Discussion Why is the illusion of free will so compelling?

[zengiraffe]

Why is the illusion of free will so compelling?

 

[Pluto]

As I understand it, it relates directly to the illusion of the individual self. Firstly, that separate self has to be there in the first place so that somebody can possess free will, and secondly its entire raison d'etre consists of struggling with life and navigating challenges. The tendency to identify with the mind-made character is an addiction of the highest order that afflicts almost everyone.

In spiritual discourse, there tends to be a spectrum of views regarding the issue of free will. This has value, because simply denying free will is likely to be a counterproductive belief system. In fact, any sort of belief system becomes a hindrance. The most direct course seems to be using the separate self's desire for improvement to direct its attention towards pure consciousness, via the 'Who am I?' question. This opens the possibility of a revelation in the present moment.

In the end, though, people who see reality as it is usually insist that there is no free will whatsoever.

 

[theboy]

free will is a double-edged sword

 

[sserafim]

Because people want to feel like they have control over their actions and destiny

free will is a double-edged sword

Wdym?

 

[druggedonsurvival]

It makes no sense to live any other way than to pretend that free will exists. If we understand that free will does not exist, then we should let whatever happens to us happen to us, because that's all we can do. This is, however, essentially the same thing as living under the assumption that free will exists. It makes no practical difference.

In terms of the average person, the desire to believe in free will probably stems from ego - as in it is harmful to one's self-image to acknowledge that we truly have no agency over who we are and what we end up doing. There is a certain terror in that as well, so perhaps it's a sort of survival mechanism built into our brains to ameliorate the fear.

 

[Forever Sleep]

Who wants to be a slave? I don't think it's great to feel powerless. Still, I think people also use fate as an excuse not to take responsibilty. It must also feel quite calming to think that every bad thing that happened to you and every bad thing you might have done wasn't actually your fault. (Obviously, some things won't be but some are choices.)

Free will is important when it comes to feeling like you can change things in life for the better but, it's also important with regards to accountability. Criminals are usually held accountable because they knowingly did things that hurt other people.

 

[DarkRange55]

I think the jury is still out on free will, scientifically.
In the realm of quantum mechanics, the concept of free will becomes complex. Quantum mechanics suggests that at the subatomic level, particles don't behave in a deterministic manner but rather exhibit probabilities. Some interpretations of quantum mechanics, such as the Copenhagen interpretation, suggest that events are probabilistic until measured, implying that free will might have a role in the act of measurement. However, the implications for human free will remain a topic of philosophical debate rather than settled science.
Even a bacterium has sufficient complexity to have something resembling free will, although to a much lesser extent than humans.
I haven't really looked into this lately.

 

[zengiraffe]

@DarkRange55 I strongly disagree with the "quantum mechanics" argument for free will. My understanding is that our scientific instruments aren't precise enough to accurately measure things at that scale, so we have to introduce probabilities into our mathematical models of subatomic particles to account for our own uncertainty. As far as I'm aware there's no hard evidence that things are actually random or probabilistic at a quantum level.

But, for the sake of argument, let's say there is true randomness at the quantum level. Randomness at a quantum level does not mean there's randomness at a macroscopic level. I can't remember the last time I was eating an apple and it randomly vanished from my hand and appeared half-way across the room as a mango. Can you? Most of our technology wouldn't work if things like this happened, and so quantum randomness, if it exists, does not affect things at the macroscopic level, like apples, mangos, and human brains.

But, for the sake of argument, let's get really crazy and say quantum randomness affects things at the macroscopic scale, that's still not an argument for free will, it's an argument for random will, and random will is not free.

At this point, we have to completely abandon reality and fabricate supernatural explanations to make free will work. It's not enough for consciousness to be an emergent property of our physical brains, we now have to make up a "soul" that drives our consciousness independently of our physical brains and the main mechanism it uses to accomplish this is "quantum randomness." Great. We did it. We found "free will." All it took was lying to ourselves and making up complete nonsense.

 

[DarkRange55]

@DarkRange55 I strongly disagree with the "quantum mechanics" argument for free will. My understanding is that our scientific instruments aren't precise enough to accurately measure things at that scale, so we have to introduce probabilities into our mathematical models of subatomic particles to account for our own uncertainty. As far as I'm aware there's no hard evidence that things are actually random or probabilistic at a quantum level.

But, for the sake of argument, let's say there is true randomness at the quantum level. Randomness at a quantum level does not mean there's randomness at a macroscopic level. I can't remember the last time I was eating an apple and it randomly vanished from my hand and appeared half-way across the room as a mango. Can you? Most of our technology wouldn't work if things like this happened, and so quantum randomness, if it exists, does not affect things at the macroscopic level, like apples, mangos, and human brains.

But, for the sake of argument, let's get really crazy and say quantum randomness affects things at the macroscopic scale, that's still not an argument for free will, it's an argument for random will, and random will is not free.

At this point, we have to completely abandon reality and fabricate supernatural explanations to make free will work. It's not enough for consciousness to be an emergent property of our physical brains, we now have to make up a "soul" that drives our consciousness independently of our physical brains and the main mechanism it uses to accomplish this is "quantum randomness." Great. We did it. We found "free will." All it took was lying to ourselves and making up complete nonsense.

The introduction of probabilities into mathematical models at the quantum scale is indeed a consequence of the inherent uncertainty and limitations in our ability to measure. Quantum mechanics relies on probabilities to describe the behavior of particles because, at that scale, traditional concepts of determinism break down. While there is no hard evidence suggesting that things are inherently random at the quantum level, the probabilistic nature of quantum mechanics has been extensively validated through experimental observations and predictive power. However, interpretations of this probabilistic behavior vary, with some interpretations suggesting underlying deterministic processes masked by our current understanding and measurement limitations.

Some interpretations of quantum mechanics suggest that there may be underlying deterministic processes or hidden variables governing the behavior of particles, while others argue for a truly random and indeterminate nature at the quantum level. At present, we don't have a definitive answer, and it remains an active area of research and philosophical inquiry.

At the macroscopic scale, randomness is an illusion due to the inability to account for all variables.

@DarkRange55 I strongly disagree with the "quantum mechanics" argument for free will. My understanding is that our scientific instruments aren't precise enough to accurately measure things at that scale, so we have to introduce probabilities into our mathematical models of subatomic particles to account for our own uncertainty. As far as I'm aware there's no hard evidence that things are actually random or probabilistic at a quantum level.

But, for the sake of argument, let's say there is true randomness at the quantum level. Randomness at a quantum level does not mean there's randomness at a macroscopic level. I can't remember the last time I was eating an apple and it randomly vanished from my hand and appeared half-way across the room as a mango. Can you? Most of our technology wouldn't work if things like this happened, and so quantum randomness, if it exists, does not affect things at the macroscopic level, like apples, mangos, and human brains.

But, for the sake of argument, let's get really crazy and say quantum randomness affects things at the macroscopic scale, that's still not an argument for free will, it's an argument for random will, and random will is not free.

At this point, we have to completely abandon reality and fabricate supernatural explanations to make free will work. It's not enough for consciousness to be an emergent property of our physical brains, we now have to make up a "soul" that drives our consciousness independently of our physical brains and the main mechanism it uses to accomplish this is "quantum randomness." Great. We did it. We found "free will." All it took was lying to ourselves and making up complete nonsense.

However, for the randomness, one example would be with quantum tunneling, that the probability of an object passing through a barrier, decreases in likeliness, as the scale increases, but is not equal to zero - Quantum mechanics theoretically works on every scale – it just becomes much much much much less likely for particle tunnel through a macroscopic barrier, but there is no dividing line.

@DarkRange55 I strongly disagree with the "quantum mechanics" argument for free will. My understanding is that our scientific instruments aren't precise enough to accurately measure things at that scale, so we have to introduce probabilities into our mathematical models of subatomic particles to account for our own uncertainty. As far as I'm aware there's no hard evidence that things are actually random or probabilistic at a quantum level.

But, for the sake of argument, let's say there is true randomness at the quantum level. Randomness at a quantum level does not mean there's randomness at a macroscopic level. I can't remember the last time I was eating an apple and it randomly vanished from my hand and appeared half-way across the room as a mango. Can you? Most of our technology wouldn't work if things like this happened, and so quantum randomness, if it exists, does not affect things at the macroscopic level, like apples, mangos, and human brains.

But, for the sake of argument, let's get really crazy and say quantum randomness affects things at the macroscopic scale, that's still not an argument for free will, it's an argument for random will, and random will is not free.

At this point, we have to completely abandon reality and fabricate supernatural explanations to make free will work. It's not enough for consciousness to be an emergent property of our physical brains, we now have to make up a "soul" that drives our consciousness independently of our physical brains and the main mechanism it uses to accomplish this is "quantum randomness." Great. We did it. We found "free will." All it took was lying to ourselves and making up complete nonsense.

I do not believe in the immortal soul personally. We do not know if consciousness is an emergent property or not yet. And as I said, in the beginning, I'm not sure if free will exists or not.

However, everything in the universe appears to be quantum. This is also simply another unknown variable at the present.

Quantum cognition - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

@DarkRange55 I strongly disagree with the "quantum mechanics" argument for free will. My understanding is that our scientific instruments aren't precise enough to accurately measure things at that scale, so we have to introduce probabilities into our mathematical models of subatomic particles to account for our own uncertainty. As far as I'm aware there's no hard evidence that things are actually random or probabilistic at a quantum level.

But, for the sake of argument, let's say there is true randomness at the quantum level. Randomness at a quantum level does not mean there's randomness at a macroscopic level. I can't remember the last time I was eating an apple and it randomly vanished from my hand and appeared half-way across the room as a mango. Can you? Most of our technology wouldn't work if things like this happened, and so quantum randomness, if it exists, does not affect things at the macroscopic level, like apples, mangos, and human brains.

But, for the sake of argument, let's get really crazy and say quantum randomness affects things at the macroscopic scale, that's still not an argument for free will, it's an argument for random will, and random will is not free.

At this point, we have to completely abandon reality and fabricate supernatural explanations to make free will work. It's not enough for consciousness to be an emergent property of our physical brains, we now have to make up a "soul" that drives our consciousness independently of our physical brains and the main mechanism it uses to accomplish this is "quantum randomness." Great. We did it. We found "free will." All it took was lying to ourselves and making up complete nonsense.

Also, the stochastic features of QM could leave, in principle, a "trace" at the macroscopic level.

This is because not every ℏ-dependent family of quantum states yields, in the limit ℏ→0, a completely deterministic classical state (phase space point). As a matter of fact:

Every possible classical phase-space probability distribution can be obtained from some suitable quantum configuration, in the classical limit.

In other words, in the classical limit the quantum non-commutative probabilities (states) become, in general, classical probabilities in the phase space (statistical states). There are quantum states that in the limit become points of the phase space (not surprisingly, this is the case for the squeezed coherent states of minimal uncertainty), but these are only special cases.

This classical statistical description, that emerges from quantum states in the classical limit, can be seen as a "trace" of the probabilistic nature of the underlying quantum theory.