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ReasonableDoubt
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Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 655
| Posted 5/27/2003 4:47 AM (GMT -6) |   | I'm going to list several events over which an individual has little or no control.
1. what time in history you are born
2. to what family you are born
3. your sex
4. your other genes that determine hair color, eye color, height, healthiness, etc.
5. what nation you are born into
6. what religion and culture you are born into
7. how you are raised by your family (by alcoholic abusive father, by single mother, etc.)
8. your IQ
9. the economic level you are born into
I'm sure there are more, but you get the point. These things strongly influence (if not determine) where you are in your life right now. They strongly influence your character - which is a major influence in the choices you make . The fact that I was born in the 20th century in the US to a good family (through no choice or merit of my own) is instrumental in the fact that I am now an attorney living a fairly well off life of ease. If I had been born 200 yrs earlier, as a woman I would not have had much choice about a career. If I had been born to a less encouraging family who cared about academics and education, it is a lot less likely I would have gone on to get a law degree.
If I was born in Ethiopia, odds are I would have been dead a long time ago b/c of starvation, drought, etc.
My point is, where I am in life is largely determined by these factors. We take it for granted, but to be born Americans we are privileged beyond estimation. I didn't do anything to deserve the life I was born into. Neither did the 3 year old starving child in Africa whose entire life consists of suffering and early death. I have no explanation as to why I was born where I was, and the children who suffer where they were. But I do know that that is not something I had any control over.
Putting aside the free will-determinism argument as philosophy or theology, practically, what kind of free will do those people have who are born into those intolerable situations.
without health, education, nurture, and other basic things, one cannot make any type of informed decision about what path to follow in one's own life.
This astonishes me more and more- how lucky I am to be an American and to be born when and where I was- how it was through absolutely no merit of my own. It is almost criminal how we take that for granted.
People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.
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BJS
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Total Posts : 587
| Posted 5/27/2003 5:12 AM (GMT -6) | | Gina: quote:
This astonishes me more and more- how lucky I am to be an American and to be born when and where I was- how it was through absolutely no merit of my own. It is almost criminal how we take that for granted.
Very true. I couldn't agree with you more. There are certainly influences upon our lives over which we have "little or no control" as you put it.
I'm not sure if you are implying with your argument that the existence of these influential events is an argument against free will, but if you are, I would respectfully disagree. No one who believes in free will believes that there are NO determinative factors in life. You list several in your post above (gender, parents, genetic make-up, nationality, etc.). What free will proponents would say, though, is that our decisions are not exhaustively controlled by God. Influenced? Sure. Forced? No. At the end of it all, despite all the influences that can affect us---whether divine, satanic, or human---we have the power to make choices that affect our destiny. God does not decide beforehand what we must choose.
Brett
"Siste viator et memento mori." | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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| Posted 5/27/2003 5:30 AM (GMT -6) | | RD: Without health, education, nurture, and other basic things, one cannot make any type of informed decision about what path to follow in one's own life.
Tom: Then how is it that there are uneducated people of poor health and unfortunate ubringing who DO make wise decisions about what path to follow in life?
Tom
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ReasonableDoubt
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Total Posts : 655
| Posted 5/27/2003 6:02 AM (GMT -6) | | TGB : You're assuming that those people live to be to the point that they can decide a path. If you're born in Ethiopia with a life span of 3 yrs, you don't have that luxury.
People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.
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ReasonableDoubt
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Total Posts : 655
| Posted 5/27/2003 6:15 AM (GMT -6) | | Hey Brett -
What is the "YOU" that makes the decisions? I would say that one's character dictates one's choices. And the things I listed are huge influences as to what character you develop.
Now, this doesn't mean that you aren't responsible for your choices. B/c who else can be held responsible other than the one performing the actions?
But, it does mean that there are many things outside one's control that are controlled by God- ie, when you're born, etc. And those things are HUGE influences in creating character, and thus choices.
When you say "We have the power to affect our own destiny" - what is meant by "we"? What is the entity exercising the will? What are you, other than your character and your physical body? You can say you have a soul, but how does the soul make decisions without the body?
Is something in each person operating outside that person's character- something that is completely uninfluenced by the factors I listed? I have a hard time believing that, but am intereste d in your comments. | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 5/27/2003 6:40 AM (GMT -6) | | Tom's right:
quote:
ReasonableDoubt: TGB, You're assuming that those people live to be to the point that they can decide a path. If you're born in Ethiopia with a life span of 3 yrs, you don't have that luxury.
Gina, Since I know some Ethiopian Christians, and have seen a video of their worship service I will just imagine them. And I will also remember my own children when they were very young: three, and two, and one, and newborn. THEY DO DECIDE. And my wife knows more than I the differences between our two boys, for the nine months she daily and nightly shared their lives so close.) Free will is given by God, and is an integral part of who we are; but is also inseparable and not a separate thing in itself.
As you say yourself, below, "I would say that one's character dictates one's choices." That is always only partially true, since we are humans and not animals. BUT, we STILL make decisions. (All sin has that first step. As does righteousness.)
quote:
Hey Brett -
What is the "YOU" that makes the decisions? I would say that one's character dictates one's choices. And the things I listed are huge influences as to what character you develop.
Now, this doesn't mean that you aren't responsible for your choices. B/c who else can be held responsible other than the one performing the actions?
But, it does mean that there are many things outside one's control that are controlled by God- ie, when you're born, etc. And those things are HUGE influences in creating character, and thus choices.
When you say "We have the power to affect our own destiny" - what is meant by "we"? What is the entity exercising the will? What are you, other than your character and your physical body? You can say you have a soul, but how does the soul make decisions without the body?
Is something in each person operating outside that person's character- something that is completely uninfluenced by the factors I listed? I have a hard time believing that, but am intereste d in your comments.
Yes, there are "many things outside one's control that are controlled by God- ie, when you're born, etc." But what God has created for us is that we share some decisions. THAT is, has been and remains, our calling: as a microcosm of all that is sensible (includes the earth) and that which is intelligable (includes the angels), and as a "mediator" (half way between God and his physical creation) who can offer all the world that is God's back to God in worship, praise and thanksgiving.
The outline "Creation, Fall, Redemption, Restoration" reminds us that we can look to both ends (Creation and Restoration) to help us understand the confusing mess that is in many places and at many times present around us. But the job we were created for gives us here, with this question, a clear understanding of the Free Will that we always have -- even in the womb during those worship sessions!!! -- jsut because THAT is who we are.
Even when "every knee shall bow" it will be out of freedom of the will and God's greatness.
Our created nature did not cease with the fall.
Nor does it cease with hardship.
PoW
Edited by - PotOnWheel on 05/27/2003 11:43:54 AM | | Back to Top | | |
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honorman
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Total Posts : 1137
| Posted 5/27/2003 9:26 AM (GMT -6) | | We have free will within the parameters of the life we are given. RD, sounds like your version of free will is being given an American twist. In other words, only if people have everything we have here can they TRULY be able to make a choice...
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honorman
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| Posted 5/27/2003 9:28 AM (GMT -6) | | However, today you can disown your family, change your sex, hair color, eye color, weight....
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honorman
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| Posted 5/27/2003 9:31 AM (GMT -6) | | Finally, RD, what does it matter how much free will others may or may not have to God as far as your life is concerned? All God cares about as far as you are concerned is the amount of free will you have and what YOU do with it.
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Tom
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| Posted 5/27/2003 9:40 AM (GMT -6) | | RD: You're assuming that those people live to be to the point that they can decide a path. If you're born in Ethiopia with a life span of 3 yrs, you don't have that luxury.
Tom: You were talking about people "Without health, education, nurture, and other basic things" and on THIS basis claimed they "cannot make any type of informed decision" about what their path in life will be. NOW you're adding to this the condition that they not live beyond the age of three?
See ya later.
Tom
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DLW
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Total Posts : 2457
| Posted 5/27/2003 9:57 AM (GMT -6) | | Whether or not one is breast fed can make a very big difference in their development. Also, whether or not we can make credible commitments to ensure care for the elderly also matters, since lacking that, in many very poor countries, the only hedge people have against the future is how many children(sons) they have. Allowing for high infant mortality rates(something which we can reduce relatively easily), this leads to them to have many children. Having many children tends to make it so the mother has less time to recover and is more likely to give birth to lower-weight babies, have less breast-milk to feed them, and other factors that lead to higher risks of complications, or diminished long-term development.
There is so much that affects us, which we didn't have any control over, but others did. This does not imply determinism. If it did, it would also imply that the cycle of poverty in so many countries is just part of God's plan and I don't believe that for one second.
dlw
Prayer from Kenya
From the Cowardice that dare not face new truth,
From the Laziness that is contented with half-truth,
From the Arrogance that thinks it knows all truth,
Lord Deliver Me. | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 5/27/2003 10:25 AM (GMT -6) | | dlw: Whether or not one is ...
PoW: Good point. But you will agree that the REAL issue is what one DOES with it all. Can one be a "microcosm" and a "mediator." (Is the widow's mite enough? The dying baby's communion with her dying mother? The martyr forgiving the soldier?)
dlw: There is so much that affects us, which we didn't have any control over, but others did. This does not imply determinism. If it did, it would also imply that the cycle of poverty in so many countries is just part of God's plan and I don't believe that for one second.
PoW: Right again, evil is not brought into the world by God. We brought sin into the Creation.
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ReasonableDoubt
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Total Posts : 655
| Posted 5/27/2003 11:03 AM (GMT -6) | | On of the points I was trying to say is that so much of one's life is outside of one's control- and is unfair from the get-go. So, where's the fairness in being born here now compared to being born to a short life of utter suffering in Africa?
This "unfairness" has nothing to do w/ what people do with their life or their free will. It has to do with God placing you in the place he wants you to be at from the very beginning. How else can you explain how we end up in the position of being born? God has "stacked the deck", so to speak, by making you be born where you are.
So if we acknowledge that, it seems that life is very unfair from the get-go - and that most of us on this board are on the lucky or privileged side of things. Why is that? Is it b/c of God's grace or plan, or is it because we somehow earned or merited our position at birth?
People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.
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ReasonableDoubt
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Total Posts : 655
| Posted 5/27/2003 11:14 AM (GMT -6) | | Honorman : ". In other words, only if people have everything we have here can they TRULY be able to make a choice..."
Not at all. Let's grant that each individual is responsible for her or his own actions, regardless. I don't have a problem with that. But I do not see how a person's actions are not greatly if not completely influenced by the factors I listed (and others, it was not exhaustive). I've NEVER said people don't make choices. I've only said that those choices are the products of influences, many of which are determined at birth and by other factors.
Even Christ said "To whom much is given, much is required." So if you are born to a life of luxury, intelligence, prosperity, and knowledge, you are given those things by God and had better use them correctly. If you are given nothing, not as much is required of you.
As far as the 3 yr old life of suffering - that person is as much of a person as you or I living a privileged life til the age of 85 in America. That person has not had the opportunity to make meaningful decisions or exercise free will. Why is that? Who decided that?
People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.
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DLW
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Total Posts : 2457
| Posted 5/27/2003 11:43 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Not at all. Let's grant that each individual is responsible for her or his own actions, regardless. I don't have a problem with that. But I do not see how a person's actions are not greatly if not completely influenced by the factors I listed (and others, it was not exhaustive). I've NEVER said people don't make choices. I've only said that those choices are the products of influences, many of which are determined at birth and by other factors.
Even Christ said "To whom much is given, much is required." So if you are born to a life of luxury, intelligence, prosperity, and knowledge, you are given those things by God and had better use them correctly. If you are given nothing, not as much is required of you.
The positive fact of choice does not imply the normative belief of some parts of Christianity that we made it on our own and as such are entitled to our subsequent well-being. We agree with you, but a belief in predetermination, though, it may inculcate feelings of humility or indebtedness for our blessings, does raise other problems/questions.
quote:
As far as the 3 yr old life of suffering - that person is as much of a person as you or I living a privileged life til the age of 85 in America. That person has not had the opportunity to make meaningful decisions or exercise free will. Why is that? Who decided that?
There are many possible reasons. Yes, people suffer who have had no chance to choose. This is gratuitous evil and if we went back far enough, it wouldn't of had to come into existence and, perhaps, our future choices can make it so it happens with a lower frequency.
Your setting up some more straw-people that don't fit with OVTheism is about.
dlw
Prayer from Kenya
From the Cowardice that dare not face new truth,
From the Laziness that is contented with half-truth,
From the Arrogance that thinks it knows all truth,
Lord Deliver Me. | | Back to Top | | |
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ReasonableDoubt
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Total Posts : 655
| Posted 5/27/2003 11:57 AM (GMT -6) | | I'm honestly not trying to set up a straw man. Can you tell me where I did? Maybe I again do not understand what the OV is then. I am going by what I was taught in philosophy about the definitions of determinism and free will. If I am wrong to go by those definitions, I need you to explain what your definitions are.
People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.
--Søren Kierkegaard | | Back to Top | | |
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DLW
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Total Posts : 2457
| Posted 5/27/2003 12:23 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
I'm honestly not trying to set up a straw man. Can you tell me where I did? Maybe I again do not understand what the OV is then. I am going by what I was taught in philosophy about the definitions of determinism and free will. If I am wrong to go by those definitions, I need you to explain what your definitions are.
I'm sorry. I meant that the arguments you learned in your philosophy course characterize free-will as implying far more than it actually implies.
My definition of free-will is that it is a positive fact, which we couldn't get rid of no matter how we try. This is taken as analogous to the reality of the political, the need to work things out, without direct reference to a commonly accepted notion of what should be the case. We can either participate in this process, or stay pure by not participating and let others have far more sway over it than otherwise would be the case. So we should accept the fact that our current relationships with God were not predetermined and may still fail, particularly if we do not dig into the word or place ourselves in communities of believers who will occasionally make discernments regarding how our walks are going.
dlw
Prayer from Kenya
From the Cowardice that dare not face new truth,
From the Laziness that is contented with half-truth,
From the Arrogance that thinks it knows all truth,
Lord Deliver Me. | | Back to Top | | |
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DLW
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Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 2457
| Posted 5/27/2003 2:01 PM (GMT -6) | | In my interpretation of MR, I argue that the only real choice Neo makes in the movie is to love Trinity more than anything else. Everything else can be viewed as cause and effect. And yet, that choice is what leads him to choose the door he did, which I believe will then set off the sequence of events leading to the relations between humans and programs/machines being irrevocably changed.
So its not really a question of whether we have huge gobs of freedom over our lives, but whether we have any, since the small choices can tend to snow-ball into having large impacts over which courses our lives will go(This, of course, is quite conducive to "happy thoughts"!!).
dlw
Prayer from Kenya
From the Cowardice that dare not face new truth,
From the Laziness that is contented with half-truth,
From the Arrogance that thinks it knows all truth,
Lord Deliver Me. | | Back to Top | | |
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Iconoclast
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Total Posts : 1227
| Posted 5/27/2003 3:05 PM (GMT -6) | | ReasonableDoubt
So if we acknowledge that, it seems that life is very unfair from the get-go - and that most of us on this board are on the lucky or privileged side of things. Why is that? Is it b/c of God's grace or plan, or is it because we somehow earned or merited our position at birth?
Iconoclast
This seems very similar to the question the disciples asked Jesus about the man who was born blind.
John 9:2-3
And his disciples asked him, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" Jesus answered, "It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be made manifest in him.
thanks,
Iconoclast
"The benefit overran the merit the first day, and has overrun the merit ever since. The merit itself, so-called, I reckon part of the receiving." - Ralph Waldo Emerson | | Back to Top | | |
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Iconoclast
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Total Posts : 1227
| Posted 5/27/2003 3:19 PM (GMT -6) | | ReasonableDoubt
What is the entity exercising the will? What are you, other than your character and your physical body? You can say you have a soul, but how does the soul make decisions without the body?
Iconoclast
I recently read a book called "The Mind and the Brain" which explores this question. It was written by someone who has researched Obsessive Compulsive Disorders (OCD). He shows how OCD is caused by a malfunctioning circuit in the brain that DETERMINES the OCD behavior. I say DETERMINE because it is an enormously powerful brain circuit that just won't shut off the DANGER, DANGER (Will Robinson?) indicator. This "causes" the patient to do all sorts of seemingly strange behaviors to try and resolve the danger they feel that they are facing. What this research has shown is that it is possible for an OCD patient to ignore this signal (massive discomfort will of course result) and bypass it AND that if this is done enough times it "re-wires" the brain circuitry such that the faulty signal is minimized.
The question is, what is this ability within us that can overcome and even program our brain circuitry? Is it some "higher order" circuitry or something entirely different? Is it the brain doing it or is it this thing we call "mind". His conclusion is that it is NOT the brain but rather there IS this thing called the "mind" that can direct the brain. He even speculates that because recently it was discovered that there are "quantum-sized" structural mechanisms within our neurons that perhaps this allows some level of indeterminacy where the "mind" (the OBSERVER part of us) might be interacting and thus influencing the brain circuitry. The issue of course is how can a "mind" interact with and overcome physical brain circuitry? One answer: quantum physics shows that an observer can collapse the probability wave function of a quantum particle. Furthermore we know that the observer can "cause" it to collapse in certain ways based on how the observer chooses to measure it. Perhaps, the observer part is the "mind" part of us that can "will" quantum-level events to occur when we so choose. Thus, our "mind" can cause a neuron to fire that normally wouldn't fire in our brain circuitry by using our will, our "observerness".
Personally, I don't think any of this is very mysterious to any of us at the phenomenological level. It is simply what we call our "attention." We direct our mind all the time by what we choose to pay attention to. This is why goals are so important. Goals direct people's attention and thus "cause" action to occur that is directed toward meeting the goal. The most powerful act of free-will we have is to choose our goals. Like Joshua did, "This day, me and my household choose to serve the Lord."
The book is well worth the read.
thanks,
Iconoclast
"The benefit overran the merit the first day, and has overrun the merit ever since. The merit itself, so-called, I reckon part of the receiving." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
Edited by - Iconoclast on 05/27/2003 8:28:31 PM | | Back to Top | | |
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