Free Will

does it exist?
i personally think its an illusion--our brain causes us to be conscious and have a mind, and our brain acts according to its own wiring when a choice is made, and chemicals or whatever in our brain cause us to have a sense of power, like "im going to do this," and then "ok i did it," making us feel like our minds actually told our brains what to do, when in reality it was the other way around.
i dont think anyone really has a choice in anything they do--were all a product of our environments and our brains react to things in how the environmnent and genetics have taught it to act.
i do kind of believe in a soul per say, or at least an abstract entity seperate from our physical bodies that is kind of wound up in our brains and minds somehow-- i dont think this "soul" has any power, though, and that all that it is capable of is experiencing what the brain and mind allow it to. without our brains this sould could not experience anything.

you're too smart for 21-you remind me of me at that age when I was much smarter than I am now.
Dont pay too much attention to internalization-it could lead to health problems.
And You are correct-free will doesnt exist not because the external world disallows it-but rather by our internal wiring;we couldnt be truly happy if happiness was thrown in our laps-we're too busy with negativity to allow ourselves the obvious gift of.

Although I don't know for sure, I suspect the free will is an illusion made to make people blameable (and therefore punishable). A society with blameable people works much better then one where everyone can do whatever the hell they want.

The 'soul' in my opinion, is simply what makes us more then rocks (and possibly animals). A rock doesn't experience. The soul is what makes us a spectator, it is the link between the electric messages sent to our brain and the fact we experience them.

I believe we do have free will.

I believe that our minds make us think logically and that would lead to cause and effect, and that is not freedom.
I do believe in a soul, and like you guys, it has not much of an ability to create free agency, but is more like an impression upon our minds and how we think and feel according to our characters.
But along with the body, mind, and soul, I believe in the heart.
Seriously, ok, the feelings of the heart are really in the brain and not in the pupming muscle, but maybe the brain is composed of the heart and mind.
I think that the heart allows us to experience choices on what we want, rather than what we need.
If there was no free agency, we would have a perfect world because we would understand to do this and that according to what was right and wrong. But we sometimes choose wrong over right and such forth.
I believe we can all choose what we do, and thus so, the fate that we come by.

What is free will?
It is the idea as a human, even in the most degrading of situations, we still have a choice.

Perhaps not major, perhaps not meager. But the fact remains, we do not have to speak, or think. We choose to do these.
We also make a choice to do our own will, or the will of God.

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Seriously, ok, the feelings of the heart are really in the brain and not in the pupming muscle, but maybe the brain is composed of the heart and mind.

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This is probable. Because the mind usually 'listens' to the heart. Anyone foolishly in love knows that LOL. Thanks!

If we did not have free will, we would be more robotic. Life would not be an experience, but a set form we carry through.
The enjoyment would be curtailed too. Achievements would cease to exist, because our lives would be measured out already, and everyone would know, you had to do this anyway.

Free will, you just got to love it.

Free will is the ability to learn from experience and change the way we would normally react to things.
If you didnt have free will then if the same condition kept comming up would you have to do the same thing over and over?

Warriors X : Even a computer can learn from past mistakes, can react better when dealing with the same situation a second time.
I wouldn't call it free will.

Would a computer knowing the odds and knowing it has failed try again to never admit defeat?

if thats how it was programmed.

We have a choice, unlike computers, because we choose to keep trying, when a computer has not option but to do what it is programmed.

Well its not uncommon for people to give up.

and no matter what choice we make, we obey our own programming. were programmed by genetics and our environment from the day were born. so were faced with a situation and our brains can be torn in two directions, and we can feel this pull as indecision in our minds, but in the end, like a computer, our brain makes the choice that fits most reasonably with how its programmed. and then we get this feeling of finality, like "well, i chose that." when in reality it was our brains that chose, and our minds that experienced the choice.

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Well its not uncommon for people to give up.

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That's their choice though, is it not?

Every action, unless involuntary is a choice.
Involuntary actions are more reactions. Like an instantaneous second. Not to be confused with free will.

Free will exists. I do not understand the argument. IF we did not have free will, would we even be debating it?

"Free will exists. I do not understand the argument. IF we did not have free will, would we even be debating it?"
Yes, if we have genetic predisposition to debating for example

On the notion of simplicity, what is simpler?

We actually have "free will" meaning every thought and action we have is random and incoherant, or we've built a psychology to create an idea that because we understand the concept there must be a limitation? (IE - we do not have free will)

Free will walks into oncoming traffic...fatalists utilize crossguards...if there IS a "right" way to understand the world this issue is definately in the crosshairs on this thread