In the tradition of Great Debates these longstanding subjects are featured yet again in several threads. I am struck in several of them, such as in this one, how difficult these conversations are … how can even discuss the subjects if we each use words to have different meanings.
So please, can we agree on what terms get defined as? When we say “intelligence”, what does that mean? “Consciousness”? “Free will”?
My attempts:
Intelligence: I have proposed that it is *the ability to come up with solutions to novel salient problems *and that it can be general or narrow, in domains salient to humans or of no interest to humans. I would also accept Pinker’s definition (pg 62 How the Mind Works: “Intelligence, then, is the ability to attain goals in the face of obstacles by means of decisions based on rational (truth obeying) rules.” He goes on to elucidate that intelligence requires desires pursued using beliefs, and I am not sure about that, as we have no way of measuring what counts for “a belief” in something alien to us.
Consciousness is the experience of agency to me and free will is the experience of that agency. I recognize that others use these terms differently, that free will has some meaning that it is somehow not the result of previous events, or something, and that is the point of this thread:
It makes no sense to debate past each other using words that have different meanings to different participants. We have to find a lexicon that allows us to talk about the same things when we use the same words.
There is a question of “free will” as decisions somehow made outside of causation. I can’t say that I get or care about that argument (and in any case there are other threads devoted to it). To me “free will” is the experience of self without which self does not exist. Consciousness is the experience of agency, the experience of making choices, that is, the experience of free will. It is as real as our selves are. Or as illusory. Take your choice.
An issue for this thread is whether or not “free will” refers to that *experience *(whether or not it is in some other sense “free” of prior causation, or ultimately determined by prior causation, if not determinable) or if it means that those choices really are somehow outside of prior causation or something else. Or if we should use/create different phrases for each of those meanings.
Likewise for “intelligence”, which I think sometimes get confused with “sentience” or “consciousness”. (Again leaving aside the discussion of whether having one to some particular degree mandates that an entity have the other, or allows the other, etc.) The fact that we each attach different meanings to these terms makes for some very frustrating attempts at discussions.
I mean in the linked thread we can’t even agree that a team of individuals with complementary talents and knowledge bases is a more intelligent system than the systems that consist of any of those individuals in isolation.
And yet no serious discussion about defining the terms?
It’s no surprise that these discussions end up going no where.
This seems to me too far removed from most people’s understanding of what it means generally, which is the idea of human freedom from “fate”, or the freedom of people to choose. Of course such a concept is totally bunk, but I think we should let this term stay the way it is rather than try to salvage it. Plenty of people do use it in the manner I described (“well god gave us free will so that we could choose to have faith in him or not, he’s not forcing us”), and it serves its linguistic purpose. What you describe does exist, and does require a term to describe it, but free will isn’t the right one. Also, the distinction between your definitions of free will and consciousness is unclear to me.
It’s plain that all animals have “free will” to a great extent, to the point that it is a nonsensical concept. Buridan’s ass would eventually eat both piles of hay, choosing the first for its own reasons. Maybe he saw it first. Maybe he’s right-handed. But he wouldn’t starve.
Consciousness is, at its simplest, a reaction to external stimuli. Shit-oh-dear, PLANTS have this. It’s just a matter of degree.
Intelligence: I will use your definition “the ability to come up with solutions to novel salient problems.” Again, it’s a matter of degree, but even planaria know enough to move away from possibly-negative stimuli they have never encountered before.
Humans are not unique, nor are we especially special. We are animals with mostly-unspecialized skills. Yeah, we’re smart, but no smarter with duck stuff than a duck is. Yeah, we can learn duck stuff better than they can learn human stuff, but talk of intelligence, consciousness, and, especially free will is usually anthrocentric onanism.
The reason this post is going nowhere is the exact same reason the other debates about free will, intelligence and conciousness are going nowhere: people are not willing to shift their definitions.
I think that intelligence is actually the easiest to define, and I think you did a reasonable job of that in the starting post. I just don’t think you brought enough clarity and conviction to the table to make people stop and take notice of the other definitions, let alone change their minds.
I for one can offer nothing in the way of a definition of free will - as far as I can tell it’s mostly a ruse by Abrahamic religions with no real application in the real world. And conciousness is a term that is so diffuse that it can mean almost anything.
IMO though, the main reason people won’t discuss their definitions is because of the implications - change the definition of conciousness, and you might have to change your stance on abortion - change the definition of free will and you might have to change your stance on religious dogma - change the definition of intelligence, and you might have to change your stance on vegetarianism / human worthiness / racial discrimination etc.
I’m not saying those are GOOD reasons, but IMHO, people get uneasy when you attempt to question their definitions of these terms, since they underpin so much of how they view the world.
I’d love to change my mind on any of these and really hope that brighter people than me will come up with some good stuff. Where I’m at right now:
Intelligence: Efficiency of higher brain functions (where ‘smarts’ is the apply these in the real world)
Consciousness: The ability to view yourself as seperate entity and ‘self’. Plants don’t have this, some mammals definetely do (apes, dolphins etc). An ape will look into a mirror and realise it is him/her he’s watching, a bird won’t. Neither will a fetus.
Free will: Social construct needed for society to function. To me, the definition in itself holds no “real” value, it’s pointless whether we have free will or whether it exists, because I think it’s a flawed idea in that way. But we need to invent it for a society to function.
If people agreed about the definitions of these terms, the debates would be about three-quarters, or more, along the way to being resolved. A large proportion of what is controversial, in this area (indeed, in most of philosophy), is how the terms are to be understood.
I don’t think there is that much disagreement here around this, especially if you are referring to g.
What seems to be controversial here is the extent to which intelligence is a reflection of nurture versus nature, and whether or not it can be quantified via means such as formal testing, or inference from proxies such as societal or cultural (or even national) successes. Further, there seems to be strong disagreement on whether various cohort averages can be reasonably assessed with any meaning–cross-population intelligence comparisons, for example.
It seems to me that the question of whether we have free will is usually brought up in the context of whether our material brain is solely responsible for our choices and actions, or whether there’s something else - some non-material “soul” - that drives us.
Around here at the SDMB, the idea that we’re just a product of material processes in the material brain is so well-accepted that the tenor of the question is changed.
Most of the time away from the SDMB when the question has come up, people assert that their idea of free will can’t happen if our personalities, choices, etc., are simply the result of material processes in the physical brain. The brain is going to do what it’s going to do in a certain situation, because it follows the laws of chemistry and physics, so it’s mostly deterministic with maybe a little quantum randomness thrown in. And the non-deterministic randomness can’t be interpreted the way that “spiritual” people view free will.
This view of free will is so broadly dismissed here, that we don’t spend much time on it, but I think it’s the more common point of contention in the real world.