Is free will just an illusion?

We are not 'making' anything random, everything is by definition random i would say, or as far as we know they are because we probably can never have the experiment where we replay certain moment with 100% same factors and circumstances to see if the results are the same. If two people go through the same circumstances, the genetics alone are going to vary the results (which would mean the factors weren't 100%, hehe)

If we could rewind our lives without the knowledge of it, why would everything turn out the same? Why can't there be changes? Do we assume that because past influences were the same, the results are always going to be same?

Christopher Hitchens made the example of a mountain in Canada that was cut in half and where you can see the roots of all trees and whatnot, and it looked like a maze right. And then went on to say that if we rewind time back, there is no reason to think the maze of roots would turn out to be exactly same. I am not saying Hitchens proves me right, because neither he or me, or you can prove that point either way.

If you drop a perfectly shaped tennis ball from the same spot and same height to a perfectly flat ground in a vacuum, is it going to bounce the same way and to the same spot on the ground every time? I don't know if this has been done, but my guess would be no. (And now i realized that maybe the rotation of earth is big enough factor to change the results, so i guess not a good example).

Your example of a child putting magnets on the fridge, the physiology of the childs brain and its interaction with the magnets is going to be a factor, the physical placement of the magnets in the childs hand is a factor.

How i would define randomness, now that you made me think about it, is probably defined by the very fact that we cannot rewind time and see if the results vary. All we can do is be in the moment called present without ever going back in what we call time to actually see that was it randomness or were things doomed to be they way they turned out to be. I am not claiming that i now proved my point objectively, but that is how i understand it.



I think that in the last example you are confusing as to what is the result. I would say the result is the cup you end up 'choosing', not the fact that you got scammed no matter what. The outcome of your supposed free will is which ever cup you choose from the three possibilities.

...but genetics aren't random. You can change the genome and even the base pairs directly. I've done altered them personally as a lab intern. Even looking at wide sets of data with "random" error, that "randomness" still follows a completely predictable normal distribution if you take enough samples, and therefore isn't really random in the philosophical sense. Don't just decide something is random because you don't know how it works.



For the same reason that perfectly rewinding a stack of dominos falling over would end up the same. If you believe in cause and effect, you believe in determinism. I can't prove cause and effect is true, but I doubt you disbelieve in that principle since the amount of items and commodities in your life which rely on it.



Yes. Give me numbers and the math will come out the same each time. I'm an engineering major who's close to a physics minor, that's a pretty easy process to run through.



What makes those factors not detemrined? Saying "that's a factor" is akin to saying "that's a thing". Yes, it's a thing, but that's a nonsequitor point. Everything is a thing. But if everything starts the same, it follows that everything ends the same. It doesn't matter how many things or factors there are.



What? Result?

I'd set up a situation that by-definition is determined. Even if you don't believe in ultimate determinism, a scenario where all the outcomes are the same is determined. That is not simply the result of the scenario, that just "is" the scenario. I wasn't claiming determinism was the result, and the example wasn't supposed to be proof of determinism. That was what I'd cleared up in the last post.

The example merely made the point that "if determinism is true, then choice can still exist". It's a conditional statement. It doesn't even have to do with claiming "determinism is real," it's just about "if determinism is real". It doesn't have to do with any of your prior remarks.

When two humans have sex that results in a child being born, their offspring randomly inherit one of the two alleles from each parent. They didn't teach you that at what ever lab you were interning in?



Ohh, it would, because you say so? Sure for a simplistic example like falling dominos when there are relatively few factors (in this example laws of physics), but when you mountain up a stack of different factors, such as random mutation, physiology of human brain, things we can't even really explain yet like consciousness, it is not as simple as you make it out to be. Because again, your entire explanation here boils down to 'you say it will'.



Ohh, i didn't know that by reducing reality to numbers, mathematicians can solve all of lifes mysteries.

Yeah, i do agree that 2+2 is 4 every time you do the math, but numbers and math equations aren't gonna solve the question of free will.



Because you say so right? What if a factor doesn't follow a deterministic pattern (example above)? As a physics minor you probably have heard of the Copenhagen interpretation?



The 'conceptual choice' you supposedly make from the three cups is still only an illusion of free-will and therefore as an example exactly the same from the others as i said originally. Sure, a choice is being made and the outcome of that choice is determined, but the choice was not done by your supposed free-will.

Okay, so I'm talking with someone of highschool level ed.

No, it's not random. Yes, I understand in highschool they tell you "one of the traits will RANDOMLY-" but it's not; everything follows a process. The thing is, in highschool, all those bindings are going to be treated as random chance because there's no point in computing that process directly, especially in natural reproduction.

It's the same as picking a colored marble out of a bowl with your eyes closed. Just because you don't see the marbles doesn't mean it's "random" even if you can use a simplified probability model to express it in highschool math class. To anyone who can see you grabbing a marble, it won't look random. Everything was a result of something prior. Your argument is just based off of the fact that you lack information. People with information (people who don't pick blind) can see that grabbing a marble followable process. The same can be said for building a genome. Or you could just throw out the finer parts of genetic engineering as a whole.


That's literally the reason for which math was invented.


Yeah, but it solves determinism. I'm not saying determinism solves will or anything of the like, but it is determined.


The Copenhagen interpretation isn't even a falsifiable hypothesis. Did you read about this off of ifl or something?


Every single thing that's ever been learned has followed a direct model. So yeah, I can just "say it will," I've got enough samples to bank on it, not to mention a more credible level of education. All you're banking off of is a lack of information: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance


Well, yeah, but that's why in my first post I wrote;



Restricted will is still will; the point I was making is that you can still deem something a "choice" regardless of determinism or not. That's why you can hold people accountable in court for "choosing" to commit a crime, etc. Unlike ultimate principles determinism or a lack thereof, will and choice just boil down to semantics since they're nothing more than forms.

You're right, restricted will is still will, but its not "free" will. I'm not saying will itself is an illusion, I'm saying free will is.

To me free will is that you have a choice not that you have every choice. That's like saying "aha you can't teleport yourself to the moon right now thus you don't have free will".

Yes, you're right. There is a difference between free will and free choice. Sometimes I use the two interchangably so my mistake for that. Free will is the ability to make a choice regardless of fate or neccessity, while free choice is having every option available to you.

However, restricted will =/= free will

As I mentioned above, you have free will when fate does not factor into the equation. By your example, it is our fate not to be able to teleport to the moon because we just don't have the ability or resources. Since fate played a factor, we don't have free will in that regard.

After a self correction based on my mistake of confusing free will and free choice, I've drawn the conclusion that we do have free will most of the time. It is free choice that is the true illusion.

Haha, gotta admit you got me there.



Cool, now tell me the equation that solves the question of free will.



All you're banking on is an assumption: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_probability

Look, i can use wikipedia too :)



If consciousness and will have nothing to do with each other, all we are arguing about is semantics. Sure we can deem something as a 'choice', but to say "you choose to do x because of free-will" is nonsensical.

We could easily hold people accountable for their actions even if we didn't use this concept of "restricted will". Actually we wouldn't have to change our justices systems that much at all, in fact we would just make them better as we would understand that sociopaths and psychopaths could be classified more as 'victims' of certain circumstances rather than independent agents who just want to harm others for the sake of it.

We all have free-will what we do it with it is our responsibility, regardless of whether you think you have it or not.