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Comment by RcouF1uZ4gsC | Hacker News Reader

Debates about free will are incredibly boring.

Basically, if there is no free will, there is no point in debating, because it is already determined what you will believe in a way that has no relationship to logic.

In addition, without free will a lot of what we consider human rights are meaningless. For example, freedom of speech, freedom of religion are useless in a deterministic world.

Morality itself is pointless in a world without free will.

Kind of like Pascal's wager, if you are wrong about there being free will when there isn't, it doesn't change anything. If you are wrong about there not being free will when there is, it is a big problem.

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> Basically, if there is no free will, there is no point in debating, because it is already determined what you will believe in a way that has no relationship to logic.

I don’t understand this. There are plenty of tasks with deterministic outcomes that are no less worth doing. Sorting a big list of numbers is deterministic, yet it’s often worth doing. There are many tasks which are deterministic but have results which cannot be “predicted” any faster than by simply performing the task.

I think of it this way: if our current understanding of physics is correct, then there is no room for free will. Everything is subatomic particles acting according to known laws. Cause and effect rules all. If, on the other hand, free will exists, then our understanding of the physical world is completely wrong. In which case all the arguments against souls, gods, demons, precognition, the afterlife, magic, and everything else weird and spooky goes out the window.

> if our current understanding of physics is correct

What do you mean by "understanding"? What does "understanding" mean in a world of determinism without free will?

> Basically, if there is no free will, there is no point in debating

But if there is no free will, you should not even try to stop someone from debating if there is a free will, because they have no choice but to debate it.

Of course I realize that if there is no free will you have no choice but to try to stop people from debating if there is a free will.

OK, I'm going to choose to stop going down this rabbit hole now.

The other part of it is that without free will, you don't have the choice on what you decide is moral, etc.

Human rights might be cosmically meaningless, but there would still be those who act as if they do have meaning. And they would have no choice in the matter.

A world without free will looks exactly like the world with free will. And that's why it's pointless.

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