[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]
Re: free will (was Radio Satan)
On Sat, 8 Jun 2002, ryan richards wrote:
> > Well, I think a person who didn't believe in free will would simply
> > argue that Ghandi, like many people, had a more complex brain than a
> > cat, and thus, his actions would not have been influenced quite so
> > directly by external stimuli. But Ghandi was certainly responding to
> > his environment when he went on hunger strikes -- he observed a
> > political situation, formulated an opinion concerning what the most
> > effective response to the situation might be, and then chose to act as
> > he did. If he had made political ideals more important to himself
> > than his personal health, for whatever reason, then his actions would
> > have been an appropriate, and possibly even predictable, response to
> > his external stimuli.
>
> I agree with everything stated above. The problem with the counter
> arguement is that Gandhi (sorry, my original misspelling) had to choose
> to make his political ideas more important than himself.
So you say. But how do you know that his political ideals were not the
product of, say, cultural conditioning or other external stimuli?
> Now did this decision come from some impulse further back in his
> consciousness (or brain chemistry if you don't believe in a soul)?
Side note: You don't have to believe in a soul in order to believe that
people (and other beings) are, in some sense, conscious.
> The answer is Yes! When it comes down to the actual act of course it is
> ultimately a neurological impulses that cause the body to move, or be
> still in spite of the impulse to not be struck in the case of Gandhi's
> followers. Just because the direct cause of an action can finally be
> reduced to an electrical charge in the brain that tells the fist to
> strike or the head to duck doesn't mean that said person necessarily had
> to obey that impulse. My experience is that it possible to overcome
> these instinctual drives through conscious choice.
But if the conscious choice to over-ride that instinctual drive expresses
itself through a neurological impulse, as you say, are you saying, then,
that the "conscious choice" is *distinct* from, or *identical* to, the
"neurological impulse" that over-rides the instinctual drive?
> Again, my conscious choice does not cause my action, it is only a
> precursor to what I am about to do or not do.
Distinct, then. But how do you distinguish between them -- especially if
your "conscious choice" does *not* cause your action?
> Oh, and by the way, "He that the Son has set free is free indeed". :)))
Whatever *that* means. ;)
"Then You capture me / I win the freedom of this slavery..."
http://www.danielamos.com/lyrics/abriefingfortheascent.html#captureme
--- Peter T. Chattaway --------------------------- peter at chattaway_com ---
"I detected one misprint, but to torture you I will not tell you where."
Winston Churchill to T.E. Lawrence, re Seven Pillars of Wisdom
---------------
Unsubscribe by going to http://www.actwin.com/OtR/
References: