Free Will And Free Choice

[fromderinside]

Here are the points untermensche tried to foist

Readiness potential is real.

1. Why it is there is pure conjecture.

2. The mind prepares for movement before it initiates it.

3. Take a thousand wild guesses about events that can't be seen and you have nothing but subjective guesses.

4. You do not have anything objective.

5. Any random set of numbers has a mean and a standard deviation.

6. These Libet type studies involving subjective guessing and basically relying on subjective guessing to draw conclusions are all an exercise in the self delusion of experimenters and their religious followers.

Below is an article demonstrating of just how wrong he is.

Neurophysiological mechanisms underlying motor feature binding processes and representations https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/hbm.25295

Abstract: Coherent, voluntary action requires an integrated representation of these actions and their defining features. Although theories delineate how action integration requiring binding between different action features may be accomplished, the underlying neurophysiological mechanisms are largely elusive. The present study examined the neurophysiological mechanisms underlying binding processes in actions. To this end, we conducted EEG recordings and applied standard event-related potential analyses, temporal EEG signal decomposition and multivariate pattern analyses (MVPA). According to the code occupation account, an overlap between a planned and a to-be-performed action impairs performance. The level, to which performance is attenuated depends on the strength of binding of action features. This binding process then determines the representation of them, the so-called action files. We show that code occupation and bindings between action features specifically modulate processes preceding motor execution as showed by the stimulus-locked lateralized readiness potential (LRP). Conversely, motor execution processes reflected by the response-locked LRP were not modulated by action file binding. The temporal decomposition of the EEG signal, further distinguished between action file related processes: the planned response determining code occupation was reflected in general (voluntary) response selection but notin involuntary (response priming-related) activation. Moreover, MVPA on temporally decomposed neural signals indicated that action files are represented as a continuous chain of activations. Within this chain, inhibitory and response re-activation pattern scan be distinguished. Taken together, the neurophysiological correlates of action file binding suggest that parallel, stimulus- and response-related pre-motor processes are responsible for the code occupation in the human motor system.

5 | CONCLUSIONS The present study addressed the neurophysiological mechanisms underlying binding processes in voluntary actions within the TEC framework. It examined the time course, functional different neural activity clusters, and the stability of the representational content of neurophysiological activity during action file coding. As such the study delineated the neurophysiological markers of the code occupation concept assumed to drive binding processes at the motor level (Stoet & Hommel, 1999). We showed that code occupation and bindings between action features specifically modulate pre-motor processes. Conversely, the motor execution processes were not modulated by action file binding. The temporal decomposition of the EEG signal further distinguished between action file related processes: the planned response, which the code occupation originated from, was reflected in general response selection (R-cluster) but not in priming-related (S-cluster) response activation. Altogether, the neurophysiological correlates of action file binding suggest that parallel, stimulus- and response related pre-motor processes are responsible for the code occupation. Moreover, decoded EEG and temporally decomposed neural signal indicated that action files are represented as a continuous chain of activations. Within this chain, inhibitory and response re-activation pattern scan be distinguished with signal decomposition.

Here are untermensche's responses to the my reply.

You addressed no point I make and dealt with no problem I raised.

You claiming to understand one thing about actual brain function is funny.

You know absolutely nothing about it minus subjective reports.

Then you know a little. You know the subjective report and nothing else.

Let the reader decide.

 

[untermensche]

burp. whoopsie.

They compared arbitrary features of brain physiology to subjective reports and concluded some physiological events have some temporal correlation to voluntary movement.

WOW!

 

[fromderinside]

Geez. untermesnche.

The 'arbitrary' features of brain processing are well defined in the literature as the references in the article demonstrate. They found through accepted practices and procedures action potential chaining (linking) underlying the gross EEG. It's a refereed paper in a reputable journal and references can be found at https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/hbm.25436

 

[DBT]

It seems that according to Unter, brain activity has no known function, its just there for decoration.

What brain function are you specifically talking about?

Which brain function creates the phenomena of experience?

The brain activity that is detected during imaging or on EEG graphs, the very same brain activity that can be used to a predict a decision before the subject is conscious of making a decision.

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

What all this research proves is that free will is complicated, puzzling, difficult to figure out. Like everything else in life -- some more than others, like truth-thinking is more difficult to figure out, and love, creativity, happiness, desire, rage. But even a "simple" thing is difficult to figure out if you analyze it to the extreme. Even a can of dog food is puzzling if it's analyzed far enough. A team of scientists could research that one can of dog food for decades and never really figure it out entirely.

The research itself on the object might do something to alter the makeup of the object, so you can never totally figure it out.

In some cases a scientist with enough information will be able to predict a decision someone will make later, and that will cause baffling questions, like what happens when you report to the subject what their decision will be later, plus also predict how this report will impact their decision.

But even so it doesn't mean there's no free will, or it's an illusion. Something is not an illusion just because it's more complicated or puzzling. Just like I think, therefore I am -- also It's puzzling, therefore it is.

 

[fromderinside]

What we call free will is from our individual references ergo it's subjective. The construct free will as applied to the world is quite different. At this point we are pretty sure things are determined so individual and personal free will are illusions. Makes sense since we perceive the past as present to make decisions about the future.

Then again science may be based on other than we are currently modelling.

 

[DBT]

What all this research proves is that free will is complicated, puzzling, difficult to figure out. Like everything else in life -- some more than others, like truth-thinking is more difficult to figure out, and love, creativity, happiness, desire, rage. But even a "simple" thing is difficult to figure out if you analyze it to the extreme. Even a can of dog food is puzzling if it's analyzed far enough. A team of scientists could research that one can of dog food for decades and never really figure it out entirely.

The research itself on the object might do something to alter the makeup of the object, so you can never totally figure it out.

In some cases a scientist with enough information will be able to predict a decision someone will make later, and that will cause baffling questions, like what happens when you report to the subject what their decision will be later, plus also predict how this report will impact their decision.

But even so it doesn't mean there's no free will, or it's an illusion. Something is not an illusion just because it's more complicated or puzzling. Just like I think, therefore I am -- also It's puzzling, therefore it is.

You keep applying the term 'free will' without explanation, rhyme or reason, as if it tells us something profound about human nature, behaviour and its drivers. The "But, but, but...we have Free Will, dontcha know, we do, we do" argument.

 

[untermensche]

It seems that according to Unter, brain activity has no known function, its just there for decoration.

What brain function are you specifically talking about?

Which brain function creates the phenomena of experience?

The brain activity that is detected during imaging or on EEG graphs, the very same brain activity that can be used to a predict a decision before the subject is conscious of making a decision.

You don't even know what an EEG is do you?

It is the recording of the average electrical activity across the entire brain.

It is not looking at anything specific.

 

[untermensche]

What we call free will is from our individual references ergo it's subjective.

Oh my god!

A rational point.

The construct free will as applied to the world is quite different.

Yes.

You are talking about the great deception.

The mind experiences free will but you claim it is really some deception.

The brain creates a consciousness and gives it information about the world and also deceives it for unknown reasons.

Like having a kid and indoctrinating it to believe in the Jesus stories.

At this point we are pretty sure things are determined so individual and personal free will are illusions.

Quantum indeterminacy says otherwise.

 

[fromderinside]

quantum indeterminacy is about interactions among fields which suggests such as a free electrons don't posses fixed properties until observed in experiments designed to measure the exact conditions (properties of the free electron) of the fields from which they come at the time of observation.

quantum indeterminacy says nothing about free will but specifies precisely what is meant by to be determined.

If you think a brain, a complex nuclear structure, is indeterminate in the same way you are going to be very disappointed. That complex structure has a sequence of operations it must accomplish to generate an overt biological action. The wheel (behavior) is already rolling down the hill.

 

[DBT]

The brain activity that is detected during imaging or on EEG graphs, the very same brain activity that can be used to a predict a decision before the subject is conscious of making a decision.

You don't even know what an EEG is do you?

It is the recording of the average electrical activity across the entire brain.

It is not looking at anything specific.

Maybe you should read more carefully, inform yourself and not make assumptions that suit your own beliefs but misrepresent what your opponent is trying to tell you; ''Scalp EEG was used simultaneously to monitor brain activity during the experiment. Libet et al. (1983) found a premovement buildup of electrical potential called readiness potential (RP) starting ∼550 ms before the movement. Unexpectedly, the conscious awareness of the decision or “the urge to move” emerged only 200 ms before movement, leaving therefore a time lag of ∼350 ms between the initial rising of the RP and the conscious awareness of the decision to flex (Fig. 1). Libet et al. (1983) interpreted the early rise in the RP as a reflexion of neuronal computation that unconsciously prepare for the voluntary action. ''

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

What all this research proves is that free will is complicated, puzzling, difficult to figure out. Like everything else in life -- some more than others, like truth-thinking is more difficult to figure out, and love, creativity, happiness, desire, rage. But even a "simple" thing is difficult to figure out if you analyze it to the extreme. Even a can of dog food is puzzling if it's analyzed far enough. A team of scientists could research that one can of dog food for decades and never really figure it out entirely.

The research itself on the object might do something to alter the makeup of the object, so you can never totally figure it out.

In some cases a scientist with enough information will be able to predict a decision someone will make later, and that will cause baffling questions, like what happens when you report to the subject what their decision will be later, plus also predict how this report will impact their decision.

But even so it doesn't mean there's no free will, or it's an illusion. Something is not an illusion just because it's more complicated or puzzling. Just like I think, therefore I am -- also It's puzzling, therefore it is.

You keep applying the term 'free will' without explanation, rhyme or reason, as if it tells us something profound about human nature, behaviour and its drivers. The "But, but, but...we have Free Will, dontcha know, we do, we do" argument.

We all apply all terms that way. We say "pencil" or "dog" or "tree" or "sky" or "air" or "green" etc. "without explanation, rhyme or reason, as if it tells us something profound about" people or things or life.

So "free will" is just one more fact of life, more complicated than some others, more puzzling in some ways, but difficult to explain, like "happiness" and "anger" and "time" and "up" and "down" and "new" and "old" and "calendar" and "feelings" and so on -- just because some things we talk about are more difficult to explain doesn't mean they're unreal or illusory.

You can't explain most of the other difficult realities. Can you scientifically explain humor and sadness and inspiration and imagination, etc.? You can't put them all into the "illusion" category just because they're difficult to explain.

At most, you have only shown that some decisions a person makes might possibly have been predictable by an observer having data, calculating what the decision was going to be even before the subject made the decision. Yet even if that's true, it doesn't make that choice a non-free choice. It is still a free choice just as surely as your free choice to type your text wall and post it.

If you're saying your choice to post it was not free, because no choice is free, then you're just re-inventing a new language with your own words.

Don't pretend to be responding to this unless you answer this: Is your decision to post a response a free choice by you, or do you have no freedom or free will to post your responses here? If you don't answer this, it proves you're a phony.

 

[fromderinside]

....

You can't explain most of the other difficult realities. Can you scientifically explain humor and sadness and inspiration and imagination, etc.? You can't put them all into the "illusion" category just because they're difficult to explain.

At most, you have only shown that some decisions a person makes might possibly have been predictable by an observer having data, calculating what the decision was going to be even before the subject made the decision. Yet even if that's true, it doesn't make that choice a non-free choice. It is still a free choice just as surely as your free choice to type your text wall and post it.

If you're saying your choice to post it was not free, because no choice is free, then you're just re-inventing a new language with your own words.

Don't pretend to be responding to this unless you answer this: Is your decision to post a response a free choice by you, or do you have no freedom or free will to post your responses here? If you don't answer this, it proves you're a phony.

1. Have you ever heard of psychophysics? We specify such as scales of annoyance, musicality, workload, preference, comfort, etc. all with the ease of setting up operational definitions specific to the -ility.

2/3. If one's consequent behavior can be predicted determination has been demonstrated.

4. My 'choice' to respond to this or any other query has a path of determination that can run back years. It's called learning. Only in the narrow sense that I'm not forced to thus or so at this time can there be any successful argument for relative free choice, not will, choice. Will isn't something biological thing do except within one's internal rationalizing scheme. Human behavior is a continuous suite of caused responses.

A startle response is not free choice.

 

[DBT]

What all this research proves is that free will is complicated, puzzling, difficult to figure out. Like everything else in life -- some more than others, like truth-thinking is more difficult to figure out, and love, creativity, happiness, desire, rage. But even a "simple" thing is difficult to figure out if you analyze it to the extreme. Even a can of dog food is puzzling if it's analyzed far enough. A team of scientists could research that one can of dog food for decades and never really figure it out entirely.

The research itself on the object might do something to alter the makeup of the object, so you can never totally figure it out.

In some cases a scientist with enough information will be able to predict a decision someone will make later, and that will cause baffling questions, like what happens when you report to the subject what their decision will be later, plus also predict how this report will impact their decision.

But even so it doesn't mean there's no free will, or it's an illusion. Something is not an illusion just because it's more complicated or puzzling. Just like I think, therefore I am -- also It's puzzling, therefore it is.

You keep applying the term 'free will' without explanation, rhyme or reason, as if it tells us something profound about human nature, behaviour and its drivers. The "But, but, but...we have Free Will, dontcha know, we do, we do" argument.

We all apply all terms that way. We say "pencil" or "dog" or "tree" or "sky" or "air" or "green" etc. "without explanation, rhyme or reason, as if it tells us something profound about" people or things or life.

So "free will" is just one more fact of life, more complicated than some others, more puzzling in some ways, but difficult to explain, like "happiness" and "anger" and "time" and "up" and "down" and "new" and "old" and "calendar" and "feelings" and so on -- just because some things we talk about are more difficult to explain doesn't mean they're unreal or illusory.

You can't explain most of the other difficult realities. Can you scientifically explain humor and sadness and inspiration and imagination, etc.? You can't put them all into the "illusion" category just because they're difficult to explain.

At most, you have only shown that some decisions a person makes might possibly have been predictable by an observer having data, calculating what the decision was going to be even before the subject made the decision. Yet even if that's true, it doesn't make that choice a non-free choice. It is still a free choice just as surely as your free choice to type your text wall and post it.

If you're saying your choice to post it was not free, because no choice is free, then you're just re-inventing a new language with your own words.

Don't pretend to be responding to this unless you answer this: Is your decision to post a response a free choice by you, or do you have no freedom or free will to post your responses here? If you don't answer this, it proves you're a phony.

A pencil, dog, cat, house, car, or a person, etc, has objective references. You can hold up a pencil for anyone to see and examine, characteristics, shape, shape, weight, colour, function: this is a pencil.... .but you don't do that with 'free will,' instead, you just apply the term arbitrarily, decision making, cognition or whatever without reason, as if by merely invoking the term, it explains something about human behaviour.

 

[untermensche]

The brain activity that is detected during imaging or on EEG graphs, the very same brain activity that can be used to a predict a decision before the subject is conscious of making a decision.

You don't even know what an EEG is do you?

It is the recording of the average electrical activity across the entire brain.

It is not looking at anything specific.

Maybe you should read more carefully, inform yourself and not make assumptions that suit your own beliefs but misrepresent what your opponent is trying to tell you; ''Scalp EEG was used simultaneously to monitor brain activity during the experiment. Libet et al. (1983) found a premovement buildup of electrical potential called readiness potential (RP) starting ∼550 ms before the movement. Unexpectedly, the conscious awareness of the decision or “the urge to move” emerged only 200 ms before movement, leaving therefore a time lag of ∼350 ms between the initial rising of the RP and the conscious awareness of the decision to flex (Fig. 1). Libet et al. (1983) interpreted the early rise in the RP as a reflexion of neuronal computation that unconsciously prepare for the voluntary action. ''

You don't know what EEG is.

About .35 of a second you say?

Based on subjective reports of events that cannot be seen.

I would say that is pretty close to 0 for human guessing about invisible "urges".

A bunch of delusions about .35 of a second.

I also know the mind prepares for movement before it moves.

This preparation seems to be done .35 of a second before the urge in some.

A lot less time in others.

.35 is an average of many guesses and is dependent on the ability of subjects to guess about invisible events.

 

[DBT]

Maybe you should read more carefully, inform yourself and not make assumptions that suit your own beliefs but misrepresent what your opponent is trying to tell you; ''Scalp EEG was used simultaneously to monitor brain activity during the experiment. Libet et al. (1983) found a premovement buildup of electrical potential called readiness potential (RP) starting ∼550 ms before the movement. Unexpectedly, the conscious awareness of the decision or “the urge to move” emerged only 200 ms before movement, leaving therefore a time lag of ∼350 ms between the initial rising of the RP and the conscious awareness of the decision to flex (Fig. 1). Libet et al. (1983) interpreted the early rise in the RP as a reflexion of neuronal computation that unconsciously prepare for the voluntary action. ''

You don't know what EEG is.

About .35 of a second you say?

Based on subjective reports of events that cannot be seen.

I would say that is pretty close to 0 for human guessing about invisible "urges".

A bunch of delusions about .35 of a second.

I also know the mind prepares for movement before it moves.

This preparation seems to be done .35 of a second before the urge in some.

A lot less time in others.

.35 is an average of many guesses and is dependent on the ability of subjects to guess about invisible events.

What kind of silly statement is that - "you don't know what EEG is." You are scraping the crud out of the bottom of your barrel of denial. Based on your comments, you have no idea about the research or its significance. You don't have a rational argument.

 

[untermensche]

I'm sorry you don't know what EEG is. You could possibly learn if you were motivated to do so.

You ignore my talk about this insignificant .35 seconds made insignificant because it is based entirely on subjective guesses about events that cannot be seen.

The problem is. It is only .35 seconds.

And where the activity seen before that .35 seconds comes from is entirely unknown.

The "explanation" of the activity is just a story some human invented based on prejudice and other members of the religion agreed to it because they like the prejudice.

 

[DBT]

I'm sorry you don't know what EEG is. You could possibly learn if you were motivated to do so.

You ignore my talk about this insignificant .35 seconds made insignificant because it is based entirely on subjective guesses about events that cannot be seen.

The problem is. It is only .35 seconds.

And where the activity seen before that .35 seconds comes from is entirely unknown.

The "explanation" of the activity is just a story some human invented based on prejudice and other members of the religion agreed to it because they like the prejudice.

It's not that I don't know what EEG is, but you who doesn't have a clue about the subject matter. It's you who dismisses research in favour of wacky ideas. Your remarks being so way off that I doubt anyone could explain things in a way that you would understand and accept.

 

[untermensche]

I'm sorry you don't know what EEG is. You could possibly learn if you were motivated to do so.

You ignore my talk about this insignificant .35 seconds made insignificant because it is based entirely on subjective guesses about events that cannot be seen.

The problem is. It is only .35 seconds.

And where the activity seen before that .35 seconds comes from is entirely unknown.

The "explanation" of the activity is just a story some human invented based on prejudice and other members of the religion agreed to it because they like the prejudice.

It's not that I don't know what EEG is, but you who doesn't have a clue about the subject matter. It's you who dismisses research in favour of wacky ideas. Your remarks being so way off that I doubt anyone could explain things in a way that you would understand and accept.

The research is absurd.

They ask subjects to guess when an "urge" starts.

What's next?

Guessing about where in your intestines your lunch is at?

 

[fromderinside]

They ask because we know that getting going or feeling something follow similar courses.

At some time after the signal to run or after stimulus produces an urge arises or beginning of physical start comes.

The time differences are not the same, but the concept that of awareness preceding action or feeling are similar.

Most have no trouble reporting or guessing awareness of either one of them within a small band of time. Pretty reliable. We find similar time course aspects of behavior in rise of sensation of image, sound, touch, desire, etc.

The study is known as human factors and the specific field is behavioral modeling and simulation. Turns out that a lot of human behavior processes are is tuning and feedback which has now become the backbone of robotics.