Is free-will an illusion?

@layman,

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Well, you're not what I'd call a "strict" determinist then, like Brian. Like Skinner, he thinks we humans passively receive "stimuli" from the external environment, with no input of our own, and then "respond" mechanically, like robots.

No, I'm pretty strict. I'm not a compatibilist. It's just that free will is just as undeniable. I wouldn't put forth some theory about human consciousness. At this point that's like a caveman theorizing about astrophysics. We just don't yet have a clear understanding of how consciousness works or what it is.

The best argument for determinism is to just note that (a priori) every event has only one outcome. Everything that happens has a 100% chance of happening, so to speak.

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@Tuna,

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The best argument for determinism is to just note that (a priori) every event has only one outcome. Everything that happens has a 100% chance of happening, so to speak.

Well, I don't think that's a very good argument, at least not if you take it back to the proposition that every that has ever happened, and ever will happen, was "pre-determined" at the instant of the big bang.

As one free will advocate put it. Of course everything is determined. We just have a role in forming that determination, and "choosing" what is determined.

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@Tuna,

Tuna wrote:

I see. As jargon goes, it looks like a poor choice to me. Where there is no possibility of false information, there is no information at all. The issue isn't symbolism. It's truth.

Truth is ehat happens when a symbolic representation of something fits the actual structure of that something. IOW, when symbolic information fits well with physical information, to use Lay's terminology. Ergo you can't define truth if you assume that there is no physical information in this world.

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@layman,

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Well, I don't think that's a very good argument, at least not if you take it back to the proposition that every that has ever happened, and ever will happen, was "pre-determined" at the instant of the big bang.

Yea, it's always good to notice when the inexplicable has creeped in. The notion that time had a beginning is incomprehensible. Brian Greene said time and space are the ways gravity expresses itself. Whatever that means.

The whole issue of free will and determinism really comes down to how we think. We're following the contours of mind, discovering what things we're bound to think.

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As one free will advocate put it. Of course everything is determined. We just have a role in forming that determination, and "choosing" what is determined.

That's a fusion of the two. It's kind of trippy. Yes, I'd go along with that.

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@Olivier5,

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Truth is ehat happens when a symbolic representation of something fits the actual structure of that something. IOW, when symbolic information fits well with physical information, to use Lay's terminology. Ergo you can't define truth if you assume that there is no physical information in this world.

That's correspondence theory. Frege shot it down a while back. Most analytical philosophers accept that truth is unanalyzable.

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@Olivier5,

i don't know why everybody randomly believes in information, truth, reality and such concepts. it comes from a naive belief in the content of consciousness, due to identity with it.

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@Tuna,

I do.

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@Tuna,

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That's correspondence theory. Frege shot it down a while back. Most analytical philosophers accept that truth is unanalyzable.

Most analytic philosophers could not recognise truth if it bit their rear end. Endlessly cutting concepts into finer and finer pieces is not philosophy; it's not bringing anyone closer to anything, let alone truth. Russel is a great example. I resolved his so-called paradox when I was 10 years old.

So show me Frege's idea and we'll talk. Or you could try to define "truth" in any other way... Go ahead, surprise us.

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@carnaticmystery,

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i don't know why everybody randomly believes in information, truth, reality and such concepts. it comes from a naive belief in the content of consciousness, due to identity with it.

Do you know why anyone believes in belief, or in concepts, or in naivety, or in consciousness, or in identity, or in "it", or in "why", or in "randomly"?

If you don't, you don't have a sentence. As for "sentience"... Ha ha ha ha.

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@Olivier5,

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Most analytic philosophers could not recognise truth if it bit their rear end. Endlessly cutting concepts into finer and finer pieces is not philosophy; it's not bringing anyone closer to anything, let alone truth. Russel is a great example. I resolved his so-called paradox when I was 10 years old.

Analytical philosophers have no more problem understanding usages of "truth" than the average person. They just noticed that there's an insurmountable logical problem with presenting a definition.

And no, you didn't solve Russell's Paradox. If there was a solution, then set theory wouldn't be axiomatized to avoid it.

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So show me Frege's idea and we'll talk. Or you could try to define "truth" in any other way... Go ahead, surprise us.

I can point you to good sources for understanding why we can't define truth, along with the valiant attempts of analytical philosophers to overcome the problem Frege demonstrated. If you're interested, let me know.

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@FBM,

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What's your stance on the Bereitschaftspotential?

I don't have a stance. What do you think it means?

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Do you have a paricular form of compatibilism that you favor?

No. Freewill and determinism are in direct contradiction.

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Also, would you mind explaining a bit about your position on the Law of Non-contradiction?

It's just something I recognize as governing my expectations. If I discern that a person is male, I wouldn't hold out the possibility that he is also female.

It's an idea that comes to mind when I encounter cognitive dissonance associated with contradictions.

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@Tuna,

Tuna wrote:

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What's your stance on the Bereitschaftspotential?

I don't have a stance. What do you think it means?

I regard it as just one reason to be unsure about the existence of free will as it is commonly understood.

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Also, would you mind explaining a bit about your position on the Law of Non-contradiction?

It's just something I recognize as governing my expectations. If I discern that a person is male, I wouldn't hold out the possibility that he is also female.

It's an idea that comes to mind when I encounter cognitive dissonance associated with contradictions.

Do you have a limit to this limit on non-contradiction? Could that man also be a hubcap or the number 9? I know I'm being silly, but I'm still trying to get a handle on where you're coming from. I don't want to jump to conclusions.

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@FBM,

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I regard it as just one reason to be unsure about the existence of free will as it is commonly understood.

Most fundamentally, will is not a concept we arrive at through reason. It's a name we give to an element of subjective experience.

Any number of arguments could be aimed at showing that subjective experience is illusory. But none of them can succeed without undermining themselves. The consideration of an argument entails subjectivity.

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Do you have a limit to this limit on non-contradiction? Could that man also be a hubcap or the number 9? I know I'm being silly, but I'm still trying to get a handle on where you're coming from. I don't want to jump to conclusions.

The LONC (Law of Non-contradiction) would be utilized in a proof that a man can't be a hubcap or a number.

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@Tuna,

Why stop at questioning NC, eh? There are said to be 3 fundamental axioms underlying traditional logic. The other two are identity (A=A) and excluded middle (either A or not-A).

I don't believe in any of them, except in their most tautological sense. They don't apply to the world any more than Euclidean geometry does, I figure.

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@Tuna,

Tuna wrote:

Most fundamentally, will is not a concept we arrive at through reason. It's a name we give to an element of subjective experience.

Good. I can't argue with that. What I wonder is whether or not there is an actual referent. People talk about experiencing lots of things that don't.

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Any number of arguments could be aimed at showing that subjective experience is illusory. But none of them can succeed without undermining themselves. The consideration of an argument entails subjectivity.

I wouldn't even attempt to do so.

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The LONC (Law of Non-contradiction) would be utilized in a proof that a man can't be a hubcap or a number.

OK, so it has a limited range of applicability. A human can't be a non-human hubcap or a number, but a human may be both male and female. We're together on that. The LONC applies to identity, but not (necessarily?) qualities? Is that close? I'm trying to delineate that range a little more sharply.

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@layman,

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Why stop at questioning NC, eh? There are said to be 3 fundamental axioms underlying traditional logic. The other two are identity (A=A) and excluded middle (either A or not-A).

I don't believe in any of them, except in their most tautological sense. They don't apply to the world any more than Euclidean geometry does, I figure.

There is no logical justification for logic itself. Statements of logic aren't about the world as if the LONC resides somewhere in time and space. We might say they're laws we discern in the construction of the world.

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@Tuna,

"The only thing permanent is change." Something like that. Heraclitus.

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@Tuna,

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That's correspondence theory. Frege shot it down a while back.

Frege can shoot at whatever he wants. A correspondence theory still holds water. Just don't expect to find "absolute truth" when relying on it.

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Most analytical philosophers accept that truth is unanalyzable.

I'm with Ollie about the relevance of analytic philsophers, eh? My response to them is always:

Analyze this, perv.

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@FBM,

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Good. I can't argue with that. What I wonder is whether or not there is an actual referent. People talk about experiencing lots of things that don't.

Descartes followed the path of discovering how far doubt goes. It ended with this: "I think. I am." Or in following his comments, we could translate it: "I experience. I am." With an accurate understanding of his meaning, this is an indubitable statement.

The concept of will has meaning when I see myself in a worldly context. Ironically, the existence of my will is never more clearly apparent to me than when my will is denied; when I see that I am in chains. But it's equally apparent when I grieve, as I do now for French people I've never met.

These feelings of defiance and grief, of a longing for justice, or a yearning to be free are the things I would talk about to explain most essentially what I am.

But do I exist? I can't doubt it.

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OK, so it has a limited range of applicability. A human can't be a non-human hubcap or a number, but a human may be both male and female. We're together on that. The LONC applies to identity, but not (necessarily?) qualities? Is that close? I'm trying to delineate that range a little more sharply.

The LONC applies to statements. We make statements about things. A thing is a fusion of identity and properties.

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@layman,

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Frege can shoot at whatever he wants. A correspondence theory still holds water. Just don't expect to find "absolute truth" when relying on it.

Frege demonstrated that truth can't be defined. It's too primal for analysis. It's not about the absolute.

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I'm with Ollie about the relevance of analytic philsophers, eh? My response to them is always:

Analyze this, perv.

But you should check them out before you make that judgment. AP isn't my philosophical homebase, but it has its own coolness. There's something calm and quiet about it compared to other philosophical paths. A good AP argument is a brick house.

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Is free-will an illusion?

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