Free Will

[Schweitzer]

I am interested in arguments for and against free will(Link to past thread (with poll) http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showfl...part=1&vc=1 )
I am making a new thread because I feel the past thread spent too much time on semantics.

My definition of free will: The ability of a rational being to be able to make a decision. That is a being acts in one way but could have acted another way independent of any probability constraints.
For example, even if someone had all the information they wanted about every particle in the universe (or multiverse or whatever) then they still could not predict how you would act at a later date. Further, they could not predict that you would act this way with x% certainty for any number of attempts and be correct x% of the time.
(A variation of Laplace's demon http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laplace%27s_demon)

I assert (because I have no evidence to back this up) that we are nothing more than complicated machines that act based on chemical reactions in our brain. If we could obtain all the information described above then we could predict a person's actions (to at the very least a very high certainty.)

Obviously a major argument against this would be quantum physics that at least currently guarantees the uncertainty of very small particles. If you believe in free will do you believe that it arises from this uncertainty? It seems like if I could predict a person's actions with a high probability well before it happened then that person does not have free will, they simply cannot be predicted with 100% certainty due to the nature of very small particles.
http://www.spaceandmotion.com/physic...heisenberg.htm

I would believe in free will if it could be shown that a human being somehow alters particles that exist within it but as far as I know there is no evidence of this yet.

I do understand we have a very long way to go to understand the human brain so discussing this may be useless until we have more information but I am interested nevertheless.

Decent site for hard determinism http://www.ovrlnd.com/Apologetics/Determinism.html

[CallMeIshmael]

FWIW,

"For example, even if someone had all the information they wanted about every particle in the universe (or multiverse or whatever) then they still could not predict how you would act at a later date."

I dont think this is a good use of a definition of free will, since if you introduce randomness, such that you could not predict future events because you need to know how events in between turned out, you dont necessarily have free will.

Randomness isnt will, its just also not deterministic (I *believe*, though im not sure if the defintion of either will or determinism now includes randomness)



From my understanding, freewilladonks believe that the human mind is capable of making choices that are neither random nor determined, which I have a hard time buying into, since I dont believe there is evidence for ANY physical process with that property

[Skidoo]

From the site you linked:

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However, human behavior cannot be uncaused, since nothing occurs without a cause.

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That seems like a wildly arbitrary assumption to make, since no one has produced anything close to sufficient evidence for such a sweeping statement which requires proving a negative.

[DougShrapnel]

Does this qualify as free will? A researcher places a very large ammount of honey in the middle of a lake. He has been studying the dances bees make when they return to the hive to communicate to the rest of the worker bees where the food is at. After awhile a bee actually shows up in the middle of the lake and notices the mother load of food. He goes back to the hive and dances his dance to communicate where it's at. Normally the bees witnessing this act will go out and get the honey. But this time they do not. It doesn't make sense that honey could be in the middle of a lake. So the bees ignore the furiously dancing bee.

What is going on in the bees mind, it's conciousness, not just the brain reactions? The problem with researching free will is that we only can view our own conciousness. We can observe behavior, but it's not enough to acurately desribe conciousness, where free will is likely to be found if it exists. To make any judgement as if you have discovered the real view on free will without first being able to witness, or observe the actual conciousness of the bee, and in the matter of human free will, others actual consciousness, you are attemping to answer with invalid data. The only valid evidence you can use is do you believe you have free will? I thinks it's safe to say, that limited ammount of, and increadibaly biased data isn't enough for a scientific consensus, or even a theory on it.

I'm afraid that IMO the same logic you used to disprove free will, also disproves consiousness, or at least make it useless. By consiousness I mean the emergant manifestation of the physical processes in the brain.

[CallMeIshmael]

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That seems like a wildly arbitrary assumption to make, since no one has produced anything close to sufficient evidence for such a sweeping statement which requires proving a negative.

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Can you name one physical process thatis neither random nor uncaused.

And, if not, explain why its a good assumption to believe that human thought is one?

[Skidoo]

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That seems like a wildly arbitrary assumption to make, since no one has produced anything close to sufficient evidence for such a sweeping statement which requires proving a negative.

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Can you name one physical process thatis neither random nor uncaused.

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No, but consciousness is far enough removed from confirmably "physical" phenomena to make that a moot point.

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And, if not, explain why its a good assumption to believe that human thought is one?

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Human thought may be somewhat reducible, but subjective awareness is not even close. I mean in practical terms of observation as well as in theory. Of course, that isn't proof, but it's a start.

Also, the credible experiences of myself and others, which are more immediately observable than even what is measured using physical instruments, imply something not reconcilable with randomness or determinism.

[CallMeIshmael]

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No, but consciousness is far enough removed from confirmably "physical" phenomena to make that a moot point.

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Do you not believe consciousness is a physical process?


If so, I find that a fairlu dubious claim, and Im interested to see the proof of it.

[arahant]

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My definition of free will: The ability of a rational being to be able to make a decision. That is a being acts in one way but could have acted another way independent of any probability constraints.

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Could you clarify your last sentence? The first sentence is basically meaningless. It looks to me like your definition includes random action as free will, which I'm sure you didn't wish to imply.

As far as arguments for and against...

The 'pro' argument would be either "I think I have free will", or "the bible implies I have free will". Both are obviously flawed. I've never actually heard any others, but I'd like to.

The 'con' argument is along the lines of "there is no reason to believe in free will, and it would violate the framework of physics as we know it".

God and free will are the same beast. Neither has any measurable impact on the observable world. Lots of people believe in them. We continue to hack away at any falsifiable prediction of either.

[Schweitzer]

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FWIW,

"For example, even if someone had all the information they wanted about every particle in the universe (or multiverse or whatever) then they still could not predict how you would act at a later date."

I dont think this is a good use of a definition of free will, since if you introduce randomness, such that you could not predict future events because you need to know how events in between turned out, you dont necessarily have free will.

Randomness isnt will, its just also not deterministic (I *believe*, though im not sure if the defintion of either will or determinism now includes randomness)



From my understanding, freewilladonks believe that the human mind is capable of making choices that are neither random nor determined, which I have a hard time buying into, since I dont believe there is evidence for ANY physical process with that property

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You are exactly right on this. I attempted to address this by saying that an action couldn't be predicted with any % certainty. If I could predict a person's actions 1 minute ahead of time with exactly 60% accuracy then if did this a large amount of times and was correct almost exactly 60% of the time then that would be an indication of randomness and not free will.
This defintion is definitely hazy and I am certainly open to better definitions.

[Schweitzer]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
My definition of free will: The ability of a rational being to be able to make a decision. That is a being acts in one way but could have acted another way independent of any probability constraints.

[/ QUOTE ]

Could you clarify your last sentence? The first sentence is basically meaningless. It looks to me like your definition includes random action as free will, which I'm sure you didn't wish to imply.

As far as arguments for and against...

The 'pro' argument would be either "I think I have free will", or "the bible implies I have free will". Both are obviously flawed. I've never actually heard any others, but I'd like to.

The 'con' argument is along the lines of "there is no reason to believe in free will, and it would violate the framework of physics as we know it".

God and free will are the same beast. Neither has any measurable impact on the observable world. Lots of people believe in them. We continue to hack away at any falsifiable prediction of either.

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The last sentence was an attempt to address the quantum nature of particles. A being can technically act in an infinite number of ways but that does not mean it has free will. Small particles are uncertain by nature, they can only be predicted to do things based on probabilities. Thus a brain made up of many of these particles can never be perfectly predicted but we could calculate a probability for every possible course of action that was accurate. If a being was able to take actions independent of our predicted probabilities then based on my definition it would have free will.

I am not sure if you meant this or not but in terms of perfectly random actions I do not address this because I do not believe randomness exists. I do not consider chaotic motion or the quantum world to be random since they can be estimated using probabilities. I can not think of anything truly random though I may be very ignorant on this issue.