Are you asking why Bryan doesn't change the centuries-long traditional terminology "free will"? It distinguishes itself from will that is determined.
Are you asking why he adds "real" and "honest-to-goodness"? That's because so many academics these days don't believe in free will, think it's a fairy tale, a historically outmoded notion. So Bryan, using "real" and "honest-to-goodness" is asking such people to ignore their learned priors and take seriously for the purposes of this discussion, actual free will of the sort you imagined you had as a child when deciding whether you wanted to play inside or out, read a book or go to a movie, have vanilla or chocolate ice cream. That sort of free will.
Your reply doesn't resolve things for me. You put emphasis on "determined" and then on a consciousness of one's own decision-making. I wonder whether a horse, an ant, an amoeba, the wind, a stream has free will, just a will, or neither free will nor mere will, in your manner of speaking.
Hi, Dan. Thanks for the follow-up. I suspect the lack of resolution is related to a refusal, like many academic today, to take the very concept of "free will" seriously. If you took it seriously you wouldn't ask if the wind or a stream has free will.
But there is a difference between not taking an idea seriously and not understanding its meaning. We don't take the idea of unicorns seriously but we understand the term's meaning.
Your initial questions seemed to imply not understanding what Bryan meant by the term, so I gave it my best shot in terms of clarifying why (I thought) he spoke of "free will" and then added "real" and "honest-to-goodness". I readily concede that if instead you merely don't take the concept seriously, different arguments are in order.
I'm trying to understand your distinctions between (1) no will, (2) mere will, and (3) free will. I posited five objects (horse, ant, amoeba, wind, stream) and asked how you'd code each. If you tell me, I might figure out better how you use "will" and "free will."
Your last reply did not use the word "determined." That word seemed important in your first reply, and something worth excavating.
>> “You can know with overwhelming certainty that I won’t shave my head tomorrow; it doesn’t change the fact that I could shave my head tomorrow.”
If someone mapped out every neuron in your brain, and knew perfectly how neurons work, and also knew the details of what you’d interact with today, then they should be able to predict with certainty whether you’d shave your head to show yourself you have “free will.” That’s based on what we know about how every other piece of matter interacts deterministically or randomly.
If that is true (which is theoretically, but not practically, testable) then your actions would be predetermined and you wouldn’t have true “free will.”
The good news is that your brain is *still the mechanism making the decision* (even it’s predetermined by the laws of physics etc) and as a result, not having free will need not change views on morality at all.
The fact that non-gene, non-family factors have an impact on outcomes (which I’d expect a priori) seems a red herring to me.
Yeah. The universe evolves according to the laws of physics. There is no “free will” in the standard model. If someone thinks free will exists, they need to explain where it fits into our best theory of physics.
> If someone mapped out every neuron in your brain, and knew perfectly how neurons work, and also knew the details of what you’d interact with today, then they should be able to predict with certainty whether you’d shave your head to show yourself you have “free will.”
Another problem: predictions of truth are not the same thing as truth, *but they appear to be* (due to cultural conditioning from the day we are born).
> That’s based on what we know about how every other piece of matter interacts deterministically or randomly.
Not quite: based on what we *believe/claim*. "Knowledge" has a very specific meaning in this context: Justified True Belief, and the True doesn't come for free (it only appears to).
> If that is true (which is theoretically, but not practically, testable)
Incorrect: just listen to scientists when they are talking casually and describing what "is true" (technically: "predicting *with certainty*" what is true), it is extremely easy to point of numerous valid epistemic and logical flaws in their claims (experience) of "reality".
> The good news is that your brain is *still the mechanism making the decision*
Your "the" is ontologically unjustified.
> even it’s predetermined
If the brain cannot alter the outcome, then what is the contextually relevant meaning of the phrase "making the decision"?
> The fact that non-gene, non-family factors have an impact on outcomes (which I’d expect a priori)
Look how you equate "fact" with "[expect] [a priori]" (mismatched *in two ways*).
Sir: are you trying to make me feel like I am living in The Truman Show?
>> If the brain cannot alter the outcome, then what is the contextually relevant meaning of the phrase "making the decision"?
If the windmill cannot alter the outcome, then what is the contextually relevant meaning of "making the energy"?
>> Look how you equate "fact" with "[expect] [a priori]" (mismatched *in two ways*).
I did not equate fact and a priori ... I expected it a priori, and this post confirmed as a fact (ok, with 99.9999% certainty, if you want to be pedantic about "fact")
It's the same as for the windmill. A windmill is the mechanism by which energy is converted, just as a brain is the mechanism by which a decision is made. What we know about science strongly suggests that both have no independent way of changing the outcome, even as they are both the mechanism by which something happens.
It's also a good analogy for understanding the non-family environmental impact. Just as a windmill's efficiency is impacted by its blueprint (genes) and manufacturing process (family environment) it is also impacted by non-family environment -- e.g., a hurricane will increase the amount of energy it produces. That doesn't mean it has free will. Same with a human.
> It's the same as for the windmill. A windmill is the mechanism by which energy is converted, just as a brain is the mechanism by which a decision is made.
Just for starters: the mechanisms are known to be extremely different, and it is known that one is very well understood while the other is not. We don't even completely understand how/why LLM's work, and we built them!
Also not well understood (or, *known to be misunderstood*): consciousness, and reality, rather important *but invisible* components of this discussion.
> What we know about science strongly suggests that both have no independent way of changing the outcome, even as they are both the mechanism by which something happens.
One thing that I know about science: it is composed of humans, and humans insist upon hallucination, deceit, untruthfulness, anti-"pedantry", etc. And sometimes, the more well educated the mind is the more powerful/believable the hallucinations.
It's especially funny because all of this phenomenon (the flaws of science) *could be* studied with (slight variations) of science's current methodologies, but it is not. It seems like science has fallen victim to the same thing that plagues most institutions: an inability to practice (or even *desire*) truthful self-reflection.
>The determinist, in contrast, can only ask for a blank check: “One day, we’re figure out the hidden forces that caused them to be so different. Until then, bear with us.”
The sophisticated determinist or free will compatibilist won't say this. You can believe both that human will is fully determined but also that there's no possible way for us to predict it
My Bayesian result is as per Sam Harris: "free will is an internally incoherent notion in the original sense, and its coherent redefinition Dennett-style is trivial". Thus no percentage proportion of genes vs. environment would mean much for the free will question.
Which of the many conflicting (sub-perceptually, thus "nonexistent") meanings of the symbol "is" are you utilizing in this context? ("*is* as per", "Free will *is", "*is* trivial")
And did you apply a flawless method of falsification to your "proof"? If so, please state some articulation of that method, noting (at least) the most powerful techniques contained within.
Two, it hardly requires powerful techniques to notice an incoherence in attempting to ascribe something that's independent from external causes but makes its choices about them (the homunculus-in-the-brain image). Again, this is partly definition failures.
I've already read it. If you believe this article leads to specific necessarily true conclusions that are conclusively counter to anything I have said here, please state it explicitly.
> Two, it hardly requires powerful techniques to notice an incoherence in attempting to ascribe something that's independent from external causes but makes its choices about them (the homunculus-in-the-brain image).
Did you take the Direct vs Indirect Realism paradox *fully* into account (we know if (sometimes) to be Indirect, but we experience and assert it to be Direct) during the formation of this "fact" within your mind?
> Again, this is partly definition failures.
Huuuuuuuuuuuuuuge!!! That, and many other already known things.
I state explicitly that, to use that article's terminology, "you're out to steal my cows".
How _would_ you assert it to be indirect? Repeat "insomuch as my perception fits the reality, which it doesn't fully" after every sentence? Its omission is a simplification of speech, there is no paradox, direct is just wrong.
Yep, I would expect things I state to be common knowledge. Yet seemingly they are not, and we have philosophers and psychologists still debating "psychocognitive problem".
I agree. Robert Sapolsky took apart that argument in his book “Determined”. Free will isn’t real, true. There’s also no such thing as America in terms of physics, that doesn’t mean the social construct that is the nation state isn’t a useful way to organise our societies.
Sapolsky in interviews shows himself to be no different from others in the debate. Both sides talk past each other.
What is at stake in the debate? Sapolsky was asked what we should do differently if his argument is correct. His answer was, “I don't know.”
Some adherents of determinism speak as if punishment should be altered or abolished as a result of their conclusion. But all they have shown (if they are correct) is that punishment is not justified on the basis of free will. Since legal, moral, and social consequences have several other rationales, this amounts to nothing.
We might as well argue about angels dancing on pinheads.
Read his book, all he says is that he’s free will isn’t real and if it is, it’s constrained significantly. With regard to what we should do, he recommends society and those who make our laws be scientific in their approach to state policy. Eg. If car accidents have gone up, change the structure of driving I.e. more speed cameras, inbuilt speed limiters etc. All common sense but rejected by 60% of the electorate in most states.
If he had said anything interesting in the interview, I would have read his book. I am interested in finding a good account of his side of the argument. But he made it clear his book would be a waste of time. I think I agree with all his factual claims, I just don’t think they entail anything. I am willing to stipulate that we have no free will. I just don’t see why anyone should care.
Free will/determinism has no impact on whether or not using science in policy is a good idea. It is simply empirical, it works or it doesn’t. And of course, if we have no free will, we will do what we are determined to do, not what is wise or desirable or effective.
I think you are putting your finger right on it here: whether we have free will or our decisions are pre-determined by millions of unknown and unknowable factors (often largely unrelated to the decision at hand) is irrelevant. Observationally the are equivalent, and in terms of practical use they are equivalent.
The best we can do is aim for the big, easier to see and understand factors in why people behave as they do and change them, and otherwise... keep on going.
But no one is claiming that America is not subject to the laws of physics. Advocates for free will are committed to the claim that there’s something “extra” that magically influences human behavior that cannot be accounted for by physics.
I don't think you need something that can't be accounted for by physics, but just something that can't be accounted for by humans. It is one thing to say that "if we know all the initial conditions of a system we can predict the outcome" and quite another to say "we know all the initial conditions of THIS system". The first is true, the second impossible. So functionally, for all intents and purposes, we have free will, or deterministic will that is unpredictable, which are roughly identical for human purposes.
Robert Sapolsky experiences reality as being identical to his perception of it (if you don't believe me, simply listen to him talk!), and more so than even most laymen, and uses his opinions as facts while "taking apart" (and rhetoric and colloquialisms) free will....the irony could hardly be richer.
> That's not what Sapolsky states. See Chapter 3 of another book of his, "Behave".
Oh the irony.
What Sapolsky states is also composed of what he has stated in various podcasts peddling his pseudo-scientific book, *and you do not know what that is*. I on the other hand, have watched some of these podcasts, and he states his opinions (often about *unknowable* matters) as facts *constantly*.
"Stating opinions as facts" is a rhetorical behavior (namely, omission of the level-of-certainty qualifiers) that does not entail "experienc[ing] reality as being identical to his perception of it".
> "Stating opinions as facts" is a rhetorical behavior (namely, omission of the level-of-certainty qualifiers)
It is that, but it is not necessarily only that.
("Is" *sometimes* means "equal", but not always.)
> that does not entail "experienc[ing] reality as being identical to his perception of it".
How do you know?
Let's take right now as an example, you make this assertion:
> "Stating opinions as facts" is a rhetorical behavior (namely, omission of the level-of-certainty qualifiers) that does not entail "experienc[ing] reality as being identical to his perception of it".
Would you have me believe that you DO NOT experience that as being True?
Or, do you believe that it DOES NOT OCCUR that humans experience Untruth as Truth, EVER?
You will or won’t shave your head tomorrow. I’m guessing won’t.
Having not shaved your head, upon reflection, at which point could you have done otherwise?
Are you busy tomorrow? Do you already have the clippers? Are you the sort of person who writes silly things on the internet and then does silly things to his hair to prove a point? Is there some chance you’ll stop being that person tomorrow?
As you run your fingers through your hair tomorrow evening, pinpoint the decisive moment.
Saying you could shave your head tomorrow is saying there is some possibility we live in a universe where you do shave your head tomorrow. But we don’t live in that universe, do we? You will not shave your head tomorrow, because things are as they are and will not be as they are not going to be.
We are trying to predict the state of the future. We can guess what it will be like, but it will be one way or another. Given perfect information we would know and would not need to predict.
Possibilities are a contrivance of prediction. The world is going to be one way, no matter what you thought possible/likely beforehand.
You could wonder if "I cannot do anything otherwise" is actually (technically) true, at least maybe. And this is only one possibly possible consequential meaning!
I assert as a fact that you are a butterfly, flitting gaily about while you dream dreams about reality. Does my assertion of fact cause reality itself (comprehensively) to fall inline with my description of it, *necessarily and without exception, across time*?
I'm no professional epistemologist, Dan; so these are but my personal thoughts, off the top of my head.
While some adjectives ("red car") modify/restrict a concept ("car") and other adjectives can negate a concept ("imitation gold"), in this case the adjective "free" merely STRESSES an aspect of the concept "will." You can't really have a determined will. "Free will" is a redundant term, if you will, emphasizing an aspect of will you wish to focus on.
I guess you could speak of a coerced will (imagine a story where a person lies under oath because a loved one had been threatened if they don't), but even then one is freely choosing to lie because of cost/benefit considerations.
But this is not a terribly difficult to understand idea: When you order chicken rather than fish, prefer vanilla to chocolate, turn right rather than left, you, I and everyone has a clear understanding they could have chosen, done, acted, preferred otherwise. That's one's will, and it's free for that reason. One might in a literary sense say "I choose THIS! I cannot choose otherwise." But that should be interpreted as stressing the intensity of conviction, not a literal denial of choice. I hesitate to go on because I can't believe everyone doesn't know this.
Now in the 20th century, as we learned more and more about how the universe works, a puzzle developed: everything seems to be determined. So how can the will be free? And I agree with Searle this is an interesting and important question. But the observation doesn't immediately lead to a denial of free will. When you have a syllogism where premises ("Everything is determined") lead to a conclusion ("There is no free will"), you don't have to accept the conclusion. You can with equal logic decide there must be something wrong with one or more of the premises. Which choice (CHOICE!) one makes is a function of whether the premises or the conclusion's denial is more obviously true. And the fact we make free choices virtually every waking minute of our lives is one of the most obvious introspectively true things we know. So it seems to me. I fear I haven't satisfied you, but I don't know I have much more.
With respect to your horse, ant, amoeba, wind, stream: Consciousness is a pre-requisite for will, so wind and stream don't have that attribute. A horse clearly does. Do ants and amoebae? IDK. I doubt the latter are conscious. Ants, like bees, I understand, have some type of communal coordination ("hive mind") I know little about, so I have no opinion as to whether individual ants have free will.
If you assume that animals don't have free will, then the empirical prediction of your model would be that "non-shared environment" would be much less significant for behavior of non-human animals, right?
Here's what Robert Plomin has to say about this:
"Dozens of inbred strains of mice, for example, have each been created by inbreeding mice for many generations so that individuals within a strain are essentially identical genetically like clones but different from other strains. Average differences between inbred strains from multiple litters are ascribed to their genetic differences on the assumption that their environments are uniform. These studies indicated widespread genetic influence on behavioural variability (Sprott & Staats, 1975). However, even more striking than these average differences between strains is the wide range of individual differences within inbred strains despite being reared in highly standardised laboratory conditions.
Because pups from inbred mouse strains are raised in the same litter with up to a dozen genetically identical siblings, environmental variance can be separated into variance between litters and variance within litters, which directly tests for shared and nonshared environment, respectively (Neiderhiser, 1989). As in human studies, this research suggests that environmental variance is almost entirely nonshared"
I would say the harder it is to account for someone’s choices does give higher credence to a free will perspective (perhaps you will never be able to actually account for all the factors because there is something like a soul with has no physical substance), fine.
However, an important caveat to make is that this would not be proportional to the percentage attributed to non family interactions - there are probably many genetic components that only get activated or change the way they activate under different environmental conditions. Under that model (which, if I can add, seems correct) we would expect it to be pretty difficult to attribute much of our choices to environmental factors.
How do you define “free will”? I understand it to be the ability to choose between alternatives. We certainly have that ability. For whatever reason, some people choose to believe in free will and others to disbelieve in it. The same person may choose differently at different times.
But that doesn't prove that our choices are undetermined. The choice between determinism and free will is a false alternative because it violates the law of excluded middle. The true alternatives are determinism or indeterminism.
So which version of free will do you choose: compatibilism or incompatibilism? According to the former, free will is compatible with determinism. In accordance with the latter, those who believe in free will (and thus reject hard determinism, according to which free will is a myth) also believe in indeteriminism, a position called ontological libertarianism—not to be confused with political libertarianism.
Ontological libertarianism rejects the law of universal causation, a position compatible with a common interpretation of quantum mechanics. However, there's a problem: If one's choices are radically undetermined, then they are spontaneous chance events in no way under the control of the agent.
If compatibilism is correct, then one's choices are self-determined, a position called “agent causation”. One's choices and resulting behavior are the result of all affecting causal conditions, both internal (from the surface of the body inward) and external (from the surface of the body outward). There are no other possible causal conditions. Those conditions that account for free will are internal. An agent is the totality of all internal conditions; there is nothing else for the agent to be. The most relevant of such conditions are those that constitute the brain. It may be objected that antecedent external events cause an agent to be whatever the agent internally is. But those events cannot act upon an agent before the agent exists, at which time the agent's internal conditions already exist.
So, again, which version of free will do you accept—the incompatibilist version accepted by about 19% of philosophers including your friend Michael Huemer or the compatibilist version accepted by about 59% (according to the 2020 PhilPapers Survey)?
Free will is NOT an empirical matter. It is axiomatic, like the laws of logic, to ANY statement. A determinist must admit that any statment he makes is merely cosmic noise predetermined at the big bang. His admission would also be cosmic noise. Any conception of the laws of physics that cannot explain conciousness and free will are necessarily incomplete.
Can someone tell me what is at stake in the free will debate?
Imagine two universes. One has free will, and the other doesn’t. Everyone in the free will universe becomes convinced of determinism, and as a result they…. (Underwear gnomes) … As a result, they become identical to the determinist universe. What changed?
Either we are one universe or the other. In neither case do we need to do anything differently, even stop arguing about things that don’t matter.
And of course, it could be that everyone in the determinist universe thinks they have free will, and then discover they do not. Same question. What do they do differently? How has knowledge of the true changed their situation?
Where does free will fit into physics? You seem to be saying nothing more than “unpredictable chaotic processes exist”. It’s not an argument refuting determinism.
Interesting post, thanks.
Bryan writes: "suppose human beings had real, honest-to-goodness free will".
What work is "free" doing?
Consider the statement without that word:
"suppose human beings had real, honest-to-goodness will".
How would that statement differ from the one Bryan actually wrote?
I might ask the same about "real."
And then about "honest-to-goodness".
We get:
"suppose human beings had will".
Very nice!
Also open for attack: "real" - what does it even mean, *exhaustively*? Or even "had" (or any variation of "is").
Are you asking why Bryan doesn't change the centuries-long traditional terminology "free will"? It distinguishes itself from will that is determined.
Are you asking why he adds "real" and "honest-to-goodness"? That's because so many academics these days don't believe in free will, think it's a fairy tale, a historically outmoded notion. So Bryan, using "real" and "honest-to-goodness" is asking such people to ignore their learned priors and take seriously for the purposes of this discussion, actual free will of the sort you imagined you had as a child when deciding whether you wanted to play inside or out, read a book or go to a movie, have vanilla or chocolate ice cream. That sort of free will.
Thanks Ross.
Your reply doesn't resolve things for me. You put emphasis on "determined" and then on a consciousness of one's own decision-making. I wonder whether a horse, an ant, an amoeba, the wind, a stream has free will, just a will, or neither free will nor mere will, in your manner of speaking.
Hi, Dan. Thanks for the follow-up. I suspect the lack of resolution is related to a refusal, like many academic today, to take the very concept of "free will" seriously. If you took it seriously you wouldn't ask if the wind or a stream has free will.
But there is a difference between not taking an idea seriously and not understanding its meaning. We don't take the idea of unicorns seriously but we understand the term's meaning.
Your initial questions seemed to imply not understanding what Bryan meant by the term, so I gave it my best shot in terms of clarifying why (I thought) he spoke of "free will" and then added "real" and "honest-to-goodness". I readily concede that if instead you merely don't take the concept seriously, different arguments are in order.
BTW, you might be surprised by how favorable I am to spirit and soul. See Ch. 27 here:
https://clpress.net/site/assets/files/1091/smithian_morals_11.pdf
I just am not sure I need "free" in front of "will."
I'm trying to understand your distinctions between (1) no will, (2) mere will, and (3) free will. I posited five objects (horse, ant, amoeba, wind, stream) and asked how you'd code each. If you tell me, I might figure out better how you use "will" and "free will."
Your last reply did not use the word "determined." That word seemed important in your first reply, and something worth excavating.
Because presumably the choices caused by genes and upbringing are "willed" too, so it's not a plausible distinction.
>> “You can know with overwhelming certainty that I won’t shave my head tomorrow; it doesn’t change the fact that I could shave my head tomorrow.”
If someone mapped out every neuron in your brain, and knew perfectly how neurons work, and also knew the details of what you’d interact with today, then they should be able to predict with certainty whether you’d shave your head to show yourself you have “free will.” That’s based on what we know about how every other piece of matter interacts deterministically or randomly.
If that is true (which is theoretically, but not practically, testable) then your actions would be predetermined and you wouldn’t have true “free will.”
The good news is that your brain is *still the mechanism making the decision* (even it’s predetermined by the laws of physics etc) and as a result, not having free will need not change views on morality at all.
The fact that non-gene, non-family factors have an impact on outcomes (which I’d expect a priori) seems a red herring to me.
Yeah. The universe evolves according to the laws of physics. There is no “free will” in the standard model. If someone thinks free will exists, they need to explain where it fits into our best theory of physics.
> If someone mapped out every neuron in your brain, and knew perfectly how neurons work, and also knew the details of what you’d interact with today, then they should be able to predict with certainty whether you’d shave your head to show yourself you have “free will.”
A problem:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necessity_and_sufficiency
Another problem: predictions of truth are not the same thing as truth, *but they appear to be* (due to cultural conditioning from the day we are born).
> That’s based on what we know about how every other piece of matter interacts deterministically or randomly.
Not quite: based on what we *believe/claim*. "Knowledge" has a very specific meaning in this context: Justified True Belief, and the True doesn't come for free (it only appears to).
> If that is true (which is theoretically, but not practically, testable)
Incorrect: just listen to scientists when they are talking casually and describing what "is true" (technically: "predicting *with certainty*" what is true), it is extremely easy to point of numerous valid epistemic and logical flaws in their claims (experience) of "reality".
> The good news is that your brain is *still the mechanism making the decision*
Your "the" is ontologically unjustified.
> even it’s predetermined
If the brain cannot alter the outcome, then what is the contextually relevant meaning of the phrase "making the decision"?
> The fact that non-gene, non-family factors have an impact on outcomes (which I’d expect a priori)
Look how you equate "fact" with "[expect] [a priori]" (mismatched *in two ways*).
Sir: are you trying to make me feel like I am living in The Truman Show?
>> If the brain cannot alter the outcome, then what is the contextually relevant meaning of the phrase "making the decision"?
If the windmill cannot alter the outcome, then what is the contextually relevant meaning of "making the energy"?
>> Look how you equate "fact" with "[expect] [a priori]" (mismatched *in two ways*).
I did not equate fact and a priori ... I expected it a priori, and this post confirmed as a fact (ok, with 99.9999% certainty, if you want to be pedantic about "fact")
“Making the energy”
So long as we are being picky, the windmill is capturing or transforming the energy, not creating it.
>> If the brain cannot alter the outcome, then what is the contextually relevant meaning of the phrase "making the decision"?
> If the windmill cannot alter the outcome, then what is the contextually relevant meaning of "making the energy"?
I do not know.
I notice you missed answering my question, I will now repost it and observe if your behavior varies from the last experiment:
If the brain cannot alter the outcome, then what is the contextually relevant meaning of the phrase "making the decision"?
> and this post confirmed as a fact (ok, with 99.9999% certainty, if you want to be pedantic about "fact")
What does the symbol "fact" mean to you?
Also:
- have you ever looked the symbol "pedantic" up in the dictionary?
- do you consider science to be "pedantic"? How about math? Or logic? (And if not: *why not*?)
It's the same as for the windmill. A windmill is the mechanism by which energy is converted, just as a brain is the mechanism by which a decision is made. What we know about science strongly suggests that both have no independent way of changing the outcome, even as they are both the mechanism by which something happens.
It's also a good analogy for understanding the non-family environmental impact. Just as a windmill's efficiency is impacted by its blueprint (genes) and manufacturing process (family environment) it is also impacted by non-family environment -- e.g., a hurricane will increase the amount of energy it produces. That doesn't mean it has free will. Same with a human.
> It's the same as for the windmill. A windmill is the mechanism by which energy is converted, just as a brain is the mechanism by which a decision is made.
Just for starters: the mechanisms are known to be extremely different, and it is known that one is very well understood while the other is not. We don't even completely understand how/why LLM's work, and we built them!
Also not well understood (or, *known to be misunderstood*): consciousness, and reality, rather important *but invisible* components of this discussion.
> What we know about science strongly suggests that both have no independent way of changing the outcome, even as they are both the mechanism by which something happens.
One thing that I know about science: it is composed of humans, and humans insist upon hallucination, deceit, untruthfulness, anti-"pedantry", etc. And sometimes, the more well educated the mind is the more powerful/believable the hallucinations.
It's especially funny because all of this phenomenon (the flaws of science) *could be* studied with (slight variations) of science's current methodologies, but it is not. It seems like science has fallen victim to the same thing that plagues most institutions: an inability to practice (or even *desire*) truthful self-reflection.
>The determinist, in contrast, can only ask for a blank check: “One day, we’re figure out the hidden forces that caused them to be so different. Until then, bear with us.”
The sophisticated determinist or free will compatibilist won't say this. You can believe both that human will is fully determined but also that there's no possible way for us to predict it
My Bayesian result is as per Sam Harris: "free will is an internally incoherent notion in the original sense, and its coherent redefinition Dennett-style is trivial". Thus no percentage proportion of genes vs. environment would mean much for the free will question.
> My Bayesian result is as per Sam Harris
This is heuristic, not Bayesian.
> Thus....
Assuming your proposition is correct, which it is not (at least not known to be).
Nope, not a heuristic. That's literally P(A)=P(A|B)=P(A|~B)=0, the edge case.
Which of the many conflicting (sub-perceptually, thus "nonexistent") meanings of the symbol "is" are you utilizing in this context? ("*is* as per", "Free will *is", "*is* trivial")
And did you apply a flawless method of falsification to your "proof"? If so, please state some articulation of that method, noting (at least) the most powerful techniques contained within.
One, https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/14/beware-isolated-demands-for-rigor/
Two, it hardly requires powerful techniques to notice an incoherence in attempting to ascribe something that's independent from external causes but makes its choices about them (the homunculus-in-the-brain image). Again, this is partly definition failures.
> One, https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/14/beware-isolated-demands-for-rigor/
I've already read it. If you believe this article leads to specific necessarily true conclusions that are conclusively counter to anything I have said here, please state it explicitly.
How about this one:
https://slatestarcodex.com/2015/04/21/universal-love-said-the-cactus-person/
> Two, it hardly requires powerful techniques to notice an incoherence in attempting to ascribe something that's independent from external causes but makes its choices about them (the homunculus-in-the-brain image).
Did you take the Direct vs Indirect Realism paradox *fully* into account (we know if (sometimes) to be Indirect, but we experience and assert it to be Direct) during the formation of this "fact" within your mind?
> Again, this is partly definition failures.
Huuuuuuuuuuuuuuge!!! That, and many other already known things.
I state explicitly that, to use that article's terminology, "you're out to steal my cows".
How _would_ you assert it to be indirect? Repeat "insomuch as my perception fits the reality, which it doesn't fully" after every sentence? Its omission is a simplification of speech, there is no paradox, direct is just wrong.
Yep, I would expect things I state to be common knowledge. Yet seemingly they are not, and we have philosophers and psychologists still debating "psychocognitive problem".
Bryan
One way to understand the difference in opinion on free-will.
If we are chemical robots (Descartes), or
If we are smarter animals (Darwin), or
If we are the image of God (Moses) -
Humans have different responsibilities,
Different possibilities,
Different hopes.
This difference in ontology (what exits)
Creates deeply different opinions.
Thanks
Clay
I agree. Robert Sapolsky took apart that argument in his book “Determined”. Free will isn’t real, true. There’s also no such thing as America in terms of physics, that doesn’t mean the social construct that is the nation state isn’t a useful way to organise our societies.
Sapolsky in interviews shows himself to be no different from others in the debate. Both sides talk past each other.
What is at stake in the debate? Sapolsky was asked what we should do differently if his argument is correct. His answer was, “I don't know.”
Some adherents of determinism speak as if punishment should be altered or abolished as a result of their conclusion. But all they have shown (if they are correct) is that punishment is not justified on the basis of free will. Since legal, moral, and social consequences have several other rationales, this amounts to nothing.
We might as well argue about angels dancing on pinheads.
Read his book, all he says is that he’s free will isn’t real and if it is, it’s constrained significantly. With regard to what we should do, he recommends society and those who make our laws be scientific in their approach to state policy. Eg. If car accidents have gone up, change the structure of driving I.e. more speed cameras, inbuilt speed limiters etc. All common sense but rejected by 60% of the electorate in most states.
If he had said anything interesting in the interview, I would have read his book. I am interested in finding a good account of his side of the argument. But he made it clear his book would be a waste of time. I think I agree with all his factual claims, I just don’t think they entail anything. I am willing to stipulate that we have no free will. I just don’t see why anyone should care.
Free will/determinism has no impact on whether or not using science in policy is a good idea. It is simply empirical, it works or it doesn’t. And of course, if we have no free will, we will do what we are determined to do, not what is wise or desirable or effective.
I think you are putting your finger right on it here: whether we have free will or our decisions are pre-determined by millions of unknown and unknowable factors (often largely unrelated to the decision at hand) is irrelevant. Observationally the are equivalent, and in terms of practical use they are equivalent.
The best we can do is aim for the big, easier to see and understand factors in why people behave as they do and change them, and otherwise... keep on going.
But no one is claiming that America is not subject to the laws of physics. Advocates for free will are committed to the claim that there’s something “extra” that magically influences human behavior that cannot be accounted for by physics.
I don't think you need something that can't be accounted for by physics, but just something that can't be accounted for by humans. It is one thing to say that "if we know all the initial conditions of a system we can predict the outcome" and quite another to say "we know all the initial conditions of THIS system". The first is true, the second impossible. So functionally, for all intents and purposes, we have free will, or deterministic will that is unpredictable, which are roughly identical for human purposes.
Robert Sapolsky experiences reality as being identical to his perception of it (if you don't believe me, simply listen to him talk!), and more so than even most laymen, and uses his opinions as facts while "taking apart" (and rhetoric and colloquialisms) free will....the irony could hardly be richer.
Education is a double edged sword.
That's not what Sapolsky states. See Chapter 3 of another book of his, "Behave".
> That's not what Sapolsky states. See Chapter 3 of another book of his, "Behave".
Oh the irony.
What Sapolsky states is also composed of what he has stated in various podcasts peddling his pseudo-scientific book, *and you do not know what that is*. I on the other hand, have watched some of these podcasts, and he states his opinions (often about *unknowable* matters) as facts *constantly*.
"Stating opinions as facts" is a rhetorical behavior (namely, omission of the level-of-certainty qualifiers) that does not entail "experienc[ing] reality as being identical to his perception of it".
> "Stating opinions as facts" is a rhetorical behavior (namely, omission of the level-of-certainty qualifiers)
It is that, but it is not necessarily only that.
("Is" *sometimes* means "equal", but not always.)
> that does not entail "experienc[ing] reality as being identical to his perception of it".
How do you know?
Let's take right now as an example, you make this assertion:
> "Stating opinions as facts" is a rhetorical behavior (namely, omission of the level-of-certainty qualifiers) that does not entail "experienc[ing] reality as being identical to his perception of it".
Would you have me believe that you DO NOT experience that as being True?
Or, do you believe that it DOES NOT OCCUR that humans experience Untruth as Truth, EVER?
Also: opinions of reality *~equal* reality, at object level runtime.
When I follow the link http://www.gmu.edu/departments/economics/bcaplan/freewill it opens the same page I get browsing to
http://www.gmu.edu/departments/economics/bcaplan/
Nothing there about free will. Something broke?
> "the main reason why I believe in free will is introspection, not any fancy argument."
How would things seem to us if we only had "compatibilist" free will? Surely just the same.
“You can know with overwhelming certainty that I won’t shave my head tomorrow; it doesn’t change the fact that I could shave my head tomorrow.”
I don’t think I can. Easy thing to demonstrate.
You will or won’t shave your head tomorrow. I’m guessing won’t.
Having not shaved your head, upon reflection, at which point could you have done otherwise?
Are you busy tomorrow? Do you already have the clippers? Are you the sort of person who writes silly things on the internet and then does silly things to his hair to prove a point? Is there some chance you’ll stop being that person tomorrow?
As you run your fingers through your hair tomorrow evening, pinpoint the decisive moment.
Saying you could shave your head tomorrow is saying there is some possibility we live in a universe where you do shave your head tomorrow. But we don’t live in that universe, do we? You will not shave your head tomorrow, because things are as they are and will not be as they are not going to be.
> Saying you could shave your head tomorrow is saying there is some possibility we live in a universe where you do shave your head tomorrow.
This assumes that potentiality *must be* exercised.
> But we don’t live in that universe, do we?
Why not simply tell us the truth of the matter?
> You will not shave your head tomorrow, because things are as they are and will not be as they are not going to be.
You would have us believe that you are literally an Oracle? Sir: I do not believe you.
We are trying to predict the state of the future. We can guess what it will be like, but it will be one way or another. Given perfect information we would know and would not need to predict.
Possibilities are a contrivance of prediction. The world is going to be one way, no matter what you thought possible/likely beforehand.
> We are trying to predict the state of the future.
It sounds to me that *at the time you wrote that comment* you were *describing* "the" "future".
Regardless: what you think you are doing is not guaranteed to be what you are actually doing.
> We can guess what it will be like....
You may not be able to do anything otherwise!
> but it will be one way or another.
For a very specific, colloquial meaning of the word "be".
> Given perfect information we would know and would not need to predict.
This makes certain metaphysical assumptions about the nature of reality.
I cannot do anything otherwise. What would it mean if I could?
You could wonder if "I cannot do anything otherwise" is actually (technically) true, at least maybe. And this is only one possibly possible consequential meaning!
I assert we live in a universe where he does not shave his head. If his head goes unshaved, we always did.
I assert as a fact that you are a butterfly, flitting gaily about while you dream dreams about reality. Does my assertion of fact cause reality itself (comprehensively) to fall inline with my description of it, *necessarily and without exception, across time*?
I'm no professional epistemologist, Dan; so these are but my personal thoughts, off the top of my head.
While some adjectives ("red car") modify/restrict a concept ("car") and other adjectives can negate a concept ("imitation gold"), in this case the adjective "free" merely STRESSES an aspect of the concept "will." You can't really have a determined will. "Free will" is a redundant term, if you will, emphasizing an aspect of will you wish to focus on.
I guess you could speak of a coerced will (imagine a story where a person lies under oath because a loved one had been threatened if they don't), but even then one is freely choosing to lie because of cost/benefit considerations.
But this is not a terribly difficult to understand idea: When you order chicken rather than fish, prefer vanilla to chocolate, turn right rather than left, you, I and everyone has a clear understanding they could have chosen, done, acted, preferred otherwise. That's one's will, and it's free for that reason. One might in a literary sense say "I choose THIS! I cannot choose otherwise." But that should be interpreted as stressing the intensity of conviction, not a literal denial of choice. I hesitate to go on because I can't believe everyone doesn't know this.
Now in the 20th century, as we learned more and more about how the universe works, a puzzle developed: everything seems to be determined. So how can the will be free? And I agree with Searle this is an interesting and important question. But the observation doesn't immediately lead to a denial of free will. When you have a syllogism where premises ("Everything is determined") lead to a conclusion ("There is no free will"), you don't have to accept the conclusion. You can with equal logic decide there must be something wrong with one or more of the premises. Which choice (CHOICE!) one makes is a function of whether the premises or the conclusion's denial is more obviously true. And the fact we make free choices virtually every waking minute of our lives is one of the most obvious introspectively true things we know. So it seems to me. I fear I haven't satisfied you, but I don't know I have much more.
With respect to your horse, ant, amoeba, wind, stream: Consciousness is a pre-requisite for will, so wind and stream don't have that attribute. A horse clearly does. Do ants and amoebae? IDK. I doubt the latter are conscious. Ants, like bees, I understand, have some type of communal coordination ("hive mind") I know little about, so I have no opinion as to whether individual ants have free will.
If you assume that animals don't have free will, then the empirical prediction of your model would be that "non-shared environment" would be much less significant for behavior of non-human animals, right?
Here's what Robert Plomin has to say about this:
"Dozens of inbred strains of mice, for example, have each been created by inbreeding mice for many generations so that individuals within a strain are essentially identical genetically like clones but different from other strains. Average differences between inbred strains from multiple litters are ascribed to their genetic differences on the assumption that their environments are uniform. These studies indicated widespread genetic influence on behavioural variability (Sprott & Staats, 1975). However, even more striking than these average differences between strains is the wide range of individual differences within inbred strains despite being reared in highly standardised laboratory conditions.
Because pups from inbred mouse strains are raised in the same litter with up to a dozen genetically identical siblings, environmental variance can be separated into variance between litters and variance within litters, which directly tests for shared and nonshared environment, respectively (Neiderhiser, 1989). As in human studies, this research suggests that environmental variance is almost entirely nonshared"
https://acamh.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/jcv2.12229
I would say the harder it is to account for someone’s choices does give higher credence to a free will perspective (perhaps you will never be able to actually account for all the factors because there is something like a soul with has no physical substance), fine.
However, an important caveat to make is that this would not be proportional to the percentage attributed to non family interactions - there are probably many genetic components that only get activated or change the way they activate under different environmental conditions. Under that model (which, if I can add, seems correct) we would expect it to be pretty difficult to attribute much of our choices to environmental factors.
How do you define “free will”? I understand it to be the ability to choose between alternatives. We certainly have that ability. For whatever reason, some people choose to believe in free will and others to disbelieve in it. The same person may choose differently at different times.
But that doesn't prove that our choices are undetermined. The choice between determinism and free will is a false alternative because it violates the law of excluded middle. The true alternatives are determinism or indeterminism.
So which version of free will do you choose: compatibilism or incompatibilism? According to the former, free will is compatible with determinism. In accordance with the latter, those who believe in free will (and thus reject hard determinism, according to which free will is a myth) also believe in indeteriminism, a position called ontological libertarianism—not to be confused with political libertarianism.
Ontological libertarianism rejects the law of universal causation, a position compatible with a common interpretation of quantum mechanics. However, there's a problem: If one's choices are radically undetermined, then they are spontaneous chance events in no way under the control of the agent.
If compatibilism is correct, then one's choices are self-determined, a position called “agent causation”. One's choices and resulting behavior are the result of all affecting causal conditions, both internal (from the surface of the body inward) and external (from the surface of the body outward). There are no other possible causal conditions. Those conditions that account for free will are internal. An agent is the totality of all internal conditions; there is nothing else for the agent to be. The most relevant of such conditions are those that constitute the brain. It may be objected that antecedent external events cause an agent to be whatever the agent internally is. But those events cannot act upon an agent before the agent exists, at which time the agent's internal conditions already exist.
So, again, which version of free will do you accept—the incompatibilist version accepted by about 19% of philosophers including your friend Michael Huemer or the compatibilist version accepted by about 59% (according to the 2020 PhilPapers Survey)?
Free will is NOT an empirical matter. It is axiomatic, like the laws of logic, to ANY statement. A determinist must admit that any statment he makes is merely cosmic noise predetermined at the big bang. His admission would also be cosmic noise. Any conception of the laws of physics that cannot explain conciousness and free will are necessarily incomplete.
Can someone tell me what is at stake in the free will debate?
Imagine two universes. One has free will, and the other doesn’t. Everyone in the free will universe becomes convinced of determinism, and as a result they…. (Underwear gnomes) … As a result, they become identical to the determinist universe. What changed?
Either we are one universe or the other. In neither case do we need to do anything differently, even stop arguing about things that don’t matter.
And of course, it could be that everyone in the determinist universe thinks they have free will, and then discover they do not. Same question. What do they do differently? How has knowledge of the true changed their situation?
Where does free will fit into physics? You seem to be saying nothing more than “unpredictable chaotic processes exist”. It’s not an argument refuting determinism.
Do causally emergent phenomenon count?