RE: Human Intelligence is an Illusion
December 17, 2018 at 10:08 am
(This post was last modified: December 17, 2018 at 11:02 am by The__Chameleon.)
I've come up with what I believe is the perfect analogy to the idea I'm trying to convey. I'm surprised this didn't occur to me before since I commonly use computer principles to explain ideas.
Imagine a computer that is programmed with a rudimentary sense of it's own being and operation. It doesn't for example have the ability to see or interact with it's own source code, but through retrospective analysis of it's own choices and the conditions in which they were made, has developed some understanding that it is, at least in part, driven by deterministic factors. This computer however has an interesting idiosyncrasy. It has either developed or been directly programmed with the perception of itself as possessing the ability to make choices independent of deterministic factors (including it's own programming). So this computer in a sense has two identities. It's cognitive sense or impression of self, and it's actual self (the whole of it's components and programming, including background processes of which it is cognitively unaware). If, for the sake of argument, the computer was right with respect to it possessing free will, then that free agency can neither be sourced by the computers cognitive self, nor it's actual self, since the computer is a machine and therefore bound to it's own mechanical nature and programming. The only other logical conclusion is that the computer was wrong about possessing the capacity for free will.
We are no different in essence than the computer described above. If we possess free will it cannot not be sourced from within as we, physically, are biological machines bound to deterministic factors. We could then still claim this external source for our capacity for free agency as part of our identity, but really how can we if we are unaware of the decision making processes initiated by that source until after they've been initiated, communicated to our subconscious, processed,, and finally driven past our cognitive awareness to our motor cortex to be executed? Free will, if it exists in any form, is by definition, miraculous. Either this miracle exists, but is not sourced within us, or it does not exist and never has. Either the non-deterministic nature of your decision making exists outside of your physical being, or you are entirely a slave to deterministic factors and really have no `free`agency.
Imagine a computer that is programmed with a rudimentary sense of it's own being and operation. It doesn't for example have the ability to see or interact with it's own source code, but through retrospective analysis of it's own choices and the conditions in which they were made, has developed some understanding that it is, at least in part, driven by deterministic factors. This computer however has an interesting idiosyncrasy. It has either developed or been directly programmed with the perception of itself as possessing the ability to make choices independent of deterministic factors (including it's own programming). So this computer in a sense has two identities. It's cognitive sense or impression of self, and it's actual self (the whole of it's components and programming, including background processes of which it is cognitively unaware). If, for the sake of argument, the computer was right with respect to it possessing free will, then that free agency can neither be sourced by the computers cognitive self, nor it's actual self, since the computer is a machine and therefore bound to it's own mechanical nature and programming. The only other logical conclusion is that the computer was wrong about possessing the capacity for free will.
We are no different in essence than the computer described above. If we possess free will it cannot not be sourced from within as we, physically, are biological machines bound to deterministic factors. We could then still claim this external source for our capacity for free agency as part of our identity, but really how can we if we are unaware of the decision making processes initiated by that source until after they've been initiated, communicated to our subconscious, processed,, and finally driven past our cognitive awareness to our motor cortex to be executed? Free will, if it exists in any form, is by definition, miraculous. Either this miracle exists, but is not sourced within us, or it does not exist and never has. Either the non-deterministic nature of your decision making exists outside of your physical being, or you are entirely a slave to deterministic factors and really have no `free`agency.
The opinions expressed are not necessarily those of the presenter.
