opnet [OpNet] Free will, the lie.

[Matryoshka]

I hear people preach of freewill, and truth be told , it makes me sick. It rather a childish thing, I know.But I can't stand people who try to say people or any organic life form were touched by a devine spark. Yes you are a snow flake, but guess what snow flakes can form the same way.

You may or may not be one of a kind, but even if you are you are still bound by some rules.You are nothing more than a reaction to the world around you.You do not act upon any devine insight.You thoughts are based on chemical impulses that are triggered in your brain, that bring up relevant data to you.The data is then filtered based on the factor(s) of action(s) you are reacting to.

Oh and a truly new idea would be something alien to us.

[Cody]

Bitch, bitch, bitch...

Seriously, just joking with you Miss Malory. Here's my reply. All things is relative and I don't mean like cousin Lester getting hitched to his niece Sally May. Divine Spark? Okay but once you say its divine spark then that means everything got touched by it. So maybe the words "divine spark" impresses the hell out of some folks but it's just another word for quantum to somebody else. Or probability. Or a thousand other words that mean something special to somebody somewhere.

As for the rest of it... Never fails to amaze me how unset some folks get over this whole free will thing. I got a theory and since its on topic you get to hear it. Anything can be done until you know for a certain knowledge that something just can't. So me, being me and not knowing what's out there in the future can do whatever the hell I want. I'm free as a bird. You, being you, knowing too much and can't do anything except go down roads you already got the maps to. My advice is to learn to enjoy the scenery. I think you and some other folks put too much stock into "knowing".

If you want to know what Captain Preston thinks of my theory your going to have to ask him yourself. I did enjoy the look on his face when he was thinking about it but then I like Captain Preston.

[Jager]

We are all God, getting to know his creation. We are the infinite possibilities that only an omniscient mind could forsee.

Signy, we can imagine God, so we can imagine the infinite. New ideas appear all the time, we just aren't always capable of interpreting them.

[Alex Craft]

"You are nothing more than a reaction to the world around you."

Actually, that's old science - pre quantum theory. The human mind can not be predicted so easily. The physics that produce thought originate on the quantum level, and so are essentially random. The person's brain does influence these random impulses, but there is a statistical chance for a human to come up with anything.

Of course, this isn't an arguement against predestination, but I didn't get the impression that you were pushing God's will.

[Matryoshka]

Random? Craft, do you think anything is truly random?Oh, you are just a silly little one, aren't you?

See if things were random then, I would think that given the many times I have used my abilities at least one of those times something different would have happened. I haven't see the sun turning pink, or my house being filled with frogs.

See, you are given a mind, and you can chose.But it is not free will.As you are limited, by the fact that you can't act on something you don't know.And given enough data your actions can be manipulated based on the action of those around.

The trick is this, most people have so many actions to react to in their whole lives, that you can't truly know everything they know.Or at least is highly unlikely ,even today.So, maybe when John was 4 he turned his head and saw coop get shot, maybe he turned his head and didn't see the cop get shot.From that detail in his life, his whole life was changed.But does that mean he has free will?No, it means that he was acting in reaction to the world around him, to all the seemingly random things.As if you have objects in your world that are random, then all must be.It is sort of all or nothing, thing here.

We live in a world of cause and effect.Nothing more, nothing less.

[Cody]

Like I said - I get to choose and you don't.

Do you really think you got the better end of the deal? If you do maybe you best be talking with Mr Meehan or Ms Cassady. They seem to think like you do. Got to warn you even Mr. Meehan says he found something that can't be explained though. He called it the divine.

Course I'm just a country boy so what would I know of such goings on.

[Preston]

To live a life without faith?

No thank you. If someone wants to skate down the road of Randian Pragmatism, so be it. Free Will doesn't guarantee you will make the right choices, just that multiple choices will be available.

When you die, if you are right, you get to be a pile of dust.

Me, I get the keys to the Eternal Kindom of Our Lord.

If you are wrong, you spend an eternity in hell.

Me? I am just a pile of dust that did his best to make the world a better place by endeavoring to do good deeds and set an upright example for others to follow.

[Alex Craft]

"We live in a world of cause and effect.Nothing more, nothing less."

Actually, no.

In fact, that statement makes me pretty much assume that you have no background in high-order physics. Quantum theory has been around since before World War II, and has only been reinforced. In fact, the appearance of novas virtually confirmed many of those theories.

You simply see the future most likely to happen. You see large events that are already shaped by large forces. You do not see the roots of reality. On a small enough scale, everything is composed purely of interacting probability fields.

"you are just a silly little one, aren't you?"

(c: That's just funny, so I'll let it slide, but I should point out that as both a probability manipulator and a fairly skilled precog, I do kind of know what I'm talking about...

I am just a pile of dust that did his best to make the world a better place by endeavoring to do good deeds and set an upright example for others to follow.

As worst case scenarios go, I kind of like that.

[Alex Craft]

Hm. Weird thought.

Anybody want to get together for a game of precognitive poker? No ESPers or telepaths allowed.

[Ghostwriter]

We may react to things, Ms Malory, but we also choose to react. It may not be all the time, but we can choose to react to something or not.

As an Aspergers' autistic, I believe we are each our own universe. Like atoms, we come together to make a greater reality. Without getting too philosophical, who's to say that we just aren't atoms in the mind of one great being? God, Goddess, doesn't matter what you call it.

I don't believe overmuch in predestination. Some things may be fated to happen, but they also may not.

[Matryoshka]

Do you believe in Newton's laws of motion?The three ones that mater. To be simple and easy.

An object in motion will stay in motion, until an outside force acts upon it.

An object at rest will stay at rest until an out side force acts upon.

Every action, has an equal and opposite reaction.

Taking those threw laws, and adding conservation of energy. Explain to me how free will can be real?

And wile "quantum physics" indicates sub atomic changes, and variables. The Quantum you or I use, works on the atomic level.OUr Quantum works under the laws of physics.We just are good at bending the rules.

Miss Codex, leave your imaginary friend out of this. I said nothing about predestination.In order to do that, I would have to say there was something out there with a plan, rather than simple laws of science.

[Sakurako Hino]

Choice through knowledge or faith = Free will. To say anthing else is an opinion based on falsehood.

I could kill someone, but I choose not to. Because I believe it is wrong.

I help someone because I know it is the right thing to do, but I could also leave them in their situation. There is nothing to stop me.

[Matryoshka]

Endeavor, you are not proving that you have free will, but that you can be programmed to understand abstract morals.In this case, good and evil, right and wrong.

No, that is not free will.

[Sakurako Hino]

Yeah, but I CAN act against those if it serves ME.

Signy, you're splitting hairs.

[Hugin]

Quote:

Originally posted by Signy Malory:
Endeavor, you are not proving that you have free will, but that you can be programmed to understand abstract morals.In this case, good and evil, right and wrong.

No, that is not free will.

Define Free Will then we can discuss it. Make sure that your definition includes the existence of independent proof, otherwise you are simply wasting time.

[Hugin]

Quote:

Originally posted by Signy Malory:
Do you believe in Newton's laws of motion?The three ones that mater. To be simple and easy.

An object in motion will stay in motion, until an outside force acts upon it.

An object at rest will stay at rest until an out side force acts upon.

Every action, has an equal and opposite reaction.

Taking those three laws, and adding conservation of energy. Explain to me how free will can be real?

Have you observed test results on Pax? He defies those three laws through use of his particular quantum expession.


When he stops bullets tests have show he exerts no force upon them. The kinetic energy of the bullet simply ceases to be. This has been viewed through multispectrum cameras and through the senses of Novas whose sensitivity to this type of phenomenon is off the chart. I myself witnessed on of these experiments when I was still with the Project, I was looking for the presence of his quantum field interacting with the bullets, they did not, at least directly in the way that would fulfill Newtons first law.


Pax does the flip side of the above trick when he practices his 'telekinesis' which is anything but. He imparts kinetic energy, but that kinetic energy did not exist until he willed it. It did not come from an outside source, it simply became.

The flight of several Novas violates the third law. They move through the air with no detectable form of propulsion. No energy imparted upon them to cause the reaction of their flight.

We are Nova, as has been shown many times the previously believed involate laws of the physical universe mean little to us.

[Ghostwriter]

I'd appreciate if you didn't insult my faith again, Ms Malory. I happen to be a Wiccan, and that faith has been the only thing that's kept me going a couple of times.

I believe in free will. I also believe in karma. Action = reaction.

I haven't been rude to you that I'm aware of. You're entitled to your beliefs, but don't go around and call any deity 'an imaginary friend' on my watch. Your beliefs do not give you the right to mock others and their beliefs.

That's the only way I can take your comment about imaginary friends. If I've taken it the wrong way, well then sue me. I don't tolerate insulting of any religion.

Codex

[Matryoshka]

Free-will, the ability to do something that is not inheartly a reaction to prior experinaces.To have the ability to at will preform actions that are not reactions.

Yes, you could say that insane people have something close to freewill.But as I said, a truly new idea would sound Alien to us.

And Endeavor, this topic is about splitting hair.It is not about broad strokes, nor about black and white moral, ideas.

[Hugin]

I don't accept your definition. You are not describing Free Will you are describing total chaos, acting in a manner completely disconnected from your experiences or environment. Anyone could choose to behave in this way. We do not because it is conterproductive to our survival.

Setting up an unreasonable definition is not any way to win a debate.

[Matryoshka]

James, some partials can't be measured as to how fast they travel. Do you know what I am talking about and why?

Pax, forms a sheild.He uses force to cancel out the forces of the bullets.H just more skilled at than others.

I don't about you, but the flying novas,are most likely using gravity. Some may have enough skill in using to cancel the effects of their flight out, but most don't, and so they change the winds, and area around them.

[Alex Craft]

Laws of thermodynamics and conservation of energy are wrong. We have known this for decades. The only reason we still use them is because thay produce reasonably accurate results when working on a subatomic level.

Science has been doing this for millenia. We produce systems that serve to describe what we perceive. However, eventually we get to the point where we percieve more than our systems describe. So we redo it.

Quantum physics began to emerge when we started to find ways to prove previous systems wrong (including conservation of energy and theromodynamics).

[Hugin]

Quote:

Originally posted by Signy Malory:
James, some partials can't be measured as to how fast they travel. Do you know what I am talking about and why?


Pax, forms a sheild.He uses force to cancel out the forces of the bullets.H just more skilled at than others.

I don't about you, but the flying novas,are most likely using gravity. Some may have enough skill in using to cancel the effects of their flight out, but most don't, and so they change the winds, and area around them.

Don't be stupid, I'm talking about Novas whom I have seen use their powers. I have the ability to see beyong normal sight. Pax has a number of abilities, and yes, his impressive 'Force Field' is the most photogenic and the one he tends to use when the cameras are on him. He also posseses the ability I described. The flyers I mention are not using gravity, or explosive propulsion, or heat currents, or wind, or any sort of energy discharge. They move through the air because they simply want to. For someone who knows so much you seem to have studied your own kind very little. There are any number of Novas active whose abilities counter Newtons laws.

[Matryoshka]

James, for someone who knows so much, one still can't see a straw man.

[Jason Grant]

I don't really know if this is relevent or even a good example, but in defence of Prodigy I gotta say that a couple of my powers don't have that force effect you guys are talkin' about. I can move things, telekinesis they call it, but there there's no action-reaction going on. If there were, I should be able to push myself off the ground with my power or hitch rides on passing planes but I can't. Actually I tried that once but all I did was bring the thing to a screeching halt. Man, was I embarassed!

I don't know if this counts either, but I can also turn down Novas, making them less Nova. Can't really see what force is making that happen either.

Oh, hi by the way. I'm new 'round here but it seems like an interestin' place.

[Jager]

The physics of Faith, or defining the entire nova/human existance down to a few natural laws?

Give me the Great Unknown any day.

[Jason Grant]

Amen brother! What's the point of livin' if you know everything your gonna do or say? What's the point to the universe if everything is all decided anyways?

[Sakurako Hino]

It is no more likely that I will know what I will say or do in the future, than it is for me to know what tomorrow's lottery numbers will be except for damned good luck.

It is also 100% unlikely that my next post is pre-determined. Holler "fate" all you will. There is no fate but what we make. It is our actions now that determine our future. If you don't like it, you have a VERY hard time grasping concepts like Responsibility and Commitment. Also it'd be bloody unlikely you'd be able to come up with any backup plans when the probable goes poof.

[Jason Grant]

If you talkin' 'bout my last post Miss Hino, you kinda missed my point. I think knowing, for sure, everything that was gonna go down all the time would suck. Big time.

[Sakurako Hino]

I know it would, but I doubt even such a thing was possible. The future is too mutable, and fact is generally warped by one's perception. But yes, it would suck if someone DID know what is going on at all times. Omnipotence isn't all that it is cracked up to be.

[Miss Baby]

Quote:

Originally posted by Alex Craft:
Laws of thermodynamics and conservation of energy are wrong. We have known this for decades. The only reason we still use them is because thay produce reasonably accurate results when working on a subatomic level.

Science has been doing this for millenia. We produce systems that serve to describe what we perceive. However, eventually we get to the point where we percieve more than our systems describe. So we redo it.

Quantum physics began to emerge when we started to find ways to prove previous systems wrong (including conservation of energy and theromodynamics).

Now, I am a simple girl, really.So please tell me how thermodynamics and conservation of energy are wrong.I know there are things that look like they break the rules, but last time I checked nothing does.So, please explain.Aside from novas, what breaks said rules?

[Ashnod]

Quote:

Originally posted by Sakurako 'Endeavor' Hino:
I know it would, but I doubt even such a thing was possible. The future is too mutable, and fact is generally warped by one's perception. But yes, it would suck if someone DID know what is going on at all times. Omnipotence isn't all that it is cracked up to be.

And not being omnipotent, you know this how? While you can theorize all you like, until you achieve such a state, how can you declare it to be "not all it's cracked up to be?" I hear the same argument made about eternity/eternal life. One is quick to mention the supposed boredom, ennui, and pain, yet those who state such things are always mortal.

How can you make definitive statements about something you have neither achieved nor experienced, nor, I suspect, have been told by someone who has?

[Sakurako Hino]

Ashnod, did anyone ever tell you that you take yourself too seriously?

Honestly, you know/knew someone who had been omnipotent? You show me that person then I'm the Empress of Japan.

[Alex Craft]

So please tell me how thermodynamics and conservation of energy are wrong.

Well...they just are.

They are pretty accurate as long as everything you're working with is larger than a molecule and moving at less than a few percent of the speed of light. When those laws were first established, that was good enough (since everything scientists worked with back then fit those criteria).

But then, we started getting better tools and started noticing that there were 'exceptions' to the laws we thought we true. Then, we managed to figure out a set of laws - largely contained in quantum theory - that fits every situation.

The older system of Newtonian physics worked for the time, but was really just an approximation based on what could be observed then. Now that we can see more, we know that those laws aren't accurate.

(If you want, I can dig out my notes and post the math, but it honestly doesn't make a lot of sense. The human brain isn't designed to work with this kind of stuff. We never evolved the capability to perceive these phenomena, so we can't really grasp them. There are exceptions to this among the nova population, but I haven't met many.)

[Alex Craft]

For the sake of fairness, I should add:

Quantum theory is just as much an approximation as Newtonian physics was. We're already starting to find 'exceptions' to our 'laws,' and that's not even counting all the stuff us nova's can pull off.

The trick is to keep finding workable systems. As we do so, we will grow closer and closer to the real truths behind the universe. This is pretty much where science leaves off and theology picks up.

[Ashnod]

Sakura-chan,

No, I don't know an omnipotent individual. Merely pointing out you're making declarations about something you have no experience with.

As I am not omnipotent either, I'm not in a position to offer evidence to the contrary. I will, however, not dismiss omnipotence as a negative state without experiencing it first.

[Sakurako Hino]

Sorry, I gathered otherwise.

[Matryoshka]

Endeavor, what would you say,if I told you that I saw the future, the same way you saw the past?Would you say there are changing factors in the past, that would change the present?

[Matryoshka]

So, Craft, given infinite time, and infinite trees.There would be nova trees, then?

See, the idea that if random things happen, then one if given enough time, and chances,everything will happen. Fire, will be wet...Now if things happens in a set number of patterns, then things are not random.If these patterns are on such a scale, that one can't understand them, then by all means one can say they are random.But, they are just on scale that you can't understand, yet.

This means, in practical terms, weather or not humans have free wills, or not, is mute.

[Alex Craft]

Theoretically, it is possible to get wet by jumping into a fire. The odds of it happening are next to none, but in the scope of infinity...sure.

Would you say there are changing factors in the past, that would change the present?

Maybe. Current theories in the nature of the universe suggest that could be possible.

-edit-

Ok, I'm not sure that I'm really defending free will here. Mostly I'm just saying that everything isn't all simple cause and effect. If free will requires that one be able to do something unexpected, then I guess I'm saying it's possible. However, I'm not sure that randomness constitutes choice.

[Cody]

Where the hell is Troll when all this big brain shit is going on? There's a little something he likes to say now and again. It goes something like;

Just cause something can happen isn't the same as saying it will happen.

No shit but I love each and every one of them that can really see the future even if I do pity the hell out of them. More the merrier. The way I figure it, just by knowing something, they set things into motion that might not ever come EXCEPT FOR THE FACT THEY "KNEW" IT WAS GOING TO. Tell me again who's got free will and who ain't. Ignorance is bliss? Maybe not but when your talking about this shit it's sure as hell freedom, brother.

The more seers out there the more they got to screw each other up just by doing or even just knowing things. I figure either every that can do the trick agrees with every other so they all know what's going to happen OR none of them know cause of the static they cause each other. Might not be true but it sounds good, don't it?