The Free Will Illusion

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine]

This is one of those debates that introduces a lot of unnecessary noise, and at it's heart the pro-deterministic argument is just an attempt to dogde moral responsibility.

You, right now, reading this are simultaneously thinking about this. Thought is one of those magical processes that is recursive in nature. The object can be the same as the subject, you and every organism with a well developed frontal cortex can think about what you are thinking about. Thought itself is an expenditure of energy to increase order. By its nature it is the polar opposite of the processes described by the deterministic camp, which relegate all actions to the exigencies of necessity. If you put forth the argument of the deterministic camp in its extreme form, the inherent ludricousness of an assumed extreme causation becomes apparent. Here's just one example, I've got lots more. From the moment Hannibal crossed the Alps, it was a given that when I had revolved around the sun for 22 years I would buy a red 2 door Toyota tercel. This is like Hegel's dialectic of History, saying that we are mere flotsam on the inevitable tide of the sum total of the infinite complexities of life. His argument had at its heart a need to show that his philosophical system was inevitable, but like most determinists he's arguing backwards from a foregone (and self serving) conclusion. The argument comes down to a selfish desire to distance oneself from the responsibility of amoral actions. It's the same moral skid that spirals into defeatistism, nihilism and a general I'm going to get mine first mentatility that makes the world a crappy place.

Ignoring the events that led up to this moment, imagine if you will that you see an elderly woman drop her wallet. There are multiple branching paths of possible futures that hinge upon what you ultimately decide to do. To say simply that you are at the mercy of deterministic forces beyond your control while you pocket an old lady's social security money doesn't really mean that you have no personal responsibility for the ethical implications of your actions, that's just a cowardly self-serving rationalization. It likewise cheapens the good deed of returning her wallet if some scoffing skeptic says that it's merely the end result of predetermined, inexorable processes that caused you to perform that action.

Thought effects thought, for good and for bad. People have true choices, for good and for bad. The thought that your actions are outside of your control and are merely the expression of some deterministic necessity goes a long ways towards explaining why the bad sleep well.

Edited June 15, 2020 by hoiditthroughthegrapevine

[Gears]

We can't tell and it really doesn't matter. Whether we actually decide to do anything, it feels like we do. If you actively believe we don't have free will, then nothing changes. If choice is an illusion, it's one that feels real enough. 

[Voidus]

Believing in a deterministic universe does not necessarily make one guilty of moral cowardice. As with any philosophical worldview it comes down to how it is applied at a personal level. Do I think I was always predetermined to do a good or bad thing? Sure. Does that change that it was a good or a bad thing? No, no it doesn't. Believing that you are at the mercy of deterministic forces is one thing, blaming those deterministic forces for a hypothetically avoidable situation and trying to argue that they excuse you from punishment is entirely another.

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine]

4 hours ago, Voidus said:

Believing that you are at the mercy of deterministic forces is one thing, blaming those deterministic forces for a hypothetically avoidable situation and trying to argue that they excuse you from punishment is entirely another.

What is the utility of the thought that you are a ruddeless ship adrift in a sea of contingency? How does the belief that you are merely a fleshy machine at the mercy of forces beyond your control affect how you percieve the world, the meaning of your actions and the purpose of your life? I've heard lots of people put forward this free will is an illusion argument, but if you followed them into Starbucks they don't glumly roll a 20 sided dice to see what type of coffee to get, they know exactly what they want to order.

4 hours ago, Voidus said:

Do I think I was always predetermined to do a good or bad thing? Sure. Does that change that it was a good or a bad thing? No, no it doesn't.

Good and Bad can't truly exist unless there is a choice. Talking about actions in the context of predetermined actions is really only describing the relative benefits or detriments of actions in regards to the particular actors. What's the point of holding people accountable for actions beyond their control? It's a little like yelling at someone that's in a coma because they wet their bed. If you're ultimately not responsible for actions can they even be called your actions? Furthermore, the predetermined part of that implies a god like level of causation.

I'll give another example of this extreme causation implied in the predetermined view of agency. Because a nudibranch in Borneo passed gas at the exact time that a neutrino passed through the earth at that specific location, the herring that passed through that cloud was subtly altered in a way that allowed it to concentrate slightly more Mercury in its bloodstream. The tuna that then ate that herring ended up in my can of starkist tunafish, and the extra molecules of mercury in my brain made me predisposed to enjoy the music of the Bee Gees. So obviously ever since my great great great great great great great great great grandfather got off a boat from London in New Amsterdam, after forgetting to wear his pilgrim hat on the trans-atlantic journey (thereby allowing the sun to beat down on his noodle and cause his brain and that of his progeny to be more predisposed to the adverse effects of Mercury concentration) I was destined to be a fan of the Bee Gees. Do I think this to absolve myself of the responsibility of loving Robin Gibb's falsetto voice? Or do I think this and trudge on, confident that nothing I can ever do or say will be anything different than the 13.8 billion years of inexorable gyrations and permutations of Cosmic Necessity have dictated that I must be. Or do I instead choose to believe that I have chosen to like the Bee Gees.

The example could be factual, but like I said earlier the whole deterministic argument seems like inverted causation, working backwards from the conclusion you a have to erect a complex system of causation that is really no different than the idea of a Watchmaker God, with the only difference being that you have substituted God's role with the new actor Cosmic Necessity or Chance.

The ability to think about your actions breaks the deterministic cycle. I know the counter argument that all your thoughts are merely the byproducts of a series of accidents that are your particular circumstances, but thought can be a purely internal self-reflective, self-altering process. 

People like Christopher Hitchens, Steven Pinker and Richard Dawkins arrive at this "robotic human" idea from a desire to remove a step from the casual chain in creation. It's a shortening of the Cosmological argument, they reason that it's simpler instead of saying "God always existed and God created the universe" to say rather that "the universe always existed", this is the foregone conclusion that their predetermination argument is aiming at proving, but this view doesn't by necessity give you a better chance at determining future actions. It's really just a means of removing God from the equation.

Everyone is free to believe what they will. I was personally agnostic from my teen years until I was 30. I even distributed handmade flyers at Bumbershoot in 2000 purportedly from The Church of We Know Not the Way called "Questions on Faith", which had 10 arguments for the existence of God that included counter arguments with the directive to talk to your pastor about questions you may have about your faith. I know that the thing that is dispensed with when you shorten the causal chain is an external morality, a sense of good and bad that exists externally from any relative moral framework. And one byproduct of this lack of Absolutes is that people can more easily rationalize bad actions, because they aren't free to choose anything and are merely subject to the accidental whims of an indifferent universe.

One final point, I think it is amazing that thoughtful and intelligent people can base an argument on the deterministic workings of the human brain and make the analogy that it's function is like that of a computer. The exact workings of the brain are still largely a mystery and no computer has ever been programmed with a subconscious. Also when a computer program retrieves data from memory it doesn't alter it unless it is directed to. The simple act of remembering alters that memory based on what you are currently thinking about. Thought alters thought. Thought is the engine of freewill, and if you don't honestly believe that then why are you reading this?

Edited June 15, 2020 by hoiditthroughthegrapevine
Typos, always typos

[Voidus]

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

What is the utility of the thought that you are a ruddeless ship adrift in a sea of contingency?

I don't choose what to believe based on utility, I choose based on what I believe to be correct.

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

I've heard lots of people put forward this free will is an illusion argument, but if you followed them into Starbucks they don't glumly roll a 20 sided dice to see what type of coffee to get, they know exactly what they want to order.

How on earth does that follow? Either you're seriously misunderstanding their argument or deliberately pretending to. Believing that choices are deterministic does not in any way predispose one towards something like rolling a dice in order to make decisions, they know what they want to order because their body posseses a unique set of taste buds and neuron configurations that predispose them to a specific flavour and the decision making centers of their brain prime them towards that choice because it will give it the largest chemical reward. It has nothing to do with dice.

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

Good and Bad can't truly exist unless there is a choice.

That's a personal belief, and I'd argue a rather extreme one. I consider plenty of things to be bad that don't have moral agency. Do Viruses 'choose' to invade a human body and wreak havok with it? No, but that's still a bad thing (To me at least)

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

What's the point of holding people accountable for actions beyond their control?

To alter their future actions, also worth noting is that if you want to make this argument then it works both ways. If this deterministic universe 'forced' me to burn down your car, then it also 'forced' the police to arrest me for doing so.

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

I'll give another example of this extreme causation implied in the predetermined view of agency.

Predeterminism does not necessarily preclude free will either, I'm also not a huge fan of strawmen as a general rule. Perhaps listen to what determinists are actually saying and respond to that rather than asserting what you think they believe.

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

The example could be factual, but like I said earlier the whole deterministic argument seems like inverted causation

It's actually just regular causation. Causes lead to effects, causation does not dictate that causes sometimes lead to effects, so long as nothing with free will intervenes.

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

The ability to think about your actions breaks the deterministic cycle.

That's an opinion, I disagree with it but you're welcome to think so. I'd say that it's still the result from deterministic factors. Are some of those factors the internal chemial, electrical and structural variables in your brain? Yes, but that doesn't change that it's a simple chain of causal events. You may assert some immaterial form of 'will' controlling these events, and that's an inherently unfalsifiable claim so I couldn't categorically state that it's wrong but I don't subscribe to such a belief myself.

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

People like Christopher Hitchens, Steven Pinker and Richard Dawkins arrive at this "robotic human" idea from a desire to remove a step from the casual chain in creation.

Let's please not assume the desires of other people and speak to the actual arguments that are being put forward here. So far as I know no one in this thread is Richard Dawkns and they certainly are unlikely to be Christopher Hitchens.

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

It's a shortening of the Cosmological argument, they reason that it's simpler instead of saying "God always existed and God created the universe" to say rather that "the universe always existed", this is the foregone conclusion that their predetermination argument is aiming at proving

That has absolutely nothing to do with determinism. The universe could have been created 20 seconds ago by a purple turtle named Fred and I'd still believe it was deterministic. Determinism has no claims about cosmological origins or religion.
 

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

I know that the thing that is dispensed with when you shorten the causal chain is an external morality, a sense of good and bad that exists externally from any relative moral framework.

I am a subjective moralist as well, but morality is, once again, an entirely different discussion. You can believe in an objective source of morality and still a deterministic universe.

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

And one byproduct of this lack of Absolutes is that people can more easily rationalize bad actions, because they aren't free to choose anything and are merely subject to the accidental whims of an indifferent universe.

People of all philosophies have no difficulties in rationalizing bad actions. You may believe determinists are more prone to this than others, I'd personally dispute that and say that anyone trying to use determinism to rationalize any of their actions is not really believing in a truly deterministic universe. Believing the world is deterministic changes very few of my actions, pretty much just how I respond to these arguments and that's about it.

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

Also when a computer program retrieves data from memory it doesn't alter it unless it is directed to

As a specialist in machine learning, yes they do. 

6 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

Thought is the engine of freewill, and if you don't honestly believe that then why are you reading this?

Because I'd rather people didn't misrepresent or misconstrue my worldview. Or if you want more of a distal cause then I'm reading this because of the starting conditions of the universe which set off an inevitable chain of events leading to this moment

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine]

First off I have to say I have the utmost respect for all the people participating in this discussion, I realize looking at my first post I came out swinging a bit too hard, and some of the positions I stated were offensive, and it was never my intent to offend so sorry about that. I really like this discussion and appreciate the opportunity to bounce ideas off of the incredibly nice people here who happen to be some of smartest people I've had the pleasure of interacting with.

I don't think that people who hold to a deterministic view of agency do so for necessarily self serving ends. I realize that some people feel that the explanation supplied by determinism is the best theoretical model for explaining causation and agency, and particularly the actions of organisms capable of sense perception and delayed reactions based on the processing of those stimuli. As a world view, especially the extreme predestined variety where actions are solely the end product of purely mechanical processes and random chance, I do believe it lends itself to those bad actors that wish to distance themselves from the effects of their actions, and it's in this regard that I dislike the application of this philosophy. 

Like you said on one of the first posts of this thread no one here is likely to have their opinion changed about where they come down on the freewill debate, and really I'm not trying to change anyone's mind. I just have my opinions and I like to see other people's opinions and talk about this stuff. I appreciate you taking the time to address the points I brought up, it's not my intent to misrepresent your position and I appreciate your clarifications/objections. 

10 hours ago, Voidus said:

I don't choose what to believe based on utility, I choose based on what I believe to be correct.

That's as it should be, my point though was that irrespective of whether one has true freewill or only labors under the delusional that one has freewill there's a qualitative difference in perception between an actor who has a belief in their own agency and one who thinks that their actions are just an expression of the physical laws governing the universe made manifest in the playing out of their predictable biological processes. 

Your position could very well be the correct one. I just choose to believe that i have the ability to alter my destiny through conscious active choice, because like Dalinar, I choose to believe that if I must fall I will rise each time a better man. That just works for me.

10 hours ago, Voidus said:

How on earth does that follow? Either you're seriously misunderstanding their argument or deliberately pretending to. Believing that choices are deterministic does not in any way predispose one towards something like rolling a dice in order to make decisions, they know what they want to order because their body posseses a unique set of taste buds and neuron configurations that predispose them to a specific flavour and the decision making centers of their brain prime them towards that choice because it will give it the largest chemical reward. It has nothing to do with dice.

Sorry, you are right, that was an oversimplification that I was using for comedic effect. There's an intuitive sense that even small choices like what kind of coffee you order are volitional, but like you said this could merely be an expression of an innate biological tendency. The point I was trying to make (which is an oversimplification for sure) is that if choice really is an illusion and chance is the only thing that governs choice you might as well roll a 20 sided die to make decisions. But like you pointed out, this ignores the biological imperative side of the equation.

10 hours ago, Voidus said:

That's a personal belief, and I'd argue a rather extreme one. I consider plenty of things to be bad that don't have moral agency. Do Viruses 'choose' to invade a human body and wreak havok with it? No, but that's still a bad thing (To me at least)

I'm talking about good and bad in a moral sense, which implies that the actor has the capacity to make a moral judgement and the agency to choose between what the actor believes to be good and bad. It sounds like a tautology, but it really isn't, no one would ascribe the capacity for moral action to the virus in your example, so applying the moral judgement of "bad" to its effects would be misguided. It is only bad in the sense that it is detrimental, that's not the same thing as saying the virus knew that it's rapid proliferation in someone's lungs would harm them and did it anyway, because it chose to be bad.

10 hours ago, Voidus said:

To alter their future actions, also worth noting is that if you want to make this argument then it works both ways. If this deterministic universe 'forced' me to burn down your car, then it also 'forced' the police to arrest me for doing so.

The point of holding people accountable for their actions is to alter their future actions. I agree with this, but it seems like this is introducing a new operational parameter. I see the evolutionary argument that societies are like composite beings with the innate tendency to develop systems and operational parameters that encourage the interactions that maximize benefits for the whole of that society. But this is granting this composite entity the agency that is denied its individual members, and becomes just one more  of the deterministic cages within which freewill is bound. But the story of History is also the story of singular individuals, like Hamrabi, Plato, Lycurgus, Confucius, Lao Tzu, Numa Pamplona, Kant, cromwell, Rousseau, Locke, Liebniz, John Maynard Keynes, Napoleon and many others that had an outsized effect on shaping the dimensions of what society is. Again, this last point is just a critique of the extreme predestined variety of determinism, but I find it hard to believe that nanoseconds after the Big Bang the fact that Sappho, Caesar, Shakespeare, Franz Kafka, and Edna St. Vincent Millay would all live the lives they did was a foregone conclusion, and that given all the initial state variables, the span and  actions of their lives could have been predicted with 100 percent certainty.

10 hours ago, Voidus said:

Predeterminism does not necessarily preclude free will either, I'm also not a huge fan of strawmen as a general rule. Perhaps listen to what determinists are actually saying and respond to that rather than asserting what you think they believe.

I don't get the first statement, how can predeterminisn not preclude freewill, they seem to be by definition antithetical.

I don't like strawman arguments either, most of the time they are built with intentional flaws. I was using that example to show the sheer complexities involved in accounting for all the variables in a given system where a foregone outcome could be expected. To predict an outcome (or at least the probability of an outcome) you have to define a closed system to control for the variables that affect that system. In the extreme predestined variety of determinism it seems to me a hard call to make where you close that system and what time frame of variables you are controlling for. Is the closed system the entire known universe, since the dawn of time? Does it extend into the hypothetical, yet postulated by Quantum Mechanics, N-Dimensional space? How about particles that move faster than the speed of light like neutrinos that hypothetically could be experiencing retrograde time, are they factored into this incredibly complex causal chain too?

10 hours ago, Voidus said:

It's actually just regular causation. Causes lead to effects, causation does not dictate that causes sometimes lead to effects, so long as nothing with free will intervenes.

Totally agree, I was again just speaking to the use of determinism by some to support a foregone conclusion. That type of inverted causation is not inherent in a deterministic worldview it's just a trick that some proponents of deterministic causation use to make their conclusions seem innate and inevitable (like Hegel, who I really like and love reading by the way)

10 hours ago, Voidus said:

That's an opinion, I disagree with it but you're welcome to think so. I'd say that it's still the result from deterministic factors. Are some of those factors the internal chemial, electrical and structural variables in your brain? Yes, but that doesn't change that it's a simple chain of causal events. You may assert some immaterial form of 'will' controlling these events, and that's an inherently unfalsifiable claim so I couldn't categorically state that it's wrong but I don't subscribe to such a belief myself.

Freewill in my opinion functions like Aristotle's Unmoved Mover, it can be a cause in and of itself, unchained to causation, thus breaking the inevitably of deterministic causation. At least that's how I like to think about it. 

10 hours ago, Voidus said:

That has absolutely nothing to do with determinism. The universe could have been created 20 seconds ago by a purple turtle named Fred and I'd still believe it was deterministic. Determinism has no claims about cosmological origins or religion.

Fair enough, but my one question is where can I sign up to become a member of The Church of Fred?

10 hours ago, Voidus said:

I am a subjective moralist as well, but morality is, once again, an entirely different discussion. You can believe in an objective source of morality and still a deterministic universe.

Sorry for the oversimplification, but this does raise an interesting question, from what is the objective morality derived from in a deterministic Universe? Is it the societal level application of utilitarian principles, greatest good for the greatest number, or is it something else? I'm really interested to hear your clarification on this point, because it's one of the main reasons I can't subscribe to the idea of deterministic causation.

If you argue from the standpoint that freewill exists then morality is a very important factor. Whether something is moral or not (correct me if I'm wrong) is based on the intent behind the action and the actor's perception of whether that intent is moral or not. In the predestined variety of determinism, an actor aware of their lack of true volition would seem to be acting in a moral vacuum, realizing the intent behind their action is simply an illusion there action just becomes the necessary outcome of their particular collection of biological imperatives combined with the exigencies of their specific existence, and thus they could argue they bear no responsibility for the result of their actions.

10 hours ago, Voidus said:

People of all philosophies have no difficulties in rationalizing bad actions. You may believe determinists are more prone to this than others, I'd personally dispute that and say that anyone trying to use determinism to rationalize any of their actions is not really believing in a truly deterministic universe. Believing the world is deterministic changes very few of my actions, pretty much just how I respond to these arguments and that's about it.

Well stated, thanks for the clarification. I totally agree about your point that all philosophical system can be turned to rationalize bad actions. My objection to determinism being used as a rationalization for bad actions is the victim mentality that it's often combined with, and the idea that personal actions are beyond one's control. This can lead to a poisonous and self serving cynicism which is really what makes the world a crappy place, not the deterministic worldview itself.

10 hours ago, Voidus said:

As a specialist in machine learning, yes they do.

That's cool brother! I had a buddy that was developing neural networks to comb through news stories to try and pick winning stocks back in 2001, it didn't work but it was a cool idea. Machine learning is a very good point and makes me wonder if in our lifetimes we'll live to see AIs struggling with the same notions of determinism vs. Freewill. That's a good sci-fi story right there.

10 hours ago, Voidus said:

Because I'd rather people didn't misrepresent or misconstrue my worldview. Or if you want more of a distal cause then I'm reading this because of the starting conditions of the universe which set off an inevitable chain of events leading to this moment

Thanks again for your well reasoned replies, I think I have a much better understanding of your position now.

It was really fun reading through your post, and I hope I've done a better job of not misconstruing or misrepresenting your position.

I've got to take a break from the Shard for a bit, alas I'm not laying on a hammock somewhere in the Cyclodes eating grapes with the ability to do nothing but think, the demands of life are starting to pile up.

If you reply to this I'll definitely reply back, but probably not for at least a couple of days.

Edited June 16, 2020 by hoiditthroughthegrapevine

[Voidus]

I enjoy these discussions as well, though I try to be aware that any discussions of personal philosophies like this are easily heated and it can be easy to accidentally overexert when being defensive about ones own points so sorry if I cam across to harsh as well, it seems that as I would hope we're engaging in the topic from a friendly and respectful standpoint.

 

4 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

That's as it should be, my point though was that irrespective of whether one has true freewill or only labors under the delusional that one has freewill there's a qualitative difference in perception between an actor who has a belief in their own agency and one who thinks that their actions are just an expression of the physical laws governing the universe made manifest in the playing out of their predictable biological processes. 

Your position could very well be the correct one. I just choose to believe that i have the ability to alter my destiny through conscious active choice, because like Dalinar, I choose to believe that if I must fall I will rise each time a better man. That just works for me.

I don't really disagree here, while I believe that the world is deterministic in nature I generally act as though it weren't. What I would term the social construct of free will is very useful for bettering all of our lives so I still claim responsibility when I make mistakes (When I can), encourage those who have 'chosen' to do good and chastise those who choose to do bad.

4 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

I'm talking about good and bad in a moral sense, which implies that the actor has the capacity to make a moral judgement and the agency to choose between what the actor believes to be good and bad. It sounds like a tautology, but it really isn't, no one would ascribe the capacity for moral action to the virus in your example, so applying the moral judgement of "bad" to its effects would be misguided. It is only bad in the sense that it is detrimental, that's not the same thing as saying the virus knew that it's rapid proliferation in someone's lungs would harm them and did it anyway, because it chose to be bad.

I don't want to risk devolving this into a semantic argument over morality given that that would be a little off topic so I'll confine myself to saying that I think I understand your point and that I was simply using the terms differently. I'm still not sure if I agree that choice is necessary for moral judgement, but if I start on the topic of morality then I'm likely to dive down a whole different rabbit hole.

4 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

and that given all the initial state variables, the span and  actions of their lives could have been predicted with 100 percent certainty.

The calculations involved would be immeasurably complex and there are the added issues that the quantum realm brings into it, in that certain events at that scale are truly random and so cannot be definitively taken into account. So in the interests of perfect accuracy I'd agree that it's not possible with 100% certainty but I believe the uncertainty comes from inherent randomness in the universe rather than free will. It could be argued that this randomness could occur inside of someone's mind and alter the chemical and electrical conditions to lead them to a different and non-deterministic decision but I would hesitate to call that free will, it's just the random addition of a new variable into the deterministic equation.
So I do believe that exceptional individuals shape society but I would say that the 'choices' that lead them to do so are ultimately just more complicated variants of the person at a coffee shop deciding what to order.

4 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

I don't get the first statement, how can predeterminism not preclude freewill, they seem to be by definition antithetical.

There is a bit of a risk of this devolving to semantics so I'll start by clarifying that by predeterminism I mean the hypothetical ability of events to be known before they happen. The exact overlap here is a little outside of my field as I don't hold both beliefs myself but know many theists do. 
eg. You have the ability to choose what to do, but God already knows which you will choose.

4 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

To predict an outcome (or at least the probability of an outcome) you have to define a closed system to control for the variables that affect that system. In the extreme predestined variety of determinism it seems to me a hard call to make where you close that system and what time frame of variables you are controlling for.

If you wanted to perfectly predict an outcome then yes you'd need to know the conditions of the entire universe and all relevant dimensions. I believe decisions are theoretically predetermined not that a human would ever actually be capable of perfectly calculating the chain of causality. That said on a smaller scale you could approximately predict the chain of events. (eg. if I stab you you will flinch from that pain) but that's always going to be probabilistic rather than a certainty due to incomplete information and insufficient calculation.

5 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

Freewill in my opinion functions like Aristotle's Unmoved Mover, it can be a cause in and of itself, unchained to causation, thus breaking the inevitably of deterministic causation. At least that's how I like to think about it. 

I have no ability to disprove this claim and take no issue with people who subscribe to it, personally I 'd argue that the simpler model of the universe is one without an unobservable (At least objectively) force but Occam's Razor is a guideline not a natural law of the universe so ultimately I couldn't entirely rule it out and it certainly does serve a useful social purpose.

5 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

Fair enough, but my one question is where can I sign up to become a member of The Church of Fred?

I unfortunately lack the time and resources to found the Church of Fred at the moment but keep your eyes on this space and if his purpleish favour should shine upon me then perhaps one day I will

5 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

Sorry for the oversimplification, but this does raise an interesting question, from what is the objective morality derived from in a deterministic Universe?

That's a very interesting question that I hadn't considered actually. I'm not an adherent of objective morality myself so it's difficult to weigh in here, I suppose I'd been thinking about a source of morality that exists outside of the universe and so while the universe if imagined as a closed system is deterministic this hypothetical outside source would not be. It's not impossible I suppose to believe that some deterministic being or rule is the objective source of morality but I don't know of anyone who genuinely believes this.
I may revise my point to say that it is possible to believe that humans don't have free will but that some external source of morality exists. But a lack of free will is not necessarily a deterministic universe so I was perhaps mistaken in my earlier remark. (I kind of feel like I'm reverting to an overly formal manner of speech but that's force of habit mostly so apologies if I come across as preachy or something, it's not my intention)

5 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

In the predestined variety of determinism, an actor aware of their lack of true volition would seem to be acting in a moral vacuum, realizing the intent behind their action is simply an illusion there action just becomes the necessary outcome of their particular collection of biological imperatives combined with the exigencies of their specific existence, and thus they could argue they bear no responsibility for the result of their actions.

Moral discussions are always tricky without endlessly regressing into definitions but I suppose it depends on how exactly you define morals. I personally don't believe there is a set of objective morality in the world, but I also believe that altruistic acts can still paradoxically be selfish. Most people who would be described as altruists will comment that doing good for other people feels good, which begs the question of are they truly altruistic?
I believe that in an ultimate moral sense we are only accountable to ourselves but as a society we are all individually predisposed to hold others to account for actions that harm that society.
It's a difficult discussion but I hope I've made my own stance clear at least.

5 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

Well stated, thanks for the clarification. I totally agree about your point that all philosophical system can be turned to rationalize bad actions. My objection to determinism being used as a rationalization for bad actions is the victim mentality that it's often combined with, and the idea that personal actions are beyond one's control. This can lead to a poisonous and self serving cynicism which is really what makes the world a crappy place, not the deterministic worldview itself.

I do understand this reasoning but yeah I'd say the chain of causation is probably the other way, some horrible people will cling to a deterministic worldview in order to justify to themselves what they've already done, but I don't believe people do things like that because of their philosophical views, or at least not often. I'd also again say that those people tend to be using the philosophy as a shield to defend themselves either from their own conscience or from the criticism of others, it's not necessarily a genuinely held belief.

5 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

That's cool brother! I had a buddy that was developing neural networks to comb through news stories to try and pick winning stocks back in 2001, it didn't work but it was a cool idea. Machine learning is a very good point and makes me wonder if in our lifetimes we'll live to see AIs struggling with the same notions of determinism vs. Freewill. That's a good sci-fi story right there.

It's an interesting time to be alive certainly, General Intelligence seems a long way off still but all it takes is the right discovery and progress can rocket forward so who knows what the future brings. My work is one of the reasons I enjoy these kinds of discussions, it really does make you think about it.

5 hours ago, hoiditthroughthegrapevine said:

Thanks again for your well reasoned replies, I think I have a much better understanding of your position now.

It was really fun reading through your post, and I hope I've done a better job of not misconstruing or misrepresenting your position.

Likewise, it's always a pleasure to speak about these topics respectfully and thoughtfully. I apologize if I came across as too defensive, it seems I misinterpreted deliberate exaggeration for misinterpretation and we humans are a weird bunch who tend to feel personally attacked when we feel like our beliefs are challenged, it can be troubling to repress that urge sometimes. Thanks for taking the time to talk, hope the demands of life don't prove too strenuous.

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine]

Turns out I have a little bit of time this morning, thanks for your replies, I feel now like I understand more of the nuances of your position, and I can see why you would ascribe to determinism. You really made some excellent points, and this has been a fun discussion.

3 hours ago, Voidus said:

I don't really disagree here, while I believe that the world is deterministic in nature I generally act as though it weren't. What I would term the social construct of free will is very useful for bettering all of our lives so I still claim responsibility when I make mistakes (When I can), encourage those who have 'chosen' to do good and chastise those who choose to do bad.

Very interesting, so if I take your point, the illusion of freewill performs a corrective function and is a feature of the deterministic system. Don't know if this analogy is appropriate, so correct me if I'm wrong, but it would basically be like the self-examing subroutine in a neural network that assigns weighted points to other subroutines to prioritize some actions that better achieve their goal (in this case better at doing "good" actions) and deprioritize the actions that are failing to achieve their goal (still better at doing "good" actions). That's super interesting and possibly the basis for AI morality. I like it!

3 hours ago, Voidus said:

I don't want to risk devolving this into a semantic argument over morality given that that would be a little off topic so I'll confine myself to saying that I think I understand your point and that I was simply using the terms differently.

Fair enough, it seems that most of the History of the discussion of Metaphysics is really just a debate about the meaning of the word being, and confusion over the subject object relationship. If I want to untangle the written equivalent of a Blacksmith puzzle, I'll try to follow Kant's arguments in the Prolegomena for a page or two. 

3 hours ago, Voidus said:

There is a bit of a risk of this devolving to semantics so I'll start by clarifying that by predeterminism I mean the hypothetical ability of events to be known before they happen. The exact overlap here is a little outside of my field as I don't hold both beliefs myself but know many theists do. 
eg. You have the ability to choose what to do, but God already knows which you will choose.

Ah, I finally see what you mean with this one, I think that a lot of the problem stemmed from the fact that I was using predeterminisn in the Omniscient Omnipresent powers of God way, when you really don't ascribe the same powers to the great casual chain of deterministic being. I also was still arguing from the standpoint of "what's the utility" of this knowledge, when I think your stance is akin to "this is just how the universe works". I think this was my biggest misunderstanding/misrepresentation  of your position.

3 hours ago, Voidus said:

I unfortunately lack the time and resources to found the Church of Fred at the moment but keep your eyes on this space and if his purpleish favour should shine upon me then perhaps one day I will

Rad brother, when that purple light comes shining I can design the t-shirts. I'm picturing the World on the back of the purple turtle, who is surrounded by glory lines like the golden starburst seen behind Christ's head in old paintings, with the turtle balanced on a 20 sided die. I know that's an oversimplification, but that would be an awesome shirt.

3 hours ago, Voidus said:

It's not impossible I suppose to believe that some deterministic being or rule is the objective source of morality but I don't know of anyone who genuinely believes this.

Another good sci-fi story Idea, about the being outside the deterministic Universe that is the source of emmanations of moral imperatives that permeate the closed deterministic universe. Maybe the particles that distribute this force for good could be called goodons, and their anti-particle could be called badons.

3 hours ago, Voidus said:

(I kind of feel like I'm reverting to an overly formal manner of speech but that's force of habit mostly so apologies if I come across as preachy or something, it's not my intention)

Don't worry about it, you sound the opposite of preachy. After I reread my original posts I saw that their tone could be construed as flippant and belittling, so I removed the comedic asides. Also when formulating a precise argument it's natural to adopt a more formal tone because nuance exists in the technical details. This debate has been nothing but fun!

3 hours ago, Voidus said:

I personally don't believe there is a set of objective morality in the world, but I also believe that altruistic acts can still paradoxically be selfish. Most people who would be described as altruists will comment that doing good for other people feels good, which begs the question of are they truly altruistic?

It seems like this would be similar to the illusion of freewill, if the illusion of altruism is a benefit to society, in that it encourages actions that are beneficial, then it's a force for good. I think where this can go off of the rails is when people who labor under the delusion that they are altruistic try to make other people feel bad because of their lack of this virtue, and the twin vices of Vanity projected to belittle and Sanctimonious rear their horrible heads.

It seems that a deterministic system should be agnostic to the motivations involved in the actions themselves, if someone does good for bad reasons the effect is still good, and likewise is someone does bad actions for good reasons the effect is still bad. You can remove the moral dimension by substituting beneficial for good and detrimental for bad, but again I am probably missing a subtle point here.

3 hours ago, Voidus said:

Likewise, it's always a pleasure to speak about these topics respectfully and thoughtfully. I apologize if I came across as too defensive, it seems I misinterpreted deliberate exaggeration for misinterpretation and we humans are a weird bunch who tend to feel personally attacked when we feel like our beliefs are challenged, it can be troubling to repress that urge sometimes. Thanks for taking the time to talk, hope the demands of life don't prove too strenuous.

It's been a fun time, you represent your position incredibly well and I think I have a much better grasp on what you mean by determinism.

And just to quote Martin Short playing the McCarthy aid Nathan Thurm on SNL "I’m not being defensive! You’re the one who’s being defensive! Why is it always the other person who’s being defensive? Have you ever asked yourself that? Why don’t you ask yourself that?"

I still think that if you think about thought, and particularly it's special property to be its own object of thought, determinism might not exist in this special recursive loop. But then again from where does this thought about thought arise? Interesting to think about for sure.

Edited June 16, 2020 by hoiditthroughthegrapevine

[danex]

Well this has been an interesting thread to read, and I’ve decided to give my 2 cents. First off, I’ve never thought about any of this before, not really. I’m just a kid in high school, haven’t exactly been rigorously studying ancient philosophy. Basically all of my ideas and information on this debate have come from this thread. So in a way, you could view my choice as choosing the winner of the argument, since I’ve had almost no outside information presented to me. I’m joking of course, if anything that would only prove which side had the better persuasive writers. Unless we live in a deterministic universe, in which case it proves absolutely nothing, as my choice wasn’t actually a choice.

Anyway, I think I’ve decided to believe in free-will. Mainly because I felt that the arguments pro-free made more sense, but I did come up with a few ideas of my own while reading all of this. So, a Deterministic Universe operates under the idea that all of my choices could be predicted before I do them, given enough information. There’s this classic idea in math relating to infinity, where it’s impossible to list all the numbers between 0 and 1. I could always go diagonally down the list, taking one number at a time, and end up with something that is not on the list. I figure this idea can somewhat be transferred over to this debate. Say you have a sufficiently powerful computer, that has predicted every thing I might do in a given scenario. I could look at that list, take one minuscule element from each possibility, and do that thing instead. Theoretically, the computer wouldn’t have predicted that. I’m sure this is completely flawed reasoning, I’ve already spotted some holes in it myself, but that’s what came to my mind while reading so I thought I’d share.

I do think that even if Free Will can not necessarily be proven, it can be proven that we don’t live in a truly Deterministic universe. All those sub-atomic random events that someone was talking about earlier, they will add up eventually. Even with an infinitely powerful computer, you couldn’t perfectly predict what today would look like if you started the simulation at the Big Bang. Those random events would stack up enough over billions and billions of years, and the computer wouldn’t be able to perfectly determine what the present looked like. 

Again, I’m literally just a high-schooler, but I thought that that might make my viewpoint somewhat interesting. A first-timer to this infamous debate. Feel free to ask me some questions I guess, if you want to try and convert me the other way, or if you want to see my first impressions on a different way of thinking.

Edited September 22, 2020 by Danex

[Kidpen]

10 hours ago, Danex said:

Well this has been an interesting thread to read, and I’ve decided to give my 2 cents. First off, I’ve never thought about any of this before, not really. I’m just a kid in high school, haven’t exactly been rigorously studying ancient philosophy. Basically all of my ideas and information on this debate have come from this thread. So in a way, you could view my choice as choosing the winner of the argument, since I’ve had almost no outside information presented to me. I’m joking of course, if anything that would only prove which side had the better persuasive writers. Unless we live in a deterministic universe, in which case it proves absolutely nothing, as my choice wasn’t actually a choice.

Anyway, I think I’ve decided to believe in free-will. Mainly because I felt that the arguments pro-free made more sense, but I did come up with a few ideas of my own while reading all of this. So, a Deterministic Universe operates under the idea that all of my choices could be predicted before I do them, given enough information. There’s this classic idea in math relating to infinity, where it’s impossible to list all the numbers between 0 and 1. I could always go diagonally down the list, taking one number at a time, and end up with something that is not on the list. I figure this idea can somewhat be transferred over to this debate. Say you have a sufficiently powerful computer, that has predicted every thing I might do in a given scenario. I could look at that list, take one minuscule element from each possibility, and do that thing instead. Theoretically, the computer wouldn’t have predicted that. I’m sure this is completely flawed reasoning, I’ve already spotted some holes in it myself, but that’s what came to my mind while reading so I thought I’d share.

I do think that even if Free Will can not necessarily be proven, it can be proven that we don’t live in a truly Deterministic universe. All those sub-atomic random events that someone was talking about earlier, they will add up eventually. Even with an infinitely powerful computer, you couldn’t perfectly predict what today would look like if you started the simulation at the Big Bang. Those random events would stack up enough over billions and billions of years, and the computer wouldn’t be able to perfectly determine what the present looked like. 

Again, I’m literally just a high-schooler, but I thought that that might make my viewpoint somewhat interesting. A first-timer to this infamous debate. Feel free to ask me some questions I guess, if you want to try and convert me the other way, or if you want to see my first impressions on a different way of thinking.

As someone who hasn't read any of this thread except for this post, the main problem is that your definition of determinism doesn't seem to be the standard. Even if some events are determined by random chance, that still isn't your choice, right? I've never seen anyone say that determinism is when you can predict all of your choices before you make them.

Like, fundamentally the two options are 

1. The universe is set in stone from the beginning and none of our decisions could have ever been any different.
Or
2. Some of the decisions we make are decided entirely by random chance.

It seems to me that both of these fall under the label of determinism. I considered myself a compatiblist until recently, but now I'm mostly just not completely sure.

Edit: Hmm. Guess I'm just repeating almost the same thing as my post earlier in this thread. Oh well,

Edited September 22, 2020 by Kidpen

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine]

Who knew that philosophical debates could have Prog Rock soundtracks?

Well, Rush has decided the question once and for all with their catchy little number that they *chose* to call Free Will.

Ah Geddy Lee,
with what clarity didst thou see,
the choicless chasm of forlorn dejection,
with subtle art you hath voiced thy rejection.
The ignorant rail and wail still,
but you have chosen to choose Free Will.
 

 

Edited September 23, 2020 by hoiditthroughthegrapevine

[FriarFritz]

I would love to join this discussion at some point in the near future, but in the meantime, here's a link to a similar discussion that apparently happened on the CivFanatics forums: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/is-langtons-ant-deterministic-does-langtons-ant-have-free-will.214305/ The really interesting thing here is the question of whether free will and determinism are necessarily equivalent.

[Shawn Malpass]

Free will is always a moot point.

[MacThorstenson]

4 hours ago, Shawn Malpass said:

Free will is always a moot point.

Please do not comment on old threads.