Another unsolved philosophical question is the one about a free will. If every action follows a trigger, a pre action, if only we are made of matter that follows the laws of physics, can there be something like a free will? Or is it just an illusion?

Even if you believe in a God and he/she/it is almighty, the course of everything, would there be space for a free will, if there is no time for God, no before of after, is there a space for human decision, a space for human or animalistic creation?

Objectively speaking, it's fairly clear that free will is an illusion, unless it emerges as a consequence of the nondeterministic nature of quantum phenomena (which feels a bit like grasping at straws).  The interesting question to me is how that illusion comes to be, given the enormous role that (apparent) choices play in our lives.

Is free will really an illusion? Lets see what it could mean.

Free will as I understand it, is the fact that I have got an understanding about what is going on around me and that I can choose between (possible) actions, according to my plans, aimes and desires...

Now there always is certain limits:

• physicallyy (I can not fly)
• mentally (I can only remember certain things, think in a limited speed)
• economically (I can only spend what I have got)
• socially (I can only be the child of my parents and culture).

But within that limits I think that I am free to choose. What would speak against that? ...

The whole question revolves around what is meant by "free."  If my brain gives rise to and corresponds to my conscious self, and if my neural firings determine my decisions, then I--my conscious self--have no freedom to do other than my brain's neural firings determine me to do.  I am not, then, free to do as I choose, independent of the workings of my brain; nor do I somehow control the workings of my brain.

On the other hand, as long as I am ignorant of constraints upon my actions, and as long as I can imagine more than one possible option, then it will seem to me that I am free to choose; moreover, it will seem to me that I can rationally exercise free will, by thinking over the ramifications of my apparently possible choices and apparently deciding on the basis of those ramifications which to do.   

Yes, this is the big question: does determination influence/reduce what we call free will or not. And can "I" (whatever that may be) influence "determination" (whatever that may be).

Should we may be start with determination: what does it really mean. Of course forces of nature work, of course our brain is part of that nature and it needs to be fed to work etc. but does this determination mean, that it is already clear, if I will win the next game in chess, what I will eat for breakfast tomorrow and what date I will die? or are ther other influences or chances?

Quantum mechanical considerations make strict determinism pretty much fall by the wayside, but statistical determinism still seems to hold.  What my brain does depends on an aggregate of subatomic events; and what my brain does dictates what I think.  It isn't as though I were a puppet master, choosing as I wanted to and then making my brain do the things that would correspond to my so choosing; rather, my brain is the puppet master, doing whatever it does and making me choose as I do.

Another question: what does "is reason for" mean? Is it a form of you hit me and I will fall? or is it more like a interdependent thing like: you hit me and I might fall, if...?

I think that communication is a key word here, rather than determination. Of course something has happened in the past and will effect (us in) the future. But it also depends on the way we react to our environment.

Determination will always be as a background thing, but not decide 'for us'. I don't even think that quantum effects are necessary to explain free will, because they only would allow some kind of 'chance', which also would not help any further.

Despite the fact, that the future and everything else is determined, I think that there is a free will. Meaning, that we (sometimes) have choices and we can form them in a fairly rational way.

 E.g. I can choose in a game of chess to open with 1. e4 or d4. Nobody will doubt that in everyday life. I can think about what to order in a restaurant or what car to buy. Of course my choices are formed and influenced by society and many other factors. But at the end of the day, my life is full of decisions that I have to make every day.

But where does freedom start and end here? I think that there are gradual differences. Where as a stone has little freedom to choose to fall when lifted, humans have developed many ways to defy gravity. And if there is gradual differences of freedom, that would mean that there is freedom.

This happens:  You find yourself confronted by a choice.  Two possible courses of action seem to you to be open to you.  You evaluate their likely consequences.  You then make the choice.  You--your brain and your body--then act so as to make one choice rather than the other.

It is your brain and body that take action, turning an intellectual possibility into an actually realized motion or act.  What makes you seem free is that it seems that you choose on the basis of your evaluation of the possible consequences.  But you are still following the dictates of your brain.  You are not defying physical law when you make your choice; you are acting in accordance with it.

If there is a mystery, it is how it is that the actions your brain makes your body take are the same ones your intellect tells you to choose. 

I commented on the similar topic in another thread.....and I noticed "rdietl ",thought this topic deserves to be disccaused more in this group.....

But frankly,I do not see why would this be so important.....

The term,I consider it a religouse term...designed to take away Human autonomy.......

I do not see , as an athiest, why would this topic be any of value.....

Ofcourse we have free will...what els ?......its magnitude  is however dependent to our education and psycological health and maturety.

To me, Life, is the result of Human free will....it is the result of the decisions we make.......although,when education and psycological health are absent,those decisions can be results of the influence of the invironments we live in.....

There has been four  schools of thoughts, in regards to self determination....

1-Marxist ( the society makes individuals ...." exclusively external influence dependency  ").

2-Hindoism/sofis ( Atma/Brahma..Internal reality..." exclusively Internal reality dependency ").

3- Existancialism ( We are already free,we just have to learn to notice it ).

4- Religouse (it is not up to us ). 

.........while external and internal influences....play a role........but I am defenetly the follower of existancialism.  

" Free will ", is not something to gain...it is something to lose.

Lets talk about chess. It is a game with very easy rules but it can become very complicating. Now we with computers have tried to count all different possibilities and have become very successful here, not perfect but still. A computer can play a fairly decent game against a human by using a very different way to look at the game. for a computer the game has got no field with 64 squares, a king with a crown or a knight on a horse. For a computer it is only data, ordered in a certain way. The aim is to gain material and to "capture the king", like in real chess.

How does the computer take a decision? I would say according to its programmed aims. (Gain material, capture king). Is there any difference to us, when we play chess? We can not count as far as many computers. We rather go for experience and intuition. All that human thinking is happening in a brain that followes certain ways and rules, that deals with information in a certain way and that tells us what to move next. Computers don't need a conscious brain, they work. So what is the specific advantage to us? Why have this 'ilusion' that gives us pain and joy, that leads us into madness and makes our philosophical lives hell, by making us reflect on such stupid thinks like a free will? Is it just a side effect - or has it got some advantage that we reflect and think? I think that the purpose is that we not only realise what is going on outside of our body, but also play with thoughts, twist them and create a phantastic and imaginative world within.

Of course this happens in a background of data (like a computer does) but it reflects something the computer does not see: the board with its pieces. And after I reflected, I can decide what to move next. Not absolutely free, but more free than a computer. And my last point: it there is a more or less of 'something', there is something.

Why do you think your brain's information processing is any more free than your computer's information processing?

I wonder if computers would crash less often if we were nice to them?

Computers do not have Cognition......

The main advantage of Human being and its difference with other life forms or its difference with non-live being...is " The cognition "......

The Cognition,goes without saying, is dependent to the external reality and the pieces it has to play with..( like chess,thhat a player has to play with pieces available in the game of chess )........but, human immagination which has no inter dependecy to reality,and his Cognition.....are bases for his "free will ".....

Going back to " Something ".......

There is no need for " something " to exist,for Human to be free in his Immaginative Cognition.   

I think computer cognition is possible.

Fine, humans have cognition.  But if that cognition arises from and is entirely dependent upon brain function, how does that make a human being any more free than a computer that lacks cognition?

Mathematic/Geometry..it is well known as not to " Exist " !!! and  unlike physics, it is not dependent to matter or existance.....and even more interesting, it is not even  " true "...that is to say, its foundations are  " shaky ", and not well founded....

How ever,it helps us human to learn about the universe.....

What it acctualy is, is true,if we accept its assumptions.....and within its laws, it is consistant based on its assumptions.....consistant enough to take the man to the moon and bring back....

Therefore.....Human cognition,does not neccessarly dependent of existance.....it only needs to not contradict its assumptions.

Human " will "  is so " free",that can defy existance of His GOD,his religon,his culture,his language...etc......

It is only up to himself to wish to confine himself to certain bounderies, " Or NOT " !

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 it is quite similar. One difference might however be, that a computer does not learn like humans do. It does not dream and is not driven and written by its past. It has got no nightmares or fear, no desires for the future. This is our drive, our motivation (not freedom). A computer is quite fixed by its very basic programme.

We are not more free than a computer, however our decisions are based on a more complex structure. A structure that makes more (self-) reflective loops, I would say. This "self awareness" is an additional structure in decision making. So our decisions are not more "free" but more "reflected" in order to our own development, to our own "creating".

A computer follows a programme, which gives exact data to react on. Our decisions may follow similar loops, but are followed by an aditional contoller, the "aware self", if I may say so. (this self follows and leads brain activity, no question: but there is some form of interaction).

one more practical point. In everyday life we act and judge people as if they would act more or less freely. A neurotic person, who has to wash his hands all day acts less free than one who does not. If one kills out of greed he gets a different sentence as if he killed in self defence or if his finger slipped by cleaning a weapon. The difference lies in the intention. If I decide to play chess, it is intended, what a computer does not have (i guess).