The Science and Mechanics of Free Will

[untermensche]

When you say 'nobody know' this or that, you are implying that nothing is known or understood.

There isn't even a hypothesis of how a bunch of cells emitting neurotransmitters becomes a mind.

We know nothing about that, and really don't even have an idea where to start.

So we certainly can't say one thing about something like "free will".

 

[ryan]

When you say 'nobody know' this or that, you are implying that nothing is known or understood.

There isn't even a hypothesis of how a bunch of cells emitting neurotransmitters becomes a mind.

We know nothing about that, and really don't even have an idea where to start.

So we certainly can't say one thing about something like "free will".

You seem to be overcomplicating this. Just remember the more general definition of free will: the ability to have acted differently.

If Newtonian mechanics were true, a scientist who believes in free will would probably have to be a compatibilist. But QM came along and at least left the answer to the question above open as a possibility.

Scientifically speaking, it is starting to seem more and more that, because of QM, this question is at least tentatively answerable. If someone recreated the universe perfectly up until my last choice, I may be able to choose differently than what I just chose.

So I say we can say something about free will. We can see if it is compatible with science. And philosophically, we can see if it is rational.

 

[untermensche]

There isn't even a hypothesis of how a bunch of cells emitting neurotransmitters becomes a mind.

We know nothing about that, and really don't even have an idea where to start.

So we certainly can't say one thing about something like "free will".

You seem to be overcomplicating this. Just remember the more general definition of free will: the ability to have acted differently.

If Newtonian mechanics were true, a scientist who believes in free will would probably have to be a compatibilist. But QM came along and at least left the answer to the question above open as a possibility.

Scientifically speaking, it is starting to seem more and more that, because of QM, this question is at least tentatively answerable. If someone recreated the universe perfectly up until my last choice, I may be able to choose differently than what I just chose.

So I say we can say something about free will. We can see if it is compatible with science. And philosophically, we can see if it is rational.

Talking about QM is just insanity.

We don't even have an explanation for the generation of a mind.

Bringing QM into this may someday help us with that but we are nowhere near being able to apply QM to the functioning of the brain.

 

[ryan]

You seem to be overcomplicating this. Just remember the more general definition of free will: the ability to have acted differently.

If Newtonian mechanics were true, a scientist who believes in free will would probably have to be a compatibilist. But QM came along and at least left the answer to the question above open as a possibility.

Scientifically speaking, it is starting to seem more and more that, because of QM, this question is at least tentatively answerable. If someone recreated the universe perfectly up until my last choice, I may be able to choose differently than what I just chose.

So I say we can say something about free will. We can see if it is compatible with science. And philosophically, we can see if it is rational.

Talking about QM is just insanity.

We don't even have an explanation for the generation of a mind.

Bringing QM into this may someday help us with that but we are nowhere near being able to apply QM to the functioning of the brain.

But you are not seeing the big picture. There is more to free will than just what you are talking about.

Are you sure you read my whole post?

 

[untermensche]

Talking about QM is just insanity.

We don't even have an explanation for the generation of a mind.

Bringing QM into this may someday help us with that but we are nowhere near being able to apply QM to the functioning of the brain.

But you are not seeing the big picture. There is more to free will than just what you are talking about.

Are you sure you read my whole post?

No you're missing my point.

Again, we don't make decisions with our brain.

We make them with our minds.

If you are not talking about minds you are not talking about how decisions are made.

 

[untermensche]

To say the mind is the same thing as the brain is to say that the magnet is the same thing as magnetism.

 

[ryan]

To say the mind is the same thing as the brain is to say that the magnet is the same thing as magnetism.

Do you believe that the mind is composed of ordinary matter, i.e. the elementary particles? Or do you believe it is something else entirely?

 

[untermensche]

To say the mind is the same thing as the brain is to say that the magnet is the same thing as magnetism.

Do you believe that the mind is composed of ordinary matter, i.e. the elementary particles? Or do you believe it is something else entirely?

I don't know how many times I have to say it.

Nobody has a clue what a mind is.

We have an amazing amount of information about the brain.

But not one shred of information on how cells emitting neurotransmitters and firing action potentials becomes a mind.

Some even think it has something to do with the iron in the blood rushing through it all.

As I said, we don't even have a testable hypothesis.

 

[ryan]

Do you believe that the mind is composed of ordinary matter, i.e. the elementary particles? Or do you believe it is something else entirely?

I don't know how many times I have to say it.

Nobody has a clue what a mind is.

The way that the mind makes sense to some people is that it can be mapped to a brain process/state. By that way of thinking, we could say that the mind is a function of brain activity; when the brain does X, we get mental thought Y. This still leaves the mind's substance a mystery but a mystery that wouldn't really explain anything useful. So for all practical purposes, we can say it is the brain.

This is far from my ideas about brain/mind, but I think many scientists/physicalists/monists would agree with it. Or they will just cut out the mental property Y and consider it to be equivalent to brain process X. For example, a visual image in my mind of my dog would be brain process X and no useful need to talk about the mind.

 

[Juma]

But you are not seeing the big picture. There is more to free will than just what you are talking about.

Are you sure you read my whole post?

No you're missing my point.

Again, we don't make decisions with our brain.

We make them with our minds.

Which is exactly as saying "computers dont make decisions with their hardware but with their running processes"

And I dont believe that you have a clue of what you think you mean when using the word "mind".

Are you refering to the experience of awareness? Because all what we are aware of (including thought etc) is clearly processes in the brain.

 

[ryan]

No you're missing my point.

Again, we don't make decisions with our brain.

We make them with our minds.

Which is exactly as saying "computers dont make decisions with their hardware but with their running processes"

And I dont believe that you have a clue of what you think you mean when using the word "mind".

Are you refering to the experience of awareness? Because all what we are aware of (including thought etc) is clearly processes in the brain.

Why do you have to be so rude? Why does everyone have to be so angry and rude on the Internet. It doesn't work in the real world, so why would it work here?

This is going to cause a ripple effect like a spherical pond, and I promise, like a real kind of karma, the ripples will come back to you - and I - in the form of someone else passing s*** forward. It is like an angry pollution.

 

[Juma]

Which is exactly as saying "computers dont make decisions with their hardware but with their running processes"

And I dont believe that you have a clue of what you think you mean when using the word "mind".

Are you refering to the experience of awareness? Because all what we are aware of (including thought etc) is clearly processes in the brain.

Why do you have to be so rude? Why does everyone have to be so angry and rude on the Internet. It doesn't work in the real world, so why would it work here?

This is going to cause a ripple effect like a spherical pond, and I promise, like a real kind of karma, the ripples will come back to you - and I - in the form of someone else passing s*** forward. It is like an angry pollution.

I'm not rude. I am honest, i really dont believe untermensche has thought through what "mind" is supposed to mean and so hasnt you.

And you are extremely rude when you obviously doesnt give a damn of my pist and still answer it but dont care shit of what I actually wrote. That is real rudeness.

 

[DBT]

When you say 'nobody know' this or that, you are implying that nothing is known or understood.

There isn't even a hypothesis of how a bunch of cells emitting neurotransmitters becomes a mind.

There does't have to be. What is well supported by evidence is that the brain is indeed producing the experience of mind/consciousness by means of electrochemical activity. How it does this is not understood. It is thought to be the patterns of firings that form the experience of consciousness.

We know nothing about that, and really don't even have an idea where to start.

Again, while it is not understood how the brain generates conscious experience, it is quite clear that it is the brain that is the agency of consciousness/mind....chemical imbalances alter mind/consciousness, physical connectivity between cells, or their failure, alters mind/consciousness, which is well enough understood: alcohol effects the brain in certain ways which in turn alter conscious experience, LSD, etc, are mind altering substances.

So we certainly can't say one thing about something like "free will".

Well, I argue that the term free will is not relevant, that it has no use as a describer of behavioural traits, character, personality or whatever else.

 

[DBT]

There isn't even a hypothesis of how a bunch of cells emitting neurotransmitters becomes a mind.

We know nothing about that, and really don't even have an idea where to start.

So we certainly can't say one thing about something like "free will".

You seem to be overcomplicating this. Just remember the more general definition of free will: the ability to have acted differently.

To which I have pointed out that the progression of time does not allow two opposing decisions/actions to take place. You (the brain) cannot decide to sit, while simultaneously, to stand. It is one or the other in any instance in time.

So if you (the brain) make a costly error which you regret a moment after it had been made, it is obvious that had you been able to choose otherwise, you would have in order to avoid your regretted decision.

It is only with the progression of time and new information feed into the brain that enables you (the brain) to see the prior error, but then of course it's too late to change. We cannot go back in time and do things differently, no matter how strong our will or desire, nor can we do differently in any given moment in time, just what the information state of the brain in that instance in time allows.

 

[ryan]

Why do you have to be so rude? Why does everyone have to be so angry and rude on the Internet. It doesn't work in the real world, so why would it work here?

This is going to cause a ripple effect like a spherical pond, and I promise, like a real kind of karma, the ripples will come back to you - and I - in the form of someone else passing s*** forward. It is like an angry pollution.

I'm not rude. I am honest, i really dont believe untermensche has thought through what "mind" is supposed to mean and so hasnt you.

And you are extremely rude when you obviously doesnt give a damn of my pist and still answer it but dont care shit of what I actually wrote. That is real rudeness.

eehhh

 

[ryan]

You seem to be overcomplicating this. Just remember the more general definition of free will: the ability to have acted differently.

To which I have pointed out that the progression of time does not allow two opposing decisions/actions to take place. You (the brain) cannot decide to sit, while simultaneously, to stand. It is one or the other in any instance in time.

So if you (the brain) make a costly error which you regret a moment after it had been made, it is obvious that had you been able to choose otherwise, you would have in order to avoid your regretted decision.

It is only with the progression of time and new information feed into the brain that enables you (the brain) to see the prior error, but then of course it's too late to change. We cannot go back in time and do things differently, no matter how strong our will or desire, nor can we do differently in any given moment in time, just what the information state of the brain in that instance in time allows.

It is not known if there is only one physically possible choice. If QM is a factor in decision making, then there is nothing that was stopping the brain from choosing differently. That's all I am saying.

 

[DBT]

To which I have pointed out that the progression of time does not allow two opposing decisions/actions to take place. You (the brain) cannot decide to sit, while simultaneously, to stand. It is one or the other in any instance in time.

So if you (the brain) make a costly error which you regret a moment after it had been made, it is obvious that had you been able to choose otherwise, you would have in order to avoid your regretted decision.

It is only with the progression of time and new information feed into the brain that enables you (the brain) to see the prior error, but then of course it's too late to change. We cannot go back in time and do things differently, no matter how strong our will or desire, nor can we do differently in any given moment in time, just what the information state of the brain in that instance in time allows.

It is not known if there is only one physically possible choice.

Can you simultaneously stand and sit? Turn left and turn right? Jump up and fall down? Close your eyes and keep them open? Write a reply and not write a reply? What is not known here? If you make one choice, to stand, that negates the choice to keep sitting in that very instance in time...of course a moment later you may feel the impulse to stand and do that. But that is not the point of what I said.

If QM is a factor in decision making, then there is nothing that was stopping the brain from choosing differently. That's all I am saying.

Why then is it so common for people to regret decisions, sometimes bitterly, if they could have chosen differently? Why is the daydream ''if only I could go back in time and change this or that decision' a common theme, if we had the ability to have chose differently in those moments in time?

 

[untermensche]

No you're missing my point.

Again, we don't make decisions with our brain.

We make them with our minds.

Which is exactly as saying "computers dont make decisions with their hardware but with their running processes"

And I dont believe that you have a clue of what you think you mean when using the word "mind".

Are you refering to the experience of awareness? Because all what we are aware of (including thought etc) is clearly processes in the brain.

Saying "processes" in the brain is to say nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

It is a non-specific filler like "stuff". Why don't you just say "stuff" in the brain?

 

[untermensche]

There isn't even a hypothesis of how a bunch of cells emitting neurotransmitters becomes a mind.

There does't have to be. What is well supported by evidence is that the brain is indeed producing the experience of mind/consciousness by means of electrochemical activity. How it does this is not understood. It is thought to be the patterns of firings that form the experience of consciousness.

So according to you we don't have to understand things to claim understanding?

Again, saying "electrochemical activity" is to say nothing.

It isn't any kind of understanding beyond simply saying "activity". Throwing words of possible explanations in doesn't add anything to understanding.

Again, while it is not understood how the brain generates conscious experience, it is quite clear that it is the brain that is the agency of consciousness/mind....chemical imbalances alter mind/consciousness, physical connectivity between cells, or their failure, alters mind/consciousness, which is well enough understood: alcohol effects the brain in certain ways which in turn alter conscious experience, LSD, etc, are mind altering substances.

There's a lot more.

Nature gives us many ablation scenarios of the human brain, strokes.

It is clear that damage to the brain can have extreme consequences on everything it means to be a human. Language, memory, emotion, movement, coordination.

But knowing that something about the brain and some activity of that brain gives rise to all these things is a million miles from knowing how it does it and what is going on.

So we certainly can't say one thing about something like "free will".

Well, I argue that the term free will is not relevant, that it has no use as a describer of behavioural traits, character, personality or whatever else.

Now you've drifted into unsupported opinion.

Again, choices are made with the mind.

If we don't know what the mind is we can't say anything about choices. We can't say if they are "free" or "forced". The only two possibilities. If it is not one it is the other.

 

[Juma]

Which is exactly as saying "computers dont make decisions with their hardware but with their running processes"

And I dont believe that you have a clue of what you think you mean when using the word "mind".

Are you refering to the experience of awareness? Because all what we are aware of (including thought etc) is clearly processes in the brain.

Saying "processes" in the brain is to say nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

It is a non-specific filler like "stuff". Why don't you just say "stuff" in the brain?

Because it aint stuff!!! I agree that processes is a vague term but it is also very precise in that I defenitely doesnt mean "stuff".

We are not things. We are processes. The decisions we make and the feelings we feels are the dynamics of the brain.