Is free-will an illusion?

@Briancrc,

I on the other hand would say that the thoughts occur to me or that I am reacting to something else. Also I use "me" only for convenience of communication. There is an assembly of "me's" no doubt and who is in control is not up to "me". Sometimes I wake up more grungy, more critic, less willing to tolerate the circumstances of life, others I feel more cooperative and empathic or even with a different outlook on what surrounds me, I am not a thing but a collection of many things...in none of this I feel I have control on who I am being. I just am.

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@FBM,

Quote:

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.

As far as anecdotes go, this sounds like what many say about their own thoughts. Many times when I hear a musician or writer interviewed and the question about their process comes up, so many musicians and authors say that they don't really understand where their lyrics, melodies, or phrases come from. They're just there along for the ride. I think that's why there were so many callings for a muse.

Neurology has been getting better at explaining the chemical and electrical processes that are at work under different conditions. I find what has been learned very interesting.

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@Olivier5,

I was referring to a transcendent explanation, out of spacetime, for the origin of reasoning in Reason, not to why we use reasoning within the realm of Darwinian evolution, that is common sense knowledge and I strive for more deeper answers then the same old blah blah blah mon cher !

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@layman,

So you think Reason is reasoning ? Right...
I would love to see your reasoning striving in a world without patterns...for starters you wouldn't have a working brain... Reason is order.

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@Briancrc,

Yes, and many, many people - myself included - report going to bed with a problem and waking up with a solution.

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http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16311045

Quote:

Unconscious manipulation of free choice in humans.
Kiesel A1, Wagener A, Kunde W, Hoffmann J, Fallgatter AJ, Stöcker C.

Abstract
Previous research has shown that subliminally presented stimuli accelerate or delay responses afforded by supraliminally presented stimuli. Our experiments extend these findings by showing that unconscious stimuli even affect free choices between responses. Thus, actions that are phenomenally experienced as freely chosen are influenced without the actor becoming aware of the manipulation. However, the unconscious influence is limited to a response bias, as participants chose the primed response only in up to 60% of the trials. LRP data in free choice trials indicate that the prime was not ineffective in trials in which participants chose the non-primed response as then it delayed performance of the incongruently primed response.

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@Briancrc,

Quote:

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.

Brian, you have said you have very little interest in philosophical questions. I certainly believe you. It shows.

This may sound insulting, but I'm not trying to insult you. I am, however, giving you my honest impressions (which could be wrong).

You make a fine cheerleader for the team you choose to align yourself with and root for. But like many cheerleaders, you wouldn't understand a word the coach was saying if you were in the locker room.

You cite an article from 1994 glorifying the solidarity of behaviorists in their agreement on fundamental theory, methodology, etc. I counter with an extensive summary, from 2009, which undertakes to summarize years of hostile in-fighting among advocates of different theories which fall under the rubric of "behaviorism." You call it "quote-mining" all while demonstrating that you understand neither the plain words of the summary, nor the theoretical issues involved. But, like I said, there is no requirement that you understand any of these issues in order to "take a side." It's your prerogative.

Nothing "wrong" with that. The role of cheerleaders is not to understand the game. Their role is have and display enthusiasm, loyalty, and unconditional support for the team. They don't have to understand the game. It's not a requirement.

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@FBM,

You can't really block thoughts out, though people seem to make a good job at it temporarily, when they fear the consequences. That's perhaps one of the things the inconscious is useful for: as a 'prison' for dangerous thoughts. But blocked thoughts come back in dreams and freudian lapses...

You don't get to choose your thoughts. You can orient them towards certain issues though, aka concentrate on something or another. "Apply your mind" is the term. But sometimes no thoughts come to you when you apply your mind to a question, no good usable one I mean, no IDEA. And you wish you could decide to have an idea but you can't... No inspiration, people call it. You can inspire your own ideas, if you see what I mean. They come to you.

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@Fil Albuquerque,

But I'm not finished... Let's keep digging.

Why does reason work? Because (as you sort of said) there is information in this world, that can be decoded, analysed, recoded, manipulated and used. In Darwinian terms, we're the champion in that niche.

It follows that reason is not an epiphenomenon. Au contraire, it is a powerful force in this world.

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@Olivier5,

I'll be more likely to be convinced when you can provide controlled, evidential support for your position(s). No offense.

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@Olivier5,

Olivier5 wrote:

But I'm not finished... Let's keep digging.

Why does reason work? Because (as you sort of said) there is information in this world, that can be decoded, analysed, recoded, manipulated and used. In Darwinian terms, we're the champion in that niche.

It follows that reason is not an epiphenomenon. Au contraire, it is a powerful force in this world.

You probably meant to say, following my lingo "why there is reasoning in the world" and as you well put it that's because there is information that CAN be decoded, but such information, in order to be accessible is not scattered nor chaotic it has patterns, ratios, hence why I insist in making a subtle distinction between the act of reasoning and Reason per se, which I meant as order in the world.

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@FBM,

If you're like me, you don't need an alarm clock to wake up at a predetermined desirable time--like at 5:00 in the morning to go fishing, for example, if you like fishing.

The "body" has an internal clock that operates without me "controlling" it. I'm not "conscious" of the working of that clock. I don't hear it ticking, I don't have to wind it up, or do anything at all for it to function.

Yet, I can "give it instructions," and it will pay attention and "obey" my commands. Normally I would never get up at 5:00, and would probably sleep right through a loud alarm if I had no predetermined resolve to wake up at that time. But that doesn't happen when "I" tell "myself" to wake "me"up at the appointed time.

A so-called "unconscious" or "subconscious" mental/physical activity is not necessarily "beyond my control." To date, no one has been able to give a thoroughly acceptable account of what the presumed "self" even is. Nonetheless, I still realize that my body and my thoughts are "mine," not yours.

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@Fil Albuquerque,

Quote:

I insist in making a subtle distinction between the act of reasoning and Reason per se, which I meant as order in the world.

That's a valid distinction and not really even subtle. Do you think anyone who has addressed you denies or disputes it?

But, as you say, there is a distinction between what the greeks called "logos" and the human act of "reasoning." One is not the other. When you are talking about one, you are NOT talking about the other, at least not if you understand the distinction and it's relevance.

Nor, of course, is that the ONLY meaning of "reason," and, once again, one sense of meaning is NOT, and should not be treated as, another, different sense of the term. In logic, doing that is called the fallacy of equivocation.

If I say someone has a "big heart," it is obvious to most that I am not making a literal reference to the physical dimensions of someone's anatomical organ.

Someone who responded by saying "that's impossible, he's a small guy," would simply display the fact that he doesn't under the term "big" in the sense I am using it.

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@layman,

When I did the allusion of it being "subtle" it was meant in the context of the discussion I was having with someone else, check it back, its a relative contextual coinage. Yes it is or should be evident but not noted enough. Stop nitpicking it is clear it was a contextual allusion since some around seam to confuse the two.

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@layman,

Quote:

Someone who responded by saying "that's impossible, he's a small guy," would simply display the fact that he doesn't under the term "big" in the sense I am using it.

Or the term "heart" for that matter, which I intended to add the first time.

Sometimes treating the same word as having the same meaning in every context is the result of a genuine lack of familiarity with any distinction. However, sometimes you get the idea that treating two different meanings of the same word as necessarily equivalent is a matter of deliberate, goal-oriented, misconstruction. Indeed, the often discredited "sophists" of ancient greek times were particularly adept at deliberate equivocation as a means of "making the weaker argument appear to be the stronger."

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@layman,

On that we agree, sophistry is an instrument of vanity, as old as mankind, as for Greeks well Greeks just become more popular in History hence the visibility...the point is sophistry was never so fashionable as it is today....the more the access to information the less value people place on it, and the more they care with vanity and appearances. Its disgusting.

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@Fil Albuquerque,

Patterns are forms, and therefore they are information... (what you call 'Reason', I call 'information' if I undetstand your linguo well).

Human reason (lowercase r) is a powerful force in this world. It's not an epiphenomenon, therefore.

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@Olivier5,

I meant: You CAN'T inspire your own ideas.

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@FBM,

Is there ANY (good) scientific experiment that doesn't try and appky reason to a problem? That doesn't use imagination and logic? Nor tries to express thoughts through complex symbolic language? The world of ideas / thoughts / the mind is there in any laboratory, in any experiment, at their core.

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@Olivier5,

What's your point? I'm waiting for you to show me as much evidence-based data for your claim of certainty regarding free will as I have shown as reason to be skeptical. That the controversy about it has persisted through the years seems to support the claim that it's not such a slam dunk as you portray it to be. Again, I'm looking at what's coming out of careful experimentation and comparing it to what comes from (apparently biased) a priori reasoning. When it comes down to the wire, the laboratory data just doesn't disappear because you don't like it.

I was once convinced of free will, too, you see. But if you only apply skepticism to things that you already disagree with, how sincere or thorough is that skepticism? That just reeks of cognitive bias/cherry picking. In my experience, there's a lot of benefit to be had through attacking one's own cherished beliefs and seeing how they stand up.

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Is free-will an illusion?

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