What does "will" mean?

[Papus79]

Will's one of those things where I see that we receive it from outside - ie. our internal hungers for x, y, or z, etc. that you could plot on Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs as well as the pressures and complexities that we take on from the nature of our social environments. Seems like for most of our lives we're in an effort to tune, modify, and cultivate the way our various lines of will surface, how we'll socially mediate the, how we'll internally mediate them, and we do a heck of a lot of sublimating as well - ie. there are plenty of times where you'll feel a strong will do one thing, it won't be appropriate to the situation, so you figure out how to exchange the currency for something you can apply it to.

I really have to posit the roots of will as evolutionary because the growth of bodies seems to be a mutual benefit situation and with moving bodies that benefit would seem to come through focused agency. As for Free Will, whether it would make me friends here or not, I have to side with the Sam Harris camp for reasons that seem even more obvious to me than whether or not we make our decisions 5 or 7 seconds after our brains process them - ie. we're in a structure of time where ultimately only one outcome or branch of outcomes is real with everything considered and there's no way to rewind time, play it 1, 10, 10,000, or a trillion tmes over and expect a prior state to lead to a different result. The implication of that last part is that our lives from birth to death are probably frozen in the same way they would be if they were recorded on DVD or Blu-Ray (random background flux of the universe also being something where it interjects where it does and, perhaps for my own lack of creativity, I can't think of how an experiment could prove that it's really random rather than complex to the point of chaotic appearance). I think for pragmatic reasons we're forced to admit that we're agents for the forces that come out of us and, if we do something grossly negligent and some type of tort or even tort plus punitive damages need to be levied that there's no one else for those damages to be levied against other than ourselves.

[Spraticus]

Mgrinder wrote….

“The same could be said of science. You are waving the magic wand of science at the hard problem. That doesn't make it go away. I have conscious experiences of qualia. Explain why. What are they, what do they do in nature? Why don't they not exist? How do they relate to the rest of nature, like mass, and charge, etc.? Waving the magic wand of science is a good idea to try, but it doesn't seem to work at all, and probably won't work in the future...”

No. The same cannot be said of science. Science offers hyptheses to explain how things might work, and then examines these and looks for evidence. It has already produced a lot of evidence for how the brain might work and the proposals for accounts of consciousness are based on substantial evidence. Followers of Chalmers on the other hand just keep saying “that doesn’t solve the hard problem,” without ever offering any proposals for how it might work. Their objections, when they do contain some specific claim, fail to match up even with the observations you can make by serious introspection.


Gertie wrote….

“The first one is can conscious brains somehow interfere with physical cause and effect? If I decide to raise my arm now, it goes up. Is that because I made a mental decision, then willed it? Or is that just a story I tell myself, when in fact it's an inevitable part of a physical causal chain I'm not aware of?”

If conscious brains can’t produce physical cause and effect how on earth am I managing to type this?
The second part is nearer. If you said that you had decided to raise your arm but it stayed still we would have to look for another explanation such as that you were lying, or you’d had a stroke and couldn’t, or that you had changed your mind and not let on. You don’t need the “will” part of the explanation; genuinely deciding to raise your arm, in a situation where you are honest and capable, will result in your arm going up. You don’t decide to do it and then separately will to do it. You might decide to do it in a moment or two but the second decision isn’t any different from the first; first you decide to raise it in a moment and second you decide, “now.” Inserting a second process, the act of willing, is giving two names to a single process.


“Then there's the psychological issue. If you allow that it's mental desires, reasoning, etc which motivate behaviour, and mental willing which somehow causes my arm to go up, then how free am I to make choices, bearing in mind psychological issues resulting from genetics, previous experience, etc, which has helped mould my fears and desires.”

I would rewrite that as…...
Then there's the psychological issue. Because it's mental desires, reasoning, etc which motivate behaviour, and mental willing ,which somehow causes my arm to go up, I am free to make choices, because psychological issues resulting from genetics, previous experience, etc, have helped mould my fears and desires and makes these choices mine.

[Gertie]

Gertie wrote….

“The first one is can conscious brains somehow interfere with physical cause and effect? If I decide to raise my arm now, it goes up. Is that because I made a mental decision, then willed it? Or is that just a story I tell myself, when in fact it's an inevitable part of a physical causal chain I'm not aware of?”

If conscious brains can’t produce physical cause and effect how on earth am I managing to type this?

As I said, the alternative is it's all accounted for by physical causation.

You assert mental causation exists, and that it's not what Chalmers would call a hard problem - so explain it. What's the science of mental causation? What are the laws, the mechanism...?

[Fooloso4]

Gertie:

The first one is can conscious brains somehow interfere with physical cause and effect?

I am not sure that this is an accurate description of what is going on. Part of the problem may have to do with the concept of cause and effect. See for example:

If I decide to raise my arm now, it goes up. Is that because I made a mental decision, then willed it? Or is that just a story I tell myself, when in fact it's an inevitable part of a physical causal chain I'm not aware of?

They may both stories you tell yourself - a story about will and a story about a temporal, sequential causal chain. If I decide to raise my arm is that decision an act of will that causes another act of will that causes me to raise my arm? I might think: "I will my arm to rise" and yet nothing happens no matter how much I say to myself "raise your arm". Why not? Perhaps because I am not actually doing anything other than having that thought, willing without acting. My moving my arm is not an act of will but simply an act, something I do.

If I raise my arm to reach for something on the shelf, is that because I decided to raise my arm or because I decided I wanted something on the shelf or because I decided that I wanted something on the shelf and then decided I had to raise my arm to get it? Or perhaps there is no deciding or willing to raise my arm at all. I might just reach for what I want.

I may decide to go for a walk but I do not decide to put one foot in front of the other or will one foot in front of the other. If I suffered an injury, however, I might have to will my leg to move. But this does not mean that there is something in me called the will that causes the leg to move. It is rather like any physical skill I learn, a matter of attention and intention. Once a skill is mastered, however, conscious attention to what I am doing can interfere with my body doing what it knows how to do. There is a good deal of discussion about this with regard to performance in music and sports.

[Jutfrank]

Putting aside the question of whether or not we have "free will" for the moment, what is our "will" itself? What does the word "will" mean?

In the masterful The World as Will and Representation, Schopenhauer crafts his own meaning of will.

If I understand him correctly, what he means by will (on a human level) is that which gives us: an explanation by the subject of its experience as an object among objects.

That is to say that when, for example, we see a tiger coming at us from behind a bush, and as a result we choose to run away, will is what explains why we run away.

As humans, we have a subjective experience (an awareness) of our own bodies as objects. Will provides us with a meaning for what we do and shows us "the inner mechanism of our being, our actions, our movements."

To explain why I just got up out of bed and made myself a peanut butter sandwich, I say to myself, "Well, that's because I wanted to do it -- I was hungry."

[Gertie]

Gertie:

The first one is can conscious brains somehow interfere with physical cause and effect?

I am not sure that this is an accurate description of what is going on. Part of the problem may have to do with the concept of cause and effect. See for example:

If I decide to raise my arm now, it goes up. Is that because I made a mental decision, then willed it? Or is that just a story I tell myself, when in fact it's an inevitable part of a physical causal chain I'm not aware of?

They may both stories you tell yourself - a story about will and a story about a temporal, sequential causal chain. If I decide to raise my arm is that decision an act of will that causes another act of will that causes me to raise my arm? I might think: "I will my arm to rise" and yet nothing happens no matter how much I say to myself "raise your arm". Why not? Perhaps because I am not actually doing anything other than having that thought, willing without acting. My moving my arm is not an act of will but simply an act, something I do.

If I raise my arm to reach for something on the shelf, is that because I decided to raise my arm or because I decided I wanted something on the shelf or because I decided that I wanted something on the shelf and then decided I had to raise my arm to get it? Or perhaps there is no deciding or willing to raise my arm at all. I might just reach for what I want.

I may decide to go for a walk but I do not decide to put one foot in front of the other or will one foot in front of the other. If I suffered an injury, however, I might have to will my leg to move. But this does not mean that there is something in me called the will that causes the leg to move. It is rather like any physical skill I learn, a matter of attention and intention. Once a skill is mastered, however, conscious attention to what I am doing can interfere with my body doing what it knows how to do. There is a good deal of discussion about this with regard to performance in music and sports.

(Sean Carroll makes my brain hurt!)

I'd say the sort of issues you mention are the types of questions neuroscience should eventually be able to sort out, and I expect we will have to abandon some of our folk psychology intuitions and language when we have a better understanding of the mechanics of how brains work.

But the initial hurdle I referred to regarding the possibility of mental causation in principle, requires a different, more fundamental explanation about the relationship between the mental and physical. Some people like Dennett disagree, and say that by explaining the physical processes you have explained everything. And you get phrases like' the mental is the physical', or 'mind is what the brain does',, or 'consciousness is an illusion' given as explanation by people who find Dennett persuasive. And trying to pin down what people who say that actually mean can be a struggle. Because, imo, Dennett obfuscates, very skillfully and elegantly, with beguiling prose and attractive distractions about language and wotnot, but doesn't give people solid coherent arguments to take away.

I don't accept one line summaries like that as an explanation, even if they're onto something, they're not explanatory. For example it doesn't explain why my heart or digestive system don't give rise to mental experience. The physical processes of brains and hearts and alimentary canals can all be explained in scientific terms. That scientific explanation doesn't include mental experience arising, or having a causal role in terms of psychological desires, fears, etc in my behaviour via brain processes.

So my position is that without an explanation for the relationship between the mental and physical, we don't really know what mental causation really means, or if it's possible. It might be that the physical processes from a photon hitting an orange, then my eyeball, then causing reactions in my visual system, then causing a complex web of electrochemical reactions in my neurons, then in my motor systems completely accounts for my hand reaching out and grabbing the orange - no mental input required. Our current understanding of physics would suggest it does. But we intuitively feel that (some of) our actions are directed by our desires and mental choices, and it's hard to understand why we'd evolve a useful mental reward system apparently tuned for utility, if it's actually useless. So... it's an open question imo.

[Fooloso4]

Gertie:

But the initial hurdle I referred to regarding the possibility of mental causation in principle, requires a different, more fundamental explanation about the relationship between the mental and physical.

Yes, I understand that. But a) that explanation may require changes to the notion of mental causation, which may include changes to our understanding of causation in general, and whether what we call causation is always a matter of causal relations, as well as our understanding of the mental and physical, and b) whether the concept of will is a necessary component or just muddies the waters or even sends us looking in the wrong direction.

So... it's an open question imo.

It's a lot of open questions imo.

[Mgrinder]

Mgrinder wrote….

“The same could be said of science. You are waving the magic wand of science at the hard problem. That doesn't make it go away. I have conscious experiences of qualia. Explain why. What are they, what do they do in nature? Why don't they not exist? How do they relate to the rest of nature, like mass, and charge, etc.? Waving the magic wand of science is a good idea to try, but it doesn't seem to work at all, and probably won't work in the future...”

No. The same cannot be said of science. Science offers hyptheses to explain how things might work, and then examines these and looks for evidence. It has already produced a lot of evidence for how the brain might work and the proposals for accounts of consciousness are based on substantial evidence. Followers of Chalmers on the other hand just keep saying “that doesn’t solve the hard problem,” without ever offering any proposals for how it might work. Their objections, when they do contain some specific claim, fail to match up even with the observations you can make by serious introspection.

I agree with Chalmers, and here is what I came up with. IT's sort of like science, maybe it is, seems testable, at the same time, it challenges all of physics, but in a nice way...

[Gertie]

Fooloso

But the initial hurdle I referred to regarding the possibility of mental causation in principle, requires a different, more fundamental explanation about the relationship between the mental and physical.

Yes, I understand that. But a) that explanation may require changes to the notion of mental causation, which may include changes to our understanding of causation in general, and whether what we call causation is always a matter of causal relations, as well as our understanding of the mental and physical, and b) whether the concept of will is a necessary component or just muddies the waters or even sends us looking in the wrong direction.

Could be.

They may both stories you tell yourself - a story about will and a story about a temporal, sequential causal chain.

Yeah I think we create coherent models of the world and of ourselves, to help us navigate the world - make predictions, plan, assume consequences - assuming mental states have some role in our behaviour. Physics, cause and effect, is a model which helps us do this, because it works. I doubt that's the whole picture tho. And consciousness has no place in that scientific model, which pretty much tells us it's incomplete. Some kind of monism could potentially rescue us from all the confusion, which is partly why it's so popular, but just asserting it because it makes things more comprehensible, tells a more coherent story, isn't enough.

On the experimental front, Libet and some successors' work suggests at least some of our decisions are made unconsciously before we're aware we've made them, tho these findings are controversial. And I don't know if you're familiar with split brain experiments, but they are hinting that our linguistic explanations (when we tell others - and perhaps when we tell ourselves?) might be post hoc rationalisations of the outcome of the complex unconscious interactions between the brain's specialised, but entwined, systems. The split brain experiments are worth checking out anyway, because they're fascinating. Here's an intro

[RJG]

“I am my will” is an oxymoronic statement. For who does this “my” refer to? Does it refer to the “I”, or someone else?

Are “I” and “will” one-in-the-same thing, or two things?? ...or is “will” a possession of “I” (as in my house, my car, my dog, etc.)?

The will is a subset of "I". A part of "me".

Okay, so then “will” and “I” are two different things; one being a part of the other (...as an apple is to a bowl of fruit). Now what about “thoughts”, …are thoughts also a part of me; (part of the “I”)?

You seem to propose that Thoughts determine/cause/control the Will that then determine/cause/control the Body’s actions. In other words T>W>B. Is this your position?

Also, does the “I” itself do anything? ...or is the “I” just the container of the parts (...as is the 'bowl' to all the fruit)?

[Mgrinder]

“I am my will” is an oxymoronic statement. For who does this “my” refer to? Does it refer to the “I”, or someone else?

Are “I” and “will” one-in-the-same thing, or two things?? ...or is “will” a possession of “I” (as in my house, my car, my dog, etc.)?

The will is a subset of "I". A part of "me".

Okay, so then “will” and “I” are two different things; one being a part of the other (...as an apple is to a bowl of fruit). Now what about “thoughts”, …are thoughts also a part of me; (part of the “I”)?

I think so, my body is part of me too. I contain multitudes.

You seem to propose that Thoughts determine/cause/control the Will that then determine/cause/control the Body’s actions. In other words T>W>B. Is this your position?

No, not really. What I will for can be determined by thoughts (I would bet, if my thoughts could be read) or predicted by my thoughts. But they do not determine my will. My will is the determining thing.

It's like the conservation of momentum. You can predict, using the conservation of momentum, what the velocities of billiard balls will be before they collide. If you measure well and do the math well, you will be right for after the collision. You can determine what will happen, but you are not the determining thing. You are not the thing that caused momentum to be conserved, nature is. The causal thing is whatever is behind the conservation of momentum is in reality, not your prediction.

Also, does the “I” itself do anything? ...or is the “I” just the container of the parts (...as is the 'bowl' to all the fruit)?

Seems to me that language uses it sometimes as a "container" (I had a thought (bowl of fruit has an apple)), sometimes language uses it as the equivalent to the will (I decided). I become my will when I decide. Am I my awareness? Do I become my awareness when i get aware?...(I saw the dog) It's a fairly confusing concept... Nevertheless, I do things. I am my will. I also see things, I see dogs. I am my awareness. I also have feelings (container). I have parts. I am my body too, I have hands.

The real issue is: is there something that translates thoughts into actions? Yes. Do I have the right to claim that the local aspect of this universal phenomenon is a part of "me"? I have as much right as you do to claim that the local part of the universal phenomenon of awareness (your awareness) of things is a part of "you". The "I" concept is a red herring. The real issue is about causation. Do thoughts have any causal relation to action? Yes. Therefore the will is a determining thing. I am a determining thing.

[RJG]

Okay, so then “will” and “I” are two different things; one being a part of the other (...as an ‘apple’ is to a bowl of fruit). Now what about “thoughts”, …are thoughts also a part of me; (part of the “I”)?

I think so, my body is part of me too. I contain multitudes.

So now we have Thoughts, Will, and Body which are all parts of “I”. ...Okay, I don't necessarily disagree.

Also, does the “I” itself do anything? ...or is the “I” just the container of the parts (...as is the 'bowl' to all the fruit)?

Seems to me that language uses it sometimes as a "container" (I had a thought (bowl of fruit has an apple)), sometimes language uses it as the equivalent to the will (I decided). I become my will when I decide. Am I my awareness? Do I become my awareness when i get aware?...(I saw the dog) It's a fairly confusing concept... Nevertheless, I do things. I am my will. I also see things, I see dogs. I am my awareness. I also have feelings (container). I have parts. I am my body too, I have hands.

The "I" concept is a red herring.

So then you (seem to) agree, that the “I” does nothing, and is nothing, in-of-itself. The “I” is just an arbitrary label that we assign to one our active parts (thoughts/will/body/etc), purely for convenience and conversation/language sake.

In other words, there is no distinct “I” entity, …there are only the parts (thoughts/will/body/etc) that we sometimes call, or associate as, “I”.

Agreed?

The real issue is: is there something that translates thoughts into actions? Yes.

Why do you say “Yes”??? --- It seems much more obvious to me that, we DO as we ‘feel’ or ‘want’, more than we DO as we ‘think’.

You seem to propose that Thoughts determine/cause/control the Will that then determine/cause/control the Body’s actions. In other words T>W>B. Is this your position?

No, not really.

It's like the conservation of momentum. You can predict, using the conservation of momentum, what the velocities of billiard balls will be before they collide. If you measure well and do the math well, you will be right for after the collision. You can determine what will happen, but you are not the determining thing. You are not the thing that caused momentum to be conserved, nature is. The causal thing is whatever is behind the conservation of momentum is in reality, not your prediction.

So now you seem to be saying 1) Thoughts DO NOT have ‘causal’ power, 2) Thoughts can only predict the (re)actions, not cause them, and 3) it is the Will that is the ‘causal’ power (the “determiner”) behind our bodily actions.

Did I interpret you correctly?

What I will for can be determined by thoughts (I would bet, if my thoughts could be read) or predicted by my thoughts. But they do not determine my will. My will is the determining thing.

Here is less clear. In the first sentence, you seem to be saying that the Will can be determined by Thoughts. Or simply put, Thoughts determine the Will. But then in the second sentence you seem to directly contradict what you just said with “But they do not determine my will.”

Which is it? What is the relationship of Thoughts to the Will? Who controls/determines who?

The real issue is about causation. Do thoughts have any causal relation to action? Yes.

Huh??? Previously you said T>W>B (Thoughts determine Will which determines Bodily Actions) was NOT correct, but now you (seem to be) saying it is. ??? So how do Thoughts have a causal relationship to Action? What is the mechanism/connecting parts that make it so?

Therefore the will is a determining thing. I am a determining thing.

“I am a determining thing” is a misleading contradictory/oxymoronic statement, and a “red-herring” to the discussion. And, also, is this Will the determining thing? Or is it the Thoughts? ...or?


Sorry Mgrinder, but I find your whole argument confusing. --- I think we just DO as we WANT. And it is these WANTS (desires/urges) that determine our Actions. Simple. This unfortunately means that since we have no say-so over our wants, we therefore have no say-so over our actions.

Albert Einstein also recognized this line of thought in Mein Glaubensbekenntnis (August 1932):

"I do not believe in free will. Schopenhauer's words: ‘Man can do what he wants, but he cannot will what he wants, [Der Mensch kann wohl tun, was er will, aber er kann nicht wollen, was er will]' accompany me in all situations throughout my life and reconcile me with the actions of others, even if they are rather painful to me. This awareness of the lack of free will keeps me from taking myself and my fellow men too seriously as acting and deciding individuals, and from losing my temper." --- Albert Einstein

[Spraticus]

(Sean Carroll makes my brain hurt!)

“I'd say the sort of issues you mention are the types of questions neuroscience should eventually be able to sort out, and I expect we will have to abandon some of our folk psychology intuitions and language when we have a better understanding of the mechanics of how brains work.”

It’s precisely those folk psychology ideas that I’m objecting to. Many of those constructs such as mind, will, soul, mentality, spirit, consciousness are, at best, superfluous; they are not so much multiplying entities as renaming a single phenomenon to make it look like many. The thing we are talking about is a process, some parts of which are hidden and other parts of which are seen; the border between the parts is mediated by the attentional system. The process involves the integration of internal and external information to modify a predictive model of the body and its surrundings. The clearest examples, for contemplative examination of this process in action, are the stabilityof the visual field and the phenomenon of blind sight. What we “see” is a construct generated by the brain and constantly updated by incoming data. At any one time we are only receiving data from a tiny part of the entire field of view, and that in discreet sacades, but we “see” the whole picture, the grand panorama, and we experience it as a smoothly continuous whole. Changes can happen in parts of the view which are not being monitored, and they simply don’t register in the brain’s picture of the world.



“But the initial hurdle I referred to regarding the possibility of mental causation in principle, requires a different, more fundamental explanation about the relationship between the mental and physical. Some people like Dennett disagree, and say that by explaining the physical processes you have explained everything. And you get phrases like' the mental is the physical', or 'mind is what the brain does',, or 'consciousness is an illusion' given as explanation by people who find Dennett persuasive. And trying to pin down what people who say that actually mean can be a struggle. Because, imo, Dennett obfuscates, very skillfully and elegantly, with beguiling prose and attractive distractions about language and wotnot, but doesn't give people solid coherent arguments to take away.

I don't accept one line summaries like that as an explanation, even if they're onto something, they're not explanatory. For example it doesn't explain why my heart or digestive system don't give rise to mental experience.”

Why would they? I am not continuously aware of these organs but when something changes enough to reach a signal level high enough to provoke attention, I certainly do notice events. We experience tachycardia, indigestion, imminent bowel movements, a sudden drop in blood pressure, etc.

“The physical processes of brains and hearts and alimentary canals can all be explained in scientific terms. That scientific explanation doesn't include mental experience arising, or having a causal role in terms of psychological desires, fears, etc in my behaviour via brain processes.”


But it does. If you think of the brain’s primary function as being the maintenance of homeostasis, these drives are the mechanisms it uses to direct the body towards the necessary adjustments, sex, food, safety and so on.

“So my position is that without an explanation for the relationship between the mental and physical, we don't really know what mental causation really means, or if it's possible. It might be that the physical processes from a photon hitting an orange, then my eyeball, then causing reactions in my visual system, then causing a complex web of electrochemical reactions in my neurons, then in my motor systems completely accounts for my hand reaching out and grabbing the orange - no mental input required. Our current understanding of physics would suggest it does. But we intuitively feel that (some of) our actions are directed by our desires and mental choices, and it's hard to understand why we'd evolve a useful mental reward system apparently tuned for utility, if it's actually useless. So... it's an open question imo.”

That is ignoring the way the model of the world is constructed and modified. The reward system is part of the goal directed behaviour system that maintains homeostasis. We learn to follow those drives/urges because achieving the desired object is rewarding.



Mgrinder wrote….

“The central hypotheses in this essay are (1) When fundamental particles, such as electrons or quarks (or bound combinations thereof: like atoms and molecules), change state, what will happen must be “calculated” (information must be processed in some manner, somehow) by the particle(s) (or something associated with the particles), and (2) A conscious experience (a “quale” (plural qualia)) aids in this “calculation”.  After this “calculation via qualia” is complete, the particle then changes state, as when an electron in the orbital of an atom jumps to a higher orbital after being hit by a photon.
Thus, this theory postulates that there are uncountable qualia (which are not much like our own human experiences, it is probably better to call them something like “primal” qualia) being generated in matter all the time, everywhere, as particles change state . However, certain of these qualia, associated with certain molecules interacting in living cells, account for the conscious experiences of living things.”

I would be interested in the comments of somebody with a lot more physical science than me. As far as I know the physical description of events like these is quite adequate. Water doesn’t need to think to be able to boil when you apply heat.

[Mgrinder]

(Nested quote removed.)

I think so, my body is part of me too. I contain multitudes.

So now we have Thoughts, Will, and Body which are all parts of “I”. ...Okay, I don't necessarily disagree.

(Nested quote removed.)

Seems to me that language uses it sometimes as a "container" (I had a thought (bowl of fruit has an apple)), sometimes language uses it as the equivalent to the will (I decided). I become my will when I decide. Am I my awareness? Do I become my awareness when i get aware?...(I saw the dog) It's a fairly confusing concept... Nevertheless, I do things. I am my will. I also see things, I see dogs. I am my awareness. I also have feelings (container). I have parts. I am my body too, I have hands.

The "I" concept is a red herring.

So then you (seem to) agree, that the “I” does nothing, and is nothing, in-of-itself. The “I” is just an arbitrary label that we assign to one our active parts (thoughts/will/body/etc), purely for convenience and conversation/language sake.

NOt really, no. When I say "I decide", that means something. It means thoughts, or a desire, or whatever is best to call it was translated into action. I don't know if we are on the same page here, we could be.

In other words, there is no distinct “I” entity, …there are only the parts (thoughts/will/body/etc) that we sometimes call, or associate as, “I”.

Agreed?

Honestly, it beats the **** out of me. It's far too confusing. The concept of "I" is all part of a processs (sensing something, that being translated into action, over and over again), that definately exists and is real. Saying there is no "I" is far too risky and confusing. When I say it is a red herring, I mean don't get caught up in confusing the idssue of what "I" is (awareness or the will or both, or whatever) with the issue that sensations are translated into action by a process that is local to my body, and this is a real process. Honestly, the issue of "I" is beyond me, and if you have an honest bone in your body, you will agree.

The real issue is: is there something that translates thoughts into actions? Yes.

Why do you say “Yes”??? --- It seems much more obvious to me that, we DO as we ‘feel’ or ‘want’, more than we DO as we ‘think’.

In the most fundamental sense, it seems to me that sensing is the basis of all thoughts or feelings or wants. An emotion like anger is basically a sensation (like sensing heat or a bright light)) your body produces to induce a useful sort of behavior. These lead to actions, for there is something that translated these sensations into either bodily movements or more sensations. A "thought" is a sensation too, produced sort of like a hallucination of a sound (if it is an auditory thought, like thinking "hey, that's a cat") again to induce a certain action or further information processing. Same with "wants" they are sensations too. It's not the best way to put it, but it seems adequate.

I think that it's reasonable to say it all boils down to "sensations", and these are translated into "action" ( where an "action" is further "sensations" (thoughts, feelings, or wants) or bodily movements) by something in nature. As long as these "sensations" are related to "action" and are not it is not just a coincidence that we have these things and then these actions occur, then the "will" exists and is a real part of nature.

(Nested quote removed.)

No, not really.

It's like the conservation of momentum. You can predict, using the conservation of momentum, what the velocities of billiard balls will be before they collide. If you measure well and do the math well, you will be right for after the collision. You can determine what will happen, but you are not the determining thing. You are not the thing that caused momentum to be conserved, nature is. The causal thing is whatever is behind the conservation of momentum is in reality, not your prediction.

So now you seem to be saying 1) Thoughts DO NOT have ‘causal’ power, 2) Thoughts can only predict the (re)actions, not cause them, and 3) it is the Will that is the ‘causal’ power (the “determiner”) behind our bodily actions.

Did I interpret you correctly?

Maybe, beats me what's going on in your head when you try to interpret me. You have a weird agenda, and will wilfully ignore me when I make good points. Thoughts cannot predict actions, rather, on can predict actions from knowing thoughts (probably).

What I will for can be determined by thoughts (I would bet, if my thoughts could be read) or predicted by my thoughts. But they do not determine my will. My will is the determining thing.

Here is less clear. In the first sentence, you seem to be saying that the Will can be determined by Thoughts. Or simply put, Thoughts determine the Will. But then in the second sentence you seem to directly contradict what you just said with “But they do not determine my will.”

Which is it? What is the relationship of Thoughts to the Will? Who controls/determines who?

It's pretty simple. If you could read my mind, you could probably predict my actions, but that would not give you causal power over what I do, just as predicting billiard ball trajectories does not make you the conservation of momentum.

To try to make it more clear, my actions can be predicted by my thoughts (if they can be read) but the thing in nature that does all the causal stuff is the translator of sensations into action (the will).

This is what I mean when I say you have a weird agenda. You're perfectly willing to understand me sometimes, then totally miss it later.

The real issue is about causation. Do thoughts have any causal relation to action? Yes.

Huh??? Previously you said T>W>B (Thoughts determine Will which determines Bodily Actions) was NOT correct, but now you (seem to be) saying it is. ??? So how do Thoughts have a causal relationship to Action? What is the mechanism/connecting parts that make it so?

God dammit. When I say "thoughts [sensations] have a causal relation to actions" I mean that they are related. It is not a coincidence that I constantly have thoughts and desires and wants all oriented to acheive a goal, and then I try to acheive that goal. My thoughts and my trying are not a coincidence, not an ongoing accident. Correlation is not always causation. The Sombrero galaxy is constantly receding from us, and the population of Earth is getting bigger. There is a correlation, but not a causal one. The two are not related. However, I think it is obvious that though there is a logical possibility that sensations and actions are not related (just a massive coincidence) the idea is not credible.

As above, you can predict my actions from my thoughts, and this is not an ongoing total coincidence, there is a relation. And the determining thing is the translator of [sensations] (assuming that's a better word) into action (i.e. the will), whatever that is in nature.

It is tedious to go over such mundane and easy stuff. Especially since it seems you will never try to get it. It's really easy BTW, none of this is hard.

Therefore the will is a determining thing. I am a determining thing.

“I am a determining thing” is a misleading contradictory/oxymoronic statement, and a “red-herring” to the discussion. And, also, is this Will the determining thing? Or is it the Thoughts? ...or?

It makes some limited sense to talk about "I", but the real crux is the simple question is the apparent relation of "sensations" and "action" a big coincidence or not?

Sorry Mgrinder, but I find your whole argument confusing. --- I think we just DO as we WANT. And it is these WANTS (desires/urges) that determine our Actions. Simple. This unfortunately means that since we have no say-so over our wants, we therefore have no say-so over our actions.

That's because you refuse to get it. I think you always will. Pride...??

Albert Einstein also recognized this line of thought in Mein Glaubensbekenntnis (August 1932):

"I do not believe in free will. Schopenhauer's words: ‘Man can do what he wants, but he cannot will what he wants, [Der Mensch kann wohl tun, was er will, aber er kann nicht wollen, was er will]' accompany me in all situations throughout my life and reconcile me with the actions of others, even if they are rather painful to me. This awareness of the lack of free will keeps me from taking myself and my fellow men too seriously as acting and deciding individuals, and from losing my temper." --- Albert Einstein

What thing in nature does the translating of "sensations" into action, Schopenhauer? Does such a thing exist? Why can't I declare it as part of "me", Schopenhauer?

[Jutfrank]

What thing in nature does the translating of "sensations" into action, Schopenhauer?

The Will. (Wille)

Does such a thing exist?

It's not a 'thing' in the normal sense. It's more like an unseen mechanism behind things.

Why can't I declare it as part of "me", Schopenhauer?

It's more that 'you' are a part of 'it'.