There isn't really a 'freewill problem'.

[Speakpigeon]

You're both somewhat right and somewhat wrong!

illusion
n.
1. a misleading impression.
2. the condition of being deceived.
3. misleading perception, esp. a visual one: optical illusion
3. (Psychology) a perception that is not true to reality by being somehow altered in the mind of the subject.

So there is a sense in which an optical illusion, in particular, while still an illusion, stops deceiving us because we know it is misleading and in what way it is misleading, even though it remains clearly somewhat misleading.
EB

I somewhat agree.

Somewhat agree?! I was under the illusion I had just put an end to the dispute. I'm now realising it was just an illusion.

I think it might be a matter of context. When the illusion has to do with commonplace experiences then it might be taken as actually useful. Such as the shadow on the chess board illusion where the white and dark squares actually are of the same shade of gray. That's useful, and indeed is the correct interpretation for recognizing what the scene represents. And then there's the illusion that the Sun is revolving around the Earth when seen in the sky. We now know that this is not the case but it doesn't stop us from refering to the Sun coming up and going down. The thing is this is a philosophy forum and we're talking about free will. This is an abstract concept we're trying to understand from an objective point of view. So I think the case still can be made that if one realizes (i.e.; understands) what free will actually is that it ceases to be an illusion.

Yes. So how would that disagree at all with the dictionary definitions I provided only to be helpful?
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

It's not so much that free will is an illusion, considering how will is formed, conscious will cannot be free. It is what it is as a result of prior information processing shaping and forming our experience of the world and self, thought and response. It's nothing more than a feel good term - ''wow, just wow, we have *Free Will* by Gosh, isn't that Swell.''

An ideology rather than reality.

Well, sure it's all very interesting, but I would really pay attention if you were at all free to speak your mind and you've just hinted you're not.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

That we think we have model doesn't mean there's really something it's the model of, or that this something is really like what the model says it is.

Still, it's perfectly rational to take your beliefs at face value if you don't know what else you could possibly do.
EB

This is inane.

We create models of ACTUAL THINGS THAT OBJECTIVELY EXIST.

Some of those models aren't very good models - they don't conform to reality, meaning that they don't predict observation very well.

Reality doesn't conform to our models - reality doesn't alter in order to fit our models and to create observations to fit our predictions.

Either one of us is completely failing to communicate a concept... or one of our concepts is fundamentally wrong. Let's assume it's a communication error - would you expand and explain what you mean more clearly?

That would be more convincing if you could ever explain convincingly how we ever get to know any particular things to exist objectively.

And this is something I very much doubt (hint: look who is my avatar!)
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

I certainly don't know you're something real out there.

And yet, if you knew I'm real, I should probably know you are.

So, no, sorry, I don't buy that.
EB

Hmm. Maybe you're winning your argument. I find myself more and more inclined to treat you as if you don't exist

I could dare you to do just that but no, your belief in me is probably unshakeable and behaving in contradiction with your beliefs would be potentially hazardous.
EB

Am I correct in inferring that English is not your native language?

No, you're not. But English is not my native language, so you'd have been correct just asserting that.

So, native speaker, can you make explicit what I just suggested here?

On the presumption that my inference is correct, let me add some clarity: treating you as if you don't exist is substantially different than believing that you don't exist. Ponder that for a moment, if you will.

I'm pondering...

Okay, enough of that.

So, sorry I'm going definitely to look even more arrogant than usual but it's clear to me you're the only one here who did less than understand perfectly good English.

You'd do well carefully reading again what it is I wrote.

I'll wait for the penny to drop.
EB

 

[Treedbear]

The illusion was destroyed.

No no no. What you should say is alas, the mystery is resolved!

ETA: or the illusion is understood

If you work on a very hard math problem and finally come to the solution, it's still a math problem.

But it's no longer my problem , or rather a problem for me.

 

[fast]

The illusion was destroyed.

No no no. What you should say is alas, the mystery is resolved!

ETA: or the illusion is understood

If you work on a very hard math problem and finally come to the solution, it's still a math problem.

But it's no longer my problem , or rather a problem for me.

That actually crossed my mind, but therein lies an ambiguity. It's not a problem (like a difficulty), yet it is a problem (like a puzzle). A puzzle but no longer puzzling.

I originally recognized what it is I thought you meant and that explains why I changed "illusion" to "illusory"--in hopes of maintaining an acceptance that an illusion remains just what it is (in keeping with the law of identity), but just as a puzzle remains a puzzle despite the loss of it being puzzling, I wanted to capture what you feel is lost when the mystery behind the illusion dissipated. It's no longer illusory on you. No longer unexplained, sure, but it's still an illusion. For something to be an illusion doesn't imply you've been duped.

 

[Kharakov]

On the presumption that my inference is correct, let me add some clarity: treating you as if you don't exist is substantially different than believing that you don't exist. Ponder that for a moment, if you will.

You remind me of nothing.

 

[DBT]

It wasn't my definition of 'free will' but 'will' - just 'will'

Fair enough. What do you think distinguishes 'will' from 'free will'?

We have will. Will is not free. Will cannot be free because it is shaped and formed in response to input and memory by means of neural architecture.

The term 'free will' is an oxymoron.

- - - Updated - - -

It's not so much that free will is an illusion, considering how will is formed, conscious will cannot be free. It is what it is as a result of prior information processing shaping and forming our experience of the world and self, thought and response. It's nothing more than a feel good term - ''wow, just wow, we have *Free Will* by Gosh, isn't that Swell.''

An ideology rather than reality.

Well, sure it's all very interesting, but I would really pay attention if you were at all free to speak your mind and you've just hinted you're not.
EB

Wow, caustic innuendo. Clever.

 

[Speakpigeon]

We have will. Will is not free. Will cannot be free because it is shaped and formed in response to input and memory by means of neural architecture.

The term 'free will' is an oxymoron.

No, it's not.

oxymoron
n. a rhetorical figure in which incongruous or contradictory terms are combined, as in a deafening silence and a mournful optimist.

I'm not sure what you could have possibly meant, though. There's nothing in these two words that would make them somehow unfit to work together to express what we mean.

Maybe you just talked foolishly in a rare moment of extreme weakness.
EB


Post-Script

moron
n. a person who is considered foolish or stupid.

 

[Speakpigeon]

It's not so much that free will is an illusion, considering how will is formed, conscious will cannot be free. It is what it is as a result of prior information processing shaping and forming our experience of the world and self, thought and response. It's nothing more than a feel good term - ''wow, just wow, we have *Free Will* by Gosh, isn't that Swell.''
An ideology rather than reality.

Well, sure it's all very interesting, but I would really pay attention if you were at all free to speak your mind and you've just hinted you're not.
EB

Wow, caustic innuendo. Clever.

It will be forever fascinating to me that brains should be able to produce apparently meaningful noises in response to meaningful utterances.

I shall make a mental note to myself not to be too engaged by these uninhabited phantoms.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

But it's no longer my problem , or rather a problem for me.

It's no longer illusory on you. No longer unexplained, sure, but it's still an illusion.

You could have expressed this by the formulation "You're no longer under the illusion...".

For something to be an illusion doesn't imply you've been duped.

I think it does, to some extent. Say, a part of you is duped, if that makes sense.

An optical illusion remains an illusion even after you've understood it's an illusion and that will be because a part of you, say your "perception system", is still fooled.

Isn't that so?
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

The illusion was destroyed.

No no no. What you should say is alas, the mystery is resolved!

ETA: or the illusion is understood

If you work on a very hard math problem and finally come to the solution, it's still a math problem.

But it's no longer my problem , or rather a problem for me.

Well, some illusions are indeed like that, others are not.

For example: The animal in the shadows turned out to be an illusion. Here, once you've realised there's no animal there, what remains are just shadows. Shadows are real shadows, so they're are not illusions, so there's no illusion left once you no longer see any animal. The realisation comes with your brain somehow stopping to interpret the shadows as some kind of animal and you no longer see any animal. Ergo, no illusion anymore.

That's different with things like the apparent "breaking" of a stick plunged halfway into water. You will still see it "broken" even after realising it's an illusion. So, the illusion will still be there.

Illusions affect different levels in our brains and language reflects that I think.
EB

 

[fromderinside]

So take away the string and you take away the perceptual conflict. Now ask yourself why was inclusion of a string enough to produce the perceptual conflict? After you clamber down this rabbit hole you'll find a limiting perceptual barrier generated by a necessary trade in physical attributes in information leading to the experience.

The mystery isn't resolved until one actually understands the physical trades being made that produce the illusion. It's never just because of this or that. It's always because a class of objects or conditions exceeding those available to the observer require some of those variables to be broken into more classes such as attribute of time versus attribute of frequency or an attribute of three dimensional interaction being required of a two dimensional presentation.

Some might even refer these phenomena as confounded variable problems.

 

[DBT]

Wow, caustic innuendo. Clever.

It will be forever fascinating to me that brains should be able to produce apparently meaningful noises in response to meaningful utterances.

I shall make a mental note to myself not to be too engaged by these uninhabited phantoms.
EB

Just look in the mirror and practice on yourself. A mental exercise if you like.

No, it's not.
oxymoron
n. a rhetorical figure in which incongruous or contradictory terms are combined, as in a deafening silence and a mournful optimist.

You are taking rhetoric far too literally. My use of 'oxymoron' is related to what I said about the impossibility of 'will' to be free, being a product of an unconscious process, etc, hence 'free will' being a rhetorical figure [loosely] in which incongruous or contradictory terms are combined.

If you don't like that...too bad. If you don't agree, take it to arbitration...or gnash your teeth in frustration. Whatever.

 

[fast]

You could have expressed this by the formulation "You're no longer under the illusion...".

For something to be an illusion doesn't imply you've been duped.

I think it does, to some extent. Say, a part of you is duped, if that makes sense.

An optical illusion remains an illusion even after you've understood it's an illusion and that will be because a part of you, say your "perception system", is still fooled.

Isn't that so?
EB

I agree with everything you said, so to answer your "isn't it so" question, I say yes.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Wow, caustic innuendo. Clever.

It will be forever fascinating to me that brains should be able to produce apparently meaningful noises in response to meaningful utterances.
I shall make a mental note to myself not to be too engaged by these uninhabited phantoms.
EB

Just look in the mirror and practice on yourself. A mental exercise if you like.

Wow, caustic explicitness. Not so clever.

For sheer lack of time, I have to guess.

Ah, but, there I go again. I keep forgetting you're not free to act. Or even just think for yourself.

No, it's not.

oxymoron
n. a rhetorical figure in which incongruous or contradictory terms are combined, as in a deafening silence and a mournful optimist.

You are taking rhetoric far too literally.

Yeah, I know, I keep forgetting it's a machine which is making those noises.

My use of 'oxymoron' is related to what I said about the impossibility of 'will' to be free, being a product of an unconscious process, etc, hence 'free will' being a rhetorical figure [loosely] in which incongruous or contradictory terms are combined.

If you don't like that...too bad. If you don't agree, take it to arbitration...or gnash your teeth in frustration. Whatever.

There's a much simpler way to look at it. It was just the wrong word to use. And I'm not motivated to fix the problem, or repair the machine.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

So take away the string and you take away the perceptual conflict. Now ask yourself why was inclusion of a string enough to produce the perceptual conflict? After you clamber down this rabbit hole you'll find a limiting perceptual barrier generated by a necessary trade in physical attributes in information leading to the experience.

The mystery isn't resolved until one actually understands the physical trades being made that produce the illusion. It's never just because of this or that. It's always because a class of objects or conditions exceeding those available to the observer require some of those variables to be broken into more classes such as attribute of time versus attribute of frequency or an attribute of three dimensional interaction being required of a two dimensional presentation.

Some might even refer these phenomena as confounded variable problems.

That, again, is irrelevant.

Why don't you give me a break and find another long retired scientist to exercise on him your talent at irrelevance?
EB

 

[fromderinside]

Retired one here.

Sure it's irrelevant if you are satisfied with an observation and an effect. Oh, wait, why is the observation relevant to the effect? It isn't. Wow. So your goal is to juxtapose two datum and declare illusion irrelevant. Magnifico chango, oh oh.

Perhaps if you spent less effort on correct sentences and more effort on correct information you''d not be bothered by old retired scientists.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Retired one here.

Aren't we all?

Sure it's irrelevant if you are satisfied with an observation and an effect. Oh, wait, why is the observation relevant to the effect? It isn't. Wow. So your goal is to juxtapose two datum and declare illusion irrelevant. Magnifico chango, oh oh.

Well, I'm sure you will be only too pleased to give as many examples as you possibly can of me doing whatever it is you're saying I'm doing.

Go on. That should be illuminating. I'll wait.

Perhaps if you spent less effort on correct sentences and more effort on correct information you''d not be bothered by old retired scientists.

So, again, I'm certain you will be thrilled by the idea of providing examples of incorrect information in what I say. Should be very easy, I gather.

Go on, you Bright Angel. Take your time.

Still. You see, if you had any manner, I wouldn't have to tell you what you should have done by yourself.

Drive-by shooting is bad manners. And that's very much a habit with you. In other words, your manner. And I gather it's a bit late for teaching you good manners now.
EB

 

[fromderinside]

Who is it you implied was being irrelevant?

FDI

Sure it's irrelevant if you are satisfied with an observation and an effect. Oh, wait, why is the observation relevant to the effect? It isn't. Wow. So your goal is to juxtapose two datum and declare illusion irrelevant. Magnifico chango, oh oh.

Speakpigeon response

Well, I'm sure you will be only too pleased to give as many examples as you possibly can of me doing whatever it is you're saying I'm doing.

Amazing. Answer precedes the query. How dat happen?*

* ^{_{self evident to most}}