Why free will is impossible

[Pandaemoni]

Free will is the way the decision is made, not an escape from causation. Think of a gopher, sticking his head up and looking backwards and forward in the causal chain, he gets a choice and a free choice, as he gets to do what he wants and he gets to do as much homework and research as he want to make that decision, he doesn't get free of the causal chain.

Your assumption is still that caused equals unfree.

Actually I disagree. I am not assuming that caused equals unfree, and am asserting that caused *may* equal unfree. We don't "know" that we make real choices, we believe it and it feels like we do, but there is no way to rewind the clock and prove that it was possible to choose the other path thst was previously forsaken.

Free will may be a veneer we place on our actions after the fact, even though the actions themselves are determined according to a complex decision making algorithm that we cannot influence or alter. It's pretty clear for example that we do not control our fight or flight instinct, yet when asked why they fought or why they ran many people do suffer from the illusion that their choice was the result of some rational process and not automatically generated by the amygdala, even though the amygdala sends command signals out before the sensory data even gets to the cortex (without which, we could not possibly have "thought" about the issues consciously).

The problem is that it is possible (and there are plenty of neuroscientists who think this is the case) that brain has mechanisms for reconciling competing goals and that the reconciliation is complex, but mechanical and outside our influence, and our belief that we "choose" which goals to favor and choose an action is just a post hoc rationalization that we overlay onto the complex way in which the brain sorts out these signals.

Free will, in that view is no more real than the illusion of time slowing down that people often experience (on a post-hoc basis) before a major accident or trauma.

I don't endorse that theory, and I don't dismiss it. As I said, it feels like I have free will, but the neuroscience that exists thus far strongly suggests that I don't, and I can't point to any specific flaw in the theory that the feeling a real fundamental choice is just illusory. In short, my position is: I don't know, but I am aware there are good arguments on both sides.

Deep down, I do believe there is free will, though if true that means that either much of neuroscience is flawed or that, perhaps, the mind is not completely generated by the brain and the faculty of free will exists only in the mind and outside of the brain.

 

[river]

the lack of free-will is acting by instinct alone

free-will is the pondering , questioning and thereby , changing the act and/or thinking

 

[Me-Ki-Gal]

the lack of free-will is acting by instinct alone

free-will is the pondering , questioning and thereby , changing the act and/or thinking

pondering , questioning is part of the human instinct . All things hUmans do is part of the human instinct

 

[river]

pondering , questioning is part of the human instinct . All things hUmans do is part of the human instinct

true

but instinct on its own , in this case , animal instinct , the survival instinct , doesn't lead to pondering nor questioning

it can't because thats not instincts Nature

 

[NietzscheHimself]

free-will is the pondering , questioning and thereby , changing the act and/or thinking

No... that is free thought. What you should be thinking of is a more dreamlike state. Where thought escapes your previous knowledge and you are lead to a choice decision wholly uncommon to all of man's previous knowledge. To fly, or not to fly; To die, or not to die; To weep, or not to weep. To sleep, or not to sleep. To be deep, or to be.

 

[river]

“ Originally Posted by river
free-will is the pondering , questioning and thereby , changing the act and/or thinking ”

No... that is free thought. What you should be thinking of is a more dreamlike state. Where thought escapes your previous knowledge and you are lead to a choice decision wholly uncommon to all of man's previous knowledge. To fly, or not to fly; To die, or not to die; To weep, or not to weep. To sleep, or not to sleep. To be deep, or to be.

hmm...

agreed but you limit the WILL to a " decision " towards the self

whereas I expand the WILL to thought or thinking , beyonds man's previous knowledge of the without

 

[Me-Ki-Gal]

hmm...

agreed but you limit the WILL to a " decision " towards the self

whereas I expand the WILL to thought or thinking , beyonds man's previous knowledge

Give me an example of thought or thinking beyond previous knowledge . Display one of these thoughts you are are thinking ?

 

[river]

Give me an example of thought or thinking beyond previous knowledge . Display one of these thoughts you are are thinking ?

energy is matter , not , matter is energy

 

[Me-Ki-Gal]

energy is matter , not , matter is energy

what ? conversion my dear . energy is all about conversion . Both are true . Gas = energy Electrical power passed threw water creates Hydrogen and oxygen. Conversion goes both ways , anyway that is not the point . You got to speak a new language to not have influence . Matter and energy are past concepts and even if your statement was true it is built upon someone else work . I call it past dependent . We are the past . We live in the past . The closest to the future you can get is your self and as some one already showed even looking at your self in the mirror is looking at the past .
O.K. give me another one this time with gusto . Something totally independent of anyone's concepts

 

[NietzscheHimself]

but you limit the WILL to a " decision " towards the self

I limited it to you interpersonally.

whereas I expand the WILL to thought or thinking , beyonds man's previous knowledge of the without

Thoughts will only get you so far. You need material to stand upon and declare your will.

 

[Regular0ldguy]

Choosing freely is not an illusion, because I am there where I actually go through the process of choosing. I have to put effort into it. For a while, during deliberation, I haven't yet made the choice. It takes an act of will to get that done. It's free only if it is caused by my unfettered intentions. Guess how I can prove I could have done the opposite? I can undo what I did. Every try to pick a paint color?

And if anyone says all choices are a result of __________, causation or instinct or whatever, that will be a vacuous statement in every case. Sure causation exists. Sure every event is caused. But is it caused by a free action or a compelled action? These are qualitatively different processes.

To say every action is the result of instinct is to just not know what an instinct is. Clearly you have broadened it to include non-instinctual actions. Survival instinct? Suicide. Eating instinct? Dieting/fasting. Social instinct? Homicide. We can act against our instincts. And we do a lot.

 

[Regular0ldguy]

If you drop down a level of complexity and start saying it's all chemical or biological or physics that's really causing it, then you are missing the consequences of structure. That's like saying pushing on the gas doesn't move the car, it's really the fuel, injection, spark, explosion, piston movement, crankshaft turning, differential spinning, axle turning, tire spinning, tire friction. Yes, there is a process, what triggered it? What put it in motion? What caused and allowed the structure to proceed? In input into the system that "causes" it to work. Sure, every component and part of the chain causes it to work, but in an importantly different way. If you look at the entire system from the highest meta-level, that's the only way you really understand the cause that explains it all. Otherwise you are just looking and the trees and not noticing its a frick'n forest.

 

[Regular0ldguy]

And yet there is nothing "free" in it... as it is predetermined by the previous moment... which is predetermined by the moment before that.
ANY reflective action is PREDETERMINED.

It was predetermined if no one saw where they came from and where they were going and made a choice as to direction. That's the difference between determined and predetermined.

If the "previous moment" is exercise of a deliberative process which wants to bend the future to its will, the pre- in predetermined goes out the window.

 

[Regular0ldguy]

The problem is that it is possible (and there are plenty of neuroscientists who think this is the case) that brain has mechanisms for reconciling competing goals and that the reconciliation is complex, but mechanical and outside our influence, and our belief that we "choose" which goals to favor and choose an action is just a post hoc rationalization that we overlay onto the complex way in which the brain sorts out these signals.

This is akin to saying because my table is make of mostly of empty space that a hard surface is an illusion. Really, well try to run through it with your forehead.

Yup, it's hard. And flat. And Solid. The level of explanation, the gross result very often is the most operative and explanatory feature of a think. The micro levels explain in a very different way. One that leaves out the major point in a lot of cases.

 

[Sarkus]

If you drop down a level of complexity and start saying it's all chemical or biological or physics that's really causing it, then you are missing the consequences of structure.

To not consider the lower levels is to fail to grasp the non-conscious reality - and leave "free-will" as merely a perception of a pattern of activity.
Yet you have issue with this understanding of free-will, and try to make free-will more than just how our consciousness perceives things.

That's like saying pushing on the gas doesn't move the car, it's really the fuel, injection, spark, explosion, piston movement, crankshaft turning, differential spinning, axle turning, tire spinning, tire friction. Yes, there is a process, what triggered it? What put it in motion? What caused and allowed the structure to proceed? In input into the system that "causes" it to work.

Yet you firstly fail to see that the input is itself part of a determined chain - yet you still seem to want to consider the world determined.
Your flaw here is that you are assuming the chain starts with a "free" action... the pressing of the accelerator... yet missing that this is just a link in the same chain.

Sure, every component and part of the chain causes it to work, but in an importantly different way. If you look at the entire system from the highest meta-level, that's the only way you really understand the cause that explains it all. Otherwise you are just looking and the trees and not noticing its a frick'n forest.

Sure - and as such you need to define free-will as a pattern of activity that gives the (conscious) appearance of choice / self-determination etc.
Otherwise you are still searching for your square circle in a universe you have already stated can't accommodate it.

It was predetermined if no one saw where they came from and where they were going and made a choice as to direction. That's the difference between determined and predetermined.

If everything is determined - i.e. acts according to cause and effect, and that chain is unbroken from time zero - then everything is predetermined. There is no logical escape. But you want to put consciousness outside of predetermination, yet still bound by determination and still bound by the unbroken chain of cause and effect?

If the "previous moment" is exercise of a deliberative process which wants to bend the future to its will, the pre- in predetermined goes out the window.

Not at all - as the "deliberative process" is all part and parcel of the same predetermined flow.
Or do you somehow consider consciousness to break the causal chain that, in such a determined universe, began with the origin of the universe?

Square circle... that's all you're looking for.

 

[Regular0ldguy]

Just can't see that the type of cause matters, can you.

Caused is predetermined. Self-conscious control can't change the future. Talk about absurd. Sheesh.

Trying to make us ignore all the conscious choices we make all day long and call it illusion. Ridiculous. Talk about defining yourself into a corner due to a conceptual mistake.

 

[arfa brane]

Just can't see that the type of cause matters, can you.

I can't see what "type" has to do with "cause", can you? What does "the type of cause" even mean?

A cause is a sufficient "reason" that some event occurs. Gravity, for example, is the cause of "falling" for objects with mass.
The rub is that we are not, and cannot be, aware of every proximate cause. This is one reason we believe in "freely acting" causes. Logically there is no such thing, but we still believe in freedom of action.

Because you can "make" a conscious choice, you are in fact stuck with the same causal "paradox".
The illusion is of spontaneity, you think that things "occur" to you and this gives you and your thoughts some kind of freedom (i.e. independence) from causality, but this doesn't really stand up to analysis.

 

[Regular0ldguy]

Treading water.

"Type of cause." I'll again give you two examples. Mechanistic automatons like a clock or the balls banging around on a pool table. All caused. No will involved. That isn't a human being. The pool ball can't look up, see where he's going and decide whether he wants to go there. That is a different type of cause than the mechanistic cause. That is exercising forsight and will. If there isn't a gun to your head or a psychosis that creates a compulsion, the will is free to do what it wants.

If you say doing what "you" want isn't free, then what is? Doing what someone else wants? That's not free.

Saying it is all caused is freedom neutral. Sure it's all caused, but the question is how is it caused? Deliberation and choice or compulsion.

Caused does not equal compulsion. Some of us have compulsions and some of us don't But cause is always present. And caused does not mean no choice was made. Some causes are choices and some are just stuff that happens. Believing either of those is true creates your false paradox.

If you don't think you have the power to change the future, you are denying that every choice you make could have gone either way, depending on how you wanted it to go. You change the future a lot. The pool ball doesn't, but he can't see what's coming and sidestep it intentionally. You can. You do it all day every day. Describing an action as caused tells us nothing about whether it was an free and intentional act or a compelled, or reflexive or autonomic act. The type of mechanism that determines which action is taken determines whether it was a free act or not.

 

[arfa brane]

Mechanistic automatons like a clock or the balls banging around on a pool table. All caused. No will involved. That isn't a human being. The pool ball can't look up, see where he's going and decide whether he wants to go there. That is a different type of cause than the mechanistic cause.

How does a clock or pool balls in motion avoid a human being the cause of a mechanism having motion in the first place?

If you don't think you have the power to change the future, you are denying that every choice you make could have gone either way, depending on how you wanted it to go. You change the future a lot.

That's irrelevant since it's unprovable. You can change your future in small increments, like maybe a few tens of minutes of "predictability" driving a car (because you have free will), but can you really change what will happen next year?

 

[Sarkus]

Trying to make us ignore all the conscious choices we make all day long and call it illusion. Ridiculous. Talk about defining yourself into a corner due to a conceptual mistake.

You are arguing from personal incredulity without actually countering the points made.

Furthermore, noone is trying to make you ignore conscious choices at all. Merely that, if we're holding to the perfect causation universe that you asked about, some of us accept that "choice" and "free-will" are conscious perceptions of pre-determined activity.

"Type of cause." I'll again give you two examples. Mechanistic automatons like a clock or the balls banging around on a pool table. All caused. No will involved. That isn't a human being. The pool ball can't look up, see where he's going and decide whether he wants to go there. That is a different type of cause than the mechanistic cause. That is exercising forsight and will. If there isn't a gun to your head or a psychosis that creates a compulsion, the will is free to do what it wants.

The will is perceived to be free, and we perceive ourselves as exercising foresight and will.

Using the pool-ball example, your "free-will" would require the pool-ball to alter direction with an uncaused and non-random interaction. Yet you accept that everything is caused.
The hunt for the square circle goes on, it seems.

But you will think that the will is the cause, perhaps? Sure - so what caused the will? The "will" and foresight may simulate possible futures, but something must cause it to choose between possible futures, right?
And that cause is non-random, as your question required.
The will could thus do nothing else but simulate those futures, and do nothing else but select the one it did.

If you say doing what "you" want isn't free, then what is? Doing what someone else wants? That's not free.

In the universe you have set up with your question - nothing is free.
"Free" is a perception of our consciousness, which it possibly requires to operate.

Saying it is all caused is freedom neutral. Sure it's all caused, but the question is how is it caused? Deliberation and choice or compulsion.

It is caused by whatever caused it. And those causes are caused by whatever caused them.

Caused does not equal compulsion. Some of us have compulsions and some of us don't But cause is always present. And caused does not mean no choice was made. Some causes are choices and some are just stuff that happens. Believing either of those is true creates your false paradox.

If you want "choice" in a universe where everything is caused then the only way is to accept "choice" as a perception rather than a reality.
A "choice" that is anything more than this illusion logically requires an uncaused and non-random element... yet you have set up the universe where everything is caused.
Hence your square circle.

If you don't think you have the power to change the future, you are denying that every choice you make could have gone either way, depending on how you wanted it to go. You change the future a lot.

Do we change the future?? Can you prove this? No.
When we exercise foresight, all our consciousness does is simulate what it thinks the future will be, and builds this into the numerous causes to the "choice".
But in the determined universe, with everything caused, the real future already knows this. It already knows the choices being made, how they were reached.

The pool ball doesn't, but he can't see what's coming and sidestep it intentionally. You can. You do it all day every day.

No we don't. We only sidestep perceptions of the future that our consciousness builds up. We are utterly compelled to do what we do. We can not do anything else. But our consciousness makes it appear as real choice. And we have no option but to accept it.

I believe I have free-will because I can not choose otherwise.

Describing an action as caused tells us nothing about whether it was an free and intentional act or a compelled, or reflexive or autonomic act. The type of mechanism that determines which action is taken determines whether it was a free act or not.

And these descriptions are of conscious perceptions of the action: the labels we use describe patterns of activity, but the patterns are ALL the same with regard being predetermined - at least within the "perfect causation" universe of your question.