So this is just food for thought and not meant to be forceful or anything like that. I remain completely open to the idea that I'm missing something dead obvious and my views are wrong.



I wonder how many people have actually willed themselves into a jail cell?


Starting right now can you guarantee that you will not think of a pink elephant even once in the next 10 minutes? I am the source.. you know I'm the source because you weren't thinking of pink elephants until I brought it up... so for the next 10 minutes can you not think of a pink elephant?

many trust me. anything you do and you know you can go for jail for it and you still do it means you will your self to jail. if you do not know it then you are obviously very stupid (talking generally here )



I can not but I can send that thought away that's for sure. Its not difficult not to think about pink elephants I am starting now and will let you know how it went

Have you ever done an illegal drug? Because by this logic it would seem you were willing yourself into a jail...



When the thought arises you will be able to see it and then put your mind on something else.. but then it will arise again and you will be able to cast it aside again... I see this as "Choice". Free will would be never having that thought come again.

Try willing your mind blank for 10 minutes. Allow no thoughts to come into your mind for 10 minutes. It is in fact possible for advanced meditators to hold concentration this long... but can you using your will alone not have a thought for 10 minutes...just pure silent awareness of the breath? What about 60 minutes?

Free will seems like a true illusion. Choice however, seems like it could be real... but the choices our mind presents at any given moment are limited. We may be free to choose one course of action over another, But that would be very limited freedom. Wouldn't we alway's want to make the correct choice? But what if our mind doesn't present the correct choice to us to choose from? Shouldn't we be able to will our minds to present us the correct choice?

We have the choice to do what we want

But do we have the choice of WHAT we want?

^This.

Jesus RhythmSpring you could have saved me pages and pages of blathering if you had just spoke up earlier!

If you have choice to do what ever you want then you are choosing what is it that you want.

Hey smoker... How did your little experiment go?

I know exactly what I do and what are the possible consequences of my doing so yes If I take illegal drug then I will my self to jail if police would found out. It is my choice nobody else's. I could have chosen not to do that and then not to be in danger of going to jail.




Only if the thought was yours but not all of them are that is my believe. That is why we can only act after they arrive.



In the world where evil is the master it is impossible to have only pure and good thoughts. Only holy man are this pure and we are very far from that. So we cant control what comes in but can definitely control what comes out. And we are definitely able to do good , right choices but many choose evil instead. But it is still our choice.

no thought of pink elephant at all. till I mentioned it now. no problem not to think about it.

I'm skeptical.. But I can allow what you said to be true.

Can you clear your mind of all thoughts for 10 minutes... no can you do it for a 60 full minutes? Nothing but silent observation of the breath.. not a single thought entering... no pink elephants, no free will thinking, blank. If you are master of your destiny (truly an owner of free will) then surely can you stop your mind... Right?


This would be a much truer test of your so called free will.


Just to reaffirm. I'm not denying choice.

Haha, yeah, I was watching this thread for a while, but didn't feel very wordy. I guess I didn't have to be!



No, I think you are just choosing to embrace or deny whatever meets you along your path. THAT is a choice.

Have you ever tried to convince yourself to love someone or not to hate them? Outside actions might change, but there is something yet immovable about a gut feeling.

Every time in my life I tried to control what I liked or wanted, it ended up being a dead end of some kind. I eventually found out that it just wasn't me. I could fool myself for a while, but I think it just isn't healthy.

Have you guys heard of the Monkey Riding a Tiger analogy (analogous to the conscious mind riding the subconscious)? The monkey is the conscious brain, grabbing things, labeling things, telling the tiger where to go, etc.

And the tiger just does whatever the f he wants. He's gotta eat. And if he listens to the monkey for a while, he loses sight of what's good for him, and eventually he passes out. He wakes up later, with a newfound determination to pay no heed to the monkey's demands. The monkey is up there for experiencing, relishing, revelling.

I said above I do not believe that all our thoughts are truly ours so we can not control that but we control what happens after that. That is free will.

If I come to you and say you can have 1 million dollars in your account second after you do something I say then I am putting thought in your head and now you have to decide. The choice is yours. I can not force you to do it you have to decide. The thought is not yours but decision will be and so is your responsibility for your decision. Problem is the temptation. Its a trap. we have to recognize it and act on it. There are many traps on our path.

Because of free will we are responsible for our choices. We can not hang that on no one else. But look around us so many refuse to do that.

People sitting in jails thinking how unfair it is but its exactly what they did to them self. They just wont take responsibility for their choices. They deny their free will.

So who puts you on your path ? Who is deciding on that if not you ? Is it not you who puts your feet in front of another ? Only possessed people do not control their bodies. If you are not possessed you are 100% controlling your body and therefore deciding and making choices.

If you hate someone there is reason for that. You should find out why as it is not natural to hate someone else. Its not ok to embrace bad feeling and be ok with it. We can change anything we want and the reason for that is our free will. I am repeating my self but again it is only up to us.

We are not poppets guys we are real. This world is real as are our choices and consequences that follow our choices. This we can not deny. We cant hide.

Consider that by choosing whether to accept the 1 million dollars, I am only manifesting the big bang, creation of the solar system, 4 billion yrs of evolution, thousands of years of social evolution, all the experiences in my life, and now the choice you present in a grand Rube Goldberg apparatus in the same way a calculator replies "4" when you posit "2 plus 2".

I'm back at post 33 trying to catch up, and you people keep posting more! Come on! Cut a guy some slack! It's like you have no choice but to keep posting...as if you're compelled to....

Meanwhile, the latest post seems to be running away from me!

To want, or not to want, that is the question.
Neither works, too.

I think you also need to challenge your own position a little more. Is free will defined by the ability to control which thoughts arise? If I could somehow control which thoughts arise, what would be the thing that's making me control those thoughts in a certain way? And what would be the thing that's giving rise to me controlling the controls of my controlling thoughts? It's an infinite regression that ends somewhere. And where it ends, is where free will is. Do you understand?

I think spacexplorer touched on an idea I had, as well. Is it a matter of will what we are given at any point in time? The universe is constant cause and effect, which means we are always experiencing new events. Likely 99% of my thoughts are effects caused by biological conditions, arising from the way my subconscious has been wired and conditioned to survive. If I meditate, and gain say 10% of ability to quiet my subconscious, then I have created my own set of events, seen in the neural pathways changing. I have willed myself into this new mindspace.

Maybe the random quantum interactions were going to set of the chain reaction resulting in my decision to alter the course of the thoughts in my head, or maybe my consciousness altered the thoughts, culminating in a certain set of waves of quantum interactions.

To me, the will was where I placed my intent, the choice was what to will.

There is of course many things I have no will or choice over, such as how fast I am flying theough space on this mote of dust. I am a finite being, thus my will governs a finite space/set of actions.

I really don't know if there is free will or choice. The biggest hangup I have is, if it is in fact an illusion, who is being fooled? Why should there exist a universe that gives ol' Mr.Peabody not only the illusion of existing as a sentient being, but also the illusion of choosing to walk his hunk of meat towards the left rather than the right?. To me, to have consciousness is to have free will/choice. How can one be without the other? If they do not exist, what is the point of it?

blue... no, yellow!

lovely topic. I wonder though, what we really mean by the term "free will". all the definitions I'm looking at suggest "independent agency" for an "individual". but it is my understanding that neither of those things exist either. at best, we're an interdependent collective. that in itself, makes the whole concept of free will much more slippery and ambiguous.

I think the real problem is that the whole question of free will vs determinism is a red herring. it does however, reveal our dominant, dualistic paradigm. I think what matters, is not whether I have full autonomy, control, or an independent agency kind of freedom. maybe what matters is just using the little volition this localized collection of symbiotic cellular processes has... in order to say, "I take responsibility for what's happening here. I may not be in control, but I can be responsible."

ultimately, as others here have alluded to, free will requires a self to possess such a quality. I keep looking (really!) but I still haven't found this elusive self thing. I mean, I do have this "sense" of self, but when I look to see where exactly it is, I just come up empty handed!

this whole business just keeps getting more and more strange and mysterious. go figure.

You cant hang outcome of your decision on some collective consciousness. If you upset someone because of your behavior who is it to blame ? All of us ? No its your doing as I said its our choices and consequences that follow.

From whatever angle you look at it at the and of your doing will be someone either happy or sad depending how you acted toward this person. The decision is only up to you not to some collective mind. As I said we cant hide behind anything or anyone.

Its us making world around us happy or sad. So make a choice