Free will and determinism

[All Becomes New]

Yes, so if free will doesn't exist then we need to relook at morality.

We're not talking about imaginary worlds.

If something is unknown doesn't mean it's not deterministic. Unpredictability doesn't equate to indeterminism.

I'd be glad to look at any example.

Quantum mechanics is off the table. One, it has no affect on the macro world when it comes to making a decision. Two, it is many levels of magnitude beneath the macro world. Three, if you class it as unpredictable, see the second point. And four, if it's random, then free will doesn't live there.

If you want to discuss religious aspects of the matter then maybe someone will join in. I won't because I don't believe in the supernatural. Notwithstanding that miracles, should they exist, are simply some of the antecedent conditions we have that determine our decisions.

If someone goes right, then there was a reason for doing so that determined their choice. So no free will. If it was random, then there's no free will involved. If it couldn't be predicted then that's irrelevant - see earlier comment.

Stripped the article I linked. I think we are done here.

 

[Bradskii]

Stripped the article I linked.

I assume you spent the $45 for the article so you know what his arguments are. Could you precis them?

 

[partinobodycular]

It's your choice that you make. Nobody makes it for you. But as you said, it's determined by countless preceding causes, over which you had no control.

But my point is... how are all of those preceding causes that went into making me who I am, not an intricate part of me? They're not manipulating me... they're creating me. I am what I am entirely because of the things that went into making me what I am. Just as what I am now will determine what I'll be tomorrow. What I was yesterday determined what I am today. And somewhere within that long line of yesterdays I developed a will. An understanding of right and wrong, that goes beyond mere physics, and makes what I am more than just an automaton. I have the ability to act according to what I desire. Rocks can do nothing of their own volition, plants can turn to face the sun, but I can do things for no other reason, but that I prefer to.

For that I have to thank that long line of preceding causes... for without them I would be a rock. As it is, I'm far more than a rock.

 

[All Becomes New]

Yes, so if free will doesn't exist then we need to relook at morality.

No, that would be absurd. That would lead to the deaths of many many people.

"They add, “Each undetermined self-forming free choice is a value experiment whose justification lies in the future and is not fully explained by past reasons. In making such a choice, we say, in effect, ‘let’s try this.’ It is not required by my past, but it is consistent with my past and is one branching pathway in the garden of forking paths my life can now meaningfully take.”41 These recent developments in the cognitive and philosophical concepts of free will are now ripe for a neurocognitive formulation of this hard question."

Randomness and nondeterminism: from genes to free will with implications for psychiatry - PMC

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

 

[Bradskii]

But my point is... how are all of those preceding causes that went into making me who I am, not an intricate part of me? They're not manipulating me... they're creating me. I am what I am entirely because of the things that went into making me what I am. Just as what I am now will determine what I'll be tomorrow. What I was yesterday determined what I am today.

Yes, who you are wasn't a series of selections that you made, boxes to be ticked. You had no choice of when or where you were born or who your parents were. You had no choice about how they brought you up. No choice if they were wealthy or dirt poor. You had no choice about where you grew up or your diet or what school you went to. You had no choice if it was a secular or religious upbringing. There are cou tress aspects of your life that made you the person that you are over which you had no control.

And somewhere within that long line of yesterdays I developed a will. An understanding of right and wrong, that goes beyond mere physics, and makes what I am more than just an automaton. I have the ability to act according to what I desire.

The correct way to refer to that as regards free will is that you have the ability to choose that which you prefer. Not what you desire. What you you prefer might align with what you desire,but sometimes doesn't. I desired to stay in bed a little longer this morning, but my preference was to get up and go to the gym. I didn't want to put myself through an hour of hard work but my preference won out.

Now what determined that I did that? Well, I can afford to join the gym. It's not far from where I live. I want to maintain my fitness as I get older. My wife wanted to go as well. I overdid a few things over the weekend. I feel a sense of satisfaction when I'm done. I feel guilty when I don't go. All these and countless others conditions determined that I got out of bed early.

Rocks can do nothing of their own volition, plants can turn to face the sun, but I can do things for no other reason, but that I prefer to.

That's right. Conditions determine what you prefer. And if you prefer to do X, it makes no sense to then say that you won't do it. Because then you are saying that your preference is actually not to do it. And that will have been determined.

You are free to give me any examples at all where you think that's not the case.

 

[partinobodycular]

If absolutely worrying is reduced to a cause as claimed, then if one continues to.go.far enough into the past then there there was an original cause which is God.

Why I am, is beyond my capacity to ascertain, and as far as I know, it's also beyond yours. As such, God is always destined to remain a placeholder for 'I don't know'... and a perpetual pretext for faith... but then again, perhaps that always was God's purpose.

 

[Bradskii]

No, that would be absurd. That would lead to the deaths of many many people.

"They add, “Each undetermined self-forming free choice is a value experiment whose justification lies in the future and is not fully explained by past reasons. In making such a choice, we say, in effect, ‘let’s try this.’ It is not required by my past, but it is consistent with my past and is one branching pathway in the garden of forking paths my life can now meaningfully take.”41 These recent developments in the cognitive and philosophical concepts of free will are now ripe for a neurocognitive formulation of this hard question."

Randomness and nondeterminism: from genes to free will with implications for psychiatry - PMC

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

What happened to your precis of the last article? What was in it that convinced you that the author was correct? Could you quote the relevant passages?

As to re-evaluating morality, why would people die? We still know the difference between right and wrong. We still will have laws that say that there will be punishment for breaking them. We'll still lock people up for breaking them.

And after answering those two items, could you tell me what in the next linked article you gave made you think this author is correct. Be aware that I'm not simply going to read umpteen pages of papers that you think prove there is free will just because the title suggests it. I'm going to assume that you have actually read it so I want to know what in it you find convincing (Notwithstanding that the paper is primarily about randomness. Where free will doesn't live).

 

[All Becomes New]

What happened to your precis of the last article? What was in it that convinced you that the author was correct? Could you quote the relevant passages?

As to re-evaluating morality, why would people die? We still know the difference between right and wrong. We still will have laws that say that there will be punishment for breaking them. We'll still lock people up for breaking them.

And after answering those two items, could you tell me what in the next linked article you gave made you think this author is correct. Be aware that I'm not simply going to read umpteen pages of papers that you think prove there is free will just because the title suggests it. I'm going to assume that you have actually read it so I want to know what in it you find convincing.

To anyone else wondering how to engage with this person, I present this:

 

[Bradskii]

To anyone else wondering how to engage with this person, I present...

Well, thanks for that. Someone might actually watch it I guess. I'm not sure why you posted here if you're not interested in discussin the matter. But if you have nothing to add to either your posts, my questions or to the articles to which you linked...then thanks for playing.

 

[Neogaia777]

Why not? In what sense is knowledge causation?

If there is two different possibilities of a way a thing can go, then they are some other percentage of possibility other than 100% and 0%, and not even a God can know for 100% sure which way it is they are going to go.

Any being can only know everything for absolutely sure always only if one of those possibilities is only absolutely 100% always, which makes the other possibility absolutely zero percent always, which means no choice, or free will, and it is the only case in which any being can always know for 100% absolutely sure which way a thing (choice) is always going to go. And if those possibilities are ever any other kind of number, then not even a God can know for sure which way it is that they are going to go.

So all knowledge cannot exist where there is multiple possibilities of ways in which a thing (or anything) can possibly go, but only when there is always only just one possibility of a way a thing can possibly go. If there are multiples, then not even a God can know.

God Bless.

 

[stevevw]

That's right. There is nothing that happens that wasn't determined by antecedent conditions. Yes, 'everything has a physical and reducible cause'. Every decision you make is determined. If that's not true then give me an example of when that hasn't happened. If you say there times when your decisions are not determined then show me.

I already did that. Phenomena like conscious experience and belief cannot be reduced to physical reductionism. So any knowledge that comes from these experiences that influences our choices and behaviour at the very least has no reducible physical cause. Or may override the physical causes through our intentions and agency.

Yes, it applies to all of them. If not, then give me an example of your first item - intention. Give me an example of something that you intended to do that wasn't determined by something.

Intention means a conscious awareness of that which is being experienced and attended to. It doesn't matter about the causes involved because the engagement of our minds opens up for non reductionist influences to over ride those physical causes.

Its not about having no physical causes but that conscious humans can overide those physical causes or at least influences the outcomes. When we believe we have control, have a meaningful imput into outcomes, self determination and agency this is based on experiential phenomena of reality. To us that is the concrete evidence of our free will, how we are participators in creating reality.

So the evidence is from phenomenal experiences and beliefs. There is plent of evidence for this. Just ask the experiencer. They will believe its fact for good reasons, their own experiences can alter reality. In fact I would say there are more witnesses for this and repeated testing than there would be for whether the earth is a phere or flat. Or whether a man can become a women lol.

 

[Bradskii]

I already did that.

No, you haven't. You just say that it can't be 'reduced to physical reductionism'. Which literally makes no sense in this context. Just tell somthing that you intended to do for which there was no reason. For which you there was no cause.

Intention means a conscious awareness of that which is being experienced and attended to. It doesn't matter about the causes involved because the engagement of our minds opens up for non reductionist influences to over ride those physical causes.

Its not about having no physical causes but that conscious humans can overide those physical causes or at least influences the outcomes.

Then give me an example.

So the evidence is from phenomenal experiences and beliefs. There is plent of evidence for this.

So...still waiting for an example that we can examine.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

Come on people want justice as retribution and for wrong doers especially when henious to suffer. They demand justice like the injustices done to blacks. They don't just want just punishment. they want heads to roll. But still the logic is incoherent. Those who do wrong cannot help it and we usually excuse them, like self defence.

This is just an expansion of the principle of excusing people on self defence and mitigating circumstances which deminish punishment or completely excuses the person from responsibility.

Generally speaking, yes.

Quite. There is an argument that 'people', particularly the victims (if any), want retribution in the name of justice, but this is an attitude that depends on the belief that the perpetrator could have done otherwise in that particular circumstance - and, in any case, ISTM that the idea that justice can mean making someone suffer simply to satisfy someone else's feelings of injury or outrage needs examination - appropriate restitution or reparation (where possible) seems a more civilised approach...

 

[Bradskii]

Quite. There is an argument that 'people', particularly the victims (if any), want retribution in the name of justice, but this is an attitude that depends on the belief that the perpetrator could have done otherwise in that particular circumstance - and, in any case, ISTM that the idea that justice can mean making someone suffer simply to satisfy someone else's feelings of injury or outrage needs examination - appropriate restitution or reparation (where possible) seems a more civilised approach...

You're right. And it's so ingrained that as much as I would argue against retribution, I would demand it if someone were to harm my family.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

I was going to say that some people suggest what is in effect dualism. But you asked for a coherent alternative, so...

Even in dualism, a choice must either be made for a reason, i.e. determined by prior events, or for no reason, i.e. random.

IOW, the question is whether there is a coherent '3rd way' that is neither deterministic nor random.

The idea that free will means the capacity to do what you want, unconstrained and uncoerced by external factors, also fails if you accept that we are entirely the product of external factors - we are coerced and constrained by our feelings, which are ultimately beyond our conscious control, and also by our knowledge, understanding, and beliefs.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

To anyone else wondering how to engage with this person, I present this:

Interesting video - although I have my doubts that the presenter was once an atheist as he claims, partly because of his exaggerated cariciatures of atheists, but mainly when he suggests that, "Atheists reject God because they think they are God", and "Atheism is about rebellion", which are both common non-atheist misunderstandings of atheist views about deities. The first is contradictory by definition; the second might be better with 'rejection' instead of 'rebellion', but that still wouldn't apply to the majority of atheists who no more reject God than they reject pixies or ghosts - they just think they're all imaginary.

 

[stevevw]

No, you haven't. You just say that it can't be 'reduced to physical reductionism'. Which literally makes no sense in this context.

It makes every sense in the context of free will. Free will is not itself something that can be reduced to physical reductionism. No more than agency, conscious experience or morality. These are abstract ideas about an aspect of reality that transcends the reductionist physicalism.

When you ask for evidence of physical reductionism your speaking a different language, a different category for the type of evidence we need for free will and experiences. Its like asking give me a physical reductionist cause of conscious experience. It cannot be done because they are different phenomena. One is quantitative and the other qualitative.

So all I can do is use our direct conscious experience of free will for which we believe as humans that its real. As real as the planet we live on. Just measured in a different way to physical stuff like rocks, chemicals and particles.

Just tell somthing that you intended to do for which there was no reason. For which you there was no cause.

Like I said our phenomenal experiences. Its knowledge of reality beyond the physical. We sense and live it everyday. Its the stuff that transcends the physical stuff. We know its real because we have direct engagement with our with our experiences with reality. It allows us to transcend physical reality with our choices and agency.

Then give me an example.

So...still waiting for an example that we can examine.

I've given examples of phenomenal experiences, belief, the knowledge we gain from our experiences and how we can use that to make choices in the world that make a difference to reality.

In some ways even QM supports this. Some interpretations make the observers choices what creates reality. In soime ways psychology supports the ability of mind over matter. The whole idea of therapy is to free oneself from that which binds us to be free to make different choices. To develop self determination as a way of overcoming psychological problems.

 

[stevevw]

Even in dualism, a choice must either be made for a reason, i.e. determined by prior events, or for no reason, i.e. random.

IOW, the question is whether there is a coherent '3rd way' that is neither deterministic nor random.

The idea that free will means the capacity to do what you want, unconstrained and uncoerced by external factors, also fails if you accept that we are entirely the product of external factors - we are coerced and constrained by our feelings, which are ultimately beyond our conscious control, and also by our knowledge, understanding, and beliefs.

Wrong post

 

[stevevw]

I wanted to post this generally rather than to one person.

I think we can overcome feelings and see things for what they are and then make real choices that change things. Even going against the causes and despite the deterministic processes. I* mean facts over feelings. We can know a fact and that our feelings are wrong and then make a choice based on the facts and not the feelings. Thats called change.

Lets say for example that the hypothesis that consciousness is prevasive throughout the universe and reality. Here we have a non deterministic aspect of reality. It cannot be reduced to the physical and deterministic and reducible processes.

Now if this is the case suddenly we are not just passive lumps of phyical stuff subject to the causes of other physical stuff. We are actually part of the equation rather than acted upon and can break that chain of physical cause and effect. Like Wheelers Participatory Principle. Conscious observers participate and are entangled in the outcomes of reality.

So in that sense our consciousness is not caused by anything physical which determinism is based on. Theres a subjective aspect to reality that can control certain outcomes in principle. So fundementally we are talking about a completely different category of reality that cannot be reduced to deterministic causes. Asking for deterministic causes is not even wrong, its a completely different way to look at free will.

Its like making humans robots limited to their mechanistic operations, Whereas consciousness is like the ghost in the machine. We cannot even understand it let alone say it been caused by the machine or has nothing to do with free will.

Put it this way I think logically free will, proper free will like libitarian free will is more related to the transcedent mind and abstract human ideas than any physical process like brain neurons or chemicals and a better inference for free will that the wires, electrical signals, programs and physical stuff.

 

[Bradskii]

I've given examples of phenomenal experiences, belief, the knowledge we gain from our experiences and how we can use that to make choices in the world that make a difference to reality.

OK, you have a belief about something. You were told about it, or read about it and the information that you received convinced you of it. And you can't decide to be convinced. You either are or you are not. If you think of a belief that you now have, then you can't 'unbelieve' it. That's not under your control. And that belief will then determine your future choices. You will make decisions because you believe it. Based on that belief.

You are given knowledge. Something is explained to you. You accept it as being true. And again, you have no choice. You can't decide to think something is false if you have already been convinced that it's true. Now that knowledge, like the belief, is one of the antecedent conditions that determine what you will do.

You don't, and you cannot, make decisions in a vacuum. You need information. You need knowledge. You need to believe that if you do X then Y will be the result. And your decision to do X or not will be based on the information that you have. It will be based on the knowledge that you have been given. It will be determined by the experiences that you have had. It will be based on the beliefs that you hold.

Every single thing that you do you will do because of what has gone before. All the factors that are relevant to your choice will determine that choice. I've explained to you how it works using the concepts of belief and knowledge and experience that you have suggested. If it doesn't work in that way, then give me an example when that doesn't happen.