Right....so the observable act of choice is...an illusion. It isn't really a choice. Choice is but nature's way of taunting us. So, necessity is what negates free-will? Right. So I need food....I have no choice but to eat. I have no choice over what to eat, or choose to starve myself.
The empirical act of choice is illusory. There's an invisible power, an agency, determining everything...causality. Order....omnipotence? Right? All is ordered....all is going according to a universal plan. Natural selection? Illusion. There is no choice....nothing is selected. All is determined. We do not participate in this determination....we are innocent "victims" of chance? God? Absolute order? The Universe?
So, the fact that I cannot choose to be immortal, or survive without food, means I have no free-will. Got it.
And the "experts" convinced me. No free-will. Holocaust? Why blame the Nazis? Ukraine? Why blame Putin?
It's either/or absolutist logic. Total and complete self-control over actions and choices, or total and complete determination of them. There is no identity. Chocolate and vanilla, like he said. dats it. dats all you get. Nothing more to ya, unless you got a time machine brah, you is fucked.
Satyr Daemon
Gender : Posts : 37196 Join date : 2009-08-24 Age : 58 Location : Hyperborea
Here's the premise: Simplicity....we begin with the bottom, the act.... Not the idea, not the ideal...but the action.
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von wrote:
In the beginning there was the action.
The act of will is observable.....a focus upon an objective Only life has this option - choice. The act of choice is an act of will - this is free to the degree that it can have multiple choices - which is another way of describing power. Now, unless you want to defend the idea that choice is illusory, you can find all the on-line "authorities" you like. I bet you can find "experts" on "Big Foote," and the "Bermuda Triangle"....and many supporting the existence of god. Especially in these times science and philosophy is indoctrinated. Try to find a biologist to defend races.... Yet, evolution is contradicted by the absence of human breeds - races. Try to find one to define 'woman'.....and in time you will be unable to find an economist that can define 'recession'.
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Satyr Daemon
Gender : Posts : 37196 Join date : 2009-08-24 Age : 58 Location : Hyperborea
It's either/or absolutist logic. Total and complete self-control over actions and choices, or total and complete determination of them. There is no identity. Chocolate and vanilla, like he said. dats it. dats all you get. Nothing more to ya, unless you got a time machine brah, you is fucked.
Yeup...they begin with the idea...idealizing it. Converting it to an abstraction that is imagined as an absolute. If you aren't able to choose not to eat, breathe, hydrate....live forever, fly....then you aren't free. See? If not one then nil. If not absolute order, then absolute disorder.
Can you choose not to breathe? Of course not....ergo, you aren't free. See?
Although, it is reported that Diogenes the Cynic died by holding his breath.
I know you can choose not to eat or hydrate and die that way.
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Satyr Daemon
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But what do I know...for reasons entirely rooted in dasein, I do not believe in absolutes - defined as immutable, indivisible, singularities. For my Dasein - because that's how I was raised and I cannot break free form my upbringing (obviously!!!!) - if I don't have absolute freedom doesn't mean I have no freedom.
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Satyr Daemon
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Language has been so corrupted....the mediocre masses are trapped in linguistics. They don't start with the act, but with the word - straight form the bible.
Their having trouble defining what masculinity is....just as they can't define what a 'woman' is. Is it so, fuckin, hard? Amazing? Brainwashed morons.
See why they want to imply that all are brainwashed - that what "subjectivity" means. We are all equally brainwashed by our cultures. Well, no, we aren't. Some can break free from what our parents told us was true. I did. My mother is a, not so fanatical, Christian, and my father was a fanatical Communist/atheist. I am neither.
Some can break free from what our parents told us was true. I did.
But your parents teachings resulted from their wants, which resulted from their physical nature, whereas your physical nature is different and so your wants are different too. Of course your nature will be a mix of your parents genetic inheritance and nurturing/epigenetics. The illusion here is that you believe your choices determined your physical nature/wants (to not be like them), when in fact it is your physical nature which gave rise to your wants and you could not have acted/done otherwise.
"According to Daniel Wegner, for instance, “The experience of willing an act arises from interpreting one’s thought as the cause of the act.” In other words, our sense of making choices or decisions is just an awareness of what the brain has already decided for us. When we become aware of the brain’s actions, we think about them and falsely conclude that our intentions have caused them."
"A man can do what he wants but not want what he wants". - Schopenhauer
Satyr Daemon
Gender : Posts : 37196 Join date : 2009-08-24 Age : 58 Location : Hyperborea
One judged and chooses before he even becomes aware of it. Cultivation - training - is about making this a second-nature, usurping your genetic impulses.
Needs...not wants. Wants can be manufactured., Need = physical Desires = mental Wants - combination of the two.
All make a choice probable, they do not make it certain.
The mind evolved to deal with the novel. That's natural selection. If all is determined there is no need for consciousness above a certain level. Everything would be a program. If A then B. If A + B then C. Novelty, the unforeseeable, is what necessitates free-will.
I did not have different needs/desires from my parents....I have the same to different degrees. Where I differ is circumstances. Different circumstances necessitating adaptation. Understanding, putting knowledge into a model corresponding to reality. Adaptation necessitates some degree of free-will, otherwise it is impossible - unless it is also predetermined and fated. Fatalism is your crutch. Fatalism is how you deal with ...regret....failure...facing the possibility that you may be unfit, weak...not possessing a quality mind. Fate is like sin...the great equalizer.
But chance is part of it. Chaos, is the source of the unforeseeable. We call it chance - luck. The brain is an organ evolved to deal with this. Choice. Choice is how an organism participates in what is being determined ....and like plants, most of it is unconscious.
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Satyr Daemon
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The illusion here is that you believe your choices determined your physical nature/wants (to not be like them), when in fact it is your physical nature which gave rise to your wants and you could not have acted/done otherwise.
Is that what I believe? I never said my choices determined my needs/desires. I said my choice of how to gratify my needs/desires if free to the degree that I have power.
I want a car....to gratify both physical needs (go to work to buy food) and mental desire (explore the city, find a mate to gratify sexual desires)...but I am free to choose how and when and where. My choice determining all future circumstances and the range of my options.
A bad choice, diminishes them; a good choice, multiplies them. My choice - in conjunction with causality - participates in determining my circumstances - to the degree that I have power.
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Satyr Daemon
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I had no choice but to be born. That choice was made for me I had no choice as to what sex or race, or species I am. I could not have been anything other than what I am. I had no choice where, in what culture, what nation, what city, i was born and raised. I had no choice over what beliefs I was force-fed, from birth onward....
But then I did have a choice as I matured, if I were to stay in the same city, in the same nation, believing the same as my parents. I tested their beliefs....and found them wanting. I explored and found more information. I understood what they simply knew.
And I chose otherwise. This choice, this entire process, determined my later options, or participated - to whatever degree - in the determination of my circumstances, and later options.
If not...then why does judgement evolve? Why is there an advantage to a good judgement, making correct choices? Or do you deny this? If so, then why did a brain that could make judgements evolve at all, and how?
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Satyr Daemon
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If there is absolutely no free-will, how does civilization emerge and why? How does a martial artist train himself to react to an unpredictable attack by usurping his natural impulses, replacing them with specific movements - all done unconsciously...without thinking it through...automatically? How can a man commit suicide, overriding every natural instinct in his body/mind?
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Satyr Daemon
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According to Daniel Wegner, for instance, “The experience of willing an act arises from interpreting one’s thought as the cause of the act.” In other words, our sense of making choices or decisions is just an awareness of what the brain has already decided for us. When we become aware of the brain’s actions, we think about them and falsely conclude that our intentions have caused them.
This is the interesting part. Plants have no nervous systems nor any brains. Yet, they act wilfully.
Nervous systems, and brains, evolve much later in evolutionary time...to apply a more efficient form of natural selection- one that is dynamic, reactive, adaptive, in real time. It evolves to usurp the body's automatic impulses and choose otherwise, and/or to focus organic energies more efficiently and hopefully more effectively. Brains offer organisms options - more choices. So big brained animals are more free than plants or less sophisticated life forms.
Yes, the brain has already decided - actually the body itself has already reacted requiring no brain participation -..and the brain can also train itself to automatically decide otherwise...correcting the automatic decision in the past. Brains can learn and gradually gain control - overriding inherited impulses. This is what is called cultivation - civilized man has learned to override - sublimate, repress, control - his natural impulses.
Some can break free from what our parents told us was true. I did.
But your parents teachings resulted from their wants, which resulted from their physical nature, whereas your physical nature is different and so your wants are different too. Of course your nature will be a mix of your parents genetic inheritance and nurturing/epigenetics. The illusion here is that you believe your choices determined your physical nature/wants (to not be like them), when in fact it is your physical nature which gave rise to your wants and you could not have acted/done otherwise.
"According to Daniel Wegner, for instance, “The experience of willing an act arises from interpreting one’s thought as the cause of the act.” In other words, our sense of making choices or decisions is just an awareness of what the brain has already decided for us. When we become aware of the brain’s actions, we think about them and falsely conclude that our intentions have caused them."
"A man can do what he wants but not want what he wants". - Schopenhauer
Is our awareness simply along for the ride accruing experiences, learning, as, for instance, a passenger in the body of a self-driving car?
Satyr Daemon
Gender : Posts : 37196 Join date : 2009-08-24 Age : 58 Location : Hyperborea
That's what he is implying. The confusion is the product of emerging self-awarness.
The part of the mind becoming aware of itself - its body, physicality - is alienated from itself. It assumes that it is a "passenger" witnessing some alien other acting.....when the actions, the body, is itself.
The assumption is that there is a 'self' that acts....when the act is the 'self'. Like in Superstring theory....there is no string that is vibrating; the vibration is all there is. Existence is dynamic....the interactivity is existence - there is no thing that exists....that is dynamic and interactive and becoming aware of itself existing. There is, in fact, no-thing. There is only activity, process - patterned (ordered) or non-patterned (chaotic) energies.
So, choice is not what some-thing other does and you simply become aware of it, after-the-fact....choice is the actor....the actor is the action - the action is choice. Yet, because of the processing time, awareness becomes aware after-the-fact...as if another is acting.
This is why Know thyself is crucial. It is an ongoing process of knowing yourself through your actions....and by knowing yourself you can understand yourself; and when you begin to understand yourself, through your actions, you can control them, i.e., sublimate, redirect, repress, control. This is increasing power over oneself - and power is what increased freedom; freedom of choice; freedom from past - which can reach the levels of self-denialk, nihilism; freedom to choose other than what you have before, or are inclined to. Freedom of the will. Will being the organic focus upon an objective. So, freedom indicates a redirection; a shift of objectives.
We see this in monks that deny their sexual and their self-interests (ego)....redirecting these impulses; sublimating them. Art is such a sublimation of libidinal energies.
If all is determined there is no need for consciousness above a certain level. Everything would be a program. If A then B. If A + B then C. Novelty, the unforeseeable, is what necessitates free-will.
But the brains reactions to the new/unknown will be determined by its present structure, it will not be able to react outside of that.
Quantum teleportation, for example, would theoretically involve creating a perfect copy of you using entangled particles. You would step into a booth here, then in some other distant location a copy of you would be formed in another booth. The version of you here would then be destroyed. In effect you've teleported, although many people would find the prospect of doing this horrifying simply because they still have the quasi-superstitious belief that there is something about us unique when we are in fact just an arrangement of fundamental particles held together by natural forces.
Satyr wrote:
If there is absolutely no free-will, how does civilization emerge and why?
One could ask how does a bird build its nest? It's not taught this. Civilization/culture is an external projection of our inner natures, in some cases in response to needs resulting from environmental conditions, and our responses themselves come from our inner natures (unconscious) not as part of some dynamic involving free will. The world is constantly unfolding according to the laws of physics.
The response to an immediate threat for example will rapidly hasten the response time from the unconscious making it seem to us almost immediate as though it were our choice.
Satyr wrote:
This is why Know thyself is crucial. It is an ongoing process of knowing yourself through your actions....and by knowing yourself you can understand yourself; and when you begin to understand yourself, through your actions, you can control them, i.e., sublimate, redirect, repress, control.
The brain is solid matter, perhaps a good way to envision it is as something like a cauliflower. Once it is formed it does not change its structure. If you are inclined towards knowing your own mind - the causes and motivations - then this is itself due to the structure of your brain. Why some would withdraw from the world and become monks, others become film stars or astronauts, is again down to the structure of their brains (assuming environmental effects remain equal).
Reflective actions would not overwrite (restructure) the brain, but simply be different choices being made by the same brain (a certain amount of plasticity is possible though, where for example the brain tries to repair itself).
To really change the physical structure of the brain intercession would be required in the form of surgery.
Satyr Daemon
Gender : Posts : 37196 Join date : 2009-08-24 Age : 58 Location : Hyperborea
But the brains reactions to the new/unknown will be determined by its present structure, it will not be able to react outside of that.
If it did there would be no leanring...no adaptation, no progress. No need for judgement and choice.
Silas wrote:
Quantum teleportation, for example, would theoretically involve creating a perfect copy of you using entangled particles. You would step into a booth here, then in some other distant location a copy of you would be formed in another booth. The version of you here would then be destroyed. In effect you've teleported, although many people would find the prospect of doing this horrifying simply because they still have the quasi-superstitious belief that there is something about us unique when we are in fact just an arrangement of fundamental particles held together by natural forces.
Don't involve me in nonsense.
Silas wrote:
One could ask how does a bird build its nest?
You never answer questions...you constantly ask. What did i say about DNA and genetics? How does a lamb know to stand immediately after birth? How does a stallion know to mount a mare and insert his penis? I'm not going to repeat myself. If you can't understand....then don't.
Silas wrote:
It's not taught this. Civilization/culture is an external projection of our inner natures, in some cases in response to needs resulting from environmental conditions, and our responses themselves come from our inner natures (unconscious) not as part of some dynamic involving free will. The world is constantly unfolding according to the laws of physics.
Las of physics...logic etc.: manmade based on man's perception of a pattern underlying patterns.
Nature = inherited memories. Nurture = experiential memories , divided into first- and second-hand. Free-will is active in the present, so in the nurture part.
Silas wrote:
The response to an immediate threat for example will rapidly hasten the response time from the unconscious making it seem to us almost immediate as though it were our choice.
A novel threat would necessitate a novel reaction - with no precedent. It would necessitate understanding, or thinking outside the box, in real time. Natural selection - those that cannot perish. Those that can, survive and pas on this ability to the next generation. Ergo prolonged sheltering diminishes this ability...modern man. Those that cannot reject.... those that cannot become objective, claim that all re equally subjective. Those that cannot exhibit free-will, dismiss it altogether.
Silas wrote:
The brain is solid matter, perhaps a good way to envision it is as something like a cauliflower. Once it is formed it does not change its structure. If you are inclined towards knowing your own mind - the causes and motivations - then this is itself due to the structure of your brain. Why some would withdraw from the world and become monks, others become film stars or astronauts, is again down to the structure of their brains (assuming environmental effects remain equal).
The brain, like all is energy. Energy that interacts slowly, relative to the perceiving mind, is interpreted as "solid".
Silas wrote:
Reflective actions would not overwrite (restructure) the brain, but simply be different choices being made by the same brain (a certain amount of plasticity is possible though, where for example the brain tries to repair itself).
Brain structure is dynamic...it is constantly rearranging the neural networks we call memories - knowledge. If it were as immutable as you wish it were we could not learn, nor adapt. We would die unable to adapt to cosmic flux.
Silas wrote:
To really change the physical structure of the brain intercession would be required in the form of surgery.
What? Are you serious? Are you this dense? Are you describing your brain? Rigid. Unable to think artistically. Ha!!!
Yes... Logic = how human thinking harmonizes with human sensual perceptions remaining consistent - non-contradicting. Intelligence = pattern recognition.
A novel threat would necessitate a novel reaction - with no precedent. It would necessitate understanding, or thinking outside the box, in real time. Natural selection - those that cannot perish. Those that can, survive and pas on this ability to the next generation. Ergo prolonged sheltering diminishes this ability...modern man.
Novel threats don't exist. I mean whatever is out in the world has been around for millions of years. Can you give an example of a novel threat without precedent? Evolution has given us the tools to negotiate this world, and the brain performs an extremely powerful adaptive function that replaces the need for further evolution. Life is a continuum so I don't consider natural selection on an individual basis to be that important. It mostly seems to be used to underscore Western society (selfishness) and its culture of atomized individualism.
Satyr wrote:
Brain structure is dynamic...it is constantly rearranging the neural networks we call memories - knowledge. If it were as immutable as you wish it were we could not learn, nor adapt. We would die unable to adapt to cosmic flux.
We do learn mostly during the brains growth period as its networks are forming. But 'constantly rearranging' after that and later in life seems a bit of a stretch. Because of its complexity - and that we become familiar with our environment during growth - it has learned how to respond to pretty much all threats already. Plasticity declines with age, and old memories must make way for new. So no it's not entirely immutable, but far less than during our younger years.
The cosmos is not really fluxing that much. Science has made incredibly accurate predictions about how it will be billions of years from now.
Satyr Daemon
Gender : Posts : 37196 Join date : 2009-08-24 Age : 58 Location : Hyperborea
Novel threats don't exist. I mean whatever is out in the world has been around for millions of years. Can you give an example of a novel threat without precedent?
Nihilism. Nuclear power. Space Travel. Low Gravity environments. Space radiation. Meteorites. Relativity. Internet dumbing-down. Obesity is a relatively new threat. Sheltering...related to obesity. Race and gender awareness - that one is causing quite a stir among the mediocre. Transsexuality - related to the previous. The mind/body confusion resulting in sexual dysphoria. Self-awareness producing morons, like you, confused between the abstract and the real.
You seem baffled by most of these...or did you read the solution in a book? Any "experts" out there offering you solutions?
Every individual has an infinitude of threats he is not expecting, and has no experience with. Otherwise, naïve dolt, there would be no progress, no evolution.
You mistake the collective knowledge of humanity as your personal exprience.....as I said, dolt, first....and second hand experiences. Second-hand means knowledge of the ages, collected and shared linguistically.
Silas wrote:
Evolution has given us the tools to negotiate this world, and the brain performs an extremely powerful adaptive function that replaces the need for further evolution. Life is a continuum so I don't consider natural selection on an individual basis to be that important. It mostly seems to be used to underscore Western society (selfishness) and its culture of atomized individualism.
So, you are the all knowing sage I've heard about. You've reached the pinnacle of existence...you are prepared for everything.
Has evolution reached its end....like some morons claim philosophy has reached its end? If so....are you the "last man"?
Silas wrote:
We do learn mostly during the brains growth period as its networks are forming.
No shit? Really?
Silas wrote:
But 'constantly rearranging' after that and later in life seems a bit of a stretch. Because of its complexity - and that we become familiar with our environment during growth - it has learned how to respond to pretty much all threats already. Plasticity declines with age, and old memories must make way for new. So no it's not entirely immutable, but far less than during our younger years.
Your sheltering confuses collective understanding and knowledge for personal understanding and knowledge. You've stopped learning, and are now outsourcing your thinking. Congratulations, you are a moron, and darn proud of it, it seems. I bet you wait for some expert to tell you what to think next....like you do for god's divine inspiration.
Have I not said: God = Humanity; Humanity = God. I have...and you did not understand. No "experts" to decipher it for ya. So, you simply dismissed it and returned to what you were told from other authority sources...those that offer you a more flattering, more comforting, perspective..
Silas wrote:
The cosmos is not really fluxing that much. Science has made incredibly accurate predictions about how it will be billions of years from now.
see...you understood nothing. Retard....by flux did I mean change occurs at a rate that no patterns persist over long periods of time - relative to human and civilizational lifespans? No! I didn't. I gave you the benefit of assuming you were above average IQ...but I gambled against the odds, and you are a member of the mediocre multitudes.
now, I will begin treating you as a child....that you are. So, here I go.... No sweetie...change does not occurs at a rate that no knowledge and no understanding is possible. It's obvious that technologies and philosophies prove that some patterns hold true for space/time spans that greatly exceed the duration of a human lifespan or a civilization...which is no more than 2.5 thousand year....not much, huh sweetie? Little boy - you are a boy aren't ya? - 10 000 years is nothing compared to cosmic time, so, obviously, my child, understanding - patterns underlying patterns - may hold true for millions or billions of earth years. So, don't worry, mommy and daddy will tell you how to take care of yourself and what do do, alright? Now run along and play with your little buddies. i know of a playground or two. ILP. Have you heard of it? I'm sure you have. I think you went to school, there.
Yes... Logic = how human thinking harmonizes with human sensual perceptions remaining consistent - non-contradicting. Intelligence = pattern recognition.
Patterns represent intelligent design.
Satyr Daemon
Gender : Posts : 37196 Join date : 2009-08-24 Age : 58 Location : Hyperborea
You already know the 'truth'....what remains, for you, is proving it. That's the only reason you are here. You work backwards. But, you belong to a majority.
Only the truth matters, not at how it is arrived. Unlike you, I’m still searching for dots to connect.
Yes...you've found the "truth"....absolute truth...final truth. Now you must connect the dots...exactly. Ass backwards.
Like building a house by starting with the roof. Roof floating in space....detached from the earth. Free from gravity.... How can I connect this floating roof, in my mind, to this earth, outside my mind? Dilemmas. Good luck with that.
You can do what ya'll always do....build a mental house in your mind - a fantasy home. There, no skill is required. No alignment. No reality to limit your fantasy. I've built entire cities like that....empires. It's fun.
Only the truth matters, not at how it is arrived. Unlike you, I’m still searching for dots to connect.
Yes...you've found the "truth"....absolute truth...final truth. Now you must connect the dots...exactly. Ass backwards.
Like building a house by starting with the roof. Roof floating in space....detached from the earth. Free from gravity.... How can I connect this floating roof, in my mind, to this earth, outside my mind? Dilemmas. Good luck with that.
You can do what ya'll always do....build a mental house in your mind - a fantasy home. There, no skill is required. No alignment. No reality to limit your fantasy. I've built entire cities like that....empires. It's fun.
There is absolute truth but I don’t know what it is. At least, I’m looking while you wait for science to make it into a math equation.
Satyr Daemon
Gender : Posts : 37196 Join date : 2009-08-24 Age : 58 Location : Hyperborea
But you do know it, dear. Why so humble? You know absolute truth. You just can't justify or prove it. You come here hoping to find a connector for your established dolts.
I can't help you. I live in reality. I explore reality. You live in your head.
