Free will or lack of.......

[the village idiot]

On 12/29/2017 at 07:47, Billhook said:

I like Chalmers idea of consciousness as a fundamental.

 

 

I watched Vespacian's "Mind over Masters" and the Sam Harris videos.

I am not convinced that the experiment which appears to show that we have no free will is valid.  The fact that your mind knows the answer before the fact becomes apparent to everyone else could be due to other factors, such as accessing the quantum in a way not understood at present.  This does not mean that you have no free will.

If consciousness is like a giant internet which soaks up every conscious thought that there ever has been, and you have found access to this "internet" by say meditation, then you could appear to see the future.  Perhaps not actually seeing the actual future but seeing a series of  events that would lead you to believe in a very likely result.

 

Take this website as being a tiny example.  You all have found access to this information by having a computer, an internet server, a code and an identity for this forum.  A modern form of going into a meditative trance!

 In the primitive world, as a Bushman, an Aborigine or a Red Indian  might induce a trance before they go off hunting for water or bison to gain similar information from the fundamental  consciousness.  They then go off on their search looking for signs to guide them.  Signs that they may have seen in their "dream"

 

I could post on here that "Billhook will be sitting under Nelson's Column at Midday on Sunday December 31st"

There is a strong possibility that you would see me there on the day, and that is the most likely scenario, but I may have been involved in an accident on the way so it did not happen.

In the same way in these experiments the mind of the volunteer has assessed the most likely outcome rather than actually seeing the future.

I remain a POSSIBILARIAN at heart but I am heading towards free will which is guided by a greater consciousness which has grown up alongside the life force, both of which came into being by random activity rather than intelligent design.

Hi Billhook,

 

I pretty much agree with your first paragraph. The brain scanner experiments do not 100% totally prove that free will doesn't exist. There may be something weird going on there that we don't yet understand. They are however strongly suggestive of the fact that there is no free will in these particular choices. I think it is valid to keep them in the mix of evidence when trying to get to the bottom of it all.

 

In actual fact, you don't need these experiments to prove logically that freedom of choice is not available. If you accept that the body acts in direct reponse to brain processes, and that these processes are all electrochemical firings of neurons that you are not aware of, inside a brain that you didn't conciously build (these are all facts) then there is absolutely no basis for free will.

 

Even if all the neural firings converged in a single region of the brain we could call the 'choice centre' where options can be weighed up and picked, this still wouldn't equate to free will as it is still just excited neurons sending chemical messages to other neurons. We have no insight into this neural activity, there is no access into it to exert any influence or choice. The brain speaks in a language we can't even hear, let alone understand. Conciousness can translate a few words of this hidden language into english, but that is the full extent of it's powers. It sees but can't do.

 

In terms of predicting the future, this is really a bit of a red herring. It is true to say that predicting the future is the brain's stock and trade, what it is programmed to do, but it is only guessing. It can only make predictions based on information it has at it's disposal (it's own past experiences and it's current environment communicated to it via the senses).It can make a pretty accurate prediction for the next brief moment in time, but not much further than that. As soon as anything new and not possible to forsee comes to the brains 'attention' all bets are off and any previous predictions are redundant.

 

In reality the world is far too dynamic for the brain to be able to be an accurate fortune teller any further ahead than the very next moment in time. We notice and get excited when a brain prediction does correlate with an event further ahead in time. We are bound to come across uncanny feeling matches from time to time due to the mind bogglingly large number of predictions the brain is making every day. The fact that these matches are so rare really shows how unavoidably bad the brain is at predicting into the future any distance. Instead of being stunned when a past thought and a future occurance match up, we should be saying "about bloomin time brain"!

[Stubby]

I am able to control and even initiate the electrochemical firing of neurons , in fact my knitted self showed me how . I therefore feel that my will is in fact of the free variety . In the not to distant future there will be more like me ..........

[Mortimer Firewood]

7 hours ago, the village idiot said:

 Apologies! I had the input of an English literature A level, and I don't appear to have the free will to squash it!

I did sociology and Physiology only as when I went to the open day all the good looking girls were signing up both those subjects.

  It was an interesting couple of years?

[WesD]

It’s a great topic this which I am finding myself thinking about it more and more in  my spare time. 

 

I am asking myself to think it over and mull the possibilities and understand the meaning and possibilities of having free will and how it would work and not having free will and how that would work and I am kind of in the middle. 

 

Even automated computers woth coding we can’t understand need input and direction. Think of aeroplanes they are fantastic machines run by computers yet they need a few things to aid them, whilst 90% of flights are automated take off and landings aren’t they need a pilot yet more important than that they need a destination otherwise where would they go? When would they stop?

 

I have come to the conclusion that like you say religion and no self no free will shouldn’t be thought of together on the basis that religion is based on free will. 

 

The one thing we can do that our brain can’t control is to ask it a question, have a minute then ask yourself to think of any topic and think deep about that topic. Yes your brain put forward topics to put to you and yes what you know and think about within that topic was already there from past experiences etc however you called upon it. You asked for a topic so it served you automatically but you guided you gave an input. 

 

Outputs I can see are wholly automated but the inputs can be manipulated. 

 

Much like google without an enquiry it’s a pretty pointless computer. Everything is already there but how does it know what to give you?

 

 

[the village idiot]

5 hours ago, WesD said:

It’s a great topic this which I am finding myself thinking about it more and more in  my spare time. 

 

I am asking myself to think it over and mull the possibilities and understand the meaning and possibilities of having free will and how it would work and not having free will and how that would work and I am kind of in the middle. 

 

Even automated computers woth coding we can’t understand need input and direction. Think of aeroplanes they are fantastic machines run by computers yet they need a few things to aid them, whilst 90% of flights are automated take off and landings aren’t they need a pilot yet more important than that they need a destination otherwise where would they go? When would they stop?

 

I have come to the conclusion that like you say religion and no self no free will shouldn’t be thought of together on the basis that religion is based on free will. 

 

The one thing we can do that our brain can’t control is to ask it a question, have a minute then ask yourself to think of any topic and think deep about that topic. Yes your brain put forward topics to put to you and yes what you know and think about within that topic was already there from past experiences etc however you called upon it. You asked for a topic so it served you automatically but you guided you gave an input. 

 

Outputs I can see are wholly automated but the inputs can be manipulated. 

 

Much like google without an enquiry it’s a pretty pointless computer. Everything is already there but how does it know what to give you?

 

 

Hi Wes,

 

It's a bit problematic using aeroplanes as an analogy. I see your point, but planes are machines designed by humans to be directed by humans. The aeroplane and everything it does was the intended outcome of the human designers.

 

Our brains are very different. Unless you believe in a supernatural designer (those who do, dont worry, it's not your fault) our brains evolved through natural selection, a completely blind, unconcious, intentionless process. No thought was involed in the process, it happens automatically.

 

We are actually quite close in our thinking on free will, but with one important difference.

 

You think the brain has some kind of limited capacity pilot, a destination setter, a question asker. I do not.

 

My argument is that the asking of the question is simply another automatic brain output. There is no asker. There is no control over what is asked. The question pops out of the unconcious brain as a direct result of all the influences the brain has been subjected to up to the point just before the question appears. The question that pops out is all that could possibly pop out. If a different group of neurons had automatically fired the instant before, a different question would have popped out. You cannot have had any control over this. There is no choice in attendance at any point in the whole history of life on Earth. I fully appreciate we experience the feeling of choice, but all there really can be is blind cause and effect.

 

We are string puppets, the rest of the universe is the puppet master.

 

This sounds terrifying, but it really isn't. It sounds bonkers, but it really isn't. In fact it can cause a perspective shift that is truly profoundly beneficial.

 

 

Edited December 30, 2017 by the village idiot

[Mark J]

As a fellow forty year old with a niggling black dog, I've found myself in a better place already as a result of this mindfullness clatter.

Edited December 30, 2017 by Mark J
Sausage fingers

[the village idiot]

10 minutes ago, Mark J said:

As a fellow forty year old with a niggling black dog, I've found myself in a better place already as a result of this mindfullness clatter.

Hi Mark, that's fantastic to hear. 

 

The knowledge that negative thoughts are just noise generated by a dodgy computer in the head can set you on a fast trajectory to betterness. Internalise the only possible conclusion that these thoughts are in no real sense 'you'. If anything is a 'you' it is the unchanging space of conciousness hidden just below the thought stream. If enough focus can be trained up it is possible to watch these completely automatic and unsummoned thoughts arise and quickly vanish from conciousness. They have nothing to attach to, their ability to cause emotional suffering can ultimately be completely stripped away. This is hugely liberating, and can add fuel to a massive shift in perspective in regards to your relationship to thoughts, changing life's experience in a fundamentally beneficial way.

 

Have you had any experience of meditation practice?

[Vespasian]

2 hours ago, Mark J said:

As a fellow forty year old with a niggling black dog, I've found myself in a better place already as a result of this mindfullness clatter.

 

If I was a doctor I'd prescribe medication, seeing as my expertise lies elsewhere, I'll prescribe the mind of Jordan Peterson..

 

look him upon on utube, you'll thank me later..

 

 

Edited December 31, 2017 by Vespasian

[the village idiot]

Afternoon everybody. Thought of a slightly different way to frame things which may possibly help some things click into place.

 

Your brain bend for today 

 

Did you choose to wake up this morning?

 

Of course you didn't. It seems like a stupid question, waking up just happens, but it is a useful insight. You have exactly the same level of choice in every thought and action you experience in life as you do in 'deciding' to wake up.

 

When the brain wakes up (usually in the morning) this is conciousness coming online. Often, for a few moments, you can experience purely just this 'watchful' state. It is a cool place to be.

 

A moment later 'you' wakes up and all merry hell breaks loose.

 

The brain directs the body about it's day completely automatically and takes 'you' along for the ride. Conciousness is aware of what is happening but does not judge it. It is perfectly content and accepting of whatever transpires.

 

In order for the brain to issue it's commands it is constantly searching for patterns, weighing up possibilities, alerting itself to possible dangers and making judgements. It comes to it's own conclusions, but for reasons now less crucial in totay's world (the brain evolved with sabre toothed tigers) the brain automatically attaches some of it's melting pot of deliberations to the construct of the self 'you' that the brain itself developed.

 

The experience in conciousness is that 'you' and the deliberations are the same thing. This is the nature of the illusion.

 

Have a think about that word 'de-liberation'. It is pretty interesting.

 

It is perfectly possible for the spell to be broken, to loosen the false bond between thoughts/actions and the illusion of 'you', and experience liberated reality (the flow of events) from the spacious, content and universally accepting state of conciousness.

 

Pure conciousness is the closest thing we have to a real 'you'. The coolest bit being that pure conciousness is by it's very nature OK with everything.

Edited December 31, 2017 by the village idiot

[WesD]

I’m still 98% with you, our brains/computers I can agree for the most part are automated, in meditation I can see there is a lot that goes on however for an output to stick it needs an input, let’s use a noise again if you hear something your brain will piece together what it thinks it’s heard and predict what has happened all with your eyes still shut so you minds eye let’s say tells you it was a car driving down the street probably too fast going off the sound (so far all automated) What then remembers your meditating and pulls you back to that breath?

 

What tells you to remember we are meditating and to leave your thoughts for the breath?