My "decision" isn't real.
If it is an actual conscious choice, that was not calculatable by the exact state prior, then consciousness is fundamental.
My "decision" isn't real.
If it is an actual conscious choice, that was not calculatable by the exact state prior, then consciousness is fundamental.
That is unless there is some sort of actual absolute meaning to the universe, which is a very boring and treacherous line of reasoning that i won't entertain here
However he existence of an omniscient entity would completely break physics as we know it so any physicalist/rationalist approch to understanding the universe can fairly safely rule it out
Free will may exist as a result of the unknown factors of human consciousness, their actions and consequences and their relations to the physicial world.
Personally I find that thought quite pleasant, because it means that free will does exist from a human perspective, and I happen to posess one of those.
What is your conception of free will? Is it just "randomness"?
If your actions are not determined by your thoughts and desires .. then they would just be completely random. How is that "free" will?
Free will, defined as autonomous decision-making partially influenced/affected by the external environment, does exist.
Now 'autonomous' = determined by the agent, i.e. the decision to have pizza today is determined by something in you, not fully determined externally, but that something is likely not your conscious experience.
In that sense, free will does not exist.
But that does *not* mean that everything you do is predictable because P!=NP. Even God, if s/he exists, does not yet know what you will do tomorrow, s/he's waiting to find out.
So: you are not free, but you are not bound to something either.
We will never be able to perfectly calculate the causal chains of the universe before they unfold, so we operate in a world of uncertain chances and maybes.
Carroll and others have a compatibilist notion of free will which is a more subtle concept that I'm not sure I'm qualified to actually explain.