What is free will?

[WAB]

Bilby:

In repped you for your answer. But:

Winds are not minds. To compare the wind to a mind is to gravely underestimate a mind. Or is that not so?

Does the wind have a mind?

 

[bilby]

Bilby:

In repped you for your answer. But:

Winds are not minds. To compare the wind to a mind is to gravely underestimate a mind. Or is that not so?

Does the wind have a mind?

In my analogy, the wind is society.

The actions of a person are determined, with society blowing the decisions like a leaf in the wind. It's determined, but not predictable. It's decided, but not willed.

The mind is a post-hoc rationalisation; It's not the driver of decisions, it is the post-decision phenomenon that tells us that our decisions were made by our consciousness. But that's putting the cart before the horse - consciousness is a result of making decisions.

 

[WAB]

DBT,

My old friend. I don't know if you remember me, but I posted as WilliamB, Gulielmus Beta, and Lotetta J Hyde, over the past fourteen years.

You and I have locked horns many times. And I have thoroughly enjoyed the discussions.

I do not think that untermenshce is arguing for a mind that is independent from the brain. I believe that he is arguing for the mind as an emergent property, or activity, of the brain. That is quite different. I don't know of anyone who actually thinks that the mind is something independent from the brain.

Just sayin.

 

[WAB]

Bilby:

In repped you for your answer. But:

Winds are not minds. To compare the wind to a mind is to gravely underestimate a mind. Or is that not so?

Does the wind have a mind?

In my analogy, the wind is society.

The actions of a person are determined, with society blowing the decisions like a leaf in the wind. It's determined, but not predictable. It's decided, but not willed.

The mind is a post-hoc rationalisation; It's not the driver of decisions, it is the post-decision phenomenon that tells us that our decisions were made by our consciousness. But that's putting the cart before the horse - consciousness is a result of making decisions.

Consiousness is the the result of making decisions??

You have it backwards.

Making decisions is the result of consciousness.

 

[bilby]

Bilby:

In repped you for your answer. But:

Winds are not minds. To compare the wind to a mind is to gravely underestimate a mind. Or is that not so?

Does the wind have a mind?

In my analogy, the wind is society.

The actions of a person are determined, with society blowing the decisions like a leaf in the wind. It's determined, but not predictable. It's decided, but not willed.

The mind is a post-hoc rationalisation; It's not the driver of decisions, it is the post-decision phenomenon that tells us that our decisions were made by our consciousness. But that's putting the cart before the horse - consciousness is a result of making decisions.

Consiousness is the the result of making decisions??

You have it backwards.

Making decisions is the result of consciousness.

Wow.

Wow yourself.

I am confident that neuroscience supports my position; and it is, I am fully aware, highly counterintuitive.

 

[untermensche]

Neuroscience has almost nothing to say about human behavior.

That is light years beyond our current understandings.

We have no clue how a brain creates a mind or anything to fill that mind.

The "will" of a bee isn't understood.

Why a bee does what it does is not understood in terms of it's neuro anatomy and physiology.

No less a human.

A decision made by a mind using ideas is not a decision made in a robotic way by a brain.

 

[fromderinside]

OK. So an AND gate or and OR gate will fail at some computable probability. The design intended is for the gate to transmit when either both inputs are present or only one of the inputs are present. Inputs are determined. That is the problem. There is a distinct probability that either gate will inappropriately report actual status based on external factors. Do these gates have free will. Obviously not. Ramp up by a factor of several trillion. Has anything changed. Nope.

Another consideration. Determinism the basis of science which people argue is the way things are based on the results of experiments tells us that the whole is equal to the sum of its parts. Sure there is the possibility that that isn't true because there is the probability that some part will appear inappropriately based on external factors. Same as above.

The question becomes do these chance occurrences or contaminations deserve the attribution of emergence. If one accepts determinism one must answer no and reject any result that can't be traced directly to events initiated by cognizant agents (scientists) in experiments. Otherwise there is no basis for things found in experiments to form a a working environment.

Have fun people.

 

[untermensche]

I'm talking about whole ideas being moved around, not something that we have no idea what it is that uses an unknown gate.

Ideas, not atoms, not electrons.

No ideas emerge from hardware by magic.

It takes software to make any use of hardware.

The mind learns.

The mind learns to overcome a desire.

It takes wanting to overcoming it to do it.

The brain records the learning.

It has no will to overcome desires. It creates them.

 

[Treedbear]

I promised my self I wouldn't do this:

But:

If free will doesn't exist, exactly where does anyone get off ridiculing or shaming a person for their views, or their behavior?

To ridicule a person for silly beliefs is to make an assumption that that person can do otherwise than that which their brain has in store for them. If they literally can do nothing outside of what their brain dictates, then that person is completely absolved from criticism.

The same would apply to a rapist, or a serial killer. Absent free will, neither should be open for censure.

I should say that I am on the fence regarding free will. But my ethics are sound, I believe. If a person behaves in such a way that they have no real control over how they think or behave, then we need to seriously examine our criminal justice system.

Shame and blame, and the predictions of those elements existing in the future, are inputs into the (entirely deterministic) decision making process. A person may not have control over his behaviour; But society does - just as the wind has control over the direction in which a leaf travels, despite the leaf having on control of its own.

The environment is hugely complex, and the results are chaotic, so that are unpredictable despite not being willed; and they are not random, despite being unpredictable.

The criminal justice system exists to influence people not to commit future crimes. Punishment of criminals is an effective means to do this, even if the criminal had no freedom to choose a different path, and is undeserving of punishment for his choices.

The whole thing as a complex mess of feedback loops, made even more complex by the brain's ability to predict (but with limited accuracy) future consequences to today's decisions, and to use those predictions as inputs into the decision making process. It's hardly surprising that this stuff is difficult to understand, or that people try to simplify it by inventing fictions such as 'free will' in an attempt to explain it - just as chemists invented phlogiston to explain fire, before they had a better understanding of how it worked.

If we are not free as individuals, then we are not free as a collective.

There is no freedom. Hence, no blame.

Freedom is only meaningful within the bounds of some context. Absolute freedom is a meaningless concept, except in a fuzzy theistic sense. Blame is possible when there is responsibility within some context, such as a society's norms. Society wouldn't exist without the ability to place blame. A person wouldn't be able to exist without the ability to assume responcibility on a personal level. How would I change my behavior if I don't assume blame for wrong decisions? Freedom only exists within limits. I am free to be what I am, and no more. Why should it matter that I could have acted differently under the same circumstances? One's "sins" are "forgiven" when one has learned from one's errors. That requires the assumption of responsibility (which is why I don't trust Kavanaugh's judgement concerning women's rights). We don't need no stinkiin' absolution.

 

[bilby]

OK. So an AND gate or and OR gate will fail at some computable probability. The design intended is for the gate to transmit when either both inputs are present or only one of the inputs are present. Inputs are determined. That is the problem. There is a distinct probability that either gate will inappropriately report actual status based on external factors. Do these gates have free will. Obviously not. Ramp up by a factor of several trillion. Has anything changed. Nope.

Another consideration. Determinism the basis of science which people argue is the way things are based on the results of experiments tells us that the whole is equal to the sum of its parts. Sure there is the possibility that that isn't true because there is the probability that some part will appear inappropriately based on external factors. Same as above.

The question becomes do these chance occurrences or contaminations deserve the attribution of emergence. If one accepts determinism one must answer no and reject any result that can't be traced directly to events initiated by cognizant agents (scientists) in experiments. Otherwise there is no basis for things found in experiments to form a a working environment.

Have fun people.

Emergence is a property of complex systems, and in no way does determinism prevent its existence.

There is nothing in our theories of how particles behave that is not completely reversible, and nothing that establishes an 'arrow of time' for any given particle. A single gas molecule in a box moves in a completely deterministic way, and (according to 1LoT) in an isolated system, will move forever in predictable ways that appear identical backwards or forwards. Equally, two, ten, or a thousand such particles each moves in a completely deterministic way, and it's impossible to tell, when looking at a single particle's interactions, whether someone has reversed the tape - it looks exactly the same forwards or backwards.

But with large numbers of particles, you can start with them all in one corner, and end with them spread roughly evenly throughout the box - but your chances of seeing the reverse is so low that it will not happen once in the entire lifespan of the universe.

The 2LoT emerges from deterministic and time reversible particle behaviour, bringing with it an 'arrow of time'. Entropy isn't a characteristic of deterministic single particle systems. But it's a very real and important characteristic of deterministic systems involving large numbers of particles.

Your belief that determinism denies or eliminates emergence is therefore demonstrably wrong.

 

[DBT]

DBT,

My old friend. I don't know if you remember me, but I posted as WilliamB, Gulielmus Beta, and Lotetta J Hyde, over the past fourteen years.

You and I have locked horns many times. And I have thoroughly enjoyed the discussions.

I do not think that untermenshce is arguing for a mind that is independent from the brain. I believe that he is arguing for the mind as an emergent property, or activity, of the brain. That is quite different. I don't know of anyone who actually thinks that the mind is something independent from the brain.

Just sayin.

Of course I remember you in all your incarnations. Hope things are going well.

As for Mr Untermensche, he has stated quite explicitly that he believes in a 'smart mind' that operates a 'dumb brain' and that it is 'mind' that is control.

The words in commas are his words.

 

[untermensche]

DBT,

My old friend. I don't know if you remember me, but I posted as WilliamB, Gulielmus Beta, and Lotetta J Hyde, over the past fourteen years.

You and I have locked horns many times. And I have thoroughly enjoyed the discussions.

I do not think that untermenshce is arguing for a mind that is independent from the brain. I believe that he is arguing for the mind as an emergent property, or activity, of the brain. That is quite different. I don't know of anyone who actually thinks that the mind is something independent from the brain.

Just sayin.

Of course I remember you in all your incarnations. Hope things are going well.

As for Mr Untermensche, he has stated quite explicitly that he believes in a 'smart mind' that operates a 'dumb brain' and that it is 'mind' that is control.

The words in commas are his words.

You at least can use your smart mind to understand some of my position.

But of course my position is as described above you and I have said it many times.

The mind is a phenomena created by some unknown activity, most likely some kind of activity occurring in the brain. The mind has a continual feedback ability, potential energy, to get the brain to do the things needed to be done to survive.

The active mind motivated by desires and sensations is what enables the human to survive.

Not the dumb brain that doesn't know anything about the world.

 

[DBT]

DBT,

My old friend. I don't know if you remember me, but I posted as WilliamB, Gulielmus Beta, and Lotetta J Hyde, over the past fourteen years.

You and I have locked horns many times. And I have thoroughly enjoyed the discussions.

I do not think that untermenshce is arguing for a mind that is independent from the brain. I believe that he is arguing for the mind as an emergent property, or activity, of the brain. That is quite different. I don't know of anyone who actually thinks that the mind is something independent from the brain.

Just sayin.

Of course I remember you in all your incarnations. Hope things are going well.

As for Mr Untermensche, he has stated quite explicitly that he believes in a 'smart mind' that operates a 'dumb brain' and that it is 'mind' that is control.

The words in commas are his words.

You at least can use your smart mind to understand some of my position.

But of course my position is as described above you and I have said it many times.

The mind is a phenomena created by some unknown activity, most likely some kind of activity occurring in the brain. The mind has a continual feedback ability, potential energy, to get the brain to do the things needed to be done to survive.

The active mind motivated by desires and sensations is what enables the human to survive.

Not the dumb brain that doesn't know anything about the world.

Yes, that is your belief. A belief that you are entitled to hold if it brings you some sort of satisfaction or comfort....however, on a public forum, it has to be pointed out that your belief rests on faith, that there is no evidence that supports your claim of autonomy of mind. On the contrary, the evidence supports conscious mind being a form of electrochemical activity of a brain, and that it is the state and condition of a brain that determines the state, conditions and attributes and abilities of the mind being generated by that brain.

 

[untermensche]

It is not a belief I must do something with my mind to get my arm to move.

It is not a belief if I want my arm to move I can move it by doing something with my mind.

You have no greater understanding of this phenomena than I do.

All we know is we do something with our mind and our arm moves.

We don't have a clue what is happening objectively because have no clue what the objective mind is.

Those that claim to know what is happening objectively are peddling religion, not science.

Science needs to discover what the objective mind is and what is happening when we use it to move the arm.

The averaging of subjective guesses about the timing of mind events is total nonsense.

 

[DBT]

It is not a belief I must do something with my mind to get my arm to move.

It is not a belief if I want my arm to move I can move it by doing something with my mind.

You have no greater understanding of this phenomena than I do.

All we know is we do something with our mind and our arm moves.

We don't have a clue what is happening objectively because have no clue what the objective mind is.

Those that claim to know what is happening objectively are peddling religion, not science.

Science needs to discover what the objective mind is and what is happening when we use it to move the arm.

The averaging of subjective guesses about the timing of mind events is total nonsense.

You forget that movement may be unconscious, reflex actions bypassing executive decision making, tics. involuntary twitches, jerks,, etc. You refuse to consider the experiments showing that movement and awareness of movement can be separated.....the subjects arm moving even while the subjects deny moving their arm.

 

[WAB]

It is not a belief I must do something with my mind to get my arm to move.

It is not a belief if I want my arm to move I can move it by doing something with my mind.

You have no greater understanding of this phenomena than I do.

All we know is we do something with our mind and our arm moves.

We don't have a clue what is happening objectively because have no clue what the objective mind is.

Those that claim to know what is happening objectively are peddling religion, not science.

Science needs to discover what the objective mind is and what is happening when we use it to move the arm.

The averaging of subjective guesses about the timing of mind events is total nonsense.

You forget that movement may be unconscious, reflex actions bypassing executive decision making, tics. involuntary twitches, jerks,, etc. You refuse to consider the experiments showing that movement and awareness of movement can be separated.....the subjects arm moving even while the subjects deny moving their arm.

Thought experiment:

What if we can talk brain to brain?

If the "I" doesn't exist, if what I think is "me" talking is actually just my brain - if there is no "I", if the sense of self is an illusion. Fine. What is to prevent a brain talking to a brain?

Since the brain dictates everything? What is to prevent a brain talking to another brain?

DBT? I call on your brain. Not DBT. But DBT's brain.

Let's talk.

Don't say "I" - because I will assume "you" are referring to your brain.

 

[WAB]

Consiousness is the the result of making decisions??

You have it backwards.

Making decisions is the result of consciousness.

Wow.

Wow yourself.

I am confident that neuroscience supports my position; and it is, I am fully aware, highly counterintuitive.

Well wow yourself. Lol. Consiousness makes decisions.

Neuroscience be damned.

Consciousness is the result of making decisions?

BwahhaAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAHAAA....

 

[DBT]

It is not a belief I must do something with my mind to get my arm to move.

It is not a belief if I want my arm to move I can move it by doing something with my mind.

You have no greater understanding of this phenomena than I do.

All we know is we do something with our mind and our arm moves.

We don't have a clue what is happening objectively because have no clue what the objective mind is.

Those that claim to know what is happening objectively are peddling religion, not science.

Science needs to discover what the objective mind is and what is happening when we use it to move the arm.

The averaging of subjective guesses about the timing of mind events is total nonsense.

You forget that movement may be unconscious, reflex actions bypassing executive decision making, tics. involuntary twitches, jerks,, etc. You refuse to consider the experiments showing that movement and awareness of movement can be separated.....the subjects arm moving even while the subjects deny moving their arm.

Thought experiment:

What if we can talk brain to brain?

That is how it works. That is how it has always worked....not supernaturally of course, but brain to brain by means of mouth, body language and the written word.

If the "I" doesn't exist, if what I think is "me" talking is actually just my brain - if there is no "I", if the sense of self is an illusion. Fine. What is to prevent a brain talking to a brain?

Self identity does exist, we are self aware, we are conscious, we think and act and communicate, these attributes and functions being the role and purpose of a functional brain.....to interact with the world through the means of consciousness.

Since the brain dictates everything? What is to prevent a brain talking to another brain?

Nothing. That is what we are doing now....both through means of consciousness, computers and the internet.

DBT? I call on your brain. Not DBT. But DBT's brain.

One and the same....except when the brain puts me the conscious self to sleep and dreams its dreams, consolidates its memories and other functions that are not conscious functions.

Let's talk.

Don't say "I" - because I will assume "you" are referring to your brain.

A brain, if healthy and functioning normally, forms self identity, learns language, self awareness, culture, interests, desires and fears and while conscious, that is experienced as being you. You talking, thinking, eating, working, reading, arguing on the internet,itself an invention of a brain

 

[bilby]

Consiousness is the the result of making decisions??

You have it backwards.

Making decisions is the result of consciousness.

Wow.

Wow yourself.

I am confident that neuroscience supports my position; and it is, I am fully aware, highly counterintuitive.

Welll wow yourself. Lol. Consiousness makes decisions.

Neuroscience be damned.

Consciousness is the result of making decisions?

BwahhaAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAHAAA....

Mirth is not a rebuttal.

 

[WAB]

Welll wow yourself. Lol. Consiousness makes decisions.

Neuroscience be damned.

Consciousness is the result of making decisions?

BwahhaAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAHAAA....

Mirth is not a rebuttal.

It's not mirth.

Consciousness makes decisions.


Decrartes? Hegel? Spinoza? Kant?