Free Will - Page 2

dammit rshulz, i have no idea what you just said.

So, it is thought that actually the brain makes the choices and not us. A simple questioN: 'What is the brain?!'. We are the brain, and the brain is us. If the brain makes a choice, we make the choice.
Course there is freewill. There can be no free will only if life is predetermined. If you don't beleive that, then there is a free will.

well, for one thing i dont think that "we" are our brains. i can explain this by saying that different parts of our brains do different things. one part is responsible for vision, one part is responsible for emotion, one part is responsible for memory, etc. if anything could be considered "we," or "i" it would be closer to thought itself, which is not the brain. the brain creates this thought, but the thought could not exist if the mind didn't exist. the mind is not the brain, because the mind is not a physical thing that you can observe and disect. can you take apart a brain and see a person's thoughts? no. the brain is responsible for human experience, by generating all these thoughts and feelings that come together to form "us."
"we" are the abstract result of a physical process. that physical process is the workings of the brain.
so the question seems to be whether or not this thing called "us" is in control of the brain, whether it is the other way around, or whether they just seem to coincidentally work parallel to each other for no known reason.

"Freedom is the recognition of necessity" said Engels.

The necessity would be knowing how combustion works. Once you know, you can make an engine and have the freedom to use it.
In this sense Marx and Engels believed humyns could master their destinies, though they haven't yet.

That said, I also do not believe there is really "free willl." However, even struggle and striving is part of what is pre-determined. That I will try to persuade you to Marxist materialism is pre-determined and which of you will respond favorably is also pre-determined. It doesn't mean it will happen without struggle, only that the struggle iitself was pre-determined.

Hmmm, good question. If the brain makes 'us' up, then is the 'us' in controll or the brain. Well, yes, the brain makes the 'us', i.e it gives us the ability to feel, to choose.So we have to make the eventuall choice. All the brain does is give us our abilities, and we have to make the eventuall choice. The brain on it's own can't do anything, it gives rise to a being and that being is in charge of it's choices.

When we make a choice, it is never a real choice.
When we decide what is the best thing to do, we are looking at the pros and cons of each decision, the one with the most pros and least cons gets picked.
If that is the way our decisions are made, our decisions are not dependant on us, but rather are dependant on the choices of the decision.

We decide what is a pro and what is a con.

Also, those choices on the decisions are still choices.

Well I don't think we decide what is a pro or con. Rather, I think we simply figure it out and demands no free will on our part.
Does one decide how bad a job offer seems?

lol, I know I do.

If we determin what a pro or a con is, then the truth is relative. While my brain strides to argue for free will, while yours is against it is a matter of different pros. And in such, different truths.

I thought earlier about being amused, and the will of a man to become amused by something. How does a man come to enjoy something that he does not need if he is controlled by chemicals in his mind? If it is from adaption of his milieu, then where did the first man come up with being amused by something he did not need. If free will was being controlled by the chemicals in our brains, I believe we would be no farther along then the ants in the ground. It is because of our free will that we are as advanced as we are, and that we have such entertainments and all.


Now think of the possibilities of a choice. Each choice has a cause and effect thingy going on, right? If the mind was able to calculate every pro and con to the situation, man would be ruling the universe right now. We would be gods. But the brain is unable to predict every outcome to the situation of a decision so it must guess at its best. And that guess is free will.

That's a very interesting interpretation of free will as the guess.
There is another possibility though, the brain can figure out what it believes the chances of each choice being best.
We spend lots of extra time thinking if the odds are close to 50/50 (and if its important of course) until something makes us pick one over the other (conclusion of our thinking or lack of time).

Thus there is not so much a guess, the brain merely picks the choice with the best chance of being good.

"Thus there is not so much a guess, the brain merely picks the choice with the best chance of being good."

Yep, and that is free will. Picking what seems best to you.

IF we did not have free will, we would all be vegetables and robotic at that.

You choose to own a computer, you choose to post. You choose what forum to post in. Gee, and there is NOT free will? I am confused a bit. I always thought free will meant;
The ability or discretion to choose; free choice: chose to remain behind of my own free will.
The power of making free choices that are unconstrained by external circumstances or by an agency such as fate or divine will.

WE always have a choice. Ying and Yang. Good and bad. Take your pick.

well what i meant by free will was control over your brain. do you control what your brain does or does your brain control what you do? that is basically what i am asking.

"Yep, and that is free will. Picking what seems best to you."
That's free will though.
You don't choose based on your own will, you choose based on how good the choice SEEMS.

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well what i meant by free will was control over your brain. do you control what your brain does or does your brain control what you do? that is basically what i am asking.

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In a healthy human, yes, you control the mind.

In an unhealthy individual, it is generally harder, depending on the circumstances of the illness.