Mar 24 2011
Sexual Preference Chemical
Is sexual preference a result of biology, environment, or personal choice? Like many things (unfortunately), scientists pursuing this question are steadily moving in one direction, while those with an ideological agenda simply ignore the science and make up the answer they want.
We are a long way from understanding everything about human sexuality, but knowledge is not black or white. We have identified a number of factors that strongly suggest sexual preference is a biological phenomenon – something you are born with. There is no evidence to suggest it is a result of upbringing, and the idea that it is a choice defies not only the scientific evidence, but the experience of most humans on the planet.
Now a new study adds to the mounting evidence that sexual preference is just another feature of hardwiring and neurochemistry. In this series of studies scientists either blocked the receptors for or the production of serotonin in mice brains. They then observed their sexual behavior.
Unaltered males displayed a clear preference for engaging in mating behavior with females. But males that were blocked for serotonin displayed no preference. Further, when another male was introduced into their cage they would give a mating call and mount the other male much more rapidly and often than unaltered males.
Researchers could then revert their behavior back to that of an unaltered male by injecting serotonin into their brains.
Of course, this one series of studies in not the final word on the question of sexuality. It is but one piece to the puzzle. We also have to extrapolate from mice to humans with caution, but mammalian sexual behavior likely has some common evolutionary roots. This now gives us something to look for in humans, although of course we cannot reproduce this kind of experiment on people.
While there is no single gene for sexual preference, and sexual preference itself is not a simple dichotomy, it is increasingly clear that sexual preference is largely determined by the biology of our brains, not anything that can be considered choice.
The neuroscience question at this time is, how much of sexual preference is genetic vs epigenetic. Is it mostly in our genes, or is it in the hormonal environment of the womb. Of course, it is the genes that largely determines that environment, but genes are not the only factor, opening the door for epigenetic factors to trump genes for gender.
Perhaps when we understand enough about the neurobiology of sexual preference, it will ironically become a choice – something that we can change about ourselves if we choose. Think of the implications of that.
217 Responses to “Sexual Preference Chemical”
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I think Ed Yong had an interesting take on this paper. http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2011/03/23/low-serotonin-mice-less-choosy-about-sex-of-partners/
“We have identified a number of factors that strongly suggest sexual preference is a biological phenomenon – something you are born with.”
What are some of the other factors? I can’t ever tell which ‘factors’ are valid, and which ones aren’t because when studies like this get discussed, there’s always critics who seem to take issue with some aspect or conclusion of the research. And googling it doesn’t seem to shed much light on it either. Or it’s usually just generalizations like “environment” or “genetic.”
It could be blocked serotonin in mice leads to a dominance display. Also, is it possible that the mice are attempting to initiate production of serotonin albeit unsuccessfully?
Countdown to when some crank begins offering serotonin treatments to cure homosexuality in 3…2…1…
I take some exception to the assumptions of that last paragraph. When/if the biological mechanism for sexual preference is discovered that doesn’t mean there is no choice. It could just mean the choice is expressed biologically, just like 100% of all choices we make.
My gut is that the true answer is ‘all of the above’: genetics, epigenetic, culture. Something like sexual preference won’t be simple.
I do think that you’re born with characteristics that CAN lead you to be gay or straight or bi. But at the end of the it is a choice.
If you say it isn’t a choice, that is like saying that being a murderer is not a choice because murderers are born with too much “aggression hormones/genes” (some of which we still don’t understand, but we do understand testosterone, for example) and so therefore they were born murderers.
I mean, I understand it’s a continuum, but let’s just please agree that it’s definitely not akin to skin color not being a choice.
# Karl Withakay – I’d put money on the fact that someone already exists whose doing it. Probably connected to a Fundamental Religion somewhere.
## hcueva – Almost every action is a choice. However, if you consider your sexuality at any level to be inherent, then there is strong evidence that homosexuality is inherent.
The moral implication is this: Consider your own preference for heterosexual relationships. Suppose you deliberately chose not to exhibit that preference. To actively choose to go against it and begin a homosexual relationship. Could you do it? How much effort would it take? And would you get any satisfaction or enjoyment from it? Most importantly, is it fair to you that you were coerced into it by social pressure.
You compare, perhaps not with malice, a murder and homosexual sex. There is a large difference. A murder breaks the safety rules of a society. It puts all of us at risk if it is tolerated. Homosexual sex is not a risk for society as a whole. Those who fear it does pose a risk, are basing their assumptions on fear of change or religious myths. Not on evidence.
Thanks for that link, NiroZ.
@hcueva: You’re confusing sexual behavior with sexual preference.
Sexual behavior is indeed a choice; that’s obvious. People have control over their actions. What people can’t control (according to this research) is which gender(s) they’re attracted to – that’s an instinct, not a behavior.
A gay person is not someone who exclusively sleeps with people of the same gender – a gay person is someone who is exclusively ATTRACTED to people the same gender. If this weren’t so, we would consider all virgins asexual!
In other words, whether you are gay, straight, or bi has nothing to do with who you choose to sleep with. That’s why we say it’s not a choice. You are certainly free to pursue people you have no romantic or sexual interest in, but (according to all scientific an anecdotal data) this won’t change your sexual preference!
@Sara
Look, I’m 100% pro gay marriage and adoption. I have close friends and family who are gay and I love them and believe they deserve every right I have.
I, however, believe that it is very risky to go around saying that because someone has certain hormones and genes then their behavior isn’t choice.
I understand the point Steven is trying to make, but this is philosophy more than science -we’d have to define choice first, and it’s problematic.
All I’m saying is, let’s be coherent, if being gay isn’t a choice because hormones make you prone to be gay, then we could say the same thing about extremely awful things such as pedophiles, murderers, etc. and we certainly don’t want that.
@giskard42
I agree with you. I think, however, that most gay bashers actually mean gay behavior when they say it is a choice.
hcueva:
When I read “it is increasingly clear that sexual preference is largely determined by the biology of our brains, not anything that can be considered choice”, I interpret that as: we do not have full control over our traits, be they physiological (like skin color) or psychological (like sexual preference).
Technically speaking, we all have a choice of whether or not to lead the life of a celibate. Yet most of us decline the option, probably because: (a) we share the desire for sex; and (b) we are taught socially acceptable ways to indulge it. In other words, we choose to indulge the desire, but not the desire itself, which is innate.
So, too (evidence suggests), is the case with homosexual desire (although I suspect that such desires fall along a spectrum, from weak/rare to strong/frequent). The difference is that social conservatives expect us to look upon the indulgence of homosexual desire as categorically immoral (i.e. along with other taboos, like incest and bestiality).
Woops, looks like (in the time it took me to write & post) several others posted more or less the same argument. Sorry for the repetition!
“definitely not akin to skin color not being a choice.”
I’m not a proponent of the lack of choice argument in support of rights. What may lack means to enable choice now may in the future be capable of being choices due to technological developments. However, I disagree with your statement. Same-sex attraction is akin to skin color to the extent that it too is incapable of being changed easily or even with the strong desire to change. The future may hold various means of changing one’s sexual orientation AND skin color. The technologies may be different as two different organs are in question (brain and skin), but it isn’t infeasible that one could choose the skin color of their children, or of themselves with the right technology. However, that these are choices or not is not a reason to extend rights. The problem is not that the individual is gay or black, it’s in the attitudes of the people that believe that these properties alone are enough to condemn said individuals to be treated as inferior.
@hcueva:
“All I’m saying is, let’s be coherent, if being gay isn’t a choice because hormones make you prone to be gay, then we could say the same thing about extremely awful things such as pedophiles, murderers, etc. and we certainly don’t want that.”
I don’t think that logic works. You’re comparing apples and oranges. You cannot take a category that is defined by a FEELING and lump it in with categories that are defined by an ACTION. That’s like saying hunger is a choice because I can choose not to eat.
If you have the urge to murder because of your hormones but choose not to, then you are not a murderer. If you have the urge to molest children but choose not to, then you are not a child molester. However, if you have the urge to have sex with people of your same gender but choose not to, then you are still gay. You could be celibate your whole life and still be gay. That’s why the comparison falls apart – murder is a choice, molesting children is a choice, homosexual sex is a choice, but sexual preference is not.
Therefore, saying “gay people can’t help being attracted to people of the same gender” is not the same logic as saying “aggressive people can’t help murderering.” It’s the same logic as saying “aggressive people can’t help being aggressive,” but that has no impact on our expectation that people behave ethically.
@hcueva
I think this is a combination of the naturalistic and slipery slope fallacies
First you seem to say that even if a perfectly ok behavior is not a choice it undermines free will as the cause of our actions, which is the basis of our laws, morals etc. aka the slippery slope
Second you imply that if someone has no choice in what feel compelled to do its automatically ok if they act on it. aka if it is natural it is therefore good.
@hcueva
P.S. Just to throw this out there, I fully recognize that your argument is not any sort of social critique of gay rights. (This is an emotional issue, so I know that sort of distinction can get lost sometimes!)
And I appreciate your support of gay rights, whether or not you consider sexual preference a choice
@hcueva: Perhaps didn’t clarify enough that there is difference between inherently being gay and the choice to have sex. Being gay is something you are. Having sex is a choice. Sex is an action. I can have same gender sex and not be gay. In the same way that a gay person have have sex with the opposite gender and not be straight.
That is my point.
Conflating the two issues is problem that many moral objectors have. Which is why I made the point regarding whether it is right to force someone to act against their inherent self when their natural action doesn’t pose any threat to society as a whole.
I am amused how choice/freewill always ties people in knots.
The problem is that there is no real choice or freewill, only what we incorrectly label “choice” or “freewill”. Freewill is the product of a dualistic brain and science has been busily disproving that hypothesis for centuries. Let it go.
BillyJoe7:
Even if we assume (as I do) that the metaphysical-dualist frame is false, I’m not sure that I would agree that “choice” and “freewill” lose their meaning or utility in discussions like these.
For example, I still have a use for words that describe situations in which my actions came about voluntarily (as opposed to via coercion by another body, force, or agent), and those words seem particularly well-suited for that purpose (at least outside of philosophy dept.’s and neuroscience labs).
However, I feel obliged to add that, since not all choices are equally desirable (e.g. some require more motivation or persuasion than others), we may have here another case of fuzzy boundaries.
Since I believe that we live in a shared single objective reality in a materialistic, naturalistic, & macro-deterministic universe, I therefore also believe that free will does not technically exist. My behavior and choices are deterministic based on the structure and inputs of my brain.
It gets a little confusing when a program is capable of reprogramming itself, but that reprogramming is itself deterministic based on inputs and prior programming.
(Even if I believed in a universe created by an all powerful being, I couldn’t see my way to believing in free will. How could I be anything other than that which my all powerful creator intended?)
However I also think that in most contexts, it is practical to act as if free will exists. That is, we have choices, and we are accountable for those choices, etc.
BillyJoe7 said:
“Freewill is the product of a dualistic brain and science has been busily disproving that hypothesis for centuries. Let it go.”
What’s the use of telling me to let it go? I thought I didn’t have a choice…
PS: I forgot to add:
On the spectrum of choice/free-will and coercion, the decision to deny one’s sexual orientation in action seems somewhere in the middle, but probably more in the direction of coercion, assuming that it usually requires strong cultural forces (e.g. the experience of sustained moral condemnation) in order to bring about an effect that is so contrary to one’s desires.
I’m not sure I see any point in worrying about the distinction between homosexual identity/inclination/desire vs behavior unless you or the person you are discussing the issue with believe homosexual behavior is wrong in some way.
If the behavior is morally wrong, then I can see the murderer analogy, even if it is a bit of hyperbole. Otherwise, the murderer analogy seems off base.
I wonder about how society would cope, when science figured out a away to sway the biological preference (I’m pretty sure this will eventually happen). I can only hope such discoveries would come when society is more reasonable about the private lives of others. But what if that technology came now, would there be a religious conservative push to eliminate the legal pursuits of the gay community? If so how ironic would that be.
like what steve just said hahaha…. Damn my short term memory.
Controlling sexual orientation of an individual seems like an elegant way of controlling population size. We know that females under stress can lose the ability to become pregnant. This makes biological sense because having children isn’t advantageous in stressful environments (e.g. famine or migration).
I wonder if anyone has explored homosexuality as a means of population size control. The hypothesis would be that the frequency of expressing a homosexual phenotype would increase in times of stress.
CivilUnrest-
Still smiling about that one!
giskard42-Solid arguments.Well done!
To clarify – I was not referring to the whole free will question when discussing sexual preference. My point is – no one decides what kind of person attracts them. Sexual attraction appears to be a very dominantly hardwired trait (again – probably some combination of genes and epigenetic factors, mostly hormonal environment of the womb). Environment may make tweaks around the edges, but the basic things that attract us (like gender) appears to be a consequence of how our brains are wired. It does not appear to be a conscious choice, nor significantly affected by environment.
And as many have pointed out – I am not talking about behavior, I am talking about how we feel.
“@hcueva:
“All I’m saying is, let’s be coherent, if being gay isn’t a choice because hormones make you prone to be gay, then we could say the same thing about extremely awful things such as pedophiles, murderers, etc. and we certainly don’t want that.”
This is a ‘slippery slope’ argument which isn’t really an argument at all: If “A is true” then “B” and “C” (bad things) might also be true, therefore “A” cannot be true.
First, B and C are not necessarily analogous with A. And, even if they are, they (and the societal response to them) can be distinguished from A due to (in the case of B and C), harm done to others if the predilection is acted upon.
.
Thank you for writing about this, Steve!
Against my better judgment, I’ve spent a lot of my free time having this conversation with people on other online forums, trying to educate. This is very helpful indeed.
Very interesting. This is the first time I’ve seen a more or less definitive answer to this topic.
There is almost nothing worse when the conclusion ends up being something like:
“X is a condition where someone may have a genetic predisposition that manifests itself when combined with the right environmental factors.”
That always seems like a cop-out for an answer.
Namuh Level, I suspect that changing sexual orientation is a lot more difficult than changing some other things, like delusional beliefs in the supernatural.
If humans ever do acquire the ability to change such basic and fundamental things, I suspect sexual orientation will be among the last things that can be changed, and by the time there is the technical ability to do so, there will be no supernatural beliefs left to compel or justify it.
I’ve found this link to be very helpful as well. It’s some starter reading on human sexual orientation from the APA:
http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/sexual-orientation.aspx
In the very first blurb defining sexual orientation, please note this:
“Sexual orientation is different from sexual behavior because it refers to feelings and self-concept. Individuals may or may not express their sexual orientation in their behaviors.”
So it is indeed a misstep to compare homosexuality with other behaviors, as sexuality is defined by who you are attracted to and how you self identify, not by your actions.
This research seemed to indicate more of a correlation between serotonin levels and preference for sexual activity with BOTH sexes. Normal male mice still typically mounted other males 20% of the time, and the low-level serotonin mice increased their mounting of females from 90% to 100%! The results don’t seem to indicate any change in preference: only the increase in preferring sex to non-sex. In humans, most typically, homosexuals are not sexually attracted to the opposite sex. Although SSRIs are known to reduce libido. I think we can safely say serotonin is related to sexual drive, but I don’t see where it can be said it has to do with preferring one sex over the other (even in mice).
Also, @ MKandefer
You’re not a proponent in using the lack of choice argument in support of extension of rights.
I can see where you’re coming from, and I think rights should be extended regardless of the choice issue. There are choices that people are allowed to make in their lives that are already constitutionally protected.
The thing is, the issue keeps coming up because it lends strength to legal arguments in favor of same-sex marriage and extension of other LGBT rights.
It factored strongly into the Obama Administrations decision to drop legal defense of Section 3 of DOMA:
http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2011/February/11-ag-223.html
“Second, while sexual orientation carries no visible badge, a growing scientific consensus accepts that sexual orientation is a characteristic that is immutable, see Richard A. Posner, Sex and Reason 101 (1992); it is undoubtedly unfair to require sexual orientation to be hidden from view to avoid discrimination, see Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Repeal Act of 2010, Pub. L. No. 111-321, 124 Stat. 3515 (2010).”
Characteristics that are immutable get stronger constitutional protection. That’s why so many people find the “choice” issue to be important.
To add to what VRAlbany is saying, another reason the “choice” issue is important here is that a lot of parents pressure their children to be straight. While this is usually well-intentioned, it’s asking gay kids to do the impossible, and that can create huge problems. It’s a waste of time and effort, it undermines the the parents’ credibility, and (worst of all) it puts the kids at elevated risk for suicide.
For this reason, convincing parents that they can’t influence their kids’ sexual orientations is a good thing, regardless of their stance on gay rights.
Now the study is about gay mice that want to be married???????
I have often thought that anyone who disagrees with me is really just experiencing a feeling that is not under his control and was determined by actions that occurred long before he was born.
I believe my grandparents grew up near a society where everything occurred according to God’s plan- and that God’s plan included every feeling, thought and action. (No will or choice).
I find it fascinating that the materialist position agrees so thoroughly with that of the existence of an omnipotent creator on the subject of free will.
It seems that people often change their attitudes, opinions and feelings as they go through life. For example, I used to love baseball. Then I didn’t like baseball so much and loved basketball. Now I play golf. Of course that means I’m a golfer now. I wasn’t one before.
I therefore disqualify myself from any comment regarding peoples sexual practices.
CivilUnrest: “What’s the use of telling me to let it go? I thought I didn’t have a choice…”
You don’t….and neither did I.
It resulted from cause and effect relations within our brains with inputs via our optic nerves from the VDU’s in front of us.
Choices are an illusion.
Either that or dualism is real.
Take your pick.
tmac: “Still smiling about that one!”
That wasn’t a choice either.
sonic: “I find it fascinating that the materialist position agrees so thoroughly with that of the existence of an omnipotent creator on the subject of free will.”
I can see no resemblance whatsoever.
They are complete opposites.
Oh, and, in any case…Ockham’s razor.
This morning I chose coffee over tea, without knowing in advance which one that I’d walk away with from the kitchen. Does that make me a coffee-tea dualist?
Seriously, framing (or context) is necessary in order for words to have meaning. And, since, as far as I can tell, no one coerced me into choosing coffee over tea this morning, I feel fully justified in describing that event as “my choice.”
Granted, it’s possible to tell the same story at the cognitive and neuronal levels, or to invoke physical, chemical, or biological concepts in a causal explanation for why the situation occurred. And “choice” may indeed have little or no meaning within those stories.
But that’s not the kind of story that most of us tell on a daily basis. Our stories take place at the level of human minds, bodies, and the settings in which we move, and those elements are every bit as real as the neuronal, hormonal, and molecular actors in scientific stories.
In other words, given the appropriate framing, stories of choice and free will are true, as well.
I am of the position that sexual preference is, indeed, something that is innate to a person and what they are born with. However, I think that innate preferences can be effected by the conscious choice to go against the innate preference or not. I also think that these innate preferences we are born with are spectral in their quality and intensity.
Like tastes for foods such as turnip greens or blue cheese maybe. You either like it or you don’t, some more than others. Or even alcohol, some desire it more than others but the desire, in most cases, can be over ridden and over come such that it is turned down or decreased in its consumption.
I also think that environmental influences and, for example, peer pressure or other pressures cannot be discounted as well. Out side pressures can be powerful and can overcome natural preferences just as one can “develop a taste” for something over time and exposure.
In other words, there is an innate preference for most things including sexual preference, the preference is variable from person to person, more intense in some and less in others, and can be influenced by environmental factors.
One must also remember that environmental factors begin from day one, out of the womb, when images are imprinted on the infant mind. Imprinting is, I think, underestimated, when it comes to certain behaviors and, in this case, sexual preference.
One possible example in point; the imprint of and preference for or desire for breasts. I wonder if this has been looked at in breast fed individuals versus non-breast fed individuals? Extend the context of this to any other “thing” about which we might be imprinted with.
BillyJoe7-
In either case (materialist- omniscient God)
you have no free will.
If you can’t see the similarity,rest assured it’s just part of God’s plan anyway.
So I guess the omniscient god has seen all there has been and will be so from it’s perspective, no matter what one might think, they have no free will, since the omnipresent god has seen it and it won’t, therefore change.
How boring it must be for the omnipresent god.
# nwtk2007
Jesse Bering did a blog post recently on studies about imprinting and homosexuality. Well actually most of the post is about homophobia but it spends some time on homosexuality as well. The work was done by Gallup, who posits that the homosexuality is actually all an imprinted behavior. (if I read it correctly – I admit I only read it once.)
I think there is a great deal of influence in imprinting or at least in the experiences of life that lead us toward one preference or another. However, I don’t think they are the dominant ones.
For example, I am heterosexual. However, over my lifetime, my views personally on personally experiencing homosexual sex have varied. Due largely to outside influences. But none of those changes ever changed my primary preference for the opposite sex.
SARA – “I think there is a great deal of influence in imprinting or at least in the experiences of life that lead us toward one preference or another. However, I don’t think they are the dominant ones.”
I would agree and point out that imprinting is just one of an unknown number of environmental influences that, most of the time, are not considered in any discussion of nature vs nurture arguments on many topics.
It is interesting that you would mention that your views on “personally experiencing homosexual sex have varied”, but your initial preference for the opposite sex has not changed.
This would suggest that you have tried the “turnip greens” even though they were not your initial preference. This alone suggests that homosexuality is, to a certain extent” a matter of choice.
I also mentioned that these innate preferences are possibly a matter of spectral degree, some more intense in one individual than in another. In other words, if one is utterly grossed out by “turnip greens” then one would be less likely to make a choice of developing a taste for them where as, if one only finds them mildly disgusting and only has a mild intensity for the initial preference, then one might more easily make the “choice” of developing a taste for them.
ntwk2007-
Re God– exactly.
Re imprinting-
A good friend used to assure me that she could change any heterosexual woman into a homosexual woman.
She certainly tried a few times.
Mixed results apparently.
But I violate my own disqualification.
Sonic, I think there are quite a few men who can do that. I know someone it happened to, a male took her to a slaughterhouse on a date. Made her a vegetarian too.
@daedalus2u
ha ha! Priceless!
regarding free will: Seems like you’d have to figure out what “free will” is to decide whether you have it. If it’s the ability to make a choice uninfluenced by our own conditions of birth, physiology, education and experience – then i think i have no free will. But what is the choice i want to make that is influenced? I am a servant to the master of my own life’s desire within me: my biologically innate desire to continue to live, to be happy and to be satisfied. I have no control over even the simplest decision, because my decision-making process is controlled by my desire, physiology and experiences. But isn’t that master the same as what my “free will” would be? Seems i don’t really need to worry about it. i can only be a witness to what I’m doing. But perhaps the more i am able to be a good (impartial) witness (through more education and experience?) the more i will be able to clearly execute the commands of my desire and fulfill my own will for my own satisfaction and happiness. Of course, i have no control over how much of a good witness i can become either i just keep making requests to this desire I never asked for to begin with (or maybe I did?)
mufi,
I don’t think we disagree on much.
But the point I am trying to make is that reality is hidden beneath the language we use every day. So it’s more than just framing or context.
Our language evolved when dualism was almost universal and hence it has a dualistic ring to it. And even materialists use it for the sake of convenience. In fact, even materialist act as if dualism is real in everyday situations.
It is much easier and simpler to say “I choose coffee” than to say “the complex mechanical cause and effect relations in this brain acting on inputs via the sensors from the body in which it is encased and correlated with special modules in the brain resulted in an output to certain parts of that body causing it to makes sounds to effect that that the brain of that body would have certain dispositinal states satisfied if coffee were to stimulate certain receptors on that body’s tongue.”
There is no evidence for an “I” and there is no evidence for a freewill, yet our everyday activities are continually denyin g that reality
“In other words, given the appropriate framing, stories of choice and free will are true, as well.”
So, here I disagree. Those stories are not true. They hide the underlying reality of a materialist brain (pending evidence to the contrary)
sonic,
“In either case (materialist- omniscient God), you have no free will.”
I’m sorry, I thought you meant from the point of view of those who believe in an omniscient god, not from the point of view of those who challenge their inconsistencies
Mlema,
I think the source of your confusion is in thinking there can be an “I” without a “freewill”, or a “freewill” without an “I”. The two would have to be intimately bound up…if they existed.
BillyJoe – are you saying you don’t exist?
Because, even if you believe you are only the sum of your parts, you’re still the sum of your parts!
daedalus2u-
Perhaps there is an epigenetic element to this sexuality stuff.
Meima-
Of course you could decide that you don’t have the ability to make a decision– and then pretend to not notice the self-refuting nature of the claim.
I often wonder why people find it hard to understand why philosophers all turn into nut jobs in the end. –I’m joking of course. Well at least sort a joking.
BillyJoe7-
What I mean is that the materialist hypothesis and the ‘God’s plan’ hypothesis are exactly the same on the issue of whether or not there is any choice (both say ‘No’).
I find it fascinating (and humorous if you must know) that two people who agree that they have no choice in there beliefs would argue about the merits of those beliefs.
Sublimely absurd.
BTW- (Off topic)– Stenger’s book “Timeless Reality”. It appears that the ‘super symmetry’ particles and the highs boson are not going to be found (at least not in the form predicted by current theory). How much does this negate the arguments he presents in that book? (Symmetry is fundamental to the model- no?)
Sonic:
I’ve been trying to unload my free will for years
One thing relating to sexuality that I don’t understand is the difference between sexual preference and fetishism. Is there a difference? Is it still unclear and its just assumed to be different? I’m a bit confused.
Mlema,
I’m saying that an “I” controlling the brain does not exist.
That is an illusion.
All there is is the brain.
sonic,
“Of course you could decide that you don’t have the ability to make a decision– and then pretend to not notice the self-refuting nature of the claim.”
Suppose, instead of a cheap and pretty ordinary joke
, you explain how decisions could possibly come about if not as a result of the sort of brain process I described a few posts ago.
Where do these decisions come from?
Or does it just magically appear out of nowhere.
sonic,
“I find it fascinating (and humorous if you must know) that two people who agree that they have no choice in there beliefs would argue about the merits of those beliefs.
Sublimely absurd.”
I think you mean ignorantly smug.
Because, if you must know, the illusion-of-self is indistinguishable, in practical terms, to the self.
The problem being that a self requires an added hypothesis: an immaterial something; a ghost in the machine.
Okham’s razor cuts deep.
BillyJoe7-Can you think of a test/experiment that would change your mind about the existence of freewill,if it were successful? Do you think that it is even a testable hypothesis?
BillyJoe said:
False dichotomy. I did not challenge
BillyJoe7:
There IS a ghost in the works! (poetically speaking)
Godel’s Incompleteness theorem (which can be used to show how a computer will never replicate the workings of the human mind)
The proof :
(I copied the following directly from http://www.miskatonic.org/godel.html, and Rucker, Infinity and the Mind)
1. Someone introduces Gödel to a UTM, a machine that is supposed to be a Universal Truth Machine, capable of correctly answering any question at all.
2. Gödel asks for the program and the circuit design of the UTM. The program may be complicated, but it can only be finitely long. Call the program P(UTM) for Program of the Universal Truth Machine.
3. Smiling a little, Gödel writes out the following sentence: “The machine constructed on the basis of the program P(UTM) will never say that this sentence is true.” Call this sentence G for Gödel. Note that G is equivalent to: “UTM will never say G is true.”
4. Now Gödel laughs his high laugh and asks UTM whether G is true or not.
5. If UTM says G is true, then “UTM will never say G is true” is false. If “UTM will never say G is true” is false, then G is false (since G = “UTM will never say G is true”). So if UTM says G is true, then G is in fact false, and UTM has made a false statement. So UTM will never say that G is true, since UTM makes only true statements.
6. We have established that UTM will never say G is true. So “UTM will never say G is true” is in fact a true statement. So G is true (since G = “UTM will never say G is true”).
7. “I know a truth that UTM can never utter,” Gödel says. “I know that G is true. UTM is not truly universal.”
This is fleshed out at the web site above mentioned:
http://www.miskatonic.org/godel.html
I am interested to know what you might think about this if you have the time to get into it, because I really respect your clear and direct way of approaching things like this.
cheers
Accidental submit. Just to finish…
I did not challenge the truth of any stories re: “the materialist brain”, assuming by that reference you mean cognitive-scientific or neuroscientific accounts of how the brain functions. I agree that this information is mostly hidden from conscious/subjective experience, and that it requires scientific tools & techniques in order to gather it.
But it does not follow from that knowledge that any story told about conscious/subjective experience is therefore false. If it did, then all scientific knowledge would itself be invalid, inasmuch as it depends on conscious/subjective experience (e.g. perception and conception).
Besides, I assume that you understood me when I said that I chose coffee over tea, even if you have to translate it into other terms (e.g. by stripping it of any subjective or metaphorical content down to some literal skeletal form, and then translate that further into the mindless mechanics of neuron firings, etc.).
PS: Note the irony in my reference to the metaphor of “neuron firing” as part of the process of stripping out metaphorical content. Yet think how impoverished science (or science journalism) would be without such metaphors!
BillyJoe7 to sonic:
Only if one believes that all language and all truth is literal. Neither hypothesis is supported by science (e.g. see conceptual metaphor).
BillyJoe7-
This is an inappropriate use of Ockham’s Razor.
You say that a entity doesn’t exist. For the sake of argument, let’s say I say the entity does exist. Our predictions for what we would find are different. This is not the situation where Ockham’s Razor applies. It applies only when our predictions are the same.
Without this limitation, I would suggest Ockham’s Razor would lead to the obvious conclusion of solipsism- nothing but my consciousness exists (since I know that exists) and that anything else is an unnecessary bunch of entities.
If you are going to misuse Ockham’s Razor- why not cut out everything but your own mind- I mean cut deep bro.
Sublimely absurd does not assume a truth value (the truth could be such).
Ignorantly smug does assume a truth value.
Obviously if I have no choice in my beliefs, then I would be unable to see or change them based on evidence either. I can accept this possibility and ‘sublimely absurd’ fits. (I kinda like the idea that my existence is an exercise in sublime absurdity…)
If I used ‘ignorantly smug’ it would indicate that I was somehow immune to the situation.
I am not.
mufi-
You are almost correct- neither hypothesis is proved by science.
Science used to support the ‘no free will’ stance (Newton).
But modern physics does include free choices.
http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1954/born-speech.html
tmac57-
That is an excellent question.
I think if a person was born and a scientist could write down every action and thought he would have over his entire life (let’s say 70 years), that would be very strong evidence that there isn’t any free will.
Otherwise it seems an open question as it would not be possible to demonstrate there is free will (the nay sayer could always claim that they will someday ‘solve’ the problems associated with less than perfect prediction).
I tend to be with Popper- that is science should avoid ‘unfalsifiable hypothesis’ when possible.
Miema-
If I’m not mistaken it was after reviewing all his previous lives that the Buddha came to the conclusion that it was desire that kept him on the wheel.
My other thought has to do with the use of an acid that worked for me on a wart- but somehow I think it might not be applicable to the problem.
Perhaps they are both equally unusable– you decide.
sonic: I would certainly agree with BillyJoe that the self metaphors that we use in everyday communication do not entail that these structures are ontologically real (e.g. that we are divided up in such a way that expressions like “I was beside myself” or “I like myself” are literally true). My point was simply that a metaphor can be true (or at least apt) in the sense that it fits well with both subjective/first-person and third-person accounts (whether the latter accounts are related by trained scientists or simply casual witnesses).
I don’t see much (if any) direct relevance to physics here, but I’m aware that some folks believe that quantum mechanics bears on the free will debate in the philosophy of mind. Suffice it to say: That’s not where I’m coming from.
Sonic:
The Buddhists welcome the wart, but I am not so complacent (at least not yet)
Although I do think I will forgo the acid for a more holistic method of ridding myself of the “wart”. I will continue to strengthen my immune system ’til the wart, in response to the onslaught of challenges caused by its own lack of cooperation with my fully integrated physiological being, can do naught but recognize itself as existing separate from and therefore in whole dependence upon me. Then, being filled with a sort of blissful gratitude for its self’s existence, it morphs into a beneficial shield against all other warts.
y’know, I couldn’t really make that metaphor work. It’s final collapse comes when the wart becomes self-aware.
oh well. Maybe I’ll look at the Buddhist thing again
mufi-
agree.
Miema-
but it seems so often it is the effort that brings joy.
tmac,
“Can you think of a test/experiment that would change your mind about the existence of freewill,if it were successful? Do you think that it is even a testable hypothesis?”
No and no.
Freewill is superfluous.
mufi
You seem to be implying that self and freewill arise out of the mechanical workings of the brain. I’m saying that the mechanical cause and effect workings of the brain produce an illusion-of-freewill. Freewill is indistinguishable from the illusion-of-freewill. But to say there is freewill is to say that there is an immaterial self controlling the brain – for which there is no evidence.
Mlema,
I cannot see any relevance for Godel’s Incompleteness Theorem (GIT) on the question of freewill.
Godel’s Incompleteness Theorem is to do with formal mathematical systems where you start of with a few basic assumptions and build a library of therorems (truth statements). The theorems that Godel said could not be proven within any such system, are all self-referential.
So, firstly, how difficult could it be to “teach” machines how to recognise self-referential questions and to deal with them appropriately?
And, secondly, consider “Deep Blue”, the computer that beat the world champion chess player at his own game. If Deep Blue were to function in a way that would be affected by GIT, it would have to be functioning on the basis of what are known as “brute force” algorithms. A “brute force” algoritm would not make a mistake, but it would run for ever trying to figure out the perfect response to the chess master’s every move. But it doesn’t run on a brute force algorithm, it runs on a “heuristic” algorithm. This means that it can make mistakes. It can actually lose a game of chess. But the bonus is that it gets to actually make a move before the universe ends.
Is there a freewill in Deep Blue? No, of course not.
Well, evolution built humans the same way. To make decisions on the run. Not perfect decisions, because they would never get made by the time the predator arrives. But mostly beneficial decisions. So why do human brains need freewill to make mistakes but machines seem to be quite capable of making mistakes without it?
sonic,
I tell you what, if you don’t think positing an immaterial entity is an unnecessary added hypothesis when the material entity can get the job done, then please hand the razor to someone who knows what it’s for.
And I like your link to the modern view on freewill: 1954!
“You say that a entity doesn’t exist. For the sake of argument, let’s say I say the entity does exist. Our predictions for what we would find are different. This is not the situation where Ockham’s Razor applies. It applies only when our predictions are the same.”
The problem is that our predictions are indistinguishable.
The difference is that I have an explantion for how my material entity does its work, but you have no explantion for how your immaterial entity could possibly do its work. How could freewill possibly work? I asked that question before and got no response.
“Obviously if I have no choice in my beliefs, then I would be unable to see or change them based on evidence either.”
Not so obviously.
How about this: evidence (things you observe, things you read, things you hear) enters the brain as sensory input via the optic and auditory nerves where, through cause and effect relations between neurones within the brain, it results in a different brain state from what existed before.
Voila, changed beliefs.
And how does freewill work again? Where does the magic insert itself into this mechanical system?
BillyJoe:
It does indeed depend on what you mean by “free will.”
For example, if you mean “freedom of humans to make choices that are not determined by prior causes or by divine intervention”, then I would agree that we have no good reason to believe that that concept is true.
But I believe that a more commonplace (and metaphysically neutral) definition of “free will” is “voluntary choice or decision” (as in: “He committed the act of murder of his own free will—no one forced him to do it.”). [See Merriam-Webster.] In this sense, “free will” is an apt description for a category of (self-propelled) human behavior and its correlating mental states.
So, when I told you that “I chose coffee over tea”, I gave eye-witness testimony to certain real events (not so unlike what I would do if I had observed a science experiment). But I did so using a first-person perspective, drawing from my memory that no body had coerced me into the act. That the choice was made largely unconsciously (i.e. once informed by a vision of the available options) does not make it any less free, in the sense that I use here.
BillyJoe-
Humans make decisions? Doesn’t a decision require making a choice?
BillyJoe7-
You claim a material entity can’t have freewill (a claim I’m not sure is true). So it is your hypothesis that an added entity is needed to account for freewill (assuming such exists for a moment). If we don’t beg the question then it is clear we can put away the Razor.
I have given you references as to how free choices work (and are used in physics practice today) before- I’ll try again.
http://www-physics.lbl.gov/~stapp/Philosophy.pdf
I’m not sure that free choices prove freewill, but I’m not sure how free choices would come about otherwise.
I’m not sure that the existence of freewill (or choices) would prove the existence of nonmaterial entities.
But I am certain that today physicists make choices that are not determined by any known law or mathematics and are not determinable by the physical configuration of the universe at the time of the choice, that is they are considered free.
If that means nonmaterial entities are making the choices, then so be it.
BTW– Somethings true in 1954, are still true today.
tmac,
“Humans make decisions? Doesn’t a decision require making a choice?
”
Yep, just like machines make “decisions” and “choices”.
I’m sorry I didn’t use the scare quotes, but I’m subject to our dualistic language just like everyone else.
One thing us humans can do is choose how we choose. We can choose to choose based upon some issue, or to just yank someones chain or to choose by random choice. We could even choose how random our choice of how we choose might be, or just make it random to yank someone elses chain because it does or doesn’t, or to be non-random and choose in such a way as to benefit someone else or our selves, either because they need our help, or they haven’t won in a while or because it just proves that we can make a choice just to make a point that we can.
I don’t think a machine can do that, yet.
mufi,
“It does indeed depend on what you mean by “free will.” ”
Yeah, but you can change the definition so much that the word becomes unrecognisable. Let’s just say that, when I use the word, I mean something that is actually “free” and “willed”. And I think there are no takers
“if you mean “freedom of humans to make choices that are not determined by prior causes…”, then I would agree..”
Then you should agree that there is no FREEwill.
“But I believe that a more commonplace (and metaphysically neutral) definition of “free will” is “voluntary choice or decision” (as in: “He committed the act of murder of his own free will—no one forced him to do it.”). [See Merriam-Webster.] In this sense, “free will” is an apt description for a category of (self-propelled) human behavior and its correlating mental states.”
So, it’s still freewill if there is influence from inside the brain as long as there is no influence from outside the brain? But surely the internal brain states get to be the way they are as a result of influences from outside the brain channelled into the brain via the optic and auditory nerves.
“That the choice was made largely unconsciously (i.e. once informed by a vision of the available options) does not make it any less free, in the sense that I use here.”
The “available options” are influences from outside, so there goes freewill already by you definition. And, if the choice was made “largely unconsciously” – as a result of mechanical cause and effect relations in the subconscious part of your brain informed by these outside influences or “available options” – again where is the “free” part in FREEwill.
Yeah, but you can change the definition so much that the word becomes unrecognisable.
Which is why I limited myself to the two definitions given in a popular English dictionary – the first of which agrees with the way that I use the term, and the second of which agrees with the way that you use it (i.e. before you knock it down).
I mean something that is actually “free” and “willed”.
Me, too, as in: a “desire, wish” that is “made, done, or given voluntarily or spontaneously.”
Of course, the concept of freedom is relative (and probably rooted in our bodily experience of motion) and falls along a spectrum (as suggested in science & engineering by the term “degrees of freedom”). [For that matter, I'm not even sure that the term "total freedom" is coherent.] That’s probably why “free will” is so often used in a social context, relative to another actor or agent.
Say, speaking of “degrees of freedom”, I just came across this gem, while googling in response sonic’s quantum mind allusion above:
source
BillyJoe7-
you make a strong argument and I am completely convinced by it. Here is an elegant defense of your stance (including your claim that quantum mechanics do not necessitate free will):
http://www.emergentmind.org/CorredoiraI3.htm
However, my point in referring to Godel is (from same web site):
“a computer can never be as smart as a human being because the extent of its knowledge is limited by a fixed set of axioms, whereas people can discover unexpected truths … (that) has been taken to imply that you’ll never entirely understand yourself, since your mind, like any other closed system, can only be sure of what it knows about itself by relying on what it knows about itself.”
You and I are driven by biological desire, and we have no choice about our choices. BUT we are aware of that.. We are AWARE that we can only rely on what we know about ourselves, and that the “will” that drives us is dictated by life’s desire for itself to continue. This awareness is the insight that a machine cannot create, because it is outside the set of axioms by which it functions. The one choice we have is whether to cooperate with the will to which we are enslaved. No machine has that choice. But i will admit that I don’t know whether that choice is free or not, I only know that my ability to step back and look at it again and again, and to a further and further degree seems to be a sort of duality. But in the end it may exist withing a unity which I’m just not able to comprehend.
I am compelled to read and write here. i have no control over that. But I’m AWARE that I’m doing it. And if I can stay in that awareness with a mind of inquiry as to whether it’s really beneficial to my life’s desire, perhaps I can fit my choice to stay or go more closely to that desire (which is apparently not my own, but is what most people call “free will”)
cheers
sorry regarding Godel: the reference and quotes are from
http://www.miskatonic.org/godel.html
NOT the site mentioned in the comment immediately above
sonic,
“I have given you references as to how free choices work (and are used in physics practice today) before- I’ll try again.
http://www-physics.lbl.gov/~stapp/Philosophy.pdf”
Sonic, if you’re unable to summarise a 30 page reference so I can decide whether or not it’s going to be worth my while to read it, then I’m going to assume it’s not worth reading.
Especially with a title like this:
“Philosophy of Mind and the Problem of Free Will in the Light
of Quantum Mechanics.”
The Quantum Mind!
No thanks, I prefer not to get my information from science that is barely on the fringe if not out past the back of beyond.
The Slipperyness of Freewill.
Perhaps those who believe in freewill need to define exactly what they mean by FREEwill. And I don’t mean the conversational and legal definitions. Free from what? And perhaps they need also to provide an explanation of exactly what mechanism gives rise to freewill. And how that mechanism can possibly leave freewill free from the influences of the mechanism that bought it about.
Otherwise all I see is magic.
…and, no, consciousness does not cause collapse of the wave function. And, even if it did, consciousness cannot determine HOW it collapses.
mufi-
there are those who see things one way and those who see it another.
Max Tegmark, the person you quote, also says,
“There are infinitely many other inhabited planets, including not just one but infinitely many that have people with the same appearance, name and memories as you, who play out every possible permutation of your life choices.”
http://space.mit.edu/home/tegmark/PDF/multiverse_sciam.pdf
I’m assuming that on a different planet he is arguing the opposite case. I doubt it is because the truth is different there.
So why would I prefer this one to the other? Because I have no choice in the matter?
(hey, don’t misunderstand- I like the guy and some of his stuff…)
BillyJoe7-
In summary-
In actual practice physicists set up experiments that require a choice to be made.
The choice made is not determined by any known mathematics or physical law.
The choice made cannot be determined by the physical configuration at the time the choice is made.
These are deemed free choices because they fall outside the formulae and calculations of physics as it is known today.
These choices effect the behavior of the objects under study.
In other words physicists today make what they deem to be free choices that effect the actions of physical objects under study.
In other words, your claim that there are not free choices (or that they couldn’t effect the physical universe) is in direct opposition to science as it is practiced today.
You can stick to the philosophical mumbo jumbo- it is a free choice for you to make.
If you want to understand the physics of the situation, I fear you will have to be prepared to read more than 30 pages as my summary does not do justice to the subject.
Sonic: thanks for the article you posted to BillyJoe7. Makes me realize i shouldn’t argue quantum mechanics – because i don’t really understand it well enough. But, leave it to an Austrian to use a dead cat in an illustration. :0 (I can say that because I’m 1/4 Austrian)
BillyJoe7: a philosophical question for you:
Why are we entitled to postulate the existence of dark matter and dark energy based only on the effects that we see they have on other matter and energy?
Miema-
If Schrodinger had used a possum as his example, then we could (given enough beer) conclude that the possum was just ‘playing possum’ and this would make sense and we could have another beer.
I see why Hawking doesn’t like the cat. Shoulda been a possum.
(I can say that because I’m 1/4 silly).
mufi-
Sorry for the remarks re: Tegmark.
What I should say is that I believe you would find that quantum effects are needed to explain the activities of living cells. You can check out enzyme tunneling and photosynthesis as examples.
sonic,
If you believe that, then you should be able to link to an experiment in quantum physics that clearly demonstrates that the consciousness of the experimenter alters the outcome of the experiment.
No such experiment exists.
So much for mumbo jumbo.
BillyJoe7-
Your statement is completely non-sequitur.
It has nothing at all to do with anything about any part of what I referenced or stated.
Clearly I have utterly failed to communicate.
I will learn and improve.
[i]testing[/i]
sonic,
I have a deep suspicion of people who cannot explain what that claim to understand and resort to links instead of giving that explanation. My suspicion is that if they cannot explain it then they probably do not understand it.
Okay, the long version of my reply to your summary:
“In actual practice physicists set up experiments that require a choice to be made.”
By using the word choice, you are assuming your conclusion.
“The choice made is not determined by any known mathematics or physical law.”
Assuming your conclusion.
“The choice made cannot be determined by the physical configuration at the time the choice is made.”
Assuming your conclusion.
“These are deemed free choices because they fall outside the formulae and calculations of physics as it is known today.”
In other words they are free choices because they are free choices.
“These choices effect the behavior of the objects under study.”
This is where you need that experiment I referred to.
“In other words physicists today make what they deem to be free choices that effect the actions of physical objects under study.”
I other words, free choices are free choices because they are taken to be free choices because you have no evidence.
“In other words, your claim that there are not free choices is in direct opposition to science as it is practiced today.”
But still you cannot seem to answer these basic questions
1) How do you define freewill?
2) How do you distinguish freewill from the illusion-of-freewill?
3) How does freewill come about?
4) How can freewill be “free” of that which brings it about?
“(or that they couldn’t effect the physical universe)”
Where did I say that?
The brain receives input from the environment and creates an output that feeds back into the environment. Action and reaction. Cause and effect. There is just no need for freewill over and above the illusion-of-freewill, and no justification for it (otherwise answer those questions). In fact, if it were to exist freewill would not only be a “ghost in the machine” but a “spanner in the works”. A sort of random veto on the workings of the brain that have evolved to react efficiently to the environment
sonic: I don’t get your Tegmark comment. Was that a slur? I’m no expert myself, but his credentials (e.g. MIT professor of cosmology) look impressive enough to me that they seem to carry at least some weight. More to the point, if the claim is that quantum mind theories are uncontroversial among relevant experts, then Exhibit A.
Besides, it’s not difficult to find other examples of physicists who are critics of such theories (i.e. even if we put aside all of the advances in neuroscience that rely upon classical assumptions). But then I don’t want to resort to any more links, given BillyJoe’s valid point above.
BillyJoe7 says he does not have free will. I believe him. And so therefore i believe that he does not have the choice whether or not to believe he has free will. Perhaps one day some little piece of info will pile onto already accumulated info in his brain, and he will suddenly find that he believes he does have free will! (of course he will have no choice in that either)
Sonic says he has free will. i believe him. And therefore I think it is his choice to believe that he has free will. But it doesn’t really matter, because he’s still going to conduct himself according to whatever kind of will he does have.
I think whether or not humans have free will will remain a question for debate. I do think that possibly free will is on a “sliding scale” if you will. That is, the more education I have, about everything, including myself and how i am affected by the physical, social, and psychological environment within me and around me, the more AWARE I am, and the more I am free to make decisions independently of those things. So, it’s not either one or the other, but more or less of one or the other.
This gives critical importance to our social structure and educational system, because we can say a disadvantaged, abused, neglected child joins a gang and murders someone through no fault of his own, because he has no free will and acted according to past events. But, as a society, being aware of the sorts of things that conspire to create this sort of murderer, we are obliged to make choices that would improve the chances of preventing such a child from having to walk that path. Again, education and awareness.
As for the interface between the will and the physical being – it is perhaps not a delineation between two distinct things, but a level of functioning to be reached. The constant observation of the Zeno effect
(that perhaps a guru might reach)
BillyJoe7 – you use the idea that the most simple explanation for anything is the right one. You have a rigid logic that denies your own ability to propound upon it. The human brain/mind is immensely complex. If you insist that it can be reduced to “algorithms” then you must allow for Godel’s theorem, that:
given any consistent set of arithmetical axioms, there are true mathematical statements that cannot be derived from the set… Even if the axioms of arithmetic are augmented by an indefinite number of other true ones, there will always be further mathematical truths that are not formally derivable from the augmented set.
That is, without some “epiphenomenon”, the logic of the machine is unprovable. The mind/brain is a “subset” of YOU.
I feel no shame in the wishy-washiness of this: that one human might possess free will and another might not. Uncertainty is sure in some situations, and (almost) everything changes
Mlema, the brain is non-algorithmic. It does not use algorithms the way a Turing Equivalent does. Gödel’s theorem does apply to it, but so what? The brain is inconsistent. It is therefore allowed to come up with answers that are self-contradictory. That is what inconsistent means.
BillyJoe knows this. He wants a definition of the term “free will” before deciding what it means and whether brains can exhibit it.
Sonic wants a non-material mind to exhibit the thing that he calls “free will”, but won’t tell us what the term “free will” means. Without an agreed upon meaning, it is difficult to have a discussion about it.
Our legal system is based on the premise, not of “free will”, but of “sane” and “insane”. A person is “insane”, if they are unable to comprehend that what they are doing is wrong and therefore illegal. The legal system is both incomplete and inconsistent.
If we applied the modern idea of “sane” and “insane” to Galileo, for his “crime” of heresy, he would be found “insane” because he was not capable of understanding that not accepting religions dogma with blind faith is wrong and therefore illegal. That is essentially what the Church did.
daedalus2u:
thanks for correcting me on my description of the brain using algorithms. Hope my analogy was still understandable.
you say:
that the legal system is based on insanity. that: “A person is “insane”, if they are unable to comprehend that what they are doing is wrong and therefore illegal.”
If they’re sane, and can comprehend that what they’re doing is illegal, you can’t try them for guilt if they had no free will in what they did!
Our justice system IS based on the assumption that we have free will. You can’t call someone “guilty” if they weren’t able to choose anything other than what they chose. Insanity comes into the equation because it interferes with the functioning of free will. Again, it’s on a scale. Everyone’s affected by the things around and inside them, and if that effect reaches a level of interfering with basic decision-making or self-control, we might say someone’s “insane” and that they don’t have free will.
I think we’ve got the definition of free will as far as BillyJoe7 goes. He says that it’s an illusion, and that we actually have no control over what we do. He believes in behavioral determinism. Thoughts, choices, actions, are all a series of input-output events. No need to complicate things with a superfluous “I”.
Sonic contends that there is an “I” that gives us the ability to enter into this stream of physiological events as a controller, or maybe just as a switch, like on a train track.
(hope I got that right for both-please correct if not)
I say: neither of these can be proven because they exist within the same subset of ideas you’re trying to prove. The moment we take the position of being separate from them in order to prove one or the other, we are just inside a bigger subset. Then a bigger one, and a bigger one, etc. We can NEVER have a vantage point by which to prove the validity of either stance. Perhaps they are both correct at different times. Perhaps there is something we don’t have any knowledge about that would solve the dilemma.
I don’t know why you say to me: the brain is inconsistent and is allowed to come up with answers that are contradictory. I didn’t realize i said anything about the brain’s inconsistency. I did say that it’s immensely complicated. Also, a brain can be very consistent and still come up with answers that are contradictory. But i don’t understand what that has to do with what I said.
anyway, thanks again for your response. hope I made more clear what I was trying to say.
M
Meima-
I think you may be onto something about different people being different. There is some question about exactly what aspects and how much is different, but the world is not peopled by people exactly like me. And I am thankful for that.
This ends with a question about Godel–
I think it would be possible to show that there aren’t really free choices- just write the formula that predicts all future choices. This is often the type of test used to adjudicate a claim.
I don’t think it is possible to disprove the claim of no free choice (one can always claim the formula is coming some day).
I don’t think it is possible to prove that free choices exist (for the reason above).
So one hypothesis is falsifiable and another is not.
One can’t be shown to be true, the other can’t be shown to be false.
What does Godel say about that situation?
mufi-
What I should have said is that we know from biology that all living cells (including brain cells) demonstrate quantum effects in their operation.
example-http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2010/10/19/1010700107.short
Note that this is very recent info (the stuff about photosynthesis is older) and applies to all cells.
I have no reason to slur Max- I noticed the same thing- that’s why I say I’m sorry about that. Very poor writing on my part.
dadaelus2u-
I don’t want an immaterial mind to exhibit anything.
I like my exhibits to be material whenever possible.
BillyJoe7 seems to think only an immaterial mind could have free will, but I’m not even sure golf balls don’t.
BillyJoe7-
It’s a practical matter. They are free choices because there isn’t anyway to predict them currently.
It is almost as circular as the definition of an electron.
We know the choices aren’t free when they are always the same, or when they are completely predictable by formula. It seems duress can make choices less free, for example.
The choices made by physicists are obviously not all the same, and it seems that nobody has figured out the formula for them yet either. Perhaps someone will one day.
This does not prove the existence of an immaterial mind. It does not even prove the existence of free choices.
But if they act like free choices and feel like free choices, then again maybe they are.
It’s a practical matter-
Mlema,
“BillyJoe7 says he does not have free will. I believe him. And so therefore i believe that he does not have the choice whether or not to believe he has free will.”
It’s not a matter of choice.
It’s a logical argument based on those four questions I asked.
“Perhaps one day some little piece of info will pile onto already accumulated info in his brain, and he will suddenly find that he believes he does have free will! (of course he will have no choice in that either)”
That will also not be a choice, just answers to those four questions.
“I think whether or not humans have free will will remain a question for debate. ”
Before you think that, please provide a definition of freewill worth debating. I think the definition will prove so slippery there will be nothing to debate.
“the more education I have, about everything, including myself and how i am affected by the physical, social, and psychological environment within me and around me, the more AWARE I am, and the more I am free to make decisions independently of those things.”
Hoiw do you figure? Surely, if there is a self/freewill, the less information provided by the brain the easier it would be for the self to veto the brain’s output (hey, I nearly said “decisions”!). And the more information, the more foolhardy it would be for the self to veto the brain’s output. Which gets right back to the “spanner in the works” analogy for the role a putative self/freewill.
Regarding Godel: I already answered that question. Instead of asking the question again why don’t you address the answer I gave the first time?
“The mind/brain is a “subset” of YOU.
I feel no shame in the wishy-washiness of this..”
How could that “YOU” be anything other than an immaterial entity. The materialist view is that it’s the other way around: The brain produces a mind complete with the illusion of self/freewill.
Mlema,
“If they’re sane, and can comprehend that what they’re doing is illegal, you can’t try them for guilt if they had no free will in what they did!”
I think it would not be to hard for brains to figure out that if they let killers go free, they may be the next to be killed. It doesn’t matter if there is no freewill, if someone has proven themselves to be unsafe to have around, he should be locked up to protect everyone else.
There is, however, one consequence of the absence of freewill. And it is a positive one. There is no longer any basis for revenge. There is no reason to treat killers inhumanely.
(And, before you complain, yes, in the above I’m speaking like a dualist simply because the language is easier.)
Mlema,
“I think we’ve got the definition of free will as far as BillyJoe7 goes. He says that it’s an illusion, and that we actually have no control over what we do. ”
No. I said there is an illusion-of-freewill and I said there is no freewill. And I said there is no “I” that controls the brain, not that there is an “I” but that doesn’t control the brain. What sense would that make?
sonic,
“But if they act like free choices and feel like free choices, then again maybe they are.”
But you still have no way to distinguish freewill from the illusion-of-freewill, and no way in which freewill could arise, and no way that it could arise without being influenced by that which gave rise to it, and no way it could contribute to the organisms survival as opposed to being a “spanner in the works”.
You don’t even have a definition of freewill that makes any sense whatsoever. I don’t think it’s even possible.
BillyJoe-
So you made a “choice” to to use ‘output’ instead of ‘decisions’?
I think I understand where you’re coming from now (maybe).The term “free will” to you is like the word “ghost”. People talk about ghosts endlessly in literature,movies,conversation,but no one has definitively come up with what a ghost really is so that we would know one when we see it.But that doesn’t stop people from having the ‘idea’ of a ghost,so it will probably continue to be with us as an abstract notion.
Mlema said: Our justice system IS based on the assumption that we have free will. You can’t call someone “guilty” if they weren’t able to choose anything other than what they chose.
I can, but then maybe that’s because, when I think of criminal guilt, I tend to think of it more as a risk assessment on behalf of society than as an individual getting his/her just desserts.
I would want to know, as a judge or juror, if the agent intended to commit the criminal act, as opposed to being coerced into it by another agent. But there are pragmatic reasons for that criterion (e.g. to locate the actual threat, predict and prevent repeat behavior, etc.), each of which is open to empirical analysis and which have little or nothing to do with metaphysics.
You might very well be right about how others approach our justice system, including its founders. But then I also think it’s possible to do the right thing for the wrong reasons.
First, let me point out that I am not prejudiced against gay people. I’m in favour of gay marriage, gay adoption, and equal rights in all areas.
That said; if sexual preference is determined by genetics, epigenetics and the amniotic environment, then we can make a simple prediction: identical twins will share their sexual preferences in the vast majority of cases.
This is not the case. I will link to Wikipedia, which lists metastudy after metastudy of sexuality in twins: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biology_and_sexual_orientation#Twin_studies — in every case, identical twins show greater concordance for sexuality than fraternal twins, showing a genetic influence, but far below 100%.
Are some people born with their sexuality determined? Maybe, but it’s clear that many aren’t, including the large majority of gay people.
We also have historical evidence of societies in ancient Greece where the large majority of men had sexual relations with other men. It’s hard to escape the conclusion that sexuality is moulded by society and individual experiences.
BillyJoe7-
To be fair-
I’ll answer the four questions.
1) Freewill is will unencumbered. Freewill is defined by what it does- that is it acts without restriction. It seems possible to restrict the will through duress, but that’s one of the ways we know it exists- it can be affected.
2) It is not possible for me to know that all existence is an not an illusion. Therefore it is not possible for me to know that freewill is not an illusion. It is also not possible for me to know the universe as a whole is not an illusion.
To quote Einstein-”Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”
3) Freewill came about the same way as everything else did. Apparently it was all a spontaneous creation. (I don’t know beyond that).
4) Freewill is free of that which created it because otherwise it wouldn’t be free.
I’ll explain that to you right after I figure out why electrons act as they do.
It may take a while, but I will do my best to keep it under 30 pages.
sonic, it’s hard for me to imagine what “unrestricted freedom” even means, let alone whether or not it really exists. That said, I think I’ll stick with my situated/relativist definition of “free will” (see above).
I like that Einstein quote – not that I would conclude from it that an objective (mind-independent) reality does not exist. But our perception/conception of it is certainly not It.
And, while I generally reserve the term “illusion” for those effects that are especially deceptive or misleading (again, in a relative sense), I understand that one can reasonably use the term more broadly to describe subjective experience as a whole.
In that sense, free will is indeed an illusion (like BillyJoe says). But it is also a “very persistent one” (unlike, say, the illusion of an oasis on the horizon of a dry and hot highway). So, for that matter, is color and gravity.
Stmac,
“So you made a “choice” to to use ‘output’ instead of ‘decisions’?
”
This brain produced the output “decisions”, but then, just as that output was about to be executed through instructions to the hands of the body in which it resides, another module became active within that brain which resulted in the output being changed to “output”.
“The term “free will” to you is like the word “ghost”. People talk about ghosts endlessly in literature,movies,conversation,but no one has definitively come up with what a ghost really is so that we would know one when we see it.”
That sounds like a pretty fair analogy.
“Freewill is will unencumbered. Freewill is defined by what it does- that is it acts without restriction.”
Unencumbered by what? That is the key to the question. If you mean unemcumbered by the laws of physics, and unencumbered by the biology and chemistry of the physiology of the organism then you have a real problem.
I don’t think that you mean that so…. by what sense is it free? If it is bound/determined by all of those things, then where/when/how does the freedom wedge itself in?
Sonic:
to expound on your views. you’ve given me more to chew on.
thanks for your “willingness”
“4) Freewill is free of that which created it because otherwise it wouldn’t be free.”
Assuming your conclusion. That doesn’t answer any question.
mufi-
I agree that your definition is more practical. You are correct that the one I gave implies the possibility of a freedom beyond the constraints of history, biology or physics. And that is what is imagined. Certainly we are subject to those constraints, but not necessarily limited by them.
A person can say ‘no’ even though the gun is pointed at her head. Happens more than we know.
ccbowers-
Free will is the will encumbered by all the factors you state.
If the will weren’t free (at least somewhat), then we wouldn’t be able to encumber it with these restrictions, would we?
I am talking about something bordering on an absolute.
I’m not sure how absolutely absolutes can be actually attained– but I don’t know lots of stuff.
Heinleiner-
You mistake a definition with a logical argument. Logic begins with premises. Those premises are given- not because they can be shown logically, but rather because they are accepted on face.
Since it is not possible to prove free will (as discussed above), and since it has not been proved not to exist, then we either take it as a premise or not.
Since it is possible to disprove the existence of free will (and it has not been), and since ‘free choices’ are part of physics as it is practiced today, I will go with the disprovable hypothesis that fits with the practice of science today over the nondisprovable hypothesis that does not agree with science as it is practiced today.
I realize I am a maverick for doing so- although I must admit I find the situation odd.
Why does an electron follow the rules?
Because it wouldn’t be an electron if it didn’t.
Mlema-
Likewise, I’m sure.
sonic,
“1) How do you define freewill?
Freewill is will unencumbered. Freewill is defined by what it does- that is it acts without restriction.”
It seems to me that even a single molecule floating in the vastness of space cannot exist unencumbered. Sooner or later it’s going to encounter a cosmic ray or two.
So, where does freewill hide so as to shield itself from all the potential influences upon it so that it can remain FREE? Perhaps it resides in a module completely isolated from the rest of the brain? That would mean no sensory input and no input from memory or any of the other specialised modules within the brain. Without that input, what could such an entity possibly do to the advantage of the brain? Without inputs, how does it know what to decide and when? When to veto and when not to veto?
“It seems possible to restrict the will through duress, but that’s one of the ways we know it exists- it can be affected.”
Hold on, you said before that “freewill…acts without restriction”, and now you say “it seems possible to restrict the will” – in fact it is “one of the ways we know it exists”. It acts without restriction and we know it exists because it can be restricted!
Perhaps you mean that freewill is unrestricted within its module within the brain (no input) but that its output to the brain can be suppressed by the rest of the brain. If so, then what actually is in charge. Does freewill veto the brain or does the brain veto freewill?
“2) How do you distinguish freewill from the illusion-of-freewill?
It is not possible for me to know that all existence is an not an illusion. Therefore it is not possible for me to know that freewill is not an illusion. It is also not possible for me to know the universe as a whole is not an illusion.”
Okay, so you agree that the illusion-of-freewill is indistinguishable from freewill. That of course means that you agree that the illusion-of-freewill has identical effects to freewill. The problem for you now is that the illusion-of-freewill can easily be explained as what the brain does. How do you explain the genesis of freewill…see next question
“3) How does freewill come about?
Freewill came about the same way as everything else did. Apparently it was all a spontaneous creation. (I don’t know beyond that).”
No, I meant how does it come about within a brain, not how does it come about through evolutionary time. But, wait, you said:
A “spontaneous creation”?
What on Earth is a “spontaneous creation”?
I thought everything evolved.
And I’m still stuggling to see how the evolution of freewill could be anything other than a spanner in the works – a random veto on the output of the brain that evolved to react appropriately to the environment. Surely such a mutation would be eliminated from the gene pool within a generation.
“4) How can freewill be “free” of that which brings it about?
Freewill is free of that which created it because otherwise it wouldn’t be free.”
Congratulations. In other words, freewill is free because it is free!
Well then, maybe you could provide me with another example of where something is produced by something else but is completely free of any influence from the thing that produced it. It’s a complete nonsense.
jamougha – I disagree. First, you are assuming preference from behavior, and this is problematic. Society and situation affects behavior, sure, but this does not necessarily mean if affects preference to the same degree.
Second, you misinterpret the significance of the twin studies. There are twin studies for many disorders known to be strongly genetic, like schizophrenia, and they show only a 50% concordance in identical twins. The fact that there is a greater concordance than fraternal twins indicates that there is a genetic factor, and the concordance for all twins suggests an epigenetic factor. Also- you cannot assume that the epigenetic environment is perfectly symmetrical for all twins – it’s not.
Finally, epigenetic factors influence development, but not necessarily determine it – so identical twins in the same womb can still develop along slightly different paths and show differences.
BillyJoe7-
The universe is the result of spontaneous creation. I believe on this point both Steven Hawking and the Pope would agree. I don’t know differently.
I’m sorry that it is inconvenient for you to read the article that I linked to. It is not possible for me to state the basics of the scientific argument better than it is presented there.
As my main point is about the state of science, it seems we are at an impasse.
It seems that you might be thinking that I am accusing you of being a ghost or personally having free will. I don’t know that either is true or false.
I apologize if there has been a misunderstanding on that point that made you uncomfortable.
sonic,
Does that mean that freewill was created at the Big Bang?
I think neither Hawking nor the pope would agree with you there.
Also, it is not inconvenient for me to read the article, it’s just that you have given me very little reason to bother. In my opinion, if you are unable to summarise the argument in that article in a few short paragraphs – as I have for the illusion-of-freewill – then excuse me if I conclude that you don’t understand it or that it doesn’t have legs
And what ever made you think you have made me uncomfortable? I’m not exactly the one who is unable to present his case. If there is an impasse here, it’s because you are neither able to present your case nor have any reply to the case I have presented here.
regards
BillyJoe
The effects of ‘imprinting’ are variable depending on individual.
Programs designed to ‘make people straight’ assume that they can make a difference by imprinting. This kind of deliberate imprinting does not seem to work. Further, I have not seen any suggestion as to what kind of ‘imprinting’ might lead to being straight, gay or bisexual. Children raised by gay parent (for example) are no more statistically likely to ‘become’ gay.
If someone has a ‘choice’ in their sexual preference, they are most likely bi (the assumption is that they have a desire for people of both genders and choose to act upon a subset of those).
A person can ‘willfully’ act against their own desires to varying degrees. Many desires can also be imprinted (like taste associations) but I am not convinced that sexuality is one of those things.
Also, a computer can be programmed to ‘choose’ based on various criteria. This choice is limited to the information the computer has and its ability to assess it.
Whatever the underlying mechanisms of choice are, the word its self remains useful in describing the outcome of deliberation processes.
Choice and freewill do not necessarily imply dualism. You can have them in a deterministic or probabilistic world as well as write it into fictional dualistic ones.
BillyJoe: I’m guessing that you would describe the the sun’s daily rising and falling (from an earthbound observer’s POV) as an illusion. Correct? Not that I necessarily object to that use of the term. I’m simply testing your usage for consistency.
But I will say that the metaphor of the sun as a solid object in motion still seems perfectly apt, from a given perspective.
And I would say the same of the free will or ghost in the machine metaphors, even though I recognize that cognitive science has a very different (though compatible) story to tell about the same literal events, in which it employs entirely different metaphors (e.g. neurons as guns firing or brain/mind as computer hardware/software).
mufi,
As I said before, I don’t think we disagree on much.
My problem with using the words “self” and “freewill” as metaphors in discussions such as this is that it gives people who do not use them as metaphors a free ride.
There are people who really do believe in disembodied minds controlling brains and the implications of their use of the words “self” and “freewill” are entirely different to yours and mine. They see them, not as metaphors, but as real entities. I don’t think we have seen any of those dualists here.
However, there are at least two posters here who interpret those words exactly the way dualists do but believe that these entities can be produced by the brain.
It is supposed to come about by some sort of quantum process which can never quite be explained. And, if I may be so bold as to say, it is based on misconceptions about quantum physics. Or, at the very least, wild and unsupported extrapolations from our actual body of knowledge and understanding of quantum processes.
It’s certainly more sophisticated than Chopra’s version of “The Quantum Mind” but no less supported by the science.
BillyJoe: Given all that I’ve written & posted so far in this thread, I’d be very surprised if any dualists mistook me for one of their own.
The quantum mind stuff is not necessarily dualist (so much as afraid of determinism), but I think this and this comment above demonstrate that we’re in agreement there, as well.
If I seem at all attached to the “free will” metaphor, it’s only because I still find it useful. Moreover, I’m not prepared (as you seem to be) to concede it to the dualists. I prefer the (admittedly more complex) task of pointing out how silly it is to interpret such metaphors literally, while also pointing out how impoverished our language would be without them.
mufi,
“I’m not prepared (as you seem to be) to concede it to the dualists.”
The problem is that freewill is a dualists’ conception that has been usurped as a metaphor by some materialists. It’s not a matter of being prepared to concede it to the dualist but, rather, of being prepared to steel it from them. Personally, Id rather not. Too much baggage.
BillyJoe7,
I’m not convinced that ‘free will’ is a dualist purely concept, as you say. I am certain that referring to ‘choice’ is not. Choice is simply the result of a deliberation process. No conflict there.
When free will is used in the context of this discussion, it (from what I gather) implies the ability and freedom for someone to reach a conclusion, alter their mental states or arrive at a set of actions through a willful (conscious) deliberative process. Is there a reasonable materialist abjection to this?
BillyJoe: Which came first? The subjective experience of free will? or the metaphysical doctrine of dualism? My money is on the former.
But, even if I’m mistaken, language is neither static nor even mostly literal. It evolves and is largely metaphoric.
So, even if the metaphysical definition of “free will” that you prefer is the original, I’m betting that the metaphysically neutral one that I prefer has become the more commonplace one (which might be why Merriam-Webster gives it top billing).
BillyJoe7 is correct about free will not really being free. Every decision made, whether optional or not, was caused by a previous decision, whether optional or not.
Jeremiah: If that’s our criterion for “free” (or “freedom”), then it describes no plausible real-world situation, and the word is basically useless.
But, if we loosen up a bit, and admit that real-world situations always feature at least some constraints (e.g. physical, biological, cognitive, and environmental), then it’s only a question of which constraints must be absent from a situation in order for the word “free” to be applicable to it.
As with most linguistic decisions, this one is a social one (i.e. a matter of convention).
@mufi
Yes, it’s a linguistic convention to describe the mechanisms of an optional process. Because obviously in the end no choices of an option were free from prior cause. The lunch menu contains options, none of which are free.
BillyJoe7 asks a good question as to whether, due to the spontaneity involved, free will was created at the big bang. It would seem to me that if causation as an inevitable process began with the big bang, then free will from then on was extinguished.
Perhaps that question is an indirect way of asking: Was there ever the potential for free will in this universe? For which I have another question: Tell me what you mean by “free will” and then perhaps I can tell you my opinion on the matter.
But I sense that there’s more than a hint of reification (a.k.a. the fallacy of misplaced concreteness) in that question, inasmuch as it takes an abstract concept, which was formed by humans based on their subjective experience, and then makes it out to be a concrete disembodied entity that can meaningfully be said to have existed (and then extinguished) at/during the Big Bang event.
If we recognize that question for what it is (viz. a product of a fallacy), then I think it becomes moot.
Free will has traditionally meant freedom from coerced choice. The will, unless I’m mistaken, was not considered to be an abstraction when the phrase came to attain that meaning. Will power was a force of nature, for example. To take away your freedom of choice was to take away the essence of that power. But in those times, the Gods had the power to do that, hence the deterministic aspect of mankind’s theistic forms of belief. Those beliefs of course persist today, and perversely as an explanation for what seems to be the inevitability of fate, and the paradox of having responsibility for actions which the Gods have forced upon us.
The big bang, if as sonic suggested, came about spontaneously, would by some accounts have made itself the final cause. Instead of free will arising in the absence of the gods, the big bang was all the God we’d ever need to determine our fate.
Sorry, you lost me.
The question is not moot because it’s not the product of a fallacy. The concreteness of the concept of will was not misplaced as far as the ancients were concerned and neither is the concreteness of our intentionality if we in fact have no real choice in the matter.
Isn’t that what BillyJoe was pointing out?
BillyJoe7-
Here is how it works-
1) We set-up a ‘delayed choice’ experiment.
2) In order to predict the results, we have to know what ‘choice’ the experimenter will make.
3) This ‘choice’ is not predicted by any known formula. Therefore it is considered ‘free’.
Is there some part of that don’t you understand?
PixelKd-
You make a good point about sexuality and ‘imprinting’.
It does seem that we could determine if and/or how much imprinting could effect sexuality by studying cases like you mention (children raised by a gay parent).
It seems there have been attempts to alter people’s preferences as well.
In my experience these seem to have variable success.
mufi-
I think you are right about metaphors and language.
I’m sure it is true of physics today, for example. (Is light a wave or a particle? Neither…)
Jeremiah-
Are you aware that physics today does not demand that all events have prior causes? (That’s how a ‘spontaneous creation’ can be considered part of a physics description.)
@sonic,
Yes I’m aware of that, but if without prior cause, the big bang qualifies as a first cause literally and a final cause metaphorically. According to Aristotle, from whom western science and philosophy derived much of modern terminology (extracted from Wikipedia):
> The final cause is that for the sake of which a thing exists, or is done – including both purposeful and instrumental actions. The final cause, or telos, is the purpose, or end, that something is supposed to serve.<
Thus determinism would have come full blown in the universe according to you and Hawking and the Pope.
The big bang being the prior cause of all events in the universe, including any that appeared to be spontaneous, the latter would still have found themselves (if endowed with any form of curiosity) in a lawfully caused and lawfully determined universe.
sonic,
“Here is how it works-
1) We set-up a ‘delayed choice’ experiment.
2) In order to predict the results, we have to know what ‘choice’ the experimenter will make.
3) This ‘choice’ is not predicted by any known formula. Therefore it is considered ‘free’.
Is there some part of that don’t you understand?”
You are again ssuming you conclusion.
1)The setting up of a delayed choice experiment you call a free choice. I’m saying that the decision was the result of cause and effect relations within the brains of the experimenter.
2) You don’t have to know the “choice” the experimenter will make to make a prediction. You can predict that, if he makes choice A, an interference pattern will definitely result and, if he makes choice B, a random pattern will definitely result. You say that the choice he makes will be free. I say it’s the result of cause and effect relations within his brain.
3) You are saying that because we do not know the complete details about how the experimenter’s brain works, freewill is correct. You are saying that if we had complete knowledge about the experimenter’s brain state we would still not be able to say what his “choice” would be. I say we would.
Since both interpretations are possible, this little scenario of yours does not provided any support for freewill.
PixelKd,
“When free will is used in the context of this discussion, it (from what I gather) implies the ability and freedom for someone to reach a conclusion, alter their mental states or arrive at a set of actions through a willful (conscious) deliberative process. Is there a reasonable materialist abjection to this?”
The lack of any proof that this is so.
I think no one here is advocating an immaterial self as the repository of freewill. So what is the materialist’s version? Sonic is promoting the quantum connection. But all we have is wild philisophical speculation, but no evidence.
The brain evolved to make appropriate “decisions” based on the sensory input together with information from memory and other specialised modules in the brain. If you are supporting the view that these “decisions” can be vetoed by freewill, then you need to provide not only a mechanism and the necessary evidence for that mechanism but also an account of how such a veto capacity could possibly cause anything but harm (either that or you don’t support the first sentence of this paragraph).
It wouldn’t matter that, if for some reason, we were found by science to have a veto capacity over some unequivocally predictable decisions, since the veto would nevertheless have to be a decision governed by the same determinative factors that all prior decisions from the time of the big bang have made inevitable.
Every decision made since that decisive event, whether optional or not, has been caused by a previous decision, whether optional or not.
BillyJoe7-
Thank-you. Your questions and comments have been useful in getting my thoughts streamlined.
I’m not sure freewill is true. I am sure that it is in keeping with actual science as it is known and practiced today as well as everyday experience.
I’m not assuming anything other than the actual observable facts.
You make claims about things that do not actually happen (nobody knows the complete state of anyone’s brain- there own or anyone else’s-).
What you say about would be known if we did know everything about a brain state might be true, but I don’t know that.
So I’m not saying that what you say couldn’t possibly be true or has been disproved (your hypothesis is not disprovable).
However, since what you propose has not been observed to be true, then I would suggest that you are the one assuming the conclusion.
You are not alone in your assumption or in making the conclusion you make.
I await further evidence.
BillyJoe7:
you argue against a free will that is “separate” from the past decisions of the input-output brain. But why separate? Humans have evolved the capacity to kill themselves if their own physiological or psychological pain becomes too great. How was that an ability that would make the species more successful? If it just evolved by accident, and was never “selected out”, then why not free will? Your statement that:
“The brain evolved to make appropriate “decisions” based on the sensory input together with information from memory and other specialised modules in the brain. If you are supporting the view that these “decisions” can be vetoed by freewill, then you need to provide not only a mechanism and the necessary evidence for that mechanism but also an account of how such a veto capacity could possibly cause anything but harm”
I think I can agree with this, except for when you say that a veto capacity couldn’t cause anything but harm. Because then how do you explain why so many people, and even the species as a whole, engages in activity which is contrary to their persistent existence? And as far as a “mechanism”, why must it be any different than the physiological mechanism which allows us to daydream? Or imagine various futures for ourselves based on how we “guess” things might play out depending on what action we take?
Murder, war, poisoning the environment, using up all the resources we need for our survival, etc. You had better hope we have free will, and that we use our ability to imagine the various outcomes of our choices, and start making ones that are beneficial to our survival, or we will follow the path of earlier civilizations, who out-succeeded their own survival.
Come to think of it, perhaps time WILL prove who is right in this argument about free will! Because in history, we see no example of our own (in vanished populations), or any species, avoiding extinction by adapting it’s choices about future outcomes to overcome its inborn drive to procreate and maximize its exploitation of its environment. BillyJoe7, you may be proven right. i hope someone will be here to congratulate you!
Free will may just be self-control: nothing more than that “veto power” you talk about. If so, it is perhaps not something we’re born with, but something that CAN be developed, and not necessarily present in any one individual. So i will say, as I’ve said in my earlier posts, it’s about awareness, education (and all experience) and i will now add: insight. These can all be functions of the physiological brain without any “ghost”. Did you know that with bio-feedback a person can learn to control their own brainwaves? And once they learn, they don’t need the biofeedback anymore. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biofeedback
“the physiological changes often occur in conjunction with changes to thoughts, emotions, and behavior”
So, maybe free will is a inter-brain function. We can’t change our own brain function from input-output, but intervention from another brain can help accomplish a choice that “vetoes” the input-output brain.
I submit to you that, if you are able to look at your own thoughts, decisions, and actions, and see no control for yourself in them, but only the playing out of your instinct to survive in relationship to your environment and experiences, you may well be in for a pleasant surprise if you are willing to explore and examine your own awareness: the very awareness that enables you to look at your own thoughts, decisions and actions, and then to make any judgment at all about how they function.
thank you SO much for pushing on in this debate, which has allowed me to examine my own beliefs in this manner, and makes me feel satisfied with my own conclusions
thanks BillyJoe7!
i had no self-control to stay out of this discussion!
And, oh yeah:
my gay and straight-but-sometimes-bi friends tell me that it’s not about which gender you want to have sex with, but it’s about who you fall in love with.
Need to study what chemicals control for “love” SEPARATE from gender to find out why either sex has sex with whichever sex they do (have sex with)
Miema, if this is a lawful universe, then isn’t it logical that everything that has evolved to exercise a choice making function will make those choices in accordance with the laws that exist in this, their universe? Are not those laws the ones that allowed lives to evolve to start with, since what clearly evolves include more and more complex decision making beings that owe their stability to the decisive elements of causation that preceded them?
It’s clearly more than bits of matter randomly bouncing off of each other which by some unnatural magic can build earths and earth-like creatures (or build your love in the bargain). It’s an effective order that’s achieved by an orderly progression of their determinative causes. Intelligent beings that make intelligent decisions would seem to have to be the product of a logically decisive progression of events.
sonic,
Well, thank you in return.
The exchange has certainly put my views in sharper focus.
“However, since what you propose has not been observed to be true, then I would suggest that you are the one assuming the conclusion.”
I would suggest that if you want to hypothesise freewill, then the burden of proof is on you.
And everyday experience is not a reliable guide. If you have followed this thread for a while, you will know what SBM practitioners say about “in my experience”. It’s unreliable – you have to put everyday experience to a scientific test.
A simple example is the checkerboard illusion. Everyone agrees that A and B are different shades of gray because that’s how we all experience it. But science tells us they are identical. And evolution tells us why we all experience them as different. Experience is not only unreliable but downright deceiving.
The other argument against freewill I have already given a few times now without a rebuttal. So I will simply repeat it:
The brain evolved to produce appropriate output (in the form of actions or speech) in response to information about the environment input into the brain via the senses combined with information about past inputs and responses stored in memory and information relayed from other specialised modules within the brain.
If you are supporting the view that these outputs, honed by evolution, can be vetoed by freewill, then you need to provide an account of how such a veto capacity could possibly cause anything but harm to the brain’s chances of survival.
Mlema,
(Why do so many posters address you as Miema?)
I think there are three things you misunderstand about evolution. Firstly, it’s not perfect. Secondly, it can’t go backwards. And, thirdly, not everything has survival value.
Evolution results in genes making bodies that have a greater chance of having them survive into the next generation. In nature, most of those genes actually don’t make it. How many baby turtles survive to adulthood. But sufficient survive to propel those genes into the next generation. Also, evolution can only build on what it already has. So our eyes are never going to be perfect because they can never be rewired so that the nerve fibres pass behind the retina instead of in front of the retina. And many characteristics promoted survival in a previous age but are less suited to the present environment. Tribalism – looking after ones own – was an obvious benefit if the aim was to propel genes into the next generation. But today those same genes are probably the root cause of racism.
Jeremiah said:
OK, thanks for the explanation.
I didn’t mean to make any historical claims re: what “the ancients” believed. In fact, if there’s one thing that BillyJoe and I agree on, it’s that non-conscious mental structures and processes play a much larger role in our lives than what many believe. Since that conclusion is based on recent (as in the last several decades) empirical research in the cognitive sciences, it no doubt clashes with many beliefs, both modern and ancient.
That said, we take for granted all kinds of folks theories and metaphors, some of which are culturally variant and others of which are universal, presumably because they are grounded in a universal human nature (or “embodied”).
My claim is that free will is probably one of those cases; viz. that it’s a concept (or abstract idea) that we humans have acquired as a natural consequence of our shared subjective experience of thought and action, when these events occur voluntarily (i.e. without feeling restrained or coerced) and/or spontaneously (i.e. without being aware of a cause).
Of course, not everyone is likely to accept that claim (e.g. just ask a dualist), and I certainly don’t presume to speak for “the ancients” – particularly those who believed that their gods were real (as opposed to personalized abstractions from their real everyday experience of natural forces).
mufi, the ancients I referred to conceived of the laws of logic that you are now using to decry the ways in which they and all that followed have continued to misuse that great conception. And nevertheless that logic tells us that causation happens lawfully whether we are conscious of it at the time or not. If the big bang came up with a logical universe, then its conscious aspects, such as human conceptual abilities, developed lawfully just as its unconscious aspects caused them to. The fact that humans make mistakes, consciously or not, does not mean that they must therefor have been free to make them.
Jeremiah: Since humans can and do make mistakes, I think it’s fair to say that they are “free to make them.”
And if you mean by “laws of logic” the methodological assumptions used in the cognitive sciences that I cited above, then I would agree that we owe some credit to ancient thinkers (e.g. Aristotle) for their formal development.
But the history of those fields (and the sciences, in general) also suggests that, as their tools & techniques improve, certain theories that were once in vogue are no longer plausible, given the latest body of evidence, demonstrating limitations to a priori reasoning, even as it is still practiced and taught in academic philosophy dept’s around the world.*
* For a full treatment of this subject, I recommend Philosophy in the Flesh, by cognitive linguist George Lakoff and philosopher Mark Johnson.
mufi, you mistakenly assumed I don’t have that book, or if I do, that I haven’t read it. Or if I’ve read it, that I don’t understand it.
Or that there’s anybody in the universe except perhaps yourself and the authors that have read every word of its 624 pages.
But again, if you’re one of those that have, you seem to have missed the part about the constraints on freedom, or that the theme includes their argument FOR metaphorical thought, not against it. A priori worldviews are what they see in need of revision, not a priori concepts of the logic that the thema of that book depend on.
In any case I had assumed we were talking about the aspects of their worldviews and logic that Hawking, the Pope and BillyJoe7 had in common, as concerns the big bang and its consequent determinism. For which the chapter in that book on Events and Causes has a lot to offer.
Remember, or don’t forget, that Hawking posits that everything that’s possible to be determined has already been determined as a consequence of the universe’s spontaneous creation.
Jeremiah: I don’t usually feel obliged to add “if you haven’t read it already” when I make a book recommendation, but consider it done in this case.
The book theme that I came away with is nicely summarized in this Johnson quote:
or as Lakoff put it:
*
If we agree on the above, then I assume that we agree that our concept of free will is no different.
But I certainly don’t mean to suggest that the concept is true in any literal sense (as if the intuition that one’s thoughts and actions are unconstrained, uncoerced, and uncaused equates to the knowledge of such). How could it be if the concept itself is structured by “what our bodies are like and how they function in the world” and limited by “only what our embodied brains permit”?
PS: However, as a metaphor, I think free will is quite true, inasmuch it connotes what it feels like to think and act, given certain conditions. It’s also quite useful to our criminal justice system as a metaphor for unlawful intent.
I can agree there are concepts, including that of free will, that are, as Johnson might say, metaphorically true. That’s not however the same as conditionally true, which conceivably could be the case if there was causation that the big bang was a posteriori to. But not the case that’s been made by Hawking and the others if there were no such information sources a priori.
In other words the big bang, if of spontaneous origin, could have brought no experience with it that precluded it from having to create the entirety of its own.
mufi,
How is your freewill-as-metaphor different from my illusion-of-freewill?
Metaphors are intended to be descriptively true, if not fundamentally so.
Illusions are intended to conceal truths.
BillyJoe7:
Humans evolved an “illusion” of free-will. They never chose to be deceived by their own materialistic brain, but they were. And many of them continue to make the mistake of thinking that they have free will.
But you are able to see that there is no free will.
How did you free yourself from that illusion? Were you born with this insight into the true nature of the brain? Did the thought simply come to you because of the experiences that were input into your brain? What mechanism caused your brain to overcome the belief in this illusion: this belief that seems to be genetically inherent? (i guess it’s possible that it isn’t genetic after all, are we mistakenly “teaching” our children that they have free will?) how could we replicate the conditions that gave you your insight in order to show them that their own “free will” is simply an illusion?
We’re working with the definition of free-will that means a sort of “veto” power, or the ability to make a choice that is independent of past choices or experiences, yes?
how have some people’s brains evolved, or operated, so as to make them think they are making decisions free of their own biologically pre-programmed brains, while others see that the decisions are made automatically by that brain, and are pre-determined by physiology?
Am I begging the question somehow? If so, please forgive me. Every time i read on this post, I get more confused. You seem to have no confusion, but to me it seems like that’s because you won’t address the contradictions that come about when you discount your own role in supporting your decision to disbelieve in free will. I’m not saying there is or isn’t free will. I can totally support (as I’ve said before) your argument that everything is pre-determined by what came before. that, philosophically-speaking, would go back to the “beginning” of things (the big bang?) as people here have said. But that same logic would mean that there was a “cause” for the big bang, a “cause” for the start of life, etc. Is that what you are implying? You seemed to rail at sonic’s (much) earlier statement that: “I find it fascinating that the materialist position agrees so thoroughly with that of the existence of an omnipotent creator on the subject of free will.”
indeed, what IS the difference between believing that everything, including the beginning of existence, were pre-determined, and saying that everything is decided by God? If, instead, it’s determined by chance, then wouldn’t an intelligent animal have the ability to intervene?
Why not the generation and evolution of a life that, although restricted by basic laws of biology and the physical world, has lots of room for choice inside that restriction?
How would a universe that determines things by chance produce an intelligent animal that determines the desirable effects of cause as well as the cause of undesirable effects?
Humans have the illusion that other things have free will. That is the source of beliefs that inanimate objects have spirits in them. Blaming inanimate things when they “do” something that someone doesn’t like is extremely common.
Do the more intelligent humans then think that inanimate things are secretly animate? Because in my book the truly inanimate cannot be deviously so.
Jeremiah: my post above is in response to BillyJoe7′s numerous comments here. My own opinions are there, too, and also in several earlier posts.
you are asking ME the question under my post, yes?
well:
Could the universe possibly produce SOME things by chance, and other things NOT by chance? Could it exist as a sort of game, with rules, by which there will be one of many results, but not a determination of which result? Only a determination that there will, indeed, be a result?!
OR – possibly a game whereby there will always be the same result, but not always gotten by the same means?
i don’t know.
If I could really answer your following question:
“How would a universe that determines things by chance produce an intelligent animal that determines the desirable effects of cause as well as the cause of undesirable effects?”
I would possibly be worshiped
BillyJoe7-
I find the evolution aspect of your argument weak.
If the brain evolved such good responses given inputs, then why is it so easy to fool?
I would suggest that the brain has evolved to think ‘seeing is believing’. If so, then freewill would be valuable as a means of vetoing that thought.
But that implies that I’m accusing you of having freewill.
And I was trying to avoid such an insult.
To get a bit carried away—
I would suggest that some humans go to church on Sunday. Chimpanzees do not. This tells us the maximum amount of brain damage required to produce a human that hasn’t evolved to worship God on Sunday.
Of course this implies that the human brain is a product of evolution as is the worship of God on Sunday.
Seems I can’t avoid the insults right now.
I find the evolution aspect weak…
sonic,
I can’t help it that you have such a poor grasp of evolution.
The brain HAS to have evolved good responses to inputs otherwise it would not have survived. The brain evolved, however, to produce output on the run. Naturally, erroneous output will occur but, more often than not, the output is appropriate to the input otherwise, as I said, brains would not have survived.
But I explained all this in my reply to Mlema.
I agree that “seeing is believing” is a good strategy when brains produce outputs on the run. However, something else comes into play when the animal, having survived the encounter, sits back in its den. It’s not the veto power of freewill though. Being FREE, freewill cannot base its decisions on ANYTHING. Meaning that it must be random. But how can a random veto possibly assist in the animal’s survival? On the other hand, if you are going to claim that the veto is not random, that it is based on information provided by the brain, then why not just stay with the brain.
It’s sort of like the argument against god.
Who needs him?
….and, so much for your comparisons.
Mlema,
“Humans evolved an “illusion” of free-will. They never chose to be deceived by their own materialistic brain, but they were. And many of them continue to make the mistake of thinking that they have free will.”
Here is the non-dualist’s version of what you just said:
Brains evolved an illusion-of-freewill. Brains never chose to be deceived by their own materialistic brain, but they were. And many of them continue to make the mistake of thinking that they have free will.
I think you will agree that it makes no sense.
“We’re working with the definition of free-will that means a sort of “veto” power, or the ability to make a choice that is independent of past choices or experiences, yes?”
Yes, independent of past and present experiences and independent of input from specialised modules within the brain.
“how have some people’s brains evolved, or operated, so as to make them think they are making decisions free of their own biologically pre-programmed brains, while others see that the decisions are made automatically by that brain, and are pre-determined by physiology?”
Evolution is not perfect.
“You seem to have no confusion, but to me it seems like that’s because you won’t address the contradictions that come about when you discount your own role in supporting your decision to disbelieve in free will.”
You forget that there is also no self that has freewill. There is the illusion-of-freewill AND the illusion-of-self. So “I” don’t have a role. It’s all the brain’s work. So, there’s no contradiction.
There is no self to discount the role of the self in supporting the self’s decision to disbelieve in freewill.
Dawn dualist language!
“You seemed to rail at sonic’s earlier statement …what IS the difference between believing that everything, including the beginning of existence, were pre-determined, and saying that everything is decided by God?”
For a start, if the above is true, god is an unnecessary hypothesis. Also the vast majority of god believers also believe in freewill. I do not. That is why I thought sonic’s comparison was disengenuous. In fact, he was completely ass over tit in my opinion.
“Why not the generation and evolution of a life that, although restricted by basic laws of biology and the physical world, has lots of room for choice inside that restriction?”
Because the random veto of freewill on the brain’s output must necessarily be deleterious to the animals survival.
BillyJoe7-
)
Being free, freewill can make decisions on anything or nothing. (I am assuming such exists).
This is completely different from random or without input, which is not a good description of free at all, is it?
But enough all ready, we will meet again.
In the meantime- thanks again.
(And don’t question if I understand evolution, you don’t need the schooling…
BillyJoe7 is right that if you owe your existence to a deterministic God, then you don’t need him in your life once he has done his deterministic deed. He can’t undetermine or redetermine anything that he didn’t determine to do beforehand. But of course if he was determined to be there with his gospel anyway, you’d better believe it.
Jeremiah: my point exactly. BillyJoe7 is a strict determinist. Everything comes from only from what has come before. It’s no different an outlook than someone who says that there’s a God who created everything, and created it in such a way that everything that followed would follow a specific path.
sonic pointed out the similarity in these two philosophies- which is what I was reiterating. I’m not saying BillyJoe7 believes there is a God. He doesn’t. I’m just repeating what sonic said about the two viewpoints being similar. I agree, you don’t need “God” for a deterministic viewpoint. BillyJoe7 would probably just say that all events were determined at the big bang.
So: the big bang created everything and determined how time would unfold,
or
God created everything and determined how time would unfold,
so what?
This is NOT an argument for a deterministic God!!!!!!
Simply a comparison between BillyJoe7′s belief that the only thing that determines human behavior is the functioning of an input-output brain, and the belief that the only thing that determines human behavior is a deterministic God.
BillyJoe7 doesn’t need a deterministic God to explain anything, because he has a deterministic brain.
You can use either one to explain why people do the things they do. It’s a very simple, easy philosophy.
i don’t think it explains consciousness or self-awareness. I think BillyJoe7 will simply say that consciousness is just an example of imperfect evolution. It’s unnecessary and simply came into existence as a fluke. It’s an illusion.
His ideas cannot be disproved.
BillyJoe7:
Very interesting development in our conversation!
When i wrote:
“Humans evolved an “illusion” of free-will. They never chose to be deceived by their own materialistic brain, but they were. And many of them continue to make the mistake of thinking that they have free will.”
it was an attempt to state YOUR viewpoint in a couple of sentences.
YOU reworded my statement to try to reflect what you felt I was saying:
you said
“Here is the non-dualist’s version of what you just said:
Brains evolved an illusion-of-freewill. Brains never chose to be deceived by their own materialistic brain, but they were. And many of them continue to make the mistake of thinking that they have free will.
I think you will agree that it makes no sense.”
That’s RIGHT! It makes no sense!
Can you write your basic viewpoint about free-will, illusion, and the human brain in just a couple of sentences? Because at this point I’m losing the coherence of what you’re saying. It seems you’re starting to contradict yourself.
The brain evolved. An illusion of free-will came into being. the brain was deceived by this component of itself into (thinking? functioning? believing?) as though it had free will. It is still deceived in many cases. But some brains (like BillyJoe7′s) have developed the ability to recognize this deception.
Is that more in keeping with your preferred language? Because it’s no different to say “it” can be deceived, while talking about your own brain, than to say “I” can be deceived!
sonic,
Yeah, this thread has dropped off the front page, so it’s perhaps time to move on.
A few final words to you though.
You imply you understand evolution but you don’t think it is necessary to respond to my criticisms of your apparent misunderstanding. That is iteresting.
You want your freewill not to be random. You want it to be fully informed by the brain. But you don’t realise that, in the final analysis, if there is not a random choice, there is no freewill and then what sort of a freewill is that?
Mlema,
I’ll repeat to you what I already said: People who believe in god also believe in freewill. Their view is not deterministic in the least. God allows people to have freewill to do as they wish. To follow their conscience. The future is open. But, being omniscient, god also knows what they will choose to do. You might reason that this is a contradiction and that, if god knows everything that will happen, the future is fixed but the point remains that the religious view is not deterministic because it includes a fundamental belief in freewill. They would argue sonic’s and your case for freewill not mine against.
“I think BillyJoe7 will simply say that consciousness is just an example of imperfect evolution. It’s unnecessary and simply came into existence as a fluke. It’s an illusion.”
Let me simply respond by saying what my view actually is:
Consciousness is not an example of imperfect evolution.
Consciousness is not unnecessary
Consciousness did not come into existence as a fluke.
Consciousness is not an illusion.
How you have deduced this from what I have said about freewill and self I have no idea.
I think perhaps it’s because when I say “illusion” you’re thinking “delusion”.
I trust you understand the difference.
BillyJoe7:
what’s the difference between believing in an illusion and being deluded?
and regarding consciousness: if consciousness is the awareness of self (perhaps that’s not the definition you use) why isn’t it the same as your “illusion” of self?
why isn’t consciousness unnecessary? (I don’t mean being awake and not in a coma – i mean being aware of my own existence) It’s debatable as to whether other animals are aware of their own existence. They apparently have survived without being aware that they have survived.
seems like a waste of energetic resources to have consciousness
and in case you’re going to say that you don’t mean self-awareness when you refer to consciousness – then lets talk about self awareness. how is being aware that your input-output brain exists, and not some ethereal “I”, any different than being aware that YOU exist, because, as you say, you ARE your brain and that’s it. you can say: I’m aware my brain exists, or, my brain is aware that my brain exists – what’s the difference? It is self-awareness, or brain-awareness. Isn’t that unnecessary for the survival and your input-output brain?
BillyJoe7:
Also, maybe you’re an evolution expert. i don’t know because I’m not one. But even though I’m no expert on what people believe about God, I know enough about that subject to assure you that your opinions on what people who believe in God believe ABOUT God, are ill-informed. You’re making broad generalizations. I have no opinion about God, but the arguments about the nature of a possibly-existing God are as complicated as the arguments about the nature of existence itself.
@BillyJoe7
>People who believe in god also believe in freewill. Their view is not deterministic in the least.<
I hate to perhaps rein in the horse I rode in on, but that statement just isn't even halfway accurate. The majority of these religionists believe in God's will (Christian, Muslim, or Hindu) as the determinate force of nature. They may not think he or it has forced them to choose, but they don't expect to make a choice that whether he approves of it or not, he has not foreseen it and allowed it for some unknown purpose. These people are fatalistic to a fault.
Deterministic to the max in other words.
They don't even have the benefit (that others of us have) of the illusion that their choices are in any sense free.
BillyJoe:
These aren’t the only available definitions, but they do well represent the ones that I often work with:
metaphor: a figure of speech in which a word or phrase literally denoting one kind of object or idea is used in place of another to suggest a likeness or analogy between them (as in drowning in money)
illusion: (1) : a misleading image presented to the vision (2) : something that deceives or misleads intellectually
“See” (wink, wink) the difference?
I think that one can fairly apply either word to the concept of free will, depending on which property one chooses to emphasize. For example, I’d say “metaphor” emphasizes the aptness of the term with respect to subjective experience in certain situations (e.g. given the bodily feeling of self-propelled action towards a particular goal), whereas “illusion” emphasizes the deceptiveness of such experiences or of the term itself (e.g. given the history of implausible metaphysical speculation it has inspired and the conflicting body of evidence from the cognitive sciences).
BillyJoe7:
I’ve composed the following for you!
I’ve tried to “stick with the brain” as much as possible.
my brain is self-aware. It knows it’s physically located in my head. It knows approximately how long, wide and deep it is. It can guesstimate its own weight. It can study itself: physiologically, psychologically, etc It can look for problems in it’s biological structure or chemical functioning. It can consider it’s own reactions to it’s surroundings. It can analyze how it thinks and examine its own logic for errors. It can often perceive when the input it’s receiving is deceptive. It can allow for confusion without becoming confused.
It knows it exists. It knows that at one time it didn’t exist, and that at some point it will cease to exist.
Because my brain is self-aware, it can intervene in those aspects of both its own input and output that it can physically affect (by using the rest of the body it controls). For example: It experiences stress when faced with using its body’s mouth for public speaking – so it can: refrain from speaking, or ignore the sweating and dry mouth and speak anyway, or utilize biofeedback or cognitive therapy to actually reduce the intensity of its physiological reaction to the stimuli of public speaking, or, take a pill. It makes a “choice” about how it will proceed, and thereby controls its own physiology, even if that means simply submitting to the unedited actions of its own physiology. It is aware of its own reactions to its environment, and, although not instantaneous, it can thereby alter its own typical output.
You can say that this is simply a higher level of development of intelligence, which has increased the brain’s ability to manipulate its environment, and thereby itself. But it is actually manipulating with the GOAL of changing itself. If it must follow one course or another with regards to itself, then that is more than pre-determination, because it is affecting its own future functioning. Many animals can become addicted to alcohol, just like a human. But only a human can seek to overcome that addiction, and manipulate his own attitudes and physiology in order to stop drinking. You can say that this is a highly-developed way to increase success in survival, but his is a difference of kind, not degree, and doesn’t need to be contrary to the survival instinct in order to be independent of it. I’m not saying that man did not evolve this difference. I’m just saying: it’s there. And if your definition of free will is the ability to veto what the programmed input/output of the brain is, then why isn’t the brain’s manipulation of itself in order to change its typical output an example of that?
you say:
“Being FREE, freewill cannot base its decisions on ANYTHING. Meaning that it must be random…On the other hand, if you are going to claim that the veto is not random, that it is based on information provided by the brain, then why not just stay with the brain.”
i say:
OK – if you stay with the brain, why can it only be a random decision in order to be called free will? Why not a choice that is made in response to the awareness of how the brain will ordinarily respond (instead of to the original input)?
Also, you say:
“how can a random veto possibly assist in the animal’s survival?” Again: not random, but free of past decisions and experiences – THAT veto could contribute to success, because it could allow the over-ride of a pre-programmed reaction that might end up being harmful in specific situations. All animals have a “will”: a will to live, to eat, to engage in reproductive activity. But only humans can conduct themselves contrariwise to that will. Hence “free” will. They often engage in activities that are directly opposed to survival. You can say those activities are based in some subservient biological will, but why are we able to “choose” to engage in them if they are not in keeping with the “will” to survive? Mistake of evolution?
Using the words “will” and “free will” to make this contrast: I have a “will” to live (that is my brain’s programmed drive to survive). Now, “free will” would mean that the brain had separated that will from its own programming in order to effect its own programming, yes? I submit that my brain can do that! (separate from itself, or rather within itself, in order to affect itself) Not PHYSICALLY separate, of course, but functionally, in order to make decisions about its how its own existence may unfold.
I contend, as in earlier comments, that awareness comes into this. If my brain is NOT aware of how it’s making decisions, it cannot change itself and its decision-making process or physiology. So, that is where my hypothesis that some brains are self-aware, and some aren’t comes into play – OR – better yet : some brains are MORE self-aware than others. And some have developed stronger abilities to intervene in their own functioning. Education, experience, awareness: determined by chance of birth, developed by life, and cultivated by the “self” – never escaping its physical bounds, but functioning at a continually higher level within whatever restrictions the material world imposes.
I really think at this point I’ve satisfied my need to say just about EVERYTHING I can say about my thoughts on this topic. (free will, not sexual preference) I’m not really looking to convince you of anything at this point. Just wanted to feel that I’ve exhausted my ability to explain myself, to see if anything changes as a result (for me or anybody else) I have lost interest in effecting the outcome
A little embarrassed that I’ve written so much here on this too. It might be inappropriate for blog comments. If so, apologies. And I plan to refrain from such in the future.
Mlema,
what’s the difference between believing in an illusion and being deluded?
An illusion is shared by everyone because there is something external to the brain (in the environment) that produces the illusion. For example, in the checkerboard illusion there is, in fact, a checkerboard (or an illustration of a checkerboard) where A and B look different to everyone who views it.
A delusion is generally an individual experience. More particularly, there is nothing external to the brain (in the environment) that produces the delusion. It is created entirely within the brain itself.
“and regarding consciousness: if consciousness is the awareness of self…why isn’t it the same as your “illusion” of self?”
It’s not. There is consciousness and consciousness OF consciousness. The self (the idea that there is an entity controlling the brain) is an illusion. Therefore, logically, self-consciousness is also an illusion.
“why isn’t consciousness unnecessary?”
This is the p-zombie problem.
Let’s just say that I don’t believe p-zombies are possible.
For humans to act and behave like they do, consciousness is necessary (I’m back to using dualist language). The corrollary is that, if robots act and behave identically to the way humans act and behave (in other words, if they pass the turing test) they would have to be conscious.
“how is being aware that your input-output brain exists, and not some ethereal “I”, any different than being aware that YOU exist, because, as you say, you ARE your brain and that’s it. you can say: I’m aware my brain exists, or, my brain is aware that my brain exists – what’s the difference? It is self-awareness, or brain-awareness. Isn’t that unnecessary for the survival and your input-output brain?”
I sympathise but you are still making the same errors
It’s not “your input-output”, it’s “the brain’s input-output”.
It’s not “you ARE your brain”, it’s “the brain, which produces an illusion of you.
It’s not “my brain is aware that my brain exists”, it’s “the brain is aware that the brain exists”
There is just a brain producing output.
There is no “I” controlling the brain’s output.
Mlema,
…unfortunatley, I didn’t get my last post in before you wasted your time on your next lengthy post. Sorry about that, but you have made the very same error as in your previous post. I don’t know what else to say.
These phrases just don’t make sense in the materialist interpretation:
“my brain…my head…my brain is self-aware…etc etc…”
“And if your definition of free will is the ability to veto what the programmed input/output of the brain is, then why isn’t the brain’s manipulation of itself in order to change its typical output an example of that?”
Because it is just the brain doing what it does by means of mechanical cause and effect. The “I” is something that supposedly overrides the mechanical cause and effect relations within the brain.
“THAT veto could contribute to success, because it could allow the over-ride of a pre-programmed reaction that might end up being harmful in specific situations.”
But how does freewill decide if the brains intended output is going to be harmful? If it doesn’t randomly veto the output, it must base it’s decision to veto on something. The only reliable something is mechanical cause and effect acting on input to produce output. But then it is not freewill. It is what the brain has already done.
And, sure, the output can be harmful, but evolution has resulted in brains that, by and large, produce outputs that have increased their chances of survival.
Jeremiah,
I don’t agree.
The major religions hold the concepts of good and evil, reward and punishment, heaven and hell. What sense would they make if not for a belief in freedom of choice.
Coincidentally, another blog that I follow (Rationally Speaking) just produced this relevant piece on “The Perils of Metaphorical Thinking”, which I recommend.
There’s nothing explicit in there about free will, but I think the conclusion applies to it, nonetheless:
So long as we heed that advice with respect to free will, we can continue to use the term in a way that is completely compatible with recent knowledge derived from the cognitive sciences, in particular, and with the methodological assumptions of the sciences, in general.
[Not only that, but we can even have a free will that's actually "worth wanting", to refer to an argument made by Daniel Dennett in Freedom Evolves.]
BillyJoe7
You say, “The major religions hold the concepts of good and evil, reward and punishment, heaven and hell. What sense would they make if not for a belief in freedom of choice.”
That’s the point. They don’t make sense. Because religions take deterministic advantage of the illusion of free will.
That’s logically how it has to work in a deterministic universe.
Jeremiah,
I already alluded to the fact that it might not make sense. There is indeed a conflict between freewill and an omniscient god. But tell that to the religious . They’re the masters of cognitive dissonance. Nevertheless they believe in good and evil, reward and punishment, heaven and hell, an omniscient god, AND freewill. So the religious view is more compatible with sonic’s view on freewill than mine. That’s the point I was trying to make.
mufi,
I understand and I agree.
Generally I am happy to use proxies such as “choice” and “decisions” in everyday language, though I never use the word “freewill” as if it meant anything.
Of course, in this thread I’ve been more concerned with this bit of your quote:
“And there’s nothing wrong with that, as long as we keep a firm grasp…on what they really mean.”
I have been concerned with what freewill really means.
And when you really think about it, there is no basis for freewill at all. At least no one here has given even the barest outline about what freewill actually looks like, how is arises (except Sonic’s link to wild speculation about The Quantum Mind), how is could be anything but random vetoing, and how that could possibly be beneficial to human brains.
BillyJoe7:
thank you so much for your reply to my recent posts, especially when i know you must grow tired of reiterating your viewpoint for me and others, again and again! I appreciate it.
I think it’s possible we see some things very similarly, and I also think it’s possible that lots of what seem to be differences may be rooted in inadequate vocabulary and metaphors (as mufi has so eloquently explained)
Here is the point to which my definition of free will has developed, (largely as a result of reading everyone’s comments here):
Free will: choices made independently of the coercion of social, psychological, and physiological influence (to the degree that consciousness can control physiology) and limited by the degree to which there is awareness of those coercions, and by the length of time needed to execute those choices.
Free will is ultimately constrained by the material world. There is no free will when it comes to defying physical laws. But there are no laws of social, psychological, or even physiological laws (on the level of thought and voluntary movement) that cannot be defied when awareness of them is there.
Even the autonomic nervous system is under the control of consciousness with the use of various tools or practices.
With this definition, i can say that I have at least some free will. But I must also say that it might be difficult to observe free will. We can only see its effects, but how are they distinguished from pre-determined effects? I think we could assess how much free will someone has by measuring their awareness of things that influence their choices, and then measuring how successfully they overcome those influences when they’re diametrically opposed to their expressed and similarly observed goals (for action, thought, or physiological response) I think this sort of thing is commonly done to assess someone’s “capacity for self-determination”.
Perhaps you will take issue with me saying: “to the degree that consciousness can control physiology” I hope I’ve shown in my earlier post to what that degree might be
If you take this to a metaphysical level, I can’t follow, because I don’t know enough about that sort of thing. But I hope you can follow my viewpoint on free will and why I think it exists for (some?) people in their everyday life, and is not an illusion.
I’ll definitely look for any response you might make, but I think i will not comment anymore. i think I’m hogging server space!
And again, i thank you friend!
cheers.
Mlema,
You are welcome
I think this about sums it up though:
“There is no free will when it comes to defying physical laws.”
Since physical laws describe everything that happens, there is no room for freewill.
IF physical laws describe everything that happens – the paradox of science that holds that nothing is certain except uncertainty.
Oh well, perhaps freewill lies snuggly bedside god in one of those ever vanishing gaps.
BillyJoe: I have been concerned with what freewill really means.
I think Julia (the author of that essay) intended that we should keep a firm grasp on what the metaphor’s user really means, lest we mistake the phenomena that s/he is trying to describe via the metaphor. Like she said earlier in that same essay: “the problem with a metaphor is simply that it’s taken too literally.” In other words, it is not the case that a literal interpretation of the metaphor is the correct one. Quite the opposite.
So, if you mean to suggest that the metaphor of free will “really means” something metaphysical or quantum-physical, then I beg to differ. I know that it can mean that (e.g. when used in philosophical discussion). But it’s not usually what I mean when I use it, and I do not believe that my use is particularly idiosyncratic or uncommon.
BillyJoe7 has made his position clear that the universe operates with physical laws that are fully deterministic, so that although we have evolved with choice making brains, the choices that they make are in the end determined by those laws and not by ourselves except as conduits for the universe’s physical forces. He’s not making some metaphorical allusion to a relative degree of freedom, so why do some others pretend otherwise, except to perhaps avoid taking a contrarian stance.
We either live in a fully deterministic universe or we don’t. If the laws, as BillyJoe says, “describe everything that happens,” then we do, and free will to any degree is an illusion. If these laws don’t determine everything, and thus the universe is not fully deterministic, then free will becomes a question of what degree rather than no degree.
As to the use or misuse of metaphors, all words and phrases are in one sense or another metaphorical, so metaphors themselves are not to blame for equivocation as to the clarity of their meaning. The blame falls on the user.
Jeremiah said of BillyJoe: He’s not making some metaphorical allusion to a relative degree of freedom, so why do some others pretend otherwise, except to perhaps avoid taking a contrarian stance.
In case this is a veiled illusion to me, that is not how I interpret BillyJoe’s use of “free will” [which is why I attributed to him above the second definition in this Merriam-Webster entry]. If anything, I think he is committed to an absolute interpretation of the term – mostly as a set-up for a science-based knockdown.
Again, that’s fine with me, so long as we’re clear about what’s being knocked down and acknowledge that there are other (perhaps more valuable) uses of the term that are still in circulation, which are only illusory if we insist on comparing it to an absolute standard of freedom (if such a reference is even coherent).
mufi, if BillyJoe has set himself up for a scientific knockdown, no-one here has so far been able to accomplish that feat. So far his only vulnerability would be in his certainty, which I pointed out was problematic from a scientific standpoint. But I can’t prove or even show it probable that the version of the universe that he’s certain of is scientifically flawed. Can you?
Jeremiah: Given that BillyJoe and I seem to share the same assumptions about how the world works, I have no desire to disprove his “version of the universe.”
But I don’t mind defending a version of “free will” that remains meaningful and useful to me, and is not even particularly illusory (unless I’m so thoroughly deceived that I’m unaware of my own true, anti-scientific beliefs on the matter).
mufi,
I think the checkerboard illusion is instructive.
Everyone sees a checkerboard and, if nobody had bothered to check, everyone would continue to see a checkerboard. In particular they would continue to see that A and B are different shades of grey – as they would be if the illustration is of a true checkerboard.
The difference would continue to be real to them untill someone demonstrated to them that A and B are actually identical, hence exposing the illusion.
Freewill is like that. The only difference is that freewill is too precious for most humans to discard and this prevents them from accepting the evidence that it is an illusion.
I think it is telling that no one seems capable of stating how exactly freewill could come about and still be something you could call FREEwill:
If you insist that freewill can be fully informed by the brain, then how does this work? If freewill goes along with the brain’s output then it is superfluous. If it goes against the brain’s output AND it is not informed by anything else, then its just a random veto. If it IS informed by something else, what is this something else. Magic? Supernatural?
I don’t understand why you don’t see the problem here.
Jeremiah,
“So far his only vulnerability would be in his certainty, which I pointed out was problematic from a scientific standpoint.”
It’s not that I’m certain, it’s just that I’m going with the assumption that everything has a natural explanation. Centuries of scientific exploration and reseach has yet to unearth a supernatural explanation, so I think that assumption is looking pretty safe.
Some see what is true and therefor find it useful. Others see what is useful and therefor find it true. Most of us are in the ‘others’ category.
BillyJoe, I’ll put it this way: I don’t need to be conscious of any causes for my thoughts or actions (or what I collectively call “my will”, although you can call it “mufi’s behavior”, if you prefer) in order to meaningfully call them “free” – so long as I specify that they are only free in a relative sense (e.g. relative to those that I sense have been forced upon me by other agents). I don’t see a problem with that.
It’s a useful illusion that has the vulnerability that all illusions have. It seems to give you options for the future that in the end won’t be yours for the choosing. The technical word for all that is rationalization.
Wow, this thread is still running on?
You’re all wrong.
The only true answer is Peace and Love.
Hmm. I could use a shot of caffiene right about now. I’m aware of the options in the kitchen, and I think I’ll go for the coffee. (It’s not particularly good coffee, but it’s less work to prepare, and I’m feeling lazy.)
Now, I certainly do not deny that there is a causal explanation for that decision, involving a host of constraints (both internal and external), of which I am not fully (or even mostly) aware at this moment. But ignorance seems a more apt description of that cognitive state than illusion.
And, since no one is holding a gun to my head, insisting that I ingest coffee (or a hot caffienated drink, in general) “against my will”, it is conventional to say that I chose that future option for myself “of my own free will.”
Would I prefer more options (more degrees of freedom)? Sure, although I also recognize that there are diminishing returns to more options (cognitive overload).
Except for ignorance, what would an illusion have to depend on?
Misinterpretation.
Which in turn determines and depends on ignorance.
mufi,
“But ignorance seems a more apt description of that cognitive state than illusion.”
Look at that checkerboard illusion again.
A and B are different shades of grey. Right?
Wrong. That is your, and mine, and everyone else’s, perception.
And, if no one examined it scientifically, we would all continue to believe that A and B are different shades of grey.
But a scientific examination reveals that the wavelengths of light refected off A and B are identical.
We still perceive A and B as being different shades of grey but now we know that, in actual fact, they are identical.
“And, since no one is holding a gun to my head, insisting that I ingest coffee… “against my will”, it is conventional to say that I chose that future option for myself “of my own free will.””
Again I’m not talking about convention.
I agree with you there completely.
I’m talking about what is really going.
A and B are represented in my brain as different shades of grey.
But what’s really going on?
What’s really going on is that the brain does not represent the external world accurately. That’s not it’s purpose. It’s purpose is to improve the chances of survival. One of those survival mechanisms is to find prey and avoid predators. This is better achieved by differentiating them from their immediate surroundings.
This is why A looks different to B. The brain is not trying to represent A and B accurately, it is trying to differentiate A from its immediate surroundings and B from its immediate surroundings. As a side-effect, A and B end up looking different when, in actual fact, they reflect the same wavelength of light.
…sorry about the aberrant apostrophe.
BillyJoe:
My understanding is that color does not really exist in the objects of perception; rather, color is constructed by the body/brain/mind out of different inputs of light. Given that, I interpret the checkerboard example to mean that how we perceive light (or the same wavelength thereof) is inconstant, given particular conditions.
Does the same observation apply to the concept of free will?
I think a closer match to color would be basic objects and spatial relations – concepts (or percepts) that help us to function in the world, but are by no means objective/mind-independent features of it. (Or, in oversimplified evolutionary terms, these tools were just useful enough to aid in our ancestors’ survival, and no more so.) Does that mean they’re illusions? In an unconventional way, I suppose. But then the checkerboard example is just a particularly quirky, unexpected one.
And free will, insofar as it describes another aspect of human experience, would of course qualify as an illusion, as well. But I don’t find it to be particularly quirky or unexpected. Rather, it’s exactly what I’ve come to expect from my experience (as in: what it feels like to think and act in non-pressured situations).
What’s more, insofar as it describes a social construct (e.g. in the legal and political domains), it’s even less subjective than that – not objective, of course (again, in the mind-independent sense) – more like intersubjective.
Intersubjectively deluded by choice?
Only if one agrees that the analogy between a choice and an illusion is an apt one.
In the context of determinism what else could it be.
mufi,
“My understanding is that color does not really exist in the objects of perception; rather, color is constructed by the body/brain/mind out of different inputs of light. Given that, I interpret the checkerboard example to mean that how we perceive light (or the same wavelength thereof) is inconstant, given particular conditions.”
Yes, colour is not out there. All there is in the external world is objects reflecting or transmitting different wavelengths of electomagnetic radiation.
That’s the first level of illusion.
But there is a second level illusion:
The same wavelength can be perceived as different colours and different wavelengths can be perceived as the same colour. In the checkerboard illusion the same wavelength is perceived as different colours.
So it seems we agree here.
But it seems you are quite happy acknowledging the illusion of colour, but you are still uncomfortable granting the illusion-of-freewill. Or are you? It’s often hard to tell:
“And free will, insofar as it describes another aspect of human experience, would of course qualify as an illusion, as well. But I don’t find it to be particularly quirky or unexpected. ”
You don’t think so?
You don’t think that the illusion of freewill varies with the circumstances? It seems to me that the illusion of freewill seems to go missing when circumstances are extreme (a gun to your head). But, strangely in circumstances that don’d matter it seems to be fully and completely present (choosing coffee for breakfast). And they are your own examples.
BillyJoe:
If we agree to adopt as our standard of truth (or non-illusion) for a human experience that it exist “out there”, then all human experience (including that which is employed in scientific pursuit) is false (and illusory). In other words, what you now call the “first level of illusion” is not only idiosyncratic (which in itself is tolerable, so long as we’re clear about what we really mean), but it’s also suggestive of a radical skepticism, which I suspect that neither of us shares.
But, that communication issue aside, if you have yet to argue that the metaphysically neutral sense of free will that I use (“voluntary choice or decision”) bears similarities to what you now call the “second level of illusion” (e.g. using the checkerboard analogy), then I either missed it or you failed to persuade me.
If, however, you stick with the metaphysically loaded definition of free will that I imputed to you (“freedom of humans to make choices that are not determined by prior causes or by divine intervention”), then we would agree that, inasmuch as real people really believe that, they are indeed deluded.
PS: Recall that neither of those definitions are my mine; rather they come from the Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary.
Also, the first definition (i.e. the one that I prefer) is metaphysically neutral, insofar as it’s compatible with both the radical sense of freedom implied by the second definition and a limited sense, in the reasoning behind a particular choice or decision is often unconscious & automatic and always constrained by “what our brain permits” (to quote Lakoff, again).
By the way, just because I think the concept of free will has descriptive and pragmatic value does not suggest that I believe it is all rosey. After all, it not only helps me to distinguish between voluntary and involuntary actions (e.g. the difference between my taking a leisurely walk around the block and my slipping on ice). It also requires me to accept that not all voluntary choices or decisions are benign or constructive (e.g. as demonstrated by addicts and sociopaths).
Welcome to the world where it’s been determined we need to feel free to choose in order for at least some of us to survive. Feeling free as well to determine and in the process mis-determine the nevertheless inevitable consequences.
That reminds of Dennett’s view on the matter, which I more or less share, which is nicely summed up here:
mufi,
Excellent quote.
…and a fit epitaph.
In Australia, we would call this Clayton’s Freewill.
)
(named after the brand of an alcohol free beer
The freewill you have when you don’t have freewill.
Oh well, its been fun.