Misty wrote:What exactly is Free Will??

I have never understood the idea that 'individuals' truly have free will. We are born without our permission, carried by the current of life of which most is out of my control, die without my permission at a time I do not get to choose. I sometimes choose things in my life but they are all choices governed by other limitations and circumstances also not my choice. So free will in my opinion is a myth fostered by whatever controls humans, and includes humans controlling other humans.

What say you?

My understanding of "free will" is based upon my understanding of how I've been put together. I see myself as a tripartite entity consisting of spirit, mind and body. A computer is a bipartite entity consisting of a mind (CPU) and a body (the entire collection of all physical components including CPU). The computer has no power to determine its own course, it just does what it is told to do. This appears to be how you see yourself, "I sometimes choose things in my life but they are all choices governed by other limitations and circumstances also not my choice."

The third aspect of my being, my spirit, elevates me above the level of a computer. I have the capacity to determine whether or not I approve of my programming and I can choose the software that determines the sort of activity I will pursue, which is how I express my free will.

Cheers, enegue.

Misty wrote:True free will would be free - unlimited - self disciplined - without fault - or would personal free will get in the way of fellow humans? True free will would give humans the power to correct all wrongs in our world, instead we are trying to blow ourselves up!

Free will allows you to choose whether or not you are content with your genetic programming. Are you happy with your genetic programming? If you are, then there will be no reason for you to change it. If you aren't, you will not rest until you have exhausted all means to do so.

Assuming you are a person who doesn't believe in the existence of the spiritual aspect of your being, put a dot on a piece of paper and label it, "me". Put other dots at points some distance from "me" and label them according to the things you personally strive for. Ask yourself, "Why do I want to take hold of these things?" Your genetic wiring is responsible for the answer to that question. In the absence of an external influence, you have no power to act outside that wiring, you are held in a state of captivity, as you have already indicated about yourself.

In physics, the term "inertia" refers to a body's resistance to movement - a body will remain at rest or continue on a linear path unless it is acted upon by an external force. People are as subject to this law as are all other bodies in the universe. However, people differ from other bodies in regard to their capacity for free will. Free will is a person's capacity to take a step of "faith", a step that takes them from their state of inertia towards a dot that doesn't yet exist on their piece of paper. They can't put it there because they don't know it exists, hence the need for an external influence, a third party.

The alternative dots, the ones a person never knew previously existed as possible goals to strive for, are not put on the piece of paper by the third party, they are put there by the person themselves as something they now consider worthy of pursuit. The third party merely presents the alternative possibilities, a person's free will compels them to conclude, "I WANT TO" or "I don't WANT TO" pursue them, regardless of the evidence. "Evidence", they come to realise, is subject to their genetic wiring anyway and constrains them to only ever see what they WANT TO see.

Cheers, enegue.

Hi, Misty.

I live in the city of Newcastle on the NSW coast, 150 km north of Sydney. I look forward to reading your comments.

Cheers, enegue

Hi, Misty.

What do you want to do that you are not free to do?

Cheers, enegue

Misty,

If you are not just blowing hot air, please answer my question!

What do you want to do that you are not free to do?

Cheers, enegue

Misty wrote:I think I would like to know what exactly happened to my first child said to have died.

Free will is the free exercise of choice, so you can choose to do what is necessary now in order to guarantee access to God when you exit this life, or you can choose not to bother and never be any the wiser. Can you see how free will works?

Misty wrote:I would like to be rich and feed all the hungry.

You don't need to be rich to feed the hungry. Just rethink what you are doing with what you currently have and use your free will to CHOOSE to give more of it to those in need. You don't have to feed ALL the hungry, just start with the ones who come to you immediate attention.

Misty wrote:I would like enough arms to hug all who need it.

Same as the last point. You don't need to hug everyone. Why not CHOOSE some of those who you currently stuggle to WANT TO to hug. You know, the ones whose personalities rub you the wrong way. Family members who you have fallen out with can often be in great need of hugs.

Misty wrote:I would like all the answers to all of my questions.

You can always CHOOSE to exercise faith that all your questions will have answers if you WANT TO be part of God's family.

Misty wrote:I would like perfect love in my personal life and in this world.

You can exercise your free will to CHOOSE to be reconnected to God or CHOOSE to stay disconnected.

Misty wrote:I would like to meet Jesus (and Elvis)

Again, this requires the exercise of your free will in regard to faith. You will either CHOOSE to enter God's kingdom through Jesus and believe his promise that you will live again, or CHOOSE not to bother.

Misty wrote:Yes, if were in prison I could think about breaking out, but if I had free will in the first place I would not be in prison.

I think you have the wrong idea about free will, Misty. The exercise of free will is what gets people into prision. However, if you found yourself there, then you could choose to exercise your free will in regard to how you spend your time, who you would connect with, what you could do about your future once you have served your sentence, etc.

Misty wrote:No, I did not say we do not have free will because we poop, but that it is programmed into our systems, so we poop when our systems determines and alerts us.

Yes, pooping is a programmed necessity, but there is still much room for the exercise of free will in regard to pooping. People exercise their free will in terms of the condition of the toilet when they have finished their poop, CHOOSING to clean up the mess they create in the bowl, or CHOOSING to leave it for some else to do. You can also CHOOSE to wash your hands, or not bother.

Misty wrote:I would not choose to be programmed to die- would you? True free will would be unrestricted not confined and limited.

Seeing that I was not born perfect, there are aspects of my genetic wiring that require a degree of stuggle to keep under control. My free will allows me to CHOOSE to engage in that struggle or not to. I CHOOSE to engage in the struggle because God tells me it is of greater long term profit than not struggling and I choose to TRUST God's wisdom. The exercise my free will also allows me to TRUST that dying will bring me into a future state of existence without the need of such struggle.

TRUST does not exist in the absence of free will.

Cheers, enegue

James195101 wrote:Sometimes I find that considering non-humans removes a little of the mist. An amoeba is a single-celled animal that survives by enveloping food, and reproducing asexually. In doing this, it demonstrates as much free will as we have. However it cannot sit back and debate whether or not it is exercising free will. Free will is a property of all living organisms. Rocks etc. do not have free will. Free will is the ability to move to effect your immediate environment. It does not mean you are exempt from the laws of nature, but it does mean that you can use the laws of nature for your benefit.

I agree with your last sentence, James. Misty seems to think that free will is the same as freedom from consequence. However, as you say we are not exempt from the laws of nature.

Every choice we make creates a branch in the chain of events that makes up our life journey, and we are not prevented in any way from choosing from any of the options available to us at any instant. God tells us that one of the options available to us is to keep his commandments, which he promises will lead to abundant life. No-one is unable to exercise their free will to put him to the test.

In regard to amoeba, I don't believe they have the same capacity to choose the type of response to a stimulus that we do. For example, do you imagine them able to respond to a stimulus with anger, surprise, joy, amusement, or indifference?

Cheers, enegue

Misty wrote:Can't stand on your own two feet so you talk about me instead of to me! Your choice but a silly one.

You appear to be annoyed that I used your name in my last post to James. Your suggestion I can't stand on my own two feet implies that you believe I am trying to enlist his aid against you somehow. What if I were to reassure you that your name only came into my mind because, as I was reading James' post, it just struck me that your understanding of "free will" is what I would refer to as "freedom from consequence"? I can only guess that your past experience on forums has rendered you a little sensitive to the use of your name.

BTW, not all my comments regarding your suggestions were the same. A number had to do with faith, because only a couple of all your suggestions were related to DOING, most of them were related to KNOWING. The two that were related to DOING, i.e. giving to the poor and giving hugs, I gave some down to earth practical alternatives to your grand suggestions. Do you understand that you are always free to be a small participant in a grand venture - if you can't give money, give your time. Look at this amazing organization - ChildFund International.

What about a comment concerning this statement? Every choice we make creates a branch in the chain of events that makes up our life journey, and we are not prevented in any way from choosing from any of the options available to us at any instant.

Cheers, enegue

Misty wrote:The idea of free will is not the same as freedom of consequence

If you believe this is so, why did you give the example of the head on collision with the truck? Because you want to be free from consequences. You don't understand that being hit by the truck before you could effect your decision, in no way affected your freedom to make the decision. You seem to believe the possibility of being hit by a truck needs to be removed in order for you to have free will. Consideration of consequences is at the core of what free will is all about. What are the chances of being it by a truck anyway? According to this insurance site, the chances are 1 in 200, which means it's highly unlikely that the exercise of your free would ever be thwarted in such a way.

You say, "A baby has no free will but trusts it will be fed if it cries.", but I have to ask, do you honestly think of yourself as a baby? Whether or not a baby has free will is not material to whether you have free will. It's irrelevant. Your desperation to prove you have no free will suggests you are tying to convince someone that you are not responsible for what you do. Maybe you are establishing a case for your defence before God, eh? I really don't think that will work, Misty. The things you do are the things that you WANT TO do: i.e, the things you FREELY CHOOSE TO DO.

Misty wrote:The phrase 'free will' is not in the bible

So, when God says through Moses:
I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, [that] I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:
Deuteronomy 30:19

He was addressing a bunch of robots and asking them to perform a task that was not in their programming? Like God created a bunch of red lights and told them that life would be theirs only if they chose to shine green. Come on, Misty!

Misty wrote:Your question was -what did I want to do that I do not feel free to do - followed with a hostile post #178. You assumed I don't DO the things within my limitations by giving me a list of things I can do which were on a smaller scale than my list to you. Did you expect me to give you a list of things I could do?

No, but responding with, "I would like to be rich and feed all the hungry" is unrelated to free will because it's not one of the options you can choose. If you DID have enough money to feed ALL the poor, then you could exercise your free will to do so or not to do so, but you don't so I made a suggestion that was within your grasp.

Free will is seen best in situations where you are asked to do something or asked not to do something - "Please place trash in the bins provided! or "Please don't walk on the grass!"

Rules!!!!

Cheers,
enegue

chazwyman wrote:There is plenty that you might want to do that you cannot, such as fly.

You can fly in many ways if you want to: balloon, hang gliding, aeroplane, etc. If you want to do these things you will take steps to make it happen, which is the differnce between WISHING TO and WANTING TO.

The laws of physics don't prevent us from flying, they actually make it possible. If it hadn't been for the pioneers of flight who took the risks to pursue the impossible, we would still be bound to terra firma. Free will enables us to push the boundaries.

chazwyman wrote:Sadly we are bound by the laws of physics to be able to do that which we are capable of. As this is well understood on the human level the myth makers that insist that our will is 'free' fail to imply this necessity to the level of the conscious brain. They assume that, in some way, the brain is capable of foregoing the necessity of cause and effect so that our actions someone do not need to comply with physics.

If you truly believe you are not free, chaz, it's because you are ignorant of the options open to you or because you simply choose to be bound. Continued discussion can remedy the first problem, but you alone hold the key to the second.

chazwyman wrote:As Shop says' "we can do as we will, but we cannot will as we will. " Our will is determined, and it is who we are. To suggest free will is to suggest that we might escape ourselves.

God, through Jesus Christ, enables us to escape ourselves.

Cheers,
enegue

chazwyman wrote:A key problem with any proof of God, that nothing comes form nothing, will also involve the question, where does God come from. As early as Aristotle this problem has a rather unsatisfactory solution. (1)There is motion in the world; (2) this motion was caused by something else; (3) if everything there is were caused to move by something else there would be an infinite cause of things, which is absurd, (4) Therefore there must have been something that caused the first thing; (5) this first thing is God. However this is unsatisfactory because God is an exception to (2).

But God doesn't MOVE, chaz. He IS.

Cheers,
enegue

chazwyman wrote:
You are missing the point completely. The Universe "IS", so why offer a further complication?

No, chaz. I understand what you are saying, but your picture is too small.

The universe consists of bodies of matter (collections of coherent atoms) that occupy positions in space. All these bodies are moving. I am a body of matter, and as such I can move from point A in space to point B. God is not a body of matter who occupies a position in space, so he doesn't have to move. He IS at point A and also IS at point B. Even though you don't believe God exists, I'm sure you can grasp the concept.

Cheers,
enegue

Wooden shoe wrote:So seeing that you know so well what God consists of Enegue... When next you talk to God, ask him for us as we do not have his number.

It's not a mystery, Wooden shoe. Jesus tells us clearly what God is:

God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.
John 4:24

The best the author of John could do to represent the notion of God is given to us as the Greek word "pneuma", which, in this context, means: "an essence, devoid of all or at least all grosser matter, and possessed of the power of knowing, desiring, deciding, and acting."

BTW, you do have God's number, you simply choose not to call.

Cheers,
enegue