How can any thinking man believe in free will, /sci/? Why do

>>7206627
Have no idea. Free will is bullshit.
So relax and let the universe unfold as it should

>>7206627

>correlate
You mean associate.

The answer to your question is just that people find it easier to go about their lives if they imagine themselves as the true locus of all their desires and intentions. We know this isn't actually the case - nonetheless, it takes some effort and understanding to appreciate why.

because they had no other choice

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Does free will exist?

>>7206632
>>7206632
>>7206632

>>7206633
Quiet your mind. How do thoughts pop into your head? Do you decide? Not really. They just emerge. Where's the free will?

>>7206638
Well if I spend the morning talking about something, big chance i will be "popping" thoughts about it later on, so I can decide what "pops". Does free will exist?

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>>7206633
>Does free will exist?
No

>>7206642
That's stimulus and response.
No free will there.

>>7206642
And why do you talk about certain things in the morning? Because you heard about them or experienced them from an external source? Because someone else brought them up? You didn't freely decide.

>>7206642
Here's something to watch:

Sam Harris on free will:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCofmZlC72g

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>>7206645
No one else brought them up, I woke up alone in a room and decided to talk about something out of many things. Today is like any other day. Them I proceeded to talk and actively think about it for 6 hours. Then I stopped. Now, after this, not only it seems easier to start the topic, but I have creative thougts about it "popping" every minute. Do I have free will?

inb4 clockwork body. If I throw a die, the way And where I throw obviously determines the result. The result is random to me though, and it will always. I will never be able to access the information with my 5 human senses that leads to the right prediction. Now consider the brain is 10 digit number of neurons firing on 20 watts. The energy I gave to the die was small, the die was random forver. Now I am giving 20 watts to a 10 digit neurons network. Does free will exist?

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>>7206655

>>7206664
Does free will exist?

>>7206627
Behavior isn't totally random though...

>>7206655
If you are arguing that a complex ordered feedback network produces free will... then all I can say is: No, the more ordered, the more it points to determinism.

>>7206655
The result only appears random. You could build a machine that could determine how the die would fall immediately after it left your hand.

Because I can do whatever I please at this moment

Because the argument that "lol since your brain is dictating your actions, you aren't really free" is retarded as hell, I am my brain

Because the phrase "free will" as you define it is absolutely useless

>>7206671
A study has been done with a roulette wheel.
Something like over 60% of outcomes could be determined.

>>7206674
Exactly, with some more effort they can nail it down. I don't see free will as being a thing we are capable of.

>>7206676
Ah here it is:
http://scitation.aip.org/content/aip/journal/chaos/22/3/10.1063/1.4753920

>>7206627
>Why do people correlate randomness with behavioral freedom?
Because the only argument AGAINST free will is determinism, which is both experimentally dis-proven AND a pathetic philosophy.

...but keep telling yourself you're better than everyone else because you're more cynical.

>>7206665
I already gave you the answer >>7206643
Fucking pay attention, shit-for-brains

>>7206672
>I can do whatever I please
What causes you to feel pleasure from it in the first place?

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>>7206685
Lel it is so pathetic, their argument goes like this: you are predictable.... TO GOD BA DUM TSS

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>>7206674
What a shame, I thought we were already at 90%
>>7206687
Does free will exist?

>>7206685
>>Why do people correlate randomness with behavioral freedom?
Even with classical mechanics out of the way. Why would random behavior give rise to free will? How is random free? Its RANDOM. It has nothing to do with choice.

>>7206693
60% using simplified approximation.
Much higher using a camera and a computer.
The paper explains.

>>7206687
>What causes you to feel pleasure from it in the first place?
Nigga I don't give a shit about your stupid philosophy. Here's the deal:

>I am my brain
>although my brain bases its decisions off of external factors, those decisions are made according to its own internal set of instructions without influence from any other sentient being, therefore free will

If you're going to say "free will doesn't exist as long as you are basing your decisions on external factors", well that's just a pile of bullshit, because it makes the entire concept of "free will" meaningless because it is impossible for any decision to be made without influence. Fuck on out of /sci/ with your philosophical bullshit, maybe try /lit/

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>>7206694
it is random
>AHA IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH CHOICE
it is not random
>AHA IT HAS A CAUSE, IT IS NOT FREE

Fucking die in a fire, mr rhetorics

>>7206698
The entire concept of free will IS meaningless. You just admitted that the brain operates deterministically. There is no place for free will.

>>7206698
>s own internal set of instructions without influence from any other sentient being, therefore free will
Not really. The internal structure was determined by 3.5 billion years of evolution. (nature)
The additional data was determined by circumstance. (nurture)
Where's your GOD now?

>>7206700
There are both elements of randomness and predetermination; however, the randomness is just untraced causation.

>>7206703
>untraced causation
Correct.

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I think I should just bring the definition of free will to this thread before it is too late.

"Free will is the ability of agents to make choices unimpeded."

pic unrelated

>>7206707
Therefore my cat has free will.
So does my toilet. It has a feedback loop on the flush mechanism. (like a perceptron). It can flush unimpeded. Ergo free will.

>>7206711
I think it is safe to say that some agents have more free will than others. Not thinking like this is being a social sciences fagggot on the way to hell.

>>7206714
So we're arguing degrees of freedom?
Well humans are limited by their brains architecture and their experience.
"unimpeded" is ambiguous. Which leads to arguments about semantics.
Free will...Scmee will.

Free will might not exist, but does that matter? In your and my experience you and me still have to make choices.

I'm not making this post out of free will, but who cares, because it certainly FEELS like I'm posting out of my free will.

>>7206720
My mother made me make this post. All goes back to my childhood and trying to be a good boy.

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You are minsanderstanding what "free will" is.
It's the freedom to act acording to one's motivation.
That does not imply that you can freely manipulate that motivation.

It is thus not incompatible with deteminism.
There will be differents causes leading you to have different motivations, and you can not control them, but once you have a motive, you may or may not (acording to the determined events) act according to that motivation.
The important part is where you aknowledge that you can have motivation for doing something, and that having this motive has consequences.

It's called compatibilism.

you don't have to be so passionate when talking about this, some people in this thread sound like atheist redditors.
Pic related, replace "phony God's blessing" with "free will".

>>7206730
>you may or may not (acording to the determined events) act according to that motivation.
If you're going through a cognitive decision process that is logical (or even emotional), how is that not deterministic?
Could you have come to any other conclusion than the one you come to, if its based on logic and experience (heuritics)?
Could you react any different if it is based on emotion?

>>7206736
But it IS deterministic, that was part of my point.

>>7207748
Well ok then

>>7207748
Seems to me like determinism could also be considered not like an on/off switch, but like a dimmer switch. Certain events, rules, emotions or things you've been taught could be much more likely to lead you to certain decisions without you realizing it than others would. Some might even be disregarded or disobeyed.

I also think the question is whether or not things can accurately be predicted before the fact, not retraced after the fact, in which case it's much easier to see clear and logical deterministic explanation for a series of events.

>>7206698
Determinism though. The external events observed by your brain were predetermined by physics. The "thoughts" in your brain are just chemical reactions responding to light hitting your eyes, sound in your ears, etc. It's not making a decision, because it's just chemicals doing their thing. It's following a set path of neural connections, and creates the illusion of free will as an afterthought. There are numerous experiments that show your brain makes decisions before you are aware of it.

>>7208034
Theoretically anything can be predicted with enough information (until you get to quantum states of things). Also keep in mind it's hard to observe things without influencing them.

>>7206720
It's interesting to talk about and gets you thinking about why we make the decisions we do. It makes me more analytical of my external stimuli influencing my decisions.

>>7206627
It's impossible to prove since everything is tied within what humans are capable of perceiving

>>7206627
Define free will

>>7208080
It's definitely provable at some point. We learn more and more about how the brain works every day. It's essentially proven that your brain creates false realities for you after the fact in order to keep things making sense.

>>7206627
What if very one has free will but uses it to pretend perfectly as if they have no free will to shirk responsibility for taking control of their destiny.

>>7208099
Lack of free will doesn't mean your choices don't matter.

>>7208100
You're right, but it does mean you don't make choices.

>>7208098
Nah it's really not
You can't even prove that I exist
Or that anyone truly exists other than yourself and even that is rather murky
Maybe free will only exists for you

>>7206707
Define choices, agent, and make in the context of the other two.

>>7206707
>>7206730
Then you have to define "You" aside from "Free will".

What are "you" actually? a certain configuration of a complex system? Recent research shows that gut flora affect human decision and personality too, so is your shit "you"?

Take it to the extreme, does putting a Geiger counter near a radiation source gives it 'free will'? As the whole system (radiation source and geiger counter) can make 'decision' unimpeded?

>>7206627
>>7206628
Did you choose to post that?

>>7208111
you make choices in conjunction with information you process how is that not free will, our brains have the ability to use it, but all the time of course not

>>7208260
Yes, but not freely.

>>7208272
You don't make choices though. Unless you consider processing if/then/else classifies as a choice, in which case my phone has an equivalent level of 'free will' as you or I.

>>7206628
>>7206643

>thinking quantum mechanics shows we have no free will

Listen, free will is a tricky thing. Free will is the ability to make your own choices. Completely your own. Nothing else determines it. So, then you say, if we are a complex arrangement of atoms, moving around such that we seem alive, and the behavior of the particles which make up the atom is based completely on statistical probability, then I too am based on statistical improbability.

This sounds logical, but this is not true

First, one of the most promising hypotheses in biology is that everything a living being can do, can be understood in terms of what it's atoms can do. We read that and connect both the idea that our particles actions are probability based, and our particles are us. So our actions being deterministic seems logical, but there is a fundamental flaw there in that connection.

There can be no "determination" of your actions, just because you are an arrangement of atoms. Your atoms and particles do what they do, they move around and are governed by some forces and all that, and through our science we know their interactions are chance based. Just because particle interactions as we understand them are based on statistical probability, doesn't mean there is a determination on what will happen. The actions of your particles may happen by chance, but that doesn't mean your physical actions do. Your actions weren't decided any years ago, they manifest from your consciousness, a mysterious thing that lets us be us.

Our consciousness, that's what this conversation should really be about. Yet unfortunately, the consciousness is a complete and total mystery. Until we can show how thoughts manifest in our conscious mind, we can't really firmly trust either side of this argument. We don't know if our particles somehow "cause" thought to happen, and we don't know if they "force' our actions. You really just don't know. So stop acting so sure of yourself that you DO know.

>>7206672
>Because I can do whatever I please at this moment
if you desired it, could you appear in on mars in 10 seconds? no

>>7210085
There are other limitations to us being able to appear on mars. Just because we can't teleport around and fly and do whatever we desire, doesn't mean we can't make a decision that hasn't already been determined for us

>>7210081

>Our consciousness, that's what this conversation should really be about.

If you want to talk about "consciousness" explicitly define it first, because different people associate this term with different things (even going so far as to confuse it with the word "conscience" because people seldom know what they're talking about). You seem to be connecting it to the occurrence of thoughts. How is that related to "consciousness" or will, decision making, intention, or any of that specifically?

>I have Super computer 2000 that can predict the future to the atom
>Make it print out what I will do in the next 10 minutes
>Do exactly opposite

Problem determinism?

This is just a question in ur stupid y tange n tanged mind

>>7206633
huh that's actually a really good way to setup a row

>>7206633
Not when my grandfather was alive.

>>7210445
Not when Paul t was running the Complex.

>>7210436
It will predict you thinking that and will even predict when you get tired of reading what it predicts you're thinking as you read it and will predict when you get tired of thinking and does what it predicts.

>>7210457
You are Super computer 2000?

this thread is filled with autists
people claiming there's no free will are just taking "free will" to literal

As an illustration, the strategy board-games chess and Go have rigorous rules in which no information (such as cards' face-values) is hidden from either player and no random events (such as dice-rolling) happen within the game. Yet, chess and especially Go with its extremely simple deterministic rules, can still have an extremely large number of unpredictable moves. When chess is simplified to 7 or fewer pieces, however, there are endgame tables available which dictate which moves to play to achieve a perfect game. The implication of this is that given a less complex environment (with the original 32 pieces reduced to 7 or fewer pieces), a perfectly predictable game of chess is possible to achieve. In this scenario, the winning player would be able to announce a checkmate happening in at most a given number of moves assuming a perfect defense by the losing player, or less moves if the defending player chooses sub-optimal moves as the game progresses into its inevitable conclusion.

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i just watched the matrix trilogy AND minority report

AMA

>>7206687
>I already gave you the answer

>Implying he wasn't predetermined to make that post
>YOU pay attention.

>>7206730
>It's the freedom to act acording to one's motivation.

So I don't have free will? I mean, I can't fly and I want that, and I can't bang that one chick I see on TV but don't even know what her name is (or what state she lives in) and I want that too.

Be advised: The standard counter to this counter leads to the following counter: "Really? So rocks have free will?" at which point you are stuck. This isn't a Joseki you want to engage in, this is an exchange I win and come out of with Sente

>>7210632
>that feel when the facts of the universe forced me to post this
Damn you!

OK, how about:

Free will is a non-deterministic decision making process normally associated with sapient beings.

Or maybe "sentient" instead of "sapient"?

Besides, what difference would it make if you _could_ prove free will doesn't exist?

You shouldn't excuse a murderer with the defense "they were destined to pull the trigger", since part of the (possibly deterministic) decision to pull the trigger is based on assessment of the consequences.
If you stop punishing criminals, you'll get more crime, even if free will doesn't exist.

Why does it seem like everybody defines "free will" as equal to random? I really don't get that.

>>7210644
see
>>7206685

>>7210639
>Free will is a non-deterministic decision making process normally associated with sapient beings.

Alright, you've got a definition. Now you just need to prove that the definition applies to anything that exists. So... good luck with that.

>>7206700

Yes, you seem to have caught up on why "free will" is impossible in a causative universe.

>>7206627
The problem with the question of free will, is that it is impossible to verify empirically whether it exists or not. The only method we have available are our own experiences. It is wholly self-evident that free-will exists with a healthy dose of determinism.

>>7210670
>Now you just need to prove that the definition applies to anything that exists. So... good luck with that.
Nope.
Personally, I'm of the opinion that free will MIGHT exist, and that it probably can't be proven or dis-proven but...
You might as well assume it exists because people are effectively unpredictable, and even deterministic people would still make decisions based on available input, so you can't say "nothing really matters since we're all destined to do what we do"".

>>7210673
>"free will" is impossible in a causative universe.
causative != deterministic

>>7210695

I know. It is also impossible in a random causative universe. Therefore impossible in both types of causative universes.

>>7210694
>You might as well assume it exists because people are effectively unpredictable, and even deterministic people would still make decisions based on available input, so you can't say "nothing really matters since we're all destined to do what we do"".

"Because deterministic processes are complex, we might as well claim they're non-deterministic."

Nigger are you for REAL? That is some serious lack of ambition.

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>>7210704
>Nigger are you for REAL?

We still don't know if humans are deterministic, and it's likely they're not.
Either way they're EFFECTIVELY non-deterministic, so you're better off assuming they have free will than not.

>>7210717
>We still don't know if humans are deterministic, and it's likely they're not.

>Everything we have ever understood has turned out to follow deterministic causation

>But maybe we're special

>>7210735
>Everything we have ever understood has turned out to follow deterministic causation
Do you even QM?

>>7210784

QM is deterministic if you assume the simplest interpretation (Which, hint, is the correct answer everywhere else so it will be for QM too)

>>7210793
>implying QM follows occam's razor

>>7206627
Explain sentience. Explain why you are seeing and experiencing things.

>>7210802

>Implying Occam's Razor isn't our only defense against God Did It and Last Thursdayism.

>>7210632
You have motivation,but it's impossible for a fine gentleman like yourself to fly because humans can't fly on their own,but you can always bang that chick,if we ignore that you are a fine standing scholar who everyone but your mother finds disgusting and if we ignore your only mean of having sex : rape.
And rock is not a living being.

http://www.jimal-khalili.com/blog/do-we-have-free-will-a-physicists-perspective.html

I agree with this view

>>7210994

So I don't have free will according to that definition, right, that's what I said.

Also notice the bit where "living" isn't part of the definition and, in fact, is not a term for anything real.

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>>7210832
>>Implying Occam's Razor isn't our only defense against God Did It and Last Thursdayism.
>implying your belief in determinism and lack of free will aren't as baseless and emotionally-driven as the average religious belief


>>7211244
>http://www.jimal-khalili.com/blog/do-we-have-free-will-a-physicists-perspective.html
A good read.
checkmate determinists

>>7206687
>What causes you to feel pleasure from it in the first place?
Neurons releasing dopamine upon doing or completing a task associated with pleasure?

If I present to you a glass of water and a glass of posion can you choose to want to take the posion over the glass of water?

If not, then how can you claim to have free will.

>>7211289
But there are suicidal people that _would_ choose the poison.
Are you claiming that only suicidal people have free will?

>>7211297
>Are you claiming that only suicidal people have free will?

No

I'll phrase this in terms of myself to better explain the point.

If I was presented the glass of water and glass of poision I would choose the water. This is ultimately because I don't want to take the poision. But if I had free will I should be able to change my own desire so that I do want to take the poision. The fact that I am incapable of doing this leads me to believe I do not have free will.

>>7211289
Why does it have to be poison? Why not orange juice. I could pick the orange juice over the water if I prefer the the sugar, or I could choose the water because I don't like the taste of orange juice. I'm still rationalizing my choice via correlation, so you could say that it was simply just my brain making choosing based on preferences ingrained in my long term memory. But what if you ask me to choose two boxes of the same color and take what's under it. How would I know which one to pick without simply choosing it based off of arbitrary rationalizations?

>>7211307
Soooo....
Because you can't choose what you _want_, even though you can choose what you _do_, you don't have fee will?

Seems kind of nit-picky to me.
Free will doesn't mean omnipotence.
There are some things you just can't change.

>>7211307
uh... what?

people don't drink the poison because the consequences of the act will kill them. you have the freedom to choose the water, you can choose the poison, or third: you can pick the cup of poison and throw it at the wall, breaking it, because your thought experiment is fucking rubbish.

but seriously. free will isn't about being able to change your own desire to do something you don't want to do. free will is the ability to make the choice to do something, anything. just because you don't do something because you've determined the consequences of that act are bad doesn't mean you don't have free will.

what if I take your same thought experiment and add a third variable: water, coke, poison. I drink the water, I transfer to coke, but I decide not to drink the poison. I chose to drink the water, I even chose to drink the coke; I can pick either-or, thus demonstrating my free will. I just choose not to drink poison because that'd be fucking stupid

there is one of these shitty subpar "philosophical" discussions every day and it's so retarded to watch a bunch of undergraduate fuckwits who enjoyed intro chem just a bit too much talk past each other.

like, one of you actually cited quantum mechanics as a reason for determinism.... all of my wats

>>7211323
>>7211329

Yes but, atleast for me personally, want I want is always what I do. If I cannot choose what I want then therefore I cannot choose what I do.

If by free to drink the poison you mean you are physically free to do so great. However, ignoring suicidal people, who just invert the experiment, you are not capable of making yourself drink it. So you might as well not be physically free.

>>7211340
I think looking at suicidal people though actually helps to show that free will does not exist.

Personally I had suicidal desires in my earlier life. But even though in my concious mental state I wanted to die I felt as though my subconcious resisted me.

>>7206628
>>7206627
>>7206633
>>7206638
>>7206665
Define "free will".

>>7211339
>Yes but, at least for me personally, what I want is always what I do.
That's very immature.
Check back once you've had some experience in the real world.

>>7211346
I just wanted to simplify suicidal people before someone came along:
"hurr durr, the suicidal person would drink the poison, where's your determinism now?"

>>7211370
Missing the point of what I mean.

I'm not some sort of cave man who when I see a nice lady I go and rape her. I'm intelligent and can percieve the consequences of my actions and I know I don't live in the now so my choices in the present take into consideration of what I desire from the future. I would aruge that this is actually what every human being does. Even when somebody says they'll do something but they don't like it they do it because they value doing something for the person requesting it and therefore they still want to do it.

>>7211375
>Betafag

>>7211375
So if you analyze the thought process enough, it becomes meaningless?
If you can identify the cause of your decision, it's not really a decision?

>I'm intelligent and can percieve the consequences of my actions and I know I don't live in the now so my choices in the present take into consideration of what I desire from the future
Yeah. That's what we call "deciding".
If free will exists, this is part of it, not a counter-proof.

>>7211381
The point is, which you are missing.

>what I desire from the future

I do what I desire. I can't decide what I desire. Therefore I can't decide what I do.

When defining "desire" I do not mean the animalistic immediate sense of the word.

>>7211388
>I can't decide what I desire. Therefore I can't decide what I do.

You're the one missing the point.
You DO decide what you desire.
That's what determines what you desire.
You can only form one desire at a time, but you can change what you desire, after all people DO change what they desire.
It's called "changing your mind".
People do it all the time.

>>7211337
Well, quantum uncertainty is actually a convincing argument *against* determinism, because the random perturbation of particles/fields means that at a fundamental level there is unpredictability inherent in literally everything that exists.

>>7211395
Then why can't I change my desire about not drinking the poision?

>>7211408
You can. You could sit there and reflect on the meaninglessness and suffering of life for days, weeks, as long as it takes until you become depressed enough to become suicidal and genuinely desire to drink the poison.

>>7211413
But what would make you desire to change that desire?

Point is, there is always another layer of motivation until we get to mechanical, dry ones.

Evolutionary process, just like you see in everything else.

>>7211413
this

Anon, not only can you change your mind about _anything_, you can purposely set out to change your mind about stuff.

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>>7211420
>But what would make you desire to change that desire?
Outside stimulus.
Girlfriend dumps you.
You find out I'm fucking your mother.
A republican gets elected president.
Taco Bell stops carrying your favorite taco.

>>7211420
What makes me desire to change that desire is wanting to make you realize the Matyroshka-doll "it's too complicated so it must be impossible to solve" fallacy you're pushing. Explain how the fundamental forces released at the outset of the universe have traveled all these eons only to result, as it was always determined that it would from the very beginning, in me calling you a faggot on the Internet.

>>7211429
>>7211430
I'm arguing for determinsim and human behavior ultimately being the result of the fundamental forces released at the onset of the universe. Go re-read my post. I'm not trying to argue for free will, I'm arguing against it.

>>7211430
Your post is confusing. My argument isn't that its too complicated to solve, its that there is always another cause behind actions and desires until we get to the beginning. But then in your second sentence you seem to criticize the idea promoted by your first.

>>7211429
What decides how you react to outside stimulus?

One person may become depressed when they find their girlfriend dumps them but another may seek to better themselves as a person.

Do you have the free will to choose how you will react to your girlfriend dumping you? And if you do not and then if your girlfriend dumping you does cause you to change your desires then havn't we just come full circle back to having no control over what you desire?

>>7211443
>Go re-read my post. I'm not trying to argue for free will, I'm arguing against it.
Obviously.

Read this once:
>>7211244
>http://www.jimal-khalili.com/blog/do-we-have-free-will-a-physicists-perspective.html

According to this guy, even a deterministic universe would allow for free will.
And our universe (probably) isn't even deterministic.

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>>7211453
>havn't we just come full circle back to having no control over what you desire?
You never connected those dots to my satisfaction.
You do control what you desire.
Just because you can trace the origins of your desire doesn't mean you don't create that desire yourself.

And you're implying the desire-forming decisions are objective when they're actually subjective.

>>7211443

I realize my post seemed to contradict itself; I should've phrased that better.

Determinism is not possible, as every particle and field since the outset of the universe has been subject to quantum "jitter" as a result of uncertainty, which is random and by its very nature unpredictable. Therefore, events now cannot be predetermined in any meaningful sense by the arrangement of things at the beginning of the universe, as every particle/field/everything has been subject to random fluctuation for billions of years. The further away you get from the beginning, the less deterministic things become.

What I was referring to by saying "it's too complicated so it must be impossible to solve" is you laying your "desires within desires within desires" argument out, like a Russian nesting doll. It's a meaningless argument, because the net cause is "outside stimulus" and therefore there IS an end to the nesting dolls of desires.

>>7211469
I see, though as I've tried to explain I didn't actually mean it as a Russian nesting doll. I wanted to point to the initial outside stimulus. Randomness may mean that things can't be determined, but it doesn't mean that free will exists either.

To me, free will has always been a kind of meaningless statement. I was more interested in counteracting those who claim to control their motivations. A random event though can still have causal effects though, right?

>>7211480
>To me, free will has always been a kind of meaningless statement
Try using my definition from earlier in this thread.

>>7210639
>>7210639
>Free will is a non-deterministic decision making process normally associated with sapient beings.

It might be that no-one has what I've described, but the definition is hardly "meaningless".

Alternatively, there are plenty of other definitions out there.

>>7211480

>a random event can still have causal effects though, right?

Yes, absolutely. However, those causal effects will become "diluted" by progressive randomness as time goes on, rendering them "less causal"

>>7211467
I think I need more time to think about this.

I'm interested. From your persceptive how do you define self? Is it your concious, you're entire mind, you're mind and body or something else entirely?

For me, self is just the concious part of the mind.

>>7211487
Try explaining what that decision making process is. That's the part that's meaningless to me.

Outside effects shape the person so much that their will is basically not their own.

>>7211499
How so less causal? As in the chain down the line can't be predicted accurately.

I guess my issue in general is that I've yet to see a real explanation for what free will is. Or if I do see one, such as "acting on one's desires without impediment" it falls suspect to easy problems (I want to fly but can't) or is so low key its not controversial or valuable.

For instance, randomness and causality and predictability. These are things I understand.

Free will. What's that?

>>7211455
I read the article and have to agree with the commenter who said that the universe appears to be deterministically chaotic. The whole concept of free will doesn't make sense to me.

>>7211505
>Try explaining what that decision making process is. That's the part that's meaningless to me.
I'm not a neuroscientist, neurologist, psychologist, psychiatrist, anthropologist, priest, rabbi or lawyer.
I'd guess no-one has ever studied everything we know about the human decision making process, and it would take decades to get most of the relevant degrees to make you an expert in most related fields of study.
What we know on the subject could fill an entire library, and is hardly "meaningless".

>>7211531
>lawyer

nioce.

>>7211531
I meant that free will (as an explanation of the human decision making process) is meaningless to me.

As in when talking about how we make decisions, people say free will. And then when I ask what free will is, someone gives a definition like "free will is associated with human decision making."

kek

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>>7211512
>I read the article and have to agree with the commenter who said that the universe appears to be deterministically chaotic.

The article's author concludes that even determinism can't prevent free will from existing, and that that the universe isn't deterministic at the quantum level anyway.

Did you read the article, or just the comments?

>>7211547
I read both. He concluded that the future can't be predicted because there are too many random variables interacting, and since we couldn't determine the future we might as well say we had free will. That's not the same as actual free will. He's just substituting it for practical purposes. The universe he describes is deterministically chaotic. So much so that it can't be predicted at all.

The author essentially says, well the universe is too random to predict, so I'm going to say there's free will since practically speaking it will be as effective as anything else.

>>7211540
>As in when talking about how we make decisions, people say free will. And then when I ask what free will is, someone gives a definition like "free will is associated with human decision making."

Most people (including me) know very little about the decision making process "under the hood".

This doesn't change the basic definition of free will which focuses on the ability to make any one of many choices.

I can't explain the exact nature of the biological mechanism of choice, but I can speculate on whether I'm "fated" to lock in on one path.
I can't prove free will exists, but if you're trying to prove it doesn't, you'll need to to better than "lol, people are dumb".

>>7211540

Free will is the absence of determination in making a decision. It is your ability to take all the information presented to you, all the thoughts and biases of your brain, and consciously do the opposite just because.

If that sounds crazy to you (because how could your brain do the opposite of what it "wants" to do, because if you did it obviously your brain "wanted" you to, even if you're unconscious of it), I'd read up on theories that treat the brain as a quantum computer and surmise that consciousness as we know it arises as an effect of our brains being able to (bear with me here, I know it sounds nuts) literally change the quantum state of matter based on our desires. I don't have time to link you a bunch of studies because I'm at work, but Google "human brain quantum computer", there have been studies that show that people's desires can change the quantum state of a particle.

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>>7211556
>The universe he describes is deterministically chaotic. So much so that it can't be predicted at all.
It's important to distinguish that he's not just saying "it's to complicated for us to figure out", he's saying the future is fundamentally unpredictable, even if the universe were deterministic.
And he doesn't debate whether the universe is deterministic, he just side-steps the issue by saying we could still have free will even in Newton's universe.

>>7211559
Okay so here free will is I can make one of any choices.

As in my choice will be random? There is no cause for it?

>>7211564
That sounds similar to this.

That does sound very interesting, I'll look it up.

People often draw comfort from their belief in free will, IE "I owned my decisions." "No one made me do it."

However if a decision is random, then why would I feel any comfort in that? The decision very well could have been any of the other options included.

>>7211575
Sure.

That free will part's the part I don't get. Define free will, and then explain how its possible.

People's definition here seems to be that the decision occurs without determination in the process, as in its random (?). That to me seems fine, but I don't see why I'd be comforted by it, since I didn't cause the decision more than anyone else. I merely received it past tense.

>>7211580

Your behaviors are not random, but neither are they deterministic. That's where the "free will" concept comes in: the idea that, because of some hitherto-undescribed high functioning on the part of the human (and other complex) brains, you can take all the causal input you receive, get your brain's default kneejerk decision, and then pause and consciously say "no", and do something different.

>>7211580
>Okay so here free will is I can make one of any choices.
>As in my choice will be random? There is no cause for it?

The question of free will's existence doesn't require us to explain the underlying mechanism, it's a philosophical question, not a "biological engineering" question, I'm not being asked to build one.
And something's existence isn't predicated on someone's ability to explain how it works.
I can't give a cause for the big bang, but that doesn't prove the universe doesn't exist.

>>7211580
>However if a decision is random, then why would I feel any comfort in that?
Because a true rand() function could be a part of your makeup.
So if I ask you to pick a number between 1 and 100, the choice is still yours, even if it's a random choice.

>The decision very well could have been any of the other options included.
Which is pretty much the definition of free will.
This argument doesn't refute free will, it just expresses a disdain for it.

>>7211580
>Define free will, and then explain how its possible.
Plenty of definitions already exist, Google that shit.
It's possible because of chaos theory and.or QM.

>>7206627
Wouldn't it be more interesting to know what the implications would be on our society if free will did or did not exist, since we cannot change or alter the concept of free will.

>>7211593
>The question of free will's existence doesn't require us to explain the underlying...

I think you are reading my writing in a harsher tone than I intend. I'm not looking for hard arguments or evidence. I'm just chilling in my room killing time before I do homework. You don't have to give me the engineering. I'm happy to just hear the concept. I know that knowing of something is not the same as it existing.

>Because a true rand() function...

Yes, and if being the vessel alone is what comforts people, good for them.

>>7211589

I'll keep reading the earlier referenced concept.
I see what you are saying, so its essentially the brain's ability to escape determinism and apply randomness?

Kek at my autism bringing me and this discussion full circle.

>>7211601
>the implications would be on our society if free will did or did not exist
Negligible.
Regardless of whether free will exists, people are relatively predictable in large groups.
And you can't stop punishing and rewarding people because "muh destiny", since even without free will, people make choices based on the likely consequences.

Can anybody think of any game changers?

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>>7211603
>I see what you are saying, so its essentially the brain's ability to escape determinism and apply randomness?
Maybe not entirely.
Check out the "Halting Problem":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halting_problem
>In computability theory, the halting problem is the problem of determining, from a description of an arbitrary computer program and an input, whether the program will finish running or continue to run forever.
>Alan Turing proved in 1936 that a general algorithm to solve the halting problem for all possible program-input pairs cannot exist.
>A key part of the proof was a mathematical definition of a computer and program, which became known as a Turing machine; the halting problem is undecidable over Turing machines.
>It is one of the first examples of a decision problem.

So a Turing Machine is 100% deterministic, and the past leads to only one possible, inescapable future, and yet the results are still potentially unpredictable.

This means even in Newton's universe humans could be unpredictable in an absolute sense.
Is that free will, even though it's deterministic?
At the very least this idea should disassociate predictability and free will.
It should also prove that many know-it-alls haven't actually considered _every_ aspect of free will before coming to this thread.

>>7206698
>If you're going to say "free will doesn't exist as long as you are basing your decisions on external factors", well that's just a pile of bullshit, because it makes the entire concept of "free will" meaningless because it is impossible for any decision to be made without influence. Fuck on out of /sci/ with your philosophical bullshit, maybe try /lit/
agreed.

>>7211370
>That's very immature.
>Check back once you've had some experience in the real world.

>Implying you have ever, in your life, done something you didn't want to do

Revealed Preference called, said to say "hi" to all you people in denial.

>>7211547
>The article's author concludes that even determinism can't prevent free will from existing, and that that the universe isn't deterministic at the quantum level anyway.

>Concludes

Things written at the bottom of arguments are only conclusions of the argument supports those things.

The only way he saved "free will in a deterministic universe" was by re-defining what "free will" means to something that isn't free will.

>>7211413
>You can.

Right now. In this instant. Why can I not RIGHT NOW desire the poison if I have free will?

Hint: Because my desires are determined by a process that isn't free from the causal universe.

>>7211421
>Anon, not only can you change your mind about _anything_, you can purposely set out to change your mind about stuff.

What magical non-deterministic process gives me that purpose?

>>7206698
>If you're going to say "free will doesn't exist as long as you are basing your decisions on external factors", well that's just a pile of bullshit, because it makes the entire concept of "free will" meaningless because it is impossible for any decision to be made without influence.

Yes congratulations on getting my point, free will as most people talk about it is meaningless.

>Fuck on out of /sci/ with your philosophical bullshit, maybe try /lit/

>Asks a question

>Declares one of the answers unwelcome

Listen kid if you can't handle truth, you may want >>>/x/

>>7212726
Whether you can change it right that moment is irrelevant. The point is you can change them if you will it.

>>7206628
>should

are you religious, m8?

>>7206627
>OP
The only random thing is gravity, everything else succumbs to it under one pretense or another. Behavioral freedom is determined by the same cause as the 4th dimension- when two things are blending the dominant structure will, not empathize, but succumb to the finer product; as to say that the potential of the chicken is outweighed by the potential of the egg. Now this implies that our behavioral freedom is determined by the product of the environment, not that we are aiming for gain or loss, but that we are gliding to either based on the winds of the depth of communication. Now the thinking man will orientate this to his, or her, will and look for chinks to initiate a subterfuge, so this is what you can call freewill- BUT again you're engaging in a dominant structure, so similar to an art of war scenario you want to surround or brace a 'calvary' to the structure, this can mean anything from simple knowledge of how to spell, type or shit, but the principle of the dominant not having an absolute remains the same.

So yes, although it's probably the most underhanded, conniving, arrogant, misinterpreted social or principle framed edge in the book, it is there- not by randomness, but by simple compassion and healthy treatment of those tender spots.

>>7213555
My god I got trips; flippin out lol

>>7210784
>muh speshul pleating

>>7213555
How is gravity the only random thing?

>>7213461
>Whether you can change it right that moment is irrelevant. The point is you can change them if you will it.

So I don't have a will free to desire the poison. A "free will," so to speak. Glad we agree.