Re: Free will is an illusion....?
Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2012 7:59 am
mockbee wrote:
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I miss my little guy............. :cona:
The Jane's Addiction Discussion Forum
http://aintnoright.org/
mockbee wrote:
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I miss my little guy............. :cona:
wow you were close to my place. i am about a 15 minute walk from there, or 5 minutes in the car if that. in the future, i would suggest King Falafel on Bathurst, right by Eglinton. It's not very nice inside but the food is fantastic! It's run by some Moroccan ladies. Really good shwarma and to die for baklava.it's done a little bit differently in the form of a roll instead of the typical triangle/diamond shape.Pure Method wrote:(actually, Artemis, I was briefly in your neighborhood, Spedina and Eglinton, a couple blocks from Casa Loma dropping off a friend - I would have reached out but we were literally only there for 45 minutes. Ate at a place called mashu mashu. very middle of the road falafel. FYC [where c = curiosity] I was camping in Algonquin Park).
Artemis wrote:
wow you were close to my place. i am about a 15 minute walk from there, or 5 minutes in the car if that. in the future, i would suggest King Falafel on Bathurst, right by Eglinton. It's not very nice inside but the food is fantastic! It's run by some Moroccan ladies. Really good shwarma and to die for baklava.it's done a little bit differently in the form of a roll instead of the typical triangle/diamond shape.
hope you had fun camping. i heard algonquin is really dry this year - no fires allowed.
I don't understand the 'but' you employ at the start of your second sentence. Do you take 'it's all chemicals' and environmental/cultural effects to be distinct? Why? To me they are one and the same thing conceived on a larger or smaller scale. The presence of lead in the environment of a fetus born before unleaded gasoline was mandatory just *is* the cause of the chemical reality inside the skull. So what?Pure Method wrote:Proceeding to my query: in that review of Dr. Harris' book, the reviewer explicitly states that "it's all chemicals" in reference to choice, consciousness, free will and the like. BUT CLEARLY, we have been arguing how circumstance, environment, and thus, culture have a massive effect on the brain's development, and more obviously from an outsider's perspective, the pattern of thought employed by an individual.
No. It all does. All science is deterministic, in the sense that it seeks explanation via mechanism. Without mechanism, science has nothing. Any purported neuroscience that doesn't seek a mechanism for consciousness is not doing neuroscience but engaging in speculative nonsense.So, as Malabou argues, some neuroscience has an emphasis on a determinist understanding of the development of consciousness
It's malleable even if we don't do those things. It's malleable with medication and physical activity too. I don't see how this matters.though, since we (as a society, not as individuals) have the ability to change massively influential factors through voting (theoretically) and policy (say, eliminating housing projects and promoting true mixed use/income development) - consciousness is malleable.
Yes, our consciousnesses are malleable. (Why were you speaking in first-person plural there?)Is our consciousness malleable? If our environment greatly affects the way we think and act, then must we accept that patterns of thought and deed are not, in fact, set in stone, but open to possible amendment?
We largely agree, it just appeared that you took there to be a dilemma between a fatalistic outlook if there's no free will (we're doomed to be killers, or stupid, or whatever) and some sort of neat trick we can pull with culture where we can exorcise ourselves from cruel fate by changing environments, even if biology can't change. The problem I saw there, aside from the conflation of fatalism and determinism (which I'm glad to see you now see) is also that it seems to retain a kind of explanatory and causal dualism (on the one hand, social causes/explanations; on the other, chemical) -- and this is also highly problematic. Once you introduce any kind of stark distinction like that, you either commit to arbitrariness (and thus inexplicability) or to some sort of non-arbitrary difference in kind, which would prevent cross-talk between the two domains. Either result is troubling.Pure Method wrote:Thanks for the response, Hype. I wasn't necessarily trying to argue against anything you said, per se, and clearly I somewhat bungled the meaning of determinism (think I'm clear on it now, things are determined as in, there is a logical explanatory reason for their being). I just wanted it out in the open in this conversation, that though insane people like Holmes and the like exist, and though for some, no positive change may be achieved/achievable, all is not lost. There's a tremendous amount of possibility in the mind - or something to that effect, was my intended point.
Adurentibus Spina wrote:We largely agree, it just appeared that you took there to be a dilemma between a fatalistic outlook if there's no free will (we're doomed to be killers, or stupid, or whatever) and some sort of neat trick we can pull with culture where we can exorcise ourselves from cruel fate by changing environments, even if biology can't change. The problem I saw there, aside from the conflation of fatalism and determinism (which I'm glad to see you now see) is also that it seems to retain a kind of explanatory and causal dualism (on the one hand, social causes/explanations; on the other, chemical) -- and this is also highly problematic. Once you introduce any kind of stark distinction like that, you either commit to arbitrariness (and thus inexplicability) or to some sort of non-arbitrary difference in kind, which would prevent cross-talk between the two domains. Either result is troubling.Pure Method wrote:Thanks for the response, Hype. I wasn't necessarily trying to argue against anything you said, per se, and clearly I somewhat bungled the meaning of determinism (think I'm clear on it now, things are determined as in, there is a logical explanatory reason for their being). I just wanted it out in the open in this conversation, that though insane people like Holmes and the like exist, and though for some, no positive change may be achieved/achievable, all is not lost. There's a tremendous amount of possibility in the mind - or something to that effect, was my intended point.
It depends on what you want to do with the information... it's helpful to know that no amount of AA "environment-jiggering" (that is what the 12 steps are, after all) will help the 80% of alcoholics AA doesn't appear to help (nor the 20% it does appear to help, but whose numbers are exactly the same as the percentage of folks who manage to stay sober without AA).Pure Method wrote:Adurentibus Spina wrote:We largely agree, it just appeared that you took there to be a dilemma between a fatalistic outlook if there's no free will (we're doomed to be killers, or stupid, or whatever) and some sort of neat trick we can pull with culture where we can exorcise ourselves from cruel fate by changing environments, even if biology can't change. The problem I saw there, aside from the conflation of fatalism and determinism (which I'm glad to see you now see) is also that it seems to retain a kind of explanatory and causal dualism (on the one hand, social causes/explanations; on the other, chemical) -- and this is also highly problematic. Once you introduce any kind of stark distinction like that, you either commit to arbitrariness (and thus inexplicability) or to some sort of non-arbitrary difference in kind, which would prevent cross-talk between the two domains. Either result is troubling.Pure Method wrote:Thanks for the response, Hype. I wasn't necessarily trying to argue against anything you said, per se, and clearly I somewhat bungled the meaning of determinism (think I'm clear on it now, things are determined as in, there is a logical explanatory reason for their being). I just wanted it out in the open in this conversation, that though insane people like Holmes and the like exist, and though for some, no positive change may be achieved/achievable, all is not lost. There's a tremendous amount of possibility in the mind - or something to that effect, was my intended point.
Okay, I think I see what you'r saying. Rather than divide explanations into subcategories such as social class versus chemical processes in an individual's brain, it is better to simply speak of "causes" -the exact kind, locality, etc. being irrelevant.
Your post just made me go back and re-read the thread, and now I'm a little bit embarassed about how I handled LJF. I might have been drunk for some of those posts, but I'd handle things very differently now. I think posting on these boards all those years may actually have been one of the things that helped me learn how to better communicate difficult ideas to different kinds of people.Pure Method wrote: ↑Sat Sep 14, 2019 2:23 pmA little embarrassed to read my questions/arguments from way back when (I was not a coherent writer), but wow! hype, thanks for being so generous with your time.
Yeah, I still hold basically the same view about free will that I did then. One thing that did change, maybe, is that I think we need to say more about the fatalistic / nihilistic upshot of all of this. This is what LJF was pressing -- and it's what many philosophers have worried about. If there's no free will, then there seems to be no responsibility, and indeed no point in trying to do anything. Meaning in life is very important. This (relationship between causal necessity and purpose in life) is something that I ended up concluding in my dissertation research, and which my post-doctoral research is now partially focused on.mockbee wrote: ↑Sat Sep 14, 2019 6:48 am
Interesting. I see. I think you haven't budged on this point since last discussion 7 yeats ago. I respect that.
Do you think philosophers should be cooperating in these studies, or do you see them as pawns?
Do your mentors/respected academics agree with your view, that neueroscience should not be used to prove or disprove the idea of free will?
Is "presence of Free Will" the correct terminology to be used here to describing the crux of what you are personally working on, or is this a tangent?
Sorry for all the Qs, this os really interesting to me and I think you have brought much clarity to the subject. Also, yiu may feel yiu have covered some/all of this before but reiterations always help.
And finally, how have you beem doing?
Code: Select all
Free will: compatibilism, libertarianism, or no free will?
Accept or lean toward: compatibilism 550 / 931 (59.1%)
Other 139 / 931 (14.9%)
Accept or lean toward: libertarianism 128 / 931 (13.7%)
Accept or lean toward: no free will 114 / 931 (12.2%)
You shouldn't be embarrassed, you were what late teens, early twenties?Pure Method wrote: ↑Sat Sep 14, 2019 2:23 pmA little embarrassed to read my questions/arguments from way back when (I was not a coherent writer), but wow! hype, thanks for being so generous with your time.
I don't see why having no free will and finding meaning in the things you do can't go hand in hand.
I think neuroscience is the "science" of guessing. We know nothing about the brain, the stuff we "know" can't be proven. I don't think we'll ever understand it. Anyone see any breakthroughs when it comes to Alzheimers, Parkinson, psychiatric illnesses etc? No. There has been none, we don't know how to treat any of that stuff. Forget it, it's too difficult.I also think that since neuroscience is the science of the brain, that's where we should look for explanations of the mechanisms by which beings with brains function.
These are good thoughts.Matz wrote: ↑Mon Sep 16, 2019 3:24 amI don't see why having no free will and finding meaning in the things you do can't go hand in hand.
I think neuroscience is the "science" of guessing. We know nothing about the brain, the stuff we "know" can't be proven. I don't think we'll ever understand it. Anyone see any breakthroughs when it comes to Alzheimers, Parkinson, psychiatric illnesses etc? No. There has been none, we don't know how to treat any of that stuff. Forget it, it's too difficult.I also think that since neuroscience is the science of the brain, that's where we should look for explanations of the mechanisms by which beings with brains function.
Yes, it seems nihilistic.Hype wrote: ↑Mon Sep 16, 2019 8:19 amThese are good thoughts.Matz wrote: ↑Mon Sep 16, 2019 3:24 amI don't see why having no free will and finding meaning in the things you do can't go hand in hand.
I think neuroscience is the "science" of guessing. We know nothing about the brain, the stuff we "know" can't be proven. I don't think we'll ever understand it. Anyone see any breakthroughs when it comes to Alzheimers, Parkinson, psychiatric illnesses etc? No. There has been none, we don't know how to treat any of that stuff. Forget it, it's too difficult.I also think that since neuroscience is the science of the brain, that's where we should look for explanations of the mechanisms by which beings with brains function.
I agree with your first point. Of course most of us actually do have meaning in our lives. That's why we care about things and do things and keep going and undergo suffering and so forth. For many people, religion (or family tradition, or family more generally) is the main source of purpose. For others it might be knowledge (science), or art, or humanitarian work. There are probably as many sources of meaning as there are people (maybe more). There are also people who lose (or have never had) hope and purpose. Many of these people are at risk of suicide or doing very dangerous or bad things. Some people are born into incredibly wretched circumstances, and many of them find hope and a way to continue, but some don't. We might think of those who are susceptible to terrorism or violent religiosity as particularly nihilistic people -- they latch onto extreme views as a source of meaning, perhaps because ordinary sources of meaning aren't cutting it, or aren't available.
So, I don't think the question of whether lack of free will and meaning are compatible in the broadest sense is that interesting. The answer seems to be obviously yes. But some philosophers (including Dan Dennett, as I wrote years ago), are worried about what would happen if we tell most people that they don't have free will. There seems to be something important about seeing your life as your own, and as determined by the choices you make in a way that is in some sense "of your own making" and "up to you", rather than already determined by the physics of the universe. This is what Nietzsche writes about in a lot of his work on nihilism: if God is dead, then Christian morality should go with it too, and then we're left with no source of purpose and no clear overwhelming reason to check our behaviour. His answer is the existentialist one: make our own meaning, make our own morality, etc., so that we don't wallow in self-absorbed nihilism. But I think this can't quite work. This view relies (as Sartre argues) on seeing one's self as free to make oneself. If we have no free will, then we are not absolutely free to make ourselves. The extent to which we can find meaning and purpose in life depends on how our lives have gone, and who we are, and what our brains are like. Some people are attracted to tradition and religion and family, or sports, or art, or intellectual pursuits. But it's not clear that everyone can do this.
The harder problems seem to me to arise when we think about how to change people's minds about what matters most. Moral and political views are very important, even for people who don't consider themselves political. Socially, huge amounts of harm are done when people find meaning in hateful ideology or destructive impulses. Governments, NGOs, priests, parents, teachers, social workers, etc., are all concerned with trying to prevent and solve social ills, and aid victims of bad actions. If there is no free will, then it starts to look very difficult to actually change anything, since if something changes, it had to change, and if it doesn't change, it couldn't, regardless of what we want. What we need to try to understand is what to do with benevolent desires in a deterministic world, where we might see how things will necessarily go (and either see that we will succeed, or see that we can't succeed), or can't see how things will go (and so be unable to know for sure how they will go). The latter seems to be the best hope for doing things we think are important, regardless of how the universe is determined to go. But this would mean it's better to be ignorant about the future? That can't be right. It can't be that ignorance about the future is the source of motivation for people to try to do good things in the world. Surely the better we understand things, the better chance we have of making them go best. This seems right, and yet in many cases the better we understand a situation, the more we realize that there is nothing we can do. And what should we do then? Nothing? Doesn't this seem nihilistic?
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On the question of neuroscience: I agree that there is very little well understood about the human brain. But it's not true that we don't understand anything about it, and it's not true that we're just guessing. Just because there haven't been any "breakthroughs" in certain specific neurological conditions, by your estimation, doesn't mean we don't understand aspects of those conditions very well. We know, for instance, that L-dopa helps Parkinson's patients retain some mobility, for some time, but unfortunately L-dopa doesn't work forever. The lack of a better treatment doesn't mean we're just guessing, it just means that it's really difficult. It's interesting that your last sentence suggests the inverse of your first one: in the first, you admit that free will doesn't necessarily mean we can't have meaning in life; in the second, you seem to suggest that our seemingly intractable ignorance about the brain makes it pointless to continue to try to understand it -- in your words: 'it's too difficult'. But is that right? Why?
Matz, you can think whatever you want, but it is "a conflict."Matz wrote: ↑Tue Sep 17, 2019 11:25 am
But when all that's said I don't see a conflict when I write that I think that having no free will and having meaning in ones life can go hand in hand and write that neuroscientists should shut down research (like I said, it shouldn't be taken completely literally) because they probably waste their time. If I think a person is doing something stupid it's ok for me to point it out and think that we can have no free will and have meaning in our lives at the same time.
Your point has a general plausibility because of how causal attributions work in medicine, but in this case it's absolutely false. The mechanism of action for the molecule is well understood, and its clinical effect is profound. I also want to suggest being a bit more careful making off the cuff statistical claims like your last sentence. That's not how clinical significance is determined, and it would be a bit absurd if it were, since "get better" is not even necessarily the point of a drug, and is a vague description. Medical research of this sort generally requires clear concepts like measurable reduction of some level of some protein or hormone or whatever.The L-dopa could be just a placebo effect like you, probably, see with lots of people taking antidepressants. Unless over 90% of the people taking it get better, then there's probably something to it.
You're probably right. I'm out of my depth here, the only philosophy book I own is Philosophy for dummies, and I haven't even read all of it, you two better handle this free will stuff. I'll go back to commenting on Dave's hair and stuffmockbee wrote: ↑Tue Sep 17, 2019 12:22 pmMatz, you can think whatever you want, but it is "a conflict."Matz wrote: ↑Tue Sep 17, 2019 11:25 am
But when all that's said I don't see a conflict when I write that I think that having no free will and having meaning in ones life can go hand in hand and write that neuroscientists should shut down research (like I said, it shouldn't be taken completely literally) because they probably waste their time. If I think a person is doing something stupid it's ok for me to point it out and think that we can have no free will and have meaning in our lives at the same time.
I think you are completely disregarding the elemental function of striving. Without the intent to strive, there is nothing.