Mystery of the Self, What is Free Will? Part 5

[ThisOneIsTaken]

This guy could be the next Kubler-Ross.

[benthejrporter]

The rescusitation research is interesting. As a Hospital Porter I have a vested interest in that. They've also found ways of reviving patients by rapidly cooling the body during cardiac arrest.

[college12003]

Again, I would love to agree, but at 1:45, the speaker assumes that free will exists. That is in itself a debate.

[Teralek]

@college12003 if it doesn't exist then there are no criminals, only mentally ill people.

[college12003]

@Teralek Are you suggesting that I believe in free will because it is undesirable not to?

[Teralek]

@college12003 No. I'm only pointing to the consequences of not existing a thing such as free will. It's fine by me that you say that there is no free will, as long as you stand by the implications of such afirmation. If there is no free will there are no criminals, only mentally ill people who commit crimes because their neurons told them too, it wasn't their fault.

[college12003]

@Teralek I never said that no free will exists. I only said that there was a debate and that the speaker made an assumption. I am aware of the implications. If there is no free will, then I believe that criminal behavior is only a mild concern compared to the more serious realities. Besides, if there were no free will, it wouldn't matter how criminals or the mentally ill were treated, as there would be no way to deviate from it.

[benthejrporter]

@college12003 If there is no free will then we are just actors following a cosmic script, not writers and directors of our own lives. I doubt this because of how when you look deeper and deeper into the workings of the universe you find more and more complexity and that never resolves into certainty. This is the Fractal model, Chaos Theory.

[college12003]

@benthejrporter I am familiar with fractal cosmology. It is intriguing, but I wonder if physics will confirm it. I do not like the idea of determinism...In fact, I am a believer in free in will, but I believe it, not because the alternative is disconcerting, but rather for other reasons. I just like to point out assumptions where I find them.