I'm interested in arguments for free will...

I'm interested in arguments for free will, however I'm interested in entertaining an argument that is ontological or epistemological. To clarify what I mean, I've read the relevant pieces of Critique of Pure Reason and, from what I understand, Kant argues that one must infer free will from the subjective intuition of morality; while I find this to be a pragmatic argument, it doesn't seem to satisfy the dispute of whether or not free will is real or possessed by humans. Can anyone offer a book that makes a solid, rational argument for free will?

Other urls found in this thread:

plato.stanford.edu/entries/incompatibilism-theories/
plato.stanford.edu/entries/incompatibilism-arguments/
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I'm stupid and I don't really care, but I think because I'm stupid I have to think about it more, I think about it stupidly so I'm probably wrong more often too, but I figure if any one smart actually reads what I say than they'll figure out, because they're smart, what I really meant to say. So that always makes me laugh, but when I think about what it means to develop free will as an individual going from a fetus or whatever to what I am now the best thing I have is Catcher in the Rye, I'm illiterate as fuck but I'm putting it forward because I want to be torn down in a way. So I can see the mountain for what it is. But Holden, he doesn't really give a shit in the end, he figures out what's wrong with him all the time but he's so obsessed with others he forgets to actually apply any of it and so he constantly does what he wants. Which is ironic because all he does is worry about what he could be doing instead. To me at least, that's the closest thing to free will for me. With or without a god, there isn't any and what you're left with is what you make for yourself by doing what you want, god or godless.

plato.stanford.edu/entries/incompatibilism-theories/

plato.stanford.edu/entries/incompatibilism-arguments/

The future is a field of potential. Conceptualize this as a multitide of semi-open or semi-closed doors.

Free will is the ability to choose from one of these doors and transform into your future you.

Are all the doors open (unlimited free will)? No.
Are all the door closed? No.
Are some doors harder or easier to go through? Yes.
Are these doors causally linked to your future, past and present? Yes because everybody comes from a different set of preconditions and we thus see the future differently.

That's how I see it. I accept that there is causality between the future and the past, yet keep the ability to make some choices.

Yeah, free will is basically just an arborescence (an upwardly directed tree graph)

How would you respond to the, in my opinion, annoying contention of hard determinists, such as Sam Harris, that given perfect, infinite information and given universal causality is true, one could predict with 100% accuracy the events of say a human life?

All free will discussions that refuse to define the subject are worthless.

Well then what really interests me about the topic is the question of whether something or someone "could have done otherwise" so let an agent have free will if they have the ability to do otherwise when an event occurs. Unless someone can come up with something interesting about the notion before the discussion has reached that point.

see
for some possible definitions

Can anyone upload the expanding brain meme about free will?

no

I'm a hard determinist and here to say that libertarianian arguments just change definitions and don't really offer any real argument or demonstration of how free will could be possessed.

ontologically, I find the concept of free will luducrios at best, and the peak of humanity's god-complex delusion at worst. Living in a cosmos where the purely artificial concept of randomicity is nowhere to be found, humans driven by their ego believe they can exercise "free will", which in his truest sense means will unhindered from any costraint, be it logic, emotion, or even the laws of physics and chemistry.

our brain is a piece of hardware whose workings are determined by a set of rules (even if we don't know them exactly), influenced by the act of chemicals, by temperature and by electro-magnetic waves. Macroscopically we, as humans, are driven by emotions, instincts, our own subconscious, past experiences, and rational logic.

to think that any single one decision anyone has ever took or will ever take could possibly be completely unshackled by every single one of these things, the very laws of the universe (and thus tantamout to being purely random), is pure folly.

bump for interest

>mfw brainlets are so BTFO'd by my argument they can't even reply

If this is actually you, good job shitting on your credibility

>implying I didn't do that to prompt a response and keep the thread alive
>implying it didn't work perfectly as intended

cool

Sure,objetively and scientifically there is no free will. But is it relevant?
The complexity of the universe created another layer of reality in wich we percieve ourselfs as free and that is enough
Even though our actions are determined,in a way we are more free than rocks,plants and animals because in this layer of reality. Good enough?

but are we? I don't think so.
In what ways are we freer than rocks and animals?

but yes, we perceive ourselves as free, even if that is not true

In the conventional sense ,of course. Our consciousness. We have to admit that we are liberated from our emotions and our most inmediate impulses ,compared to animals,even if ultimately we are not free because we depend on our neurons fireing this or that way and so on and so on.
I think this apparent free will we have works in the same way as physics: newonian physics are a real thing but as we know on a atomic level things are different. But newtonian physics even if ultimately they depend on lower layers,they still work

So after having read through the article regarding incompatibilist arguments, I think that the issue that I have is that these arguments (on both sides) are seemingly just semantical and are incommensurate with the experience of being human. I suppose this is why scientists want to argue that the ego or self is an illusory experience but that just seems like a very convenient answer. I guess then one of my objections is: given that humans are in fact determined, why do we have consciousnes? Or if you prefer something more tight, why is there experience? I guess the question really has no bearing on whether there is or is not free will but it certainly seems like if the only cause for events necessary are initial premises and causality then there would be subjectivity no?

there would be no* subjectivity

Free will exists and determinism is wrong, and that fact is self-evident.

Could you justify that proposition?

its self-evident

Free will is something that one is always immediately aware of, much like one's phenomenal experience. To suggest that it doesn't exist is an absurdity.

That's in some sense what my convictions on the subject are but I don't think that really qualifies as a rational proof. I suppose you could argue that it doesn't necessarily have to be a rational argument in order for it to be true but saying it's real because I experience it isn't generally accepted as good argumentation nor is it really any different than saying god is real because I experience Him.

This doesn't prove anything, but if you assume that free will does not exist, then arguments against free will become amusingly absurd... i.e., everyone who ever argues about free will is essentially forced to argue about something that doesn't exist

>being aware of something necessarily means it is real
hm