@urquan's banner p

urquan

The end desire of the system is Kubernetes for human beings

7 followers   follows 0 users  
joined 2022 September 04 22:42:49 UTC

				

User ID: 226

urquan

The end desire of the system is Kubernetes for human beings

7 followers   follows 0 users   joined 2022 September 04 22:42:49 UTC

					

No bio...


					

User ID: 226

I've thought about this before -- free will, even if it didn't exist, is not something that you can act like it doesn't exist. At the very least, it's kind of trippy, you have to act like you believe there's free will even if you don't believe there's free will, it's baked into the pie. The very principle of "acting" requires, in some sense, a "belief" in free will.

I'm not actually sure what "acting like free will doesn't exist" even looks like -- you could sit on the floor and do nothing, I guess, but that is an action that requires a "choice" you "make" to do it. The concept is just an aspect of everything we do. It's even more fundamental than breathing -- you can stop breathing (and suffocate), but in doing so you're taking an action that you could choose not to do! It's impossible to choose not to act like you have free will, since by doing so you've acted like you have free will.

It's rather the opposite of Descartes' old claim, that thinking proves the mind's existence, in a way beyond even radical doubt: acting proves free will's existence, but in a way that not only doesn't silence doubt but even invites it by its total immediacy and inalienable connection to our existence. It is so automatic as to be unremarkable, and thus it becomes so incomprehensible that it becomes impossible not to remark on it. In other words, it's impossible to act like you don't have free will, but it's easy to think you don't have free will. And the unbridgeable gap between act and thought demands an explanation. Thus free will debates are a massive playing field in philosophy.

I act, therefore I have free will. Or not.