Compatibilism: What's that About?

[Jarhyn]

Nobody has suggested that the brain is a static system. Nevertheless, each increment of change within a determined system is fixed by antecedents.

And Marvin keeps pointing out that the fact that it is driven from antecedents isn't a problem to free will.

Just because the will (the current situational moment forces) came from a confluence of past events does not mean that the will is any less than what it actually is now, and what it actually is now is something that just got done considering that it wanted salad, and spewed "salad please" rather than "what the guy with the gun says, please".

Rather the observability and reliability of the system in translating moment forces forward in time ALLOWS us to determine freedom at all.

The only (false) "freedom" that does not exist here and has never existed is freedom from antecedent events.

Honestly, you vacillate so many times here between "compatibilist free will works but is a bad definition because 'it seems contrived to me'" (as if the axiom describing equality doesn't look a bit contrived!), and "compatibilist free will can't exist because (DBT's contrived to be broken definition of) free will is broken!" That nobody here really knows what if anything, is consistent inside your head.

One may ask "what is the result of this system, does (particle a) have 'freedom' through (zone b)?" And with compatibilist free will, this question may be sensibly answered.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

Necessitation is necessitation is necessitation.

No. Causal necessity is never absent. Other forms of necessity may be present or absent. If you fail to make that distinction, you'll end up saying silly things. For example:

Necessitation means something is necessitated, not freely chosen.

No one was forcing me to order the salad. No one was forcing me to order the steak. The only thing forcing me to order the salad instead of the steak was my memory of having bacon and eggs for breakfast and a double cheeseburger for lunch. So, the inner necessitation was my own goals and reasons, and my own interests. Free will is when someone decides for themselves what they will do, while free of coercion and undue influence. It never requires being free of ones own goals, reasons, or interests.

Because this event, like all events, was causally necessary from any prior point in time, we must conclude that it was necessitated that the salad would be freely chosen.

So, your statement is incorrect. The fact that something is causally necessitated does not mean that it was not freely chosen. Quite the opposite: It means that it was necessary that it would be freely chosen.

If an action is necessitated by the non-chosen state of the system, how can it be claimed to be freely willed or chosen? It can't.

I hope you see now that it can be claimed to be freely chosen. The non-chosen state of the system happens to make choices all the time. For example, it can choose whether to order the steak or the salad. And, pardon me, but it seems a bit silly to claim that the non-chosen state of the system is not free to make choices when you just saw it making choices in the restaurant.

By definition, it cannot be held up as an example of free will.

Only by the carefully crafted definitions built upon the original paradox. But a paradox is not a solid foundation for anything. A paradox is basically a self-induced hoax. The original paradox was created by the false suggestion that causal necessity was a meaningful constraint, something that we must be free of. It's baloney. Causal necessity is nothing more than reliable cause and effect, something that we all take for granted because we see it in everything that happens and everything we do. It is neither an object nor a force. It has no power to cause or necessitate anything. All of that power rests within the actual objects and forces that make up the physical universe. And, we happen to be one of those objects, that go about in the world causing stuff to happen, and doing so for our own goals, reasons, and interests.

 

[Jarhyn]

Necessitation is necessitation is necessitation.

No. Causal necessity is never absent. Other forms of necessity may be present or absent. If you fail to make that distinction, you'll end up saying silly things. For example:

Necessitation means something is necessitated, not freely chosen.

No one was forcing me to order the salad. No one was forcing me to order the steak. The only thing forcing me to order the salad instead of the steak was my memory of having bacon and eggs for breakfast and a double cheeseburger for lunch. So, the inner necessitation was my own goals and reasons, and my own interests. Free will is when someone decides for themselves what they will do, while free of coercion and undue influence. It never requires being free of ones own goals, reasons, or interests.

Because this event, like all events, was causally necessary from any prior point in time, we must conclude that it was necessitated that the salad would be freely chosen.

So, your statement is incorrect. The fact that something is causally necessitated does not mean that it was not freely chosen. Quite the opposite: It means that it was necessary that it would be freely chosen.

If an action is necessitated by the non-chosen state of the system, how can it be claimed to be freely willed or chosen? It can't.

I hope you see now that it can be claimed to be freely chosen. The non-chosen state of the system happens to make choices all the time. For example, it can choose whether to order the steak or the salad. And, pardon me, but it seems a bit silly to claim that the non-chosen state of the system is not free to make choices when you just saw it making choices in the restaurant.

By definition, it cannot be held up as an example of free will.

Only by the carefully crafted definitions built upon the original paradox. But a paradox is not a solid foundation for anything. A paradox is basically a self-induced hoax. The original paradox was created by the false suggestion that causal necessity was a meaningful constraint, something that we must be free of. It's baloney. Causal necessity is nothing more than reliable cause and effect, something that we all take for granted because we see it in everything that happens and everything we do. It is neither an object nor a force. It has no power to cause or necessitate anything. All of that power rests within the actual objects and forces that make up the physical universe. And, we happen to be one of those objects, that go about in the world causing stuff to happen, and doing so for our own goals, reasons, and interests.

In fact if not for causal necessity, if not for determinism, we would never be able to determine or calculate freedom within the system at all.

 

[Jarhyn]

...
My failed experiment is much closer to what one needs to do to demonstrate an empirical fact, much better designed, yet it too failed the test of providing objective data. You have much further to go to convince anyone of anything other than what are your prejudices. Saying while not doing isn't providing objective anything.

I really don't need to prove anything. If I was able to figure it out as a teenager in the public library then so can you.

I'm sure what you out figured out as a teenager would prove useful advancing our knowledge of things except we we had your level of understanding before we knew reality existed.

I can only hope you see the irony in my statement.

After my father died, I spent time in the public library, browsing the philosophy section. I think I was reading something by Baruch Spinoza that introduced the issue of determinism as a threat to free will. I found this troublesome until I had this thought experiment (whether I read it in one of the books or just came up with it myself, I can’t recall).

The idea that my choices were inevitable bothered me, so I considered how I might escape what seemed like an external control. It struck me that all I needed to do was to wait till I had a decision to make, between A and B, and if I felt myself leaning heavily toward A, I would simply choose B instead. So easy! But then it occurred to me that my desire to thwart inevitability had caused B to become the inevitable choice, so I would have to switch back to A again, but then … it was an infinite loop!

No matter which I chose, inevitability would continue to switch to match my choice! Hmm. So, who was controlling the choice, me or inevitability?

Well, the concern that was driving my thought process was my own. Inevitability was not some entity driving this process for its own reasons. And I imagined that if inevitability were such an entity, it would be sitting there in the library laughing at me, because it made me go through these gyrations without doing anything at all, except for me thinking about it.

My choice may be a deterministic event, but it was an event where I was actually the one doing the choosing. And that is what free will is really about: is it me or is someone or something else making the decision. It was always really me.

And since the solution was so simple, I no longer gave it any thought. Then much later, just a few years ago, I ran into some on-line discussions about it, and I wondered why it was still a problem for everyone else, since I had seen through the paradox more than fifty years ago.

Let me put your position in perspective. At a certain age boys begin playin with themselves. If your ideas of marriage and social conduct comes from this you would be typical. However we are in a world with others and the insights you gained by reflecting on your masturbation's would be inappropriate social conduct. You have to get beyond yourself. That's why science is so damn important. It demands you find empirical justification for what you place as fact.

Welcome to my world.

Uh, as Tommy Smothers would say, "Well...well...SAME TO YOU FELLA!".

I find it interesting that folks are like "base it on facts" when axioms don't come from "facts" they come from "how language has to be shaped to discuss facts at all".

Which may be at the root of your problem since language comes from within humans based on their experience of the world which is not directly linked to the world. We don't play by man's rules. What man plays is driven by the rules governing the nature of the world. HOWARD HUGE difference.

The fact that we don't get to make the rules of physics and math is exactly the reason why when a definition seems to offer no value and make no sense, you abandon it for one that has value and makes sense.

I have offered exactly some definitions here that make sense and allow the math I wish to do to not prove all sentences.

It is exactly that the universe has (apparently) fixed principles of operation that get us to the point where your definitions of "free" and "will" take a trip through the plumbing, and the man has to conform to the reality rather than pretending something real is a paradox.

The reality is that "free" is not a term of operational mechanism, it is a term of description, a resolution of a truth calculation.

It's just "will", as in "will continue until acted on an outside force." "Acted on by an outside force?" then determines "free?"

We didn't decide the laws of thermodynamics. You just kind of have to live with them. And for the language in which the laws of thermodynamics are descriptive, for them to remain descriptive, then we must apply and accept that things can be "free" in this way.

 

[fromderinside]

That's why science is so damn important. It demands you find empirical justification for what you place as fact

language comes from within humans based on their experience of the world which is not directly linked to the world. We don't play by man's rules. What man plays is driven by the rules governing the nature of the world. HOWARD HUGE difference.

The fact that we don't get to make the rules of physics and math is exactly the reason why when a definition seems to offer no value and make no sense, you abandon it for one that has value and makes sense.

I have offered exactly some definitions here that make sense and allow the math I wish to do to not prove all sentences.

It is exactly that the universe has (apparently) fixed principles of operation that get us to the point where your definitions of "free" and "will" take a trip through the plumbing, and the man has to conform to the reality rather than pretending something real is a paradox. ..'
We didn't decide the laws of thermodynamics. You just kind of have to live with them. And for the language in which the laws of thermodynamics are descriptive, for them to remain descriptive, then we must apply and accept that things can be "free" in this way.

Making sense is not the objective of science. The experiments conducted IAW Scientific Method generate material results which are the facts demonstrating the reality to the experiment.

The point is that the way 'we' (meaning you) make theory is not in the theory made to describe results but in the empirical results of the experiment conducted that lets us use our language to approximate what the results demonstrate. One reason there is uncertainty is we can never describe what the results are exactly because we use language. which is based on our experience and conforms to rationality rather than reality.

It is why I keep carping about you people using subjective experience rather than material consequences to support your views. The data speaks for itself. Contrived theory to cover material result are not the results.

 

[Jarhyn]

...
My failed experiment is much closer to what one needs to do to demonstrate an empirical fact, much better designed, yet it too failed the test of providing objective data. You have much further to go to convince anyone of anything other than what are your prejudices. Saying while not doing isn't providing objective anything.

I really don't need to prove anything. If I was able to figure it out as a teenager in the public library then so can you.

I'm sure what you out figured out as a teenager would prove useful advancing our knowledge of things except we we had your level of understanding before we knew reality existed.

I can only hope you see the irony in my statement.

My choice may be a deterministic event, but it was an event where I was actually the one doing the choosing. And that is what free will is really about: is it me or is someone or something else making the decision. It was always really me.

And since the solution was so simple, I no longer gave it any thought. Then much later, just a few years ago, I ran into some on-line discussions about it, and I wondered why it was still a problem for everyone else, since I had seen through the paradox more than fifty years ago.

That's why science is so damn important. It demands you find empirical justification for what you place as fact.

Welcome to my world.

I find it interesting that folks are like "base it on facts" when axioms don't come from "facts" they come from "how language has to be shaped to discuss facts at all".

Which may be at the root of your problem since language comes from within humans based on their experience of the world which is not directly linked to the world. We don't play by man's rules. What man plays is driven by the rules governing the nature of the world. HOWARD HUGE difference.

The fact that we don't get to make the rules of physics and math is exactly the reason why when a definition seems to offer no value and make no sense, you abandon it for one that has value and makes sense.

I have offered exactly some definitions here that make sense and allow the math I wish to do to not prove all sentences.

It is exactly that the universe has (apparently) fixed principles of operation that get us to the point where your definitions of "free" and "will" take a trip through the plumbing, and the man has to conform to the reality rather than pretending something real is a paradox. ..'
We didn't decide the laws of thermodynamics. You just kind of have to live with them. And for the language in which the laws of thermodynamics are descriptive, for them to remain descriptive, then we must apply and accept that things can be "free" in this way.

Making sense is not the objective of science. The experiments conducted IAW Scientific Method generate material results which are the facts demonstrating the reality to the experiment.

The point is that the way 'we' (meaning you) make theory is not in the theory made to describe results but in the empirical results of the experiment conducted that lets us use our language to approximate what the results demonstrate. One reason there is uncertainty is we can never describe what the results are exactly because we use language. which is based on our experience and conforms to rationality rather than reality.

It is why I keep carping about you people using subjective experience rather than material consequences to support your views. The data speaks for itself. Contrived theory to cover material result are not the results.

Making sense is the purpose of language.

Tying language to concrete description is the purpose of math.

Tying math to the raw function of reality is the purpose of physics.

Refining the model of physics (and other adjoining studies of material reality) is the purpose of science.

Cross-reference and review of scientific knowledge is the purpose of academics.

I dare say the whole purpose is to make sense of this shit.

This is not at the physics layer. This is at the math layer.

When you invoke "deterministic" and "causally necessary" you dip down to math.

Math says in this linear evolving system that you can calculate what something will do within a bound based on the momentary state of that system. I've had to actually do that to figure out several really hoary debug sessions inside the avionics of a 787: take the processor state, read the machine code look at "what it will do (were it to continue running) in 100 or so very complicated mechanical operations on a bunch of electrons charges."

Usually this was after the system itself notified a failure of freedom.

It is designed with the right kind of regulatory control to determine when some part of it is observably unfree to some requirement.

When this happens, what the system will do changes from "instruction says will be in state (behavior 1)" to "instruction says will be in state (behavior 2)"

All of it is objectively "concrete" through to the metal.

I'm sorry I can't deabstract it further for you, because as I pointed out, you aren't paying me enough for that.

 

[fromderinside]

Not true. I have a nickel.

You make sense if language of interpretation matches what it tries to describe.

It doesn't for my afore mentioned reason that language is developed through interpreting experience by social beings which cannot experience reality. Thus language always falls short, as does interpretation, in conveying through with the goal of science which explaining the nature of reality.

It fails, as you suggest, because tying to a concrete description is math which is, at best, ad hoc, designed by persons with a need to explain phenomena. Empirical study results often present unique challenges. Humans are forced to reinterpret existing math or invent new maths to accomplish their need for order.

Russell and Whitehead tried to systematize and integrate different logics and maths but failed.

Principia Mathematica - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Russell and Alfred North Whitehead wrote their three-volume Principia Mathematica hoping to achieve what Frege had been unable to do. They sought to banish the paradoxes of naive set theory by employing a theory of types they devised for this purpose. While they succeeded in grounding arithmetic in a fashion, it is not at all evident that they did so by purely logical means. While Principia Mathematica avoided the known paradoxes and allows the derivation of a great deal of mathematics, its system gave rise to new problems.

In any event, Kurt Gödel in 1930–31 proved that while the logic of much of Principia Mathematica, now known as first-order logic, is complete, Peano arithmetic is necessarily incomplete if it is consistent. This is very widely—though not universally—regarded as having shown the logicist program of Frege to be impossible to complete.

As a result Godel treated incompleteness

Gödel's incompleteness theorems - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The first incompleteness theorem states that no consistent system of axioms whose theorems can be listed by an effective procedure (i.e., an algorithm) is capable of proving all truths about the arithmetic of natural numbers. For any such consistent formal system, there will always be statements about natural numbers that are true, but that are unprovable within the system. The second incompleteness theorem, an extension of the first, shows that the system cannot demonstrate its own consistency.

Employing a diagonal argument, Gödel's incompleteness theorems were the first of several closely related theorems on the limitations of formal systems. They were followed by Tarski's undefinability theorem on the formal undefinability of truth, Church's proof that Hilbert's Entscheidungsproblem is unsolvable, and Turing's theorem that there is no algorithm to solve the halting problem.

I really can't go much further. I believe I've falsified your claim that "Tying language to concrete description is the purpose of math."

 

[DBT]

Nobody has suggested that the brain is a static system. Nevertheless, each increment of change within a determined system is fixed by antecedents.

And Marvin keeps pointing out that the fact that it is driven from antecedents isn't a problem to free will.

Sure, that's the job of a compatibilist. Just as it's the job of an incompatibilist to point out the flaws in the compatibilist argument.

Which I have been doing by describing the problems with compatibilism and supporting what I say with arguments, evidence from neuroscience on brain function, cognition, agency, etc, etc.

I am not the only incompatibilist. The argument is well supported. As pointed out Compatibilism is a carefully crafted definition designed to make freedom of will appear compatible with determinism.

Which, for the reasons given over many pages, is not compatible with free will.

''Compatibilism is the belief that free will and determinism are compatible ideas, and that it is possible to believe both without being logically inconsistent.[1] It may, however, be more accurate to say that compatibilists define 'free will' in a way that allows it to co-exist with determinism.'' - wiki.

 

[DBT]

Necessitation is necessitation is necessitation.

No. Causal necessity is never absent. Other forms of necessity may be present or absent. If you fail to make that distinction, you'll end up saying silly things. For example:

I didn't say it was ever absent. Just the opposite.

Necessitation means something is necessitated, not freely chosen.

No one was forcing me to order the salad. No one was forcing me to order the steak. The only thing forcing me to order the salad instead of the steak was my memory of having bacon and eggs for breakfast and a double cheeseburger for lunch. So, the inner necessitation was my own goals and reasons, and my own interests. Free will is when someone decides for themselves what they will do, while free of coercion and undue influence. It never requires being free of ones own goals, reasons, or interests.

Bur determinism/necessitation is not a matter of force or coercion, just the way things must necessarily go given prior states of the system.

Prior states determine current states determine future states.

No deviations. Not forced, just determined....one state forms the next state which forms the next state.....each state fixed by the last.

Because this event, like all events, was causally necessary from any prior point in time, we must conclude that it was necessitated that the salad would be freely chosen.

If determined, it cannot be anything but salad. There is no choice, if salad, there is no alternative, salad it must necessarily be. Not forced, not coerced, just fixed by antecedents.

So, your statement is incorrect. The fact that something is causally necessitated does not mean that it was not freely chosen. Quite the opposite: It means that it was necessary that it would be freely chosen.

What I said was, for the reasons outlined above and other posts, correct. Determined actions are not freely willed actions, they are fixed by antecedents....as determinism is defined.

If an action is necessitated by the non-chosen state of the system, how can it be claimed to be freely willed or chosen? It can't.

I hope you see now that it can be claimed to be freely chosen. The non-chosen state of the system happens to make choices all the time. For example, it can choose whether to order the steak or the salad. And, pardon me, but it seems a bit silly to claim that the non-chosen state of the system is not free to make choices when you just saw it making choices in the restaurant.

Some do claim it, no doubt. But as all actions within a determined system are fixed by antecedents, with no alternatives possible, nothing is freely chosen. All actions are the inevitable consequence of the state of the system in any given instance in time....thereby, free will plays no part.

By definition, it cannot be held up as an example of free will.

Only by the carefully crafted definitions built upon the original paradox. But a paradox is not a solid foundation for anything. A paradox is basically a self-induced hoax. The original paradox was created by the false suggestion that causal necessity was a meaningful constraint, something that we must be free of. It's baloney. Causal necessity is nothing more than reliable cause and effect, something that we all take for granted because we see it in everything that happens and everything we do. It is neither an object nor a force. It has no power to cause or necessitate anything. All of that power rests within the actual objects and forces that make up the physical universe. And, we happen to be one of those objects, that go about in the world causing stuff to happen, and doing so for our own goals, reasons, and interests.

Freedom by definition implies the possibility of doing otherwise. Determinism denies all ability of doing otherwise. Within a determined system, freedom is an illusion.

Think about watching videos, the characters appear to go about their lives, appearing to make decisions, fight their foes, struggle and die, yet everything can be replayed and the same actions take place exactly as determined by the media.

That is essentially how determinism works.

 

[Jarhyn]

I am not the only incompatibilist

Ad Populum..

Russell and Whitehead tried to systematize and integrate different logics and maths but failed.

Look up Langland's Program. Langland succeeded where Russell and Whitehead failed.

As pointed out Compatibilism compatibilist free will is a carefully crafted definition

As pointed out, so is ∀u∀v(∀x(x∈u⇔x∈v), designed to make it appear as though one set may be considered equal to another set referred to with a different nominal symbol.

Definitions MUST be crafted in ways which do not allow the systems they are inserted into to prove all sentences.

Introducing an axiomatic contradiction like the religion of hard determinism does, does not invalidate the math other people do on responsibility and causality such that momentary responsibility has meaning. It just makes them incapable of doing that math, and probably ending up on the wrong side of it when other people figure out that they behave badly and do not operate internal oversight properly on their actions.

Not understanding addition does not invalidate addition. It merely makes you bad at addition.

Not understanding freedom and will as operational concepts in the derivation of situational responsibility does not invalidate responsibility, it just makes you irresponsible.

 

[fromderinside]

Russell and Whitehead tried to systematize and integrate different logics and maths but failed.

Look up Langland's Program. Langland succeeded where Russell and Whitehead failed.

Inompleteness still applies.

 

[Jarhyn]

Russell and Whitehead tried to systematize and integrate different logics and maths but failed.

Look up Langland's Program. Langland succeeded where Russell and Whitehead failed.

Inompleteness still applies.

Not to what I just mentioned.

Your statement, the one I responded to, was about integration of all maths against each other. That's what Langland's Program is: a complete integration of maths across disparate fields.

Definitions MUST be crafted in ways which do not allow the systems they are inserted into to prove all sentences.

Introducing an axiomatic contradiction like the religion of hard determinism does, does not invalidate the math other people do on responsibility and causality such that momentary responsibility has meaning. It just makes them incapable of doing that math, and probably ending up on the wrong side of it when other people figure out that they behave badly and do not operate internal oversight properly on their actions.

Not understanding addition does not invalidate addition. It merely makes you bad at addition.

Not understanding freedom and will as operational concepts in the derivation of situational responsibility does not invalidate responsibility, it just makes you irresponsible.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

I didn't say it was ever absent. Just the opposite.

That's the point. Causal necessity is never absent. Other forms of necessity, for example legal necessity, may be present or absent. When they are absent, we are free from that necessity. In Germany, there are speed limits in many areas, but on the Autobahn, there is only speed "advice", which does not necessitate that you follow this advice. So, we are free to go as fast as we want.

But we are never "free of cause and effect", because cause and effect is required for every freedom we have to do anything. So, the notion of being free from "that which enables our freedom" is an oxymoron. It is a logically impossible freedom.

Bur determinism/necessitation is not a matter of force or coercion, just the way things must necessarily go given prior states of the system.
Prior states determine current states determine future states. No deviations. Not forced, just determined....one state forms the next state which forms the next state.....each state fixed by the last.

Exactly. But don't get lost in the abstraction! In concrete reality, a relevant example would be Sapolsky's 3 million years of evolution leading to intelligent human beings finishing up their workday at 5pm, and discussing the possibility of going to a restaurant for dinner. That conversation leads to several of them deciding that they will eat at Ruby Tuesdays. Their decision causes them to drive to the restaurant, walk in the door, and browse their menus. Each of them sees several items they would enjoy, and each of them resolves their many options into a single dinner order. One tells the waitress, "I will have the Top Sirloin, please". Another says, "I will have the New Orleans Seafood platter". And when it is our turn, we remember the bacon and eggs we had for breakfast, and the double cheeseburger we had for lunch, and wisely say, "I will have the Endless Garden Bar".

Everything in this scenario proceeds deterministically. All of the events were reliably caused by prior events, with no deviations. This includes the mental events that took place in each customer's brain as they considered their many alternate possibilities and reduced that to a single conscious intent. The intent was expressed to the waitress as an "I will have X for dinner".

No one was coerced or unduly influenced to make some other choice than the one they chose for themselves. Therefore, each made the choice of their own free will (as ordinarily and operationally defined). And, it was causally determined, from any prior point in time, that they would do so.

Because this event, like all events, was causally necessary from any prior point in time, we must conclude that it was necessitated that the salad would be freely chosen.

If determined, it cannot be anything but salad. There is no choice, if salad, there is no alternative, salad it must necessarily be. Not forced, not coerced, just fixed by antecedents.

Have you seen the Ruby Tuesdays Menu? Obviously, the meal could have been quite a number of different things. Therefore, the statement, "If determined, it cannot be anything but salad" is clearly false. Nor can you claim, "There is no choice", when choosing clearly happened and a choice was made inside each brain at the table.

You were absolutely right to say "Not forced, not coerced, just fixed by antecedents". Because being "fixed by antecedents" definitely does not imply coercion or undue influence.

And that is why being fixed by antecedents does not contradict free will. The notion that it does is part of the paradox, the self-induced hoax, brought on by the seemingly innocent question, "How can you be truly free if you are the result of antecedent causes?"

What I said was, for the reasons outlined above and other posts, correct. Determined actions are not freely willed actions, they are fixed by antecedents....as determinism is defined.

Again, you're using a different definition of "free will". You're imagining something that is "free from antecedent causes". And there is no such event, at any time or in any place. All events are the reliable result of prior events (as demonstrated in the restaurant example). This includes the event of choosing, in which the menu of multiple possibilities was reduced to a single dinner order.

Freedom by definition implies the possibility of doing otherwise.

The "possibility of doing otherwise" is built into the choosing operation. In order for choosing to happen, there must be at least two real possibilities to choose from, and it must be possible to choose either one. When faced the with the choice between ordering the steak or the salad, both the steak and the salad must be real possibilities, things that can actually happen if we choose them. And, of course, it must be possible to choose either one. "I can choose the steak" must be true and "I can choose the salad" must also be true. These are assumed true, by logical necessity, before we start evaluating our two options. None of these can be assumed false without bringing the choosing operation to a screeching halt.

So, we always have at least two options to choose from, and it is always possible to choose either one of them. The possibility to choose either one of them is "the possibility of doing otherwise".

If is it causally necessary that we will be making such a choice, then it will be logically necessary that we will have the ability to do otherwise.

Determinism denies all ability of doing otherwise.

Yeah, you'd think that, but it is false nonetheless. If it is determined that we will be making a choice, then it is also determined that we will have the ability to choose the steak and an equal ability to choose the salad.

Since we decided that we will choose the salad. So, what are we to call the steak? Was the steak every an "impossibility"? Nope, it was always possible to choose the steak for dinner. What we call choosing the steak is, "what we could have done".

Within a determined system, freedom is an illusion.

No. That's way off. Within a determined system, only one freedom is an illusion, the freedom from being in a determined system. Every other freedom remains both real and meaningful, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, freedom from slavery, and freedom to choose for ourselves what we will do.

Think about watching videos, the characters appear to go about their lives, appearing to make decisions, fight their foes, struggle and die, yet everything can be replayed and the same actions take place exactly as determined by the media.

But you've said we were watching a video, determined by the media. So, that's not a proper analogy for real life. It can only be seen as propaganda for preaching a fatalistic version of determinism.

That is essentially how determinism works.

Determinism works like this: One event causes another event which causes another. Choosing to eat at Ruby Tuesdays causes us to be sitting in the restaurant looking at a literal menu of alternate possibilities. Which causes us to each perform a choosing operation that causally determines what we will order for dinner. Each making their own choice of their own freely chosen "I will".

 

[fromderinside]

Russell and Whitehead tried to systematize and integrate different logics and maths but failed.

Look up Langland's Program. Langland succeeded where Russell and Whitehead failed.

Inompleteness still applies.

Not to what I just mentioned.

Your statement, the one I responded to, was about integration of all maths against each other. That's what Langland's Program is: a complete integration of maths across disparate fields.

Definitions MUST be crafted in ways which do not allow the systems they are inserted into to prove all sentences.

Introducing an axiomatic contradiction like the religion of hard determinism does, does not invalidate the math other people do on responsibility and causality such that momentary responsibility has meaning. It just makes them incapable of doing that math, and probably ending up on the wrong side of it when other people figure out that they behave badly and do not operate internal oversight properly on their actions.

Not understanding addition does not invalidate addition. It merely makes you bad at addition.

Not understanding freedom and will as operational concepts in the derivation of situational responsibility does not invalidate responsibility, it just makes you irresponsible.

Read the article on Godel's Incompleteness theorem again.

Gödel's incompleteness theorems​

Gödel's incompleteness theorems are two theorems of mathematical logic that are concerned with the limits of provability in formal axiomatic theories. These results, published by Kurt Gödel in 1931, are important both in mathematical logic and in the philosophy of mathematics. The theorems are widely, but not universally, interpreted as showing that Hilbert's program to find a complete and consistent set of axioms for all mathematics is impossible.
The first incompleteness theorem states that no consistent system of axioms whose theorems can be listed by an effective procedure (i.e., an algorithm) is capable of proving all truths about the arithmetic of natural numbers. For any such consistent formal system, there will always be statements about natural numbers that are true, but that are unprovable within the system. The second incompleteness theorem, an extension of the first, shows that the system cannot demonstrate its own consistency.
Employing a diagonal argument, Gödel's incompleteness theorems were the first of several closely related theorems on the limitations of formal systems. They were followed by Tarski's undefinability theorem on the formal undefinability of truth, Church's proof that Hilbert's Entscheidungsproblem is unsolvable, and Turing's theorem that there is no algorithm to solve the halting problem.

There are several problems. First no math can be complete. No integration of maths can be complete nor can they demonstrate their own own consistency. My critiques are that no self defined system (that is math systems) reflects reality nor can they demonstrate - probably a consequence of the indefinability of truth - the reality of anything.

 

[Jarhyn]

Russell and Whitehead tried to systematize and integrate different logics and maths but failed.

Look up Langland's Program. Langland succeeded where Russell and Whitehead failed.

Inompleteness still applies.

Not to what I just mentioned.

Your statement, the one I responded to, was about integration of all maths against each other. That's what Langland's Program is: a complete integration of maths across disparate fields.

Definitions MUST be crafted in ways which do not allow the systems they are inserted into to prove all sentences.

Introducing an axiomatic contradiction like the religion of hard determinism does, does not invalidate the math other people do on responsibility and causality such that momentary responsibility has meaning. It just makes them incapable of doing that math, and probably ending up on the wrong side of it when other people figure out that they behave badly and do not operate internal oversight properly on their actions.

Not understanding addition does not invalidate addition. It merely makes you bad at addition.

Not understanding freedom and will as operational concepts in the derivation of situational responsibility does not invalidate responsibility, it just makes you irresponsible.

Read the article on Godel's Incompleteness theorem again.

Gödel's incompleteness theorems​

Gödel's incompleteness theorems are two theorems of mathematical logic that are concerned with the limits of provability in formal axiomatic theories. These results, published by Kurt Gödel in 1931, are important both in mathematical logic and in the philosophy of mathematics. The theorems are widely, but not universally, interpreted as showing that Hilbert's program to find a complete and consistent set of axioms for all mathematics is impossible.
The first incompleteness theorem states that no consistent system of axioms whose theorems can be listed by an effective procedure (i.e., an algorithm) is capable of proving all truths about the arithmetic of natural numbers. For any such consistent formal system, there will always be statements about natural numbers that are true, but that are unprovable within the system. The second incompleteness theorem, an extension of the first, shows that the system cannot demonstrate its own consistency.
Employing a diagonal argument, Gödel's incompleteness theorems were the first of several closely related theorems on the limitations of formal systems. They were followed by Tarski's undefinability theorem on the formal undefinability of truth, Church's proof that Hilbert's Entscheidungsproblem is unsolvable, and Turing's theorem that there is no algorithm to solve the halting problem.

There are several problems. First no math can be complete. No integration of maths can be complete nor can they demonstrate their own own consistency. My critiques are that no self defined system (that is math systems) reflects reality nor can they demonstrate - probably a consequence of the indefinability of truth - the reality of anything.

Try reading it again. You seem to have an issue of living on the inside of a Chinese room.

My subject is not on "the completeness of math" it is on the unification of it. Unitary does not imply complete.

Langland's Program has done what you are claiming cannot be done: an integration of all maths with each other.

If you wish to make the claim that the universe is deterministic, and so to use the truth of what determinism means under the axioms of the math that discusses the meaning of "deterministic" (which you have to do to claim causal necessity), then you have to deal with all the rest of the ways those axioms produce other sentences that are true by those same axioms.

As it is, math is not even necessarily self-defined. We could as easily define it in terms of the fundamental observed properties of physics, and in terms of the extant fields.

From there axioms would still precipitate.

The point here is that when we use sensible definitions then we can do sensible math. When we use nonsensical definitions, we can do zero math. If we can do zero math, we can do zero science, because science uses math to describe, quantify, and structure the models published through it.

All science rests firmly on a foundation of math.

If no self-defined system can reflect reality, nothing at all can reflect reality... but that's clearly bogus.

Here we are reflecting reality with so-called "self-defined systems." It's almost as if much like your false notion of "free will", your notion of what "self defined" implies is also a failure.

 

[fromderinside]

Russell and Whitehead tried to systematize and integrate different logics and maths but failed.

Look up Langland's Program. Langland succeeded where Russell and Whitehead failed.

Inompleteness still applies.

Not to what I just mentioned.

Your statement, the one I responded to, was about integration of all maths against each other. That's what Langland's Program is: a complete integration of maths across disparate fields.

Definitions MUST be crafted in ways which do not allow the systems they are inserted into to prove all sentences.

Introducing an axiomatic contradiction like the religion of hard determinism does, does not invalidate the math other people do on responsibility and causality such that momentary responsibility has meaning. It just makes them incapable of doing that math, and probably ending up on the wrong side of it when other people figure out that they behave badly and do not operate internal oversight properly on their actions.

Not understanding addition does not invalidate addition. It merely makes you bad at addition.

Not understanding freedom and will as operational concepts in the derivation of situational responsibility does not invalidate responsibility, it just makes you irresponsible.

Read the article on Godel's Incompleteness theorem again.

Gödel's incompleteness theorems​

Gödel's incompleteness theorems are two theorems of mathematical logic that are concerned with the limits of provability in formal axiomatic theories. These results, published by Kurt Gödel in 1931, are important both in mathematical logic and in the philosophy of mathematics. The theorems are widely, but not universally, interpreted as showing that Hilbert's program to find a complete and consistent set of axioms for all mathematics is impossible.
The first incompleteness theorem states that no consistent system of axioms whose theorems can be listed by an effective procedure (i.e., an algorithm) is capable of proving all truths about the arithmetic of natural numbers. For any such consistent formal system, there will always be statements about natural numbers that are true, but that are unprovable within the system. The second incompleteness theorem, an extension of the first, shows that the system cannot demonstrate its own consistency.
Employing a diagonal argument, Gödel's incompleteness theorems were the first of several closely related theorems on the limitations of formal systems. They were followed by Tarski's undefinability theorem on the formal undefinability of truth, Church's proof that Hilbert's Entscheidungsproblem is unsolvable, and Turing's theorem that there is no algorithm to solve the halting problem.

There are several problems. First no math can be complete. No integration of maths can be complete nor can they demonstrate their own own consistency. My critiques are that no self defined system (that is math systems) reflects reality nor can they demonstrate - probably a consequence of the indefinability of truth - the reality of anything.

Try reading it again. You seem to have an issue of living on the inside of a Chinese room.

My subject is not on "the completeness of math" it is on the unification of it. Unitary does not imply complete.

Langland's Program has done what you are claiming cannot be done: an integration of all maths with each other.

If you wish to make the claim that the universe is deterministic, and so to use the truth of what determinism means under the axioms of the math that discusses the meaning of "deterministic" (which you have to do to claim causal necessity), then you have to deal with all the rest of the ways those axioms produce other sentences that are true by those same axioms.

As it is, math is not even necessarily self-defined. We could as easily define it in terms of the fundamental observed properties of physics, and in terms of the extant fields.

From there axioms would still precipitate.

The point here is that when we use sensible definitions then we can do sensible math. When we use nonsensical definitions, we can do zero math. If we can do zero math, we can do zero science, because science uses math to describe, quantify, and structure the models published through it.

All science rests firmly on a foundation of math.

If no self-defined system can reflect reality, nothing at all can reflect reality... but that's clearly bogus.

Here we are reflecting reality with so-called "self-defined systems." It's almost as if much like your false notion of "free will", your notion of what "self defined" implies is also a failure.

We're having a discussion using self-referenced statements about how and whether maths can capture the essence of experimental findings. Clearly we're not communicating at all. It is particularly true with respect nature of reality.

Not all math has has been discovered, new findings require new maths, usually invented ad hoc by insightful persons to capture their form and function. You seem to be trying to save the value of logical rational description. Yet we know that that cannot be employed to verify their nature.

 

[DBT]

I am not the only incompatibilist

Ad Populum..

Russell and Whitehead tried to systematize and integrate different logics and maths but failed.

Look up Langland's Program. Langland succeeded where Russell and Whitehead failed.

As pointed out Compatibilism compatibilist free will is a carefully crafted definition

As pointed out, so is ∀u∀v(∀x(x∈u⇔x∈v), designed to make it appear as though one set may be considered equal to another set referred to with a different nominal symbol.

Definitions MUST be crafted in ways which do not allow the systems they are inserted into to prove all sentences.

Introducing an axiomatic contradiction like the religion of hard determinism does, does not invalidate the math other people do on responsibility and causality such that momentary responsibility has meaning. It just makes them incapable of doing that math, and probably ending up on the wrong side of it when other people figure out that they behave badly and do not operate internal oversight properly on their actions.

Not understanding addition does not invalidate addition. It merely makes you bad at addition.

Not understanding freedom and will as operational concepts in the derivation of situational responsibility does not invalidate responsibility, it just makes you irresponsible.

Definitions of conditions in relation to a system - the brain in this instance - should to be related to that system.

If it is to be claimed that we have 'free will' it has to be explained what will is, its role and function in the brain and the nature of its freedom.

Compatibilism does not do that, instead, compatibilists insist that acting uncoerced or forced in accordance with one's will is an example of free will.

A definition that fails to take into account the nature of will or its role and function in the brain.... that will plays absolutely no role in decision making or action initiation.....yet will is meant to be 'free?'

Free will is an illusion, a semantic house of cards.

 

[DBT]

I didn't say it was ever absent. Just the opposite.

That's the point. Causal necessity is never absent. Other forms of necessity, for example legal necessity, may be present or absent. When they are absent, we are free from that necessity. In Germany, there are speed limits in many areas, but on the Autobahn, there is only speed "advice", which does not necessitate that you follow this advice. So, we are free to go as fast as we want.

But we are never "free of cause and effect", because cause and effect is required for every freedom we have to do anything. So, the notion of being free from "that which enables our freedom" is an oxymoron. It is a logically impossible freedom.

Bur determinism/necessitation is not a matter of force or coercion, just the way things must necessarily go given prior states of the system.
Prior states determine current states determine future states. No deviations. Not forced, just determined....one state forms the next state which forms the next state.....each state fixed by the last.

Exactly. But don't get lost in the abstraction! In concrete reality, a relevant example would be Sapolsky's 3 million years of evolution leading to intelligent human beings finishing up their workday at 5pm, and discussing the possibility of going to a restaurant for dinner. That conversation leads to several of them deciding that they will eat at Ruby Tuesdays. Their decision causes them to drive to the restaurant, walk in the door, and browse their menus. Each of them sees several items they would enjoy, and each of them resolves their many options into a single dinner order. One tells the waitress, "I will have the Top Sirloin, please". Another says, "I will have the New Orleans Seafood platter". And when it is our turn, we remember the bacon and eggs we had for breakfast, and the double cheeseburger we had for lunch, and wisely say, "I will have the Endless Garden Bar".

Everything in this scenario proceeds deterministically. All of the events were reliably caused by prior events, with no deviations. This includes the mental events that took place in each customer's brain as they considered their many alternate possibilities and reduced that to a single conscious intent. The intent was expressed to the waitress as an "I will have X for dinner".

No one was coerced or unduly influenced to make some other choice than the one they chose for themselves. Therefore, each made the choice of their own free will (as ordinarily and operationally defined). And, it was causally determined, from any prior point in time, that they would do so.

Because this event, like all events, was causally necessary from any prior point in time, we must conclude that it was necessitated that the salad would be freely chosen.

If determined, it cannot be anything but salad. There is no choice, if salad, there is no alternative, salad it must necessarily be. Not forced, not coerced, just fixed by antecedents.

Have you seen the Ruby Tuesdays Menu? Obviously, the meal could have been quite a number of different things. Therefore, the statement, "If determined, it cannot be anything but salad" is clearly false. Nor can you claim, "There is no choice", when choosing clearly happened and a choice was made inside each brain at the table.

You were absolutely right to say "Not forced, not coerced, just fixed by antecedents". Because being "fixed by antecedents" definitely does not imply coercion or undue influence.

And that is why being fixed by antecedents does not contradict free will. The notion that it does is part of the paradox, the self-induced hoax, brought on by the seemingly innocent question, "How can you be truly free if you are the result of antecedent causes?"

What I said was, for the reasons outlined above and other posts, correct. Determined actions are not freely willed actions, they are fixed by antecedents....as determinism is defined.

Again, you're using a different definition of "free will". You're imagining something that is "free from antecedent causes". And there is no such event, at any time or in any place. All events are the reliable result of prior events (as demonstrated in the restaurant example). This includes the event of choosing, in which the menu of multiple possibilities was reduced to a single dinner order.

Freedom by definition implies the possibility of doing otherwise.

The "possibility of doing otherwise" is built into the choosing operation. In order for choosing to happen, there must be at least two real possibilities to choose from, and it must be possible to choose either one. When faced the with the choice between ordering the steak or the salad, both the steak and the salad must be real possibilities, things that can actually happen if we choose them. And, of course, it must be possible to choose either one. "I can choose the steak" must be true and "I can choose the salad" must also be true. These are assumed true, by logical necessity, before we start evaluating our two options. None of these can be assumed false without bringing the choosing operation to a screeching halt.

So, we always have at least two options to choose from, and it is always possible to choose either one of them. The possibility to choose either one of them is "the possibility of doing otherwise".

If is it causally necessary that we will be making such a choice, then it will be logically necessary that we will have the ability to do otherwise.

Determinism denies all ability of doing otherwise.

Yeah, you'd think that, but it is false nonetheless. If it is determined that we will be making a choice, then it is also determined that we will have the ability to choose the steak and an equal ability to choose the salad.

Since we decided that we will choose the salad. So, what are we to call the steak? Was the steak every an "impossibility"? Nope, it was always possible to choose the steak for dinner. What we call choosing the steak is, "what we could have done".

Within a determined system, freedom is an illusion.

No. That's way off. Within a determined system, only one freedom is an illusion, the freedom from being in a determined system. Every other freedom remains both real and meaningful, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, freedom from slavery, and freedom to choose for ourselves what we will do.

Think about watching videos, the characters appear to go about their lives, appearing to make decisions, fight their foes, struggle and die, yet everything can be replayed and the same actions take place exactly as determined by the media.

But you've said we were watching a video, determined by the media. So, that's not a proper analogy for real life. It can only be seen as propaganda for preaching a fatalistic version of determinism.

That is essentially how determinism works.

Determinism works like this: One event causes another event which causes another. Choosing to eat at Ruby Tuesdays causes us to be sitting in the restaurant looking at a literal menu of alternate possibilities. Which causes us to each perform a choosing operation that causally determines what we will order for dinner. Each making their own choice of their own freely chosen "I will".

Short on time tonight, I'll just quote this perspective on the subject;

Here is the problem. Frankfurt cases are strongly disanalogous to physical determinism. In a Frankfurt case, the person's action is not determined by any actual physical laws. The sense in which the person "cannot do otherwise" is entirely counterfactual. It is that if they tried to choose otherwise, someone (or some mechanism) would step in and ensure that they don't succeed. But this "trying" isn't even possible under physical determinism. It's not the case that if I tried to behave otherwise than I do, physical laws would step in and stop me. It's that I can't even try to behave otherwise if physical determinism is true (it is not a physical possibility).

This, then, is the problem with Frankfurt cases. They push certain intuitions -- that we can be morally responsible for our actions even if we couldn't do otherwise -- because, contrary to determinism, they smuggle in libertarian intuitions. They do this because alternative possibilities are only ruled out counterfactually.

For all Frankfurt cases show, the reason why we judge a person free and responsible in those cases is that (A) we judge the person had libertarian free will to make the choice (they caused their action independently of physical laws), but (B) alternative possibilities are counterfactually ruled out because, if they libertarian-ly tried to choose something else, some mechanism would force them to behave the same way.

Accordingly, Frankfurt cases don't seem sufficient to me to philosophically motivate compatibilism. They're a poor analogy to determinism. In order to motivate compatibilism, we would have to tell a story like the one above (about voting for democrats) using determinism. But when we tell such a story, it doesn't seem at all like the person is free or morally responsible.


But now if Frankfurt cases aren't sufficient to motivate compatibilism, what can be? A Strawsonian picture of reactive attitudes (see section 4.3 here) perhaps? I'm happy enough with this kind of compatibilist picture of moral responsibility -- with the idea that we can sensibly hold people morally responsible in a deterministic world. But now, it seems to me, we're no longer talking about free will. We're merely talking about moral responsibility. And so compatibilism about free will, it seems to me, remains insufficiently motivated.''

 

[DBT]

Necessitation is the antithesis of freedom.

To be consistent, if you sincerely believed this, you would have to concede that all uses of the words free and freedom are mistaken (and should therefore be eliminated from the English language).

It's not what I believe.

You seemed to have missed the context of my remark. You have snipped the following explanation and misrepresent what I said.

I'm not surprised. I said that it's not about what I believe, but the terms and references of the issue, which I went on to outline...you know, the part you excluded.

Your tactics are transparent. Or perhaps you just see what suits your needs, the rest being ignored.

 

[Jarhyn]

Definitions of conditions in relation to a system

You misuse the word "system". "System" used here is "axiomatic system of linguistic description", and the system that must be looked at is "the system which describes the deterministic physics" not the subsystem of that which describes neural systems.

As has been pointed out, and that which you cannot really sneak away from because we are all watching you like a hawk, is that neural systems may behave in reality in any way that Turing systems behave and then some, and Turing systems can do all the things, observably, within a deterministic system that are necessary to execute and regulate what it will do.

If it is to be claimed that we have 'free will' it has to be explained what will is

Did that: "Will" in any deterministic system is a set of configurations which determine a situational moment.

I pointed to a will held by a dwarf: Open Door. That will was not free. In this case it was a set of arbitrary instructions lined up for a Turing machine to execute, followed by operation of an object test: Is Door Open?

Now I will point out that whether a will is free or not is a matter of analysis, not decision. One cannot decide such that a will becomes free. It was either always constrained or always free, and causal necessity determines this.

At best one can train themselves to more readily identify unfree wills and short circuit their constraint. The goal is to calculate whether a will is even likely to possibly be "free" so as to not waste effort.

I don't have to even prove humans have this. I mean we do: the dwarf mind was directly designed through examinations of the process of human decision making and operation.

But I don't really need to go that far. I just need something that proves beyond the shadow of a doubt "deterministic systems allow both sensible definitions of "free" and "will"". Then I get the transform from the modal logic between the capabilities of neurons and of Turing machines.