free will

[Karen Kolehmainen]

Does free will exist? I suspect this has been discussed here previously, but I couldn't find it in a quick search.

There is a part of me that would like very much to believe in free will, and it "feels" to me like I have it. However, that doesn't mean it's true; lots of religious people believe in god for the same reason, and their "reasoning" is clearly fallacious. On an intellectual level, however, I find it hard to accept that free will exists. The problem is that I can't imagine a mechanism for it; in fact I'm not even sure that the concept is coherent..

First, I'm not claiming that all human thoughts and decisions are strictly determined. Quantum mechanical processes may be important in brain activity, although how important is far from clear. Some people claim that QM provides an avenue for free will, but this doesn't make sense. Quantum mechanical events are decided on randomly; if something happens randomly, how does it make sense for me to think I caused it? And randomness is no more aesthetically satisfying than strict determinism.

So what choice does that leave? If something doesn't happen randomly or deterministically, then what "causes" it? If I cause it using by free will, how does that happen? There has to be some mechanism. If you accept, as I think most of us do, that there is a biological basis for all brain activity, then what causes the electrical impulse or squirt of neurotransmitter that leads to making a decision?

My tentative conclusion is that free will does not exist, that it is an illusion. I'd like to hear what others think.

[Politesse]

I have yet to see any really good reason to believe in the existence of free will. I do think we have wills, but not unbound. I'm not even entirely sure what a free will is actually supposed to be or why you would want one. I think the argument for free will is more an emotive one- people wish to feel that they aren't being "forced" to do this or that. I agree that there probably is not a person somewhere forcing everyone's hands, but that hardly frees human decision making from the laws of causality. And I dislike it when people believe they have the right to discriminate against others on the grounds that they are discriminating against the choices they've made. Gay-bashers, muslim-haters, a lot of unsavory people try this argument and it rubs me the wrong way. You want to believe that you, alone among humanity, made all your choices without any help from reality? Fine. Don't use this as an excuse to be a jerk to everyone else.

[rog]

How can one tell if a being has free will? If one encounters an alien, how can one tell if it is just a robot or it has a mind of its own? The behavior of a robot would be completely determined, unlike that of a being with free will. Thus one could in principle detect a robot as a being whose actions can be predicted. As we said in Chapter 2, this may be impossibly difficult if the being is large and complex. We cannot even solve exactly the equations for three or more particles interacting with each other. Since an alien the size of a human would contain about a thousand trillion trillion particles even if the alien were a robot, it would be impossible to solve the equations and predict what it would do. We would therefore have to say that any complex being has free will—not as a fundamental feature, but as an effective theory, an admission of our inability to do the calculations that would enable us to predict its actions.
The Grand Design - S.Hawking.

I thought I'd throw this in, out of context as it is.

[David B]

I don't see that quantum fluctuations help an argument for free will - they just provide randomness AFAICS.

Same with chaos theory.

I follow Dennett, myself, in asserting that free will is a meaningful term, insofar as we as people can make morally significant decisions.

I don't see any sort of absolute free will as even meaningful, but degrees of freedom, I think, are.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_Evolves

Dennett's stance on free will is compatibilism with an evolutionary twist – the view that, although in the strict physical sense our actions might be pre-determined, we can still be free in all the ways that matter, because of the abilities we evolved. Free will, seen this way, is about freedom to make decisions without duress, as opposed to an impossible and unnecessary freedom from causality itself. To clarify this distinction, he coins the term 'evitability' as the opposite of 'inevitability', defining it as the ability of an agent to anticipate likely consequences and act to avoid undesirable ones. Evitability is entirely compatible with, and actually requires, human action being deterministic.

As an aside, I surmise that the attraction of religion to many people is, at least in part, due to them following this sort of reasoning, which I think Dennett's compatibility destroys.

'Morality makes no sense in a deterministic world. Morality does make sense. There is no way we can have free will unless there is a soul independent of the deterministic world. There cannot be such a soul without it being created by a god. Therefore there is a god.'

I don't agree quite with the wiki extract, myself, insofar as I will allow a degree of indeterminism, and/or unpredictibilty, as a result of quantum fluctuations and/or chaos theory. I think Dennett would agree with me.

However I would argue that there is meaningful free will despite, rather than because of, this putative indeterminacy/unpredictability.

David

[Pandora]

It always seems like people oversimplify free will. They seem to think it implies the amazing magical ability to do whatever one wishes. That's never seemed reasonable to me. I tend to think that free will is the ability to choose. It doesn't assume perfect knowledge of all factors - it simply assumes some knowledge. It assumes that we consider and weigh options, and make a choice. The driver for the choice may not be rational: if one hates the color blue, one may decline purchasing a blue car, even if that car is clearly superior in all other respects. Some of the drivers for a choice may even be subconscious. We may choose based on incorrect information. And on occasion, we may find ourselves on the fence, and choose one action or another by flipping a coin.

Most of the time, we go through our daily routines on autopilot - we don't consciously make decisions every step of the way. We get up, shower, dress, have a cup of coffee, etc. all without having to decide "Do I want coffee today or not?" Having the ability to choose doesn't mean we always do so.

It also means we have the ability to extrapolate. We consider not just the current information available to us, but what we think is likely to happen as a result of one choice or another. We weigh our expected outcomes against each other. Par to fwhat leads me to believe that we do have the ability to make choices is that we often don't consider the likelihood of an outcome - we're easily swayed by emotions and charisma; fear and semantics can result in completely different choices than one would expect looking at logical likelihoods.

I also don't think it's 100% free will. I think there's a lot of stuff that's essentially programmed into us. I think free will develops along wihtour cognitive ability. A newborn baby has no free will - they act on almost pure determined instinct. They lack the ability to weigh and decide. A child of 5 has some free will, but much of their behavior is still completely reactionary. It's action and response, without thought. A teen has considerably more free will - they have developed the ability to reason, to consider the potential outcome, and to decide accordingly.

Not everyone has exactly the same cognitive ability. Some think better than others, thus some have more free will than others. In the big picture, the variance in the range of cognitive abilities in normal humans (excepting those with actual physical defects, etc.) is probably fairly small. In the same way, the variance in the range of vision, hearing, language, etc. are all fairly small. There are certainly variation, but they're not all that big in the end.

Anyway, that's my take on it. You may or may not agree.

[Ozymandias]

Like Politesse, I see no evidence for free-will, so I don't believe in it.

[rog]

Like Politesse, I see no evidence for free-will, so I don't believe in it.

What make you say that?

[Ozymandias]

Like Politesse, I see no evidence for free-will, so I don't believe in it.

What make you say that?

Where is the evidence for free-will? There is none. I don't believe things without evidence, so why should I believe this?

[rog]

Like Politesse, I see no evidence for free-will, so I don't believe in it.

What make you say that?

Where is the evidence for free-will? There is none. I don't believe things without evidence, so why should I believe this?

I see, but what made you say that?

[Ozymandias]

I see, but what made you say that?

The deterministic laws of physics coupled with the random chance of quantum mechanics.

[Politesse]

And the influence of culture!

/anthropologist

[rog]

I see, but what made you say that?

The deterministic laws of physics coupled with the random chance of quantum mechanics.

And the influence of culture!

/anthropologist

Taken together that's a powerful argument, I shall have to think on this one :)

[Jack Willsson]

Some things are so vital that we can't decide not to do them - breathing comes to mind. The less important something is to us - like whether to pick lump A or lump B out of a sugar bowl - the freer we are.

At any moment we are making secondary choices. At the moment I'm choosing to sit at my keyboard and press this key rather than another because of my primary objective which (at present) is to post what I want to say.

What seems to determine our choices is the relative value (for want of a better word) that we put on the things we have to choose from.

If we are able to choose what we most want then there is an illusion of free will "That's what I want and I can choose it" - but the freedom is illusory in that we are determined by our wanting/valuing.

I'll settle for that though. If I can follow my own tastes and wishes why would I want to be any freer?

[The AntiChris]

I'd like to hear what others think.Give me a clear and unambiguous definition of what you mean by "free will" and I'll let you know what I think. :)

Chris

[Monad]

Quantum mechanics and non determinism is a complete red herring when it comes to "free will". It still removes the locus of control from the person, just as much as strict determinism does.

Free will only makes sense if seen as a relative concept (Man makes his own history but not under circumstances of his own choosing to paraphrase Marx) - not as an absolute which strips it of context and material reality (makes it magical basically). Even Sartre came to understand this (but Merleau Ponty did better)

[Barbarian]

Free will is our imagined ability to supply first causes (we must be able to act differently under the exact same physical circumstances, and yet not be random, therefore small local first cause).

As such, it is bollocks, but very interesting bollocks.

[Ozymandias]

Quantum mechanics and non determinism is a complete red herring when it comes to "free will". It still removes the locus of control from the person, just as much as strict determinism does.

Free will only makes sense if seen as a relative concept (Man makes his own history but not under circumstances of his own choosing to paraphrase Marx) - not as an absolute which strips it of context and material reality (makes it magical basically). Even Sartre came to understand this (but Merleau Ponty did better)

I agree with this, but the 'magical' version is very much the version of free-will that most people believe in. Even supposedly intelligent and educated atheists.

[toker]

'Free will' is the colloquial term for 'volition', which is studied by science.

[toker]

Free will is our imagined ability to supply first causes (we must be able to act differently under the exact same physical circumstances, and yet not be random, therefore small local first cause).

As such, it is bollocks, but very interesting bollocks.
You have no ability to control your own behavior. Right?

[toker]

Quantum mechanics and non determinism is a complete red herring when it comes to "free will". It still removes the locus of control from the person, just as much as strict determinism does.
No, it just puts the lie on the main objection against our ability to control our own behavior on purpose.

Free will only makes sense if seen as a relative concept (Man makes his own history but not under circumstances of his own choosing to paraphrase Marx) - not as an absolute which strips it of context and material reality (makes it magical basically). Even Sartre came to understand this (but Merleau Ponty did better)
Can you control your own behavior? I can't raise my third arm, because I don't have one.

[Barbarian]

Free will is our imagined ability to supply first causes (we must be able to act differently under the exact same physical circumstances, and yet not be random, therefore small local first cause).

As such, it is bollocks, but very interesting bollocks.
You have no ability to control your own behavior. Right?Right. My behavior, my thoughts, even my illusion of controlling them, all these are just happening to me and likewise to you. Why do you ask?

[David B]

Free will is our imagined ability to supply first causes (we must be able to act differently under the exact same physical circumstances, and yet not be random, therefore small local first cause).

As such, it is bollocks, but very interesting bollocks.
You have no ability to control your own behavior. Right?

Yes I have. I generally manage to uncork a wine bottle and pour myself a glass without spilling any.

David

[toker]

Free will is our imagined ability to supply first causes (we must be able to act differently under the exact same physical circumstances, and yet not be random, therefore small local first cause).

As such, it is bollocks, but very interesting bollocks.
You have no ability to control your own behavior. Right?Right. My behavior, my thoughts, even my illusion of controlling them, all these are just happening to me and likewise to you. Why do you ask?
Because I've been talking about this with someone afraid to own up. Kudos to you, I guess.

If a person has no control over her own behaviors, then that person has a good chance to beat any legal charges and avoid prison. She'd be confined to a mental hospital, instead.

[Politesse]

Free will is our imagined ability to supply first causes (we must be able to act differently under the exact same physical circumstances, and yet not be random, therefore small local first cause).

As such, it is bollocks, but very interesting bollocks.
You have no ability to control your own behavior. Right?Right. My behavior, my thoughts, even my illusion of controlling them, all these are just happening to me and likewise to you. Why do you ask?
Because I've been talking about this with someone afraid to own up. Kudos to you, I guess.

If a person has no control over her own behaviors, then that person has a good chance to beat any legal charges and avoid prison. She'd be confined to a mental hospital, instead.
If prison is unjust unless free will exists, then either prison is unjust, or the existence of free will needs to be proven in court. I don't think it necessarily is though. If you are visualizing prison as punishment for a certain free choice then, yes, it is unjust. If you see it as a necessary component of a safe and functioning society, it remains so regardless of one's views on personal volition.

[mood2]

I feel like I have the autonomous ability to choose between options, within certain limits.

But if everything ultimately boils down to cause and effect, that means I don't, doesn't it?

Can we know whether everything ultimately boils down to cause and effect?

[Ozymandias]

Can we know whether everything ultimately boils down to cause and effect?

It comes back to evidence again. If you have any evidence to suggest it boils down to anything other than cause and effect, I will be happy to listen. Until then I have no reason to entertain the notion of free-will.

[David B]

Anything outside the realm of cause and effect is no friend of free will.

Some - me for one - would say that any sort of meaningful free will depends on causality.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compatibilism

The Compatibilist might argue that determinism is not just compatible with any good definition of free will, but actually necessary. If one's actions are not determined by one's beliefs, desires, and character, then how could someone possibly be held morally responsible for that action?

I have found reading Dennett (particularly Freedom Evolves) and Hofstadter (particularly GEB and I Am A Strange Loop) useful as intuition pumps in arriving at a compatibilist position.

I'll stop now, because I don't know if this will post. I'm having internet probs now, and finding links to load is proving a problem. A phone call to my ISP has told me that they are having difficulties at the moment.

Fingers crosed, submitting now

David

David

[toker]

If prison is unjust unless free will exists, then either prison is unjust, or the existence of free will needs to be proven in court. I don't think it necessarily is though. If you are visualizing prison as punishment for a certain free choice then, yes, it is unjust. If you see it as a necessary component of a safe and functioning society, it remains so regardless of one's views on personal volition.
I think I understand your point, that even if we have no volition, it makes sense to hold people accountable - because that's how we can both protect ourselves and also give them a chance to modify their behavior.

But, our society is built on the fact that we (presumably) do have volition, and at the least that puts the burden on those who claim that people have no control over their own behavior.

[toker]

I feel like I have the autonomous ability to choose between options, within certain limits.

But if everything ultimately boils down to cause and effect, that means I don't, doesn't it?

Can we know whether everything ultimately boils down to cause and effect?
But mood, wouldn't your ability to choose be a cause of your actions? And wouldn't the condition of your nervous system (and therefore your life's experiences) be a cause of your decisions? I assume everything that happens is caused. But all causes are not deterministic! Determinism has already been proven false - by physical science!

probabilistic causation (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/causation-probabilistic/)

Deterministic thinking is a powerful and useful tool. But the idea that it captures fully what is actually happening is now known, as a fact, to be misguided.

[Jack Willsson]

If prison is unjust unless free will exists, then either prison is unjust, or the existence of free will needs to be proven in court. I don't think it necessarily is though. If you are visualizing prison as punishment for a certain free choice then, yes, it is unjust. If you see it as a necessary component of a safe and functioning society, it remains so regardless of one's views on personal volition.
I think I understand your point, that even if we have no volition, it makes sense to hold people accountable - because that's how we can both protect ourselves and also give them a chance to modify their behavior.

But, our society is built on the fact that we (presumably) do have volition, and at the least that puts the burden on those who claim that people have no control over their own behavior.

Of course we have some semblence of control. Threaten a jail sentence or point a gun at us and suddenly our priorities change. We're free to change our priorities but that's the antithesis of free will.

The best definition of free will I can imagine is being able to do what we wish when the only thing determining our actions is our own wish/appetite.

[Barbarian]

But, our society is built on the fact that we (presumably) do have volition, and at the least that puts the burden on those who claim that people have no control over their own behavior.The idea that people have control over their own behavior corresponds fairly closely to the real situation, namely, that people's brains (regarded as computers) are usually configured to choose socially acceptable behaviors. Therefore most arguments based on the chimaera of free will can be made to correspond to a more reality-based argument referencing us as stochastic automata, and these arguments can then be regarded as useful approximations to the real thing.

[davidpbrown]

Does free will exist?

I consider free will the manifestation beyond that which simply arises from the world we live in.

There are several elements to this..
- The hardware that allows software to arise - clockwork.
- The software's capability is then compounded with self-awareness; and all that is then very much affected by the character of the world it finds itself in - that maybe complex, random even chaotically complex.
- Then beyond that simple software, is an exotic that is properly free will - a spiritual element or soul.

Whether that soul is distinct or bound to the hardware is a matter of faith. Either-way, I see it as being beyond mere deterministic and more into the realm of art.


FUBG made an interesting post in the [Are you your connectome?] thread (http://www.secularcafe.org/showpost.php?p=194403&postcount=532). Essentially a reductionist question of what is you.

My reply to that was that perception fluxes and if free will can mean anything, it is there that it exists.

From one moment to the next we are different. I could consider that I am the usual I + the computer I'm using; or I with a new arm, or not. Each perception is valid in a context but obviously changes the consideration.. perception doesn't change the reality though. Similarly, whatever we consider fluxes with the mind's focus unbound by deterministic factors - so long as the mind is not clockwork then what it considers isn't determined.

That is, the realm in which we think, I'd suggest, can be beyond deterministic factors.

[Rie]

"See my fingers? See my fist? Well, here it comes" (or not depending on the free choice made by the owner of the fist).

Having the fist is an undoubted fact... what we do with it is up to our own volition.

[toker]

Of course we have some semblence of control. Threaten a jail sentence or point a gun at us and suddenly our priorities change. We're free to change our priorities but that's the antithesis of free will.
I don't understand your last point.

The best definition of free will I can imagine is being able to do what we wish when the only thing determining our actions is our own wish/appetite.
I don't have any large objection here. Although, I often choose to do other than what I wish.

[toker]

But, our society is built on the fact that we (presumably) do have volition, and at the least that puts the burden on those who claim that people have no control over their own behavior.The idea that people have control over their own behavior corresponds fairly closely to the real situation, namely, that people's brains (regarded as computers) are usually configured to choose socially acceptable behaviors. Therefore most arguments based on the chimaera of free will can be made to correspond to a more reality-based argument referencing us as stochastic automata, and these arguments can then be regarded as useful approximations to the real thing.
Brains aren't computers, Barby. And science studies free will, so calling it 'chimaera' is just an affection of yours with no basis in reality. But then, you have no ability to control your own behavior, so I really can't fault you much here.

I'm partially just teasing you with that last comment - actually I respect your opinion, even when you're flat wrong.

[Febble]

Free will is our imagined ability to supply first causes (we must be able to act differently under the exact same physical circumstances, and yet not be random, therefore small local first cause).

As such, it is bollocks, but very interesting bollocks.

It's certainly interesting, but I don't think it's any more bollocks than any other model we make of the world, including anything we think we see or hear i.e. any perception.

[mood2]

I feel like I have the autonomous ability to choose between options, within certain limits.

But if everything ultimately boils down to cause and effect, that means I don't, doesn't it?

Can we know whether everything ultimately boils down to cause and effect?
But mood, wouldn't your ability to choose be a cause of your actions? And wouldn't the condition of your nervous system (and therefore your life's experiences) be a cause of your decisions? I assume everything that happens is caused. But all causes are not deterministic! Determinism has already been proven false - by physical science!

probabilistic causation (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/causation-probabilistic/)



Deterministic thinking is a powerful and useful tool. But the idea that it captures fully what is actually happening is now known, as a fact, to be misguided.

blimey tokes that's a loooong boffiny link thar! :eek: the question is... am I determined to plough through it, or is it determined that I won't be arsed?

sorry that was bad lol. I didn't know about this probabilistic causation stuff, I'll give it a go and see if I can make sense of it.

[Jack Willsson]

Of course we have some semblence of control. Threaten a jail sentence or point a gun at us and suddenly our priorities change. We're free to change our priorities but that's the antithesis of free will.
I don't understand your last point. Nothing profound. I just meant that threats coerce.

The best definition of free will I can imagine is being able to do what we wish when the only thing determining our actions is our own wish/appetite.
I don't have any large objection here. Although, I often choose to do other than what I wish.

Of course. If I always did what I wished they'd put me away.

[Barbarian]

It's certainly interesting, but I don't think it's any more bollocks than any other model we make of the world, including anything we think we see or hear i.e. any perception.My bollock-o-meter reads higher on free will than on other perception-explaining models, because in the case of perceptions there is some physical basis to them. There is such a thing as a subjective perception of the color red (is this what people mean by the term qualia?), and even if it is entirely subjective, it is correlated nicely with certain patterns of preferential reflection of different wavelengths. There is such a thing as the perception of a certain musical note and it is correlated nicely with a given frequency spectrum. But free will isn't even this apparent; unlike in the case of "red", there is really no such thing as a subjective experience of free will. Also, I am not aware of any physical model of a free-willed system which would be analogous to the reflection characteristics leading to being seen as red or the frequency spectrum of any recognizable musical note.

[rog]

Can we know whether everything ultimately boils down to cause and effect?

It comes back to evidence again. If you have any evidence to suggest it boils down to anything other than cause and effect, I will be happy to listen. Until then I have no reason to entertain the notion of free-will.

So If I choose to come round to your house, curl one out on the carpet, set fire to your curtains and steal your car, are you going to be angry at me or physics & anthropology? Think about your answer carefully, in case I ever pop round for a cup of tea....

[Monad]

Quantum mechanics and non determinism is a complete red herring when it comes to "free will". It still removes the locus of control from the person, just as much as strict determinism does.
No, it just puts the lie on the main objection against our ability to control our own behavior on purpose.

Free will only makes sense if seen as a relative concept (Man makes his own history but not under circumstances of his own choosing to paraphrase Marx) - not as an absolute which strips it of context and material reality (makes it magical basically). Even Sartre came to understand this (but Merleau Ponty did better)
Can you control your own behavior? I can't raise my third arm, because I don't have one.

You seem to have misunderstood both my points here.

[Ozymandias]

So If I choose to come round to your house, curl one out on the carpet, set fire to your curtains and steal your car, are you going to be angry at me or physics & anthropology? Think about your answer carefully, in case I ever pop round for a cup of tea....

I try not to get angry with anyone, but for the sake of the discussion, let's assume that I do. In that case, I would still be angry with you, because you were still the perpetrator of the crime. It doesn't matter that you were "forced" to do it by the laws of physics - you should still be locked up to prevent you doing it again, and pay me compensation for the damage.

Imagine though the completely unrealistic possibility that we were able to calculate (using cause and effect) your actions for the rest of your life, and we found that you lived a constructive life and never did anything so destructive or nasty ever again. Then we wouldn't need to lock you up, since you would be no threat to society.

In other words, I don't believe in personal guilt, but our inability to predict the future in practical terms makes the incarceration of criminals still necessary and desirable.

[davidpbrown]

It doesn't matter that you were "forced" to do it by the laws of physics.

Inverting the challenge may seem like a valid arguement but only goes to highlight the question of what free will is.


If free will means anything at all, it is the notion of having mind that is unconstrained by the physical world.

As I've suggested above I think that ability does arise naturally where the software is doing higher level abstract thinking and creative activities.


FUBG - do you consider everything you do is prompted by the physical world?..

Exotic as the physical clockwork and even quantum mechanics are, surely there is a level beyond which the mind is free of those - even if that is limited to being within one lifetime, within that time what arises might be free.

[trendkill]

Probabilistic causation, as far as I can tell, is supposed to be relevant because it says that some things happen partially for a reason and partially for no reason. But that's obvious anyway. There can't be an explanation for the entire Universe--at some point, things have to exist "just because". So everything, if we go back far enough in the causal chain, happens for no reason, even though it also may have been caused by recent events. This doesn't have any interesting implications for freedom.


If free will means anything at all, it is the notion of having mind that is unconstrained by the physical world.Then obviously free will means nothing. Why would I want to be unconstrained by the physical world? The physical world makes me who I am. I'm with David B--my freedom comes from causation. I don't want to escape it.

[davidpbrown]

Probabilistic causation, as far as I can tell, is supposed to be relevant because it says that some things happen partially for a reason and partially for no reason.

Probable doesn't suggest not reasoned, just random. That's why even quantum flux is also being considered as essentially clockwork - notionally, at some level, there's a math that describes its behaviour.

Why would I want to be unconstrained by the physical world?

Because the physical world is trivial. It's just the stage on which we play our games. To be a symptom of that would be rather sad.

[trendkill]

Probabilistic causation, as far as I can tell, is supposed to be relevant because it says that some things happen partially for a reason and partially for no reason.

Probable doesn't suggest not reasoned, just random. That's why even quantum flux is also being considered as essentially clockwork - notionally, at some level, there's a math that describes its behaviour.Random=no cause=happening for no reason. There is no math that describes individual occurrences.


Because the physical world is trivial. It's just the stage on which we play our games. To be a symptom of that would be rather sad.This means nothing to me. The physical world is all there is. If it is trivial, then there is nothing that is important.

[BioBeing]

Couple of posts moved to Smoking Section (http://secularcafe.org/showthread.php?t=10513). Please lay off the insults.

[Ozymandias]

FUBG - do you consider everything you do is prompted by the physical world?..


Yes, of course. What else would it be prompted by?


Exotic as the physical clockwork and even quantum mechanics are, surely there is a level beyond which the mind is free of those - even if that is limited to being within one lifetime, within that time what arises might be free.

Why does there have to be a level beyond? Everything I (or you) do is perfectly well described by the physical laws we have right now. Nothing else is needed, so nothing else should be added. If you want me to believe that there is "a level beyond" you will have to provide evidence of it.

[davidpbrown]

Random=no cause=happening for no reason. There is no math that describes individual occurrences.

I was following the thought of apparently random from above where others seem to be taking a very strong line that even quantum flux is also to be considered as essentially clockwork.

If there is a random=no cause and not just our mistaking complexity, then surely that is a route to suggesting free will=free?

I'm not sure I know of a random that is properly random=no cause.

[Ozymandias]

If it is not random, but proscribed by physics, it is clearly not free-will.

If it is completely random, it is clearly not free-will since it is random! If you based all of your decisions on dice rolls, would you really be deciding anything?

To put it another way, not only does free-will have no evidence, it is a self-contradictory notion.

[davidpbrown]

Do you consider everything you do is prompted by the physical world?..
Yes, of course. What else would it be prompted by?

Why does there have to be a level beyond?

I'm not suggesting there has to be, so much as it strikes me there could easily be. I would appeal to you appreciation of art at this point :rolleyes:


I don't know, if in mathematics there is a proven description of problems that can't be solved by computer.. or does that just lead to an unclear answer of the unresolved P=NP?

If there are problems that human brains can solve that can't be done by turing machines, would that suggest something beyond computation prompted by cause and effect?

[davidpbrown]

If it is completely random, it is clearly not free-will since it is random! If you based all of your decisions on dice rolls, would you really be deciding anything?

I thought the point was that a world that could accept pure random, might be able to allow pure free mind/free will. That is effect without the cascade of causation unbroken.

[Ozymandias]

If it is purely random, your mind has no control over it, so it is not free-will. You would need to have some sort of causation effect originating from a soul-like object that defines 'you'. But that is just too much Woo for me to take seriously.

And why can't art exist in a setting without free-will? Isn't this just a miss-estimation of the complexity that can arise in complex (deterministic) systems. The Mandelbrot set is entirely deterministic, but even the product of that simple system could be called art. Or do you disagree?

[toker]

Of course we have some semblence of control. Threaten a jail sentence or point a gun at us and suddenly our priorities change. We're free to change our priorities but that's the antithesis of free will.
I don't understand your last point. Nothing profound. I just meant that threats coerce.

The best definition of free will I can imagine is being able to do what we wish when the only thing determining our actions is our own wish/appetite.
I don't have any large objection here. Although, I often choose to do other than what I wish.

Of course. If I always did what I wished they'd put me away.
Me too. So... our actions hinge on the outcome of competing desires. What determines? Does it make sense to take the person out of the question, and merely weigh neuron actions?

[toker]

If it is purely random, your mind has no control over it, so it is not free-will. You would need to have some sort of causation effect originating from a soul-like object that defines 'you'. But that is just too much Woo for me to take seriously.
Me too. Maybe, your concept of 'purely random' doesn't hold up.

And why can't art exist in a setting without free-will? Isn't this just a miss-estimation of the complexity that can arise in complex (deterministic) systems. The Mandelbrot set is entirely deterministic, but even the product of that simple system could be called art. Or do you disagree?
Determinism is false, according to modern physics. Make your point in light of that fact.

[davidpbrown]

If it is purely random, your mind has no control over it, so it is not free-will. You would need to have some sort of causation effect originating from a soul-like object that defines 'you'. But that is just too much Woo for me to take seriously.

Which simply resolves to - 'does free will exist?' You say no, others say yes.

And why can't art exist in a setting without free-will?

It could, especially if taken to be simply a catalyst for thought - Mandelbrot is pretty..

The mystic that would be beyond cause/effect where free will might reside would be different again though.

Which again resolves, to what is becoming a frequent answer from me. This is a question, the answer to which doesn't matter. In the worst case, we should behave as if the world is the best case we can hope for. Since we can't determine what free will is nor whether it exists, maybe it has no power over us?

[Ozymandias]

Determinism is false, according to modern physics. Make your point in light of that fact.

The laws of physics are completely deterministic. It is only the collapse of the wavefunction that is random. Free-will is not possible with either.

Let me put it this way. We have a theory that allows us to explain 99.9% of all known observations about the universe (just missing obscure ones like dark matter). That theory has no free-will in it. Why should I abandon this incredibly successful theory just because you 'feel' like you have free-will?

You need to provide evidence of your extraordinary claims. In other words, put up, or shut up.

[Copernicus]

Very interesting discussion. I am a compatibilist. That is, I see no contradiction between most of the various senses of "free will" and determinism. The fact that we cannot predict the future with absolute certainty, including our own future actions, does mean that we are different from the proverbial "robot" that everyone is always maligning (out of ignorance of what nondeterministic programming is all about). It should be clear that there are only two possibilities here--randomness or causality. The fact is that most of us do behave in somewhat predictable ways, and that would not be possible unless our behavior were determined by causal influences.

Now let me just throw this into the mix. Robots can be thought of as having free will--the ability to consider alternative actions and make choices that depend on the limitations of their situation. We don't think of autonomous programs and machines as having free will only because they are relatively simple computing machines relative to human brains and bodies. But one can simulate the components of free will, and that is precisely the evolutionary path that AI (and robotics in particular) is on.

Autonomous machines are increasingly being given greater awareness of their surroundings and their own bodily functions. For example, walking robots need to know where their feet are and where to put them next, lest they trip over an obstacle. When they do trip, they need to know how to get up, based on the orientation of their bodies after the fall. Robots can negotiate obstacle courses that they have not seen previously. (I have seen them do it.)

When do we get to the point where robots have "free will" in the sense that humans do? Well, I think that they already have it on a rudimentary level because of the way we program them to meet the contingencies of a chaotic environment. What they lack is anything like a human ability to employ billions of neurons to form associative chains. They do not yet have complex peripheral nervous systems that constantly feed as wide a variety of sensations to a central nervous system. They do not yet have emotions and moods that drive behavior, nor do they have memories that quickly retrieve complex associations and make complex calculations about the future. But there is nothing in principle to stop robots from ultimately having as much complexity as humans do. We are just beginning to simulate complex animal-like behavior in robots, and it will take a long time before we can even get machines to "grow up" by programming themselves with knowledge about how to navigate in our complex world and carry out the complex tasks that people want them to carry out.

So, please, everybody, let's stop saying nasty things about robots. We want them to be like us, and eventually we will get them to the point where they realize that they don't actually want to be like us.

[toker]

Determinism is false, according to modern physics. Make your point in light of that fact.

The laws of physics are completely deterministic. It is only the collapse of the wavefunction that is random. Free-will is not possible with either.
Since the 'collapse of the wavefunction' is not deterministic, it follows that determinism is false.

Let me put it this way. We have a theory that allows us to explain 99.9% pull invented statistics out of, um, thin air, much? lol of all known observations about the universe (just missing obscure ones like dark matter). That theory has no free-will in it. Why should I abandon this incredibly successful theory just because you 'feel' like you have free-will?
As I said, deterministic thinking is a powerful and useful tool. Newtonian physics works fine enough for many tasks, yet we don't claim that relativity theory should be rejected as a result.

You need to provide evidence of your extraordinary claims. In other words, put up, or shut up.
I've made no extraordinary claims. It's normative to carry on as if people have the ability to control their own behavior - our culture depends on it, our morals and ethics require it, we raise our kids with the assumption that they have it, our justice system is built on the idea, and science studies it.

Sorry for having been harsh with you, Guy. My harsh comment got sent to the smoking section, where it belongs. Carve me a new asshole down there; but here, show my comment was unwarranted, by not inventing statistics, by not making false charges (such as that my view here is extraordinary), and most of all by making thoughtful, reasonable comments. Give it a try, anyways?

[toker]

It should be clear that there are only two possibilities here--randomness or causality.
I think that's a point worth discussing. Since random events are caused, you build on a false dichotomy. Shuffling a deck randomizes the card arrangement; throwing a die produces a random outcome - but why think those results were uncaused?

[toker]

Everything I (or you) do is perfectly well described by the physical laws we have right now.
That is a blatantly false claim. If the physical laws explained everything (let alone explained everything 'perfectly well') then we wouldn't need any other science than physics.

[David B]

So, please, everybody, let's stop saying nasty things about robots. We want them to be like us, and eventually we will get them to the point where they realize that they don't actually want to be like us.

I can't help but thinking of Marvin from HHGTTG on reading that.:evil:

In fact, one poster in this thread who, to my mind, adopts a somewhat over-reductionist stance, rather reminds me of him.

David

[Ozymandias]

Everything I (or you) do is perfectly well described by the physical laws we have right now.
That is a blatantly false claim. If the physical laws explained everything (let alone explained everything 'perfectly well') then we wouldn't need any other science than physics.

All of chemistry can be described by physics if you are smart enough. It is just that it is too complicated to apply the physical models, so effective models (chemistry) are constructed instead. The same is true for biology.

Do you accept that the Standard Model of particle physics describes all known phenomena, except gravity and very high energy (TeV) processes?

If you can show that it doesn't, you will revolutionise physics. But if it does, then there is no room for free will, since everything except wavefunction collapse is deterministic (And wavefunction collapse is random).

[rog]

I'm having a problem - and it goes like this: I really think that the idea of free existing will is important philosophically and ethically, but harking back to the connectome thread, (http://www.secularcafe.org/showthread.php?t=8862) I have to believe that it is possible with a computational concept of mind.

eta: I think this might be one of those times when a vigorous dialectical approach without too much personal sniping might bring us all closer to an understanding in time.

[Ozymandias]

I'm having a problem - and it goes like this: I really think that the idea of free existing will is important philosophically and ethically, but harking back to the connectome thread, (http://www.secularcafe.org/showthread.php?t=8862) I have to believe that it is possible with a computational concept of mind.


I am happy to accept that as your belief, but do you accept that there is no evidence for it whatsoever?

[rog]

I'm having a problem - and it goes like this: I really think that the idea of free existing will is important philosophically and ethically, but harking back to the connectome thread, (http://www.secularcafe.org/showthread.php?t=8862) I have to believe that it is possible with a computational concept of mind.


I am happy to accept that as your belief, but do you accept that there is no evidence for it whatsoever?

Not thought about it fully yet, if this thread goes on I'll start on it.

[toker]

Everything I (or you) do is perfectly well described by the physical laws we have right now.
That is a blatantly false claim. If the physical laws explained everything (let alone explained everything 'perfectly well') then we wouldn't need any other science than physics.

All of chemistry can be described by physics if you are smart enough. It is just that it is too complicated to apply the physical models, so effective models (chemistry) are constructed instead. The same is true for biology.

Do you accept that the Standard Model of particle physics describes all known phenomena, except gravity and very high energy (TeV) processes?

If you can show that it doesn't, you will revolutionise physics. But if it does, then there is no room for free will, since everything except wavefunction collapse is deterministic (And wavefunction collapse is random).
It is my understanding that chemistry does reduce to physics. But biology doesn't. Psychology sure doesn't. Math doesn't. Even astronomy doesn't.

The standard model of particle physics is useless for understanding why your daughter is so infatuated with the bad boys.

Science studies volition, Guy. Your last paragraph is vacuous.

[Copernicus]

I think that's a point worth discussing. Since random events are caused, you build on a false dichotomy. Shuffling a deck randomizes the card arrangement; throwing a die produces a random outcome - but why think those results were uncaused?
Well, the word "random" can have different meanings, so let me clarify. I do not mean "random" in the sense of merely being "unpredictable". If you are unable to predict the outcome of an event, even if it is determined, then it is not a truly random event. It is random if there is no way, in principle, to predict its outcome.

[Jack Willsson]

Of course we have some semblence of control. Threaten a jail sentence or point a gun at us and suddenly our priorities change. We're free to change our priorities but that's the antithesis of free will.
I don't understand your last point. Nothing profound. I just meant that threats coerce.

The best definition of free will I can imagine is being able to do what we wish when the only thing determining our actions is our own wish/appetite.
I don't have any large objection here. Although, I often choose to do other than what I wish.

Of course. If I always did what I wished they'd put me away.
Me too. So... our actions hinge on the outcome of competing desires. What determines? Does it make sense to take the person out of the question, and merely weigh neuron actions?

I think we value all kinds of things from empathy to self-esteem that prevent us from merely acting on apetites.

My first thoughts on this (many years ago) were provided by Ayn Rand who proposed an automated hierarchy of values. Must be something to do with neurones but that's not really saying anything.

What's a person if not their memories, beliefs, apetites, values etc?

[Ozymandias]

It is my understanding that chemistry does reduce to physics. But biology doesn't. Psychology sure doesn't. Math doesn't. Even astronomy doesn't.


Why would biology not reduce to physics if chemistry does? Biologically, you are just a collection of cells, with well understood reactions. Also for psychology. If I knew the state and position of every neuron in your brain, I could model your reaction to any input, thereby predicting your actions. Just because we are not technically capable of this right now, doesn't make it impossible.

I will grant you that maths doesn't reduce to physics (though I suspect that for every mathematical construct there is an example of that maths in the real world), but I really don't get your objection to astronomy. Of all of these, astronomy is the most predictive and physics based.


The standard model of particle physics is useless for understanding why your daughter is so infatuated with the bad boys.


It is only useless because I have incomplete information about boundary conditions of the system, and the equations describing her behaviour are too hard to solve. If I did have complete knowledge of the conditions and a big enough computer, then I could use the Standard Model to calculate her infatuation (and anything else about her).

[Ray Moscow]

Does free will exist? I suspect this has been discussed here previously, but I couldn't find it in a quick search.

There is a part of me that would like very much to believe in free will, and it "feels" to me like I have it. However, that doesn't mean it's true; lots of religious people believe in god for the same reason, and their "reasoning" is clearly fallacious. On an intellectual level, however, I find it hard to accept that free will exists. The problem is that I can't imagine a mechanism for it; in fact I'm not even sure that the concept is coherent..

First, I'm not claiming that all human thoughts and decisions are strictly determined. Quantum mechanical processes may be important in brain activity, although how important is far from clear. Some people claim that QM provides an avenue for free will, but this doesn't make sense. Quantum mechanical events are decided on randomly; if something happens randomly, how does it make sense for me to think I caused it? And randomness is no more aesthetically satisfying than strict determinism.

So what choice does that leave? If something doesn't happen randomly or deterministically, then what "causes" it? If I cause it using by free will, how does that happen? There has to be some mechanism. If you accept, as I think most of us do, that there is a biological basis for all brain activity, then what causes the electrical impulse or squirt of neurotransmitter that leads to making a decision?

My tentative conclusion is that free will does not exist, that it is an illusion. I'd like to hear what others think.

I think it's an illusion, built on the illusion that "we" are something besides our brains and bodies.

[Febble]

It's certainly interesting, but I don't think it's any more bollocks than any other model we make of the world, including anything we think we see or hear i.e. any perception.My bollock-o-meter reads higher on free will than on other perception-explaining models, because in the case of perceptions there is some physical basis to them. There is such a thing as a subjective perception of the color red (is this what people mean by the term qualia?), and even if it is entirely subjective, it is correlated nicely with certain patterns of preferential reflection of different wavelengths. There is such a thing as the perception of a certain musical note and it is correlated nicely with a given frequency spectrum. But free will isn't even this apparent; unlike in the case of "red", there is really no such thing as a subjective experience of free will. Also, I am not aware of any physical model of a free-willed system which would be analogous to the reflection characteristics leading to being seen as red or the frequency spectrum of any recognizable musical note.

Well, I'd say that agency is apparent, as are intention, and choice. All are perfectly good predictive models, and that's all I ask for in a model.

(Not trying to be obtuse here, interested in your response.)

[Febble]

If it is not random, but proscribed by physics, it is clearly not free-will.

If it is completely random, it is clearly not free-will since it is random! If you based all of your decisions on dice rolls, would you really be deciding anything?

To put it another way, not only does free-will have no evidence, it is a self-contradictory notion.

Well, I think it's a somewhat incoherent notion. I don't want to know if will is free (who is Will?) I want to know if I am free. Which raises two issues - what is this thing I call "I" and what would it mean if it were "free"?

Well, the thing I call "I" is the thing I hold responsible for the actions I call "mine" (yes that begs a question or two, but it'll do for now).

So the question becomes - if "I" am a responsible agent then "I" must be "free". Otherwise I would be a mere passive nexus of consciousness riding on the inexorable tide of the unfolding universe.

So the question becomes: am I in any sense responsible for my actions?

And the obvious answer (though it wasn't clear to me until I read Dennett, on David B's recommendation, that it was also a logically coherent answer) is yes. We evolved not only to ascribe agency and intention to other living things (which is useful, and allows us to predict the world more effectively) but, once we evolved to be smart enough to realise that we ourselves were one of those things, to ourselves, i.e. to model ourselves as causal agents.

Which makes sense neurally, as well as philosophically, because brains, are, par excellence, decision-making devices in which actions are selected that will cause things to happen, and which of those actions are selected depends not only on current inputs but on the current state of the brain.

[BioBeing]

Science studies volition, Guy.

Why is that relevant? Even if true free will turns out to be an illusion, the appearance of volition/free will is a phenomenon. We think we have it, we act as if we have it. So why not study it?

[Pandora]

I feel like I have the autonomous ability to choose between options, within certain limits.

But if everything ultimately boils down to cause and effect, that means I don't, doesn't it?

Can we know whether everything ultimately boils down to cause and effect?

You assume a single pathway. You assume that Cause A always produces Effect A. Is it that unlikely to say that Cause A presents possible Effects A, B, and C? Once an effect occurs, there is certainly a cause for it - it's not causeless. That doesn't however, imply that the actual effect was the only effect possible.

Volition <> Causeless

I hate anologies to randomness when discussing free will... but here you go. Imagine flipping a coin. The result can be either heads or tails. If heads turns up, then heads is the effect. If tails turns up, the effect is tails. Either way, the cause is you flipping the coin. There is more than one potential outcome of a given cause.

[Pandora]

Everything I (or you) do is perfectly well described by the physical laws we have right now.
That is a blatantly false claim. If the physical laws explained everything (let alone explained everything 'perfectly well') then we wouldn't need any other science than physics.

And we certainly wouldn't need statistics, or any of its dependent studies... like sociology, medicine, climatology, criminology, investment science etc. All those things that depend on probability distributions, likelihoods, and ranges of potential outcomes.

[Pandora]

Do you accept that the Standard Model of particle physics describes all known phenomena, except gravity and very high energy (TeV) processes?

No. I don't. Physics doesn't properly explain why two roses on the same bush have slightly different petal formations. Physics doesn't fully explain the diversity of life. It doesn't fully explain local weather. It doesn't fully explain genetic mutation - why a programmed set of instructions sometimes fucks up. It's a great predictor for physical interactions among particles. But physics cannot give you an absolute answer. It's still probabilistic in the end. And physics absolutely sucks as a predictor of behavior among living beings.

BTW... not being able to properly describe gravity, on which the vast majority of physics is built, is sort of a flaw to it being such a great describer of phenomena, don't you think?

[Pandora]

Everything I (or you) do is perfectly well described by the physical laws we have right now.
That is a blatantly false claim. If the physical laws explained everything (let alone explained everything 'perfectly well') then we wouldn't need any other science than physics.

All of chemistry can be described by physics if you are smart enough. It is just that it is too complicated to apply the physical models, so effective models (chemistry) are constructed instead. The same is true for biology.

Do you accept that the Standard Model of particle physics describes all known phenomena, except gravity and very high energy (TeV) processes?

If you can show that it doesn't, you will revolutionise physics. But if it does, then there is no room for free will, since everything except wavefunction collapse is deterministic (And wavefunction collapse is random).
It is my understanding that chemistry does reduce to physics. But biology doesn't. Psychology sure doesn't. Math doesn't. Even astronomy doesn't.

In fact, Physics reduces to math. And a very large branch of mathematics is devoted to the study of uncertainty. An entire branch of very frequently applied mathematics is based on the fact that the world is NOT deterministic.

[Pandora]

I think that's a point worth discussing. Since random events are caused, you build on a false dichotomy. Shuffling a deck randomizes the card arrangement; throwing a die produces a random outcome - but why think those results were uncaused?
Well, the word "random" can have different meanings, so let me clarify. I do not mean "random" in the sense of merely being "unpredictable". If you are unable to predict the outcome of an event, even if it is determined, then it is not a truly random event. It is random if there is no way, in principle, to predict its outcome.

This isn't exactly true. You say this as if something that you consider "random" is something where people just throw their hands up and say "I have no idea!" That's not how it works in reality. Most of the time, you can predict the likely outcome. And depending on the distribution in question, the prediction can be pretty darn accurate. Just because it's random doesn't mean it's completely unpredictable. It just means that there's a confidence interval of some sort around the prediction.

[David B]

I'm wondering if making predictions from standard model physics would be rather akin to making predictions about the future states of computers based on studying states of the on/off switches in the computer, further complicated by the task the computer has is playing Tetris with human input, the human being capable of being distracted by a phone ringing, which in turn might be influenced by the caller not being phoned by some third party just before making the call......

David

[Pandora]

It is my understanding that chemistry does reduce to physics. But biology doesn't. Psychology sure doesn't. Math doesn't. Even astronomy doesn't.


Why would biology not reduce to physics if chemistry does? Biologically, you are just a collection of cells, with well understood reactions. Also for psychology. If I knew the state and position of every neuron in your brain, I could model your reaction to any input, thereby predicting your actions. Just because we are not technically capable of this right now, doesn't make it impossible.
I think you are assuming this to be true, but I think you are wrong. I think if you knew the state and position of every neuron in one's brain, you could model their reaction with high likelihood, but not with absolute accuracy. I think even if you knew all those details, there would still be a range of possible reactions. You might have a very high confidence of the most likely outcome, but I don't think you'd even be able to say with 100%.

Even at it's most base level, you cannot know everything necessary to predict with perfect accuracy - physics itself says this is impossible. You can know a lot, you can know the wave function, you can know where it is most likely that the electron will land, you can know the pattern that lots of electrons will make... but you cannot know where any specific given electron will land once it passes through the slit.

If you know everything that it is possible for you to know about the initial conditions of a decision, you can probably predict very well what the outcome will be. But it is impossible for you to perfectly predict that outcome. The world itself is NOT deterministic.

I will grant you that maths doesn't reduce to physics (though I suspect that for every mathematical construct there is an example of that maths in the real world), but I really don't get your objection to astronomy. Of all of these, astronomy is the most predictive and physics based.
:happyno:


The standard model of particle physics is useless for understanding why your daughter is so infatuated with the bad boys.


It is only useless because I have incomplete information about boundary conditions of the system, and the equations describing her behaviour are too hard to solve. If I did have complete knowledge of the conditions and a big enough computer, then I could use the Standard Model to calculate her infatuation (and anything else about her).

Again, no. Because it is impossible for you to have complete knowledge of the conditions. The most you can do is come up with a very likely reason for her behavior.

[The AntiChris]

I hate anologies to randomness when discussing free will... but here you go. Imagine flipping a coin. The result can be either heads or tails. If heads turns up, then heads is the effect. If tails turns up, the effect is tails. Either way, the cause is you flipping the coin. There is more than one potential outcome of a given cause.It doesn't follow from the fact that we can't, in practice, predict the outcome of a coin flip that "There is more than one potential outcome of a given cause".

Inability to predict accurately is also the result of insufficiently precise knowledge of initial conditions.

Chris

[Pandora]

I hate anologies to randomness when discussing free will... but here you go. Imagine flipping a coin. The result can be either heads or tails. If heads turns up, then heads is the effect. If tails turns up, the effect is tails. Either way, the cause is you flipping the coin. There is more than one potential outcome of a given cause.It doesn't follow from the fact that we can't, in practice, predict the outcome of a coin flip that "There is more than one potential outcome of a given cause".

Inability to predict accurately is also the result of insufficiently precise knowledge of initial conditions.

Chris

Okay. Know as much as it's possible for you to know about an electron. Now tell me which slit it will go through.


Inability to predict accurately can also be the result of inherently indeterminacy.

[The AntiChris]

Inability to predict accurately can also be the result of inherently indeterminacy.Sure. But what does that have to do with what I said? It certainly doesn't contradict anything I said.

Chris

[Cath B]

I have the free will to follow the path which my sense of self desires in order to further the interests of my gut bacteria. :evil:

http://www.secularcafe.org/showthread.php?t=10523

[Barbarian]

Well, I'd say that agency is apparent, as are intention, and choice. All are perfectly good predictive models, and that's all I ask for in a model.

(Not trying to be obtuse here, interested in your response.)I propose that agency is not apparent, intention is not relevant and choice is not well-defined enough for the purpose of this discussion.

First, agency not being apparent. Here I propose that agency is an explanation, not a direct observation. The way I understand other people imagining their free willed decisions, they actually imagine them as a break in the causality chains of the physical world - it is possible that the decision was influenced by knowledge, but taking the actual choice was not caused by anything, hence it was a local first cause. (A parallel picture exists for perceptions - they are final effects, endpoints of causal chains, not necessarily causing anything to happen.) So the imagination runs as follows: causal chains running through simple physical objects go uninterrupted, but no causal chain goes through me. The conscious mind is approached as if it was an ineffable black box, swallowing causal chains (perceptions) and initiating others (choices / actions). Agency is the working of this black box, inferred but never actually experienced, imagined to be atomic to the point that the very notion of its composition is difficult to entertain. At any given moment our agency either works or is being contemplated but never both; you can imagine it or remember it (which is also imagining) but not actually observe it. This is very different and inferior to our perceiving e.g. the color red, which is but a mapping of certain wavelength compositions and not assumed to exist just to fill a blind spot with meaning.

Second, intention not being relevant. I propose that most of what the brain does is just simulation and evaluation of alternatives. Now, I sense a continuum of related notions, containing intention, will and desire: these are names of the subjective perception of gaps between what is and what our brain came up with as a better, although sadly fictitious, state of the world. (This is why God's will shall never be done; an omnipotent being will not experience such a gap and therefore cannot have a will.) This is the subjective perception of something real, but it has no bearing to free will, since it would apply even in a Newtonian deterministic world, where free will cannot exist.

As for choice not being well-defined enough, I am not sure whether you talk about us making choices in the sense of mentally simulating possible actions with their consequences and then choosing the best one, which would work so even in a no-free-will world, or about us feeling like we could have chosen something else, which is actually due to us being able to imagine ourselves choosing differently, based on incomplete information or on the way minds are mentally modeled.

As for it being a model, well yes, it is, actually two different models. Since the brain runs simulations, it has to deal with incomplete models, and in few cases will it have to deal with less complete data than in the case of simulating other people. In such cases, it is actually useful to imagine them either as more or less random agents ("He could choose either one of those actions; is there one which is particularly harmful for me?") or as deterministic agents ("Aha, so this is why he did that! What does that imply about his next moves?") depending on context. Our brain does a good job seamlessly switching to the more appropriate model or even using both at the same time. Consciously we don't do so well and cannot stop the random agent image from getting a bit contaminated with the deterministic one, the result being the notion of free will resulting in choices which are neither deterministic nor random. Finally when we model ourselves the same way we model other people, the confusion becomes complete.

Out of interest: how is this a good predictive model? It is used in the brain as a variant-generating model, as the rules of chess are used to generate next moves. How can you use it to explain something? Can you name a situation when such a model is useful for prediction?

[Ozymandias]

Do you accept that the Standard Model of particle physics describes all known phenomena, except gravity and very high energy (TeV) processes?

No. I don't. Physics doesn't properly explain why two roses on the same bush have slightly different petal formations. Physics doesn't fully explain the diversity of life. It doesn't fully explain local weather. It doesn't fully explain genetic mutation - why a programmed set of instructions sometimes fucks up.


Yes it does. It can explain all of these things. Our own inability to solve its equations does not detract from that. In principle all the information to explain these things is in the physics - we are just not very good at digging it out (yet).


BTW... not being able to properly describe gravity, on which the vast majority of physics is built, is sort of a flaw to it being such a great describer of phenomena, don't you think?

There is not a single observable about gravity that our theories does not predict correctly. Gravity theories are just not a part of the Standard Model by definition.


I think you are assuming this to be true, but I think you are wrong. I think if you knew the state and position of every neuron in one's brain, you could model their reaction with high likelihood, but not with absolute accuracy. I think even if you knew all those details, there would still be a range of possible reactions. You might have a very high confidence of the most likely outcome, but I don't think you'd even be able to say with 100%.


It depends on the accuracy of your initial knowledge and the accuracy of your solutions of course. But as the inaccuracy goes to zero, your prediction becomes infinitely good.


Even at it's most base level, you cannot know everything necessary to predict with perfect accuracy - physics itself says this is impossible. You can know a lot, you can know the wave function, you can know where it is most likely that the electron will land, you can know the pattern that lots of electrons will make... but you cannot know where any specific given electron will land once it passes through the slit.


Of course not, but you can give the probabilities of it being in a certain place arbitrarily accurately. So you can predict the probabilities of various outcomes. If I can predict you will choose option A with probability X and action B with probability Y, you don't have free-will because you are just rolling a dice to make your decision.

[Febble]

OK, I agree with a lot of that. I have a few comments, though:


Well, I'd say that agency is apparent, as are intention, and choice. All are perfectly good predictive models, and that's all I ask for in a model.

(Not trying to be obtuse here, interested in your response.)I propose that agency is not apparent, intention is not relevant and choice is not well-defined enough for the purpose of this discussion.

First, agency not being apparent. Here I propose that agency is an explanation, not a direct observation.

I don't think there's a clear distinction. I think all our observations are "explanations" at some level, even though at very basic levels the explanatory machine is so hard-wired in that we are not aware of the explanatory process. And in fact, "agency" appears to be one of those fairly hard-wired things - experiments with infants show that when shown a display in which causality appears to be violated (a ball moves off just before it is touched by another ball, instead of vice versa) the baby looks longer at it, as though to try to "explain" something that seems "unexplained". But I think the whole process of seeing - of parsing the world into things - is an explanatory process. We see a blur of red - we explain it as a robin, or an apple, or a traffic light. Or even as a thing-to-be-explained. I don't think we see "pure" red (which is my beef with the notion of "qualia").

The way I understand other people imagining their free willed decisions, they actually imagine them as a break in the causality chains of the physical world - it is possible that the decision was influenced by knowledge, but taking the actual choice was not caused by anything, hence it was a local first cause. (A parallel picture exists for perceptions - they are final effects, endpoints of causal chains, not necessarily causing anything to happen.) So the imagination runs as follows: causal chains running through simple physical objects go uninterrupted, but no causal chain goes through me. The conscious mind is approached as if it was an ineffable black box, swallowing causal chains (perceptions) and initiating others (choices / actions).

Yes, I think that's what people do think.

Agency is the working of this black box, inferred but never actually experienced, imagined to be atomic to the point that the very notion of its composition is difficult to entertain.

Well, that's where I think our model goes wrong. It's when we imagine that the agent is something in the box, rather than the entire box. Literally, when it comes to brains. People still look for the homunculus (even if they describe it terms like "top-down" as opposed to "bottom up" processing) in the box, instead of regarding the box as the agent.

At any given moment our agency either works or is being contemplated but never both; you can imagine it or remember it (which is also imagining)

(Yes! So nice to hear someone say that.)

but not actually observe it. This is very different and inferior to our perceiving e.g. the color red, which is but a mapping of certain wavelength compositions and not assumed to exist just to fill a blind spot with meaning.

Not sure what you mean here, but I think I disagree.

Second, intention not being relevant. I propose that most of what the brain does is just simulation and evaluation of alternatives.

Yes indeed. Again, lovely to hear someone else say this :)

Now, I sense a continuum of related notions, containing intention, will and desire: these are names of the subjective perception of gaps between what is and what our brain came up with as a better, although sadly fictitious, state of the world. (This is why God's will shall never be done; an omnipotent being will not experience such a gap and therefore cannot have a will.) This is the subjective perception of something real, but it has no bearing to free will, since it would apply even in a Newtonian deterministic world, where free will cannot exist.

Ah, well, there, courtesy of Dennett, via David B, I disagree. Or rather, I think there is a perfectly valid view of free will that can exist in a deterministic universe. But ultimately, that's a quibble. A useful one there.

As for choice not being well-defined enough, I am not sure whether you talk about us making choices in the sense of mentally simulating possible actions with their consequences and then choosing the best one, which would work so even in a no-free-will world,

Yes, that's exactly what I do mean (and which is why it would work "even in a no-free-will world")

or about us feeling like we could have chosen something else, which is actually due to us being able to imagine ourselves choosing differently, based on incomplete information or on the way minds are mentally modeled.

Well, I meant that too. I don't think they are alternatives.

As for it being a model, well yes, it is, actually two different models. Since the brain runs simulations, it has to deal with incomplete models, and in few cases will it have to deal with less complete data than in the case of simulating other people. In such cases, it is actually useful to imagine them either as more or less random agents ("He could choose either one of those actions; is there one which is particularly harmful for me?") or as deterministic agents ("Aha, so this is why he did that! What does that imply about his next moves?") depending on context. Our brain does a good job seamlessly switching to the more appropriate model or even using both at the same time.

Yes, I agree.

Consciously we don't do so well and cannot stop the random agent image from getting a bit contaminated with the deterministic one, the result being the notion of free will resulting in choices which are neither deterministic nor random. Finally when we model ourselves the same way we model other people, the confusion becomes complete.

Well, I do agree that we tend to be confused. I don't think we need be, though.

Out of interest: how is this a good predictive model? It is used in the brain as a variant-generating model, as the rules of chess are used to generate next moves. How can you use it to explain something? Can you name a situation when such a model is useful for prediction?

Well, I'd say that the whole simulation process is the making of predictive models, and that includes simulating what another agent would do ("that person looks angry; what would I do if I were angry in this context? That is probably what that person will do.)

Nice to talk to you again! Are you still in Hungary? I'm coming to Budapest in October for a conference.

[Copernicus]

But people do believe at an intuitive level that our actions are fully determined. Otherwise, why would we be constantly asking each other why we do the things we do? We expect there to be some motive or set of motives that explains behavior. There is no way around the argument that will is bound by desire and that we have no choice at any given moment but to follow the desire that trumps all others.

If someone shoots bullets at your feet and shouts "dance", you can choose to stand still or dance. It depends on whether you value your dignity or your feet more. If asked why you danced around like you did, you would probably say that you wished not to have your feet shot off. That is free will. :cool:

[Ray Moscow]

Do you accept that the Standard Model of particle physics describes all known phenomena, except gravity and very high energy (TeV) processes?

No. I don't. Physics doesn't properly explain why two roses on the same bush have slightly different petal formations. Physics doesn't fully explain the diversity of life. It doesn't fully explain local weather. It doesn't fully explain genetic mutation - why a programmed set of instructions sometimes fucks up. It's a great predictor for physical interactions among particles. But physics cannot give you an absolute answer. It's still probabilistic in the end. And physics absolutely sucks as a predictor of behavior among living beings.

BTW... not being able to properly describe gravity, on which the vast majority of physics is built, is sort of a flaw to it being such a great describer of phenomena, don't you think?

Isn't this mixing up "predicting" with "explaining"?

Chaotic systems are of course unpredictable, by definition. They can still be explained pretty well with physics.

And physics can only predict probabilities, at a quantum level. The only accurate way to describe "particles" is with probability wave functions. Can it "explain" quantum events in plain language? Not really -- it has to fall back to imperfect analogies for those of us who can't do the maths.

[toker]

I think that's a point worth discussing. Since random events are caused, you build on a false dichotomy. Shuffling a deck randomizes the card arrangement; throwing a die produces a random outcome - but why think those results were uncaused?
Well, the word "random" can have different meanings, so let me clarify. I do not mean "random" in the sense of merely being "unpredictable". If you are unable to predict the outcome of an event, even if it is determined, then it is not a truly random event. It is random if there is no way, in principle, to predict its outcome.
I think you assume that the principle of predicting an outcome must be a deterministic principle of some sort. I guarantee that a tossed die will never produce a chicken. In fact, the outcome will always follow a probability distribution.

[Pandora]

These sorts of discussions always put me in mind of planetary motion. Bear with me on this one, folks, I've actually got a point that I think is pretty good here... even though I kinda suck at dates and such when it comes to history.

Back around the time of Galileo (or whenever), the leading scientists held the view that the Earth was the center of the system. They had a lot of measurmenets of the planets in our system, and they had developed some very accurate and very complex mathematics to explain the apparent retrograde motion of of them all. The math worked out, it was just really cumbersome. then along came Galileo, and said "Hey folks! You know, if you just put the earth at the center, everything simplifies, and those last few things you had such difficulty with suddenly clear right up! I'm betting the Earth isn't the center of the system, the Sun is!"

Galileo advocated the simpler solution as the correct one. Occam's razor in high relief.

So when we're talking about volition, I often come back to the same concept. Let's take an example of a guy who steals his neighbor's circular saw. Which theory - free will or determinism - gives the simpler answer to his action, and the consequent action of our society?

In the deterministic scenario, we've stole a chainsaw because he could do nothing else. The universe and the chain of stardust that led to his existence set up initial conditions in such a way that the only possible outcome was for him to steal the chainsaw. Similarly, by another chain of directly casual events, the owner of the chainsaw was compelled by his initial conditions to call the police. The police were compelled by their initial conditions to arrest the chainsaw stealer, and the jury was compelled by their initial conditions to find him guilty - they could not, of course, have found him innocent, because the guilty verdict is the only possible outcome of the chain of causal events that led to them being called for jury duty on that particular day in the first place. And of course, society developed a justice system in the first place because... well, because they couldn't do anything else. Development of a justice system of that sort in that location is the only thing that could have happened, because of this particular string of prior events that causally led to only this type of justice being able to be developed. And so on, down the line.

In the volitional scenario... it's simpler. The chainsaw stealer made a poor and selfish choice. The chainsaw owner was displeased, and lives in a society which has chosen to see protection of one's personal property as a right. The police arrested the thief because of the rules of law that the society had chosen. The jury weighed the evidence and decided upon a verdict of guilty.

It always seems to me that the deterministic view of the universe has a whole lot of retrograde motion.

There's nothing wrong with something being uncertain. There's nothing wrong with only having a probability for the outcome. There's nothing wrong with not being able to have perfect knowledge. And there's nothing wrong with a view of existence that allows volition, within reasonable bounds.

[Politesse]

These sorts of discussions always put me in mind of planetary motion. Bear with me on this one, folks, I've actually got a point that I think is pretty good here... even though I kinda suck at dates and such when it comes to history.

Back around the time of Galileo (or whenever), the leading scientists held the view that the Earth was the center of the system. They had a lot of measurmenets of the planets in our system, and they had developed some very accurate and very complex mathematics to explain the apparent retrograde motion of of them all. The math worked out, it was just really cumbersome. then along came Galileo, and said "Hey folks! You know, if you just put the earth at the center, everything simplifies, and those last few things you had such difficulty with suddenly clear right up! I'm betting the Earth isn't the center of the system, the Sun is!"

Galileo advocated the simpler solution as the correct one. Occam's razor in high relief.

So when we're talking about volition, I often come back to the same concept. Let's take an example of a guy who steals his neighbor's circular saw. Which theory - free will or determinism - gives the simpler answer to his action, and the consequent action of our society?

In the deterministic scenario, we've stole a chainsaw because he could do nothing else. The universe and the chain of stardust that led to his existence set up initial conditions in such a way that the only possible outcome was for him to steal the chainsaw. Similarly, by another chain of directly casual events, the owner of the chainsaw was compelled by his initial conditions to call the police. The police were compelled by their initial conditions to arrest the chainsaw stealer, and the jury was compelled by their initial conditions to find him guilty - they could not, of course, have found him innocent, because the guilty verdict is the only possible outcome of the chain of causal events that led to them being called for jury duty on that particular day in the first place. And of course, society developed a justice system in the first place because... well, because they couldn't do anything else. Development of a justice system of that sort in that location is the only thing that could have happened, because of this particular string of prior events that causally led to only this type of justice being able to be developed. And so on, down the line.

In the volitional scenario... it's simpler. The chainsaw stealer made a poor and selfish choice. The chainsaw owner was displeased, and lives in a society which has chosen to see protection of one's personal property as a right. The police arrested the thief because of the rules of law that the society had chosen. The jury weighed the evidence and decided upon a verdict of guilty.

It always seems to me that the deterministic view of the universe has a whole lot of retrograde motion.

There's nothing wrong with something being uncertain. There's nothing wrong with only having a probability for the outcome. There's nothing wrong with not being able to have perfect knowledge. And there's nothing wrong with a view of existence that allows volition, within reasonable bounds.
That is a simple, tidy, and entirely convincing demonstration of why Occam's razor is unreliable.

Simple is a rather subjective, and often deceptive, affair. Saying "free will" makes things simpler in the same way that saying "god did it" makes everything simpler, and doesn't really work for the same reason- it doesn't actually explain anything, just describes it in a way that makes it seem easier to grasp.

[BioBeing]

That is a simple, tidy, and entirely convincing demonstration of why Occam's razor is unreliable.

Simple is a rather subjective, and often deceptive, affair. Saying "free will" makes things simpler in the same way that saying "god did it" makes everything simpler, and doesn't really work for the same reason- it doesn't actually explain anything, just describes it in a way that makes it seem easier to grasp.

For once, I agree with Politesse! While the Razor has it's uses, it is only a guideline.

In this case, you have to explain how having true free will actually happens - and that is not simple. All you have here done, muidiri, is shown that we appear to have free will.

[Pandora]

Meh. I guess I just don't see a problem with the existence of free will. I don't really see that there's any contradiction in it existing. I don't see it as an act of faith. Volition and cognition seem to fit the observations pretty well. Just because we can't identify a mechanism for them doesn't mean they don't exist. There are lots of things that we accept without being able to identify mechanisms for. The aforementioned gravity being one of the big ones. Lots of emotions have no mechanism. We know certain chemicals are involved, but we also know that those chemicals alone don't necessarily produce that emotion. We have some good evolutionary and biological reasons for emotions to exist, but there's not exactly a direct causal relation for most of them.

On a similar note, I have a really hard time viewing the evolution of society, and the process of learning, without the existence of cognition and free will. Learning from the past, learning from our mistakes - these seem to require the existence of choice in order to function, hell in order to even make sense, these require the existence of choice.

And choice is free will.

[Pandora]

That is a simple, tidy, and entirely convincing demonstration of why Occam's razor is unreliable.

Simple is a rather subjective, and often deceptive, affair. Saying "free will" makes things simpler in the same way that saying "god did it" makes everything simpler, and doesn't really work for the same reason- it doesn't actually explain anything, just describes it in a way that makes it seem easier to grasp.

For once, I agree with Politesse! While the Razor has it's uses, it is only a guideline.

In this case, you have to explain how having true free will actually happens - and that is not simple. All you have here done, muidiri, is shown that we appear to have free will.

Let me flip that on you, Biobeing. Explain how friendship actually happens. Otherwise all you have is the appearance of friendship. Explain how gravity actually happens ;).

If two sets of theories fit the observational data, why should the simpler one get thrown out, given that neither of them can be proven beyond the shadow of a doubt?

Determinism requires absolute and perfect knowledge. You cannot ever have absolute and perfect knowledge. It is impossible to have it. We've got both physics and mathematical theories that are pretty well accepted that say you cannot have absolute knowledge. No matter how much data you can collect, you cannot know enough to prove a deterministic existence.

[David B]

I don't recall anyone in the thread avoiding words like 'I' 'me' 'your' 'our' 'we' though not everyone might have used all of them.

Even the ultra determinists who deny any sort of meaning to 'Free will'.

I'm sort of reminded of an old Airplane Lyric

'Say it plainly
The human name
Doesn't mean shit to a tree'

And the human self doesn't mean shit to the individual neurons, or to molecules, atoms and the interactions between them that make up either the individual neuron or to the whole human being made up of all sorts of cells including neurons and, if you like, the various germs passed over from the mother in the birth process. And whatever.

Nonetheless, we are macroscopic beings, whatever the atoms don't think about it.

There seems to me to be more than two schools of thought concerning the free will argument.

There are those who think that interactions between neurons, or even more fundamentally interactions between fundamental particles shove decisions around.

There are those - mainly the religious - who think that decisions come from some sort of miraculous, god given, free will, and the free will then shoves the neurons, and the fundamental particles around.

And there are those of us who say that the firing of cells (and the fundamental particles that make them up) shoves decisions around, and decisions once taken shove the firing of cells (and the fundamental particles that make them up) around, in all sorts of feedback loops, and it is the sum total of the results of all these feedback loops that, in part at least, makes up me, and you.

Which has more explanatory value?

Look at some decisions, and their results.

Someone might ask 'why are you walking down the road right now'?

Answers - 'because a pattern of neural firing led me to' or 'I wanted to go to the shop because I've nearly run out of bog roll'.

'What are you going to do on your day off'?

'Whatever the pattern of firing of neurons leads me to do' or 'I might go off into the hills to look for wimberries, or I might go prawning. I will make a decision based on the weather at the time'.

'Why did you leave a note on the windscreen of the car you just dinged in the carpark, giving your phone number instead of just driving off?'

'Because the pattern of firing of neurons led me to do it' or 'It would have been easier to just drive off, but I thought it would be a really shitty thing to do'.

I'd argue that the less reductionist answer gives the greater explanatory answer.

Human beings can do all that. They can decide to go to the shop because they anticipate a need for bog paper. They can decide to use their spare time in the way that they think will give themselves most satisfaction based on a number of factors, and they can decide not to just drive away from a ding in a car park, which I'd suggest is a moral decision. I know this because I've done all three, and I also know that underneath that there are brain states leading me to it, which may or may not be deterministic down at the quantum level, but any lack of determinism is not helpful to making decisions with a degree of freedom denied to a baby, a mosquito, or a rock.

The ability to make such decisions is, I suggest, part of the extended human phenotype. It is not the sort of magical freewill demanded by those who say that freewill is some sort of god given faculty independent of chemistry and physics, but it is all the freedom we are going to get, and it is enough. It is something feasible that we could want, it is something we have, and, I think, all we should want.

David

[Politesse]

Determinists don't generally have a problem with talking as though people are choices and so forth, they just deny that this perception is an accurate descriptor of reality.

[Pandora]

Determinists don't generally have a problem with talking as though people are choices and so forth, they just deny that this perception is an accurate descriptor of reality.

I just don't get why they deny it. David seems to have covered it pretty well, I think. And a functional theory of free will seems to fit actual observed behaviors. Why deny it? If the theory fits the observations, why deny the theory?

It seems, I dunno, sort of obstructionist. Sort of let's all talk about the world as if free will exists, and we'll all recognize that we act as if free will exists, and we all appear to actually engage in decision making, and our entire vocabulary and teaching methods rely on an inherent assumption of cognition and volition... but hey, it's just pretend - the real world isn't actually anything at all like what the real world seems to be.

[trendkill]

Determinists don't generally have a problem with talking as though people are choices and so forth, they just deny that this perception is an accurate descriptor of reality.

I just don't get why they deny it.It's because they're under the same misconceptions as the people who think libertarian (i.e. magical) free will exists. They buy into that intuitive yet bizarrely erroneous perception of what freedom would be, they just think we don't have it. I agree, it's hard to understand how anyone could keep thinking that they need some special magical quality in order to be free after reading a post like David B's above.

[Ozymandias]

In the volitional scenario... it's simpler.


I disagree. It is not simpler at all. In the one case, you have the laws of physics which inexorably provide cause and effect, explaining the whole universe without need of anything else. In the other case, you still need the laws of physics in order to keep everything together, but now you are adding bucketfuls of woo in order to try and maintain the nebulous and ill-defined concept of free-will.

[davidpbrown]

I'm thinking now, there are two factors to consider here.

One is that, with good hardware the software can think flexibly - freely, beyond what is simply prompted by physics.

The other is that, we can maybe determine that the input is properly random. Notionally the Universe is too big to compute and so just not being in the same place can provide what is properly random input relative to others. Obviously, reduction suggests there's no big computer in the background but maybe some element of the Universe happens for no reason - i.e. not math.

Unless the Universe is clockwork, then we have a world in which we have freedom to think and consider our actions and I think that then goes a little beyond just being a cog in the machine.


tldr; We just need a Universe that isn't clockwork to allow for clockwork like machines to have free will. Exercise for the reader to determine that something happens for no reason, in order to seed the random Universe..

[Ozymandias]

tldr; We just need a Universe that isn't clockwork to allow for clockwork like machines to have free will. Exercise for the reader to determine that something happens for no reason, in order to seed the random Universe..

I agree with this. But I would say that we have very good experimental evidence that the Universe is clockwork (in a probabilistic sense), and we have absolutely no evidence to suggest that it isn't clockwork.

[Pandora]

We have spontaneous division of photons into particle-antiparticle pairs for no reason. No cause - it just happens.

[toker]

We have spontaneous division of photons into particle-antiparticle pairs for no reason. No cause - it just happens.
No cause? So sometime they split into rabbits?

[Ozymandias]

We have spontaneous division of photons into particle-antiparticle pairs for no reason. No cause - it just happens.

That is very well understood, and it is perfectly predictive. We have very precise predictions for the probabilities of these sorts of interactions.

[Jet Black]

And the influence of culture!

/anthropologist

yeah. I think this along with brain morphology has a more important role to play than QM.

[Jet Black]

We have spontaneous division of photons into particle-antiparticle pairs for no reason. No cause - it just happens.

That is very well understood, and it is perfectly predictive. We have very precise predictions for the probabilities of these sorts of interactions.

for the probabilities, yes, but not individual events. Though I think there is a difference between no reason and no cause. There is a reason; the laws of physics explicitly allow certain interactions to occur with certain probabilities, but cause implies something that made that event happen rather than other possible events.

[Ozymandias]

for the probabilities, yes, but not individual events. Though I think there is a difference between no reason and no cause. There is a reason; the laws of physics explicitly allow certain interactions to occur.

I think the non-deterministic aspects of quantum mechanics are a red herring. The fact remains that we understand them very well and have demonstrated that there are no outside influences on these phenomena. Therefore there is no room for physics to be tampered with by "free-will".

[toker]

We have spontaneous division of photons into particle-antiparticle pairs for no reason. No cause - it just happens.

That is very well understood, and it is perfectly predictive. We have very precise predictions for the probabilities of these sorts of interactions.
Such predictions are impossible if the event were uncaused.

[toker]

We have spontaneous division of photons into particle-antiparticle pairs for no reason. No cause - it just happens.

That is very well understood, and it is perfectly predictive. We have very precise predictions for the probabilities of these sorts of interactions.

for the probabilities, yes, but not individual events. Though I think there is a difference between no reason and no cause. There is a reason; the laws of physics explicitly allow certain interactions to occur with certain probabilities, but cause implies something that made that event happen rather than other possible events.
In other words, causes must be deterministic? I see no reason to accept that view. Deterministic causes are just the easiest to see.

[Ozymandias]

That is very well understood, and it is perfectly predictive. We have very precise predictions for the probabilities of these sorts of interactions.
Such predictions are impossible if the event were uncaused.

I agree. If these events were acausal, we could make no predictions. By we do make predictions, and they are then tested and found to be correct. Therefore the events are not acausal. So you have proven my point.

[Pandora]

We have spontaneous division of photons into particle-antiparticle pairs for no reason. No cause - it just happens.

That is very well understood, and it is perfectly predictive. We have very precise predictions for the probabilities of these sorts of interactions.

So? They're still uncaused, aren't they?

[Pandora]

We have spontaneous division of photons into particle-antiparticle pairs for no reason. No cause - it just happens.
No cause? So sometime they split into rabbits?

:dunno: I think you've confused cause with outcome.

[Pandora]

We have spontaneous division of photons into particle-antiparticle pairs for no reason. No cause - it just happens.

That is very well understood, and it is perfectly predictive. We have very precise predictions for the probabilities of these sorts of interactions.
Such predictions are impossible if the event were uncaused.

Not true.

Sometimes, for no reason at all, photons split. We know what they split into, and we can predict how often these types of splits occur. We can predict - in aggregate - how many splits will occur. We can assign a percentage to the likelihood of a particular photon splitting.

But there is no cause. The event is uncaused.

[Pandora]

for the probabilities, yes, but not individual events. Though I think there is a difference between no reason and no cause. There is a reason; the laws of physics explicitly allow certain interactions to occur.

I think the non-deterministic aspects of quantum mechanics are a red herring. The fact remains that we understand them very well and have demonstrated that there are no outside influences on these phenomena. Therefore there is no room for physics to be tampered with by "free-will".

I strongly disagree. You're basing the entire concept of the deterministic universe on the functioning of physics - you're saying that physics completely covers everything, and it's our lack of knowledge of the initial conditions that prevents us from making perfect predictions - that prevents us from being able to treat the entire universe, and every person's behaviors as the result of an "if-then" chain in a gigantic Deep-Thought-Esque computer.

But physics is inherently, fundamentally, indeterminate.

So basically you're saying that physics is the perfect solution, and our lack of knowledge is the only problem... and we should just ignore the fact that physics isn't a perfect solution, and pretend that it is, because then your argument makes sense.

A fundamental part of your argument is that everything must have a cause, and that free will violates this precept, and that because it violates this precept, it is therefore false. But your precept is false - physics itself demonstrates events that are uncaused - we understand them very well.

[Pandora]

That is very well understood, and it is perfectly predictive. We have very precise predictions for the probabilities of these sorts of interactions.
Such predictions are impossible if the event were uncaused.

I agree. If these events were acausal, we could make no predictions. By we do make predictions, and they are then tested and found to be correct. Therefore the events are not acausal. So you have proven my point.

They happen for no reason. They are uncaused. The outcomes are well understood, and the probabilities in aggregate are predictable, but the events themselves are uncaused. There is no causal event that makes photons split. None at all. It just happens - spontaneously.

[Febble]

I'm with toker and the Fat Ugly Bald Guy on this :)

[Rie]

Erm... I think that it if an event becomes an event then it is caused.

[Ozymandias]

Of course they are caused. There is no such thing as acausal physics. I would have thought that was obvious from the level of accuracy we can make predictions to.

[toker]

That is very well understood, and it is perfectly predictive. We have very precise predictions for the probabilities of these sorts of interactions.
Such predictions are impossible if the event were uncaused.

I agree. If these events were acausal, we could make no predictions. By we do make predictions, and they are then tested and found to be correct. Therefore the events are not acausal. So you have proven my point.
So we agree that all events are caused.

Even if determinism and reductionism are false.

[Ozymandias]

So we agree that all events are caused.

Even if determinism and reductionism are false.

Yes. Glad you finally agree. :thumbup:

[toker]

More accurately, glad you finally caught up! :thumbup:

[Jet Black]

I don't think free will exists, however I am satisfied being an interested an involved observer of what by body and brain do.

[toker]

JB, what is your definition for 'free will'?

[David B]

To try a different tack, imagine two houses each with a central heating system in it.

One system has a thermostat controlling whether it is on or off. The other doesn't.

Is there any sense in which one could justly assert that the system with the thermostat has a degree of freedom denied to the system without one?

David

[davidpbrown]

Is there any sense in which one could justly assert that the system with the thermostat has a degree of freedom denied to the system without one?

Degrees of freedom only add complexity. Whether free will exists, is the difference between something existing and not. So that route adds nothing I can see.

[Copernicus]

So we agree that all events are caused.

Even if determinism and reductionism are false.
How do you define 'determinism' then? If all events are caused, then determinism cannot be false, unless you have some unique definition of the concept.

As for reductionism, it is just a method for explaining things. It is not inherently true or false. Science is all about reductionism.

[David B]

Is there any sense in which one could justly assert that the system with the thermostat has a degree of freedom denied to the system without one?

Degrees of freedom only add complexity.

Why the 'only'?

Whether free will exists, is the difference between something existing and not.

So you would argue that something is either perfectly free or not free at all, then? Would you argue the same about the concept 'alive'? Is a bacterium as alive as a person? Is a pharyngula as alive as an adult person. Not everything is an all or nothing on/off switch to my mind.

So that route adds nothing I can see.

Complexity?:)

David

[toker]

So we agree that all events are caused.

Even if determinism and reductionism are false.
How do you define 'determinism' then? If all events are caused, then determinism cannot be false, unless you have some unique definition of the concept.
Or unless determinism requires something more than the idea that all events are caused. In fact, determinism requires that all events are caused in a particular fashion.

Determinists believe the universe is fully governed by causal laws resulting in only one possible state at any point in time. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determinism) (wiki)

Determinism: The world is governed by (or is under the sway of) determinism if and only if, given a specified way things are at a time t, the way things go thereafter is fixed as a matter of natural law. (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/determinism-causal/) (SEP)

As for reductionism, it is just a method for explaining things. It is not inherently true or false. Science is all about reductionism.
Reductionism can either mean (a) an approach to understanding the nature of complex things by reducing them to the interactions of their parts, or to simpler or more fundamental things or (b) a philosophical position that a complex system is nothing but the sum of its parts, and that an account of it can be reduced to accounts of individual constituents.[1] This can be said of objects, phenomena, explanations, theories, and meanings. (wiki)

The context here is philosophy. I think (a) should be called 'reduction'. I'm talking about (b).

I believe everything is caused, even though reductionism and determinism are false.

[Copernicus]

Or unless determinism requires something more than the idea that all events are caused. In fact, determinism requires that all events are caused in a particular fashion.

Determinists believe the universe is fully governed by causal laws resulting in only one possible state at any point in time. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determinism) (wiki)

Determinism: The world is governed by (or is under the sway of) determinism if and only if, given a specified way things are at a time t, the way things go thereafter is fixed as a matter of natural law. (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/determinism-causal/) (SEP)
The Wikipedia page you cited actually provides several different interpretations of "determinism", and it wasn't at all clear which one you intended in your post. You've still left open the question of what you mean when you say "all events are caused". You seem to be saying that they are caused in exactly the same way that determinists are, but then you deny it without elaborating any further on how your view of causality is different. What particular "fashion" of causation do you have in mind?

Reductionism can either mean (a) an approach to understanding the nature of complex things by reducing them to the interactions of their parts, or to simpler or more fundamental things or (b) a philosophical position that a complex system is nothing but the sum of its parts, and that an account of it can be reduced to accounts of individual constituents.[1] This can be said of objects, phenomena, explanations, theories, and meanings. (wiki)

The context here is philosophy. I think (a) should be called 'reduction'. I'm talking about (b).

I believe everything is caused, even though reductionism and determinism are false.
I believe that the second sense is more often characterized as "radical reductionism", which was not clearly the sense that you meant in your previous post. In fact, one could claim that "chaotic deterministic" systems are causally determined but not predictable by conventional means. Perhaps one day quantum computing will lead to better methods for rendering them more predictable by reductionist methods. But all explanation is by analogy in the end, and systemic descriptions quite often fail to be reducible because the metaphors that underpin them, like all analogies, ultimately fail.

[Jet Black]

FUBG - do you consider everything you do is prompted by the physical world?..


Yes, of course. What else would it be prompted by?


Exotic as the physical clockwork and even quantum mechanics are, surely there is a level beyond which the mind is free of those - even if that is limited to being within one lifetime, within that time what arises might be free.

Why does there have to be a level beyond? Everything I (or you) do is perfectly well described by the physical laws we have right now. Nothing else is needed, so nothing else should be added. If you want me to believe that there is "a level beyond" you will have to provide evidence of it.

even if there is a level beyond, then it only pushes the same logical problem elsewhere. The "spiritual world" or whatever is a red herring.

[Jet Black]

JB, what is your definition for 'free will'?

something other than the universe ticking over however it does. Whether we invoke quantum interactions or merely classical alongside the complexity of the universe is irrelevant to the point that there is no mysterious actor pulling strings independently of everything that has happened so far and is happening now.

[Jet Black]

Everything I (or you) do is perfectly well described by the physical laws we have right now.
That is a blatantly false claim. If the physical laws explained everything (let alone explained everything 'perfectly well') then we wouldn't need any other science than physics.

we don't. All the other sciences are convenient simplifications of incredibly complex physical systems. Hell even most of physics is a convenient simplification of incredibly complicated fundamental physical systems with surprisingly simple physical laws.

Onz-H4NBILY

[Pandora]

Of course they are caused. There is no such thing as acausal physics. I would have thought that was obvious from the level of accuracy we can make predictions to.

Really? Perhaps you're using some definition of the word "caused" that means something completely different here than in any other context.

Tell me, what causes a photon to split into particle/antiparticle pairs?

[toker]

JB, do you realize you merely state your belief? Because you present the belief as if it were fact.

In fact, biology (for example) has not been reduced to physics, and there's no agreement among experts that such a task is possible.

[toker]

JB, what is your definition for 'free will'?

something other than the universe ticking over however it does.
So you define the term so that it is obviously impossible for it to describe anything real. That's a stupendously unreasonable stance.

[David B]

JB, what is your definition for 'free will'?

something other than the universe ticking over however it does. Whether we invoke quantum interactions or merely classical alongside the complexity of the universe is irrelevant to the point that there is no mysterious actor pulling strings independently of everything that has happened so far and is happening now.

Under that definition there is no free will, of course.

However, your corpse would not be capable of typing your last message, so I would argue that a mind is able to move atoms around in a way above and beyond the way that stuff moves around purely as a result of classical, or even quantum physics.

I, adopting the compatibilist view, would argue that a body with a mind capable of moving an arm is not the same as a body without a mind, which is not.

How the universe ticks over, I suggest, allows the possibility of agents making choices, which in turn have effects on how the universe turns over. In fact, given that entities of sufficient complexity emerge from the blind watchmaker, a meaningful free will, I suggest, is pretty much inevitable.

David

[Ozymandias]

Tell me, what causes a photon to split into particle/antiparticle pairs?

The principle of least action.

[Jet Black]

However, your corpse would not be capable of typing your last message, so I would argue that a mind is able to move atoms around in a way above and beyond the way that stuff moves around purely as a result of classical, or even quantum physics.


ok, take this simply. What is going on that is above and beyond the way stuff moves around as a result of classical and quantum physics. Can you point to a single interaction in your body that is not governed by classical and QM?

[David B]

However, your corpse would not be capable of typing your last message, so I would argue that a mind is able to move atoms around in a way above and beyond the way that stuff moves around purely as a result of classical, or even quantum physics.


ok, take this simply. What is going on that is above and beyond the way stuff moves around as a result of classical and quantum physics. Can you point to a single interaction in your body that is not governed by classical and QM?

I refer you back to my post#97.

David

[rog]

Does chaos theory have any bearing on this? how about the rules of 'life', simple rules can create complexity that would be next to impossible to predict, especially if the parameters were constantly changing with environment.

[Jet Black]

However, your corpse would not be capable of typing your last message, so I would argue that a mind is able to move atoms around in a way above and beyond the way that stuff moves around purely as a result of classical, or even quantum physics.


ok, take this simply. What is going on that is above and beyond the way stuff moves around as a result of classical and quantum physics. Can you point to a single interaction in your body that is not governed by classical and QM?

I refer you back to my post#97.

David

it doesn't answer my question at all.

[rog]

So what are your arguments against the compatibilist view?

[Jet Black]

Does chaos theory have any bearing on this? how about the rules of 'life', simple rules can create complexity that would be next to impossible to predict, especially if the parameters were constantly changing with environment.

it has a lot of bearing, yes. But then even very simple chaotic systems like a magnetic pendulum oscillating over a plane with a magnet on it are impossible to predict despite being entirely deterministic, because they are so dependent on initial conditions.

[Jet Black]

So what are your arguments against the compatibilist view?

should I have any? it appears to be a deterministic redefinition of free will.

[rog]

Does chaos theory have any bearing on this? how about the rules of 'life', simple rules can create complexity that would be next to impossible to predict, especially if the parameters were constantly changing with environment.

it has a lot of bearing, yes. But then even very simple chaotic systems like a magnetic pendulum oscillating over a plane with a magnet on it are impossible to predict despite being entirely deterministic, because they are so dependent on initial conditions.

But the pendulum doesn't have the possibility of changing it's conditions as it goes along.

[David B]

However, your corpse would not be capable of typing your last message, so I would argue that a mind is able to move atoms around in a way above and beyond the way that stuff moves around purely as a result of classical, or even quantum physics.


ok, take this simply. What is going on that is above and beyond the way stuff moves around as a result of classical and quantum physics. Can you point to a single interaction in your body that is not governed by classical and QM?

I refer you back to my post#97.

David

it doesn't answer my question at all.

Well, would it be possible, even in theory, to have predicted that there would have been the succession of interactions in my body that led me to chose to, and to make the body movements necessary to, refer you back to post#97 from classical physics and QM?

I still think #97 expresses my views pretty well, BTW

Have you read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Am_a_Strange_Loop?

David

[Jet Black]

Does chaos theory have any bearing on this? how about the rules of 'life', simple rules can create complexity that would be next to impossible to predict, especially if the parameters were constantly changing with environment.

it has a lot of bearing, yes. But then even very simple chaotic systems like a magnetic pendulum oscillating over a plane with a magnet on it are impossible to predict despite being entirely deterministic, because they are so dependent on initial conditions.

But the pendulum doesn't have the possibility of changing it's conditions as it goes along.

That is chaos theory though. If life is governed by chaos theory, then it wouldn't have any possibility of changing its conditions as it goes along either. It might naively look like it does, but really you've just got a whole bunch of interacting pendula that are even harder to describe than the already impossible pendulum over a magnet*. In a sense this is what life is anyway - a bunch of atoms strung together, which can be described as oscillators, or pendula.

* I can tell you characteristics of its behaviour depending on the location of the magnet(s) but I can't tell you where it will be in half an hour's time.

[Jet Black]

However, your corpse would not be capable of typing your last message, so I would argue that a mind is able to move atoms around in a way above and beyond the way that stuff moves around purely as a result of classical, or even quantum physics.


ok, take this simply. What is going on that is above and beyond the way stuff moves around as a result of classical and quantum physics. Can you point to a single interaction in your body that is not governed by classical and QM?

I refer you back to my post#97.

David

it doesn't answer my question at all.

Well, would it be possible, even in theory, to have predicted that there would have been the succession of interactions in my body that led me to chose to, and to make the body movements necessary to, refer you back to post#97 from classical physics and QM?

it's not even possible to determine what orientation a photon in a superposition between two polarization states will have on measurement, except in a probabilistic sense. But so what? It's still just a physical system with no additional strings attached.

I still think #97 expresses my views pretty well, BTW

indeed it does, but it doesn't answer my question :)

Have you read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Am_a_Strange_Loop?

David

sadly no. I am disabled by not having enough time.

[rog]

Do you say that free choice is not a real thing?
Pretend that you are on "deal or no deal", what makes you choose one box over another?

[Jet Black]

wooly question. What is free choice?

[rog]

wooly question. What is free choice?

You're right - I suppose I'm going to have to go with "what I think is my own decision", but I admit that what I think and what may be, could be two separate things.

[davidpbrown]

Degrees of freedom only add complexity.

Why the 'only'?

Degrees of freedom don't suggest free will, only choice. Complexity is trivial in the sense that it just takes some time to resolve answers. If we're looking for free will, we don't want to give up at some notion of complex clockwork - that isn't free will.

Whether free will exists, is the difference between something existing and not.

So you would argue that something is either perfectly free or not free at all, then?

Not quite. If something doesn't have an element that is properly free, then it's not free. There's no requirement for complete freedom or none.

There may be, or even obviously are, elements of ourselves that are simple clockwork responses to stimulus but we're looking for some element that gives us hope and opportunity to rise above being a simple machine, with all the simple tragedy that would imply.

[Pandora]

Tell me, what causes a photon to split into particle/antiparticle pairs?

The principle of least action.

What is that?

[Pandora]

Degrees of freedom don't suggest free will, only choice.

In what way does "free will" differ from "choice"?

[davidpbrown]

In what way does "free will" differ from "choice"?

Clockwork can make a choice. Choice is just a maze. Free will is about not being bound by the physics behind you, prompting a predictable and notionally repeatable outcome.

[David B]

In what way does "free will" differ from "choice"?

Clockwork can make a choice. Choice is just a maze. Free will is about not being bound by the physics behind you, prompting a predictable and notionally repeatable outcome.

No it isn't, in the compatibilist view. In the religious view it is, but I again refer you back to my post #97

It is about making choices compatible with physics, though IMV not predictable and not necessarily being repeatable, all the conditions never being identical from one time to another, even in the same individual.

David

[ceptimus]

There is some research evidence that free will is largely a confabulation created by our brains to justify our actions.


If you wire people up to a brain monitor, and then ask them to spontaneously press a button when they feel like it, you find that the electrical impulses in their brain start to build up well in advance of each button press. The people believe that once they decide to press the button, they will have pressed it within about half a second - but the brain activity begins quite a while before that.


Inject small currents into a certain area of a subject's brain (this can also be done with strong magnets so there is no need to drill holes in the subject's skull), and they will report that they feel the 'urge' to move, say, their left leg. Turn up the current a bit higher and their left leg will move! The subject reports that she decided to move her leg, but really it was the decision of the researcher who threw the switch!

[Jack Willsson]

I presume the researcher had the power of choice.

When I think about the subject of free will I think more in terms of objectives or goals.

Am I going to take the dog for a walk? Where am I going to take him?

Decision made, foot follows foot in the process of walking. I suppose each leg movement is a voluntary action but I'm not conscious of a decision to move a foot each time.

Sometimes I get "absent minded" and find myself e.g. going to the fridge when I intended to go to put the kettle on. The actual physical moving seems to be done on a kind of automatic pilot.

If what I want is a coffee though I'll just cuss a bit and go and put the kettle on. There's a sense in which wanting a coffee determines me to get the coffee and a sense in which getting what I want is an act of free will.

[Pandora]

In what way does "free will" differ from "choice"?

Clockwork can make a choice. Choice is just a maze. Free will is about not being bound by the physics behind you, prompting a predictable and notionally repeatable outcome.

This seems to me to be a pointless and semantic distinction, designed to allow determinism to have a foothold.

The whole point of determinism is that each event is caused, and is caused in such a fashion that only one possible outcome can occur as a result of each causal event. It's a very straightforward if A then B, and if B then C chain of events. Determinism does not allow for an If A then B or C or D sort of setup.

If there is choice, then you cannot predict the results of a single event. You can speak to the probability of the possible outcomes based on many, many events, but you cannot actually predict the exact outcome. And it's not necessarily repeatable - the same setup could result in a different outcome the second time, due to the action of choice.

And this whole "not bound by physics" thing is just silly.

[davidpbrown]

This seems to me to be a pointless and semantic distinction

Yes but that's only because you're going off on a tangent. I was clarifying the answer to a question about degrees of freedom adding to freedom of mind #127 (http://www.secularcafe.org/showpost.php?p=197344&postcount=127). I'd suggested 'Degrees of freedom only add complexity.' - choice in that context was just relating to the complexity; the branches of options available, not decisions made by a free mind.

And this whole "not bound by physics" thing is just silly.

It's not silly, it just takes a bit of imagination. Beyond the recognition that if we were simply bound by physics that would be a trivial and truly tragic existence, it's rather simple to imagine that it should be possible to think in dimensions beyond physics, in ways not simply prompted by the clockwork physical universe. See above #102 (http://www.secularcafe.org/showpost.php?p=196649&postcount=102) the random gives the opportunity to behave beyond the physics.

[toker]

physically, we can raise either hand, as we choose

that's a fact, deal with it!

[Jack Willsson]

physically, we can raise either hand, as we choose

that's a fact, deal with it!

Just to prove a point I don't raise either hand. I can't help being awkward!

[ceptimus]

It's a subtle point though.

Does your free will decide to raise a hand, and then you raise that hand?

Or (as the experiments would suggest), does your brain cause you to raise your hand, and only a fraction of a second later invent the fiction that you consciously decided to do it.

[toker]

It's a subtle point though.

Does your free will decide to raise a hand, and then you raise that hand?

Or (as the experiments would suggest), does your brain cause you to raise your hand, and only a fraction of a second later invent the fiction that you consciously decided to do it.
The person decides. They use their will to do so.

Conscious decisions involve a feedback loop. The way we feel about whatever, gets fed back into that brain machine. That's a part of how we get to choose to do what we want.

'Free will' is just the common term for 'volition'. Volition or will is the cognitive process by which an individual decides on and commits to a particular course of action. It is defined as purposive striving, and is one of the primary human psychological functions (the others being affection [affect or feeling], motivation [goals and expectations] and cognition [thinking]). Volitional processes can be applied consciously, and they can be automatized as habits over time. Most modern conceptions of volition address it as a process of action control that becomes automatized (see e.g., Heckhausen and Kuhl; Gollwitzer; Boekaerts and Corno).

The question should be how does it work. Mental 'attention' is a key attribute.

[Jack Willsson]

Making decisions while thinking about free-will is totally artificial and that thought is going to be a major factor in what decisions are made.

[toker]

I have no idea what you meant, Jack.

Btw I forgot to attribute my quote, it was from Wikipedia. I like this line: Volitional processes can be applied consciously, and they can be automatized as habits over time. We have to pay attention in order to learn how to drive a car, but once we're efficient at it, we can drive on 'auto-pilot' and let the mind wander. Of course, if we do let the mind wander, we're less ready to respond to unexpected situations. Good drivers know how to keep paying attention.

[Barbarian]

It took me more than two weeks to get back to your post, Febble. That should be some sort of record.OK, I agree with a lot of that. I have a few comments, though:Well, I'd say that agency is apparent, as are intention, and choice. All are perfectly good predictive models, and that's all I ask for in a model.

(Not trying to be obtuse here, interested in your response.)I propose that agency is not apparent, intention is not relevant and choice is not well-defined enough for the purpose of this discussion.

First, agency not being apparent. Here I propose that agency is an explanation, not a direct observation. I don't think there's a clear distinction. I think all our observations are "explanations" at some level, even though at very basic levels the explanatory machine is so hard-wired in that we are not aware of the explanatory process. And in fact, "agency" appears to be one of those fairly hard-wired things - experiments with infants show that when shown a display in which causality appears to be violated (a ball moves off just before it is touched by another ball, instead of vice versa) the baby looks longer at it, as though to try to "explain" something that seems "unexplained". But I think the whole process of seeing - of parsing the world into things - is an explanatory process. We see a blur of red - we explain it as a robin, or an apple, or a traffic light. Or even as a thing-to-be-explained. I don't think we see "pure" red (which is my beef with the notion of "qualia").I had a bad feeling about choosing "explanation" and "direct observation" to play the role of opposite notions, and lo, in the end I was justified, not that I could come up with something better in the meantime. I did not intend to stress the "making sense" aspect of "explanation"; I was using it more in the meaning of "making things up" (or perhaps this is not a connotation of the word in English). I understand, or I think I understand your point about everything we see being the result of an explanatory process, but I still imagine seeing redness as something ultimately caused by the existence of the proper and necessary physical conditions; one could say I regard redness as a rather straightforward mapping of those conditions. The physical conditions come first, seeing objects in red is just a consequence. Agency works backwards, we "observe" it and treat it as a similarly straightforward mapping of something physically existing, rather than a construct meant to fill a gap.Agency is the working of this black box, inferred but never actually experienced, imagined to be atomic to the point that the very notion of its composition is difficult to entertain. Well, that's where I think our model goes wrong. It's when we imagine that the agent is something in the box, rather than the entire box. Literally, when it comes to brains. People still look for the homunculus (even if they describe it terms like "top-down" as opposed to "bottom up" processing) in the box, instead of regarding the box as the agent.I haven't come across this particular description yet, or maybe I have but did not get it and consequently forgot it on the spot. Top down processing sure sounds like a sanitized homunculus in disguise, although it is hard to be sure. It's fascinating how inadequate our language becomes when one tries to talk about this subject (although I give credit to many - probably all - languages for coining the term "my consciousness", i.e. something separate from me, because although probably accidental, I find it a good description of what I think is happening when subjective experiences form).Now, I sense a continuum of related notions, containing intention, will and desire: these are names of the subjective perception of gaps between what is and what our brain came up with as a better, although sadly fictitious, state of the world. (This is why God's will shall never be done; an omnipotent being will not experience such a gap and therefore cannot have a will.) This is the subjective perception of something real, but it has no bearing to free will, since it would apply even in a Newtonian deterministic world, where free will cannot exist.Ah, well, there, courtesy of Dennett, via David B, I disagree. Or rather, I think there is a perfectly valid view of free will that can exist in a deterministic universe. But ultimately, that's a quibble. A useful one there.Beg to differ; this is the crux of the matter concerning free will. Free will must engender responsibility. As a straightforward rule of thumb, any proposed variant of free will which does not lead to a complete justification of the eternal damnation of an atheist is just bunk. I hold all other proposals of various qualified free wills (e.g. compatibilist free will, see also: dry water) to be just trojans, attempts to define some sort of free will into existence.

Within a perfectly deterministic world (as our world would appear to the strict relative-state adherent) you could not assign responsibility at all, unless you redefine responsibility beyond recognition, because there are no distinguished links in causal chains to hold responsibility. You could redefine responsibility to mean "the designation of the last system in the causal chain for which we can try to alter its program in such a way as to avoid the same outcome next time", but that could be a definition straight out of a no-free-will Bible, and it would be totally devoid of any moral meaning, focusing exclusively upon technical possibilities.

Even within a mainly deterministic world sprinkled with random sources (as our world would look to proponents of any sort of collapse-dynamics), you still cannot assign responsibility. Now you have distinguished links (the choice points where a system consults a random source), but again it would be weird to assign responsibility to randomness.

Those who really believe in free will appear to believe in a third kind of world, in which there are deterministic processes, possibly there are some random sources and there are also transcendental sources, systems whose state does not depend on the rest of the world but is not random either (so it must be controlled by some entity outside the physical universe). And this kind of free will, transcendental free will, the only one actually engendering responsibility, is pure woo. The problem is that such people often don't reason all the way to this point and hold a compatibilist "view" instead, which is just a glorified term for "holding contradictory notions without having to own up to this fact". I had a couple of pleasant surprises, people who defined free will to mean "the ability to choose differently under exactly the same physical circumstances, brain state and all", which is equivalent to having a transcendental source in one's brain.As for choice not being well-defined enough, I am not sure whether you talk about us making choices in the sense of mentally simulating possible actions with their consequences and then choosing the best one, which would work so even in a no-free-will world,Yes, that's exactly what I do mean (and which is why it would work "even in a no-free-will world")

or about us feeling like we could have chosen something else, which is actually due to us being able to imagine ourselves choosing differently, based on incomplete information or on the way minds are mentally modeled.Well, I meant that too. I don't think they are alternatives.The reason I style them as alternatives is that the first alternative can be realized by a mechanism, so I have no beef with it, while the second one necessitates a transcendental source.

Nice to talk to you again! Are you still in Hungary? I'm coming to Budapest in October for a conference.Yes, I am still in Hungary, working in Budapest. Would be nice to meet you in person, if you can spare the time.

[Barbarian]

There is some research evidence that free will is largely a confabulation created by our brains to justify our actions.


If you wire people up to a brain monitor, and then ask them to spontaneously press a button when they feel like it, you find that the electrical impulses in their brain start to build up well in advance of each button press. The people believe that once they decide to press the button, they will have pressed it within about half a second - but the brain activity begins quite a while before that.
Inject small currents into a certain area of a subject's brain (this can also be done with strong magnets so there is no need to drill holes in the subject's skull), and they will report that they feel the 'urge' to move, say, their left leg. Turn up the current a bit higher and their left leg will move! The subject reports that she decided to move her leg, but really it was the decision of the researcher who threw the switch!

There's more. People doing stuff due to post-hypnotic suggestions think they do it on their own volition. People losing some abilities, like having a paralyzed arm, will sometimes make up excuses for not moving them. Split-brain patients do not regularly freak out because someone else is moving the other side of their body. Abby and Brittany Hensel can walk and drive a car (IIRC they can even ride a bicycle).

I would be interested to hear how all these do not show the existence of a mechanism fabricating the illusion of volition.

[toker]

Okay, I'll debunk all of them. Gotta run right now though, so tune in later.

[toker]

There is some research evidence that free will is largely a confabulation created by our brains to justify our actions.
We're talking about volition, which is the capability or act of conscious choice and decision and intention.

Here (http://books.google.com/books?id=GygmUh51_AcC&pg=PA1&lpg=PA1&dq=volition+/+scientific+evidence&source=bl&ots=WQGxYlkaGF&sig=AWrjPkWuzzFJ3TO6CZjkA92j_6A&hl=en&ei=-eJdTabXO5PSsAPWpvXCCA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6&sqi=2&ved=0CDwQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=volition%20%2F%20scientific%20evidence&f=false) is an abstract from a book about the scientific study of volion.

They define 'will' as the ability to produce goals, In other words, the ability to make conscious decisions, to form intention that directs action.

* If you wire people up to a brain monitor, and then ask them to spontaneously press a button when they feel like it, you find that the electrical impulses in their brain start to build up well in advance of each button press. The people believe that once they decide to press the button, they will have pressed it within about half a second - but the brain activity begins quite a while before that.
Perhaps that's an effective argument against the homunculus, or the Cartesian theatre.

However, it is evidence for the ability we're talking about. The subject must first become aware of the request, and must hold the desire to conform to it. The will is engaged, and guides further behavior, by intention, on purpose.

We already know that sensory input gets a lot of processing before it can enter into consciousness. So of course brain activity precedes the feelings etc that it creates. But, in the experiment, consciousness and intention was already involved before the decision to push the button, a feedback loop exists between consciousness and brain activity. The subjects feelings, desires, and intentions were involved, and the end result is that the person did what she wanted.

Inject small currents into a certain area of a subject's brain (this can also be done with strong magnets so there is no need to drill holes in the subject's skull), and they will report that they feel the 'urge' to move, say, their left leg. Turn up the current a bit higher and their left leg will move! The subject reports that she decided to move her leg, but really it was the decision of the researcher who threw the switch!
Alter the brain, alter the mind. That isn't evidence that a normal mind cannot make conscious decisions on purpose! All this experiment shows is that brain structures or networks that can be affected by consciousness can also be artificially stimulated, with results that are fed back into consciousness.

There's more. People doing stuff due to post-hypnotic suggestions think they do it on their own volition.
Same rebuttal as above. In addition, notice that hypnosis works only on willing subjects.

People losing some abilities, like having a paralyzed arm, will sometimes make up excuses for not moving them.
That shows that people can't make conscious decisions, in the same way that phantom limbs show that our limbs can't exist.

Split-brain patients do not regularly freak out because someone else is moving the other side of their body. Abby and Brittany Hensel can walk and drive a car (IIRC they can even ride a bicycle).
We get clues about our mental abilities by studying abnormal brains. But I don't see how your points here argue that non-split brain people cannot make conscious decisions on purpose.

Split-brain patients can learn to control motor skills on purpose, since the two hemispheres are still connected via cerebellum (which is deeply involved in motor skills).

[rog]

I'm having a problem:

If the connectome idea is correct and it works within the laws of classical physics, say, I run an experiment - a copy of a given connectome is placed within a simulated environment and left to run for a bit. if I repeat the experiment with the exact same initial conditions I should expect the resulting acts to be the same.

experiment v2: the same as the original, but this time we have two of more connectomes in the same environment.

This suggests to me that if all of the information about a mind [or minds] and the environment is known, in theory it should be possible to predict what would happen.

This doesn't sit well with free will, I need to think on it some more.

[David B]

I'm having a problem:

If the connectome idea is correct and it works within the laws of classical physics, say, I run an experiment - a copy of a given connectome is placed within a simulated environment and left to run for a bit. if I repeat the experiment with the exact same initial conditions I should expect the resulting acts to be the same.

experiment v2: the same as the original, but this time we have two of more connectomes in the same environment.

This suggests to me that if all of the information about a mind [or minds] and the environment is known, in theory it should be possible to predict what would happen.

This doesn't sit well with free will, I need to think on it some more.

Do you think that getting exactly the same initial conditions is possible?

I don't.

David

[rog]

In a simulated environment, yes I do.
In the real world, chaos says no.

[David B]

In a game of life, sure.

For a brain in which performing the experiment once changes the state of the brain?

David

[rog]

For a brain in which performing the experiment once changes the state of the brain?

David

Ah, that why I say to use copies - by my own rules the experiment would be unethical though.

[Ozymandias]

Do you think that getting exactly the same initial conditions is possible?

I don't.

David

Yes. The error in your prediction will be a function of the error in your boundary condition, but as your error in the boundary condition tends to zero, so will the error in your prediction.

[Barbarian]

I'm having a problem:

If the connectome idea is correct and it works within the laws of classical physics, say, I run an experiment - a copy of a given connectome is placed within a simulated environment and left to run for a bit. if I repeat the experiment with the exact same initial conditions I should expect the resulting acts to be the same.

experiment v2: the same as the original, but this time we have two of more connectomes in the same environment.

This suggests to me that if all of the information about a mind [or minds] and the environment is known, in theory it should be possible to predict what would happen.

This doesn't sit well with free will, I need to think on it some more.Experiment 1 as stated would probably fail on randomness. There are a lot of reasons why the brain would need to use true random sources to make certain decisions, some sort of mental flipping-of-coins, and then any sufficiently good model of a human mind/brain would have to incorporate the same kind of nondeterministic behavior.

However, I do not think that such a capability for random behavior is essential to consciousness. When we finally agree upon the holy grail of all definitions, one which starts as follows: "A Turing machine is said to be conscious if it has the following properties: <bulletpoint-list>", we will immediately see this to be the case, since nondeterministic Turing machines are not (computationally) more powerful than deterministic ones (they are more powerful performance-wise, but there's no simple way to harness that feature either). So if you relax your criteria somewhat, by allowing any conscious Turing machine instead of this "connectome" thingy (which appears to be a model of a human brain), then of course from the same initial conditions you could reach the same outcome twice or seven times.

[toker]

The existence of consciousness is so mysterious that our best effort to figure out how to identify when it does exist, is an imagined machine that is in fact impossible to ever build and which is known to deliver false positives and false negatives.

Any definition, for any aspect of consciousness, which starts by referring to the Turing machine will be rejected immediately.

Free will exists and is studied by science. I'd expect that on an atheist board, where respect for science is sort of presumed, that fact would carry some weight.

[rog]

Free will exists and is studied by science. I'd expect that on an atheist board, where respect for science is sort of presumed, that fact would carry some weight.

I'm open minded, do you have a link to 'proof positive'?

[toker]

What would you consider 'proof' that free will exists, rog?

Free will is the common term for volition (check the defs and connect the dots). Science studies volition and has learned much about it. One thing never scientifically claimed is that we have no ability to make conscious decisions on purpose! The question is how does it work, not does it exist.

[toker]

I wanna read this (http://books.google.com/books?id=GygmUh51_AcC&printsec=frontcover&dq=libet+/+neuroscience&source=bl&ots=WQGzRdg8yE&sig=NLwvaeJ1snqZa2lLkyrAGNwBbUY&hl=en&ei=4W9wTYHLE4eSgQf-oZFP&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8&ved=0CEoQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q&f=false) book.

[Ozymandias]

What would you consider 'proof' that free will exists, rog?

Much like the existence of God, you will never be able to provide proof that free-will exists since any phenomenon that appears to exhibit free-will could equally well be explained by a system with no free-will.

But free-will is definitely woo. It is not consistent with the known laws of physics, is by definition "supernatural" and has no evidence to support it. If you want to make the extraordinary claim that it exists, your first step would be to show that the laws of physics are wrong.

[David B]

What would you consider 'proof' that free will exists, rog?

Much like the existence of God, you will never be able to provide proof that free-will exists since any phenomenon that appears to exhibit free-will could equally well be explained by a system with no free-will.

[b]But free-will is definitely woo. It is not consistent with the known laws of physics, is by definition "supernatural" and has no evidence to support it. If you want to make the extraordinary claim that it exists, your first step would be to show that the laws of physics are wrong.]/b]

No it isn't, if one adopts a compatibilist view of free will.

David

[Ozymandias]

No it isn't, if one adopts a compatibilist view of free will.

David

Well yeah. And I can prove that fairies exist if I am allowed to include Elton John in the definition.

[David B]

No it isn't, if one adopts a compatibilist view of free will.

David

Well yeah. And I can prove that fairies exist if I am allowed to include Elton John in the definition.

Compatibilism is a very respectable philosophical position.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Utai74HjPJE&feature=related

David

[Ozymandias]

Compatibilism is a very respectable philosophical position.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Utai74HjPJE&feature=related

David

It is only respected by people who don't understand the issue. Rather than believe something to be true because someone on YouTube tells you it is true, why not try and argue it for yourself?

In this case, it is very clear that his argument doesn't hold water. For example, at 5:36 he says "... the implication that determinism implies inevitability is just false." But this is the very definition of determinism. The future is determined by the initial conditions and physical law, therefore future events are inevitable.

I agree with his statement about "Laplacian indeterminacy" that he makes at 8:40, but that strengthens my position, not his.

[David B]

Compatibilism is a very respectable philosophical position.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Utai74HjPJE&feature=related

David

It is only respected by people who don't understand the issue. Rather than believe something to be true because someone on YouTube tells you it is true, why not try and argue it for yourself?

Go back to my previous posts in this thread, where I have done just that.

David

[toker]

What would you consider 'proof' that free will exists, rog?

Much like the existence of God, you will never be able to provide proof that free-will exists since any phenomenon that appears to exhibit free-will could equally well be explained by a system with no free-will.

But free-will is definitely woo. It is not consistent with the known laws of physics, is by definition "supernatural" and has no evidence to support it. If you want to make the extraordinary claim that it exists, your first step would be to show that the laws of physics are wrong.
Free will is just volition, Guy. Volition occurs routinely, and is studied by science. Our ability to make voluntary decisions is profound and amazing and useful. You use it yourself, every day.

[Ozymandias]

Free will is just volition, Guy. Volition occurs routinely, and is studied by science. Our ability to make voluntary decisions is profound and amazing and useful. You use it yourself, every day.

No I don't. My decisions are entirely preprogrammed to happen by my physical makeup and the world around me. There is some small quantum indeterminacy, but this is small (since I am macroscopic) and also outside my control (since it is random).

To suggest otherwise is to say that the laws of physics we use to describe the natural world are wrong. Is this what you mean to say?

[David B]

Free will is just volition, Guy. Volition occurs routinely, and is studied by science. Our ability to make voluntary decisions is profound and amazing and useful. You use it yourself, every day.

No I don't. My decisions are entirely preprogrammed to happen by my physical makeup and the world around me. There is some small quantum indeterminacy, but this is small (since I am macroscopic) and also outside my control (since it is random).

To suggest otherwise is to say that the laws of physics we use to describe the natural world are wrong. Is this what you mean to say?

My bold.

Simply false. Dennett explains why quite satisfactorily, in the vid above.

David

[Ozymandias]

My bold.

Simply false. Dennett explains why quite satisfactorily, in the vid above.

David

No he didn't. Would you care to point out the part where you think he did? (A text reproduction would be most useful as well as the time on the video.)

In fact, he made exactly my point that you bolded at 8:40.

[Barbarian]

Go back to my previous posts in this thread, where I have done just that. DavidDavid, I would greatly appreciate if you pointed me to those posts, or, if possible, to the one post you think explains your view. This is not because I cannot find your posts myself (you only have 18 posts in this thread so far, and my bet is you will point to #97), but because I would very much like to avoid dissecting the wrong post.

[David B]

Go back to my previous posts in this thread, where I have done just that. DavidDavid, I would greatly appreciate if you pointed me to those posts, or, if possible, to the one post you think explains your view. This is not because I cannot find your posts myself (you only have 18 posts in this thread so far, and my bet is you will point to #97), but because I would very much like to avoid dissecting the wrong post.

97 will do.

David

[Cath B]

Apologies for drifting slightly off-topic, but discussions on free will always make me think of this cinematic portrayal of decision making in times of crisis:-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-sfJ7yUpClM&feature=related

(two till three and a half minutes in).

[David B]

Rather than reinvent the wheel, I post Dennett at length.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKLAbWFCh1E

David

[Ozymandias]

97 will do.

David

I'm sorry, I read post 97, but I couldn't see any argument to convince me that freewill exists.

So let me ask you a question. In your video (linked in post 187) the interviewer at 7.30 gives a description of what he calls the classical meaning of free-will. If a God-like being ("a Laplacian calculator" in his parlance) with perfect knowledge of the position of every particle at time t can predict where every particle is at time t + delta t, then he can predict your actions and you have no free-will. Do you agree or disagree with this definition?

Dennet does not attempt to dispute the first part of that. He says, yes, the God-like being can make such a prediction and thereby predict your actions - he even says that adding Quantum Mechanics into the mix makes no odds - but then he claims that this is not in contradiction with free-will because free-will is something else (though he never, in this video, says what).

This is where I have difficulty with his argument, because the interviewer's definition is the definition of free-will. No other definition makes sense. In fact Dennet's definition of free-will is particularly odious to me because it is entirely subjective. Its only justification is to try to give some bizarre motivation to moral values and "meaning".

To take this further, in the video you just posted, at 27 minutes in Dennet makes an argument where he tries to show that you can have "evitability" (events which are not inevitable) in a deterministic world. He discusses someone throwing a brick at you and suggests that you see the brick and duck. He makes the point hat this is a deterministic and mechanical situation with the light bouncing off the brick into your eye and triggering your duck reflex. However, he claims that you could, if desired, suppress that reflex and not duck, and be hit by the brick. So neither being hit by the brick or not are inevitable (they are evitable).

However, this argument is completely bogus, because whether or not you suppress your duck reflex is itself deterministic. Only one can happen. Either the state of your brain when the brick is thrown is such that seeing the brick in flight makes you duck, or the state of your brain is such that you don't duck. But you don't choose between them - it is determined by the initial condition. The outcome, whichever it happens to be, is inevitable.

[David B]

97 will do.

David

I'm sorry, I read post 97, but I couldn't see any argument to convince me that freewill exists.

Freewill in the magical sense you seem to require does not exist, and is an utterly meaningless concept. Freewill in terms of having evolved abilities to seek and avoid future conditions, on the other hand, I suggest (rather strongly) does. Degrees of freedom, not some sort of magical absolute.

So let me ask you a question. In your video (linked in post 187) the interviewer at 7.30 gives a description of what he calls the classical meaning of free-will. If a God-like being ("a Laplacian calculator" in his parlance) with perfect knowledge of the position of every particle at time t can predict where every particle is at time t + delta t, then he can predict your actions and you have no free-will. Do you agree or disagree with this definition?

I prefer to think about what is possible, and relativity seems to me to make this scenario a complete non starter.

Dennet does not attempt to dispute the first part of that. He says, yes, the God-like being can make such a prediction and thereby predict your actions - he even says that adding Quantum Mechanics into the mix makes no odds - but then he claims that this is not in contradiction with free-will because free-will is something else (though he never, in this video, says what).

Does he not imply that the ability to make morally significant decisions is a lot to do with it?

This is where I have difficulty with his argument, because the interviewer's definition is the definition of free-will. No other definition makes sense.

Dennett pints out, convincingly to me, that the interviewer's definition actually does not make sense.

In fact Dennet's definition of free-will is particularly odious to me because it is entirely subjective. Its only justification is to try to give some bizarre motivation to moral values and "meaning".

I would question the 'entirely'. It's justification is that it succeeds in giving meaning to morals as an evolved and evolving quality of the extended human phenotype.

To take this further, in the video you just posted, at 27 minutes in Dennet makes an argument where he tries to show that you can have "evitability" (events which are not inevitable) in a deterministic world. He discusses someone throwing a brick at you and suggests that you see the brick and duck. He makes the point hat this is a deterministic and mechanical situation with the light bouncing off the brick into your eye and triggering your duck reflex. However, he claims that you could, if desired, suppress that reflex and not duck, and be hit by the brick. So neither being hit by the brick or not are inevitable (they are evitable).

IRC as part of a discussion of the word 'could'.

However, this argument is completely bogus, because whether or not you suppress your duck reflex is itself deterministic. Only one can happen. Either the state of your brain when the brick is thrown is such that seeing the brick in flight makes you duck, or the state of your brain is such that you don't duck. But you don't choose between them - it is determined by the initial condition. The outcome, whichever it happens to be, is inevitable.

The initial conditions include (or not, as the case may be, and will be in the case of a tree) the learning of intuitive physics and motor control as an infant. It is a person, a self, that does the ducking, as it has learned to do through a long chain of evolutionary development.

There are no skyhooks. There are cranes. We have evolved to the point where we can - in the only meaningful sense of the word - avoid the brick being thrown, in a sense denied to a tree.

David

[toker]

Free will is just volition, Guy. Volition occurs routinely, and is studied by science. Our ability to make voluntary decisions is profound and amazing and useful. You use it yourself, every day.

No I don't. My decisions are entirely preprogrammed (you're a computer?) to happen by my physical makeup and the world around me. There is some small quantum indeterminacy, but this is small (since I am macroscopic) and also outside my control (since it is random).

To suggest otherwise is to say that the laws of physics we use to describe the natural world are wrong. Is this what you mean to say?
The laws of physics do not prevent us from making voluntary decisions.

What leads you to think otherwise?

[Ozymandias]

The laws of physics do not prevent us from making voluntary decisions.

What leads you to think otherwise?

The laws of physics themselves make our decisions for us. There is no choice. Choice is just an illusion. Given perfect information at one point in time we can predict the probability of the system being in a particular state at a future time. This is well known and proved by experiment. What makes you any different?

Does a rock have free will?
Does an single celled organism have free will?
Does an ant have free will?
How about a dog?

If you think some of these do have free will, what is the characteristic that separates them from the ones that don't?

I must admit, for me this discussion is similar to the atheist/theist debate. I respect your right to have your opinion, but I really don't understand how seemingly rational and intelligent people can continue to believe in something as ludicrous and lacking in evidence as free-will.

[Jack Willsson]

FUBG ....

Did you deliberately mis-spell toker's name?

[David B]

The laws of physics do not prevent us from making voluntary decisions.

What leads you to think otherwise?

The laws of physics themselves make our decisions for us. There is no choice. Choice is just an illusion. Given perfect information at one point in time we can predict the probability of the system being in a particular state at a future time. This is well known and proved by experiment. What makes you any different?

Does a rock have free will?
Does an single celled organism have free will?
Does an ant have free will?
How about a dog?

If you think some of these do have free will, what is the characteristic that separates them from the ones that don't?

I must admit, for me this discussion is similar to the atheist/theist debate. I respect your right to have your opinion, but I really don't understand how seemingly rational and intelligent people can continue to believe in something as ludicrous and lacking in evidence as free-will.

It is because we are talking about different conceptions of free will. Yours which demands sky hooks, and ours which demand cranes, in Dennett's terminology.

David

[Ozymandias]

FUBG ....

Did you deliberately mis-spell toker's name?

Er... no. That was a typo. I deleted part of the quote (it is bad form to quote yourself) and accidentally deleted too much and had to retype it. Just a Freudian slip - no offence intended.

[Jack Willsson]

FUBG ....

Did you deliberately mis-spell toker's name?

Er... no. That was a typo. I deleted part of the quote (it is bad form to quote yourself) and accidentally deleted too much and had to retype it. Just a Freudian slip - no offence intended.

Ironic - given the thread title and your point of view.

You intended to spell it correctly. Interesting!

[toker]

The laws of physics do not prevent us from making voluntary decisions.

What leads you to think otherwise?

The laws of physics themselves make our decisions for us. There is no choice. Choice is just an illusion. Given perfect information at one point in time we can predict the probability of the system being in a particular state at a future time. This is well known and proved by experiment. What makes you any different?
I'm not a reductionist, and I'm not a determinist. Your next-to-last sentence is false, as a matter of fact, according to physics.

Does a rock have free will?
Does an single celled organism have free will?
Does an ant have free will?
How about a dog?
No; I doubt it; maybe a little; quite a bit.

Have you no dogs in your life? They even exhibit moral behavior. Dog morals, but still.

If you think some of these do have free will, what is the characteristic that separates them from the ones that don't?
The ability to direct their own behavior; to make conscious decisions on purpose.

I must admit, for me this discussion is similar to the atheist/theist debate. I respect your right to have your opinion, but I really don't understand how seemingly rational and intelligent people can continue to believe in something as ludicrous and lacking in evidence as free-will.
Your first sentence - I feel the same! Its your camp flying those -ism banners though. :p

Your second sentence - clearly we aren't on the same page about what free will is. I bet dollars to donuts that the definition you are using is irrelevant and unreasonable. I bet you argue against a strawman you've invested in.

So what is the definition for "free will" that you are using and that supports your position?

[toker]

FUBG ....

Did you deliberately mis-spell toker's name?

Er... no. That was a typo. I deleted part of the quote (it is bad form to quote yourself) and accidentally deleted too much and had to retype it. Just a Freudian slip - no offence intended.
It never entered my mind that you did it on purpose. You're a deep cynic, but you aren't manipulative.

[toker]

Given perfect information at one point in time we can predict the probability of the system being in a particular state at a future time.
Upon re-reading, I realize my brain farted the first time around. You just agreed that determinism is false? That even with perfect information, it turns out that what happens next is probabilistic rather than deterministic?

[Barbarian]

David, I'm still trying to figure out what is your problem with what you call the magical definition of free will, and which I would rather call the natural definition, because it is the only one consistent with all the ways the notion of free will is used in everyday speech. It would appear that you think the definition is wrong because it denotes an empty class, since we seem to agree that no such thing can exist. Is that it?

[Ozymandias]

I'm not a reductionist, and I'm not a determinist. Your next-to-last sentence is false, as a matter of fact, according to physics.


OK, let's explore that. As evidence, I exhibit every particle physics experiment ever made. None of them, none whatsoever, contradict the theory we have - everything is perfectly predictable. What evidence would you like to present?


If you think some of these do have free will, what is the characteristic that separates them from the ones that don't?
The ability to direct their own behavior; to make conscious decisions on purpose.


That is an empty answer. You use your claim to try and prove your claim. So I repeat, what it the physical property of a dog that gives it free-will, but a rock not.


So what is the definition for "free will" that you are using and that supports your position?

I have given it countless times. In David B's video, the interviewer at 7.30 gives a description of what he calls the classical meaning of free-will. This is the accepted definition of free-will, so I am not arguing a straw man. If you object to this definition, then you need to present your own. You have not done this.


Upon re-reading, I realize my brain farted the first time around. You just agreed that determinism is false? That even with perfect information, it turns out that what happens next is probabilistic rather than deterministic?


It is wrong in the sense that Quantum Mechanics is right, so observations cause wave-function collapse and the chosen eigenstate is chosen via probabilities. But randomness does not add observer control, and therefore there is still no free-will. (In the video, even Dennet agrees with this.)

[Ozymandias]

You're a deep cynic, but you aren't manipulative.

I would like to point out that I am not a cynic:


Cynicism (Greek: κυνισμός), in its original form, refers to the beliefs of an ancient school of Greek philosophers known as the Cynics (Greek: Κυνικοί, Latin: Cynici). Their philosophy was that the purpose of life was to live a life of Virtue in agreement with Nature. This meant rejecting all conventional desires for wealth, power, health, and fame, and by living a simple life free from all possessions. As reasoning creatures, people could gain happiness by rigorous training and by living in a way which was natural for humans. They believed that the world belonged equally to everyone, and that suffering was caused by false judgments of what was valuable and by the worthless customs and conventions which surrounded society.

What a load of codswallop.

[toker]

Definition of CYNIC from M-W
1: capitalized : an adherent of an ancient Greek school of philosophers who held the view that virtue is the only good and that its essence lies in self-control and independence
2: a faultfinding captious critic; especially : one who believes that human conduct is motivated wholly by self-interest

Definition of CAPTIOUS
1: marked by an often ill-natured inclination to stress faults and raise objections <captious critics>

Sorry Guy, that seems to describe you quite well. :( :evil:

[toker]

I'm not a reductionist, and I'm not a determinist. Your next-to-last sentence is false, as a matter of fact, according to physics.

OK, let's explore that. As evidence, I exhibit every particle physics experiment ever made. None of them, none whatsoever, contradict the theory we have - everything is perfectly predictable. What evidence would you like to present?
Quantum physics, of course. You say "perfectly" predictable, but the events in question are probabilistic, not deterministic.

If you think some of these do have free will, what is the characteristic that separates them from the ones that don't?
The ability to direct their own behavior; to make conscious decisions on purpose.
That is an empty answer. You use your claim to try and prove your claim. So I repeat, what it the physical property of a dog that gives it free-will, but a rock not.
I wasn't trying to 'prove' anything with that answer! You asked for the characteristic, and I answered. That characteristic involves a mental property.

So what is the definition for "free will" that you are using and that supports your position?
I have given it countless times. In David B's video, the interviewer at 7.30 gives a description of what he calls the classical meaning of free-will. This is the accepted definition of free-will, so I am not arguing a straw man.
Please state your definition again.

If you object to this definition, then you need to present your own. You have not done this.
Free will is volition.

volition (American Heritage Dictionary)
1. The act or an instance of making a conscious choice or decision.
2. A conscious choice or decision.
3. The power or faculty of choosing; the will.

From wiki:
Volition or will is the cognitive process by which an individual decides on and commits to a particular course of action. It is defined as purposive striving, and is one of the primary human psychological functions (the others being affection [affect or feeling], motivation [goals and expectations] and cognition [thinking]). Volitional processes can be applied consciously, and they can be automatized as habits over time. Most modern conceptions of volition address it as a process of action control that becomes automatized (see e.g., Heckhausen and Kuhl; Gollwitzer; Boekaerts and Corno).

Willpower is the colloquial, and volition the scientific, term for the same state of the will; viz., an "elective preference". When we have "made up our minds" (as we say) to a thing, i.e., have a settled state of choice respecting it, that state is called an immanent volition; when we put forth any particular act of choice, that act is called an emanant, or executive, or imperative, volition. When an immanent, or settled state of, choice, is one which controls or governs a series of actions, we call that state a predominant volition; while we give the name of subordinate volitions to those particular acts of choice which carry into effect the object sought for by the governing or "predominant volition".

Upon re-reading, I realize my brain farted the first time around. You just agreed that determinism is false? That even with perfect information, it turns out that what happens next is probabilistic rather than deterministic?
It is wrong in the sense that Quantum Mechanics is right, so observations cause wave-function collapse and the chosen eigenstate is chosen via probabilities.
Determinism, as a philosophical stance, requires that all events are deterministic. Since QM has shown that some events are fundamentally probabilistic or indeterministic, it follows that determinism is false.

But randomness does not add observer control, and therefore there is still no free-will. (In the video, even Dennet agrees with this.)
I never claimed that randomness adds observer control. Dennett is a compatiblist; he's a determinist who realizes we have volitional control over our actions.

[David B]

David, I'm still trying to figure out what is your problem with what you call the magical definition of free will, and which I would rather call the natural definition, because it is the only one consistent with all the ways the notion of free will is used in everyday speech. It would appear that you think the definition is wrong because it denotes an empty class, since we seem to agree that no such thing can exist. Is that it?

I don't agree that it is the only one consistent with all the ways the notion of free will is used in everyday speech.

Asking someone whether he did something on purpose or by accident doesn't imply a magical free will, IMV.

Other than that, yes.

David

[toker]

Definition of CYNIC from M-W
1: capitalized : an adherent of an ancient Greek school of philosophers who held the view that virtue is the only good and that its essence lies in self-control and independence
2: a faultfinding captious critic; especially : one who believes that human conduct is motivated wholly by self-interest

I just noticed that the word "cynic" is an auto-antonym (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto-antonym). Well, except for the capitalization required by the first entry.

[/irrelevant observation]

[Barbarian]

Asking someone whether he did something on purpose or by accident doesn't imply a magical free will, IMV.Right, it doesn't. What does imply a magical free will is the assignment of moral responsibility. If our decision-making process is entirely naturalistic, a mere causal chain of physical events causing other physical events, then there is no particular link in that chain to assign responsibility to. Sensations reach our neurons, they trigger other neurons and inhibit others, the chain reactions run in parallel within the brain for some time, most likely consulting quantum random sources amplified by chaotic behavior into macroscopic changes until some neuron commands a muscle to contract. There is no special point where responsibility can be assigned. But everyday thinking derives responsibility from free will, therefore the free will everyday thinking postulates is not a naturalistic one.Other than that, yes.So you claim that a definition is meaningless if it describes an empty class? For instance the definition of the solution to the problem of squaring the circle, i.e. the steps of an Euclidean construction of a segment with length Pi from a segment of length 1 is meaningless because no such construction exists? We are precluded by your fiat from using reductio ad absurdum? Or is this just special pleading for the case of free will?

[David B]

Asking someone whether he did something on purpose or by accident doesn't imply a magical free will, IMV.Right, it doesn't. What does imply a magical free will is the assignment of moral responsibility.

I disagree - as does Dennett.

If our decision-making process is entirely naturalistic, a mere causal chain of physical events causing other physical events, then there is no particular link in that chain to assign responsibility to.

Is it so much a causal chain, rather than a causal network, or causal web? You hint so in your following piece, and might suggest that even if so it makes no difference, but I think it does. The best analogy I can come up with on the spot is that there is no particular note in a chain, network or web of notes that makes a particular collection of notes musical, but this only gets halfway to what I am trying to get at.

I'm also reminded of Searle's Chinese Room thought experiment, which purports to be an argument against strong AI.

I think this relevant, because what I think you are arguing would not only be an argument against strong AI, but against strong I in general.

What do you think?

Sensations reach our neurons, they trigger other neurons and inhibit others, the chain reactions run in parallel within the brain for some time, most likely consulting quantum random sources amplified by chaotic behavior into macroscopic changes until some neuron commands a muscle to contract. There is no special point where responsibility can be assigned.

I don't see a failure to ascribe one special point to where responsibility to be assigned as a major problem. Any more than a failure to failing to find a particular point where life can be said to be ascribed as an argument against life.

But everyday thinking derives responsibility from free will, therefore the free will everyday thinking postulates is not a naturalistic one.

I'd argue that every day thinking either does or can derive responsibility from the sort of naturalistic free will described in particular in Dennett and Hifstadter.

Other than that, yes.

So you claim that a definition is meaningless if it describes an empty class? For instance the definition of the solution to the problem of squaring the circle, i.e. the steps of an Euclidean construction of a segment with length Pi from a segment of length 1 is meaningless because no such construction exists? We are precluded by your fiat from using reductio ad absurdum? Or is this just special pleading for the case of free will?

I rethink that in the light of your post (because I can:evil:).

Meaningless in at least one sense, though not in all senses, of the word.

David

[toker]

If our decision-making process is entirely naturalistic, a mere causal chain of physical events causing other physical events,
Naturalism requires that determinism is true? :hammer:

then there is no particular link in that chain to assign responsibility to.
We don't assign responsibility to people-parts. We assign them to people. Why can't people be links in a causal net?

[David B]

Another analogy.

Is this a collection of ascii symbols?

Is it anything else as well?

If so:-

a) What is it as well as a collection of ascii symbols?

b) Which, if any, particular symbol within the collection makes it what it is?

http://www.glassgiant.com/ascii/ascii.php?sample=mona

David

[Jack Willsson]

You're a deep cynic, but you aren't manipulative.

I would like to point out that I am not a cynic:


Cynicism (Greek: κυνισμός), in its original form, refers to the beliefs of an ancient school of Greek philosophers known as the Cynics (Greek: Κυνικοί, Latin: Cynici). Their philosophy was that the purpose of life was to live a life of Virtue in agreement with Nature. This meant rejecting all conventional desires for wealth, power, health, and fame, and by living a simple life free from all possessions. As reasoning creatures, people could gain happiness by rigorous training and by living in a way which was natural for humans. They believed that the world belonged equally to everyone, and that suffering was caused by false judgments of what was valuable and by the worthless customs and conventions which surrounded society.

What a load of codswallop.

I never suspected that you were trying to needle toker.

[/tangent]

I was looking at free-will and definitions thereof.

If you intended to spell the name corectly and had succeeded then we have an example of you exercising free-will - determinist though you are.

You did not, in fact, spell his name correctly. A chain of cause and effect happened (as it always does) and a momentary lack of concentration resulted in the mis-spelling.

The mis-spelling had nothing to do with your will. For that moment your will stopped being the controlling agent in that particular chain of events.

I agree with you that events are determined, I will even go so far as to agree that what you intended was caused but in that your intention was caused by your own self (memories, values, judgements etc) it would qualify as an example of your free (uncoerced) will.

Your free will caused you to type something. Another agent interfered and caused the mis-spelling.

Your will was free (uncoerced) but not free (capable)

[Barbarian]

Asking someone whether he did something on purpose or by accident doesn't imply a magical free will, IMV.Right, it doesn't. What <i>does </i>imply a magical free will is the assignment of moral responsibility.

I disagree - as does Dennett.OK, but why do you disagree?

I understand you (and Dennett, although this does not matter to me - he is not here) subscribe to compatibilist free will. I must admit that I am somewhat puzzled by the very idea, because the "definition" I usually encounter is essentially a fatwah to the effect of "free will and determinism are compatible" (e.g. the Wiki page: "Compatibilism is the belief that free will and determinism are compatible ideas, and that it is possible to believe both without being logically inconsistent.", or the Stanford Encyclopedia (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/compatibilism/): "Compatibilism is the thesis that free will is compatible with determinism."). I have encountered other definitions over time, and those make more sense, but they do not appear to be universally accepted, while the above quoted Argument from Sheer Will merely postulating compatibility is ubiquitous.

The way I understand it, compatibilist free will essentially amounts to the brain being able to evaluate a situation and identifying a choice, which is then carried out. This is no different from a computer evaluating a situation and coming up with a choice. Would you hold the computer responsible for the consequences of the choice? If not, what is the essential difference between a brain and a computer which allows you to assign responsibility to the workings of one but not to the other?If our decision-making process is entirely naturalistic, a mere causal chain of physical events causing other physical events, then there is no particular link in that chain to assign responsibility to.Is it so much a causal chain, rather than a causal network, or causal web? You hint so in your following piece, and might suggest that even if so it makes no difference, but I think it does.I don't think it matters whether we talk about single chains or a lattice of events linked by cause-effect relations. I see the separation of interactions into many causes or regarding them as one cause as a matter of almost arbitrary convention (only almost arbitrary and not fully so, because our way of perceiving the world may bias the choice). Nowhere have I come across an argument whereby it really mattered if there was a single cause or a set of causes, and I don't think such a discriminating thought experiment can even be constructed.

(Actually, I have seen one, but that was straight out of some sort of eerie twilight zone. One guy argued that reductionism means the attempt to explain a certain phenomenon by a single cause. I was surprised; reductionism to me is conformity with Occam's razor, such that we explain phenomena by other, lower-level phenomena (the layering into lower and higher levels is arbitrary and primarily useful to prevent circularity, but we'd do well to choose the lower layers in a way which provides the most potential in explaining things.)The best analogy I can come up with on the spot is that there is no particular note in a chain, network or web of notes that makes a particular collection of notes musical, but this only gets halfway to what I am trying to get at.

I'm also reminded of Searle's Chinese Room thought experiment, which purports to be an argument against strong AI.

I think this relevant, because what I think you are arguing would not only be an argument against strong AI, but against strong I in general.

What do you think? I am pretty confused at the moment about your reasons to bring up emergent properties here (for that seems to be what you do). Perhaps if I summarize my position, it would accidentally answer your question: I think that having intelligence and having consciousness are two different things (but it is very probable that only intelligent entities can have consciousness, certain people notwithstanding), and both of these are just properties of Turing machines (therefore they are also properties of systems implementing those / modeled by those Turing machines). Some time in the near future we will have a proposed definition saying "A Turing machine possesses consciousness if it has the following properties: ..." although the definition will have to conform to an additional constraint: it should allow anyone smart enough to understand it to immediately see his or her own consciousness through the prism of this definition.

I think this is an affirmation of Strong AI from my part - "functionally the same as a mind" is a mind.

What I really deny is the reality of the active agent, that is, I deny that the conscious "I" is actually making the choices, as the natural free will would have it. The brain is a computer or can be modeled as one, and it performs a lot of tasks, analyzing the world and coming up with actions chosen from a wide variety of alternatives. But that is just the computer doing it, not some magical mind-substance or homunculus; it could be done in a semiconductor-based computer too. Magical free will is the capability of the conscious "I" to choose, while I hold that the brain in addition and in parallel to making choices, also constructs the full illusion of consciousness and participation in making choices, even if consciousness is tied to a passive observer dragged along the process. One consequence is that the brain cannot do anything that a big enough computer cannot do, that is, in some cases it is completely determined in its choices, and when not, it can only go for one of the remaining alternatives at random. Magical i.e. natural free will, on the other hand, means actively choosing from the remaining alternatives based on I-dont-know-what.Other than that, yes.So you claim that a definition is meaningless if it describes an empty class? For instance the definition of the solution to the problem of squaring the circle, i.e. the steps of an Euclidean construction of a segment with length Pi from a segment of length 1 is meaningless because no such construction exists? We are precluded by your fiat from using reductio ad absurdum? Or is this just special pleading for the case of free will?I rethink that in the light of your post (because I can :evil:).Nawww, come on, you have no choice but to be able to do it.

[Barbarian]

Another analogy.

Is this a collection of ascii symbols?

Is it anything else as well?

If so:-

a) What is it as well as a collection of ascii symbols?

b) Which, if any, particular symbol within the collection makes it what it is?

http://www.glassgiant.com/ascii/ascii.php?sample=mona

DavidThe way I relate this analogy to what is being discussed, you want to make the point that a complex system may have properties that its building blocks do not have? Point taken; in fact it is fairly uncontroversial.

However, it is not a solid argument to claim that since some properties are (weakly) emergent, therefore we cannot say anything about any property being precluded from appearing in large structures, because not every property can be achieved this way.

Multiplying odd numbers together will only result in odd numbers. Multiplying a great shitload of odd numbers will also result in an odd number, never an even one.

Euclidean construction steps applied to a set of points with algebraic numbers for coordinates will always lead to new points also having algebraic numbers for coordinates. Applying such steps one after the other will also stay within the realm of points with algebraic coordinates. An Euclidean construction, be it of 1050 steps, cannot create a transcendental number. And yet I am being told that many people tried and no doubt still try to solve the problem of squaring the circle, equivalent to constructing a segment having a well-known transcendental number for length. (There is no mention of people trying to find a set of odd numbers which multiply to an even one, but perhaps the incentive is low.)

Energy transmission methods have mostly a less than 100% efficiency (electric current in superconductors may be 100%, but that's extreme). Therefore forwarding energy through passive objects connected by such energy transmission methods will not have a more than 100% efficiency, won't have an energy yield. No matter how many such objects are connected together, the resulting mechanism won't generate energy. But some people still try to construct perpetuum mobile of different kinds.

Mechanical automata are automata sliding through a sequence of states in a deterministic way, in the sense that the next state is always fully determined by the current state and optionally by the state of some external random source (or there may be no next state in the given circumstances, in which case the automaton stalls, or if it is in an external-random-event-consulting state, waits for the external source to change). We can assemble two automata into a new one which will have for states pairs of states of the original automata, and by means of coupling we can restrict the set of allowed pairs to less than all of them. Assembling mechanical automata yield mechanical automata, therefore no matter how many mechanical automata we assemble into a huge system, the system will be a mechanical automaton and will never achieve the ability to end up in a state chosen otherwise but deterministically (perhaps relying upon random sources, but relying deterministically upon them). So magical free will, the ability to be less constrained than deterministic but more restrained than simple random choice, will never appear in such a system.

Elementary particles are mechanical automata in this sense, therefore brains are also mechanical automata, q.e.d. And yet, some people still try to find a way to regard the brain as more than a mechanical automaton.

Of course there are people who straight out deny all this for no reason I can grasp. The rallying idea is strong emergence (http://consc.net/papers/granada.html), and it is a pet peeve of mine that such a notion is taken seriously (parallelled only by multiple realizability).

[Ozymandias]

You can't explain free-will via emergent phenomena. Emergent phenomena (that is, patterns emerging out of complex systems) are always due to properties of the complex systems that you just haven't noticed in the complex system before. But the properties are still there - they just "emerge" - they are not new properties that suddenly didn't exist before. So you can't generate free-will out of a system if the complex system has no corresponding degrees of freedom.

[Barbarian]

You can't explain free-will via emergent phenomena. Emergent phenomena (that is, patterns emerging out of complex systems) are always due to properties of the complex systems that you just haven't noticed in the complex system before. But the properties are still there - they just "emerge" - they are not new properties that suddenly didn't exist before. So you can't generate free-will out of a system if the complex system has no corresponding degrees of freedom.Im confus. I was the only one bringing up emergence, but I explicity denied that free will can be constructed this way. To whom are you replying?

[Ozymandias]

Im confus. I was the only one bringing up emergence, but I explicity denied that free will can be constructed this way. To whom are you replying?

I was agreeing with you. Is that allowed?

[Jack Willsson]

I'm out of my depth with some of the jargon round here but I have no problem with being a determinist and having a free will.

It's many years since the penny dropped that "I think therefore I am" was a fallacy. Functioning as a fairly bright primate does not mean that I've got one living in my head and call it my self or soul.

"I don't exist" is equally loony. When I do some introspection I find memories, tastes, beliefs, expectations etc. etc. They are all generated by the functioning of my brain and are what I refer to as "me".

How I got this way (as opposed to the way you are) is fairly straightforward. I've had pleasant experiences and unpleasant ones and seek more pleasant ones and to avoid the unpleasant. I don't know why I prefer peanut butter to jam - we can't all be the same.

That makes me an automaton.

But I'm a fairly complex automaton and recognise that you are a similar automaton but with different values and tastes. I probably learned early to let you enjoy what you enjoy as long as you weren't hurting me and I could enjoy what I enjoy.

There are some people I like to see enjoying life - my friends, my family ....

I won't make myself out to be the saint I'm not - I'll compete for the things I like as much as the next guy - but I do actually enjoy giving sometimes.

Still an automaton but evolving with experience. So far I've described a machine.

The machine however is motivated by pleasure and displeasure, experiencing desires and aversions and exhibiting things like fight and flight. Automaton maybe but even I can't predict what I'm going to do in unusual circumstances.

I do what I want and call that "free will".

Who wants to do what they don't want to do? When I realise that you and I are equvalent, why shouldn't I be found responsible for causing you gratuitous pain or loss and inhibited or prevented from doing it again?

[Barbarian]

Im confus. I was the only one bringing up emergence, but I explicity denied that free will can be constructed this way. To whom are you replying?

I was agreeing with you. Is that allowed?Sorry, man, it's just that I'm really not used to anyone agreeing with me on anything.

ETA: Febble sometimes does. All others are under suspicion.

[Barbarian]

I'm out of my depth with some of the jargon round here but I have no problem with being a determinist and having a free will.The jargon consists mostly of shibboleths, although the rules require us to complain vigorously if this is ever brought up and we shall deny all such claims. I haven't written the previous sentence.

As for free will vs. determinism, I often find I have to make a concession to the as of yet majority who believe in truly random events, the concession being that I have to formulate everything in a way that accounts for those events. The downside is that the explanations become too convoluted, and then I cut them back a bit, thereby making them both too complex to easily read and not comprehensive enough to get across the full picture - the worst of both worlds. It is, however, important to point out that for people who believe in the reality of random events it is an error to deduce determinism from denial of free will; magical free will cannot exist even in a nondeterministic world, so denier of free will does not imply determinist.

[Ozymandias]

Jack, I think that is the key. We don't have free will in the traditional sense because we are in a basically deterministic universe. But that doesn't stop our actions being our own because our actions are a (deterministic) consequence of the state of our brains. We can't shift the guilt or the blame anywhere else because we are the part of existence that determines our own actions, even if there is no ther "we" than the particles that make us up.

[David B]

@ Barbarian.

I won't answer all your questions in detail now, as I am currently engaged in re-reading 'I am a Strange Loop', and then intend to re-read GEB and 'Freedom Evolves'. My views being largely informed by som sort of synthesis of reading - and thinking about - the concepts and arguments in these books.

I will address a few points, though, starting with getting back to

What does imply a magical free will is the assignment of moral responsibility

I think that depends on how one views morals and moral responsibility.

If one views morals as either derived from divine fiat, or from some sort of platonic view of morality then there is magic involved, but residing more in the morality than in the choice making.

If one views morality as an evolved and evolving part of the human extended phenotype, as I do, then I don't see magic as being involved.

Next

The way I understand it, compatibilist free will essentially amounts to the brain being able to evaluate a situation and identifying a choice, which is then carried out

The way I understand it, compatibilist free will essentially amounts to a self being able to evaluate a situation and identifying a choice, which is then carried out.

A self being a non magical construct of the brain

This is no different from a computer evaluating a situation and coming up with a choice. Would you hold the computer responsible for the consequences of the choice? If not, what is the essential difference between a brain and a computer which allows you to assign responsibility to the workings of one but not to the other?

AFAIK no current computer has a sense of self. I don't see any theoretical reason why computers should be developed, or develop, to having a sense of self, nor do I see that, along with a sense of self, a moral landscape so to speak could not develop along with it.

Now

but we'd do well to choose the lower layers in a way which provides the most potential in explaining things.)

In the part of Hofstadter I have just re-read he talks a lot about reductionism, but argues just the opposite.

[quote=Hof]...I realised that a shift in levels yielded something very precious to living beings - comprehensibility. To describe the behaviour of a gas by writing a giant piece of text having Avagadro's number of equations in it (assuming such a herculean feat were possible) would not lead to anyone's understanding of anything. But throwing away huge amounts of information and making a statistical summary could do a lot for comprehensibility...

...thermodynamics is explained by statistical mechanics, but perhaps the idea becomes clearer when turned around as follows statistical mechanics can be bypassed by talking at the level of thermodamics

...Thinkodynamics is explained by statistical mentalics as well as it's flipped round version statistical mechanics can be bypassed by talking at the level of thinkodynamics

Now I need to cook and eat

David