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Do you believe in free will? (lemmy.world)

submitted 3 days ago by Dr_Box@lemmy.world to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

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There is an argument that free will doesn't exist because there is an unbroken chain of causality we are riding on that dates back to the beginning of time. Meaning that every time you fart, scratch your nose, blink, or make lifechanging decisions there is a pre existing reason. These reasons might be anything from the sensory enviornment you were in the past minute, the hormone levels in your bloodstream at the time, hormones you were exposed to as a baby, or how you were parented growing up. No thought you have is really original and is more like a domino affect of neurons firing off in reaction to what you have experienced. What are your thoughts on this?

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[–] last_philosopher@lemmy.world -1 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Yes.

I observe free will directly. Watch: I will choose of my own free will to type a tilde at the end of this sentence instead of a period~ Behold free will.

Everything that says we don't have free will depends on indirect observations that blatantly make faulty assumptions. Do our senses accurately tell us about the state of the universe, and ourselves within it? Are our interpretations of this infallible?

Most egregious is the assumption that classical mechanics governs the mind, when we know that at a deep level, classical mechanics governs nothing. Quantum mechanics is the best guess we have at the moment about how objects work at a fundamental level. Many will say neurons are too big for the quantum level. But everything is at the quantum level. We just don't typically observe the effects because most things are too big to see quantum effects from the outside. But we don't only look at the brain from the outside.

Nor can we say that the brain is the seat of consciousness. Who can say what the nature of reality is? Does space even exist at a fundamental level? What does it mean for consciousness to be in a particular place? What's to say it can only affect and be affected by certain things in certain locations? Especially when we can't pinpoint what those things are?

So yeah I believe in free will. It's direct observation vs. blatantly faulty reasoning.

[–] racketlauncher831@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Quantum mechanics only says that you can't predict the spin of certain particles. Those particles are at a vastly different scale of the things we see in everyday life. Yes, a photon might suddenly change direction and I won't see it because it's a wave function, right? But only at a really small odd. I bet it has never happened to me or anyone in my continent, if not the entire human race in all time. Let alone neurones in my brains experiencing quantum effects.

Quantum mechanics dismisses no argument of determinism because how low the possibilities are.

Even if macroscopic particles do behave randomly, it is still a random behaviour, not your decision.

[–] last_philosopher@lemmy.world 1 points 21 hours ago

Let alone neurones in my brains experiencing quantum effects.

But that's zeroing in on the idea that quantum mechanics directly affects neurons, which affect free will. Which is only one way one could conceivably argue free will exists. But I'm saying I don't need to come up with a specific way, because I observe free will more directly than anything else. So there's basically infinite ways it could happen, including for example:

Some undiscovered conscious force behind quantum mechanics that has yet to be discovered that is able to affect the brain via microtubules
Some undiscovered conscious force that exists entirely outside of known physics and is able to affect some part of the brain via a totally novel mechanism not related to quantum mechanics
The whole world being a simulation which for unknown reasons is set up to hide our own free will from us
Everyone having the wrong perspective about causality in general, such as the external world being governed and dictated by the self rather than the other way around, much the same way dreams can be controlled by the free will of lucid dreamers. Or being wrong about some other fundamental reality of the universe in such a way that consciousness would make more sense.