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Ask HN: How can you be rational and still believe in free will?

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Re: Ask HN: How can you be rational and still believe in free will?

#51

Post by noodle »

Xurinos wrote: post #48
noodle wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so, it seems to me that we have different viewpoints. i would say that you have free will until it is completely gone. if you're being manipulated, you have free will but are being externally influenced, and you only have no free will when you are completely predestined. looks to me like you are the opposite, that you only have free will if you are completely influence-free. thoughts?

Hm. I think we are mostly the same. I would say that you have free will if, after you have removed all possible influences, you are still able to choose. Many things in life reduce your choices, but reduced choices are still choices. We often have choices we ignore or neglect, too. When I mentioned the manipulation, I meant that it was to be complete manipulation, whatever the source(s). My point was to differentiate…

you don't think that manipulation on the level of being able to fully remove free will would have to originate from a fundamental force?

Re: Ask HN: How can you be rational and still believe in free will?

#52

Post by Xurinos »

noodle wrote: post #51
Xurinos wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hm. I think we are mostly the same. I would say that you have free will if, after you have removed all possible influences, you are still able to choose. Many things in life reduce your choices, but reduced choices are still choices. We often have choices we ignore or neglect, too. When I mentioned the manipulation, I meant that it was to be complete manipulation, whatever the source(s). My point was to differentiate…

you don't think that manipulation on the level of being able to fully remove free will would have to originate from a fundamental force?

I can make my computer output the number 42, and we can argue that there is a force behind me that resulted in that program to output 42 (as well as in Scott Adams's choice of the number and my inevitable reading of his books, etc etc). But it is easier to identify that I manipulated my computer to output 42.

Similarly, our environment may be affected by any number of forces, and we may be entirely pattern-matching, reacting machines who learned how to react from experiences in our environment.

Re: Ask HN: How can you be rational and still believe in free will?

#54

Post by superk »

mjgoins wrote: post #21

I say this every time this topic comes up, which seems to be often, so I'm sorry to sound like a broken record, but y'all need to read 'Freedom Evolves' by Dan Dennett, followed up by his longer more important work, 'Consciousness Explained.' You might not agree with his conclusions, as they're fairly radical, but it answers the question of the original post.

Since you've read both books would you mind just summing up the jist of it.

Re: Ask HN: How can you be rational and still believe in free will?

#55

Post by losethos »

noodle wrote: post #42
Xurinos wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> what do you feel like is the alternative to free will? predestination? I would propose that the alternative is manipulation, and the most extreme form of manipulation is predestination. Less extreme forms are environmental manipulation, our bacterial collective, and so forth. Was it predestined by God or by some initial atomic movement or potential energy? We do not have evidence either way, but it is fair to point…

so, it seems to me that we have different viewpoints. i would say that you have free will until it is completely gone. if you're being manipulated, you have free will but are being externally influenced, and you only have no free will when you are completely predestined. looks to me like you are the opposite, that you only have free will if you are completely influence-free. thoughts?

Is this obsession with free will about culpability? Why ask why :-)

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Re: Ask HN: How can you be rational and still believe in free will?

#59

Post by [deleted] »

Luc wrote: post #23

'Freedom evolves' by Daniel Dennett deals with this. http://www.amazon.com/Freedom-Evolves-Daniel-C-Dennett/dp/01... Our future may be fixed, but our nature is not. We don't have a 'God's eye view' that sees all our past and future laid out before us. From our perspectives conditions change and we change to adapt to them to the extent possible. It seems to me the confusion mainly arises if you consider your mind as b…

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: How can you be rational and still believe in free will?

#60

Post by [deleted] »

aidenn0 wrote: post #43
amichail wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In other words, it would be irrational to not operate on the assumption that you have free will. Religious people might say something similar about God's existence.

This is very different from Paschal's wager. Paschal's wager presents a false dichotomy: either you believe in no god, or you believe in the christian God. There are a plethora of religions to choose from, and it is also possible that there is a very strange god who puts all athiests in heaven and all believers in hell. Therefore Paschal's wager breaks down. However, we have a true binary split here when talking abou…

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