Is free will an emergent property of the human brain?

[Iacchus32]

Originally posted by Mentat
If there is no present moment, then all that has changed is a few people's perception of the Universe as though it existed in "slices" of time.

I think everything which is alive lives for the moment. Otherwise at what point are we going to know we exist?

 

[Bernardo]

Indeed. That's why I say that "the present is an illusion". It exists only in our mind, and is nothing but a biased notion that serves a purpose (that of satisfying current needs now, and long-term needs later).

No it can't be an illusion. Illusions vanish with inspection. They are false. The present, while in our perception, is real. This is where all we are functions. It is where I type this post and you read it, where you feel joy, or get angry, or run the perfect 100m race. The present is where our "rubber meets the road".

So I'm back to my previous statement;
There can be no denying of the present. It's all we have - where we dwell - our own eternity.

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by Iacchus32
I think everything which is alive lives for the moment. Otherwise at what point are we going to know we exist?

At no point, why must everything exist in "points"? Can not our realization of our own existence exist "smeared" over a certain period of time?

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by Bernardo
No it can't be an illusion. Illusions vanish with inspection. They are false.

Exactly. After having futher inspected the issue, via this thread, has the present not been shown to be an illusion?

The present, while in our perception, is real. This is where all we are functions. It is where I type this post and you read it, where you feel joy, or get angry, or run the perfect 100m race. The present is where our "rubber meets the road".

And yet it took me many milliseconds (in fact, almost a whole second) to read what you wrote, and then another few seconds to think of exactly how to word the response that you are now reading.

So I'm back to my previous statement;
There can be no denying of the present. It's all we have - where we dwell - our own eternity.

And yet I have denied the present, and have presented logical reason to believe that I'm right. That doesn't mean that I am right, merely that I've presented a case that contradicts yours, and you haven't countered it.

 

[Iacchus32]

Originally posted by Mentat
At no point, why must everything exist in "points"? Can not our realization of our own existence exist "smeared" over a certain period of time?

Consider the point where the tape meets the heads on a CD cassette recorder. Granted the medium (tape) is continuous but, there is only one point at which the recording can occcur (the heads).

Thus it would suffice to say, our perception is very much like the heads of a tape recorder.

 

[Canute]

Originally posted by Iacchus32
Consider the point where the tape meets the heads on a CD cassette recorder. Granted the medium (tape) is continuous but, there is only one point at which the recording can occcur (the heads).

Thus it would suffice to say, our perception is very much like the heads of a tape recorder.

There are a range of points at which the tape meets the head. We have no way of constructing 'one point'. In fact there may be no such thing as one point.

 

[Bernardo]

Originally posted by Mentat
Interesting. If there was a present, an actual present, then much of science would be invalidated (since a lot of it requires constant travel along the axis of time)

If there is no present then I wonder what exactly is 'traveling' along this axis?

Truthfully though, I can honestly see your point. Everything we process in our mind is already gone. I can't argue against this because it is factual.

But...

I also believe there comes a time (pardon my use of this word) when pure analytical descriptions of the world don't do the everyday experience of our world justice because simply walking to the video store or ordering pizza contains a present. "What's up?" is a phrase we use all the time to inquire about the present experience someone is having. Human social conduct is rooted in the application of a very real present tense.

While your argument is very valid, I also believe for all practical purposes - the present cannot be denied.

 

[Canute]

Is the argument here basically about whether time is a continuum or a series of 'instants'?

If it is a series of instants then there is a present instant. But if it is a continuum then there isn't a present instant, there is just a subjective 'quantisation' of an unquantised variable.

Is that the underlying issue?

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by Bernardo
If there is no present then I wonder what exactly is 'traveling' along this axis?

Everything is, but - as per Relativity theory - not all at the same speeds. Therefore, the present must be smeared out over long periods of time, and must therefore not really exist in the sense that we usually think of it. At the same time, there could be a smallest incriment of time, but this would probably be at the Planck scale - at which point a second would seem like an eternity.

But...

I also believe there comes a time (pardon my use of this word) when pure analytical descriptions of the world don't do the everyday experience of our world justice because simply walking to the video store or ordering pizza contains a present. "What's up?" is a phrase we use all the time to inquire about the present experience someone is having. Human social conduct is rooted in the application of a very real present tense.

While your argument is very valid, I also believe for all practical purposes - the present cannot be denied.

Remember my response to Iacchus, when he asked why it is that we are always aware of a "present tense"? I said it is probably an evolutionary "trick" that forces us to pay more attention to current necessities than to far-off goals. Even without the existence of a "present" (the kind that the specious present tricks us into believing in) there is still a distinct difference between "current" or "recent" and "far-off" or "future".

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by Canute
Is the argument here basically about whether time is a continuum or a series of 'instants'?

Not exactly. It's more about whether the "specious present" says anything about reality as a whole. IOW, is there a point in time where I thought about pizza, or is that an event smeared out over time?

 

[Bernardo]

Originally posted by Mentat
. . .is there a point in time where I thought about pizza, or is that an event smeared out over time?

Of course there is, it's called the present.

Would the chain of events that took place happen without that thought? The origin of this particular 'event chain' occurred on it's own. How can a series of events begin without something to begin with?

The thought, "I want pizza", was initiated by your bodies examination of it's current condition of hunger. Your mind is able to

-harness this incoming information (present condition),
-knowledge from the past (where you got good pizza before)
-manipulate the current environment (phone the order in)
-to produce a satisfying result in the future (it arrives).

All this by using the present as a pivot point.

 

[Iacchus32]

Originally posted by Canute
There are a range of points at which the tape meets the head. We have no way of constructing 'one point'. In fact there may be no such thing as one point.

This is merly an argument for what is "relative." For example, if you took the point of a needle and magnified it 100,000 times under an electron microscope, it would certainly look different than the point of the needle you just pierced your hand with via the aid of the naked eye.

So, at what point does the point become a point? Obviously when it serves its "effective purpose" of being a point.

 

[Zantra]

Originally posted by Canute
Freewill is a big problem. If we have freewill the current scientific model is wrong, for the universe is not causally closed as science assumes. Also it would mean that consciousness is causal which, unless you believe that consciousness is material, is in direct conflict with science.

Yet if we do not have freewill we have to scrap our legal system, and will have a hard time explaining feelings of guilt. One might also ask how come we are never taken by surprise by what we do?

If consciousness is not causal then we must assume that we can tell the future. Otherwise there would be no explanation for how we can know that we've decided to do something tomorrow and actually do it when the time comes.

It's a logical minefield.

On feelings of guilt. This is a natural biochemical response to actions which may be beyond our control. It's much the same way that we have remorse and fear over death. It's a part of our natural process, but we still experience feelings of regret over it. Just because something is inheirent, doesn't automatically preclude emotional response over it.

 

[Zantra]

OK first to the perception of "the present". We must ultimately concede that the term "present" is a subjective word, and not objective. For further clarification I'd refer to the ancient greek story abou the rabbit and the tortoise. (demacules was it?) If the turle started first, but the rabbit was faster, the rabbit would never win the race because the distance between the 2 would be broken down into halfs in infinite increments, so the rabbit would never win, if we broke time down in the same way( I may be off on the details, but you get the point.) So this has all been discusses and agreed upon.

As to free will- It does not exist. It is an illusion. tea or coffee. He chose coffee because he had coffee that morning, and because he's had coffee 16 times over the past 3 weeks, and had tea only once. And because he prefers the taste of coffee. And because his wife hates it when he drinks tea. And because coffee is first on the menu, and because tea gives him gas.. and on, and on and on.

People try to equate the inequities in the decision making process with free will, when in actuality, it merely comes down to things that we haven't taken the trouble or time to gauge yet. The gaps between the thought process and the actual choice do not actually exist. There is a process which leads us to sucessfully make a choice from all our selections. It's based on our past actions, beliefs, experiences, thoughts, and actions. He would have inevitably chosen coffee. To know all thought processes leading up to this decision is to know and predict the future. It's like gambling without the risk.

Consider this: Everything that we are is casuality. Free will claims to be a drop of randomness amongst a see of order. Let's consider this. We as human beings have evolved through a natural process of ordered selection. Our physical makeup. Including our brains. Our thought processes, our behaviors, our decisions, all have roots in basic human instinct. At the root of it is ID EGO, and SUPEREGO, controlling our lives, our minds, our choices. Sure, we have a higher thought process that gives us the illusion that we are making free choices. But not before the old ID, EGO, And super ego gives it first level clearance. And those are subconscious processes beyond our control. We don't even percieve of them most times. Like the fight or flight response. The survival instinct. That's why so many find it so difficult to sacrifice their lives. It's the battle between the subconscious self preservation, and the higher brain function telling us that we have to kill ourselves to save many more lives, etc. And the same applies to our normal every day decisions. Like the study on how we have already made a decision a split second before we react to that decsion. It's all been decided, we just haven't gotten the update yet. It's all a matter of perception. And free will is a matter of perception of reality, and our understanding of the process. We percieve our decisions as something that isn't static because we lack the undestanding of all the variables that go into the making of each decision. If we did, we'd see that there is actually order in what we percieve as chaos

Or at least that's how I see it

 

[Iacchus32]

Originally posted by Mentat
Not exactly. It's more about whether the "specious present" says anything about reality as a whole. IOW, is there a point in time where I thought about pizza, or is that an event smeared out over time.

Just as with digitized music, each "selected interval" (hence point) becoms an "encoded event" which, could be strung out in a whole series of encoded events to achieve this smearing effect if you will. Which, isn't to say that each event cannot be pinpointed (relatively speaking) somewhere along the way.

 

[Canute]

Originally posted by Zantra
On feelings of guilt. This is a natural biochemical response to actions which may be beyond our control. It's much the same way that we have remorse and fear over death. It's a part of our natural process, but we still experience feelings of regret over it. Just because something is inheirent, doesn't automatically preclude emotional response over it.

Biochemically speaking, how does one distinguish between an act that leads to guilt and an act that doesn't. Are you saying the difference is entirely biochemical, and that our conscious appraisal of these acts are irrelevant? Are you saying we could invent anti-guilt pills? Someone's going to make a fortune.

 

[Canute]

Originally posted by Iacchus32
Just as with digitized music, each "selected interval" (hence point) becoms an "encoded event" which, could be strung out in a whole series of encoded events to achieve this smearing effect if you will. Which, isn't to say that each event cannot be pinpointed (relatively speaking) somewhere along the way.

Try using real music, it's a lot harder to make this argument.

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by Bernardo
Of course there is, it's called the present.

But it doesn't exist...unless it's the many milliseconds it takes for a complete thought to be perceived, in which case photons must be moving across time faster than "the present" is...but that means they're in the future!

Would the chain of events that took place happen without that thought? The origin of this particular 'event chain' occurred on it's own. How can a series of events begin without something to begin with?

Well, it began with something, but that "something" is probably the first time I ate pizza.

The thought, "I want pizza", was initiated by your bodies examination of it's current condition of hunger. Your mind is able to

-harness this incoming information (present condition),

But this (harnessing the information) is a process not an event.

All this by using the present as a pivot point.

How did you get this conclusion from those series of events? There were obviously many "pivot points", and all of these "points" were actually processes, which means there is still no noticable or definable point called "the present".

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by Zantra
As to free will- It does not exist. It is an illusion. tea or coffee. He chose coffee because he had coffee that morning, and because he's had coffee 16 times over the past 3 weeks, and had tea only once. And because he prefers the taste of coffee. And because his wife hates it when he drinks tea. And because coffee is first on the menu, and because tea gives him gas.. and on, and on and on.

Oh, man, Zantra... Do I have to go over all of this again?

Free will cannot be disproven, and your version of determinism doesn't change that. The fact that limiting factors on his decision (that he had had coffee so many times, and didn't care for tea or whatever) existed at all is enough to prove that there is free will. If there were no free will, then he would not choose coffee "because of" anything except for the fact that he was going to choose it. Remember?

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by Iacchus32
Just as with digitized music, each "selected interval" (hence point) becoms an "encoded event" which, could be strung out in a whole series of encoded events to achieve this smearing effect if you will. Which, isn't to say that each event cannot be pinpointed (relatively speaking) somewhere along the way.

So, what are you trying to say?

 

[Bernardo]

I will reply to you Mentat but I'm busy for a while.

I'm beginning to think (every time I post) that if we went to school together you'd be coming to take my milk money each day

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by Bernardo
I will reply to you Mentat but I'm busy for a while.

I'm beginning to think (every time I post) that if we went to school together you'd be coming to take my milk money each day

No, I'm not a bully. I might show you up in class, when your science experiment was scientifically inaccurate, but...well, that's another story .

 

[Iacchus32]

Originally posted by Canute
Try using real music, it's a lot harder to make this argument.

Do you mean listening to it live, and in "the moment," without the benefit of any playback equipment? What's the difference? All the conductor need do is signal the queue, if he wants the orchestra to pause during the middle of a performance. It may not be as convenient as pushing buttons on your stereo, but the effect is still the same. Whereas if he wants to resume, all he need do is signal the queue.

 

[Canute]

No that's not it. The point is that to use digitised music as a mataphor for time passing is confusing. Digitised music is quantised into instants. There's no reason to suppose that real undigitised music, or time, is like this.

 

[Iacchus32]

Originally posted by Canute
No that's not it. The point is that to use digitised music as a mataphor for time passing is confusing. Digitised music is quantised into instants. There's no reason to suppose that real undigitised music, or time, is like this.

And yet for all intents and purposes it sounds the same, except perhaps with more clarity than old "analog style" recordings, suggesting the technique, although artificial, must be the closest "approximation" to what actually occurs in real time. Meaning, that's the reason why it works and why it works so well.

While indeed, everytime we become aware -- "in the moment" -- we are in effect "resampling" (updating) all of the information which enters through our perception.

Almost sounds like "updating" the frames in a motion picture doesn't it? Oh, and how do we know that this "awareness function" of the brain doesn't "oscillate" at a certain frequency? i.e., at so many "thought-frames per second?" Why shouldn't it? Everything else in nature oscillates.

 

[Zantra]

Originally posted by Mentat
Oh, man, Zantra... Do I have to go over all of this again?

Free will cannot be disproven, and your version of determinism doesn't change that. The fact that limiting factors on his decision (that he had had coffee so many times, and didn't care for tea or whatever) existed at all is enough to prove that there is free will. If there were no free will, then he would not choose coffee "because of" anything except for the fact that he was going to choose it. Remember?

Oh my GOD. are you serious man? Don't tell me you're going to bogg me down with wordplay again Ok substitute "because of" with "as a result of", or whatever phrase fits the scenario. He was going to choose the coffee due to the selection process which lead to coffee.

This is a fruitless argument on both sides. It's like I'm saying the universe is infinite and you're saying "show me the end of the universe".

You have to at least concede that if I were correct, and free will was just an illusion created by the complexity of determinism's design, that we would be unable to tell the difference.

 

[Zantra]

Originally posted by Canute
Biochemically speaking, how does one distinguish between an act that leads to guilt and an act that doesn't. Are you saying the difference is entirely biochemical, and that our conscious appraisal of these acts are irrelevant? Are you saying we could invent anti-guilt pills? Someone's going to make a fortune.

You're asking me to attach a logic to emotional response, which is impossible. Do that, and you will be a millionaire. All I'm saying is that we react to something regardless of our ability to control it. I'm saying (if you read my post right after my response to yours) is th at we are contolled by base instincts (ID EGO SUPER EGO) which don't discern between right and wrong. they are only reacting to a situation..

 

[Iacchus32]

Determinsim = boundaries

If the Universe is endless then free will must exist. If the Universe is not endless then it must be pervaded by determinism.

And yet in an endless Universe we can set up boundaries which give us the illusion of determinism, and yet boundaries which are nonetheless breeched, through the capacity of free will.

 

[Canute]

Originally posted by Zantra
You're asking me to attach a logic to emotional response, which is impossible. Do that, and you will be a millionaire. All I'm saying is that we react to something regardless of our ability to control it. I'm saying (if you read my post right after my response to yours) is th at we are contolled by base instincts (ID EGO SUPER EGO) which don't discern between right and wrong. they are only reacting to a situation.. [/B]

So where do right and wrong come from? My point was that it's very difficult to show that feelings of guilt are entirely biochemical. It's not easy to imagine a chemical compound that encodes for feelings of guilt.

You said to Mentat -

"You have to at least concede that if I were correct, and free will was just an illusion created by the complexity of determinism's design, that we would be unable to tell the difference."

Which is exactly he said to you. Freewill is unprovable. This does not entail that it does not exist, but just that it might not.

Iachus32

And yet for all intents and purposes it sounds the same, except perhaps with more clarity than old "analog style" recordings, suggesting the technique, although artificial, must be the closest "approximation" to what actually occurs in real time. Meaning, that's the reason why it works and why it works so well.

True. All I was saying is that there is no evidence that time or space are quantised. There is therefore no evidence that there is a present 'instant' instead of an arbitrary sampling of a particular sized slice of it, what someone here called our 'specious' present.

As you say, perhaps the mechanism is oscillations in the brain,(roughly as Francis Crick argues) which can be fooled by film frame rates and high speed digital sampling. However that is about our perception, not evidence that time is quantised.

 

[Zantra]

Ya, mentat and I already had this argument eons ago. It's a stalemate. He can't prove free will exists any more than I can prove that it doesn't. No one can. But it's been kinda slow in in philosophy lately. Was just trying to create a debate
This is a neverending argument, but we still argue it- Why? I guess because it passes the time.. lol. Actually- I argue it. Mentat just points out how futile it is

To the biochemical stuff. Well basically, I'm saying that we react to situations at a basic level, regardless of their relevance, guilt or not. That's the premise of it. After the initial response, we then logical sort it out with our higher brain functions, which is based on past experiences, and all the other factors that go into determinism.

There is a saying. Problems cannot be solved at the same level at which they were created- al einstein said this. And this means that we are trying to solve the problem of how we arrive at a particular conclusion, but we are using our own minds to do it. We need a computer much more complexed than the human mind to calculate all the variables involved in the deterministic equation-assuming such an equation exists.