My only problem with hard determinism

[elman]

Quote:
Originally Posted by elman
Yes I am a completely different thing than I was moments ago. I have more experinces than moments ago and different thoughts now. It is like the greek philosopher said about not being able to step into the same river twice.

Then when you say "I" you mean something completely different to what everyone else means. We all think of ourselves has having some element of continuity. You betray this in yourself, in fact, by saying "I have more experiences than moments ago" you can't have more experiences than moments ago because moments ago you did not exist - that is, if you are your mental state.

I existed moments ago. Why did you not exist moments ago?

Quote:
I would agree I am not limited to my mental state. I am also my memories and my desires and my fears and my thoughts.

How many times have I told you that those are part of your mental state? 3 times just in the post to which you are replying, and there are at least 5 other times! Are you even reading what I'm saying?

Then why use the term mental state? Just say me. I am my mental state so just leave it at I.

Quote:
OK so you have a point with objects who have no choice. Why does that relate to people with brains who do have choices?

I'll address this with the computer example later.


Quote:
As I said I am different at different points in time.

There are two possible meanings of that sentence the first one, which I agree with, is that the properties of you change over time, but there is still a continuous you underlying all of that. A piece of wax which melts is still the same piece of wax even though you can say "the wax is different."
The second meaning, the one that you must mean if "you" is identical with "your mental state" is that the referent of the word "I" changes at different points of time. This would mean you can't say, "I know more than I did yesterday" because the referent of the word I - the currently existing mental state - didn't exist yesterday.

I don't follow. Why did I not exist yesterday?
Quote:
I don't think this is correct. I have argued against both your conclusion and your premises.

Which premise in particular? (Note that the "three options" is not so much a premise as a lemma, sense it took reasoning to get there. You would have to attack the reasoning.)

Did you give me the reasoning?

Quote:
If I am my mental state then I have no problem with my decisions being controlled by my mental state- me.

There should be no problem anyway - you could still possibly have incompatibilistic free will if your mental state was not you but controlled your decision.

But I thought you were insisting it was me.

Quote:
No just a denial of your agency theory.

You are using "agency" to imply an agent - a person. I was talking in terms of causation, where anything can be an agent - a billiard ball, for example.

"If something other than your mental state (your thoughts, emotions, reasoning, sense experience, memories and so on) causes your decision, how can it be you who made the decision?"

If I am the same as my mental state then something other than my mental state did not cause the decision, because I caused my decision, otherwise the decision was not a decision and does not exist and neither does any other decision in history.


Quote:
By me being my mental state.

If you are your mental state, and something other than your mental state causes the decision, then you certainly didn't make the decision. It's easy to see: Let Y = you and M = your mental state

Using your difintion of mental state as being me than nothing other than my mental state caused the decision.
Quote:
Neither is memories.

How on earth is that relevant? You seemed to be arguing that if you were angry and didn't act on it, something outside your mental state must be restraining you.

Why is that true if my mental state and me are the same?

Quote:
Nothing.

Now we're getting somewhere.

This is equivalent to option (2) of the trichotomy. Before we go further, do you see this, do you agree with this? If nothing controls the mental state, then that is the same as saying the mental state had no cause? (Or more accurately, that the mental state had no cause which determined its contents)

If I and my mental state are the same thing yes.


Quote:
Refusing to accept my argument on your part is not a failure to justify myself on my part.

What argument? Perhaps you should state yourself in terms of premises and conclusions.

Premise: Do I have different options from which I can chose? Answer: Yes Conclusion: I have free will.

Quote:
You keep mistaking my decisions for being random.

I'm not making a mistake, I'm making a logical argument to that conclusion - if you deny that your decision was determined by something other than you, the argument (which I'm not going to repeat) is that it must be random. Just because you feel like it's not random does not mean it isn't!

It may be random to you. It is not random to me because I caused it to happen.


Quote:
They are not, I cause them. I think your are working on the assumption my prior mental state is the complete cause of my present mental state

No, your prior mental state partially causes your present mental state. External factors also cause your present mental state, in the form of sense experience. Do you agree that these are the two causes of your present mental state?

Two of the many.


Quote:
and I think you are assuming my mental state cannot be one in which I make choice.

No, that's wrong. My argument is that your mental state is determined by your previous mental state and external factors, but that you don't have infinite previous mental states, so your present mental state must be wholly determined by external factors.

I did not agree these were the only factors in determining my mental state.

How are we so far? But your present mental state is what causes your decision (right?)

No not right. My present mental state-i.e. me is what decides.

Quote:
I don't need but the one mental state in which to make a choice. You are just saying the same thing over and over and basically you are just saying I have no ability to make a choice but not providing any evidence this is correct.

No, I'm not presenting evidence, I'm presenting an argument. It's as if you don't even understand there's an argument there.

I certainly don't see a valid argument anywhere in any of this.

There is no evidence in this debate - if there were evidence, it would be science, not philosophy.

I have evidence. My observations and experience.


Quote:
No they are not similar in the question of free will. I have free will. I computer does not. It is more like the ball only more complicated.

But I'm not discussing free will not in the computer example - I'm discussing causation. So you have to tell me what exactly is different - in terms of causation - between the computer and me which prevents the analogy from working.

The computer does not cause itself to do what it does. The programing is the cause and the programing is caused by a human.

Note you can't just claim "I have free will, the computer doesn't" because firstly, that's begging the question and secondly, because the analogy is purely about causation not free will. You have to find a difference between a human and a computer in terms of causes.

Human causes the computer to do what it does.


Quote:



Quote:
Now you are getting back to the cause of the computer's action, a human with a brain.
If we were created by a God who gave us no free will your analogy would be correct.

The analogy is correct - because the analogy is determining what causes me or the computer to pick up the pencil, not about whether I or the computer was free to do it.

I pick up the pencil because I have the ability to chose to do so. The computer does it because a human had the ability to program the computer as he did.


Quote:
I am glad you brought up the computer. Yes the computer decisions related back to the human that created the compute. My decisions however do not relate back to my creator because my creator made me able to make my own decisions, not like the computers we make that are not free to make their own original decisions but are controlled completely by their programing.

Please read the example through again completely, tell me the difference between humans and computers in terms of causation, and we can talk. I'm not discussing free will yet, I'm discussing causation.

I have been talking about causation also. humans cause computer programing.

The computer's action was caused by it's CPU state.

No it was caused by the human who progamed it.

My action was caused by my mental state.

True but since you and your mental state are the same think you caused you action.

The CPU's state was caused by a previous CPU state, and some input from outside. My mental state was caused by my previous mental state and some input from outside. Where's the difference?

Humans were the input from outside and my mental state, i.e. me is not caused exclusivly by who I was yesterday and outside forces.

 

[quatona]

Correct when there is evidence the others are incorrect in their assumptions and I have no evidence that I am incorrect in my assumptions.

Since the only evidence for your take is your own self-perception I think it would be fair to give others the same courtesy of allowing them to consider their self-perception sufficient evidence.

 

[FishFace]

I existed moments ago. Why did you not exist moments ago?

We both did. But our mental state now did not exist moments ago, did it? Therefore we are not identical with our mental state.

Did you give me the reasoning?

Yes. We take the cause of your decision, which we say is something to do with your mind - i.e. part of your mental state. We ask what caused that. First we can divide that into two different options - either it was caused by something or it wasn't. Pretty simple. So we take the first option and we divide it further - either the cause was something else in your mind (part of your mental state) or it was outside your mind. Technically it could be both, but in that case we'll count that as still being in your mind. The reasoning is simple. We've just said "either this must be true or that must be true" twice.

If I am the same as my mental state then something other than my mental state did not cause the decision, because I caused my decision, otherwise the decision was not a decision

That was the point. But you don't have to be the same as your mental state, it just has to include everything in your mind at one point in time.

Using your difintion of mental state as being me

I didn't claim that, you did, but never mind.

If I and my mental state are the same thing yes.

Well... I'll take it to mean that you agree if your mental state means everything in your mind at one point in time. OK, we are considering option two of the trichotomy here. Let's remind ourselves of what that is. We have some part of your mental state causing the decision, and we ask what caused that mental state. The answer, in option 2, is "nothing."
Now, what kind of event (we can think of the creation or modification of the mental state as an event) has no cause? The only kind of event that has no cause is a truly random event - as far as I can see. If you think there's some other kind of event, what kind could that possibly be?
But if the event - the cause of your decision - is random, then the decision is also random. That is why option 2 is not an option you want to pick, understand? I'm not saying that your decision is random, I'm saying that, if you say the cause of the decision (your mental state) had no cause then your decision would be random.

Premise: Do I have different options from which I can chose? Answer: Yes Conclusion: I have free will.

A premise is a claim, not a question. I think I can see what you mean though:

Premise: If I have a different option from which I can choose, I have free will.
Premise: I have a different option from which I can choose.
Conclusion: I have free will.

That's a very simple argument, but I can question the second premise - how do you know you could actually have chosen the different option? That is a completely unfalsifiable and unverifiable claim. It's practically meaningless, in fact, because you can never make the exact same choice twice.
A little diversion here: in fact, I would say that denying the second premise is the only way in which we can have any kind of will at all, free or not. Suppose that, upon making a choice between two things, you actually might choose either option, regardless of your mental state. Then your will has absolutely no influence over your choice - because your will is part of your mental state. The only way I see that you can have free will in any meaningful sense is if you are could have chosen differently, had your will (and therefore mental state) been different. But that means you're not in the same situation - even robots can choose differently if the state of their CPU is different. I suggest you read Hume's Enquiries, the chapter "On Liberty and Necessity".

It may be random to you. It is not random to me because I caused it to happen.

See a couple of paragraphs up - if you deny that anything caused you to cause the decision then it would be random.

Two of the many.

What kind of things, other than other mental states and external reality presented to the mind by the senses, causes the present mental state? Just an example or two would be fine.

I have evidence. My observations and experience.

Why should we trust that your brain gives you an accurate insight into the workings of itself? If we successfully programmed a sufficiently complicated computer, it could perform introspection (just as Chimpanzees can, for example) it could even be programmed to "think" (for want of a better word) that it had freedom, when in fact it was entirely determined.

Quote:
No they are not similar in the question of free will. I have free will. I computer does not. It is more like the ball only more complicated.

The computer does not cause itself to do what it does. The programing is the cause and the programing is caused by a human.
Human causes the computer to do what it does.

Ah, a good response. However, the programming is part of the computer, is it not? So by that token, the computer does cause itself to do what it did.
It would be easier if you understood the exact relation between you and your mental state - your mental state is like the current state of the program in the computer. (I do not mean to say by this that you actually have a program running.)
Your mental state is part of you, and so, by the same token as with the computer, you (which includes your mental state) cause your action.
The source of the computers current state is its program, whose cause is a human being.
The source of our current (mental) state is what is under dispute. I think this is the key to the next stage of the debate - resolving our differences on what exactly "goes into" making our present mental state - the floor is yours.

" The computer's action was caused by it's CPU state."

No it was caused by the human who progamed it.

Your statement is correct, but it doesn't contradict mine. Remember, causation is transitive. So I am saying that the computer's action was caused by it's CPU state, but that was caused by its previous CPU state, which was caused by the one before that, which was caused by the one before that ........ which was caused by the program, which was caused by the human. Any and all of those are causes.

 

[elman]

Since the only evidence for your take is your own self-perception I think it would be fair to give others the same courtesy of allowing them to consider their self-perception sufficient evidence.

I do. What I am resisting is their telling me my perceptions are incoorect.

 

[FishFace]

I do. What I am resisting is their telling me my perceptions are incoorect.

Tell me, why should I believe your perceptions are correct? Again, read Libet, Mind Time and you'll find out that your perceptions are almost certainly incorrect in this area!

EDIT: besides, the entire point of the debate is questioning the assumption "my perception of having a choice means I could have chosen differently given the exact same circumstances." When you are dealing with someone who questions that premise, it makes no sense to use that premise to argue against them. It would be like telling an atheist that they ought to believe in God because God told us to.

 

[elman]

Originally Posted by elman
I existed moments ago. Why did you not exist moments ago?

We both did. But our mental state now did not exist moments ago, did it? Therefore we are not identical with our mental state.

This is not logical. I and my mental state existed moments ago and we still do although slightly changed by the interval of time.

Quote:
Did you give me the reasoning?

Yes. We take the cause of your decision, which we say is something to do with your mind - i.e. part of your mental state. We ask what caused that. First we can divide that into two different options - either it was caused by something or it wasn't. Pretty simple. So we take the first option and we divide it further - either the cause was something else in your mind (part of your mental state) or it was outside your mind. Technically it could be both, but in that case we'll count that as still being in your mind. The reasoning is simple. We've just said "either this must be true or that must be true" twice.

I chose the both option, then neither has to be true to the exclusion of the other.

Quote:
If I and my mental state are the same thing yes.

Well... I'll take it to mean that you agree if your mental state means everything in your mind at one point in time. OK, we are considering option two of the trichotomy here. Let's remind ourselves of what that is. We have some part of your mental state causing the decision, and we ask what caused that mental state. The answer, in option 2, is "nothing."

No the anwer is I caused it if I am my mental state.

Now, what kind of event (we can think of the creation or modification of the mental state as an event) has no cause? The only kind of event that has no cause is a truly random event - as far as I can see.

No if I chose it and I cause it, it is not random.

I'm not saying that your decision is random, I'm saying that, if you say the cause of the decision (your mental state) had no cause then your decision would be random.

And I am saying if it has no cause but me it is not random.

Quote:
Premise: Do I have different options from which I can chose? Answer: Yes Conclusion: I have free will.

A premise is a claim, not a question. I think I can see what you mean though:

Premise: If I have a different option from which I can choose, I have free will.
Premise: I have a different option from which I can choose.
Conclusion: I have free will.

That's a very simple argument, but I can question the second premise - how do you know you could actually have chosen the different option?

Because in similar circumstances in the past I did chose the different option.

That is a completely unfalsifiable and unverifiable claim.

It is also a completely unverifiable claim that I was not able to chose the other option.

It's practically meaningless, in fact, because you can never make the exact same choice twice.

But being able to make the similar choices twice is some evidence of my perception being correct.

A little diversion here: in fact, I would say that denying the second premise is the only way in which we can have any kind of will at all, free or not. Suppose that, upon making a choice between two things, you actually might choose either option, regardless of your mental state. Then your will has absolutely no influence over your choice - because your will is part of your mental state. The only way I see that you can have free will in any meaningful sense is if you are could have chosen differently, had your will (and therefore mental state) been different. But that means you're not in the same situation - even robots can choose differently if the state of their CPU is different. I suggest you read Hume's Enquiries, the chapter "On Liberty and Necessity".

I have to deny I have options from which I can chose in order to have free will? Not understandable.

Quote:
It may be random to you. It is not random to me because I caused it to happen.

See a couple of paragraphs up - if you deny that anything caused you to cause the decision then it would be random.

This is the conclusion you want to reach. It is not true.

Quote:
Two of the many.

What kind of things, other than other mental states and external reality presented to the mind by the senses, causes the present mental state? Just an example or two would be fine.

We can be influenced by many things and we can decided to do things that influence our moods. No one really knows all the things that go into a decision being made. We don't understand that anymore than we can explain consciousness.

Quote:
I have evidence. My observations and experience.

Why should we trust that your brain gives you an accurate insight into the workings of itself?

Why would we assume it is delusional?

If we successfully programmed a sufficiently complicated computer, it could perform introspection (just as Chimpanzees can, for example) it could even be programmed to "think" (for want of a better word) that it had freedom, when in fact it was entirely determined.

No you have not yet been able to build a robot that can truly think, not even as good as a monkey.

Quote:
No they are not similar in the question of free will. I have free will. A computer does not. It is more like the ball only more complicated.


Quote:
The computer does not cause itself to do what it does. The programing is the cause and the programing is caused by a human.
Human causes the computer to do what it does.

Ah, a good response. However, the programming is part of the computer, is it not? So by that token, the computer does cause itself to do what it did.
It would be easier if you understood the exact relation between you and your mental state - your mental state is like the current state of the program in the computer. (I do not mean to say by this that you actually have a program running.)
Your mental state is part of you, and so, by the same token as with the computer, you (which includes your mental state) cause your action.

Only in the sense that a generator is part of a car, so the generator causes the car to run.

The source of the computers current state is its program, whose cause is a human being.
The source of our current (mental) state is what is under dispute. I think this is the key to the next stage of the debate - resolving our differences on what exactly "goes into" making our present mental state - the floor is yours.

I can program myself. A computer cannot originate a program.

" The computer's action was caused by it's CPU state."


Quote:
No it was caused by the human who progamed it.

Your statement is correct, but it doesn't contradict mine. Remember, causation is transitive. So I am saying that the computer's action was caused by it's CPU state, but that was caused by its previous CPU state, which was caused by the one before that, which was caused by the one before that ........ which was caused by the program, which was caused by the human. Any and all of those are causes.

You are talking about a cause in the chain of causes and I am talking about an original cause, one not caused by a prior cause and not random.

 

[quatona]

I do. What I am resisting is their telling me my perceptions are incoorect.

I was under the impression that you concluded from your own self-perception on the human condition in general. Maybe I misunderstood.

If you personally feel you are choosing that´s no problem for me.

 

[elman]

I was under the impression that you concluded from your own self-perception on the human condition in general. Maybe I misunderstood.

If you personally feel you are choosing that´s no problem for me.

I assume that since I have free will, everyone is like me and also has free will, but I have no problem with people disagreeing with me on anything.

 

[elman]

=FishFace;41905467]Tell me, why should I believe your perceptions are correct? Again, read Libet, Mind Time and you'll find out that your perceptions are almost certainly incorrect in this area!

Just tell me why my perceptions are almost certainly incorrect. I don't have the time or inclination to read libet.

EDIT: besides, the entire point of the debate is questioning the assumption "my perception of having a choice means I could have chosen differently given the exact same circumstances." When you are dealing with someone who questions that premise, it makes no sense to use that premise to argue against them. It would be like telling an atheist that they ought to believe in God because God told us to.

My assumption based on my perceptions that I have options, and make choices, is not at all like telling an atheist they ought to believe in God because God told us to.

 

[FishFace]

This is not logical. I and my mental state existed moments ago and we still do although slightly changed by the interval of time.

No, your mental state is momentary - it is the sum of your thoughts, emotions, perceptions, memories and so on. When one of your emotions changes, or if you get another memory, then the sum of those things - your mental state - is new. It has never existed before.
The state of a snooker game is the position and velocities of all the balls. When you hit a ball, you get a new set of positions, a new state. Saying that a person is the same as their mental state is like saying a snooker game is the same as the position and velocities of all the balls - doesn't make sense, because the positions change.

I chose the both option, then neither has to be true to the exclusion of the other.

Doesn't work because, if you say it had causes both internal and external, then we take the internal part and ask again, "what caused that." The external causes are irrelevant because they don't help you at all. This means that choosing both is just like choosing only internal - because I end up asking, "what is the cause of this (internal) cause." Even if you answer "both" for ever, then eventually you will run out of internal causes because you can't have caused things before you existed.

No the anwer is I caused it if I am my mental state.

We're not asking what caused the decision any more, we're asking what caused the cause. What did cause the cause? What caused that? What caused that? If I ask this ad infinitum you will run out of things to answer with. You can't say the same thing twice because things can't cause themselves.

No if I chose it and I cause it, it is not random.

You need to look at this again because I'm not asking about the cause of the decision, I'm asking about the cause of the cause. You said that there was no cause for the cause, in which case my argument (if you go back to my post) is that your decision must be random. Think about it. Here "x <-- y" means "x was caused by y"

Decision <-- Part of your mental state <-- Nothing

If nothing caused your mental state, then your mental state was random, so your decision was random by proxy.

Note it doesn't make sense if you say you were the cause of your decision directly:

Decision <-- You <-- ?

Well, your parents presumably were the cause of you, does that mean your parents caused your decision? You see, "you" cause your decision inasmuch as your mental state (part of you) causes your decision.

And I am saying if it has no cause but me it is not random.

Don't you understand? If it has no cause but you then nothing caused you, which is clearly not the case. Consider the following causal chain:

A pool cue strikes the cue-ball. The cue ball moves. The cue ball hits a red ball. The red ball moves. The red ball falls into a pocket.

The red ball being pocketed was not caused only by the red ball moving. It was caused also by the cue ball hitting it. Equally, we can say it was caused by the pool cue hitting the cue ball. Just as well, we can say it was caused by your decision to move the cue. And again, we can say that it was caused by whatever caused your decision, and whatever caused that.
The problem is your apparent inability to grasp the difference between you causing something and something in you causing something. When "you" cause the pool cue to move, it is not you, your existence, that is doing the causing. It is your wish to win the game of pool, combined with your knowledge of the rules of pool, and so on.
They are most certainly not you - so are you the cause of moving the pool cue? No. But something in you is causing it, which is what you mean, but that kind of language is not accurate enough for philosophy.

Because in similar circumstances in the past I did chose the different option.

Similar - but not the same. By this argument, a computer has free will, because it is programmed to pick up a red pencil when its variables (x,y,z) = (0,0,1) but programmed to pick up a blue pencil when its variables are (0,0,1.000000000001).
The circumstances are similar, but not the same. So it didn't have free will. Every time in the same circumstances, it would do exactly the same thing, right? How do you know you wouldn't?

It is also a completely unverifiable claim that I was not able to chose the other option.

Of course. That is why we have to appeal to reasoning and not evidence - because there isn't, and will never be, any evidence. It is unverifiable that all water boils at 100 degrees, (under standard conditions) but I trust you still think it's true?
The thing is, if we look at a completely new physical system, do we assume that it does different things under the same circumstances, or that it operates regularly? As Hume points out, we assume that it acts regularly. If at some point it acts differently - say a computer crashes - we assume that there is some hidden difference that we were unaware of. Why do you not apply this same logic to human beings?

But being able to make the similar choices twice is some evidence of my perception being correct.

It's only evidence if it's also evidence that the computer has free will. It does different things in similar situations, and that's the only evidence you've brought up for you having free will.

I have to deny I have options from which I can chose in order to have free will? Not understandable.

Then read Hume, and a good companion to Hume. This has all been said before, many times over.

This is the conclusion you want to reach. It is not true.

What, if the cause of the cause of your decision is nothing, then your decision is not random? How can it be anything but random? The only thing without a cause I can even imagine is something random. So the cause of your decision (you say this cause is you) must be random, so the decision, too, is random.

We can be influenced by many things

And what are they, except things that are external to us, presented to the senses? Oh, I suppose if you apply magnets to the brain, then that influences you. Is that what you mean? Well, just put that under "external factors" - it makes no difference.

and we can decided to do things that influence our moods.

But that decision, of course, is part of your mental state. You've not given an example of anything really new.

No one really knows all the things that go into a decision being made. We don't understand that anymore than we can explain consciousness.

I didn't say I knew all the things, I said I knew all the types of things. I don't know every single integer, but I know that every single one is either odd or even.

Why would we assume it is delusional?

Because of this argument that I've been trying to get you to understand. You haven't even understand the precursor to it, I'm afraid, and all you've got against it is a pretty flimsy piece of self-perception. As we know - read Libet - self-perception isn't reliable.

No you have not yet been able to build a robot that can truly think, not even as good as a monkey.

Of course not, but why don't you think it's possible?

Only in the sense that a generator is part of a car, so the generator causes the car to run.

Exactly. The generator causes the running, the programming causes the action, your mental state causes your decision.
The car does not cause the running (but a part of it does)
The computer does not cause the action (but a part of it does)
You do not cause the decision (but a part of you does)

We have to use precise terminology here - this is philosophy. You are not the cause of your decision - your mental state is.

So - do you have a difference, in terms of causation, between a computer and a human? This is what I was trying to find out, and you seem to agree that your first one didn't work.

I can program myself. A computer cannot originate a program.

What reason is there to think that it could not? We have only had computers for less than 65 years. Human brains have evolving for half a billion years! There's no reason to think a computer can't be creative - if you can define creativity.

You are talking about a cause in the chain of causes and I am talking about an original cause, one not caused by a prior cause and not random.

But the human is not the original cause. In fact, as we've discussed, the human is not the cause at all. It was a collection of the human's mental states which caused the program - the human, without any mental states to do with computers, would not have caused the program at all. So the human is not the original cause. Nor is their mental state, because as you said, the mental state has a cause, which has a cause, which has a cause...

You merely assert that there can be something without prior cause that isn't random. Yet what would that be? The only things I know of, or can imagine, that have no cause, are random. If they have no cause, then there is no regularity - what happens regularly without a cause? And if there is no regularity, then it is random.

 

[quatona]

I assume that since I have free will, everyone is like me and also has free will, but I have no problem with people disagreeing with me on anything.

Fair enough. Since I have no "freewill" I will in return assume that nobody else has.
In addition I feel confirmed in my notion by the fact that neither you nor anyone else has so far given an explanation as to how "freewill" is logically possible, in the first place.

 

[FishFace]

Just tell me why my perceptions are almost certainly incorrect. I don't have the time or inclination to read libet.

Libet performed an experiment. He asked people to do something like wiggle a finger or push a button while looking at a dot rotating on a screen, and note the position of the dot, "when he/she was first aware of the wish or urge to act."
Performing the action automatically recorded the position of the dot on the screen, and the scientists later could work out the time it had been pushed in relation to when the subject thought the were going to. It turned out that there was a gap of about 200 milliseconds between "wishing" to act and actually doing it - no surprises.
However, they also attached electrodes to the subject's head, and found that the brain started preparing for the action a full half a second before the subject performed it - 300 milliseconds before they consciously knew about wanting to do it.

Now, we don't need to go into the complicated analysis here, because we're interested in a very broad conclusion - that your perception is not accurate with regard to yourself.

My assumption based on my perceptions that I have options, and make choices, is not at all like telling an atheist they ought to believe in God because God told us to.

*sigh* you are misunderstanding the analogy. The point is that you assume what you seek to convince me of, when you are trying to convince me of it. In that respect, the two arguments are exactly the same.
Of course they're different otherwise - if they were just the same argument, there'd be no point in the analogy.

 

[Patashu]

is that theoretically, and perhaps actually, all events, even his very remark, had their inevitable genesis in the early moments of the universe. What I ate for breakfast, for example, was determined by a very particular chain of cause/effect events that occurred billions of years before the Earth formed. It seems neigh impossible that within the coalescence of hydrogen atoms billions of years ago lay the inevitability of the bacon and eggs I had for breakfast, but this is what I see as hard determinism taken to its logical extreme.

Thoughts?

Well, if you take a completely deterministic system like, say, Conway's Game of Life, what happens in the 102373rd iteration is determined by what happened in the 1st iteration. What's the problem, aside from personal incredulity?

And besides, what's the alternative? If you introduce a random factor (quantum flucations, say) then the statement is now 'What I had for breakfast this morning was influenced by the specific configuration of the universe at the beginning of time plus a random factor."

 

[Washington]

Well, if you take a completely deterministic system like, say, Conway's Game of Life, what happens in the 102373rd iteration is determined by what happened in the 1st iteration. What's the problem, aside from personal incredulity?

Start with post #4.

 

[Patashu]

Start with post #4.

I said aside from personal incredulity. Something can be absurd but true.

As a thought experiment, let's say that you had precise knowledge of the initial conditions of the universe plus the rules by which it operates. Assuming some ridiculous amount of computing power as well as hard determinism you can now make accurate predictions about anything in the history or future of the universe, including what you'll have for breakfast tomorrow; you just have to simulate the universe up to that point. It'll be an exact re-creation.

Neat, huh? But I don't see what's impossible about it.

 

[Washington]

I said aside from personal incredulity. Something can be absurd but true.

Quite right, and my mistake for speed reading through your question.

As a thought experiment, let's say that you had precise knowledge of the initial conditions of the universe plus the rules by which it operates. Assuming some ridiculous amount of computing power as well as hard determinism you can now make accurate predictions about anything in the history or future of the universe, including what you'll have for breakfast tomorrow; you just have to simulate the universe up to that point. It'll be an exact re-creation.

Neat, huh? But I don't see what's impossible about it.

Neither do I. As a matter of deterministic reality it is undeniable. It's just that after the BB, when atoms had formed, their interrelationship was such that it contained the inevitable end product known as bacon and eggs for my breakfast. That if one or several atoms had not formed or been in different positions I would have had gruel instead. To put a finer point on it, determinism says that the reason I had bacon and eggs may well be that billions of years ago atom X combined with atom Y instead of atom Z. Could such an insignificant bonding, one among a kazillion [sup]kazillion[sup]kazillion[/sup][/sup], really necessitate my bacon and eggs? The likelihood boggles the mind. My mind, anyway.

 

[Patashu]

The odds of you having bacon and eggs last thursday are one in a quingabooglezillion, but the odds of you existing are only slightly greater then that. A system consisting of enormous amounts of particles all bouncing and interacting is chaotic, ie small changes in the input lead to huge changes in the output given enough time. Even the most minute of changes in the right place could have made Earth a completely different place or not a place to speak of. However, there must be a result of the system, and it happens to be what you're seeing right now.

PS: If you ever invent time travel, don't screw around with t=0.

 

[FishFace]

To put a finer point on it, determinism says that the reason I had bacon and eggs may well be that billions of years ago atom X combined with atom Y instead of atom Z. Could such an insignificant bonding, one among a kazillion [sup]kazillion[sup]kazillion[/sup][/sup], really necessitate my bacon and eggs? The likelihood boggles the mind. My mind, anyway.

It might boggle the mind but it is far from absurd. It makes perfect sense, in fact. We are used to factors, present years ago, affecting the present day via some chance sequence of events. It is the inevitable product of extending that to massive proportions.

 

[elman]

Fair enough. Since I have no "freewill" I will in return assume that nobody else has.
In addition I feel confirmed in my notion by the fact that neither you nor anyone else has so far given an explanation as to how "freewill" is logically possible, in the first place.

How did you decide to assume you have no free will?

 

[quatona]

How did you decide to assume you have no free will?

I didn´t decide it.
What determined you to believe you make choices?