To observe that we don't have free will.

[MesonBoson]

Most of us feel that we have free will.

But when we are faced with making any choice, we are using pre-existing decision-making equipment on pre-existing circumstances.

And so the decision that we make is the only one that our particular mind would make, in that particular situation.

We have to live our lives as though we have free will.

But once you see that life is like the groove in a record, merit and blame become equal imposters.

I dont know. Maybe you are BU, maybe you're not. I can't quite decide...

We are computer game some teen being somewhere is playing sims with us

I never thought of that, I hope my side wins

Do you want to let everyone out of prison then? If nobody in there was responsible for their choices, then they shouldn't be in there, should they?

But you would say that!

No I don't want dangerous bastards let out. I want them in prison.

But I'm just saying it's not their fault that they are cunts.

Their life path was always going to go that way.

Poor, horrible, things.

Of course it wasn’t. If it was, then everyone would be in prison. You have the free will not to steal a car or kill someone every single day.

These Friday night Mumsnet threads are the best argument for being teetotal I’ve ever seen.

I don't see how this connects to what I've said: "Of course it wasn’t. If it was, then everyone would be in prison"

How do you mean?

I don't drink btw

This is unbelievably crass.

So rapists, murderers and paedophiles, you're saying it's not their fault?

hmm this argument assumes its conclusion: that if a decision is caused, it cannot be free. But freedom doesn’t require choices to be uncaused or random. A decision can be both determined by your character, values, and reasoning and genuinely yours. If your choices were not connected to who you are, they would be arbitrary, not free.

The fact that there is one choice you would make in a given situation doesn’t eliminate agency—it describes it. And merit and blame are not imposters; they are ways of evaluating the character, intentions, and reasoning that produced the action. A person being the cause of their actions is precisely why praise and blame make sense.

Patiently waiting for mine to put in the motherlode cheat 🙄

I definitely am fascinated by simulation theory. A lot of top physicists believe it’s a very likely probability. Reading into it blows my mind!

A person may the proximate cause of their actions, but they are part of a much longer deterministic chain.

I don't know what simulation theory is.

And I don't know any top physicists either.

If it's going to happen, it's going to happen.

Yes.

That's exactly what I'm saying.

Everything they did was what they were always going to do.

I might hate and despise them, but I also pity them.

I'm glad my life path didn't lead me that way.

But the path is already laid out.

We don't bring anything 'free' to our decision making

But your 'decision - making equipment' and your circumstances are both unique to you, so it's you personally who is making choices based on them.

Your reasoning is just a cop-out for poor decisions. It's a way of saying "it wasn't my fault" even if everyone was telling you that you're making a crap choice.

The free will is a Bible definition: you only get the free will to chose how you live but you are not free in which consequences you get, therefore you have free will to believe in God, do good and end up in Heaven because if you chose free will to chose evil you end up in hell

That's very true, but where is the freedom?

Every choice we make is the one that we personally would make in those circumstances.

We just have a personal algorithm rolling in side of us.

We have will. But not freedom.

Nobody ever made a mistake on purpose.

Poor decisions lead to poor consequences.

I'm not saying 'not their fault'; I'm saying that fault is an illusion.

I'm sorry, I'm not prepared to engage with discussion of imaginary friends.

Though, if you are a believer, you might ponder on Martin Luther and the concept of Grace

So your path was always to indulge in hard drugs on a Friday night?

Free will is a Biblical concept. You therefore are not well educated to discuss it if you think it originated somewhere else

good try though, I needed some laugh today , many people enlarge their brains on here by pretending and cannot prove it, once given a teeny tiny test

If nobody has free will, why do people change their minds. If there is no possible way to break out of the inevitable path they are on, how can they change?