Free Will

Is the mind the same as the body? What is consciousness? Can machines have it?

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RCSaunders
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Re: Free Will

Post by RCSaunders »

Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 3:42 am
RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 1:35 am My point is, if there can be no conscious phenomena without a corresponding cerebral action it makes that conscious phenomena dependent on the physical brain.
Actually, it doesn't. It may rather mean that the physical brain's activity is dependent on what consciousness is flowing through it. Or it may mean that there is a third thing that is causing both.
Any other factors are irrelevant. If A cannot happen without B, than A is dependent on B. No matter how many other factors you want to pile on. Without B there is no A.

No matter how you describe it, like, "consciousness flowing through it," if there can be no, "consciousness flowing through it," without the corresponding brain behavior, that consciousness is dependent on that brain behavior, because it would not exist without it.

It has nothing to do with your primitive Humean notion of cause.
Belinda
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Re: Free Will

Post by Belinda »

RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 11:53 am
Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 3:42 am
RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 1:35 am My point is, if there can be no conscious phenomena without a corresponding cerebral action it makes that conscious phenomena dependent on the physical brain.
Actually, it doesn't. It may rather mean that the physical brain's activity is dependent on what consciousness is flowing through it. Or it may mean that there is a third thing that is causing both.
Any other factors are irrelevant. If A cannot happen without B, than A is dependent on B. No matter how many other factors you want to pile on. Without B there is no A.

No matter how you describe it, like, "consciousness flowing through it," if there can be no, "consciousness flowing through it," without the corresponding brain behavior, that consciousness is dependent on that brain behavior, because it would not exist without it.

It has nothing to do with your primitive Humean notion of cause.
Belinda
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Re: Free Will

Post by Belinda »

RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 11:53 am
Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 3:42 am
RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 1:35 am My point is, if there can be no conscious phenomena without a corresponding cerebral action it makes that conscious phenomena dependent on the physical brain.
Actually, it doesn't. It may rather mean that the physical brain's activity is dependent on what consciousness is flowing through it. Or it may mean that there is a third thing that is causing both.
Any other factors are irrelevant. If A cannot happen without B, than A is dependent on B. No matter how many other factors you want to pile on. Without B there is no A.

No matter how you describe it, like, "consciousness flowing through it," if there can be no, "consciousness flowing through it," without the corresponding brain behavior, that consciousness is dependent on that brain behavior, because it would not exist without it.

It has nothing to do with your primitive Humean notion of cause.
Your idea of causality is primitive,RCSaunders. Immanuel Can understands that "a third thing causes both".

For instance 1.Night does not cause day but both night and day are caused by the changes in the position of Earth relative to Sun.

Instance 2. The heating up of a gas does not cause it to expand but both events are caused by the nature of gases.

It is possible that nature as a whole process is orderly such that nature is the ultimate uncaused cause of all events. Immanuel may well claim that God is the ultimate uncaused cause of all events.
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Terrapin Station
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Re: Free Will

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Belinda wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 12:54 pm For instance 1.Night does not cause day but both night and day are caused by the changes in the position of Earth relative to Sun.
That's noting that correlation and/or contiguity are not the same thing as causality.

This, however:
Instance 2. The heating up of a gas does not cause it to expand but both events are caused by the nature of gases.
Is confusing the idea of something being enabled by properties with causality.
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Free Will

Post by Immanuel Can »

RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 11:53 am
Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 3:42 am
RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 1:35 am My point is, if there can be no conscious phenomena without a corresponding cerebral action it makes that conscious phenomena dependent on the physical brain.
Actually, it doesn't. It may rather mean that the physical brain's activity is dependent on what consciousness is flowing through it. Or it may mean that there is a third thing that is causing both.
Any other factors are irrelevant. If A cannot happen without B, than A is dependent on B.
Not at all. What you should say is, "If A cannot happen without B happening first, then A is dependent on B. But if A is contemporaneous with, or comes before B, then A is not dependent on B."

This is because that which is a "cause" always has to come before that which is an "effect."

But even if you said that, that would still be an invalid conclusion.

For if A and B happen contemporaneously, then it is likely that A and B are BOTH caused by C. :shock: C, being "another factor," is not only relevant but essential, in that case.

And if B always comes before A, is it not also quite still possible that B is the first effect of another factor, C, and A is C's second effect, but B is still not causing A? :shock: Of course.

All this can be simply illustrated. Let us say the axiom "Where there's smoke (B), there's fire" (A) is universally true. (It's not, I know; but let's pretend.)

If it's true, then fire causes smoke, B causes A, we might say.

But does it? What if fire and smoke come into existence at exactly the same moment (BA): then it's not fire that's causing smoke, but maybe combustion (C1), heat (C2) or a pyromaniac (C3) that's causing both.

The validity of our deduction depends not on the correspondence of B and A, but on our certainty of the basic axiom ("where there's smoke, there's fire"), the chronological order of B and A, and our level of prior certainty that there's no "other factor" (C1, C2, C3) involved in the phenomenon.
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Re: Free Will

Post by RCSaunders »

Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 1:44 pm
RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 11:53 am
Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 3:42 am
Actually, it doesn't. It may rather mean that the physical brain's activity is dependent on what consciousness is flowing through it. Or it may mean that there is a third thing that is causing both.
Any other factors are irrelevant. If A cannot happen without B, than A is dependent on B.
Not at all. What you should say is, "If A cannot happen without B happening first, then A is dependent on B. But if A is contemporaneous with, or comes before B, then A is not dependent on B."

This is because that which is a "cause" always has to come before that which is an "effect."

But even if you said that, that would still be an invalid conclusion.

For if A and B happen contemporaneously, then it is likely that A and B are BOTH caused by C. :shock: C, being "another factor," is not only relevant but essential, in that case.

And if B always comes before A, is it not also quite still possible that B is the first effect of another factor, C, and A is C's second effect, but B is still not causing A? :shock: Of course.

All this can be simply illustrated. Let us say the axiom "Where there's smoke (B), there's fire" (A) is universally true. (It's not, I know; but let's pretend.)

If it's true, then fire causes smoke, B causes A, we might say.

But does it? What if fire and smoke come into existence at exactly the same moment (BA): then it's not fire that's causing smoke, but maybe combustion (C1), heat (C2) or a pyromaniac (C3) that's causing both.

The validity of our deduction depends not on the correspondence of B and A, but on our certainty of the basic axiom ("where there's smoke, there's fire"), the chronological order of B and A, and our level of prior certainty that there's no "other factor" (C1, C2, C3) involved in the phenomenon.
Have any view of cause you like, but the stupid Humean view of cause and effect is just nonsense. Events do not, "cause," events. I had nothing to say about, "cause," which is an almost useless concept as currently understood. The only meaning of cause that matters is the fact that nothing happens without a reason or explanation--there is no magic and there are no miracles. But the, "reason," for any event is not some notion of, "same cause, same effect," because not a single event in history has ever had a single thing that could be called it's cause, because every physical event is contingent on an indefinite number of relationships.

Your absurd example:
What if fire and smoke come into existence at exactly the same moment (BA): then it's not fire that's causing smoke, but maybe combustion (C1), heat (C2) or a pyromaniac (C3) that's causing both.
I said nothing about, "cause." I said:
Any other factors are irrelevant. If A cannot happen without B, than A is dependent on B. No matter how many other factors you want to pile on. Without B there is no A.

No matter how you describe it, like, "consciousness flowing through it," if there can be no, "consciousness flowing through it," without the corresponding brain behavior, that consciousness is dependent on that brain behavior, because it would not exist without it.
I said nothing about, "what causes what," only that if one thing is impossible without the other they are interdependent and neither can be without the other. It has nothing to do with, "how," they are dependent, only that they are. I does not matter if A occurs before B, or after B, or simultaneously with B, or if something about A cause B, or vice versa, or if something else causes them both. I there cannot be a B without an A then B is dependent on A, period.

In the formula for DC voltage, E=IR, there is no "cause." It is a description of a dependency. The voltage in a DC circuit is not caused by the current and resistance, the voltage will be the product of the current and resistance because the voltage is dependent on their values. All three, in fact, are interdependent, but none causes the others.
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RCSaunders
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Re: Free Will

Post by RCSaunders »

Belinda wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 12:54 pm
RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 11:53 am
Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 3:42 am
Actually, it doesn't. It may rather mean that the physical brain's activity is dependent on what consciousness is flowing through it. Or it may mean that there is a third thing that is causing both.
Any other factors are irrelevant. If A cannot happen without B, than A is dependent on B. No matter how many other factors you want to pile on. Without B there is no A.

No matter how you describe it, like, "consciousness flowing through it," if there can be no, "consciousness flowing through it," without the corresponding brain behavior, that consciousness is dependent on that brain behavior, because it would not exist without it.

It has nothing to do with your primitive Humean notion of cause.
Your idea of causality is primitive,RCSaunders. Immanuel Can understands that "a third thing causes both".

For instance 1.Night does not cause day but both night and day are caused by the changes in the position of Earth relative to Sun.

Instance 2. The heating up of a gas does not cause it to expand but both events are caused by the nature of gases.

It is possible that nature as a whole process is orderly such that nature is the ultimate uncaused cause of all events. Immanuel may well claim that God is the ultimate uncaused cause of all events.
Do you have a reading compehension problem? I said nothing about, "cause." I said:
Any other factors are irrelevant. If A cannot happen without B, than A is dependent on B. No matter how many other factors you want to pile on. Without B there is no A.

No matter how you describe it, like, "consciousness flowing through it," if there can be no, "consciousness flowing through it," without the corresponding brain behavior, that consciousness is dependent on that brain behavior, because it would not exist without it.
I said nothing about, "what causes what," only that if one thing is impossible without the other they are interdependent and neither can be without the other. It has nothing to do with, "how," they are dependent, only that they are. I does not matter if A occurs before B, or after B, or simultaneously with B, or if something about A cause B, or vice versa, or if something else causes them both. If there cannot be a B without an A then B is dependent on A, period.

I certainly don't mind your criticizing what I say, but it might make sense to be sure it's actually what I said.
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Re: Free Will

Post by RCSaunders »

RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 2:24 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 1:44 pm
RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 11:53 am
Any other factors are irrelevant. If A cannot happen without B, than A is dependent on B.
Not at all. What you should say is, "If A cannot happen without B happening first, then A is dependent on B. But if A is contemporaneous with, or comes before B, then A is not dependent on B."

This is because that which is a "cause" always has to come before that which is an "effect."

But even if you said that, that would still be an invalid conclusion.

For if A and B happen contemporaneously, then it is likely that A and B are BOTH caused by C. :shock: C, being "another factor," is not only relevant but essential, in that case.

And if B always comes before A, is it not also quite still possible that B is the first effect of another factor, C, and A is C's second effect, but B is still not causing A? :shock: Of course.

All this can be simply illustrated. Let us say the axiom "Where there's smoke (B), there's fire" (A) is universally true. (It's not, I know; but let's pretend.)

If it's true, then fire causes smoke, B causes A, we might say.

But does it? What if fire and smoke come into existence at exactly the same moment (BA): then it's not fire that's causing smoke, but maybe combustion (C1), heat (C2) or a pyromaniac (C3) that's causing both.

The validity of our deduction depends not on the correspondence of B and A, but on our certainty of the basic axiom ("where there's smoke, there's fire"), the chronological order of B and A, and our level of prior certainty that there's no "other factor" (C1, C2, C3) involved in the phenomenon.
Have any view of cause you like, but the stupid Humean view of cause and effect is just nonsense. Events do not, "cause," events. I had nothing to say about, "cause," which is an almost useless concept as currently understood. The only meaning of cause that matters is the fact that nothing happens without a reason or explanation--there is no magic and there are no miracles. But the, "reason," for any event is not some notion of, "same cause, same effect," because not a single event in history has ever had a single thing that could be called it's cause, because every physical event is contingent on an indefinite number of relationships.

Your absurd example:
What if fire and smoke come into existence at exactly the same moment (BA): then it's not fire that's causing smoke, but maybe combustion (C1), heat (C2) or a pyromaniac (C3) that's causing both.
I said nothing about, "cause." I said:
Any other factors are irrelevant. If A cannot happen without B, than A is dependent on B. No matter how many other factors you want to pile on. Without B there is no A.

No matter how you describe it, like, "consciousness flowing through it," if there can be no, "consciousness flowing through it," without the corresponding brain behavior, that consciousness is dependent on that brain behavior, because it would not exist without it.
I said nothing about, "what causes what," only that if one thing is impossible without the other they are interdependent and neither can be without the other. It has nothing to do with, "how," they are dependent, only that they are. I does not matter if A occurs before B, or after B, or simultaneously with B, or if something about A cause B, or vice versa, or if something else causes them both. If there cannot be a B without an A then B is dependent on A, period.

In the formula for DC voltage, E=IR, there is no "cause." It is a description of a dependency. The voltage in a DC circuit is not caused by the current and resistance, the voltage will be the product of the current and resistance because the voltage is dependent on their values. All three, in fact, are interdependent, but none causes the others.
Last edited by RCSaunders on Sat Jul 31, 2021 2:34 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Free Will

Post by Immanuel Can »

RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 2:24 pm Have any view of cause you like, but the stupid Humean view ...
Is irrelelvant here. I don't invoke him. I just point out what logic requires.
Events do not, "cause," events.
Hume did not say this. And I don't invoke Hume here, or refer to his arguments. It's you who pulled him in. Let's get him out.
I said:
Any other factors are irrelevant. If A cannot happen without B, than A is dependent on B. No matter how many other factors you want to pile on. Without B there is no A.

No matter how you describe it, like, "consciousness flowing through it," if there can be no, "consciousness flowing through it," without the corresponding brain behavior, that consciousness is dependent on that brain behavior, because it would not exist without it.
You said "dependent." Either that entails causality, or else you'll have to specify precisely in what way something can "depend" on another without "causing" it.

Go ahead.
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Re: Free Will

Post by RCSaunders »

Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 2:32 pm
RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 2:24 pm Have any view of cause you like, but the stupid Humean view ...
Is irrelelvant here. I don't invoke him. I just point out what logic requires.
Events do not, "cause," events.
Hume did not say this. And I don't invoke Hume here, or refer to his arguments. It's you who pulled him in. Let's get him out.
I said:
Any other factors are irrelevant. If A cannot happen without B, than A is dependent on B. No matter how many other factors you want to pile on. Without B there is no A.

No matter how you describe it, like, "consciousness flowing through it," if there can be no, "consciousness flowing through it," without the corresponding brain behavior, that consciousness is dependent on that brain behavior, because it would not exist without it.
You said "dependent." Either that entails causality, or else you'll have to specify precisely in what way something can "depend" on another without "causing" it.

Go ahead.
See my last post.
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Free Will

Post by Immanuel Can »

RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 2:36 pm See my last post.
I confess I have limited familiarity with voltage, not being an electrical engineer or even a dilettante in that field. As a result, your example does not convey anything I can confirm. I would have just to accept your word for it, which would, of course, be irrational for me to do.

But if the principle you're claiming is true, it should be generally demonstrable. Do you have a more common example?
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Re: Free Will

Post by RCSaunders »

Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 2:58 pm
RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 2:36 pm See my last post.
I confess I have limited familiarity with voltage, not being an electrical engineer or even a dilettante in that field. As a result, your example does not convey anything I can confirm. I would have just to accept your word for it, which would, of course, be irrational for me to do.

But if the principle you're claiming is true, it should be generally demonstrable. Do you have a more common example?
The Ohms law example is only an illustration, not an argument. My explanation was thorough. However, if you're interested:

The Ohms Law Calculator page provides a very brief explanation and illustration of Ohms law which can be used to calculate current, voltagle, resistance, or power in a dc circuit. You will not see the word, "cause," in that explanation.

If you are really interested, Fundamentals of Direct Current Circuits is a very thorough explanation of DC circuits and Ohms law.
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Re: Free Will

Post by henry quirk »

While you guys wander out into the weeds, I'll try and bring this back to what it's all about, at the root.


Man is a free will or he's not. There's no middle ground.

Reality is determined or not. There's no middle ground.


Man as free will means he is not mired in, and subject to, innumerable causal chains, but, instead, begins, bends, and ends, at least some, causal chains. He is a cause, an agent. He intends and has the power to, at the very least, attempt to realize his intention.

If man is not a free will, not an agent, then he is nuthin' but mired in, and subject to, innumerable causal chains. His intent is a fiction. He has no causal power.

My experience of myself, in the world, clearly, consistently, evidences man is a free will. My daily experience of others evidences man is a free will.


A determined Reality is a predictable one. This seems to be the case. My experience, regularly, consistently, is that A -> B -> C. Where there seems, to me, to be variance in that, unpredictability, is only cuz I haven't a grasp of all the factors, of all the causal threads conspirin'. It seems to me: the old chestnut of the computer calculatin' the position and movement of every particle thereby grantin' absolute knowledge of what's to come is right on the money.

If you or I had access to such a calculator, we would be real-life Hari Seldons ('cept we wouldn't be lookin' at probables; we'd be lookin' at determineds) and would know exactly what is to occur, micro- and macro-scopically, everywhere, all the time...with one exception.

Where there is intention, there can be no determinism, and intention lives in only place: the free will.


I make no attempt to reconcile what is apparent (the on-goin' existence of free wills) with what is evident (the utterly determined Reality we free wills live within). I will not seek the half-assed solution of a quantum bridge to make the two compatible (cuz I think spooky quantum-ism is hooey). I won't retreat from man as causal agent so as to shelter in some supposed loophole in cause & effect.

It's a conundrum: the causal agent movin' as he chooses thru the agglutinate of causal chains that is Reality.

Recognize the conundrum and live with it; torture your reason comin' up with reconciliations; adopt the nihilism of you as Roomba

Them's the options. the first is sensible and sane; the second is madness; the third is stupid

I choose the first. cuz I'm suave

'nuff said (for now) though I imagine down the road the kerfuffle will tempt me again and I'll trot myself out to piss in someone's cereal
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Re: Free Will

Post by RCSaunders »

henry quirk wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 4:20 pm It's a conundrum: the causal agent movin' as he chooses thru the agglutinate of causal chains that is Reality.
It's only a conundrum if you assume everything is only determined by physical principles. While it must be true that the behavior of all merely physical entities is determined (described by) physical principles, it is equally true that for a very tiny number of physical entities there is another principle that makes them unique. It's called life. While the physical aspects of an organism are determined as all merely physical things are, those aspects of an organism's behavior which we call living is not determined by physical principles but is made possible by them.

There's no conundrum unless you accept the physicalist's premise.
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Free Will

Post by Immanuel Can »

RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 5:01 pm
henry quirk wrote: Sat Jul 31, 2021 4:20 pm It's a conundrum: the causal agent movin' as he chooses thru the agglutinate of causal chains that is Reality.
It's only a conundrum if you assume everything is only determined by physical principles.
I think we have to make the key distinction here: to say that many things follow strictly physical laws, but some don't, is no form of Determinism. It's what any free-willer believes. And to say that people "determine" things is only to use the word as a synonym for "make up their minds firmly"; it's unrelated to Determinism.

Determinism is a complete Monism: in all its forms, only one thing, force or rule governs everything and is the ultimate explanation of every phenomenon. If there were two forces involved in how the world works, then NEITHER of them could be called "Determinative." Rather, each would subvert the conclusive Determinative role of the other.

Physicalist Determinism insists only physical forces explain everything that happens.

There are other forms of Determinism.

But any form of Determinism is going to have to insist that if it's not physical forces that are Determinative, then the physical forces are themselves determined by something else, like perception (Mystical Determinism) or a particularly autocratic "god" (Calvinism). But Determinism does not, in any of its forms, allow for more than one Ultimate Determinant. The rest, it has to insist, is only (as Henry says) "hooey," a misunderstanding of things that are still subject to the Ultimate Determinant.

So "will" is just another delusion, a result of human failure to understand that they were all really predetermined to do what they did anyway. (that's Compatibilism's flaw: it says "will" but means "physical forces" when it does).
While it must be true that the behavior of all merely physical entities is determined (described by) physical principles, it is equally true that for a very tiny number of physical entities there is another principle that makes them unique. It's called life.

You can say so.

But if you do, then you just stopped being a Determinist at all, and became a Dualist, if you ever were a Determinist at all. This is because your statement claims there are two forces: "physical principles," is one; "life" is the other. That is, unless you subsume "life" to the "physical principles," in which case your statement is wrong -- there is no actual determinant of anything but the "physical forces," and you can be a Determinist again.

Which did you mean?
While the physical aspects of an organism are determined as all merely physical things are, those aspects of an organism's behavior which we call living is not determined by physical principles but is made possible by them.
Dualism again. The either the "physical forces" are behind will, or else they are not: but if they are not, then "will" is a distinct category of causal agency, and Determinism isn't true.

So really, you're a Dualist?
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