Does the multiverse hypothesis resolve the omniscience versus free will paradox?

It has been argued by nontheists that the supposed omniscience of God would eliminate any possibility of free will for humans. But if we consider the multiverse, an apparently infinite construct in which all the various possibilities exist, we can picture the omniscient One as having access to the knowledge of all the different universes. This knowledge would not affect our ability to individually make decisions and, in essence, bring our unique universe into existence with each decision. In this way, God can both be omniscient and allow for free will.

Maybe the deeper meaning of "free will" is that God created all the infinite, different possibilities with the multiverse, leaving us free to choose among them.

Just a thought.

 

i figure if you have a multiverse where everything that can happen must then free will doesn’t exist all actions must be done

Not sure we have free will in one universe god or not

and if god exists im not sure it would have free will either

 

But all actions must occur simply due to the nature of infinity. If we were to posit an all-knowing creator, and point to our notion of free will as a goal of the creator, the multiverse seems a logical way to achieve that goal, perhaps the only feasible way. It's not as if having a personal relationship with an infinite number of people in an infinite number of universes would be beyond the limit of something omnipotent. I don't understand why theists don't embrace the multiverse.

 

Even with an infinite number of universes, the actions, and resulting reactions, would follow causality. Each of them being unique changes nothing. Each universe in its own, would be fully deterministic. By 'choosing' one would not enter a different universe, they would still be contained within the one they began. You cannot claim that because there are infinite versions of you, that you have gained the ability to choose from an infinite number of decisions. The only 'you' is the one in this universe, you have access to no other, and cannot enter another verse through will.

The other universe's might as well not exist as far as you are concerned, so your will, and your separate 'choices', are still isolated and determined under an omniscient God. You could also just consider each of those universe's another galaxy where, through sheer luck, things seem to work the same way, and there are identical people. Your ability to make choices isn't going to instantly transport your soul to a different galaxy. Another way to explain it would be to say that there are an infinite number of trains...You're on one, and the only place you can go is forward in time, down a specific track, known as the determinism railroad...'choosing' where you sit isn't going to change the fact that you're on a train you can't get off of.

The fact that the universes are separate does nothing to take away from determinism. God is still God, you are still you, Free Will is still a joke.

 

im not a physicist so i don’t know that existence is actually infinite

and god as the maker of such a multiverse could happen for all i know i don’t see how even that effects free will ( or would ensure god has free will ) if the future can be completely accurately know then your choices are just a part of the nature of things they become physics themselves you under condition z will do x or multiverse x, a, d, f and zort ( don’t ask ) and this may apply to god as well

any way the hostility to the idea might be that it challenges the necessity of god some theists want to believe they must be right and the right kind of multiverse means gods not logically necessary and might be unlikely
Even the bible can get venomous about how god is so to be so obvious you have no excuse for not believing in it Koran’s worse on that one

 

I haven't really figured out what free will is. It's supposed to be the opposite of determinism, but is it deeper than that? One option is that our minds are random, that our "free will" is just our minds playing dice with our opinions. If it is not random, then it depends on something. Unless that something is random too, our brains will take it into account and become deterministic. There is a scale of opinions from completely random, through partially random, to completely deterministic, but I don't see the argument for that the mind is "free".

Can anyone produce an example of free will in action?

 

I interpreted multiverse to mean presumably beginning with a single universe which immediately begins fissioning itself into multiple universes so that each possibility represented by each particle's ambiguous wave function is realized among the new universes at a proportion which matches the probabilities obtained from quantum calculations. I began life as a single individual zygote, the quantum fluctuations of which immediately caused further fissioning of new universes as all the different possible outcomes were being played out among those new universes. At each point in time, I am the only real MAYTAG with my individually unique set of memories. There may be others in some of the other universes who are nearly identical, but they are not me. The only real mes (from my perspective in the current universe) are the one I am right now and the infinite number of possibilities which lie before me. When I realize a particular possibility, I collapse the others so that they no longer exist in my universe. Multiverse claims that those other possibilities are also realized, each in new universes which fissioned off from mine when I made a particular decision or observation.

 

Our minds have no more free will than the computer you use to make posts on this forum. Just because you can't see what the computer does, or know how it does it, doesn't mean it has some way of doing things that is outside of the laws of physics, and thereby outside the path of determinism. The same goes for our brains...they are just even more complicated, and less straightforward. Random is a word to use when you don't see why things happen, but everything happens for a reason. If you roll dice, the number you get may be a surprise to you, but if i replay the throw in slow motion, you can watch closely as the result eventually makes perfect sense. Nothing free or random needs to happen for results to make sense, given circumstances. The brain is a complex computer, that uses living cells, chemicals, acids, fats, all kinds of things, instead of gold and metal wiring. We have eyes instead of a monitor, senses instead of a mouse and keyboard. A circulatory and respiratory system instead of a power supply and cooling fan.

It really is obvious.

 

Interesting theory, but this is only possible if your consciousness is the only one that actually exists. It would not be possible for you to be creating your own universe while also living with other consciousnesses that are doing the same thing. What you are describing is a single-player virtual reality God game. I have to say that while interesting, is not a valid concept for reality.

 

The decisions made by others are manifest as part of the unique set of observations I can make in my single universe. I would find, from my perspective, that my observations generally coincide with the most likely of the possible outcomes as would be determined by an impossibly difficult quantum calculation which would determine their probability. There would be the occasional outliers, but highly unlikely ones probably would not be observed in any particular universe, including mine. We are all real and in this same universe right now. But as the picoseconds tick away, wave functions are collapsing and many of the possible yous cease to exist in this universe. Only the you which I observe continues to exist in this universe. Things are no different from your perspective. You may make a decision which is unobserved by me and our universes will have split in two. But a you relevant to my universe, who does what I observe him to do still exists in mine. In your new universe, that me would not exist, but be replaced by another who observed your decision. See? I don't have to be the only one. There are enough universes for everyone to have several of their own personals. Of course, we only get one for each instant of time.

 

Nah bro, might as well suggest that if you type 2+2 into a calculator a bunch of times, eventually it'll say 5 instead of 4. I seriously doubt it. You are what you are now, as a result of what you were a minute ago, considering the consequences of what has happened since then. End of story.

 

You're right. It's about as silly as suggesting that a single photon will pass through a double slit apparatus and emerge on the other side behaving as if it had encountered interference from photons passing through whichever slit it missed which did not exist.

 

Yeah, the parts about randomness are just to make sure that nobody creates an off topic discussion about quantum effects in our brains.

 

Our decisions in this universe would be limited, hence the absence of free will in light of an all powerful and all knowing deity.

 

In a way, I agree, although that kind of renders a lot of Ayn Rand's philosophy irrelevant though.

The premise behind Objectivism is that we should use free will in the pursuit of rational self-interest. If we don't have free will, then we don't have rational self-interest, but rather a predetermined "program" we're following as a combination of our circumstances and genes.

If anything, a truly deterministic reality means that collectivism should take precedence, because survival is no longer a matter of individual choices but rather cooperative actions and calculations.

 

Do you guys understand the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics? I don't believe it for a second, but under that interpretation, all possible futures exist in front of us and only become a part of our universe when we get there to observe a particular future. The other possibilities occur also, but in alternate universes. God can be omniscient of all the possible futures without disrupting our free will. He knows what we are going to do because the multiverse he created contains all the possibilities. But we still get free will because our own perspective only follows a singular timeline which gives us the ability to carve out our own.

I think Christians should jump on board with this multiverse hypothesis. Maybe even donate a little money to research... for Jesus.

 

What will you do with the half of the collective who refuse to work or contribute in any way?

 

I don't see how the multiverse would grant free will in the fact of an omniscient deity. It would result in an infinite number of universes in which no one has free will or any choice in their fate rather than one.

 

Half is a rather large assumption.

The worst that any First World nation usually faces is no higher than a quarter -- and that's not a matter of unwillingness to work as much as it is the inability to find a job during hard times.

In good economic times, unemployment usually isn't higher than about 10 to 15%. In a lot of areas, it can be as low as 3%.

So, it's not really a matter of will. It's a matter of opportunities.

A lot of Europe is stereotyped as having a larger freeloader contingent than us, but most of Europe has a "workfare" system rather than just a welfare one.

This way, the people without a conventional job receive assistance, but they have to contribute in some way to get it.

This can be done here as well, and all it requires is effective networking with local businesses.

 

If God knows what choices we make, that we do not have free will. It does not matter if there are other possibilities available, what you choose, the Maytag of universe #x, is already predetermined. I am well aware of how the multiverse works.

Free will destroys God.
God destroys free will.

The two do not coexist.

 

Guys. Guys. Study quantum. Even mindless particles seem to exhibit free will on the quantum level.

 

Particles don't have a will...

 

Many worlds interpretation does not postulate the multiverse quite the same as DC Comics does.

In MWI, the future, from our perspective, has limitless possibilities, with certain ones only being more probable than others. There is not one narrative for each universe. Each universe constantly splits off into others, each representing a possible future of that universe. Kind of like branches on the tree of life.

 

Particles do not have free will, the exist in a state of probability.

 

I guess that's why the phrase "seem to" existed in that sentence.