Free Will And Free Choice

[untermensche]

Brain agency is easily tested. Apply chemical changes, alcohol, drugs, electrical stimulation of brain regions, structural changes, etc, etc, and see what happens to consciousness, perception, emotions, decision making......

Remove the tires from your car and see how well it drives.

That proves "car agency".

What a horribly irrational thought.

When you are drunk your brain does not take over.

Your will is just hampered because the machine it controls is not functioning properly and giving it the information and lucidity it needs.

The cognitive deficits caused by these injuries to the right hemisphere, leads to the over compensation by the left hemisphere of the brain for the injury, resulting in delusions.

"Over compensation"?

Who says there is any other way for a damaged brain to compensate?

You can't say anything about the function of normally behaving brains by looking at damaged brains. You can only make the same mundane observation. Damage alters behavior.

It's like trying to make claims about how birds fly by looking at birds with damaged wings.

And even damaged brains desperately try to give the mind information. They are still the slave to the mind.

Because a mind making survival decisions is better than a dumb brain that creates delusions making them.

 

[DBT]

Brain agency is easily tested. Apply chemical changes, alcohol, drugs, electrical stimulation of brain regions, structural changes, etc, etc, and see what happens to consciousness, perception, emotions, decision making......

Remove the tires from your car and see how well it drives.

That proves "car agency".

What a horribly irrational thought.

When you are drunk your brain does not take over.

Your will is just hampered because the machine it controls is not functioning properly and giving it the information and lucidity it needs.

The cognitive deficits caused by these injuries to the right hemisphere, leads to the over compensation by the left hemisphere of the brain for the injury, resulting in delusions.

"Over compensation"?

Who says there is any other way for a damaged brain to compensate?

You can't say anything about the function of normally behaving brains by looking at damaged brains. You can only make the same mundane observation. Damage alters behavior.

It's like trying to make claims about how birds fly by looking at birds with damaged wings.

And even damaged brains desperately try to give the mind information. They are still the slave to the mind.

Because a mind making survival decisions is better than a dumb brain that creates delusions making them.

Better yet, you should actually consider the science instead of dismissing it in favour of your Voodoo Magic and onsider what happens to mind with chemical changes, electrical stimulation, surgery or lesions.


Decision making by the brain
"And the electrical activity in these neurons is known to reflect the delivery of this chemical, dopamine, to the frontal cortex. Dopamine is one of several neurotransmitters thought to regulate emotional response, and is suspected of playing a central role in schizophrenia, Parkinson's disease, and drug abuse," Montague says. "We think these dopamine neurons are making guesses at likely future rewards. The neuron is constantly making a guess at the time and magnitude of the reward."

"If what it expects doesn't arrive, it doesn't change its firing. If it expects a certain amount of reward at a particular time and the reward is actually higher, it's surprised by that and increases its delivery of dopamine," he explains. "And if it expects a certain level (of reward) and it actually gets less, it decreases its level of dopamine delivery."

Thus, says Montague, "what we see is that the dopamine neurons change the way they make electrical impulses in exactly the same way the animal changes his behavior. The way the neurons change their predictions correlates with the behavioral changes of the monkey almost exactly."

 

[fromderinside]

We already now why we feel the need to create a placeholder called experience.

Who is this "we"?
You mean "YOU"?

Experience is absolute truth.

The only absolute truth we have.

Tell me about something that is not an experience.

That is all you could possibly know about. It all your mind has access to.

Truth of any stripe has nothing to do with experience.

Experience is what is encoded inside and outside by our preceptive instruments. What we call consciousness experience is basically an inner speech (Thanks DBT) playback of what our brain processes have filtered and sorted from that sense material as representative of what the world is like at that particular time in context with what has been previously encoded.

We have no absolute truth, only current events compared with previous events.

Most of what we sense is not relayed as subvocal inner speech, ergo not part of conscious experience. For instance a thirty millisecond perception of a thirty millisecond sensation is very different from that sense perception at three milliseconds. Both inputs were input to our brain but only the the terminal version becomes something of which we are aware.

Or experience is at best a skeleton of what is sensed and manipulated by neural processes.

Yet when we create confounding perceptions, like when when one ear receives a masking tone after the other ear has already been exposed to a tone for three milliseconds, one does retain the first three millisecond version of perception of the partly masked thirty millisecond tone so we know the three second version has been sensed. This is similar to the brain resolving the sensing of an trapezoidal frame rotating with an iron pipe as a pipe passing through a frame.

I suspect one can attribute a relative truth to what is processed if we mean to brain processes designed to maximum sense relative to previously sensed inputs relative to what has just been processed.

 

[untermensche]

Remove the tires from your car and see how well it drives.

That proves "car agency".

What a horribly irrational thought.

When you are drunk your brain does not take over.

Your will is just hampered because the machine it controls is not functioning properly and giving it the information and lucidity it needs.



"Over compensation"?

Who says there is any other way for a damaged brain to compensate?

You can't say anything about the function of normally behaving brains by looking at damaged brains. You can only make the same mundane observation. Damage alters behavior.

It's like trying to make claims about how birds fly by looking at birds with damaged wings.

And even damaged brains desperately try to give the mind information. They are still the slave to the mind.

Because a mind making survival decisions is better than a dumb brain that creates delusions making them.

Better yet, you should actually consider the science instead of dismissing it in favour of your Voodoo Magic and onsider what happens to mind with chemical changes, electrical stimulation, surgery or lesions.

What science?

Your attempt at philosophy was embarrassing.

Trying to drive a brain malfunctioning under the effects of alcohol does not show brain agency in the least.

That you think it does shows you can't think.

You are an ape posting things you don't understand and can't defend.

Saying some transmitter is associated with pleasure and addiction is interesting but it tells us nothing about the will and nothing about consciousness.

Many people overcome addiction with will power.

A will is something you develop over years with practice and effort.

Not all wills are the same thing.

Dopamine is also a pressor that spares the kidneys.

A lack of Dopamine is associated with Parkinson's disease.

Dopamine itself has nothing to do with pleasure.

When it binds in certain areas in the brain that is associated with the mind experiencing pleasure.

 

[untermensche]

Truth of any stripe has nothing to do with experience.

All you know absolutely are your experiences.

All else is conjecture.

The existence of all else is faith.

 

[fromderinside]

Wrong.

We don't know our experiences. There are a variety of experiences available at every moment from which the one subvocalized selected by lot from them. We neither know why nor how they are selected except through experiment. That's a long way from knowing.

Compare your statement with mine, My statement provides the potential for material verification whereas yours provide only the vaporware of 'I know trust me'.

 

[untermensche]

Wrong.

We don't know our experiences....

They are all we know even if our knowledge of them is not perfect.

We know nothing else but our experiences.

I can experience your words written freely claiming you are not free.

I cannot experience you. Even if I have the visual experience of your body.

I can only have faith that you exist.

 

[fromderinside]

Ah, the 'even if' ploy

rephrasing your finish.

'I' 'I' 'I'

 

[DBT]

Remove the tires from your car and see how well it drives.

That proves "car agency".

What a horribly irrational thought.

When you are drunk your brain does not take over.

Your will is just hampered because the machine it controls is not functioning properly and giving it the information and lucidity it needs.



"Over compensation"?

Who says there is any other way for a damaged brain to compensate?

You can't say anything about the function of normally behaving brains by looking at damaged brains. You can only make the same mundane observation. Damage alters behavior.

It's like trying to make claims about how birds fly by looking at birds with damaged wings.

And even damaged brains desperately try to give the mind information. They are still the slave to the mind.

Because a mind making survival decisions is better than a dumb brain that creates delusions making them.

Better yet, you should actually consider the science instead of dismissing it in favour of your Voodoo Magic and onsider what happens to mind with chemical changes, electrical stimulation, surgery or lesions.

What science?

Your attempt at philosophy was embarrassing.

Trying to drive a brain malfunctioning under the effects of alcohol does not show brain agency in the least.

That you think it does shows you can't think.

You are an ape posting things you don't understand and can't defend.

Saying some transmitter is associated with pleasure and addiction is interesting but it tells us nothing about the will and nothing about consciousness.

Many people overcome addiction with will power.

A will is something you develop over years with practice and effort.

Not all wills are the same thing.

Dopamine is also a pressor that spares the kidneys.

A lack of Dopamine is associated with Parkinson's disease.

Dopamine itself has nothing to do with pleasure.

When it binds in certain areas in the brain that is associated with the mind experiencing pleasure.

I am quoting from neuroscience, experiments, results and analysis by those who work in the field. You on the other hand make up whatever suits your needs, saying whatever you feel makes it appear like you have something to say when in fact you don't....only hot air and woo, or is that poo?

Meanwhile:
Brain agency:
Neuroscientists have repeatedly pointed out that pattern recognition represents the key to understanding cognition in humans. Pattern recognition also forms the very basis by which we predict future events, i e. we are literally forced to make assumptions concerning outcomes,and we do so by relying on sequences of events experienced in the past.

Huettel et al. point out that their study identifies the role various regions of prefrontal cortex play in moment-to-moment processing of mental events in order to make predictions about future events. Thus implicit predictive models are formed which need to be continuously updated, the disruption of sequence
would indicate that the PFC is engaged in a novelty response to pattern changes. As a third possible explanation, Ivry and Knight propose that activation of the prefrontal cortex may reflect the generation of hypotheses, since the formulation of an hypothesis is an essential feature of higher-level cognition.
A monitoring of participants awareness during pattern recognition could provide a test of the PFC’s ability to formulate hypotheses concerning future outcomes.

 

[fromderinside]

Ah. I suggest you look into military combat performance and workload research DBT. There's an advantage in that sort of research since it also takes into account integration of balance with decision making. A lot of effort has gone in to such as understanding the golden arm aspect of group flight performance dynamics. These researchers also have a lot of freedom in selection of observers.

 

[untermensche]

Only minds care about research.

Brains have no idea there is such a thing as research.

Brains are cells that emit molecules.

They do not have knowledge of anything. They respond the way they have evolved to respond.

But a mind is an adaption to a specific time and place.

That is why the brain relies on it for survival and follows it's commands like a dutiful slave.

 

[fromderinside]

Only minds care about research.

Brains have no idea there is such a thing as research.

Brains are cells that emit molecules.

They do not have knowledge of anything. They respond the way they have evolved to respond.

But a mind is an adaption to a specific time and place.

That is why the brain relies on it for survival and follows it's commands like a dutiful slave.

We await Untermensche's contributions to the Free Will and Free Choice conversation.

 

[DBT]

Only minds care about research.

Brains have no idea there is such a thing as research.

Brains are cells that emit molecules.

They do not have knowledge of anything. They respond the way they have evolved to respond.

But a mind is an adaption to a specific time and place.

That is why the brain relies on it for survival and follows it's commands like a dutiful slave.

So, in your estimate, minds are some sort of disembodied entities floating in the astral plane, ready to come down to earth and manifest within a brain, because, well, that's how you believe the world works?

 

[untermensche]

Only minds care about research.

Brains have no idea there is such a thing as research.

Brains are cells that emit molecules.

They do not have knowledge of anything. They respond the way they have evolved to respond.

But a mind is an adaption to a specific time and place.

That is why the brain relies on it for survival and follows it's commands like a dutiful slave.

We await Untermensche's contributions to the Free Will and Free Choice conversation.

"We"?

You have contributed to my cause by freely giving your subjective opinions.

Every response you make screams: "I am a free mind with ideas I can freely show you".

 

[untermensche]

Only minds care about research.

Brains have no idea there is such a thing as research.

Brains are cells that emit molecules.

They do not have knowledge of anything. They respond the way they have evolved to respond.

But a mind is an adaption to a specific time and place.

That is why the brain relies on it for survival and follows it's commands like a dutiful slave.

So, in your estimate, minds are some sort of disembodied entities floating in the astral plane, ready to come down to earth and manifest within a brain, because, well, that's how you believe the world works?

I have no idea what a mind is or what the will is.

But I know that if any entity is not free then the judgements it makes are meaningless.

Your position is that a brain that isn't you is forcing you to believe what you believe. You say that what you believe is not what YOU have FREELY chosen to believe.

Mine is that belief is an act of the free will and only minds understand ideas, not brains.

My position is that a free yet many times timid and deluded mind evolved to make survival decisions because that is better than a robotic brain.

 

[untermensche]

Like I said: A mind is an adaption to a specific time and place.

There is no universality of mind as a result.

Every mind is an individual adaption to specific experiences with specific underlying capacities.

 

[fromderinside]

"We"?

You have contributed to my cause by freely giving your subjective opinions.

Every response you make screams: "I am a free mind with ideas I can freely show you".

Every answer I've provided was about as close to formal input -output as can be devised. You insist on calling what is clearly determined coming from me as freely made. Your reflex to my deterministic presentations, IMHO, are determined as well.

 

[DBT]

Only minds care about research.

Brains have no idea there is such a thing as research.

Brains are cells that emit molecules.

They do not have knowledge of anything. They respond the way they have evolved to respond.

But a mind is an adaption to a specific time and place.

That is why the brain relies on it for survival and follows it's commands like a dutiful slave.

So, in your estimate, minds are some sort of disembodied entities floating in the astral plane, ready to come down to earth and manifest within a brain, because, well, that's how you believe the world works?

I have no idea what a mind is or what the will is.

But I know that if any entity is not free then the judgements it makes are meaningless.

Your position is that a brain that isn't you is forcing you to believe what you believe. You say that what you believe is not what YOU have FREELY chosen to believe.

Mine is that belief is an act of the free will and only minds understand ideas, not brains.

My position is that a free yet many times timid and deluded mind evolved to make survival decisions because that is better than a robotic brain.

If you don't know what mind or will is, how can you say mind is autonomous, that mind acts independently of the brain?

If you don't know what mind or will is, or how it forms, there is nothing you can say about it.

Yet you do.

 

[untermensche]

I have no idea what a mind is or what the will is.

But I know that if any entity is not free then the judgements it makes are meaningless.

Your position is that a brain that isn't you is forcing you to believe what you believe. You say that what you believe is not what YOU have FREELY chosen to believe.

Mine is that belief is an act of the free will and only minds understand ideas, not brains.

My position is that a free yet many times timid and deluded mind evolved to make survival decisions because that is better than a robotic brain.

If you don't know what mind or will is, how can you say mind is autonomous, that mind acts independently of the brain?

If you don't know what mind or will is, or how it forms, there is nothing you can say about it.

Yet you do.

I can say without any doubt that the judgements of any unfree entity are meaningless.

That I can say things like that is evidence of something with the ability to use language to make rational observations.

The brain does not use reason.

It uses Serotonin and Dopamine and Norepinephrine.

Are you claiming your opinions are not freely chosen?

How did you get them then and how do they have meaning?

Please answer that question. Specifically.

 

[untermensche]

"We"?

You have contributed to my cause by freely giving your subjective opinions.

Every response you make screams: "I am a free mind with ideas I can freely show you".

Every answer I've provided was about as close to formal input -output as can be devised. You insist on calling what is clearly determined coming from me as freely made. Your reflex to my deterministic presentations, IMHO, are determined as well.

I agree.

There is input in the form of experience and output in the form of potentially rational opinions.

And a free mind that freely chooses what it will believe.

You have freely chosen to believe you have evidence you are not free.

You don't have any evidence of that but it doesn't matter.

You are what is called "deluded".

And think saying your delusions are shared makes you anything but part of a religion.