Concept of free will vs taking responsibility

[Dimebag]

I would like to discuss the similarities and differences between the two concepts of free will, and the concept or idea that a person can be responsible, can have a goal, and actively work to achieve that goal by anticipating any problems, facing them and finding solutions to overcome them.

In the case of free will, people typically discuss determinism and how it makes free will, or the ability to choose otherwise given the same exact set of circumstances as being mutually exclusive.

I would agree with that conclusion. In a world where our bodies and brains are deterministically functioning, that is, in a way in which physical laws determine how our bodies and brains function, and interact with the world, as well as receive information, the way in which our brains make decision are governed by those laws, and as such, unless some kind of indeterminacy in those physical laws were introduced, maybe via quantum indeterminacy, that the same choices or decisions would always be made.

This view also brings into question the commonsense view that we that make choices or decisions are a kind of insulated and separate agent to our brains, and separate to the influences of the world and sensory information, memories, habits, etc which might unconsciously influence our decisions. What we are as selves are that very sensory information, memories, habits, etc. This is not to say there is something to be discussed about a subject object division in our experience. There may in fact be that division, or appear to be, even if it is illusory.

The influences which govern the choices made by the self, or seemingly made by the self can be both external, AND internal, as well as conscious AND unconscious.

If all influences were conscious, we might be right to say that the self IS the one making decisions. But if parts or all of those influences to choice were unconsciously influencing the outcome, one might be less inclined to say the self IS making decisions, but might rather be witness TO decisions, and claiming responsibility FOR those choices, for lack of another more responsible agent being present.

This means the actual reality of conscious choice occurring is illusory if some or all of the influences to what goes into making a decision are unconscious influences.

On the upside, IF one can make more of those influences conscious rather than being unconscious to those influences, one might increase their LEVEL of freedom to choose deliberately.

It is at this point that I would like to introduce the idea of responsibility.

I would like to define responsibility as, the attempt to increase one’s conscious awareness of both internal and external influences to choice. In becoming more responsible, an agent or self becomes more capable, more able to respond appropriately to the external demands of a situation, and to their desired goals.

One’s goals might also become more consciously focussed upon, so as to be less influenced by immediate short term gain, and maintain focus on more long term goals which require the delay of gratification. This brings in the idea of self control. Self control is required to not always give in to more visceral urges, and to focus on long term goals. Self control is, the ability of an organism to not make choices which prioritise short term goals over long term goals.

Self knowledge is a crucial part of self control, and in knowing one’s weaknesses, one’s flaws, etc, so as to counteract those built in tendencies which might sabotage one achieving longer term goals. Examples may include, procrastination, anxiety and the flight fawn or fear response when faced with difficulties which one has never overcome.

So why might some people feel like their choices are already dictated by their built in tendencies, and feel powerless to control desired outcomes? It could be that they lack self knowledge, lack self control, lack worthy long term goals for which one would make sacrifices of short term desires. This might amplify one’s perception that they are determined and thus, they have no control over outcomes of their choices. It might mean they feel more nihilistic, like there is no point or meaning in life. The two views likely go hand in hand.

Ultimately, it is better for one’s well-being to feel as in control of themselves and destinies as possible, because nihilism leads to depression, and dissatisfaction with life. Humans need to feel capable, potent, and in control as much as they can be.

This doesn’t mean humans are gods, there are circumstances beyond their control, but they can attempt to foresee those circumstances, and take steps to mitigate those circumstances. There is always uncertainty in life, but if one adopts a nihilistic view of then world and of themselves in it, where they as the agent are passive and have no ability to choose and simply react to situations, they make themselves slaves, or victims of fate. Humans have the ability to control their choices, to determine what direction they take in life, to foresee challenges and find ways to overcome them, and this can ALL happen in a deterministic universe.

Ultimately, if the reality of the situation is, the self is simply an observer of all senses, habits and mental activity of the mind, this does not mean that the human mind cannot increase self control, increase self knowledge of intrinsic tendencies, and take actions to mitigate those tendencies and habits in pursuit of some desired future goal.

If we are just observers, or if we aren’t even anything at all, that doesn’t mean the choices and achievement of worthwhile goals, and having and benefitting from desirable long term outcomes isn’t a worthwhile set of experiences which should take place for that observer.

It must see that things could be better, it must admit that it could do better, it must be mindful of its own shortcomings and limitations, and it must take steps or actions to overcome those limitations.

Free will or not, this is better than the alternative.

[Wizard22]

The essence of your argument hinges on an intellectual capability for self-reflection, self-knowledge, self-awareness, self-consciousness, etc. that would entail recognition of "this is the part of my own mind that makes these decisions, from these options, for these various reasons and causes." But most humans do not have such a level of internalized-doubt or internalized-questioning. Most humans are not "that" self-aware, and furthermore, do not need to be, in order to "make the decision". Most of humanity, if not all, and all animals, simply "make their decisions and choices" without need for self-awareness, questioning themselves as to why and how.

When psycho-analyzing the nature of biology of animals, and why animals behave how they do, the first process is between yourself as Observer and your target subject as The Observed. You examine animals, or other people, 'doing' as they do, and the hypothesis of "choice" comes much later, as-if people and animals had options or alternatives to have done things differently. This is purely hypothetical, and Objective.

It presumes that there could have been better choices, better options, in the past, if only you had known the future before you made the choice.


This complicates the matter of Determinism and Free-Will.

It means that there is some 'better' or 'best' alternative to any and all "decision-making processes". And there are. People use knowledge and wisdom, gained from experience, gained from previous successes and failures, to adjust their current and future behaviors, for 'better' or 'the best' outcomes.

This is basically called: Learning.

And if a person, or animal, can "Learn", then they can improve their decision-making ability, called "Choice".


Therefore, Learning is the predicate of Choice... which people do differently, and some people fail to do at all, thus repeating the same behaviors, producing the same mistakes, and living their life in "loops" or suffering the same penalties as before, endlessly.

[phyllo]

The influences which govern the choices made by the self, or seemingly made by the self can be both external, AND internal, as well as conscious AND unconscious.

If all influences were conscious, we might be right to say that the self IS the one making decisions. But if parts or all of those influences to choice were unconsciously influencing the outcome, one might be less inclined to say the self IS making decisions, but might rather be witness TO decisions, and claiming responsibility FOR those choices, for lack of another more responsible agent being present.

I seems to me that the self is conscious thought, the subconscious and the physical body.

Subconscious decisions are also decisions being made by the self.

As for the physical body, hormones and the structure of the brain contribute to the decision that a person makes. This has to be considered an aspect of self.

To say that the self is a witness to decisions rather than making decisions, is to deny parts of the self.

It's still you breathing even though, even when, you are not consciously aware of your breathing.

[phyllo]

So why might some people feel like their choices are already dictated by their built in tendencies, and feel powerless to control desired outcomes? It could be that they lack self knowledge, lack self control, lack worthy long term goals for which one would make sacrifices of short term desires. This might amplify one’s perception that they are determined and thus, they have no control over outcomes of their choices. It might mean they feel more nihilistic, like there is no point or meaning in life. The two views likely go hand in hand.

Ultimately, it is better for one’s well-being to feel as in control of themselves and destinies as possible, because nihilism leads to depression, and dissatisfaction with life. Humans need to feel capable, potent, and in control as much as they can be.

Nihilism seems to be something completely separate from determinism and free-will.

There could be a specific point to life and a specific meaning to life, to your life. And you are forced to live it and fulfill it. Therefore, you both have no control and you also have a point and meaning.

[Dimebag]

So why might some people feel like their choices are already dictated by their built in tendencies, and feel powerless to control desired outcomes? It could be that they lack self knowledge, lack self control, lack worthy long term goals for which one would make sacrifices of short term desires. This might amplify one’s perception that they are determined and thus, they have no control over outcomes of their choices. It might mean they feel more nihilistic, like there is no point or meaning in life. The two views likely go hand in hand.

Ultimately, it is better for one’s well-being to feel as in control of themselves and destinies as possible, because nihilism leads to depression, and dissatisfaction with life. Humans need to feel capable, potent, and in control as much as they can be.

Nihilism seems to be something completely separate from determinism and free-will.

There could be a specific point to life and a specific meaning to life, to your life. And you are forced to live it and fulfill it. Therefore, you both have no control and you also have a point and meaning.

My theory as to the intersection of determinism and nihilism is learned helplessness, which results in an external locus of control, and a passive habit of reaction, and therefore a more hedonistic short term form of behaviour.

If you are taught that you, the conscious self don’t actually make choices, your self understanding will feed back onto your self capacity or self esteem, limiting your actual capacity through that limiting belief. Belief matters and even an untrue or flawed belief like free will might be important for learning and future behaviour.

[promethean75]

"If you are taught that you, the conscious self don’t actually make choices, your self understanding will feed back onto your self capacity or self esteem, limiting your actual capacity through that limiting belief."

On the contrary, being free from the sense of guilt that comes with the belief in freewill might actually be liberating, empowering. Imagine how many people haven't done what they truly wanted to do for fear of being condemned, blamed, and marked as morally reprehensible by their peers, becuz of the belief in freewill.

If anything causes one to lack self-esteem, it's a bad conscience. Feeling shame, feeling guilty in a moral sense. And all this is due to the machinations of the theory of freewill.

Also, that one does not really have freewill has never stopped anyone from acting as if they did. That's to say, u can't, literally, act and behave as if u had no choice, as if everything u do is determined. So there's no applicable difference in praxis between being determined and being free.

What matters here is the effect and the weaponization of the fallacious theory of freewill; it deprives one of confidence, courage and self respect. The currency of the theory has absolutely no reality other than as a moral judgement used to make guilty. Not in the sense of being culpable - one is culpable and 'responsible' for stealing the TV becuz they suffer the consequences - but in the sense of being made to feel bad for what one has done.

What is this 'badness' that they feel? Where does it come from? It's a moral value judgement, not a property of the act of stealing a TV.

And who judges morally? Those who are offended in some sense. And who is offended? Those who are powerless in some sense. If one lacks the immediate physical means to prevent one from stealing a TV, the next best way to deter TV theft is to make the thief think he ought not steal a TV becuz that would make him a bad person.

[promethean75]

Better to say 'strong or weak willed' rather than 'free or unfree will'. It isn't that a person stands beside his choice as someone who takes freely into account his options and then chooses what to do... as if he could have not had the strength to decide just what course of action he takes. In fact he is inseperable from his willing, which is inseperable from what he is... strong or weak. The first step in the erroneous line of freewill reasoning is the separation of the Cartesian cogito from the force of its will; it does not have a will... it is a will. Freewill requires a separation that simply does not exist.

"The term "me" (as in the statements "it's up to me", "it is you who willed that") had already been recognized as empty in the preface of Beyond Good and Evil (or as connected with the superstition about the soul). Later Nietzsche stated more clearly that it was a tautology ("what will I do? what will my decision be?" – "it's up to you" – that actually means: your decision depends on your decision, something happens in your mind and not somewhere else...).

"For, in just the same way as people separate lightning from its flash and take the latter as an action, as the effect of a subject which is called lightning, so popular morality separates strength from the manifestations of strength, as if behind the strong person there were an indifferent substrate, which is free to express strength or not. But there is no such substrate; there is no "being" behind the doing, acting, becoming. "The doer" is merely made up and added into the action – the act is everything. People basically duplicate the action: when they see a lightning flash, that is an action of an action: they set up the same event first as the cause and then yet again as its effect. (...) "We weak people are merely weak. It's good if we do nothing; we are not strong enough for that" – but this bitter state, this shrewdness of the lowest ranks, which even insects possess (when in great danger they stand as if they were dead in order not to do "too much"), has, thanks to that counterfeiting and self-deception of powerlessness, dressed itself in the splendour of a self-denying, still, patient virtue, just as if the weakness of the weak man himself – that means his essence, his actions, his entire single, inevitable, and irredeemable reality – is a voluntary achievement, something willed, chosen..." - FN

[Wizard22]

Ontology is the matter of 'If you believe in Free-Will, or not, then it has a causal effect on reality'.

Therefore, whether you believe it or not, you are inevitably "making a choice".

So the next question is about how you can "change" your choice.


I do personally believe that everybody is constantly "making this choice", which is what "Causality" is as a phenomenon.

People are "positively inclined" or "negatively declined" toward Reality, and it fluctuates.

People can choose rightly, or wrongly.

[promethean75]

That's the high-school philosophy of freewill. We're doing post-graduate philosophy of freewill.

[Dimebag]

Better to say 'strong or weak willed' rather than 'free or unfree will'. It isn't that a person stands beside his choice as someone who takes freely into account his options and then chooses what to do... as if he could have not had the strength to decide just what course of action he takes. In fact he is inseperable from his willing, which is inseperable from what he is... strong or weak. The first step in the erroneous line of freewill reasoning is the separation of the Cartesian cogito from the force of its will; it does not have a will... it is a will. Freewill requires a separation that simply does not exist.

"The term "me" (as in the statements "it's up to me", "it is you who willed that") had already been recognized as empty in the preface of Beyond Good and Evil (or as connected with the superstition about the soul). Later Nietzsche stated more clearly that it was a tautology ("what will I do? what will my decision be?" – "it's up to you" – that actually means: your decision depends on your decision, something happens in your mind and not somewhere else...).

"For, in just the same way as people separate lightning from its flash and take the latter as an action, as the effect of a subject which is called lightning, so popular morality separates strength from the manifestations of strength, as if behind the strong person there were an indifferent substrate, which is free to express strength or not. But there is no such substrate; there is no "being" behind the doing, acting, becoming. "The doer" is merely made up and added into the action – the act is everything. People basically duplicate the action: when they see a lightning flash, that is an action of an action: they set up the same event first as the cause and then yet again as its effect. (...) "We weak people are merely weak. It's good if we do nothing; we are not strong enough for that" – but this bitter state, this shrewdness of the lowest ranks, which even insects possess (when in great danger they stand as if they were dead in order not to do "too much"), has, thanks to that counterfeiting and self-deception of powerlessness, dressed itself in the splendour of a self-denying, still, patient virtue, just as if the weakness of the weak man himself – that means his essence, his actions, his entire single, inevitable, and irredeemable reality – is a voluntary achievement, something willed, chosen..." - FN

My view is a biological and psychological based view. Our brains are divided into more short term reward seeking and self preservation functions, and more forward looking regulating and goal setting functions.

You can view them as the Id and the superego. The id is more of an unconscious and automatic form of reaction, and has direct control over the behaviour of the human body. The superego is more of an observing, judging, planning and thinking function of the mind, and only has indirect control over the ID brain functions, and therefore indirect control over the body, though it can overrule the ID through forms of rationalisation, but ultimately the ID eventually demands some form of “payment” for those overrullings, in the form of a reward or promise of future reward.

The id is a bit like a child, the superego like a parent.

Sometimes, the superego gets completely cut out, the id becomes fully in charge with no intervening the behaviour of the id. The superego is also a judging function, and if the self or ego is deemed to have violated its own norms, the superego loses more of its ability to override the id, and performs only the judging function, leading to low self esteem and depression, possibly nihilism or a lack of meaning.

When this occurs, one is essentially in trouble and must basically beg for the superego to come back, for that to happen one must first start telling the truth, about themselves and owning up to their own shortcomings. This allows the superego to begin a process of redemption of the ego, through self judgement, the owning of past mistakes and shortcomings, and the instilling of a promise to the self by the ego that firstly, one wants to do and be better, one will allow themselves to be judged, and one will respond to self judgement.

It doesn’t sound very psychologically healthy, but that’s because most psychology these days is of a humanistic form, more of a mothering caring instinct which forgives one’s mistakes instead of judging and forcing one to learn from them and act differently in the future.

If one doesn’t believe they have the ability to change themselves, then they will not change, the id will remain in control and the future goals will never be achieved, and one floats along satisfying short term urges and feeling shameful without actually being aware of it, which shows up as depression.

[Immanuel Can]

I would like to define responsibility as, the attempt to increase one’s conscious awareness of both internal and external influences to choice.

Here's a very basic problem: we're depending on free will concepts even to be able to articulate what "responsibility" is.

In Determinism, the basic difference between that and free will is the belief that the set of material preconditions (hereafter called "the P-set") predetermines all apparent changes, both material and cognitive, that take place in the universe. Nothing else does, and nothing else actually contributes to the outcome.

However, in your statement, you assume the existence of an "I." "I" means, "the individual." This presupposes that the individual exists. Under Determinism, the individual does not actually exist at all, among causal factors; all that truly exists to cause things is the P-set that led up to this particular set. So brain chemistry and such, all material stuff, predetermines what feeling of "I-ness" happens. Human identity is gone: it's exposed as being nothing but a particular disposition of the P-set.

"Choice" is a phenomenon of free will. Under determinism, it's the P-set that totally determines what outcome there is, and the feeling of "choice" or "wanting" is only a seeming, or what they call and "epiphenomenon." That means it's a false sensation that the individual gets that he, not the P-set, made the difference in a given case. That "choice" sensation actually changes nothing. The P-set presets all choices, as well.

"Responsibility" is a further problem, from this perspective. Since all "choices" are merely P-set configurations, and since there is no actual "I" to make such things, the feeling that one is "responding" or is "responsible" is again only an epiphenomenon that goes along with certain configurations of P-set. One cannot "take" responsibility: one has a mere feeling of being responsible thrust upon one by the P-set, or else the P-set does not result in such a feeling, but there's no "responsibility" to be actually had for that, nor any "I" who is responsible for it. There's only the P-set.

The upshot: if we want to make logical progress with the implications of Determinism or of free will, we can't just take epiphenomena like identity, choice and responsibility as given. They're only given if free will is already true. Otherwise, we'd be begging the question. All that Determinists would have to say in rebuffing us is that those are all mere by-products of the P-set doing its own thing, and are not actually reflective of what is actually producing any of the particular outcomes in the universe. So you haven't given us an alternative to free will, so much as that you have presumed the existence of free will, and then added "responsibility" to the list of things it might entail.

Of course, Determinists are in an equally serious pickle, really: they can't just say that identity, choice and responsibility are all "epiphenomena," and then expect us to just believe it because that's what Determinism might require. They would need to show that they are all "epiphenomena." And they can't, for the very good reason that there's nobody for them to show it to, if "identity" isn't real, and no "choice" of believing Determinism to be made, and no "responsibility" if we don't.

[Wizard22]

The Decision-Making Process is an Artistic one, hence why the human brain/mind is Undetermined and has Free-Will.

Those who are Creative, with High IQ, have the capacity to 'create' Choices/Options/Solutions/Problems that none else can.

Those with Low IQ feel helpless, hopeless, and powerless by comparison.

Thus they depend on God/Luck/Determinism/Government to do their thinking and Decision-Making for them.


Prom doesn't believe in Free-Will, because he is Narcissistic and not Self-Conscious.

Prom can't imagine a Mind-Body Duality, which is why he denies his own Free-Will.

[Wizard22]

Choice is a Creative Act.