Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by RejuvenArt on December 29, 2010 at 9:47pm

Well after reading this discussion, I certainly need to be learned on a deeper level of this subject before I can make an educated response. Thank you for the prompt of thought!

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Permalink Reply by Secular Forces 2013 on January 12, 2011 at 11:31pm

with the internet
... more and more do?

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Permalink Reply by John Cameron on January 26, 2011 at 2:48pm

I think the answer is yet to be determined.  We are just begining to peer into the physical basis for thoughts and memories.  Any opinion on the origin of agency in our conciousness must necessarily be mostly conjecture.  That said, past experience has shown that the explanation for natural phenomena has had a concrete physical basis in all cases where science has come to understanding.  Why should a person's will be any different and therefore only free in the sense that it will respond independently to outside stimulus.  Even if the basis of thought is solely chemical in nature, then there must be some element of randomness in the system.  (i.e. ? thought mutation).  Now, my free will is telling me to stop thinking so hard and grab a beer.

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Permalink Reply by John Camilli on January 29, 2011 at 11:15pm

I would define choice as the introduction of freedom into a causal system, meaning an acausal interruption into an otherwise causal sequence (or the opposite, a causal interruption into an acausal sequence). In order to consider humans any different from rocks, we would have to be capable of such a feat. Otherwise, we are just lifeless, drifting husks of matter, acting only as we must.

 

DesCartes tried to posit that the pineal gland was the locus of man's ability to affect reality - where thought became action, but his guess bore no fruit (actually there are some rather interresting studies on the possible production of DMT in the pineal gland which could, in a roundabout way, end up lending some validity to Rene's theory, but hallucinogen production in the brain would only explain the feeling of choosing, not an actual means by which one might affect choice. The feeling would be an illusion. Which brings to mind a study done recently in which stimulation of the post-parietal cortex created a desire to move while, alternately, stimulation of the motor cortex triggered movement without the desire, thereby explaining at least one instance in which both the desire to move and the act of moving were created thorugh chemical stimulation.

 

Another study I recall, had subjects choose between pushing one of two arbitrary buttons. EEGs showed that the subject's "choice" could be predicted several seconds ahead of their physical movement, even before they were aware they had made a choice. This suggest to me that the feeling of wanting to perform an action is symptomatic of the process which causes it, rather than the feeling being the cause itself.

 

 

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Permalink Reply by Jacob on March 21, 2011 at 11:40am

I never got this. What does it matter? What is free will? Knowing about it changes nothing. You'll still make the same actions. But that's just me.

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Permalink Reply by Tom Williams on March 26, 2011 at 2:38am

Will I have Salad or pizza for lunch? I've been putting on weight, I should have salad... but the pizza smells great... but my girlfriend would be pissed if I had pizza as she is on a diet... and the pizza is more expensive... and the TV told me that'd I'd get Heart disease if I ate lots of junk food...

 

Determinism is complicated. The amount of factors that effect a decision are immense, but they are all from pre-programming, past experiences, genetics, anything that has led to the moment you are in right now. just because some of them are brought to consciousness they get labeled "free will" rather than instinct... you still arrive at a decision based on knowledge and environment.

 

All systems in the universe respond in predictable ways (if they didn't science wouldn't work AT ALL), some of them are very very complicated, like the brain, and seem random before further research, but if we are to believe that science can actually explain the whole universe then we should reject free will - as free will would be completely ruining the predictability of the universe in any location where self aware beings could come in and enact their free will.

 

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Permalink Reply by Jedi Wanderer on March 26, 2011 at 6:19am

Noooo. We have been determined to use science to begin with, just like we have been determined to have eyes and to be able to see. How are we any different from any other animal, in that we can anticipate what is about to happen and react so that we can avoid danger and seek out reward? Your argument that self-aware beings change the predictability of the universe is downright silly. Why stop at self-aware beings? An insect "aware" of its environment to a certain degree can respond to it and change the course of things, but you wouldn't argue free will here, would you?

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Permalink Reply by Jedi Wanderer on March 26, 2011 at 11:47am

Hah, I love that we keep coming back to this discussion. I'm gonna send you a request to join my new group, maybe you can help me decide on how things really work in probably the most important way - how we determine what is good/bad and right/wrong.

 

Anyway sadly no, I haven't read DDI by DD. What I've read of Dennett's I've loved, but I am too busy writing these days to actually do much reading. I've got a lot of catching up to do. But the points you bring up are spot on. Even viruses may have choice. Obviously we've got a lot more choice, but this is a matter of difference of degrees, not differences in kind. People who argue for free will must really misunderstand what determinists mean by our arguments. We are not saying that choice does not exist, but neither are we saying that it is "free" as in unconstrained by reality and natural causes. But you've got to admit, it is sort of weird to say that we have choice but that it is more of an illusion than anything else. As weird as it may be, however, and as weird as evolution is and even existence (which is really quite bizarre if you think about it), the notion of free will makes still less sense. Weirdness abounds!

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Permalink Reply by Park Bierbower on March 26, 2011 at 3:38pm

What seems to be the problem with strict determinism?  is it that it doesn't really translate well into the workings [and illusion] of choice in regards to the human psyche, or did I miss something?

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Permalink Reply by MCT on March 26, 2011 at 8:07pm

I think freewill is the illusion, not choice. Since choice as a determined mental calculation is reducible to perceptual evidence, we must make room for the concept. Obviously there is nothing different in the causal interactions that make up choice and reflex, but we, and other sufficiently complex neural networks, do in fact consider logically plausible scenarios and choose from them, while trees don't, they react in a less complex or non-mental method. I think strict determinism works as long as people don't insist that choice is, by definition, acausal. Every event that occurs, does so causally, even the mental consideration of logically plausible outcomes and action towards the end of one.

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Permalink Reply by Park Bierbower on March 26, 2011 at 8:21pm

Thats right.  Its the concept of "choice" that is also attached to "free will" that makes it so hard to understand for some people.  We make choices.  So do computers, in a much simpler way.  Maybe its merely the definition that needs revised, because today I was trying to define "intent" and was having a hard time figuring it out in a way that doesn't relate to a "free will" way of thinking. (that is in the sense there ultimately is no difference between intent and reaction)

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Permalink Reply by MCT on March 26, 2011 at 9:08pm

Intent is a lot like choice. But, if I had to separate the two, I would say choice includes more action and intent includes more meaning, but they both entail both. I may have intended to do well on the test but I chose too many wrong answers. Intention is more in respect to a goal. And choice is more in respect to an action.

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