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von Darkmoor
Small Press Publisher (and Dancer still)
      
Date Joined Dec 2005
Total Posts : 3056
| Posted 7/17/2007 10:24 PM (GMT -5) |   | | | |
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Frank
Adept
Date Joined Aug 2005
Total Posts : 629
| Posted 7/18/2007 7:36 AM (GMT -5) | | | Two smart-asses walk into an online discussion forum... | | Back to Top | | |
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erazmus
Master
Date Joined Jul 2005
Total Posts : 4539
| Posted 7/18/2007 1:15 PM (GMT -5) | | | | |
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von Darkmoor
Small Press Publisher (and Dancer still)
Date Joined Dec 2005
Total Posts : 3056
| Posted 7/18/2007 2:23 PM (GMT -5) | | Yes.
Free will enables the individual to make a choice and change the choice, their mind, their direction, at will. As they desire. Predictability comes into play, but all influences must be weighed, as, at any given moment, any individual can effect change. The lack of free will forces compliance, forces no mid-step switches, no mid-thought consideration of repercussions, no mid-act cessation of action. Fearing change, fearing consequences, fearing responsibilities - doing or not doing something due to fear is not a lack of free will. It is still a choice, often the smarter one at that. Robotic following of a predetermined path, turns and all, versus a winding path, not random by any means, just influenced by the predictable effects of life and circumstances. We definitely desire free will.
Yet since (by definition) the omnipotent personage knows such-and-such will happen, then it will happen, whether so-and-so will do or not do it. Regardless of free will. Meaning, while omni-one did not draw the picture in advance, omni-one knows what the picture is and will be. That does not change, regardless of free will, as the perpetrator of the act is both of lesser import than the completion of the prophecied act and prone to do the whatever the totality of the circumstances predicts.
Western mindset has a hard time grasping this. Eastern mindset calls this 'First Cause' which means, while omni-one did not directly do a specific thing, it is a result of something omni-one did do, so omni-one is the cause of it. They demonstrate this through the ever popular use of the rock dropped in a body of water. Prior to the disruption the placid water did nothing but wend its way. Upon striking its surface (and ultimately sinking from view and any further involvement), the rock sent ever-expanding circles of waves outward over time and distance. Larger waves become lesser waves become ripples become ebb and flows until finally on the outer edge of its reach, it rocks a fisherman's craft once or twice and dwindles away. Did that ebb and flow rock the boat? Yes, it did - because the rock fell way back in the middle of the circles. First cause. The water would have minded it's own damn business if it had been left to itself. And it did this hundreds of times, rocking several things in its progress across the surface.
Everything is the fault of the rock. Better yet, first cause lies with the hand that dropped the rock.
But who is making the prophecy, Mike? If omni-one, then it is no longer prophecy but a statement of fact, a predestinated act. If mortal, or at least non-omni-one, prophecy is again dependent more upon the commission or omission of an act, not necessarily by the individual. Acts are based upon established behavior. Insurance companies make prophecies all of the time. More of them generally become truth rather than not. If it is a non-omni-one originated prophecy that effectively predicts someone doing something so abnormally out of character and committing or not committing an act there is no remotely reasonable explanation for - no matter how slight - then there is an unusual lack of free will caused by some undue influence. By prophesier or other doesn't matter, but in such a situation, someone took the free will away.
I know I'm not Lane, but this was a good question. I yield the floor at this time.
~~~~~~~~~~
Jason M. Waltz
Fantasy Acquisitions Editor Staffs & Starships Magazine
~~~~~~~~~~
Ever waltz with the Devil? Or devil with a Waltz? Visit von Darkmoor's thoughts to find out (and read a review or two). | | Back to Top | | |
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Lane
Neophyte
Date Joined Jul 2007
Total Posts : 118
| Posted 7/19/2007 12:45 PM (GMT -5) | | Well, it depends on the nature of prophecy and what you consider to be "free" will.
If prophecy is infallible, then it looks like we're bound to a "fatalistic" interpretation, i.e., if Prophecy P says that Event A is to come about, then there is nothing Characters C and D can do to prevent it. If S is the subject of that prophecy, then S has no free will to bring about A.
However, if prophecy is merely a guess, or a potential (think David Eddings' Belgariad/Mallorean style prophecies), then it would seem like the actors in a prophecy must actively work. In that way, prophecy isn't a prediction but a guide about what will happen if certain conditions are met. For example, if C and D do A, then B will (necessarily) result.
But this really side-steps the larger issue, which is "what is free will?" Lots of philosophers, like Thomas Hobbes or Dan Dennett, believe in what is called "compatibilism," or the idea that free will is compatible even with a universe whose events are "determined" (we call this "determinism.").
The basic tenet of determinism is that every event happens for a reason, or more succinctly, everything has a reason. There are strong and weak versions of determinism. A strong version is something like determinate materialism, which states that everything has a physical cause. A weaker version would be something more like Leibniz' principle of sufficient reason -- for every event E, there is some reason R sufficient to bring about E.
The typical way that "free" will is defined is "if you could have done other than you did." Put into what we call "modal semantics," we're saying that if we can imagine a logically possible world where you did other than what you did in this world, then you were "free" in that choice. This is "modal possibility;" i.e., if there is a modal possibility that you did otherwise, then your action wasn't "determined."
The problem is that it's always easy to imagine doing other than we did without asking the probative question of why we didn't do other than we did. So modal possibility might not track the kind of possibility we want when we talk about free will.
Absolute free will of this sort is often called "libertarian free will," or the ability to always have a choice in your action. Compatibilism denies that we have LFW, but still says that the modal possibility is sufficient to call our will "free."
Myself, I find these assertions puzzling. If the principle of sufficient reason is true (and there's lots of good reasons to think it is), then the very idea of indeterminism is incompatible with the universe. So weak determinism is a "default position." Humans do make choices in our actions, and so if we're calling prophecy fallible, then we always have a choice whether to perform the actions called for by the prophecy.
Now, it may be that prophecy refers only to what will happen outside our control, i.e., floods, earthquakes, etc. If that's the case, then those things can be fully determined (even physically) and so there's no logical disconnect. It's only in the realm of human action that prophecy presents these issues, and so we just have to ask whether prophecy is fatalistic, or whether it is merely a "guide" for action.
However, if it just a guide, the question of morality comes up. Immanuel Kant argued that free and rational autonomous choice was necessary for morality (nota bene: Kant believed that morality flowed from obligation). So if an actor in a prophecy is obligated to follow that prophecy (or else risk leaving it unfulfilled) then that throws a monkey wrench in our moral theory.
These are interesting questions; I might have to explore some of them in future writing, specifically the morality of following prophecy. For instance, if you knew that slaying the child who would grow up to be the Dark Lord would save millions of lives, would you still do it? Kant would say that you should not; the child always has the potential to not choose to act in accordance with the prophecy, and so your killing prevents the child from potentially exercising moral good, while at the same time being in itself immoral.
But on the other hand, a consequentialist would say that your action was imminently moral. Who's right?
-L. | | Back to Top | | |
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erazmus
Master
Date Joined Jul 2005
Total Posts : 4539
| Posted 7/19/2007 1:15 PM (GMT -5) | | Thanks Howard and Lane,
I'm thinking of prophesy in a classic sense. Vague in details, always and inevitably right in outcomes.
Had Pharoh not ordered slain the sons of Abraham born in the year of the jewish liberator, moses would not have been put adrift on the river and come to be rised in pharohs house-- but one of the babes born at that time, maybe Moses still, would have liberated the jews.
Free will doesn't come into it. Everyone makes their choices-- kill the children, don't bother. Set your son adrift, try to hide him, let the soldiers kill him. Yet in classic prophesy none of these choices affect the outcome-- the jews are still liberated. My bible stories are mostly filtered through Cecil B. DeMill, but in the movie version the jews are delievered the hard way-- it could have come to pass much gentler. If Moses had become Pharoh he might have set them free without a single miracle-- fulfilling the prophesy in a way less advantagous for the God of the Hebrews while preserving the place of the Gods of the Egyptians.
If you posit a being of infinite knowledge as providing (to mortals) the prophesy, then those mortals can be either determined or free-willed. Like the flood or an Earthquake, the superior vantage point of the prophesies generator makes the outcome as inevitable as gravity. Where the stories come from is the inevitable opposition to the prophesies outcome-- Pharoh always sets his will against the prophesy, or else there isn't any story. Moses grows up a jew laborer, saves the life of the pharohs son and wins his peoples freedom doesn't have the lasting potential of the Exodus.
Mike
Michael D. Turner
"Psyched Up" in _Turn the other Chick_-ed. E. Friesner-Baen books
www.baen.com
"Dutchman Rescue"in Continuum SF #6
www.continuumsciencefiction.com/orders.htm
"An Incident at Black Tongue Tavern" in _Bash Down the Door and Slice Open the Badguy_ from Fantasist Enterprises:
www.fantasistent.com/books/anthologies/BASH.php
www.fantasistent.com/books/anthologies/BASH.php
"Stains" in Tales of the Talisman 3-1 www.zianet.com/hadrosaur/index.html | | Back to Top | | |
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Lane
Neophyte
Date Joined Jul 2007
Total Posts : 118
| Posted 7/19/2007 4:07 PM (GMT -5) | | If prophecy is inevitably right, then we're edging closer and closer to the fatalistic view of prophecy. The inclusion of omniscience further muddies the water (I am not, however, one of those philosophers who believes free will to be incompatible with God's omniscience... more on this later).
Let's say that no matter what, the outcome of the prophecy is going to happen. Therefore, human action is powerless to prevent this event, whether we're free or not (you're right about that). But to the point that at least one human action is necessary for that outcome, that event must happen. At least one person is, at some point, going to be bereft of free will.
Again, the question of morality arises. If it was necessary for Pharaoh to oppose Moses, was Pharaoh truly immoral?
My (unsolicited) answer is no; morality is the same regardless of the presence of volition or will.
-L. | | Back to Top | | |
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Dru
Bemused Bystander
Date Joined Jul 2007
Total Posts : 33
| Posted 7/19/2007 5:29 PM (GMT -5) | | "Does freewill exist in a state where prophesy can happen?"
Short answer: Up to the author. Longer answer:
Yes.
If you posit an omniscient being who can see past and future all at once, then, as was suggested already, its prophecy is a statement of fact. "This is what will happen." In this case, the prophecy doesn't determine the action; the action determines the prophecy. So, yes, free will is possible; it is the result of humans exerting their free will that the being is reporting in its prophecy.
The problem, of course, is the level of *detail* of the prophecy. Fortunately for prophecy, free will only goes so far; most of life is out of any individual's control.
So, the prophet tells me "Dru will leave her office at 5 p.m. today," but I decide to assert my free will and leave at 4:30.
Obviously, something will intervene -- the talkative prof next door will walk in and I won't manage to extricate myself until 5, no matter how much I try.
Alternatively, I'll decide to leave at 6, but I'll get a call from a friend I really want to see, saying, "hey, meet me for a drink at 5!" Or the fire alarm will go off at 4:40, and although I'll try to stubbornly stay in my office, the administrator in charge of building safety will insist I leave with her, and I'll finally give in rather than be a jerk about it. And if I'm really determined to buck free will? I'll pull a pen out of the drawer and stab myself through the carotid artery with it. Alas, I'll found -- dead or alive -- and removed from my office at 5 p.m.
In other words, that prophecy was pretty darn detailed -- person, place, time -- but there was still a lot of information left out about what might lead me to leave at that moment despite my stubborn intentions to do otherwise.
Prophecy would be accurate, for a TRULY omniscient being, even if the world is a complex and chaotic system, every choice splits the universe into infinite futures, and the act of observing affects what is observed. A truly omniscient being could still see that infinity and track the event in question through it -- and, again, simply report what happened before it happened. And since the reception of the prophecy would be calculated into the equation of the timeline it's reporting on, it will have taken free-will attempts to avoid the prophecy into account, and the result it reports will reflect those attempts. The events in the timeline without the prophecy may be different from the events in the timeline with the prophecy, but in both cases, humans still exercised their free will, and the prophecy will still be accurate.
As long as you take this kind of view -- action determines prophecy -- then there's no moral paradox. Only if you assume prophecy determines action does morality (and free will) come into question.
The Harrow
The Mark of Ashen Wings
~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Clockwork Heart
Coming from Juno Books
February 2008
~~~~~~~~~~~~~ | | Back to Top | | |
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von Darkmoor
Small Press Publisher (and Dancer still)
Date Joined Dec 2005
Total Posts : 3056
| Posted 7/19/2007 6:24 PM (GMT -5) | | | This is a most cool and thorough discussion, Mike and Lane and now Dru! I've reread this thread twice now and have lots of thoughts bubbling around in the old noggin. They shall have to wait, however, as I am suffering from too little sleep and too much headache to speak as eloquently as either of you at this point.
I will depart with but one comment. To this
I say: Both. And that is the beauty of free will.
~~~~~~~~~~ Jason M. Waltz Fantasy Acquisitions Editor Staffs & Starships Magazine~~~~~~~~~~ Ever waltz with the Devil? Or devil with a Waltz? Visit von Darkmoor's thoughts to find out (and read a review or two). | | Back to Top | | |
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