The Will Requires Timing

what doesnt?

Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

Tags:

• physics
• science
• philosophy
• natural
• relativistic
• skepticism
• will
• power

[Charlesdance]

Occam's razor I put forth. Your neurons are willing you to believe in will! Alas, no other reason to assume.

[pyrrho314]

@Charlesdance : I don't see how that in any way contradicts my position. Since I literally AM those neurons, if "they" make me think something that IS me making me think something.

[pawnstar3]

People that don't believe in free will simply don't understand what free will actually means. It doesn't mean we have control over everything - it means we have freedom to make decisions based on things that are generally determined. In other words we can't will what we desire, but we can choose to act on that desire. That's where something like moral culpability comes into play. To be aware of a consequence, for instance, demonstrates the will.

[pyrrho314]

@pawnstar3 : well I'm pretty much saying "will power" means what you say, and "free will" as a term is misleading. I'm saying "free will" sounds like "control over everything" to people and that's probably what it ought to mean since people have this slave-wanting-freedom view of the term "free". I have both a reformed idea of "freedom" but also terms that avoid the complications, like "will power" rather than "free will". It changes the questions.

[pawnstar3]

@pyrrho314 Is it safe to say that you're a compatibilist then? It seems to me that compatibilism combines the better elements of both determinism and free will and correctly states that the two can co-exist if they're defined properly. 

[pyrrho314]

@pawnstar3 : when I don't know something, always, I adopt a spectrum of ideas to try to cover the phenomenon. I am AT LEAST compatibilist. But as I'm not a determinist I see no reason to give up the idea that the future has multiple possibilities. So atm I am not a compatabilist, as I think there is still likely something to navigating into the future, it is not set. However, if it was proved we made no choices, I would at that point be a compatabilist because I live with will.

[Qntkka]

@pyrrho314 You are welcome! :)

[pyrrho314]

@trick0171 : one, to questions in cognitive science where the physics of how thinking works is a part of the study. Questions about a proper view toward punishment and rehabilitation, as you've raised. The question of how can we best use our will. Simply having an open question about how it works that acknowledges the potency of the answer. All these things require will power to be "put to use" by a conscious being.

Freedom needs to be understand as domain limited.

[trick0171]

@pyrrho314

I guess I'm not really sure what you are advocating with "will power". Lets assume it came "through the will"...what does that mean in terms of other philosophical questions. I can tell you what questions are important to the free will vs. no free will distinction, but what questions are important to the "will power" vs. "no will power" distinction?

[pyrrho314]

@trick0171 : I am not advocating free will, and it's not the sort of idea that advocating "will power" imposes. In the latter case the question is if the energy came through the will or not, not a question of metaphysical responsibility-ness adhering to the actor.

[trick0171]

I would suggest that this leads to equalization being the most rational response, as no one is more deserving that another for what they have, and no one is less deserving. Would you agree with this as well?

Thanks.

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[trick0171]

@pyrrho314

Agreed. Indeed! :)

The tiger should be put down (or if possible fixed) only to prevent further harms, not because it deserves to be put down for eating the child. Or a car will either be fixed or junked if it is too dangerous to drive. In that sense the faulty car is equally as "responsible" for an accident. This is indeed not the type of "responsibility" that the idea of free will imposes.

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