According to Robert Sapolsky, human free will does not exist

[BSilvEsq]

I submit that Determinism (as DBT and I define it -- and as you understand to be Radical Fatalism) necessarily precludes the existence of Free Will (as DBT and I define it -- i.e., Libertarian Free Will in which human cognition is not so constrained by antecedent activity as to be pre-determined)

And I maintain that in your very definition, you have a syntax error, and so your attempt to define anything at all failed.

Therein lies the ultimate cop out and evasion. There is no error in the definition. Rather, you simply reject the definition as being inconsistent with your view of reality. The hubris of that approach is overwhelming.

 

[BSilvEsq]

I disagree with the fatalist implication too.
The universe is big, we are small. The total determinist calculation for the entire universe would probably have to be bigger than the universe. We’re just agents, little focii of information so small that FAPP we might as well be operating in an unbounded universe featuring futures that bend to everyone’s will. The deterministic universe is so vastly complex that it easily accommodates subjective experiences that contradict objective observation. IOW, there is no real contradiction between deterministic and non-deterministic constructs of our understanding of the universe. The “two views” would eventually converge if our understanding was exponentially more vast.

That is an interesting perspective. Maybe yes, maybe no, maybe both. I have a belief that differs, but I respect the belief you put forward.

The one notion with which I take issue is that of a calculation being necessary or even a part of a fatalistic form of determinism. The ability of anyone (including an omniscient and omnipotent God) to be able to predict the future is not a component of the paradigm, and is arguably precluded by the paradigm because nobody can ever know what the coalescence of all antecedent activity will produce at any given moment because the totality of that coalescence has never previously occurred, much less occurred with sufficient regularity to form a basis for an informed prediction of the consequence.

 

[Jarhyn]

I disagree with the fatalist implication too.
The universe is big, we are small. The total determinist calculation for the entire universe would probably have to be bigger than the universe. We’re just agents, little focii of information so small that FAPP we might as well be operating in an unbounded universe featuring futures that bend to everyone’s will. The deterministic universe is so vastly complex that it easily accommodates subjective experiences that contradict objective observation. IOW, there is no real contradiction between deterministic and non-deterministic constructs of our understanding of the universe. The “two views” would eventually converge if our understanding was exponentially more vast.

I mean, yes. As I have said, all deterministic systems of rules capable of processing general fields, can be modeled in any finite regard as probabilistic systems. All probabilistic systems likewise can be modeled as deterministic ones in any finite regard, even at scales as vast as our universe, assuming a machine big enough to model it and with enough time to do so, or with features that transform in the correct ways.

This is the admission that probabilistic systems == deterministic systems, however the modeling for one might require a vastly greater complexity to present it in some deterministic ways for very large finite probabilistic systems,and so you are correct that there's no contradiction going on in the first place.

The two views already converge, in that way, and I think this is the reason either view cannot be disproven: they both have to be true, no matter how it's actually being assembled as if by some Spinozan God.

Therein lies the ultimate cop out and evasion. There is no error in the definition.

Well, I explained my issue, specifically that you're violating one of the basic precepts of language as significant as the one that makes "this statement is false" syntactically erroneous and nonsensical.

I find your claim that it is an evasion to be the ultimate cop-out and evasion. It is a refusal to acknowledge the type/instance break in the clause "the ability to do otherwise" as implies the intent to reference an immediate rather than a type as the holder of ability.

It is a syntax error. It will always be a syntax error.

No computer language could be assembled where that construction of words or concepts or nearest equivalents in the software language would ever be allowed, because assembling all the tokens, along with the implicit ones, would result in an attempted assignment of class instance members of a static type, or thereabouts.

Language and definitions can be junk, and wrong.

 

[DBT]

It boggles my mind that folks here are unwilling to accept the logical fallacy of a belief that they, themselves, reject as fallacious

We point out the logical fallacy that is shared between radical fatalism and libertarianism.

Who was talking about Libertarianism? Was anyone arguing for Libertarianism?

Who brought up the term 'radical fatalism?" Why was that done?

Is not the issue here about compatibilism and how they define their terms and conditions?

Are they wrong?


.

 

[DBT]

I think that you defined determinism in much the same way as it is defined.

This sentence is either a rank tautology, or (more worryingly) suggests that there is a single "correct" way in which determinism IS defined, and against which we could test any proposed alternative definition for "correctness".

Might I suggest that what you meant to say was:

I think that you defined determinism in much the same way as it is defined by me.

I work with the definition given by compatibilists. I don't disagree with the definition that Jarhyn gave.

 

[DBT]

When considering whether Compatibilism has a valid argument for free will, it doesn't matter how the world really works because compatibilists define their version of free will in relation to their definition of determinism.

If the world does have random events, events that alter how things go, how would that help establish an argument for free will?
How would free will work in relation to random events? What would it look like? Some version of Libertarian free will, where random events somehow coincide with one's will?

 

[Jarhyn]

I work with the definition given by compatibilists

No, you seem to not, because every few days you come back spouting "no alternative actions" in a stunning flurry of syntax error.

Let me repeat that that construction of words, in ANY programming language at any point in time anywhere is a syntax error.

Programmers have, for every compiler that detects and rejects such errors, been forced to detect such orderings of words and make a warning that tells people about this and scolds them mechanically for even trying.

I wish we would just install a spell checker feature for people that detects "couldn't have done otherwise" and just red squiggles it with the explanation "modal error: apparent use of individual instance in place of type", particularly when attempting to speak to an individual instance rather than a type.

Sadly, though, because it is sometimes left ambiguous because of the informality of spoken English, they don't always get exposed in every instance; some instances would detect incorrectly without fully expanded syntax in the first place.

If the world does have random events, events that alter how things go, how would that help establish an argument for free will

We already explain this quite a bit: to the extent these "random" events (and I can't explain enough that you also do not have a coherent definition of randomness presented here or elsewhere), that to the extent this randomness exceeds the regularity of the nervous system, we would have to tolerate some manner of "sloppiness" among each other in our behavior, not because we all just claim a right to be a bit sloppy but because the universe itself has noise around the edges.

As it is, this kind of interaction of non-correlated events, or statistically independent events from the perspective of an outcome creeping in, we actually see something like this in reality in computational events: a transistor has a threshold region, where if the voltage is in a small boundary range on the transistor when the clock fires, it fires unreliably, unreasonably, in a way also not correlated to what it normally measures. When this happens, quite pointedly, we attribute responsibility NOT to the circuit, NOT to the measurement, but to the "random chance".

So whenever such noise is louder than all the signals, it's the noise that steals causal focus from the system.

This means that whenever such locally statistically independent data were to overcome the signal, this is is a constraint to free will, not a provider of it.

This is in fact one of the most important differences between the paradigm of compatibilism and radical fatalism: that inversion of the role of "randomness". You literally blame the noise and whatever is allowing it to be noisier than the signal.

(And there is where the radical fatalist really does get to blame something else such as the big bang for what happens, because the big bang created a lot of "noise" that only correlates to weird stuff happening far away).

Our goal is to keep stuff like the noise of the big bang as far away from how our minds function as is possible, according to compatibilists.

 

[pood]

The extraordinary tedium of this debate needs to be enlivened with new input from other members. But given how boring and repetitive this has become, how do we lure them in?

I know! Snazzy ad campaigns!

Ad for determinism

Hey, kids, you knew it all along — it’s one grand puppet show!

But who’s pulling the strings?

Here’s a hint: it starts with the letter “D”.

That’s right — determinism!

Making shit happen since the dawn of time!

Expect no less!

Ad for free will

Danger, danger, Free Will Robinson! Determinism is lurking around that corner, waiting to kidnap you and push you around!

Don’t let the diabolical Mr. D get away with it!

Remember, kids, you are responsible for your own lives. Don’t fob off that responsibility on anyone or anything. Make good free choices!

 

[Jarhyn]

At any rate, from my perspective the failures caused by Libertarians and Radical Fatalists both are simply this: in attributing freedom to randomness, people seeking to be free see a lack of random and paralyze themselves inappropriately, or they see a plethora of randomness and they say "that makes you responsible" and seek to inject randomness so as to get LESS reliable outcomes and neither of those conclusions are true.

No matter which way you flip the coin you get bad advice.

And the most troubling part is that in the short term, giving someone that trick coin gives you a leg up over them if they act in clear support of it and if you act in principle as a compatibilist despite your words to them.

Just telling people this inversion of the truth starts a grift from which you are the benefactor.

To someone who rejects grifting as unethical harm, it seems like a pretty big and widespread issue.

It also makes me wonder insofar as if this is a grift that naturally helps some ("people without dreams are easy to control"), then is this also an explicit gnostic grift for some? Are there compatibilists out there -- not just in action but in internal model as well -- preaching Radical Fatalism so as to hobble everyone but themselves? Or is there a zeitgeist more of people realizing this somewhere in a deep part of their mind, in a state machine they cannot reasonably access, where Radical Fatalism 'makes sense' only because talking about it benefitted them in an abstract way?

We do know that the failure to believe in one's own freedoms has been studied and that performance on a number of tasks goes down in that situation, so it could very well be something that we evolved to trick each other into believing for our own sakes.

 

[Elixir]

notion with which I take issue is that of a calculation being necessary or even a part of a fatalistic form of determinism.

I did not intend to imply the necessity of such calculus. I was positing a hypothetical calculation - one that would be theoretically possible in a deterministic universe.

is arguably precluded by the paradigm because nobody can ever know what the coalescence of all antecedent activity will produce at any given moment

Our inability to perform such hypothetical calculations is irrelevant. I can’t even calculate the square root of 13975 in my head, and that’s a tiny number. My inability doesn’t preclude anything. In fact it would be a universal necessary in a sufficiently complex deterministic universe, for it to successfully masquerade as non-deterministic under examination by a logical species.

I am not saying that the universe IS deterministic, only that at some level it becomes beyond our capacity to discern, almost by definition. There could simply be no way to put the question to bed from within the universe under examination.

There are a few phenomena that defy deterministic analysis (quantum entanglement etc) but I don’t take that to mean that since we ain’t able to figger it out, it must be magic. But maybe it is - we wouldn’t know. My take is that it’s probably like lightning was to pre-scientific cultures. Magical, FAPP, but explicable given a much broader base of knowledge.

 

[Elixir]

All probabilistic systems likewise can be modeled as deterministic ones in any finite regard, even at scales as vast as our universe, assuming a machine big enough to model it and with enough time to do so, or with features that transform in the correct ways.

That’s another way of saying what I was trying to express. I don’t understand the math that would prove its applicability to all “possible” universes (aka probabilistic systems, if all possible universes ARE probabilistic).
I assume that the size of the modeling “machine” would have to exceed the size of the universe it attempts to model, as it has to contain models of everything including attempts to model it. (How does one “model” a quark without using something bigger than a quark?)
But that would just be an incidental feature. Unless our ACTUAL universe is just a model of an even-more-actual one.