The basic premise of asking about free will vs. determinism is flawed, because it comes with the inherent assumption that we possess some matterless ethereal "soul" that is capable of making decisions. In actuality, the more scientists study the brain, the more areas of consciousness are ascribed to certain parts, and it's becoming increasingly obvious that every aspect of thought is derived from the arrangement and firing patterns of our neurons.

The second fault I find in the question is the definition of what exactly a "decision" is. A decision is a choice between two or more outcomes, arrived at by the weighing of various factors associated with each. Soul-ists posing the question seem to think that people "decide" based on NOTHING at all. This is NEVER the case! Our decisions are always based on something--if you choose mint chocolate chip icecream over cookies 'n' cream, it's probably because you like it more, it has less calories, you know you'll get a bigger scoop, or you haven't had it in a while and you crave the novelty. Try telling people to choose with only their soul--they'll fail every random number test every created miserably.

So to summarize what I've just said: the free will question is moot because 1) we cannot make decisions independently of our brains (there is nothing to make a decision), and 2) a decision is inherently deterministic by definition. "True" spontaneous behavior has yet to be shown, and I seriously, seriously doubt it ever well.

So if you want the pessimistic viewpoint that we are deterministic, so be it. I see determinism and free will as identical. As for "fate"...no, fate does not exist. People think it's "fate" when something works out well, similarly to how people thank God when something good happens, but never get angry at him when something bad does.

Great points, this is basically what I was trying to get at in my post, but I just didn't articulate myself so well. Tell me if I'm wrong, but can you sum up determinism as everything has cause and effect? Also I brought up string theory earlier, which I don't know much about, but to my understanding it says that there are other universes in which you make every possible decision. Basically every path that can be taken will be explored.

The basic premise of asking about free will vs. determinism is flawed, because it comes with the inherent assumption that we possess some matterless ethereal "soul" that is capable of making decisions. In actuality, the more scientists study the brain, the more areas of consciousness are ascribed to certain parts, and it's becoming increasingly obvious that every aspect of thought is derived from the arrangement and firing patterns of our neurons.

I don't think an argument of free will vs determinism necessarily assumes the existence of a human soul. I think there's still an interesting argument there for people like me that don't believe in the soul.
The human brain might be more deterministic on a lower level, but I think it's still interesting to debate whether or not free will can exist on a higher level.

"Nothing is ment to be, things happens because it does" - Me; Ken

Quite a stupid comment eh? I do not believe in fate, god or karma. Humans are responsible for their actions, and once something is done, it cannot be undone. Not in the small scale. We can never go back in time, or undo the action we did a split second ago.

I don't really believe in any sort of balance or omniscient force out there, the universe just seems too big. I think that if there is, it's impossible for us to understand or even think about so it makes no difference to us whether it exists or not. So I guess I choose freewill.

You can choose a ready guide
In some celestial voice
If you choose not to decide
You still have made a choice

You can choose from phantom fears
And kindness that can kill
I will choose a path that's clear
I will choose Freewill!

Nathan, you have successfully destroyed my hopes and dreams...

I wanted to be the first to quote Rush!

Anywho, I most certainly side with the Free Will-ers on this one. Too many assholes are too successful (in the terrible U.S. sense of the word) for me to believe in Karma, and fate? Well, I just have a hard time believing that everything (Or anything, for that matter) is pre-destined - If it were so, then there would be no point to life, at least not for myself.

Woo! Rush!

I havent hqd ti,e to reqd the topic so far, im paying for this online ti,e over in france. its free time and we seem to be in ike the ghetto of paris hahaa so qpologies if my typing is shit, god knows WTF this keyboard is about haha.

I think free will and fate kinda co exist together.

fate gives you the chances and opputuinties. free will decides if you take that or not. If that makes sense?

I hopefully will get more in depth later, I just wanted to see xhatwas going on.

Cool thread topic

Ive always Thought that this is the type of stuff that dev thinks about, i wonder what he thinks on this topic

Agreed. but then i can't help thinking that we don't know entirely how our brains work - who's to say that something our respective mothers ate messed up our brain development in some unseen way that lay dormant until the time where we made that certain decisions?

Yeah, but your brain is always in some state at some particular moment in time. Ignoring quantum physics and randomness for a second, in a completely deterministic universe, if you were able to rewind time and feed your brain the exact same set of inputs at the same time, I think it'd produce the exact same set of outputs. What caused your brain got into that state is another story entirely.

A single threaded computer program will always produce the exact same set of outputs for a specific set of inputs (as long as the hardware it's running on is working properly), obviously our brains are infinitely more complex than a computer program, but I think the same principle applies to some extent.

what about the scientific proof that photons act differently depending on whether they're being observed or not?

Yeah, quantum physics. I used to believe the universe was completely deterministic until I heard about quantum physics, it's a total headfuck when you learn how random the universe really is on tiny scales, and how different it is from what we see in everyday life.

I guess the question is, on the scale of human neurons, how much of an effect does quantum randomness have on the workings of your brain? I'm pulling this out of my arse, but my (uneducated) guess is that it would have some effect, but the effect would be so small, or would be cancelled out so much, that given the exact same brain state, and exact set of inputs and outputs, your brain would make the same decision the vast majority of the time.

That doesn't fit with the multiple universes theory then - there has to be a universe where up until this exact point in time everything is the same EXCEPT this time i choose not to post this.

[djskrimp]

Dev, please don't think I'm trying to be cheeky or "fanboi" when I say this:

I can and I cannot.

Those words best define for me what I think of free will versus fate. Regardless of whether or not my life is mapped out, *I* still have to make the choice. Even if it isn't really me making it. I'm the only one who lives in my head, that I know of, so I can't worry about whether or not a map of my life has already been created by The Cartographer. I simply can, or cannot.

While i like the idea of Karma and would like if Karma were the controlling force in the universe, I belive in free will.

That doesn't fit with the multiple universes theory then - there has to be a universe where up until this exact point in time everything is the same EXCEPT this time i choose not to post this.

That there are multiple universes, is far from being proven. As far as I'm aware, it's little more than conjecture at this point.

I have never given this much thought actually...I tend to just roll with the punches and not ponder life in general.

I'll join the earlier posters in the idea of that we believe we have free will, but it's really all mapped out for us. Karma, sure...but only if it's subconscious or "from the heart" so to speak. Otherwise I'm sure it'll bite us in the ass, in this life or the next. Maybe Karma is the only way we can truly change our fate?

What's your take on this Devin?

I believe in free will. There is nothing we can't control. And if i will be run over by a car tomorrow, it is not my fate. It's the fault of the driver's own free will.

I have never given this much thought actually...I tend to just roll with the punches and not ponder life in general.

Haha, that's exactly how I am.

Also, this entire discussion is just about how we as beings try to add reason to our existance. It's something we can never know to an absolute certainty, but it gives us comfort to believe in them. The human mind is fun.