Desire: in general, a subject's capacity to become, by means of his ideas, the cause of the actual existence of the objects of those ideas. — Mww

Do I understand this definition correctly? I can only desire something that is feasible?

"I want to become Superman" is therefore not a desire, as it's not feasible?

By the way, on Leo.org these four words seem to be synonymous:

desire
request
wish
will

I can only desire something that is feasible? — Quk

No, I think the definition implies one can desire in accordance with whatever idea crosses his mind, but that desire doesn’t mean he has the capacity to cause, or to will, those ideas to manifest objectively.

On the other hand, one can attain only that which is feasible, or possible, which could be said to be the limitation of practical desire.

one can desire in accordance with whatever idea crosses his mind — Mww

Does this agree with Dawnstorm's idea regarding "trigger"?

1. Trigger. A sudden craving for cheese vs. seeing a piece of cheese and wanting to eat it. The object triggers the situational instance of will/desire, vs. something else (some association? a random firing of neurons?) triggers the will/desire. — Dawnstorm

I take these "mind-crossings" and other "triggers" into account in my illustrations, I just call them "reasons" (or "causes") instead of wills or desires. A trigger itself is not a will nor a desire. When the rising sun triggers my will to leave the bed, that trigger is 150 million kilometers away from my mental location. My will doesn't generate the sun. It's true that my will can generate another will, but -- vice versa -- my will cannot generate that same will's cause or reason. An egg cannot generate its mother.

Does this agree with Dawnstorm's idea regarding "trigger"? — Quk

Ehhhh….dunno. Maybe. Smacks of psychology to me, while I’m more inclined toward speculative metaphysics for its explanatory power.

someone can of course have reasons for choosing something that isn't their preference. — flannel jesus

The clearest example of a free choice is a choice made against and despite all biases, drivers, necessities and forces. Choosing the cake that no one wants, that you don't need, that you think will taste horrible, that you are told not to choose, that will kill you, and without any need to choose anything at all - choosing that cake, can only be an act of freedom. Giving ones life can be an act of freedom.

There are gradations of course. Choosing the cake that you hate but for someone else who loves that cake, knowing that other person doesn't expect or even know about the cake (so no cake is needed), this might be a cake chosen out of free will and no outside forces.

So what is freewill then - what is left to drive the choice if one is choosing outside of all biases, drivers, and forces?

I don't know, but describe it this way - we create the thing called "will" in the same instant we choose against forces that demand we choose something else. When we seek all three cakes, see our drivers and biases towards this cake or that one, and then choose something else, the choice is the physical manifestation of the now created "my will" that consents to that choice belonging to "me".

Choosing the cake that no one wants, that you don't need, that you think will taste horrible, that you are told not to choose, that will kill you, and without any need to choose anything at all - choosing that cake, can only be an act of freedom. — Fire Ologist

There's a reason to choose that horrible, toxic, useless cake. This reason leads the will. The will doesn't have the freedom to deactivate this reason. You may think there is no such reason, but I'd say there is one; you just need to take a closer look.

And if there's no such reason, then the cake selection is pure random. In that case too the will has no freedom; it's just controlled by a random trigger instead of a reason.

"The will is free."

The problem with this statement is that the expression "free" is incomplete.

Free of what? That's the missing part. The will can only be free of special reasons and causes.

So, I think the issue cannot be generalized; it needs to be specialized.

Example:

If I'm indifferent to cakes, there's no reason to eat one, nor is there any reason not to eat one. In this special case the will is free of cake related reasons.

But the will is not free in general. There's always a cause or a reason for a decision. It's impossible to inhibit all causes and reasons of the universe.

"My will is currently free of cake related reasons."

That is a complete statement because it gives the word "free" a reference. The word "free" makes sense now. Cakes are not influencing my will at this moment.

There's always a cause or a reason for a decision. It's impossible to inhibit all causes and reasons of the universe. — Quk

If it is impossible to inhibit all reasons, is there a single reason, or a manifold of reasons under a particular rubric, necessary in itself, to cause any decision? Is there one reason impossible to inhibit for decision-making?

To arrive at the possibility of a singular condition is the very epitome of specialized, insofar as the will’s freedom, and the will’s limitations thereby infused into it, are given.

Is there one reason impossible to inhibit for decision-making? — Mww

Is there any reason among all reasons which cannot influence a decision? -- I don't think so.

Can all reasons influence a decision? -- Yes, I think so.

Is there any reason among all reasons which cannot influence a decision? -- I don't think so. — Quk

But I’m asking about the possibility of there being one reason which always influences any decision.

Could there be a single universal non-dividable reason influencing any decision? I'd say no, not a single one; I see a threefold core:

1. Logic in general
2. Causality in general
3. Random in general

In the instance we are being invited to examine here, IMO none of the four subjects are applying their 'free will'. I would actually go further and claim that there are no such things as graduations of free will either ("Wow! You were almost free willing there!") ... In much the same way that IMO there's no such thing as a 'near death' experience.

I'll respond to this quickly and then get back to earlier replies (sorry to everyone for the delays).

Yes, I think I agree with you. I was speaking very loosely and I'll come up with a different formulation to express the gradation I was thinking of.

I'm interested in non-vague concepts, that is, concepts that do not admit of degrees, and do not admit of borderline cases. It seems you think that the line between free will and unfree will is sharp (or perhaps the line between will and non-will is sharp), and also the line between alive and dead is sharp, perhaps? Other possible concepts that are perhaps not-vague are consciousness, space, and less-than-7.

The vast majority of concepts are vague - they admit of borderline cases. Famous ones are heap/pile and baldness. Others could include human, chair, lawnmower, male, female, liquidity, planet, wall, food, kidney, brain, and pretty much any concept you care to think of.

Oh, and welcome to the Philosophy Forum :)

I understood your "gradation" as a reference to the amount of options, not to the will's intensitiy. I understood, the will which accepts 100 options has a greater freedom than that other will which accepts 3 options. Anyway, even this quantitative idea won't work, in my opinion, because the amount of options is a relative number: Considering 2 cakes doesn't necessarily imply a higher number than considering the cherry, chocolate, and nut of 1 cake. The large Sahara doesn't necessarily imply a greater variety than the small Stonehenge does.

Yes there is arbitrariness in the things we choose to count. Very interesting. I'll get back to your earlier posts as well asap.

The conclusion here is that there are gradations of free will, of choice, from particular to absolute, depending on our preferences/values.

Is this a good analysis? — bert1

uh no not necessarily. someone can of course have reasons for choosing something that isn't their preference. — flannel jesus

I will say yes, there are degrees of free will. Some people have a lot of self-awareness and others have none. How much free will we have depends on how self aware we are. Also, the greater the degree of empathy, the greater our reasoning and therefore, our free will. In general the boarder our consciousness is, the greater our reasoning and the greater our reasoning is, the greater our free will.

I chose this because I think it is right, rather than I chose this because I feel a desire for it.

So my desire is predicated on the assumption that ecclesiastical cakes and my tastes are predictable and consistent. {I decided to leave that autocorrection just for fun} In other words, desire presumes determinism. — unenlightened

I see what you mean. The OP wasn't intended to be a total refutation of determinism. The idea is that our choices are determined, but the thing that determines them can range from the particular to the universal. I'm wondering if that's interesting and relevant to the free will/determinism debate as it allows for freedom from some determinants but not others. And it's possible to become more free (perhaps) by valuing more universal things than particular things. Are we free to choose our values? Maybe not, but if we are determined, perhaps by our education, to value the general and universal, then perhaps we are more free as a result.

The particulars here, seem to be in decisions made from past experiences. In your example the choice was made by a past decision. — DifferentiatingEgg

Quite possibly, but what decision exactly? Was the decision to like cakes (in the cases of Geraldine and Ursula especially) made by them? Or was it made by their ancestors desire for calories in order to survive? Do we carry on the decisions of our ancestors? Or is that just a weird way to think of it?

But perhaps something occurs that makes you change that decision. Like some Icecream is 400 calories per serving, some are 100 calories per serving. You may decide that from now on you want to try something with less calories. So you update a decision preference. To decide means to kill off other options.

Yes, so your decisions are influenced by education perhaps? So you want to survive, that's instinctive, perhaps a decision made by ancestors and carried on in you. Now in the modern world, this instinct to acquire calories, works against the overall will to live. Once that is learned, by means of acquiring a concept (say, of diabetes), then a choice becomes available when it wasn't available before. One is no longer determined just by the instinct to acquire calories, the overall desire to live can allow one to decide not to consume the calories. Is this later state more free in any sense? It's still determined, but there are more options, and each alternative is, perhaps, possible.

Where as true spontaneous choice in the matter requires us to be free from preformed decisions.

Would such a choice be random/arbitrary, then? I'm open to the idea that that's what free choice is, and that's OK.

Can’t we choose that which we would never choose? Select, what we don’t want? What could determine that? Besides freedom?

Can’t we choose, anyway, despite our slavery? Can’t we willingly do the will of others, even unto death? This is like “if someone forces you to go one mile, go two miles.”

We have to build and create our freedom - it doesn’t sit there in some sort of faculty of the soul waiting to be exercised.

We may be driven by physics.
We may be driven by desires, instinct, sub-conscious forces and the stars.
But if we reflect on as many of these slaveries as we can consciously identify, and then act, seemingly randomly, but willingly, anyway, we might start to create a free will.

The idea is that our choices are determined, but the thing that determines them can range from the particular to the universal. — bert1

How external to the free chooser do you see the universal or the particular? This is interesting. I need to think about thinking in between universals and particulars to find freedom.

Freedom, it seems to me, can’t make sense of that freedom is grounded within the system that the free thing participates in.

Like in a political system - we aren’t free because of the laws that protect our freedom. The laws can’t create freedom, only limit it. We are free first, regardless of any government or laws (if we are free at all). Government, laws and systems have nothing to do with my freedom. If I have freedom.

So it seems (to me), freedom has to be imposed, created, new, unsubstantiated, unfounded, from outside of, despite, any system at all.

So it is easy to see how freedom must be impossible. We are always within some system, so there is always something that drives and forces us to be where, what and even who, we are. It seems.

It think psychological freedom starts with the notion of consent.

We aren’t free, we are strapped into a rollercoaster and have no choice but to take the ride, and no choice but to go up when it goes up and down when it goes down. We can struggle to free ourselves from these chains, which is impossible it seems to me. We’d have to use chains as tools to break our chains. But freedom doesn’t come from our relationship to the chains. Instead we can accept the chains, consenting on the way up to the higher, and consenting again on the way down to the lower. We start to see where we are going before we get there. If we learn to do this, we can learn how to deny consent to the higher, even though we are going up, and that is when we might start to find a space for freedom. Freedom is first born in the space in between where we are (by necessity) and where are going (by necessity). But living in the space between where we are and where we must be going is living somewhere where we are not yet, and so akin to living in a space of possibility, more open to something new and unpredictable.

Freedom is just me, unattached, not driven by anything nor able to be touched by any force, existing in the space ahead of where I am before I get where I have to go.

The only possibility for freedom seems to be a freedom created from nothing. Seems impossible. But because phenomenologically my freedom seems so obvious, and because I desire to know, I am forced to continue to wonder how I seem to have freedom.

Personally I believe free will is actually very limited, and that most of the choices we make are done by subconscious algorithmic thought processes that mean the thing we choose we likely always going to be the thing chosen in that particular instance. I believe only in the rare cases where the mental algorithm comes back with equal percentages does free will truly exist.

Psychologists talk about a 'fight or flight' response. An automatic response to the perception of threat. Presumably, psychologically, one has no freedom about having this response or not, but also presumably, one does have freedom to fight or fly, unless one is caught in a trap and one's struggles in either case are in vain.

The only possibility for freedom seems to be a freedom created from nothing. — Fire Ologist

This seems correct to me, and accords with the meaning in the game of 'go'. A stone or a configuration of connected stones has degrees of freedom corresponding to the unoccupied spaces around and within it. In order to survive permanently a configuration needs two degrees of internal freedom - two separate internal spaces so that even entirely surrounded, both cannot be filled because the fill of the first would be itself surrounded, and not survive until the second space could be filled.

Humans, it appears, have only one such internal empty space — a singular awareness, and thus our freedom is temporary. Hence the inadequacy of the individual and the necessity for relationship. Hence the desperation of the narcissist and psychopath.

You are "free" to chose, it is just not your "conscious awareness" that is making most of the choices instead the subconscious (organism as a whole) seems to be doing most of the choosing and the "consciousness is informed later and tries to take the credit.