Free will and determinism

[Bradskii]

You have missed the point. I asked why should we punish people for doing wrong if there is no agency and free will to choose. That its all deterministic. Your explanation pnly serves toi further support that we have free will.

Making consequences for choices in behaviour, saying its a safety measure, keeping people who would do harm off the streets and denying them freedom, show that we believe people could have made a different choice. Enough so that we are willing to take away their freedom and punish them.

Yes. They did what they preferred to do. As we all do. They knew the consequences. As we all do. They decided to go ahead anyway, performing an act that was determined. If you don't steal then it's because you've lived a different life. You have different DNA. You don't need the money. You are averse to risk. What has determined your decisions is not the same as has determined the decisions of the guy who robs your house. So we emphasise him that there will be a punishment for doing it. We persuade him that he should prefer a different course of action.

Yes but we still draw a line with most cases and we don't deminish the potential accountability that person should have had regardless of those mitigating circumstances because other people in those sitations chose not to break the law. We still punish them. We make not of the mitigating circumstances but in most cases this will not get them off. They are still sentenced to some form of punishment and accountability.

For the reasons I gave. It's a deterrent. It keeps them out of society until they can be persuaded that stealing things is not worth the risk.

But in reality we do. So theres an explanation gap between the assumption that everything can be reducedd to physical deterministic processes and what actually happens in real life. How we actuallt behave based on what we truely believe through our conscious experiences which tell us there is free will.

Again, this is just 'I feel like I have it'.

But yes the logical conclusion for the material reductionist is we should not hold people accountable as they cannot help it due to a raft of predetermined influences making people do what they do.

If the punishment for drinking and driving was tying you to a stake and burning you alive then DUI would stop overnight. Not because all of a sudden, with our free will, we had decided it was wrong. The punishment would deter us. That wouldn't be a free will decision. The punishment would determine our decision. So we have to have a punishment to stop people stealing. As a deterrent. The punishment determines people's actions. If it doesn't work, then either keep punishing or make the punishment greater until people are persuaded that it's not what they really want to risk. It determines their actions.

OK so maybe the true answer is that its both. Its both deterministic and sometimes free will. Its a sort of gradient of a lot of deterministic influence ie we have to eat, hunger is a great basic driver we cannot get around.

I'm afraid not. Once you see that free will cannot exist with determinism then you start looking at what determines our actions. And it's literally everything that has gone before. None of which we could control.

We can act counter to our desires and drives and rise above them and thats the great capacity of intelligent, rational and conscious humans.

Only if it's what you prefer to do. And that depends on the type of person you are. And you had no control over that.

I think its a sad position to take. It limits human potential. But I can understand it if one assumes that there is only the physical and material world. Everything is then restricted to the naturalistic material processes.

Nothing changes except how we deal with other people. You still do what you think you want to do. You still make decisions that you think are your own. But it's easier to forgive others if you accept that what they did was determined by circumstances beyond their control. And it's a difficult thing to do.

 

[stevevw]

I'm afraid this is nothing more than 'it certainly feels like I have free will and I make decisions, so it must exist'. We discounted arguments like this in the first couple of dozen posts.

Its more than appealing to feelings though isn't it. You just admitted so much in saying we penalise people for making wrong choices. You forget the most important sentence of my post which says a lot.

"The fact that we do hold people accountable and we have laws and moral standards we all agree with is evidence of the fact we treat agency, free will and morality as being real phenomena in the world and for society".

So its more than feelings. We actually take peoples freedoms away, we actually make them suffer as a consequence. Saying that we relegate another human to a life of suffering, ostrasization, ridecule, condemnation, take away they jobs, their livihoods, destroying their family, children based on some feelings is just as crazy as basing physics on feelings.

 

[Bradskii]

Its more than appealing to feelings though isn't it. You just admitted so much in saying we penalise people for making wrong choices. You forget the most important sentence of my post which says a lot.

"The fact that we do hold people accountable and we have laws and moral standards we all agree with is evidence of the fact we treat agency, free will and morality as being real phenomena in the world and for society".

Yeah, we treat free will as being real. I have enormous difficulty in doing otherwise. It really seems as if I have it. But that's not evidence for its existence. So maybe you should try addressing determinism instead. This line of argument (gee, it must exist because it feels real) goes nowhere. You might as well say the earth is stationary because it doesn't feel like we're moving.

I can't keep responding to the same position (it's not an argument) if I've already discounted it a few times. And been discounted very many times throughout the thread.

 

[Neogaia777]

@stevevw

I think you are misunderstanding me here. Technically, there is no such thing as free will, and all of yours/mine/others decisions are all already made up, or are are all already chosen/decided for us, etc. But it's just that, from our perspective or point of view, they are not, etc, but that's only due to our own ignorance of what we don't fully understand or know, etc.

None of us knows all the deep intricate intricacies of determinism, etc. If we did, we would be God, or be equal to God, etc. And just because we still have to have consequences for what we decide are wrong or harmful actions, for the good of our societies, etc, does not mean we should be seeking retribution or revenge against someone, etc, and just because we do have to do that, does not at all prove free will, etc. It only proves that we "don't know", etc, and that we "don't know" only, etc.

None of us knows any of ours or anyone else's predestiny, or what has already been chosen or decided, or already made up for them already, etc. So, from our perspective at least, it's still a neverending open field of possibilities, or possible outcomes, even if it really isn't technically, etc. We don't know the path that has already been chosen or has already been laid out for any of us, etc. So this means from our perspective or point of view, people can still learn and develop and grow, and gain in knowledge, and education, and experience, and can potentially change some or any of their actions, etc, but that is only from our point of view, etc, a point of view that is due to not knowing or being ignorant, etc, ignorant of the intracacies of determinism, etc. It is way, way too much information for us to know, and is way, way more than our puny little brains could ever process or handle. Even our most sophisticated computers or A.I.'s are not even anywhere close to it, and might even never be maybe, etc, because it's way, way more information than even they will probably ever be able to handle, etc, no matter how far advanced, or how sophisticated they get, etc.

But, we have people face consequences for what the majority of our societies think are wrong or harmful actions in order to maintain our societies or social orders/structures, and to keep people in it safe, etc, but it's not ever supposed to go beyond that, etc. Because if you are seeking for someone else to be hurt or harmed due to any of their actions, then you are not forgiving people of their sins or trespasses in your heart, and are taking to sword of vengeance up for yourself, when God specifically warns us against both of those things, even saying that for a mere human being to harboring that in their heart, is like drinking a poison to them, or you/me/we/us, and God also specifically says He won't forgive you of your sins if you do not forgive others of theirs in your heart, etc, and He also says "Vengeance is mine, and mine alone and only, and I alone will repay", etc. So we have people face consequences for what we deem are wrong or bad or evil actions for the good of our societies, and for our own personal safety, and nothing more. We are not supposed to be harboring or nursing anything else beyond that, etc. If you do, it could cost you your eternity, etc.

And when you see all this from the perspective of determinism, it makes it a whole heck of a lot easier not to do do that, etc. Wishing or desiring for someone else to be punished, or hurt or harmed, or wishing or desiring for them to suffer, is like drinking a vial of poison, and could cost you your eternal soul, etc, Those kinds of hearts, cannot be allowed into Heaven, etc. We are also not judging anyone's eternity also, as that could cost you your soul also, etc. But the only reason we have people face consequences for things that are deemed wrong or bad or evil by the majority, or our societies is just to keep the rest of us safe, and that is all, etc. The right kind of heart is wishing we didn't have to do it, but also knowing that we have to do it for the good of our societies in a fallen world, etc, The right kind of heart also hopes that other people will learn and grow and change and repent, and not do any of those wrong or bad or illegal things anymore, etc, because we can still allow for that not knowing anyone else's technically already predetermined/prechosen for them path, or anyone's predestiny, etc, so we know that's still possible for them, etc, and we've seen others do it, etc, and so we hold out hope for them, etc. But if they keep doing what is bad or evil, or harmful or hurtful or wrong, etc, then we have no choice but to impose some consequences upon them for that, if only temporarily, etc, as we are also not judging anyone's eternity or right standing with God in the afterlife either, etc, cause that would also be a sinful poison for us to drink, and will poison our souls also, etc.

Anyway, techincally everything is already made up or already decided up for us and there is only ever one way it can ever go, etc, but from our perspective or point of view, it isn't, because we don't know nearly enough about determinism, or each of our own very, very unique, and very, very specific predestinies, etc. So to us, there are still a bunch of a ton of very, very different multiple, and many different very numerous different ways things can go, or possibilities, etc. Even if techincally, there really isn't ever really, etc.

God Bless.

 

[rjs330]

Reason is using logic on the information you have to reach a valid conclusion. It's a tool to facilitate decisions. That seems like the opposite pole to the idea of free will.

The information you have includes the things you have learned about the world and the feelings you have about those things.

Can you explain how you think free will is involved?

Therexwoukd be no purpose for reason if free will wasn’t involved. Reason helps us decide what course of actionbyo take. The fact that people decide to go against reason and logic shows we have free will.

And they choose to do so despite the fact that reason would dictate it would be better to do something else. Risk vs reward. Sometimes we decide we decide the risk is worth it and other times we decide it's not. It could be for the exact same action. We nake a free will decision to disregard the risk despite the fact that reason would tell us it's not worth it. "I knew I shouldn't have done that, but I did it anyway.".

I chose. "I'm glad I made that decision, i knew I shouldn't have done that and it turns out I was right."

The fact the we can reason things through and choose to either go with what reason says is the best choice or ignore it in favor of a different choice that goes against reason is evidence of free will.

 

[rjs330]

decisions are all already made up, or are are all already chosen/decided for us, etc.

By whom or by what?

But it's just that, from our perspective or point of view, they are not, etc, but that's only due to our own ignorance of what we don't fully understand or know, etc.

You have not shown how our point of view is incorrect. What do you mean we don't know? Knowledge is irrelevant if we gave no free will. What good is knowledge to us or understanding?

Even our most sophisticated computers or A.I.'s are not even anywhere close to it, and might even never be maybe, etc, because it's way, way more information than even they will probably ever be able to handle, etc, no matter how far advanced, or how sophisticated they get, etc.

If this is so far above us then how can you be so sure of its reality. You are basing your position on something that must be taken by faith that it is reality. You can have no evidence of its existence if no one can prove its existence.

He won't forgive you of your sins if you do not forgive others of theirs in your heart, etc, and He also says "Vengeance is mine, and mine alone and only, and I alone will repay", etc. So we have people face consequences for what we deem are wrong or bad or evil actions for the good of our societies, and for our own personal safety, and nothing more. We are not supposed to be harboring or nursing anything else beyond that, etc. If you do, it could cost you your eternity, etc.

This is evidence for free will. You are pointing out the necessity of forgiveness. How can it cost us eternity if we don't? That's injustice. Vengeance can never be wrong. Forgiveness can never be right. Because we cannot choose either and the command is worthless. Justice is meaningless. Justice has no worth. Justice has no value. Why would a just God not forgive us if we don't forgive others? I have no choice in tge matter. I was always not going to forgive so why would He tell me to if I'm not going to? That is illogical.

But the only reason we have people face consequences for things that are deemed wrong or bad or evil by the majority, or our societies is just to keep the rest of us safe, and that is all, etc.

Then why do we let them go once they have committed a crime. There us no such thing as rehabilitation. There us no such thing as impulse control. We know that in poor communities there is more crime. We are told that poverty causes crime and if we give people enough money they won't commit crime. Criminality is irrelevant. You were always goingvto be a thief. Lock them up after tmhe first crime because we can never know they won't steal again. They can't be rehabilitate.

Remember Paul's words.

Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labor, working with his hands the thing that is good, that he may have whereof to give to him that hath need. Let no corrupt speech proceed out of your mouth, but such as is good for edifying as the need may be, that it may give grace to them that hear. And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, in whom ye were sealed unto the day of redemption. Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamor, and railing, be put away from you, with all malice: and be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, even as God also in Christ forgave you.

- - Bible Gateway

www.biblegateway.com

Eph.4.28,Eph.4.29,Eph.4.30,Eph.4.31,Eph.4.32&version=ASV

You can't tell someone who was always goingvto steal not to steal. Paul's words are irrelevant. How can you grieve the Holy Spirit by NOT putting things away from you because you were always going to do those things?

Jesus told the woman to go and sin no more.that is an impossibility if there is no choice. He would have just told her to go.

 

[stevevw]

Yeah, we treat free will as being real. I have enormous difficulty in doing otherwise. It really seems as if I have it. But that's not evidence for its existence. So maybe you should try addressing determinism instead. This line of argument (gee, it must exist because it feels real) goes nowhere. You might as well say the earth is stationary because it doesn't feel like we're moving.

I can't keep responding to the same position (it's not an argument) if I've already discounted it a few times. And been discounted very many times throughout the thread.

Noticed the first few words I wrote ie "Its more than feelings". You took off arguing against a stawman you created and didn't address my actual claim. What are you saying is the type of evidence we need. If its something to do science then your mistaken. Thats like using a test tube to measure love.

If as we agree we believe free will is real then like other experiences such as morality, colors, or love are also real phenomena that we need to measure in a different way to material reductionist methods.

We can use our lived experiences as a measure and evidence. Its logically incoherent to say that we may put to death or sentence some to years in prison denying them the rights we all agree humans should have to thrive based on feelings. We know thats not enough as feelings could be wrong like you said "people could feel the earth stands still".

We use much more than feelings and that is why we are confident and justified to punish wrongdoers for their choices and actions. We measure this by the testing we have done for millenia. That is we know that humans are moral beings and that certain chosen behaviour is wrong, is detrimental to humans. In fact we can see a history of not holding people accountable and the chaos it brings.

That evidence is just as good as science. Its a direct measure of human behaviour based on the reality of how humans interact. It has been repeated like anh good science testing over and over again with the same results. That is we know humans are capable of free choice in certain situations which can have negative effects. Enough so that we will take them out of society.

 

[Bradskii]

Noticed the first few words I wrote ie "Its more than feelings". You took off arguing against a stawman you created and didn't address my actual claim. What are you saying is the type of evidence we need. If its something to do science then your mistaken. Thats like using a test tube to measure love.

No. Far from it. It the world is deterministic then there is no free will. You can address that as you see fit. Your best bet it to give me an example of an event without a cause. A decision made that wasn't determined by anything at all. I can't prove there is no free will. But you can prove there is by doing that.

We can use our lived experiences as a measure and evidence. Its logically incoherent to say that we may put to death or sentence some to years in prison denying them the rights we all agree humans should have to thrive based on feelings.

Who said we lock people up on feelings? That is exactly what I said we shouldn't do. We shouldn't punish people because we feel a sense that we want retribution. We lock them up for practical reasons. As a deterrent and as a protective measure.

In fact we can see a history of not holding people accountable and the chaos it brings.

We hold them to account for what they have done. I didn't say that we don't punish them. But they are not ultimately responsible for their actions. So their punishment is not retribution. The threat of punishment is a persuasive measure to try to convince people to act correctly. It becomes one of the antecedent conditions that hopefully will guide them in the correct direction. If it doesn't then we commit to the punishment otherwise it is worthless proposing it. We show the threat is real.

 

[Neogaia777]

By whom or by what?

You have not shown how our point of view is incorrect. What do you mean we don't know? Knowledge is irrelevant if we gave no free will. What good is knowledge to us or understanding?

If this is so far above us then how can you be so sure of its reality. You are basing your position on something that must be taken by faith that it is reality. You can have no evidence of its existence if no one can prove its existence.

This is evidence for free will. You are pointing out the necessity of forgiveness. How can it cost us eternity if we don't? That's injustice. Vengeance can never be wrong. Forgiveness can never be right. Because we cannot choose either and the command is worthless. Justice is meaningless. Justice has no worth. Justice has no value. Why would a just God not forgive us if we don't forgive others? I have no choice in tge matter. I was always not going to forgive so why would He tell me to if I'm not going to? That is illogical.





Then why do we let them go once they have committed a crime. There us no such thing as rehabilitation. There us no such thing as impulse control. We know that in poor communities there is more crime. We are told that poverty causes crime and if we give people enough money they won't commit crime. Criminality is irrelevant. You were always goingvto be a thief. Lock them up after tmhe first crime because we can never know they won't steal again. They can't be rehabilitate.

Remember Paul's words.

Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labor, working with his hands the thing that is good, that he may have whereof to give to him that hath need. Let no corrupt speech proceed out of your mouth, but such as is good for edifying as the need may be, that it may give grace to them that hear. And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, in whom ye were sealed unto the day of redemption. Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamor, and railing, be put away from you, with all malice: and be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, even as God also in Christ forgave you.

- - Bible Gateway

www.biblegateway.com

Eph.4.28,Eph.4.29,Eph.4.30,Eph.4.31,Eph.4.32&version=ASV

You can't tell someone who was always goingvto steal not to steal. Paul's words are irrelevant. How can you grieve the Holy Spirit by NOT putting things away from you because you were always going to do those things?

Jesus told the woman to go and sin no more.that is an impossibility if there is no choice. He would have just told her to go.

From our perspective it is still an open field of different possibilities and everything can still be changed, or done differently.

This is why we are still commanded to forgive and not steal and whatnot.

God Bless.

 

[stevevw]

No. Far from it. It the world is deterministic then there is no free will. You can address that as you see fit. Your best bet it to give me an example of an event without a cause. A decision made that wasn't determined by anything at all. I can't prove there is no free will. But you can prove there is by doing that.

When you say give me a situation where there is no cause you are appealing to material reductionism, to the science method of physical mechanisms. I just explained to you that free will falls within the non reductionist and material paradigm. Yet you ignored this and asked for material reductionist causes.

Its like conscious experiences of say awe, pain or colors. The material mechanisms like neurons, electrical signals, chemicals or physics cannot explain conscious experiences. They cannot explain morality. So appealing to material mechanistic causes that reduce to the physical processes is useless.

So I could say explain to me the mechanistic causes of the experience of color, a red experience or pain. You will not be able to come up with a cause because no amount of mechanistic processes or causes can explain this. Free will, agency and morality are similar phenomena that are not reduced to mechanistic causes.

Who said we lock people up on feelings? That is exactly what I said we shouldn't do. We shouldn't punish people because we feel a sense that we want retribution. We lock them up for practical reasons. As a deterrent and as a protective measure.

You said about free will "I'm afraid this is nothing more than 'it certainly feels like I have free will and I make decisions, so it must exist'. In other words free will is not real, its just that we feel it is but we are wrong. The same logic applies to morality or our sense of agency and control in the world.

So if we are locking people up based on the false illussion that they have free will then we are locking them up based on feelings, the feeling that we have free will and nothing objectively real.

According to this logic everything goes out the windown as arbitrary because it doesn't matter that we shouldn't punish people because we feel a sense that we want retribution. We should not also punish people because we feel its practical. Practical is not justification for punishing someone who has t done anything wrong accordiing to this logic.

Your just arbitrarily using certain reasons you like and feel is justified. No reason should be reasonable because according to the logic 'they could not help it and have done nothing wrong'. You can only do wrong if you freely choose to do so. Your determination of 'wrong' is also aribitrary.

We hold them to account for what they have done. I didn't say that we don't punish them. But they are not ultimately responsible for their actions. So their punishment is not retribution.

Come on people want justice as retribution and for wrong doers especially when henious to suffer. They demand justice like the injustices done to blacks. They don't just want just punishment. they want heads to roll. But still the logic is incoherent. Those who do wrong cannot help it and we usually excuse them, like self defence.

This is just an expansion of the principle of excusing people on self defence and mitigating circumstances which deminish punishment or completely excuses the person from responsibility.

How can we hold them responsible no matter what they do. We should not be putting them in jail at all. Not even puniushing them at all. They have a right to make life hell for others. Its just how they were programmed. Its the cruel system who is arbitraity making up the rules lol.

The threat of punishment is a persuasive measure to try to convince people to act correctly. It becomes one of the antecedent conditions that hopefully will guide them in the correct direction. If it doesn't then we commit to the punishment otherwise it is worthless proposing it. We show the threat is real.

Why when those threats mean nothing because its too later, they are already destined to do what they do. No amount of threats will do anything to change this. If it does then it then supports free will because the person who was predestined to do what they would do is now choosing to not go down that path.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

Therexwoukd be no purpose for reason if free will wasn’t involved. Reason helps us decide what course of actionbyo take. The fact that people decide to go against reason and logic shows we have free will.

And they choose to do so despite the fact that reason would dictate it would be better to do something else. Risk vs reward. Sometimes we decide we decide the risk is worth it and other times we decide it's not. It could be for the exact same action. We nake a free will decision to disregard the risk despite the fact that reason would tell us it's not worth it. "I knew I shouldn't have done that, but I did it anyway.".

I chose. "I'm glad I made that decision, i knew I shouldn't have done that and it turns out I was right."

The fact the we can reason things through and choose to either go with what reason says is the best choice or ignore it in favor of a different choice that goes against reason is evidence of free will.

Not free will, but feelings. The results of subconscious impulses, evaluations, conditioned and unconditioned drives, social mores, moral intuitions, etc., competing to reach conscious awareness. As far as consciousness & reason are concerned, feelings are a given, a brute fact, in a particular context at a particular time.

You use reason to reach a conclusion because you feel that reason is the best way or is the right thing to do. You may decide to ignore the reasoned conclusion because you feel like taking a risk; perhaps because the reasoned conclusion feels dull, or the alternative feels more exciting, or you just feel in a contrarian mood, and the risk seems small (by reason or feeling). Those feelings are something you are consciously aware of or become consciously aware of, but they're not under conscious control - unless a stronger feeling compels you to try and suppress one feeling in favour of another.

Reason is slave to the passions and consciousness is the interpretation of that interaction as personal agency.

But if it makes any difference, it is your subconscious that generates those competing feelings, your reason that evaluates the possible responses and their outcomes, your consciousness that arrogates agency, and your reason that justifies or excuses them in retrospect.

You can call it free will, but the 'freedom' is a label for our ignorance of the underlying causes of those feelings and their relative strengths, and the 'will' is typically a label for the strongest feeling that corresponds to our social mores, moral intuitions, or conditioned drives - or the strongest feeling of all (depending on the outcome).

We generate post-hoc narratives of excuses and justifications for beneficial and adverse outcomes in acknowledgement of the competing feelings we had when making the choice, whether they were gut instincts, moral intuitions, etc. But given that those feelings were outside our conscious control, it's reasonable to suggest that the resulting choice or decision was inevitable.

 

[rjs330]

From our perspective it is still an open field of different possibilities and everything can still be changed, or done differently.

This is why we are still commanded to forgive and not steal and whatnot.

God Bless.

From God's perspective it IS an open field of different possibilities. And it's his perspective that we have a choice in what we do and we can make things better or worse by those decisions made by our free will to do so. Biblically it is so.

“Anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own.” (John 7:17)

Elijah went before the people and said, “How long will you waver between two opinions? If the LORD is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him.” But the people said nothing.

However this does not preclude God's intervention in that process in order for him to work out things to his purpose.
God can disrupt or intervene or make things happen as he will. This is also evident in scripture. His disruption can be quite jarring.

A man’s mind plans his way [as he journeys through life], but the Lord directs his steps and establishes them.” (Proverbs 16:9 AMP)

God can be very involved in the dealing of our lives. For example.

“…no one can say, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ except by the Holy Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 12:3)

No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them…” (John 6:44)

Notice his involvement here. But pay close attention to the words becauae they are important. Vital really. Jesus didn't say that the drawing of the HS determines that the person WILL come. It shows God's involvement to draw a person. But ultimately the person will make a choice. How do we know this?


And this is the judgment, that the light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their works were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, and cometh not to the light, lest his works should be reproved. But he that doeth the truth cometh to the light, that his works may be made manifest, that they have been wrought in God.
Bible Gateway passage: John 3:19, John 3:20, John 3:21 - American Standard Version

The light came but the people loved darkness rather than light. This is why there is judgement. The spirit draws but rhe people reject.

It's nonsensical and illogical for God to judge this if the people had no choice to follow the light or reject the light when the spirit is drawing them.

So it's evident by scripture that we most certainly have free will. However it is also evident in scripture that God can and does intervene in lives of men.

Our lives are not one or the other. God has not set this earth to be and then left it to see what happens. He is involved when he chooses to be. But this involvement is not absolute with every one at every moment of their lives.

Jeremiah 7:24
Verse Concepts
Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but walked in their own counsels and in the stubbornness of their evil heart, and went backward and not forward.

and then fell away, it is impossible to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame. For as touching those who were once enlightened and tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the age to come,
Bible Gateway passage: Hebrews 6:6, Hebrews 6:4, Hebrews 6:5 - American Standard Version

This often is the confusion. We have free will. It is clear. But God can and does intervene and insert himself as he wills and determines things for his own purposes.

Neither position of free will or determinism is absolute.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

... It the world is deterministic then there is no free will.

It makes no difference whether the world is deterministic or stochastic. A truly random event has no prior cause, so, presumably, cannot be a product of will, free or otherwise. As it happens, our world gives every indication of being stochastic at the quantum level but, by averaging out, effectively deterministic at macro-scales.

But even at macro-scales, there are all kinds of events we can view as effectively random because they're unpredictable. However, I doubt that free will advocates would support pseudo-randomness as an explanation for free will.

OTOH, if free will is neither deterministic nor random/pseudo-random, is there a coherent alternative? if so, what is it?

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

...

If the punishment for drinking and driving was tying you to a stake and burning you alive then DUI would stop overnight. Not because all of a sudden, with our free will, we had decided it was wrong. The punishment would deter us. That wouldn't be a free will decision. The punishment would determine our decision. So we have to have a punishment to stop people stealing. As a deterrent. The punishment determines people's actions. If it doesn't work, then either keep punishing or make the punishment greater until people are persuaded that it's not what they really want to risk. It determines their actions.

The threat of punishment alone is not a particularly effective deterrent for those with low moral or social conformity, e.g. habitual criminals, as evidenced by the amount of crime and recidivism in countries with punitive legal systems, but there are alternatives that can be effective for some.

 

[Neogaia777]

From God's perspective it IS an open field of different possibilities. And it's his perspective that we have a choice in what we do and we can make things better or worse by those decisions made by our free will to do so. Biblically it is so.

“Anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own.” (John 7:17)

Elijah went before the people and said, “How long will you waver between two opinions? If the LORD is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him.” But the people said nothing.

However this does not preclude God's intervention in that process in order for him to work out things to his purpose.
God can disrupt or intervene or make things happen as he will. This is also evident in scripture. His disruption can be quite jarring.

A man’s mind plans his way [as he journeys through life], but the Lord directs his steps and establishes them.” (Proverbs 16:9 AMP)

God can be very involved in the dealing of our lives. For example.

“…no one can say, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ except by the Holy Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 12:3)

No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them…” (John 6:44)

Notice his involvement here. But pay close attention to the words becauae they are important. Vital really. Jesus didn't say that the drawing of the HS determines that the person WILL come. It shows God's involvement to draw a person. But ultimately the person will make a choice. How do we know this?


And this is the judgment, that the light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their works were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, and cometh not to the light, lest his works should be reproved. But he that doeth the truth cometh to the light, that his works may be made manifest, that they have been wrought in God.
Bible Gateway passage: John 3:19, John 3:20, John 3:21 - American Standard Version

The light came but the people loved darkness rather than light. This is why there is judgement. The spirit draws but rhe people reject.

It's nonsensical and illogical for God to judge this if the people had no choice to follow the light or reject the light when the spirit is drawing them.

So it's evident by scripture that we most certainly have free will. However it is also evident in scripture that God can and does intervene in lives of men.

Our lives are not one or the other. God has not set this earth to be and then left it to see what happens. He is involved when he chooses to be. But this involvement is not absolute with every one at every moment of their lives.

Jeremiah 7:24
Verse Concepts
Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but walked in their own counsels and in the stubbornness of their evil heart, and went backward and not forward.

and then fell away, it is impossible to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame. For as touching those who were once enlightened and tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the age to come,
Bible Gateway passage: Hebrews 6:6, Hebrews 6:4, Hebrews 6:5 - American Standard Version

This often is the confusion. We have free will. It is clear. But God can and does intervene and insert himself as he wills and determines things for his own purposes.

Neither position of free will or determinism is absolute.

God in the OT is God the Holy Spirit, or God the Spirit, and didn't know all in or at or from the beginning, or in the OT, and is not God the Highest Heavenly Father that Jesus introduces us to, which is the Highest God of all, and for which everything is deterministic, and all was/is always already known, who is also the original chief primary cause of all or everything/everyone else in and from the very beginning, etc.

He has the other Two to show us Himself, for it is the one thing He cannot do.

In order to do that He would have to give up or sacrifice some of His foreknowledge, or knowledge, etc.

Instead He gave us the other Two.

God Bless.

 

[Neogaia777]

There also cannot be choice and full knowledge. The two just simply cannot co-exist.

God Bless.

 

[Neogaia777]

And as for yet another point, I wish you guys could all crawl outside of your little religious boxes for a bit, and would consider what it would have to be like to be all-knowing, etc.

Would you even be capable of having any of the kind of much more human emotional reactions to things if you were, or did?

Why would you, for example, get angry about a thing of which you already knew, etc? And not only already knew, but you were the original cause of it, and there was never any kind of real possibility of it going any other way. Which was only going according to the way you made it go, or wanted, and it couldn't ever go any other way, etc?

Anyway, I digress. But I really do wish you guys could crawl put of your little religious boxes for a bit, and put your thinking caps on, and use basic simple logic and reason, etc.

Jesus did, so why can't you?

God Bless.

 

[Neogaia777]

God the Spirit's anger/wrath was poured out on His biological Son Jesus, and after that His wrath was finished, once and for all and for good, and was fully satisfied, and it is Jesus wrath we have to worry about when Jesus comes back, for he will be armed with the Heavenly Father's judgements, which might be very, very different from any other kinds of judgments that we have received before, etc, which was where he (Jesus) went, and is where he will be returning from, while God the Holy Spirit stayed here, just as He has always been here, and is still here with us even right now, etc. When Jesus comes back starts the 7th day, which will be a very long period of time, and God the (Holy) Spirit will get to rest on that day while Jesus takes over for a while, etc, maybe He gets to go to where the Heavenly Father is/always was at that time, IDK? But, either way, the 6th day has been ever since the first land animals, and is only about to finally end right now, and each day marks a whole different kind of new era/age, and the 7th might be as well, and might even be the next step in evolution, or a whole different kind of existence, etc, until the end of that 7th day, which will mark the very last and final resurrection and judgement of this whole entire 7 day creations age, when the old ones will be done away with/destroyed, and whole new ones put in their place for everything to begin again, etc.

I think that's enough information for now.

But there is more, a lot more, etc.

God Bless.

 

[Bradskii]

When you say give me a situation where there is no cause you are appealing to material reductionism, to the science method of physical mechanisms. I just explained to you that free will falls within the non reductionist and material paradigm. Yet you ignored this and asked for material reductionist causes.

You are free to give me any event without a cause. If you can't then we're going to have to go with a deterministic world. I'm not interested in awe or the colour red. The event can be a decision if you like. I don't mind. Literally any event at all.

You said about free will "I'm afraid this is nothing more than 'it certainly feels like I have free will and I make decisions, so it must exist'. In other words free will is not real, its just that we feel it is but we are wrong. The same logic applies to morality or our sense of agency and control in the world.

That's right.

So if we are locking people up based on the false illussion that they have free will then we are locking them up based on feelings, the feeling that we have free will and nothing objectively real.

No. We lock them up because they stole your car. We tell them that it's not his car, he's not allowed to take it and if he does we'll put him in jail. Hopefully that will convince him not to do it.

According to this logic everything goes out the windown as arbitrary because it doesn't matter that we shouldn't punish people because we feel a sense that we want retribution. We should not also punish people because we feel its practical. Practical is not justification for punishing someone who has t done anything wrong accordiing to this logic.

Practical reasons are the only reasons. Are you actually reading what I'm writing?

Come on people want justice as retribution and for wrong doers especially when henious to suffer. They demand justice like the injustices done to blacks. They don't just want just punishment. they want heads to roll. But still the logic is incoherent. Those who do wrong cannot help it and we usually excuse them, like self defence.

This is just an expansion of the principle of excusing people on self defence and mitigating circumstances which deminish punishment or completely excuses the person from responsibility.

Generally speaking, yes.

How can we hold them responsible no matter what they do. We should not be putting them in jail at all. Not even puniushing them at all. They have a right to make life hell for others. Its just how they were programmed. Its the cruel system who is arbitraity making up the rules lol.

If you don't think it's a good idea to deter people from stealing your car, then so be it.

 

[Bradskii]

Why when those threats mean nothing because its too later, they are already destined to do what they do. No amount of threats will do anything to change this. If it does then it then supports free will because the person who was predestined to do what they would do is now choosing to not go down that path.

I've answered this separately because it's quite important, so please address just this point.

If you don't have any threat of punishment for stealing, people are likely going to steal things. But if it's known that if someone does steal then they'll be arrested, charged and possibly go to jail then that might well change their minds about it.

Does this make sense to you?