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Are there any decent arguments for free will?
(lemmygrad.ml)
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this post was submitted on 19 Jan 2024
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My take is simple.
We do not live in a vacuum, our actions will always be conditioned by our current and past material conditions. However, contradictions are inherent in nature and there lies our free will, in our constant struggle for development.
That's not really an argument for free will. In a dialectical determinist view, internal contradictions drive everything and causes things to affect other things and so on.
Id like to add Rosa quote to this "Before a revolution happens, it is perceived as impossible; after it happens, it is seen as having been inevitable.".
The thing with determinism is that it views things as inevitable outcomes AFTER they happen, so it is impossible to argue against it. The process of struggling to resolve contradictions is what embodies free will in my opinion.
Is ice freely struggling with air with the possibility of cooling it or being melted? Where would you find a material source for free will. Maybe pure chance is possible, but that doesn't imply choice.
Lol i think it goes without saying that free will is for sentient beings.
Edit: also would repeat that we do not live in a vacuum, nature is connected and determined. Other beings free will can overcome yours and likewise.
Then where does sentience come from? I don't expect you to be able to answer this obviously, but I don't see why sentience isn't just an incredibly complex material reaction that came into existence in extreme absurdity and improbability.
sentience is a highly developed stage of matter. millions of years of evolution led to sentience, or in other words millions of years of struggle.
yeah, but what is it? how does it have free will? isn't it just regular matter subject to conditions, not able to make decisions.
But sentient brings can make decisions, right? Unlike an ice cube. You can choose to have toast or oats for breakfast. You can't choose to live in a mansion unless you have the credit score or cash. The smaller the decision, the more control you have, the bigger the decision, the less control, but the latter doesn't discount some freedom to choose; it just means that at some point you come up against the limits of reality.
The idea that whether I chose toast or oats is pre-determined seems strange. We can't ever prove or disprove it.
One way of looking at it could be between an idealist and a dialectical materialist conception of free will. From the idealist perspective, free will means unlimited free will. Like free expression or abstract 'freedom'. But from a materialist perspective, if there's free will, it must be understood as fettered and dialectically related to material conditions.
That is, we make history, but not under conditions of our choosing.
All this said, I've not thought about this question since becoming a Marxist and I'm somewhat persuaded by the above answer that the question may rely on something of a category error. I'll be thinking more about that. Still a great question to ask, btw!
A sentient being “chooses” between given options, but that choice is not “free.” One chooses oats or toast because they are prefer it at that moment for a variety of factors. It could take less work, it could taste better due to how their taste buds work or whatever, it could be cheaper. I mentioned your marxist take in my post. I think it's strange to start with the assumption that it does exist somehow.