(June 15, 2015 at 12:00 pm)robvalue Wrote: Sure, free will means just about anything to anyone, that's the problem. It needs pinning down before you can say very much about it. I very much doubt there is an agreed definition.
My point was you cannot choose to act "as if there are no choices" because that's a contradiction in terms. But again, you have to define what choice means first; choice can sometimes not mean an actual choice according to some lingo.
Fuck it, I'm going to erase everyone's free will.
I would say a computer program can make choices, but I would not say it has free will, as the choices are just a product of programming and input. The computer itself has no say in the matter.
In the same way a human makes choices, but it is a product of genetics and input. So the smarty pants scientists who say we have no free will are saying that there is nothing that the individual is contributing. It is just a product of inherited genetics and surroundings.
And the longer the program runs, and the more input that is taken in, the things it chooses can change. So my programming and input led me to think more about free will, and because of such, the output is a skepticism towards its existence. The skepticism towards its existence causing me to behave differently.
We see the same thing with chess computers, as they change their moves based on how long they have to analyze the board, the moves of the opponents, and occasionally, the self-teaching aspect that changes the choices it makes the more games it plays.
