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Free Will [Deckle Edge]

Sam Harris · 3 HN comments
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Amazon Summary
A BELIEF IN FREE WILL touches nearly everything that human beings value. It is difficult to think about law, politics, religion, public policy, intimate relationships, morality—as well as feelings of remorse or personal achievement—without first imagining that every person is the true source of his or her thoughts and actions. And yet the facts tell us that free will is an illusion. In this enlightening book, Sam Harris argues that this truth about the human mind does not undermine morality or diminish the importance of social and political freedom, but it can and should change the way we think about some of the most important questions in life.
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This question is much more interesting when you realize that modern neuroscience is (slowly) going more and more into area that there is no free will in humans.

What is a reason to live if they are not your decisions driving it? Skipping over all (judical etc) consequences, if this is true, then life has no sense and it's more/less ok to end it - what's funny, suicide would also not be your (as in free will) decision... Meaning this is a time bomb programmed into any thinking brain (and any AI as, what's double funny, this logic also applies to any AI).

Dodge that homo sapiens :)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will

https://www.amazon.com/Free-Will-Sam-Harris/dp/1451683405

dragonwriter
> This question is much more interesting where you realize that modern neuroscience is (slowly) going more and more into area that there is no free will in humans.

Science inherently approaches the universe in a way which leaves no room for materially meaningful "free will"; only strict material determination and randomness.

idanoeman
I don't think the scientific method is inherently materialistic - it's just that our most validated theories about how the world work are materialist.
If you haven't already read them, Sam Harris' Free Will and Moral Landscape are totally worth reading.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/1451683405

http://www.amazon.com/dp/143917122X

We respond to external stimuli in a unique way, true. I'm not saying free will does not exist, but YOU as an agent do not have that will. It's actually a combination of genes + historical feedback loop between environment and you. When you are asked to pick between a color (red or green), on what basis do you pick that color?

The recent book on Free Will by Sam Harris: http://www.amazon.com/Free-Will-Sam-Harris/dp/1451683405 is relevant here.

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