OK, but once you have the given initial setting, everything is essentially deterministic from there on out.
I think the madelbrot set is entirely deterministic. There is nothing random involved.
But how?
Well, “being able to predict” is a big loophole. Simply not being capable to do this wouldn’t mean a system, though large and complex, wouldn’t then be deterministic.
The Mandelbrot set is deterministic, if you know the initial point exactly. On a small enough length scale, things are non-local or “fuzzy”, and it is meaningless to discuss their position (or momentum or whatnot) beyond a certain precision. I’m not saying that it’s too hard for us to measure, I’m saying discussing position beyond that precision simply doesn’t have any meaning whatsoever. There’s no such thing as point particles on a certain scale. If the length scale of the uncertainty is comparable to the length scale of the chaotic sensitivity, then its not possible to predict the outcome. Not just too hard for us to do because of the complexity of the system, not possible.
That doesn’t mean that a system can’t follow a predestined path, it just means that some systems can’t follow a predictable path.
This doesn’t shed any light on free will vs. fate, but it might mean that true determinism (i.e. a clockwork universe which you operate with a crank) is impossible to prove. Not impossible, mind you, but unprovable.
Sigh …
We have free will within the limits imposed by determinism.
Example: I have the free will to decide to have ice cream with dinner, but determinism prevents me from deciding to be a giraffe.
Clear now? Good.
My example was a thought experiment. The point is that, even in impossible optimum circumstances, there will probably be large enough differences in the initial conditions to lead to different final states. In contrast to the model suggested in the OP, whereby the same input always gives the same output.
As for the rest of your theories, it sounds to me like you’re suffering from quantum mysticism. “self-reflecting consciousness collapsing its own uncertainty”? C’mon. There’s no reason to believe that consciousness has anything to do with quantum mechanics. Rather, any interaction significant enough to yield information about a quantum state will force it to collapse into one of its basis states. Whether or not anyone gathers the information is irrelevant.
It does?!?
::Giraffe winks out of existance in a puff of logic::
Forgive me if I don’t add much to this topic, but it all seems fairly simple to me.
In this case, the coupling of a pair is what collapses the uncertainty. In other words, free will and determinisim are two sides of the same coin. It sounds kind of wimpy, but you have free will up until you determine the outcome.
I think the OP has zoomed over your head – though I appreciate a person who can get to the heart of an issue!
Do you have free will to decide to have an ice cream after dinner, if you are just an ongoing chemical reaction?
True, fate is actually more akin to what the philosophers refer to as predeterminism. There is a difference between the two. Determinism means that behavior is confined within certain parameters {birds can fly, dogs can’t]. Predeterminism means that all actions are on a set, unalterable course.
An unprovable statement falls well within the limits Godel showed to exist in any logical system of sufficient self-reflective power. Though I don’t think this is unprovable, as you might note from my constant meanderings on the subject.
I note you do not deny that the universe COULD be deterministic, which is nice. I agree that I am sometimes struck by “quantum mysticism,” yet I assure you that my consciousness-collapsing theory is not so far off the mark from true science. I would refer you to John Gribbin’s “In Search of Schrodinger’s Cat” which has a largish section toward the end dealing with the philosophical implications of quantum theory. One such heading is “Who observes the observers?” While I see your point, the author goes to great lengths to elaborate that the creation of the universe itself is possibly a sort of reverse process. This is his paraphrase with my own interpretations thrown in.
The universe probability waveform exists spouting all possibilities like we know those little quantum “fuzzies” do. Not until life evolves to conduct a scientific experiment is a truly stunning reaction taking place: the observation of a serious quantum event. Small quantum probabilities have collapsed here and there throughout history, but only after intelligent life began probing the mysteries of the deep did a truly stunning quantum event occur. In order to deal with this, the universe’s waveform collapsed to allow an answer to appear from the experiment. The upshot of this is that the experiment, forcing an otherwise HIGHLY improbably quantum event, created the universe we know.
This, as well, falls into Godel’s unprovable trap, but I want to clarify that I do not start tossing quantum magic around to mask a non-defendable position.
That said, collapsing waveforms ALWAYS happens backwards in the same way (I’m at a loss to word that correctly, sorry). We know what something did, yeah? But the only way it could have done that is if we collapsed it (or something else collapsed it, it doesn’t need to be us). Thus, a collapsed waveform is self-supporting. A happened before B, but B caused A to cause B. I know I’m saying this rather murkily, but I hope you see what I mean.
Every time, then, a waveform is collapsed it HAD to be that way. I’m not talking predictive determinism, I’ve stated multiple times that one cannot predict the future, but just plain old, the-universe-did-this-because-in-the-end-it-had-no-choice determinism.
yes but it is limited by how much they know.
there are people interested in limiting other peoples power, free will, therefore there is information hiding going on.
if you can’t solve your problems because someone has hiden information from you then your free will is limited.
Dal Timgar
Oh, Dal, must you try to hijack?
People may have certain knowledge in the form of chemically stored memories which are a part of the system that effects output. Yes, behavioral outcome would by changed the absense of such chemicals. Unless you are suggesting “demons” entering the system and occluding or destroying these chemical engrams in order to cause the system to have even less free will that then OP postulates, you are off topic.
But “free” and “random”, or “chaotic”, are not the same thing. Also, free and predictable are not necessarily opposites. Once we talk about “will”, the randomness must be irrelevant; otherwise, “will” would mean just a random flip of a logical gate.
Random, I understand; free is misterious.
I made several posts above relating to whether or not the human mind can be a deterministic system. That is to say, if you could somehow put two exact copies of people in the exact same environment, would they react in exactly the same way? Think the same thoughts, say the same things, etc. I argue they wouldn’t.
If the universe, including human beings, was deterministic, I think it’d be pretty hard to argue for the existance of free will. We would just be reacting to stimuli based on a predictable set of rules.
However, I don’t think the universe is deterministic. I think it is probabilistic (I don’t know if that’s a real word), meaning that the rules only provide for things to happen with a certain probability, and they do, but if you reran the whole universe you’d get a different outcome each time.
This doesn’t disprove predeterminism, but I think it puts it outside our realm of knowledge. You would essentially have to postulate an omnipotent being with nothing better to do than to script the outcome of every probabilistic event so that it still looks random. What’s the point? Even if you believe in a God, who wants to believe in such a loser God?
Sure, the universe is to some degree probablistic. But, if we have no power over the probability, we still have no free will.
An interesting point. As has been said, this may be an indication that the universe is deterministic, but not predetermined. So, the question you raise is whether our apparent unpredictability is the same thing as a true free will. If not, then we are instinctual beings running on our biochemical software.
If our random future is akin to a fractal where a particular path is unpredictable but the overall possibilities are determined, then are we able to choose our own path within the confines of the fractal possibilites?
But I’m just raising more questions here. It seems like we’re trying to prove a negative or trying to prove that God does/does not exist. There doesn’t seem to be any concrete evidence to hang your hat on because our speculations themselves could be predetermined response to the question and available evidence.
Total weak determinism here. This is the “I can’t fly but I can choose to build an airplane” argument that does not actually have anything to do with determinism. If you feel it does, then replace “I” with “a motorcycle” or some other obviously inanimate object and you suddenly must draw the conclusion that it, too, has free will (if you thought it implied “I” did in the first place, of course). This is not the case. Just because a person can imagine an action which is impossible by its nature does not confirm that it has only limited freedoms. That would be a seperate conclusion.
Argh! I have only heard this “argument” from people arguing free will so far. This “argument” begs the question, and I know few people who would seriously use that (at least in so holy a place as this ).
If I were to start a new post, “Other people can cause things to happen to you that are out of your control” no one would even respond, except perhaps to laugh at my grasp of the obvious. And yet, in that circumstance, you have no free will, you are a recipient of determinism (i.e.-given A, B follows, which is what I’ve been saying all along). Because we all affect each other (and forget quantum physics here) then we are all sort of bound up in a deterministic process. The best outcome of this is the “First Mover” being the first one with free will…the first excercize of which caused everyone else to fall into determinism. The only way to believe in free will is the following:
If any of those are false, then I feel determinism follows.
BTW,
“determinism” n: a doctrine that acts of the will, occurances in nature, or social or psychological phenomena are determined by antecedent causes.
In other words, “Unless you know how to violate cause and effect, or feel that you are not a part of the universe, determinism is true.”
Honestly, guys, I want to believe in a free will, but I have never found a satisfactory justification for it.
hijack?
every adult is going to be affected by previous life experiences. affected, not controlled. but who had how much control of those life experiences?
i attended catholic schools like my sisters but they became catholics and i became an agnostic. i 4th grade the nuns gave us brochures from a book distributing company and i looked thru it expecting to be bored. that is how i 1st discovered sci-fi novels. it is there i discovered the concepts of atheism and agnosticism.
your environment can have deterministic influences but you can choose how to react to deterministic influences. there is free will but it is not unlimited.
i am sorry if you do not see how my posts relate to the topic. maybe i do too much short hand thinking.
i am a lazy typist.
Dal Timgar
affected: To have an influence on or effect a change in
controlled: Authority or ability to manage or direct
While these are not synonyms, correctly, their consequence is the same in that the controllee or the affectee neither 1)directed himself or 2)changed things himself. Forgive my use of the masculine, its only been the english standard for hundreds of years and I find it easier to work with than pronoun dancing.
Saying you can “choose to react to deterministic influences” shows that at least weak determinism is true. I do not feel my reasoning from weak determinism to strong determinism is hard to follow, but then again I’m defending it so…
I think I have free will, therefore I do.
(BTW, jmullaney started this thread because of an exchange he and I had on the "Intelligence and Religion"thread. I may be mistaken, but in some of his posts, he seems to believe that a rock stops being a rock when no one is looking at it, that there were no stars before there were people to look at them. He also claims to have witnessed transubstantiations equivalent to Jesus’ turning water into wine. Y’see, he seems to think that if a single particle can change state upon being observed, why, then, whole objects could be made to change form and substance just by looking at them and willing them to change!)