Compatibilism: What's that About?

[Jarhyn]

So to recap ALL of my arguments on "free will" thus far:

Let "free* X" be "when X shall have it's requirement met".

Let a "will*" be "a list of instructions with a requirement attached"

Let "free will**", used without reference to a specific will be "will selected by the free execution of the will specifically to choose wills by a set of of requirements bounded on observation of 'consent'"

Consent is an absurdity in and of itself deserving its own thread. For now we can accept that there is some thing "consent" and that violating it is considered "coercion".

But here, we are discussing wills and freedom thereof, and so...

I may observe that a universe with specific and deterministic laws which govern it has been instantiated on a base field of memory in 64 bit operation space.

It has some dependencies but we can, in total treat this as a deterministic system. It is in fact "superdeterministic" insofar as it has a pseudorandomized series coming in, and even that comes on what will be an assumedly deterministic pattern.

If the universe were triggered with this seed, in the presence of the basic "raw field", it ends up in the same moment of the same day in the same place.

This assumes I play along and do all the same stuff at all the same exact times, or have a machine that does this for me, driven from the same seed for all determinations.

So, I hit start. Some things happen, I wave my hands, time progresses, and now on the screen there is a dwarf in a room. In true DF manner, I will call him Urist.

Urist is a "woodcutter" who holds a very "sharp" "axe" made of "adamantine" that when "fighting" may be used to "chop" at "body parts" and will very effectively "cut" them off.

Urist holds a will* to go to the Meeting Area and Fight. I can stop time, read his transistors, and read off his scripted actions, as he is doing it. It's right there in objective, binary reality. He has the intent to take five steps, open a door, walk down the hallway, and so on, and then when he gets there, start a conflict "somehow".

This will* has been his freely* selected will*. This will* precipitated because Urist really really likes fighting, and so holds the requirement, needing regular service, to "FIGHT!". Why does he like it so much? Who knows! Blame random happenstance! It is one of his traits compounded by one of his values, though, in truth. It might as well be considered analogous to "a genetic trait".

He has not been "threatened", or told to start a fight by some random, mysterious, collectively imposed force by which wills* might be assigned "as if from god, or external force". I will note he could be subjected to either of these two things. But Urist has not.

This will is observably freely held. Urist has "Free Will**" even though his Will* to Fight is not itself "free*".

Second, there is the discussion of how Urist, while he freely holds** the will* to fight, the will* to fight is itself not free*.

For this, we will have to consider, for a moment, the capability of this universe to have some slightly absurd thing happen: randomly, all by happenstance, doors may "lock" for some period of time.

When this happens, the door may not be opened.

When Urist assembled this will*, he looked at his path from his starting point to his destination, and saw all the doors were unlocked in that moment, according to his understanding.

Urist, being a simple "dwarf", cannot know that or when doors lock randomly, but is built in such a way that when he encounters a locked door where one is expected to be unlocked, he will attempt to find a different path, and failing his ability to do so, his will*, will "fail": some pattern is given to a process, and the process clears out the will* and deals with the "failure".

His subjective, imaginary assumption that the will* would be free is false: the door is locked.

This is all a matter of mechanical facts.

The system will cogitate, and an outcome will come to pass: Urist stands before the locked door, and attempts to open it.

Urist fails to open the door.

Urist's will* to fight was never free*, even if it was freely held**

 

[Marvin Edwards]

So to recap ALL of my arguments on "free will" thus far:

Good.

Let "free* X" be "when X shall have it's requirement met".

Urist is able to satisfy his own will.

Let a "will*" be "a list of instructions with a requirement attached"

Right. The instructions are the general sketch of a plan to satisfy his genetic need to fight.

Let "free will**", used without reference to a specific will be "will selected by the free execution of the will specifically to choose wills by a set of of requirements bounded on observation of 'consent'"

Consent is an absurdity in and of itself deserving its own thread. For now we can accept that there is some thing "consent" and that violating it is considered "coercion".

The distinction is that with free will consent is implied by the fact that it is one's own will, but with coercion the consent is gained by the threat of harm. Coercion creates a moral dilemma where we must choose which is the lesser harm: (a) to consent to carry out the demands or (b) to suffer the threatened consequences.

To give Urist more of a free will, you need to give him an alternate will, a "plan B", perhaps something that he can do instead of fighting when fighting is impossible due to the locked door.

But here, we are discussing wills and freedom thereof, and so...

I may observe that a universe with specific and deterministic laws which govern it has been instantiated on a base field of memory in 64 bit operation space.

A model of a universe.

It has some dependencies but we can, in total treat this as a deterministic system. It is in fact "superdeterministic" insofar as it has a pseudorandomized series coming in, and even that comes on what will be an assumedly deterministic pattern.

Amen. Random may be assumed to be deterministic even if unpredictable.

If the universe were triggered with this seed, in the presence of the basic "raw field", it ends up in the same moment of the same day in the same place.

This assumes I play along and do all the same stuff at all the same exact times, or have a machine that does this for me, driven from the same seed for all determinations.

Well, you needn't play along. You can program your game to accept a variety of values in its variables, and throw an exception when it runs into something it cannot handle...or, perhaps even generate a random response to an exception.

So, I hit start. Some things happen, I wave my hands, time progresses, and now on the screen there is a dwarf in a room. In true DF manner, I will call him Urist.

Ah! So Urist has a gender even though you don't.

Urist is a "woodcutter" who holds a very "sharp" "axe" made of "adamantine" that when "fighting" may be used to "chop" at "body parts" and will very effectively "cut" them off.

Urist holds a will* to go to the Meeting Area and Fight. I can stop time, read his transistors, and read off his scripted actions, as he is doing it. It's right there in objective, binary reality. He has the intent to take five steps, open a door, walk down the hallway, and so on, and then when he gets there, start a conflict "somehow".

This will* has been his freely* selected will*. This will* precipitated because Urist really really likes fighting, and so holds the requirement, needing regular service, to "FIGHT!". Why does he like it so much? Who knows! Blame random happenstance!

Well, in this case we can blame the programmer whose will was to give him that will, but go on...

It is one of his traits compounded by one of his values, though, in truth. It might as well be considered analogous to "a genetic trait".

Quite so.

He has not been "threatened", or told to start a fight by some random, mysterious, collectively imposed force by which wills* might be assigned "as if from god, or external force". I will note he could be subjected to either of these two things. But Urist has not.

But I hear told that the great god Jarhyn, who created this universe, might have also created Urist's will. So, if a willful agent willfully alters (or creates) Urist's will, then that would be an undue influence. It would be similar to the case where a neuroscientist implants a device that insures Urist will vote for a Democrat.

This will is observably freely held. Urist has "Free Will**" even though his Will* to Fight is not itself "free*".

Second, there is the discussion of how Urist, while he freely holds** the will* to fight, the will* to fight is itself not free*.

For this, we will have to consider, for a moment, the capability of this universe to have some slightly absurd thing happen: randomly, all by happenstance, doors may "lock" for some period of time.

When this happens, the door may not be opened.

When Urist assembled this will*, he looked at his path from his starting point to his destination, and saw all the doors were unlocked in that moment, according to his understanding.

Urist, being a simple "dwarf", cannot know that or when doors lock randomly, but is built in such a way that when he encounters a locked door where one is expected to be unlocked, he will attempt to find a different path, and failing his ability to do so, his will*, will "fail": some pattern is given to a process, and the process clears out the will* and deals with the "failure".

His subjective, imaginary assumption that the will* would be free is false: the door is locked.

This is all a matter of mechanical facts.

The system will cogitate, and an outcome will come to pass: Urist stands before the locked door, and attempts to open it.

Urist fails to open the door.

Urist's will* to fight was never free*, even if it was freely held**

What kind of constraint would prevent Urist from holding his will? (What would constrain his FreeWill** or his freely holding** his will*?)

It would seem that, since his will is encoded, that it would held indefinitely until the coding is modified.

One final thing, if we programmed a little imagination into Urist, he could probably figure out that he could chop through any door with his adamantine axe.

 

[Jarhyn]

To give Urist more of a free will, you need to give him an alternate will, a "plan B", perhaps something that he can do instead of fighting when fighting is impossible due to the locked door.

Well, he does have a plan B, something he can do... That something is "get a little bit more stressed".

And when his stress becomes... Well, high enough... He throws a tantrum.

i don't really need to give him anything though. He doesn't need to be "more" free. Certainly I could replace the thing in his head with an AI that looks at the requirement, looks at the will, and then just sort of does "whatever it's going to do, maybe the will it just had suggested to it, maybe pick it's nose with an axe".

that would be funny, and would potentially lead to very strange wills existing and different kinds of wills, some invented by this weird insanity.

but it would not make the free wills of Urist any more or less free. The ones that find their requirements are free. The ones that miss their requirements are not.

as long as one of those wills which is free is "to decide for himself in this moment what he shall do", he has Free Will**

But I hear told that the great god Jarhyn, who created this universe, might have also created Urist's will. So, if a willful agent willfully alters (or creates) Urist's will, then that would be an undue influence. It would be similar to the case where a neuroscientist implants a device that insures Urist will vote for a Democrat.

Alters yes, creates no.

Creating something is not indie influence over. It's pretty much the definition of due influence.

Altering it after the fact after it becomes its own thing... That can get a little hairy.

When I created Urist, I didn't say "let's whip up a universe, and it's going to contain Urist, specifically, who is going to love fighting with friends, and have a primary occupation in which he gets emotionally attached to the deadliest weapon that exists in his universe."

Ok, so, to be honest I DID create him in this thought exercise with that purpose, but it doesn't make any difference either way. He holds a will. It's his now, and while you can be angry at me for doing it, too, it's still his as much as is mine.

He stopped being his "prior causes" last Thursday, when the universe tumbled out of worldgen and the fortress became more than merely 7 dwarves abstracted as a caravan.

What kind of constraint would prevent Urist from holding his will? (What would constrain his FreeWill** or his freely holding** his will*?)

Oh, now this is the part where I bring in Rovod. I'm not going to do more to Urist, he's been through enough, first getting locked into the room to become a were-rabbit, and then in a different universe, getting his leg cut off in a spinning disk trap only to drop his crutch in a spinning disk trap, only to dodge the spinning disks and then fall instead into a pit of magma.

Rovod is instead walking down the hall. He wants to go socialize in the dining hall.

Instead, he gets pulled aside by Urist. God Damn, this guy. I thought I was done with him with the magma... whatever. Ok, so Urist says if Rovod doesn't sneak down to the display room, grab a particular battle axe off the display, and give it to Urist, Urist is going to kill Rovod's whole family.

Rovod now has a new will: sneak down to the display room, steal WinkBlinder the Fortuitious Wind, an Artifact Adamantine Battle Axe, and give it to Urist.

While Rovod is doing that, the administrator of the fort calls an emergency alert, and all the dwarves except Rovod pile into the Drawbridge Room.

The alert immediately ends, but Urist finds himself assigned to the drawbridge room. He stays there.

One of those quantum events happens and the door locks.

Now, stepping outside our "perfectly deterministic universe", an event happens: the "fortress administrator" assigns a task to pull a lever. It is a lever only Rovod is designated as a worker for.

Rovod pulls the lever.

A drawbridge somewhere lowers.

Whatever was under that drawbridge... Well, it's just not there anymore.

Where did it go?

And where is Urist all of a sudden?

Rovod goes down, steals an axe, and then just kind of keeps it.

Let's examine more closely what happened: Urist held, by his own Free Will** the will* to threaten Rovod into stealing his battle axe back again after the last time I causal necessity melted him.

Urist's freely held** will* was not free*.

Next Rovod held the coerced** will* to steal the axe for Urist, and this coerced** will* was free*.

Next Rovod held the coerced** will* to pull a lever, and this coerced** will* was free*.

Finally, Urist got smashed into oblivion by a falling drawbridge.

As we can see, there are a few kinds of coercion here. One is coercion of a mundane sort, and the other is coercion by a slightly more enigmatic pathway which is avoids normal stressful coercion and which is not objected to by the dwarf. Still, they are both coercion and both "undue".

We can discuss what to do about wills that are apparently free, so to make them clearly not (preventing harm in the moment through active measures).

We can discuss what to do about "drive wills" that are not well controlled or filtered by their "active fulfillment agent" (corrections programs).

We can discuss what to do when someone's drive wills or other will structure is just... problematically broken (mental hospitals).

We can discuss when someone has powerful drive wills leveraged over their normal self-actualization (coercion against consent to requirement).

Sadly, Urist cannot chop through the door. If he had a field property (building destroyer) associated with his particle, he could; but he lacks this token in his structure. He, as a result, lacks any ability to break the door. It could be made of "wood" and be the only thing standing between open air and a hundred meter tall column of magma and the door would stay there, closed.

Interesting enough, when he becomes a Were-rabbit in a few seconds following his tipping of the statue, he will get this token, and become able to assail the door, on which the other side thereto is a squad of very well armored and armed dwarves.

Oh, and thank fuck he finally dropped that axe when he changed into a mostly mindless werecreature.

 

[fromderinside]

Observation. Experiments on material things observed. Will, conscious + design are stuff we try to use to explain when we don't experiment.

"Cogito ergo sum" is based on self observation. Its subjective, not objective.

It also comes way after life exists and substantially evolves.

A desire to control ourselves in our (conscious) environment motivates us to fabriate discover the causes rationalizations of events. This presumed need to exercise of control is rationalized with comes built-in by natural selection in intelligent species. It motivates us to design things like scientific method, and extensions to our senses, like telescopes and microscopes and stethoscopes.

I'm sure we aren't motivated to design whatever. Very few humans can design. So the idea of human beings motivated to exploit such knowledge has the faint odor of spoiled thought. We came upon these things over long times by the accumulated work of many persons at great cost.

Desire arises from some form of neural and chemical genesis most of which predate (autonomic and voluntary nervous systems, locus coeruleus, Hypothalamus and Thalamus, even cerebellum) humans and humans with language. So I'm assuming you don't have a thing to which you can point with which one can intervene directly for testing.

So another subjective self defined facility? Puleez. Your rationalistic rantings of facility are very obvious fabrications.

 

[DBT]

It eliminates the possibility of alternate actions and freedom of choice. Freedom of choice entails the possibility of doing otherwise, determinism eliminates any possibility of doing anything that is not determined by antecedents, one state fixing the next, which fixes the next and the next as events unfold as determined, not freely willed or freely chosen, but determined.

We agree that causal necessity is a matter of each event being reliably determined by antecedent events. But when I show you examples of causal necessity, in which each event is reliably determined by antecedent events, you claim it must be happening outside of causal necessity or that it must not be really happening.

I have never said or implied anything of the sort. I don't know how you came to such a conclusion.

There is no event that is ever outside of causal necessity. Causal necessity never tells us anything useful about any specific events, because it is a general fact that equally applies to all events.

The term 'causal necessity' is just a reference to a system, determinism, where all events are fixed by antecedents, therefore necessarily progress as determined, one state leading to the next without deviation any the possibility of something different happening.

But all of our real-life human issues happen to be about specific kinds of events. There are pandemic events where people become infected with Covid-19. There are car accidents. There are people hugging each other. There are people making tough decisions, like which car or house to buy, or who they will marry and when.

Determinism doesn't exclude complexity, intelligence or rational response, only that nothing is freely willed.

Nothing is freely willed because everything that happens is fixed by initial conditions and the way things go ever after, with - as per your own definition - no deviation.

All of those various events are equally causally necessary, but each is a very different type of event, that we must deal with in different ways.

Of course, but how anyone deals with them is determined by the information condition of each and every respondent, not their will.

One, unable to deal with stress, may fall to pieces emotionally, another may thrive because they find the challenges stimulating. Each according to their own condition.

What indications are there that behavior has a biological basis?

*Behavior often is species specific. A chickadee, for example, carries one sunflower seed at a time from a feeder to a nearby branch, secures the seed to the branch between its feet, pecks it open, eats the contents, and repeats the process. Finches, in contrast, stay at the feeder for long periods, opening large numbers of seeds with their thick beaks. Some mating behaviors also are species specific. Prairie chickens, native to the upper Midwest, conduct an elaborate mating ritual, a sort of line dance for birds, with spread wings and synchronized group movements. Some behaviors are so characteristic that biologists use them to help differentiate between closely related species.

* Behaviors often breed true. We can reproduce behaviors in successive generations of organisms. Consider the instinctive retrieval behavior of a yellow Labrador or the herding posture of a border collie.

* Behaviors change in response to alterations in biological structures or processes. For example, a brain injury can turn a polite, mild-mannered person into a foul-mouthed, aggressive boor, and we routinely modify the behavioral manifestations of mental illnesses with drugs that alter brain chemistry. More recently, geneticists have created or extinguished specific mouse behaviors—ranging from nurturing of pups to continuous circling in a strain called "twirler"— by inserting or disabling specific genes.

* In humans, some behaviors run in families. For example, there is a clear familial aggregation of mental illness.

* Behavior has an evolutionary history that persists across related species. Chimpanzees are our closest relatives, separated from us by a mere 2 percent difference in DNA sequence. We and they share behaviors that are characteristic of highly social primates, including nurturing, cooperation, altruism, and even some facial expressions. Genes are evolutionary glue, binding all of life in a single history that dates back some 3.5 billion years. Conserved behaviors are part of that history, which is written in the language of nature's universal information molecule—DNA.

Free will is an event in which a person decides for themselves what they will do while free of coercion and undue influence. It happens. When it happens it is causally necessary, just like every other kind of event.

Nothing to do with free will. The brain is a information processor, the decisions it makes is determined by an interaction of information within the system.

The brain as a deterministic system is equally subject to causal necessity as the world at large.

The information processing activity of the brain has its initial state and how things go ever after are fixed as a matter of natural law, in this instance, the architecture of the brain, its immediate physical condition, chemistry and electrochemical processing activity.

That covers it. The rest is repetition. And the reason why I stopped responding to the three other posters. Too much time wasted.

I'll just add dissociative identity disorder as an example of the consequences of non-chosen brain condition and its implications for free will.....where each personality has their own sets of behaviour and associated will;

Think about the implications of the condition for the notion of free will;

''A person with dissociative identity disorder can go through dramatic changes in behaviour and speech patterns from one occasion to the next.

The person switches from identity to identity, or feels the presence of 2 or more people living inside their head. Each identity may have its own name and characteristics such as voice, expressions and mannerisms. The main characteristics of dissociative identity disorder are:

• A disruption of identity, where the person has 2 or more distinct personality states. This is different to having an imaginary friend, which is not a sign of a mental health problem. It is also different to ‘possession’ by a spirit or entity in some cultures or religions, which is not considered a disorder.
• A change in identity that involves altered behaviours, emotions, thoughts, memories and perceptions — these may be observed by others or felt by the person.
• Repeated and excessive gaps in memory (amnesia) for everyday events, important personal information, large portions of childhood or traumatic events. The person may not be able to recall memories or people they have met from when they were in another personality state.''

 

[Jarhyn]

@DBT, we all know that the real reason you are only responding to Martin is because his posts demonstrate the weakest understanding of Free Will here, other than you and FDI. He commits the most eggregious uses of sloppy language, beyond you and FDI (repeated failure to specify whether he is talking about "the will to select wills free of coercion" or "the freedom of a given will to it's requirement"), and because also, he fails to cut into your not-even-wrong as consistently as the rest of us.

Again, you beg the question repeatedly, failing to look at or even acknowledge that the definitions presented to you have no conflict with "causal necessity".

As has been pointed out in the mechanically "simple" deterministic universe in which Urist lives he holds a will, and undeniably objectively so. The will is either selected by himself for his wants and needs, or it is selected by someone or something else and undeniably so. The will is either going to have it's requirement satisfied or it is going to return "failure" and undeniably so.

When the requirement is not selected by himself we say "he was coerced, his will* is not freely held**" because this satisfies the objective definition of coercion.

When his will is not going to satisfy it's requirement we say "his will* is not free*". This is a different statement than "he lacks free will**".

These are simple, objective, mathematical facts of his existence, and undeniably so.

If you wish to make such statements as X cannot exist in Y, you are vulnerable to disproof through counterexamples, especially when you make a claim of a logical system.

That you dislike that computers can hold things which satisfy the definition of "will" is not my problem, it is nobody's problem but your own.

I get that you dislike the discussion of how these objective things we call "wills" in this context exist in a way we can objectively call free, and that the discussion of how and why they are free has direct structural extension to much more complicated context of these concepts operating in our own "deterministic system".

The system I show you is deterministic and ridiculous. It has a (very inept, most times) god who ends up letting problems go too long until they need to be lanced like a hot boil.

But those problems have some wills, and those wills are, oftentimes, free.

Interesting enough, sometimes the problem is that they wish to have more work assigned by "the administrator".

And sometimes the problem is, objectively, right now in this moment, that "Urist" just really likes to "fight".

This discussion, this verbiage allows us to make that recognition, and design solutions to the problem of threats to our mutually compatible self actualization.

 

[The AntiChris]

his posts demonstrate the weakest understanding of Free Will here, other than you and FDI. He commits the most eggregious uses of sloppy language, beyond you and FDI .

I disagree. I think Marvin presents one of the clearest explanations/defences of compatibilism.

Personally, I'd prefer it if Marvin attempted a different approach to DBT's particular dogmatic free will denialism but I'm not at all convinced that it would make any difference to DBT's responses.

 

[Jarhyn]

his posts demonstrate the weakest understanding of Free Will here, other than you and FDI. He commits the most eggregious uses of sloppy language, beyond you and FDI .

I disagree. I think Marvin presents one of the clearest explanations/defences of compatibilism.

Personally, I'd prefer it if Marvin attempted a different approach to DBT's particular dogmatic free will denialism but I'm not at all convinced that it would make any difference to DBT's responses.

I do like his approach to the ideas in the clarity once the fundamental mechanics can be mashed out and demonstrated.

It's a great approach to discussing it in a way someone who is not a hardened determinist can understand. It presents the fundamental question, which does revolve around "free from what?"

It lacks the satisfaction of examining "what, exactly is free and what exactly is it free from?"

 

[Marvin Edwards]

The term 'causal necessity' is just a reference to a system, determinism, where all events are fixed by antecedents, therefore necessarily progress as determined, one state leading to the next without deviation any the possibility of something different happening.

Neither determinism nor causal necessity can be called a "system".

A system is an object with multiple parts operating in some fashion as a whole. An atom is a system. A universe is a system. A person is a system. A central nervous system is a system.

Determinism and causal necessity are descriptive comments about how a given system operates. A system that operates deterministically will necessarily produce the same effects given the same causes.

Determinism describes a single characteristic of a system, but determinism itself is not a system. Determinism is neither an object nor a force. It cannot cause events. It has no agency. Determinism never determines anything. Only the actual objects (quarks, atoms, molecules, species of living organisms, planets, stars, etc.) and forces (gravity, etc.) that make up the physical universe can cause events to happen.

So, when you use the phrase, "as determined", you need to keep it straight in your head that it is the various objects and systems and forces that are doing the determining, not some mythical entity called "Determinism".

All causation, current and antecedent, are the result of the natural behavior of actual objects and actual forces.

As always, new events are being reliably created by prior events. An event is any change within a system. For example, within the solar system, the changes in the positions of the planets are events, solar flares are events, and the steady consumption of available fuel within the Sun is an event. Each event is reliably caused by the natural behavior of the objects involved.

Determinism does not cause any of these events. It merely asserts that whatever the behavior is, it is reliably caused by prior events.

Determinism doesn't exclude complexity, intelligence or rational response, only that nothing is freely willed. Nothing is freely willed because everything that happens is fixed by initial conditions and the way things go ever after, with - as per your own definition - no deviation.

No will is free of all prior causes.

But a will may be chosen while free of specific prior causes, like coercion and undue influence. This is what "freely willed" means to most people, that they have chosen for themselves what they will do, that they were not coerced or unduly influence to make a choice that they would not normally make for themselves.

how anyone deals with them is determined by the information condition of each and every respondent, not their will.

We are talking about situations that involve choosing. The "information condition" causes choosing to happen. Choosing causes the will to happen. The will causes the response.

One, unable to deal with stress, may fall to pieces emotionally, another may thrive because they find the challenges stimulating. Each according to their own condition.

Of course.

The brain as a deterministic system is equally subject to causal necessity as the world at large.

Oddly, no. Nothing is ever "subject to causal necessity" because causal necessity is not a king sitting on a throne giving us orders as to what we will do. Causal necessity is not an object. Causal necessity is not a force. It is merely a comment.

Causal necessity is the objects and forces themselves as they go about doing what they do. The Sun's mass pulls upon the Earth's mass, keeping it in orbit. Causal necessity is not doing this. Causal necessity is about the Sun and the Earth doing it.

The information processing activity of the brain has its initial state and how things go ever after are fixed as a matter of natural law, in this instance, the architecture of the brain, its immediate physical condition, chemistry and electrochemical processing activity.

Oh, and nothing is "subject to natural law", for the same reasons. Natural laws are derived by observing the behavior of the actual objects and forces. These laws describe the reliable patterns of behavior that science has observed and noted. The behavior determines the natural laws, not the other way around.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

his posts demonstrate the weakest understanding of Free Will here, other than you and FDI. He commits the most eggregious uses of sloppy language, beyond you and FDI .

I disagree. I think Marvin presents one of the clearest explanations/defences of compatibilism.

Personally, I'd prefer it if Marvin attempted a different approach to DBT's particular dogmatic free will denialism but I'm not at all convinced that it would make any difference to DBT's responses.

I do like his approach to the ideas in the clarity once the fundamental mechanics can be mashed out and demonstrated.

It's a great approach to discussing it in a way someone who is not a hardened determinist can understand. It presents the fundamental question, which does revolve around "free from what?"

It lacks the satisfaction of examining "what, exactly is free and what exactly is it free from?"

Freedom is the ability to do what we want. To have an ability, like the ability to perform choosing or the ability to hammer a nail, means that you are free to choose and free to hammer a nail whenever you choose to do so.

A constraint is something that prevents you from doing what you want. Coercion prevents you from choosing what you want, and forces a choice on you that you don't want. Lacking a hammer, or a nail, or two arms may prevent you from hammering a nail.

Of course, the best hammers and nails are adamantine. However the best reasoning to make a choice is seldom adamant.

 

[Jarhyn]

his posts demonstrate the weakest understanding of Free Will here, other than you and FDI. He commits the most eggregious uses of sloppy language, beyond you and FDI .

I disagree. I think Marvin presents one of the clearest explanations/defences of compatibilism.

Personally, I'd prefer it if Marvin attempted a different approach to DBT's particular dogmatic free will denialism but I'm not at all convinced that it would make any difference to DBT's responses.

I do like his approach to the ideas in the clarity once the fundamental mechanics can be mashed out and demonstrated.

It's a great approach to discussing it in a way someone who is not a hardened determinist can understand. It presents the fundamental question, which does revolve around "free from what?"

It lacks the satisfaction of examining "what, exactly is free and what exactly is it free from?"

Freedom is the ability to do what we want. To have an ability, like the ability to perform choosing or the ability to hammer a nail, means that you are free to choose and free to hammer a nail whenever you choose to do so.

A constraint is something that prevents you from doing what you want. Coercion prevents you from choosing what you want, and forces a choice on you that you don't want. Lacking a hammer, or a nail, or two arms may prevent you from hammering a nail.

Of course, the best hammers and nails are adamantine. However the best reasoning to make a choice is seldom adamant.

Why would you need to be free* to do it whenever you wish, for it to be a free will**? Indeed many situations happen in which we are not free to hammer a nail, but we still have free will** in general.

Indeed, I have the freely held** will* to find a gorgeous turkey feather this spring. It is not near the front of my priorities, but it's in there.

Whether this will* is free*, despite the fact I freely hold** it, is up to the state of reality and the progression of how causality cogitated. My partial will*, "keeping my eyes looking for the right patterns on the ground, where turkeys congregate" is clearly, trivially, free*. As to whether the whole thing's requirement of finding the feather is free* is not up to me.

Similarly, I could freely will** to hammer a nail, but my will* is not free* on account of the lack of the necessary bits of metal.

The will** and the will* are, in this model, separable.

Indeed so too are the "provisional freedom" assessments, subjective things, and the "actual result", a real and objective thing.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

... Indeed, I have the freely held** will* to find a gorgeous turkey feather this spring. It is not near the front of my priorities, but it's in there.

The will is not free. It is set by your decision to find that feather this spring. We presume you will carry that fixed intention around with you in the back of your mind until it is convenient to go looking for that feather. Then you will look. And either you'll find it or find that it is no longer convenient to pursue that objective.

Whether this will* is free*, despite the fact I freely hold** it, is up to the state of reality and the progression of how causality cogitated. My partial will*, "keeping my eyes looking for the right patterns on the ground, where turkeys congregate" is clearly, trivially, free*. As to whether the whole thing's requirement of finding the feather is free* is not up to me.

Hate to say this, but you're using DBT's definition of free will. You're thinking that the will itself is somehow free. But free will is about our freedom to choose that intention for ourselves. If someone told you that they would shoot you if you didn't find a turkey feather, then that would be their will and not yours.

Similarly, I could freely will** to hammer a nail, but my will* is not free* on account of the lack of the necessary bits of metal.

In the absence of a hammer and nail, you personally lack the freedom to hammer a nail. If you choose to hammer a nail anyway, then that freely chosen intention would lead you to the hardware store, where you would purchase the hammer and some nails. Then you would hammer some nails and that intention would be satisfied because its requirement would be met.

 

[Jarhyn]

The will is not free

Well, the will MAY be free. We don't know yet for really wether it is or is not.

It may be one or the other, but it is inevitable, whichever one it ends up being.

We presume you will carry that fixed intention around with you in the back of your mind until it is convenient to go looking for that feather

No, this particular will is freely held, and always partially at least a little bit active. Humans, unlike dwarves, can do that.

It is not unlike my freely held will "to defend myself from physical threats".

I hold many such wills all the time, but that arrow is already in flight. It is kind of like the difference between a classic software function output and an FPGA output. The FPGA is just a constant open I/O process. Our reality does happen to host wills this way.

Hate to say this, but you're using DBT's definition of free will.

No, I'm not.

You're thinking that the will itself is somehow free

Not on its own, I'm not. It takes a will, and it takes a physics with an active momentary state. I'm thinking the will* with a requirement, given the results of the system, will either meet the requirement or it will not, and sometimes the will* in question is "the will to source one's own requirements as one pleases". This will is only free some of the time: some of the time there are wills that we don't please which we only hold, against our consent, because we must lest we die.

We lack the freedom, being what we are, to do so over certain concerns of reflexive response (such as the wildly powerful demands of one's own action to do whatever the guy with the gun tells us), and so we call such events "coercion".

In the absence of a hammer and nail, you personally lack the freedom to hammer a nail.

Yes. This is agreed. Yet while I lack the freedom to hammer a nail, I do not lack the freedom to hold the will.

The longer I hold the will, the more frustrated I will get over failing it's requirements repeatedly. It is certainly not healthy to hold a will* that is not free*. But it's certainly possible to freely hold** an unfree* will*.

Of course when discussing a will*, whether it is free*, requires discussing the state of the system and what happened.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

Well, the will MAY be free. We don't know yet for really whether it is or is not.

By "free will" you seem to mean a will that you are "free to satisfy". In other words, nothing prevents you from meeting the requirement of that will. If it is your will to go out the door, but the door is locked, then your will, by your definition, is not free.

You are still free to hold that will, banging your fists against the door, yelling at it, or yelling for someone else to come and help, etc.

It is not unlike my freely held will "to defend myself from physical threats". I hold many such wills all the time, but that arrow is already in flight. It is kind of like the difference between a classic software function output and an FPGA output. The FPGA is just a constant open I/O process. Our reality does happen to host wills this way.

I had to lookup Field-Programmable Gate Array (FPGA). An FPGA appears to be firmware that the developer can alter to handle a specific application more efficiently. I think it would only be useful when speed is of the essence. But personally I would frown on using them because the speed of hardware is always getting faster, making the FPGA device obsolete in a few years...so you might as well implement the application with standard software.

But back on topic, you are willing to defend yourself from physical threats. You are also willing to brush your teeth, shower daily, fix breakfast, go to work, etc. The list can be pretty long.

Your personal collection of existing wills was built up over time. At some point in the past you chose to accept each of those wills and make them an integral part of your current identity and personality. Having chosen to build each of these habits in the past removes the need to choose to do them. Instead they have become your habits.

Perhaps in your early life your parents forced you to develop some of these habits. But once you were on your own it is up to you to continue or abandon any one of them. So, at this point they are your freely chosen collection of pre-chosen wills.

It takes a will, and it takes a physics with an active momentary state. I'm thinking the will* with a requirement, given the results of the system, will either meet the requirement or it will not, and sometimes the will* in question is "the will to source one's own requirements as one pleases". This will is only free some of the time: some of the time there are wills that we don't please which we only hold, against our consent, because we must lest we die.

We lack the freedom, being what we are, to do so over certain concerns of reflexive response (such as the wildly powerful demands of one's own action to do whatever the guy with the gun tells us), and so we call such events "coercion".

I think you understand coercion. It is when someone forces you to do his will rather than your own. His will is free, but your will, being subject to his will, is not free.

My understanding of free will, as commonly used when assessing a person's responsibility for their actions, is a choice that is free of coercion and other forms of undue influence (such as a significant mental illness that (a) distorts their reality with hallucinations and delusions, or that (b) subjects them to an irresistible impulse, or that (c) impairs their ability to reason.

It is the freedom in choosing the will that free will is about, not in the freedom to hold the will after it is chosen and not in the freedom to carry out the chosen will.

 

[Jarhyn]

Well, the will MAY be free. We don't know yet for really whether it is or is not.

By "free will" you seem to mean a will that you are "free to satisfy". In other words, nothing prevents you from meeting the requirement of that will. If it is your will to go out the door, but the door is locked, then your will, by your definition, is not free.

You are still free to hold that will, banging your fists against the door, yelling at it, or yelling for someone else to come and help, etc.

It is not unlike my freely held will "to defend myself from physical threats". I hold many such wills all the time, but that arrow is already in flight. It is kind of like the difference between a classic software function output and an FPGA output. The FPGA is just a constant open I/O process. Our reality does happen to host wills this way.

I had to lookup Field-Programmable Gate Array (FPGA). An FPGA appears to be firmware that the developer can alter to handle a specific application more efficiently. I think it would only be useful when speed is of the essence. But personally I would frown on using them because the speed of hardware is always getting faster, making the FPGA device obsolete in a few years...so you might as well implement the application with standard software.

But back on topic, you are willing to defend yourself from physical threats. You are also willing to brush your teeth, shower daily, fix breakfast, go to work, etc. The list can be pretty long.

Your personal collection of existing wills was built up over time. At some point in the past you chose to accept each of those wills and make them an integral part of your current identity and personality. Having chosen to build each of these habits in the past removes the need to choose to do them. Instead they have become your habits.

Perhaps in your early life your parents forced you to develop some of these habits. But once you were on your own it is up to you to continue or abandon any one of them. So, at this point they are your freely chosen collection of pre-chosen wills.

It takes a will, and it takes a physics with an active momentary state. I'm thinking the will* with a requirement, given the results of the system, will either meet the requirement or it will not, and sometimes the will* in question is "the will to source one's own requirements as one pleases". This will is only free some of the time: some of the time there are wills that we don't please which we only hold, against our consent, because we must lest we die.

We lack the freedom, being what we are, to do so over certain concerns of reflexive response (such as the wildly powerful demands of one's own action to do whatever the guy with the gun tells us), and so we call such events "coercion".

I think you understand coercion. It is when someone forces you to do his will rather than your own. His will is free, but your will, being subject to his will, is not free.

My understanding of free will, as commonly used when assessing a person's responsibility for their actions, is a choice that is free of coercion and other forms of undue influence (such as a significant mental illness that (a) distorts their reality with hallucinations and delusions, or that (b) subjects them to an irresistible impulse, or that (c) impairs their ability to reason.

It is the freedom in choosing the will that free will is about, not in the freedom to hold the will after it is chosen and not in the freedom to carry out the chosen will.

Well, holding the will is the result of the freedom of the will that operates that particular choosing.

Technically, I have oversight on that? But I consent to what is there currently, for the most part, and I review the ones I can remember fairly regularly. Occasionally a really old one goes off and occasionally I have to put it down like some kind of weird zombie process.

The reason I bring up FPGAs is because they are continuous. You can pour in data as fast as you have data, and they're always spewing some output or another.

Or, if you will, such wills are like the drone pipes on a bagpipe.

I recognize that sometimes wills come from more irresistible impulses almost akin to exploits. They are generally of the sort we don't choose freely which is why it's so fucked up when someone puts a lever under one. Many of us would install different choices than the ones we make by default.

I think it also pays to give recognition to see how someone might unfreely hold a will, that came from their own "neural neighborhood".

Let's look at some unnamed serial killer. Let's for a moment see that this person knows they kill people. They hold off their best as they may, but there's just this NEED screaming in their head.

When it wakes up, they aren't really steering anymore.

And when they do what it tells them to do, when they don't fight it, they end up getting to FEEL something.

That's not really a free will**, it is not freely held**, even if the will*, terrible as it is, is free* to the conclusion of it's "requirement".

When someone lives in such a cage, their bravest act is to see to their own demise.

And for our own part we ought seek to observe the path of their wills, see the arrow in flight, and pluck it from the air and throw it aside, to break their bow and put them in a place where they will not get a new one.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

Let's look at some unnamed serial killer. Let's for a moment see that this person knows they kill people. They hold off their best as they may, but there's just this NEED screaming in their head.

Or, perhaps there is no NEED screaming in their head. Perhaps instead they are sociopathic, and simply enjoy the killing for the sense of control it gives them and because they enjoy the game of avoiding getting caught. Rather than feeding some irresistible impulse, it is simply feeding their ego.

 

[Jarhyn]

Let's look at some unnamed serial killer. Let's for a moment see that this person knows they kill people. They hold off their best as they may, but there's just this NEED screaming in their head.

Or, perhaps there is no NEED screaming in their head. Perhaps instead they are sociopathic, and simply enjoy the killing for the sense of control it gives them and because they enjoy the game of avoiding getting caught. Rather than feeding some irresistible impulse, it is simply feeding their ego.

Well, part of them most certainly is, and maybe that part is watching too. You might be describing a different neural group of the same brain as I am.

The point is that this thing can protect itself in some sick way from recognizing that it is evil, by not being connected directly to any of the parts of the mind that operate that capability.

Human neurology is weird, and sometimes regulatory controls present in some are absent in others.

We can recognize that even when someone unfreely holds** such a will*, they nonetheless do have the will*, and everyone including every force of agency within their own skull too has a responsibility to constrain that will* and make the driving impulse behind it unfree*.

 

[DBT]

The term 'causal necessity' is just a reference to a system, determinism, where all events are fixed by antecedents, therefore necessarily progress as determined, one state leading to the next without deviation any the possibility of something different happening.

Neither determinism nor causal necessity can be called a "system".

What does a deterministic system mean?

''A deterministic system is a system in which a given initial state or condition will always produce the same results. There is no randomness or variation in the ways that inputs get delivered as outputs''

A system is an object with multiple parts operating in some fashion as a whole. An atom is a system. A universe is a system. A person is a system. A central nervous system is a system.

Determinism and causal necessity are descriptive comments about how a given system operates. A system that operates deterministically will necessarily produce the same effects given the same causes.

How a system operates, if deterministically, may be called - by definition - a deterministic system.

Compatibilism is built on semantics. Semantics won't help establish the idea of free will, that takes agency. That will is able to make a difference. Will cannot make a difference to outcomes within a determined system, consequently determinism negates free will agency.

Determinism describes a single characteristic of a system, but determinism itself is not a system. Determinism is neither an object nor a force. It cannot cause events. It has no agency. Determinism never determines anything. Only the actual objects (quarks, atoms, molecules, species of living organisms, planets, stars, etc.) and forces (gravity, etc.) that make up the physical universe can cause events to happen.

So, when you use the phrase, "as determined", you need to keep it straight in your head that it is the various objects and systems and forces that are doing the determining, not some mythical entity called "Determinism".

All causation, current and antecedent, are the result of the natural behavior of actual objects and actual forces.

As always, new events are being reliably created by prior events. An event is any change within a system. For example, within the solar system, the changes in the positions of the planets are events, solar flares are events, and the steady consumption of available fuel within the Sun is an event. Each event is reliably caused by the natural behavior of the objects involved.

Determinism does not cause any of these events. It merely asserts that whatever the behavior is, it is reliably caused by prior events.

Determinism doesn't exclude complexity, intelligence or rational response, only that nothing is freely willed. Nothing is freely willed because everything that happens is fixed by initial conditions and the way things go ever after, with - as per your own definition - no deviation.

No will is free of all prior causes.

But a will may be chosen while free of specific prior causes, like coercion and undue influence. This is what "freely willed" means to most people, that they have chosen for themselves what they will do, that they were not coerced or unduly influence to make a choice that they would not normally make for themselves.

how anyone deals with them is determined by the information condition of each and every respondent, not their will.

We are talking about situations that involve choosing. The "information condition" causes choosing to happen. Choosing causes the will to happen. The will causes the response.

One, unable to deal with stress, may fall to pieces emotionally, another may thrive because they find the challenges stimulating. Each according to their own condition.

Of course.

The brain as a deterministic system is equally subject to causal necessity as the world at large.

Oddly, no. Nothing is ever "subject to causal necessity" because causal necessity is not a king sitting on a throne giving us orders as to what we will do. Causal necessity is not an object. Causal necessity is not a force. It is merely a comment.

Causal necessity is the objects and forces themselves as they go about doing what they do. The Sun's mass pulls upon the Earth's mass, keeping it in orbit. Causal necessity is not doing this. Causal necessity is about the Sun and the Earth doing it.

The information processing activity of the brain has its initial state and how things go ever after are fixed as a matter of natural law, in this instance, the architecture of the brain, its immediate physical condition, chemistry and electrochemical processing activity.

Oh, and nothing is "subject to natural law", for the same reasons. Natural laws are derived by observing the behavior of the actual objects and forces. These laws describe the reliable patterns of behavior that science has observed and noted. The behavior determines the natural laws, not the other way around.

his posts demonstrate the weakest understanding of Free Will here, other than you and FDI. He commits the most eggregious uses of sloppy language, beyond you and FDI .

I disagree. I think Marvin presents one of the clearest explanations/defences of compatibilism.

Personally, I'd prefer it if Marvin attempted a different approach to DBT's particular dogmatic free will denialism but I'm not at all convinced that it would make any difference to DBT's responses.

The Muppets airing their opinions

@DBT, we all know that the real reason you are only responding to Martin is because his posts demonstrate the weakest understanding of Free Will here, other than you and FDI. He commits the most eggregious uses of sloppy language, beyond you and FDI (repeated failure to specify whether he is talking about "the will to select wills free of coercion" or "the freedom of a given will to it's requirement"), and because also, he fails to cut into your not-even-wrong as consistently as the rest of us.

Again, you beg the question repeatedly, failing to look at or even acknowledge that the definitions presented to you have no conflict with "causal necessity".

As has been pointed out in the mechanically "simple" deterministic universe in which Urist lives he holds a will, and undeniably objectively so. The will is either selected by himself for his wants and needs, or it is selected by someone or something else and undeniably so. The will is either going to have it's requirement satisfied or it is going to return "failure" and undeniably so.

When the requirement is not selected by himself we say "he was coerced, his will* is not freely held**" because this satisfies the objective definition of coercion.

When his will is not going to satisfy it's requirement we say "his will* is not free*". This is a different statement than "he lacks free will**".

These are simple, objective, mathematical facts of his existence, and undeniably so.

If you wish to make such statements as X cannot exist in Y, you are vulnerable to disproof through counterexamples, especially when you make a claim of a logical system.

That you dislike that computers can hold things which satisfy the definition of "will" is not my problem, it is nobody's problem but your own.

I get that you dislike the discussion of how these objective things we call "wills" in this context exist in a way we can objectively call free, and that the discussion of how and why they are free has direct structural extension to much more complicated context of these concepts operating in our own "deterministic system".

The system I show you is deterministic and ridiculous. It has a (very inept, most times) god who ends up letting problems go too long until they need to be lanced like a hot boil.

But those problems have some wills, and those wills are, oftentimes, free.

Interesting enough, sometimes the problem is that they wish to have more work assigned by "the administrator".

And sometimes the problem is, objectively, right now in this moment, that "Urist" just really likes to "fight".

This discussion, this verbiage allows us to make that recognition, and design solutions to the problem of threats to our mutually compatible self actualization.

I'm only responding to Marvin because I don't have time to respond to four posters and multiple posts and countless points.....which just comes down to repeating the same basic elements from the argument from incompatibilism.

And of course, it is Marvin's thread, not yours, not Poods or Antichris'

Besides, Marvin does as well as is possible with the notion of compatibilism.

 

[fromderinside]

Marvin wrote:

Freedom is the ability to do what we want. To have an ability, like the ability to perform choosing or the ability to hammer a nail, means that you are free to choose and free to hammer a nail whenever you choose to do so.

Pretty impractical to construct Freedom from want. Both are subjective. One must establish first causes. As You must know by now subjective statements must be derived through presentation of objective data underlying what one subjectively senses. Reality must be at the base of any meaningful statement of real condition. To declare something does not prove it just because the one declaring it is real.

 

[DBT]

The term 'causal necessity' is just a reference to a system, determinism, where all events are fixed by antecedents, therefore necessarily progress as determined, one state leading to the next without deviation any the possibility of something different happening.

Neither determinism nor causal necessity can be called a "system".

What does a deterministic system mean?

''A deterministic system is a system in which a given initial state or condition will always produce the same results. There is no randomness or variation in the ways that inputs get delivered as outputs''

A system is an object with multiple parts operating in some fashion as a whole. An atom is a system. A universe is a system. A person is a system. A central nervous system is a system.

Determinism and causal necessity are descriptive comments about how a given system operates. A system that operates deterministically will necessarily produce the same effects given the same causes.

How a system operates, if deterministically, may be called - by definition - a deterministic system.

Compatibilism is built on semantics. Semantics won't help establish the idea of free will, that takes agency. That will is able to make a difference. Will cannot make a difference to outcomes within a determined system, consequently determinism negates free will agency.

Determinism does not cause any of these events. It merely asserts that whatever the behavior is, it is reliably caused by prior events.

Not merely 'reliably caused' but determined, which means fixed. No alternative actions possible, no 'may have done otherwise' no 'possibly have done otherwise' no freely willed actions, all actions necessitated, not willed, by antecedents, most of which we are not even aware of.

Determinism doesn't exclude complexity, intelligence or rational response, only that nothing is freely willed. Nothing is freely willed because everything that happens is fixed by initial conditions and the way things go ever after, with - as per your own definition - no deviation.

No will is free of all prior causes.

Of course not. Which is why we have will, but it is not free will.

But a will may be chosen while free of specific prior causes, like coercion and undue influence. This is what "freely willed" means to most people, that they have chosen for themselves what they will do, that they were not coerced or unduly influence to make a choice that they would not normally make for themselves.

Will is formed by an interaction of information before it is brought to consciousness fully formed: we feel prompted or impelled to take action.

how anyone deals with them is determined by the information condition of each and every respondent, not their will.

We are talking about situations that involve choosing. The "information condition" causes choosing to happen. Choosing causes the will to happen. The will causes the response.

Information inputs stimulates processing, information processing is the agency of decision making. A rational, intelligent system.

It's more than enough. It's an absolute Marvel of Evolution

The brain as a deterministic system is equally subject to causal necessity as the world at large.

Oddly, no. Nothing is ever "subject to causal necessity" because causal necessity is not a king sitting on a throne giving us orders as to what we will do. Causal necessity is not an object. Causal necessity is not a force. It is merely a comment.

I didn't say that. It's the property of the system, the interaction of objects and related events that is deterministic.

Causal necessity is the objects and forces themselves as they go about doing what they do. The Sun's mass pulls upon the Earth's mass, keeping it in orbit. Causal necessity is not doing this. Causal necessity is about the Sun and the Earth doing it.

'Causal necessity' just refers to the properties of the system. That states and conditions must necessarily proceed as determined.

That if something happens, it happens necessarily.

The information processing activity of the brain has its initial state and how things go ever after are fixed as a matter of natural law, in this instance, the architecture of the brain, its immediate physical condition, chemistry and electrochemical processing activity.

Oh, and nothing is "subject to natural law", for the same reasons. Natural laws are derived by observing the behavior of the actual objects and forces. These laws describe the reliable patterns of behavior that science has observed and noted. The behavior determines the natural laws, not the other way around.

Fixed as a matter of natural law' is just a way of defining determinism. There is no separation between 'natural law' and the properties of the system. 'Natural law' is just another way of saying 'physical properties.'

Determinism: The world is governed by (or is under the sway of) determinism if and only if, given a specified way things are at a time t, the way things go thereafter is fixed as a matter of natural law.