Freewill Vs. the Programmed Brain

From the article:
Many scientists and philosophers are convinced that free will doesn’t exist at all. According to these skeptics, everything that happens is determined by what happened before—our actions are inevitable consequences of the events leading up to the action—and this fact makes it impossible for anyone to do anything that is truly free.

It seems to me that this is extremely reductionist and ignores the idea that parallel systems can produce varied effects. The human brain is hugely parallel and therefore won't always produce the same result.

Also, it seems that these people are viewing the mind as a series of states such that any one state is evidence against the idea of freewill. Again, the mind is an active process and I think slicing consciousness up this way is causing part of the confusion.

In keeping with the nature of the article though - I think this is one reason why Objectivism is good - it holds man as a free being, a heroic being, a being that has his life as his moral purpose.

Freewill vs the Programmed Brain
(Edited by Tim Scobey on 8/21, 8:05am)

Post 1

Thursday, August 21, 2008 - 9:55am

Tim,

The point is not that the human brain will always produce the same results; it is that in any given situation, only one outcome is possible. Obviously, the mind and brain are continually evolving in response to new experiences and new situations, so that the same choices will not necessarily be repeated, but that doesn't mean that they're not determined by antecedent causes.

As for the propensity to cheat by those who had read that free will is a myth, the article suggests that it was due to their belief that without free will, there would be no moral responsibility, so that cheating would then be okay. But that doesn't follow either. One could believe in determinism and still believe in right and wrong, if one also believes that one's choices are determined by one's moral values. In other words, if one truly believes that cheating is wrong, then one will avoid it, but the choice to avoid it will itself be determined by that belief.

- Bill

Post 2

Thursday, August 21, 2008 - 12:37pm

The point... is that in any given situation, only one outcome is possible. ...but that doesn't mean that they're not determined by antecedent causes.

What you are saying is that the deterministic principles in play are those within the brain itself and not from external factors?

Post 3

Thursday, August 21, 2008 - 1:14pm

Tim:

After many months of give and take with Bill on the subject of freewill, I asked him point blank whether, in his view of determinism, all of our values, which he says determine our actions, were in fact ultimately determined by antecedent factors residing wholly outside of ourselves. He answered in the affirmative. So, in his view, we are as determined in our nature and as set in our course through life by outside influences and forces as any inanimate object in the universe. He may argue that we can be held morally accountable for our actions because they depend upon our values. But, since we are not ultimately responsible for the values that we hold, his view of moral accountability has little to do with what this phrase means to those of us who do believe in self-determined freewill. I mention this in order to save you considerable time in arriving at this understanding. Feel free to carry on in this discussion. Despite this significant disagreement with Bill, he does have many great insights into this and other topics related to Objectivism and he will certainly get you thinking about things at a deeper level.

Regards,
--
Jeff

Post 4

Thursday, August 21, 2008 - 1:27pm

Tim, Bill is a good guy, but he's a determinist. he just can't help himself. he should have come out with that first thing in his comment above, but he didn't have any real choice in the matter.

Post 5

Thursday, August 21, 2008 - 4:29pm

Thanks, Ted. I am indeed a good guy. But to to say I "couldn't help it" implies that I couldn't have done otherwise even if I wanted to. But if I wanted to, then I would have done otherwise. Therefore, it's not true that I couldn't help it. QED ;-)

- Bill

Post 6

Thursday, August 21, 2008 - 5:34pm

Tim,

Having parallel processes or complex processes does not imply or support that determinism is false. I'm a software developer, I make complex parallel processes that are deterministic.

I think reality is deterministic. I think we make choices, mainly due to our own thinking and feelings. I agree with compaibilism.

Some basic physics...

Reality is everything that currently exists and the process everything goes through as things change. Time is a measure of reality's changes. At each moment through reality's flow through its continual states, there is only one possible next state. I think that reality's next state is completely dependent on reality's current state and the processes reality goes through as it changes. That which is in reality's current state is all that exists. Hence time travel is not possible, there is no past nor future reality to travel to, they do not exist.

That reality was once in a different state is evident to us through unchanging records of what reality once was. So the past does not exist, but information about what the past was like is still around. Similarly, one can predict how reality will change and what state it will become, predicting the future.

A perfectly random event is where if it were possible to rewind reality and replay from the same starting state, the next state could be different. I think there are no perfectly random events. Hence reality is deterministic. There are practically random events (changes in reality that are impossible to predict).

Now that we've taken care of relevant physics...

In the human brain we are consistent with reality (its deterministic) and we make choices. We sense how reality works, generate plans, simulate plan results, and choose and execute plans. This is the basics of our choosing process, which has lots more complexity. From Wikipedia, "The question of free will is whether, and in what sense, rational agents exercise control over their actions and decisions." Tada - compatibilism.

If we disagree at this point, we'll have to take a break. Check back with me later after I create human level "artificial" intelligence.

Post 7

Thursday, August 21, 2008 - 5:37pm

Jeff wrote,

After many months of give and take with Bill on the subject of freewill, I asked him point blank whether, in his view of determinism, all of our values, which he says determine our actions, were in fact ultimately determined by antecedent factors residing wholly outside of ourselves. He answered in the affirmative.

Well, "ultimately" all of the values determining our actions were due to factors that existed before we were born. But some of our values were indeed determined by us -- through the thinking that we chose to do in response to our previous values.

So, in his view, we are as determined in our nature and as set in our course through life by outside influences and forces as any inanimate object in the universe.

Yes, in the sense that all of our actions are as necessitated as those of inanimate objects, but that doesn't mean that our actions are of the same sort (i.e., mechanistic) as those of inanimate objects. Clearly, they are not.

He may argue that we can be held morally accountable for our actions because they depend upon our values. But, since we are not ultimately responsible for the values that we hold . . .

Oh, yes we are!

. . . his view of moral accountability has little to do with what this phrase means to those of us who do believe in self-determined freewill. I mention this in order to save you considerable time in arriving at this understanding. Feel free to carry on in this discussion. Despite this significant disagreement with Bill, he does have many great insights into this and other topics related to Objectivism and he will certainly get you thinking about things at a deeper level.

Why, thank you Jeff. But I must correct your statement that, according to my view, we are not responsible for our values. We are indeed responsible for them, insofar as our values are adopted through our own thinking and evaluation, even if these were in fact determined by antecedent causes.

Tim, in answer to your question, the deterministic principles in play are those that are determined internally as well as externally.

- Bill

Post 8

Thursday, August 21, 2008 - 7:38pm

Bill writes:

and

We are indeed responsible for them

, insofar as our values are adopted through our own thinking and evaluation, even if these were in fact determined by antecedent causes.

Bill:

It's all reductio ad absurdum. You say some of our values were acquired through our thinking. But, as you have pointed out often in the past, our "choice" to think or not to think is determined by what "value" we place on thinking itself. You can go round the merry-go-round as often as you like, but you always end up at your core postulate that we are born with a certain nature that determines what values we will ultimately adopt, and that all of our future development: our values, our thinking, our choices and our actions, are all predetermined by the initial pattern at our birth. During our life we will face an uncountable number of "decision points". But you have made it clear in the past that as we reach each and every one of these points, our prior development will not just influence, but will causally determine the "choice" we make - because, given all of the conditions of the universe and the state of our own development, we could not choose at that moment any differently.

When you say:

Well, "ultimately" all of the values determining our actions were due to factors that existed before we were born

you use the word determined in the sense of predetermined by factors outside of our direct control. Then you immediately write:

But some of our values were indeed determined by us

Here you are using determined to imply (at least to someone who hasn't spent hours discussing this issue with you) that we exercise some sort of causal control over this determination. However, that is certainly not the case as your second sentence is unnecessary and merely collapses to the first upon any examination.

It is important for Tim to understand that when Bill speaks of "choice", "value" and "responsibility", he is using these terms in a manner far different from what people who believe in freewill mean by them.

And Bill, I truly hope that I haven't misrepresented you here. I really am trying to accurately represent your views.

Regards,
--
Jeff

[Edited for a typo]
(Edited by C. Jeffery Small on 8/21, 8:46pm)

Post 9

Friday, August 22, 2008 - 9:32am

I wrote,

Well, "ultimately" all of the values determining our actions were due to factors that existed before we were born.

Jeff replied,

you use the word determined in the sense of predetermined by factors outside of our direct control. Then you immediately write:

But some of our values were indeed determined by us

Here you are using determined to imply (at least to someone who hasn't spent hours discussing this issue with you) that we exercise some sort of causal control over this determination.

We do, but that doesn't mean that our control over it wasn't determined by our previous values. The difference here is between a remote cause and a proximate cause. Take the case of a pit bull that recently attacked a child. We could say that the pit bull caused the death of the child it attacked (the proximate cause), but that the attack itself was caused by the animal's prior breeding (the remote cause). Or: my political values caused me to vote for Candidate X (the proximate cause), but those values were themselves determined by my previous thinking (the remote cause).

It is important for Tim to understand that when Bill speaks of 'choice', 'value' and 'responsibility', he is using these terms in a manner far different from what people who believe in freewill mean by them.

Not necessarily. Let's say that you are taking a multiple choice test. You know the correct answer and you want to score as high as possible on the test, because your grade depends upon it. Under these circumstances, are you free to choose one of the wrong answers? To be sure, you are physically free to choose a wrong answer, since no one is forcing you to choose the right one. However, you are not psychologically free to choose a wrong answer, because you have absolutely no reason or motive for doing so. Under these circumstances, you will necessarily choose the answer that you recognize as right. Despite this fact, no one would say that this is not a "choice" -- that you did not "choose" the right answer. Nor would anyone say that you were not "responsible" for the choice that you made or that you did not "value" making it.

- Bill

(Edited by William Dwyer on 8/22, 9:36am)

Post 10

Friday, August 22, 2008 - 9:42am

Sorry, Bill - it just doesn't wash, and you're digging your hole deeper [which, of course, you're determined to do].;-)

Post 11

Friday, August 22, 2008 - 9:44am

Bill,

You say, "To be sure, you are physically free to choose a wrong answer, since no one is forcing you to choose the right one. However, you are not psychologically free to choose a wrong answer..."

Can you explain what the word "choose" means in that sentence? I understand the 'physically free' part and the 'not psychologically free' part (up to a point), but I don't understand what meaning the word "choose" can have if we don't have some degree of agency at what we would refer to as 'choice point' in time.

When you said, "...determined by my previous thinking...", was that 'previous thinking' a volitional act? Were you a causal agent in any way when doing that thinking?

Post 12

Friday, August 22, 2008 - 10:20am

I wrote, "To be sure, you are physically free to choose a wrong answer, since no one is forcing you to choose the right one. However, you are not psychologically free to choose a wrong answer..."

Steve replied,

Can you explain what the word "choose" means in that sentence? I understand the 'physically free' part and the 'not psychologically free' part (up to a point), but I don't understand what meaning the word "choose" can have if we don't have some degree of agency at what we would refer to as 'choice point' in time.

"Choose" means what it normally means in that context. "You 'chose' the right answer" means that you could have chosen an alternative answer if you had wanted to -- if you have had valued making that choice! If there were no alternatives, then of course there would have been no choice. And if you weren't free to choose one of the alternatives were you to value making it, there would also have been no choice. What the choice does not depend on, however, is that you could just as well have chosen an alternative under precisely the same physical and psychological conditions. It was this latter point that the example was designed to illustrate, since no one would say that you could just as well have chosen a wrong answer, even though you recognized the right one and were sufficiently motivated to choose it.

When you said, "...determined by my previous thinking...", was that 'previous thinking' a volitional act? Were you a causal agent in any way when doing that thinking?

Yes, it was a volitional act, but the volitional act wasn't free; it was determined by the value that you placed on the choice to think. You had to value choosing to think over not choosing to think; otherwise, you wouldn't have made the choice. That's the argument. Disagree with it if you must, but understand what I'm saying.

- Bill

Post 13

Friday, August 22, 2008 - 11:48am

Bill,

I'm not agreeing or disagreeing at this time - just trying to understand.

You said, "...the volitional act wasn't free; it was determined by the value that you placed on the choice to think. It seems to be an infinite regress - each point where a 'choice' was made, was really just an execution of the instruction to 'choose' the valued option. And the value was a product of the thinking, but the thinking was the result of having the value for thinking. Do we come to a place in this chain of cause-effect as we trace our way backward where we find ourselves looking at something that was a form of a first cause?

Is your position a form of compatibilism?

Question: If someone puts a gun to my head, they really are physically compelling on one level, but if I understand you correctly, what is actually happening is that they are changing my alternatives such that different values come into play. So it would still be my values that determine my choice. Is that right?

Post 14

Friday, August 22, 2008 - 12:10pm

According to Bill, I haven't even the barest understanding of value-determinism. That said, here is my understanding of value-determinism:

=========
-belief is not a choice

-currently felt desires are the over-arching impetus for all action taken

-there is no original or creative intellect free from the swamp of our desires -- the intellect is just an adding machine plus an old-fashioned weight scale (adding up our potentially-competing desires, and weighing them for a winner each time)
=========

It's kind of like we are animals who will follow desires, but with some extra powers of calculation (so that we experience merely more desires than the lower animals do). However, it goes without saying that Bill doesn't agree with this.

:-)

Ed

Post 15

Friday, August 22, 2008 - 12:18pm

I wrote, "...the volitional act wasn't free; it was determined by the value that you placed on the choice to think."

Steve replied,

It seems to be an infinite regress - each point where a 'choice' was made, was really just an execution of the instruction to 'choose' the valued option.

It wasn't an "instruction" to choose the valued option. You chose the option, because you valued it.

And the value was a product of the thinking, but the thinking was the result of having the value for thinking. Do we come to a place in this chain of cause-effect as we trace our way backward where we find ourselves looking at something that was a form of a first cause?

Yes, there is no infinite regress. The "first cause" of the choice to think is the child's original desire to understand. Rand gives the analogy of a child's learning to focus his eyes: "Why does he learn to focus them? Because he's trying to see -- to perceive. Similarly, an infant or young child learns to focus his mind in the form of wanting to know something -- to understand clearly. That is the beginning from which a fully conscious, rational focus comes." (Ayn Rand Answers, p. 154)

Responding to Ed, yes we are like animals who follow desires (if one understands the term "desire" in a broader sense than the more limited sensual form in which animals experience it). Like animals, we are goal directed and choose our actions in order to satisfy the goals that we desire to achieve. If we had no initial desire to achieve a goal, we would have no reason to make any of the choices that we do. A choice is a means to an end, and is made in order to achieve a desired end or goal.

- Bill
(Edited by William Dwyer on 8/22, 12:41pm)

Post 16

Friday, August 22, 2008 - 11:32am

I'd like to point out that the Heisenberg uncertainty principle is no longer accepted in many institutions and there are peer-reviewed experiments that discredit it. It states that you cannot know both the spin and moment of a particle at a particular time and was a primary tenet of quantum physics.

I agree with Einstein that "God does not play dice," and thus I reject quantum mechanics as a system of real theories. I believe they are useful in predicting the underlying true mechanisms of physics, but that there are other processes at work (laws of physics) that we have not yet accurately modeled.

As Objectivists, we are inclined to say that the universe is deterministic because we say that the consequences of our actions and the changes we make on the world are predictable according to the observed laws of physics. This means it is not possible for a random event such as a river turning to blood to happen (no law of physics for such a change).

However, we are forced to be compatibilists because Objectivists believe in free will (otherwise there is no purpose for a moral code).

How do we reconcile these two seemingly opposing forces? Although, in a purely physics-based sense, our future thoughts might be predictable, it is impossible to have enough information ahead of time to make that prediction. This is because the universe is the world's fastest computer. It has all the information and computes outcomes at the speed of time. This is the metaphysically given. Thus, the effect is that we appear to have free will. Until we understand the nature of consciousness more (and we will have reverse-engineered the brain completely by 2029, see Ray Kurzweil's The Singularity is Near for more information), we must act under the assumption that we do have free will. The scientific method is to follow a hypothesis until you have evidence against it. I have evidence for free will (I'm free to stop writing this right now, but I won't), but I have no evidence against it, aside from my theory of deterministic physics (not constituting hard evidence).

Note that lack of hard evidence for God is the primary reason that I don't believe in religion. I'm sure many of you feel the same way.

Post 17

Friday, August 22, 2008 - 12:50pm

Bill,

You chose the option, because you valued it.

That is a shallow ... no, hollow ... view of "value." Besides that hollow view of it -- a hollow view which even explains the actions of growing or semi-mobile plants and both the higher and lower animals -- there's a uniquely human view, and use, of value. It's a view / use of value which leads to objective values; something otherwise-absent in nature or the nature of necessarily-subjective animals.

Ed

Post 18

Friday, August 22, 2008 - 12:53pm

Bill,

You said, "The "first cause" of the choice to think is the child's original desire to understand." Was that because it was the first, as earliest, in that chain, or was it a unique kind of event. I ask that because a desire can be seen as similar to a hunger or an itch or a sensation of some sort - and they are usually 'caused' by a physiological trigger. After becoming an adult is it no longer available? Was it available to the child only one time?

What about this: When I read what you have written, I have to think about it. And how hard I think, within a certain range of effort, seems to be a choice that isn't 'determined' by anything prior. I would concede that the range represents a combination of my current situation (how much time do I have right now, how mentally awake am I, where does this kind of issue stand relative to what I'm interested in now) and my values (at this point, relative to you and this subject am I valuing combativeness, expressiveness, learning, deeper understanding of volition, etc.) - that is, the range seems to be determined by prior values, but the effort within the range seems free of that.

Post 19

Friday, August 22, 2008 - 12:54pm