In Free Will, What Makes it "Free"

[ryan]

I am not sure what you mean or what this has to do with my post.

My reply is related to you said; ''Well, I don't see how free will is not solely defined as a decision made freely '' - which ignores the nature and the mechanisms of decision making.

Given your definition, a computer may be defined as having free will because it has the ability to make decisions freely.

But the brain is a computer (see functionalism). Furthermore, I wouldn't think that a brain has free will without quantum mechanics. Free will could not exist with only classical mechanics.

This is also confusing me. I only said that the readiness potential is a strong argument against free will.

Taken to its conclusion, it virtually eliminates the idea of 'free will' (free from what, free to do what), which is a poorly defined concept in any case.

I agree.

 

[ryan]

Maybe we both have different ideas about what free will is. What is you definition of it?

Free will is a fictional construct in which many people believe. Like Santa Claus or God.

The details vary from believer to believer; but they are not really important, because none of them are descriptions of reality.

I don't think that most people really understand what free will really means. You're probably used to arguing against their versions.

 

[Juma]

Free will is a fictional construct in which many people believe. Like Santa Claus or God.

The details vary from believer to believer; but they are not really important, because none of them are descriptions of reality.

I don't think that most people really understand what free will really means. You're probably used to arguing against their versions.

This is a better definition of what it is really about:

"You have a free will" means that you in a specific situation could have chosen do act otherwise than you actually did.

It is about the illusion that there is an "I" that freely chooses between choices.

 

[ryan]

I don't think that most people really understand what free will really means. You're probably used to arguing against their versions.

This is a better definition of what it is really about:

"You have a free will" means that you in a specific situation could have chosen do act otherwise than you actually did.

I believe that quantum mechanics allows this kind of free will.

It is about the illusion that there is an "I" that freely chooses between choices.

We are fundamentally the particles and their collective quantum mechanical behavior that gives us the illusion that there is no free will.

 

[Juma]

This is a better definition of what it is really about:

"You have a free will" means that you in a specific situation could have chosen do act otherwise than you actually did.

I believe that quantum mechanics allows this kind of free will.

It doesnt. QM only gives you randomness.

 

[ryan]

I believe that quantum mechanics allows this kind of free will.

It doesnt. QM only gives you randomness.

That is exactly how you should expect free will to work.

 

[DBT]

It doesnt. QM only gives you randomness.

That is exactly how you should expect free will to work.

Randomness does not allow decision making.

 

[DBT]

But the brain is a computer (see functionalism). Furthermore, I wouldn't think that a brain has free will without quantum mechanics. Free will could not exist with only classical mechanics.

The brain is an information processor that gathers and processes information from the macro world and responds to the objects and events of the macro world, other people, animals, etc, according to where they are and what they are doing...and not in a random manner, using quantum randomness, unless that brain happens to be dysfunctional.

Why do you think quantum randomness helps rational decision making in relation to macro scale events?

 

[Juma]

It doesnt. QM only gives you randomness.

That is exactly how you should expect free will to work.

No. Concept of "Free will" is supposed to make you responsible for your actions. (In that they emanate from "you", not your body. That doesnt work if it is random.

 

[ryan]

But the brain is a computer (see functionalism). Furthermore, I wouldn't think that a brain has free will without quantum mechanics. Free will could not exist with only classical mechanics.

The brain is an information processor that gathers and processes information from the macro world and responds to the objects and events of the macro world, other people, animals, etc, according to where they are and what they are doing...and not in a random manner, using quantum randomness, unless that brain happens to be dysfunctional.

Why do you think quantum randomness helps rational decision making in relation to macro scale events?

I haven't speculated on whether it does or not. I am only saying that quantum mechanics must play at least some role in decision making.

 

[ryan]

That is exactly how you should expect free will to work.

No. Concept of "Free will" is supposed to make you responsible for your actions. (In that they emanate from "you", not your body. That doesnt work if it is random.

That's an ethical concern. Like I keep saying, the only way that free will seems to make any sense at all is with a will that has at least some freedom.

 

[Juma]

No. Concept of "Free will" is supposed to make you responsible for your actions. (In that they emanate from "you", not your body. That doesnt work if it is random.

That's an ethical concern. Like I keep saying, the only way that free will seems to make any sense at all is with a will that has at least some freedom.

Yes, it is an ethical concern. "Free will" is an ethical concept. Its a way of looking on how people act. Not a physical explanation of how the human psyche actually work.

 

[DBT]

The brain is an information processor that gathers and processes information from the macro world and responds to the objects and events of the macro world, other people, animals, etc, according to where they are and what they are doing...and not in a random manner, using quantum randomness, unless that brain happens to be dysfunctional.

Why do you think quantum randomness helps rational decision making in relation to macro scale events?

I haven't speculated on whether it does or not. I am only saying that quantum mechanics must play at least some role in decision making.

How?

The idea that free will is related to a proposed ability to make different choices on equal internal states is absurd, superposition does not exist on macro scales (wave collapse) and randomness within the system only produces random events, unchosen glitches, twitches, erratic behaviour at best.
Quantum randomness, infinitesimal as it is on macro scales, is not a chosen state of the brain and is not related to deterministic processes of the macro world, consequently does not aid rational decision making.

The best you can say is, it eliminates Hard Laplacian Determinism with a softer quantum version where the future is not fixed, but neither are brain states chosen through an act of will, thereby enabling 'free will'

This is an illusion.


''Wave functions - the probability waves of quantum mechanics - evolve in time according to precise mathematical roles, such as the Schrodinger equation (or its more precise relativistic counterparts, such as the Klein-Gordan equation). This informs us that quantum determinism replaces Laplace's classical determinism Knowledge of the wave functions of all of the fundamental ingredients at some moment in time allows a ''vast enough'' [Laplace] intelligence to determine the wave functions at any prior or futures time.

Quantum determinism tells us that the probability that any particular event will occur at some chosen time in the future is fully determined by knowledge of the wave function at any prior time.

The probabilstic aspect of quantum mechanics significantly softens Laplacian determinism by shifting inevitability from outcome-likelihoods, but the latter are fully determined within the conventional framework of quantum theory.'' - Brian Greene.

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No. Concept of "Free will" is supposed to make you responsible for your actions. (In that they emanate from "you", not your body. That doesnt work if it is random.

That's an ethical concern. Like I keep saying, the only way that free will seems to make any sense at all is with a will that has at least some freedom.

Quantum particle position is not a conscious choice.

 

[PyramidHead]

As Juma said, the main reason people want to believe they have free will is so they can feel personally responsible for the good things they freely do, and hold others personally responsible for the bad things they (others) freely do. Randomness doesn't help in either case.

 

[fromderinside]

As Juma said, the main reason people want to believe they have free will is so they can feel personally responsible for the good things they freely do, and hold others personally responsible for the bad things they (others) freely do. Randomness doesn't help in either case.

So we invent free will to justify our inclination for being special, self centered. I'm pretty Baboons in one tribe don't think much of baboons from another tribe. Typically in encounters between them the members of the larger tribe usually kills all the young and males of the other tribe. I think that goes for most social species. They have free will too?

I'm going to stick with apparent randomness of possible choices as a basis for free will if you don't mind.

 

[DBT]

I'm going to stick with apparent randomness of possible choices as a basis for free will if you don't mind.

That's a surprise.

 

[Juma]

As Juma said, the main reason people want to believe they have free will is so they can feel personally responsible for the good things they freely do, and hold others personally responsible for the bad things they (others) freely do. Randomness doesn't help in either case.

So we invent free will to justify our inclination for being special, self centered. I'm pretty Baboons in one tribe don't think much of baboons from another tribe. Typically in encounters between them the members of the larger tribe usually kills all the young and males of the other tribe. I think that goes for most social species. They have free will too?

I'm going to stick with apparent randomness of possible choices as a basis for free will if you don't mind.

You mean, as sn argument that free will is bullshit or ? You are a bit hard to understand sometimes...

 

[ryan]

DBT and Juma, I have been thinking about how my version of free will can have the ethical factor and why it is fair to be accountable for our choices. This is a response to both of your posts.

The first part is just setting up the second part about the freedom to choose ethically and responsibly.

We have an n number of choices in t amount of time for some situation x. Our mental models will help us predict the outcome y.

Maybe quantum uncertainty tips the close-call decisions, which is the form of free will that I was talking about. Let's say that we choose y1, and y1 results in punishment, where the bad totally outweighs the good. Yes we are responsible for that choice because we chose it - live and learn. The consequences/repercussions are given to us because we chose wrongly.

I expect that evolution tells us that people who learn from parents, society, teachers, etc. have a better chance at survival and thus reproducing.

Now, y1 gets hardwired more out of being a close choice of similar choices that need to be made in the future. It will become much less likely for quantum uncertainty to allow y1 to be chosen again.


Here's where responsibility and ethics comes in.

Let's imagine the we have some other y1 and a y2. y1 in this case has less of a pay off than y2, but y1 is more ethical. We will assume that the subject is certain that y2 will be more advantageous. We will also assume that this is one of those close decisions that comes down to a "quantum superposition of choices" quantum uncertainty. The quantum mechanism simultaneously knows that there is an ethical option y1 that is outweighed by a more appealing option y2. The quantum homunculus, if you will, is ultimately responsible for making this choice. It would be part of our thought process, so it is as much of who we are than anything can be.

Outside of the thought experiment, this actually makes sense in the real world. I think that everyone has there own gray area of ethics. We have all known or know about some pretty "bad" people who seem to just glide through life leaving a path of destruction and then sleep well at night. And then there are the "bad" people who turn themselves in for an overbearing feeling of guilt. The bad people who feel guilt went too far past their personal gray area.

We don't know when this pinch of guilt will come or if it will come at all. So our "quantum consciousness", which is ultimately who we would be as agents because the more "hard wired" choices are our unchangeable natures, is what is actually responsible and rightfully so.

 

[DBT]

Ryan, I found an article by a theoretical physicist which gives a brief but good outline of the problem with free will in relation to physics, I hope this link helps.

The article lists 10 misconceptions in regard to the subject of free will.

As a sample;

Fact 2: All known fundamental laws of nature are either deterministic or random. To our best present knowledge, the universe evolves in a mixture of both, but just exactly how that mixture looks like will not be relevant in the following.


Having said that, I need to explain just exactly what I mean by the absence of free will:

a) If your future decisions are determined by the past, you do not have free will.

b) If your future decisions are random, meaning nothing can influence them, you do not have free will.

c) If your decisions are any mixture of a) and b) you do not have free will either.


1. If you do not have free will you cannot or do not have to make decisions.

Regardless of whether you have free will or not, your brain performs evaluations and produces results and that’s what it means to make a decision. You cannot not make decisions. Just because your thought process is deterministic doesn’t mean the process doesn’t have to be executed in real time. The same is true if it has a random component.

This misconception stems from a split-personality perspective: People picture themselves as trying to make a decision but being hindered by some evil free-will-defying law of nature. That is nonsense of course. You are whatever brain process works with whatever input you receive. If you don’t have free will, you’ve never had free will and so far you’ve lived just fine. You can continue to think the same way you’ve always thought. You’ll do that anyway.

 

[ryan]

Ryan, I found an article by a theoretical physicist which gives a brief but good outline of the problem with free will in relation to physics, I hope this link helps.

The article lists 10 misconceptions in regard to the subject of free will.

As a sample;

Fact 2: All known fundamental laws of nature are either deterministic or random. To our best present knowledge, the universe evolves in a mixture of both, but just exactly how that mixture looks like will not be relevant in the following.


Having said that, I need to explain just exactly what I mean by the absence of free will:

a) If your future decisions are determined by the past, you do not have free will.

b) If your future decisions are random, meaning nothing can influence them, you do not have free will.

c) If your decisions are any mixture of a) and b) you do not have free will either.


1. If you do not have free will you cannot or do not have to make decisions.

Regardless of whether you have free will or not, your brain performs evaluations and produces results and that’s what it means to make a decision. You cannot not make decisions. Just because your thought process is deterministic doesn’t mean the process doesn’t have to be executed in real time. The same is true if it has a random component.

This misconception stems from a split-personality perspective: People picture themselves as trying to make a decision but being hindered by some evil free-will-defying law of nature. That is nonsense of course. You are whatever brain process works with whatever input you receive. If you don’t have free will, you’ve never had free will and so far you’ve lived just fine. You can continue to think the same way you’ve always thought. You’ll do that anyway.

I am a reductionist at heart, so I am happy that I am on the same page as the author for "Fact 1".

Do you understand what the author meant by, "Just because your thought process is deterministic doesn’t mean the process doesn’t have to be executed in real time."?

In 4. the author says, "Besides, as I explained above, these processes might have a random component that is even in principle not predictable. It is presently not very well understood just exactly how relevant such a random component might be."; this is my argument.

But then the author says, "but neither do you have free will because nothing can influence this randomness.". My argument is that we are the randomness. We are the ones making these random decisions, but from an outsider's point of view, it's random.

You can choose between y1 and y2. y2 might be more beneficial, but maybe y1 is more ethical. The choice is ours to make.