

EDIT: Experiments show a time delay between a decision being made and a person being aware of making that decision. The decision is made first, and then enters your awareness at which point you take ownership of the decision. The time delay is real and you can read about the study. I'll find the link if need be.

This will be testable in the future. Once we have something that can read the brain in some basic manner and give reliable results. Give multiple subjects two choices if we can know what the person will chose before they consciously make the decision then we won't have free will. Now if we can't it won't disprove it as it may mean that we just can't read it well enough.

But there is also the outside influence and quantum interactions which may make what we will decide unknowable till the decision is made.

This would seem quite complicated to me. I think occam 's razor applies and free will exists. The decision may be made in the subconscious but, the conscious mind controls it. In computer parlance, the conscious mind programs while the subconscious compiles and runs the program.

 

[moonbogg]

This would seem quite complicated to me. I think occam 's razor applies and free will exists. The decision may be made in the subconscious but, the conscious mind controls it. In computer parlance, the conscious mind programs while the subconscious compiles and runs the program.

Well, I'm not in the business of changing minds, but I would encourage you to have a look at the study and what the researchers have to say about it. A quick googling is sure to get you there.

 

[sandorski]

I don't know if Free Will exists, but I'm not convinced that just because our Subconscious makes a decision before our Consciousness is aware of it that it means there is no Free Will. It may simply just be a process that has developed within ourselves to the point of not requiring Conscious awareness anymore. For example, tying your shoes at one time required deep concentration, but in time one barely even needs to be aware that their shoes need tied, they just do it.

In a similar fashion, over the years we establish a set of values, preferences, and other factors that we have decided to base our lives around. After going through the process repeatedly we may simply put it, or parts of it, into the background where the established processing just does its' thing and spits out a result to the Conscious Mind later.

 

[disappoint]

Tying my shoes is so simple, I could do it in my sleep! Zzzzz

Hey who tied my shoes? Was it me?

It may sound like a silly question, but Moonbogg, it sounds like you're saying it wasn't me. Help me understand what you really mean.

 

[moonbogg]

I don't know if Free Will exists, but I'm not convinced that just because our Subconscious makes a decision before our Consciousness is aware of it that it means there is no Free Will. It may simply just be a process that has developed within ourselves to the point of not requiring Conscious awareness anymore. For example, tying your shoes at one time required deep concentration, but in time one barely even needs to be aware that their shoes need tied, they just do it.

In a similar fashion, over the years we establish a set of values, preferences, and other factors that we have decided to base our lives around. After going through the process repeatedly we may simply put it, or parts of it, into the background where the established processing just does its' thing and spits out a result to the Conscious Mind later.

That sounds perfectly reasonable to me and I wouldn't see why not, but I'm not a neuroscientist or brain researcher. I'd have to go back to the study and look for the implications of their results. I think they may have information directly pertinent to your suspicions and they may have that part figured out for you. In short, there might be a real answer to your thoughts.

 

[lotus503]

Interesting Topic - Free will exists because we have the ability to direct our thoughts and because we can direct our thoughts we can determine our beliefs which are at least partially what drives the subconscious
Consider we all have an inner voice, the inner voice speaks to us, sometimes it tells us great Job sometimes it reminds us how shitty our behavior is. This inner voice is a manifestation of the meaning we attach to experiences in our lives both consciousnesses and subconsciously.

However there is another layer altogether of consciousness. its the layer that understands what the inner voice is an can determine to direct thought elsewhere.

Free will is in fact our ability to direct our thought and if you direct your consciousness thought enough, it will in fact change the unconsciousness patterns.

I think Free will isn't an on or off switch, rather a sliding scale.

 

[Zodiark1593]

So, if I were to stick my knife into some random person at the supermarket, could I tell a judge that it wasn't of my own free will, and basically get away scott-free.

 

[Cerpin Taxt]

So, if I were to stick my knife into some random person at the supermarket, could I tell a judge that it wasn't of my own free will, and basically get away scott-free.

Well you couldn't blame the judge for sentencing you to life in prison. He couldn't help himself.

 

[Paul98]

Please link to the study, I have read about other studies done but nothing that showed that the researchers actually knew what the decision they made was.

Edit: I had been looking for something like this a couple months ago and didn't see it. It's the exact question I was wondering about.

 

[Paul98]

Not having free will doesn't mean you aren't responsible for your actions. Also it doesn't mean you don't choose what you are going to do, it just may not be a conscious decision. It's still being processed in your brain with outside stimulus.

 

[moonbogg]

Excerpts taken from a website (http://io9.com/5975778/scientific-evidence-that-you-probably-dont-have-free-will) that references the study and gives the name of the researcher. You'll likely need to dig to get access to the real paper, otherwise you need to pay to read it on an actual scientific journal site that features published work. However, this website covers the findings and provides sources. This is not a dead topic and is hotly debated of course. You can find plenty of people arguing for and against it.

"For example, a study by John-Dylan Haynes in 2008 showed a similar effect to the one revealed by Libet. After putting participants into an fMRI scanner, he told them to press a button with either their right or left index fingers at their leisure, but that they had to remember the letter that was showing on the screen at the precise moment they were committed to their movement.

The results were shocking. Haynes's data showed that the BP occurred one entire second prior to conscious awareness — and at other times as much as ten seconds. Following the publication of his paper, he told Nature News:

The first thought we had was 'we have to check if this is real.' We came up with more sanity checks than I've ever seen in any other study before.
​

The cognitive delay, he argued, was likely due to the operation of a network of high-level control areas that were preparing for an upcoming decision long before it entered into conscious awareness. Basically, the brain starts to unconsciously churn in preparation of a decision, and once a set of conditions are met, awareness kicks in, and the movement is made.

Regarding Sam Harris and his book, "Free Will"

'Indeed, Sam Harris has made a compelling case that we don't have it, but that it's not a problem. Moreover, he argues that the ongoing belief in free will needs to come to an end:

Sam Harris States, "A person's conscious thoughts, intentions, and efforts at every moment are preceded by causes of which he is unaware. What is more, they are preceded by deep causes — genes, childhood experience, etc. — for which no one, however evil, can be held responsible. Our ignorance of both sets of facts gives rise to moral illusions. And yet many people worry that it is necessary to believe in free will, especially in the process of raising children."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_Harris_(author)

Others prominent academics (philosophers primarily, such as Daniel Dennett) argue against the views of Sam Harris, however, those who's arguments are based largely on brain studies and neuroscience tend to lean toward the idea that free will is illusory.

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

Strangely, Martin Luther agrees with your view of free will in his 'On Bondage Of The Will' though I suspect you'd disagree with his reasoning.

No-one can achieve salvation or redemption through their own choices —people do not choose between good or evil, because they are naturally dominated by evil, and salvation is simply the product of God unilaterally changing a person's heart and turning them to good ends.

 

[moonbogg]

Strangely, Martin Luther agrees with your view of free will in his 'On Bondage Of The Will' though I suspect you'd disagree with his reasoning.

I wouldn't agree. I am atheist.

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

I wouldn't agree. I am atheist.

Like I said. However, there are things to be learned from great philosophers whether you share their beliefs or not. I urge you to keep an open mind and keep questioning.

 

[moonbogg]

Like I said. However, there are things to be learned from great philosophers whether you share their beliefs or not. I urge you to keep an open mind and keep questioning.

I agree absolutely. I even chose to agree with you.

 

[Moonbeam]

I have heard that if you cut the corpus callosum there will be two people in one head and only one that can speak, but still with two separate states of consciousness. Imagine if when conjoined the one who could talk didn't like the other. If consciousness in thinking and thinking requires words, what can the other within do to plea its case? Perhaps in order to be truly conscious both have to love each other. But how will the victim forgive the abuser, or is the problem reversed.

 

[lotus503]

I have heard that if you cut the corpus callosum there will be two people in one head and only one that can speak, but still with two separate states of consciousness. Imagine if when conjoined the one who could talk didn't like the other. If consciousness in thinking and thinking requires words, what can the other within do to plea its case? Perhaps in order to be truly conscious both have to love each other. But how will the victim forgive the abuser, or is the problem reversed.

Thought is but one part of consciousness, us absent our thoughts is yet another, and in my opinion higher level.

I have been impressed with how eckhart tolle defines this.

 

[Moonbeam]

Thought is but one part of consciousness, us absent our thoughts is yet another, and in my opinion higher level.

I have been impressed with how eckhart tolle defines this.

"The realm of consciousness
is much vaster than thought can grasp. When you no longer believe everything you think, you step out of thought and see clearly that the thinker is not who you are."

Never heard of him but I will now. Thanks.

 

[Braznor]

Think of it in this way:

We are free only to the extent our brains allows us to be so.

A brain with lesser learning or knowledge is less free than a brain which is capable of higher learning or knowledge or understanding.

In essence what our brain knows or understands makes us more free willed in terms of that wisdom we gained over that course of such computed thought.

 

[piasabird]

Free Will is impossible. I cant choose to be rich just because I want to. This one statement disproves it.

In my church we refer to Morale Agency. Given a set of circumstances you can make a choice from available choices that will be inline with your beliefs or standards of conduct or violate them. If you are offered a beer, you can refuse or accept or make up some kind of response like "That is against my Religion" or "I told my parents I wouldnt drink". Regardless of your choice there are always responibilities and repurcussions for every decision. If you are lucky, maybe you will have a rich lawyer.

 

[sandorski]

Free Will is impossible. I cant choose to be rich just because I want to. This one statement disproves it.

In my church we refer to Morale Agency. Given a set of circumstances you can make a choice from available choices that will be inline with your beliefs or standards of conduct or violate them. If you are offered a beer, you can refuse or accept or make up some kind of response like "That is against my Religion" or "I told my parents I wouldnt drink". Regardless of your choice there are always responibilities and repurcussions for every decision. If you are lucky, maybe you will have a rich lawyer.

"Free Will" only pertains to choices one makes, not whether we can simply wish things into existence.

 

[schmuckley]

I would argue that very few people actually care about the question of free will. Evidence has shown that we don't have it. Studies show that the subconscious brain arrives at a decision and then that information is brought up to the top level, or conscious mind, and you become aware of what your subconscious "chose".
I've read that consciousness is simply awareness, and awareness can't choose anything. We are aware of the results of what our complex brains do only after the brain has done it. So, we are like observers who have hitched a ride in this world and we are aware of what is happening, like watching a movie, but we have no true control over anything. If that's the case, then what purpose does consciousness serve? Why would consciousness evolve at all?

Are you trying to say you're not responsible for your own actions?
You are.

 

[moonbogg]

Are trying to say you're not responsible for your own actions?
You are.

Are you trying to say you read the entire thread? You didn't.