The Illusion of Free Will: A Scientific Perspective

[Travis_King]

What's the likelihood of the universe being deterministic and you knowing anything that resembles truth?

What is the likelihood of me having an apple and you having an orange?

I thought perception was also a deterministic event and the way things seem to play out. Without some sort of emergent free will science would be saying goodbye to veracity and "Hello deterministic events". You'd have no control over ANYTHING, including scientific theories and propositions.

You have control in the sense that determinism describes how (or by what mechanism) the components of the system function. If it's the case that as a result of a deterministic universe humans have collectively come up with veracity in science, then it is entirely likely and plausible that they will continue to be veracious in this way.

This is entirely incorrect. It's saying that a book's story is entirely correct because the events in it follow proper science as defined within the story's plot. It sounds a bit like "the Bible is true because the Bible says so"

Yet another gross overexaggeration.

Perhaps I should have used the term logically consistent, or reliable, as opposed to accurate (though I debate this on the grounds that if something is logically consistent and repeatable, then I can think of no reason why it should not be called "accurate" as well). But my point was not to demonstrate how the skeptic is wrong, but rather that this idea:

suppose that it is true. Then it'll guarantee that scientists will draw the conclusions that they do draw, even when those conclusions are false

Is untrue. If a scientist is doing his work with veracity and rigorous methods, then he should trust that repeatable conclusions are accurate. Whether we are somehow misguided and things which accurately explain observable phenomena are in some way false (or the explanations unknowable) is a matter for epistemologists. Just becasue determinism is true, a biologist needn't worry that his conclusions about observable, repeatable biological phenomena are false.

Determinism doesn't lead you away from truth simply because you have "no choice" but to go along with it. If it is determined that a person does good science and comes up with a good conclusion, then that's fine, if it is logically consistent and coherent, then others will agree. If his science is crap, then his conclusion will be crap, and others will point this out.

Logic, mathematics, all these systems which we use to examine our world. Are you suggesting that, despite constant efforts and demonstrating their consistency and coherence and applicability, that a deterministic framework means that this cohesion is an illusion? That we are fooling ourselfs into believing that 1+1=2, when in reality it doesn't?

 

[Maui]

What is the likelihood of me having an apple and you having an orange?

Well, you clearly missed the point, in a deterministic environment there is no such thing as 'likelihood'.

You have control in the sense that determinism describes how (or by what mechanism) the components of the system function.

Then you have a a very skewed perception of what 'control' means. 'Describes how' is very different to 'control'. You should discard 'control' and use 'You describe how determinism describes the components...' which is tautologiocal statement.

If it's the case that as a result of a deterministic universe humans have collectively come up with veracity in science, then it is entirely likely and plausible that they will continue to be veracious in this way.

The question is how would humans, being deterministic processes, come up with veracity in science? You are not making sense and substituting unknowns with impossible and unseen miracles.

Yet another gross overexaggeration.

Perhaps I should have used the term logically consistent, or reliable, as opposed to accurate (though I debate this on the grounds that if something is logically consistent and repeatable, then I can think of no reason why it should not be called "accurate" as well).

What you refer to as 'logically consistent' can only be regarded as 'logically consistent' by those who believe a forced deterministic 'conclusion' is carrying any weight at all. One of the distinctive features of free will is that we can doubt. If one has no doubts about one's beliefs, i guess one could label oneself a deterministic voice let off by a chemical goo.

Is untrue. If a scientist is doing his work with veracity and rigorous methods, then he should trust that repeatable conclusions are accurate. Whether we are somehow misguided and things which accurately explain observable phenomena are in some way false (or the explanations unknowable) is a matter for epistemologists. Just becasue determinism is true, a biologist needn't worry that his conclusions about observable, repeatable biological phenomena are false.

A biologist would have all the resons in the world to doubt his conclusions had they been predetermined by events in the 17th century. I see no reason to even call them 'conclusions'.

Determinism doesn't lead you away from truth simply because you have "no choice" but to go along with it. If it is determined that a person does good science and comes up with a good conclusion, then that's fine, if it is logically consistent and coherent, then others will agree. If his science is crap, then his conclusion will be crap, and others will point this out.

Do you even understand that whether 'others will agree' was something that was decided by events in the far past and logic had no say in it in any imaginable way?

Logic, mathematics, all these systems which we use to examine our world. Are you suggesting that, despite constant efforts and demonstrating their consistency and coherence and applicability, that a deterministic framework means that this cohesion is an illusion? That we are fooling ourselfs into believing that 1+1=2, when in reality it doesn't?

If we are not thinking but producing noise in accordance with events in the past, 1+1=2 can only be 'true' within the plot that has been developing for billions of years.

 

[Travis_King]

Well, you clearly missed the point, in a deterministic environment there is no such thing as 'likelihood'.

That clearly wasn't your point.

The question is how would humans, being deterministic processes, come up with veracity in science? You are not making sense and substituting unknowns with impossible and unseen miracles.

I really don't understand how this is ruled out by determinism? Care to explain this further?

What you refer to as 'logically consistent' can only be regarded as 'logically consistent' by those who believe a forced deterministic 'conclusion' is carrying any weight at all. One of the distinctive features of free will is that we can doubt. If one has no doubts about one's beliefs, i guess one could label oneself a deterministic voice let off by a chemical goo.

Does my conclusion that 1+1=2 lose it's logical consistency in a deterministic framework?

A biologist would have all the resons in the world to doubt his conclusions had they been predetermined by events in the 17th century. I see no reason to even call them 'conclusions'.

No, he wouldn't. How do you justify this claim? If a hypothesis is made, and the experiment by which it is tested is directly observable, and a repeatable and coherent conclusion is drawn based on those results, what does it matter if the events were determined? I don't see how a need for free will comes into this at all.

Do you even understand that whether 'others will agree' was something that was decided by events in the far past and logic had no say in it in any imaginable way?

Do you understand that whether or not determinism is true, things are still carried out by people (the agents of events). The scientific community will agree with something if it is logically consistent and repeatable. Are you proposing that determinism, what, tricks people into thinking things? That sounds like fatalism, not determinism.

If we are not thinking but producing noise in accordance with events in the past, 1+1=2 can only be 'true' within the plot that has been developing for billions of years.

C'mon now.

 

[Maui]

No, he wouldn't. How do you justify this claim? If a hypothesis is made, and the experiment by which it is tested is directly observable, and a repeatable and coherent conclusion is drawn based on those results, what does it matter if the events were determined?

So you still fail to see a difference between being forced to make a decision and making the decision on your own? What if someone were to put a gun to your wife's head and demanded that she acknowledged that she were a jihadist? You would accept that for truth? Really?

I don't see how a need for free will comes into this at all.

Because you are obviously unable to tell apart forced behavior from voluntary one.

Do you understand that whether or not determinism is true, things are still carried out by people (the agents of events). The scientific community will agree with something if it is logically consistent and repeatable. Are you proposing that determinism, what, tricks people into thinking things? That sounds like fatalism, not determinism.

When did i claim the community wouldn't agree? Their actions would be determined by small variations of input parameters in the brain, so why should we be concerned what they have to say? As far as free will is concerned, both determinism and fatalism preclude free will and it's determinism which tricks people into 'thinking' things, if one were to hold a deterministic view of the world.

C'mon now.

Good point. Reminds me that a lot of times we produce deterministic noise. But sometimes there's a signal, we call it 'ideas'(they drive the world) and I've come to appreciate it when the signal to noise ratio is above 50%. The bright minds who are able to produce a signal seem to be the ones who set us the most apart from the animal kingdom and the reigns of determinism.

 

[Bill_McEnaney]

Is untrue. If a scientist is doing his work with veracity and rigorous methods, then he should trust that repeatable conclusions are accurate. Whether we are somehow misguided and things which accurately explain observable phenomena are in some way false (or the explanations unknowable) is a matter for epistemologists. Just becasue determinism is true, a biologist needn't worry that his conclusions about observable, repeatable biological phenomena are false.

Travis, is determinism true or isn't it? You seem to be contradicting yourself. First, you say that determinism untrue. Then you tell us that "Just because it is true . . ."

Determinism doesn't lead you away from truth simply because you have "no choice" but to go along with it. If it is determined that a person does good science and comes up with a good conclusion, then that's fine, if it is logically consistent and coherent, then others will agree. If his science is crap, then his conclusion will be crap, and others will point this out.

Consistency is a necessary condition for truth, not a sufficient condition for it. A proposition or a set of propositions is true only if it's consistent, but not if and only if it's consistent. Truth implies consistency, but consistency doesn't imply truth. Propositions are mutually consistent if and only if they can be true together. They're true if and only if they conform to reality.

Truths can be incoherent. For example, the can be irrelevant to one another. In fact, their truth and their consistency may be the only logical properties that they have in common.

Logic, mathematics, all these systems which we use to examine our world. Are you suggesting that, despite constant efforts and demonstrating their consistency and coherence and applicability, that a deterministic framework means that this cohesion is an illusion? That we are fooling ourselfs into believing that 1+1=2, when in reality it doesn't?

Of course not. My point is that if laws of nature guarantee that we'll believe what we in fact do believe, even when that belief is false, we may be unable to know whether we know anything.

 

[Travis_King]

Travis, is determinism true or isn't it? You seem to be contradicting yourself. First, you say that determinism untrue. Then you tell us that "Just because it is true . . ."

How should I know?

In these discussions there is typically in an implicit agreement that we'll assume one way or the other. Generally when talking about determinism we assume the positive.

Consistency is a necessary condition for truth, not a sufficient condition for it. A proposition or a set of propositions is true only if it's consistent, but not if and only if it's consistent. Truth implies consistency, but consistency doesn't imply truth. Propositions are mutually consistent if and only if they can be true together. They're true if and only if they conform to reality.

Sure. Still don't get your point.

Mine is that whether or not the universe operates deterministically, if our observations don't conform to reality then our conclusions are inadequate.

Yes, if it is the case that our observations don't conform to reality, that the conclusions that we draw are inaccurate. Then, I suppose determinism is indirectly responsible for that. But determinsm itself does not preclude accurate observation of reality.

It is equally likely that our observations perfectly reflect reality, in which case every conclusion, having been determined by the initial state of the universe, is perfectly capable of being accurate, or true.

Of course not. My point is that if laws of nature guarantee that we'll believe what we in fact do believe, even when that belief is false, we may be unable to know whether we know anything.

But you are not looking at the whole picture. Why does it guarantee the things we believe? How? It's not an operator, constantly fidgeting and adjusting our minds to shape our beliefs. That's what I meant when I said it describes the way the world works.

When you believe something, you do so for reasons. You have evidence, you have theories, you have experiences to weigh this evidence against, you have subconscious motivations for your beliefs, biases, etc. These things all factor into your forming a belief. This is the mechanism by which a deterministic universe would "guarantee" your belief.

Do you see what I mean about determinism not being the problem? If it is the case that we act rationally and our observations relfect reality, then conclusions drawn in a deterministic universe can be accurate, or true. If our observations do not accurately reflect reality, then our conclusions are suspect. But this does not change whether we have a deterministic framework or not.

Can you give a hypothetical example of what you mean by laws of nature guaranteeing a belief that is false?

If we look at it, it happens all the time on the individual scale. If I as a youth mistakenly believe that 1+1=3, then as you say, determinism guaranteed that I would hold a false belief. But then a teacher corrects me. "No, Travis, 1+1=2." That correction is part of the continuing deterministic chain of events, so after that I hold the belief that 1+1=2. Determinism guaranteed that, as well.

EDIT: And I still don't really see how free will helps us...

 

[Travis_King]

So you still fail to see a difference between being forced to make a decision and making the decision on your own? What if someone were to put a gun to your wife's head and demanded that she acknowledged that she were a jihadist? You would accept that for truth? Really?

Admittedly, my view of the self is probably putting a bias on what you mean by "forcing you to make a decision".

What does it mean to make a decision "on your own". When you make a decision, you are doing it because you want to for the most part, right? If determinism is true, the want doesn't go away. You still want to do that thing, and when you do it, I don't understand why it automatically becomes something that is not your own.

The problem, I think, stems from what we mean by "you", not the cause of the decision.

Because you are obviously unable to tell apart forced behavior from voluntary one.

Forced by what, may I ask?

Because the mechanism by which determinism would "force" you to do something would be, basically, by "making" you feel your desires, emotions, and motivations. Basically, determinism "forces" you to choose as you want to choose?

it's determinism which tricks people into 'thinking' things, if one were to hold a deterministic view of the world.

Where do you get this idea from?

Good point. Reminds me that a lot of times we produce deterministic noise. But sometimes there's a signal, we call it 'ideas'(they drive the world) and I've come to appreciate it when the signal to noise ratio is above 50%. The bright minds who are able to produce a signal seem to be the ones who set us the most apart from the animal kingdom and the reigns of determinism.

So now we come to the crux of things. Does the rest of the extant universe operate deterministically, and it is only our consciousness which divorces us from that?

 

[Bill_McEnaney]

Everyone,

I'm sorry I may not know how to answer your questions now when I've just listened to the Stanford Encyclopedia's article about causal determinism. Unfortunately, the physics is too, too hard for me because I'm too ignorant about the mathematics that it uses.

After my computer read me the encyclopedia article, one description of determinism sound much like Carl Hempel's Hypothetico-Deductive Model of Scientific Explanation. To sum it up, Hempel believes that with a set of initial conditions and the laws of nature, you can deduce what will happen. The laws and the conditions imply that the events will happen.

The encyclopedia article suggests to me that for determinism to work the way Hempel's model says that scientific explanation works, you'd need to know everything about the universe's current state, however elusive that knowledge may be.

Travis, I misinterpreted what you told us about consistency, coherence, cohesion and repeatability. Although I didn't think much about Plato's Early Socratic Dialogues, my misinterpretation of you thoughts reminded me that in those dialogues, Socrates believes that logical consistency is a sufficient condition for truth. You seemed pragmatic enough to settle for consistency, coherence, cohesion and repeatability if scientific arguments were inconclusive. I'm sorry because I suspect that I barely skimmed what you wrote. Shame on me and on my impulsive streak.

 

[Pythagorean]

So you still fail to see a difference between being forced to make a decision and making the decision on your own? What if someone were to put a gun to your wife's head and demanded that she acknowledged that she were a jihadist? You would accept that for truth? Really?

This really is a non sequitor. It has nothing to do with the discussion of determinism. The question isn't whether you can make choices, but whether you actually choose to make choices. That is, determinism doesn't contest "will", it contests "free will".

Consider a system... information enters the system and it does an internal calculation and the system move five feet left; alternatively, an external force pushes it five feet left. The question of whether those internal calculations are deterministic is different than the question of whether the influence came from internally or externally.

 

[Travis_King]

Bill, this question has been debated for centuries...it seems you aren't alone in not knowing the answers!

With regards to your last point, yea, mostly I take a pragmatic stance on the idea of "truth". However I do recognize that the pragmatic "necessary conditions" for truth are not really all that convincing from an epistemological standpoint.

I know some people who hear the pragmatic argument and think it amounts to saying, "Well, this seems to be good enough. Let's stop here, I'm pretty sure we're ok saying we 'know' this to be a 'truth'." It's hard to say who's right.

For anyone else still reading, I'd like to see a discussion on what the necessary conditions are for "free". As one might have deduced from my argument a couple pages back, I believe that freedom is whatever we want to do. Our freedom is only challenged by coercion, which is to say anything which 'forces' us or demands that we do something which we do not agree with, or which we do not want to, or cannot, do.

 

[Pythagorean]

For anyone else still reading, I'd like to see a discussion on what the necessary conditions are for "free". As one might have deduced from my argument a couple pages back, I believe that freedom is whatever we want to do. Our freedom is only challenged by coercion, which is to say anything which 'forces' us or demands that we do something which we do not agree with, or which we do not want to, or cannot, do.

I think that's my problem with free will too. I don't really know of a reasonable definition. Here's how I see the definitions:

will: the ability for an organism to carry out its chosen action

free will: the idea that organisms chose actions independently of determinism, i.e. independent of influences from the physical world.

In behavioral sciences, this isn't a very helpful idea. There would be no way to model it. But more importantly, it seems to be unnecessary. People's decisions are found to ultimately come down to a combination of biological, psychological, and social factors, all twisted in a complicated spiral of emergent behavior. It's like dropping a handful of tic-tacs. You can't predict exactly what pattern will come out because off all the small differences in initial conditions, but you know all the forces involved and how they generally statistical outcomes over a large number of trials.

 

[Bill_McEnaney]

Bill, this question has been debated for centuries...it seems you aren't alone in not knowing the answers!

That's comforting. The older I get, the more I need to question what I believe. I'm something like Socrates. He thought long and hard about why anyone would believe that he was wise. "Well," he said to himself, "maybe it's because I know that I'm ignorant." As you know, in the Early Socratic Dialogues, he usually made fools of proud people who thought they already knew the right answers to his questions. Too often, they only repeated widely-held false opinions.

With regards to your last point, yea, mostly I take a pragmatic stance on the idea of "truth". However I do recognize that the pragmatic "necessary conditions" for truth are not really all that convincing from an epistemological standpoint.

I believe that truth consists of conformity between the intellect and reality. I say "intellect" first because too many people want to conform reality to their their intellects, not the other way around. I want to know how things actually are. If the word shows me that I'm wrong about something, it's time for me to change my mind. I'm not going to be a relativist about truth.

Maybe I told you guys about Karl Popper's asymmetry between confirmation and refutation. The idea is that any scientific inductive argument is always inconclusive when it supports its conclusion. However many experiments confirm it, there's no contradiction in saying that there may be a counterexample that disproves it conclusively. You might count a million white swans when you're testing your theory that all swans are white. That strong statistical evidence will help you write a strong inductive argument for that conclusion. But that conclusion is still false because some swans are black. Some scientific belief may only seem to be knowledge.

I know some people who hear the pragmatic argument and think it amounts to saying, "Well, this seems to be good enough. Let's stop here, I'm pretty sure we're ok saying we 'know' this to be a 'truth'." It's hard to say who's right.

Many do that. But you can still ask the pragmatist why they believe the pragmatic theory about truth is true. If they appeal to usefulness when you ask them to argue for that theory, their argument probably will be useless for proving what they want it to prove. After all, it probably will be circular.

For anyone else still reading, I'd like to see a discussion on what the necessary conditions are for "free". As one might have deduced from my argument a couple pages back, I believe that freedom is whatever we want to do. Our freedom is only challenged by coercion, which is to say anything which 'forces' us or demands that we do something which we do not agree with, or which we do not want to, or cannot, do.

The trouble is, at least for me, that some coercion can be internal and other coercion can be external. I can still ask whether laws of nature determine what I choose by governing what happens in my body.

 

[apeiron]

For anyone else still reading, I'd like to see a discussion on what the necessary conditions are for "free". As one might have deduced from my argument a couple pages back, I believe that freedom is whatever we want to do. Our freedom is only challenged by coercion, which is to say anything which 'forces' us or demands that we do something which we do not agree with, or which we do not want to, or cannot, do.

Another way to look at it is that global constraints create local freedoms. So anything that is not globally forbidden, can - indeed must - happen.

So toss a die and the constraints - all the information that went into creating a six-sixed object that got properly thrown - do determine a lot, but are then indifferent about which face actually lands.

This seems merely an epistemological view of determinism. But it becomes ontological if you accept that there are quantum or chaotic limits to measurement - if you believe you can never obtain the complete information needed to constrain a system's degrees of freedom to a single determined outcome.

So this re-frames the physical level model of determinism.

You then want to step up to ask how human choice fits with this model. Again, a key point often overlooked is that it is our awareness of social and physical constraints on our personal degrees of freedom that creates a sense of being choosers. If we know we are meant to do one thing, this is why we know equally that there is now the option of acting in contrary fashion.

But then what we actually do becomes a mix of this social "coercion", the world's physical limits (we can't decide to levitate, etc) and the information we supply ourselves (all the stuff like our memories, goals, physiological state, etc).

So the effective freedom we have is to combine a variety of kinds of information to weave our own highly personalised states of global constraint (our moment to moment states of intentional awareness). And these mental states then act top-down to highly constraint (tightly determine) the activities of our bodies (we shift our feet - they have no choice - because we want to get to the kitchen).

Freewill remains a perennial debate because people are attached to a particular mechanical notion of determinism (one where the global constraints, like the laws of physics, are treated as mysteriously immaterial - the necessary information must be held in the mind of God perhaps ). And then the opposite of determined is taken as random.

But a systems approach demands that we account for all the information driving a process in a material fashion. And so already we are asking the question, well who determined things to be this way? Who constructed the global constraints that define the local degrees of freedom in play?

 

[audioloop]

to look at it is that global constraints create local freedoms. So anything that is not globally forbidden, can - indeed must - happen.

reframed:

it is not possible, is determined.

and

and what is possible, is likewise determined (by the former).
...then, a full determinism.

 

[lavinia]

I generally think that free-will is an illusion; but free-will can be a big subject with different peoples having different connotations.

I differentiate it form will-power. Will-power is an organism's ability to get what it wants. Free-will is the notion that the organism can choose what it wants. There's definitely will-power, but free-will seems like it would evade cause and effect and as far as we have measured, we don't do that.

What do you think of the probably antiquated idea that free will is the ability to choose to do good?

 

[Ryan_m_b]

...ability to choose...

Is there even a good definition for this?

 

[someGorilla]

What do you think of the probably antiquated idea that free will is the ability to choose to do good?

If you assume there's something as the "ability to choose" you are already begging the question.

 

[jduster]

Is there even a good definition for this?

yes, there is an adequate definition, but not a pleasant, flattering or satisfying one.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

yes, there is an adequate definition, but not a pleasant, flattering or satisfying one.

Go on, put me out of my misery.

 

[lavinia]

If you assume there's something as the "ability to choose" you are already begging the question.

I haven't thought this through analytically. Perhaps you could help.

What for instance does it mean to have the ability to choose anything?

 

[Pythagorean]

What do you think of the probably antiquated idea that free will is the ability to choose to do good?

Free will is just the ability to choose choices (good or bad) depending on how you define "choose".

What for instance does it mean to have the ability to choose anything?

There's two different versions of choose that automatically must come out of this discussion. At some level, we make a decision, we "choose". But did we choose to choose? I.e. was that process of choosing deterministic or is there some magical violation of cause and effect (a spirit, a soul: free will) that allows us to engage in behavior independent of causality?

I think most people elect to believe in the magical violation, simply because it's a natural, normal part of consciousness to believe so, to operate as a functionally independent agent. But I think the reality is that our behavior is more deterministic.

 

[lavinia]

Free will is just the ability to choose choices (good or bad) depending on how you define "choose".


There's two different versions of choose that automatically must come out of this discussion. At some level, we make a decision, we "choose". But did we choose to choose? I.e. was that process of choosing deterministic or is there some magical violation of cause and effect (a spirit, a soul: free will) that allows us to engage in behavior independent of causality?

I think most people elect to believe in the magical violation, simply because it's a natural, normal part of consciousness to believe so, to operate as a functionally independent agent. But I think the reality is that our behavior is more deterministic.

ok but you still can have or not have the ability to choose to do good. That is not controversial. What is controversial to me is why we choose not to.

 

[Pythagorean]

"Good" is a value judgment. We're taught "good" by our parents and peers and society (and of course, genetics certainly plays some role too, as we've adapted to altruism to some extent). Our frontal lobes are left open to tweaking all the way through to our early 20's when they finally get "finalized" (myelination). But this is only one part of the brain and it is in competition with other parts of the brain. Depending on development, genetics, and social happenstance, different people will have a stronger "good" muscle in their brain than others.

Sociopaths have a particular "dysfunction" in their neurobiology in their amygdala, an important emotional aspect of weighing "good" and "bad" (in fact, amygdala has direct connections to the orbitofrontal cortex). In many cases, sociopaths "choose" not to do good because they don't have the same value judgment as you or I may have about what is "good" (they may know on some intellectual leve that society does not like it, but they do not emotionally feel the same way about it that you or I might). In other cases, you or I may just disagree on what "good" is based on our cultural norms. In yet other cases, people's primal brains just tend to over power their social brain, possibly because this is precisely the behavior that has worked for them in their development period (i.e. they've somehow been rewarded for it, which can be typical in neglectful parenting cases, where negative behavior gets the child some attention when positive behavior doesn't).

on psychopathy:
http://bjp.rcpsych.org/content/182/1/5.full

 

[someGorilla]

ok but you still can have or not have the ability to choose to do good. That is not controversial. What is controversial to me is why we choose not to.

I don't see why choosing to do good should be regarded as something different from choosing to eat an ice cream. What has "good" to do with the existence of free will? A certain climate can do me good; does the climate have free will?
I'm also quite persuaded that "good" can have a meaning only at the level of human interrelationships - a level at which free will manifestly exists (for any sensible notion of "exists"). But there's not, for me anyway, any definition nor any meaning of "good" at the deeper level of analysis at which you can wonder if free will exists.
Also, what is choosing? If you choose to do something then you have free will? Fine. But did you choose to choose it, or were you necessitated to choose it? Did you choose to choose to choose it? Of course the chain can't be followed very far, it gets totally fuzzy after the first one or two links. The concept itself of choosing goes out of focus the more you try to pin it down. There is experimental evidence that (at least some of) our acts of choosing happen way before we are aware of them. I'll look for a link to that. Experiments have been made – by magnetic resonance imaging if I recall well – monitoring a given area of a subject's cortex and foreseeing with an advance of seconds a choice he would make. Seconds is a lot. Even microseconds would be a lot (it it were possible to time with that precision the occurrence of an act of choosing) but seconds is a macroscopic lot. It's scary. It gives a hard, experimentally tested reason to wonder whether the one who is choosing in your head is really you.
What I think is that in order to state that free will exists, or even to negate that free will exists, you need to be speaking of somebody's free will. The question whether free will exists makes sense as long as you have a metaphysical concept of a conscious being, person, soul, call it what you want. Here is the rub. If we are talking at the low level of quantum mechanics, there are no consciences, and it makes no sense to talk of free will. (Funny how there are people wanting to see free will in quantum indeterminacy, refraining from referring to conscience lest they appear animistic or something.) If we are talking at the high "hi, how are you?" level of human interactions, you do what you want and you expect people to do what they want, and that's it. If you mix levels, which is both intellectually fascinating and unavoidable, you get stuck in the mud of thought.
I don't think the question has an answer – other than saying that free will and determinism are not in contradiction. At least I am in good company (from Kant to Buddha).
If someone cares to argue that free will and determinism are in fact mutually exclusive, can he give clear definitions of both? Possibily in logical (symbolic) form? I think it will be easy to show that no contradiction exists, or that the definitions rest on some unresolved vagueness.
But being the scientifically-minded basher that I am I'd like real facts to get better ideas from. Who knows where the future will lead us. If we ever reach a theory capable to describe effectively the workings of the brain (everything from atoms to the whole system), we might have new ground to set this discussion on. Same if we could build a conscious machine – but I suspect the most logical way to do it would be to leave it grow and self-organize, thus losing the power to describe its inner workings.

 

[marty1]

In my experience "free will" is used as an excuse to explain why some people make the wrong decisions.

 

[lavinia]

"Good" is a value judgment. We're taught "good" by our parents and peers and society (and of course, genetics certainly plays some role too, as we've adapted to altruism to some extent). Our frontal lobes are left open to tweaking all the way through to our early 20's when they finally get "finalized" (myelination). But this is only one part of the brain and it is in competition with other parts of the brain. Depending on development, genetics, and social happenstance, different people will have a stronger "good" muscle in their brain than others.

Sociopaths have a particular "dysfunction" in their neurobiology in their amygdala, an important emotional aspect of weighing "good" and "bad" (in fact, amygdala has direct connections to the orbitofrontal cortex). In many cases, sociopaths "choose" not to do good because they don't have the same value judgment as you or I may have about what is "good" (they may know on some intellectual leve that society does not like it, but they do not emotionally feel the same way about it that you or I might). In other cases, you or I may just disagree on what "good" is based on our cultural norms. In yet other cases, people's primal brains just tend to over power their social brain, possibly because this is precisely the behavior that has worked for them in their development period (i.e. they've somehow been rewarded for it, which can be typical in neglectful parenting cases, where negative behavior gets the child some attention when positive behavior doesn't).

on psychopathy:
http://bjp.rcpsych.org/content/182/1/5.full

- Many actions that would be judged as heinous - e.g. euthanasia against mentally challenged people or against a race of people that are viewed as inferior - involve value judgements.

- To me there is a difference between what is good and what is the right thing to do in a particular situation. In the first case, there can be no disagreement. In the second case, there can.

i put it this way because my naive sense is that the idea of good in this setting is not meant to be relative.

 

[lavinia]

I don't see why choosing to do good should be regarded as something different from choosing to eat an ice cream.

Well then I will cancel all of my charitable donations and spend the money on Hagendaas coffee ice cream. Yum.

 

[chiro]

In my experience "free will" is used as an excuse to explain why some people make the wrong decisions.

Freedom is the ability make your own choices and live with the consequences of them.

How can you get a better system than that?

 

[chiro]

- Many actions that would be judged as heinous - e.g. euthanasia against mentally challenged people or against a race of people that are viewed as inferior - involve value judgements.

- To me there is a difference between what is good and what is the right thing to do in a particular situation. In the first case, there can be no disagreement. In the second case, there can.

i put it this way because my naive sense is that the idea of good in this setting is not meant to be relative.

Both of these outcomes are based on perceptive decisions that are completely narrow relative to a much more global viewpoint of perception.

This mistake is made all the time because people think they have global understanding about situations when they don't.

Hell most people can't even think about the decisions they make will affect themselves and others past a week or a year: how the hell can people comprehend the intracacies and relationships of things that occur on both massive time scales and also on massive scales of interrelationships?

The picture for all of us is always incomplete and the sooner we at least acknowledge that, the better off we will be.

 

[Pythagorean]

- Many actions that would be judged as heinous - e.g. euthanasia against mentally challenged people or against a race of people that are viewed as inferior - involve value judgements.

- To me there is a difference between what is good and what is the right thing to do in a particular situation. In the first case, there can be no disagreement. In the second case, there can.

i put it this way because my naive sense is that the idea of good in this setting is not meant to be relative.

I don't disagree with your examples of value judgments, but when you speak of an objective "good" does that imply that people who disagree with your perception of what that objective good is are wrong? How do you go about finding out which behaviors are objectively good when two people disagree on a behavior's nature?

And... more importantly, what does it have to do with free will?

 

[lavinia]

I don't disagree with your examples of value judgments, but when you speak of an objective "good" does that imply that people who disagree with your perception of what that objective good is are wrong? How do you go about finding out which behaviors are objectively good when two people disagree on a behavior's nature?

And... more importantly, what does it have to do with free will?

Those are good questions. Not sure if I even know how to think abut it.

I would guess that free will and Good are,in this context, connected. The ability to choose to eat ice cream for instance is neither good nor bad. The ability to choose to do good is free will. But maybe this is nonsense. I don't know. I am a little surprised though that the only idea of good proposed here is relativistic with some speculations about the workings of the nervous system thrown into justify it.

 

[lavinia]

Both of these outcomes are based on perceptive decisions that are completely narrow relative to a much more global viewpoint of perception.

Your language is too technical for me. Can you boil it down?

This mistake is made all the time because people think they have global understanding about situations when they don't.

\

I would agree with that - as would anyone I guess.

Hell most people can't even think about the decisions they make will affect themselves and others past a week or a year: how the hell can people comprehend the intricacies and relationships of things that occur on both massive time scales and also on massive scales of interrelationships?

True that.

The picture for all of us is always incomplete and the sooner we at least acknowledge that, the better off we will be.

Why will we be better off? I ask because in meditation the idea is to dispense with distracting thoughts to reach a state of inner completeness - the true self.

 

[Evo]

Well then I will cancel all of my charitable donations and spend the money on Hagendaas coffee ice cream. Yum.

This has become more a "random thoughts" thread suitable for GD than a discussion about the philosophical meaning, which is the intention of the guidelines.

All members need to have a working understanding of philosophy to post in this forum. Please read the guidelines, the rules for the first post apply throughout the thread.

 

[Maui]

There's two different versions of choose that automatically must come out of this discussion. At some level, we make a decision, we "choose". But did we choose to choose? I.e. was that process of choosing deterministic or is there some magical violation of cause and effect (a spirit, a soul: free will) that allows us to engage in behavior independent of causality?

I think most people elect to believe in the magical violation, simply because it's a natural, normal part of consciousness to believe so, to operate as a functionally independent agent. But I think the reality is that our behavior is more deterministic.

Yes, more deterministic or mostly deterministic is demonstrably true. At the same time, there are traits of conscious behavior that appear to rule over processes that govern bodily functions and behavior.

How can we explain someone(the self?) taking medication to correct harmful processes like cancer cells, viruses, autoimmune disorders, etc.? Does it make sense to say the processes chose the best medication for themselves or for other impaired processes(or other more qualified processes prescribed the best medication)? I agree we are zombie-like most of the time, this is beyond doubt as far as i am concerned, but there is seemingly more going on - processes can't be happy or sad, a solid case cannot be made that processes can understand, dream or imagine. There still seems to be a small corner to us that is still largely unexplored.

 

[Pythagorean]

Yes, more deterministic or mostly deterministic is demonstrably true. At the same time, there are traits of conscious behavior that appear to rule over processes that govern bodily functions and behavior.

How can we explain someone(the self?) taking medication to correct harmful processes like cancer cells, viruses, autoimmune disorders, etc.? Does it make sense to say the processes chose the best medication for themselves or for other impaired processes(or other more qualified processes prescribed the best medication)? I agree we are zombie-like most of the time, this is beyond doubt as far as i am concerned, but there is seemingly more going on - processes can't be happy or sad, a solid case cannot be made that processes can understand, dream or imagine. There still seems to be a small corner to us that is still largely unexplored.

You're saying:

"processes can't be happy or sad"
therefore
"a solid case cannot be made that processes can understand, dream, or imagine".
(and so, I presume, you mean determinism must not be the whole story?)

You are talking about the hard problem: how we can have subjective experience, but I think this is independent of the question of determinism. I disagree that processes can't be happy or sad, but that's probably for another thread to discuss our merits.