[mszlazak]

Originally Posted by Interesting Ian

Unknown Author


I disagree with this. *I* determine which choice is made.



Not true, I may have made my mind up about something.



How is the concept of the self obscure?



But this just flies in the face of our experience. One might be starving -- thus one desires very much indeed to consume food. Yet we know through our immediate experience that we can deny ourselves.

So what would this author say about that? The only thing he could say is that in fact denying myself food -- contrary to appearances -- is actually my greatest desire! In which case I say that's fine. But in that case one is not really saying anything of any substance. Because whatever we do is by definition our greatest desire. However it doesn't constitute any difficulty for the notion that a desire can arise spontaneously, unpredictable from the previous physical state of the world or even ones prior psychological state.




This "thing" is our self which is distinct from our reason, character, desires or whatever.



What problem??



This is just complete nonsense!

There's some confusion about the notion of causation. Claiming that X causes Y is naive. In reality often there's a network of cause and effect so that many factors have to be present (necessary conditions) before X causes Y. It may be the case that A, B and C have to happen, or be in place, in addition to X happening before Y occurs. We can still say X causes Y, but equally we could say any of the others causes Y too (or at least have to be present before Y happen).

So reasons do indeed cause us to act, but nevertheless the willingness of the self to act upon that reason also has to be present.




It may be hard for you perhaps, but it certainly isn't for me. This ""something"" is simply the self.



These are just competing desires. As pointed out before, the decision whether I shoot or not can always be defined as the greatest desire. But if so this is just a trivial truth. The point is that it seems I can decide to shoot, but spontaneously, at the very last second, decide not to. And it is the self which finally decides whether to shoot or not. The self which is quite distinct from ones character, ones intelligence, ones memories, ones interests etc.

I'll need to respond to the rest in a separate post since there seems to be a limit to the amount of text one can post.

Originally Posted by Interesting Ian

Nonsense. To repeat myself X,Y and Z may all be causes of A. But they all need to be present before A occurs. Likewise reasons for action might very well need to be present. But it still requires the decision of the self to act upon those reasons.

What the author doesn't appear to understand is that one can make an arbitrary (albeit not random) choice. If I'm driving along in a car, and I am lost, and I come to a T junction, I can decide to turn either left or right. Reasons and desires may not come into it, so according to the author it would then be impossible for me to choose. Nope, impossible for an android perhaps, but not me. Of course, to reiterate if I decide to turn left one can always claim that deep down I desired this course of action, but then, as explained before, that's not really saying anything.



Complete nonsense. Reasons, desires as well as the decision of the self are all vital ingredients of ones actions. They all cause ones actions in the same way that X, Y and Z all have to occur and all cause A to happen. The conceivability of acting against ones desires and interests and reasons need not imply that I would ever actually do so. If I spotted a £50 in the street I would pick it up and put it in my pocket. I would never ever not do so. So reasons and desires very much dictate my behaviour. But to my mind it is absurd to say that it is impossible that I would not pick it up. Impossible for a robot, but not for people.




It would not happen. They would choose the same. Or at least it could only happen if some random element was introduced into one or both Universes.



{shrugs} In that case I don't subscribe to Libitarianism.

Er, mszlazak? No point in me addressing the rest now it's transpired I'm not a libertarian is there?

Anyway, I agree entirely about the 2 Universes. So I'll miss all that out.



Absolutely not. He's presupposing the correctness of the materialist metaphysic.



So I agree with Libertarians on this issue but not the 2 Universes thought experiment (unless this author is attacking a strawman).



Absolute nonsense. To quote my essay on my website (near the end):

It seems to me that we have this concept of the self which in one sense changes, but yet without changing what we essentially are. To elucidate; although our apparent personality, and intelligence, and interests may change radically throughout our lives, nevertheless we feel very strongly that there is a real sense in which we are one and the very same person throughout our lives. Thus despite, for example, our 5 year old self, our sober adult self, or our drunk adult self exhibiting quite radically different personality traits, and having differing intelligence and differing interests, we are still generally very firmly convinced that we are literally the same self throughout our lives and therefore throughout these various differing mind states.

But how can this be? If my adult self has radically different interests, intelligence and, broadly speaking, an apparently quite different personality from when I was a child, then how can it be argued I am still one and the very same person? I suggest the puzzlement here is simply a failure to recognize a distinction between consciousness and that which is the subject of such conscious experiences. Or to put it another way: I propose experiences are had by an experiencer (self). Thus there is no difficulty in supposing that experiences can differ quite radically in nature and yet be had by the very same experiencer or self. The opponents of such a view are implicitly supposing that a person is simply the sum of various conscious experiences rather than the author of such experiences. This notion of a self I propose is known in philosophical parlance as a substantial self.



On the contrary -- it is momumentally counter intuitive. Read my essay to see why.

Briefly until I come back later to this thread.

Ian your remarks are contradictory and I'm starting to suspect that you really are not a libertarian but a determinist that hasn't realized it yet.

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