RE: Do animals have free Will?
February 10, 2012 at 9:21 am
(This post was last modified: February 10, 2012 at 9:44 am by genkaus.)
(February 9, 2012 at 4:27 pm)Chuck Wrote: Based on what do you say the more conceptually capable, the more genuinely free are the will? It seems to me that the more conceptually capable, the more might be the capacity to conceptualizing a will as being free. But that does not actually make the will free.
It takes quite a bit of power of conceptualization to coneptualize the sky as a dome sitting over a flat earth, and this concept may even have some degree of explanatory power, but that does not make the concept correct.
Not exactly. I'm saying that the more conceptually capable, the greater the possibility of the will being free. For example, I wouldn't consider fundies to have free-will if all their thoughts, actions, beliefs and motivations are dictated by the bible. And yet, I wouldn't consider them conceptually inferior to me either.
(February 9, 2012 at 4:47 pm)Rhythm Wrote: Np, if that's your definition then a very large number of creatures on this planet have free will.
No they won't. How could they act with reference to their thoughts and actions if they are not aware of them?
(February 9, 2012 at 4:47 pm)Rhythm Wrote: If your definition hinges on levels of this ability that increase on a scale towards human beings before being classified as "free will", then yes, that's rigging the game.
Your read my definition. you tell me if that is the case.
(February 9, 2012 at 4:47 pm)Rhythm Wrote: Let me ask you this. In relation to a wolf, just how competent are you at hunting deer by making "decisions with reference to knowledge, motivations, thoughts and actions"? Is this game rigged in favor of the wolf?
That depends. I'm not certain if the wolf makes its decisions after considering its own motivations and thoughts or if the behavior is innate or ingrained. If its the former, then the wolf is more competent, if latter, I am.
(February 9, 2012 at 4:47 pm)Rhythm Wrote: Can you demonstrate that our own relative level or grade of "free will" is not "a necessary consequence of its(our) biology and conditioning"?
By not acting according to biological impulses or learned behavior.
(February 9, 2012 at 4:47 pm)Rhythm Wrote: If you're referring to relative ability (and our measure for that is our brains ability and stage of development) then I don't see how you could avoid marking down human beings as creatures that act according to a necessary consequence of our own biology and conditioning. Since that's exactly how we understand our brains to operate (by consequence of biology and conditioning)
If that was true, then we'd never gain any new knowledge. Our knowledge is not given to us by our biological make-up and all conditioning is repetition according to per-existing knowledge. For new knowledge to develop, there needs to be capacity for thought independent of either.
(February 9, 2012 at 5:00 pm)Godschild Wrote: I believe the real problem in this discussion is choice vs. freewill. I train dogs to obey certain commands, yet at times they will refuse to do so, this is a deliberate choice. As for what the reasons, I'm not always sure, I do not see it as freewill. Min added to Tack's analogy that animals kill for a reason (survival), and man kills for a reason (war, hate, self defense, law enforcement and ect.) or for no reason (mentally ill).
Rhythm wrote that animals such as the chimps and domesticated cats kill for no reason, I disagree. The domesticated cat will kill mice, birds, rabbits and ect. and leave them lying around uneaten, they do this out of instinct, an instinct that's been altered because of their domestication and thus will leave a kill uneaten. As for the chimps no one has proven they kill other chimps for no reason, the video he posted shows chimps in cooperation which IMO shows they had a reason.
The above shows all had a choice except for the mentally ill person, thus choices were made both by animals and man. The difference that I see in this, that man made moral choices and animals made instinctual choices. Moral choices = freewill Instinctual choices = no freewill
Instinctual choice is a contradiction in terms. If you are acting according to instinct, you are not acting by your choice.
(February 9, 2012 at 8:36 pm)padraic Wrote: Some animals are also self aware.EG dolphins and some apes can recognise their image in a mirror as themselves. Virtually no other animals have that ability,as far as I'm aware.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_test
I don't think that the mirror test is a reliable confirmation of self-awareness.
