What is a choice?

A miserable little pile of ${ secrets }

You tell me, Neo

Maybe you can choose what it is

mental state of all devs in devRant in one post lmao

you have a choice to believe that you don't have a choice

A lie

We are neuronal networks of one kind or the other (most likely biological). Even as large neuronal networks with huge contexts we still are the product of our architecture and inputs. So the most a choice could ever be is a derivative of input and context.

From a more practical perspective, making a choice is the weighting of alternate options. And having a choice is the presence of alternate options.

Neither is deterministic because nothing is due to the nature of physics which is founded on probailities - to the point where miniscule amounts of matter can actually come into existence and transition to non-existence randomly...

But neither is free in the philosophical sense either. There are always needs to satisfy and consequences to maximize or minimize. And neuronal networks like us are just lots of more or less simple mathematical functions and their parameters. There is no free will in math.

At the end, you have a choice but no choice of the method used to choose it.

1.1_5-illusionofchoice.mp3

@Oktokolo yup. The most common made mistake is to conclude free will from nondeterminism.
And free will is not a well defined concept anyway.

@Lensflare Most humans aren't free to choose whether they assume free will or not.

I’ll do you one better: Why is a choice?