Searching for GOD...

[torridon]

How will you factor in the finding that our unconscious mind takes decisions seconds before our conscious mind is aware of it?

That is also entirely consistent with the paradigm of cause and effect.  Desires arising subconsciously do so for a reason.

[Stranger]

But your explanations do not explain how our conscious freedom to make choices can be compatible with physically predetermined events.  These two posits are logically incompatible.

You didn't answer my questions. This is something else that has been explained to you more times than I can remember and yet here you just repeating the same things as if nobody had said anything.

Why do you never tackle the explanations directly?

YET AGAIN: there is no logical (or any other kind of) incompatibility between freedom to do as we want (what we all experience) and "physically predetermined events". If you think there is then you need to provide the actual logic, not just assert it.

Do you honestly believe that this reply was entirely predetermined by every event which has occurred since the beginning of time?

If not, then something must have interacted with the chains of physically predetermined cause and effect in order to create this reply I am consciously composing.

YET AGAIN: whatever this something is must make its choice entirely due to pre-existing reasons or not. It cannot possibly be any less "predetermined" than a physical brain (unless it involves randomness).

THE PHYSICAL WORLD HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH MINDS HAVING TO BE "PREDETERMINED" OR INVOLVE RANDOMNESS.

And please do not refer back to quoting dictionary definitions which explain nothing.

No, they don't explain anything but they do cut through your dishonest, or thoughtless, attempts to pretend "freedom" in the sense of our experience (we can do as we want) is the same thing as your self-contradictory idea of "freedom".

Nobody experiences what you call "freedom", it's impossible that they could, because what you call "freedom" is incoherent nonsense.

[Alan Burns]

Nobody experiences what you call "freedom", it's impossible that they could, because what you call "freedom" is incoherent nonsense.

My version of freedom is simply that I have the freedom to consciously choose what I do.

Your version of freedom claims that my choice has already been predetermined before I invoke it.

So in making this reply, which you will no doubt disagree with, my apparent freedom to choose these words must be an illusion using your logic, because my choice of words was predetermined.  But predetermined by what?  Where does the chain of predetermined activity originate?  Is there a determining cause?  If so what determines the cause?  Can you not see that your logic is obviously flawed because it ultimately takes the cause of my actions away from what comprises "me" and into the continuum of the material universe.  Whatever comprises "me" just becomes part of the endless chains of cause and effect.  Yet I am personally being accused of deliberate dishonesty.  For me to be personally responsible, I would need a means of causing this deliberation - but if all causes are predetermined, how can I be responsible for these deliberate acts of dishonesty?

[Alan Burns]

Because that is what freedom from cause and effect means.  It means random.  If there is no reason for a choice then it is random, this is what the words mean. I don't know how we can make this any simpler.

But I have never claimed that a conscious choice is free from cause and effect.  What I claim is the freedom to consciously consider reasons and contemplate what we are about to do before we consciously choose to do something.  Physically predetermined chains of cause and effect will not allow such freedom.

[Stranger]

My version of freedom is simply that I have the freedom to consciously choose what I do.

Except that it isn't just that, is it?

You are not content with being able to do whatever you want, you want to be able to choose your basic wants as well, despite the fact that this leads to an obvious infinite regress. That is just one of the reasons your version of freedom is logically incoherent.

But, as always, you just ignore the inconsistencies, no matter how many times they are pointed out.

Can you not see that your logic is obviously flawed...

Then point out the flaws! Every time you say it's flawed you just reiterate your own position. "Your logic must be wrong because it disagrees with my position" isn't a counterargument. The whole point is that it disagrees with your position.

...because it ultimately takes the cause of my actions away from what comprises "me" and into the continuum of the material universe.

The exact opposite is true. You insist that a choice cannot be fully determined by what led up to it (including your own state of mind), so that means some part of the choice must be unconnected with both the circumstances of the choice and "you".

But, as always, you just ignore the inconsistencies, no matter how many times they are pointed out.

[Stranger]

But I have never claimed that a conscious choice is free from cause and effect.

Yes, you have.

Every time you claim that a choice is not "predetermined", you are saying some element of it is "free" from cause and effect. You just seem unable to grasp that that means that it's random and that nothing can possibly be made more "free" as a result.

What I claim is the freedom to consciously consider reasons and contemplate what we are about to do before we consciously choose to do something.

So is all this conscious contemplation and choosing entirely due to reasons/causes or not?

Physically predetermined chains of cause and effect will not allow such freedom.

The logic of cause and effect is the same regardless of them being "physical" or not. The word "predetermined" is redundant.

There was nothing about the "freedom" described in your preceding sentence that is incompatible with cause and effect.

[Alan Burns]

Except that it isn't just that, is it?

You are not content with being able to do whatever you want, you want to be able to choose your basic wants as well, despite the fact that this leads to an obvious infinite regress. That is just one of the reasons your version of freedom is logically incoherent.

But, as always, you just ignore the inconsistencies, no matter how many times they are pointed out.

Then point out the flaws! Every time you say it's flawed you just reiterate your own position. "Your logic must be wrong because it disagrees with my position" isn't a counterargument. The whole point is that it disagrees with your position.

The exact opposite is true. You insist that a choice cannot be fully determined by what led up to it (including your own state of mind), so that means some part of the choice must be unconnected with both the circumstances of the choice and "you".

But, as always, you just ignore the inconsistencies, no matter how many times they are pointed out.

Sorry, but the inconsistency lies with you.
By insisting that choices are fully predetermined, there can be no definitive cause for what determines the choice, because the cause itself will be fully predetermined.  Which takes the ultimate cause away from me and into the never ending chains of physical cause and effect in a fully deterministic material universe.

Yet I have the apparent freedom to choose these words which tell you that your logic is flawed.  Because your logic leads to the conclusion that whatever I choose to type is just an inevitable predetermined consequence of past events with no definitive causal event.  Can you not see the futility of your arguments which effectively means you are arguing with the predetermined consequences of this material universe which just happen to be occurring on this keyboard?

[BeRational]

Sorry, but the inconsistency lies with you.
By insisting that choices are fully predetermined, there can be no definitive cause for what determines the choice, because the cause itself will be fully predetermined.  Which takes the ultimate cause away from me and into the never ending chains of physical cause and effect in a fully deterministic material universe.

Yet I have the apparent freedom to choose these words which tell you that your logic is flawed.  Because your logic leads to the conclusion that whatever I choose to type is just an inevitable predetermined consequence of past events with no definitive causal event.  Can you not see the futility of your arguments which effectively means you are arguing with the predetermined consequences of this material universe which just happen to be occurring on this keyboard?

How do you know you have freedom to choose?

When you make a choice, how do you know you could have made any other at that time?

How do you know that it does not feel like freedom, but it is really completely predetermined?

How would you be able to tell?

[Stranger]

Sorry, but the inconsistency lies with you.

Where? Nothing that follows points out an inconsistency. Perhaps we need to add "inconsistency" to the list of things you don't understand...

By insisting that choices are fully predetermined, there can be no definitive cause for what determines the choice, because the cause itself will be fully predetermined.  Which takes the ultimate cause away from me and into the never ending chains of physical cause and effect in a fully deterministic material universe.

Argumentum ad consequentiam fallacy, and It hasn't taken it away from you anyway, you are a part the cause and effect.

For the reasons explained to you endlessly, this is inevitable unless there is randomness in your choice making (magic soul or not).

Yet I have the apparent freedom to choose these words which tell you that your logic is flawed.

But never words that actually point out a flaw.

Because your logic leads to the conclusion that whatever I choose to type is just an inevitable predetermined consequence of past events with no definitive causal event.  Can you not see the futility of your arguments which effectively means you are arguing with the predetermined consequences of this material universe which just happen to be occurring on this keyboard?

Quite apart from this being another argumentum ad consequentiam fallacy, there is nothing about human discourse and hoping to change minds that is inconsistent with determinism.

And the glaring contradictions in your own position still stand and you still seem unable to bring yourself to even think about them...

[torridon]

But I have never claimed that a conscious choice is free from cause and effect.  What I claim is the freedom to consciously consider reasons and contemplate what we are about to do before we consciously choose to do something.  Physically predetermined chains of cause and effect will not allow such freedom.

Your first sentence is contradicting your third sentence, confused, or what ?

'Contemplation' is entirely consistent with the principle of cause and effect.  The thoughts that arise in a mind, do so for reasons.

[Alan Burns]

How do you know you have freedom to choose?

When you make a choice, how do you know you could have made any other at that time?

How do you know that it does not feel like freedom, but it is really completely predetermined?

How would you be able to tell?

Because I know I am personally responsible for my own actions.
Otherwise I would be just a machine with no freewill of my own.
It is a fundamental property of being human.

[Alan Burns]

Your first sentence is contradicting your third sentence, confused, or what ?

Not if you acknowledge the difference between physically determined (no control)
And spiritually determined (by the conscious will of the human soul)

'Contemplation' is entirely consistent with the principle of cause and effect.  The thoughts that arise in a mind, do so for reasons.

But what drives the process of contemplation?  Is it just part of the never ending chains of physically predetermined cause and effect?  Or is it consciously driven by you?

[Alan Burns]

Argumentum ad consequentiam fallacy, and It hasn't taken it away from you anyway, you are a part the cause and effect.

But your short sighted logic allows me no personal input to the chains of predetermined cause and effect.  I just become a physically predetermined link in the endless chain.

[torridon]

Not if you acknowledge the difference between physically determined (no control)
And spiritually determined (by the conscious will of the human soul)But what drives the process of contemplation?  Is it just part of the never ending chains of physically predetermined cause and effect?  Or is it consciously driven by you?

Answered such nonsense questions a gazillion times already Alan.  If a desire to contemplate something arises in you, there is a reason for that, otherwise it is random.  It is the factors that formed the desire to contemplate it that are the 'driving force'.  There isn't a separate 'me' or 'you', somehow distinct from the cut and thrust of change, we are all part of it, founded by it, and our responses form consequences downstream. I cannot just dream up a desire to do something out of nowhere, if humans could do that then we would be agents of randomness; we do things for reasons.

[Stranger]

Not if you acknowledge the difference between physically determined (no control)
And spiritually determined (by the conscious will of the human soul)

Oh, not this utter idiocy again! Either everything happens entirely because of what led up to it (determinism) or not, which means randomness.

That applies just as much to the choices made by "the conscious will of the human soul" as it does to anything else that is logically self-consistent.

But what drives the process of contemplation?  Is it just part of the never ending chains of physically predetermined cause and effect?  Or is it consciously driven by you?

False dichotomy (again).

FFS, how many more times - have you really forgotten all the times this nonsense of your has been answered? If not, why just repeat it as if nobody had said anything? Why not address the answers you already had?

What are you afraid of? Why be so dishonest?

[Alan Burns]

I cannot just dream up a desire to do something out of nowhere, if humans could do that then we would be agents of randomness; we do things for reasons.

Of course we have the freedom to dream up things.
It is not random.
It illustrates our powers of imagination.
The reason is because it is what we consciously choose to do.
We are free to dream up whatever we like.
We are not machines.

[Stranger]

But your short sighted logic allows me no personal input to the chains of predetermined cause and effect.  I just become a physically predetermined link in the endless chain.

[Irrelevances removed]

Which is again both false and another argumentum ad consequentiam.

It's false because you are once again begging the question by assuming that there is a "you" that is separate from cause and effect.

Jeez, you could provide examples for an entire book on logical fallacies using your posts.

[Stranger]

The reason is because it is what we consciously choose to do.

And what's the reason for that choice?

[torridon]

Of course we have the freedom to dream up things.
It is not random.
It illustrates our powers of imagination.
The reason is because it is what we consciously choose to do.
We are free to dream up whatever we like.
We are not machines.

So if we are not random, then we are deterministic.  This is what not random means. I cannot make this any simpler.  The products of our imagination are not completely free, they are determined by our memories, by our congitive functioning and we cannot control such things.  Our imagination is an outcome of these factors over which we have no control.

[Alan Burns]

Why be so dishonest?

You have yet to inform me how I can possibly be personally responsible for a deliberate act of dishonesty if everything I do is entirely predetermined by endless chains of predetermined cause and effect.

[Stranger]

You have yet to inform me how I can possibly be personally responsible for a deliberate act of dishonesty if everything I do is entirely predetermined by endless chains of predetermined cause and effect.

Transparent evasion and dishonesty (again).

Which would make you more responsible, Alan?

• Your choice being the direct result of who you are, your character, beliefs, experience, and so on; everything that makes you you, or
  
  
• some part of your choice being totally unrelated to who you are (or anything else, for that matter)?

[Alan Burns]

Transparent evasion and dishonesty (again).

Which would make you more responsible, Alan?

Your choice being the direct result of who you are, your character, beliefs, experience, and so on; everything that makes you you, or

But your logic dictates that all these things will themselves be predetermined, so no scope for personal responsibility.

some part of your choice being totally unrelated to who you are (or anything else, for that matter)?

My choice is related to the conscious will of my human soul - which is the only way I can be held to account for my actions

[Stranger]

But your logic dictates that all these things will themselves be predetermined, so no scope for personal responsibility.

There has to be something that is responsible. A person has to come about somehow, and if it isn't nature, nurture, and experience, there is nothing else but randomness.

My choice is related to the conscious will of my human soul - which is the only way I can be held to account for my actions

That isn't an answer, it's avoiding the question of how your soul makes up its mind.

Unless you are paying no attention at all, every time you type that things are decided by "the conscious will of the human soul", you must know by now that people will say pretty much what I've just said, so why not accept that as the position and try to actually answer the point?

Why the mindless, bot-like repetition?

[Alan Burns]

There has to be something that is responsible. A person has to come about somehow, and if it isn't nature, nurture, and experience, there is nothing else but randomness.

But how can a person be personally responsible for their nature, nurture and experience if it is all predetermined?

That isn't an answer, it's avoiding the question of how your soul makes up its mind.

Unless you are paying no attention at all, every time you type that things are decided by "the conscious will of the human soul", you must know by now that people will say pretty much what I've just said, so why not accept that as the position and try to actually answer the point?

Why the mindless, bot-like repetition?

Because it is the reality we all live in.
I do not think many people actually believe that their conscious choices are entirely predetermined.
Certainly none that I have come across, except on this forum.

[Sebastian Toe]

But your logic dictates that all these things will themselves be predetermined, so no scope for personal responsibility.

Just because we do not know how something works does not infer that it does not happen.