Free Will vs Determinism

[SS10]

Hi All / Leo

 

I had recently been re-watching your video on free will vs determinism and had a few queries regarding this.

Firstly, you seem to make an argument for determinism here - something which I cannot get my head around. 

You said a proof that we do not have free will is that we do not control mechanisms in our body & psychology, i.e we do not control our lungs breathing, blinking, our thoughts. However, part of Gods intelligent design is that we do not need to be aware, nor control these mechanism. Our subconscious delegates these task to micro-systems in our body. If we had to will every single decision, every biological survival process (ie breathing, etc) we would literally go insane. 

Take Amazon, for instance, if Jeff Bezos had to do every single task and will everything in Amazon,  Amazon will not exist, so Jeff Bezos delegates process to other parts of Amazon because it inst positively counter-productive for Jeff Bezos to do this. 

Could it be that when I blink, i do indeed will such blink, but I do not need to be aware that I am willing it, my consciousness has bigger survival matters to deal with, it wouldn't make sense to will every single micro decision such as blinking, when I can simply delegate this to my eyelids. It will be like Jeff Bezos packing a box at an Amazon warehouse, as well as dealing with customer service.

Furthermore, if your deterministic, how can you simultaneously be a self-help guru? The notion that there is a self, that controls things is the very mechanism in which you've built your brand/company. Im not saying we have 100% control, im not even saying we have 5% control, but to insist we have no say in our decision process what so ever is ludicrous. One can initiate self-discipline, self-awareness and self-control. Note that to achieve this, there has to be a self in the first place. Which is something determinism denies. 

The determinism / free will debate is fundamentally the same as the duality of master vs slave. Are we the master or slave to/of our self? However I maintain that We are both. We are also neither. Master nor Slave isnt an absolute, so to maintain one side of this duality fundamentally goes against your teachings. 

To maintain that reality / our behavior is fundamentally deterministic is to also disregard personal responsibility.

If you are telling people to wake up, this implies that there is a "ghost", a "CEO",  or a "controller" inside ones body to indeed wake up. By telling people that you can awaken is inadvertently making an argument for free will, because your are insisting that once can actually have the will to awaken. If one was doomed to never awaken through determinism - then you telling them to wake up would be pointless, as there lives are already pre-determined.

Sorry for the long sort of  question, please can someone tell me were i could have gone wrong in my thinking, or indeed add on to my arguments if you agree.

 

[from chaos into self]

You can tell a computer to wake up. It’ll do so. Yet you won’t claim a computer has free will

 

a human is basically a complex biological computer

Edited October 29, 2020 by from chaos into self

[cuteguy]

If the actions that you claim come after thinking, and thoughts arise on their own, how can there be a DOer?

 

When 'you' do something, and 'you' think "I did this", the thought "I did this" is just like the clown who wasn't in the play but comes out at the end of the show to get the applause, as Rupert Spira likes to put.

[SoonHei]

oh, this again

?

[Claymoree]

20 minutes ago, SoonHei said:

oh, this again

?

Give me some too! 

[The0Self]

Free will is the understandable but rather silly notion that there's something else besides infinite everything.

[Someone here]

Prison privileges are not freedom

 

[SoonHei]

32 minutes ago, Claymoree said:

Give me some too! 

dig in champ!

i've got an infinite supply

[Moksha]

Disprove this: Everything is inevitable.

[SS10]

Everything = Nothing , therefore nothing is inevitable.

[Moksha]

8 minutes ago, SS10 said:

Everything = Nothing , therefore nothing is inevitable.

False premise.

Everything <> Nothing.

Time <> Timeless.

Form <> Formless.

[justfortoday]

There is no such thing as free will, because there is no individual self.

[SS10]

@Moksha

3 minutes ago, justfortoday said:

There is no such thing as free will, because there is no individual self.

35 minutes ago, Moksha said:

Disprove this: Everything is inevitable.

Your point doesn't really say anything. I can also say to you "Disprove this: Nothing is inevitable" or "Disprove this: Unicons exist". If you are going to @  me at least quote something I said and then attack that as opposed to to asking me do something which cant be done. Just out of interest what would proof for "Everything/nothing/unicorns is 'blank'" even look like lol? You want me to prove this in a science lab or something? lol gtfo

[SS10]

@toocrazytobecrazy Lol exactly, the dumbest comment ive heard. Wasn't this forum supposed to have high level intellectuals? I think Leo should have an entrance exam to determine whether people should be allowed to comment.

[How to be wise]

@SS10 The answer is determinism. We act based on our emotions, but we can’t control what emotions we feel. The emotions come by themselves.

[Moksha]

@SS10 It was a trap; you can't prove a negative

You can prove a positive, though. If you want to claim that free will exists, where is your proof?

How would free will even work? Where do you think the freedom comes from? Can you offer any examples of a choice that is actually free?

[SS10]

5 minutes ago, How to be wise said:

@SS10 The answer is determinism. We act based on our emotions, but we can’t control what emotions we feel. The emotions come by themselves.

Again, please pick something out that I said and directly show me how it is wrong. Yes, we have emotions, desires and urges, But that doesnt mean that you cant control weather you act upon them. Your essentially justifying rape, if one has an strong sexual impulse, as we all do, there is still an entity that has the ability to control themselves.

Edited October 29, 2020 by SS10

[SS10]

@Moksha Do you control your urge to have sex? You dont have 100% autonomy of the arising of the urge, but you have some control over the action. The urge to have sex is just an evolutionary necessity, which in a sense is natures bribe for you to have sex. You choose to act upon that bribe in a sense, despite the urge being strong. Its not like you get horny in public and just start jerking of lol - you have control. 

[How to be wise]

@SS10 Notice that self-restraint is another emotion. If people could willingly feel it, there would be no rape in the world. Unfortunately we don’t choose whether to feel self-restraint or not. For most people, it arises by itself, hence they don’t commit rape. But for a few, it doesn’t come up, hence they must commit rape.

Rape is not justified, but the rapists are also not to blame. They didn’t have the self restraint that most of us have. They never chose to not feel self-restraint.

[Shin]

2 minutes ago, SS10 said:

@Moksha Do you control your urge to have sex? You dont have 100% autonomy of the arising of the urge, but you have some control over the action. The urge to have sex is just an evolutionary necessity, which in a sense is natures bribe for you to have sex. You choose to act upon that bribe in a sense, despite the urge being strong. Its not like you get horny in public and just start jerking of lol - you have control. 

I could argue that it's your need to feel in control that is at play, which comes from an emotion.

We can go on all day with this