Free Will

[andrewducker]

Note: Option two should include a "Not". Please pretend it does.

[Poll #1786450]

Context is the discussion here where someone is completely failing to explain to me what they mean by the term.

Comments

[andrewducker]

My views are similar to this:

If you can't see that, then try this.

[woodpijn.livejournal.com]

Hee, this is going to be fun.

Although I can't tell if there was meant to be a "not" in the second option or if you're making some subtle meta point.

Personally I agree more with Mike and Andrew Stevens in the linked debate.

[ninebelow.livejournal.com]

Although I can't tell if there was meant to be a "not" in the second option or if you're making some subtle meta point.

I was trying to work that out too!

[pete stevens (from livejournal.com)]

I think I am thinking, therefore I might possibly be.

[andrewducker]

I'm an idiot. But I'm not changing it now because (a) it's funny and (b) a bunch of people have answered it now.

Oh well!

[andrewducker]

Can you explain what you mean by Free Will then, because I'm not getting it from them...

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

Haha, I assumed it was a subtle meta point.

[andrewducker]

Sadly I'm not that smart at this time in the morning!

[heron61.livejournal.com]

I think there is room for choice in our decisions and that the future as a whole it not predictable (quantum mechanics supports this, and I don't believe we'll find any determinate order underlying its apparent chaos). However, it's also clear that the majority of the choices that people make are exceedingly determinate.

Similarly, I believe in Everett's many worlds hypothesis, but don't believe that every particle event spawns a new universe, because much of the world as a whole is clearly determinate, but not all of it. I remember a discussion of chaos theory I read years ago, where the author talked about predicting the weather, and said that most of the time weather prediction was relatively easy, but sometimes, presumably due to complex chaotic interactions, it wasn't predictable all all - I think both the universe and humans work that way too. I think that for any sort of ultimate prediction of human behavior we will be left with statistics, and they may end up as highly accurate statistics, but that in some cases that's all we'll ever be able to know - much as with the paths and lifespans of various particles.

[strawberryfrog.livejournal.com]

Dan Dennett wrote a whole book on the subject, which I don't pretend to understand.

[recycled-sales.livejournal.com]

I think this is one of those arguements that I usually try to ignore. Generally it's because I believe one thing (irrationally) and would probably argue the opposite if pressed for debate.

[andrewducker]

I did understand the Wikipedia article*, and thoroughly agree with it. So that's good!


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elbow_Room_%28book%29

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I’m also enjoying the accidental irony of a question about free will only having one answer.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I first read this question as Do you believe in free WiFi and was immediately thinking about marginal costs of data movement, fixed infrastructure costs and the psychology of pricing signals. I enjoyed that. Thinking about Free Will has also been fun. Two thinking moments (or arguably two moments where the physical entity identified as me did some nifty algorithm sorting and appeared to derive pleasure from it) for the price of one. Bravo.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I am uncertain if free will exists. The evidence we have seems to be consistent with both hypotheses; that free will exists and that a combination of probabilistic and deterministic physical occurrences. I think this may be a difficult thing to prove from the inside of our own brains / souls.

I tend to believe in it – for a given value of believe.

The Universe appears to be set up in a way that requires either free will or the illusion of free will. Free will, I think, under pins morality and morality appears to be a significant aspect of the evolution of complex social animals.

It may be the case that I do not have free will but that all of you do.

[andrewducker]

Can you tell me what you mean by "Free Will"?

[andrewducker]

Free WiFi is good insofar as it attracts people that you want it to.

So for bars and coffee shops that want people to come in, make themselves comfy, and buy lots of their produce it's as much a good as comfy seats and the right kind of music.

[strawberryfrog.livejournal.com]

I really liked his Darwin's Dangerous Idea. A great book, in all senses of the word.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

So, free wifi as free as a comfy seat in a coffee shop and paid for by an extra penny on a cup of coffee or one penny off the pay of the barista or dividend for the shareholders or a penny off the tax bill.

I find the psychology of this sort of thing very interesting.

I’ve two great revelatory moments in my philosophical life and one was about the heuristics of buying mustard and I’ve been trying to find a way back to that since I was 22.

[andrewducker]

An ADSL connection that would be perfectly sufficient for a WiFi connection should be less than £30/month. The router, about £40 in total.

If that adds a penny onto each cup of coffee then they aren't selling enough of them :->

(And nowadays they should have an internet connection in anyway, to run their chip/pin machines over.)

[alitheapipkin.livejournal.com]

I believe in it but the 3rd option is probably also correct.

Possibly the most accurate description of my views is that I wish to live in a world where my entire life is not determined by my brain chemistry and therefore I operate on the assumption that there is free will because I do not want to contemplate the alternative. This may be total self-delusion but frankly I don't care.

[andrewducker]

That is, I'm sure, a common approach. It's certainly one I used to share :->

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I'm thinking something like a fifth of a penny per cup of coffee assuming that you load the entire cost of internet set up on to the WiFi element of the coffee.

Although, as you end up loading both the WiFi element and the paying for your coffee with a card element onto the coffee it's a moot point.

Except for the fact that Free WiFi is a selling point whereas Free Comfy Chairs is less advertised and Free Paying by Chip and Pin rarely mentioned despite the first being a side effect of the last.

People, free willed or otherwise are deeply irrational in many way.

[simont]

I wanted to vote both "there is not such a thing" and "never heard a good definition".

Excluding the compatibilist definition (which clearly does exist and is a useful concept for some purposes but I generally think it's best considered as a completely distinct concept that is not what people are talking about in this sort of conversation), the concept of free will seems to be that it's a factor influencing brain activity (and thence people's actions) which is neither deterministic nor random but some third option.

That's not really a definition, in that all it does is tell you what free will is not. I don't think I've ever heard a coherent explanation of what reasonable kind of thing that might fit that description it is; I occasionally hear people saying things like "Well, it's choice!" in defiance of all known neurology, but that doesn't really strike me as adequate.

But even without a definition, just on the basis of the above definition-by-negatives, I'm happy to take the position that I think there isn't such a thing; of course I have no proof of that, but it seems like a weird concept and not obviously a necessary consequence of anything else I believe, so I'll assume not until proven otherwise.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

Starter for Ten…

From an external point of view I would describe it as the decision process that you have (or appear to have) undertaken that leads you to act or to forebear to act in a certain and for which I can find you morally culpable or praiseworthy.

I think the external view is easier to describe and to accept than the internal view.

The internal view is really hard to define (once reason why my belief is a belief and not a thought and why it’s for a certain value of believe).

That part of me that having been presented with a set of data about the universe and theories about how that data fits together and drawn conclusions about the likely outcomes of a course of action choses which course of action to take internally. I’m utterly undecided if that choice is entirely determined by mechanistic determinants and / or probabilistic factors or if there exists some I who sorts the choices like an invisible Sorting Hat and is unfettered by the mechanics of the universe.

If only the weak form of Free Will exists (i.e. an internally private mechanistic free will) then morality still exists but as a filter for preferring more or fewer physical entities loaded with a certain set of algorithms. If strong form Free Will exists morality exists because there is choice.

This is tricky –but as you ask the question I will not be so rude as to ignore your request for a working definition.