Is free-will an illusion?

@Fil Albuquerque,

Quote:

use of reasoning derives from the existence of Reason in the first place

If you're arguing that reasoning actually exists, and that it is not a mere illusion, Fil, then I guess you're affirming that free will exists.

You may be on to something, come to think about it.

1 Reply

@layman,

That there are debates in a field on the implications of a conceptual system is hardly evidence that there is disagreement on the core principles

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We now know that most humans are capable of deriving arbitrary relations among stimulus events without direct training or instruction to do so. For example, a person who is taught that A 5 B and A 5 C, where the letters represent novel stimuli, will likely derive that B 5 C. This relation between B and C is arbitrary because the stimuli are not physically similar or equivalent. It is also derived because it has not been directly trained. Many relations other than equivalence, such as relations of comparison and opposition, can also be derived in this manner (Dymond & Barnes, 1995; Green, Stromer, & Mackay, 1993; Roche & Barnes, 1996). Moreover, individuals can generate very complex relational networks with just a few directly trained relations (Steele & Hayes, 1991).

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@Briancrc,

Quote:

That there are debates in a field on the implications of a conceptual system is hardly evidence that there is disagreement on the core principles

Say what? "Core principles?" The passage you quoted is showing how the "core principles" are being challenged:

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We now know that most humans are capable of deriving arbitrary relations among stimulus events without direct training or instruction to do so.

Emphasis on the word "now" (formerly rejected and unexpected). As your own article explains:

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Derived stimulus relations present a challenge to behavior analysts because the results are not expected from a strict conditioning paradigm; this is why the relations are often called derived or emergent.

Of course this rejection of the possibility of "derived stimulus relations" was the very type of methodology that Chomsky (and virtually every other psychologist/linguist on the planet) rejected in the first place.

1 Reply

Quote:

Another feature of relational responding is that stimulus relations can mutually combine to reveal new relations. When arranging three objects according to size, for instance, responding to just two stimulus relations can reveal a third stimulus relation. One might place a watermelon the left of an apple because it is bigger, and a cherry to the right of the apple because it is smaller. Responding to just these two relations (the watermelon is bigger than the apple and the cherry is smaller than the apple) reveals a third relation: The watermelon is bigger than the cherry. This relation is entailed when the other two relations are combined, and can be determined without even directly comparing the watermelon to the cherry.

This passage reminds me of an old experiment, possibly done by Piaget, I don't exactly recall.

A young child, say a three year old, will tell you that an identical amount of liquid contained in a tall, narrow glass, is "more" than that same amount contained in a short glass with a large diameter.

He will even give this same answer if you empty one glass and then pour the very same water back an forth between the glasses. Pour it into the tall glass, and he will say it's "more," pour it into the short glass, and he will says it's "less" (than it was in the tall glass).

At a certain age and stage of development, children will grasp the concept of identity and stop saying that either one is more or less than the other when the same water is poured back and forth.

Did they learn this from "experience?" No, their mind simply matured. It's this kind of thing which led Chomsky to say the explanation for language manipulation could only be found in "innate" factors (although he now denies that he ever said it was "innate" to begin with). It can't be "taught" by merely looking at (and "responding to") the environment--it's a product of "reason."

Under Platonic theory, concepts such as "identity" are in fact "learned" (he was a Skinnerian at heart). It just that they weren't learned here. They were experienced, pre-birth, in the "realm of forms."

1 Reply

@layman,

Reasoning is the processing of Reason makes it more appealing to your comprehension ? Computers do that ! Furthermore, rocks process their gravity in and around the earth...things have an order and a ratio. Some do more complex computations then others but that's about it.

1 Reply

@Olivier5,

Olivier5 wrote:

FBM wrote:

It's before awareness, therefore it's not conscious. Doesn't matter if it's 1 second or 0.00000001 second.

It does matter. A lot can happen in a mental second. Such as:

(patient all wired up, talking to self in laboratory...)
...

You keep on posting hypotheticals, and I'll keep on posting experimental data.

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@Fil Albuquerque,

Quote:

Reasoning is the processing of Reason makes it more appealing to your comprehension.

No, Fil, actually it doesn't, although I'm sure that way of looking at it is better for YOU. Merely asserting, by way of definition, that reason is merely computation, does not, and cannot, change what reason actually is. Many do seem, however, to think that they have the right and liberty to define any and everything in their own idiosyncratic way that they think is consistent with their prejudices and wishes.

They seem to think that definitions make a thing what it is. Homey don't play dat. It don't work that way. What a thing "is" dictates the proper definition for it, not vice versa.

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@FBM,

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You keep on posting hypotheticals, and I'll keep on posting experimental data.

I'll bet you will! As if "data" explains anything. As if the dubious premises adopted by those you want to cite are indubitable. No need for comment, just spam that data, eh!?

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@FBM,

Quote:

It's before awareness, therefore it's not conscious. Doesn't matter if it's 1 second or 0.00000001 second.

This is one of the most presumptuous, least supported, least considered, least persuasive, and most naïve statements of purported "fact" that has appeared in this thread, and there have been a lot of them made in a similar vein. Let's break this claim down a little, eh?

1. The "it" is presumably the purported "instant" at which the decision is made. Yet no paper cited claims to have demonstrated that. They only measure "neural activity," etc., which has not been shown to be the "decision itself.

2. The "awareness" referred to here is not presented as such in any of these papers. It is merely the "report" (by the subject) of his perceived awareness. Huge difference, one which is totally ignored by FBM, despite it being pointed out to him many times, including by those publishing "scientific papers" in peer-reviewed journals.

3. "therefore" indicates that there is a an ironclad logic basis for what follows, which is: "it's not conscious." If "conscious" is supposed to mean the same thing as "awareness" then this statement does not "follow from" the premise. It IS the premise. If it's not the same, then what the hell is it. Not even an attempt to explain. The word "conscious" does have a certain mystique and "scientific air" about it perhaps. Or maybe more what you would call a philosophical or metaphysical air. Unfortunately, that mystique adds nothing, as a matter of substance.

1 Reply

@layman,

Continued

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Doesn't matter if it's 1 second or 0.00000001 second.

4. FBM has broken this down to one part of a second out of 100 million (parts). That's certainly an extremely high degree of purported discernment for something that can't, by admission of the very articles he presents, be discerned to begin with, eh?

Quote:

You keep on posting hypotheticals, and I'll keep on posting experimental data.

Of course he doesn't "speculate" or deal in "hypotheticals" like you do, eh, Ollie? This boy deals in DATA, by God!

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@Briancrc,

Just because somebody says "it works" doesn't mean it's true. You have to learn to be a bit more sceptical, Brian, and ask for some evidence. Until then, don't get near any used-car salesman.

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@layman,

Along the same line, one of the articles posted by Brian (don't remember which) gave this example of complex verbal communication, that can ba a challenge for behaviorists:

If you say many times "green car" to your toddler when you see a green car, after a whike he will also say "green car" when he sees one. And if you say "red truck" to your kid ech time yoy see a red truck, he will learn to do the same. That's okay; behaviorists get that. But if the kid sees a green truck and says "green truck" without having been trained to use this particular word combination, behaviorists are in trouble...

That's how complex verbal behavior needs to be to confuse a behaviorist. They got us confused with parrot, i guess.

1 Reply

@Fil Albuquerque,

Fil darling... The reason we are undown with reason is that it WORKS. It provides a massive darwinian advantage. One can track animals by their footprints to hunt them, etc. Ergo, reason is as necessary for our survival as air.

So if anyone tells you that your mind, your reason, and the agency that goes with it, are all illusions, just tell him to do away with the air he's breathing.

1 Reply

@layman,

Quote:

This boy deals in DATA

Yes, and not very well either since we're the ones digging for data in his posted articles, and when we do, for instance pointing at the fact that the accuracy of prediction only gets good well within one short second of decision awareness time, he dismisses that data as irrelevant.

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Quote:

J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry. 1992 Oct;55(10):964-6.
Focal transcranial magnetic stimulation and response bias in a forced-choice task.
Brasil-Neto JP1, Pascual-Leone A, Valls-Solé J, Cohen LG, Hallett M.

Abstract
The effects of transcranial magnetic stimulation were studied on the performance of a warned, forced-choice response time task by normal adults. The task consisted of extension of the index finger in response to the click produced by the discharge of the magnetic coil (go-signal). The subjects were asked to choose the right or left finger only after the go-signal was delivered. Single magnetic stimuli were delivered to the prefrontal or motor area, and in the control situation, away from the head. Magnetic stimulation affected hand preference only when it was delivered to the motor area. With stimulation of this area, subjects more often chose the hand contralateral to the site stimulated with response times that were mainly less than 200 ms. With longer response times (between 200 and 1100 ms), magnetic stimulation had no effect on hand preference regardless of the site stimulated. Stimulation of prefrontal areas yielded results similar to the control situation. These results suggest that response bias in this paradigm is caused by an effect of magnetic stimulation on neural structures within, or closely related to, the motor areas of the brain. Although the response bias was clear and predictable, the subjects were unaware of its existence. It is possible to influence endogenous processes of movement preparation externally without disrupting the conscious perception of volition.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1431962

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@layman,

Quote:

Say what? "Core principles?" The passage you quoted is showing how the "core principles" are being challenged

I am happy to discuss the methodology of any study, but you continue to quote-mine articles looking for those phrases you think is a demonstration that the field isn't capable of something. You overgeneralize from single studies and attempt to define a consensus on a topic by looking to the detracters; all the while ignoring the major scientific and national offices who have reviewed and accepted the overwhelming evidence of the efficacy of the methodology.

One of the philosophical assumptions is that behavior happens for lawful reasons. A deterministic subject matter supports baseline logic. If behavior happened for the reasons that you think, then this logic wouldn't hold. Problem is....it has for decades, as evidenced by thousands of studies across species.

The hysteria that comes with the implications of these facts is disproportionate to what has actually happened since their discovery. We now have tools that can be used to advance our way of life. The pattern of what happens when challenging ideas come to light is to ignore them for long periods. The length of time between the discovery of a useful fact and it's adoption can be exceptionally long. The discovery that citrus juice would prevent scurvy was discovered around 1600. That discovery didn't get adopted until the advent of the mercantile marine some 150 years later.

This hysteria that has come from the findings of behavioral research also parallels the hysteria that followed the dissemination of the theory of evolution. In science, theories explain facts. The theory of evolution was largely ignored and even kept from highschool text books until after SPUTNIK. And we're still having to defend from the attacks on evolution. To suggest that the science of evolution is shaky, weak, or too incomplete to account for the pattern or process of evolution is overwhelmingly refuted by the scientific community. To suggest that the evolutionary account of human behavior vis-a-vis behaviorism is shaky, weak, or too incomplete to account for the process of behavioral development is also refuted by the scientific community.

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@Olivier5,

Quote:

But if the kid sees a green truck and says "green truck" without having been trained to use this particular word combination, behaviorists are in trouble

That was Chomsky's misunderstanding. The phenomenon is extremely well accounted for through processes of stimulus generalization, etc.

1 Reply

@Briancrc,

Here's a question that I've asked others before: Would you say that you experience consciously choosing the thoughts that you think?

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@FBM,

Quote:

Here's a question that I've asked others before: Would you say that you experience consciously choosing the thoughts that you think?

I have the perception that I author my thoughts. When I think English words, those words can set the occasion for other words to be "thought." These private behaviors occur to me, but I explain it not as something that takes place in another universe. Does this get at the question?

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@Briancrc,

Briancrc wrote:

Quote:
Here's a question that I've asked others before: Would you say that you experience consciously choosing the thoughts that you think?

I have the perception that I author my thoughts. When I think English words, those words can set the occasion for other words to be "thought." These private behaviors occur to me, but I explain it not as something that takes place in another universe. Does this get at the question?

I'm not sure. The sense of agency seems to be the result of ongoing interactions among a small handful of areas of the brain, like the premotor cortex, inferior parietal lobule, etc. Of course, I'm not aware of that activity itself, just the resulting sense of being the author of my own thoughts and deeds. But speaking from the perspective of natural selection, that sense need not be an accurate representation of what's going on, just a useful one. Much like human vision isn't a very accurate representation of the full electromagnetic spectrum, but it's useful to this species.

Subjectively, I've tried to figure out how my own thoughts arise. I don't have the experience of choosing what to think. Actually, when I meditate, I notice that my thoughts are jumping from topic to topic apparently randomly. I may start thinking about monitoring my thoughts, but pretty soon I'm thinking about an ex-girlfriend or my students or a baseball game. Eventually, the idea that I want to monitor my thoughts comes back around, but it only lasts briefly before I'm thinking about fishing or lifting weights or sex or something.

In everyday life, of course, I feel and act as though I were consciously choosing my thoughts and behavior, but when I put my own mental behavior under the microscope, so to speak, I can't experience that initial instant of volition. It seems to arise out of the subconscious from subliminal processes.

2 Replies

Is free-will an illusion?

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