This is a thread to allow discussions about how those lucky enough to have free will make decisions.
As materialism doesn’t explain squat, this thread is a place for explanations from those that presumably have them.
And if they can’t provide them, well, this will be a short thread.
So do phoodoo, mung, WJM et al care to provide your explanations of how decisions are actually made?
Neil makes a good point, I think. Just as “front loading” is a predetermined caricature of evolution, strict determinism could be said to be a caricature of a non-deterministic universe.
Fair enough. I still don’t see how that releases us from the responsibility of choice.
phoodoo,
It seems you have misunderstood the purpose of this thread. On this thread what materialism says or does not say about free will is off topic.
The sole purpose of this thread is to allow you to explain how decisions are made in phoodoo world.
I realize you want to talk about anything except that. Your constant redirection to what materialism says or does not say simply highlights your inability to explain how you make decisions, rather then distract from it as you seem to hope!
Keep up the good work!
Alan,
That’s not at all what Neil is saying.
He wrote:
That’s obviously false. Determinism isn’t tantamount to front loading, nor is it inimical to evolution.
Patrick:
Alan:
Do you mean “the responsibility of choice” in the sense of “something we have to do”, or in the sense of moral responsibility?
Since we’re held responsible by other people who’s behavior is also determined, obviously we can’t be released from that. 😉
(I haven’t pondered it deeply, in case that’s not obvious.)
Evolution in the original sense of the word meant unfolding.
Strict determinism does seem to make nonsense of contingency.
That’s what’s wonderful about this puzzle. It seems it can’t be true…..but can’t be false either! Quantum indeterminacy has seemed to some to save the day. But dice! With the universe!!!
Quantum indeterminacy really doesn’t have anything to do with strict determinism.
Odd as that sounds.
Quantum theory is strictly deterministic. If it weren’t you wouldn’t have savvy guys like Jerry Coyne saying otherwise.
Do I understand this completely? No.
But my understanding is that indeterminacy is about our ability to know. Not about determinism.
You, me, Einstein and Bohm wish that were true. But alas…
“The Schrodinger equation is perfectly deterministic. ”
“…it’s at least logically possible for a completely deterministic system to look non-deterministic to observers within it, something that I think is interesting in its own right.”
https://www.quora.com/Why-is-quantum-physics-not-deterministic
ETA,m from same link:
“First of all, it isn’t that QM isn’t deterministic, strictly speaking. It’s that when you try to interpret a result in terms of classical physics, you have to give up determinism or realism or both.”
Keep reading.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m totally on your side. But, sadly, the consensus is heavily against us. They say It’s not just about our ignorance of hidden waves.
It seems consistent with quantum theory that every possible branching actually occurs.
That makes my brain hurt, which I relieve by thinking of reality as static, when we consider time as a dimension. I equate omniscience and strict determinism.
I also share Elizabeth’s aversion to the verb to be. I wish I had the self discipline to avoid it. I don’t think existing or being means anything coherent. We say things are out of habit and convention. This usually leads to pointless and unproductive discussions.
Why not?
I’m good with the notion that we cannot and will never perceive the strict determinism of existence.
But I can’t help having the spooky feeling that I am a tepe being read, rather than an author writing one.
petrushka,
Only if you leave out wavefunction collapse.
Coyne accepts that quantum theory is non-deterministic. He just argues that this makes no difference at the level of human behavior, because the quantum non-determinism is lost in the noise.
Something analogous is true in the case of digital computers. If you initialize a computer to a given digital state and let it run in the absence of non-deterministic events (like asynchronous interrupts or refresh-induced variations in memory request latency), then the computer (assuming it isn’t broken) will advance through a strictly determined series of states. Reset it to the same initial digital state and it will trace out that same series of states. This happens because the computer is designed to be digital, not analog, so that its computational results are unaffected by the noise that inevitably afflicts electronic circuitry.
In the case of human brains, I think the analogy fails for two reasons:
1) Even if human brains were insensitive to quantum events in a way that’s analogous to computers’ insensitivity to circuit noise, you’d still have the possibility of truly non-deterministic events acting as inputs to the brain.
A contrived example: Suppose a pair of scientists are deterministically conducting an experiment involving the decay of a small sample of radioactive material. They deterministically agree to break for lunch after the next decay event occurs. After some unpredictable amount of time, the decay event non-deterministically occurs, the equipment registers it, and the scientists break for lunch.
If you could rerun the scenario, the decay event would happen at a different time, and the future histories of the scientists would be altered, potentially quite dramatically. Example: if the decay event occurs early enough, one of the scientists meets a woman at the sandwich shop and strikes up a conversation. They hit it off, date, and eventually marry, having several children.
If the decay event occurs a little bit later, they never meet, and those children never come into existence.
The moral of the story: Even a deterministic system can behave non-deterministically if provided with non-deterministic inputs, and once you’ve introduced non-determinism into the mix, its effects can persist indefinitely.
2) It’s not clear to me that neurons are insensitive to quantum “noise”; in fact, I rather suspect the opposite. I described this earlier in the thread:
petrushka,
Yes, and that’s the “many worlds” interpretation of QM. But note that when you adopt the MWI, it no longer makes sense to say that you chose X versus Y, when the choice hinges on a quantum event. You chose both. In some worlds you chose X, and in some you chose Y. The you who is asking the question will find yourself in one or the other, but they both exist.
It’s deterministic, because both choices happen, but it certainly isn’t anything like classical determinism, in which one choice happens, but it was determined.
petrushka,
You don’t think it’s coherent to distinguish between things that exist and things that don’t?!
I would disagree vehemently. I think with the rise of AI and also the questions surrounding end of life and comas that question about mind have never been more relevant.
What I find to be especially interesting is that there is really no empirical way to know if a body has a mind or not. So it’s guaranteed to be a topic that we will be talking about in the 22nd century as well
peace
Compatibalism is required to maintain God’s sovereignty over creation. If determinism does not hold then God is not in complete control of what happens.
peace
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I make decisions by deciding. Perhaps that’s what happens in phoodoo world too. Are we in phoodoo world, because if we are, doesn’t what he says go?
Not for a Keithsian Skeptic.
Either of those definitions are fine. Picking are deciding are things that minds do but computers can’t
peace
ditto. It seems to me that folks here want a step by step description of what happens when we decide. This is nothing but a huge category error. Deciding is not a step by step process. That is the whole point
peace
Mung,
Tautologies are not explanations.
It’s pretty clear at this point that none of you can explain how decisions work in your bizarro world of immaterial souls and physical bodies.
Why not admit that?
Now I’m not sure what you mean.
A metaphor is a figure of speech that represents something else. What do you think that Trinity and the incarnation represent? What is the reality behind the metaphor?
peace
How do you decide that something is a tautology rather than an explanation?
I think you need to spell out what you are looking for here. I for one have no clue what would satisfy you short of a decision algorithm.
peace
I think this is profound observation and more correct than the materialist determinists are willing to admit.
peace
This doesn’t make any sense.
Plus, who said anything about immaterial souls and physical bodies? OMagain said materialism is off topic.
Phoodoo world can be a world in which decisions “just happen,” that’s all. Like evolution.
How do decisions work? The question doesn’t even make sense.
Mung fail.
fifth,
An explanation. We’re asking for an explanation, not an algorithm.
You could start by addressing a few problems that you’ve been sweeping under the rug — problems that the physicalist handles with ease:
1) How does the immaterial soul get information from the physical world in order to make decisions? (Hint — “revelation” is not an acceptable answer.)
2) How does the immaterial soul represent and manipulate information in the process of making decisions? (Not an algorithm — a description.)
3) How does the immaterial soul, having made a decision, get the physical body to do its bidding?
Here’s how I, as a physicalist, answer the equivalent questions.
Three huge problems for dualists, all easily handled by physicalists.
A few points I shouldn’t have to make.
“No free will” does not entail:
a lack of deliberation
or planning
or understanding consequences
or learning
It’s just like ID, there’s no “there” there at all. And apparently, no real curiosity. The attempt is made to make it all magical and/or due to God somehow, and thus something that defies explanation
Somehow, I think it quite plausible that FMM doesn’t know the difference between a definition (or tautology, whatever) and an explanation.
Sometimes one thinks that there will be a spark of curiosity to be had from “immaterialists” or whatever they’re calling themselves. But any curiosity always seems to be limited to the hope that “materialism” can’t explain things, thus that ‘it’s all miraculous and not “mere atoms”‘ is all true (via fallacious thinking, that is). The fervent hope from ID to “free will” is simply that there “can be no explanation,” and we can dispense with the difficulty and uncertainties of science.
Obviously they can fully evade attempts at discovery and curiosity about what’s really going on, but it’s certainly far from the best that humanity can sometimes manage to do.
Glen Davidson
So you think it’s the same whether things were intricately planned or not, so long as it’s all deterministic?
Pretty poor thinking from both Neil and yourself.
Glen Davidson
This is just silly. Why assume dualism is the only alternative to physicalism in the first place?
To answer your question, matter has no form of its own accord, so it’s simply a mistake to think that matter informs anything at all, including an immaterial soul. You have it exactly backwards. It is matter that is informed.
ETA: Whether the soul is composed of matter and form?
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/form-matter/
But why say ‘no free will” of a world in which people can do what they want to, because they want to?
Must you have egg in your beer?
walto,
It feels like free will, but there’s no magic ingredient. Software and hardware / wetware.
Where do ‘wants’ come from?
If you have free will, do you get to choose what you want?
Do you choose to be hungry?
Not if you can’t make up your mind!
The fact that atheists even exist is the greatest argument for free will.
Laws and prior conditions. But freedom is just a matter of being able to do what one wants–wherever the wants and motives came from–isn’t it? That’s all I mean by it, anyway.
What do you mean? In w1 does what happens have to happen?
Haha, that’s poppycock.
We have already determined that the only ones who can make decisions are immaterialists. Its like asking how do you throw a ball or take a step. By putting one foot in front of the other of course. So one either makes a decision, or one sits around waiting for chemicals to move them. In your case, I guess you just wait for someone to move you?
How can you tell a person with no legs how to take a step? Its not even a relevant question. A more relevant one is, who do you wait for, to help push you around? Who do you wait for to give you a thought, since you can’t do it yourself.
Ha, yea, let’s try to figure out how this one works.
The chemicals in your brain demand that you be atheist, because, well, that is the chemical pattern they are in.
But chemical patterns aren’t based on logic, they are based on physics, because how could a chemical know what is logic, it is only a chemical which knows nothing.
So its not logical to be atheist.
Waiting for a chemical change so that my choice will be made for me.
walto,
How can a mix of chemicals do what it wants, its just a mix of chemicals. Chemicals want? Chemicals just do what physics makes them do.
Are you starting to see the biological robot conundrum your side has put yourselves in?
How can one even begin to take step two in thinking about their world, without getting past this problem first.
You are mixing up two entirely different questions here. First things first. Whatever I am–chemicals, idea in God’s mind, mix of matter and mind, neutral third stuff, whatever–the question before us is this: is my freedom a matter of doing what I want to do, because I want to do it? I say yes. What do you say?
You’re funny about this sort of thing, phoodoo. You want to know what evidence for god would be, but when asked what you mean by ‘god’ you refuse to answer. Similarly, the question of how ‘free will’ works depends on what ‘free will’ is supposed to be. Given my conception (see above), whether or not one is made solely of matter is irrelevant. Given yours, maybe it’s important–but you have to say just what that is before anybody could know that.