@Secular_Squirrel
Yes, whenever a philosophical issue is debated and unresolved for 2500 years or more it is a pretty good bet that the ambiguity of definitions is at the core of the infinite philosophical loop of unsatisfactory arguments.

@Secular_Squirrel There can be no free will at all. It is pure illusion. The only thing that could motivate the destruction of programming is other programming which competes with the original programming for survival in an evolutionary struggle.

@Secular_Squirrel I'm not sure what making you "more of an outcast" has to do with anything. Programs are idiosyncratic, based on the unique forces acting on each individual: genetic, environmental, systemic, stochastic, etc. Regardless of what it "makes you", the "you" has zero control over it.

@Secular_Squirrel Easy. Feedback loops between different parts of a deterministic system. The fact that I want my computer to detect the level of fragmentation of data on the hard drive and to automatically defragment itself after meeting a threshold does not make it "free". Scale up the metaphor in complexity and you are doing the exact same thing. You may be functioning more optimally, but not more freely.

@Secular_Squirrel I hope it's clear that the role "I want" in my metaphor is taken up by evolution in the real example. In other words, those creatures capable of more optimal self-management (via self-knowledge or any other mechanism) and who become more able to survive and reproduce have an advantage and are thus around to tell their tale. The ones who cannot are not. We are the ones whose ancestors were able to do that good trick.

@Secular_Squirrel So it sounds like your project is to sell improved self-knowledge. And your strategy was to sell that as personal empowerment. And your tactic to sell personal empowerment was the concept of free will. But now that you've recognized free will is basically meaningless or an illusion, you are looking to either rescue the free will concept somehow, or else replace it with some other personal empowerment concept that might be equally compelling.

If you want my advice on this, I would simply abandon free will altogether in this project. I think just going to the root concept, personal empowerment, is plenty sufficient. I don't think you can sell the "longer chain means less slavery" as a motivational strategy. Are you motivated by that? I'm not. And anyway, it's not accurate. It presupposes an essential freedom that is restricted by outside forces, but there is no essential freedom "underneath" those forces anyway. It's turtles all the way down, ha ha.

So why would someone care about personal empowerment? It's easy: you are selling the ability to do and get more of what you want. That's what people are after anyway. I don't think anyone really cares about their fundamental existential freedom anyway. People generally don't care to examine why they want what they want, they are content to just accept their wants. I think you can leave the sleeping dog of the free will illusion lie if you want, and just not even address that issue in your project of enhancing self-knowledge.

Or if you think that exposing one's illusions and analyzing one's wants is somehow central to the self-knowledge project, then just put free will on the list of illusions, brainwashing, and programming, along with the hundreds of other items, and allow people to prioritize according to their own purposes.

Selling personal empowerment is dead easy. Freakin' Tony Robbins can do it: Confused about why you aren't getting ahead? Wish you could have more satisfaction? Apply inquiry and self-knowledge to hack your life into the increased performance you know you deserve.

@Bobby9 Laws of nature. Physics. Duh. [en.m.wiktionary.org]

@Bobby9 Unless you control what you want and always have since birth, then something else has controlled what you want, whether it be genetics, environment, or randomness. Therefore, your will is not free. Genetics, environment, and randomness are features of nature. It follows laws. Therefore, nature’s laws control you.

@Secular_Squirrel. Absolutely love. I'm not educated in philosophy but think in these terms (with improper terms) constantly. I feel like I am fighting this battle of redefining myself based on pre programming and then reprogramming and then trying to trace the whys and how's of said programming and then becoming frustrated at my lack of control half the time. Feeling weak when I don't make the choice I want to make. What a mind bender. Everything you and others here said here makes perfect sense to me but I could never repeat it myself. But it all gives me a small clue.

@Bobby9 Why did you decide to against going to Canada? Ultimately, it was because you did not want to go as much as you wanted to follow orders. Whether the reason you want to cite is a desire to remain loyal to your nation, or the desire to not appear to be a coward, or the desire to keep your promises, or whatever, those are all desires. The fact that one desire out-competed the others is not evidence of freedom of will, only of a battle between desires - desires that were given to you without your input, or before "you" even existed as the person you are today.

Where did those desires come from? Either your genetics, your environment and upbringing, or randomness.

The exact same thing is true about the grocery store. I'm not arguing that you can't do whatever you desire, only that you cannot control what you desire. Again, you might have conflicting desires (i.e., I will get healthy salad because I want to stay healthy instead of delicious cake that I want), but those are still competing desires (the desire to remain healthy vs. the desire for instant pleasure) - which you did not choose.

@Bobby9 My argument is that there is nothing BUT pressures for and against decisions. Once you add up all the pressures for an against, there is nothing left over to be "free". If you think there is, the burden of proof is on you to demonstrate what that could be and where that could live. Religious people throughout the centuries have tried to prove it is the "soul", disconnected from the world, that allows us to make free decisions. Of course that argument is nonsense, both because there is zero evidence for a soul, and because it is logically impossible that a soul could make a decision with no influence (how would it know what options to weigh, for instance?).

If you'll read carefully you'll see I made no assumptions whatsoever, but instead pointed out that whatever reason you give, it is based upon a desire over which you have no control. Indeed, what you report confirms this and proves my point. The fact that you came up with a reason for acting that was a desire to not have to look over your shoulder overwhelmingly demonstrates exactly what I said: you were driven by your desires, in this case, desire to avoid punishment. Where did you get that fear of punishment? Did you choose to have that fear? No. That fear was given to you without your say-so in any way. That totally negates free will altogether. The fear held a virtual gun to your head and forced you act regardless of any other desires. Why? Because that fear won the competition with all of your other desires, as you yourself admit. The fact that you may or may not have been able to imagine lots of possible outcomes and test those against your desires is not free will, it is the playing out of the competition between desires - none of which you chose. The fact that you did what you wanted to do is not under debate, only that what you wanted to do is not up to you.

It's amazing to me that you admit you have no choice and then try to insist that you do. This is known as cognitive dissonance. Look it up.

@Bobby9 You have yet to account for what is left over after all the pressures, and just keep trying to insist that it is free will without any evidence whatsoever. I argue there is nothing left, and that all that exists are pressures, and that is what is supported by every piece of neurological evidence on the subject.

I don't actually experience things any differently, for what it's worth: I think all human beings are built to have the illusion of perfect agency and free will, or at least our cultures train it into us from so early it makes no practical difference. Either way, it's just that: an illusion. Apparently, a particularly pernicious one in your case.

As far as egos, I do enjoy a snark against the flippant and the glib now and then, but I think you ought to look up psychological projection next. No wait, I'll help you: [en.wikipedia.org]

@Bobby9 Here's a popular article illustrating some of the science: [blogs.scientificamerican.com]

@Bobby9 Furthermore, I have to say, your argument is getting weaker and weaker, and I'm clearly backing you into a corner. If you have to admit that every decision is influenced by pressures, then how the heck can that be "free" in any meaningful sense? If we are trying to say the will is "free" then shouldn't it be "free" of pressures too? How much pressure is too much pressure? Is a literal gun to your head still a "free" decision? Do you still have "free" will then? Certainly, you still have a competition between desires even then, though there is clearly a huge thumb on the scale, but it is ultimately still a battle between desires and not a "free" choice at all.

@Bobby9 To ignore evidence and proper argument is a literal example of ignorance. Your lack of caring about my argument is irrelevant and demonstrates a reaction of loss from an emotional (not logical) commitment to an outcome that I have proved false.

Asserting that “influences do not negate free will” without any support or evidence or without accounting for what is left over after influences are summed up demonstrates that you have nothing at all but your illusions. Meanwhile, I’ve cited scientific studies proving my point.

Admit it: you lost the argument.

@Bobby9 sigh Hopeless ignorance. I can’t help you if you can’t abide by basic rules of argument or decency.

@Bobby9 What baseless assertion have I made? I offered a scientific study in evidence of my claim. As it happens, you are actually the one guilty of all you claim I am doing, including the need to check you ego. This is a classic demonstration of psychological projection. Check yourself before you wreck yourself, bro. LOL.

@Bobby9 I'm afraid you need some education on how to argue and debate, and what counts as a baseless assertion and what counts as evidence. It's really difficult to conduct a productive discussion with you when you can't follow the basic rules, and act like you don't even know the difference between the essential components of an argument. I can try to lay things out in really simple syllogistic form for you, but I don't have a lot of faith that you will get it, follow along, nor recognize what is what.

Also, while I am certainly guilty of being snarky, poking, and personalizing, it is my intention to come across as doing it with with a generally good-natured "smack talking" attitude for fun. Perhaps I'm doing a poor job of coming across that way in this medium, but I don't have frequent problems with others picking up what I'm putting down. So to answer your question, what is "indecent" is the escalation I'm feeling from you on the personalizing attacks, to the exclusion of being able to discuss the actual content of the argument. Whenever you don't like that I'm winning, you just dig in your heels and restate what you've said before, and claim it is "self-evident" or counts as evidence, when it fact it does nothing of the sort. There is zero support for the claim. You act as if your own subjective experience ought to count as an authority. If that were case, we'd be forced to take every nut job's account of their burning bush experience with God as the honest truth. Well, we don't have to do that, because we can distinguish between subjective reality, intersubjective reality, and objective reality. I'm trying to argue at the level of objective reality.

@Bobby9 Let me try a simple experiment with you, though it's probably a waste of time because you are obviously a dunce and a troll. But let's test and see for sure whether you have the wherewithal to even do this much properly. Try to follow this syllogism:

Premise 1: All desires are givens.
Premise 2: Givens are not chosen.
Conclusion: No desires are chosen.

Question for you, Chuckles: Does the conclusion follow from the premises?

Hint: whether you accept the premises or not isn't part of the question.

@Bobby9 If you could read, you'd see that I proved my point, even going so far as to provide evidence of a scientific report. You are obviously a troll because you don't care about the issue, merely about re-iterating your baseless assumptions and trying to bully anyone who disproves it, even with scientific evidence. Done with you and your nonsense. Go wank somewhere else.

@Bobby9 Blocked. Bye troll.

@Secular_Squirre.... I'll have to go into this deeper a bit later. Breifly tho...Kant's idea was "The thing in itself" the one energy in all things. Later Schopenhauer realized that the eastern ideas that had just begun to reach the west were exactly in tune with Kantian thought. Life eats life and in doing so creates all things. All sacrifice in all religion is based on this. The universe works in this mannor...from the tiniest organisms to the largest black holes. Schopenhauer became dis-illusioned at this fact and declared life is something that should not have been. Nietzsche came along and said not only is this the way it is but it is as it should be. Embrace the will to nature, or as he says...the will to power. Be a willing sacrifice to nature. Accept it and go forth into each new day knowing as the Dakota Indians did....today is a good day to die.
Sorry for rambling thru this. I sometimes cloud the pool in trying to get my point across. Keep reading and then read some more and when your done....read some more. It's all out there.

@Secular_Squirrel Why send messages? This issue should be out there for all. If we cross a line let others see where the line is. I totally understand because I too am being criticized for stepping on overly sensitive toes and also threatened with banishment. I see this as a control issue and am seeing many call themselves 'very liberal' or even 'left of liberal'. I see this as just another form of extremism which harms the movement. One person here told me he doesn't want to have debates. He just does as he is told (loyalty, which is a conservative virtue is creeping in with liberals). Many don't want to hear the "truth" like the famous line by Jack Nickelson in "A Few Good Men". Here is a link that shows where we are headed: [un-denial.com]

@Secular_Squirrel
Exactly, and for me the supreme example of free will is the person who goes on hunger strike to the point of death.
Since the argument against free will is predicated on the assertion that you cannot tell where your desires come from, denying actual detectable desires (food and survival) that have physical and identifiable origins for reasons easily identified as moral judgement based upon social need or desire, completely invalidates that argument and offers a potential proof of free will.

@Secular_Squirrel Dark, very dark.