I think a more precise way to phrase what they showed, philosophically, would be like this:
" Very likely, to the extent that flies are conscious, then they have a SUBJECTIVE FEELING of possessing free will. " In other words, flies seem to possess the same kind of internal spontaneity-generation that we possess, and that we associate with our subjectively-experienced feeling of free will. -- Ben G On Jan 24, 2008 7:57 AM, Robert Wensman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > 1. Brembs and his colleagues reasoned that if fruit flies (Drosophila > melanogaster) were simply reactive robots entirely determined by their > environment, in completely featureless rooms they should move completely > randomly. > Yes, but no one has ever argued that a flier is a stateless machine. It > seems like their argument ignores the concept of internal state. If they > went through all this trouble just to prove that the brain of the flies has > an internal state, it seems they wasted a lot of time on something trivial. > > I cannot see how the concept of "free will" has got anything to do with > this. > > /R > ________________________________ > This list is sponsored by AGIRI: http://www.agiri.org/email > > To unsubscribe or change your options, please go to: > http://v2.listbox.com/member/?&; -- Ben Goertzel, PhD CEO, Novamente LLC and Biomind LLC Director of Research, SIAI [EMAIL PROTECTED] "If men cease to believe that they will one day become gods then they will surely become worms." -- Henry Miller ----- This list is sponsored by AGIRI: http://www.agiri.org/email To unsubscribe or change your options, please go to: http://v2.listbox.com/member/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=89412948-cb41f5
