More like your'e finished.

Who chooses their parents or their first teachings?

The environment on belief of a higher power than ourselves.

What are you talking about now?

I get so damn frustrated with your "logic" that isn't.

What does any belief in a higher power have to do with the conscious will?

I'm sorry you are frustrated. This whole thread is full misunderstandings of what the will even is.

The question of whether it is "free" or not is a moot point. Its a silly question.

The will is just the will. It is either used or it is not used.

If a living thing is not aware enough to make conscious choices, then it responds to its programing or instincts and acts automatically.

The power of a person or entity to take focused conscious action and to direct itself, that is the will. It is awareness and intelligence enough to think and act, independent of programing.

Once again, it seems that I would need a vocabulary transplant in order to follow some of these things as they are written.

To simplify things...

What is an example of something freely decided or chosen which is completely independent of prior influence?

Did you really say that Creative? What do you mean by "original belief system?

Prior influence does not mean that a person is not making a conscious choice of his own.

A conscious choice is made when one is aware of, and/OR accepts the consequences of his actions and choices.

The will is used when a person has the awareness and intelligence enough to think and act, independent of programing. (Not independent of "influence.")

Everyone is influenced.

The argument is about 'free' will Jb. No one is arguing that the will does not exist.

A belief system is everything that one has come to accept/believe as true.

I know but to argue about "free will" is pointless. The will is just the will. Of course it is "free" if you are conscious enough to actually USE IT.

The only way it could NOT BE FREE is if there was someone pulling your strings 100% of the time and you were a puppet or a robot that had to follow your programming to the letter 100% of the time.

Its a silly argument.

The only way it can be free is if it independent of outside influences, because that is what determines what one decides/chooses.

geez...

That's like saying that just because you see an advertisement to vote for John Joe, you have no CHOICE IN THE MATTER. You HAD to vote for him because you were "influenced." That is ridiculous. You can still vote for him OR NOT.

The person chooses. Influences don't "choose." They only "influence."

You have a strange idea about what freedom is.

4 Creative:
To say that there is no free choice or "free will" because there are "influences" is to render everyone helpless in the face of influences. It sounds like not taking responsibility for your own decisions or actions. You can tell the judge "Its not my fault! I am the victim of influences!"

("I saw an advertisement that told me that if I did not like the tire to bring it back and it showed a little old lady throwing the tire through a plate glass window. So thats why I did it officer. I am a victim of advertising!" ) <----example


4 wux:
If everything is "deterministic" then nobody is responsible. You can tell the judge "It was fate!" Its not my fault! I am a victim of a deterministic universe! I can't help myself.

4 Dragoness:
In your world anyone who believes in a "higher power" has no "free" will of their own. This explains why you are at odds with the idea that there is no "higher" power. I can understand that. But do you take full responsibility for your decisions and actions or do you blame "influences" or "a deterministic universe?"

***************

Has anyone ever heard the expression "You have a brain, use it!"

You can say the same thing about the WILL.

You have a will, use it!

It is the power to direct your own thoughts, actions and attention.

We are not the victims of 'influences' or 'fate.' We are not puppets or robots. We are conscious thinking human beings who make our own choices and we are responsible for the consequences of our actions whether you realize it or not.

anything that has a "need" has no "Free Will" ..a "need" is an indication that forces exist beyond one's own will..for it is the "need", that drives, force or control the one in question ...

for example....the need to eat food and drink water will force one to make choices they otherwise wouldn't have made ...

if that need is not met then other forces will or may move in against them and force them to make a decision or these forces will make a decison for them

the end results of not full filling the need to replenish the body is death

and this concept of how "need" takes away "Free Will" even applies to a God

a God supposedly wants for naught....therefore if a God makes a decision to "Create" what would be the purpose to create unless it has a need...

that a God has a "need" takes away that God's "Free Will" as soon as the God creates or full fill that need....the end results of a God fulling a need is that it's not a God since Gods supposedly wants for naught ...

the most logical question that will arise from this concept pertaining to Gods is "who says that a God has no needs or wants for naught ...and the most logical answer would be...then why are they considered to be Gods

No it's not.



I never said that influences do the choosing, they determine what and how one chooses.



Your oversimplifying and conflating things here...

We are not discussing freedom in general. We are discussing the human will. Just because one recognizes and possibly identifies the influencing factors upon one's own thinking does not mean that s/he must choose according to any given one of them, which is what your example above concludes. It does, however, mean that one cannot choose that which is unknown. Let's use your example...

I see an advertisement which says to vote for John Joe, what do I do?

I read it. I know that there is an election. I know that there is a candidate named John Joe.

That alone does not mean that I must vote for him. It is not the only influencing factor. Whatever the others are, they also play a role in my thinking, and therefore affect my will accordingly. Whatever I choose to do will be in accordance with what I believe is the best choice regarding the situation at hand. I will willfully choose according to what I believe about the overall situation. Those recognized choices will be in accordance with how it is being perceived and framed within my own mind. We are creatures capable of volition. That is not negated by the fact that our will is determined by life's influences and personal preference.




Poor examples which are only taking into account one particular form of influence and acting as if it is the only one. I could very well look at both of your examples and not be significantly influenced by either because some prior exposure has led me to believe otherwise.

Your displaying an old fairy tale/Christian fear-mongering line of thinking. Just because the will is influenced does not mean that one should not be held accountable for their actions. We are aware of the laws, and therefore they too play a role in what influences us. If we knowingly break the law because something else holds more influence upon our will, it does not mean that we should not be held accountable to society.

The irony I see here lies in the notion that your attempting to portray some inherently 'free' ability to choose. I could argue quite soundly that a completely 'free will' has no accountability, but I fear that that would not be understood. You do bring up an opportunity for growth in thought here though. In this your also invoking the concept of self-direction, which I agree with but do not think that that establishes a 'free' will. It actually allows one to be able to identify what determines one's thinking/will/actions. The idea that self-direction necessitates 'free will' is wrongly had because you are not taking into consideration what is necessary for one to do such a thing.

If I want to successfully guide myself in any given direction, I must be able to identify what that takes. I must identify where I am and where I want to go, and then take the necessary steps to achieve that goal. All of those things are determined by not only my actions, but also the recognition and identification of other prior influences which caused the current situation. Let's say that I have a personality feature which I would like to change about myself. What is absolutely necessary in order to do such a thing?

1.) I must first admit that it(the feature) exists - which requires the recognition of it. If this is not the case, then I cannot intentionally change it. The change must be intentional in order for it to be self-direction.

2.) I must then identify the specific circumstances in which that particular personality feature plays a role. For if I cannot do such a thing, then I will not be able prevent it from proceeding the next time it happens. Preventing it is necessarily required in order to change it.

3.) I must then be able to recognize the circumstances as they unravel or prior to unraveling in order to hold the potential for change in my conscious mind.

4.) At the time where the feature would normally play a role, I must approach or react in a different way. I must do this enough times that I can break the old habit and employ anew.

5. All of the above necessarily demands the prior acknowledgment of the specific determining factors along with the conscious and deliberate implementation of new reactions to those particular circumstances.

Successful self-direction contradicts 'free' will. It necessarily employs determinism.

Don't know who chooses their parents, but you said "belief system" not "teachings" - completely different.

I feel like dissecting... sorry Sky,





"The faculty of conscious and especially of deliberate action."

If the above is to be considered as the will, then it is innate, and therefore it's existence is necessarily beyond our control. It is already there when we are born. I do not disagree.

How is it possibly used if not for wants/preferences? How can one deliberately act if not in accordance to wants?

One cannot make a mistake on purpose.



Choice is necessarily a product of the will? Don't you mean that choosing is necessarily a product of the will?



Think of your least favorite thing. Are you telling me that you believe that you can willfully change it so that it becomes your favorite thing? Hmmmmm...





This makes no sense Sky. One does not "decide" that they like the taste of apple pie. They either do or they don't and that depends completely upon one's innate sense of taste. You have no choice in what foods you find tasty. You may however have a choice in whether or not eat them again, according to that.

If what you claim is true, then there would be no such a thing as suffering in any form, because one would be able to 'decide' that whatever is going on is their favorite thing, and they would be able to willfully enjoy it.





Your severely conflating things here. There are many kinds of personal preferences, all of which are not determined on equal grounds, and none of which are 'freely' chosen. All of which first require knowing about them and comparing to others, which demands the idea of that being determined by exposure. One cannot willfully choose that which is not known to be a choice. Personal preference of foods does not require nor is it determined by being decided upon by a conscious individual. It only requires the innate ability for one to recognize that they either do or do not like a particular thing after having tasted it. That is facilitated by something entirely beyond our control. You have no choice in the physiological nervous system that you are born with. That includes the sense of taste. You do not determine it, it determines what you like the taste of, or not.

Seeing how one's original belief system is one's first teachings, I find the above to be an attempt to side-step the validity of what contradicts your own personal point of view.

Show me how there is any difference at all.

One's original belief system and all that it entails will color the world accordingly. It is the first means that one has by which to translate observation, to make sense of what is seen in the person's own mind.

Wrong?

Unconscious choices huh? Let me showyou where your argument fails.

1.)Choosing requires more than one option.

2.)That requires volition.

3.)Volition requires conscious thought.

Therefore, automated/unconscious actions are not chosen.





And the fact that you see it differently makes it wrong?



If it were only that easy.

Show me.

I gotta game to watch...

Go Cincy!

Boo Jets!

Creative said:From a free will perspective, I would say that one must first decide that (the feature) exists. And from there, it continues to exist until one decides that it does not exist, for “deciding that it no longer exists” marks the point where the entire cycle of “changing the feature” ends. So really, one’s own decisions are what drives the whole process. It starts with a decision and ends with a decision.

So as I see it, the complexity of that whole 5 step process is unnecessary. All that is really required is
1) Decide that (the feature) exists
2) Decide that (the feature) doesn’t exist.

Those are the two decisions that define the process. And they are the only two factors that are absolutely required.

Now of course, the nature of free will dictates that one can make any other decisions as to prerequisites and dependencies and intermediate steps and by-products and results and whatever. But all of those contain their own two step, start/end sub-processes, which are delimited by the “decide/decide not” steps. Different people may do different things in between. Or one may just go directly from 1) to 2) without doing anything in between. (And interestingly enough, the directness of the route from 1) to 2) could be considered a good measure of one’s own personal power and/or ability – in the human sense. But that’s getting off the subject.)

One of the problems I see here is that there doesn’t seem to be much recognition of the flip side of the free will
coin – that free will includes the capability of deciding that something is “not”. Sort of like the conundrum “Can God make a rock so heavy he himself can’t lift it?” The key is not in God’s lifting ability, the key is in God’s ability to decide not to be able to lift the rock. So the size of the rock is just a red herring. God could decide not to be able to lift a grain of sand.

In other words, if we’re going to talk about free will, it must to be treated as an absolute – and likewise for deteminism. Otherwise we’re simply arguing about where to draw a line and say “This is where the miracle occurs”.

Now if we treat free will as an absolute, then we must conclude that, as with the God/rock conundrum, free will allows for the decision that one does not have free will – and poof, just like that, no free will. Or one could decide that one’s freedom of will is limited to specific factors, and poof, just like that, “limited freedom of will”.

------------------------------

The basic argument for determinism seems to be: Everything that we do understand is deterministic, therefore everything that we don’t understand must be deterministic as well.” (Which, in itself, seems to indicate that determinism is a requirement for understanding. But that’s another tangent.)

But it doesn’t stop there. We go on and build this hugely complex set of rules (e.g. logic, science) for evaluating deterministic factors. But those rules are designed to deal only with deterministic factors. They cannot be applied to non-deterministic factors because the very foundation of the rule set is the postulate that all things examined must be deterministic. So in truth, attempting to apply those rules of evaluation to something non-deterministic is an error in category. Quite simply, it’s attempting to evaluate apples using methodology/criteria designed for evaluating oranges. The only thing it can result in is factors relating to oranges. And the results are obvious – e.g. “it is not ripe because the skin is green” and we miss out on enjoying all those delicious Granny Smith apples because they’re green.