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Author Topic:   Free will vs Omniscience
Straggler
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Posts: 10333
From: London England
Joined: 09-30-2006


(1)
Message 963 of 1444 (880334)
08-02-2020 3:57 PM
Reply to: Message 962 by Sarah Bellum
08-02-2020 9:06 AM


Re: Introducing An Old Argument Revisited
We have no more choice than the wooden cuckoo has to pop out of the clock and chirp every hour.
If we have no more free will than a cuckoo clock does it make any sense to hold people responsible for their actions any more than we would hold the wooden cuckoo responsible for it’s?
Isn’t everything, every good and every wickedness, ultimately just God’s doing in this scenario?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 962 by Sarah Bellum, posted 08-02-2020 9:06 AM Sarah Bellum has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 965 by Sarah Bellum, posted 08-02-2020 5:12 PM Straggler has not replied

  
Straggler
Member
Posts: 10333
From: London England
Joined: 09-30-2006


Message 1086 of 1444 (881036)
08-16-2020 5:33 PM
Reply to: Message 1085 by Sarah Bellum
08-16-2020 4:34 PM


Re: Introducing An Old Argument Revisited
If we were, somehow, to have two identical systems (two identical universes), their future histories would be exactly the same. It would be impossible for them to be different.
What if the physical laws by which the systems evolve have built in randomness (a la quantum theory)? Then the two systems could diverge at every quantum level operation and interaction and follow very different paths. That sort of randomness would not constitute free will as generally conceived but it would mean the end states are different and only calculable as probabilities rather then the more clockwork model you envisage.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1085 by Sarah Bellum, posted 08-16-2020 4:34 PM Sarah Bellum has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 1087 by Sarah Bellum, posted 08-16-2020 6:02 PM Straggler has replied

  
Straggler
Member
Posts: 10333
From: London England
Joined: 09-30-2006


(1)
Message 1136 of 1444 (881207)
08-19-2020 6:13 PM
Reply to: Message 1087 by Sarah Bellum
08-16-2020 6:02 PM


Re: Introducing An Old Argument Revisited
What is free will anyway?
Well that does seem to be half the battle - Truly defining what we mean.
But most people have an albeit vague concept of freewill and science seems to suggest that this notion of freewill is something of an illusion.
This Wiki page covers a lot of it including the Libet experiment which I found a bit disturbing the first time I heard about it.
Link

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 Message 1087 by Sarah Bellum, posted 08-16-2020 6:02 PM Sarah Bellum has replied

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