- Joined
- Nov 4, 2013
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- 17,653
Hello, this is my first topic on the Serious Discussion page. This might contain some sensitive stuff, though. I have been thinking, and I just want to ask...
Do people really understand free will?
I mean, in the case of humans, it seems that even when it is said that we have free will, we still have natural behaviors that make us belittle, pick on or even discriminate against others. Take a look at GameFAQs, for example. They hate on pretty much everything and pick on those who disagree with them or have a different opinion all the time. It is like they are animals.
With that said, not only have we still classified ourselves as animals, but whether we have instincts or not, we still have emotions and even natural behaviors that are akin to those of other animals. Do not get me wrong, though; that does not mean that we do not have free will, as I am sure we still have it, nonetheless. However, I must say that there are many people out there who are still hindered by natural behaviors and don't have control over their emotions. While that does not take away free will entirely, it does limit it in some way. In fact, while true free will, like most other "true" things, may not be achievable at all; our natural behaviors that we have still keep us from getting close to that true free will level on this day.
The thing is, freedom is not without responsibility, and too many people out there are irresponsible nowadays. They don't seem to know that just because they have free will, that does not give the right to kill or say bad things about others, etc. That is why we have laws and rules, and even those may only go so far in changing how people do things, for people can ignore them, and do things they are not supposed to do, or say things they are not supposed to do.
It doesn't help that there is plenty of ignorance in many people too, and these natural behaviors have a way of contributing to such ignorance, when just because they can choose to ignore something, doesn't mean it will go away. Everything has a consequence, and while they may not affect a person now, they will later, no matter how long it will take. I mean, you can't just say something won't impact us, like a small comet that will destroy civilization nonetheless, or even climate change for that matter, and expect it to go away, no matter how powerful you are politically or how many people believe you. The thing is, ignorance can come in many forms, so while people can be smart on one thing, they can be ignorant on another. In fact, there is too much ignorance in the world, nowadays, which prevents us from seeing the error of our ways. It doesn't help that such ignorance can be taught to young children, too, as they already don't know any better, and can develop believing in worse. I do feel bad for such children learning things that may not be true, as parents are not always right. Plus, people will try to find reasons to hate anything, even if they are not true, as that is another natural behavior that leads to such things, which I say is mentally unhealthy.
With that said, people can rely too much on other people, even if they are wrong. I know of someone from another site who said that a female coworker believed in this certain politician who is against the COVID vaccine, and will not take it herself, but that does not mean she is in the right for doing so. Not having the vaccine can have negative, long term effects that they don't immediately see. That said, it is not bad to listen to the news, but people may still believe them on things they are wrong about, which is sad.
To add to the natural behavior thing, they, along people saying dumb or wrong things that others listen to, cause those others to pick on and discriminate against others and even be violent towards them, which makes me feel that people are not truly free at all. They may still have free will, but with people not opening up to people of other colors, have mental or physical diseases or disorders or even those who are LGBT, including those unwilling to open up at all, that takes away the "freedom" for others to share an opinion or say something about anything, even though those picking on or discriminating against them do not have any actual power over them.
Say what you will about survival of the fittest, which I am going to include in this in a way, but in terms of the weak, others try to take advantage of the weak, like young kids, who can't speak for themselves. I personally believe survival of the fittest applies to everything, from businesses to even sports. The fact that there are the weak is why we have the strong, as it is the strong's responsibility to protect the weak, and that the weak become strong and have to defend new members of the weak, and so on. Now, whether survival of the fittest is real or not is not that important here, for my main point is: Nobody should feel threatened or discriminated against or even taken advantage of, even if they are among the "weak". There are people who should know better than to do that.
While it may be unorthodox and not-so-acceptable to bring comic books into this, Peter Parker, AKA Spiderman's Uncle Ben once said that "With great power, there must also come great responsibility". Think of it however you want, but in real life, I personally find this to be true. To me, freedom is power, and power should not be abused. Too many people still do that, though, and that can, with all I said above, create negative effects in our society. Heck! The internet itself is power, different from real life, but grants power for people to interact with those worldwide, without one government controlling it, it seems. However, people abuse their power online. Just because they have power on the internet and what the internet is does not mean people should treat it differently from real life, and abuse their power on there as well. It's also a shame people won't accept responsibility for some things they do, even if it is their fault due to natural behaviors, and will try to make others have the blame and suffer for it.
Let me tell you one thing; when the USA was coming into existence, our founding fathers said "All men are created equal." However, back then, even they used this to refer only to themselves, which means just white people from western Europe. Not African Americans were considered for this. Neither were Asians, women, Native Americans, heck! Not even Eastern Europeans were among the "all men who were created equal" back then. They were left out! As history showed, none of these other people had civic rights, and had to push for them later on. While I'd hate to bring religion into this as well, religious people have gone by rules of morals and good, such as "Thou shall not kill", treat others as they would treat you, be nice, etc. However, it seems that, as a friend told me, even they exclude some other people, especially those of other religions, races or are just different, as if they did not matter at all. Quite sad, actually.
Anyway, I just want to say that with all of the above that I said, free will is limited by things such as emotions and natural behaviors that we have that may be like those of other animals, making it so we are not as different from them as we think; and while it is true that true free; or 100 percent free will) will can never be reached, our natural behaviors and emotions (not that the latter, emotions are a bad thing; they are more of a consequence of natural behaviors in this case, and I meant lack of control of emotions, too) are preventing us from getting close to that, and are thus preventing us from getting better or making things better, and in turn, keep us from reaching our true potential as humans. It will also hinder our ability to take responsibility and not blame others for some things they did not do, but the people blaming them did, all due to natural behaviors. This is all keeping us from being what we really can be.
So, what do you all think of this? Any criticisms are welcome.
Do people really understand free will?
I mean, in the case of humans, it seems that even when it is said that we have free will, we still have natural behaviors that make us belittle, pick on or even discriminate against others. Take a look at GameFAQs, for example. They hate on pretty much everything and pick on those who disagree with them or have a different opinion all the time. It is like they are animals.
With that said, not only have we still classified ourselves as animals, but whether we have instincts or not, we still have emotions and even natural behaviors that are akin to those of other animals. Do not get me wrong, though; that does not mean that we do not have free will, as I am sure we still have it, nonetheless. However, I must say that there are many people out there who are still hindered by natural behaviors and don't have control over their emotions. While that does not take away free will entirely, it does limit it in some way. In fact, while true free will, like most other "true" things, may not be achievable at all; our natural behaviors that we have still keep us from getting close to that true free will level on this day.
The thing is, freedom is not without responsibility, and too many people out there are irresponsible nowadays. They don't seem to know that just because they have free will, that does not give the right to kill or say bad things about others, etc. That is why we have laws and rules, and even those may only go so far in changing how people do things, for people can ignore them, and do things they are not supposed to do, or say things they are not supposed to do.
It doesn't help that there is plenty of ignorance in many people too, and these natural behaviors have a way of contributing to such ignorance, when just because they can choose to ignore something, doesn't mean it will go away. Everything has a consequence, and while they may not affect a person now, they will later, no matter how long it will take. I mean, you can't just say something won't impact us, like a small comet that will destroy civilization nonetheless, or even climate change for that matter, and expect it to go away, no matter how powerful you are politically or how many people believe you. The thing is, ignorance can come in many forms, so while people can be smart on one thing, they can be ignorant on another. In fact, there is too much ignorance in the world, nowadays, which prevents us from seeing the error of our ways. It doesn't help that such ignorance can be taught to young children, too, as they already don't know any better, and can develop believing in worse. I do feel bad for such children learning things that may not be true, as parents are not always right. Plus, people will try to find reasons to hate anything, even if they are not true, as that is another natural behavior that leads to such things, which I say is mentally unhealthy.
With that said, people can rely too much on other people, even if they are wrong. I know of someone from another site who said that a female coworker believed in this certain politician who is against the COVID vaccine, and will not take it herself, but that does not mean she is in the right for doing so. Not having the vaccine can have negative, long term effects that they don't immediately see. That said, it is not bad to listen to the news, but people may still believe them on things they are wrong about, which is sad.
To add to the natural behavior thing, they, along people saying dumb or wrong things that others listen to, cause those others to pick on and discriminate against others and even be violent towards them, which makes me feel that people are not truly free at all. They may still have free will, but with people not opening up to people of other colors, have mental or physical diseases or disorders or even those who are LGBT, including those unwilling to open up at all, that takes away the "freedom" for others to share an opinion or say something about anything, even though those picking on or discriminating against them do not have any actual power over them.
Say what you will about survival of the fittest, which I am going to include in this in a way, but in terms of the weak, others try to take advantage of the weak, like young kids, who can't speak for themselves. I personally believe survival of the fittest applies to everything, from businesses to even sports. The fact that there are the weak is why we have the strong, as it is the strong's responsibility to protect the weak, and that the weak become strong and have to defend new members of the weak, and so on. Now, whether survival of the fittest is real or not is not that important here, for my main point is: Nobody should feel threatened or discriminated against or even taken advantage of, even if they are among the "weak". There are people who should know better than to do that.
While it may be unorthodox and not-so-acceptable to bring comic books into this, Peter Parker, AKA Spiderman's Uncle Ben once said that "With great power, there must also come great responsibility". Think of it however you want, but in real life, I personally find this to be true. To me, freedom is power, and power should not be abused. Too many people still do that, though, and that can, with all I said above, create negative effects in our society. Heck! The internet itself is power, different from real life, but grants power for people to interact with those worldwide, without one government controlling it, it seems. However, people abuse their power online. Just because they have power on the internet and what the internet is does not mean people should treat it differently from real life, and abuse their power on there as well. It's also a shame people won't accept responsibility for some things they do, even if it is their fault due to natural behaviors, and will try to make others have the blame and suffer for it.
Let me tell you one thing; when the USA was coming into existence, our founding fathers said "All men are created equal." However, back then, even they used this to refer only to themselves, which means just white people from western Europe. Not African Americans were considered for this. Neither were Asians, women, Native Americans, heck! Not even Eastern Europeans were among the "all men who were created equal" back then. They were left out! As history showed, none of these other people had civic rights, and had to push for them later on. While I'd hate to bring religion into this as well, religious people have gone by rules of morals and good, such as "Thou shall not kill", treat others as they would treat you, be nice, etc. However, it seems that, as a friend told me, even they exclude some other people, especially those of other religions, races or are just different, as if they did not matter at all. Quite sad, actually.
Anyway, I just want to say that with all of the above that I said, free will is limited by things such as emotions and natural behaviors that we have that may be like those of other animals, making it so we are not as different from them as we think; and while it is true that true free; or 100 percent free will) will can never be reached, our natural behaviors and emotions (not that the latter, emotions are a bad thing; they are more of a consequence of natural behaviors in this case, and I meant lack of control of emotions, too) are preventing us from getting close to that, and are thus preventing us from getting better or making things better, and in turn, keep us from reaching our true potential as humans. It will also hinder our ability to take responsibility and not blame others for some things they did not do, but the people blaming them did, all due to natural behaviors. This is all keeping us from being what we really can be.
So, what do you all think of this? Any criticisms are welcome.
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