Starboy

Theli, a machine that makes choices based on logic has no choice. A machine that can make a choice based on the roll of a die would appear to have a mind of its own. It would appear to have “free will”.

Starboy

Red Expendable

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Starboy:
<strong>Until we can decide what free will means I am not sure this discussion will lead anywhere.

As I see it:

Free will == to make a choice with no constraints or external interference.

Note the complete absence of reason or thought in the definition. It is not excluded but it is not required. Choosing based on the outcome of the mindless roll of the die would qualify. IMO if you require reason as part of the definition of free will then the existence of “free will” becomes problematic. How free is a choice that is dictated by logic. How free is a choice that is constrained by other desires such as the desire to keep on living. It seems to me that reason doesn’t create choice it destroys it. Perfect reason with perfect knowledge will result in free will only for choices that result in the same outcome. Before continuing with this discussion I think we should arrive at a definition for the term “free will”.

Starboy</strong>[/QUOTE

Your definition of freewill - mentioning having no constraints, does this imply that a person would have knowledge of everything in the universe? If you aren't all-knowing, then you would have SOME kind of constraint. And yes, by your definition of freewill - would be an impossibility. But I don't agree with your definition of freewill.

I've responded to a post like this months ago. But my definition of freewill is the ability to make a choice. Sure, you might be basing that choice from other choices you made in the past, and all of this based on other actions beyond your control that lead up to this choice you make. But it's still a choice. And one that you are free to make.

For example, if you choose to go see a movie - it would of course be based partly on external events (a the movie was made and released, you saw the ad), and internal events (you prefer to watch a particular kind of movie) - but ultimately, you choose of freely to go to the movie or not.

Just because the movie was made, and you like that movie, doesn't mean you have to go. you can go or not, and either way, it's still a choice. Made freely - by you. This is freewill, at least by my definition.

If you are going to set up a definition of freewill that can obviously not exist - one that implies that a person must KNOW everything and be capable of everything - as you imply by saying 'no constraints' - then of course the freewill is an impossibility.

However if you set up another defintion of freewill, by saying something like:

freewill is the ability to make a choice (this includes choosing NOT to act) without another entity FORCING your decision. By forcing I mean, physically restraining you and dragging someplace, or injecting you with drugs to make do something you would not do without being brainwashed, or whatever.

If someone were to kidnap you and bring you to a place, that would not be of your own FREEWILL.

However, if someone were to hold a gun up to your head, and said 'come with me or you die' - then that would be a choice made of your own freewill because although you might die if you said I'm not going, it's still a choice you were given.

RedEx

xeren

Hey Theli, sorry it's taken so long to reply

I'm not sure how satisfactory(or to the point) my answer is going to be, but here goes...

I think the kind of free will that most people feel they have, is that they are only partially influenced by their past. For instance, why someone would rather stay home one night instead of going out.

And we here on this board would argue with a person like that, saying, "No, that decision to stay stay home instead of going out was only based off of past experiences and external stimuli."

Of course, that is a very hard thing for us to prove, what with science's limited knowledge of the brain. But what is the alternative? There really is no alternative. We could ask, "Well, then if your decision to stay home was only based partially on past experiences and external stimuli, then what else was it based on?

The respondent would have very little to answer with, for as we all know (and hopefully have agreed on by now), random influences playing a part in the decision don't mean more free will, they only mean less.

The answer i have gotten from my theist friends are mind-body dualism concepts. They say that the soul is where the mind lay, and that makes the free will decision. They feel it solves the problem, but they too haven't taken the idea to its logical conclusion. They never have an answer for me when i point out that moving the decision-making center from the brain to the soul only moves the problem elsewhere, it doesn't solve it. Either the soul's decision making is caused or uncaused. There is no way around it.

So to finally answer your question: "What is the free will we don't possess?" I would have to answer that it is simply the result of people not thinking about what true free will would have to entail.

The "free will we don't possess" is the belief that we can make decisions that are only partially based on our past and external influences, without ever realizing that there is nothing else that the remaining influence for the "free will" decision could be based on.


I hope that answered your question Theli, after all that, but it probably didn't so feel free to ask me again.

-xeren

[ November 30, 2002: Message edited by: xeren ]</p>

Theli

Starboy...
There seems to be a gap.

And it also indicated a process.

I never said that the brain chooses the best path all the time. The way I see it is that there are 3 factors that governs each choice.
Goal - be it food, intelectual stimulation or sex. Whatever drives us at the moment of choice.
Situation - availability of the goal, and what side-effects persuit will bring.
Logic (intelligence) - the ability of the brain to calculate the best course of action to persuit the goal.

According to your theory there is a fourth factor. One that influence the choice as these 3 does.
Wich is it?

A choice must be a single path, you cannot choose several routs.

Determinism would suggest that if the situation was identical then the people's actions/choices would be identical also. No matter wich choices was the best.

I don't see how chance is a vital part of choice. If chance was a necessity for choice, then is logic? Does a coin choose wich side to land on?

This is a question of determinism.

Excacly.
But logic is much more than just a system (like math), it's used in the simpliest of choices.
I would like to rephraze the term "governed by logic", to "calculated by logic". As "governed" would imply an outside force.
To say that we don't have free will because of determinism would be like saying: I don't make my own choices, my body does.
As if the brain is something we only use for special occations, like on an exam.

I would say that bacteria must have some sort of logic, or it could not survive. It's actions, just like ours is based on goals. Although the process is extremely simplistic.
We would not regard them so much as choices in the general sense, as they are very instinctive. And the bacteria has a very low intelligence.

We had a thread in that topic earlier. And I would say that computers do choose, but I don't think that choice is the criteria in wich we define life.
About rational... I don't know wich definition you are using, but the way I understand it, rationality is a measurement of a beings choosing-ability (logic). How good the being is to calculate the outcome of an action.
Where you want to draw the line between rational and irrational is up to you.

Will is based on desire, and will governs our goal.
Reason calculates the best route to reach that goal, atleast tries to.

"Will to make choices" seems abit ambigious to me, I would rather say: ability/freedom to persuit ones goals.
How do you explain the process of a choice not based or influenced by reason?
Where does the choice come from?
What made that choice? What created it?

Yes.

Why not?
How would a machine make a real choice?
What is REAL free will?

In what sense do you mean "mind"?
If the 'choice' was directly controled by the random function then why would the machine even need a mind?

That's a general missconception by the old definition of free will that dictionaries tends to use.
The idea that a choice is created only in the mind of the being making a choice, and is not influenced by it's situation.
How would such a being survive?

From what I've reasoned, determinism seems flawed on many points. And I believe that chance is a part of our choice (be it external or internal), but it's not required.
Thanks for your cluster of replies .

xeren...
It's ok.

Yes, among others.

Along with the persons goal, and priority at the moment. The person might be tired at the moment, a factor that would make the person prioritize staying home.

Ofcourse. Our perception/concept of chance might just be part of our inability to forsee events. It's still a hot topic.

Excacly, as the title of this thread asks: what is real free will?
What is the alternative?

Yes, this is another thing. Souls (as most theist concepts) are scientific dead-ends, walls that has been created to keep all the questions out.
Then you must ask yourself, how does a soul create a choice?
Is it random, influenced by the body's perception of our reality, does the choices come from a spirit land, or is the soul simply our own inborn goals?

A good question I tend to ask theists is: what purpose does the brain have?
Is it just there imitating the soul?

Partially caused by a 700 year old definition of the term, including demons and goblins.

It seems we are in agreement on all parts. Thanks for replying.

[ November 30, 2002: Message edited by: Theli ]</p>

Zadok001

Starboy:

No, doesn't work. Making a choice is, by definition, a process that requires consideration. You don't "make a choice" randomly.

"Which one of these do you like better?"

Next time someone asks you that, say "Well, I know which one I like better, but I'll just flip a coin to decide what to tell you." That obviously doesn't work - You aren't CHOOSING when a random element is introduced.

(Note: If the random element only covers a small selection of the possible choices you can make, it isn't random - You made a CHOICE as to what option to eliminate. Flipping a coin to decide where to go for dinner is still making a choice. You've decided NOT to jump off a balcony instead of having a nice steak.)

All creatures can make choices. Most, like bacterium, cats, humans, etc. (to say nothing of Cyril) do it mostly on a reward-punishment basis. i.e., If I eat this food, I will not die. I do not wish to die. Therefore, I will eat this food. That's a choice, based on logic, and almost all living organisms have it. (This is debatable, but I would say even instinct is a 'choice,' per se.)

Pure randomness is NOT a choice. A random decision is not a decision at all. A random event has no room for choice. It just occurs as one of many probabilistic outcomes.

You seem to be confusing action with choice. Just because I slip and fall doesn't mean I _chose_ to slip and fall, yet your model allows for that. It was random, many outcomes were possible, therefore it was a choice I made freely. Eh, no.

Starboy

Greetings RedEx:

I agree that you can’t eliminate the past from any choice. I also agree that you do have to arrange your existence so that you find yourself at any given moment of choice. In other words if you didn’t go to a restaurant and sit down to order, that particular choice of what to eat would not be presented to you.

Be that as it may at the moment of choice if you so desire you can choose in a way that has no outside influence including anything that you bring to the decision by using a random selector such as a random coin or die.

There are those here that would argue that the way the choice is made is important to the meaning of “free will”. That using a random selector would not qualify. I don’t agree with this. It is not important how the choice is made, what is required is 1) there is a will to make a choice; 2) it is made freely.

The will to make a choice is demonstrated by selecting with a die just as well as it is demonstrated by using logic or reason. Using a random selector also satisfies the requirement of being free. Thus selection with a random coin would IMO constitute “free will”.

Please don’t get me wrong. I do not advocate the use of random selection in all decisions. I only argue that “free will” exists in so much as it can be demonstrated in this special case. In any argument were the question is “does X have free will”, it is important to establish if there is such a thing as “free will”. I think this argument demonstrates the existence of “free will”.

Starboy

Zadok001

Starboy:

The problem, as we've stated, is random is not free. To wit. When your 'random' choices are made, the UNIVERSE, not an individual, is effectively making the choice. It is random, it is based on probabilistic laws determined by the universe. A BEING does not make a decision, thus, that being cannot use their will to affect that decision.

Theli

Starboy...

Wich goal/desire do you refer to that does not have it's remedy outside the self?
If the goal is not ouside the self then it's inborn.

What would you say is being restraints. Is logic a restraint? Is outside influence (percieving the goal) a restraint?

Obviously there must be or the non-free-will argument fails, and determinism isn't to blame for it.

BTW, a choice based on will cannot be random. And how can a choice not be based on a will?

[ November 30, 2002: Message edited by: Theli ]</p>

Starboy

Zadok001:

I could agree with your point of view if I thought that humans and their minds were somehow disconnected from the universe, but I do not. My mind is as much a part of the fabric of the universe as the coin with which I would make a selection. The will to make a choice does not dictate the method of making the choice. To say that it must be reason is not definitive. Anyone who has taught college physics can attest to the variety of “reasons” that can be given as an answer to a physics question. Your requirement also begs the question, what method of selection is a person using when their “reasoning” is faulty? In that case are they not exercising their “free will” when making a choice? What are they doing?

The "will" in free will does not imply the use of reason; it only implies the "will" to make a decision. WRT to "free will" the method of the decision is unimportant. Using a random selector demonstrates the ability to make a "free" choice and thus have “free will”.

Starboy

Starboy

Zadok001:

If I understand you correctly you claim that if I use a die to make a selection I am not making the choice the die is. If we take this idea to it’s logical conclusion any decisions I made based on information that I did not somehow detect directly with my own senses would not be my decision. Is that the gist of it? If I used a compass to decide which way to go I would not be deciding, it would be the compass. If I stop to put gas in my car it is not my decision but that of the gas gauge?

Perhaps I represent you incorrectly, please clarify.

Starboy