ok, let us suppose still you insist you are not free for the reasons you stated above. But would you not admit that there are huge part of your life which is free? Such as drinking water instead of beer, going for a walk instead of sleep etc etc? In that case should you not then say, at least some part of your life is free, while you feel the other part is not? Would it not be more accurate claim? Outright claiming life is deterministic sounds somewhat confused inaccurate and untrue claim.

There is part of your life which is deterministic, but there is also part which free. This seems more accurate claim and truth.

Is it not the case of your free choice to be unfree with all the reasons you stated, why you are not free, therefore that was your free choice not to be free? You are still free.

Both TLP and PI seems written in richly aphoristic style, which attract broad range of different interpretations by the academics and readers.

What is his view on mental objects such as fear, anger, joy, hope, doubt ...etc? What is his idea on existence of God?

If you had dolphine's genes, then you wouldn't be sitting in your room in front of your PC or on the phone typing in English, asking these questions.  And because you would not have human reasoning and linguistic abilities, you wouldn't be asking about free will questions.  Maybe you could be reasoning in your head about these questions, but still you wouldn't be typing the questions in English.

And of course, you could make lots and lots of presumptions, inferences and imaginations on the metamorphic illusions, but but but you will know yourself, that it is a necessity in your reality that you cannot transform physically and biologically into any one of those beings no matter how much you would wish to.

You will be forever you, and you know it well for truth, that you cannot change that. This is a determinism and necessity.

But for you to make simple daily life decisions such as going for a walk, or sleeping, listening to music or reading, you only need your dispositional decision in your mind. And in that regard, you are FREE.  Death of all life cycles is determined. No one can change that.

So life has deterministic, and also free aspects.  Life is not an atomic object. 

In the case of AI machines, would it not be the state of "powered ON" being them conscious in the human terms?
My PC has ON OFF and also SLEEP options. It only works when it is "ON".

You simply decide to go for a walk or sleep etc. You don't need the other constraints and variables for making these simple decisions.

Please explain in detail with evidence and proof, why you need the effects of genes, environments, nutrients and experiences to go for a walk or sleep etc.

In the words of Sun Tzu from The Art of War: “Know thy self, know thy enemy. A thousand battles, a thousand victories.” — RussellA

Witty is an interesting and significant philosopher, because the issues he had raised were compelling and important.

I used to read Witty with minor interest, peripheral significance, and not a great deal. But I will be reading him with more attention and focus.

He definitely has intriguing points, views and arguments in his philosophy . His weakness seems come from the inconsistency between TLP and PI, and his concept of words, objects and the world.

What does he say about God and religion? I am going to read about that topic in the near future.

Everyone will die sometime in their life, so it is determined. But they can go for a walk, or read, or listen to music or have a nap. They are free.

Having been  born, living and dying inevitable deaths are universal fate and destiny no life can escape from.  Only in that sense, life is deterministic.

But the content of all the lives are unique, random, irreplaceable, non exchangeable, unrepeatable and free.  In that sense all life is both deterministic and free in nature.

Being an agnostic is perfectly fine, if that is the stance you have decided to take. Nothing wrong with that, especially from a philosophical point of view.

And of course, by all means you could keep on inferring what would be the case, had you had those people's, animals, aliens genes, DNAs, fates ... etc even in another galaxies or possible worlds or parallel universes. But you should also ask, if you could really take on their genes, DNAs and fates and their lives in your real life?

Remember, every life is unique, and only valid for once in a lifetime, so there is no definition of individual life. The only definition of life in general terms is, that it is an entity born, lives and destined to die sometime. The content of your life is irreplaceable and unique, and all the individual lives since the start of the universe have been the same - unique, irreplaceable and never to be repeated.

The great analytic philosophy vs continental philosophy divide.

My favourite city is Paris, and we always stay near the Left Bank, so perhaps I should be moving away from Wittgenstein and towards Sartre. — RussellA

Analytic philosophy is still great for critical exercises. But if you are moving towards the continental philosophy, then Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, Heidegger, Sartre or even Deleuze are all great philosophers.

:up:

but not internal sensations such as fear, anger, etc. — RussellA

In that case, would you not feel that referentialism and logical positivism are blind system? I mean, the world is not just material, but there are also mental sides too.

You talked about Five apples and Give me a slab scenario in the posts.  Before you and I sit down face to face in between the actual apples and slabs, they are just mental objects whilst we talking about them.  I have no clue what apples and which slab you are referring to.

The PI is opposed to Referentialism, whereby words refer to objects in the world. To be an object existing in the world in space and time it must have some kind of essence. — RussellA

Does the "object" also include mental objects such as fear, anger, pain, joy and hope ...etc? Or does it just mean material objects in the external world?

Perhaps Corvus is correct and Nikki is just innocently posting philosophical human dilemmas on a philosophy site to help him/her/them complete a philosophy course. :halo: — universeness

Yeah, I don't presume or even imagine anyone with real personal crisis of their life would come to Philosophy Forum, and cry out seeking for help. :)

No problems mate. They are all great philosophers. Their importance in the history of philosophy comes from not the truths they concluded, but from the significant issues they raised, and how they explained the issues with their supporting arguments.

After reading them, whoever you decide to judge as right, is right.

You are welcome my friend. :)  If I quickly and roughly try to summarise their points,

Descarte - Truth and  knowledge comes from your mind, and knowledge is innate. He was a rationalist.

Hume - Truth and Knowledge comes from your experience of external object and world via impressions and ideas. He was an empiricist.

Kant - Knowledge comes from outside from your sensation, but it needs concepts in your mind to be able to know and judge what they are. Intuition and imagination combines the externally given sense data with the internal concepts, and allow knowledge and judgments possible.

Some knowledge is never known to the human mind e.g. God, Freedom and Afterlife etc etc. They are outside of human knowability.  For knowledge of God, the concept is postulated rather than perceived or sensed i.e. it is the world of faith and postulation. Kant didn't deny the existence of God, Freedom and Afterlife etc. He limited the power of human reason and knowability, saying they are in the world of faith and belief, and their existence is postulated rather than reasoned, sensed or perceived.

Kant tried to combine the rationalist and empiricist and come to a more complete system of epistemology.

If you want to know more about religious knowledge and God, then I would start with Kierkegaard.

If you are still interested on the topics of Truth and Knowledge, I would recommend you to read :)
Rene Descartes (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/descartes/)
David Hume (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hume/)
Immanuel Kant (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant/)

Yes, exactly. It was Socrates who said it. The dictum is recorded in Plato's Apology. — javi2541997

I feel Socrates was right in saying that. He was the first philosopher in history who turned the philosophical focus into human life i.e. what is life, what is better life, and how one should live, from the wonders of the universe topics which were philosophical trends at the time.

I read the OP as just a topic of Philosophy of Life rather than some outcry of personal problems.

Humans have reasoning abilities as well as highly developed linguistic capabilities (which no other species have), hence they do think about life and death, and ask these questions, and philosophers debate on the topic from speculating attitudes.

Was it Socrates who said, "Unexamined life is not worth living.", and "the ultimate goal of human existence is not just to live but to live a good, meaningful and virtuous life."?

We typically sleep for around 6 hours every day, but I wonder what happens to reality when we sleep. Do we wake up in the moment after we fall asleep / lose consciousness? — Cidat

Reality keeps on existing as it has been. To the sleeper, the reality disappears, as he/she enters either into a dreaming state or total black out (unconscious state).

When waking up, the sleeper's memory will bring the person back into the normal reality that he has been sleeping, not newly born or thrown into the world at that moment.

Even death has a bit of romantic vibes. — javi2541997

"Death does not concern us, because while we exist death is not present, and when death is present we no longer exist.” - Epicurus :cool:

Then it's the wrong question. — Vera Mont

What does life mean? That something is not inanimate or dead. That's what the word 'life' means. The property of aliveness itself cannot be interpreted as information. We are not mere symbols to convey a message to some external intelligence. — Vera Mont

The OP seems well aware of what life means.  It seems clear what he seeks is the significance, purpose or meaningfulness of life.

Questions on the meaning of life have been asked millions of times from ancient times by the Stoics, philosophers of Religion and Existentialism, and it is a perfectly good philosophy topic.

It is natural and human thing to do for mature adult people to ask such questions at some point in their lives, have thoughts or debates on the topic without having to feel stress, guilt or negativity.

Seeking the meaning of life is not replacing life with meanings, but trying to find what makes life happy and worthwhile.

Some people are content with just living, and some seek the meaning of life. Each to their own.
Meaning of life doesn't have to be something grandiose or drastically dramatic.

Anything, no matter how trivial, one finds happy doing, makes them absorbed, totally oblivious of life and the world could be good enough meaning of life.

Read somewhere, meaning of life is to find / create meaning of life. :cool:

Thank you.

Yes, it is just my own opinion :)

There is no meaning of life. — niki wonoto

Meaning of life is to be searched / created by each individual to suit their own desire, purpose and taste in life. :)

What about when dreaming? — bert1

When dreaming being unconscious, the person cannot communicate with others, hence cannot be conscious.

Now apply this to consciousness. I have accused two things of being conscious. A rock and a human being. What are we going to look for as evidence of consciousness in (a) a rock, and (b) a human? — bert1

For an object to be conscious, it has to be

1. a living - such as a person, dog, cat, monkey ... etc. Non living objects like machines cannot be conscious, even if it behaves intelligently, acts, and works like a conscious being.

2. must be able to communicate intelligently with another conscious being via behaviour (intelligent animals like monkeys, dogs and cats) or language (in case of human being),

3. respond to environmental changes / demands, or carry out their act of biological demands for their survival. (such as wild animals hunting for survival, birds feeding their chicks etc)

Therefore rocks are definitely not conscious, while most humans are. Some humans are not conscious (those in comma, sleeping or fainted drugged or drunk to unconscious state)

And how can you know that for real?

pun intended.... — A Realist

When one asks "What is real?", it implies that he / she feels the situation or object perceived could be unreal or fake.

Usually in this situation, one immediately starts some verification process on the object, or uses his / her intuition and susses out whether it is real or not.

Therefore being real implies that objects or situation has been perceived, and
1. inferred and judged as real via some verification
2. judged via intuition as real, not fake

Of course human sense organs are not perfect, and there is always the possibility of getting wrong, and the same goes with the verification process or techniques. 

For the question "What is real?", the answer would be, any object or situation, information or knowledge that had been gone through the verification / intuition process, and found (judged) to be not fake, not unreal.

Doubting the whole external world or existence just because something is not appearing as expected or different from what it really is (arguments from illusion) oversimplification on the situation caused by imperfect human sense organs.

:100: :up:

Having seen the tree, the brain will convert the image into the ideas of the tree in perception, memory or imagination i.e it will become a mental state which is totally different from the physical state of the brain. 

The tree couldn't possibly walk into the brain, and start growing in the brain as another tree or copy of it just because the brain saw it, and it is seen to be the representation or information of the tree :rofl:

Question is: If these experiences are representations of things in the outside world, why would I expect such a representation to be reducible to the brain activity that supports it? — Apustimelogist

The word "reducible" sounds problematic. Why do they have to "be reducible"?
Could they be viewed as "being caused by" ?

"If these experiences are representations of things in the outside world (OP), and are caused by "the brain activity that supports it" (OP) - Doesn't it sound more feasible? And it would be reasonable to expect such causal events.

If our experiences are always going to be irreducible regardless then how can this irreducibility be used as an argument against physicalism? — Apustimelogist

They aren't, hence it can't.

What are the differences between mater and energy?

Energy gets generated from matter's movement (e.g. fall), gravity, chemical process etc. Energy is a physical entity. Energy is not material. Matter is just stationery mass.

I read an article about Hegel, the author stated that "synthetic a prior knowledge regards the formal cognitive structures which allow for experience." is this really right??
My reading of Kant....I never thought that "synthetic a priori knowledge" “makes experience possible,” but basically gives us (makes possible) a lot of human knowledge (mathematical, geometrical, and metaphysical judgments, etc.). — KantDane21

Kant never said synthetic a priori knowledge makes experience possible.  What Kant did was, asking how synthetic a priori knowledge is possible.

It is possible by the operation of a priori judgment.  A priori judgment is possible by the presentation of a priori concepts, and the workings of intuition and imagination in mind.

Good point. There's a reason mathematicians begin their proofs with definitions. I wasn't tempted to read the long OP without being clear at the start what was being talked about. . — FrancisRay

:cool: :ok:

it seems that most people are incapable of thinking outside of their social context. Reading these replies has reinforced that idea. — Brendan Golledge

Another reply said that I ought to have defined God before talking about him, when again, that was covered in the first sentence of my post. — Brendan Golledge

Defining concept of controversy before discussion is an important and critical step in philosophy.  I am surprised that anyone would find unfamiliar with the request.
Definition has always been the main interest in philosophical tradition since the time of Plato, Socrates and Aristotle.

Defining the concepts makes sense, because it will be the case, when one starts talking about a garden, and what he meant was his backyard grass patch and plant and tree ground, but the other could be insisting that his garden is always and must be his favourite Chinese restaurant.  The discussion would end up somewhere in nowhere.

You say, your definition of God has been made already in the post as "your experience of highest value".  I didn't accept it was actually a definition of any God in philosophical sense. In philosophical debate and discussion, you must bring something that is objective and concrete, then try to convince your readers and audience to agree with your points. 

God is a religious concept, and one must at least make clear which God one is talking about - is it Judaism, Christian God? or is it Islamic or Hindu God? or would it be some Pagan Kabbalistic God?
You cannot bring something so subjective and a new age type definition of your experience, and expect others to see your points let alone understand what you are even talking about.

To someone, personal experience of highest value could be money, to others, it could be bodily pleasure, fame, power and authority,  friendship, health ... etc etc.  Your God as your personal experience of highest value sounds uniquely and excessively subjective to the extent to convince me that it couldn't possibly be a philosophical definition of God.

I felt your post is a very well written article. I have no problem with the length of the post. I just liked Wittgenstein's quote regarding God and faith in @Ciceronianus post.

The only point I was going to ask was, would it not have been better, if it started with the definition of God, and as the main issue with God in Philosophy is Ontology, i.e. the existence of God, i.e. PROVE does God exist? Where is God? What is God?, then progress into experiencing God, and all the rest?

Maybe you did define God and proved the ontology in the post I am not 100% sure. At the time I quickly scanned the post while having my lunch.