Do you believe in free will?

[The Grand Nudger]

Actually, Apo, I think your "point" these past few posts was that I was incorrect, misinformed, ignorant, incompetent, handwaving, boasting of evidence we didn't have, etc.....turns out I wasn't, but I'm glad to see we're back on the rails. I'm sure the diversion gave others time to organize their thoughts very well (and it seems the conversation has been moving forward in our absence). Meanwhile, some of us have been discussing the merits of these ideas as effects, even if we cannot rely on them as objects or things in the manner in which they had been treated traditionally. I'm not sure, btw Genk, why knowledge of the future would automatically become one of the factors which led to a future state, I am immediately reminded of the Greek story of Cassandra. I see many reasons for precluding the notion of it's existence (possibility and actuality are entirely different things, agreed?) one of which being the lack of a specific answer but more importantly, I haven't been able to find even a general answer, but chiefly, that it cannot be demonstrated to exist, and that many of the things attributed to it can be shown to occur elsewhere, through a mechanism and process which would seem to imply the polar opposite of "free will". In the end, if all that is required to point to a free will is to say that we make choices, whatever "we" means, or that we are an agent, whatever "agent" means, and this underpins those things you mentioned, such as responsibility, then that's good enough for me as far as those things are concerned (but only as far as they are concerned). The concept only needs to work as far as our experience here is concerned to be treated as a concept. It is strange though, to see us so desperately attempting to pigeon-hole a preconceived notion like "free will" into a better understanding of what goes into our minds than it was conceived under.

I think Tack, that anytime is a good time for you to hop in, and the best place for you to begin would be by showing the other half of this duality, or the hook that allows it to interface with the demonstrated half, or both.

[Angrboda]

Turns out you were wrong. But if you have to preserve your ego at all costs, even though you were plainly wrong, so be it. I'll just have to accept that it's pointless to talk about anything with you because you can't recognize the truth even if it bites you in the ass. I realize, given what I know about cognitive bias, that there are other possible reasons for your behavior other than incompetence; however, at the end of the day, you still can't see you were wrong, which makes me doubt your ability to ever see or admit that you're wrong. And if you lack that ability, there's no point in discussing anything with you, as you're as closed-minded, dogmatic and irrational as a creationist.

[The Grand Nudger]

Was I, I'm sorry, again I defer to those uninformed people at Stanford. Your determination that I (and by extension they) am wrong comes from what, a philosophical argument made 17 priors that no longer criticizes our concept of self (since we have learned, in that 17 year interim by means of demonstrable evidence, that this ciriticism was at least partially correct, that there is no self as a thing as far as we can tell, only as an effect of a machine? So, redefinition, but no elimination.)? Well damn my ego. Since I'm speaking to an eliminative materialist, I'm wondering why I even have to mention this, since it has been the strongest criticism of the position almost since the position was first expressed. Such a strong opposition, in fact, that Churchland herself has opined that she would not call it "eliminative" anything..if she were forming the position today. How your arguments surrounding the self and some incinerated planet are compatible with either eliminative materialism or the position of cognitive science still eludes me. But my ego is probably getting in the way. How something about the self is being handwaved away by those who do not even attempt to make the argument you presented them as making eludes me. Again, probably my ego. That a statement that plainly lays out both what we know and the limits of what we know is ignorance eludes me, ego again? Here I am arguing evidence, and you're responding with philosophy...hmn, what to choose, what to choose.... In this case, it would seem that even though your philosophy and my evidence lead us to roughly the same conclusion, I would probably defer to the evidence available as the strongest case for our shared conclusion. Especially since that evidence both validated and called into question a philosophical position all at once.

(To be clear, I'm no stranger to being wrong, I'm more often wrong than right (and those are just the times I realize it, god knows how often I'm wrong without realizing so, but I'd rather you provided me with a better reason than because I say so, or because this philosophy says so, when I'm refering to evidence and evidence alone, with no assumptions made about anything more than what that evidence suggests, when i keep providing references for precisely what I'm saying, while you keep ignoring them.)

[Angrboda]

"[T]hat this ciriticism was at least partially correct, that there is no self as a thing as far as we can tell, only as an effect of a machine?"

"Certainly the brain "causes" the I, but the brain is not the "I"."

Your current statement and my original statement. They are saying the same thing. The only person who has changed anything is you, by equivocating about the place until you finally end up agreeing with what I originally said. But yeah, I can see how agreeing with what you now say to be true is me being wrong.

(Oh, and if you would be so kind, I'd appreciate a reference to those later comments of Churchland. Thanks.)

(And here from Genkaus is an example of exactly why I was making the distinction I was making, which I explicitly labeled as a problem for the compatibilist: "Formation of ego does not separate your from causal chain. It creates "you" as a separate entity within the causal chain - separate from the rest of the chain. ")

[The Grand Nudger]

Care to point to where I've changed my statement at all. We are our brains. The effect is what our brain is doing. Is this not the position of eliminative materialsm btw? That nueroscience will replace our ideas of what the self is by providing a better understanding of how the brain functions (which appears to be exactly what it has done since the book you linked was written, all by way of handwaving and hiding ignorance, I'm sure)? How many times do I have to say this, I do not assume that we are more than the workings of our brains, and neither, it seems, would an eliminative materialist. But perhaps I'm wrong, and if you would be so kind, please point out where and why? Perhaps you would like to explain why we might assume that there is more (and in doing so, explain why eliminative materialism is flawed.........)

(Looking for a more definitive source, thusfar all I can get are unverified remarks about a speaking engagement and the softening of those parts of the Churchland's positions that followed after criticism of things they seem to feel they don't have much at stake in. Specifically with regards to eliminating folk psychology. Care to help me source it? You might be more familiar. It may just be some un-sourced and unjustified thing that slipped into the general conversation surrounding EM, one never knows)

[genkaus]

Dude, you should atleast segregate your posts a bit so that I may understand which parts are addressed to me.

I'm not sure, btw Genk, why knowledge of the future would automatically become one of the factors which led to a future state, I am immediately reminded of the Greek story of Cassandra.

The choices we make depend on our knowledge at the time - including the knowledge of the expected consequences of our choices. The certain knowledge of those consequences would form a part of whole knowledge and therefore be a factor. We can choose to ignore that factor, like the Trojans did in Cassandra's case, but it would be a factor nevertheless.

I see many reasons for precluding the notion of it's existence (possibility and actuality are entirely different things, agreed?) one of which being the lack of a specific answer but more importantly, I haven't been able to find even a general answer, but chiefly, that it cannot be demonstrated to exist, and that many of the things attributed to it can be shown to occur elsewhere, through a mechanism and process which would seem to imply the polar opposite of "free will".

To my knowledge, the question is still undecided (regarding the conventional definition of free will), because the known set of deterministic forces have been causally insufficient. In that sense, the commonly defined free-will is sort of "god-of-the-gaps" used to fill the absence of knowledge about the unknown factors.

In the end, if all that is required to point to a free will is to say that we make choices, whatever "we" means, or that we are an agent, whatever "agent" means, and this underpins those things you mentioned, such as responsibility, then that's good enough for me as far as those things are concerned (but only as far as they are concerned). The concept only needs to work as far as our experience here is concerned to be treated as a concept.

Isn't that kind of all it could be?

It is strange though, to see us so desperately attempting to pigeon-hole a preconceived notion like "free will" into a better understanding of what goes into our minds than it was conceived under.

Is it strange? We reevaluate and redefine old concepts in light of new knowledge all the time.

[NoMoreFaith]

That might be the first time I agreed with everything you said genkaus.

Didn't realise threads could get past 25 pages without becoming flamewar

[The Grand Nudger]

Apo and I have been handling all the flaiming, it's good old fashioned fun..lol

[Angrboda]

(Looking for a more definitive source, thusfar all I can get are unverified remarks about a speaking engagement and the softening of those parts of the Churchland's positions that followed after criticism of things they seem to feel they don't have much at stake in. Specifically with regards to eliminating folk psychology. Care to help me source it? You might be more familiar. It may just be some un-sourced and unjustified thing that slipped into the general conversation surrounding EM, one never knows)

Naw, as you suggest, I'm a little rusty. My point in all this, assuming I had one, is that unqualifiedly equating "the self" with the brain is that it is too much — the compatibilist is arguing that there is a self that can be defined as somehow an identifiable and self-contained entity in the causal chain, that gives the compaitibilist notion that the self is doing anything at all more credibility than it deserves; in my opinion, that's giving the compatibilist half the argument for free.

[The Grand Nudger]

Yet the eliminative materialist urges precisely that, that we purge ourselves of these antiquated notions such as self, and reduce it to biology, which I have done, and you are arguing against. That's why I'm riled up, if you haven't been able to figure that out yet (or if I have been completely incapable of successfully communicating my thoughts on the matter). You're criticizing me and those who I draw my appraisals of such matters from for doing exactly what you suggest that we do, not because of the strength of your argument (or the strength of the EM argument), I might add, but because we have evidence that seems to confirm the argument in one sense while simultaneously suggesting that the concept need not be eliminated, only redifined in light of that evidence which brought us here in the first place. It seems that it's satisfying for you to suggest it in an argument, but if someone actually does it in practice, you appear to be very conflicted on the matter.

You and I agree completely as far as the credibility of the compatibilists argument, and that there's no point in just rolling over for half of it. Of course, that may be bias, I'm not the kind of person that rolls over for arguments...am I..lol?