Chickenpox Lollipops

[Aeson]

Personally I don't think I've ever broken the laws of physics, and even if perhaps I have somehow, I really don't know how to do it... it could only be an inborn thing I didn't choose to have... so it'd just be it's own fluke.

[Kidlicious]

I literally have no idea what you mean. Not believing in the supernatural means that free will is all there is.

Ok so you aren't a materialist (believe we are meat machines as.Elok puts it) what is your argument for free will and how do you define free will? Does it occur because of nature or the supernatural?

[Kidlicious]

Like I told Molly, I believe he's trying to imply that, if you don't believe in God, you must necessarily be a strict materialist determinist, or whatever you call people who think choice is an after-the-fact label for our meat machines reacting in a theoretically predictable manner.

More accurately that you have to be a materialist or believe in the supernatural and that if you're a materialist you can't believe in free will.

[BlackCat]

Ok so you aren't a materialist (believe we are meat machines as.Elok puts it) what is your argument for free will and how do you define free will? Does it occur because of nature or the supernatural?

Nope, I don't think it's something advanced as that - just that what you wrote was complete gibberish

[kentonio]

Personally I don't think I've ever broken the laws of physics, and even if perhaps I have somehow, I really don't know how to do it... it could only be an inborn thing I didn't choose to have... so it'd just be it's own fluke.

What does breaking the laws of physics have to do with anything? They are just the rules of the sandbox, they don't determine decision making and will.

Ok so you aren't a materialist (believe we are meat machines as.Elok puts it) what is your argument for free will and how do you define free will? Does it occur because of nature or the supernatural?

More accurately that you have to be a materialist or believe in the supernatural and that if you're a materialist you can't believe in free will.

You're using seriously questionable logic there. Why would an absense of supernatural mean that free will wasn't possible? That doesn't make sense. We're creatures who have evolved a certain level of mental capability over millions of years. We have certain behaviours/thought processes which are determined by our evolutionary backpath and our scale. Within those constraints we can do basically whatever we choose. There is no fate, no luck, no predetermination, just whatever we create for ourselves. I find that rather wonderful personally.

[Aeson]

What does breaking the laws of physics have to do with anything? They are just the rules of the sandbox, they don't determine decision making and will.

Actually they do. You can test this. Start doing lots of drugs.

[kentonio]

Actually they do. You can test this. Start doing lots of drugs.

No, you can alter your capabilities by taking drugs or being hit around the head by a large stick, but it doesn't determine anything at all.

[Kidlicious]

What does breaking the laws of physics have to do with anything? They are just the rules of the sandbox, they don't determine decision making and will.





You're using seriously questionable logic there. Why would an absense of supernatural mean that free will wasn't possible? That doesn't make sense. We're creatures who have evolved a certain level of mental capability over millions of years. We have certain behaviours/thought processes which are determined by our evolutionary backpath and our scale. Within those constraints we can do basically whatever we choose. There is no fate, no luck, no predetermination, just whatever we create for ourselves. I find that rather wonderful personally.

No doubt you think it's a wonderfull idea. Thzt only means you are biased towards the idea.

There's nothing wrong with MY logic. How can you believe that your thinking isn't der t re rmined, but evdrhthing else is? You must have some reason or you'ed wasting our time with "wonderfull" stories.

[kentonio]

No doubt you think it's a wonderfull idea. Thzt only means you are biased towards the idea.

That doesn't really make any sense. That's like saying 'I like ice cream, but then again I would because liking it makes me biased towards it.'

There's nothing wrong with MY logic. How can you believe that your thinking isn't der t re rmined, but evdrhthing else is? You must have some reason or you'ed wasting our time with "wonderfull" stories.

What do you mean 'everything else is'? Nothing is.

[Kidlicious]

:face slap: Taking drugs doesn't determine what you will think!

[Elok]

Kid's arguments are vaguely phrased as usual, but I can kind of see what he's saying. If there's no supernatural component to the mind, then everything you do is ultimately the consequence of some biochemical hanky-panky, no? You take an external stimulus, run it through your attitudes formed by past experiences, and spit out a reaction. In theory, everything you think, do or say should be totally predictable by a person with enough knowledge about you (albeit a level of knowledge which is currently not available to anyone, and won't be for the foreseeable future). Am I wrong?

[Kidlicious]

That doesn't really make any sense. That's like saying 'I like ice cream, but then again I would because liking it makes me biased towards it.'

Oh dear. No. It's like saying ice cream is good because you like it.

What do you mean 'everything else is'? Nothing is.

Let me get this straight, you don't believe anything is determined by the laws of nature?

[Kidlicious]

That's right Elok.

[kentonio]

:face slap: Taking drugs doesn't determine what you will think!

That is correct, taking drugs certainly does not determine what you will think. If you take Ecstacy for instance the brain will release a blast of serotonine which makes you extremely happy. That might make you want to see the best in people and feel good about yourself, but it does not make you think in any definite way.

Kid's arguments are vaguely phrased as usual, but I can kind of see what he's saying. If there's no supernatural component to the mind, then everything you do is ultimately the consequence of some biochemical hanky-panky, no? You take an external stimulus, run it through your attitudes formed by past experiences, and spit out a reaction. In theory, everything you think, do or say should be totally predictable by a person with enough knowledge about you (albeit a level of knowledge which is currently not available to anyone, and won't be for the foreseeable future). Am I wrong?

Simple answer to that is we have no idea. Theoretically you could possibly say that with a powerful enough computer with enough data you can predict anything, but the range of variables is just so mind numbingly vast that it becomes a ridiculous concept that such a thing could ever be done. The chief different here of course is that even if anything can be predicted, thats still a very, very different thing to everything being predetermined by the will of some supernatural being.

Oddly enough though, I can think of very few things that make a supernatural being less believable than thinking about the number of variables that could potentially effect the future.

[Kidlicious]

If people have free will how can you predict what they will do?