And you should be able to sue the scientist and demand compensation in the case that you lose your job!
Why free will is impossible
- Thread starter litewave
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And you should be able to sue the scientist and demand compensation in the case that you lose your job!
Thank you for your post, I really appreciate it!
Which would be true for robots that function analytically - in the sense that each move of a robot needs to be programmed specifically, or the robot won't do it.
The kind of conceptual analysis that would be adequate for the moves of a robot may not be adequate for the moves of a human (and may also differ from one human to another).
For example, for a robot, "walking up the stairs" is a jungle of numbers, letters, electricity, steel and plastic. But what exactly does "walking up the stairs" mean for a human? A sequence of "flex muscle A1 - rest for 0.2 ms - flex muscle A2" etc. etc.? Does it mean something like "Move left foot 0.3m N, then move right foot 0.2m upwards, readjust balance, move right foot onto the stair" etc. etc.?
Exactly. To really prove or disprove free will with that kind of experiment, they would have to time original intentions, as they arise during the day.
This means that the person would need to be connected to the device for measuring brain waves 24/7 (and not feel in any way bothered by it, as being aware that one is measured could affect one's decision-making) and any intentions that may have anything to do with previous intentions or ideas would have to be excluded.
IOW, it appears that the way Libet set up the experiment, it would work to prove or disprove free will in beings that have no memory, no body and do not exist in an environment.
It seems like an analysis for robots ...
Yes...but that is a special case. They didn't find that they could predict the whereabouts of just "people with jobs" "during the workday". (93.6% of people don't even have jobs any more.)
The point is, that for all our free will, we behave like little automata, and not even very complicated automata at that, in certain respects.
outstanding
i am muddling thru mele's Effective Intentions: The Power of Conscious Will where he critiques both wegner and libet focusing on pretty much the same points you present
Processes have parts, and the various parts of a process may have more and less proximal initiators. A process that is initiated by an item in the PPG may have a subsequent part that is directly initiated by a consciously made decision. The conscious self -- which need not be understood as something mysterious -- might more proximally initiate a voluntary act that is less proximally initiated by an item in the PPG. Readers who, like me, prefer to use 'self' only as an affix may prefer to say that the acquisition or formation of a relevant proximal intention -- and specifically, an intention that is consciously acquired or formed -- might more proximally initiate an intentional action that is less proximally initiated by an item in the PPG .
for instance, before i walk out of my door in the morning, i already have a rough formulation of what the rest of the day entails. i do not have to consciously initiate an intention to have lunch or file a report. it had already been done by virtue of the fact that i am not spending the day in bed
The way I see it, one problem with some explanations for and against free will is that they are too arcane.
I think an explanation in favor that free will exists, or that it does not, should be simple enough for the average person to understand it and apply it, given the relevance of free will.
I think an explanation in favor that free will exists, or that it does not, should be simple enough for the average person to understand it and apply it, given the relevance of free will.
Or we just aren't all that used to "be in the moment".
Buddhist meditators, for example, develop an acute awareness of the present moment, and things that average people may do on autopilot, those meditators learn to do a lot more consciously and conscientiously, thus not at all feeling as if they had no free will.
This tells us that we have a lot of potential for free will, but don't necessarily use it or cultivate it.
willusionism - 0
free will - 1
much of my life does seem like i am autopilot
one of endless repetition
instances of free agency in my life mostly consists of what libet labels "conscious veto" aka "free won't" aka procrastination
After having perused a considerable amount of self-help and productivity books and other materials, my views on this matter have changed.
I think our perceptions and ideas of free will are related to how aware we are of the things we do every day.
From my own experience, I know that if I follow those productivity ideas about planning one's day, becoming more assertive, being in the present moment and such, I do have a much more intense, specific, punctual sense of free will, there is a clearer awareness of there being a choice - "I can do this, or I can do that. I can say this, or I can say that."
First off, I do believe in free will, I just see no compelling reason to believe other than my own preference and my faith that free will is not an illusion. Second, though, what you state doesn't "tell us" anything. Your explanation for the control and perceptions of monks are, at best, a pro-free will interpretation of what occurs with them. The question of whether there is or is no free will remains unanswerable on a fundamental level at the present time.
Still, it will be interesting to see if science doesn't provide clearer guidance in the future (and then amusing to watch people reject the science—whichever side it may support—in favor of their personal preferences).
There also seems to be no compelling reason to believe that we don't have free will.
That's why I said "This tells us that we have a lot of potential for free will, but don't necessarily use it or cultivate it."
And yet many experience the question as pressing.
I do think that moral considerations can trump scientific ones.
To believe we don't have free will is demoralizing; it is moral to reject that which is demoralizing.
Pierre-Normand
Registered Member
There are scientists aplenty, and some philosophers also, who believe that it already has been settled scientifically that free-will is impossible. But if those purported proofs of impossibility are premised on faulty interpretations of the scientific data in the light of conceptually flawed characterizations of our ordinary notion of free-will (and also flawed conceptions of laws, explanation and reduction), shouldn't we be amused?
I think many of the 'scientific' arguments that purport to show human free-will to be fundamentally compromised (as opposed to its being merely curtailed in cases of social conditioning or psychopathology) often rely on assumptions similarly found in arguments that purport to show that we can't directly perceive the external world or that we can't know from ordinary observation that other people enjoy 'private' states of consciousness. Those arguments only seem to rely on a modern scientific understanding of the mind. They actually often depend on interpreting scientific results in the light of and old-fashioned philosophically motivated sceptical epistemology.