In Free Will, What Makes it "Free"

[ryan]

DBT and bilby, you both are out of control with your positive assertions. There have been tests done on quantum mechanical processes for life, and they are still testing this. There are studies showing more and more evidence for such processes in fruit flies and in humans, and that's just for the olfactory system.

Your positive claims are far from justified.

And no, I will not post anymore information about this. If you give a damn, you can find it your selves.

 

[bilby]

DBT and bilby, you both are out of control with your positive assertions. There have been tests done on quantum mechanical processes for life, and they are still testing this. There are studies showing more and more evidence for such processes in fruit flies and in humans, and that's just for the olfactory system.

Your positive claims are far from justified.

And no, I will not post anymore information about this. If you give a damn, you can find it your selves.

I am very glad indeed that I am not under your control; and I am glad (if a little surprised) that you recognise this.

It's OK if you don't have any evidence to back up your position. Just don't expect anyone else to subscribe to it until you present some.

 

[DBT]

DBT and bilby, you both are out of control with your positive assertions. There have been tests done on quantum mechanical processes for life, and they are still testing this. There are studies showing more and more evidence for such processes in fruit flies and in humans, and that's just for the olfactory system.

Your positive claims are far from justified.

And no, I will not post anymore information about this. If you give a damn, you can find it your selves.

That it is the architecture of the brain that processes its inputs, photons, airborne molecules, etc, magnetic fields, etc, for some species, is indisputable. No functional and active neural processing, which entails ion flow, chemical messengers, etc, there is no consciousness or decision making.

There is not a single example anyone suffering from memory function loss being able to function normally....not because 'free will' is constrained, but because the connectivity between cells and their structures and connections has broken down.

This is not just a 'positive claim' - it is the fact of the matter. Consciousness always breaks down (allowing for the given degree plasticity) in the presence of structural breakdown.

And no, I will not post anymore information about this. If you give a damn, you can find it your selves.

Your error lies in category, it's not the principles and features of matter/energy on QM scale that processes information.

 

[PyramidHead]

One stance would be that the 'free' in the 'free will' is not a property of the brain, or even the person, but the situation in which the choice is being made. Compatibilism says you don't look for free will in the brain, you look for it between individuals, as ordinary people do, and as courts do. You reject this view, but it seems that it still provides information. A person who is coerced into doing something is, under usual assumptions, not doing it of their own free will. Their brains will look the same as people who are being coerced--at least they won't be different in a necessary/sufficient way to tell they are not being coerced. But their behavior has a relevant difference that impinges on how the law treats them, so I think there must be something to it, at least pragmatically.

Doesn't work.

Definitions of behaviour without regard to the sources and processes that produce them are not valid definitions.

All decisions and all behaviours, whether coerced or not, are formed and generated by the brain and its information processing activity.

All human interactions, how people think, perceive themselves, behave toward others, relationships, needs, wants, fears, is an activity of a brain. The brain being the sole agent of self identity, thought and decision making...sometimes coerced through circumstances and sometimes expressions of desire, hope, enjoyment and so on.

But surely there is a difference between a coerced action and a non-coerced action. I was a spectator to your long exchange with TheAntiChris on this very topic in another thread, and you prevaricated to a large extent without giving a succinct answer. So: is there a difference between coerced behaviors and non-coerced behaviors, to the extent that, for example, someone could be held legally culpable for the latter and not the former?

 

[PyramidHead]

DBT and bilby, you both are out of control with your positive assertions. There have been tests done on quantum mechanical processes for life, and they are still testing this. There are studies showing more and more evidence for such processes in fruit flies and in humans, and that's just for the olfactory system.

Your positive claims are far from justified.

And no, I will not post anymore information about this. If you give a damn, you can find it your selves.

The error you continue to make is to focus on the 'free' part, which is something that can possibly be attributed to quantum particles if you stretch the definition, and not the 'will' part, which is something that definitely CANNOT be attributed to anything lacking a brain. Particles do not have brains. While they may behave randomly--freely, if you like--they do not possess a WILL, and so cannot be said to have free will. If no particle has free will, one cannot reasonably argue that people have free will because they are made of particles that have free will.

 

[fromderinside]

First we smell molecules. Second if one is making a point about sensitivity it would be that the difference between molecules may be one atom and we might detect a single molecule. That's unlikely since it is nearly impossible to restrict an odorant to single molecules on the olfactory mucosa. This goes in the same bag as hearing is sensitive to movement of a single angstrom on the basilar membrane, seeing is sensitive to as few as four photons on the retina, and other such nonsense which has been in the 'well known' bag since the '40s.

I don't know if you watched it, but he says that if you switch the carbon atoms with silicon atoms in a particular molecule, then the smell totally changes. The chemical function of the whole molecule stays exactly the same, so previous theories would suggest that the smell would be exactly the same. However, the smell is actually completely different. The best way that they can explain this is with different vibrations of the electrons that are in the silicon rather than the carbon.

And it is not a single quantum effect of one electron that we sense, it is many of the same quantum effects in the odor.

Seth Lloyd explains it very well from 43:00 to 48:00 here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcXSpXyZVuY .

As I understand it Lloyd explained it as an idealized logical exercise. My points should be taken since you welt so long on saying exactly what I wrote. Understanding requires being able to integrate the concomitants which you clearly did not do. As bilby aptly puts it changing an atom in a molecule changes the nature of the molecule.

Finally since we've gone all the way to magnetic sensitivity I conducted experiments with fish using grids that set up fields traditional electromagnetic fields and varied their orientation with the spine of the fish. Results included rocket fish and snapping fish (fish who because of alignment with field either muscled their way out of the thank or broke their spines by jerking head toward tail. Clearly species are influenced by fields. Consider a bird flying crossing magnetic fields those fields influencing electrochemical activity in its tissue. Direction sense results? Probably. Not magic.

Nothing here to aid those who want to save will through QM principles. Consider that QM phenomena reinforce Macro mechanics consistently.

 

[ryan]

DBT and bilby, you both are out of control with your positive assertions. There have been tests done on quantum mechanical processes for life, and they are still testing this. There are studies showing more and more evidence for such processes in fruit flies and in humans, and that's just for the olfactory system.

Your positive claims are far from justified.

And no, I will not post anymore information about this. If you give a damn, you can find it your selves.

I am very glad indeed that I am not under your control; and I am glad (if a little surprised) that you recognise this.

It's OK if you don't have any evidence to back up your position. Just don't expect anyone else to subscribe to it until you present some.

As cool as it would be to be known as a guy who puts people under his "control", I have to say that wasn't my intention.

 

[ryan]

That it is the architecture of the brain that processes its inputs, photons, airborne molecules, etc, magnetic fields, etc, for some species, is indisputable. No functional and active neural processing, which entails ion flow, chemical messengers, etc, there is no consciousness or decision making.

There is not a single example anyone suffering from memory function loss being able to function normally....not because 'free will' is constrained, but because the connectivity between cells and their structures and connections has broken down.

This is not just a 'positive claim' - it is the fact of the matter. Consciousness always breaks down (allowing for the given degree plasticity) in the presence of structural breakdown.

And no, I will not post anymore information about this. If you give a damn, you can find it your selves.

Your error lies in category, it's not the principles and features of matter/energy on QM scale that processes information.

Do you not think that even the slightest quantum action will eventually have a significant on a system as intricate as the brain?

 

[ryan]

DBT and bilby, you both are out of control with your positive assertions. There have been tests done on quantum mechanical processes for life, and they are still testing this. There are studies showing more and more evidence for such processes in fruit flies and in humans, and that's just for the olfactory system.

Your positive claims are far from justified.

And no, I will not post anymore information about this. If you give a damn, you can find it your selves.

The error you continue to make is to focus on the 'free' part, which is something that can possibly be attributed to quantum particles if you stretch the definition, and not the 'will' part, which is something that definitely CANNOT be attributed to anything lacking a brain. Particles do not have brains. While they may behave randomly--freely, if you like--they do not possess a WILL, and so cannot be said to have free will. If no particle has free will, one cannot reasonably argue that people have free will because they are made of particles that have free will.

It is generally accepted that many particles and their behavior make up a brain, which has the ability to make choices. So then why can't I say that all of the quantum actions of each particle in the brain makes up some of the behavior of each particle in the brain that makes these choices.

 

[bilby]

The error you continue to make is to focus on the 'free' part, which is something that can possibly be attributed to quantum particles if you stretch the definition, and not the 'will' part, which is something that definitely CANNOT be attributed to anything lacking a brain. Particles do not have brains. While they may behave randomly--freely, if you like--they do not possess a WILL, and so cannot be said to have free will. If no particle has free will, one cannot reasonably argue that people have free will because they are made of particles that have free will.

It is generally accepted that many particles and their behavior make up a brain, which has the ability to make choices. So then why can't I say that all of the quantum actions of each particle in the brain makes up some of the behavior of each particle in the brain that makes these choices.

Because the behaviour of a brain is not a characteristic of those smaller scale processes that make it up.

In the same way that the electrons in a lump of rock are not harder than the electrons in a sponge, electrons in a neuron are not making choices any more than electrons in rocks are making choices.

The system makes choices. Its components do not.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_division

 

[DBT]

But surely there is a difference between a coerced action and a non-coerced action. I was a spectator to your long exchange with TheAntiChris on this very topic in another thread, and you prevaricated to a large extent without giving a succinct answer. So: is there a difference between coerced behaviors and non-coerced behaviors, to the extent that, for example, someone could be held legally culpable for the latter and not the former?

This shouldn't be so difficult to grasp, I thought I had explained it sufficiently.

Of course there is a difference between a coerced action and an non coerced action, the former means that you are being pressured or forced to act against your will, and in the latter case you are not being pressured or forced to act against your will.

But because your will is shaped by underlying causes, the interaction of information at a cellular level, you have 'will' - but it is not 'free will'

So your will is indeed being thwarted by coercion, but it is not 'free will' that is being thwarted. It was never free to begin with.

The distinction in law is that a functional brain should have the means at its disposal to understand the rules of society and adhere to them, so coercion does indeed factor into the issue of responsible agency.

Quote;
... Our contention is not that neuroscience does (or will) disprove free will; rather, we contend that free will is an antiquated concept that impairs our understanding of human behavior and thereby clouds our thinking about ethics. ...

''We ought to think about decision making in terms of neurological control, not because this is some sort of eternal absolute truth, but because among the options on the table currently, it shows the most promise of coherently unifying the scientific, ethical, judicial, and personal realms of our experience, and because it has the best chance of improving our understanding of ourselves and one another. Research in neuroscience is already well underway, and we can manipulate control across species using conditioning, drugs, and lesions. 4
Just as we have learned to consider our decisions as “free choices,” we can shift our introspection toward our varying levels of control. A man forced to choose between a hamburger and heroin might be acutely aware that his control is being compromised by an addiction. Insisting that he has (or lacks) free will ads nothing to our understanding of his behavior. Nor does it provide any useful suggestions of what we as a society ought do with him legally. An understanding of the problems that opiate addiction creates for one's self-control and how best to treat these difficulties, along with a knowledge of the user's history, would help a judge or jury make informed decisions based on the likely outcomes of various incarceration and rehabilitation programs.''

Quote;
''Because most behavior is driven by brain networks we do not consciously control, the legal system will eventually be forced to shift its emphasis from retribution to a forward-looking analysis of future behavior. In the light of modern neuroscience, it no longer makes sense to ask "was it his fault, or his biology's fault, or the fault of his background?", because these issues can never be disentangled. Instead, the only sensible question can be "what do we do from here?" -- in terms of customized sentencing, tailored rehabilitation, and refined incentive structuring.''


''Man does at all times only what he wills, and yet he does this necessarily. But this is because he already is what he wills.'' - Arthur Schopenhauer

Of course it's not actually at all times, brain lesions, chemical imbalance, coercion, etc, all effect the brains expression of will/action.

 

[ryan]

I don't know if you watched it, but he says that if you switch the carbon atoms with silicon atoms in a particular molecule, then the smell totally changes. The chemical function of the whole molecule stays exactly the same, so previous theories would suggest that the smell would be exactly the same. However, the smell is actually completely different. The best way that they can explain this is with different vibrations of the electrons that are in the silicon rather than the carbon.

And it is not a single quantum effect of one electron that we sense, it is many of the same quantum effects in the odor.

Seth Lloyd explains it very well from 43:00 to 48:00 here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcXSpXyZVuY .

As I understand it Lloyd explained it as an idealized logical exercise. My points should be taken since you welt so long on saying exactly what I wrote. Understanding requires being able to integrate the concomitants which you clearly did not do. As bilby aptly puts it changing an atom in a molecule changes the nature of the molecule.

Finally since we've gone all the way to magnetic sensitivity I conducted experiments with fish using grids that set up fields traditional electromagnetic fields and varied their orientation with the spine of the fish. Results included rocket fish and snapping fish (fish who because of alignment with field either muscled their way out of the thank or broke their spines by jerking head toward tail. Clearly species are influenced by fields. Consider a bird flying crossing magnetic fields those fields influencing electrochemical activity in its tissue. Direction sense results? Probably. Not magic.

Nothing here to aid those who want to save will through QM principles. Consider that QM phenomena reinforce Macro mechanics consistently.

From what I have been reading, there is a theory called the Ehrenfest theorem. It seems to be saying that classical mechanics is just an outcome of quantum mechanics. In other words, there may only be quantum mechanics while classical mechanics is really just incidental.

Anyways, it's still up to what all of the particles do that dictates what the entire system does.

 

[Kharakov]

Consider a bird flying crossing magnetic fields those fields influencing electrochemical activity in its tissue. Direction sense results? Probably. Not magic.

Nothing here to aid those who want to save will through QM principles. Consider that QM phenomena reinforce Macro mechanics consistently.

http://www.wired.com/2011/01/quantum-birds/

 

[DBT]

Consider a bird flying crossing magnetic fields those fields influencing electrochemical activity in its tissue. Direction sense results? Probably. Not magic.

Nothing here to aid those who want to save will through QM principles. Consider that QM phenomena reinforce Macro mechanics consistently.

http://www.wired.com/2011/01/quantum-birds/

This being an instance of information input, but it is still the processor (brain) and the processor alone that makes sense of its inputs according to its architecture. It is not quantum superposition that is making choices in which direction to fly. That's the evolved function of the processor, the unchosen condition brain portion of the bird.

 

[ryan]

It is generally accepted that many particles and their behavior make up a brain, which has the ability to make choices. So then why can't I say that all of the quantum actions of each particle in the brain makes up some of the behavior of each particle in the brain that makes these choices.

Because the behaviour of a brain is not a characteristic of those smaller scale processes that make it up.

In the same way that the electrons in a lump of rock are not harder than the electrons in a sponge, electrons in a neuron are not making choices any more than electrons in rocks are making choices.

The system makes choices. Its components do not.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_division

Define "choice". If you use the term "brain", then define "brain"; etc. But please don't.

It eventually comes down to functionalism . What is necessary for a thought? What is necessary for the shortest time that a thought can exist in? Nobody knows.

 

[bilby]

Because the behaviour of a brain is not a characteristic of those smaller scale processes that make it up.

In the same way that the electrons in a lump of rock are not harder than the electrons in a sponge, electrons in a neuron are not making choices any more than electrons in rocks are making choices.

The system makes choices. Its components do not.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_division

Define "choice". If you use the term "brain", then define "brain"; etc. But please don't.

They are your words; If there is something about my reply that makes you think I am using them differently from you, then please let me know.

It eventually comes down to functionalism . What is necessary for a thought? What is necessary for the shortest time that a thought can exist in? Nobody knows.

No, it really doesn't. A discussion of functionalism is way too advanced for a debate in which we have participants who don't agree on whether quantum-scale particles think.

Big complex systems do things that their components do not. The answer to your question "It is generally accepted that many particles and their behavior make up a brain, which has the ability to make choices. So then why can't I say that all of the quantum actions of each particle in the brain makes up some of the behavior of each particle in the brain that makes these choices" is that to do so would be to invoke the fallacy of division. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_division.

You can't say it because it does not follow logically from your premises.

We observe that brains make choices - even simple brains (such as those of roundworms or jellyfish) that are not believed to be self-aware do this. We know that molecules do not make choices. An atom from a lump concrete isn't harder than an atom from a piece of sponge; the particles that make up a brain are indistinguishable from the particles that make up a lump of coal. Lumps of coal don't think, so wherever thinking comes from in brains, it is NOT from the particles that make them up - it must be a result of the particular arrangement of particles. Particles don't think - dynamic arrangements of particles think.

The whole is more than the sum of its parts.

 

[Kharakov]

In the same way that the electrons in a lump of rock are not harder than the electrons in a sponge, electrons in a neuron are not making choices any more than electrons in rocks are making choices.

When saying something doesn't make choices, I pick something that I know doesn't make a choice, like the outcome of a rule set given certain inputs. 2+2 didn't make a choice to be 4, I made a choice to follow a rule set to arrive at a specific conclusion.

You don't know electrons don't make choices. I'm positive that's something that anti-electronic brain's think...

The system makes choices. Its components do not.

Voters in a group don't make choices, the democratic system makes choices. It just doesn't jive.

 

[Juma]

In Free Will, What Makes it "Free"

Consider a bird flying crossing magnetic fields those fields influencing electrochemical activity in its tissue. Direction sense results? Probably. Not magic.

Nothing here to aid those who want to save will through QM principles. Consider that QM phenomena reinforce Macro mechanics consistently.

http://www.wired.com/2011/01/quantum-birds/

"Proposed", "no evidens".... Sigh.


And even if, this ha nothing to do with free will.
Ryans arguments for Libertarian free will is BS because:
1) libertarian free will is notactually observed.
2) LFW is a logical impossibility
3) random qm explanation with no details on what qm really solves...

 

[ryan]

The whole is more than the sum of its parts.

Then how do you know that quantum effects of the particles are not also part of this whole?

 

[bilby]

The whole is more than the sum of its parts.

Then how do you know that quantum effects of the particles are not also part of this whole?

I studied physics, biochemistry and molecular biology.

How else do people typically come to know stuff about the invisible microscopic world, other than by study?

Here is a nice simple account.