Another "Free Will" debate.

Great Debates
41

When I make a choice, it’s in a context. There are things I take into account. And of course I myself form the context in which the choice is made. I do not regard the choice as having been “caused” by any of those, but your mileage (and definition of “free will”) may vary.

To me, “no free will” implies that there is no meaningful sense in which there is an “I” who made a choice here; rather, the choice was dictated by extraneous factors alone. By “extraneous factors”, I mean that any other individual placed in the same situation would make the exact same choice (so “I” have nothing to do with it) or else the choices that I do make (if we pretend that we can stick me in the same situation over and over again and repeat the test of what choice I “would” make) do not differ significantly from those made by other individuals placed in the same situation (so again “I” have nothing to do with it).

I will also include among “extraneous factors” various aggregate categories into which I could be categorized, in such a way that if choices “I” make are not significantly different from choices that are or would be made by someone with (let’s say) the same hair color as me, then once again “I” have nothing to do with the choice, it’s explained by (or in part by) the category of which I am a representative example.

I will, however, split hairs: it doesn’t count if you work up such an elaborate description of extraneous factors that, in doing so, you’ve specifically described me. In other words, I may well behave exactly like any “other” person who has had exactly my life experiences (every single solitary second thereof, without the tiniest smattering of any variation) and is, at decision-making time, in exactly the same context. The reason it doesn’t count is that this is just a rewording of the concept of “me”. Who I am, the “I” who either does or does not possess free will, is something that possesses meaning only in relationship, and if you define the entirety of the rest of the universe as it relates to me you’ve defined me. That to me is in accordance with, not opposition to, free will.

Again, your terminologies may be different.

42

Isn’t that meaningless? There are in reality millions of reasons that conspired to then me posting here; yet, intellectually speaking, I could think it is very useless. It will be a crap shoot that someone will be interested in what I post, yet I posted, was that free will?

Not that that makes the religion’s flavor of free will valid: Knowing all of humanity does follow their own causes and specially knowing religion is an accident that depends mostly on were you are born, that that version of free will is a bunch of hooey. It is one of the main reasons why I do think there is no way there is a deity waiting at the end to take us to hell, either there is no deity, in which case there is nothing to worry anymore, or there is someone that already knows indeed that free will as expressed in religion today is silly, because we are mostly prisoners of this universe until we die.

However, I do think in discussions of free will we are acting always to exclude the middle.

There is randomness in the system, while I do think that classic free will is bananas, I’m not sure we can get rid of it totally. IMHO trying to influence our programed existence is one of the results of our evolution; yes, that is also not obtained by free will, but just as we became self aware we began to change the course of our nature and while the choice does remain limited, it seems our intelligence can overcome many situations nowadays that were a matter of destiny before. Of course, there is a lot of room for improvement.

43

Well according to Diogenes the Cynic it does.

44

I disagree that we humans will ever know all there is to be known, but for arguments sake, lets say we do…

That kind of knowledge is omniscience, right? I could then predict the future (any future) with certainty, including what my own actions will be, what will come of them, and so on.

So, what exactly be the nature of your existance? You become aware of what motivates you, you know what you will do because of that, and you know what will happen next. Kinda like passively watching some old rerun, don’t you think?

Ok. We eat food. We like the taste. We know that the chemicals in the food (say, choclate), mixed the way they do, stimulate the buds on our tongues in a particular way, and those in turn tickle the brain with the right impulses that we have interpreted as “mmm mmm good”. Since we like those impulses, we can predict that we will seek them out again in the future, under conditions set “just so”. Now, granted, knowing that, I still “enjoy” the tastes.

But alas, chocolate has a depressing effect on my waistline.

Here’s the choice. Eat chocolate, and enjoy the impulses, or, make sure that I don’t put myself in a situation were I will grab at the bon-bons.

Some folks seem content at being a passive observer as their bodies move about and poop. Just “being” is enough reason to go on. But it seems that trying to reduce the Human experience to a bunch of chemical reactions kinda “dehumanises” us. But then, we wouldn’t have to justify our actions (or inactions) either. Is that the goal here?

“Sorry, honey. I had to stick my wick in that girl. After all, I’m just a pile of hormones, after all, and I have no free will. Pass the salt, will ya?”

45

I was assuming for sake of argument that that was so, but was pointing out that there’s something here that thinks it’s an ‘I’, whether or not it really is one.

I’ll let you take that up with Dio, who said in post 6, “You will simply act according to programming.” I don’t care what we call it, really.

Who knows? But nobody’s telling a dog or a fruit fly that whatever level of self-awareness it has is bullshit because there is no self, so it can’t be existentially bothered by being told that. That is apparently strictly a human dilemma.

OK, but why should a part of a deterministic process have problems with being part of a strictly deterministic process? Why should the cookie ever crumble that way, except in the occasional statistical outlier? It does seem a lot like a fish being troubled by always being in water.

46

The best explanation I’ve heard for the concept of the self is this:

Our brains are extraordinarily complex means of communicating electrochemical signals back and forth over neural connections. Different parts of this network handle different functions: there’s a part of the network that processes inhibitions, the part of the network that processes aggression, the part of the network that processes empathy, the part of the network that processes laziness, etc.

There’s also a super-module in the brain: it takes input from each other part of the network, weighs the different inputs, and chooses a course of action based on these inputs. This super-module isn’t magical, supernatural, or divine: it’s just another set of neural pathways. But if I’m going to identify an “I” that makes choices, this super-module might be the best place to point at. That’s the part of me that’s most different from you, the part of me that gives me the most distinction to my personality.

Do I have “free will”? The idea is, as Dio said, incoherent if you believe that our consciousness exists entirely within our nervous system. All the networks in my brain are all I have to make my decisions; there’s no ghost in this body that’s directing things independently of neurochemical signals.

BUT: that super-module, along with all the other modules, have evolved to be discerning, creative, contemplative, etc. These are (to a certain degree) adaptive traits to have. It may be that I could not have chosen otherwise than I have chosen–but I have still chosen, through that process of weighing evidence, beliefs, opinions, etc. Those electrochemical processes are me, and they do make choices.

My will may not, in some metaphysical sense, be free; but that does not mean my will does not exist.

Daniel

47

Until you’ve included all the determinants of an action, you can’t calculate the result. Your prediction of the effect of chocolate on your waistline and your prediction of your wife’s response to infidelity are determinants too.

48

Well, I’d say it’s an adaptive trait to believe you have control over your destiny. If you believe this to be true–if you believe that the choices you make matter–you’re a lot likelier to make choices, especially choices that result in short-term difficulty. If you believe that you’ve got no control over your own existence, then you’re a lot more likely to be passive, and passivity over the long term is not going to be a successful reproductive strategy.

Daniel

49

But just because we are incorporating more variables into our internal model of the world (ourselves, for example), and possibly optimizing a more complex set of goals than animals with less advanced abstract thinking, there is no point where determinism falls away due to number of variables. It’s just a more complex thinking process but still just as deterministic as if we only had 3 neurons or even zero.

50

Do you believe that bonfires have free will? What do you do to a bonfire that’s getting out of control, going somewhere you don’t want it to go?

Three things:

  1. You apply an aversive (e.g., water) that will keep it away from the areas you don’t want it to go to; and
  2. You remove the stimulants (e.g., fuel) that are encouraging it to go to those areas; and
  3. You might add more stimulants (e.g., fuel) in the areas where you do want it to be active.

Folks are the same way, assuming we’re bags of chemicals. If we’re just meta-processing modules, and some super-module is evaluating the situation in a way that you don’t like, you change the situation. You apply aversives, you remove positive stimuli, you add positive stimuli to encourage the behavior you want.

“Yes, honey, you’re a bag of chemicals. So am I, and this bag of chemicals is experiencing great pain based on your actions. To modify the situation, this bag of chemicals is going to leave your sorry chemical ass. You’ll be hearing from my chemical lawyer.”

The adulterous super-module, confronted with these new stimuli, will probably evaluate the situation differently in the future.

Of course, if we raise kids well, then they come equipped with a super-module who can predict such events. They will realize that the negatives (including negative inputs from their neural network that controls empathy) outweigh the positives (including positive inputs from their neural entwork that controls lust). Their super-module will have been strengthened in its capacity for selecting those behaviors that will maximize the positives. And that’s where responsibility enters the picture.

Daniel

51

You didn’t address my question, which was, what is the point of existance if you knew all those determinants?

Because to know everything there is to know about myself, and all the things that may affect that decision (like the weather), kinda reduces a person to being a passive observer in life.

Today, I will do “xyz”. Tomorrow, because of the rain, my neighbor will cut me off on the highway, which will make me late for work, get fired, and yada yada yada.

What do you do with the knowledge of everything? What could motivate anyone to strive to be better at anything, or seek to improve their life when they know in advance that they will fail, based on the formula “abc”?

I didn’t win life’s lottery, because my IQ isn’t over 110. That means I am doomed to a lifetime of failure, poverty, and dissapointment. :confused:

52

I’m pretty much with Dio on this. The concept of free will in the STRONG sense is completely and utterly incoherent. We all make choices. We do so by some internal process we can trace back to something and identify it as “ourselves.” However, asserting that we are somehow free FROM OURSELVES makes no sense.

You cannot define or explain it. If you can, be my guest. Either explain what free will is, or even treat it like a black box if you need and at least explain what role it functionally plays in the making of choices that is different from it not being there. I don’t think you or anyone can. Hence it’s completely nonsensical to put it forth as a concept in any discussion on choice and responsibility.

The only real purpose of Free Will in the strong sense as far as I can tell, is to give an easy, nonsense word to use in place of an actual argument in a debate on theodicy.

Oh, but you aren’t a materialist? Well, when did I say you had to be? Be my guest: invent any sort of supernatural laws or elements or anything you wish. Just make sure you explain what difference any of them make or how they are relevant to the issue.

Explaining how a soul (whatever THAT is!) can have “Free Will” is no easier than explaining how a brain can have it. All the basic problems are still there. You can’t have responsibility without causality or at least some explanation of how the chooser choice one thing over another. But as soon as you’ve explained how a choice got made… you’ve left no room for “Free Will” to do anything.

Quite literally, then, the concept of Free Will demands practiced and dedicated ignorance on the question of how choices are made. As soon as you even start to think about choices in a rational manner, the entire concept collapses in on itself.

53

It is more complex than that, IIRC there is something like a mirror effect in our brain that is giving us self-awareness, IOWs it is not just the neurons.

54

You’re assuming there is a point to existence.

Good thing we’re not omniscient then, eh? :wink:

55

If any moral “choice” is the result of causes and not free will - how can the can the choice be labelled, in any way, moral? If one’s choices are pre-determined, it seems meaningless to assign a moral value to them. They’re just the natural result of my body interacting with the environment I’m in. We usually think of moral choices in terms of ‘good’ or ‘bad’ (or amoral) – but if free will is an illusion, aren’t all of our ‘choices’ essentially amoral?

I’m glad you started this thread because these questions have been on my mind lately.

56

I was framing my comments in the manner of my posts further back in the thread.

I postulated that to know, with 100% certainty, what I will do in any conceivable situation, it would require knowledge as vast as knowing everthing about the universe itself. Which sorta makes our efforts to produce stimuli moot. We will already know whether we will succeed, how others will react, and so on.

Most folks don’t watch reruns of baseball games. It’s not as enjoyable knowing what will happen before it does.

Why give a rat’s fuzzy rear end about anybody else except yourself and furthering your wants/needs/desires?

Let’s say you smack a child. It cries. So what? Why should you care? Because I might get in trouble with the law? So, is it ok to smack a kid if you can get away with it?

57

This, again, I’ve never understood.

Why? Because there is no MYSTERY left after you know how you’d choose? If I pulled a gun on your true love, let’s say that you know for pretty certain that you’d choose to disarm me and try to save her, risking your life, every time. There’s no mystery there. But isn’t it still your choice? And, indeed, a pretty important and distinctive choice that cuts to the core of your character?

How does understanding or being able to predict your choices rob them of meaning? The whole point is that you own your identity: who you are is important to you. The choices you make flow from that, including choices about how to change yourself.

Now you’re just proposing causal paradoxes, as well as confusing choices with outcomes. It’s one thing to know how you’d choose: that’s just knowing yourself. It’s quite another to basically know the future. That’s a completely different, and often logically paradoxical question. Trying to introduce the paradoxes of knowing the future with the issue of knowing what determines choices is just a way to try and make it seem like deterministic choices are paradoxical, when they aren’t.

58

So? What does that have to do with whether or not our choices are determined? If we highly value surprise, then maybe we wouldn’t want to know as much about ourselves as complete self-knowing omniscience. But otherwise, who cares?

I’m pretty certain I know exactly what I’ll choose to do over the next 24 hours, based on past experience with myself and a pretty good idea of what the person I am chooses to do in various situations. I’m still going to live those 24 hours, and I’m still going to enjoy them. I really don’t get your point.

This is a completely different question, yet again. What does this have to do with knowing that choices are determined by SOMETHING? What is your alternative anyway: knowing that the choices we make are not really up to us but are instead totally random nonsense?

Maybe the concept is so foreign that it didn’t occur to you, but off the top of my head: because you DO care about the kid’s feelings because you have things like empathy and values?

59

Why did we humans develope the self awareness to the point of desiring to debate the nature of ourselves? I’m not sure that was an accident… what purpose in Darwinian logic does me fretting over the nature of myself (or other abtract concepts, like God) serve?

Dog’s don’t, and they are a succesfull species. (At least, I don’t think they do. They seem to typify the “bag of chemical” lifestyle so embrassed by some here. Give 'em a good belly rub, and they are set!)

Even more so for insects and bacteria.

Do you feel that a person who creates a great symphony, or painting, or mathmatical equation is just marking time until their chemical bonds fail? Life must seem pointless, then.

60

Amoral in terms of an absolute morality? Well, yes but an absolute morality doesn’t exist. In terms of a morality defined by a society? No. This kind of morality is the product stemming from society’s need to affect your programming.