What is the actual free will humans have?

[ruby sparks]

The mind has to be intimately connected to the brain to influence it.

I agree. This would seem to have to be the case, as far as we can tell.

I see the mind influencing the brain as a kind of feedback mechanism.

Me too. Though I am not an expert, and as far as I am aware, no one yet fully understands the complicated mechanisms, though my guess is that it might be better to think of them as vastly complicated processes, and involving feedback and interaction as they go along, rather than thinking of one mechanism that involves feedback.

But one thing is certain the brain and the mind are not the same thing.

I broadly agree. Personally, I'm a property dulaist not a substance dualist, so I would only go so far as to say that the mental has different properties to the physical.

What is a thought?

Dunno.

Answer that and we may know what it is capable of.

My approach is to ask what we can investigate about consciousness without knowing the answer to the above question.

Let's agree that neither of us is going to 'win' this discussion. You're a different sort of dualist to me, so let's agree that after we have finished discussing it, we can both keep our dulaisms if we want to. Because let's face it, there is no clincher. Not as far as I know.

 

[ruby sparks]

Sorry, 'dunno' wasn't very forthcoming. I'll try again.

To me, a thought is essentially a complicated sensation (or series of complicated sensations). It's something we feel and experience.

One of the most basic sensations is, arguably, pain. And this, awareness of pain, is often used as a starting point to explore consciousness.

 

[untermensche]

I see the mind influencing the brain as a kind of feedback mechanism.

Me too. Though I am not an expert, and as far as I am aware, no one yet fully understands the complicated mechanisms, though my guess is that it might be better to think of them as vastly complicated processes, and involving feedback and interaction as they go along, rather than thinking of one mechanism that involves feedback.

I don't think we can say much about it. It would not be anything like what humans have built and it may involve quantum properties or other properties of matter we don't understand in the context of brain activity.

But we can't say it is impossible for there to be a feedback mechanism. We can't say that since the brain creates the mind it is impossible for the mind to have a feedback influence based on "computations" in the mind (thoughts) on other parts of the brain.

We would have to know what the mind and consciousness are objectively to say what they can do and not do to the brain.

There are a million things to study about neurons and how they may work together.

Trying to explain the activity of billions without even understand how a few could work together functionally is lunacy.

 

[untermensche]

Sorry, 'dunno' wasn't very forthcoming. I'll try again.

To me, a thought is essentially a complicated sensation (or series of complicated sensations). It's something we feel and experience.

One of the most basic sensations is, arguably, pain. And this, awareness of pain, is often used as a starting point to explore consciousness.

The will is not so much in having thoughts. They do just pop into existence.

The will is involved in which thoughts we see as true and serious and make a continuing part of us and which we discard.

 

[ruby sparks]

Sorry, 'dunno' wasn't very forthcoming. I'll try again.

To me, a thought is essentially a complicated sensation (or series of complicated sensations). It's something we feel and experience.

One of the most basic sensations is, arguably, pain. And this, awareness of pain, is often used as a starting point to explore consciousness.

The will is not so much in having thoughts. They do just pop into existence.

The will is involved in which thoughts we see as true and serious and make a continuing part of us and which we discard.

Now we are mixing up free will and consciousness. That is ok, they're related.

To some extent, I agree with you. In those cases where brain activity has crossed a threshold so that conscious awareness arises, we make decisions which are at least partly conscious and in some cases largely so.

I think the OP started off by saying consciousness is a passenger on a bus that it is not driving. Or maybe that was the other thread on consciousness. Anyways, I don't see it quite that way. Conscious thoughts can be a driver, imo.

For example, if you consciously decide to move your arm right now, it cannot be ruled out that the decision may have been effectively made before you were aware of it. But, if you decide you are going to move your arm in 10 minutes time, and if in 10 minutes time you do, then the prior conscious intent has played a role. This, I think, is the difference between 'instantaneous' decisions and 'deliberated' decisions. Instantaneous ones are, I think closer to being reflex, even if they are not actually just a reflex. There are all sorts of decisions. There's probably a spectrum.

A better example than deciding to move your arm in 10 minutes, something more everyday, might be you consciously planning to go for a drive tomorrow. If you go for a drive tomorrow then the fact that you consciously planned it has played a part.

On the topic of free will, I'm not going to say that we have free will to decide to go for a drive tomorrow, just that we have enough agency freedoms to do it. There probably being no such thing as actual, true, complete or ultimate free will, it only makes sense to talk about degrees. So imo we are not drivers with free will, but we can still drive.

 

[untermensche]

Now we are mixing up free will and consciousness. That is ok, they're related.

No I am saying the "will" is connected to some kind of mental activity.

We do "something" in our minds to get the arm to move.

But this is such a practiced skill and our controls are very strong so it seems like no effort at all. Some can even think the consciousness is not involved since it can do it with so little involvement.

 

[ruby sparks]

Now we are mixing up free will and consciousness. That is ok, they're related.

No I am saying the "will" is connected to some kind of mental activity.

We do "something" in our minds to get the arm to move.

But this is such a practiced skill and our controls are very strong so it seems like no effort at all. Some can even think the consciousness is not involved since it can do it with so little involvement.

I'm agreeing with you that the 'will' is connected to some kind of mental activity. I'm agreeing with you that on those occasions when we consciously decide to move an arm, the mental activity is causal.

But it's too simplistic, imo, and not borne out by science, to say that the conscious will is the only thing acting. There are plenty of times when it isn't. There are others when you thought it was but it wasn't (confabulation). There are different types of decision, ranging from totally non-conscious to largely conscious. There are numerous illusory aspects to consciousness. Now, if you don't accept all that, that's fine, but honestly I don't want to carry on discussing it with you if all you're going to do is talk about lunacy and tricks and simply restate your personal opinions to the contrary over and over. No offense.

By the way, you could take on board all the science and still be a dualist. Just sayin'. No need to trash the science for that reason.

 

[untermensche]

Now we are mixing up free will and consciousness. That is ok, they're related.

No I am saying the "will" is connected to some kind of mental activity.

We do "something" in our minds to get the arm to move.

But this is such a practiced skill and our controls are very strong so it seems like no effort at all. Some can even think the consciousness is not involved since it can do it with so little involvement.

I'm agreeing with you that the 'will' is connected to some kind of mental activity. I'm agreeing with you that on those occasions when we consciously decide to move an arm, the mental activity is causal.

But it's too simplistic, imo, and not borne out by science, to say that the conscious will is the only thing acting. There are plenty of times when it isn't. There are others when you thought it was but it wasn't (confabulation). There are different types of decision, ranging from totally non-conscious to largely conscious. There are numerous illusory aspects to consciousness. Now, if you don't accept all that, that's fine, but honestly I don't want to carry on discussing it with you if all you're going to do is talk about lunacy and tricks and simply restate your personal opinions to the contrary over and over. No offense.

By the way, you could take on board all the science and still be a dualist. Just sayin'. No need to trash the science for that reason.

It seems to me what you first do is take experience seriously and try to explain it.

You don't jump to the wild conclusion that the brain is somehow tricking consciousness without definitive proof.

And proof is not the science of human guessing.

 

[ruby sparks]

It seems to me what you first do is take experience seriously and try to explain it.

You don't jump to the wild conclusion that the brain is somehow tricking consciousness without definitive proof.

And proof is not the science of human guessing.

I don't know how you get to characterising science as 'jumping to wild conclusions' or saying that what it doesn't do is take experience and try to explain it (that's exactly what it does do). Your view is just a misrepresentation of science, and actually I'm starting to doubt you've even read much of it in relation to this topic. As such, I'm afraid I'm going to have to discount your ill-informed personal opinions, which imo verge on dogma.

History is replete with those who dismiss science when it suits them, when it doesn't accord with their deeply-held beliefs on a particular phenomenon. Fortunately, science carries on regardless, finding stuff out, even if some don't like it.

I think we are done. Go in peace at Christmas time.

 

[untermensche]

We are done because we will agree to disagree.

There is no science to take seriously in terms of understanding what the consciousness or the will are.

 

[ruby sparks]

There is no science to take seriously in terms of understanding what the consciousness or the will are.

Possibly. Possibly not. But you don't necessarily strike me as someone who might know if that's the case or not.

We are done because we will agree to disagree.

No prob. Best wishes of the season to both your brain and your mind.

 

[fromderinside]

free will is a subjective phenomenon or experience.

 

[ruby sparks]

Ok now I think I've changed my mind. I think I'd rather keep talking to untermensche.

 

[untermensche]

free will is a subjective phenomenon or experience.

So you were forced to write that?

And you know that how?

 

[untermensche]

There is no science to take seriously in terms of understanding what the consciousness or the will are.

Possibly. Possibly not. But you don't necessarily strike me as someone who might know if that's the case or not.

I agree.

I am not reading the journals as they come out, except for some fraction of the drug journals, which one is taught to be very skeptical of.

There is the famous Libet study, and the studies like it that followed and still follow. What nobody ever tells you is Libet did not make any of the conclusions many so-called scientists are making today.

These studies are devoid of any objective understanding of consciousness yet they claim they have some understanding of what it is doing.

Based entirely on subjective guessing about the timing of the "will".

It is emperor's new clothes stuff.

 

[Juma]

free will is a subjective phenomenon or experience.

So you were forced to write that?

And you know that how?

Because it is obvious. You cannot observe that you have free will, yet you feel that you have it.
Thus it is just a subjective feeling.

 

[untermensche]

free will is a subjective phenomenon or experience.

So you were forced to write that?

And you know that how?

Because it is obvious. You cannot observe that you have free will, yet you feel that you have it.
Thus it is just a subjective feeling.

When I know that if I do "something" with my mind my arm will move that is not just a feeling.

It is knowing something as well as anything can be known.

 

[Juma]

Because it is obvious. You cannot observe that you have free will, yet you feel that you have it.
Thus it is just a subjective feeling.

When I know that if I do "something" with my mind my arm will move that is not just a feeling.

It is knowing something as well as anything can be known.

How do you observe that? When I move my arm I definitely do not observe that ”I will my arm to be moved”. i only observe that I move my arm and that it feels like it is what I want.

 

[DBT]

free will is a subjective phenomenon or experience.

So you were forced to write that?

And you know that how?

Nobody talking about force. The issue is the process of cognition as carried out by a functional brain. It being this process that forms and generates both you and your experiences.....

 

[fromderinside]

free will is a subjective phenomenon or experience.

So you were forced to write that?

And you know that how?

If one takes a subjective view, yes I was forced to write that.

The only reason for my statement was to reconcile a sequence of events into cause and effect relationships.

That observation came as a result of observation and experiment.