DRFseven

No, I don't see your point. You think I'm saying your dopamine is administered incorrectly? I'm saying that you choose chocolate and I choose vanilla because you get a bigger reward through the reward pathway when the "chocolate cells" in your memory are activated than I get when MY chocolate cells are activated. My bigger reward comes from the vanilla ones. The same mechanism that weighs the variables for solving the "chocolate or vanilla" problem, informs motor cortex cells that these special cell groups win, and your internal dialog goes 'Chocolate; yes!", and then your jaws move up and down and you say "I'll have the chocolate."

Now, regarding your stance on THIS issue, yes; you get a bigger reward jolt from comparing the idea of "free choice" with the the way you know and love to feel, than you get from comparing the idea of "automatic choice" with it. That doesn't mean your dopamine is working wrong, of course; it's working the way it's supposed to work by telling you on a cellular level what has worked in the past. How well our method of knowing things conforms to reality depends upon how much each issue NEEDS to conform to reality in order to continue being utilized in decision-making. Take evolution; how important to survival is it that people understand evolution? It's NOT important, and obviously people who don't understand it are not hindered by their lack of understanding; at least survival-wise.

For the issue of free choice, I think it is starting to become an issue. There has been a break-through with imaging technology, allowing much greater understanding of the mechanics of decision-making, which used to depend upon animal.and lesion studies. Now we have a window on the brain during decision-making tasks for "normal" as well as functionally damaged brains. We can introduce dopamine to dopamine-starved brains and the differences in performance as well as function. As was shown in another forum yesterday, we can SEE the difference between "normal" and clinically depressed brain activity, which puts a damper on arguments against physical facts of depression.

It seems nonsense because you have it all wrong. Just because it's "natural" and you can't help it doesn't mean you're RIGHT about what you think. You or I or anyone could, of course, always be wrong. If you were to argue in a court of Law that something was not true because it made you feel bad to think it was not true, you'd lose. On the other hand, physical evidence would work well toward proving a contention.

So far, so good, except that it contradicts almost everything ELSE you say. This is compatiblism, where we say WE choose because it is, after all, our own experiences that enable the choice and our own brain supplying the motivation to choose an alternative. And we DO make choices all day long. The problem is, that's not what people really mean when they say "free choice". What they really mean is that they are not bound by any mechanism; that THEY, their conscious selves, not some unconscious brain cells, picked some choice out of others that could just as easily have chosen.

Can you not think about pink elephants?

OK, so you're saying, you don't know how it works, but you're sure it's wrong? We're not talking brain science here (heh, heh); this is a blatent cop-out because simple explanations abound. I've even given several, myself, but if you don't believe me, you can look it up. Even failing to do that, can you give me a simple concept of how "free choice" might work? How do we come to know things and what constitutes a decision? With nothing telling our brain cells how to fire, what is it that makes them fire some way?

That's some kind of fantasy you have about determinism. I've told you how psychological determinism works; now you tell me how I'm wrong and how free choice works.

ManM

Synaesthesia,
I'm not quite sure what you tried to say there... According to DRFseven, you did not in fact choose to end your post prematurely.

excreationist,
Something like that. Now you claim that physical processes have different properties. These things could be color, roughness, sound, etc. But logical consistency is not a physical property of anything. What you are basically proposing is that a certain type of physical process has an immaterial property that we perceive somehow. Not all physical processes have this immaterial property, and so 2+2=4 is qualitatively different than an apple. Plato is probably rolling in his grave right about now. How did a physical process come to have an immaterial property?

Regarding a 'life force', I really don't know. Emag fields do not seem to be physical matter, yet they have a relation to physical matter. I do not find it outside the realm of possibility that there are other fields we do not know about yet. One day we might very well find out there is an immaterial component to life. I do not want to rule out that possibility by asserting we are nothing more than physical matter.

DRFseven,
We differ on this issue in the same way we differ over ice cream flavors? Would you say that your preference for vanilla is any more true than my preference for chocolate? I hope you will agree that such a claim would be nonsense. But if you equate chocolate vs. vanilla with determinism vs. freedom, you are left with the exact same conclusion! How do you say your preference for determinism is any more true than my preference for freedom? By asserting determinism you have destroyed your grounds for asserting determinism. What is the flaw in that reasoning? Does your preference constitute grounds for the assertion of an absolute?

I'm thinking you haven't been understanding what I've been saying. I have not been claiming that we are independent of mechanism. I have not made any mention of us being an uncaused cause. An uncaused cause cannot change itself without losing its uncaused nature. While being free from causality, such a being would not be able to change itself at all. It would remain eternally the same. This is just as counter-intuitive as hard determination. On one end we have rocks, on the other we have the Roman Catholic God. No, I am not proposing freedom from causality. I am proposing self-determination.

I find it very dangerous to ground philosophical arguments on something as dynamic as science. I find it even more dangerous to support philosophical arguments with scientific speculation. Yet since you insist, I'll use some of my engineering background… Neural networks are indeterminate in nature. Basically they are a structure with rules. There are inputs, a threshold, and an output. When the combination of weighted inputs rises above the threshold the output is triggered. The weights associated with the inputs are altered by the feedback from previous input/output correlations. Multiple possible outputs (generated through learning or creative thinking) are stored in memory. A given inputs is compared to the expected outputs via parallel processing. The more an input is correlated to a single output the more the weights are adjusted to reach that particular output by itself. Thus an output becomes self-reinforcing. However, it is possible for an input to cause a shift in other outputs. This adjusts weights which may change some of the correlations between other inputs and outputs. Poof, you are looking at the world in a new way. Keep in mind that the inputs and outputs are not necessarily sensory perceptions, but could rather be memory or results from other processes.

And so the architecture is flexible enough to accommodate change. These mechanisms don't happen independent of you, they are you. The architecture can modify itself through internal feedback. You can change your mind through thought.

DRFseven

Yep; one answer rings your bell; another rings mine. Chocolate and vanilla.

You are confusing value judgements with facts. Value judgements can't be "wrong" in themselves, because if you think something is pretty or tasty, it IS pretty or tasty to YOU, and that's all a value judgement describes - what something seems to you. But you could think the moon was made of green cheese, and if someone asked what the moon was made of, the neural configuration that spelled "green cheese" would ring your bell. But, then an astronault could go to the moon and bring back moon rocks instead of green cheese, so you would likely, then, know you were wrong. Your opinion that the moon was made of green cheese would not constitute the moon being, in fact, made of green cheese (as having an opinion that chocolate tastes best would constitute chocolate BEING best, to you).

It is only the notification system that is the same; the reward pathway. It informs us of which alternative we favor.

First off, it's not a preference for determinism. Remember, I, too used to not WANT determinism to be the system under which we operate. I was uncomfortable with mechanism, too, but it was impossible for me to deny the facts. The nature of memory, the sequence of activation, the interpretation of imaging techniques, the behavioral evidence; all of it points out the mechanism by which choices are determined. I began to realize the absurdity of the idea of "free choice" because an undirected choice is meaningless. It's like wanting to travel to a warm country for the winter, and trying to employ "free flight" to get there; why would we want that, we'd never get there!

I hope this has been answered to your satisfaction by the discussion of value judgement vs fact.

Absolute fact, yes; absolute value, no. I want to make sure you understand I am saying that there are absolute facts, not that one can be absolutely sure their knowledge reflects those facts.

But you said we had some kind of "uncaused" meta-beliefs. Where'd that come from?

Of course I think change in opinion is inherent in humans; it is inevitable in that chain of causal events that reflects our experience. Things happen; we find that our minds have changed.

Absolutely, ManM. Much of the stimuli is from thoughts (memory)., both conscious and subconscious.

But, you see, that is a compatiblist view, which does not accomodate uncaused meta-beliefs.

ManM

DRFseven,
Who is being informed? You have used this sort of language the entire time. Who do you think the mechanism is informing? What finds our minds to have changed? You are writing as if there is a difference between our mind and some sort of 'real us' that observes our mind. Are you proposing the ghost in the machine? The ghost is not subject to the machine, nor is the machine subject to the ghost. They are one and the same. The machine has the capability to change itself. You have the capability to believe in elves.

I'm the one confusing value judgments with facts? You make a claim about absolute reality (determinism), and then you compare it to chocolate and vanilla. After that you lecture me on the difference between value judgments and facts? Please tell me, how I am supposed to make this distinction given that the exact same process decides both value and fact?

You told me before that determinism is simply what rings your bell. Chocolate and vanilla, right? Either it is a preference or it is not. Make up your mind already! Anyway, now I'm convinced you are using some weird definition of free choice. When I say 'free choice', I am talking about our ability to determine ourselves. It isn't undirected because we are the ones who directed it! Isn't that the common sense notion of our freedom?

Elves apparently. Where did I say this?

excreationist

ManM:
Synaesthesia,
I'm not quite sure what you tried to say there... According to DRFseven, you did not in fact choose to end your post prematurely.
I think DRV7 would say that Synaesthesia did choose (make a decision or selection), but the specific outcome was inevitable.

"I think you were saying that in general, natural processes can't be "true" or "false"... somehow showing that logical statements can't be any more "true" or "false" than other physical processes."
Something like that. Now you claim that physical processes have different properties. These things could be color, roughness, sound, etc. But logical consistency is not a physical property of anything. What you are basically proposing is that a certain type of physical process has an immaterial property that we perceive somehow. Not all physical processes have this immaterial property, and so 2+2=4 is qualitatively different than an apple. Plato is probably rolling in his grave right about now. How did a physical process come to have an immaterial property?

How about this... higher mammals can do a bit of reasoning using their neural net brains... they might consider possibilities and work out what seems to be a valid course of action. This logic is done using a physical means - using neurons.
The neurons are used to store patterns about how the world works (fuzzy rules) and when the animal is working out what they're going to do they use those patterns to work out the appropriate course of action based on their goals and current environment...
BTW, there are excitatory and inhibitory signals... these would encourage or discourage (respectively) neurons firing.
Anyway, it is kind of computational - in fact, there are things called "neurocomputers" which are special computers that use those ideas.

The patterns stored in the neuron's weights are bits of fuzzy information...

And as I said earlier, 2+2=4 written on a screen is also information which we interpret... it is only information if we know how to translate those shapes into some other meaning. e.g. asdji2iojeoas doesn't really symbolize anything more that a group of letters...

So shapes on a screen are a way of storing information, just like the weights of neurons are, and the RAM of computers... 2+2=4 is a special kind of information because it is claiming that it is true. If it was just a number it would just refer to a generic quantity of objects. If it was just a name of an animal, then it would refer to a generic type of that animal.

Anyway, logical statements are groups of symbols that a symbol-decoding system can use and evaluate... so we can interpret the statement and agree with it or disagree with it. (e.g. if it says 2+2=5)

ManM

excreationist,
I thought the point of this thread was to challenge the idea that we can choose our beliefs. It spun off into the question of whether we could choose anything. If you support our ability to choose then you are on my side.

Now I would speculate that our structure has some sort of mechanism for determining an amount of internal effort or energy. Perhaps it has something to do with the input weights or amount of feedback between neurons. Those things which are easier for our structure to accommodate are what we find to be intuitive. In order for that to mean anything I also have to assert that our structure is hardwired for truth, but able to accommodate falsehood. I don't find it unreasonable to say that we were created so that the truth 'seems' or 'feels' right.

DRFseven

The conscious *I*; who speaks my internal dialog.

I think the mechanism informs that concious *I*. Yes, of course our brains are a part of us, but I don't think anyone can deny perceiving a personal self. I don't refer to my brain as "me" because I am more than just my brain; I am the rest of my body, and my perceptions, too. When I say my brain tells me, I mean that the brain-state generated by all the stimuli and processes seems like something, and what it seems like is not processes but words and feelings that seem like a self that is personal and feels some kind of way. Now THAT was crystal clear, right?

No, I'm not proposing that ghost. You only need a ghost when you try to do away with cause. The self is not a ghost, it's a perception caused by a state and it certainly IS subject to the machine.

In response to change-inducing stimuli! Remember, I said the feedback loop includes the environment? Envir. transforms body state which uses info in the changed body state to direct environment-changing behavior, and so on.

If my body-state is so directed by my environment.

"Chocolate ice-cream is good" cannot be true or false, right? It's a value judgment. But, "Chocolate ice-cream is good for patching stucco" CAN be true or false. The question, "What is good?", gets answered "chocolate ice-cream by me as a result of that reward pathway, but, in reality, the goodness lies in my mind, not the ice-cream.. But the goodness of chocolate ice-cream for patching stucco is a property inherent in the ice-cream, not in my mind. I don't get the pleasure bell for thinking of patching the stucco with ice-cream, though; I get the "bzzzzt, wrong!"

But that process doesn't create facts, it only informs you of whether you like them as answers to something or not. And it's not nice to ask me to explain something and then, when I do, accuse me of lecturing you!

Yes, that answer seems right to me, according to my reasoning schemes, it correlates with other facts. It matches with "correct".

Maybe you're using preference in an unusual way, such as "Which horse do you 'like' for this race?", meaning "Which horse do you have reason to believe will win?"

Ifl, when you say "our ability" to determine, you mean our body/brain-state's ability to modulate activation of neural activity that correlates to elimination of alternatives, behaviorally, then that is my defintion of choice, but it is definitely NOT the common meaning of freedom of choice. The common meaning does not take the neural mechanism responsible for the perception into account. The experiential effects are ignored; disconnected from the resulting perception.

Don't you remember; it was one of your main points? You said some of our conclusions or beliefs had reasons but our first or meta or primary beliefs were assumptions without causes.

excreationist

ManM:
I thought the point of this thread was to challenge the idea that we can choose our beliefs. It spun off into the question of whether we could choose anything. If you support our ability to choose then you are on my side.
I believe that we make decisions or selections but I also think that only physical processes are involved... so therefore only one outcome, based on an initial configuration of the brain and the environment, is inevitable...
You seem to believe that people can make decisions that weren't inevitable given the rules of physics and the initial configurations of the brain and the environment... i.e. that they truly have free will... I only think that people don't know what decisions they make until after they've been through the decision making process - so they aren't aware of how inevitable those decisions were.

Now I would speculate that our structure has some sort of mechanism for determining an amount of internal effort or energy.
Yeah... this would be when we sense we're having a "brain overload" and also when we're being frustrated.

Perhaps it has something to do with the input weights or amount of feedback between neurons. Those things which are easier for our structure to accommodate are what we find to be intuitive. In order for that to mean anything I also have to assert that our structure is hardwired for truth, but able to accommodate falsehood. I don't find it unreasonable to say that we were created so that the truth 'seems' or 'feels' right.
Well as I said earlier, I think one of our main drives is "connectedness" or "coherence"... this would motivate our desire for truth... it gives us a warm-fuzzy feeling... but on the other hand, in reality, certainty is hard to find... and people might invent it to satisfy their cravings.

excreationist

Perhaps ManM is talking about instinctual desires... e.g. sucking/kissing is good just because it is... when we're scared we have to try and run or hide or fight back or get nervous, etc, just because we feel compelled to...
Something like that.

DRFseven

Perhaps he is, but, if so, I don't see why he would call it an assumption or a belief. I thought he was talking about presuppositions. I thought he meant that he thought (awkward sentence!) that he could just pick something out to believe without cause, and that would provide the reasoning for other opinions.

Wow, this is my first post with my new, space-age, glowing-red, THREE BUTTON, optical mouse that replaced my one-button Mac mouse. I feel quite hi-tekky.