Also, people have totally fucked up the standard definition of 'Free Will', because it has been emalgamated in modern language to 'will' or 'willpower'. The free part is not freedom from any oppressing thing, it describes the ability to act:
Will = the desire to do or think a certain thing
Free = the act of being able to do that thing
Therefore Free Will simply means the exercise of will, and the ability (freedom) to do so. In this case, the term 'Free' requires nothing to set itself against.
We're not saying you're "hardwired" to prefer one flavour over another, nor that you were "destined" or "predetermined" to choose that flavour. We're saying that whatever flavour you pick, given the technology and sufficient understanding of how the brain works, we could go back and show how ongoing electrochemical processes in your body led to your choosing that particular flavour.
People need to stop characterizing our position as one that believes in destiny and other such nonsense.
Bingo, exactly my point in the first post above. If you had the technology or understanding, you could go back and prove this. Or alternatively, you might be wrong, because we don't have sufficient technology or understanding of consciousness. You are working on theory at the moment, and extrapolating it to points far on the horizon. This might be fair scientific hypothesising, but it is nothing more - so well done, you have reached the level of 'cogent theorising'. This does not = scientific method, because scientific method requires complete execution of the method to be valid: you cannot simply perform one experiment & claim absolute truth, you cannot prove a theory without evidence, and you cannot just stop at the hypothesis, put your hand up, and shout 'done it, Miss!'.
Essentially your argument has all the scientific validity of religious belief.
If I ate whatever was at hand when hungry and shat on the floor whenever I felt the urge, you'd have an argument. But, uh, no.
But evolution's programmed you differently. Your mistake is not seeing how you're hard-wired to do all this stuff.
I"m hardwired to pick between the two different flavours of tea I've got in the cupboard? Pasta or roast veggies for dinner?
We're not saying you're "hardwired" to prefer one flavour over another, nor that you were "destined" or "predetermined" to choose that flavour. We're saying that whatever flavour you pick, given the technology and sufficient understanding of how the brain works, we could go back and show how ongoing electrochemical processes in your body led to your choosing that particular flavour.
People need to stop characterizing our position as one that believes in destiny and other such nonsense.
The thing is, though, while I agree completely, I'm not sure it means "free will" doesn't exist. I think it just means the common conception of 'free will' is nonsensical. I don't think it means that some element of choice exists in our biology- we have brains to interpret and react to sense data, and the quality of our brains determines the appropriateness of our reaction to said sense data, with an element of random chance. Because we can't rewind time, and our perspective is inherently limited to this forward-through-time existence, the "illusion" of free will is a powerful enough influence on our actions that it, well, exists.
I guess what I am saying is that the illusion is powerful enough it is impossible for our limited imaginations to escape on an instinctive, fundamental level- we can all intellectually recognize that if we rewound time, the exact same events would occur (barring some undiscovered quantum thing), but I don't think any of us can intuitively care or think that matters, no matter how nihilist we become. Partly because the illusion is grounded in the reality that parts of our brain will conflict with others when we make decisions- researchers just recently looked at people's brains while they decided on a classic moral dilemma scenario, which goes something like: If secret police are looking for you and a group of people you are with, and a baby is crying and can't be hushed, and if the police find you they will execute the entire group, is it moral to strangle the baby to make it quiet?
Researchers found that most people had the instinctive, "Baby! Protect! Nurture!" response conflicting with areas of the brain associated with pragmatic thought. They also found that differences in those two areas across individuals accounted for the different responses made to the scenario. That does seem to indicate the eventual conclusion each person made was inevitable, but the process itself would appear to that individual to be an internal debate ending in a choice that could have gone the other way.
I don't believe in anything other than the illusion of free will, yet I'm perfectly willing to condemn someone for the choices they've made. I might have some sympathy for their limitations or circumstances, but in the day-to-day I certainly act as if I believe that I have free will and that others do as well.
I don't see that changing.
Essentially your argument has all the scientific validity of religious belief.
Oh, god, can we not get into this again? In any event, you're misunderstanding- the argument is that according to all currently known laws and accepted theories, the universe proceeds on a single inevitable path for everything not on the quantum scale.
Now, that does leave a little wiggle room- if the brain is sensitive enough that quantum-scale fluctuations and randomness can have an impact on the wider emergent property of consciousness, then you could claim that if one rewound time then there is at least a chance that some other action might be taken due to quantum butterflies in the brainpan.
But until some indication that quantum uncertainty has an impact on consciousness, the only conclusion we can make is that free will is an illusion- because that is what the evidence suggests. You should reverse your objection- it's an, as yet, unconfirmed hypothesis that free will might at least exist within the boundaries of certain probabilistic ranges, while it seems to be an inescapable scientific conclusion that we do not, in fact, have free will as the term is commonly accepted to mean.
The other thing reinforcing the illusion is our lack of omniscience or the ability to account for every influence on our own actions. One of those influences, and a powerful one, is the belief in free will itself. Let me try an example:
A psychiatrist is seeing a patient with low self-esteem due to recent weight gain. The psychiatrist is acquainted with modern neuropsychology and recognizes the patient's weight gain was an inevitable consequence of various influences, both internal and external, on their brain. But the psychiatrist also recognizes that he/she is an influence as well, and if they tell the patient that with some diet and exercise, they can choose to eliminate the weight and feel better about themselves, he/she can influence said patient's behavior. Whether or not the psychiatrist succeeds is a foregone conclusion, but it would never, ever appear that way to the psychiatrist or the patient.
We're not saying you're "hardwired" to prefer one flavour over another, nor that you were "destined" or "predetermined" to choose that flavour. We're saying that whatever flavour you pick, given the technology and sufficient understanding of how the brain works, we could go back and show how ongoing electrochemical processes in your body led to your choosing that particular flavour.
People need to stop characterizing our position as one that believes in destiny and other such nonsense.
Bingo, exactly my point in the first post above. If you had the technology or understanding, you could go back and prove this. Or alternatively, you might be wrong, because we don't have sufficient technology or understanding of consciousness. You are working on theory at the moment, and extrapolating it to points far on the horizon. This might be fair scientific hypothesising, but it is nothing more - so well done, you have reached the level of 'cogent theorising'. This does not = scientific method, because scientific method requires complete execution of the method to be valid: you cannot simply perform one experiment & claim absolute truth, you cannot prove a theory without evidence, and you cannot just stop at the hypothesis, put your hand up, and shout 'done it, Miss!'.
Essentially your argument has all the scientific validity of religious belief.
It is by no means an open-and-closed matter, but all scientific evidence to date at least supports the idea that free will is an illusion and we're all just part of an enormous system of emergent, natural processes that began with the big bang.
You accuse me of being religious, yet your position relies on the supernatural. In order to prove it we would need to discover something that is capable of violating the laws of physics.
We're not saying you're "hardwired" to prefer one flavour over another, nor that you were "destined" or "predetermined" to choose that flavour. We're saying that whatever flavour you pick, given the technology and sufficient understanding of how the brain works, we could go back and show how ongoing electrochemical processes in your body led to your choosing that particular flavour.
People need to stop characterizing our position as one that believes in destiny and other such nonsense.
Bingo, exactly my point in the first post above. If you had the technology or understanding, you could go back and prove this. Or alternatively, you might be wrong, because we don't have sufficient technology or understanding of consciousness. You are working on theory at the moment, and extrapolating it to points far on the horizon. This might be fair scientific hypothesising, but it is nothing more - so well done, you have reached the level of 'cogent theorising'. This does not = scientific method, because scientific method requires complete execution of the method to be valid: you cannot simply perform one experiment & claim absolute truth, you cannot prove a theory without evidence, and you cannot just stop at the hypothesis, put your hand up, and shout 'done it, Miss!'.
Essentially your argument has all the scientific validity of religious belief.
It is by no means an open-and-closed matter, but all scientific evidence to date at least supports the idea that free will is an illusion and we're all just part of an enormous system of emergent processes that began with the big bang.
Your position is closer to religious belief because in order to prove it we would need to discover something in the human brain that is capable of violating the laws of physics as we understand them right now.
Fixed for a technicality.
I think most of the Anti-FW types here are arguing the idea of determinism. The idea that the universe obeys a certain set of mathematical laws and therefore choice is an illusion since everything is simply playing out according to the results of the "Universe Equation" and based upon whatever the universes initial conditions were.
This was a popular idea in physics and such in the late 1900s (ie - pre-QM and Special relativity). Of course QM through a huge wrench in the whole thing by basically showing we'd never be able to determine accurate starting conditions for ANYTHING.
From there, it comes down to whether you believe the entire universe is still deterministic, we just can't ever see it due to the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. Or whether there's actually randomness going on. All of which still depends on the idea that there's nothing else going on that we're not aware of.
I think most of the Anti-FW types here are arguing the idea of determinism. The idea that the universe obeys a certain set of mathematical laws and therefore choice is an illusion since everything is simply playing out according to the results of the "Universe Equation" and based upon whatever the universes initial conditions were.
This was a popular idea in physics and such in the late 1900s (ie - pre-QM and Special relativity). Of course QM through a huge wrench in the whole thing by basically showing we'd never be able to determine accurate starting conditions for ANYTHING.
From there, it comes down to whether you believe the entire universe is still deterministic, we just can't ever see it due to the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. Or whether there's actually randomness going on. All of which still depends on the idea that there's nothing else going on that we're not aware of.
The thing is, on the quantum level it only introduces a deterministic range of possibilities measured by probability, not "anything can happen." And then, so far, nothing indicates that quantum uncertainty extends beyond the quantum level- big things behave differently than small things.
And in many cases you can measure quantum uncertainty and probability and calculate that it all cancels out- the route a particle takes is the only route that it can take. We just can't predict it before the fact, though we can account for its behavior after.
Professor Phobos on
0
Options
MrMisterJesus dying on the cross in pain? Morally better than us. One has to go "all in".Registered Userregular
From there, it comes down to whether you believe the entire universe is still deterministic, we just can't ever see it due to the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. Or whether there's actually randomness going on. All of which still depends on the idea that there's nothing else going on that we're not aware of.
Suppose there is actually quantum randomness--there are no hidden variables or anything like that. Now, how does that have anything to do with free will, again? That's why I said that the world is deterministic in all the relevant senses: because quantum randomness is a red herring that really has nothing to do with anything.
Furthermore, determinism and free will aren't really opposed to each other. At least, only nonsensical versions of 'free will' are incompatible with determinism.
I only skimmed this thread, so I apologize in advance if I'm repeating anyone. Anyways, here are my thoughts on free will.
I think "free will" requires some sort of metaphysical, supernatural force which controls one's decision making, etc. Something outside the realm of cause and effect, natural occurances, physical reality, science. A "soul," if you will.
As someone who doesn't believe in the supernatural, I don't think free will therefore exists. However, I think "free will" only matters for religious reasons. The illusion of free will, which we may call "free will" depending on our definition, is plenty for an atheist mindset, in my opinion. While it may all occur because of billions of small cause and effect relationships we probably will never fully understand, that doesn't matter in day to day life.
The only place free will matters, like I said, is within a religion. A mystical sort of free will, for example, has to exist for the Christian mythos of God and Angels and Original Sin, etc to make sense. Since a religious person probably already holds some supernatural beliefs, they probably won't have a problem believing in a soul. For them, that's the answer to free will.
Octopus Melody on
0
Options
citizen059hello my name is citizenI'm from the InternetRegistered Userregular
the ability to create an equation describing the past from the position of the present does not imply predestination or a lack of 'real' choice.
Pretty much--I'm a compatibilist myself. The world is, in all relevant respects, deterministic. Regardless, we have 'free will' insofar as such a thing makes sense.
Consider it this way: suppose you offer me a choice between a delicious slice of chocolate cake and a knife to the face. You can predict ahead of time that I'll choose the cake. Does that mean that I am somehow lacking an essential component of decision-making? No--it just means that you're able to judge that I (like most people) would choose cake over death.
The only problem I have with this example is that it's not really a choice. Your natural instinct for self-preservation pretty much guarantees that you're going to do everything you can to avoid the face-stabby. You're not really deciding between cake and death, you're deciding between death and not-death.
I've read the discussion about brain chemicals and particles making a predetermined decision for you. I've read the part saying that nobody should be considered "great" for anything they're simply preprogrammed to do.
What about a situation where you're faced with the choice of dying or not, and you choose death even though dying is the last thing you want to do and it's totally against your natural instincts? An example would be the soldier who throws himself on a grenade to save his squadmates. Surely he has many reasons to live...family & friends back home, a job, a whole life outside of his military career...but in that critical instant he...or something within him...chooses to die and give all of that up so that his buddies don't have to.
Even if you don't consider it to be a "free will" choice...even if that soldier was "predestined" to make that decision in that moment...is even that not enough to be considered an act of heroism?
Or are we really just worthless lumps of flesh acting out roles predetermined by the circumstances in our lives, in which case there really is no meaning to it all and we should just all kill ourselves because hey, what's it matter anyway?
I mean, all this discussion about synapses and chemicals is neat, it really is. But it sounds more like a "How Stuff Works" article than anything else, because it's really only explaining how things happen the way they do and not why. If it's a given that there's a lot we don't know about the brain, why are so many people speaking with such apparent certainty merely based on what we do know?
Man, this thread is deep. My brain chemicals hurt. I think it's time for some pudding.
What is the thing that has the illusion of control, though? And what would it mean to escape this illusion?
My understasnding is that our conciousness is experiencing an illusion.
Escaping from the illusion wouldn't generally mean much, I think, if you're talking about merely understanding the situation. If you're talking about eliminating things like the readiness potential though, that would be both interesting and weird.
Also, and this is partially directed at saint2e, the point (or, at least, one point) of praise is that it is another incentive structure. People enjoy receiving praise, ergo they try harder to receive it. It essentially makes the environment riper for individuals who excel. Some people are more capable than others, or "get luckier" than others. I see no reason to not give them praise as well, as it's not like praise necessarily has no effect on them.
Unless someone can make a case that our brain isn't responsible for our conciousness and that our environment has nothing to do with how we act, as well as show that at that point we aren't just acting randomly, free will doesn't exist or make sense.
Um, can you make the case for any of those things? Nobody can make the case against them because at our current level of knowledge, we still have fuck all actual evidence to support those statements either way, they are pure conjecture based on some educated guessing at the moment. That aside, I agree with Jeffe you are also choosing a moronic definition of free will so it suits your argument; but since nobody can prove any of this either way, cry havoc and let loose the dogs of semantics.
First, I don't have to "prove" anything, no does anyone else. That's asking for a degree of certainty that is untenable in most intellectual pursuits. The relationship of our brains to the way we experience the world isn't, from what I understand, a hotly disputed subject. Fiddling around with various parts of the brain will affect our experiences. Similarly, the effect of our environments is also, from what I understand, fairly well established via experiment.
I only skimmed this thread, so I apologize in advance if I'm repeating anyone. Anyways, here are my thoughts on free will.
I think "free will" requires some sort of metaphysical, supernatural force which controls one's decision making, etc. Something outside the realm of cause and effect, natural occurances, physical reality, science. A "soul," if you will.
As someone who doesn't believe in the supernatural, I don't think free will therefore exists. However, I think "free will" only matters for religious reasons. The illusion of free will, which we may call "free will" depending on our definition, is plenty for an atheist mindset, in my opinion. While it may all occur because of billions of small cause and effect relationships we probably will never fully understand, that doesn't matter in day to day life.
The only place free will matters, like I said, is within a religion. A mystical sort of free will, for example, has to exist for the Christian mythos of God and Angels and Original Sin, etc to make sense. Since a religious person probably already holds some supernatural beliefs, they probably won't have a problem believing in a soul. For them, that's the answer to free will.
For me, since I've grown up as a Catholic I've always had to manage my thoughts related to it with the larger scheme of things. As a result of my desire for the super natural I've also had to deal with the fact that I'll like some things better then others because I want them to be so. The combination of these two have led me to occasionally think that we probably don't have free will (especially given a supreme being/God) given that there are likely (because I like the idea) multiple universes in which our decisions are made differently, creating the situation where the whole has free will, but each person is doomed to a fate not yet known.
An alternative is that we are caught in a situation where the results of our actions are merely the necessary components for the rest of existence to continue functioning. Sort of like all the crazy stuff that happens at the atomic level like particles decaying or not decaying and such.
However, all that is nonsensical and I will discuss a more plausible reason for free will existing. It would make sense that we are going to do a lot of things in life because situations combine to force us to a given conclusion. But I think that in our ability to observe and judge ourselves and our environment lies the seeds of free will, even if we choose not to act. Free will is a lot like chaos I think, in that it is the disruption of pattern for no purpose.
For me, since I've grown up as a Catholic I've always had to manage my thoughts related to it with the larger scheme of things. As a result of my desire for the super natural I've also had to deal with the fact that I'll like some things better then others because I want them to be so. The combination of these two have led me to occasionally think that we probably don't have free will (especially given a supreme being/God) given that there are likely (because I like the idea) multiple universes in which our decisions are made differently, creating the situation where the whole has free will, but each person is doomed to a fate not yet known.
An alternative is that we are caught in a situation where the results of our actions are merely the necessary components for the rest of existence to continue functioning. Sort of like all the crazy stuff that happens at the atomic level like particles decaying or not decaying and such.
However, all that is nonsensical and I will discuss a more plausible reason for free will existing. It would make sense that we are going to do a lot of things in life because situations combine to force us to a given conclusion. But I think that in our ability to observe and judge ourselves and our environment lies the seeds of free will, even if we choose not to act. Free will is a lot like chaos I think, in that it is the disruption of pattern for no purpose.
You type a lot, but sadly convey no understanding.
Specifically, you are attributing "purpose" to the universe at large. Why should it have purpose?
This thread reminds me of the above strip from XKCD. Assuming there is no free will, what now? How does this affect anything, other than to say "I now believe/am convinced that there is no free will (and all metaphysical things that it relates to)?" Will I look at a situation and go "Well, since there's no free will, I guess I'll stab you, it was meant to be, asshole!"? This is an interesting debate, but I fail to understand the implications.
Also, what is all this about a person suddenly not being responsible for something just because of a lack of free will? All of what comprises that "person" still did the act, and in cases where they could do it again, why not seek to prevent them from that and go through the motions as you were meant to do as well? Sure, they couldn't do anything else, but if free will doesn't exist, they wouldn't ever have done anything different, so why shouldn't they take the blame for their actions?
Assuming there is no free will, what now? How does this affect anything, other than to say "I now believe/am convinced that there is no free will (and all metaphysical things that it relates to)?" Will I look at a situation and go "Well, since there's no free will, I guess I'll stab you, it was meant to be, asshole!"? This is an interesting debate, but I fail to understand the implications.
It's really not an interesting debate to me. It's just a matter of clarification. My only real interest (as it were) in the thread is that even in the context of a religion (where your choices may send you to heaven or hell) there isn't free will and the concept still makes essentially no sense.
Assuming there is no free will, what now? How does this affect anything, other than to say "I now believe/am convinced that there is no free will (and all metaphysical things that it relates to)?" Will I look at a situation and go "Well, since there's no free will, I guess I'll stab you, it was meant to be, asshole!"? This is an interesting debate, but I fail to understand the implications.
It's really not an interesting debate to me. It's just a matter of clarification. My only real interest (as it were) in the thread is that even in the context of a religion (where your choices may send you to heaven or hell) there isn't free will and the concept still makes essentially no sense.
In your answer to my question you said that it's the consciousness that experiences the illusion of free will. Within the context of being a conscious being, doesn't "free will" actually make perfect sense, and refer to an experience that other conscious beings will recognise and understand?
I suppose the drift of that question was, if you declare free will to be meaningless, aren't you also saying that the consciousness is meaningless? In the sense that the consciousness perceives itself as undergoing processes which are of a radically different type to the mere movement of particles in (say) a puddle or a bowl of soup. But from the all-seeing, all-understanding perspective which can observe the universe as being deterministic, wouldn't it perceive this self-regard of the consciousness as something "different" as being as illusory as free will itself is?
In your answer to my question you said that it's the consciousness that experiences the illusion of free will. Within the context of being a conscious being, doesn't "free will" actually make perfect sense, and refer to an experience that other conscious beings will recognise and understand?
I suppose the drift of that question was, if you declare free will to be meaningless, aren't you also saying that the consciousness is meaningless? In the sense that the consciousness perceives itself as undergoing processes which are of a radically different type to the mere movement of particles in (say) a puddle or a bowl of soup. But from the all-seeing, all-understanding perspective which can observe the universe as being deterministic, wouldn't it perceive this self-regard of the consciousness as something "different" as being as illusory as free will itself is?
I'm not sure I understand the first paragraph, as you seem to be conflating conciousness and free will, particularly with respect to the first sentance of your second paragraph. Your "...refer to an experience that other concious beings will recognize and understand" bit seems wrong on its face, as it plainly refers to something that a fair number of concious beings don't recognize and/or don't understand (almost certainly, I think, because the concept itself makes very little sense).
Assuming there is no free will, what now? How does this affect anything, other than to say "I now believe/am convinced that there is no free will (and all metaphysical things that it relates to)?" Will I look at a situation and go "Well, since there's no free will, I guess I'll stab you, it was meant to be, asshole!"? This is an interesting debate, but I fail to understand the implications.
It's really not an interesting debate to me. It's just a matter of clarification. My only real interest (as it were) in the thread is that even in the context of a religion (where your choices may send you to heaven or hell) there isn't free will and the concept still makes essentially no sense.
In your answer to my question you said that it's the consciousness that experiences the illusion of free will. Within the context of being a conscious being, doesn't "free will" actually make perfect sense, and refer to an experience that other conscious beings will recognise and understand?
I suppose the drift of that question was, if you declare free will to be meaningless, aren't you also saying that the consciousness is meaningless? In the sense that the consciousness perceives itself as undergoing processes which are of a radically different type to the mere movement of particles in (say) a puddle or a bowl of soup. But from the all-seeing, all-understanding perspective which can observe the universe as being deterministic, wouldn't it perceive this self-regard of the consciousness as something "different" as being as illusory as free will itself is?
There is no reason to believe that "meaning" is a valid concept outside of human discourse, much like "beautiful" or "ugly."
It's just shorthand for the complex interplay of determined events which lead us to prefer one thing over another, or associate one thing with another.
I think "free will," defined as a notion that a person can somehow operate outside the chemical reactions of their brain to decide what it does, is a completely absurd concept. I also fail to see how it makes any difference as long as we don't have the means to understand the brain to that extent that we know how someone will act. Maybe free will can be disproven if the technology ever arises to completely analyze the workings of someone's brain such that, for example, you can ask them in a lab setting to choose a random number and know in advance exactly what they'll pick. But even then I don't see how that will impact our lives in any way, other than to give people a meaningless excuse to justify their actions.
I think "free will," defined as a notion that a person can somehow operate outside the chemical reactions of their brain to decide what it does, is a completely absurd concept. I also fail to see how it makes any difference as long as we don't have the means to understand the brain to that extent that we know how someone will act. Maybe free will can be disproven if the technology ever arises to completely analyze the workings of someone's brain such that, for example, you can ask them in a lab setting to choose a random number and know in advance exactly what they'll pick. But even then I don't see how that will impact our lives in any way, other than to give people a meaningless excuse to justify their actions.
If you know what the outcome will be with set of input x, you can modify x such that a new outcome is achieved. You could potentially have a form of mind control with this method. In reality, the computational power and access to data that this would require, not to mention the resources necessary to alter things happening outside of the mind that you want to control, would most likely make this impossible.
In your answer to my question you said that it's the consciousness that experiences the illusion of free will. Within the context of being a conscious being, doesn't "free will" actually make perfect sense, and refer to an experience that other conscious beings will recognise and understand?
I suppose the drift of that question was, if you declare free will to be meaningless, aren't you also saying that the consciousness is meaningless? In the sense that the consciousness perceives itself as undergoing processes which are of a radically different type to the mere movement of particles in (say) a puddle or a bowl of soup. But from the all-seeing, all-understanding perspective which can observe the universe as being deterministic, wouldn't it perceive this self-regard of the consciousness as something "different" as being as illusory as free will itself is?
I'm not sure I understand the first paragraph, as you seem to be conflating conciousness and free will, particularly with respect to the first sentance of your second paragraph. Your "...refer to an experience that other concious beings will recognize and understand" bit seems wrong on its face, as it plainly refers to something that a fair number of concious beings don't recognize and/or don't understand (almost certainly, I think, because the concept itself makes very little sense).
In your first post, you said that we don't have free will, we just have the illusion of control. But everyone has experienced that illusion, right? (Well, perhaps there are some marginal cases, but you get the drift.) So the term "free will" refers to that experience. That's what I'm saying, basically, when I say that "free will refer to an experience that other conscious beings will recognise and understand".
I don't mean to conflate consciousness with free will, but I do mean to connect them. From within the experience of consciousness, then willing things, apparently freely, is something that we experience and can describe and share with other conscious beings and so on... I suppose what I'm trying to get at is that while from the perspective of a hypothesized "ultimate reality" or "total knowledge", this might be an illusion, then, because we live in that illusion, unless there's some way to "step out of it", we might as well regard that illusion as reality. My guess is that to step out of the illusion of free will (as opposed to merely proposing that it is an illusion) would be a step of a similarly radical nature to stepping out of consciousness.
Posts
Will = the desire to do or think a certain thing
Free = the act of being able to do that thing
Therefore Free Will simply means the exercise of will, and the ability (freedom) to do so. In this case, the term 'Free' requires nothing to set itself against.
Bingo, exactly my point in the first post above. If you had the technology or understanding, you could go back and prove this. Or alternatively, you might be wrong, because we don't have sufficient technology or understanding of consciousness. You are working on theory at the moment, and extrapolating it to points far on the horizon. This might be fair scientific hypothesising, but it is nothing more - so well done, you have reached the level of 'cogent theorising'. This does not = scientific method, because scientific method requires complete execution of the method to be valid: you cannot simply perform one experiment & claim absolute truth, you cannot prove a theory without evidence, and you cannot just stop at the hypothesis, put your hand up, and shout 'done it, Miss!'.
Essentially your argument has all the scientific validity of religious belief.
The thing is, though, while I agree completely, I'm not sure it means "free will" doesn't exist. I think it just means the common conception of 'free will' is nonsensical. I don't think it means that some element of choice exists in our biology- we have brains to interpret and react to sense data, and the quality of our brains determines the appropriateness of our reaction to said sense data, with an element of random chance. Because we can't rewind time, and our perspective is inherently limited to this forward-through-time existence, the "illusion" of free will is a powerful enough influence on our actions that it, well, exists.
I guess what I am saying is that the illusion is powerful enough it is impossible for our limited imaginations to escape on an instinctive, fundamental level- we can all intellectually recognize that if we rewound time, the exact same events would occur (barring some undiscovered quantum thing), but I don't think any of us can intuitively care or think that matters, no matter how nihilist we become. Partly because the illusion is grounded in the reality that parts of our brain will conflict with others when we make decisions- researchers just recently looked at people's brains while they decided on a classic moral dilemma scenario, which goes something like: If secret police are looking for you and a group of people you are with, and a baby is crying and can't be hushed, and if the police find you they will execute the entire group, is it moral to strangle the baby to make it quiet?
Researchers found that most people had the instinctive, "Baby! Protect! Nurture!" response conflicting with areas of the brain associated with pragmatic thought. They also found that differences in those two areas across individuals accounted for the different responses made to the scenario. That does seem to indicate the eventual conclusion each person made was inevitable, but the process itself would appear to that individual to be an internal debate ending in a choice that could have gone the other way.
I don't believe in anything other than the illusion of free will, yet I'm perfectly willing to condemn someone for the choices they've made. I might have some sympathy for their limitations or circumstances, but in the day-to-day I certainly act as if I believe that I have free will and that others do as well.
I don't see that changing.
Oh, god, can we not get into this again? In any event, you're misunderstanding- the argument is that according to all currently known laws and accepted theories, the universe proceeds on a single inevitable path for everything not on the quantum scale.
Now, that does leave a little wiggle room- if the brain is sensitive enough that quantum-scale fluctuations and randomness can have an impact on the wider emergent property of consciousness, then you could claim that if one rewound time then there is at least a chance that some other action might be taken due to quantum butterflies in the brainpan.
But until some indication that quantum uncertainty has an impact on consciousness, the only conclusion we can make is that free will is an illusion- because that is what the evidence suggests. You should reverse your objection- it's an, as yet, unconfirmed hypothesis that free will might at least exist within the boundaries of certain probabilistic ranges, while it seems to be an inescapable scientific conclusion that we do not, in fact, have free will as the term is commonly accepted to mean.
The other thing reinforcing the illusion is our lack of omniscience or the ability to account for every influence on our own actions. One of those influences, and a powerful one, is the belief in free will itself. Let me try an example:
A psychiatrist is seeing a patient with low self-esteem due to recent weight gain. The psychiatrist is acquainted with modern neuropsychology and recognizes the patient's weight gain was an inevitable consequence of various influences, both internal and external, on their brain. But the psychiatrist also recognizes that he/she is an influence as well, and if they tell the patient that with some diet and exercise, they can choose to eliminate the weight and feel better about themselves, he/she can influence said patient's behavior. Whether or not the psychiatrist succeeds is a foregone conclusion, but it would never, ever appear that way to the psychiatrist or the patient.
You accuse me of being religious, yet your position relies on the supernatural. In order to prove it we would need to discover something that is capable of violating the laws of physics.
Fixed for a technicality.
I think most of the Anti-FW types here are arguing the idea of determinism. The idea that the universe obeys a certain set of mathematical laws and therefore choice is an illusion since everything is simply playing out according to the results of the "Universe Equation" and based upon whatever the universes initial conditions were.
This was a popular idea in physics and such in the late 1900s (ie - pre-QM and Special relativity). Of course QM through a huge wrench in the whole thing by basically showing we'd never be able to determine accurate starting conditions for ANYTHING.
From there, it comes down to whether you believe the entire universe is still deterministic, we just can't ever see it due to the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. Or whether there's actually randomness going on. All of which still depends on the idea that there's nothing else going on that we're not aware of.
The thing is, on the quantum level it only introduces a deterministic range of possibilities measured by probability, not "anything can happen." And then, so far, nothing indicates that quantum uncertainty extends beyond the quantum level- big things behave differently than small things.
And in many cases you can measure quantum uncertainty and probability and calculate that it all cancels out- the route a particle takes is the only route that it can take. We just can't predict it before the fact, though we can account for its behavior after.
Suppose there is actually quantum randomness--there are no hidden variables or anything like that. Now, how does that have anything to do with free will, again? That's why I said that the world is deterministic in all the relevant senses: because quantum randomness is a red herring that really has nothing to do with anything.
Furthermore, determinism and free will aren't really opposed to each other. At least, only nonsensical versions of 'free will' are incompatible with determinism.
I think "free will" requires some sort of metaphysical, supernatural force which controls one's decision making, etc. Something outside the realm of cause and effect, natural occurances, physical reality, science. A "soul," if you will.
As someone who doesn't believe in the supernatural, I don't think free will therefore exists. However, I think "free will" only matters for religious reasons. The illusion of free will, which we may call "free will" depending on our definition, is plenty for an atheist mindset, in my opinion. While it may all occur because of billions of small cause and effect relationships we probably will never fully understand, that doesn't matter in day to day life.
The only place free will matters, like I said, is within a religion. A mystical sort of free will, for example, has to exist for the Christian mythos of God and Angels and Original Sin, etc to make sense. Since a religious person probably already holds some supernatural beliefs, they probably won't have a problem believing in a soul. For them, that's the answer to free will.
The only problem I have with this example is that it's not really a choice. Your natural instinct for self-preservation pretty much guarantees that you're going to do everything you can to avoid the face-stabby. You're not really deciding between cake and death, you're deciding between death and not-death.
I've read the discussion about brain chemicals and particles making a predetermined decision for you. I've read the part saying that nobody should be considered "great" for anything they're simply preprogrammed to do.
What about a situation where you're faced with the choice of dying or not, and you choose death even though dying is the last thing you want to do and it's totally against your natural instincts? An example would be the soldier who throws himself on a grenade to save his squadmates. Surely he has many reasons to live...family & friends back home, a job, a whole life outside of his military career...but in that critical instant he...or something within him...chooses to die and give all of that up so that his buddies don't have to.
Even if you don't consider it to be a "free will" choice...even if that soldier was "predestined" to make that decision in that moment...is even that not enough to be considered an act of heroism?
Or are we really just worthless lumps of flesh acting out roles predetermined by the circumstances in our lives, in which case there really is no meaning to it all and we should just all kill ourselves because hey, what's it matter anyway?
I mean, all this discussion about synapses and chemicals is neat, it really is. But it sounds more like a "How Stuff Works" article than anything else, because it's really only explaining how things happen the way they do and not why. If it's a given that there's a lot we don't know about the brain, why are so many people speaking with such apparent certainty merely based on what we do know?
Man, this thread is deep. My brain chemicals hurt. I think it's time for some pudding.
My understasnding is that our conciousness is experiencing an illusion.
Escaping from the illusion wouldn't generally mean much, I think, if you're talking about merely understanding the situation. If you're talking about eliminating things like the readiness potential though, that would be both interesting and weird.
Also, and this is partially directed at saint2e, the point (or, at least, one point) of praise is that it is another incentive structure. People enjoy receiving praise, ergo they try harder to receive it. It essentially makes the environment riper for individuals who excel. Some people are more capable than others, or "get luckier" than others. I see no reason to not give them praise as well, as it's not like praise necessarily has no effect on them.
First, I don't have to "prove" anything, no does anyone else. That's asking for a degree of certainty that is untenable in most intellectual pursuits. The relationship of our brains to the way we experience the world isn't, from what I understand, a hotly disputed subject. Fiddling around with various parts of the brain will affect our experiences. Similarly, the effect of our environments is also, from what I understand, fairly well established via experiment.
I agree with everything you said.
An alternative is that we are caught in a situation where the results of our actions are merely the necessary components for the rest of existence to continue functioning. Sort of like all the crazy stuff that happens at the atomic level like particles decaying or not decaying and such.
However, all that is nonsensical and I will discuss a more plausible reason for free will existing. It would make sense that we are going to do a lot of things in life because situations combine to force us to a given conclusion. But I think that in our ability to observe and judge ourselves and our environment lies the seeds of free will, even if we choose not to act. Free will is a lot like chaos I think, in that it is the disruption of pattern for no purpose.
Specifically, you are attributing "purpose" to the universe at large. Why should it have purpose?
This thread reminds me of the above strip from XKCD. Assuming there is no free will, what now? How does this affect anything, other than to say "I now believe/am convinced that there is no free will (and all metaphysical things that it relates to)?" Will I look at a situation and go "Well, since there's no free will, I guess I'll stab you, it was meant to be, asshole!"? This is an interesting debate, but I fail to understand the implications.
Also, what is all this about a person suddenly not being responsible for something just because of a lack of free will? All of what comprises that "person" still did the act, and in cases where they could do it again, why not seek to prevent them from that and go through the motions as you were meant to do as well? Sure, they couldn't do anything else, but if free will doesn't exist, they wouldn't ever have done anything different, so why shouldn't they take the blame for their actions?
It's really not an interesting debate to me. It's just a matter of clarification. My only real interest (as it were) in the thread is that even in the context of a religion (where your choices may send you to heaven or hell) there isn't free will and the concept still makes essentially no sense.
In your answer to my question you said that it's the consciousness that experiences the illusion of free will. Within the context of being a conscious being, doesn't "free will" actually make perfect sense, and refer to an experience that other conscious beings will recognise and understand?
I suppose the drift of that question was, if you declare free will to be meaningless, aren't you also saying that the consciousness is meaningless? In the sense that the consciousness perceives itself as undergoing processes which are of a radically different type to the mere movement of particles in (say) a puddle or a bowl of soup. But from the all-seeing, all-understanding perspective which can observe the universe as being deterministic, wouldn't it perceive this self-regard of the consciousness as something "different" as being as illusory as free will itself is?
I'm not sure I understand the first paragraph, as you seem to be conflating conciousness and free will, particularly with respect to the first sentance of your second paragraph. Your "...refer to an experience that other concious beings will recognize and understand" bit seems wrong on its face, as it plainly refers to something that a fair number of concious beings don't recognize and/or don't understand (almost certainly, I think, because the concept itself makes very little sense).
Yes.
It's just shorthand for the complex interplay of determined events which lead us to prefer one thing over another, or associate one thing with another.
If you know what the outcome will be with set of input x, you can modify x such that a new outcome is achieved. You could potentially have a form of mind control with this method. In reality, the computational power and access to data that this would require, not to mention the resources necessary to alter things happening outside of the mind that you want to control, would most likely make this impossible.
Originally, we just used psychology and the occasional pummeling.
Then we added chemicals, aside from those naturally produced by our bodies.
Now, we can cram electrodes in your brain or have you pop pills.
In your first post, you said that we don't have free will, we just have the illusion of control. But everyone has experienced that illusion, right? (Well, perhaps there are some marginal cases, but you get the drift.) So the term "free will" refers to that experience. That's what I'm saying, basically, when I say that "free will refer to an experience that other conscious beings will recognise and understand".
I don't mean to conflate consciousness with free will, but I do mean to connect them. From within the experience of consciousness, then willing things, apparently freely, is something that we experience and can describe and share with other conscious beings and so on... I suppose what I'm trying to get at is that while from the perspective of a hypothesized "ultimate reality" or "total knowledge", this might be an illusion, then, because we live in that illusion, unless there's some way to "step out of it", we might as well regard that illusion as reality. My guess is that to step out of the illusion of free will (as opposed to merely proposing that it is an illusion) would be a step of a similarly radical nature to stepping out of consciousness.