Re: Free Will in the Atlantic
Posted by
Pieter Steenekamp on
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/Free-Will-in-the-Atlantic-tp7601346p7601519.html
From a very high altitude perspective, humans are either:
a) the atoms in our bodies and behavior is the result of complexity that emerges from the interaction of all the different physical components in our body. To quote Yoshua Epstein "if you haven't grown it, you haven't explained it"
or
b) the above plus something more.
Then there is the question of free will.
If you accept (a) above and reject free will, your beliefs are congruent.
Also, if you accept (b) and accept free will, your beliefs are also congruent.
I understand the positions of these two combinations and I can't really argue against either.
What I do not understand is the acceptance of (a) and the rejection of free will. It's not that I'm saying it's wrong, it's just that I don't understand how one can reconcile the acceptance that we are the emergent complexity from the interaction of all the components in our system and nothing more with the acceptance of free will.
"What is this pantheism and why can't we take it apart or study it?"
FWIW, I am also an atheist and I feel that I never had a choice in
being any other way. The free will-determinism discussion seems to
happen seasonally on Friam and it provides an opportunity to reason
differently. This round has proven intellectually fruitful for me, so
thank you for your thoughtful and determined contributions.
There are some here that post about pan-psychism/theism, posthumanism,
private consciousness, platonism, transcendentalism, buddhism, satanism,
libertarianism, goddess worship, you name it. For reasons beyond me, and
especially lately, I find inspiration in sympathizing with the positions
of others, others that present experiences radically different than my
own[0]. For our discussion, pantheism seemed like the kind of doctrine
that stands to benefit from finding *will in all things*, a generalized
vitalism[1]. My posted objection to the metaphysical framing of the
discussion was the result of my grappling with discomfort, a desire to
clarify something for myself. Ultimately, I am unsure whether we will be
able to take something like *will* apart. My feeling is that if it
remains a negative object, then like absence, we certainly will not. If
on the other hand, like vacuum, it comes to be defined positively, as
fields or substrate or whatever, well then who knows? It seems to me that
like a mechanistic description of the cosmos, we have to want to build
it. In response to your closing remark, I add that if you want to
change the world, will be granted, you follow the evidence _and_ what
you want to be true.
[0] Maybe it is from being couped up for a year? Maybe the echo-chamber
is boring me to tears? Yo no se.
[1] Generalized, perhaps, by abandoning the distinction that living things
are imbued with non-physical stuff and, instead, imagining *choice* to be
an inherent and ubiquitous quality of the unfolding universe. And yes,
this is clearly problematic too.
--
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