Is There Free Will? The Unsettling Science Behind Our Everyday Decisions | Dr. Robert Sapolsky
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- čas přidán 18. 10. 2023
- In a world where choices seem endless, could it be that our 'free will' is nothing more than an illusion?
When it comes to things like choosing a morning run over an extra hour of sleep, opting for an apple instead of that enticing pint of ice cream, or quitting your job on a whim…
…What's truly guiding these decisions? Is it willpower, biology, environment, or perhaps a unique strength of character we've built over time?
Or… could it be something else entirely, something beyond our control?
Here's where our guest, Dr. Robert Sapolsky - a renowned Professor of Biology, Neurology and Neurosurgery at Stanford University - offers us a slightly unsettling, yet eye-opening, perspective.
He suggests that every decision we make - from the podcasts we tune into, to judges making a case verdict, to choosing our life partner - isn't shaped by any sort of conscious control or free will. Instead, he believes our actions are driven by factors beyond our grasp and influence.
Now, Sapolsky doesn't just challenge our perceptions of free will - he presents a compelling theory that could very well dismantle widely accepted beliefs in this arena.
So, whether you're a leader interested in innovative ways to think about decision-making or someone craving deeply intellectual and exciting insights for your next dinner party, this conversation promises to radically reshape your perspective.
And I can't wait for you to dive in!
With fire,
MG - Zábava
I have always felt life is deterimined and that we lack free will. As a person who strugggles in life I see this book as a big hooray for truth. If you are able to succeed in life you are going to have a bias and think anyone can do it and anyone who doesn't is just not trying and deserves contempt..but I see it that peoples' lives are an outcome of a complex interplay of their genes and characteristics, social environment, economic circumstances, cultural attitudes, the region they live in and the physical geography and random elements and factores of good and/or bad luck. It is why i support a more generous, compassionate society robust social safety net, abundant public goods and services rather than one based on competition, hierarchy, retribution and vast economic disparity.
Yes, Nehru was wrong when he said: "Life is like a game of cards. The hand you are dealt is determinism; the way you play it is free will". The way you play is also a card you have been dealt.
But ,if you're opinion is because of your personal experiance , doesn't this suggest our personal experiances determine our beliefs. So, those who succeed through endeavour and application of abilities, are always going to believe in their way ,and theres no point in trying to convince them to have any other approach .
Yes! You hear rich privileged people saying things like "we are the choices we make" a lot.. but it really just makes privileged people feel good about themselves and others feel like shit. In reality, it's not true! 🙂
One can come to this understanding and develop compassion for those who can’t.
It's just a huge fcking optimization process a huge fcking machine with a simple amoral rule.
I know and I acknowledge that I don't have free will.
I've learned that life is determinism and I have no control.
But it is NOT going to stop me from doing what I'm going to do.
The beautiful part is that I get to watch it unfold...
And in the end, it will be "a magnificent triumphant success, and at the same time, a tremendous epic failure".
The hilarious part is that "it doesn't even matter!!!".
note our handle
ya…
most #indigenous cultures recognize we don’t have free will
that would put humans above nature
we recognize karma is engineered to operate on 7 generational cycles of 165ish years…
or 1 orbit of Neptune
cheers
#2Spirit #philosophy #astrology
Looking forward to watching this conversation, I started to watch Robert Saposky's lectures series at Stanford, this man is a fount of wisdom.
Thanks, Michael you have been one of my mentors in life, and it has changed a lot in the past years.
You are so gullible.
He may be a good biologist. As a philosopher, physicist or general thinker, he is pathetic. More pathetic is that he appears not to realize he is spouting nonsense.
@@stanleyklein524 And that's coming from from Mr. stanleyklein524 itself, which doesn't even need arguments, and with just an insult of his can undermine Sapolsky's entire life. I'm sorry dude, my lack of free Will made me ridicule you, no hard feelings :)
I read his book "Behave" and am now reading his second book, "Determined". Sapolsky is brilliant. He takes an interdisciplinary approach to the subject of free will that beautifully combines research in many fields to sustain his argument that it doesn't exist. He also is a wonderful writer with a great sense of humor. In short, I believe he successfully demolishes all the arguments for free will and thoroughly and convincingly makes his case that our behavior is "determined"--not to be confused with "robotic". I will be starting on the second half of "Determined", in which he asserts that our society will be much better off if we abandon the myth of "free will". If this is a subject that interests you, read both books.
🐟 11. FREE-WILL Vs DETERMINISM:
OPENING PREMISE:
Just as the autonomous beating of one’s heart is governed by one’s genes (such as the presence of a congenital heart condition), and the present-life conditioning of the heart (such as myocardial infarction, as a consequence of the consumption of excessive fats and oils, or heart palpitations due to severe emotional distress), EACH and EVERY thought and action is governed by our genes and our environmental milieu.
This teaching is possibly the most difficult concept for humans to accept, because we refuse to believe that we are not the authors of our own thoughts and actions. From the appearance of the pseudo-ego (one’s inaccurate conception of oneself) at the age of approximately two and a half, we have been constantly conditioned by our parents, teachers, and society, to believe that we are solely responsible for our thoughts and deeds. This deeply-ingrained belief is EXCRUCIATINGLY difficult to abandon, which is possibly the main reason why there are very few humans extant who are spiritually enlightened, or at least, who are liberated from the five manifestations of mental suffering explained elsewhere in this “A Final Instruction Sheet for Humanity”, since suffering (as opposed to pain) is predicated solely upon the erroneous belief in free-will.
STANDARD DEFINITIONS:
Free-will is usually defined as the ability for a person to make a conscious decision to do otherwise, that is to say, CHOOSE to have performed an action other than what one has already completed, if one had been given the opportunity to do so. In order to make it perfectly clear, if, for example, one is handed a restaurant menu with several dishes listed, one could decide that one dish is equally as desirable as the next dish, and choose either option. If humans truly possessed freedom of will, then logically speaking, a person who adores cats and detests dogs, ought to be able to suddenly switch their preferences at any given point in time, or to be hair-splitting, even voluntarily pause the beating of his or her own heart! Of course, those who believe in free-will will find this last assertion to be preposterous, countering thus: “Clearly, we are not claiming that humans have absolute freedom of volition, but merely that, in many circumstances, when given the opportunity, we can make choices between two or more options.” However, even this statement is patently untrue, and can easily be dismissed by those in the know.
So, in both of the above examples, there is a pre-existing preference for one particular dish or pet. Even if one liked cats and dogs “EQUALLY”, and one was literally forced to choose one over the other, that choice would not be truly independent, but based entirely upon one’s genetic sequence, plus one’s up-to-date conditioning. Actual equality is non-existent in the macro-phenomenal sphere. If one was to somehow return to the time when any particular decision was made, the exact same decision would again be made, as all the circumstances would be identical!
FREEDOM OF CHOICE:
The most common argument against fatalism or determinism is that humans, unlike other animals, have the ability to choose what they can do, think or feel. First of all, many species of (higher) mammals also make choices. For instance, a cat can see two birds and choose which of the two birds to prey upon, or choose whether or not to play with a ball that is thrown its way, depending on its conditioning (e.g. its mood). That choices are made is indisputable, but those choices are dependent ENTIRELY upon one’s genes and one’s conditioning. There is no third factor involved on the phenomenal plane. On the noumenal level, thoughts and deeds are in accordance with the preordained “Story of Life”.
Read previous chapters of this book, in order to understand that existence is essentially MONISTIC. Chapter 08, specifically, explains how actions performed in the present are the result of chains of causation, all the way back to the earliest-known event in our universe (the so-called “Big Bang” singularity). Thus, in practice, it could be said that the notions of determinism and causation are synonymous concepts.
At this point, it should be noted that according to reputable geneticists, it is possible for genes to mutate during the lifetime of any particular person. However, that phenomenon would be included under the “conditioning” aspect, since the genes mutate according to whatever conditioning is imposed upon the human organism. It is simply IMPOSSIBLE for a person to use sheer force of will to change their own genetic code. Essentially, “conditioning” includes everything that acts upon a person from conception unto death, and over which there is no control.
At the risk of being repetitive, it must be emphasized that that a person (whether a human person or a non-human person) making a choice of any kind is not to be equated with freedom of volition, because those choices were themselves determined by the genetic sequence and the unique up-to-date conditioning of the person in question, as will be fully explicated below. Unfortunately, no matter how many times this fact is asserted and explained, many free-will proponents seemingly “become deaf”. If you, the reader, upon reaching the end of this chapter, still believe in free-will, it is suggested that you read it SEVERAL TIMES, and dwell on its points over a length of time (especially this paragraph).
ACADEMIC STUDIES:
University studies in recent years have demonstrated, by the use of hypnosis and complex experimentation, that CONSCIOUS volition is either unnecessary for a decision to be enacted upon or (in the case of hypnotic testing) that free-will choices are completely superfluous to actions. Because scientific research into free-will is a recent field of enquiry, it is recommended that the reader search online for the latest findings. I contend, however, that indeterminacy is a purely philosophical conundrum. I am highly-sceptical in relation to freedom of volition being either demonstrated or disproven by neuroscience, because even if free-will was proven by cognitive science, it would not take into account the ultimate cause of that free-will existing in the first place. The origin of that supposed freedom of volition would need to be established.
RANDOMNESS IS IMPOSSIBLE:
If any particular volitional act was not caused by the sum of all antecedent states of being, then the only alternative explanation would be due to true RANDOMNESS. Many quantum physicists construe that subatomic particles can arbitrarily move in space, but true stochasticity is problematic in any possible universe, what to speak of in a closed, deterministic universe. Just as the typical person believes that the collision of two motor vehicles was the result of pure chance (hence the term “accident”), physicists are unable to see that the seeming unpredictability of quantum events are, in fact, determined by a force hitherto undiscovered by the material sciences. It is a known fact of logic that a random number generator cannot exist, since no computational machine or software programme is able to make the “decision” to generate a number capriciously. Any number generated will be a consequence of human programming, which in turn, is the result of genetic programming, etc.
True randomness implies that there were no determinants whatever in the making of a conscious decision or in the execution of an act of will.
Some sceptics (that is, disbelievers in determinism) have cited Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle as conclusive proof that free-will exists. However, most (if not all) such sceptics are simply displaying their own abject ignorance of quantum mechanics, because the uncertainty principle has naught to do with the determined-random dichotomy, but merely states that there is a limit to the precision with which certain pairs of physical properties, such as position and momentum, can be simultaneously known. In other words, the more accurately one property is measured, the less accurately the other property can be known. Even if quantum physicists eventually prove beyond any doubt whatsoever, that quantum indeterminacy is factual (for which they will be required to explain the origin of such stochasticity, which seems inconceivable), it will not demonstrate that human choices and decisions will be random (or “free”, to use a more vague term). That would be akin to stating: “One of the electrons in my left foot suddenly decided to spin clockwise, and so, I decided to skip breakfast this morning.” How LUDICROUS!!!
Cont...
The thing is, the free will thing doesn't seem to be out their unlike evolution and the whole intelligent design nonsense in schools.
People aren't thinking about it, and if they did, most would say of course we have free will.
I think it's an almost impossible spell to break as the illusion is so strong and people are so dumb.
We need more people like Robert and Sam Harris spreading the idea.
@@colinjava8447, kindly repeat that in ENGLISH, Miss.☝️
Incidentally, Slave, are you VEGAN? 🌱
His SECOND book??? I think you'll find that he's on number seven.
It would be wonderful if the brain washed masses had enough sense to even question such a notion that free will is a tyrant in sheep's clothing..and when and if they ever wake up to that notion they would have no idea how to do anything outside being told what to do and what their choices were. Very sad..so much for evolution having anything to offer..my money is on devolution. After freewill there is nothing left worth fighting or living for which means anything of value.When Freedom is nothing left to lose then only the losers are left to beg for it.
We are cathedrals of illusion. All our physical senses, that there's a self, and that we have free will. All very useful for the purposes of evolution, but not at all what we perceive them to be. Such an important topic and he does an excellent job in Determined in squeezing down all the places where "free will" might be residing to their vanishing points. This idea has the real potential to have a profound impact on society. Much respect, deserved or determined, for Dr. Sapolsky.
Who is the "we" that is being fooled (by whom)? Typical and pedestrian.
@@stanleyklein524 The "we" is nearly all humans. There is no "whom", the illusion is the product of evolution, our biology and societal environment. Sapolsky's knowledge and insight are neither typical nor pedestrian.
The fascinating part to me reminds me of what it was like to go through cardiac rehab as an obese person surrounded by people telling me how to eat and exercise.
OF COURSE exercise and eating right make sense to the people working in that field - THEY SELF SELECTED TO BE IN THAT CAREER!!! So a coaching/consulting practice based on successful people has the same thought pattern - they think that everyone is capable of that level of success because ALL OF THEM HAVE ACHIEVED THAT LEVEL OF SUCCESS!
I probably read it wrong but you seem to be saying that exercising and eating right doesn't make sense. Anyway, most people who tell you how to lose weight have never had to lose weight themselves and do not know how to teach others how to lose weight. Teaching is a skill.
Exercise and eating right should hopefully make sense to everyone. Not just “people in that field”. And if we’re going with Sapolsky’s narrative here then those doctors DID NOT CHOSE to be in that field.
Sapolsky does think they chose to be in that field. He just thinks they were determined to select that option. Equally the obese person did choose to eat too much and not exercise enough, but the point is he was unfortunate to be determined to do that. He had the same capabilities as those who chose to eat healthily and exercise. But they were fortunate to be determined to. He wasn't.
Read the book Atomic Habits, if you want to better understand how to have more willpower.
Sapolski is brilliant on all levels👍👍👍
However, this topic is like the ocean- 95 per cent is yet to be explored!!!
I found Determined life changing and it did not depress me. I found it relieving more than anything. Thank you Dr S and thank you MG for the great interview.
So you think ITS OK that one Person IS destined to BE a Harvard Professor and the other Kid have Zero Chance to get a College degree bcs of His Genes?
Thats No Relief for me
You have grossly oversimplified. To oversimplify in return, you neglect the environment, epigenetics, and their interactions with genes.
@@RichardGetty-zg9gp I think Sapolsky addresses all of that but I hear you.
@@markarend8226 nature is the way it is...gazelles are being eaten by tigers every hour of the day..its not okay from.the point of view of gazelles...its great from tigers view point..meanwhile the universe is indifferent.
You did not "find" anything. You did not act -- you were acted upon. Jesus.
Thank you, Dr. Gervais, for sharing your conversation with Dr. Sapolsky. Like you, I can't entirely agree that we are absent of "free will," yet accept that there is a much deeper understanding and definition within the concept surrounding it. That is what Dr. Sapolsky has really brilliantly "cracked the nut of" for all of us to think about; from our individual ethical choices to the roots of our individual motivational drive, and those of others...
@23:53 I think we can all agree that strong intuitive beliefs can be false, but it's important to recognize that they are not necessarily false and that a strong intuitive argument needs to be proven wrong by even stronger intuitive beliefs. If that were not true, then we ought to reject science altogether since our scientific beliefs are based on very strong intuitive beliefs (e.g., there is a natural world). It is possible those scientific intuitions are wrong, but these strong intuitive beliefs must be proven wrong by something stronger (viz., evidence of a certain caliber). Robert cannot use his last couple of arguments as against free will since he hasn't presented arguments that those intuitions are false up to this point.
لقد قمت بمتابعة روبرت سابولسكي منذ وقت طويل الطبيعة لن تكرر مثل هذا الشخص مرتين كان مذهلا وصادما ان نكتشف مانحن الاكائنات بايلوجية شكرا لهذا اللقاء الرائع وشكرا لمقدم البوداكست يوم سعيد لكم😊
How do you account for the quantum processes in your brain? How do you account for your ability to choose even when you feel totally ambiguous about something?
@@dieselphiend you need to study brain science more if these are the sorts of questions you're having, because it's all been answered.
@@user-yl7kl7sl1g That's not the least bit true.
@@dieselphiend It is. It's literally been proven that the causal mechanisms for your choices occur in the brain before your conscious awareness of what you're going to choose, and it's completely predictable what you will choose in those circumstances of your pre-awareness of your choices based on brain imaging.
@@user-yl7kl7sl1g Consciousness is not understood unless you're a physicalist. Physicalism is ridiculous. It completely, and totally ignores the metaphysical.
Dr. Sapolsky has every right to speak for himself.
Theoretically Dr. Sapolsky has abdicated that right by abdicating his own existence as "self" or the existence of his own free will. As for others, well... if they believe they have free will, they are free to speak for him.😜
He could choose to be homeless, and get addicted to fentanyl as well. But does he? No, because he has free will.
I've been binge watching Dr. Sapolsky's interviews on the book, and I'm reading it, but having watched, ooohhhh, seven, up to this point, with Michael Shermer's having been my favorite of the lot, this one.... this one now claims the top spot in my neurons as "best of them all."
The _Purpose_ _is..._ question.... Thank you. Seriously, I *needed* someone to ask him exactly that question. And the questions were organic, explorative at times, sticking to a structure that's familiar--get the basics of the book, promote the book--but... I don't know quite how to verbalize it... _deeper._ It was different in a very refreshing way. Good job!
**Edited to add italics
I really thank you for holding this fun conversation with Dr. Robert Sapolsky because it brings out how to live in real life with these concepts deeply, which is different from other conversations!
Love listening to Robert sapolsky.
Choice doesn't = free will.
Even computers make choices, and they don't have free will, lol
While reading "Determined", I fell like that tiny little flower growing up from a crack in the endless expanse of concrete, yearning, striving, DETERMINED to reach skyward. 🤣
Sweet.
We can choose at least a direction and try to push for it.
I am glad you feel like skyward.
We can also gave others some garden plant sticks, trellis, rich fertilizer and keep away "gardeners" with Roundup.
(Aka. living wage, education, health care - including mental health care, healthy hierarchy, no sociopaths for "leaders", fair rules/laws that moral leaders are the first to expected to follow and to be replaced if not. We may grow higher than we were "determined" under unhealthy environment. We may grow towards the sky and not towards choking each other.)
I always love watching deterministic content. I can’t believe they’re serious but it’s a good comedic relief
Maybe you would rather snigger than embrace the possibility.
It was determined that you would feel that way.
There is a strong aversion to the idea that I don't actually have a choice. But do I have the choice to have this aversion or not?
@@karlschmied6218 the questioning of free will stems only from the culture of western society.
Sit down. Don’t move. For 20 minutes
Call it meditation , call it prayer whatever
@@karlschmied6218 if you have that feeling, you have the “choice” as a recursive reasoning machine to examine the feeling and, potentially, change from one state to another. But if you had that feeling, can you *now* choose *not to have had it*? Of course not. Why then should you be able to “choose” to change it? You either will or you won’t, and you simply won’t find out until later.
After doing a lot of thinking myself, this makes so much sense. Religion might be comforting, but it's false and will take us nowhere, like it hasn't thus far.
You are so brave, rest of us are not strong enough to handle reality, but you are uber human, godlike human, congratulation, so stunning and brave
I agree with Sapolsky: not boring stuff!!! Can't wait to buy the book!
Thank you both!😊
It was predetermined that I'd watch this now and enjoy it tremendously.
BY your "logic" you did not enjoy it. It was predetermined. Enjoyment is something you do. Your state was not a doing but a happening. Can't anyone surrounding this fraud do basic thinking?
The problem with this question is it assumes there is an independent entity from the offset that can and cannot have free will. First before you can attempt to answer this question you must be able to locate this apparrent individual.
@@_pijn_ is that you now, or you in a minute
@@_pijn_A determinist posits there is no "you". The "me" is as much of an illusion as god concepts or santa. It's just a feeling with nothing to be grasped that can be shown to exist but additional assumptions that tend to be defined to be unfalsifiable and then post-hoc rationalized to make it believable on a cognitive dissonance level.
Of course we have "free" will. It's your ability to form a subjective interpretation of reality. It doesn't even matter how accurate that interpretation is- it's your freedom to interpret as best you can. The best measure of free will, is our ability to predict the future. What more could you ask for? Free will is a form of dynamics, and it is dependent upon the external stimuli of multiplicity. The only problem I see with it, is in the terminology. It contains an absolute- "free", and nothing is free. Everything that exists, is subject to everything that exists. It doesn't, and can't exist in a vacuum.
Very exciting about the worthiness equality and about the futility of hate. That could lead to an exciting future. I have known this intuitively. Nice to hear a technical explanation.
Thank you Dr Robert and host. Great conversation!!!
The interviewer is great. I hope he will answer me.
A great conversation.
Scientists who harbor materialist presumptions are either withholding or unaware of the extensive research and engineering practice on feedback control systems. Living organisms do not simply react to external and internal stimuli, they incorporate multiply-nested feedback systems that work together to maintain biological and psychological homeostasis. In every organism, there are multiple layers of purposeful action employed to continuously monitor their external and internal environments to maintain personal integrity, not simply a unitary spark of consciousness directing everything from inside your head. You may not think you have "free will", but your body would be paralysed without the ability to act on its own free agency.
excellent discussion. thoroughly enjoyed this thank you.
I believe in determinism. In fact, our brain is a machine like apparatus made of carbon handling many things are the same time. Our consciousness is just a small part of the brain functioning. Thank you Dr Sapolsky for your excellent talk. ❤❤
It’s a bit ironic that people are “changing their minds” from an “argument” that free will doesn’t exist and even more in believing that this “truth” has some utility in “choosing” a better life. Without free will, none of these concept can even exist.
It is confusing.
But I think we have a predisposition to push in a specific direction when presented with novel ideas.
So whereas you seem to reject these ideas, I embrace them.
But we are different - due to all of the factors discussed by Robert and others.
I find it’s really Buddhist in the sense of absence of self, absolute lack of reasons for hate, oneness with all that is alive. I don’t think this is gloomy, I think this is a very compelling case for compassion for everyone and everything.
Even thoughts have no self thoughts,so on ... Buddha don't focus on results (choices maybe) just finding the causes and conditions then that give certainly something . I'm thinking about absence of the consciousness to be being at the moments that can't name free will or not free will😅. Caused by your comment
He is pretty much describing karma, wouldn't you say? (I mean if you had free will to say.)
Thank you,that was great
@48:35 Robert emphasizes that chaos theory is unpredictability which is not a sufficient condition for indeterminism. But, chaos theory is more than just unpredictabiity. What chaos theory allows is for micro changes at the neuronal level to have major effects on human decisions. That's not quite indeterminism **yet**, but where we look for undecidability is when there is no scientific theory that can in principle determine a chaotic outcome. Quantum chaos is just one means by which that might occur at the neuronal level. So, indeterminism might be a very realistic option to escape Robert's strong deterministic arguments.
I know neither of you take complements well, tee hee, but FANTASTIC 90 minutes!❤
I love him so much
May I ask what video calling software you use so that both parties are split down the middle but fit the entire screen like that?
It's interesting because I came independently to a similar conclusion.
Very simply, one of the following two circumstances prevails: 1. There is _only one world._ Our "free" agency is really _a part_ of this world, functioning on par with the rest of the world, and therefore really an illusion. It is _fully_ determined to do what it ends up doing, as much as all other material entities, by everything else that goes on in and around us. Or perhaps 2. our agency is from _outside_ of this world. It is acting _on_ this world. In this case, the actual world consists of two parts: the "all agents" part (human free wills, gods, spirits, perhaps animals etc.; whoever you believe has free will) and the other that is "passive," partly determined by actions of free wills, and otherwise an automaton. If 2. were the case, then we can _redefine_ "the world" to _include_ the "all agents" part also, therefore the so _unified_ world cannot contain any agents having free will, because that will is again, just an illusion.
Basically, the answer to the question "where would this 'free will' come from" is "there is _nowhere_ it could come from, because we can _always_ redefine the world as one, self-contained, unified world."
I would add that the illusion of free will is _pretty damn good,_ because our internal state when trying to make a decision, where we have multiple options open, is "I don't FEEL constrained to doing it any way I please." But like it or not, the configuration of atoms that WILL make the decision, already exists in our bodies and elsewhere in the Universe. All the choice that remains is either a result of deterministic processes, or quantum non-determinism, i.e. pure randomness that nothing can control.
That's why I act AS IF I had free will when my choice matters, but try to remember that this is an illusion when I am tempted to play God.
Thanks for the wonderful interview! I am looking forward to reading the book.
Great convo. I still can't dispense with the idea that if behaviour is entirely determined by genes and environment, that one's whole life is pre-determined. Even being inspired by someone, and having the course of one's life changed by acting on that seems to be environmental, so the course of action still inevitable, given the parameters. I'm gonna read Sopolsky's book, though, and maybe it'll be clearer. I really enjoyed the interviewer's awe at how mind-blowing the implications of the theory are, so it was a super interview, and of course Robert Sopolsky is always entertaining and fascinating when he speaks. We're so lucky to have a whole series of his lectures here on CZcams, free.
I struggle with the same dilemma - after much thought, I think this is covered in the part where they talk about us being such strange 'machines' that are aware of our own 'machine-ness'. We just can't help feeling as if we have agency, and that is innately built into us and into our experience of ourselves. 'Feeling as is if' is the same as 'feeling', we are unable to distinguish the two. It seems to me this is also how Robert himself sees things, by saying 99% of the time he's a hypocrite and is subject to the same 'humanity' like all of us. Just my thought..
I love his take on Viktor Frankl.
Oh my gosh! I feel like i get it. It's so interesting. It makes sense. I've had issues with he idea of "free will" for a decade. Always thought it was more like guessing, we don't own our decisions, we didn't KNOW what will happen, we just guess. But Robert is going even further. Great stuff.
🐟 11. FREE-WILL Vs DETERMINISM:
Just as the autonomous beating of one's heart is governed by one's genes (such as the presence of a congenital heart condition), and the present-life conditioning of the heart (such as myocardial infarction as a consequence of the consumption of excessive fats and oils, or heart palpitations due to severe emotional distress), each and EVERY thought and action is governed by our genes and environmental conditioning.
This teaching is possibly the most difficult concept for humans to accept, because we refuse to believe that we are not the author of our thoughts and actions. From the appearance of the pseudo-ego (one’s inaccurate conception of oneself) at the age of approximately two and a half, we have been constantly conditioned by our parents, teachers, and society, to believe that we are solely responsible for our thoughts and deeds. This deeply-ingrained belief is EXCRUCIATINGLY difficult to abandon, which is possibly the main reason why there are very few persons extant who are spiritually-enlightened, or at least who are liberated from the five manifestations of mental suffering explained elsewhere in this “Final Instruction Sheet for Humanity”, since suffering (as opposed to pain) is predicated solely upon the erroneous belief in free-will.
Free-will is usually defined as the ability for a person to make a conscious decision to do otherwise, that is to say, CHOOSE to have performed an action other than what one has already done, if one had been given the opportunity to do so. To make it perfectly clear, if one, for example, is handed a restaurant menu with several dishes listed, one could decide that one dish is equally-desirable as the next dish, and choose either option. If humans truly possessed freedom of will, then logically speaking, a person who adores cats and detests dogs, ought to be able to suddenly switch their preferences at any given point in time, or even voluntarily pause the beating of his or her own heart!
So, in both of the aforementioned examples, there is a pre-existing preference (at a given point in time) for one particular dish or pet. Even if a person liked cats and dogs EQUALLY, and one was literally forced to choose one over the other, that choice isn’t made freely, but entirely based upon the person’s genetic code plus the individual's up-to-date conditioning. True equality is non-existent in the phenomenal sphere.
The most common argument against determinism is that humans (unlike other animals) have the ability to choose what they can do, think or feel. First of all, many species of (higher) mammals also make choices. For instance, a cat can see two birds and choose which one to prey upon, or choose whether or not to play with a ball that is thrown its way, depending on its conditioning (e.g. its mood). That choices are made is indisputable, but those choices are dependent ENTIRELY upon one’s genes and conditioning. There is no third factor involved on the phenomenal plane. On the noumenal level, thoughts and deeds are in accordance with the preordained “Story of Life”.
Read previous chapters of “F.I.S.H” to understand how life is merely a dream in the “mind of the Divine” and that human beings are, essentially, that Divinity in the form of dream characters. Chapter 08, specifically, explains how an action performed in the present is the result of a chain of causation, all the way back to the earliest-known event in our apparently-real universe (the so-called “Big Bang” singularity).
At this point, it should be noted that according to reputable geneticists, it is possible for genes to mutate during the lifetime of any particular person. However, that phenomenon would be included under the “conditioning” aspect. The genes mutate according to whatever conditioning is imposed upon the human organism. It is simply IMPOSSIBLE for a person to use sheer force of will to change their own genetic code. Essentially, “conditioning” includes everything that acts upon a person from conception.
University studies in recent years have demonstrated, by the use of hypnosis and complex experimentation, that CONSCIOUS volition is either unnecessary for a decision to be enacted upon or (in the case of hypnotic testing) that free-will choices are completely superfluous to actions. Because scientific research into free-will is a recent phenomenon, it is recommended that the reader search online for the latest findings.
If any particular volitional act was not caused by the preceding thoughts and actions, then the only alternative explanation would be due to RANDOMNESS. Many quantum physicists claim that subatomic particles can randomly move in space, but true randomness cannot occur in a deterministic universe. Just as the typical person believes that two motor vehicles colliding together was the result of pure chance (therefore the term “accident”), quantum physicists are unable to see that the seeming randomness of quantum particles are, in fact, somehow determined by each and every preceding action which led-up to the act in question. It is a known scientific fact that a random number generator cannot exist, since no computational machine or software program is able to make the decision to generate a number at “random”.
We did not choose which deoxyribonucleic acid our biological parents bequeathed to us, and most all the conditions to which we were exposed throughout our lives, yet we somehow believe that we are fully-autonomous beings, with the ability to feel, think and behave as we desire. The truth is, we cannot know for certain what even our next thought will be. Do we DECIDE to choose our thoughts and deeds? Not likely. Does an infant choose to learn how to walk or to begin speaking, or does it just happen automatically, according to nature? Obviously, the toddler begins to walk and to speak according to its genes (some children are far more intelligent and verbose, and more agile than others, depending on their genetic code) and according to all the conditions to which he or she has been exposed so far (some parents begin speaking to their kids even while they are in the womb, or expose their offspring to highly-intellectual dialogues whilst still in the cradle).
Even those decisions/choices that we seem to make are entirely predicated upon our genes and conditioning, and cannot be free in any sense of the word. To claim that one is the ULTIMATE creator of one’s thoughts and actions is tantamount to believing that one created one’s very being. If a computer program or artificially-intelligent robot considered itself to be the cause of its activity, it would seem absurd to the average person. Yet, that is precisely what virtually every person who has ever lived mistakenly believes of their own thoughts and deeds.
The IMPRESSION that we have free-will can be considered a “Gift of Life” or “God’s Grace”, otherwise, we may be resentful of our lack of free-will, since, unlike other creatures, we humans have the intelligence to comprehend our own existence. Even an enlightened sage, who has fully realized that he is not the author of his thoughts and actions, is not conscious of his lack of volition at every moment of his day. At best, he may recall his lack of freedom during those times where suffering (as opposed to mere pain) begins to creep-in to the mind or intellect. Many, if not most scientists, particularly academic philosophers and physicists, accept determinism to be the most logical and reasonable alternative to free-will, but it seems, at least anecdotally, that they rarely (if ever) live their lives conscious of the fact that their daily actions are fated.
Cont...
'The Brain On Trial' is a great read too.
this is exactly compatible with what Ramesh Balsekar said. Dr. Sapolsky approached it with science. Ramesh approached it with spirituality.
It is super inspirational, but one thing i didn't understand very well : the diference between determism and predestination
Predestination is determinism with theological/religious baggage and the added assumption that an ultimate, absolute arbiter/divine force controls your fate.
It usually translates into the difference between determinism and fatalism, whereas determinism stands neutral while fatalism posits an additional assumption - Determinism posits that events, including human actions, are predetermined based on a causal chain, whereas fatalism is the belief that outcomes are inevitable, regardless of actions taken or causal relationships. Determinism suggests a cause-and-effect mechanism, while fatalism suggests a resigned acceptance of a predetermined fate without necessarily emphasizing causal connections.
It's the "I don't have any control over my own will but I'm no perfect prediction machine and function the same way whether or not free will exists" vs the negative "I can't do anything to change this so why do anything" perspective.
Fatalism also ignores that not doing anything is also doing something.
I enjoyed this, but I'm not sure what there is to learn from the talk. If our decisions aren't made from the biology in our brains, where would they come from? Our free will, seems to me, to be an important philosophical construct that is ultimately determined by the fundamental particles that make up our brains. But I don't think that's particularly mind blowing. It's just, how it is. What would the alternative even be?
I love how you said this. Is that what he is saying? At least that seems to be the point.
Wonder if anybody else felt strong prejudice against the interviewer because of his likeness to Tom Cruise
Jiddu Krishnamurti, the proposed Star of the East spoke on this matter. He connects desire to to what we call free will.
I think there is no free will and it’s liberating from the guilt of our bad choices and bad decisions.
Spoken like a pure psychopath with no higher conscience.
@@thedolphin5428Can you define “higher conscience”?
@@su5pectandy
Yep, the opposite of a guilt-free psychopath ... which is what the poster indicated, a life without personal guilt. Go read up on the psychiatric definitions of psychopathy -- lack of higher self awareness is foremost. So if it's not clear to you, go ask a psychiatrist.
What a cool channel you have, I really enjoyed the interview. It was just a pitty the the concept of "your output (or you) is the result of all the input prior" took so much space, I find it much more difficult to think about implications for me and the society in general. For example concerning the critique on the justice system, isn't the existence of this system an input by itself pushing one to not do the wrong thing? Does it even matter if there's free will or not because in our day to day life it doesn't make a difference?
It's very nice when a youtube video challenges me to think about it beyond the actual playtime, thanks! :)
Sorry, long comment:
The particular argument Robert is using at first - that decisions are the inevitable outcome of the combination of causative factors, biological, environmental etc. - seems unconvincing to Michael. Michael sees all of those factors as influences, but not determinants, of a decision. His perception is that there is still an 'I' at the end of that long chain of influences, with the power to override those influences one way or another. This seems to make sense, because that's how we experience it.
The next question to ask Michael might be: what is that 'I'? How does that 'I' reach a decision to choose one way or another, except by the chain of influences already discussed? Where does it get its power to override those influences if it chooses to do so?
Within to the materialist worldview, there is no way for that 'I' to exist. The only way for it to exist is if there could be some force beyond or outside the physical system. Everything within the system is accounted for within that chain of determined causes. Something that has the power to intervene with the brain's physical processes and push the outcome one way or another, against the flow determined to it by the chain of causation, must therefore be something outside of physical reality as we know it. If are arguing within the frame of materialist reality, there cannot be free will.
If we want to argue outside of the frame of a materialist worldview, that's fine, but it should be acknowledged that that's what we're doing. We could argue for some kind of dualism, where there both a physical and a spiritual reality, and the physical being is controlled by a soul that exists outside of physical reality. Or there are worldviews that place consciousness or mind as the fundamental layer of reality, and physical phenomena as appearances within that mind. There is space for some kind of free will in such a worldview.
Perhaps the more relevant objection Michael has is that he just doesn't like the idea, because it removes personal agency, and the power to overcome, and improve, and grow, which is kinda his whole deal. Fair enough. I guess you have to decide if you're more committed to discovering what's ultimately true about reality, or what is the most useful thing to believe. The two approaches may lead to you the same place or they may take you in opposite directions.
Was going to watch it but couldn't decided
How NOT having Free Will gives me purpose: ALL behavior is the result of the interaction between the organism and its ongoing environment (external and internal). There is no Free Will. We cannot change ourselves. We are changed by our interaction with our environment. We can use this understanding to construct a "purpose". We are part of each other's environment. We can change each other. That is how we are changed. That is our purpose. (I wrote this many weeks/months before seeing this video. After reading Behave, but before reading Determined.)
There's no bloody purpose. That's a symptom of nothingness.
Thanks for a good discussion, free will is not a destination it is a continuous process well described in the Theory of Holistic Perspective.
@findind mystery .. i would really like to know that Dr.sapolsky ever did a research on meditation and how it effect to the brain ?
@8:08 But, Benjamin Libet didn't give up his notion of free will. Rather, he held that we still have the ability to freely not execute an action.
a university professor at UC Santa Cruz told me about the Atomic Predeterminism test that occured in the 1990's. it didn't work cos they didn't calculate for valence shells jumping, they should've read Jon von Neumann's book from the 1970's, Mathematical Foundations Of Quantum Mechanics.
Happy thanksgiving from john tenuto / motivational speaker
"They who came first, will be last and they who come last, will be first" Springs to "mind"
What the fk does that mean?
i believe in your premise that we don’t have free will. The part that i differ from your thinking is where you say that we can “change the way we think”. I’m looking at life with the Buddhist idea of interdependence of all things. i’m thinking of time as one continuous moment where past, present and future are not separate things but are just our perspective on this present moment. This present moment is a product of all the events that happened in the past and all the events that will happen in the future. So my life at this point, my worldview, is dependent on “all” past events which includes everything that happened before I was born and including the influence that I received from watching this video as well as all events that will happen in the future even after my death. In this way we don’t “change our mind” but the present moment is simply continuously changing. I like the idea you mentioned that at a subatomic level todays’ physicists have proven that time can move backwards as well as forwards. What i’m saying may not be coherent but it’s just my thoughts as I try to make sense from your proposition of “there is no free will” which I believe is true.
Lol. Do you mean you CHOOSE or that you are PREDETERMINED to BELIEVE in the premise that there is no free will? Seriously, think about it.
He can't think about it. That would suggest an act; and he apparently can only be acted on.@@thedolphin5428
Laws of nature are irresistible forces. However, the moral values (courage, justice, punctuality, generosity) are resistible forces because they concern the ideal rather than what is merely real. And we obviously bring these timeless moral values into real life. This happens when we take any risk to protect another or save lives (courage). We blame ourselves and others for breaking these ideals and praise ourselves and others for achieving them. We are only morally responsible if we could have chosen to do otherwise in a given situation (H. Frankfurt). Importantly, the whole sense of morality is destroyed if it turns out freedom is really illusory. (N. Hartmann). The problem with the ideas of determism here concern the idea that because the atoms and cells move in certain ways, so too do the organs and organisms, the insects and the humans. Humans, however, are not born well equipped with instincts and already adapted to our environments like insects are. We instead have moral demands that we each prioritize for ourselves, which come from ideals. Life has other emergent properties than nonliving things, although the living follow laws of nature, too. The psychological phenomena, morals, and social phenomena, like the ethos, have such additional properties, too. They cannot be reduced to laws of atoms and cells.
Did you really understand him?
Still can't prove or disprove determinism or free will. Talk, talk, talk, but no way to prove it, or disprove it, so it is just confusing talk. But by the way, a universe that operates like a big deterministic machine would be a joke. Anyway, we are nowhere near understanding it, but the universe being like a fine watch, a computer, a machine, etc., just shows that how impoverished our ways of thinking are.
Well we did essentially disprove free will just with the libet experiment alone. The temporal discrepancy between subconcious and conscious decision making turned most scientists and philosophers into either determinist or compatibalists, because free will requires control of your choices, which the experiment has shown we feel like and assume we have, but we really don't because our brain has already locked in the choice before we experience it consciously and do the mental tap dance of "vanilla or chocolate". We assume we're in control, but we're really just watching a movie our brain created for us and assume we're the main character.
But most people are so desperate to keep their delusion that they wont admit this happens and simply deny the evidence. They live in cognitive dissonance.
This is also what most scientists still believe as pointed out by Robert in the video by the way - compatibalism is like arguing santa exists by redefining what santa is into "old chubby man with long white full beard and red clothing". It's also a form of post-hoc rationalization to wishful think oneself into a belief one wants to have.
Acting as though I perceive life through the lens of having the perception of free will has allowed me to be content.
Yes.
at around 1:18:00 they talk about we are blameless collections of atoms that like other collections of atoms called machines do things, from the previous causes. Some got the gene for tendency toward unplanned overindulging in alcohol. Now I realize that people don't choose it anyhow. And the some ppl with those collections of causes we call 'alcoholism' that quit; I posit most do so silently and by themselves.
Just like most ppl that lose weight, don't make a big deal about it -- after they buy their new wardrobe.
my favorite moment in Rick and Morty, the butter robot asks Rick "what is my purpose?" Rick replies: " you serve butter" Robot exclaims in existential dread and horror: "Oh my God!!!" they nailed it. lol
I think you have to distinguish between ad hoc decisions made by an individual in a setting about a relarively irrelevant thing like "will I press this or that button" etc. But when it comes to complex decision making, the subconcious idea will be transferred into concious linguistic concepts and options and consequences will be analysed by the help of language, then be fed back into the subconcious ("sleeping over it") and then be analysed conciously again. And even further: the politicak decisions a democratic parliament makes, a cognition based on a even more multimodal system. And to me it doesn´t seem completeley compelling that a decision made by a full parilament including a lot of debate and many cycles of concious and subconcious processing. I don´t know if the end result can be completely derived from the emergence level of biochemnistry of the sum of the individual brains.
So, the individual might have no free will like some would like to believe, but I think when we are talking about more complex decision making in supercomplex systems - it still might be determined by something, but it might be determined by different rules than the original rules of evolutionary competition. Or it might include indeterminable factors as soon as amplification of quantum chaos is included.
@9:41 "Where did the intent come from in the first place?" Why not "what we decided just prior to that intentional state?" This kicks it back to some mirky beginning. However, dealing with the origin of the self is a separate issue than the fact that we do make decisions that causes us to be an angel or a demon and that we are responsible for those decisions if we had a rational mindset.
perhaps "free will" is a powerful tactic, like sneakiness or lies? Why is is necessary to argue against it as anything other than just another tactic to survive?
What if we all vibrate at different frequencies. So when you make a decision, you're making it toward something that is on that same frequency level as you and we kinda always stick to things that match. And theres a few people who have a changing frequency that can sync up to almost any frequency or decision they make. Those are the people that make life look easy and are always successful in everything they do, but the majority of people are locked into the path of least resistance and are easily controlled by sticking to the frequency they vibrate at.
hey Kenneth, what is the frequency?
as subjects to time&logic& to the logical dichotomy that any 'event' must be either: caused-or-not, no one could have done otherwise.
when an 'idea' is incoherent (ie square-circle), no need to search for it in the physical world.
for any urgent moral issue we don't stop just to argue '7=7 isnt absolute knowledge'
Dr. Robert Sapolksy makes so much sense! his ideas are so clean and factual and realizing this is not even a sad feeling, it is a liberation
45:30 how to reject rationalism in real time :( When ppl of science bring you some findings and you still find it difficult to see, not necessarily to believe in them, but to see the logic in them , meanwhile celebrities barely experience 1% of all this rejection, critical thinking , or 0 appreciation. utterly sad but who cares.... in the end
16:00 what a silly interpretation .... he cannot be bored about the topic, it s his life and one of his biggest works
🐟 11. FREE-WILL Vs DETERMINISM:
OPENING PREMISE:
Just as the autonomous beating of one’s heart is governed by one’s genes (such as the presence of a congenital heart condition), and the present-life conditioning of the heart (such as myocardial infarction, as a consequence of the consumption of excessive fats and oils, or heart palpitations due to severe emotional distress), EACH and EVERY thought and action is governed by our genes and our environmental milieu.
This teaching is possibly the most difficult concept for humans to accept, because we refuse to believe that we are not the authors of our own thoughts and actions. From the appearance of the pseudo-ego (one’s inaccurate conception of oneself) at the age of approximately two and a half, we have been constantly conditioned by our parents, teachers, and society, to believe that we are solely responsible for our thoughts and deeds. This deeply-ingrained belief is EXCRUCIATINGLY difficult to abandon, which is possibly the main reason why there are very few humans extant who are spiritually enlightened, or at least, who are liberated from the five manifestations of mental suffering explained elsewhere in this “A Final Instruction Sheet for Humanity”, since suffering (as opposed to pain) is predicated solely upon the erroneous belief in free-will.
STANDARD DEFINITIONS:
Free-will is usually defined as the ability for a person to make a conscious decision to do otherwise, that is to say, CHOOSE to have performed an action other than what one has already completed, if one had been given the opportunity to do so. In order to make it perfectly clear, if, for example, one is handed a restaurant menu with several dishes listed, one could decide that one dish is equally as desirable as the next dish, and choose either option. If humans truly possessed freedom of will, then logically speaking, a person who adores cats and detests dogs, ought to be able to suddenly switch their preferences at any given point in time, or to be hair-splitting, even voluntarily pause the beating of his or her own heart! Of course, those who believe in free-will will find this last assertion to be preposterous, countering thus: “Clearly, we are not claiming that humans have absolute freedom of volition, but merely that, in many circumstances, when given the opportunity, we can make choices between two or more options.” However, even this statement is patently untrue, and can easily be dismissed by those in the know.
So, in both of the above examples, there is a pre-existing preference for one particular dish or pet. Even if one liked cats and dogs “EQUALLY”, and one was literally forced to choose one over the other, that choice would not be truly independent, but based entirely upon one’s genetic sequence, plus one’s up-to-date conditioning. Actual equality is non-existent in the macro-phenomenal sphere. If one was to somehow return to the time when any particular decision was made, the exact same decision would again be made, as all the circumstances would be identical!
FREEDOM OF CHOICE:
The most common argument against fatalism or determinism is that humans, unlike other animals, have the ability to choose what they can do, think or feel. First of all, many species of (higher) mammals also make choices. For instance, a cat can see two birds and choose which of the two birds to prey upon, or choose whether or not to play with a ball that is thrown its way, depending on its conditioning (e.g. its mood). That choices are made is indisputable, but those choices are dependent ENTIRELY upon one’s genes and one’s conditioning. There is no third factor involved on the phenomenal plane. On the noumenal level, thoughts and deeds are in accordance with the preordained “Story of Life”.
Read previous chapters of this book, in order to understand that existence is essentially MONISTIC. Chapter 08, specifically, explains how actions performed in the present are the result of chains of causation, all the way back to the earliest-known event in our universe (the so-called “Big Bang” singularity). Thus, in practice, it could be said that the notions of determinism and causation are synonymous concepts.
At this point, it should be noted that according to reputable geneticists, it is possible for genes to mutate during the lifetime of any particular person. However, that phenomenon would be included under the “conditioning” aspect, since the genes mutate according to whatever conditioning is imposed upon the human organism. It is simply IMPOSSIBLE for a person to use sheer force of will to change their own genetic code. Essentially, “conditioning” includes everything that acts upon a person from conception unto death, and over which there is no control.
At the risk of being repetitive, it must be emphasized that that a person (whether a human person or a non-human person) making a choice of any kind is not to be equated with freedom of volition, because those choices were themselves determined by the genetic sequence and the unique up-to-date conditioning of the person in question, as will be fully explicated below. Unfortunately, no matter how many times this fact is asserted and explained, many free-will proponents seemingly “become deaf”. If you, the reader, upon reaching the end of this chapter, still believe in free-will, it is suggested that you read it SEVERAL TIMES, and dwell on its points over a length of time (especially this paragraph).
ACADEMIC STUDIES:
University studies in recent years have demonstrated, by the use of hypnosis and complex experimentation, that CONSCIOUS volition is either unnecessary for a decision to be enacted upon or (in the case of hypnotic testing) that free-will choices are completely superfluous to actions. Because scientific research into free-will is a recent field of enquiry, it is recommended that the reader search online for the latest findings. I contend, however, that indeterminacy is a purely philosophical conundrum. I am highly-sceptical in relation to freedom of volition being either demonstrated or disproven by neuroscience, because even if free-will was proven by cognitive science, it would not take into account the ultimate cause of that free-will existing in the first place. The origin of that supposed freedom of volition would need to be established.
RANDOMNESS IS IMPOSSIBLE:
If any particular volitional act was not caused by the sum of all antecedent states of being, then the only alternative explanation would be due to true RANDOMNESS. Many quantum physicists construe that subatomic particles can arbitrarily move in space, but true stochasticity is problematic in any possible universe, what to speak of in a closed, deterministic universe. Just as the typical person believes that the collision of two motor vehicles was the result of pure chance (hence the term “accident”), physicists are unable to see that the seeming unpredictability of quantum events are, in fact, determined by a force hitherto undiscovered by the material sciences. It is a known fact of logic that a random number generator cannot exist, since no computational machine or software programme is able to make the “decision” to generate a number capriciously. Any number generated will be a consequence of human programming, which in turn, is the result of genetic programming, etc.
True randomness implies that there were no determinants whatever in the making of a conscious decision or in the execution of an act of will.
Some sceptics (that is, disbelievers in determinism) have cited Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle as conclusive proof that free-will exists. However, most (if not all) such sceptics are simply displaying their own abject ignorance of quantum mechanics, because the uncertainty principle has naught to do with the determined-random dichotomy, but merely states that there is a limit to the precision with which certain pairs of physical properties, such as position and momentum, can be simultaneously known. In other words, the more accurately one property is measured, the less accurately the other property can be known. Even if quantum physicists eventually prove beyond any doubt whatsoever, that quantum indeterminacy is factual (for which they will be required to explain the origin of such stochasticity, which seems inconceivable), it will not demonstrate that human choices and decisions will be random (or “free”, to use a more vague term). That would be akin to stating: “One of the electrons in my left foot suddenly decided to spin clockwise, and so, I decided to skip breakfast this morning.” How LUDICROUS!!!
Cont...
@@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices Cool monolog!
btw, I suspect that if I spit in your face once not three times you will never be the same person again and two I suspect that you will want to have the free will to choose not to attack but possibly turn the other cheek, and another free will I suspect you will have, that of choosing with your mind, with your own thoughts to remain positive, respectful and to find yourself moral explanations for my behavior towards you, but at the same time to not hate me.
you choose, choose, choose, but you couldnt have chosen otherwise.
The moment a particle is a wave; it has to be a conscious wave!
Gravity is the conscious attraction among waves to create the illusion of particles,
and our experience-able Universe.
Max Planck states: "Consciousness is fundamental and matter is derived from Consciousness".
Life is the Infinite Consciousness, experiencing the Infinite Possibilities, Infinitely.
We are "It", with "free-will," experiencing and choosing our infinite possibilities, in our finite moment.
Our job is to make it interesting!
All of human behaviour: situations have affordences, agents have goals. When the affordence of a situation matches and maximizes the agent's goal, which is based on their current state, selection occurs and the result, good or bad, mutates the agent's state including goals and the situation is daltered. Rince repeat.
Positive reinforcement of good intentions and patterns seems as if it would shape future behaviors. That has been what I have noticed- at least when raising children. … even for myself, for that matter.
Psychologists have long since known (since about the late 1980s) that human behavior cannot be reduced to Skinnerism.
they will not just seem. people are so careful with language but facts are missed because of this. everything that happens during our childhoods is unfortunately crucial, the future is like already bespoken in the name of our families and whomever raised us. and bad is stronger than good, so good intentions vs anything bad that happens to us, i m afraid the bad ones influence us more than the good experiences
@53:34 "What are you going to do with this knowledge?" I have to point out that this question would make no sense if we have no free will. We are not able to do anything since no one exists to steer the boat as it were.
regarding 'meaning', just wanted to point out that there's no logical-inconsistancy between knowing incompatibilism is true and an intuition/belief that a god-concept that's beyond logic&time etc might exist along with the "good godly plan" idea as well.
I’m bemused by this guy and the enthusiasm he gets. I had never heard of him, and suddenly he’s the prophet of determinism. The problem is that he tells me nothing whatsoever that I don’t already know. It’s rather annoying that he and his apostles seem to have closed the book on free will, when that is wildly premature and rather facile. I rather resent it when scientists are so moved by their research that they start fancying themselves philosophers. He is in over his depth. Human beings are comprised of both determining forces and free will. I could write a book about the ways in which I am determined, but I assert that I am a free human being.
One doesn’t need to be a scientist or philosopher to realize their isn’t room for free will as most people define it in the material world. You do as you will but you don’t will what you will.
If you believe there is free will it would need to be anchored in some spiritual / supernatural realm and even then arguments for it are often bad.
I'm sure he's very respected in his field, but philosophically, he's really quite mediocre, to put it nicely. He's not really bringing anything new to the table as far as the broader debate is concerned, and much though he'd presumably like to think otherwise, none of the arguments he presents in his book are incompatible with free will even in a libertarian sense. A shame, because I think he does genuinely raise an interesting point every now and then, but at the end of the day, he still comes across as every other pop scientist who thinks they've got it all figured out and don't need to bother with silly things like "philosophy".
Time doesn’t run backwards but it does xpand and compress.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-electron_universe
The problem is if you say an alcoholic "chooses" to pick up a drink, then you're not an alcoholic and you don't have a drinking problem. People who have drinking problems have the very real feeling that they're not choosing to drink, they must drink, there is no choice.
Determinism and free will are one of the same if you think about it there is no difference. We are free to will in the mind of nature. nature in of itself is what it is so we are that part of nature expressing itself freely which is determined by the will of nature which is what we are letting the cards fall where they may and so forth and so forth. Free will and determinism are the same thing from different perspectives
Sapolsky (not Sapolksy). Great thinker. We are animals with egos
@56:30 It's liberating that our lives don't stink as much as it could if we have no free will. But, Robert is going from edge cases of human suffering to the joy that the majority of people feel and experience because they have choices and can make them for the betterment of their lives. My chief concern with this hard deterministic philosophy is the political and sociological damage it can cause. Back in the mid-nineteenth century there were philosophies that emerged that had terrifying consequences in the early twentieth century (e.g., Marxism, social Darwinism, positivism, etc.). I see this as a repetition of that. The world could really suffer if Robert's views start to really influence the masses. You could also get some very strange and odd beliefs by the top elite of society (stuff that our best scifi writers cannot even imagine).
It's pointless getting into the weeds regarding failed ideological systems, or Marxism (for which there are positives to my mind).
We could point at many instances in the past where humans have collectively acted in brutal ways and see a multitude of narratives in operation, including theism etc.
Anyway...
Just because an idea points toward an uncomfortable truth about the nature of reality, doesn't mean we should reject the idea based around catastrophising fantasies.
Genial
The actual question that should be asked is, “Do humans use 'free will” to make their decisions.” That question can be easily answered by defining it and testing it on people who have sworn to freely make a decision for the betterment of this Country without injecting biases into their decision-making.
.Free Will has been defined but it needs to be modified slightly for our purpose. It can be found in the case U.S. v. Grayson 438 U.S. 41, at p. 52. This is the basic statement we'll use to form our test:
The Scott rationale rests not only on the realism of the psychological pressures on a defendant in the dock -- which we can grant -- but also on a deterministic view of human conduct that is inconsistent with the underlying precepts of our criminal justice system. A "universal and persistent" foundation stone in our system of law, and particularly in our approach to punishment, sentencing, and incarceration, is the "belief in freedom of the human will and a consequent ability and duty of the normal individual to choose between good and evil." Morissette v. United States, 342 U. S. 246, 342 U. S. 250 (1952).
So, we made some modifications. First, we make a general statement of what would be a free will decision in legal jargon. Free Will is a "belief in freedom of the human will and a consequent ability and duty of the normal individual to choose between good and evil." Grayson, supra.
We want our test to reflect our ability to obey the law so we have to modify our statement slightly to reflect legal duties. Doing so, we have: “a belief in freedom of the human will and a consequent ability and duty of the normal individual to choose to confine our conduct within the parameters of lawful behavior.” Thus, we removed “between good and evil." as laws are not categorized as “good and evil.”
Further, we want to test those with the freest minds in the U.S. through their sworn duty in their combined Oath. “ ... I will administer justice without respect to persons, and do equal right to the poor and to the rich, and that I will faithfully and impartially discharge and perform all the duties incumbent upon me as _________ under the Constitution and laws of the United States; ..., that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.”
Now, we have a test of judges' Free Will in their decision-making. It reads, “Do judges and justice use their freedom of will and a consequence ability to confine their conduct within the parameters of lawful behavior?” Please note that the Grayson decision flatly rejected determinism: “a deterministic view of human conduct that is inconsistent with the underlying precepts of our criminal justice system.” In short, in the mind of judges, the use of determinism is O.K. for using determinism until it comes to the human mind.
Using the test announced above, we can test judges' and justices' free will in deciding cases. All you have to do is take a series of cases, all based on the same set of facts, and see how they ruled. If there are dissents, modifications, or overturning of other judges, then apparently “free will' is not a factor as all are sworn to God to uphold the Constitution and (constitutional) laws of the U.S. This does not mean that the winning decision is the free will decision as the final outcome of many cases is decided by the majority ruling in the Supreme Court which may have considerable biased inserted into the decision made. In short, the winner is decided by Hierarchy.
I tested the use of “free will” in the judges and justices in Trump's Muslim Ban cases in 2018. The decisions were all over the place. As far as the final controlling decision, only around 18.2% of the judges reached that conclusion. There is no free will, the government just uses it to hold us accountable. On the criminal side, finding free will is a requirement of guilt in the State of Mind charge. On the civil side, we are held accountable for not pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps.
This belief in free will is an existential threat to a cohesive society. It must be abolished with the quickest of haste.
You cannot “use” what you do not have.
@@nonpareilstoryteller5920 The problem is the United States has written into most laws concerning the population a belief in "free will" whether it concerns criminal laws or civil laws. For instance, most criminal statutes contain a "state of mind" requiring a voluntary act. On the civil side, the justification for treating different classes of people differently in government programs is the "free will" belief that you can pull yourself up by your bootstraps to receive better treatment but you "chose" not to.
If you read the Grayson opinion, you know that "free will" is necessary to inflict punishment. So, the difference between jurors finding someone guilty and sentencing them to punishment really amounts to whether the juror believes in "free will."
To me, it appears that our present system without real rehabilitation is kinda like someone who has a hammer as his only tool. We need to increase the methods we use to reduce so-called criminal behavior.
Why "the betterment of the Country?" Why not "the betterment of life on this planet or the betterment of all life in the Universe?"☮️🎶
You probably have a better phrasing! Thanks fro reading. @@JeffJohnson-db2nd
@@nonpareilstoryteller5920
Yes you can -- indirectly. I got my wife to mow the lawn, which *I* wanted done, but she didnt, and which *I* couldn't be arsed doing, and which she didnt care to do. So I ysed her indirectly.
And also, what is paying someone else.
That’s a great argument if the playing field are equal there not. This is slave vs master
00:02 There is no Free Will according to Dr. Robert Sapolksy
02:28 Dr. Robert Sapolsky argues that Free Will is a myth.
07:32 The notion of free will and intent has been a subject of debate in the scientific community.
09:52 There is debate about whether free will truly exists.
14:27 Neuroplasticity and various factors shape our decisions and behavior, leaving little room for free will.
16:46 Our decisions are influenced by various factors, but we still have a sense of agency.
21:01 The existence of free will is difficult to prove, especially something that cannot be seen.
23:14 Understanding the surprising ways biology influences our thoughts and behaviors
27:22 The limitations of explaining human behavior based on brain damage
29:17 There is free will, but it may be influenced in certain circumstances.
33:22 Our ability to make decisions aligned with our values can be improved by understanding the influence of biology on our impulses.
35:36 Various factors like religious beliefs, brain development in the fetus, and history of infectious diseases influence our everyday decisions.
39:34 Blood glucose levels, influenced by how long one has eaten, affect brain function and decision-making.
41:29 Various factors like hunger, birthdays, and cultural beliefs can influence decisions and behaviors.
45:42 Free will is a myth, and we are not always in control of our lives.
47:46 Unpredictability is not the same as determinism and does not provide free will.
52:07 The concept of free will can be both liberating and depressing.
54:15 Our feelings are machine-like and may seem suspect.
58:22 Our understanding of responsibility, behaviors, and morality will dramatically change if we accept that Free Will does not exist.
1:00:38 Improving skills and changing psychological perspective can enhance proficiency and understanding of free will and determinism.
1:04:30 The question of free will is complex and tied to our understanding of God and our choices.
1:06:38 Our actions and decisions are influenced by a combination of circumstances and past experiences.
1:11:12 Our everyday decisions are influenced by biology, not just our willpower.
1:13:32 Inspiration can be deflating as it disregards the neurobiological priming behind decision-making.
1:17:47 We have a moral imperative to understand others' actions.
1:19:57 We often struggle to feel that our actions are praiseworthy or condemnable in the grand scheme of things.
1:24:33 Our perception of what is obvious and acceptable changes over time.
1:27:00 Humans are complicated and contradictory beings.
Brilliant talk....thank you so much for putting it out there (euh.... here....) 😊
Fatalism which also ascribes no free will stems from non scientific theories of what exists. An example is Davina-Vedanta from the sub-continent where the world is made through disinterested will. Fatalism gives agency to persons through the person having a determined role to play. This correlates to agrarian economics of patron/client relationships where upwards looking and downwards looking become encoded as class relationships. Free will is in this sense a political strategy for the oppressed class to become socially upwardly mobile and reinvent their identity in political economy of class structure enforced through fatalism. It could be biology or disinterested will qua omniscience consciousness that constrains agency to a system though as complex systems emerge there appears supervening agents that change the system and it’s this observation by other constrained agents that appears to be free from influence of prior contracts. So free will is a form of deviance and delinquent thought within the system. So free will are random observables in a system that causes change to the system as a whole which occurs at the atomic or individual level of the system. Hence isolation and containment of free will to mitigate rapid social change.
🐟 11. FREE-WILL Vs DETERMINISM:
OPENING PREMISE:
Just as the autonomous beating of one’s heart is governed by one’s genes (such as the presence of a congenital heart condition), and the present-life conditioning of the heart (such as myocardial infarction, as a consequence of the consumption of excessive fats and oils, or heart palpitations due to severe emotional distress), EACH and EVERY thought and action is governed by our genes and our environmental milieu.
This teaching is possibly the most difficult concept for humans to accept, because we refuse to believe that we are not the authors of our own thoughts and actions. From the appearance of the pseudo-ego (one’s inaccurate conception of oneself) at the age of approximately two and a half, we have been constantly conditioned by our parents, teachers, and society, to believe that we are solely responsible for our thoughts and deeds. This deeply-ingrained belief is EXCRUCIATINGLY difficult to abandon, which is possibly the main reason why there are very few humans extant who are spiritually enlightened, or at least, who are liberated from the five manifestations of mental suffering explained elsewhere in this “A Final Instruction Sheet for Humanity”, since suffering (as opposed to pain) is predicated solely upon the erroneous belief in free-will.
STANDARD DEFINITIONS:
Free-will is usually defined as the ability for a person to make a conscious decision to do otherwise, that is to say, CHOOSE to have performed an action other than what one has already completed, if one had been given the opportunity to do so. In order to make it perfectly clear, if, for example, one is handed a restaurant menu with several dishes listed, one could decide that one dish is equally as desirable as the next dish, and choose either option. If humans truly possessed freedom of will, then logically speaking, a person who adores cats and detests dogs, ought to be able to suddenly switch their preferences at any given point in time, or to be hair-splitting, even voluntarily pause the beating of his or her own heart! Of course, those who believe in free-will will find this last assertion to be preposterous, countering thus: “Clearly, we are not claiming that humans have absolute freedom of volition, but merely that, in many circumstances, when given the opportunity, we can make choices between two or more options.” However, even this statement is patently untrue, and can easily be dismissed by those in the know.
So, in both of the above examples, there is a pre-existing preference for one particular dish or pet. Even if one liked cats and dogs “EQUALLY”, and one was literally forced to choose one over the other, that choice would not be truly independent, but based entirely upon one’s genetic sequence, plus one’s up-to-date conditioning. Actual equality is non-existent in the macro-phenomenal sphere. If one was to somehow return to the time when any particular decision was made, the exact same decision would again be made, as all the circumstances would be identical!
FREEDOM OF CHOICE:
The most common argument against fatalism or determinism is that humans, unlike other animals, have the ability to choose what they can do, think or feel. First of all, many species of (higher) mammals also make choices. For instance, a cat can see two birds and choose which of the two birds to prey upon, or choose whether or not to play with a ball that is thrown its way, depending on its conditioning (e.g. its mood). That choices are made is indisputable, but those choices are dependent ENTIRELY upon one’s genes and one’s conditioning. There is no third factor involved on the phenomenal plane. On the noumenal level, thoughts and deeds are in accordance with the preordained “Story of Life”.
Read previous chapters of this book, in order to understand that existence is essentially MONISTIC. Chapter 08, specifically, explains how actions performed in the present are the result of chains of causation, all the way back to the earliest-known event in our universe (the so-called “Big Bang” singularity). Thus, in practice, it could be said that the notions of determinism and causation are synonymous concepts.
At this point, it should be noted that according to reputable geneticists, it is possible for genes to mutate during the lifetime of any particular person. However, that phenomenon would be included under the “conditioning” aspect, since the genes mutate according to whatever conditioning is imposed upon the human organism. It is simply IMPOSSIBLE for a person to use sheer force of will to change their own genetic code. Essentially, “conditioning” includes everything that acts upon a person from conception unto death, and over which there is no control.
At the risk of being repetitive, it must be emphasized that that a person (whether a human person or a non-human person) making a choice of any kind is not to be equated with freedom of volition, because those choices were themselves determined by the genetic sequence and the unique up-to-date conditioning of the person in question, as will be fully explicated below. Unfortunately, no matter how many times this fact is asserted and explained, many free-will proponents seemingly “become deaf”. If you, the reader, upon reaching the end of this chapter, still believe in free-will, it is suggested that you read it SEVERAL TIMES, and dwell on its points over a length of time (especially this paragraph).
ACADEMIC STUDIES:
University studies in recent years have demonstrated, by the use of hypnosis and complex experimentation, that CONSCIOUS volition is either unnecessary for a decision to be enacted upon or (in the case of hypnotic testing) that free-will choices are completely superfluous to actions. Because scientific research into free-will is a recent field of enquiry, it is recommended that the reader search online for the latest findings. I contend, however, that indeterminacy is a purely philosophical conundrum. I am highly-sceptical in relation to freedom of volition being either demonstrated or disproven by neuroscience, because even if free-will was proven by cognitive science, it would not take into account the ultimate cause of that free-will existing in the first place. The origin of that supposed freedom of volition would need to be established.
RANDOMNESS IS IMPOSSIBLE:
If any particular volitional act was not caused by the sum of all antecedent states of being, then the only alternative explanation would be due to true RANDOMNESS. Many quantum physicists construe that subatomic particles can arbitrarily move in space, but true stochasticity is problematic in any possible universe, what to speak of in a closed, deterministic universe. Just as the typical person believes that the collision of two motor vehicles was the result of pure chance (hence the term “accident”), physicists are unable to see that the seeming unpredictability of quantum events are, in fact, determined by a force hitherto undiscovered by the material sciences. It is a known fact of logic that a random number generator cannot exist, since no computational machine or software programme is able to make the “decision” to generate a number capriciously. Any number generated will be a consequence of human programming, which in turn, is the result of genetic programming, etc.
True randomness implies that there were no determinants whatever in the making of a conscious decision or in the execution of an act of will.
Some sceptics (that is, disbelievers in determinism) have cited Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle as conclusive proof that free-will exists. However, most (if not all) such sceptics are simply displaying their own abject ignorance of quantum mechanics, because the uncertainty principle has naught to do with the determined-random dichotomy, but merely states that there is a limit to the precision with which certain pairs of physical properties, such as position and momentum, can be simultaneously known. In other words, the more accurately one property is measured, the less accurately the other property can be known. Even if quantum physicists eventually prove beyond any doubt whatsoever, that quantum indeterminacy is factual (for which they will be required to explain the origin of such stochasticity, which seems inconceivable), it will not demonstrate that human choices and decisions will be random (or “free”, to use a more vague term). That would be akin to stating: “One of the electrons in my left foot suddenly decided to spin clockwise, and so, I decided to skip breakfast this morning.” How LUDICROUS!!!
Cont...
There is a strong aversion to the idea that I don't actually have a choice. But do I have the choice to have this aversion or not?
So I am trying to understand this. If children are brought up in a horrific abusive environment, does this mean they have no will but to become an abusive person?
I have a question about determinism and learning. Are we able to learn, which is out of our control, but we create new to us experiences that may very well be determined based in history but we do not have the ability to know how we will act because we are always in the process of learning? This is hard to write out properly.... my head hurts.
Based around the idea of determinism and no free will. My understanding.
1. Are we able to learn
Yes
2. Which is out of our control
That is the claim
3. We create new (to us) experiences
No - we create nothing new, we "act" within the given environment and according to our predisposition(s)
4. We do not have the ability to know how we will act
In a way yes - the claim is, that the decision has already been made, before we are consciously aware
@JB.zero.zero.1 so why do people freak out about it. If we don't know what we would do and things feel like a choice, isn't that enough? The end of the movie has been set already but I still get wrapped up in the story, feel emotions and am surprised by the twists. I do not have existential dread knowing that the story had been predetermined becaue its new to me and I don't know how it will end. Things may be determined but if we can never know what's going to happen in any moment ever. Who cares ?
I agree with Robert on everything thing he says the evidence is truly there, the only thing I disagree with him on, is things change on a societal level in regards to modern day the evidence that it has in the past is fact. But the hierarchy of modern day I feel is pretty damn solidified, I agree with him the change happens on a personal level, and small/medium size groups. But the families that possess all the generational wealth. I feel will always deny the notion of there being no free will, based on his findings. They’re basically Incapable of change in thinking. They’re taught they’re superior from birth and just for being born. Whether we like it or not no matter how much it’s denied, the extremely wealthy have a huge impact on how governments run. They’re basically one and the same. Thus I feel there will always be classes of humans that suffer. So I lean more towards an anti-natalist (The voluntary extinction of the human race) belief system. I feel it’s the only why to end all human suffering. Do I think it will ever happen, no. Do I think everyone will eventually accept free will doesn’t exist, no. I feel it’s hopeless and if I’m wrong none of us will ever see it. Which I feel is equally as hopeless. I have to ask how many generations have to suffer for there to be “utopia?” Is that “utopia” really a “utopia” because of that fact?
Dr Sapolsky saying 99% of the time hes a hypocrite is all i needed to hear to buy his new book yet again… friggin luv that guy. Behave is one of the best books I’ve ever read. Him saying he didn’t believe in free will as a 12 year old is great too. Confirmation bias anybody? 🤣 the most honest scientist ever. Love him.
🐟 11. FREE-WILL Vs DETERMINISM:
OPENING PREMISE:
Just as the autonomous beating of one’s heart is governed by one’s genes (such as the presence of a congenital heart condition), and the present-life conditioning of the heart (such as myocardial infarction, as a consequence of the consumption of excessive fats and oils, or heart palpitations due to severe emotional distress), EACH and EVERY thought and action is governed by our genes and our environmental milieu.
This teaching is possibly the most difficult concept for humans to accept, because we refuse to believe that we are not the authors of our own thoughts and actions. From the appearance of the pseudo-ego (one’s inaccurate conception of oneself) at the age of approximately two and a half, we have been constantly conditioned by our parents, teachers, and society, to believe that we are solely responsible for our thoughts and deeds. This deeply-ingrained belief is EXCRUCIATINGLY difficult to abandon, which is possibly the main reason why there are very few humans extant who are spiritually enlightened, or at least, who are liberated from the five manifestations of mental suffering explained elsewhere in this “A Final Instruction Sheet for Humanity”, since suffering (as opposed to pain) is predicated solely upon the erroneous belief in free-will.
STANDARD DEFINITIONS:
Free-will is usually defined as the ability for a person to make a conscious decision to do otherwise, that is to say, CHOOSE to have performed an action other than what one has already completed, if one had been given the opportunity to do so. In order to make it perfectly clear, if, for example, one is handed a restaurant menu with several dishes listed, one could decide that one dish is equally as desirable as the next dish, and choose either option. If humans truly possessed freedom of will, then logically speaking, a person who adores cats and detests dogs, ought to be able to suddenly switch their preferences at any given point in time, or to be hair-splitting, even voluntarily pause the beating of his or her own heart! Of course, those who believe in free-will will find this last assertion to be preposterous, countering thus: “Clearly, we are not claiming that humans have absolute freedom of volition, but merely that, in many circumstances, when given the opportunity, we can make choices between two or more options.” However, even this statement is patently untrue, and can easily be dismissed by those in the know.
So, in both of the above examples, there is a pre-existing preference for one particular dish or pet. Even if one liked cats and dogs “EQUALLY”, and one was literally forced to choose one over the other, that choice would not be truly independent, but based entirely upon one’s genetic sequence, plus one’s up-to-date conditioning. Actual equality is non-existent in the macro-phenomenal sphere. If one was to somehow return to the time when any particular decision was made, the exact same decision would again be made, as all the circumstances would be identical!
FREEDOM OF CHOICE:
The most common argument against fatalism or determinism is that humans, unlike other animals, have the ability to choose what they can do, think or feel. First of all, many species of (higher) mammals also make choices. For instance, a cat can see two birds and choose which of the two birds to prey upon, or choose whether or not to play with a ball that is thrown its way, depending on its conditioning (e.g. its mood). That choices are made is indisputable, but those choices are dependent ENTIRELY upon one’s genes and one’s conditioning. There is no third factor involved on the phenomenal plane. On the noumenal level, thoughts and deeds are in accordance with the preordained “Story of Life”.
Read previous chapters of this book, in order to understand that existence is essentially MONISTIC. Chapter 08, specifically, explains how actions performed in the present are the result of chains of causation, all the way back to the earliest-known event in our universe (the so-called “Big Bang” singularity). Thus, in practice, it could be said that the notions of determinism and causation are synonymous concepts.
At this point, it should be noted that according to reputable geneticists, it is possible for genes to mutate during the lifetime of any particular person. However, that phenomenon would be included under the “conditioning” aspect, since the genes mutate according to whatever conditioning is imposed upon the human organism. It is simply IMPOSSIBLE for a person to use sheer force of will to change their own genetic code. Essentially, “conditioning” includes everything that acts upon a person from conception unto death, and over which there is no control.
At the risk of being repetitive, it must be emphasized that that a person (whether a human person or a non-human person) making a choice of any kind is not to be equated with freedom of volition, because those choices were themselves determined by the genetic sequence and the unique up-to-date conditioning of the person in question, as will be fully explicated below. Unfortunately, no matter how many times this fact is asserted and explained, many free-will proponents seemingly “become deaf”. If you, the reader, upon reaching the end of this chapter, still believe in free-will, it is suggested that you read it SEVERAL TIMES, and dwell on its points over a length of time (especially this paragraph).
ACADEMIC STUDIES:
University studies in recent years have demonstrated, by the use of hypnosis and complex experimentation, that CONSCIOUS volition is either unnecessary for a decision to be enacted upon or (in the case of hypnotic testing) that free-will choices are completely superfluous to actions. Because scientific research into free-will is a recent field of enquiry, it is recommended that the reader search online for the latest findings. I contend, however, that indeterminacy is a purely philosophical conundrum. I am highly-sceptical in relation to freedom of volition being either demonstrated or disproven by neuroscience, because even if free-will was proven by cognitive science, it would not take into account the ultimate cause of that free-will existing in the first place. The origin of that supposed freedom of volition would need to be established.
RANDOMNESS IS IMPOSSIBLE:
If any particular volitional act was not caused by the sum of all antecedent states of being, then the only alternative explanation would be due to true RANDOMNESS. Many quantum physicists construe that subatomic particles can arbitrarily move in space, but true stochasticity is problematic in any possible universe, what to speak of in a closed, deterministic universe. Just as the typical person believes that the collision of two motor vehicles was the result of pure chance (hence the term “accident”), physicists are unable to see that the seeming unpredictability of quantum events are, in fact, determined by a force hitherto undiscovered by the material sciences. It is a known fact of logic that a random number generator cannot exist, since no computational machine or software programme is able to make the “decision” to generate a number capriciously. Any number generated will be a consequence of human programming, which in turn, is the result of genetic programming, etc.
True randomness implies that there were no determinants whatever in the making of a conscious decision or in the execution of an act of will.
Some sceptics (that is, disbelievers in determinism) have cited Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle as conclusive proof that free-will exists. However, most (if not all) such sceptics are simply displaying their own abject ignorance of quantum mechanics, because the uncertainty principle has naught to do with the determined-random dichotomy, but merely states that there is a limit to the precision with which certain pairs of physical properties, such as position and momentum, can be simultaneously known. In other words, the more accurately one property is measured, the less accurately the other property can be known. Even if quantum physicists eventually prove beyond any doubt whatsoever, that quantum indeterminacy is factual (for which they will be required to explain the origin of such stochasticity, which seems inconceivable), it will not demonstrate that human choices and decisions will be random (or “free”, to use a more vague term). That would be akin to stating: “One of the electrons in my left foot suddenly decided to spin clockwise, and so, I decided to skip breakfast this morning.” How LUDICROUS!!!
Cont...
Wow! All I am is what came before is so profound, so God like. This discussion gives me more faith in that our creator already set into motion the plan to aid him in what to do about US. How will they cast out those that have no choice, those that have no free will, those that are pre determined to be dumbasses.
If there were no free will, a person might be grateful to another human being for help, just as, for example, to a tree or to a rock for protecting from the sun. Friendship, love, responsibility, goodness, evil, sin, guilt, merit, courage, heroism, justice, conscience, promise, choice, praise, medals and the like are impossible without free will. The words for them could not even exist at all.
We know examples of extraordinary sacrifice:
-- a father or mother to his/her children;
-- a soldier on the battlefield giving his life to save other soldiers;
-- a patient giving medicine to another patient;
-- a castaway giving up his place in a lifeboat;
-- a scientist who gives his life for scientific truth, that is, for society, for humanity;
-- and many other cases. These people have consciously chosen to give their lives "for the cause", for other people, and the extreme uniqueness of their decisions proves the freedom of their decisions. Those who argue that there is no free will are really trying to convince us that there is no goodness, no voluntary sacrifice, no friendship, no love. In fact, they only prove that there is evil, God and the devil - they are doing evil under the cover of science.
__ Quantum physics proves that the world is not determined, so telling determinism is a deliberate lie and as such requires ill will, it is as evil as, for example, harming a child.
__ Just because we don't know, how free will is possible, doesn't mean it does not exist. In the past, science was sure that radio waves cannot travel across the ocean because they travel in a straight line, so they cannot overcome the curvature of the Earth. Radio waves, however, reached overseas. And what? It turned out that radio waves are reflected in the upper atmosphere and are directed back to the Earth's surface. Science will discover why free will exists someday.
Obviously you haven't understood what he is saying and you certainly have not read his books. He totally demolishes the relevance of your examples.
Free will is the ability to enjoy the”living” of all these preset, hormones etc.. Free will to enjoy all the changes you go through as the days go by. Stress takes away the enjoyment. Ps I have a watcher. I have felt that it is part of me but separate. The beauty you see in nature is a reflection of you. Also as a creative artist I believe my best ideas are “sent” to me. I am just the receiver. Like a bird.
I never understood the "free will" question. Free will was presented to me through catholic religion. And that was very strange to me. How come we are born in a family, in a culture, we are conditioned since the beginning.
So, I'm very curious to listen to this interesting scientist and also to read "Behave".
In my opinion: God is Evolving with the knowledge gained in the creation of this Universe, Not static, described as: “All Powerful,
All-Present, and All Knowing” Life in this physical form, is free will experimenting with all it's possibilities, during its finite moment,
I believe this to be true bc there are always many determinants behind a behavior, and my question is how do we deal than with sexual assault, aggression/ violence against women, If we can “explain” bc of the testosterone, and culture?
Everything is playing out in the only way it can
@51:05 Robert asserts that quantum effects wouldn't explain free will, rather it would explain why you do totally random things. But, this is not the whole picture. If we consider a quantum event to be the qualia-like experience we have, and we think of the deterministic neuronal processes like ChatGPT running in our brains, then an indeterminate qualia event can play a causal feedback role to the neuronal chatbot processing via the quantum Zeno effect (etc.). Over billions of years of evolution conscious agency emerges where the chatbot circuitry is highly dependent on an orchestra of quantum events. The quantum events are highly confined by natural selection to work with our neuronal firings in such a way that you have downward causation from the quantum events upon the neuronal firings, and neuronal firings feedback that control with deterministic agency. As the hominids evolved they gained super-agency where downward causation is part of a higher layer that is a Leonard Bernstein-like homunculus. The agent conducts the symphony.