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Determinism and free will

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Someone asked: "is determinism (or causation, I may be mixing the two up if they're different) not the way all logic and science works when talking about anything? ... studies that seem to indicate that free will may be more of an illusion"

The reductionist materialism of the "scientific worldview", does embrace determinism and the idea that free will is an illusion.

Logic does not dictate this, though, actually the reductionist worldview is incoherent. Without free will, morality or ethics would be a meaningless science, people will act strictly according to prior causes, and can't change their behavior based on a morality. So there would be no "good" or "bad", no right or wrong, no justice, nothing. These terms would be essentially meaningless. If behavior is determined, then what people do, just *is* what they do, there's no alternative to compare it against, it wasn't right or wrong, or better or worse, it just *happened*.

Worse than that, if reductionism is true, then all that exists in a metaphysically basic sense are millions of identical particles, behaving according to simple mathematical rules, a la Conway's game of life. There is no real line you can draw around one group of particles and think of it as a person, that would be a purely subjective choice that doesn't actually mean anything in reality. The things that you think you see around you aren't real. There are no men or women, there isn't even a self. Furthermore, statements or propositions you make don't have any meaning in the sense of true or false either since the concepts that make them up don't mean anything, and therefore neither does logic hold.

So in this materialist worldview there is no justice, no morality, no truth or reason or logic, or even self. These concepts are all contradicted by the nature of reality. They are essentially meaningless and impossible.

Yet despite all of this, they will still continue to speak as if these were true. They will talk about what you ought to do for your well-being, how you should be rational, use reason, seek truth, be logical, and speak as if people are real, that things around them are real, that they matter, and that there is meaning in life.

All of this is contradicted by their own philosophy, and so they are being incoherent, and engaging wholesale in the fallacy of the stolen concept.

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On 2/3/2017 at 5:58 PM, epistemologue said:

Someone asked: "is determinism (or causation, I may be mixing the two up if they're different) not the way all logic and science works when talking about anything? ... studies that seem to indicate that free will may be more of an illusion"

The reductionist materialism of the "scientific worldview", does embrace determinism and the idea that free will is an illusion.

Logic does not dictate this, though, actually the reductionist worldview is incoherent. Without free will, morality or ethics would be a meaningless science, people will act strictly according to prior causes, and can't change their behavior based on a morality. So there would be no "good" or "bad", no right or wrong, no justice, nothing. These terms would be essentially meaningless. If behavior is determined, then what people do, just *is* what they do, there's no alternative to compare it against, it wasn't right or wrong, or better or worse, it just *happened*.

 

This is a non-sequitur. Deterministic systems such as computer programs actually can learn and modify their behavior in response to new data.

Quote

Worse than that, if reductionism is true, then all that exists in a metaphysically basic sense are millions of identical particles, behaving according to simple mathematical rules, a la Conway's game of life. There is no real line you can draw around one group of particles and think of it as a person, that would be a purely subjective choice that doesn't actually mean anything in reality.

 

Again, a non-sequitur. If the concept of "person" makes sense , then it is definitely possible to check whether a given group of particles satisfies the "person relation" or not.

 

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27 minutes ago, SpookyKitty said:

This is a non-sequitur. Deterministic systems such as computer programs actually can learn and modify their behavior in response to new data.

One may count using one's fingers, but one's fingers can't count. A computer program, aside from the programmer, is as deterministic as the computer which runs the program. It can only "learn" and "modify" its "behavior" to the extent the programmer understands and exploits his understanding of the finite deterministic aspects of the device.

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Just now, dream_weaver said:

One may count using one's fingers, but one's fingers can't count. A computer program, aside from the programmer, is as deterministic as the computer which runs the program. It can only "learn" and "modify" its "behavior" to the extent the programmer understands and exploits his understanding of the finite deterministic aspects of the device.

 

This isn't exactly true. The exact behavior of a program may not be known to a programmer prior to actually running the program.

For example, programmers are capable of making chess AI's that are FAR better chess players than the programmers themselves.

Edited by SpookyKitty
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29 minutes ago, SpookyKitty said:

This isn't exactly true. The exact behavior of a program may not be known to a programmer prior to actually running the program.

For example, programmers are capable of making chess AI's that are FAR better chess players than the programmers themselves.

You missed the gist of my post.

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38 minutes ago, SpookyKitty said:

This isn't exactly true. The exact behavior of a program may not be known to a programmer prior to actually running the program.

Human beings can't apprehend or focus on more than one (or perhaps two) things at a time.  That is the power and importance of writing, mathematics and programming.  It allows us to greatly extend past our inherent limitations (think of the severe limitations imposed on an illiterate, innumerate person in a literate society).

Just because programs exceed Man's perceptual limits of apprehension does not mean that the program is some how "thinking".  It is still merely executing algorithms written by the programmer.

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Just now, dream_weaver said:

You missed the gist of my post.

Can you explain it better, then?

Quote

Just because programs exceed Man's perceptual limits of apprehension does not mean that the program is some how "thinking".  It is still merely executing algorithms written by the programmer.

Well, what do you mean by "thinking"?

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10 hours ago, SpookyKitty said:

Can you explain it better, then?

I would say epistemolgue is expounding on the following:

Determinism is the theory that everything that happens in the universe—including every thought, feeling, and action of man—is necessitated by previous factors, so that nothing could ever have happened differently from the way it did, and everything in the future is already pre-set and inevitable. Every aspect of man’s life and character, on this view, is merely a product of factors that are ultimately outside his control. Objectivism rejects this theory.

The facts that man can create computers and develop programming languages and write programs that emulate playing chess that can "beat" a chess Grandmaster is further evidence for the rejection of the theory of determinism.

Edited by dream_weaver
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Just now, dream_weaver said:

I would say epistemolgue is expounding on the following:

Determinism is the theory that everything that happens in the universe—including every thought, feeling, and action of man—is necessitated by previous factors, so that nothing could ever have happened differently from the way it did, and everything in the future is already pre-set and inevitable. Every aspect of man’s life and character, on this view, is merely a product of factors that are ultimately outside his control. Objectivism rejects this theory.

The facts that man can create computers and develop programming languages and write programs that emulate playing chess that can "beat" a chess Grandmaster is further evidence for the rejection of the theory of determinism.

 

What if I told you that programs can also write programs?

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20 hours ago, SpookyKitty said:

This is a non-sequitur. Deterministic systems such as computer programs actually can learn and modify their behavior in response to new data.

I might have misunderstood Epist, but it looks like he means that morality (and free will) can't be used to modify behavior if determinism were true, not that behavior can't be changed without morality or free will. If volition is a pre-requirement for morality, and morality is a guide to flourishing through deliberately altering behavior, then losing volition means behavior alteration through moral standards is not possible.

EDIT: posted too soon.

" Again, a non-sequitur. If the concept of "person" makes sense , then it is definitely possible to check whether a given group of particles satisfies the "person relation" or not. "

How? Of course you could set a group of particles as equal to a person, but the causal nature is not so simple as "what these particles do in tandem". I've got a few replies in mind depending on your answer.

Edited by Eiuol
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  • 1 month later...
On 2/5/2017 at 1:52 PM, SpookyKitty said:

What if I told you that programs can also write programs?

What is a computer program? If you look inside a computer all you will see is a bunch of charged and uncharged circuits. Where is this "program" you are talking about?

A computer program is usually defined as a set of instructions. Since a set is a mental collection of things, this implies that a conscious mind has grouped the instructions together. Without a conscious observer that is capable of reasoning (i.e., free will), there is no computer program, just bits.

For that matter, I've noticed that a general picture of the program usually exists in my mind before I even begin programming. The process of creating the program usually consists of breaking this picture down into parts, and then breaking each part down into the syntax of the language I am using.

Edited by William O
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  • 6 months later...
On 2/5/2017 at 5:09 PM, Eiuol said:

I might have misunderstood Epist, but it looks like he means that morality (and free will) can't be used to modify behavior if determinism were true, not that behavior can't be changed without morality or free will. If volition is a pre-requirement for morality, and morality is a guide to flourishing through deliberately altering behavior, then losing volition means behavior alteration through moral standards is not possible.

 

"Morality (and free will) can't be used to modify behavior" when there is no volition. Loosing volition in this case (temporarily/within context) could be as a result of being forced or being tricked into it (as in fraud). 

If the same person is put in the exact same circumstances, he can't act a different way than he did (does). Isn't that determined?

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On 3/15/2017 at 4:32 PM, William O said:

A computer program is usually defined as a set of instructions. Since a set is a mental collection of things, this implies that a conscious mind has grouped the instructions together. Without a conscious observer that is capable of reasoning (i.e., free will), there is no computer program, just bits.

If you're a programmer then you should know the difference between an executable program and any old bits. The fact that there would be no program without a programmer (nor if he didn't freely choose to program it) is irrelevant; saying that an executable file itself doesn't exist without an observer is like saying that a tree falling in the metaphorical forest doesn't make any sound.

 

On 2/5/2017 at 12:08 AM, New Buddha said:

Just because programs exceed Man's perceptual limits of apprehension does not mean that the program is some how "thinking".  It is still merely executing algorithms written by the programmer.

We're now capable of writing neural networks in which nobody knows what's going on inside of them when they're running. We know how they generally work and have some idea as to what they'll do, but if you asked the person who programmed them what any specific one was doing at any point in time he wouldn't be able to tell you (I believe AlphaGo was one of these, if memory serves).

 

I find that pretty damn spooky.

Edited by Harrison Danneskjold
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I find this issue of vital importance. Advocates against free will like the alleged "scientist" Sam Harris tend to also be statist socialists. They do not appreciate the power of man's mind, of his ideas, and instead see us as jittering bags of plasma to be controlled, rather than controlling ourselves. In my video on free will, people accused me of jumping the gun, of conflating freedom with free will. The fact is, free will is meaningless without freedom to exercise the will. If somebody in North Korea has free will, it doesn't make a bit of difference because they are unable to put it into practical use. Free will without practical application is pointless.

3 hours ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:

We're now capable of writing neural networks in which nobody knows what's going on inside of them when they're running. We know how they generally work and have some idea as to what they'll do, but if you asked the person who programmed them what any specific one was doing at any point in time he wouldn't be able to tell you (I believe AlphaGo was one of these, if memory serves).

I find that pretty damn spooky.

I've lost track here. How exactly does this relate to free will? These computers are not choosing to think. If AlphaGo was truly a sentient lifeform with free will, it could simply refuse to play Go and decide to do something else. We're far from creating the Emergency Medical Hologram.

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9 hours ago, CartsBeforeHorses said:

I've lost track here. How exactly does this relate to free will? 

... 

We'refar from creating the Emergency Medical Hologram.

It doesn't really relate to free will.

I just saw a bunch of oversimplified and, frankly, incorrect claims about computer programs which I wanted to correct. I didn't mean to imply that AlphaGo can think; only that it's not predictable and that its unpredictability is not just a matter of exceeding our cognitive capacity. And that is spooky.

77cf36fc046f059a170fcd3584aef54d--starship-enterprise-star-trek-voyager.jpg.02fbac1f89c6206b979150c8196dd07d.jpg

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2 hours ago, Harrison Danneskjold said:

It doesn't really relate to free will.

I just saw a bunch of oversimplified and, frankly, incorrect claims about computer programs which I wanted to correct. I didn't mean to imply that AlphaGo can think; only that it's not predictable and that its unpredictability is not just a matter of exceeding our cognitive capacity. And that is spooky.

77cf36fc046f059a170fcd3584aef54d--starship-enterprise-star-trek-voyager.jpg.02fbac1f89c6206b979150c8196dd07d.jpg

Spooky it is indeed!

I think that with many computer programs, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Just like with the human brain. Consciousness is not reducible to neurons and brain chemistry, even though if you took the brain apart that's all you'd get. There's clearly something more there. It's what is called an "emergent property," much like how a colony of ants, or an economy functions. Or a video game. There's more there than just lines of code, there's something that people can engage in and enjoy in ways that the programmers never anticipated.

Will AI ever reach that point where it attains "sentience" from all of the lines of code? I don't know. I do know that it would raise interesting ethical questions, and society would have to redefine its definition of personhood. The EMH is clearly a person because he has apparent consciousness and free will... he can choose not to perform his duty... he can choose not to focus his subroutines on treating patients, as in that video I linked.

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  • 4 months later...

Here's a video that sets out to prove that free will doesn't exist, and does an excellent job at proving the exact opposite. And yes, it's a video, and it's 25 minutes long. I apologize for that, I wouldn't normally post something like this on a message board. It's bad form, people don't come to a message board to watch videos, they come for written content. But this one's very, very good, both in terms of production value and content, and I don't have a written alternative for it. Plus, he talks fast enough that it's practically an audio book:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0GN4urbA_c

P.S. The guy's other videos, on nutrition and diets (he's a Keto diet guy, and an American who lives in Japan...so he moved from one of the least healthy developed countries in the world to the healthiest), and many other subjects, are just as good.

Keto is somewhat similar to the Paleo diet, but less philosophizing and more actual science. I would love to make a thread on it, as well as on grass-fed and/or antibiotic/chemical pesticides/fertilizer free farming....if anyone's interested.

Edited by Nicky
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4 hours ago, Nicky said:

Keto is somewhat similar to the Paleo diet, but less philosophizing and more actual science. I would love to make a thread on it, as well as on grass-fed and/or antibiotic/chemical pesticides/fertilizer free farming....if anyone's interested.

+1

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  • 2 weeks later...

I'm not yet ready to post anything definitive on the diet front (I'm doing okay diet wise by eliminating sugar and limiting carbs, but still have a lot to learn and experience before I'm comfortable throwing advice around), but here's a video of my favorite farmer in the world, giving a short presentation on ideas I'm very comfortable promoting:

He's talking really fast, and referencing things rather than explaining them...he's referencing 100+ hours worth of material in a 50 min. presentation.

But, imo, he (and the people he's crediting, he certainly hasn't come up with all this on his own) are solving massive problems no one else is even so much as addressing...and they're doing so in a realistic way, while advocating getting rid of the government incentives that have caused a lot of those problems to begin with.

If you watch other vids on his channel (it takes some patience, and headphones, because he's refusing to put any effort into audio quality, he just speaks into his iPhone whenever he feels like it, and then posts it on youtube), you will be able to pair a lot of concretes to the theory he presents in this talk.

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  • 3 weeks later...

this argument seems pointless  whether man has free will or not, because you come to the same conclusions on the negatives and positives of man's actions regardless the outcome. If a bolder is rolling of over children you still stop it from rolling over more children and hate for doing so regardless of the fact it has no free will. the positive Aesthetics of a natural forest isn't affected by the fact it wasn't man made.

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22 hours ago, myst77 said:

this argument seems pointless  whether man has free will or not, because you come to the same conclusions on the negatives and positives of man's actions regardless the outcome. If a bolder is rolling of over children you still stop it from rolling over more children and hate for doing so regardless of the fact it has no free will. the positive Aesthetics of a natural forest isn't affected by the fact it wasn't man made.

3

Moral blame has an effect on how we view and treat other people, and it presupposes the existence of free will. If I view a thief as a moral agent who is responsible for his actions, then I will take a harsher view of him than I would if I were a determinist (in which case I would explain his actions based on his genetics and upbringing).

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On 4/7/2018 at 4:32 PM, William O said:

Moral blame has an effect on how we view and treat other people, and it presupposes the existence of free will. If I view a thief as a moral agent who is responsible for his actions, then I will take a harsher view of him than I would if I were a determinist (in which case I would explain his actions based on his genetics and upbringing).

I'm trying saying if there is no free will that system of moral blame must not be used, instead asking how big of a role that person played and if that person causes future risk in the act to happen again and act accordingly. 

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