Free Will Debate

[Anomalocaris]

the question seems to me to be, can something be sufficiently different in your brain to have caused you to make different decision, without that difference being directly traceably to an earlier difference that had already existed outside your brain? 

if not, then no decision really originated in your brain.   it is just first perceived by you as a difference in your brain.

Why would that be desirable? I *want* my decisions to be based on my experiences (outside events affecting me). It would be exceedingly strange if they were not.

Most likely, that small difference in my brain that 'decided' is the result great number of previous events, both inside and outside of my brain. No single one of them would be enough for a different decision, most likely. Those previous influences had to come together to affect the activity of my brain for the decision to happen.

In other words, both external and internal events affect my decisions. Duh.

I make no judgements regarding whether that is desirable.  I only ask whether that could be true.

regarding both external and internal events affect your decision. does the doc-called internal event truly have any significant freedom to transpire differently resulting in different decisions if all external events remain the same? if not, then there is no real internal events, only intermediate effects of external events.

it is possible the brain magnifies the chaotic nature of how decision responds to subtle changes to external events. but other things can also magnify the chaotic nature of how effects of external events impinges on your brain. Also, a macroscopic chaotic system is still in most cases essentially deterministic.

[The Grand Nudger]

Not necessarily uncaused (alot of people believed that it was a gift from the gods). More that it was a potent and primary cause unto itself, meaningfully and fundamentally separate from the mundane types of causal chains involved in trees falling down or animals acting on instinct.

[Anomalocaris]

It seems that people frame 'free will' in a way that requires it to be an 'uncaused cause'. Is that seriously what people mean by 'free will'?

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It is will, just not a free will.

So, once again, what is the significance of the adjective 'free' in this context? The decision was 'made by me' in that the *decision* was an event in *my* brain. I based that decision on my experiences, desires, thoughts, etc. How is that *not* free?

what meaning is there in “made by me” if there is no possibility of your making a different decision under each circumstance?

[The Grand Nudger]

And to answer that explicitly, it's not free in all of the ways that any bit of biology isn't free. Our alleged free will was supposed to be the thing we possessed which set us apart from all of that. It isn't, it doesn't, there's no evidence we possess it, but that was what it was supposed to be.

The evergreen criticism of compatibilist free will of any kind is that it's propositionally and evidentiarily interchangeable with no free will at all.

[polymath257]

Why would that be desirable? I *want* my decisions to be based on my experiences (outside events affecting me). It would be exceedingly strange if they were not.

Most likely, that small difference in my brain that 'decided' is the result great number of previous events, both inside and outside of my brain. No single one of them would be enough for a different decision, most likely. Those previous influences had to come together to affect the activity of my brain for the decision to happen.

In other words, both external and internal events affect my decisions. Duh.

I make no judgements regarding whether that is desirable.  I only ask whether that could be true.

regarding both external and internal events affect your decision.   does the doc-called internal event truly have any significant freedom to transpire differently resulting in different decisions if all external events remain the same?   if not, then there is no real internal events, only intermediate effects of external events.

it is possible the brain magnifies the chaotic nature of how decision responds to subtle changes to external events.   but other things can also magnify the chaotic nature of how effects of external events impinges on your brain.   Also, a macroscopic chaotic system is still in most cases essentially deterministic.

I *all* external events were *exactly* the same, including *all* events prior to my conception, and *all* events leading up to that decision, then no, I don't think I would make a different decision: I would be exactly the same, with the same desires and beliefs, same opportunities, and same prejudices, and so would *expect* to make the same decision.

If I *could* make a different decision, that would seem quite strange given I would be exactly the same either way.

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It seems that people frame 'free will' in a way that requires it to be an 'uncaused cause'. Is that seriously what people mean by 'free will'?

---

So, once again, what is the significance of the adjective 'free' in this context? The decision was 'made by me' in that the *decision* was an event in *my* brain. I based that decision on my experiences, desires, thoughts, etc. How is that *not* free?

what meaning is there in “made by me” if there is no possibility of your making a different decision under each circumstance?

That the significant information processing occurred in my brain. In other words, by me.

Once again, is the definition of 'free will' such that it requires the decision be an uncaused cause?

[The Grand Nudger]

Free will was that "seem strange".

[polymath257]

Free will was that "seem strange".

Why would I make a different decision if *I* am exactly the same and *everything* else is also exactly the same?

[Anomalocaris]

I make no judgements regarding whether that is desirable.  I only ask whether that could be true.

regarding both external and internal events affect your decision.   does the doc-called internal event truly have any significant freedom to transpire differently resulting in different decisions if all external events remain the same?   if not, then there is no real internal events, only intermediate effects of external events.

it is possible the brain magnifies the chaotic nature of how decision responds to subtle changes to external events.   but other things can also magnify the chaotic nature of how effects of external events impinges on your brain.   Also, a macroscopic chaotic system is still in most cases essentially deterministic.

I *all* external events were *exactly* the same, including *all* events prior to my conception, and *all* events leading up to that decision, then no, I don't think I would make a different decision: I would be exactly the same, with the same desires and beliefs, same opportunities, and same prejudices, and so would *expect* to make the same decision.

If I *could* make a different decision, that would seem quite strange given I would be exactly the same either way.

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what meaning is there in “made by me” if there is no possibility of your making a different decision under each circumstance?

That the significant information processing occurred in my brain. In other words, by me.

Once again, is the definition of 'free will' such that it requires the decision be an uncaused cause?

That does seem to go the essence of “will”.   Otherwise there seem to fundamentally be no will, much less free will.    There is only belated internal perception that an externally initiated process, long underway along a pre-determined trajectory, is nearing an specific type of intermediate point to which we assign arbitrary but ultimately unwarranted significance.

[The Grand Nudger]

Free will was that "seem strange".

Why would I make a different decision if *I* am exactly the same and *everything* else is also exactly the same?

I have no idea, it's a good question.  Nevertheless, instrumental to the concept of a free will..as opposed to a local will, or just a will - fullstop.....is the idea that we are meaningfully outside of the clockwork universe. That, even if you were the same, and all things were the same, the issue of choosing a or b fundamentally hinges on a you free of that empowered to and capable of going down either causal path.

[Anomalocaris]

Why would I make a different decision if *I* am exactly the same and *everything* else is also exactly the same?

I have no idea, it's a good question.  Nevertheless, instrumental to the concept of a free will..as opposed to a local will, or just a will - fullstop.....is the idea that we are meaningfully outside of the clockwork universe.  That, even if you were the same, and all things were the same, the issue of choosing a or b fundamentally hinges on a you free of that empowered to and capable of going down either causal path.

The conflict between the apparent ultimate impossibility of the existence of any will on the one hand, and the apparent benefit of assigning responsibility based on pretension of the existence of a free will on the other, require much more sophisticated assessment than it seems to generally be given.

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Free will was that "seem strange".

Why would I make a different decision if *I* am exactly the same and *everything* else is also exactly the same?

The question is not why would you, but could you.