I don't believe in a higher being. Mainly because there is no proof of a such thing. But if we assume that everything that happens happens randomly then we still wouldn't have a free will. The will would be random.

I'm lost on the whole "determined" and "random" thing...

If someone does something, it is either pre-determined or a random act? Random how? Random to someone who views the act? Random to the person who commited the act?

I'm confused.

If it is not determined then it has to be random. Otherwise it would be determined!

It all comes down to our main views. You believe that our actions shapes the future while I believe that our actions are shaped by the past (and thus are determined, which ultimately makes the future determined as well).

I suggest everyone use their free will and bail from this discussion. The argument is entirely flawed.

Why can't it just be that those "random acts" were in fact acts of free will? Why can't it be that those 'determined" acts were also acts of free will?

To me it just sounds like you use something you can grasp an argument around and claiming it as predetermined and everything you have no answer for you simply shrug your shoulders and say "Well, I have no idea, so let's just call it random".

What he says is true in a sense.

As I was reading this thread he asked "If you were to rewind time and set it to right before a man robs a bank, would he still rob it?"

Of course most answered "Of course" and he then declared it as "predetermined". Now that is where his bolded above comes into play. The man who wanted to rob the bank did so because he thought about it, planned it out and everything. His past actions shaped into what he was going to do that day and it didn't matter whether you rewind back 10 times or even 100 times to that exact point before he leaves the car and enters the bank.

Now was that predetermined as he says? No.

It was premeditated, and that is why the result would not change.

You don't believe that our actions are completely shaped by the past though. That's a great difference.

It has to be random if it's not determined, that is the basic logic I'm talking about.

And the free will cannot be random or determined if it wants to remain free.

You make an excellent point, to the OP. I would simply say, however, that you have merely pointed out two extremes. It is somewhere in the middle. In the middle between other things controlling our outcomes (randomness as you put it) and our decisions controlling our outcomes.

It is never in the polar extremes that outcomes are made, but you did highlight a flaw in the traditional view of things. You analysed the situation well even though I disagree with your overall premises on determinism.