ight..
 

i forgot what this is called but it is a discussion point in the free will vs. determinism debate
It quite simply goes like this...

a person offers you a choice between a dead mouse or chocolate cake. Which would you choose?

most of the time a person would choose the cake.. But the question lies if you were still acting under your free will so select the cake. Because how do you know the person who was offering you these things influence your future actions because they KNEW you were going to select the cake.. i.e. your actions were determined.



forgive me if some parts dont make sense im in a rush lmao... This goes out to everyone beside Priime who would select the dead mouse..:pimp:

i wanna know what choices you were offered before you got high as hell and typed this

Lmaooo

I often see the free will versus determinism debate as a false dichotomy because I don't see them as being mutually exclusive. Things aren't absolutely determined by EITHER free will or pre-determination. There's often a combination of both and you can see how something comes about as a result of free will to an extent and how it is pre-determined to another extent. It's not an either/or issue.
In my view, your free will isn't something that's determined by whether someone can surmise that you would choose a cake over a dead mouse. Free will is an ability, and just like any other ability (such as the ability to lift heavy things) we all have it in different degrees. Since it's an ability, just like someone else might run faster or slower than you, other people can exercise free will to a greater or lesser extent than you. We do not all have the same capacity for free will, and we are all likewise bound by deterministic factors to varying degrees. What determines the extent to which someone can exercise free will is the options they have at their disposal. The greater your options, the more you can exercise free will and the less bound you are by deterministic factors. Someone who is locked up in prison and billionaire with a private jet both have the free will to fly to Barcelona, but they obviously don't have the same obstacles and barriers and one can exercise that free will more readily.

Is ensnaring one's decision to choose the cake not a manipulation of the situation, as opposed to a determinant either for, or against free will, and deterministic probability? And, does the probability of those individuals' collective choices negate that that choice was an exercise of free will based upon a societal normative?

@NOBLE i sense a bit of Compatibalism in your response lol.. Plus you mentioned:

"We do not all have the same capacity for free will, and we are all likewise bound by deterministic factors to varying degrees. What determines the extent to which someone can exercise free will is the options they have at their disposal. "

And what about prior events? Do they not determine the decisions we make today? Hard Determinism is under-rated

@Rant what do you think? I'd like to think that manipulation should tie into the debate of determinism.
Or for arguments sake lets assume that the person who is offering you these choices is not in anyway trying to manipulate your choice.. Does that still mean you have free will considering the probability of you choosing the cake is higher than the mouse? I don't believe so

Yes, in a way, giving someone a choice between something which they'll probably deem positive and something which they'll probably deem negative robs them of free will because free will is best exercised when a person sees options for themselves and they choose between those options. Most people will not see eating a dead mouse as an option, so you've really only given them one option by offering cake or a dead mouse. However, I'd hesitate to say that means you "predetermined" their choice because they may see more options than the two you've given them, so them choosing one of the two is more reliant on how many options they see rather than the choices you've given them.

I wasn't aware that my position regarding free will/determinism had a name (because I'm not well-versed in these types of arguments). But after googling "Compatibalism," I agree that it's definition does fit with my position. I do believe that a belief in both free will and determinism is possible without being logically inconsistent.
I suppose I tend to view it that way because I don't really believe in absolutes, and I believe most things exist in the realm of duality and that polar opposites are usually inherent in one another. No mountain without a valley, no light without dark, yin-yang type of thinking. If there is such a thing as determinism, then there necessarily has to be something which is not deterministic, otherwise, there would be no need to distinguish something as deterministic and we probably wouldn't even realize it. So to argue that things are deterministic yet there is NOTHING which is not deterministic goes against my sensibilities.
To answer your question, yes, prior events help determine our decisions, but not absolutely. You can decide in spite of prior events. We can take that conversation even deeper and talk about how time is an illusion and then weigh what exactly "prior events" mean in light of that. If you think about it (here comes the compatibalism) the argument you're making actually ties in with the way I have defined free will. The average person sees a "choice" as being between two good or desirable things, for example, cake or ice cream. When someone gives you a "choice" between a desirable thing and an undesirable, that's really no choice at all but more like a threat or coercion or something else. For example, I can put a gun to your head and then give you a "choice:" Give me all your money or get your head blown off. In my view, free will is limited by the options one has at his disposal, or really, the options one sees for himself, because you may have some options that you are not aware that you have, but you will act based on what you know. If one doesn't see getting their head blown off as a viable option, then them giving you their money in that scenario can't really be argued to have been done out of their free will.