Scientific Justification for Free Will?

[Divine Insight]

Is there any scientific justification for the notion of Free Will?

Question #1. If you believe their is, can you please state your scientific evidence for the existence of Free Will.

Question #2. If you believe there is no scientific justification for the notion of Free Will, then please explain how we can have any scientific justification for holding anyone responsible for their actions. In fact, wouldn't the very notion of personal responsibility be scientifically unsupportable?

[otseng]

[Replying to post 1 by Divine Insight]

My perspective (twist) on question #1 is if god existed there could be no free will. At least if god is really all knowing, all seeing, is active in our lives, etc. and created man then free will is an illusion because god has already ordained what we will do/think... IMHO

There are actually several theories on God knowing everything (including the future) and man having libertarian free will. Molinism is just one example. Personally, I do not subscribe to this. I think the problem lies not in the fact that God knows everything, but if He has decreed everything. If he has not decreed everything, then I see no problem with God knowing everything and yet man having libertarian free will.

[otseng]

Well, is there a 'random choice'? Or, are things predetermined by the state of the brain chemistry, the connections and the environment. If we 'rewound' a moment in time, and presented the same scenario (down to the quantum scale), would the choice always be the same?

How would we know? What test can we do to determine that?

If we can't. does the question have any meaning at all, from a scientific point of view?

Thank you Goat,

You have hit my point dead center square on!

That is precisely what I'm asking.

If the concept of Free Will Choice is a meaningless question in science, then surely the concept of Personal Responsibility is equally meaningless?

That is precisely the point I'm getting at here.

And I agree with your point.

There is no scientific evidence for the existence of free will. Yet, free will is foundational to ethics and morality.

What this shows is the limits of science. The only thing that secularists can do is to ignore and dismiss the issue.

From a secualr point of view, ignore the question, and do what you have to do.

Stop over thinking nonsense.

[Goat]

Well, is there a 'random choice'? Or, are things predetermined by the state of the brain chemistry, the connections and the environment. If we 'rewound' a moment in time, and presented the same scenario (down to the quantum scale), would the choice always be the same?

How would we know? What test can we do to determine that?

If we can't. does the question have any meaning at all, from a scientific point of view?

Thank you Goat,

You have hit my point dead center square on!

That is precisely what I'm asking.

If the concept of Free Will Choice is a meaningless question in science, then surely the concept of Personal Responsibility is equally meaningless?

That is precisely the point I'm getting at here.

And I agree with your point.

There is no scientific evidence for the existence of free will. Yet, free will is foundational to ethics and morality.

What this shows is the limits of science. The only thing that secularists can do is to ignore and dismiss the issue.

From a secualr point of view, ignore the question, and do what you have to do.

Stop over thinking nonsense.

It is?? Define 'Free Will ' in a manner that is consistent..that everyone will agree on. Make sure you reconciliate incompatibism and compatiblism. Once you do that, I will acknowledge you ahve a point. Until you can, then I don't see how you can support that claim.

Until that can be done, I don't see how the concept of 'Free Will' has meaning.

[otseng]

It is?? Define 'Free Will ' in a manner that is consistent..that everyone will agree on. Make sure you reconciliate incompatibism and compatiblism. Once you do that, I will acknowledge you ahve a point. Until you can, then I don't see how you can support that claim.

Until that can be done, I don't see how the concept of 'Free Will' has meaning.

"Free will is the ability of agents to make choices unconstrained by certain factors."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_will

"'Free Will' is a philosophical term of art for a particular sort of capacity of rational agents to choose a course of action from among various alternatives."
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/freewill/

"voluntary choice or decision"
"freedom of humans to make choices that are not determined by prior causes or by divine intervention"
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/free%20will

Do you accept these definitions?

[Goat]

It is?? Define 'Free Will ' in a manner that is consistent..that everyone will agree on. Make sure you reconciliate incompatibism and compatiblism. Once you do that, I will acknowledge you ahve a point. Until you can, then I don't see how you can support that claim.

Until that can be done, I don't see how the concept of 'Free Will' has meaning.

"Free will is the ability of agents to make choices unconstrained by certain factors."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_will

"'Free Will' is a philosophical term of art for a particular sort of capacity of rational agents to choose a course of action from among various alternatives."
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/freewill/

"voluntary choice or decision"
"freedom of humans to make choices that are not determined by prior causes or by divine intervention"
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/free%20will

Do you accept these definitions?

No, I don't. Because, it doesn't address the issues of compatibilism verses incompatiablism, or the dozen or so different concept of determination.

Those definitions ignore a lot of the variations, many of which are mutually exclusive.

[Divine Insight]

And I agree with your point.

There is no scientific evidence for the existence of free will. Yet, free will is foundational to ethics and morality.

What this shows is the limits of science. The only thing that secularists can do is to ignore and dismiss the issue.

This is indeed how I feel.

I personally believe that life is mystical, or spiritual, and therefore I have reasons for believing in free will. However, my personally beliefs are irrelevant. This also does not send me running to worship Zeus, or Jesus, or any specific religious dogma.

I think that a pure secular society could create a culture based upon "subjective ethics". In other words, they could make laws and enforce those laws using majority rule as the basis for their subjective ethics.

However, they would have absolutely no justification in holding anyone personally responsible for breaking these rules. In other words, when they arrest and convict "criminals" (i.e. people who break the law) they would have no right in viewing those people from the perspective that they had a choice.

They could only view them as "defective biological brains" that can't seem to follow the secular rules.

In other words, they would have no justification to speak in terms of "punishments" for criminals.

If they incarcerate a criminal the idea would not be to punish the criminal, but rather to protect the rest of society from this criminal. It would be ludicrous to "punish" a person who can't even be said to have "Free Will". We'd have to view all criminals as nothing other than defective biological computers.

There would be no justification to "blame" them or hold them responsible for their actions.


So it's possible to have law and order in a secular world.

It's just make no sense to 'blame' those who break the law.

~~~~

On the other hand, if we're going to assume Free Will Choice, then we must also give up secularism and concede a mystical magical "soul". Because there can be no secular justification for Free Will Choice.

[olavisjo]

.

[No, I don't. Because, it doesn't address the issues of compatibilism verses incompatiablism, or the dozen or so different concept of determination.

Those definitions ignore a lot of the variations, many of which are mutually exclusive.

You often criticize others for playing word games, and here you are doing the exact same thing.

The question before you is very simple, are all your actions determined by the laws of nature (physics, chemistry, biology, quantum mechanics etc...) or are some of your actions determined by the thing inside of you that calls itself "I".

This is the "free will" we are talking about, do you wish to obfuscate it with your philosophical objections and definitions?

So what will it be, will your response (or lack of response) to this post be determined by the laws of nature or by you?

[LarryTheChristian]

[Replying to post 1 by Divine Insight]

Hello
I am new on the forum. I have surfing the internet and found this site with interesting topics.
I have more untraditional views on God and Jesus. The bible was written by man to explain his views on the history of God. However men back in those days and the most intelligent men today do not have the knowledge or intelligence to comprehend God's creations. Science today is man's interpretation of how God created everything or anything. If God were to give us every scientific detail we wouldn't have the capacity to store or the comprehension for it. So imagine back in the days when the bible was being written! A lot of it was in layman's terms. A lot of it is factual.
As far as free will Yes God is all knowing and knows your decisions before you do and he knows the outcome of everything. However it is still free will as we don't know the outcome and therefor we still need to make a choices. He knows what is in your heart but do you? Are you going to do good or bad? It's your choice!
Peace!

[Goat]

[Replying to post 1 by Divine Insight]

Hello
I am new on the forum. I have surfing the internet and found this site with interesting topics.
I have more untraditional views on God and Jesus. The bible was written by man to explain his views on the history of God. However men back in those days and the most intelligent men today do not have the knowledge or intelligence to comprehend God's creations. Science today is man's interpretation of how God created everything or anything. If God were to give us every scientific detail we wouldn't have the capacity to store or the comprehension for it. So imagine back in the days when the bible was being written! A lot of it was in layman's terms. A lot of it is factual.
As far as free will Yes God is all knowing and knows your decisions before you do and he knows the outcome of everything. However it is still free will as we don't know the outcome and therefor we still need to make a choices. He knows what is in your heart but do you? Are you going to do good or bad? It's your choice!
Peace!

So, you are a 'compatablist'. I personally can't see the logic behind that, particularly when you are talking about the one who 'knows' also being a 'creator god'.

[Nilloc James]

I think asking for a scientific justification for free will is failing to consider what science can and cant do. Science uses observation to understand things. But a universe with amd without free will look the same. So science cant answer the question of if there is free will.