Exploring Immortality Cultivation

Do humans truly possess free will?

On Earth, this question was initially a matter of theology, then it became a philosophical issue, and then, as Stephen Hawking put it, it was ultimately explored as a scientific problem.

Are our choices made according to our free will, or are they the results of a biological machine called the "brain" making a series of binary decisions?

From the perspective of Evolution Theory, the latter seems more likely. After all, something called "Self-Awareness" or "free will" serves no purpose in increasing survival rates and should not become a dominant gene spread throughout a population. Even advocates for free will concede that free will is more like "intelligence" redundancy, an accessory manifestation of the highly evolved human brain.

In other words, as long as the understanding of the brain is sufficiently deep, controlling a person's will is actually very simple. Because the foundation of will is always the physical thinking organ.

For the Shenzhou People Clan, it's the same.

Both the soul and the brain, these two thinking organs, can influence human will. Given specific stimulation to specific areas, introducing specific content with specific strength, one can interfere with human emotions, affect human judgment, disturb human perception, and ultimately master human consciousness.

The human heart is really such a simple thing.

This is the basis of the spells from the Yangshen Pavilion.

For Wang Qi, retreating was inevitable, fear was inevitable, wavering was inevitable. This had nothing to do with whether the will was examined; it was purely because Chen Feng's power had interfered with his thinking, shaking his thought processes from the subconscious level.

What to do in this situation?

Very simple, since "retreat" has become an inevitable factor, a fixed quantity, then just include this fixed quantity into the calculation as well.

When your thoughts and even your instincts are deceiving you, mathematical truths never will!

Chen Feng had switched through seventeen types of Martial Arts Fist Intent in succession, be it like the ice hell that freezes Heaven and Earth, or the True Fire of the Great Sun that burns everything, or like the Emperor descending to the mortal world, majestic and grand. And with each change of Fist Intent, his hand techniques changed seventeen times as well, each form completely mismatching the Martial Arts Fist Intent. When his presence was elegant and untainted, his punches and kicks were despicably cunning, targeting the lower body; when his bearing was archaic and robust, simple yet profound, his hands and feet were instead elusive and mysterious; and when he appeared innocent and untraceable, his strikes opened up wide and pushed forward irresistibly.

Martial Arts Fist Intent is, in itself, a Suggestion Technique, and when ordinary cultivators use this move, they too hypnotize themselves. Initially, after deceiving and hypnotizing oneself, the soul becomes more active, mana circulates more smoothly, and invisibly enhances one's own strength. But for Chen Feng, forgoing such Illusion Techniques to focus on the actual fight would be foolish, so he didn't hypnotize himself at all.

This had an extra benefit: he didn't need to match his bearing with his punches and kicks, and others would always misjudge his movements based on the Martial Arts Fist Intent he projected.

The two exchanged punches and kicks for a while longer until Chen Feng, using powerful Boxing Intent, forced Wang Qi back and stepped back a few steps as well, then said, "It's about time now."

Wang Qi stopped his barrage of punches and kicks, wiping the sweat from his forehead: "This is the first time I've been pressured so much in a fight." But instead of feeling gloomy as expected, his fighting spirit soared.

Finally, he had seen the level of a True Inheritor of the Five Excellences!

Chen Feng shook his sore arms. In the fierce battle just now, Wang Qi's mastery over the first level Fist Intent had grown increasingly proficient, with several defenses swatting away Chen Feng's attacks using the first level punches. Chen Feng couldn't help but exclaim in admiration, "The skills you've learned on your own are truly freakish. It seems that that proof of Completeness has indeed given you a lot to gain—just from the foundation of your punches and kicks, you might be the most solid one I've ever met. Once you've achieved Foundation Establishment, we'll have to have a proper fight."

Wang Qi was quite confident: "Boss, by that time, the situation may not be the same anymore."

After Wang Qi completed his Foundation Establishment, the qualitative gap between the two was erased, and Chen Feng could no longer easily defeat Wang Qi with Illusion Techniques.

After their exchange, Chen Feng changed into a new outfit in his living quarters and then got busy in the Empirical Department. Meanwhile, Wang Qi went to Chen Feng's study to reflect on their recent battle.

First was the gain in Martial Skills. A first order sword technique that he had accidentally comprehended through Godel's Completeness Theorem while randomly swinging his sword was still quite rudimentary. It required Wang Qi himself to perfect it. Using the transformative power of group theory, he could arbitrarily convert his swordsmanship into sword techniques and hand techniques, and he could also apply the experience of fist and foot skills into his swordplay.

Next was the tactical experience. The girl who happened to pass by was not wrong; in the fundamental areas of Martial Arts, he had reached perfection. Each punch, each kick, and each calculation in Mana Engineering, he was truly a master.

Yet, he still did not know what he was capable of, the level of power his swordsmanship could unleash, nor where his weaknesses lay.

Chen Feng's own tactical choices did, however, offer Wang Qi numerous insights. If it really came down to fist and foot skills, or the subtlety of their moves, he was actually far superior to Chen Feng—no, in fact, the boxing routes of Tianling Ridge were akin to "sloppy punches to defeat the master," and in this area, even Ai Qinglan might not be stronger than him. However, relying on the simplest Pseudo- Martial Arts Fist Intent, he could oppress Wang Qi. The Magic that made one forget seven seconds of short-term memory was terrifying indeed, though it had significant limitations. After using the Pseudo- Martial Arts Fist Intent to suppress opponents of the same level, Chen Feng could then calmly execute his ultimate move.

A single powerful Skill was not very useful, but combining multiple suitable Skills into a set, like what Chen Feng did, was terrifying.

Naturally, Wang Qi would not directly copy Chen Feng's method. His combat style was completely different from Chen Feng's. Facing a strong opponent, he preferred to wait for a gap in their defense and then decide the battle with one strike. Until that moment, he would rather endure a few punches himself to maintain the leeway to observe his opponent.

The decisive "strength" and "weakness" did not only lie in power but also in the information possessed by both sides, as well as tactics—wisdom was equally a form of strength.

Even if the opponent was the type who grew stronger during a fight, I could evolve faster than him!

What Wang Qi needed to emulate was Chen Feng's approach to combining techniques. He knew many mental methods, swordsmanship, movement techniques, and Spells, including powerful ones like the Elephant Phase Wave Skill and the Heavenly Entropy Technique from the start, and encompassing systems like the Heavenly Song. However, most of his Skills lacked coordination.

"Mathematics is the core, the basis that connects all Cultivation methods... My level of mathematics is higher in this life than in my previous one, and the Godel Completeness Theorem could take me far on this road, so I need to use the Cultivation methods of the Wanfa Sect as my foundation and framework to find a combat style that suits me," Wang Qi pondered, "So what's most suitable for me is..."

He did not know how much time had passed when suddenly, Wang Qi was startled awake by an abnormal phenomenon.

It was the sound of blades breaking through the air!

Wang Qi quickly pushed open the window and then witnessed a scene that chilled him to the bone—the sky was filled with more than a dozen Flying Swords heading straight for this courtyard!

——————————————————————————————————

Stephen Hawking stated in "The Grand Design" that ultimately all philosophical questions will turn into scientific ones. For example, questions like "What is Life?" and "What is the essence of the world?" were discussed by philosophers a thousand years ago, but now they are researched as scientific questions.

Personally, I believe this is the correct relationship between philosophy and science. Any philosopher who tried to deduce natural laws from philosophy ended up being historically humiliated. Not to speak of Aristotle from the distant past, even Hegel, one of the greatest modern philosophers, could not avoid this fate [Hegel once asserted that if astronomers studied a little philosophy, they would know that there can only be seven planets in the solar system, and then Gauss published a paper—they calculated the orbit of Ceres, proving it was a planet (incidentally, there was no concept of asteroids or dwarf planets at that time; by those days' criteria, the number of planets in the solar system would be terrifying)].

By the time of the last philosophical giant, Heidegger, philosophers had already become wiser. They no longer discussed the nature of the world but rather the relationship between humans and the world—that is, the philosophy of life.

This is the reality of philosophy. After the "method of science" arose, it only became a predecessor on its deathbed for science. Philosophy has no instructive significance for science itself; its role is merely to encourage scientists to move forward—nothing more.