this post was submitted on 05 Aug 2023
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I would argue the vast majority of people are like this, this is the neutral position. You act in the world as if the implications of all of this are meaningless.
Even if you believe there is no free will, it doesn't change how you behave in any significant way, because your are the sum total of your parts.
The Dan Dennett's and Sam Harris' of the world are having an argument that ultimately means nothing to us because we'll act the same way regardless of this information.
Yeah. To me it's not even a fun philosophical exercise like thinking about what came before the big bang or if there is anything 'outside' of the universe. I feel like it's a debate from before modern physics. Like, 500 years ago there was a lively debate on the matter of free will in a religious context. And I guess the only way to still believe in free will and its contradiction with the laws of nature is when you believe in God. But for everyone else it's just so damn obvious free will can't exist and it's just human ego wanting to pretend we have control. 'Free will doesn't exist' is as obvious and unimpactful of a fact to me as 2+2=4.
I disagree with that view, mostly because I don't think that free will means completely random. Imagine the goldbach conjecture, there are two simple rules, divide by two if even, multiply by three and add 1 if odd. If you take any number, it is impossible to determine when that number will enter a loop, unless you go through the whole process. The brain is like that, but a trillion times more complicated. Is the brain deterministic? Yes. But does that mean you can determine what choice someone will make? No.