Syamsu wrote:
(Nested quote removed.)
Both, but mainly the majority of intellectuals, scientists, many posters on these forums.
Consider the current situation, where for example if you go to wiki to find out how free will works, that there is virtually no practical knowledge there. Yet in daily life people often talk in terms of choosing. Is that really a normal situation?
It means there is still common, and religious, knowledge about freedom, but this knowledge is being surpressed by a happenstance conspiracy of like-minded intellectual thugs. Moreover this common and religious knowledge about freedom is not unshakeable. The credibility of it can be diminished, as well as the logic used with the words can vary (use the word choose to describe a situation where the result is forced). So as to say that the chance of an individual in society to become genuinely deeply confused about freedom is greatly increased through science. That is to cause deep identity-crises for people.
When Gene obliges that as far as he is concerned people can have any "spiritual fetish" they want, and then at the same time outright dismisses theory in terms of freedom to explain things, where the agency is left a subjective issue, is disengenious. "spiritual fetish" is a very mildly insulting term. But there is very widespread intellectual thuggery to systematically insult all acceptance of subjectivity.
I agree that many science-based materialist thinkers are dismissive of the 'libertarian' idea of free will. They usually cite ‘emergence’, or some fuzzy thesis, to attempt to incorporate a watered-down version of freedom with their precious 'determinism'.
I suspect that these people are not comfortable with the indeterminate nature of freedom and demand an explanation to be presented in determinate causal terms. If this cannot be given, which in principle it cannot, then they generally try to claim that we ought not to believe in freedom in the proper sense.
As I keep pointing out, ad nauseum, everyone, in practice, believes in freedom and are incapable of really disbelieving it. What would be the point in believing one thing in practice and another in theory? The theoretical belief in freedom could only be a problem if it was creating negative tendencies in society. I can't see how this is possible. Any functioning society requires that individuals see themselves as free, responsible moral agents. How can we believe in freedom and see it as an illusion at the same time? Might be possible for a subtle thinker, but surely not the average person! If we really believed freedom was an illusion then we would stop praising and blaming others for their actions (which might actually be a good thing!), but we would also cease to feel in the least responsible for our own actions, other than, for example, the way we might think of the snake as responsible for biting the victim (and that would probably be a bad thing!).
I don't think that the patronizing, dismissive attitude shown by some 'materialists' towards those who are happy to accept the indeterminate nature of freedom is the result of any organized conspiracy. I think it is just a reaction to cover their own insecurity and fear of uncertainty, a way of reassuring themselves that they have a firm grip on reality. My own tendency is to feel compassion rather than anger towards them if they seem intensely troubled and angry themselves.
- By Good_Egg
- By Fried Egg