Why should we be guilty or responsible of our actions if free will is an illusion?

[bahman]

I have a new thread that I discussed that free will is an illusion. Here we discuss important consequences of absence of free will. The main questions are as following: Why we should be guilty of our action if free will is an illusion? What is the purpose of Heaven and Hell? How judiciary system could be justified?...

Simple.

When we hold people responsible for their actions it CAUSES others to think about theirs. When we punish people for crimes it can CAUSE them to consider not committing the same crime. Simple cause and affect.

On the other hand what is the point of punishment when a person with FREE WILL will do what the fuck he or she wants?

Actually it is not that simple. The problem with the cause and effect picture is that intellect is an illusion in this framework so we cannot really be affected with what we define as good and bad.

[Terrapin Station]

If I'm hiking and a tree falls on me, I see the tree as guilty or responsible for falling on me/for my injuries, even though the tree didn't make a decision to fall on me. Nevertheless, the tree is what fell on me, so the tree is what's responsible.

What should happen to the tree? Nothing aside from being removed from the trail if it's blocking it. The tree won't fall on someone else.

In the case of human criminals, we know that certain people have a disposition to commit crimes again, whether they're caused to or not. Those people should be separated from the general population in order to avoid a repeat of their crimes.

Of course, as someone else pointed out, if strong determinism is true, then we don't have a choice to remove those folks from the general population or not anyway. We'll do what we're caused to do.

[Scott Mayers]

And it would actually create logical problems with respect to Totality if we could actually pick only one unique path because then it would make some possibilities untrue in reality even though logically possible.

Speaking of logic, it’s important to note that all possibilities are true in reality. What makes a particular possibility untrue in actuality is the improper combination of conditions, and unknown conditions.

For example, the possibility of human flight was always true in reality, and always will be true. However the actuality of human flight did not occur, and will not occur, until the proper combination of conditions is discovered in either written or mind memory, and then put into place.

By this reasoning, a round square or a married bachelor are possible. Understanding bound to the logical limitations of language cannot conceive of the proper combination of conditions to make it so, thus impossible is defined. However, the logic of infinite potentiality indicates that the proper combination for the known illogical does exist within infinite potentiality. If such combination of conditions known and unknown were ever discovered, the married bachelor could indeed exist in actuality, as could a round square. Perhaps another dimension is a required condition.

I agree in part. I don't think that any one contingent reality, though, could supersede the rules permitted to consistency of the laws there. Though reality as a whole can contain all that is possible, it doesn't mean that those worlds are 'complete' or 'consistent' and these may then simply be like unfinished or partial fragments that go nowhere.

Think of it this way: since EVERYTHING is possible, than this includes ironically THAT each thing is possible, even the idea that nothing is possible or that only some things are. This may not make sense but it is alright if these worlds cannot MEET! So we may still be unable to do what you are thinking in this particular existence.

One way that I am certain could allow us to get to other realities would be at points where we die and 'split' to any other possible worlds where you don't die. You may not be able to 'prove' this happens though even to yourself. [I thought of something that Max Tegmark in "Our Mathematical Universe" also posed but in better depth than his regarding this. It was actually uncanny to how close he came to what I figured out in more detail too. (Maybe he had access to private emails where I discussed this ? )]

[TSBU]

This question, the one about free will, is posted in every philosophy forum at least once a month, I've learnt that is impossible to explain some things to some people. They cannot understand why they can decide and at the same time they are guided by causality. They sometimesstart talking about quantum phisics and more things they don't understand to explain causality, forgetting that, if we are guided by luck, "we" are not deciding, it's luck wich is deciding.
We don't need to have exactly the same thoughts, we don't need to agree exactly in how we manage our plans.
After all, this question you are asking ourself is probably a question that a person ask yo himself when yhat personn see a difference between his thoughts and other person thoughts... but we all (maybe with different words) know that we can decide, the question about causality doesn't tell you anything new about that, it can imply, maybe, a new way to understand knowledge, but... I think it's a question that doesn't have the same answer to everybody (because we don't have the same brains).

So, as I said, free will is not an ilusion if you understand by free will, that we can't decide, and decissions change consequences in Universe. It's an illusion (a useless ilusion) if you understand by free will, that we can act out of reality, not guided by our knowledge, by what we are, etc.

Last post here, good luck with your thoughts, maybe writing to yourself questions and answers being alone would be interesting for you.

[Scott Mayers]

This question, the one about free will, is posted in every philosophy forum at least once a month, I've learnt that is impossible to explain some things to some people. They cannot understand why they can decide and at the same time they are guided by causality. They sometimesstart talking about quantum phisics and more things they don't understand to explain causality, forgetting that, if we are guided by luck, "we" are not deciding, it's luck wich is deciding.
We don't need to have exactly the same thoughts, we don't need to agree exactly in how we manage our plans.
After all, this question you are asking ourself is probably a question that a person ask yo himself when yhat personn see a difference between his thoughts and other person thoughts... but we all (maybe with different words) know that we can decide, the question about causality doesn't tell you anything new about that, it can imply, maybe, a new way to understand knowledge, but... I think it's a question that doesn't have the same answer to everybody (because we don't have the same brains).

So, as I said, free will is not an ilusion if you understand by free will, that we can't decide, and decissions change consequences in Universe. It's an illusion (a useless ilusion) if you understand by free will, that we can act out of reality, not guided by our knowledge, by what we are, etc.

Last post here, good luck with your thoughts, maybe writing to yourself questions and answers being alone would be interesting for you.

You sound defeated. Surprising to most is if they read things like the Greek works only to discover ALL of these questions have been asked before. They don't 'end' because we haven't found agreed closure to some things that may themselves require us going through them again and again. That is, life itself is a process that involves going through stages of inquiry about the same things over and over because otherwise we'd require simply trusting in the authorities to have deemed such issues closed. Death itself is the perfect closure anyways. So issues like this still have to be redressed and repeated if only for those who haven't yet questioned these things.

[Hobbes' Choice]

I have a new thread that I discussed that free will is an illusion. Here we discuss important consequences of absence of free will. The main questions are as following: Why we should be guilty of our action if free will is an illusion? What is the purpose of Heaven and Hell? How judiciary system could be justified?...

Simple.

When we hold people responsible for their actions it CAUSES others to think about theirs. When we punish people for crimes it can CAUSE them to consider not committing the same crime. Simple cause and affect.

On the other hand what is the point of punishment when a person with FREE WILL will do what the fuck he or she wants?

Actually it is not that simple. The problem with the cause and effect picture is that intellect is an illusion in this framework so we cannot really be affected with what we define as good and bad.

But we are affected.
When I poke you in the eye, you cannot see.

Now consider your position, How can you have free will without an intellect?

[Terrapin Station]

They cannot understand why they can decide and at the same time they are guided by causality.

If you're talking about compatibilism, it's definitely impossible to explain it to me. I just can't make any sense out of it.

[GreatandWiseTrixie]

In short, we shouldn't. We should advocate for lighter punishments. Stealing from a corrupt megacorruptioncorporation should only have 5 days community service. In fact it is a community service.

[bahman]

But we are affected.
When I poke you in the eye, you cannot see.

We are talking about whether the knowledge of good and bad could affect our decision. What I am arguing is that that is only an illusion since what intrinsically determines what you do is microscopic motions of your constitutes which are based on cause and effect.

Now consider your position, How can you have free will without an intellect?

You cannot.

[TSBU]

They cannot understand why they can decide and at the same time they are guided by causality.

If you're talking about compatibilism, it's definitely impossible to explain it to me. I just can't make any sense out of it.

I've never call it that way, but I guess that's how people who can't see it call it. To be honest, I managed to put that (and more things) in a head one time, it took me three weeks, in Spanish, out of a forum, and puting some effort on it. In many cases I think it would take me less to put that in a head, but in a person who knows a little about this filed reading books etc, and have been thinking that "compatibilism" is wrong a long time, I think it's nearly impossible to change that in less than some hours. The question (this, and nearly all questions) is posted cyclically, and nobody wants to say the same over and over if he doesn't gain anything... going out of the thread, but maybe I would like a thread about this.

No offense, I'm not calling you stupid or anything, wrong or right, every idea can be put in some heads (for example, religious ideas), and it's redundant to say all the time that, evidently, what i think true is true in my own perspective and I can be (am) wrong like every human being.

[Terrapin Station]

No offense, I'm not calling you stupid or anything, wrong or right, every idea can be put in some heads (for example, religious ideas), and it's redundant to say all the time that, evidently, what i think true is true in my own perspective and I can be (am) wrong like every human being.

Definitely I agree with this.

I think it's ridiculous that people regularly assume that if something is understandable to some, then it must be understandable to them, too. People proceed as if they and everyone else are what I call "ideal rational agents," but really no one is. It's just another way that arrogance crops up. Really, we all have various biases, dispositions, etc. where some things just aren't going to make sense to us.

[Hobbes' Choice]

But we are affected.
When I poke you in the eye, you cannot see.

We are talking about whether the knowledge of good and bad could affect our decision. What I am arguing is that that is only an illusion since what intrinsically determines what you do is microscopic motions of your constitutes which are based on cause and effect.

Now consider your position, How can you have free will without an intellect?

You cannot.

Then what the fuck are you asking stupid questions for?

[bahman]

Then what the fuck are you asking stupid questions for?

What I am saying is that our actions is determined unless you can show that the argument in another argument is wrong so the question is that why we should feel guilty if our bad actions if it is so.

[Hobbes' Choice]

Then what the fuck are you asking stupid questions for?

What I am saying is that our actions is determined unless you can show that the argument in another argument is wrong so the question is that why we should feel guilty if our bad actions if it is so.

What is meant by the "I" in that answer? How can you feel 'guilty' since you do not have a self?
And if you are not what you seem how can you make any 'action'?

NB These are rhetorical questions.

[bahman]

What is meant by the "I" in that answer?

It seems that "I" is self generated by left part of your brain.

How can you feel 'guilty' since you do not have a self?

I have a sense of self. Don't you?

And if you are not what you seem how can you make any 'action'?

You are correct. But I can perform actions because I have a self generated by left part of my brain.