Update: Knowing that free will is just an illusion, how to continue living?

[MischievousMonkey]

What makes u not believe

Started thinking like that when I entered high school. Wondering what's the difference between someone who can "make it", accomplish their dreams, and someone who can't. Asking myself if you can decide to change, and if that's the case, why some people do and other don't.

And it's always come down to personal experiences, which nobody has power over. If you take a decision, and not another, it's often because of how you think, or how you feel. And these are parameters who come from who you are and what happened to you. Knowing that who you are is dictated by what happened to you (experiences) and what you're made of (genes), two variables nobody has power on... I can't help but conclude that talking about choice is a fallacy.

 

[I Really Mean It]

What makes you choose something over another thing? What makes you take a particular decision that another person wouldn't?

You'll come to the same conclusion as me.

It could be a choice made in the moment, or one that sees me spend days deliberating over a decision. What makes me choose? Multiple factors, one of which being how my life will be affected by the decision I make.

 

[MischievousMonkey]

It could be a choice made in the moment, or one that sees me spend days deliberating over a decision. What makes me choose? Multiple factors, one of which being how my life will be affected by the decision I make.

You didn't really answer to the second question I asked though.

Whether the "choice" you believe you make was an instant one or one that took a longer time, you agree that there are multiple factors weighing in that leads to that "decision" right? What I'm saying is that you have power on none of these factors, which disqualify that action you took from being a choice.

Can you give me an example of something you did that you believe was a choice? It'll be easier to try and debunk it.

 

[Dreamzeedream]

Started thinking like that when I entered high school. Wondering what's the difference between someone who can "make it", accomplish their dreams, and someone who can't. Asking myself if you can decide to change, and if that's the case, why some people do and other don't.

And it's always come down to personal experiences, which nobody has power over. If you take a decision, and not another, it's often because of how you think, or how you feel. And these are parameters who come from who you are and what happened to you. Knowing that who you are is dictated by what happened to you (experiences) and what you're made of (genes), two variables nobody has power on... I can't help but conclude that talking about choice is a fallacy.

You cant control what happens to you but you can control how you react and how you let it effect you. Alot of people dont have the will and self discipline to change. You gotta have will power. You change you are instead of letting life molding you to be someone your unhappy with. To change the world you have to change yourself. To change yourself is to change your kondbaer and the way you think

 

[YamakaSmacker]

Can you prove it to me? I swear I'd rather believe in them.


Traumatic experiences are this: experiences. You don't decide what experience happen to you. So you don't decide to change. You have no power over it.

You don't decide your experience but you decide what you experience. If I decide to take a trip for spiritual enlightenment and become enlightened then I made a choice to change myself

 

[MischievousMonkey]

You cant control what happens to you but you can control how you react and how you let it effect you. Alot of people dont have the will and self discipline to change. You gotta have will power. You change you are instead of letting life molding you to be someone your unhappy with. To change the world you have to change yourself. To change yourself is to change your kondbaer and the way you think

You drew the line between people who can change, because they have the will power and self discipline to do so, and those who can't, because they have not those things. But you don't decide whether you have will power or self-discipline. You are either born with it, or was raised in a way that makes you have these things, or some experiences in your life led you to develop them. In none of the cases I just evoked, in none of them you have power over what's happening.

That means that you don't decide to change, you were molded to do so by life events or genes, and you can't change that.

You don't decide your experience but you decide what you experience. If I decide to take a trip for spiritual enlightenment and become enlightened then I made a choice to change myself

What makes you "decide" to take a trip for spiritual enlightenment? Feeling the need to be enlightened, a sentiment of being lost maybe, it can be several reasons... Reasons that made you take this action.

But you had no say in the matter because these reasons happened to you. If you "decide" to take a trip to gain in knowledge because you lived something traumatizing? The reason you did that is because of this experience (no influence over it) and your personality, how you react to adversity and experiences such as this... And your personality is a construct built progressively as you live and react to different experiences that are imposed over you ever since you were a cell in your mother's belly.

If you think about it, you could pinpoint every so called "decision" you ever made in your life to previous experiences if you had a super computer that recorded everything you ever lived ever and how your brain were influenced by it.

 

[Dreamzeedream]

You drew the line between people who can change, because they have the will power and self discipline to do so, and those who can't, because they have not those things. But you don't decide whether you have will power or self-discipline. You are either born with it, or was raised in a way that makes you have these things, or some experiences in your life led you to develop them. In none of the cases I just evoked, in none of them you have power over what's happening.

That means that you don't decide to change, you were molded to do so by life events or genes, and you can't change that.


What makes you "decide" to take a trip for spiritual enlightenment? Feeling the need to be enlightened, a sentiment of being lost maybe, it can be several reasons... Reasons that made you take this action.

But you had no say in the matter because these reasons happened to you. If you "decide" to take a trip to gain in knowledge because you lived something traumatizing? The reason you did that is because of this experience (no influence over it) and your personality, how you react to adversity and experiences such as this... And your personality is a construct built progressively as you live and react to different experiences that are imposed over you ever since you were a cell in your mother's belly.

If you think about it, you could pinpoint every so called "decision" you ever made in your life to previous experiences if you had a super computer that recorded everything you ever lived ever and how your brain were influenced by it.

Everything we know has to be taught in developed and people dont changed because they choose not to


Your gene's dont dictate what you become in life. But your life experience does HELP mold you . I'll give u that

 

[YamakaSmacker]

You drew the line between people who can change, because they have the will power and self discipline to do so, and those who can't, because they have not those things. But you don't decide whether you have will power or self-discipline. You are either born with it, or was raised in a way that makes you have these things, or some experiences in your life led you to develop them. In none of the cases I just evoked, in none of them you have power over what's happening.

That means that you don't decide to change, you were molded to do so by life events or genes, and you can't change that.


What makes you "decide" to take a trip for spiritual enlightenment? Feeling the need to be enlightened, a sentiment of being lost maybe, it can be several reasons... Reasons that made you take this action.

But you had no say in the matter because these reasons happened to you. If you "decide" to take a trip to gain in knowledge because you lived something traumatizing? The reason you did that is because of this experience (no influence over it) and your personality, how you react to adversity and experiences such as this... And your personality is a construct built progressively as you live and react to different experiences that are imposed over you ever since you were a cell in your mother's belly.

If you think about it, you could pinpoint every so called "decision" you ever made in your life to previous experiences if you had a super computer that recorded everything you ever lived ever and how your brain were influenced by it.

Are you saying we have absolutely no choice or limited choices?

 

[MischievousMonkey]

Everything we know has to be taught in developed and people dont changed because they choose not to


Your gene's dont dictate what you become in life. But your life experience does HELP mold you . I'll give u that

Why do they choose not to change?

Are you saying we have absolutely no choice or limited choices?

No choice at all

 

[YamakaSmacker]

Why do they choose not to change?


No choice at all

Down to the toppings i happen to try on a pizza today? Say I wanted to be spontaneous. You say the spontaneity isn't a choice but what about what we do while being in that mood.

 

[MischievousMonkey]

Down to the toppings i happen to try on a pizza today? Say I wanted to be spontaneous. You say the spontaneity isn't a choice but what about what we do while being in that mood.

Yes, down to this

Moods don't pop out of nowhere, there are the results of multitud of stimuli unconciously processed by the fast brain. Studies show it. Daniel Kahneman and his book Thinking Fast and Slow showed that something as simple as making read to people series of words containing (not exclusively) vocabulary linked to old people (old, grey, rest, shyt like that) while giving words more related to sports to another group of people made a major difference: he then told the people who he gave the lists to to go to another room where the test would continue, knowing that they would have to walk a long corridor to get to that room.

Well almost all the people who were given the energetic list walked that corridor noticeably faster than the group with the old list, who took it slow.

Plenty other expériences confirmed how much we are influenced by our environment and expériences. The sun, the temperature, songs passing on the radio, dreams you had, things going on in your life, whether you're hungry or not, the last show or video you saw on the internet with a pizza ad on...

All this shyt is registered by our brain whether you're aware of it or not. Combine it with your personality and you get the explanation for every choice you ever made, down to the pizza toppings.

Like I said, we're just extremely complex machines telling ourselves we're more than that.

 

[YamakaSmacker]

Yes, down to this

Moods don't pop out of nowhere, there are the results of multitud of stimuli unconciously processed by the fast brain. Studies show it. Daniel Kahneman and his book Thinking Fast and Slow showed that something as simple as making read to people series of words containing (not exclusively) vocabulary linked to old people (old, grey, rest, shyt like that) while giving words more related to sports to another group of people made a major difference: he then told the people who he gave the lists to to go to another room where the test would continue, knowing that they would have to walk a long corridor to get to that room.

Well almost all the people who were given the energetic list walked that corridor noticeably faster than the group with the old list, who took it slow.

Plenty other expériences confirmed how much we are influenced by our environment and expériences. The sun, the temperature, songs passing on the radio, dreams you had, things going on in your life, whether you're hungry or not, the last show or video you saw on the internet with a pizza ad on...

All this shyt is registered by our brain whether you're aware of it or not. Combine it with your personality and you get the explanation for every choice you ever made, down to the pizza toppings.

Like I said, we're just extremely complex machines telling ourselves we're more than that.

Had no choice but to dap

 

[J Money]

Real interesting thread topic. I had a thought process of something similar last week.

Dapped and rapped

 

[Goodbye World]

I've thought something similar before but never went this deep into it. Great post op. I notice nobody had been able to debunk anything you've said.

 

[BlackJesus]

If choice and responsibilities don't exist and everything is predetermined that means there is no such thing as good or bad. Yet OP acknowledges the existence of good and bad in his original post. Which is it? True not to juelz an answer.

Also meanz crimes are not an actual thing and murderers and rapists are predetermined to murder and rape. If they commit crimes, we should just correct their chemical imbalance and release them back on the streets. No punishment because they are not responsible.

Whites enslaving blacks was also predetermined. They couldn't help it.

This discussion is basic philosophy. Your (wrong) argument is not new. There are *many* logical inconsistencies in OPs viewpoint he couldn't even begin to see.