•But what if God doesn’t exist? Does that mean we have
free will? Well, a lot of people who don’t believe in God think that, instead
of having a soul distinct from our bodies, we have instead simply a body which
is a conglomeration of physical
particles. And what physical particles do, they say, isn’t determined by
anyone’s will, it is determined by the laws of physics. Given the laws of
physics and the positions of the atoms, some people think everything is
predictable from there. There are theories in physics which have gotten away
from this kind of determinism at the physical level, but if the universe is
only the matter in it, then a person’s choice cannot be the final determiner of what they do.
If materialism is true, libertarian free will is excluded, and I maintain that compatibilist free will is highly problematic given materialism, since it relies on the idea on the idea of acting for a reason, but in the final analysis, if materialism is true, that never happens. The physical state of the world, not the reason, determines what we do.
7 comments:
I asked my son-in-law, a biologist, whether he thought trees might have consciousness. I found his answer intriguing. He opined that the ability to choose between alternatives was not only necessary for consciousness, it might even be the principle attribute of it. So, he said, an animal such as the family dog was probably conscious at some level, because it could obviously choose between various actions (Should I lie on the couch, or under the window?) Plants, on the other hand, have no choice in what they do. It is all stimulus and response. We even see this in ourselves. How many times have you been engaged in some simple, repetitive task (such as folding laundry), and find (often with a bit of surprise) that you're done? You weren't paying attention, because there was no choosing going on. It was an unconscious act.
So perhaps, if he is correct, the fact that we humans are conscious beings is in and of itself proof that we have free will.
I just wish those people who don't believe in free will would stop arguing with me and getting mad at me. Like I have a choice in being annoying?
Linked to "free will" is personal responsibility. If there is no God, personal responsibility is harder to establish. Behavior is explained by genetic disposition or chemical imbalance or mental illness. We often see media attempts to explain brutish behavior in these physicalist terms. The satisfying answer for many is not found in soulish concepts like the will. Responsibility is the key issue. It implies a moral dimension to our behavior. If God does not exist, moral responsibility is much more difficult to establish. Over time, as the theistic underpinnings lose influence, moral responsibility diminishes.
oozzielionel said...
Over time, as the theistic underpinnings lose influence, moral responsibility diminishes.
Balderdash. Societies don't decrease their punishments as they lose theistic underpinnings, excepting the crimes that only the theists care about. Individuals don't change their morals when they change their religions, except for the morals strictures only the religion cares about.
It seems then that you agree in part that some moral strictures diminish - those that some people care about while others don't care so much.
oozzielionel said...
It seems then that you agree in part that some moral strictures diminish - those that some people care about while others don't care so much.
I thought the topic was moral responsibility, not moral strictures. I would agree that moral strictures increase and decrease in a variety of ways, including that a loss of theistic belief seems correlated with removing some strictures and adding others.
Bradly Bowen is an atheist who writes on the Secular Outpost Blog.He wrote an article attaching me for opposing his defense of the "Swoon theory" (the idea that Jesus didn't die on the cross but just swooned). I had the temerity to beat his arguments (no I was not insulting--just a bit sarkie) so they banned me, Here is my answer....
https://metacrock.blogspot.com/2019/09/my-answer-to-bradley-bowen-on-blood-and.html
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