Yep, "free will" is something of an illusion... even the most logical thought process is still just a cascade of chemical signalling in a neural network. It's not all deterministic though, quantum mechanics means that you'll never know "exactly" what happens next. that's what keeps things interesting 🪩

the idea that all choices are predetermined is something i really don't want to believe but i'm not sure we know enough about the universe to say for certain

Oh boy, do I have a treat for you... Here's a talk by Dr. Robert Sapolsky, a highly respected neuroscientist and primatologist. I'm not sure he persuaded me of his own conclusion, but a fascinating talk nonetheless.

Love it.

We have free will from our perspectives If there is only one timeline, and the future already exists, we have no free will from the perspective of someone who can see the whole timeline - but that's only scary because it brings up scary questions, in my opinion. There might be good answers. Maybe whoever sees the whole timeline is some author writing a good story for us to be in, and it's fine for us that someone always knew what we'd do. If there are quantum divergences that split different possibilities into multiple timelines, meaning a timeline happens for every possibility, then why are you experiencing this timeline and not another timeline? Maybe free will is just different versions of you experiencing every possible choice. That's kinda not scary to me. If there are quantum uncertainties that no level of existence can get around, with only one timeline but no possible view of the future, then we have free will in the sense that our choices actually determine which 1 of 2 timelines will happen. That's also kinda not scary to me. Replying to you instead of the original asker because idc about leaderboard points on this one. PS if I have no free will then when I say "Digit is hot" that's not me saying that, it's the universe making me say the only possible thing for me to say at the time. That kinda implies god thinks she's hot or something

you are already rank #1 on leaderboard 😹 nice response

Predeterminism and free will are sort of different... The former is, everything is predictable, if you had enough data... I.e. if you knew the exact atomic position and momentum of everything. That, I think, is wrong, basically because of QM. (But it makes for an amazing sci-fi series "Devs" with Nick Offerman.) but "free will" is this sort of quasi-mystical idea that there's something directing your choices other than natural / biochemical / physical processes. This, I think, is also wrong. Consciousness, the idea that you are a distinct "thing" apart from the world, is an illusion. Take psychedelics to realize that fact.

Wait what?? I've been treating it like a job trying to get to the top and didn't even notice I made it Thank you 🎉 I shall now party with a bowl of weed and some cold water 🎉

Ok, fine. So what is less wrong than these 2 things?

Well materialism is a good start... Nothing that uniquely imbues life with supernatural "woo" that is unexplainable by the sum constitution of our physical beings

You lost me 😄

You're a bag of chemicals that millions of years ago figured out how to walk, fuck, and (as of late) do Tik Tok dances.

It's both true and nah.

I love to think that randomness is ultimate null hypothesis and time only makes sense in open-ended worlds. Determinism arises because of replication of systems which optimizes for energy efficiency of "computing" the same permutation in a limited span. Then having the same span is boring and low-level permutations build new non-reducible entities which repeat the same meta-cycle.

When you overcome this, life gets a lot easier. You can control your thoughts, everything else follows.