Compatibilism: What's that About?

[DBT]

This has been dealt with numerous times.

Yes. It has.

Yet the question of menu selection came up again in the assumption that the compatibilist narrative is correct.

It is not correct because, to reiterate, only one action is possible in any instance in time within a determined system. Being determined by the circumstances, inputs (menu items) brain state/processing, where if Steak and Salad is determined, you select Steak and Salad, the option is fixed, that is your option/action in that instance in time, being determined, no alternative possible. Other diners have their own [determined] options and actions.......the menu caters for many tastes/brain information states.

Determinism is a Harsh Mistress. One that doesn't allow alternate choice or freedom of will, a total and complete control freak.

''Proponents of many popular compatibilist arguments often agree in rejecting contra-causal or magical free will. Yet they seem to be trying, at all costs, to rescue some snippet of freedom from the obvious fact that everything that happens in this universe is either caused by something that went before or is a truly random event.

Neither of these alternatives provides any room for what most people would call free will. Of course human beings make choices. I am not denying this. Nor am I denying that we can be more or less constrained in the choices available to us, nor that we can be held responsible for some choices and not others. But we should not confuse the decision making powers of a living creature with freedom of the will.''

 

[DBT]

Wow, According to Compatibilists, Computers have free will. Magical thinking in the twenty first century.

You seem to have a lot of mythical beliefs about compatibilists.

Jarhyn has made that claim. Hence my comment.

You have made the claim that free will is not possible at all so why should anyone care that you think that suddenly "computers have wills, and the wills can be free" is a invalid statement?

It's not a clear case that they cannot; I have made a clear case in fact that they may.

My comment was related to your claim that computers may have not only have will, but free will.

I pointed out that you are making a category error by conflating function with will.

Again, will is not the same as function. Function is determined by the construction of a mechanism, which has no 'will' - but functions as designed and constructed, current through circuits, information is processed, output is produced. Information in, information out. Garbage in garbage out. Rational input in, rational results out......

Nothing is being willed, nothing is being freely willed. Mechanical systems do not operate on the principle of will or free will.

 

[Jarhyn]

Wow, According to Compatibilists, Computers have free will. Magical thinking in the twenty first century.

You seem to have a lot of mythical beliefs about compatibilists.

Jarhyn has made that claim. Hence my comment.

You have made the claim that free will is not possible at all so why should anyone care that you think that suddenly "computers have wills, and the wills can be free" is a invalid statement?

It's not a clear case that they cannot; I have made a clear case in fact that they may.

My comment was related to your claim that computers may have not only have will, but free will.

I pointed out that you are making a category error by conflating function with will.

Again, will is not the same as function. Function is determined by the construction of a mechanism, which has no 'will' - but functions as designed and constructed, current through circuits, information is processed, output is produced. Information in, information out. Garbage in garbage out. Rational input in, rational results out......

Nothing is being willed, nothing is being freely willed. Mechanical systems do not operate on the principle of will or free will.

And yet again you fail to even make a a single criticism or argument against it beyond a mere dismissal, which you offer to any thing approaching "wills which are free".

Your ascertainment of what is a "category error" given the fact that you seem unable to understand or parse the difference between "mutability" and "subjectivity" and your inability to understand that "will can be a function" means that it is probably pointless to have this conversation with you, DBT, at all.

Anything into garbage is garbage, in this math, I think.

I have pointed out a series of instructions unto a requirement, held observably in a system.

Scripts fairly trivially in fact meet the qualities of a "will", as I have defined the word.

Wills can contain whole definitions of functions.

Definitions of functions can contain packaged wills.

The very idea of "function" and "will" here as defined may be homologous.

As to whether DBT, talking to a firmware engineer, understands the idea of "function" is questionable at best, too.

So why should I give a rat's fuck whether you, someone who does not believe humans (or anything) can hold the thing we call "wills" and whether such "wills" can be "free, with respect to their requirements", think that computers can or cannot have such?

Why would this be more "absurd*" than humans holding the same?

Unless you really don't think it's all that absurd that humans do?

But we are machines in a deterministic system, so sauce for the goose...



*(you, or at least I mean nonsensical, btw)

 

[Jarhyn]

It has become apparent that DBT does not understand what is meant by the utterance of the phrase "choice function"

Let's look at a concrete, objective, mathematical "choice function" which is "free to it's requirement" of making a choice.

For this we need to define a system, and a system state, on a base field (which will for our case be R, the set of all reals).

This is not a "closed system", though it may be contained inside a closed system.

Let listA {[1,Y1],[2,Y2],...[n,Yn]} such that listA.pop yields (Y1), and listA becomes {[1,Y2],...,[n-1,Yn]}. For the sake of brevity

Let us then also implement "listA.push(Yv)" which will likewise add rather than subtract an element at the head.

Pop is a simple choice function on listA.

It will make a choice OF listA and return the choice.

Note that there is a requirement to this choice function: when listA is empty, it must return not "0" but ∅. These are not the same.

Therefore this choice function itself has a freedom that may be addressed: whether the list is free to pop.

Most engineered choice functions have a function in fact to ascertain this, which returns an objective measurement of its own momentary provisional freedom: listA.empty() returns "true" when listA is exactly ∅. We will arbitrarily use "1" to denote true, just to keep it R(eal).

This is an imaginary idea of freedom, though; if pushed, and then popped, the idea will be invalidated, as the list will have the freedom and never have returned a ∅; if simply popped after, it will be a valid assessment and the function will return whatever it does to show an error. It will in that moment BE unfree rather than Imagine it's unfreeness.

listA is an object with a choice function.

But moreover, listA.pop is also a choice function that deterministically "pops" the first element.

Determinism does no injury to the idea of choice, or even of "freedom of choice": listA.pop is a recognizably "constrained" choice function, and is entirely deterministic in it's actions.

Also, another interesting fact of listA: it must have had something pushed into it so to have something popped off.

Hence the need for the menu, and why they are "possibilities" in that context. They have been "pushed" into listA, and while listA is not empty, it has the "freedom" to return an element.

All these words are describing concrete operations of an object.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

Yet the question of menu selection came up again in the assumption that the compatibilist narrative is correct.
It is not correct because, to reiterate, only one action is possible in any instance in time within a determined system.

You're confusing an actuality with a possibility. Every item on the restaurant menu is a possibility. However, the Chef Salad on the table in front of me is an actuality. There will be only one actuality. However, there are always multiple possibilities.

Choosing, inputs multiple possibilities, and, outputs an intention to actualize exactly one of them.

Because choosing is a deterministic operation, it should be obvious to you that multiple possibilities are a logical requirement. And they will always be present in the mind whenever choosing happens. Therefore, the claim that "only one action is possible in any instance in time within a determined system" is clearly false.

In a deterministic system that includes a human brain with the neurological capacity to make decisions, that mind will always have multiple possibilities to choose from during that operation.

The correct formulation of the idea of determinism is that "only one possibility will be actualized". But there is never any possibility that is removed by determinism. Every possibility that occurs to the mind will be causally necessary, inevitable, and will appear at that time and place without deviation.

Determinism is a Harsh Mistress.

And apparently she's not very bright, either.

 

[fromderinside]

Wow, According to Compatibilists, Computers have free will. Magical thinking in the twenty first century.

You seem to have a lot of mythical beliefs about compatibilists.

Jarhyn has made that claim. Hence my comment.

You have made the claim that free will is not possible at all so why should anyone care that you think that suddenly "computers have wills, and the wills can be free" is a invalid statement?

It's not a clear case that they cannot; I have made a clear case in fact that they may.

So, just in case you missed it:

You confuse what we can do with both subjective and objective analysis. Taking what we sense without measurement and calling it computer misses the fact that the computer is not possible without the use of the scientific method to frame it's structure and function. That man does both sense and measure gives us a step up from anything that just senses no matter how close those senses are to what is measured. Your statement computer lacks demonstrated materiality which is measured as well. The rest of your snowstorm fails as well for the same reason. This is a flaw you cannot overcome with just subjective sense, language, and mathematics. The bottom line is that man interpreting determinism with only subjective and subjective based tools is not even up to what man can do nor is that adequate for defining determinism.

I think we've known since the time we first picked up a stone that there was something important beyond our mind. I also think that other species are progressing toward similar understanding of their worlds as they use material to live and succeed in it.

It's interesting insofar as someone who wishes to discuss subjective versus objective measures does not actually pay attention and hand-waves away discussions of what makes something "subjective" or "objective" in the first part.

Your bloviation on such is a hot, sick, confused mess.

The computer is an object, observable in all it's functions, such that it can objectively and observably instantiate a mathematical principle.

This has been used specifically to prove a number of things in math which extend to proving a number of things of physics.

And since we are attempting to treat a structure of math -- "Deterministic systems" -- objectively observing a computer "doing the thing" proves the claims of hard determinism to be spurious.

As much as you dislike it, showing a mathematical structure to positively contain some thing that you FDI claim is impossible of something with that structure proves your claims wrong.

And that something is an object, wholely observable, entirely made of materials, being examined of it's immediate physical properties.

One of it's immediate physical properties is that it clearly and observably contains some thing that has a "will".

One of those immediate physical properties is that that will has an observable "freedom value", which in this moment is "unfree" because the door is locked.

What exactly do you think is not an observable object here?

Do you think because the structure of the dwarf is electrons that it is not a real object?

Do you think that just because that structure is distributed across a large number of transistors that it is not a real object?

The actual physical dwarf looks not a thing like the depiction on the screen, nor do the "doors" or the "levers". The interface is itself a subjective interpretation of the objective behavior of the system.

I'm not talking about the interface though, I'm talking about the real, actual machine, with real parts that have real properties.

one of those parts is a single "bit" of memory that is "locked" as in "will not 'open' for a dwarf"

that single bit in memory is an object.

the several bits in memory that when presented to the processor such that result contains new bits that will direct the dwarf's bits to change such that they objectively create "proximity" to the door, and which will drive the attempt? Those are objects too.

All of this is object properties all the way down.

You are clearly not ready to think about this on "whole human person" level scales yet.

Bottom line. Objective is material humans measure. It's not something humans make that humans program to then use to execute subjective brain pfarts. In the sense that a scientist uses a computer to execute equipment that present material experiments it is a tools of science. It is programmed to provide material inputs to humans from which it records and performs designed analyses that output to humans. I was doing such in the sixties.

And then FDI claimed that a physical computing machine is not a piece of material that humans measure.

There you have it folks.

FDI, a computer is an object and not only is it an object, it is an object made very easy to measure. It is an object which is objectively capable of measuring itself (re:debuggers).

As I have said, I have produced an object, inside this object. That it is made of an orientation of charge potentials, and operates as a cogitation of a machine makes no difference to it's object properties.

You can wave your hand claiming it is "subjective" but it is an object no less objectively than a human brain.

The fact that you don't understand this means that it is to me unlikely that you will ever understand how or that you have been proven wrong.

Not just demonstrated or evidenced as wrong but proven, in the same way that any other Computer assisted proof functions.

The difference, the conflation, the failure of FDI's understanding is the confusion of "subjective" with "arbitrarily configurable".

Arbitrary configurability does no damage to using an object like a computer to prove that "objects may be configured in some given way" because it is trivially true a computer is an object so if it can be configured to hold some thing that satisfied the definition of a will, operate a behaviorally closed system in a manner observably meeting the definition of "deterministic", and be shown to contain events in which the "will" is observably going to have it's requirements met, and in which it is possible for that "will" to NOT have it's requirements met, you have proven something of "deterministic system": that deterministic systems may contain free wills.

There you go. You produced an object within the computer. The object (a self designed object) is not an objective thing. It is a human fashioned thing, something you produced of your design. Hint, hint, hint "arbitrarily configurable" is your design. It is something you (feel the self reference coming on) designed, not objective. BTW I said computer - it is an instrument - is something one uses to measure.

No speedskating my interpretations please. Uh, no it isn't capable of debugging itself since it reacts to cosmic objects causing unforeseeable errors that need external justifications for their occurrences. If you've never worked on something that gets up into the atmosphere you probably aren't going to be among those who are aware these things happen. Redundancy, debuggers both internal and collateral, knowledge of effects like radiation and comsmic activity are necessary for proving and preserving operablility.

Wow, According to Compatibilists, Computers have free will. Magical thinking in the twenty first century.

"The object is not an object": the hard determinists.

The two of you don't think HUMANS have this particular will I describe nor do you think that it can be "free" or "constrained" by the definitions offered so why should I give a rats fuck about whatever else you think is incapable of holding it?

I offered definitions and I am not about to shy away from the implications those definitions have for animals and other non-human objects.

"Arbitrarily configurable" is not subjective.

Mutability is not subjectivity, it is only mutability. Subjectivity is looking at the same object and coming to different conclusions about how you relate to it, such as "I think it is beautiful" and "I think it is not beautiful" because each person has a different "subjective definition" of beauty.

Objectively, the object is a 3x3 cube of copper.

I could take a hammer and hammer the object into any shape I wish. It is still going to be an object with objective properties. This is mutability. Some people may consider it more or less beautiful (subjectivity) but objectively, it will have whatever shape it has been given (objective mutability).

It doesn't matter if the computer has whatever design I put over it. It's mutability is not subjectivity.

What we call the "dwarf", what we call the "door" what word we use to describe "locked state" THAT is all subjective and in fact has a cohomology with the situation where we rename them "elf", "portal", and "DNE state".

The important point is understanding "this entity holds a list of instructions unto a requirement" and "the requirement shall/shall not be met".

EYUP. Human will, any will, is a delusion when sensed by humans. Sensing is self referenced so here we go round and round.

 

[fromderinside]

Wow, According to Compatibilists, Computers have free will. Magical thinking in the twenty first century.

You seem to have a lot of mythical beliefs about compatibilists.

Jarhyn has made that claim. Hence my comment.

You have made the claim that free will is not possible at all so why should anyone care that you think that suddenly "computers have wills, and the wills can be free" is a invalid statement?

It's not a clear case that they cannot; I have made a clear case in fact that they may.

So, just in case you missed it:

You confuse what we can do with both subjective and objective analysis. Taking what we sense without measurement and calling it computer misses the fact that the computer is not possible without the use of the scientific method to frame it's structure and function. That man does both sense and measure gives us a step up from anything that just senses no matter how close those senses are to what is measured. Your statement computer lacks demonstrated materiality which is measured as well. The rest of your snowstorm fails as well for the same reason. This is a flaw you cannot overcome with just subjective sense, language, and mathematics. The bottom line is that man interpreting determinism with only subjective and subjective based tools is not even up to what man can do nor is that adequate for defining determinism.

I think we've known since the time we first picked up a stone that there was something important beyond our mind. I also think that other species are progressing toward similar understanding of their worlds as they use material to live and succeed in it.

It's interesting insofar as someone who wishes to discuss subjective versus objective measures does not actually pay attention and hand-waves away discussions of what makes something "subjective" or "objective" in the first part.

Your bloviation on such is a hot, sick, confused mess.

The computer is an object, observable in all it's functions, such that it can objectively and observably instantiate a mathematical principle.

This has been used specifically to prove a number of things in math which extend to proving a number of things of physics.

And since we are attempting to treat a structure of math -- "Deterministic systems" -- objectively observing a computer "doing the thing" proves the claims of hard determinism to be spurious.

As much as you dislike it, showing a mathematical structure to positively contain some thing that you FDI claim is impossible of something with that structure proves your claims wrong.

And that something is an object, wholely observable, entirely made of materials, being examined of it's immediate physical properties.

One of it's immediate physical properties is that it clearly and observably contains some thing that has a "will".

One of those immediate physical properties is that that will has an observable "freedom value", which in this moment is "unfree" because the door is locked.

What exactly do you think is not an observable object here?

Do you think because the structure of the dwarf is electrons that it is not a real object?

Do you think that just because that structure is distributed across a large number of transistors that it is not a real object?

The actual physical dwarf looks not a thing like the depiction on the screen, nor do the "doors" or the "levers". The interface is itself a subjective interpretation of the objective behavior of the system.

I'm not talking about the interface though, I'm talking about the real, actual machine, with real parts that have real properties.

one of those parts is a single "bit" of memory that is "locked" as in "will not 'open' for a dwarf"

that single bit in memory is an object.

the several bits in memory that when presented to the processor such that result contains new bits that will direct the dwarf's bits to change such that they objectively create "proximity" to the door, and which will drive the attempt? Those are objects too.

All of this is object properties all the way down.

You are clearly not ready to think about this on "whole human person" level scales yet.

Bottom line. Objective is material humans measure. It's not something humans make that humans program to then use to execute subjective brain pfarts. In the sense that a scientist uses a computer to execute equipment that present material experiments it is a tools of science. It is programmed to provide material inputs to humans from which it records and performs designed analyses that output to humans. I was doing such in the sixties.

And then FDI claimed that a physical computing machine is not a piece of material that humans measure.

There you have it folks.

FDI, a computer is an object and not only is it an object, it is an object made very easy to measure. It is an object which is objectively capable of measuring itself (re:debuggers).

As I have said, I have produced an object, inside this object. That it is made of an orientation of charge potentials, and operates as a cogitation of a machine makes no difference to it's object properties.

You can wave your hand claiming it is "subjective" but it is an object no less objectively than a human brain.

The fact that you don't understand this means that it is to me unlikely that you will ever understand how or that you have been proven wrong.

Not just demonstrated or evidenced as wrong but proven, in the same way that any other Computer assisted proof functions.

The difference, the conflation, the failure of FDI's understanding is the confusion of "subjective" with "arbitrarily configurable".

Arbitrary configurability does no damage to using an object like a computer to prove that "objects may be configured in some given way" because it is trivially true a computer is an object so if it can be configured to hold some thing that satisfied the definition of a will, operate a behaviorally closed system in a manner observably meeting the definition of "deterministic", and be shown to contain events in which the "will" is observably going to have it's requirements met, and in which it is possible for that "will" to NOT have it's requirements met, you have proven something of "deterministic system": that deterministic systems may contain free wills.

There you go. You produced an object within the computer. The object (a self designed object) is not an objective thing. It is a human fashioned thing, something you produced of your design. Hint, hint, hint "arbitrarily configurable" is your design. It is something you (feel the self reference coming on) designed, not objective. BTW I said computer - it is an instrument - is something one uses to measure.

No speedskating my interpretations please. Uh, no it isn't capable of debugging itself since it reacts to cosmic objects causing unforeseeable errors that need external justifications for their occurrences. If you've never worked on something that gets up into the atmosphere you probably aren't going to be among those who are aware these things happen. Redundancy, debuggers both internal and collateral, knowledge of effects like radiation and comsmic activity are necessary for proving and preserving operablility.

Wow, According to Compatibilists, Computers have free will. Magical thinking in the twenty first century.

"The object is not an object": the hard determinists.

The two of you don't think HUMANS have this particular will I describe nor do you think that it can be "free" or "constrained" by the definitions offered so why should I give a rats fuck about whatever else you think is incapable of holding it?

I offered definitions and I am not about to shy away from the implications those definitions have for animals and other non-human objects.

"Arbitrarily configurable" is not subjective.

Mutability is not subjectivity, it is only mutability. Subjectivity is looking at the same object and coming to different conclusions about how you relate to it, such as "I think it is beautiful" and "I think it is not beautiful" because each person has a different "subjective definition" of beauty.

Objectively, the object is a 3x3 cube of copper.

I could take a hammer and hammer the object into any shape I wish. It is still going to be an object with objective properties. This is mutability. Some people may consider it more or less beautiful (subjectivity) but objectively, it will have whatever shape it has been given (objective mutability).

It doesn't matter if the computer has whatever design I put over it. It's mutability is not subjectivity.

What we call the "dwarf", what we call the "door" what word we use to describe "locked state" THAT is all subjective and in fact has a cohomology with the situation where we rename them "elf", "portal", and "DNE state".

The important point is understanding "this entity holds a list of instructions unto a requirement" and "the requirement shall/shall not be met".

You make your bed when you say "cube 3x3." A severely limited person would as three whah? The rest of us would say "it lacks physical/material reference. More than copper is required."

 

[Jarhyn]

Wow, According to Compatibilists, Computers have free will. Magical thinking in the twenty first century.

You seem to have a lot of mythical beliefs about compatibilists.

Jarhyn has made that claim. Hence my comment.

You have made the claim that free will is not possible at all so why should anyone care that you think that suddenly "computers have wills, and the wills can be free" is a invalid statement?

It's not a clear case that they cannot; I have made a clear case in fact that they may.

So, just in case you missed it:

You confuse what we can do with both subjective and objective analysis. Taking what we sense without measurement and calling it computer misses the fact that the computer is not possible without the use of the scientific method to frame it's structure and function. That man does both sense and measure gives us a step up from anything that just senses no matter how close those senses are to what is measured. Your statement computer lacks demonstrated materiality which is measured as well. The rest of your snowstorm fails as well for the same reason. This is a flaw you cannot overcome with just subjective sense, language, and mathematics. The bottom line is that man interpreting determinism with only subjective and subjective based tools is not even up to what man can do nor is that adequate for defining determinism.

I think we've known since the time we first picked up a stone that there was something important beyond our mind. I also think that other species are progressing toward similar understanding of their worlds as they use material to live and succeed in it.

It's interesting insofar as someone who wishes to discuss subjective versus objective measures does not actually pay attention and hand-waves away discussions of what makes something "subjective" or "objective" in the first part.

Your bloviation on such is a hot, sick, confused mess.

The computer is an object, observable in all it's functions, such that it can objectively and observably instantiate a mathematical principle.

This has been used specifically to prove a number of things in math which extend to proving a number of things of physics.

And since we are attempting to treat a structure of math -- "Deterministic systems" -- objectively observing a computer "doing the thing" proves the claims of hard determinism to be spurious.

As much as you dislike it, showing a mathematical structure to positively contain some thing that you FDI claim is impossible of something with that structure proves your claims wrong.

And that something is an object, wholely observable, entirely made of materials, being examined of it's immediate physical properties.

One of it's immediate physical properties is that it clearly and observably contains some thing that has a "will".

One of those immediate physical properties is that that will has an observable "freedom value", which in this moment is "unfree" because the door is locked.

What exactly do you think is not an observable object here?

Do you think because the structure of the dwarf is electrons that it is not a real object?

Do you think that just because that structure is distributed across a large number of transistors that it is not a real object?

The actual physical dwarf looks not a thing like the depiction on the screen, nor do the "doors" or the "levers". The interface is itself a subjective interpretation of the objective behavior of the system.

I'm not talking about the interface though, I'm talking about the real, actual machine, with real parts that have real properties.

one of those parts is a single "bit" of memory that is "locked" as in "will not 'open' for a dwarf"

that single bit in memory is an object.

the several bits in memory that when presented to the processor such that result contains new bits that will direct the dwarf's bits to change such that they objectively create "proximity" to the door, and which will drive the attempt? Those are objects too.

All of this is object properties all the way down.

You are clearly not ready to think about this on "whole human person" level scales yet.

Bottom line. Objective is material humans measure. It's not something humans make that humans program to then use to execute subjective brain pfarts. In the sense that a scientist uses a computer to execute equipment that present material experiments it is a tools of science. It is programmed to provide material inputs to humans from which it records and performs designed analyses that output to humans. I was doing such in the sixties.

And then FDI claimed that a physical computing machine is not a piece of material that humans measure.

There you have it folks.

FDI, a computer is an object and not only is it an object, it is an object made very easy to measure. It is an object which is objectively capable of measuring itself (re:debuggers).

As I have said, I have produced an object, inside this object. That it is made of an orientation of charge potentials, and operates as a cogitation of a machine makes no difference to it's object properties.

You can wave your hand claiming it is "subjective" but it is an object no less objectively than a human brain.

The fact that you don't understand this means that it is to me unlikely that you will ever understand how or that you have been proven wrong.

Not just demonstrated or evidenced as wrong but proven, in the same way that any other Computer assisted proof functions.

The difference, the conflation, the failure of FDI's understanding is the confusion of "subjective" with "arbitrarily configurable".

Arbitrary configurability does no damage to using an object like a computer to prove that "objects may be configured in some given way" because it is trivially true a computer is an object so if it can be configured to hold some thing that satisfied the definition of a will, operate a behaviorally closed system in a manner observably meeting the definition of "deterministic", and be shown to contain events in which the "will" is observably going to have it's requirements met, and in which it is possible for that "will" to NOT have it's requirements met, you have proven something of "deterministic system": that deterministic systems may contain free wills.

There you go. You produced an object within the computer. The object (a self designed object) is not an objective thing. It is a human fashioned thing, something you produced of your design. Hint, hint, hint "arbitrarily configurable" is your design. It is something you (feel the self reference coming on) designed, not objective. BTW I said computer - it is an instrument - is something one uses to measure.

No speedskating my interpretations please. Uh, no it isn't capable of debugging itself since it reacts to cosmic objects causing unforeseeable errors that need external justifications for their occurrences. If you've never worked on something that gets up into the atmosphere you probably aren't going to be among those who are aware these things happen. Redundancy, debuggers both internal and collateral, knowledge of effects like radiation and comsmic activity are necessary for proving and preserving operablility.

Wow, According to Compatibilists, Computers have free will. Magical thinking in the twenty first century.

"The object is not an object": the hard determinists.

The two of you don't think HUMANS have this particular will I describe nor do you think that it can be "free" or "constrained" by the definitions offered so why should I give a rats fuck about whatever else you think is incapable of holding it?

I offered definitions and I am not about to shy away from the implications those definitions have for animals and other non-human objects.

"Arbitrarily configurable" is not subjective.

Mutability is not subjectivity, it is only mutability. Subjectivity is looking at the same object and coming to different conclusions about how you relate to it, such as "I think it is beautiful" and "I think it is not beautiful" because each person has a different "subjective definition" of beauty.

Objectively, the object is a 3x3 cube of copper.

I could take a hammer and hammer the object into any shape I wish. It is still going to be an object with objective properties. This is mutability. Some people may consider it more or less beautiful (subjectivity) but objectively, it will have whatever shape it has been given (objective mutability).

It doesn't matter if the computer has whatever design I put over it. It's mutability is not subjectivity.

What we call the "dwarf", what we call the "door" what word we use to describe "locked state" THAT is all subjective and in fact has a cohomology with the situation where we rename them "elf", "portal", and "DNE state".

The important point is understanding "this entity holds a list of instructions unto a requirement" and "the requirement shall/shall not be met".

You make your bed when you say "cube 3x3." A severely limited person would as three whah? The rest of us would say "it lacks physical/material reference. More than copper is required."

So you fail to accept SI, then.

Playing at idiotic responses because someone fails to reference units? As if any of the discussion of SuBjEcTiViTy has anything to do with that.

Mutability is not subjectivity.

You seem to be trying really hard at this point to look away.

Why do you need so badly for the object to not be an object?

 

[Jarhyn]

Wow, According to Compatibilists, Computers have free will. Magical thinking in the twenty first century.

You seem to have a lot of mythical beliefs about compatibilists.

Jarhyn has made that claim. Hence my comment.

You have made the claim that free will is not possible at all so why should anyone care that you think that suddenly "computers have wills, and the wills can be free" is a invalid statement?

It's not a clear case that they cannot; I have made a clear case in fact that they may.

So, just in case you missed it:

You confuse what we can do with both subjective and objective analysis. Taking what we sense without measurement and calling it computer misses the fact that the computer is not possible without the use of the scientific method to frame it's structure and function. That man does both sense and measure gives us a step up from anything that just senses no matter how close those senses are to what is measured. Your statement computer lacks demonstrated materiality which is measured as well. The rest of your snowstorm fails as well for the same reason. This is a flaw you cannot overcome with just subjective sense, language, and mathematics. The bottom line is that man interpreting determinism with only subjective and subjective based tools is not even up to what man can do nor is that adequate for defining determinism.

I think we've known since the time we first picked up a stone that there was something important beyond our mind. I also think that other species are progressing toward similar understanding of their worlds as they use material to live and succeed in it.

It's interesting insofar as someone who wishes to discuss subjective versus objective measures does not actually pay attention and hand-waves away discussions of what makes something "subjective" or "objective" in the first part.

Your bloviation on such is a hot, sick, confused mess.

The computer is an object, observable in all it's functions, such that it can objectively and observably instantiate a mathematical principle.

This has been used specifically to prove a number of things in math which extend to proving a number of things of physics.

And since we are attempting to treat a structure of math -- "Deterministic systems" -- objectively observing a computer "doing the thing" proves the claims of hard determinism to be spurious.

As much as you dislike it, showing a mathematical structure to positively contain some thing that you FDI claim is impossible of something with that structure proves your claims wrong.

And that something is an object, wholely observable, entirely made of materials, being examined of it's immediate physical properties.

One of it's immediate physical properties is that it clearly and observably contains some thing that has a "will".

One of those immediate physical properties is that that will has an observable "freedom value", which in this moment is "unfree" because the door is locked.

What exactly do you think is not an observable object here?

Do you think because the structure of the dwarf is electrons that it is not a real object?

Do you think that just because that structure is distributed across a large number of transistors that it is not a real object?

The actual physical dwarf looks not a thing like the depiction on the screen, nor do the "doors" or the "levers". The interface is itself a subjective interpretation of the objective behavior of the system.

I'm not talking about the interface though, I'm talking about the real, actual machine, with real parts that have real properties.

one of those parts is a single "bit" of memory that is "locked" as in "will not 'open' for a dwarf"

that single bit in memory is an object.

the several bits in memory that when presented to the processor such that result contains new bits that will direct the dwarf's bits to change such that they objectively create "proximity" to the door, and which will drive the attempt? Those are objects too.

All of this is object properties all the way down.

You are clearly not ready to think about this on "whole human person" level scales yet.

Bottom line. Objective is material humans measure. It's not something humans make that humans program to then use to execute subjective brain pfarts. In the sense that a scientist uses a computer to execute equipment that present material experiments it is a tools of science. It is programmed to provide material inputs to humans from which it records and performs designed analyses that output to humans. I was doing such in the sixties.

And then FDI claimed that a physical computing machine is not a piece of material that humans measure.

There you have it folks.

FDI, a computer is an object and not only is it an object, it is an object made very easy to measure. It is an object which is objectively capable of measuring itself (re:debuggers).

As I have said, I have produced an object, inside this object. That it is made of an orientation of charge potentials, and operates as a cogitation of a machine makes no difference to it's object properties.

You can wave your hand claiming it is "subjective" but it is an object no less objectively than a human brain.

The fact that you don't understand this means that it is to me unlikely that you will ever understand how or that you have been proven wrong.

Not just demonstrated or evidenced as wrong but proven, in the same way that any other Computer assisted proof functions.

The difference, the conflation, the failure of FDI's understanding is the confusion of "subjective" with "arbitrarily configurable".

Arbitrary configurability does no damage to using an object like a computer to prove that "objects may be configured in some given way" because it is trivially true a computer is an object so if it can be configured to hold some thing that satisfied the definition of a will, operate a behaviorally closed system in a manner observably meeting the definition of "deterministic", and be shown to contain events in which the "will" is observably going to have it's requirements met, and in which it is possible for that "will" to NOT have it's requirements met, you have proven something of "deterministic system": that deterministic systems may contain free wills.

There you go. You produced an object within the computer. The object (a self designed object) is not an objective thing. It is a human fashioned thing, something you produced of your design. Hint, hint, hint "arbitrarily configurable" is your design. It is something you (feel the self reference coming on) designed, not objective. BTW I said computer - it is an instrument - is something one uses to measure.

No speedskating my interpretations please. Uh, no it isn't capable of debugging itself since it reacts to cosmic objects causing unforeseeable errors that need external justifications for their occurrences. If you've never worked on something that gets up into the atmosphere you probably aren't going to be among those who are aware these things happen. Redundancy, debuggers both internal and collateral, knowledge of effects like radiation and comsmic activity are necessary for proving and preserving operablility.

Wow, According to Compatibilists, Computers have free will. Magical thinking in the twenty first century.

"The object is not an object": the hard determinists.

The two of you don't think HUMANS have this particular will I describe nor do you think that it can be "free" or "constrained" by the definitions offered so why should I give a rats fuck about whatever else you think is incapable of holding it?

I offered definitions and I am not about to shy away from the implications those definitions have for animals and other non-human objects.

"Arbitrarily configurable" is not subjective.

Mutability is not subjectivity, it is only mutability. Subjectivity is looking at the same object and coming to different conclusions about how you relate to it, such as "I think it is beautiful" and "I think it is not beautiful" because each person has a different "subjective definition" of beauty.

Objectively, the object is a 3x3 cube of copper.

I could take a hammer and hammer the object into any shape I wish. It is still going to be an object with objective properties. This is mutability. Some people may consider it more or less beautiful (subjectivity) but objectively, it will have whatever shape it has been given (objective mutability).

It doesn't matter if the computer has whatever design I put over it. It's mutability is not subjectivity.

What we call the "dwarf", what we call the "door" what word we use to describe "locked state" THAT is all subjective and in fact has a cohomology with the situation where we rename them "elf", "portal", and "DNE state".

The important point is understanding "this entity holds a list of instructions unto a requirement" and "the requirement shall/shall not be met".

EYUP. Human will, any will, is a delusion when sensed by humans. Sensing is self referenced so here we go round and round.

So, note where I make the discussion in this post which has been bolded. Read the whole post but I think you're making a category error, and looking at things sloppily.

It has become apparent that DBT does not understand what is meant by the utterance of the phrase "choice function"

Let's look at a concrete, objective, mathematical "choice function" which is "free to it's requirement" of making a choice.

For this we need to define a system, and a system state, on a base field (which will for our case be R, the set of all reals).

This is not a "closed system", though it may be contained inside a closed system.

Let listA {[1,Y1],[2,Y2],...[n,Yn]} such that listA.pop yields (Y1), and listA becomes {[1,Y2],...,[n-1,Yn]}. For the sake of brevity

Let us then also implement "listA.push(Yv)" which will likewise add rather than subtract an element at the head.

Pop is a simple choice function on listA.

It will make a choice OF listA and return the choice.

Note that there is a requirement to this choice function: when listA is empty, it must return not "0" but ∅. These are not the same.

Therefore this choice function itself has a freedom that may be addressed: whether the list is free to pop.

Most engineered choice functions have a function in fact to ascertain this, which returns an objective measurement of its own momentary provisional freedom: listA.empty() returns "true" when listA is exactly ∅. We will arbitrarily use "1" to denote true, just to keep it R(eal).

This is an imaginary idea of freedom, though; if pushed, and then popped, the idea will be invalidated, as the list will have the freedom and never have returned a ∅; if simply popped after, it will be a valid assessment and the function will return whatever it does to show an error. It will in that moment BE unfree rather than Imagine it's unfreeness.

listA is an object with a choice function.

But moreover, listA.pop is also a choice function that deterministically "pops" the first element.

Determinism does no injury to the idea of choice, or even of "freedom of choice": listA.pop is a recognizably "constrained" choice function, and is entirely deterministic in it's actions.

Also, another interesting fact of listA: it must have had something pushed into it so to have something popped off.

Hence the need for the menu, and why they are "possibilities" in that context. They have been "pushed" into listA, and while listA is not empty, it has the "freedom" to return an element.

All these words are describing concrete operations of an object.

 

[fromderinside]

Objectively, the object is a 3x3 cube of copper.

I could take a hammer and hammer the object into any shape I wish. It is still going to be an object with objective properties. This is mutability. Some people may consider it more or less beautiful (subjectivity) but objectively, it will have whatever shape it has been given (objective mutability).

It doesn't matter if the computer has whatever design I put over it. It's mutability is not subjectivity.

What we call the "dwarf", what we call the "door" what word we use to describe "locked state" THAT is all subjective and in fact has a cohomology with the situation where we rename them "elf", "portal", and "DNE state".

The important point is understanding "this entity holds a list of instructions unto a requirement" and "the requirement shall/shall not be met".

You make your bed when you say "cube 3x3." More than copper is required."

So you fail to accept SI, then.

Playing at idiotic responses because someone fails to reference units? As if any of the discussion of SuBjEcTiViTy has anything to do with that.

Mutability is not subjectivity.

You seem to be trying really hard at this point to look away.

Why do you need so badly for the object to not be an object?

Units by material dimension measures which specify the material extent of the object making it an identifiable material object as opposed to a subjective thing such as 3x3 cube (whatever) copper? It's fiction, made up, subjective, unless all the elements of dimensionality including number correct potential measures (length width, depth, extents) of object 'copper cube'. Also, if relevant you can include form and extent of mutated(ness)

 

[Jarhyn]

Objectively, the object is a 3x3 cube of copper.

I could take a hammer and hammer the object into any shape I wish. It is still going to be an object with objective properties. This is mutability. Some people may consider it more or less beautiful (subjectivity) but objectively, it will have whatever shape it has been given (objective mutability).

It doesn't matter if the computer has whatever design I put over it. It's mutability is not subjectivity.

What we call the "dwarf", what we call the "door" what word we use to describe "locked state" THAT is all subjective and in fact has a cohomology with the situation where we rename them "elf", "portal", and "DNE state".

The important point is understanding "this entity holds a list of instructions unto a requirement" and "the requirement shall/shall not be met".

You make your bed when you say "cube 3x3." More than copper is required."

So you fail to accept SI, then.

Playing at idiotic responses because someone fails to reference units? As if any of the discussion of SuBjEcTiViTy has anything to do with that.

Mutability is not subjectivity.

You seem to be trying really hard at this point to look away.

Why do you need so badly for the object to not be an object?

Units by material dimension measures which specify the material extent of the object making it an identifiable material object as opposed to a subjective thing such as 3x3 cube (whatever) copper? It's fiction, made up, subjective, unless all the elements of dimensionality including number correct potential measures (length width, depth, extents) of object 'copper cube'. Also, if relevant you can include form and extent of mutated(ness)

You are being pedantic about how much information I am including about a "physical reality", a hypothetical but still entirely valid discussion about the concept of subjectivity in a discussion of definition.

Thought experiments in the realm of settled physics are entirely valid.

Obtuse does not even BEGIN to describe what you are doing.

Why, again, do you need so badly for the computer to not be an object, albeit highly mutable, when it so clearly is?

You are trying so hard to look away from this as if looking at it will somehow break you.

It has not broken Marvin.

It has not broken Pood.

Why are you so afraid it will break you?

 

[fromderinside]

You are being pedantic about how much information I am including about a "physical reality", a hypothetical but still entirely valid discussion about the concept of subjectivity in a discussion of definition.

Thought experiments in the realm of settled physics are entirely valid.

Obtuse does not even BEGIN to describe what you are doing.

Why, again, do you need so badly for the computer to not be an object, albeit highly mutable, when it so clearly is?

You are trying so hard to look away from this as if looking at it will somehow break you.

It has not broken Marvin.

It has not broken Pood.

Why are you so afraid it will break you?

No. it has only been broken by you the self proclaimed one who does magic with computers. Anyone can, if the follow a simple set of principles can design and execute an experiment. So far you've failed to show you are up to the task. Your ---, .... to date has not demonstrated you can even do the logic of an experiment. You have failed to specify anything resembling an experiment or an experimental result.

 

[Jarhyn]

You are being pedantic about how much information I am including about a "physical reality", a hypothetical but still entirely valid discussion about the concept of subjectivity in a discussion of definition.

Thought experiments in the realm of settled physics are entirely valid.

Obtuse does not even BEGIN to describe what you are doing.

Why, again, do you need so badly for the computer to not be an object, albeit highly mutable, when it so clearly is?

You are trying so hard to look away from this as if looking at it will somehow break you.

It has not broken Marvin.

It has not broken Pood.

Why are you so afraid it will break you?

No. it has only been broken by you the self proclaimed one who does magic with computers. Anyone can, if the follow a simple set of principles can design and execute an experiment. So far you've failed to show you are up to the task. Your ---, .... to date has not demonstrated you can even do the logic of an experiment. You have failed to specify anything resembling an experiment or an experimental result.

No, YOU claimed I do "magic" with computers.

I claim I do material operations with computers and I have the policy do describe in fairly painstaking detail what it is, how, and how what I do with them is an objective exercise.

What is interesting is that you want so very badly to look away from an object existing as an object, and away from specific observable object properties it has.

The fact of the matter is that I'm using settled science. That's what a computer sits on: it is an object formed from confident operation of physics in a deterministic way.

I took an object, showed it can harbor some thing that is "a list of actions unto a requirement" (I opened up the dwarf's structure and showed it containing a list), and then I proved "the requirement MAY be satisfied" (by situations each where it was, and other situations where it was not), as well as objective, observable situations wherein the origin of the requirement of the will could also be ascertained.

Then you claimed that mutability was subjectivity when it is not.

Again, why do you, FDI need so badly for the object to not be an object? Would you like me to give you a file which will mutate your own computer into a static object where you can observe Urist's will, crack it open and see the literal, bitwise shape of Urist's will to open the door such that his will is deterministically "not free"?

But no, I am not going to do that for you. You can download the game yourself and watch it happen in front of you, see the computer objectively tell you in big red job cancellation notifications when wills are objectively, observably unfree to their requirements, particularly ones that come from "administrated tasks".

I don't have any faith that you would be able to make any sense of the engine, but it would be funny to watch you try.

All I need really from it is a valid construction of it's math: a dwarf in a room with a will to open a door.

Then I can observe whether his will is free: is the door locked? Of course, I'm calculating whether his will is free knowing all the secrets of his universe's physics: my answer that I get IS his freedom. What I come up with on paper is what happens in his reality, in our reality owing to the statistical levelling of computers to a mathematical, deterministic (not merely superdeterministic) form.

What I come up with on paper is in fact "the door is locked, will is not free".

There is a real freedom in whether the door opens.

Again, all mere properties of objects.

Why do you want the object to not be an object so badly FDI?

 

[fromderinside]

You are being pedantic about how much information I am including about a "physical reality", a hypothetical but still entirely valid discussion about the concept of subjectivity in a discussion of definition.

Thought experiments in the realm of settled physics are entirely valid.

Obtuse does not even BEGIN to describe what you are doing.

Why, again, do you need so badly for the computer to not be an object, albeit highly mutable, when it so clearly is?

You are trying so hard to look away from this as if looking at it will somehow break you.

It has not broken Marvin.

It has not broken Pood.

Why are you so afraid it will break you?

No. it has only been broken by you the self proclaimed one who does magic with computers. Anyone can, if the follow a simple set of principles can design and execute an experiment. So far you've failed to show you are up to the task. Your ---, .... to date has not demonstrated you can even do the logic of an experiment. You have failed to specify anything resembling an experiment or an experimental result.

No, YOU claimed I do "magic" with computers.

I claim I do material operations with computers and I have the policy do describe in fairly painstaking detail what it is, how, and how what I do with them is an objective exercise.

What is interesting is that you want so very badly to look away from an object existing as an object, and away from specific observable object properties it has.

The fact of the matter is that I'm using settled science. That's what a computer sits on: it is an object formed from confident operation of physics in a deterministic way.

I took an object, showed it can harbor some thing that is "a list of actions unto a requirement" (I opened up the dwarf's structure and showed it containing a list), and then I proved "the requirement MAY be satisfied" (by situations each where it was, and other situations where it was not), as well as objective, observable situations wherein the origin of the requirement of the will could also be ascertained.

Then you claimed that mutability was subjectivity when it is not.

Again, why do you, FDI need so badly for the object to not be an object? Would you like me to give you a file which will mutate your own computer into a static object where you can observe Urist's will, crack it open and see the literal, bitwise shape of Urist's will to open the door such that his will is deterministically "not free"?

But no, I am not going to do that for you. You can download the game yourself and watch it happen in front of you, see the computer objectively tell you in big red job cancellation notifications when wills are objectively, observably unfree to their requirements, particularly ones that come from "administrated tasks".

I don't have any faith that you would be able to make any sense of the engine, but it would be funny to watch you try.

All I need really from it is a valid construction of it's math: a dwarf in a room with a will to open a door.

Then I can observe whether his will is free: is the door locked? Of course, I'm calculating whether his will is free knowing all the secrets of his universe's physics: my answer that I get IS his freedom. What I come up with on paper is what happens in his reality, in our reality owing to the statistical levelling of computers to a mathematical, deterministic (not merely superdeterministic) form.

What I come up with on paper is in fact "the door is locked, will is not free".

There is a real freedom in whether the door opens.

Again, all mere properties of objects.

Why do you want the object to not be an object so badly FDI?

My problem with computer 'experiments' is in the area of the universe presumed. It is always determined by the designer of the experiment so that outputs are always constrained to best guesses by the designer about the nature of the world rather than reality. Simulation cannot emulate reality. It can only approximate it to the extent that reality is known and that to the limits of computer capacity. An example is weather simulation. Such have improved over the years as more data was fed in to the models. This only strengthens one's surmise that unless we know everything about something outcomes will aways degrade over length of experiment.

I find such experiments useful as first guesses about what is known will come out in time. But, as with weather emulation the outputs are only as good as the inputs and the inputs are always limited leading to increasing uncertainty over duration, projection, of simulation. In the case of weather this reduces to I dunno from about two week simulations.

When dealing with unknowns of possibilities such as will in a determined environment, the presumptions required cannot be directly verified since we don't how it works, if it works, in the real world. One of those unknown unknowns.

Physics isn't settled nor is it knowable through simulation on a device that fails as the result of changes in the world in which it operates. Your stomping of feet aside you have not presented a verifiable reasoned argument for your hypotheses nor simulation outcomes.

 

[Jarhyn]

You are being pedantic about how much information I am including about a "physical reality", a hypothetical but still entirely valid discussion about the concept of subjectivity in a discussion of definition.

Thought experiments in the realm of settled physics are entirely valid.

Obtuse does not even BEGIN to describe what you are doing.

Why, again, do you need so badly for the computer to not be an object, albeit highly mutable, when it so clearly is?

You are trying so hard to look away from this as if looking at it will somehow break you.

It has not broken Marvin.

It has not broken Pood.

Why are you so afraid it will break you?

No. it has only been broken by you the self proclaimed one who does magic with computers. Anyone can, if the follow a simple set of principles can design and execute an experiment. So far you've failed to show you are up to the task. Your ---, .... to date has not demonstrated you can even do the logic of an experiment. You have failed to specify anything resembling an experiment or an experimental result.

No, YOU claimed I do "magic" with computers.

I claim I do material operations with computers and I have the policy do describe in fairly painstaking detail what it is, how, and how what I do with them is an objective exercise.

What is interesting is that you want so very badly to look away from an object existing as an object, and away from specific observable object properties it has.

The fact of the matter is that I'm using settled science. That's what a computer sits on: it is an object formed from confident operation of physics in a deterministic way.

I took an object, showed it can harbor some thing that is "a list of actions unto a requirement" (I opened up the dwarf's structure and showed it containing a list), and then I proved "the requirement MAY be satisfied" (by situations each where it was, and other situations where it was not), as well as objective, observable situations wherein the origin of the requirement of the will could also be ascertained.

Then you claimed that mutability was subjectivity when it is not.

Again, why do you, FDI need so badly for the object to not be an object? Would you like me to give you a file which will mutate your own computer into a static object where you can observe Urist's will, crack it open and see the literal, bitwise shape of Urist's will to open the door such that his will is deterministically "not free"?

But no, I am not going to do that for you. You can download the game yourself and watch it happen in front of you, see the computer objectively tell you in big red job cancellation notifications when wills are objectively, observably unfree to their requirements, particularly ones that come from "administrated tasks".

I don't have any faith that you would be able to make any sense of the engine, but it would be funny to watch you try.

All I need really from it is a valid construction of it's math: a dwarf in a room with a will to open a door.

Then I can observe whether his will is free: is the door locked? Of course, I'm calculating whether his will is free knowing all the secrets of his universe's physics: my answer that I get IS his freedom. What I come up with on paper is what happens in his reality, in our reality owing to the statistical levelling of computers to a mathematical, deterministic (not merely superdeterministic) form.

What I come up with on paper is in fact "the door is locked, will is not free".

There is a real freedom in whether the door opens.

Again, all mere properties of objects.

Why do you want the object to not be an object so badly FDI?

My problem with computer 'experiments' is in the area of the universe presumed. It is always determined by the designer of the experiment so that outputs are always constrained to best guesses by the designer about the nature of the world rather than reality. Simulation cannot emulate reality. It can only approximate it to the extent that reality is known and that to the limits of computer capacity. An example is weather simulation. Such have improved over the years as more data was fed in to the models. This only strengthens one's surmise that unless we know everything about something outcomes will aways degrade over length of experiment.

I find such experiments useful as first guesses about what is known will come out in time. But, as with weather emulation the outputs are only as good as the inputs and the inputs are always limited leading to increasing uncertainty over duration, projection, of simulation. In the case of weather this reduces to I dunno from about two week simulations.

When dealing with unknowns of possibilities such as will in a determined environment, the presumptions required cannot be directly verified since we don't how it works, if it works, in the real world. One of those unknown unknowns.

Physics isn't settled nor is it knowable through simulation on a device that fails as the result of changes in the world in which it operates. Your stomping of feet aside you have not presented a verifiable reasoned argument for your hypotheses nor simulation outcomes.

The area of the universe presumed is exactly the area of the universe the computer occupies.

Think about it this way, perhaps, if you are not afraid of seeing the object as an object: the computer is an object, highly mutable.

The computer itself (not talking specifically about simulation, but the object of the computer) contains a relationship where one thing observably holds a will. This is not arbitrary, nor subjective. It is there, and it is painfully easy to observe, through a debugger window. The debugger window can't debug itself but it doesn't need to.

That will exists in "a deterministic closed system which exists in the broader universe".

It is not disconnected per SE, it is not existing in a vacuum, and it can ONLY have "properties and relationships that are allowed by our broader deterministic universe".

So if I show a property existing "there", I have ALSO shown it existing here, because "there" exists subordinate to "here" and is limited in properties to the ones "here" allows of it.

They can hold "wills"? That means "wills" exist, even if it is only inside the computer. It would be up to you to prove that they are isolated to that context but it also disproves through counter example your central contention: wills may exist and that while provisional freedom is imaginary that there is still also a real moment of determination on freedom.

Their wills can objectively, observably be dependently "free or constrained" on the basis of their deterministic system? That means "freedom" is a property of a will in a deterministic context. It is important to note, absent this context, the will is just free-floating, like the "type" listA, rather than a given instantiation.

Thus by demonstrating these things existing observably on a (mutable) object, I demonstrate them existing in reality.

And yes, computers function by fairly settled physics with observable large scale mechanics.

You might not know "how it works" in humans but my goal here has never been to discuss specifically how it works in humans.

My goal is to prove, with mathematical certainty, that these things are not forbidden by determinism.

For that, I use the computer, by which the fundamental pieces are proven as certainly existing. How neurons Implement richer variations of such things is also something I'm working my way through, but in all honesty we may never know.

What I DO know is that if a simple, low-mutability Turing machine can host these structures and operate concretely on these as observed, a human brain can as well, and add many more layers of nuance and complexity besides.

 

[DBT]

Wow, According to Compatibilists, Computers have free will. Magical thinking in the twenty first century.

You seem to have a lot of mythical beliefs about compatibilists.

Jarhyn has made that claim. Hence my comment.

You have made the claim that free will is not possible at all so why should anyone care that you think that suddenly "computers have wills, and the wills can be free" is a invalid statement?

It's not a clear case that they cannot; I have made a clear case in fact that they may.

My comment was related to your claim that computers may have not only have will, but free will.

I pointed out that you are making a category error by conflating function with will.

Again, will is not the same as function. Function is determined by the construction of a mechanism, which has no 'will' - but functions as designed and constructed, current through circuits, information is processed, output is produced. Information in, information out. Garbage in garbage out. Rational input in, rational results out......

Nothing is being willed, nothing is being freely willed. Mechanical systems do not operate on the principle of will or free will.

And yet again you fail to even make a a single criticism or argument against it beyond a mere dismissal, which you offer to any thing approaching "wills which are free".

Your ascertainment of what is a "category error" given the fact that you seem unable to understand or parse the difference between "mutability" and "subjectivity" and your inability to understand that "will can be a function" means that it is probably pointless to have this conversation with you, DBT, at all.

Anything into garbage is garbage, in this math, I think.

I have pointed out a series of instructions unto a requirement, held observably in a system.

Scripts fairly trivially in fact meet the qualities of a "will", as I have defined the word.

Wills can contain whole definitions of functions.

Definitions of functions can contain packaged wills.

The very idea of "function" and "will" here as defined may be homologous.

As to whether DBT, talking to a firmware engineer, understands the idea of "function" is questionable at best, too.

So why should I give a rat's fuck whether you, someone who does not believe humans (or anything) can hold the thing we call "wills" and whether such "wills" can be "free, with respect to their requirements", think that computers can or cannot have such?

Why would this be more "absurd*" than humans holding the same?

Unless you really don't think it's all that absurd that humans do?

But we are machines in a deterministic system, so sauce for the goose...



*(you, or at least I mean nonsensical, btw)

Bluff and Bluster. Empty Rhetoric. You fail to understand what has been explained and supported. You make ludicrous claims like computers have will or free will.

You have yet to grasp the nature and implications of determinism even though you gave a reasonable definition of it.

To save time and effort;


''Compatibilists are unable to present a rational argument that supports their belief in the existence of free will in a deterministic universe, except by defining determinism and/or free will in a way that is a watered down version of one or both of the two concepts.
As I understand it, Determinism (which I take to be Causal Determinism) posits that all activity in the universe is both (i) the effect of [all] antecedent activity, and (ii) the only activity that can occur given the antecedent activity. That is what is meant by saying that everything is “determined” — it is the inexorable consequence of activity that preceded it. In a deterministic universe, everything that has ever occurred, is occurring, and will occur since the universe came into existence (however that might have occurred) can only occur exactly as it has occurred, is occurring, or will occur, and cannot possibly occur in any different manner. This mandated activity necessarily includes all human action, including all human cognition.''


''As I understand the notion of Free Will, it posits that a human being, when presented with more than one course of action, has the freedom or agency to choose between or among the alternatives, and that the state of affairs that exists in the universe immediately prior to the putative exercise of that freedom of choice does not eliminate all but one option and compel the selection of only one of the available options.

Based on the foregoing:

1. If Causal Determinism is true (i.e., accurately describes the state of the universe), then humans lack Free Will because the truth of Causal Determinism means that (a) humans lack the ability to think in a manner that is not 100% caused by prior activity that is outside of their control, as human cognition is simply a form of activity that is governed by Causal Determinism, and (b) there are no such thing as true “options” or “alternatives” because there is one, and only one, activity that can ever occur at any given instant; and
2. If Free-Will exists in its pure form, then Causal Determinism is not true because the existence of Free Will in its pure form depends upon (a) the existence of true “options” or “alternatives,” and (b) humans being capable of thinking (and acting) in a manner that is not 100% caused by prior activity that is outside their control.

''It should suffice to say that none of the various arguments for Compatibilism courageously presented on the Stanford website is satisfying, and all suffer from the same flaw identified above — namely, a stubborn refusal to come to grips with the true and complete nature of Causal Determinism and Free Will. Or, as William James less generously observed, all efforts to harmonize Causal Determinism an Free Will are a “quagmire of evasion.” - Bruce Silverstein B.A. in Philosophy

 

[Jarhyn]

@DBT:

Bluff and Bluster. Empty Rhetoric. You fail to understand what has been explained and supported.

What I find interesting is that you, who claim "no thing has "free will" even when presented with an object containing a will that is free to it's requirement", thinks it's somehow "MORE impossible" or "nonsensical" for a computer to have a "will" than a human.

It's almost as if you think humans DO have free will and only computers don't?

But in a deterministic system, if one machine has a will that has "determined freedom", then any machine of sufficient complexity and mutability may.

You have yet to grasp the nature and implications of determinism.

'Compatibilists are unable to present a rational argument that supports their belief in the existence of free will in a deterministic universe, except by defining determinism and/or "free" and "will" in a way [that hard determinsts ignore]"

Means that compatibilists have a rational argument that supports their concepts of free will in a deterministic universe. Full stop.


''As I understand the notion of Free Will, it posits that a human being, when presented with more than one course of action, has the freedom or agency to choose between or among the alternatives, and that the state of affairs that exists in the universe immediately prior to the putative exercise of that freedom of choice does not eliminate all but one option and compel the selection of only one of the available options.

So... Libertarian free will again? The thing that everyone here chucks out the window?

Yawn...

From there everything else you speak falls apart.

Again, since you did not appear to have read it, the discussion on what is meant when discussing "freedom of choice" in deterministic systems.

It has become apparent that DBT does not understand what is meant by the utterance of the phrase "choice function"

Let's look at a concrete, objective, mathematical "choice function" which is "free to it's requirement" of making a choice.

For this we need to define a system, and a system state, on a base field (which will for our case be R, the set of all reals).

This is not a "closed system", though it may be contained inside a closed system.

Let listA {[1,Y1],[2,Y2],...[n,Yn]} such that listA.pop yields (Y1), and listA becomes {[1,Y2],...,[n-1,Yn]}. For the sake of brevity

Let us then also implement "listA.push(Yv)" which will likewise add rather than subtract an element at the head.

Pop is a simple choice function on listA.

It will make a choice OF listA and return the choice.

Note that there is a requirement to this choice function: when listA is empty, it must return not "0" but ∅. These are not the same.

Therefore this choice function itself has a freedom that may be addressed: whether the list is free to pop.

Most engineered choice functions have a function in fact to ascertain this, which returns an objective measurement of its own momentary provisional freedom: listA.empty() returns "true" when listA is exactly ∅. We will arbitrarily use "1" to denote true, just to keep it R(eal).

This is an imaginary idea of freedom, though; if pushed, and then popped, the idea will be invalidated, as the list will have the freedom and never have returned a ∅; if simply popped after, it will be a valid assessment and the function will return whatever it does to show an error. It will in that moment BE unfree rather than Imagine it's unfreeness.

listA is an object with a choice function.

But moreover, listA.pop is also a choice function that deterministically "pops" the first element.

Determinism does no injury to the idea of choice, or even of "freedom of choice": listA.pop is a recognizably "constrained" choice function, and is entirely deterministic in it's actions.

Also, another interesting fact of listA: it must have had something pushed into it so to have something popped off.

Hence the need for the menu, and why they are "possibilities" in that context. They have been "pushed" into listA, and while listA is not empty, it has the "freedom" to return an element.

All these words are describing concrete operations of an object.

 

[DBT]

Yet the question of menu selection came up again in the assumption that the compatibilist narrative is correct.
It is not correct because, to reiterate, only one action is possible in any instance in time within a determined system.

You're confusing an actuality with a possibility. Every item on the restaurant menu is a possibility. However, the Chef Salad on the table in front of me is an actuality. There will be only one actuality. However, there are always multiple possibilities.

Every item is not only a possibility, but a necessity for someone. Each person to their own menu item. Each menu item that is selected is not probabilistically selected, not freely willed, but necessarily selected. It cannot happen otherwise.

If you select Steak and Salad, your wife selects Lasagna, your friend selects Spanish Mackerel and his wife selects Caeser Salad, four menu items are taken, each and every item selection necessitated/fixed/ determined by the mental/physical condition of the person/brain/mind involved in the process of determination.

.

1. If Causal Determinism is true (i.e., accurately describes the state of the universe), then humans lack Free Will because the truth of Causal Determinism means that (a) humans lack the ability to think in a manner that is not 100% caused by prior activity that is outside of their control, as human cognition is simply a form of activity that is governed by Causal Determinism, and (b) there are no such thing as true “options” or “alternatives” because there is one, and only one, activity that can ever occur at any given instant; and
2. If Free-Will exists in its pure form, then Causal Determinism is not true because the existence of Free Will in its pure form depends upon (a) the existence of true “options” or “alternatives,” and (b) humans being capable of thinking (and acting) in a manner that is not 100% caused by prior activity that is outside their control.'' - Bruce Silverstein - BA Philosophy - Quora
   https://www.quora.com/profile/Bruce-Silverstein-1

,
Choosing, inputs multiple possibilities, and, outputs an intention to actualize exactly one of them.

'Possibility' implies uncertainty, that something may or may not happen. There are no 'possibilities' in determinism. What is determined must necessarily happen as determined

Because choosing is a deterministic operation, it should be obvious to you that multiple possibilities are a logical requirement. And they will always be present in the mind whenever choosing happens. Therefore, the claim that "only one action is possible in any instance in time within a determined system" is clearly false.

Options within a determined system are not 'possibilities' in the sense that an action may or may not happen. Options are either open or closed for someone depending on the state of the system.

There is, for instance, the option to become an astronaut, to fly to the Space Station, an option that is not realizable for 99.999% of the population

In a deterministic system that includes a human brain with the neurological capacity to make decisions, that mind will always have multiple possibilities to choose from during that operation.

There are no possibilities within the brain/mind in the sense that something not determined could possibly happen. Each incremental state of the brain in each and every moment in time is fixed by antecedents. No other 'possibility' exists within a determined system.

''As I understand it, Determinism (which I take to be Causal Determinism) posits that all activity in the universe is both (i) the effect of [all] antecedent activity, and (ii) the only activity that can occur given the antecedent activity. That is what is meant by saying that everything is “determined” — it is the inexorable consequence of activity that preceded it. In a deterministic universe, everything that has ever occurred, is occurring, and will occur since the universe came into existence (however that might have occurred) can only occur exactly as it has occurred, is occurring, or will occur, and cannot possibly occur in any different manner. This mandated activity necessarily includes all human action, including all human cognition.'' - Bruce Silverstein - BA Philosophy - Quora

The correct formulation of the idea of determinism is that "only one possibility will be actualized". But there is never any possibility that is removed by determinism. Every possibility that occurs to the mind will be causally necessary, inevitable, and will appear at that time and place without deviation.

Correct, with the caveat that other 'possibilities' are not your possibilities, but other people's necessitations. Which is why determinism negates freedom of will.

Determinism is a Harsh Mistress.

And apparently she's not very bright, either.

Events proceed as determined, no deviation, no possibility of doing otherwise. Fixed as determined. No negotiation. No alteration. No going back.

 

[Jarhyn]

not freely willed

It cannot happen otherwise.

And again, like a child who doesn't understand algebra, you fail to distinguish between what we are talking about (compatibilist free will, which does not get injured by "cannot do otherwise"), and libertarian free will.

It's right at the top of your post, and all the rest is blatherskite attached to that wrongness.

Libertarian free will, as has been denounced a hundred times and more, is not the topic here, but compatibilist concepts of "free" and "will" and "that one particular will happening to be free or not"

As I pointed out, the concept we use to denote freeness is the same concept used in discussing listA's freeness: it is the objective resolution of a given determined event in a way involving a normal return rather than a null return.

The ultimate point here is that there is exactly one definition of "free" and "will" that will ever be capable of making sense, and that all definitions that make sense are that definition worded differently but still fundamentally cohomologous.

To then gripe that we are being precise and "it only works when being precise" is in fact just complaining that there is an underlying mathematical structure that is being discussed.

Do we have to go back to °°° and •••?

 

[Marvin Edwards]

You're confusing an actuality with a possibility. Every item on the restaurant menu is a possibility. However, the Chef Salad on the table in front of me is an actuality. There will be only one actuality. However, there are always more than one possibility.

Each person to their own menu item. Each menu item that is selected is not probabilistically selected, not freely willed, but necessarily selected. It cannot happen otherwise.

The choices made "will" not happen otherwise, but they certainly "can" happen otherwise. Every item on the menu is a real possibility for every person at the table. The fact that they will not choose an item does not logically imply that they could not choose that item.

It is a simple matter of what "can" and "will" actually mean. What "will" happen is not the same as what "can" happen.

And whenever choosing happens, there will always be at least two things that "can" happen, even though there is only one thing that "will" happen.

If you select Steak and Salad, your wife selects Lasagna, your friend selects Spanish Mackerel and his wife selects Caeser Salad, four menu items are taken, each and every item selection necessitated/fixed/ determined by the mental/physical condition of the person/brain/mind involved in the process of determination.

Absolutely correct! Even though I "could" have selected the Lasagna, I didn't. And given those exact same circumstances, I never "would have" selected the Lasagna, even though I "could have".

1. If Causal Determinism is true ... - Bruce Silverstein - BA Philosophy - Quora

If Bruce would like to participate in this conversation, then I'd be happy to straighten him out as well. But I see no point in trying to have a conversation with someone who isn't here to defend his position. You may prefer his rhetoric to your own, but he is not actually saying anything that you are not already saying. So, let's avoid unnecessary redundancy.

'Possibility' implies uncertainty, that something may or may not happen.

Exactly. The function of our notions of "possibility" is to deal with everyday uncertainty. When we do not know what "will" happen, we imagine what "can" happen, to prepare for what does happen.

There are no 'possibilities' in determinism.

When we are in the context of deterministic reality, there are no possibilities. Thus, when addressing functional possibilities we shift into a different context, the context where we speak of things that "can" happen, rather than things that "will" happen. We don't know whether the traffic light will be red or green when we get there (the deterministic reality is unknown), but we know for certain that it could be red and it also could be green (two real possibilities).

The function of a "possibility" is to allow us to imagine things that may or may not happen. The restaurant menu, for example, is a list of things that we might or might not choose for dinner. The function of such an imagined future is to "try it out" to see if we might want to choose it. For example, when I considered having that steak for dinner, I recalled having bacon and eggs for breakfast and a double cheeseburger for lunch, and what first looked good to me suddenly seemed less appetizing. That's how a "possibility", something that "can" happen, logically functions.

A possibility might never be selected, but it remains a possibility, something we have the "ability" to do, something that we "can" do, even if we never actually do it.

What is determined must necessarily happen as determined

Yes. And if it is "determined" (causally necessary) that I would consider the possibility of the steak, and then reject it, then that possibility, as a mental event, was causally necessary from any prior point in time and inevitably "would" happen, without deviation.

Of course, it "could" have happened differently. If I had coffee and toast for breakfast, and a salad for lunch, then the possibility of steak for dinner "would" have been very appealing, and I "would", under those circumstances, order the steak instead of the salad for dinner.

But that, of course, did not happen, even though it "could" have.

Options within a determined system are not 'possibilities' in the sense that an action may or may not happen. Options are either open or closed for someone depending on the state of the system.

An "option" is a possible choice. It is something that you "can" choose, even if you never choose it. To use the word "option" invokes the context of possibilities.

The fact that we definitely will not choose that option does not mean that we could not choose it.

Both the salad and the steak were options that were "open" to me. To be "open" simply means that I had the ability to choose it, if I wanted to.

In one scenario, where I had the bacon at breakfast and the cheeseburger at lunch, that recollection "closed" the steak option, and I chose the salad.

But the closing was done by me, due to my own reasons. Determinism did not step in and close that option for me. I did that myself. In fact, determinism simply insured that it would be me, and no one else, that would close that option.

There is, for instance, the option to become an astronaut, to fly to the Space Station, an option that is not realizable for 99.999% of the population

That's a good point. We may imagine ourselves as astronauts without it being a real possibility. That would be a fantasy for most people. A fantasy is not expected to be a real possibility.

Superman may "leap tall buildings in a single bound", but that is physically impossible for us.

A real possibility is something that we actually can do, if we choose to do it.

In a deterministic system that includes a human brain with the neurological capacity to make decisions, that mind will always have multiple possibilities to choose from during that operation.

There are no possibilities within the brain/mind in the sense that something not determined could possibly happen.

The paradox here is created by conflating the two "senses" that we're talking about. Are we speaking in the sense of possibilities, or, are we speaking in the sense of actualities. These are two very different senses. Are we speaking of things that "can" happen, or, are we speaking of things that "will" happen.

I believe it is a mental error to confuse these two contexts. Most of the time, we use them correctly, and even closely, without confusion.

For example, "I chose the salad, even though I could have chosen the steak", is considered a true statement in both its parts.

But now the hard determinist comes along and says, "No, you never could have chosen the steak". Which makes no sense at all, because, just a moment ago, before I had made my choice, "I can choose the salad" and "I can choose the steak" were both equally true.

If "I can choose the steak" was ever true at any point in the past, then "I could have chosen the steak" will be forever true in the future, when referring to that same past. It is a simple change in the tense of the verb. It is built into the logic of our language.

So, back to your original question. What does it mean to say "something that is not determined cannot possibly happen"? It means we're confusing things.

Why? Because something that can possibly happen may or may not be determined to happen.

Events proceed as determined, no deviation,

Correct.

no possibility of doing otherwise.

Still logically false. Determinism never eliminates any possibility of doing otherwise. The possibility of doing otherwise never requires that we actually do otherwise, but only that we can do otherwise if we choose to. I chose the salad, but I could have chosen the steak. The steak was a real possibility, and my choosing it was really possible, even though I would never choose it under those conditions.