Freedom
Freedom does not exist in any form you might imagine. Everything is objective, and inextricably interconnected. It’s all interactions of change from one state to another. Nature is playing out just exactly as it does. ‘Randomness’ does not provide the universe with freedom. It is a non-sense term to begin with. It doesn’t matter if you are unable to predict outcomes, there are still causes for everything and ‘randomness’ does not open the door to freedom.
There is no free-will for conscious beings, in any place within the universe. As a human, just try not to breathe. Where is the freedom? You will not hold your breath until death just to prove this wrong. It’s utter tyranny of nature. You have no choice but to breathe. Your forward motion is compelled away from noxious stimulus and towards sustenance in a more or less complicated design. Even suicide is beyond your control being completely contingent in certain predispositions and pre-conscious internal processes. We haven’t a choice with regard to the question “to be, or not to be?” We carry on till we do not.
The illusion of freedom allows us to cope with existence. There are forces of nature that propelled us forward effectively so that we meet our needs. Every action is guided pre-consciously by nature. Animals with limited consciousness don’t ponder the question of whether or not they are free; hunger, or whatever similar cause, drive them. It is the same with the human animal, but our self-reflection makes us rationalize it all as a stream of logical decision making; a post-hoc illusion of control.
Our thoughts are entirely determined. We have no control over the thoughts that enter our minds. Nor do we have control over the ‘meaning’ in our life. Every experience we observe happens exactly as it is intended, given the state of the universe at just that point. All of our prior experiences and conditioning are just as objective as anything else in the physical world. The crest of this wave is the contents of consciousness in the present moment.
If we are unable to understand the dynamics of influence and response in human interaction that does not mean there is not an explanation. If there are too many billiard balls for any one person to contemplate that does not mean that it is not a fact that everything is caused. Everything is a fact of the matter. This includes all human interactions and the meaning attached to those relationships.
More positive influence can be brought into the world by recognizing the truth that we have no freedom than pretending that we have it. In questions of justice we see that there are real root causes and influences that once recognized propel us towards remedy. Understanding our deepest drives as evolutionarily bedrock as opposed to evil or sinful, help us to accept our faults and channel them productively. We can stop blaming ourselves and others, and see the world as one totality under the control of nature. Finally, if we understand that everything is objective we can find out how things work and exploit that knowledge.