Article on free will in Wired. Based on research.

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Originally Posted by Open Mind

Paul , forget the word 'Libertarian' .... I don't know the historical origin but it is possibly a strawman used by determinists to make freewill sound difficult concept.... it isn't.

Then please define what you mean by freewill.

No. I don't think so. What is the problem? Classical causality = the law of cause and effect. When we apply this to the mind we have cause = freewill ..... effect = fate ...... in otherwords we have freewill how we react to our fate, which in turn will create another effect/fate and freewill how we react to it and so on ..... freewill and fate are two sides of the same coin of cause and effect.

Please define this "freewill" that is the cause. What causes it; how is it determined; what process produces it?

Now there is no problem here either with the conscious/freewill mind being a casual mind and the subconscious mind being the habitual effects of the conscious mind.

There is a big problem: You have not defined what you mean by freewill.

Solved.

Only in your own mind.

Do you understand that you have not defined freewill?

~~ Paul

[Open Mind]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

Probably, although we may have different definitions of some of the terms she used.

You say we have freewill, Blackmore says we don't .... you obviously don't agree on the very meaning of the word 'freewill'?

'...... all human actions, whether conscious or not, come from complex interactions between genes, memes and all their products in complicated environments. The self is not the initiator of actions, it does not 'have' consciousness and does not 'do' the deliberating. There is no truth in the idea of an inner self inside my body that controls my body and is conscious. Since this is false, so is the idea of my conscious self having free-will.

Dennet (1984) has described many versions of the idea of free will and argues that some of them are worth wanting. Unlike Dennet I neither think the 'user illusion' is benign , nor do I want any version of free will that ascribes it to a self who does not exist.

Sue Blackmore – The Meme Machine, Page 237

[Open Mind]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

Please define this "freewill" that is the cause.

I would say freewill = awareness of having a degree of choice and making a choice

What causes it: how is it determined; what process produces it?

Does anyone know? All I am saying is the materialist's argument doesn't work , there is something wrong with it.

Why? Because there is no evolutionary advantage to unconscious processes becoming conscious, if consciousness is an illusion generated by the unconscious processes, there is no evolutionary advantage in a sense of conscious freewill either, if all choices are unconsciously made in brain prior to sense of freewill . ... this is an internal contradiction of materialist logic and a violation of materialist's natural selection, materialism is not enough IMHO...

Materialism reduces a sense of consciousness and a sense of freewill to pointless delusion, epiphenomena with no survival advantage other than self deception? Whose benefit is the self deception of freewill for? The materialist must answer it is for the benefit of the consciousness which is in turn is also viewed as a self deception? .

Open Mind ...
Solved.

When I said 'solved' I meant there is no need to view 'Libertarian Freewill' as the only alternative to materialistic type of solutions. In response to the common question 'is life fate or freewill?' ....I was saying it is both. Our freewill is a cause, the effect is fate... the materialist is arguing fate is the cause, freewill is the effect. The exact opposite of our experience.

[Interesting Ian]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

Originally Posted by Ian
The definition of any word is arbitrary. The point is that free will has a particular meaning.

Paul
Which would be what, exactly?

You've read my blog entry. Let me repeat the relevant part:

We tend to think of our behaviour as being a result of our desires and intentions. Thus, for example, in waking up in the morning I might have the choice of having either porridge, or eggs and bacon for breakfast. I am immediately aware of having the power to choose which to have. I might choose eggs and bacon because I prefer the taste. Or I might choose porridge, maybe not because I prefer the taste, but because I am concerned with my weight or health. But whatever I choose it seems for all the world that it is my choice, and it is ultimately my choice even though I might be heavily influenced in making one choice or the other. Thus I may have no problems with my health and weight, have no ethical problems with eating meat, and vastly prefer the taste of eggs and bacon. Therefore it would seem I have no reason to choose to eat porridge for breakfast and every reason to eat eggs and bacon instead. Yet, notwithstanding all of this, I nevertheless still appear to have the power to choose to eat porridge. This power to choose between alternatives is what most of us tend to refer to as free will.

Ian
I don't believe that free will has a mechanism. I do not subscribe to the mechanistic philosophy -- as I've repeated to you over and over and over again. And I don't understand what "libertarian" free will means.

Paul
Then choose a word other than mechanism. It is a process, or an algorithm, or a device, or something.

It is? Why do you say that?

There has to be a sequence of steps that one goes through to make a free choice. Please describe the steps, paying particular attention to the part that is neither predetermined nor random.

I decide to do something, decide to move my body in the appropriate way, then it happens.

Ian
As I keep explaining ad nauseum a decision or choice by definition is not non-conscious. Otherwise we would need to say a statue chooses to remain still.

Paul
No, we wouldn't. We can simply say that statues don't make choices.

What about a moving object? Say the Earth orbiting the Sun? And if that doesn't make a choice either how can you say that we do??

Ian
We're in full control. I do not make decision as to put one foot in front of another, but I do choose to walk to a particular destination. Whilst I am walking I am on "autopilot", but at any time my conscious will can intervene to abort my walking.

Paul
But it would be too late, because you would have already walked off the cliff. You must decide to continue walking toward the destination, self-correcting along the way, or you have no idea where you will end up. You must make a sequence of decisions to keep yourself on the path.

You're simply using a different definition of choice that I do. Choosing which University degree to do, and "choosing" to keep my balance when I walk along are very different. It just causes confusion and endless pointless arguments when you conflate the two. That goes for consciousness too where you and other materialists keep redefining it as a physical process.

Ian
So computers make decisions?

Paul
Yes.

Let's make this very simple and consider the case of a pocket calculator. If I punch in 2 + 3 and it displays 5, it is extremely confusing to say that it chooses to display 5.

If you say that is ultimately all that we human beings do, then you are presupposing the materialist metaphysic. I maintain that under such a metaphysic free will and choices are an illusion.

[David Bailey]

Ian,

You have to realise (well I expect you do really) that those materialists that need to argue that all mental activity is equivalent to clockwork, do so by changing the meaning of phrases like "free will" and "consciousness" to try to fit what they think reality must be. After that, they get exasperated with people that want to use these words with their original meaning!

David

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Originally Posted by Open Mind

You say we have freewill, Blackmore says we don't .... you obviously don't agree on the very meaning of the word 'freewill'?

Where did I say we have "freewill"? Haven't I been asking for a definition?

I would say freewill = awareness of having a degree of choice and making a choice

Making a choice how?

Does anyone know? All I am saying is the materialist's argument doesn't work , there is something wrong with it.

So you're blabbing on and on about freewill without knowing what you're talking about? I thought that was the case.

Why? Because there is no evolutionary advantage to unconscious processes becoming conscious, if consciousness is an illusion generated by the unconscious processes, there is no evolutionary advantage in a sense of conscious freewill either, if all choices are unconsciously made in brain prior to sense of freewill . ... this is an internal contradiction of materialist logic and a violation of materialist's natural selection, materialism is not enough IMHO...

All choices are not made prior to a sense of will! That would require that I make all my choices the instant I am born, because pretty soon thereafter the feeling of will sets in.

Materialism reduces a sense of consciousness and a sense of freewill to pointless delusion, epiphenomena with no survival advantage other than self deception?

No, it doesn't. But apparently you are going to ignore everything I've proposed about the evolution of will, just so you can beat up on materialists.

When I said 'solved' I meant there is no need to view 'Libertarian Freewill' as the only alternative to materialistic type of solutions. In response to the common question 'is life fate or freewill?' ....I was saying it is both. Our freewill is a cause, the effect is fate... the materialist is arguing fate is the cause, freewill is the effect. The exact opposite of our experience.

But you refuse to describe the source of your free will decisions. So your version of free will is a textbook case of a god of the gaps argument.

~~ Paul

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Originally Posted by Ian

We tend to think of our behaviour as being a result of our desires and intentions. Thus, for example, in waking up in the morning I might have the choice of having either porridge, or eggs and bacon for breakfast. I am immediately aware of having the power to choose which to have. I might choose eggs and bacon because I prefer the taste. Or I might choose porridge, maybe not because I prefer the taste, but because I am concerned with my weight or health. But whatever I choose it seems for all the world that it is my choice, and it is ultimately my choice even though I might be heavily influenced in making one choice or the other. Thus I may have no problems with my health and weight, have no ethical problems with eating meat, and vastly prefer the taste of eggs and bacon. Therefore it would seem I have no reason to choose to eat porridge for breakfast and every reason to eat eggs and bacon instead. Yet, notwithstanding all of this, I nevertheless still appear to have the power to choose to eat porridge. This power to choose between alternatives is what most of us tend to refer to as free will.

This does not clarify whether you have a libertarian or compatibilist view of free will.

It is? Why do you say that?

Because if there is no process that leads from your current state of mind to your decision, then the decision is random. Either it's determined or it's random. Until you can describe a process that is not wholly determined/random, you've got nothing.

I decide to do something, decide to move my body in the appropriate way, then it happens.

How do you decide?

What about a moving object? Say the Earth orbiting the Sun? And if that doesn't make a choice either how can you say that we do??

Because we use a much more complex decision making process, which I choose to call a decision.

You're simply using a different definition of choice that I do. Choosing which University degree to do, and "choosing" to keep my balance when I walk along are very different. It just causes confusion and endless pointless arguments when you conflate the two. That goes for consciousness too where you and other materialists keep redefining it as a physical process.

I agree that I have a different definition, but that is not the source of the arguments. The source of the arguments is that you cannot identify a decision-making means that is neither deterministic nor random.

Let's make this very simple and consider the case of a pocket calculator. If I punch in 2 + 3 and it displays 5, it is extremely confusing to say that it chooses to display 5.

Agreed. I think there needs to be more complexity before I'd use the word choose.

I'm perfectly happy to abandon the use of the word choice except for conscious human decisions. It makes no difference to me. The point is that you have no way of making choices except for deterministic/random. You have no description of the sort of free will you desire.

~~ Paul

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Originally Posted by David

You have to realise (well I expect you do really) that those materialists that need to argue that all mental activity is equivalent to clockwork, do so by changing the meaning of phrases like "free will" and "consciousness" to try to fit what they think reality must be. After that, they get exasperated with people that want to use these words with their original meaning!

Wrong. I get exasperated because those people won't specify these elusive "original meanings" that they are supposedly using.

You people have not specified what you mean by free will. It's really that simple.

~~ Paul

[David Bailey]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

Wrong. I get exasperated because those people won't specify these elusive "original meanings" that they are supposedly using.

You people have not specified what you mean by free will. It's really that simple.

~~ Paul

Ultimately you can only define things in terms of other things, and if you keep on doing that you end up in an infinite regress - you can't always work with definitions. Nobody who was not immersed in this debate would understand how anyone could ask for the meaning of free will!!

Even mathematical theories end up with axioms. If we can't accept the concepts such as personal free will, how can we accept any of maths or science - maybe our heads are filled with clockwork mechanisms that make logical falsehoods look like truth!

David

[Interesting Ian]

Originally Posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos

This does not clarify whether you have a libertarian or compatibilist view of free will.

I've explained what free will means. Whether it is libertarian or compatibilist depends on what one means by these terms.

Let's take compatibilism first. It claims that determinism and free will are not mutually exclusive. But this of course depends on what you mean by "determinism". If you mean that physical reality is governed by physical laws, or that all change in the world is brought about by the innate power of physical processes, then of course it is abundantly clear that free will is not compatible with determinism.

If by "determinism" you mean that physical laws merely describe physical processes, and that causality is merely a conjunction of events like Hume argued, then free will is compatible with determinism.

Thus all physical things/processes might be conscious to a certain degree and physical laws merely describe their freely chosen behaviour. Thus the Earth orbits the Sun because it wishes to do so.

So my notion of free will may or may not be compatibilist depending on what you mean by "determinism".

Libertarian? To quote mszlazak who in turn is quoting some anonymous author. "Imagine two parallel universes, identical in every detail, and imagine a man in each universe, identical in their character and knowledge and desires and everything else, standing in totally identical circumstances. Now imagine that one of these men chooses to kill his wife, but the other man chooses not to".

This author is claiming that those who subscribe to libertarian free will must agree that it is possible for one man to kill his wife but the other wouldn't. In that case I do not subscribe to libertarian free will.

So perhaps it's the case that I neither subscribe to compatibilism or libertarianism.