Is a choice being made or a reaction occuring?

Question

Freewill states that we have a choice, but aren't we just reacting based off the personalities we've developed thus far?

Answer 1

no other animals play game like human.
...we have a choice ,fortunately, but just when we are aware,unfortunately.

Answer 2

Whether we choose one explanation or another, anything we might decide must ultimately be be based on belief, since there is no apparent way to prove or disprove either. But this doesn't necessarily make the choices equally valid.
For instance, if the choice is for a purely mechanical explanation of -well, choice itself, then one is confronted with the necessity of explaining how and why there is the "illusion", as one person put it, of choice. If this were the case then what possible purpose could such an illusion serve? And in fact the idea of selective action without choice is an oxymoron.
On the other hand, there are good reasons for assuming that real choice exists. First, if we truly assume otherwise then we would effectively give up deciding or acting upon anything and would essentially become zombies. If we assume that we actually do have choice, then we effectively become responsible for our actions, and can then decide what the pattern of our future actions will be. And by doing this we can then follow a predetermined course, while if we were to decide that we had no actual power to alter our actions then we would also be deciding that any plans about future acts would be futile, since we would also have decided that we could have no power to affect our present or future actions.
The theory of non-existence of free will may seem reasonable at first, since it is based upon the principles of physics. But in the real inner world the idea fails to account for the realities of experience.

Answer 3

The Determinist Argument:

1. Every event must have a cause.

2. Human Actions are events.

3. Therefore, every human action is caused...

4. So, determinism must be true.




i. The Free Will Argument:

1. The Argument of Moral Responsibility states that if determinism were true, no person would be able to change his actions, therefore no one could ever be held morally responsible for his own actions. Common sense tells us that we can change our actions by our own choice.

2. We can and have overcome our desires and inclinations. Both common sense and fact show that we can actively change our behavior. Determinist reply: We only perceive that we can change our actions and behavior.

3. We do not feel compelled to act. At the time of a decision, we feel we have had other choices. Determinist reply: Such feelings of control are illusions; we are just ignorant of all the irresistible forces acting upon us.

4. At a certain time we feel that we could have chosen to act differently. Determinist reply: Our behavior is already determined by previous events. Therefore you can not change your behavior.

ii. The Implications of Determinism: Man becomes nothing more than a puppet.





I myself believe in the domino philosophy of cause and effect.
The space in between each domino is the free will that we get to have, each effect may lead to one domino or to next in a whole another direction.

Answer 4

Yes. But. Even though you may be preconditioned to a certain response to a certain occurrence you still have a choice to go with 'old tried and true' or try something new. If you decide not to do either one and just do nothing, then you still have made a choice. When you go to McDonald's and eat french fries, you chose precisely which french fry you ate first. If we're not brain dead then we are making choices every step of the way. Like it or not.

Answer 5

Certainly, that is why you have at your finger tips the most knowledge than any other group of people on the face of the earth to make decision and opportunities that will lead you towards a path that is either greater and better than that of which you are on, or the choice to do worse and uglier than you are on, and thus.....reap the fruits of your human travels, or suffer the consequences. Either way, that free will will get ya....every time, so choose wisely.

Answer 6

Your problem arises out of your desire to view liberty as an absolute. In this context, you can never deem yourself free. I am a certain being and I react to things in a certain way. But I accept that it is I who is reacting thus. The fact that I may have come to be this way out of causal process doesn't really pose a problem to me, because I fully accept I am who I am. I am therefore also the one taking the actions and, in that sense, am a free agent.

Answer 7

Most of the time this is true. But it is possible to notice this occuring; our unconscious reactive behaviour. And the more it becomes conscious, the more choice we have in practically defining our experience.
Ultimately, of course, free will is an illusion.

Answer 8

Both. Have you ever wondered "What if"?if and when it does happen..... it's both.