Free Will

[Sleeppy]

Multiple simultaneous influence potentials. An influence is only potentially a cause, especially in a mind that works with thoughts in parallel.

Take how memory works for example. A car isnt one picture but multiple simultaneous thoughts that generate an image of something like it.

Edit: without that aspect there would not be the real time type of awareness that we have

What determines whether an influence influences, or doesn't influence? What determines their potential?

 

[idav]

What determines whether an influence influences, or doesn't influence? What determines their potential?

There is no way out of determinism, I named a way out of hard determinism. After all will is determined.

 

[idav]

With compatablism the multiple influeces are not caused, they cant be, leaving room for a choice that could not happen with plain ole deterministic physics, thus influences dont matter, choice does.

 

[Sleeppy]

There is no way out of determinism, I named a way out of hard determinism. After all will is determined.

Could you reiterate? What is your argument against hard determinism?.. Please simplify your wording as much as possible, so that it is easier for me to read and interpret.

 

[Sleeppy]

With compatablism the multiple influeces are not caused, they cant be, leaving room for a choice that could not happen with plain ole deterministic physics, thus influences dont matter, choice does.

Are these multiple influences always existing? Or do they randomly come into and out of existence?

 

[idav]

Could you reiterate? What is your argument against hard determinism?.. Please simplify your wording as much as possible, so that it is easier for me to read and interpret.

Quantum theory disproves hard determinism. Determinism depends on newtonian physics but hidden variables like spin and velocity have been debunked.

Also starting with the singularity that would apply and no way to say that nature was determined to do this over that.

 

[idav]

Are these multiple influences always existing? Or do they randomly come into and out of existence?

Always existing.

 

[Sleeppy]

Quantum theory disproves hard determinism. Determinism depends on newtonian physics but hidden variables like spin and velocity have been debunked.

Also starting with the singularity that would apply and no way to say that nature was determined to do this over that.

We don't know enough about quantum mechanics to jump to this conclusion. You may be right, but we can't be certain just yet. Causal Determinism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

 

[idav]

We don't know enough about quantum mechanics to jump to this conclusion. You may be right, but we can't be certain just yet. Causal Determinism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

Of course theories are falsifiable as they should be but determinism is losing without even having to bring in non locality. If someone has a determinisic solution for qm many scientists want to find it cause so far tests show a negatory on that.

 

[idav]

Multiple world theory is the only interpretation i know of that is able to account for all the real experiments and thought experiments. And isn't mystical like the copenhagen interpretation.

 

[Thief]

All this means is that nothing impeded what he did, not that he had a free will. Freewill is the ability to have done differently. So, could Adam have done differently than he did? NO.

Two things can be cited as relevant to his situation.

1) All acts/events are deterministic: they are caused to be what they are and cannot be otherwise.

2) If one believes in an omniscient god then his knowledge of the future, in essence, makes it impossible for the future to be anything other than what he knows. If he sees you taking a bath next Saturday, then there's no way you cannot take that bath. You cannot "choose" not to take the bath.
​

While I seldom use the second argument to defend the assertion that there is no such thing as freewill---it's too dependent on one's concept of god---I feel the first is pretty unassailable.

I do not assume God lurks about in the head of every person.
On the contrary.....He does not know what you will do next.

That's part of freewill.
If you were hearing such a Voice....would you dare do anything without His consent?

Man as a species Day Six.

AFTER Day Seven....the Garden event.

Adam is a chosen specimen.
An alteration is performed on body and in spirit.

Then came the choice.

If someone obeys your every word....does he have freewill?
Give him a choice and see what happens.

The choice.....partake and die.....or go on as is.

We have become that creature that seeks knowledge...even as death is pending.

Without that character....following your carcass into the box and into the ground would be the likely result.

 

[Skwim]

I do not assume God lurks about in the head of every person.
On the contrary.....He does not know what you will do next.

Okay. You don't think he's omniscient.

om·ni·scient
adjective \-shənt\ : knowing everything : having unlimited understanding or knowledge
Source: Merriam-Webster.


omniscience
1610s, from M.L. omniscientia "all-knowledge," from L. omnis "all" (see omni-) + scientia "knowledge"
Source: Dictionary.com
​

Which means you can ignore my second relevancy, as I indicated.

 

[idav]

The problem is that free will isn't an ontological question.

Your saying it isnt real? Should have an ontological answer.

 

[Nakosis]

It certainly can. Options are alternatives---things (generally taking the form of a noun) whether they're recognized or not. Choices are recognized alternatives that can be, A) an object, like an option, or B) an instance of selection (an action---think verb here). So, whereas the determinist like myself recognize options (alternatives) exist, e.g. A or B, we don't believe choice is involved when one rather than the other is picked. A or B was picked because all the cause/effect events leading up to the moment of that event insured the result would be one rather than the other.

Ok, a difference only justify by your belief in determinism.

Yup, but not necessarily so.

ok, seemingly but not seemingly. Too much contradiction there to work.

Wrong, and in spades.

So determinism doesn't imply that say a computer which new all past events leading up to this moment could correctly determine the next?

I disbelieve anything that flies in the face of fact and/or logic. With the exception of some subatomic events it is illogical to claim that actions are uncaused, which is the implication of freewill advocates, unless, that is, they believe their freewill events are utterly random.

However the fact is, apparently, people make choices, but since you don't believe in the uncaused cause it is necessary to deny the apparent. Random events have nothing to do with freewill. Uncaused actions have nothing to do with freewill. Freewill requires that a person acts according to their will which happens to be a cause.

Predictability is nothing more then an assemblage of pertinent factors and assessing them properly. Unpredictability is a failure of such an assembly and assessment.

Like using the wrong equation?

In effect, yes. I don't believe my actions are utterly random in nature.

I hope not. That would deny your will as the cause for your actions.

If you regard volition as arising without cause, then yes.

Volition just means acting according to your will. You do have a will don't you? And you make decisions because of your will that result in you taking actions don't you?

So why is it apparently not true?

You said yourself that we make choices is only apparent. Still it is apparent. So determinism is what is not apparent.

What theory is that? I certainly haven't propounded any theory. I've simply stated what I see as the mechanics of actions: determinism.

Determinism remains a theory. If it is only mechanics no will, no volition is needed.

Don't confuse a thing, in this case god, with the explanation of it. ---a common mistake creationist make when they rail against evolution and the theories that explain it.

God is assumed, like determinism. Explanations are developed from these assumptions.

As I recently mentioned elsewhere, proof only applies to math, logic, and alcohol; not to theories. Actually, determinism and freewill are philosophical constructs that seek to explain certain mechanics of the mind. So far, people have pretty much fallen all over themselves attempting to explain the will and its claimed freedom. On the other hand, determinism is an incredibly simple concept, although greatly despised by those who have a personal stake in the existence of freewill. Sin and salvation fall splat on the ground without it.

Freewill is an incredibly simple concept although passionately argued against by people who have a stake in determinism.

Some peoples views of sin and salvation are as unworkable as some people's views of freewill.

 

[Nakosis]

At least hard determinism is falsifiable or even false from what I have seen. Unfortunately that isn't enough to give humans free will. Will in itself seems like as strange concept to begin with, when life ever shows or has will is more about autonomy than anything else. With that, autonomy isn't enough for free agency either. All that said I find it paradoxical since hard determinism is falsifiable. Actions are indeed happening where more than one potentiality is possible.

I am reading back though because your argument against hard determinism I find interesting.

However the freewill you are referring to.

A person being able to do other then what they did, what does this have to do with a person's will? Or really how does one act against their will? Because that is what someone would have to do other then what they did?

 

[idav]

I am reading back though because your argument against hard determinism I find interesting.

However the freewill you are referring to.

A person being able to do other then what they did, what does this have to do with a person's will? Or really how does one act against their will? Because that is what someone would have to do other then what they did?

For actions to be set in stone their prior cause would have to be responsible for a determined effect. What happens when a prior cause is quantum is that its physical state is not a factor therefore any effect is possible and not determined by newtonian physics.

That concept would have to apply to decision making in the brain. I think the brain works thst way with many parralel simultaneous thoughts and processes. So that any given influence can never be enough to override all other influences which would give the actual freedom to do other than what mechanics would do.

I have been looking at quantum computing and it is giving sure signs this is possible. Especially considering the fact that the brain is so powerful it will absolutely take a quantum computer to achieve what the brain can do. We already use qm for basic computer functionality. In the q computers it isnt just 1s and zeros but can be both simultaneously allowing for parralel processing, multiple processes simultaneously. Quantum computing proves the reality and application of superpositions of particles in quantum states.

 

[Sleeppy]

Of course theories are falsifiable as they should be but determinism is losing without even having to bring in non locality. If someone has a determinisic solution for qm many scientists want to find it cause so far tests show a negatory on that.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/determinism-causal/#QuaMec

Einstein and others perhaps thought that this was a defect of the theory that should eventually be removed, by a supplemental hidden variable theory[6] that restores determinism; but subsequent work showed that no such hidden variables account could exist. At the microscopic level the world is ultimately mysterious and chancy.

So goes the story; but like much popular wisdom, it is partly mistaken and/or misleading. Ironically, quantum mechanics is one of the best prospects for a genuinely deterministic theory in modern times! Even more than in the case of GTR and the hole argument, everything hinges on what interpretational and philosophical decisions one adopts. The fundamental law at the heart of non-relativistic QM is the Schrödinger equation. The evolution of a wavefunction describing a physical system under this equation is normally taken to be perfectly deterministic.[7] If one adopts an interpretation of QM according to which that's it—i.e., nothing ever interrupts Schrödinger evolution, and the wavefunctions governed by the equation tell the complete physical story—then quantum mechanics is a perfectly deterministic theory. There are several interpretations that physicists and philosophers have given of QM which go this way. (See the entry on quantum mechanics.)

More commonly—and this is part of the basis for the popular wisdom— physicists have resolved the quantum measurement problem by postulating that some process of “collapse of the wavefunction” occurs from time to time (particularly during measurements and observations) that interrupts Schrödinger evolution. The collapse process is usually postulated to be indeterministic, with probabilities for various outcomes, via Born's rule, calculable on the basis of a system's wavefunction. The once-standard, Copenhagen interpretation of QM posits such a collapse. It has the virtue of solving certain paradoxes such as the infamous Schrödinger's cat paradox, but few philosophers or physicists can take it very seriously unless they are either idealists or instrumentalists. The reason is simple: the collapse process is not physically well-defined, and feels too ad hoc to be a fundamental part of nature's laws.[8]

In 1952 David Bohm created an alternative interpretation of QM—perhaps better thought of as an alternative theory—that realizes Einstein's dream of a hidden variable theory, restoring determinism and definiteness to micro-reality. In Bohmian quantum mechanics, unlike other interpretations, it is postulated that all particles have, at all times, a definite position and velocity. In addition to the Schrödinger equation, Bohm posited a guidance equation that determines, on the basis of the system's wavefunction and particles' initial positions and velocities, what their future positions and velocities should be. As much as any classical theory of point particles moving under force fields, then, Bohm's theory is deterministic. Amazingly, he was also able to show that, as long as the statistical distribution of initial positions and velocities of particles are chosen so as to meet a “quantum equilibrium” condition, his theory is empirically equivalent to standard Copenhagen QM. In one sense this is a philosopher's nightmare: with genuine empirical equivalence as strong as Bohm obtained, it seems experimental evidence can never tell us which description of reality is correct. (Fortunately, we can safely assume that neither is perfectly correct, and hope that our Final Theory has no such empirically equivalent rivals.) In other senses, the Bohm theory is a philosopher's dream come true, eliminating much (but not all) of the weirdness of standard QM and restoring determinism to the physics of atoms and photons.

This small survey of determinism's status in some prominent physical theories, as indicated above, does not really tell us anything about whether determinism is true of our world. Instead, it raises a couple of further disturbing possibilities for the time when we do have the Final Theory before us (if such time ever comes): first, we may have difficulty establishing whether the Final Theory is deterministic or not—depending on whether the theory comes loaded with unsolved interpretational or mathematical puzzles. Second, we may have reason to worry that the Final Theory, if indeterministic, has an empirically equivalent yet deterministic rival (as illustrated by Bohmian quantum mechanics.)

What type of test could we perform, without affecting the results?

 

[Sleeppy]

Have We Been Interpreting Quantum Mechanics Wrong This Whole Time? | Science | WIRED

 

[Thief]

Okay. You don't think he's omniscient.

om·ni·scient
adjective \-shənt\ : knowing everything : having unlimited understanding or knowledge
Source: Merriam-Webster.


omniscience
1610s, from M.L. omniscientia "all-knowledge," from L. omnis "all" (see omni-) + scientia "knowledge"
Source: Dictionary.com
​

Which means you can ignore my second relevancy, as I indicated.

So as your hand obeys your freewill......
Your hand does as you think you should or because you felt like it.....
Then God is NOT in the background guiding your moves to a predestined end?

 

[Sleeppy]

So as your hand obeys your freewill......
Your hand does as you think you should or because you felt like it.....
Then God is NOT in the background guiding your moves to a predestined end?

Was Judas written about before his time?