Free Will - Does It or Does It Not Exist?

by truth_b_known 52 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

  • Anna Marina
    Anna Marina

    If ultimate justice exists and every person will know, that means at some point every person would have to be alive. Including those who were conceived but died in the womb or died too young to know anything.

  • jhine
    jhine

    Perhaps determinism is what the Bible calls man's sinful nature .

    Because of original sin we have all inherited a " sinful nature " . Sin is doing what we want not want God wants and because of our genes, our upbringing and other things not under our control we all " fall short " . Of course our parents, teachers and other human influencers are subject to the same flaws determined by their genes, upbringing etc . So the cycle is "determined " to continue .

    So God sent Jesus to break the cycle of sinfulness for which in a way we aren't responsible.

    Now weather that means that no one should be punished for crimes they have committed? Well it's true that the fear of human punishment does deter people and many have been rehabilitated from a criminal lifestyle.

    However it's also true that even really nice people can do nasty things , lie , gossip , backbite , envy etc .

    So determinism makes sinners of us all . We need help to break free from that. The Bible tells us that " God so loved the world that He sent His Son to die for us while yet we were still sinners "

    Sermon over . I just felt that l wanted to put a Christian spin on this discussion.

    Jan

  • Anna Marina
    Anna Marina

    I guess determinism then would be when someone gets caught up with love of money, believes Bitcoin is going to the moon and put their savings into it.

    Then when the price falls off the edge of a cliff and they lose their money they believe it was all inevitable and think there is no such thing as free will. Whereas there is such a thing as not believing every stupid story you are told and wising up.

  • Vanderhoven7
    Vanderhoven7

    Try, "I had no choice" in a court of law.

  • Disillusioned JW
    Disillusioned JW

    Free will exists only in the sense of being free to act in accordance with our nature. But our human nature, as a result of our biology, includes built-in constraints as to what we can do and as to what we can not do. Definitely no personal deity is involved, and very probably no deistic creator is involved either.

  • Disillusioned JW
    Disillusioned JW

    Claiming temporary insanity, or other impaired mental condition, in a court of law has sometimes worked.

  • Vanderhoven7
  • joey jojo
    joey jojo

    As humans, our main drivers are food, sleep and procreation. We spend a lot of our energy around these 3 things.

    Then we have our pre-set expectations, belief systems and attitudes we inherit from our parents to contend with.

    That doesn't leave much room for free will.

  • BettyHumpter
    BettyHumpter

    I'm not sure it does. I think at the instant of the big bang every subatomic particle was going wherever it was going and from that point on it was like a break on a giant billiards table. Everything, including me, my parents, Julius Caesar, ladies basketball and even Lloyd Evans was inevitable from that point. Certain billiard balls combing in a certain way bouncing off another, causing the other to bounce off the other and on and on.

    But we have no way of knowing the current or starting position of every subatomic particle, so whether all history was ordained in that instant or not doesn't matter except as a mildly depressing thought exercise. It feels like we have free will, so we should pretend we do.

  • enoughisenough
    enoughisenough

    I think we have free will, but we don't always have the freedom to do what we would be our "will".

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