The illusion of free will

[Sarkus]

No it doesn't. Once again, a mere illusion of deciding to move my hand wouldn't cause my hand to move. That's why we would call it an illusion...duh!

Another example of where you blatantly and deliberately ignore previous explanations. Please stop trolling.

Then why have you consistently claimed that my choice to move my hand actually raising my hand is an illusion. Your whole argument has been framed around this impossibility of ourselves, or our wills, being the initiator of our actions. That this is only an illusion. IOW, that we are not REALLY the initiator of our actions. That other hidden causes initiate action. Are you now denying all this, that choosing to raise my hand really DOES raise my hand?

I've never denied that you choosing to raise your hand really does raise your hand.
But your freewill is not the initiator of the action. And your perception of freewill is illusory. The actual actions you perform will occur whether freewill is illusory or not.
But don't worry, there's little point in me explaining any further because you have repeatedly shown that even when I do, you ignore it and post either lies or just continue with your misunderstanding.

I already pointed out the flaw in that premise: every event that is caused is also caused.

And now you're stating tautologies ("All X are X").

Hence to the extent that freewill is a caused event does not entail that it cannot cause. Neither does the fact that freewill initiates causes entail that it must be uncaused. We simply have no examples in our experience of a caused event that doesn't cause, or of a causing event that is uncaused. This has already been pointed out to you repeatedly. I guess you forgot.

Is this a test to see how much patience I have?
Please stop trolling, MR. I'm no longer going to correct you on everything you continue to misunderstand. You have shown there is little point as you will continue with your misunderstanding regardless.
So please stop trolling.

 

[Magical Realist]

John Searle on Freewill (just 9 minutes!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rZfSTpjGl8

 

[Quantum Quack]

Obviously if you can compare actual outputs to a distribution of possible outputs, or describe the outputs WITH a probability function, then they are not the same thing. The role of a dice has an input, and then has an output. What number turns up. That output is not a distribution of possible outputs. It is an actual outcome that could have turned out differently. Are you grasping the difference between mathematical constructs and actual events yet? Can't you see that if we are comparing individual outputs with determinism, we must do the same with probabilistic indeterminism?

Say we have two sets of dice.
1] a dice set that determines a thermostats opening time. [mechanical and automatic]
2] a dice set that informs a self determined actor of the time to open the thermostat. [volition, willed, chosen]

What do you think will be the outcomes of both situations... ?
Probabilistically?
Other?
Is Item 2 able to be calculated probabilistically?
And if so and you informed the actor of the probability what do you think he would do?
NB: Sarkus you pose an interesting study in how to avoid loosing a debate. I am curious as to how you treat the above either as a debate to be won or a way to improve understanding of the nature of the issue.

 

[Quantum Quack]

The obvious question come to the fore:
If the self determined actor has the ability to choose to ignore the dice and decide for himself when the thermostat opens is he demonstrating freewill [ self determination ]? [ we may wait for an awful long time for that thermostat to open (if ever)]
Is it an illusion?
How is it that people can defy probability but the Dice can not?

 

[Quantum Quack]

edited: My statement was flawed.
posted this video instead:
Minority report
[video=youtube;q2bmImPNKbM]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2bmImPNKbM[/video]

 

[Quantum Quack]

John Searle on Freewill (just 9 minutes!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rZfSTpjGl8

great video MR!
I am amazed though how one can equate a bridge collapsing due to an earthquake with something of a completely different category that being "life".
That a human being can be reduced to being nothing more than a "dead" "billiard ball".

Until science can get close to what "life or living" actually is then it has not a lot to say about freewill IMO
The prof uses a scenario of a man in a restaurant being offered a choice between steak and fish*?
He says that if the man's choice is being determined he will simply wait for that choice to be made for him. But alas in a restaurant he and only he can decide, but he is a determinist so he starves to death while waiting for his choice to be determined. [chuckle] ( I guess then he would probably blame God (cause & Effect) for not acting and complain "Why hast thou forsaken me?")

 

[Sarkus]

Say we have two sets of dice.
1] a dice set that determines a thermostats opening time. [mechanical and automatic]
2] a dice set that informs a self determined actor of the time to open the thermostat. [volition, willed, chosen]

What do you think will be the outcomes of both situations... ?
Probabilistically?
Other?
Is Item 2 able to be calculated probabilistically?
And if so and you informed the actor of the probability what do you think he would do?

If you knew the starting conditions and the nature of all the probability functions, you could determine the probabilistic outcome of each.
Item 2 is able to be calculate probabilstically if the starting conditions and probability functions are known, and if you had computers capable of performing the calculations.
That it can't be done at a practical level does not negate that it would be theoretically possible.

NB: Sarkus you pose an interesting study in how to avoid loosing a debate. I am curious as to how you treat the above either as a debate to be won or a way to improve understanding of the nature of the issue.

There is no debate here, QQ. MR has successfully put an end to that by repeatedly trolling the same misunderstandings, despite 19 pages of trying to correct his misunderstandings.
To disagree and be able to show why is laudable, but when you continually fail to understand what it is you're disagreeing with, and thus raise irrelevant or just plain incorrect criticisms as a result, and not just to do it once but repeatedly, then there is no longer discussion. Just trolling.

 

[Quantum Quack]

If you knew the starting conditions and the nature of all the probability functions, you could determine the probabilistic outcome of each.
Item 2 is able to be calculate probabilstically if the starting conditions and probability functions are known, and if you had computers capable of performing the calculations.
That it can't be done at a practical level does not negate that it would be theoretically possible.
There is no debate here, QQ. MR has successfully put an end to that by repeatedly trolling the same misunderstandings, despite 19 pages of trying to correct his misunderstandings.
To disagree and be able to show why is laudable, but when you continually fail to understand what it is you're disagreeing with, and thus raise irrelevant or just plain incorrect criticisms as a result, and not just to do it once but repeatedly, then there is no longer discussion. Just trolling.

and if item 2 actor fails to perform as predicted what then?
Would you just simply say that you got the calculations wrong and that proves nothing...

 

[Sarkus]

The obvious question come to the fore:
If the self determined actor has the ability to choose to ignore the dice and decide for himself when the thermostat opens is he demonstrating freewill [ self determination ]? [ we may wait for an awful long time for that thermostat to open (if ever)]
Is it an illusion?
How is it that people can defy probability but the Dice can not?

We can't defy it. It just appears that we can.
The dice/thermostat system is (your option 1) is a simple system that has but one input: the dice roll.
The person has a near infinite inputs, and the internal system is rather more complicated in how it processes all those inputs.
The way it acts as a result of those inputs and that processing gives the appearance of freewill because we are not aware of either all the inputs nor the actual processing.

But again, your questions, much like MR's, show that you continue to fail to understand the basic aspects of the argument, yet you continue to raise the same flawed objections to it despite repeatedly being told of your misunderstandings.

 

[Sarkus]

and if item 2 actor fails to perform as predicted what then?

If we knew the exact starting conditions, the probabilistic function of the outputs of all the individual interactions, we would be able to describe the probabilistic outcome with 100% accuracy, theoretically.
Would we be able to predict a specific outcome? No. And to think I am saying we could would be to misunderstand what a probability function is.
If the actor had the same starting conditions and did the same exercise an infinite number of times, the distribution of outcomes would be described by the probability function.

If we roll a single six-sided die, the probability function is p(x)=1/6, but we can not predict a specific single with accuracy (expected accuracy would be 1/6). But we can know the probability function, and know from that that if we rolled the die an infinite times then it would land on each face 1/6th of the time.

 

[Sarkus]

The prof uses a scenario of a man in a restaurant being offered a choice between steak and fish*?
He says that if the man's choice is being determined he will simply wait for that choice to be made for him. But alas in a restaurant he and only he can decide, but he is a determinist so he starves to death while waiting for his choice to be determined. [chuckle] ( I guess then he would probably blame God (cause & Effect) for not acting and complain "Why hast thou forsaken me?")

I haven't watched the video yet, I am at work and don't have access.
But if that is the example the guy uses then he, like you, wholly misunderstands the argument, or quite possibly is countering a differing argument than the one I make.

His claim that the guy could wait for the his choice to be determined is flawed (if his counter is against my argument) as the determination involves, as part of that process, the same functions and outputs that we then interpret as conscious choice.
I.e. He, like you and MR, fails to realise that we would act in exactly the same manner whether freewill is illusory or not. The same way our eyes perceive optical illusions in exactly the same way even when we know them to be illusions. Our brain can not help but see it the way it sees it.

 

[Quantum Quack]

We can't defy it. It just appears that we can.
The dice/thermostat system is (your option 1) is a simple system that has but one input: the dice roll.
The person has a near infinite inputs, and the internal system is rather more complicated in how it processes all those inputs.
The way it acts as a result of those inputs and that processing gives the appearance of freewill because we are not aware of either all the inputs nor the actual processing.

But again, your questions, much like MR's, show that you continue to fail to understand the basic aspects of the argument, yet you continue to raise the same flawed objections to it despite repeatedly being told of your misunderstandings.

Oh I think I have a pretty good handle on the concepts involved and I already know that they can't ever be proven regardless of how strong belief is in them. Unfalsifiable due to the incapacity to ever be able to perform the calculations correctly or completely. Yet I wonder that this in fact may lead to the counter notion that freewill is indeed not an illusion simply because of the scale of calculating required defies comprehension. That due to the sheer volume [infinite] of data involved a huge amount of actual freedom is achieved.
Either way all this is just talking and as suggested in the video provided by MR there has been no progress in this field of inquiry for a couple of hundred years, nor I hesitate to say will there be in the future until science learns more about the nature of life, consciousness and the way we have a will to self animate and a "rock" doesn't.

 

[Quantum Quack]

I haven't watched the video yet, I am at work and don't have access.
But if that is the example the guy uses then he, like you, wholly misunderstands the argument, or quite possibly is countering a differing argument than the one I make.

His claim that the guy could wait for the his choice to be determined is flawed (if his counter is against my argument) as the determination involves, as part of that process, the same functions and outputs that we then interpret as conscious choice.
I.e. He, like you and MR, fails to realise that we would act in exactly the same manner whether freewill is illusory or not. The same way our eyes perceive optical illusions in exactly the same way even when we know them to be illusions. Our brain can not help but see it the way it sees it.

please accept that I have added to the scenario by including the death by starvation bit.. [chuckle]

 

[Quantum Quack]

As a pertinent aside;
There is a thing that I call the Probability Trap.
Years ago I suggested a web based experiment to prove the telepathic interrelationship between two rats.
Two rats, siblings of the same litter are separated after reaching 1 year of age.
One is sent to London the other is kept in Melbourne.
Both are put in complex mazes of differing design but similar size and scale.
In each maze a hidden sensor is fitted that when tripped by a rat relays a signal to the other rats maze to automatically release food in response. If no signal is sent the other rat dies.
[the sensor could be virtual, web based using real time live streaming of the mazes in use, to avoid the possibility that the sensor could be sensed by the rats.]
The question is how many rats would have to perish before a pair of rats managed to sustain indefinitely the food supply for each other.
The probability of success is very low yet at some point [millions or more rats later] we would have two rats happily suggesting a psychic connection and surviving quite well.
But of course we would declare that it is just a matter of probability that we would find two rats that somehow managed to keep each other alive with out knowing of the others existence. [thousands of kilometers apart]
And if the first pair of rats happened to be successful we would simply declare that we and they are "lucky".
So no matter what test was created to evidence psychic connectivity it could and due to fear, most likely would always be put down to probability [ coincidence or chance ]
The probability of this planet existing as it does for example is utterly staggering, yet here we are...[ mere coincidence ~ a probability function]

So to me, no matter what evidence is provided for freewill to be a reality and not an illusion, science will always cling to it's probability functions as a way of explanation because as science stands today it has no choice but to.

 

[Sarkus]

Oh I think I have a pretty good handle on the concepts involved and I already know that they can't ever be proven regardless of how strong belief is in them. Unfalsifiable due to the incapacity to ever be able to perform the calculations correctly or completely.

If the argument is valid then the conclusion does stem from the premises.
If the premises are also true then the conclusion must be true.

If all A are B, and all B are C, then logically all A are C.
I do not need to provide any further proof that all A are C other than proving the premises true.

So, can we prove that cause and effect hold? All science suggests it does. Can we provide mathematical proof? No. Science does not work that way.
Can we prove that the universe is either probabilistic or strictly deterministic? Well, that's where it probably does get tricky to demonstrate scientifically.
But that does not invalidate the argument, it merely means that if you accept the premise as true then (if the argument is valid) you must accept the conclusion as true.
If you don't accept the premise as true, why not (and arguing from consequence would be fallacious).
[quotre]Yet I wonder that this in fact may lead to the counter notion that freewill is indeed not an illusion simply because of the scale of calculating required defies comprehension. That due to the sheer volume [infinite] of data involved a huge amount of actual freedom is achieved. [/quote]Scale of calculation does/should not impact the nature of that calculation. There is undoubtedly freedom in as much as we perceive there to be so. But it may be no more freedom than a pseudo-random number generator has freedom to select between 1 and 100... We perceive that it could have selected any number, but actually it follows a deterministic process, and thus the number was always going to be that number, irrespective of our interpretation of the system.

Either way all this is just talking and as suggested in the video provided by MR there has been no progress in this field of inquiry for a couple of hundred years, nor I hesitate to say will there be in the future until science learns more about the nature of life, consciousness and the way we have a will to self animate and a "rock" doesn't.

There has been vast amounts of progress in precisely those things you mention, and in science in general, which seems to add weight to both the notion that cause and effect hold, and that the universe is either deterministic or probabilistic.
Once those notions are accepted, the conclusion holds (unless you see a flaw in the argument that does not stem from misunderstanding?). There need be no more advances to understand that. The advances will be in understanding why it is we perceive freewill the way we do.

 

[Quantum Quack]

If the argument is valid then the conclusion does stem from the premises.
If the premises are also true then the conclusion must be true.

If all A are B, and all B are C, then logically all A are C.
I do not need to provide any further proof that all A are C other than proving the premises true.

So, can we prove that cause and effect hold? All science suggests it does. Can we provide mathematical proof? No. Science does not work that way.
Can we prove that the universe is either probabilistic or strictly deterministic? Well, that's where it probably does get tricky to demonstrate scientifically.
But that does not invalidate the argument, it merely means that if you accept the premise as true then (if the argument is valid) you must accept the conclusion as true.
If you don't accept the premise as true, why not (and arguing from consequence would be fallacious).

Yet I wonder that this in fact may lead to the counter notion that freewill is indeed not an illusion simply because of the scale of calculating required defies comprehension. That due to the sheer volume [infinite] of data involved a huge amount of actual freedom is achieved.

Scale of calculation does/should not impact the nature of that calculation. There is undoubtedly freedom in as much as we perceive there to be so. But it may be no more freedom than a pseudo-random number generator has freedom to select between 1 and 100... We perceive that it could have selected any number, but actually it follows a deterministic process, and thus the number was always going to be that number, irrespective of our interpretation of the system.
There has been vast amounts of progress in precisely those things you mention, and in science in general, which seems to add weight to both the notion that cause and effect hold, and that the universe is either deterministic or probabilistic.
Once those notions are accepted, the conclusion holds (unless you see a flaw in the argument that does not stem from misunderstanding?). There need be no more advances to understand that. The advances will be in understanding why it is we perceive freewill the way we do.

You have assumed that scientific knowledge is correct and that science has no further evolving to undergo.
This is a dangerous and immature assumption and not one that most professional and erudite scientists would entertain.
I have already countered with the fact that cause and effect are illusionary temporal considerations yet this has no bearing on your position. Why not?
I have also countered with the fact that "nothing" is our greatest influence, yet you have failed to seriously consider that. Why not?

There is also in line with my thoughts you quoted above, that if influences were exactly the same value to the person, example influence a,b,c,d... all equaled 10 points each then one could suggest that if all influences were applied as equal then none would be considered as being influential individually. Does this not grant the person a freedom to choose?
When dealing with infinite influences the chance of influences being of equal value would be rather high. [ to the point of mind numbing tedium] Does this not grant freedom to choose?

eg. If a man is surrounded by influences that were all equal in appeal, does he not have freedom of choice [ according to your model ]

 

[Sarkus]

So to me, no matter what evidence is provided for freewill to be a reality and not an illusion, science will always cling to it's probability functions as a way of explanation because as science stands today it has no choice but to.

Simply untrue: science uses statistics to help ensure that only when discoveries consistently show the same thing do we consider them as relevant. Your experiment would be subject to that same rigour, and if some statistically relevant discovery was made, science would be all over it like a rash in trying to understand it.

 

[Quantum Quack]

Simply untrue: science uses statistics to help ensure that only when discoveries consistently show the same thing do we consider them as relevant. Your experiment would be subject to that same rigour, and if some statistically relevant discovery was made, science would be all over it like a rash in trying to understand it.

Yes maybe, but they would still claim it to be mere chance, until they discovered the mechanism.
and in the mean time we end up with a lot of dead rats!

 

[Quantum Quack]

Tell me Sarkus using the same rational as you have would you consider the reality of "life" to be an illusion of cause and effect?
That you and I are not really living, that the sense of being alive is an illusion generated by cause and effects.
It is the same issue is it not?

 

[Sarkus]

You have assumed that scientific knowledge is correct and that science has no further evolving to undergo.
This is a dangerous and immature assumption and not one that most professional and erudite scientists would entertain.
I have already countered with the fact that cause and effect are illusionary temporal considerations yet this has no bearing on your position. Why not?
I have also countered with the fact that "nothing" is our greatest influence, yet you have failed to seriously consider that. Why not?

I have made no such assumption, nor can what I have written be construed as such.
Science is under a permanent state of evolving its theories and conclusions.
I have already responded to your notion of cause and effect being a temporal illusion. I even provided the post number when you previously asked why I had not responded.
Simply put, whether things happen in a linear perception of time or whether it all occurs at t=0, effect is the result of a cause. That is all that is required for the notion of cause and effect to hold.
I have also found the notion of "nothing" to be irrelevant as I do not consider "nothing" to be possible. There is always something.
I explained this previously as well, and you have not since shown why I should take the notion to be possible.

There is also in line with my thoughts you quoted above, that if influences were exactly the same value to the person, example influence a,b,c,d... all equaled 10 points each then one could suggest that if all influences were applied as equal then none would be considered as being influential individually. Does this not grant the person a freedom to choose?

No. On what basis would it choose? what would cause the person to select one over the other. It could be random, sure, but then the person has no "choice" in a random selection. But if there is an actual choice then there must be a cause behind it, that tipped the scale in favour of whichever one was selected. We may not be aware of it, hence we may think our "choice" is a display of freewill.

When dealing with infinite influences the chance of influences being of equal value would be rather high. [ to the point of mind numbing tedium] Does this not grant freedom to choose?

The chance of them being equal would be next to zero.
If you accept there are an infinite points between 0 and 1, there would still be an infinite number even if one of them was 0.5 in width. The rest of the infinite would then sum to 0.5, but would each be far less than that single influence.
Further, it is probable that the infinite influences converge into much larger ones, and above a certain size we become aware of them. And those influences already include our conscious thoughts as part of the complex feedback involved.