GENIUS FORUMS

I think what a person means by "experience" must be dependent on how they view free will. If he believes in free will, then he must feel that his thoughts are actively controlled by him and therefore are not part of passively incoming experience, so he would define "experience" to consist only of the five senses. Whereas if he doesn't believe in free will, then he must see his thoughts as another source of passively incoming data and therefore sees experience as including thoughts with the five senses.

Does anyone know of any exceptions to this rule?

I wouldn't say that not believing in free will means that everything is passive - although that was my initial reaction and seems to be that of many others. One still can eithat activly or passivly think or do - but what is more difficult to reconcile because it is counter-intuitive is that causality can cause active thinking and doing in certain individuals.

That's true. I didn't mean to say that the practice of thinking changes, but that a broader perspective opens up in which the active practice of thinking is seen as the passive activity that it really is. I think anyone who seeks to consciously define "experience" will naturally do it from the broadest perspective they are aware of.

Is the knowledge of this receptacle of ever-passive incoming data a priori or a posteriori?

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Leyla Shen wrote:Is the knowledge of this receptacle of ever-passive incoming data a priori or a posteriori?

For most people it is posteriori, that is, pulled from from one's arse.

Kidding aside,

Matt wrote:I think what a person means by "experience" must be dependent on how they view free will.

Yes, "what a person means," assuming he actually thinks about his beliefs. Most people do not even know what their beliefs are because they do not examine them. Beliefs then become a default or reactive mode of operation.

If he believes in free will, then he must feel that his thoughts are actively controlled by him

Or, if not actively, that his thoughts controlled or more accurately projected, passively by him, again as default or reactive mode of operation. Emanating from the subconsious or at least unconsious part of him.

and therefore are not part of passively incoming experience, so he would define "experience" to consist only of the five senses.

Why would someone believing in free will naturally or necessarily subscribe to this five-sense-only limitation? Actually, if anything, it would seem they would tend to attribute experience more to the mind.

Whereas if he doesn't believe in free will, then he must see his thoughts as another source of passively incoming data and therefore sees experience as including thoughts with the five senses.

Why would the role of thought be exclusive to one belief or the other? The one believing in free will could include the mind, through which will is implemented into the world. The one who doesn't believe in free will, who attributes experience to sources completely outside himself, could still include thought as the main receptor, and vehicle of action.

How are you looking at the concept of experience?

By "experience" in this context I'm referring solely to incoming information that can be thought about.

First we have to make it clear that freewill doesn't really exist, and just because you believe it exists doesn't make it so.

Causality determines the course of thinking, which determines the nature of experience: Sometimes passive, sometimes active, the notion of experience rests on one's ability to reflect on their thinking, which increases consciousness, which converts a passive experience into a far more active one.

Matt Gregory wrote:How are you looking at the concept of experience? By "experience" in this context I'm referring solely to incoming information that can be thought about.

What is the source of this incoming information?

The senses, and the mind depending on whether you consider it a sense or not.

*If he believes in free will
*he must feel that his thoughts are actively controlled by him
*Therefore his thoughts are not part of passively incoming experience
*he would define "experience" to consist only of the five senses

*if he doesn't believe in free will
*he must feel that his thoughts are not actively controlled by him
*then he must see his thoughts as another source of passively incoming data
*therefore sees experience as including thoughts with the five senses

I think this question would be determined in how you define the mind. It could be considered a sixth sense, but I believe it to be more than that.

The mind is a repository for sensorial stimulation that is gathered and analyzed. It is also a generator of thought both from external and internal sources. To say that thoughts are actively controlled by him would mean that he could turn his mind on and off at will, which I suppose in certain instances, could be achieved. Can you stop yourself from thinking at will without going into some type of meditative trance? Even when you are trying not to think, you are thinking about trying not to think. However, his thoughts would not be a passively incoming experience because his mind translates that which is sensed through active or passive incoming data into meaning/perception. Free will comes in when one acts on that meaning or perception. So, it would then seem that his experience would consist primarily of the mind (choice) and secondarily of the senses (action).

The other you describe I believe is called a determinist, and I have yet to understand this philosophy. But in an attempt to address the no free will experience, it would seem he would not have any experiences because his choices are already determined. In essence, he is a victim of nature. He would have no ownership or responsibility in anything in which he was involved, therefore, I'm not quite sure how that would define his experience other than through the senses...but how thought plays in I'm not quite sure - he may think them illusory.

passthrough wrote:*If he believes in free will
*he must feel that his thoughts are actively controlled by him
*Therefore his thoughts are not part of passively incoming experience
*he would define "experience" to consist only of the five senses

*if he doesn't believe in free will
*he must feel that his thoughts are not actively controlled by him
*then he must see his thoughts as another source of passively incoming data
*therefore sees experience as including thoughts with the five senses

I think this question would be determined in how you define the mind. It could be considered a sixth sense, but I believe it to be more than that.

The mind is a repository for sensorial stimulation that is gathered and analyzed. It is also a generator of thought both from external and internal sources. To say that thoughts are actively controlled by him would mean that he could turn his mind on and off at will, which I suppose in certain instances, could be achieved. Can you stop yourself from thinking at will without going into some type of meditative trance? Even when you are trying not to think, you are thinking about trying not to think. However, his thoughts would not be a passively incoming experience because his mind translates that which is sensed through active or passive incoming data into meaning/perception. Free will comes in when one acts on that meaning or perception. So, it would then seem that his experience would consist primarily of the mind (choice) and secondarily of the senses (action).

The other you describe I believe is called a determinist, and I have yet to understand this philosophy. But in an attempt to address the no free will experience, it would seem he would not have any experiences because his choices are already determined. In essence, he is a victim of nature. He would have no ownership or responsibility in anything in which he was involved, therefore, I'm not quite sure how that would define his experience other than through the senses...but how thought plays in I'm not quite sure - he may think them illusory.

No. Freewill isin't because one is acting on one's perception, that's still causation and is determined as anything else. Determinism doesn't mean one isin't experiencing anything I don't know where you got that from. Determinism is the view that everything is determined with respect to causation and what you experience in the world. Determinism is the realization that you don't even choose to think, that it merely pops in your head, as with desires, choices, actions, etc..

Faust:

Determinism doesn't mean one isin't experiencing anything I don't know where you got that from.

passthrough wrote: The other you describe I believe is called a determinist, and I have yet to understand this philosophy. But in an attempt to address the no free will experience,...

Faust:

No. Freewill isin't because one is acting on one's perception, that's still causation and is determined as anything else.

That is your understanding.

Faust:

Determinism is the view that everything is determined with respect to causation and what you experience in the world. Determinism is the realization that you don't even choose to think, that it merely pops in your head, as with desires, choices, actions, etc..

Since you do seem to know a lot about this, why don't you help me to understand it better...but don't go into causality, I'm well aware of that...I would like you to go into the psychology of mind that thinks you are determined. It is not that I don't understand the definition of it...I just cannot believe that one thinks they are subject to it...except

If you accept God, the Ultimate Reality, then from an infinite standpoint, I can understand how you believe this to be true, but from a finite standpoint, I do not understand how one can be this way unless and until they accept God. If they just think that they are the same nature as a rock, I think they are wrong. Humans were given consciousness to think..to attain an understanding of that infinite perspective...until then, they are a rock and as conscious as one. I think this is where I have been getting stuck in this forum for so long, but maybe there is more. I'm sure you'll let me know.

passthrough wrote:Since you do seem to know a lot about this, why don't you help me to understand it better...but don't go into causality, I'm well aware of that...I would like you to go into the psychology of mind that thinks you are determined. It is not that I don't understand the definition of it...I just cannot believe that one thinks they are subject to it...except

If you accept God, the Ultimate Reality, then from an infinite standpoint, I can understand how you believe this to be true, but from a finite standpoint, I do not understand how one can be this way unless and until they accept God. If they just think that they are the same nature as a rock, I think they are wrong. Humans were given consciousness to think..to attain an understanding of that infinite perspective...until then, they are a rock and as conscious as one. I think this is where I have been getting stuck in this forum for so long, but maybe there is more. I'm sure you'll let me know.

It doesn't matter if you accept ultimate reality or not the fact of determinism doesn't change. Yes we were GIVEN the ability for consciousness that's why we're not free we haven't even chosen to have this ability. And the ability for an individual to strive to find truth and be self conscious relies on the character/heredity, and the environment. So when I one day decided to get into reading Nietzsche, now I look back and realize it wasn't really a 'free' action. The desire for Truth was sparked in me from some other cause I don't remember and I began to search for the truth, and ever since then I've been unravelling ultimate reality. And when you look at the great philosophers you realize that they never chose to do what they did, it was instead already in them and hence their everlasting substance.

And the ability for an individual to strive to find truth and be self conscious relies on the character/heredity, and the environment. So when I one day decided to get into reading Nietzsche, now I look back and realize it wasn't really a 'free' action. The desire for Truth was sparked in me from some other cause I don't remember and I began to search for the truth, and ever since then I've been unravelling ultimate reality. And when you look at the great philosophers you realize that they never chose to do what they did, it was instead already in them and hence their everlasting substance.

How do you know this to be true? Is consciousness randomly parceled out? Is the ability to gain wisdom a genetic crap shoot? I think not. It is why what Radhakrishnan said makes more sense to me…our past determines what we are in the present, but the choice to change our future is free. To me, there exists a right way of being and if you choose it you are no longer free but determined to live in that right way of being, if you do not choose it, you suffer until you learn or you die.

It is my opinion that consciousness is freely given in order to make these choices despite our character, heredity and environment to gain wisdom and to learn the truth.

passthrough wrote:How do you know this to be true? Is consciousness randomly parceled out? Is the ability to gain wisdom a genetic crap shoot? I think not. It is why what Radhakrishnan said makes more sense to me…our past determines what we are in the present, but the choice to change our future is free. To me, there exists a right way of being and if you choose it you are no longer free but determined to live in that right way of being, if you do not choose it, you suffer until you learn or you die.

It is my opinion that consciousness is freely given in order to make these choices despite our character, heredity and environment to gain wisdom and to learn the truth.

There's no such thing as random, it's all causation. It's also genetic and environment. Why do you think some people will simply refuse the truth or refuse to be philosophers? Because it's not in them. It's like forcing them to take up accounting. It's also character too, as Weininger said, genius is entirely individual, whereas talent is hereditary.

If the past determines what we are in the present, that means what we are in the present will determine the future...

Trust me, choosing to lead a path to enlightenment is not a conscious choice at all, it just happens, like a light in you, as if it was your destiny, your determined role in the universe. The main reason why I became philosophical was due to cognitive dissonance and being alienated by the surrounding environment, that caused me to lead a philosophical life. Now others may also have these events, but they don't act on it because they aren't free, their temperments and environment simply don't spark it.

Now, you can certainly tell people of truths you've discovered, and whether they pick up on it or not is also determined.

Since you do seem to know a lot about this, why don't you help me to understand it better...but don't go into causality, I'm well aware of that...I would like you to go into the psychology of mind that thinks you are determined. It is not that I don't understand the definition of it...I just cannot believe that one thinks they are subject to it...except

I am a determinist. I haven't believed in free will, or even had the illusion thereof, in over two decades. My actions are caused by my desires, and my desires aren't chosen by me - far from it. I have had emotions that I would rather not have, and that upon thinking are completely silly. But knowing this doesn't get rid of the emotion. If I had free will, emotions would be 100% under control.

If you understand that everything that goes on in your brain is caused, I don't see why determinism still doesn't make sense to you.

In spite of my determinism, I go on behaving in a way that would be common with people who have the illusion of free will. I don't have a defeatist attitude and act as if I felt responsible for my own actions, because blaming causation for everything would have a negative outcome, at least from my perspective.

Since we have no way of knowing the outcome of our actions, to us it is as if nothing is set in stone. So really, I see no reason why a determinist would act different than a freewillist.

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PT,

It is why what Radhakrishnan said makes more sense to me…our past determines what we are in the present, but the choice to change our future is free.

Sounds quite right, and if a reasoning consciousness was an absolute slave to determinism to the core, then those that think that they think, are actually not, making reasoning an irrelevant or illogical act. How can then determinism be justified by reasoning? In fact those that have "reason" to believe it so, anything happening either way should not actually and really matter to them, so what is their problem? Really?

Sapius wrote:PT,

It is why what Radhakrishnan said makes more sense to me…our past determines what we are in the present, but the choice to change our future is free.

Sounds quite right, and if a reasoning consciousness was an absolute slave to determinism to the core, then those that think that they think, are actually not, making reasoning an irrelevant or illogical act. How can then determinism be justified by reasoning? In fact those that have "reason" to believe it so, anything happening either way should not actually and really matter to them, so what is their problem? Really?

No it doesn't sound right at all. If he believes that his present was determined by his past, then his future is determined by his past because his present state influences the future.

It's not that we don't think we're thinking, it's that you're thinking isin't chosen. Our thoughts just pop into our head, we don't choose to do it. And how you deal with your thinking is determined by your character and environment.

Faust13 wrote:

Sapius wrote:PT,

It is why what Radhakrishnan said makes more sense to me…our past determines what we are in the present, but the choice to change our future is free.

Sounds quite right, and if a reasoning consciousness was an absolute slave to determinism to the core, then those that think that they think, are actually not, making reasoning an irrelevant or illogical act. How can then determinism be justified by reasoning? In fact those that have "reason" to believe it so, anything happening either way should not actually and really matter to them, so what is their problem? Really?

No it doesn't sound right at all. If he believes that his present was determined by his past, then his future is determined by his past because his present state influences the future.

It's not that we don't think we're thinking, it's that you're thinking isin't chosen. Our thoughts just pop into our head, we don't choose to do it. And how you deal with your thinking is determined by your character and environment.

What is thinking or reasoning according to you? And does a tree think or reason as you do?

Determinism has nothing to do with free will. When we imagine free will in such a way that it can be proven false by determinism, we should see that such a conception of free will is false even in a partially or completely random system. One is not free to will what he will if that which he wills is randomly selected. Nevertheless, that conception of free will is something of a straw man, as few who are inclined towards philosophy would ever accept such a thing. When one argues a case for free will, they allow for a causal or semi-causal system, but nevertheless argue that a person is partially that which causes them to take action. It seems that I choose when to light my cigarette, because I do choose when to light my cigarette. Some of the events that are part of the process of lighting a cigarette can be seen as being incorporated into what we call "I" when the term is used in this way by the conventions of common language.

I should also say that I'm not a determinist. It's easy to conceive of a completely deterministic system, and indeed such a thing fits nicely with the conventional thought of an orderly and understandable universe. Nevertheless, it strikes me as sheer faith to suggest that just because, for example, the position of electrons in a double-slit experiment could have an unknown deterministic explanation, means that they then must have such an explanation. This isn't to say that I support the wholesale rejection of inductive inferences where they are useful, but rather that it simply isn't useful to posit determinism. We should say that it seems impossible for the universe to be completely random, but nevertheless, this doesn't mean that random elements couldn't exist within it, or that this randomness couldn't provide the base upon which an otherwise causative system rests.

EI,

One speaks according to who he is specking to, and needs to incorporate different methods to try and convey what he is talking about, hence at times it may seem one is using ‘partial’ causality.

In my opinion, free will in no way contradicts the law of causality in any way, completely. I don’t see it in what I do, rather in what I don’t/didn’t do, even if it is caused, for it is me that is caused. And “I” am not a nothing whatsoever.

The factor of a thing, that has its own causally created attributes, then work under the same principal. Causality is not falsified at any point. In fact, it creates a will through things, not that it wills it, it’s simply a blind “will” to survive, the driving force of all that there is. That is not to be taken as ‘survival of the fittest’, nor that it has any agenda, because it never ever had one to begin with; infinity in every which direction, from any which point, in any which dimension.

passthrough wrote:*If he believes in free will
*he must feel that his thoughts are actively controlled by him
*Therefore his thoughts are not part of passively incoming experience
*he would define "experience" to consist only of the five senses

*if he doesn't believe in free will
*he must feel that his thoughts are not actively controlled by him
*then he must see his thoughts as another source of passively incoming data
*therefore sees experience as including thoughts with the five senses

I think this question would be determined in how you define the mind. It could be considered a sixth sense, but I believe it to be more than that.

The mind is a repository for sensorial stimulation that is gathered and analyzed. It is also a generator of thought both from external and internal sources. To say that thoughts are actively controlled by him would mean that he could turn his mind on and off at will, which I suppose in certain instances, could be achieved. Can you stop yourself from thinking at will without going into some type of meditative trance? Even when you are trying not to think, you are thinking about trying not to think. However, his thoughts would not be a passively incoming experience because his mind translates that which is sensed through active or passive incoming data into meaning/perception. Free will comes in when one acts on that meaning or perception. So, it would then seem that his experience would consist primarily of the mind (choice) and secondarily of the senses (action).

Okay. I'm trained as a computer scientist, so I tend to think of experience in terms of input (senses) and output (choice). Data goes into the brain through the senses and just the body in general, then the brain more or less does a computation of what it should do next, and then the choice is the result and the body acts on it.

The other you describe I believe is called a determinist, and I have yet to understand this philosophy. But in an attempt to address the no free will experience, it would seem he would not have any experiences because his choices are already determined. In essence, he is a victim of nature. He would have no ownership or responsibility in anything in which he was involved, therefore, I'm not quite sure how that would define his experience other than through the senses...but how thought plays in I'm not quite sure - he may think them illusory.

It's kind of like standing here on the earth and watching the sun go around us. Yes, the sun is going around us on one level, but if we were to stand on the sun and look at the earth, then we would see that the earth is spinning. Or if we were to stand on the moon. Or Mars. Or Venus. Or if we were to stand any other place, we would see the earth spinning. So, our experience of free will is like standing on the earth. Determinism is best seen by standing outside oneself and looking from a larger perspective. In particular, by looking at our present decisions and looking at how they could have possibly been molded by our past experiences. The experience of free will is always there, but the determinist repudiates the reality of it.

Matt said,

The experience of free will is always there, but the determinist repudiates the reality of it.

I must be the only person who doesn't experience it.

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Shahrazad wrote:Matt said,

The experience of free will is always there, but the determinist repudiates the reality of it.

I must be the only person who doesn't experience it.

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freewill is an illusion that is all.