bd-from-kg

jj:

Huh? We all agree that the results of lots of natural processes look random; the point is whether they’re really, intrinsically random. If they aren’t, we have determinism, which you claim is incompatible with free will. Now you say that whether the world is deterministic is irrelevant – the only thing that matters is that it looks indeterministic?

The many-worlds interpretation would be completely pointless if it did not deny that the outcomes are really intrinsically random. Do you think that its advocates are willing to postulate an incredible multiplicity of worlds for no reason at all? Of course it denies this.

Note: For the record, I take no position on whether the world is deterministic or not; I think the evidence is inconclusive at this point.

That’s just the problem. If you were to try to say exactly what it is that you want, or would like to be the case, or simply under what circumstances you would say that this thing you call “free will” exists, maybe we could get somewhere. (Of course, you’re not allowed to use the phrase “free will” or other ambiguous weasel words in your description.) My contention is that if you try to do this you’ll find that it’s impossible. In other words, try to define properties such that, if a world has them, free will exists in that world. I say that you can’t do it, and that this is why you haven’t done it. And the reason you can’t do it is that you don’t have a logically coherent concept in mind.

Before making statements like this, try learning something about what you’re talking about. Compatibilism is a very commonly held position among philosophers (it’s probably the position of a substantial majority, in fact); it shouldn’t be too difficult to find a discussion of it. (Actually I think my discussion in my first post is pretty good, but perhaps you’d prefer to see something by someone who’s a professor in a department of philosophy.) I can assure you that compatibilism does not assume “hidden variables” or anything of the sort; it doesn’t even assert that determinism is true.

jj

Well, I guess you really didn't have much to add here. A proof by blatant assertion, an ad-hominem or three ...

You've made a totally nonsensical statement about Many-Worlds. Of course it can be random, and you get ALL those worlds split off because of sheer randomness. Many Worlds does simply NOT provide a bias one way or the other. People have argued many things, but you've no way to hidden variable determinism through that route. All you get is more universes, with no cause or effect relationship to hidden variables.

While we're at it, we can dismiss the Transactional Model, too, from the point of hidden variables. It posits the transactions, but makes no proof and shows no evidence that there is anything totally positivist about THOSE interactions, and as things like QCED show, probabilistic extrapolation of a photon's behavior gives us all of what we need to derive what we observe in QM, optics, etc, including the speed of light, the probability that something will be sooner or later than 'c', (which we now have existance proofs for, with massive energy involved, just as expected), and so on. TM simply pushes the randomness one level down, to the interaction of the forward and reverse waves. There's still as much a random mechanism as there ever was.

Now, this isn't a proof, I agree. There's just no bias one way or other in the TM or MW models, and that's how it is. You're selectively interpreting said models without considering that you've just pushed various axioms and postulates a bit deeper.

I didn't start this thread. I didn't say what I think "free will" is, might be, ought to be, or anything else. YOU, on the other hand, float the straw man, despite YOUR unwillingness to providesuch a definition, that suggests that I have or wish to produce some particular idea, when in fact I have been asking questions. While I hardly claim the same skills, I guess you'd be railling at Socrates the same way?

Don't tell me that I have an incoherent definition of "free will" in my mind, I've been asking for a coherent definition. I know very well that the definitions I see, based on my understanding of both physics and intellegence/learning behaviors (and yes, I have a bit of experience in both), make no sense. They contain assumptions that are either supernatural for free will, or unprovable for determinism. (Well, it's worse than that, but those issues have already arisen here.)

So, do you have one that makes sense that doesn't posit the supernatural? I'm not saying you do, but it's long since time you stop repeatedly torturing the straw man that I haven't put something forth to discuss. If you're arguing that the idea needs revisiting, well, fine, but stop shreiking insensately at me like I'm the one who designed the idea.

Free will and determinism are not my bright ideas, after all, and both of them suffer, I think, from a hopeless lack of precision and internal consistancy in light of what we know of natural processes.

As to randomness, well, we simply have to disagree. I will cheerfully agree that true randomness is not proven. Of course, that's a useless statement, because nothing in science can be absolutely proven. On the other hand, despite decades of search for hidden variables, the only ones posited are both highly unparsimonious and tautologically unobservable. One can posit as many tautological unobservable things as one wants, but where do we get when we apply the scientific method there? Nowhere.

So I think there is evidence, and the trend is clear. Since we'll never have absolute proof one way or the other , I'll go with my conclusion and you go with your belief. That's how it is.

You'd do well not to spout insults, though.

bd-from-kg

jj:

I said that the MWI is deterministic. Is this right? Let’s see:

From The Everett FAQ:

From A Many-Worlds Product Paradigm for Quantum Inertia and Quantum Gravity (by William D. Eshleman):

Perhaps what you mean by the MWI is not the interpretation proposed by Everett (or one of its offshoots) but some hitherto unknown interpretation?

What about the Transactional Interpretation? Well, this is from The Transactional Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics by John Cramer.

Since Cramer was the one who invented (or discovered if you prefer) the TI, this is pretty much “from the horse’s mouth”; further citations would be superfluous.

However, the last statement (taken out of context) could be misleading. In the TI the “causes” sometimes follow their effects temporally rather than preceding them. This is arguably inconsistent with determinism as ordinarily understood, but it is equally inconsistent with “intrinsic randomness”. In the TI every event is fully caused. Nothing is truly random taking everything into account, but some events at the “quantum” level look random in the sense that they could not predicted even if (ignoring the Uncertainty Principle for a moment) one knew absolutely everything about the history of the universe preceding it.

At any rate, the TI leaves no room for “libertarian free will”. The LFW advocate is not going to be satisfied (to put it mildly) with the fact that some acts are caused by events that lie in the future; what he wants is acts (or mental events of some kind that lead to acts) that have no cause at all (that is, no fully determining cause).

So the MWI is unambiguously deterministic, and the TI leaves no room for true randomness. Case closed.

By the way, it isn’t strictly true that MWI and CI make the same predictions. Or at least many MWI advocates don’t think it’s true. All that’s true for sure is that all of the predictions of either theory that can be tested (or at any rate that have been tested) at this point are the same, so experimental results to date cannot be used to decide between them. On the other hand TI really does make the same predictions as CI in all cases.

I haven’t “floated” any “straw men”. I’ve provided a definition of what I mean by free will: “Being ‘free to choose’ does not mean that one is a ‘random number generator’ able to make random choices unrelated to who one is – one’s character, personality, likes and dislikes, but just the opposite: that one is able to base one’s choices on who one is – on what one prefers.” I think that this is basically the only logically coherent conception of free will. (More on this later.)

And I certainly didn’t suggest that you have some definite conception of free will; on the contrary, I suggested that you try to come up with one, because that’s basically the only way to really come to understand that there is no logically coherent conception of free will other than a compatibilist one.

Admittedly my statement that “the reason you can’t do it is that you don’t have a logically coherent concept in mind” was a bit sloppy. I should have said that no one has a logically coherent concept of free will (other than a compatibilist one), because there isn’t one.

Even supernaturalist assumptions can’t save the notion of “libertarian” or “metaphysical” free will. Let me repeat: there is no logically coherent conception of free will other than a compatibilist one. It just doesn’t matter what you assume about the “nature of things”.

Now let’s look at my statement that you would do well to learn something about what you’re talking about, you said:

And later:

These comments clearly show that you are completely unfamiliar with compatibilism. As Dr. Mark Daley says, compatibilism is “the most widely held contemporary point of view on freedom of the will”. Saying that you should learn something about the most commonly held point of view on the subject before making such sweeping (and false) pronouncements about it is not an insult, but simply good advice.

Here are some reasonably good introductions to compatibilism. The first is right here on the II site: the section Compatibilism: the Only Sensible Notion of Freewill in Richard Carrier’s review of In Defense of Miracles. Other pretty good explanations can be found here and here. Of course there are much longer treatments as well, all the way up to book length. And naturally there are also some pretty good criticisms of compatibilism; I’ll leave you to find these for yourself.

By the way, it’s bad form to spout insults and then complain about the other guy spouting insults. The best response is to be perfectly courteous and let the reader draw the contrast. Or alternatively you can just say that you don’t discuss things with people who insist on being rude. Trading insults is always a bad idea; it just leads to a mudslinging contest.

jj

We're not going to agree on this. You've missed my point about both TM and MW, I think, which is that it can be based on either causal or random interpretations, and while people have formulated it with something in mind, the interpretation itself is not incompatable with the other. (As, I personally conclude, it must be if it is compatable with QM in general.)

As to "compatabilism", well, it seems to me like it's still a waste of time. Yes, I know people think this and that, but I think it's just hiding the fundamental questions under a great lot of words.

So let's just agree to disagree.

bd-from-kg

jj:

TI and MWI are interpretations; it doesn’t make sense to talk about basing them on interpretations. But in any case you missed my point. My original objection was to your statement:

Well, there is considerable suggestion otherwise. The fact that there many be interpretations kinda, sorta like TI and MWI that involve intrinsic randomness doesn’t change the fact that these interpretations (which have a good many fans among particle physicists – especially MWI) do not involve intrinsic randomness. The physicists who embrace these interpretations are not taking a neutral stance on the issue of intrinsic randomness; they are rejecting it.

You’re entitled to your own opinion about whether intrinsic randomness exists (and therefore determinism is false) but you are not entitled to enlist a supposed overwhelming consensus among physicists to support this opinion, because there is no such consensus.

That’s interesting. The last sentence is contrary to what every particle physicist of repute thinks. Could you give us your credentials in this area which qualify you to dispute this consensus?

You’re entitled to your opinion about whether compatibilism is a waste of time. You’re not entitled to state an opinion about what it must involve to “make sense” unless you have some familiarity with it.

jj

Well, we're not going to agree. Yes, one can simply take the same old randomness arguments and point them at both TM and MW. No, one doesn't have to. One doesn't have to NOT do so, either.

When you do that, you can have your interpretation of choice, and still have randomness about. Is this right? Who knows. You don't, I don't.

As to credentials, I'm not a particle physicist, but I don't see them quite saying what you seem to be saying. They expect more "structure". So do I. Maybe you do, too. More structure in "elementary" particles, hidden/wrapped dimensions/somethingliekthatwehaven'tthoughtofyet can all be said to be likely in some fashion or other.

But that does not prevent, at all, each individual interaction being random. It can provide a mechanism otherwise, but it need not, in order to be accurate.

As to compatablism, it's not so much a waste of time, but of words, perhaps. Perhaps I should apologize for calling it a waste of time, rather, if you please, I'll emend my position to saying that I think it's unnecessary overcomplication. I can, without making a fancy new title, simply point out that it is entirely possible that one can have a determined universe in which one can not beforehand know the results, because of hidden variables, because of a lack of precision or accuracy, or again because of somethingwedidn'tthinkofyet. To me, this is still determinism, even if we can't see it, manipulate it, or use it. It could be said to be an appearance (not illusion) of free will that we can't shake, which is, I admit, a somewhat ironic outcome, but we don't need all those words, now, do we?

So, perhaps rather than not understanding, I'm not accepting it.

I do reserve the right to think for myself, including about QM and particle physics, even if I don't do either for a living. Do I have proof? Well, as much as you do, which is to say that neither of us can yet make it science, because neither of us can falsify it, one may hope to add 'yet', but we can't say that with assurance.

Question: Have you digested QCED? I have some books on it, but they are still packed and I don't know a good web reference. I wonder what you think of the idea (which is not fully formed, like everything else at this tme, of course)?

edited because I sant cpell... as usual...

AnthonyAdams45

"Free will" insofar as it means anything means "I choose." Now I can be as dense as the next guy, but I don't see how saying, "there is a randomness in causality" equals "I choose?" To say that the randomness manifests itself as going out for a pint now and as taking a piss later doesn't indicate any sense of choosing.

Your randomness seems to me a form of compatibilism... no slight intended.

jj

I understand no slight intended, but why overcomplicate all of this?

Let us consider several possible scenarios (no, I'm not suggesting there are the only these, note).

1) Either via hidden variables or whatever (something that has to be compatable with the present observations, everything is determined.

2) QM, or something underlying it, is truly random. The resulting processes are, then, partially random. Learning occurs, randomness occurs, and we have a situation where we have randomness driving a learning system.

3) We have "free will" in the supernatural sense. Conciousness itself creates such a thing, something that is not represented by the chemical processes in the brain.

4) Situation 1) is correct, but we have no way to observe the relevant variables, and we must treat the system as though it is random, even though it is fully determined.

Each of these things is something different. Compatabilism simply seems, to me, to confuse the issue.

I think (yes? no?) that 3) is "free will" by anybody's definition.

In 2, we have learning systems whose behavior is intrinsicly unpredictable, and that can show what appears entirely as though it is self-determination, although we may know that at the heart of it, it is nothing but the result of a random process.
Do we call that free will? I keep asking this question, but nobody wants to hit it head on.

4) is actually 1) but looks like 2). It reads a lot like my sometimes flip reply "I'm predestined to believe in free will", but only if we accept that 2) is "free will". There is not enough reach there to get to situation 3, there is no supernatural component.

Finally, 1) is determinism. Can we agree on that?

Now, yes we have compatabilism, we have this, we have that, but we have a situation that is probably, to the extent we understand at least, one of these 4 results, or maybe 3) because we can leave out 3), if we are opposed to supernatural processes.

So, what do we call these 3 or 4 situations? Please? They aren't the same thing, so we ought to have names for them, not one name, either. :banghead:

I've seen a whole lot of verbiage here, some attacks, some reasonable discussion, and so on, but frankly, it seems to me that we've got far too much overcomplication, and not enough direct speech.

That's what I think. It wouldn't be the first time I have disagreed with experts, and it would be the nth time I disagreed with the general population.

So it goes.

P.S. If it helps any, I'm a strong Popperian sort of scientist at heart. Talking about the unknown is great, but we gotta give due to evidence and the ability to falsify things sooner or later. I'm not saying anyone here is necessarily doing the opposite, just explaining my own position.

Oh, and no, I'm not a logical positivist. If you think about my take on QM, that would be, as they say, "right out". Given what I know of chaos theory (having built lots of digital filters with quantization noise in my time, that being one good example of a more general problem), I have trouble with the idea of "exact" as it relates to the real world, and I don't only mean Heisenberg uncertainties.

As usual, edited to fix gross and atrocious typos.

excreationist

I think it is clearer to say that neurons fire once their inputs reach a certain threshold... (and some inputs can inhibit the neuron's firing).
The input levels can be affected by "noise" though... which would be random quantum fluctuations. If the inputs aren't near the threshold level and the noise is fairly minor (as it would be compared to large-scale molecules) then the noise would hardly ever affect the workings of the neurons. They'd be mostly deterministic.
I think it is kind of like a TV set... there might be an occassional inference with the signal - mostly due to deterministic things - like other radio waves but the picture gets through pretty well.
Or it could be like a computer that has RAM that doesn't work 100%.... the computer might work for minutes at a time seemingly perfectly, but then programs might crash, due to a crucial piece of information being in the faulty part of the RAM. The cause of the faulty part of the RAM would mostly be from high level problems during the RAM being manufactured... or at least that would have been the case when RAM had larger transistors. (They are approaching an atomic scale now)
So I'm saying quantum noise just adds a tiny little bit of extra noise, that can of course accumulate over time (the butterfly effect) but it wouldn't affect things much during short periods of time.

At least one of the interpretations involves hidden variables. So it is conceivable that there are hidden variables that we can't measure.

I don't think so... it's kind of like a billiard ball with some dust on it. It won't act like a perfect sphere, but it is *approximately* deterministic, which means that good players can do amazing pool shots.

No, learning begins with memory, and then some inputs and a mechanism that tries to get the system's predictions to match or make sense of the inputs - to find the patterns. Something like that.

Given exactly the same inputs, I think neurons would behave the same way, assuming that the sum of the inputs isn't right near a threshold and there isn't a lot of noise/interference.
BTW, it appears that neurons in our brains are more complex than what I was saying... there are gasnets that simulate this - basically it involves neurons sending messages through gases as well, rather than only relying on signals between directly connected neurons. I guess that gas would be much more influenced by quantum randomness - since it is only a small molecule - NO (nitric oxide).
So I guess after all the brain is influenced by quantum fluctuations to *some* extent. And sometimes this interference builds up and gets bad - e.g. they have a mental illness. This would usually be blamed on genetics and things like stress, etc, rather than quantum fluctuations since those other sources of interference would probably have a much greater effect....

I'd say that our brains learn *despite* random processes... well I guess randomness is good if you want a lot of creativity (and the risk of insanity)... but I don't think neural nets really need to be initialized to random values and there doesn't need to be lots of extra noise for neural nets to learn.

BTW, I made this neural net applet a while ago.

It shows the patterns (inputs and outputs) and accuracy on the right. You can move the red circles to test the outputs manually. It initially has a lot of noise (notice the outputs flashing) but this can be eliminated - or increased. You can select some training patterns and click "train" to begin teaching the neural net. It will "infer" some of the other patterns. This is just a simple single-layer neural net... it's about as much as I know in depth about them. You can also click on the grid to disable some of the neurons, to simulate brain injury. Sometimes killing certain neurons will result in many patterns being unlearnt(?) while other neurons aren't as necessary. Then with less neurons, you can often get it to learn all the patterns again...
Having noise makes the strengths of the inputs/outputs (inhibitory/excitory(?)) signals stronger in the neural network and it can make it "guess" the right outputs sometimes... but it also makes it make more mistakes... but after learning it begins to make less and less mistakes. (Assuming noise/interference is presence, but in this applet at least, noise isn't essential)

No, I think the main reason we think different things is because we have had different past experiences (traumas, etc), different current experiences and different brain chemistry, which I think we use to work out what we desire and our thoughts are a reflection of our desires (and experiences).

AnthonyAdams45

Nope, not free will, just not pre-QM view of determinism. Still determinism, just not the blocked and locked version of the past.

There ya go