Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 4.3bsd-beta 6/6/85; site l5.uucp Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!gamma!epsilon!zeta!sabre!petrus!bellcore!decvax!decwrl!sun!l5!laura From: laura@l5.uucp (Laura Creighton) Newsgroups: net.philosophy Subject: Re: Science & Philosophy vs Rosenism Message-ID: <174@l5.uucp> Date: Wed, 2-Oct-85 17:57:20 EDT Article-I.D.: l5.174 Posted: Wed Oct 2 17:57:20 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 5-Oct-85 08:14:51 EDT References: <1495@pyuxd.UUCP> <2197@pucc-h> <1510@pyuxd.UUCP> Reply-To: laura@l5.UUCP (Laura Creighton) Organization: Ell-Five [Consultants], San Francisco Lines: 29 In article <1806@pyuxd.UUCP> rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen) writes: > >Because you haven't been listening (apparently). Free will means the ability >to act independently of physical constraints, whether from the surrounding >environment, or the insides of one's own body. Think about what religionists >mean when they speak of "free will" to choose between right and wrong. Clearly >they are referring to an ability to make a choice regardless of one's physical >make-up: choosing not to sin despite the physical desire to do so. Can you >act contrary to your physical make-up without an external agent to do so for >you INDEPENDENT of your make-up? > Rich, it is you who are not listening. This is the third time I have tried to make this point. If you will read philosophy for a bit you will see that this is *exactly* what a lot of philosophers are claiming. They claim that you are NOT CONSTRAINED by either YOUR PHYSICAL MAKEUP or YOUR ENVIRONMENT when you make a FREE CONSCIOUS DECISION. Your free conscious decisions are not determined. That is the claim. Not that they are determined by a physical agent external to your physical self (ie a soul) but that they are not determined at all. They either are self-determing (which makes human beings free agents) or they arise spontaneously (as in how an electron decays), but they are not determined. You are prefectly free to disagree with this. You are not free to reinterperet what everybody says in light of what you think they must mean. -- Laura Creighton (note new address!) sun!l5!laura (that is ell-five, not fifteen) l5!laura@lll-crg.arpa Brought to you by Super Global Mega Corp .com