Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi dmb, Steve said: That no one thinks of a bird's defiance of gravity (a biological pattern trumping an inorganic pattern) as an example of free will is exactly my point. It is the analogy I am drawing to call into question why we would think of a social pattern trumping a biological pattern (say, resisting the urge to urinate in public) as an exercise of free will. dmb says: That's exactly what I don't get about the analogy. It doesn't make sense to talk about the will until we get to social level morality. Steve: I already granted that we don't talk about the will before we get to the social level. My question is why not? Why would you think of social patterns as internally willed but biological patterns as determined by external forces? That's totally SOM, dude. dmb: That's when the expression of preferences begins to meet with resistance, particularly the biological impulses and instincts. Steve: Incorrect. As soon as there is a second set of value patterns there is conflict with the first set if they are truly a different set of value patterns. dmb: As far as I know, animals cannot defy their own urges and instincts. I don't even think it would be fair to say that house-broken dogs have any free will. We train them to poop outside by using their own instincts against them. We can get them to prefer the yard by making in-door pooping very unpleasant for them. Steve: Don't social patterns for humans function in exactly the same way? Steve said: [the question of free will has to be framed around an independent agent] ... Because independence is another name for freedom. If the so-called agent is dependent or causally related to other things, then it is not a free agent. dmb says: Well, there you have reasserted the will as a separate metaphysical entity and opposed it to determinism, which follows from causal relations. As my dictionary puts it, determinism is the doctrine that all events, including human action, are ultimately determined by causes external to the will. Steve: Yep, this free will issue depends on thinking of things as either internal or external to the subject. The whole issue of free will versus determinism depends entirely on SOM premises. dmb: But to say the agent is dependent doesn't necessarily mean he is subject to causal relations, that she must act according to the laws of causality. It just means the agent is not isolated from or separate from all other things. I mean, to say we exist in relation to everything else is not the same thing as saying everything causes us to will or act or choose or whatever. Steve: When you buy into the premises of the free will/determinism Platypus, the question is not whether causality is real but only whether or not there is an internal cause located in the will that can at least sometimes trump external causes. Steve said: Einstein is noting that the feeling of willing a given action is something that everyone experiences, but in what sense does it mean anything to say this willing is free? ...Is claiming to have free will saying that our acts are frequently accompanied by the feeling of having willed the act? If so, no one should disagree, but what more could someone possibly mean is unclear to Einstein who was quoting Schopenhauer (who had the same difficulties with the notion as Harris and I) since we don't have the feeling of willing our will. dmb says: The feeling of willing our will? I just can't make any sense of that notion. Why does this second will keep popping up? Steve: Because you assert that not only do humans will certain acts but that willing is itself in some meaningful sense free. dmb: I don't understand why anyone would look for some other will in addition to or behind the will as it's experienced by ordinary people every day. If we make choices all the time, on what basis do we say that free will is bunk? Steve: We make choices all the time, but what does it mean to say that that choosing is done freely? In MOQ terms, I think all it can mean is that social patterns can sometimes trump biological patterns and intellectual patterns can sometimes trump social patterns. dmb: In what sense is that experience not real? Steve: I've affirmed many times the idea that we have a sense of intending or willing many of the acts that we perform. The question is what can it mean to say that that willing is free? dmb: Like I said, this is an empirical question with an empirical answer. And it's not just a feeling of freedom that we experience. It's also a practical matter, where we live with the consequences of those choices, have feelings of regret or satisfaction as they play out. Steve: What are we supposed to take away from the fact that we have feelings of regret (often even when others tell us that it isn't our fault or there's nothing we could have done differently)? Just how does that make free will empirically verifiable? Best, Steve
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Ham, Steve: I actually want to like tea, especially iced tea since it is so often offered this time of year, but I just don't. That wouldn't even be a problem if I could just will myself not to want to want to like iced tea which I can't do even if I want to want to want to like iced tea. Do you see the problem of regress inherent in asserting freedom of will? Ham: Not really. I used to smoke cigarettes and suck on a pipe. It was a habit I enjoyed, until I developed a cough and willed myself to stop. I now smoke an occasional cigar, which I found more enjoyable and less cough-producing. But should this prove to be detrimental to my heath, I'm convinced that I could will myself off cigars, too. Steve: You didn't will yourself to not want to smoke which was what was required in the example I gave. Your value of smoking can be trumped by your value of personal health if you happen to value one over the other, but you can't will yourself to value one over the other. Either you do or you don't. Your are not free to value smoking over your health if you actually value your health more than smoking. Steve: Einstein made the same point: Honestly, I cannot understand what people mean when they talk about the freedom of the human will. I have a feeling, for instance, that I will something or other; but what relation this has with freedom I cannot understand at all. I feel that I will to light my pipe and I do it; but how can I connect this up with the idea of freedom? What is behind the act of willing to light the pipe? Another act of willing? Schopenhauer once said: Der Mensch kann was er will; er kann aber nicht wollen was er will (Man can do what he will but he cannot will what he wills). Ham: Man cannot will what he wants, but he can will what he intends. I think there's a distinction to be made between wanting and willing that these men overlooked. Willing expresses intention but is not necessarily what we want. I may want to sleep past ten in the morning, but knowing that I have work that won't wait, I exercise my free will to set the alarm for eight instead. Steve: If you agree with me that Man cannot will what we wants... as you say above, then what does it mean to say that his will is free? Man wills things but saying that not only does he have will but that this will is also free doesn't seem to mean anything. All you are saying then is the obvious claim that man has preferences and acts on them. These preferences often conflict and one preference often takes precedence over another in given situations. Where exactly does freedom come into this? Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
On Wed, Jun 15, 2011 at 4:27 PM, Andre Broersen andrebroer...@gmail.com wrote: dmb to Steve: Also, why does the question of free will have to be framed around an independent agent. In what sense is such agency independent? Why can't the issue be framed as agency within the whole range and context of static patterns? Andre: This is what disturbs me about this incessant 'willing' to free... Please try to keep it down, Andre. The adults are trying to have a conversation. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
On Jun 15, 2011, at 6:09 PM, david buchanan wrote: dmb says: ... The MOQ says DQ is the quality of freedom ... Without DQ nothing could grow or change... DQ degenerates into chaos. Without DQ, static quality would fossilize or die of old age. Marsha asks: So is the DQ that dmb is defining about DQ or is it non-DQ? ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Steve to Andre: Please try to keep it down, Andre. The adults are trying to have a conversation. Andre: Point taken Steve. If preference and determinism are on the same continuum, this implies that freedom is also on a continuum from little (or none) at the inorganic static quality level...to some freedom at the biological..., considerable freedom at the social...,nearly complete choice at the intellectual...and to complete freedom at the Dynamic 'Code of Art' level... As such, it's apparent that this 'value' continuum (of freedom) stretches between largely determined sub-atomic particles to complete artistic freedom. This is important (metaphysically) as this continuum facilitates, in a largely deterministic physical world, a notion of moral responsibility and considerable intellectual freedom for an individual regarding aesthetic decisions'. The MOQ puts an end to this ancient frewill vs determinism controversy by showing that both preference and probability are subsets of value. As the distinction between subject and object becomes relatively unimportant in the MOQ, so does the distinction between probability and preference. There is no basic difference between mind and matter with regard to freewill, only a difference in degree of freedom'. (Anthony's PhD, p 137) Time to play outside again. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
dmb said: ... The MOQ says DQ is the quality of freedom ... Without DQ nothing could grow or change... DQ degenerates into chaos. Without DQ, static quality would fossilize or die of old age. Marsha snarked: So is the DQ that dmb is defining about DQ or is it non-DQ? dmb says: I've paraphrased what Pirsig wrote in Lila and repeated in his 2005 summary of the MOQ: As to which is more important, Dynamic or static, both are absolutely essential, even when they are in conflict. As stated in LILA, without Dynamic Quality an organism cannot grow. But without static quality an organism cannot last. A few lines later, he says the same thing about metaphysics: The static language of the Metaphysics of Quality will never capture the Dynamic reality of the world but some fingers point better than others and as the world changes, old pointers and road maps tend to lose their value. And in Lila, he and James both say there must always be a discrepancy between concepts and reality because concepts are static and reality is dynamic. We find this idea throughout ZAMM as well, particularly in his explanation of our mythos as an evolved set of analogies and undefined Quality as the generator of all defined things. When the mystic insists that reality is outside of language, he's making the same point in yet another way. If all these explanations do not make the point clear, then I don't know what else to tell you. It seems pretty clear that the hang up is all about definitions. Definitions are the foundation of reason and all these words, as Pirsig uses them, have a coherent, consistent meaning. But you like to capriciously alter the meaning of words at and so confusion and frustration is the inevitable result. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will Program
START program. A: Do you feel compelled to push the right-hand button? IF Yes, GOTO C. B: Do you feel compelled to push the left-hand button? IF Yes, GOTO D. C: Do you feel compelled to Stop? IF Yes, GOTO B. PUSH the left-hand button. GOTO E. D: Do you feel compelled to Stop? IF Yes, GOTO A. PUSH the right-hand button. GOTO E. E: STOP Program. Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
On Jun 16, 2011, at 12:53 PM, david buchanan wrote: dmb said: ... The MOQ says DQ is the quality of freedom ... Without DQ nothing could grow or change... DQ degenerates into chaos. Without DQ, static quality would fossilize or die of old age. Marsha snarked: So is the DQ that dmb is defining about DQ or is it non-DQ? dmb says: I've paraphrased what Pirsig wrote in Lila and repeated in his 2005 summary of the MOQ: As to which is more important, Dynamic or static, both are absolutely essential, even when they are in conflict. As stated in LILA, without Dynamic Quality an organism cannot grow. But without static quality an organism cannot last. A few lines later, he says the same thing about metaphysics: The static language of the Metaphysics of Quality will never capture the Dynamic reality of the world but some fingers point better than others and as the world changes, old pointers and road maps tend to lose their value. And in Lila, he and James both say there must always be a discrepancy between concepts and reality because concepts are static and reality is dynamic. Marsha: Duh... We find this idea throughout ZAMM as well, particularly in his explanation of our mythos as an evolved set of analogies and undefined Quality as the generator of all defined things. When the mystic insists that reality is outside of language, he's making the same point in yet another way. Marsha: Duh again... dmb: If all these explanations do not make the point clear, then I don't know what else to tell you. It seems pretty clear that the hang up is all about definitions. Definitions are the foundation of reason and all these words, as Pirsig uses them, have a coherent, consistent meaning. Marsha: Are you summarizing from these quotes this one point: 'Definitions are the foundation of reason and all these words, as Pirsig uses them, have a coherent, consistent meaning. Duh... I've always accepted that RMP uses his meanings in their context coherently. You missed explaining your quote: DQ degenerates into chaos. when in LILA RMP states: But Dynamic Quality is not structured and yet it is not chaotic.. I think this might represent capriciously alter the meaning of words at and so confusion. You pulled all these quotes together. Please offer your summarized point??? dmb: But you like to capriciously alter the meaning of words at and so confusion and frustration is the inevitable result. Marsha: Right. Keep shoveling, but I am not accepting the vapid, innocuous euphemisms as intellectual competency. ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
dmb, I'm sure you think your paraphrasing is always correct, but it is mentally constructed from your own biases. And thergrouping together of your paraphrased comments out of context make them sound like attributes of DQ. And please don't miss explaining your quote: DQ degenerates into chaos. when in LILA RMP states: But Dynamic Quality is not structured and yet it is not chaotic..I think RMP would have paraphrased this statement differently. Marsha On Jun 16, 2011, at 12:53 PM, david buchanan wrote: dmb said: ... The MOQ says DQ is the quality of freedom ... Without DQ nothing could grow or change... DQ degenerates into chaos. Without DQ, static quality would fossilize or die of old age. Marsha snarked: So is the DQ that dmb is defining about DQ or is it non-DQ? dmb says: I've paraphrased what Pirsig wrote in Lila and repeated in his 2005 summary of the MOQ: As to which is more important, Dynamic or static, both are absolutely essential, even when they are in conflict. As stated in LILA, without Dynamic Quality an organism cannot grow. But without static quality an organism cannot last. A few lines later, he says the same thing about metaphysics: The static language of the Metaphysics of Quality will never capture the Dynamic reality of the world but some fingers point better than others and as the world changes, old pointers and road maps tend to lose their value. And in Lila, he and James both say there must always be a discrepancy between concepts and reality because concepts are static and reality is dynamic. We find this idea throughout ZAMM as well, particularly in his explanation of our mythos as an evolved set of analogies and undefined Quality as the generator of all defined things. When the mystic insists that reality is outside of language, he's making the same point in yet another way. If all these explanations do not make the point clear, then I don't know what else to tell you. It seems pretty clear that the hang up is all about definitions. Definitions are the foundation of reason and all these words, as Pirsig uses them, have a coherent, consistent meaning. But you like to capriciously alter the meaning of words at and so confusion and frustration is the inevitable result. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Matt and all, Metaphysics is binding. Physics is open to discussion. I like Pirsig's take on DQ, binding and undefined. MOQ suggests an explanation that: You have to bind yourself before you can be free. Joe On 6/15/11 5:46 PM, Matt Kundert pirsigafflict...@hotmail.com wrote: snip In the Hegelianism I like, when it comes to freedom and autonomy, you gotta' give it to get it. You have to bind yourself before you can be free. snip Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
On 6/16/11 7:00 AM, Steven Peterson peterson.st...@gmail.com wrote: Hi Steve and all, If something remains indefinable, there is a freedom in choosing it. Organic, inorganic, social, intellectual are supposedly metaphysical terms. I dislike social and substitute emotional (indefinable) as the root for DQ. Joe Steve: What are we supposed to take away from the fact that we have feelings of regret (often even when others tell us that it isn't our fault or there's nothing we could have done differently)? Just how does that make free will empirically verifiable? Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
I suppose a more MoQish way of saying this is that your paraphrasing is constructed from your patterns. On Jun 16, 2011, at 2:27 PM, MarshaV wrote: dmb, I'm sure you think your paraphrasing is always correct, but it is mentally constructed from your own biases. And the grouping together of your paraphrased comments, out of context ,make them sound like attributes of DQ. And please don't miss explaining your quote: DQ degenerates into chaos. when in LILA RMP states: But Dynamic Quality is not structured and yet it is not chaotic..I think RMP would have paraphrased this statement differently. Marsha On Jun 16, 2011, at 12:53 PM, david buchanan wrote: dmb said: ... The MOQ says DQ is the quality of freedom ... Without DQ nothing could grow or change... DQ degenerates into chaos. Without DQ, static quality would fossilize or die of old age. Marsha snarked: So is the DQ that dmb is defining about DQ or is it non-DQ? dmb says: I've paraphrased what Pirsig wrote in Lila and repeated in his 2005 summary of the MOQ: As to which is more important, Dynamic or static, both are absolutely essential, even when they are in conflict. As stated in LILA, without Dynamic Quality an organism cannot grow. But without static quality an organism cannot last. A few lines later, he says the same thing about metaphysics: The static language of the Metaphysics of Quality will never capture the Dynamic reality of the world but some fingers point better than others and as the world changes, old pointers and road maps tend to lose their value. And in Lila, he and James both say there must always be a discrepancy between concepts and reality because concepts are static and reality is dynamic. We find this idea throughout ZAMM as well, particularly in his explanation of our mythos as an evolved set of analogies and undefined Quality as the generator of all defined things. When the mystic insists that reality is outside of language, he's making the same point in yet another way. If all these explanations do not make the point clear, then I don't know what else to tell you. It seems pretty clear that the hang up is all about definitions. Definitions are the foundation of reason and all these words, as Pirsig uses them, have a coherent, consistent meaning. But you like to capriciously alter the meaning of words at and so confusion and frustration is the inevitable result. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
On 6/16/11 7:11 AM, Steven Peterson peterson.st...@gmail.com wrote: snip Man wills things but saying that not only does he have will but that this will is also free doesn't seem to mean anything. snip In DQ/SQ metaphysics something remains indefinable in everything. You are free in willing the indefinable. No judgment has been passed on you. Joe Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Joe, What do you mean by undefinable? Mark On Jun 16, 2011, at 1:18 PM, Joseph Maurer jh...@comcast.net wrote: On 6/16/11 7:11 AM, Steven Peterson peterson.st...@gmail.com wrote: snip Man wills things but saying that not only does he have will but that this will is also free doesn't seem to mean anything. snip In DQ/SQ metaphysics something remains indefinable in everything. You are free in willing the indefinable. No judgment has been passed on you. Joe Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Steve] You are not free to value smoking over your health if you actually value your health more than smoking. Yes you can, it's called changing your mind. Also you are free to choose short-term pleasures (smoking) over long-term interests (health), even if you value the latter over the former. [Steve] Man cannot will what we wants... [Craig] But a person can decide what s/he wants. Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Marsha said to dmb: I'm sure you think your paraphrasing is always correct, but it is mentally constructed from your own biases. And thergrouping together of your paraphrased comments out of context make them sound like attributes of DQ. And please don't miss explaining your quote: DQ degenerates into chaos. when in LILA RMP states: But Dynamic Quality is not structured and yet it is not chaotic..I think RMP would have paraphrased this statement differently. dmb responds with textual evidence to the contrary (not that it will make any difference): Life can't exist on Dynamic Quality alone. It has no staying power. To cling to Dynamic Quality alone apart from any static patterns is to cling to CHAOS. He saw that much can be learned about Dynamic Quality by studying what it is not rather than futilely trying to define what it is. Static quality patterns are dead when they are exclusive, when they demand blind obedience and suppress Dynamic change. But static patterns, nevertheless, provide a necessary stabilizing force to protect Dynamic progress from DEGENERATION. Although Dynamic Quality, the Quality of freedom, creates this world in which we live, these patterns of static quality, the quality of order, preserve our world. Neither static nor Dynamic Quality can survive without the other. What would be a good way to paraphrase Pirsig's description of static patterns as a necessary stabilizing force and the quality of order that preserves our world? You think this stable order is best paraphrased as an ever-changing cloud, do you? I think that use of language is just plain stupid and the idea conspicuously at odds with the text. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Mark, In MOQ metaphysics DQ is indefinable. This appeals to evolution, levels in existence, for an answer, since emotions cannot be defined. Not so essence in SOM. To argue that we cannot know the indefinable leaves you hanging from the SOM tree of mathematical logic. 1 has two definitions indefinable individuality DQ and the number 1 SQ definable logic of mathematics when 2 follows 1 in order. Joe On 6/16/11 2:42 PM, 118 ununocti...@gmail.com wrote: Joe, What do you mean by undefinable? Mark On Jun 16, 2011, at 1:18 PM, Joseph Maurer jh...@comcast.net wrote: On 6/16/11 7:11 AM, Steven Peterson peterson.st...@gmail.com wrote: snip Man wills things but saying that not only does he have will but that this will is also free doesn't seem to mean anything. snip In DQ/SQ metaphysics something remains indefinable in everything. You are free in willing the indefinable. No judgment has been passed on you. Joe Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Steve -- You didn't will yourself to not want to smoke which was what was required in the example I gave. Your value of smoking can be trumped by your value of personal health if you happen to value one over the other, but you can't will yourself to value one over the other. Either you do or you don't. You are not free to value smoking over your health if you actually value your health more than smoking. I willed myself not to smoke cigarettes and pipes. Must I give up cigars in order to satisfy your requirements for an example of free will? There is more to will (intention) than simply responding to value. For instance, it requires judgment to prioritize one's values, plus self-control to act upon them rationally. I exercise free choice in both of these functions. Don't you? Steve: If you agree with me that Man cannot will what we wants... as you say above, then what does it mean to say that his will is free? Man wills things but saying that not only does he have will but that this will is also free doesn't seem to mean anything. All you are saying then is the obvious claim that man has preferences and acts on them. These preferences often conflict and one preference often takes precedence over another in given situations. Where exactly does freedom come into this? I can will to work out in the gym every day or not at all. I choose to exercise in the gym once a week and supplement this with daily exercising at home. I can will to correspond with people I don't enjoy talking with, to put off mowing the lawn when I don't feel like it, or to shop for a cinnamon bun rather than eating a Danish pastry my wife left for me. Do you deny that I am free to make such choices? But of greater importance to society at large are the moral values one acts upon. Will the citizen cast his vote for a politican who believes in taxing the rich to support the poor? Will the legislator approve a bill to legalize gay marriage, abolish capital punishment, or incorporate Sharia principles into common law? Does the home owner whose mortgage is worth more than his devalued home simply default on his payments? Does the physician who knows his patient is terminal end the suffering with a lethal drug? The freedom exercised in such value-based actions affects all of us and can determine the course of our nation's history. Weighty thoughts to ponder relative to Free Will, eh? Freely speaking, Ham Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Craig, On Tue, Jun 14, 2011 at 9:50 PM, craig...@comcast.net wrote: [Steve] This is sufficient for will, but what are you adding when you attach the word free? Craig: So: what is the difference between exercising your will exercising your free will? When an amoeba backs away from acid or a philadendron turns toward the sun, it is exercising its will, but it is not FREE to dive into the acid or turn away from the sun, so it is not exercising FREE will. Steve: In the MOQ, Pirsig used that example to talk about the amoeba's response as an exercise of preference based on Quality. Pirsig points out that there is no empirical difference between describing such events as causally linked or as a stable pattern of preference. The difference between an amoeba and a human in the MOQ is that the amoeba does not have any social or intellectual patterns. Is the metaphysical entity known as the will one of these types of patterns? [Craig, previously] Once we form an intention/decide, we can consider the consequences of doing/not doing the action then are free to change our mind based on this feedback. Animals that cannot do this, do not have free will. [Steve] I agree that humans can consider past events and project into the future, and animals probably can't. But why think this ability is more free than a bird's ability to flap its wings and fly Craig: Because it is the basis for your choice. Steve: Humans have freedom to choose because they can deliberate and deliberation is free because it is the basis of choice? This is circular. [Steve] You assert that we are free to change our minds upon reflection. How do I know that we have any choice but to change our minds upon reflection and to reflect in the first place if conditions dictate? Craig: I feel I am free to change my mind, so the burden of proof is on someone who denies I am free to change my mind. That person is going to have a very difficult task. Of the millions or billions of people who for thousands of years felt they free to change their mind, every one of them would have to be wrong every single time. The odds are staggering. Steve: We can both try to claim the burden of proof is on the other all we want, but isn't the burden of proof always on anyone who wants to convince another of something? We share that burden equally. I am as skeptical of your claim that you have free will as you are of my claim that free will is an unnecessary extra-added metaphysical ingredient with no empirical basis and no legitimate explanatory power. Like yours, many of my actions also follow deliberation and then a decision and are accompanied by the felt intention to do the act that I did. Given those empirical facts, how do I know that a metaphysical entity called my will is what caused the act and further that this entity is free in some meaningful sense? [Steve] I can't simply decide by force of will to prefer 2+2=5 over 2+2=4 Some things we decide, some things we prefer. That we can't always decide our preferences is irrelevant. [Steve] In the MOQ, what type of static pattern the will? Craig: The will is the interaction of different spovs. Steve: That answer is not available in the MOQ. That interaction is either itself a pattern, a collection of patterns, or DQ. Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Ham, Steve -- How is the preference in intellectual preferences different in kind from biological preferences? I can't simply decide by force of will to prefer 2+2=5 over 2+2=4 any more than I can will myself not to bleed when stabbed through the heart. Ham: I'm not distinguishing biological preferences from intellectual preferences. Preferences are volitional responses to value sensibility. They can be emotional, physical, aesthetic, social, or intellectual. Mathematical values are a horse of a different color. We don't respond valuistically to numbers or equations any more than to the fact that Paris is a city in France, or that the sun rises in the morning. So, I fail to see why you would suppose that equations had any relevance to sensible value or personal preference. Steve: In the MOQ, every response is a valuistic one, but, whatever. Ham: Why do you insist on complicating what amounts to exercising your will? Do you prefer coffee or tea? Do you like pop music or the classics? Are you more attracted to blondes or brunettes? Do you support liberal or conservative candidates? THESE are preferences, Steve. They are all based on your personal values. Steve: Sure, these are preferences, but I don't recognize any freedom to not value what I now value. I am a collection of such values. (I don't have such values, such values have me.) I prefer coffee to tea, and I can choose coffee over tea or tea over coffee in any given situation if I want, but my preferences simply are what they are. They aren't free as far as I can tell. I can't change what I want as a simple matter of will. I am not free to prefer tea over coffee. If my preferences change over time (which is to say, if the collection of patterns of value referred to as I changes over time), it will not be a matter of will but of having new experiences. I actually want to like tea, especially iced tea since it is so often offered this time of year, but I just don't. That wouldn't even be a problem if I could just will myself not to want to want to like iced tea which I can't do even if I want to want to want to like iced tea. Do you see the problem of regress inherent in asserting freedom of will? Einstein made the same point: Honestly, I cannot understand what people mean when they talk about the freedom of the human will. I have a feeling, for instance, that I will something or other; but what relation this has with freedom I cannot understand at all. I feel that I will to light my pipe and I do it; but how can I connect this up with the idea of freedom? What is behind the act of willing to light the pipe? Another act of willing? Schopenhauer once said: Der Mensch kann was er will; er kann aber nicht wollen was er will (Man can do what he will but he cannot will what he wills). (Planck, M. Where is Science Going?, p. 201) Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Steve said to dmb: ... Also, you keep putting up some radical determinism as the only alternative to belief in a radically internal entity called the will. To deny free will is only to deny the existence of this entity. It is not to say that everything is already determined. Most things could just be random or just held to be of unknown cause. ..., the MOQ says we are not free to the extent we are controlled by static patterns and free to the extent that we follow DQ, but in the MOQ, where does the traditional metaphysical entity called the will come in? Nowhere that I can see. All I find are denials of it. dmb says: I did not realize that you were talking about a radically internal metaphysical entity. I thought we were talking about people. I thought we were talking about the capacity to resist impulses and desires, not some metaphysical entity's ability to alter or eliminate them. We're on two different topics, apparently. Never mind. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi dmb, On Wed, Jun 15, 2011 at 12:36 PM, david buchanan dmbucha...@hotmail.com wrote: Steve said to dmb: ... Also, you keep putting up some radical determinism as the only alternative to belief in a radically internal entity called the will. To deny free will is only to deny the existence of this entity. It is not to say that everything is already determined. Most things could just be random or just held to be of unknown cause. ..., the MOQ says we are not free to the extent we are controlled by static patterns and free to the extent that we follow DQ, but in the MOQ, where does the traditional metaphysical entity called the will come in? Nowhere that I can see. All I find are denials of it. dmb says: I did not realize that you were talking about a radically internal metaphysical entity. I thought we were talking about people. I thought we were talking about the capacity to resist impulses and desires, not some metaphysical entity's ability to alter or eliminate them. We're on two different topics, apparently. Never mind. Steve: Resisting impulses and desires usually translates in MOQ terms as social and/or intellectual patterns sometimes trump biological patterns under certain circumstances. But there is no more freedom in such situations understood as the product of the freedom of an independent willing agent than there is in that biological patterns such as flying birds resisting the impulse to fall in acquiescence to gravity. Pirsig opposes such a view of freedom as freedom from causal forces in favor of freedom to flourish. The seed planted in good soil is more free to flourish than one planted in sand, but neither is any more of a willful agent or any more free from causal environmental pressures. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Steve said to dmb: Resisting impulses and desires usually translates in MOQ terms as social and/or intellectual patterns sometimes trump biological patterns under certain circumstances. But there is no more freedom in such situations understood as the product of the freedom of an independent willing agent than there is in that biological patterns such as flying birds resisting the impulse to fall in acquiescence to gravity. dmb says: I don't follow your reasoning. First of all, falling is not an impulse. Since nobody thinks of free will as the freedom to defy gravity, I do not get your analogy. Also, why does the question of free will have to be framed around an independent agent. In what sense is such agency independent? Why can't the issue be framed as agency within the whole range and context of static patterns? The levels are not independent or discontinuous metaphysical categories and we are not independent of them. Isn't that what Pirsig opposes when he opposes the metaphysics of substance? Whether we're talking material substance, mental substance or divine substance, we'd be talking about the essential nature underlying phenomena. That is essentialism, the metaphysics of substance. Einstein, by the way, believed in Spinoza's God, which was conceived as the substance underlying all of nature. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Steve] Humans have freedom to choose because they can deliberate and deliberation is free because it is the basis of choice? This is circular. Sure is. Eliminate deliberation is free because it is the basis of choice to bust out of the circle. [Steve] isn't the burden of proof always on anyone who wants to convince another of something? We share that burden equally. No no. [Steve] I am skeptical of your claim that you have free will as you are of my claim that free will is an unnecessary extra-added metaphysical ingredient with no empirical basis and no legitimate explanatory power. I disagree with Harris that talk about free-will is gibberish. He is like the marcher who says that everyone in the formation is out-of-step but him. Millions or billions of people have for thousands of years talked about free will, but Harris a few others think they're the only ones making sense. Your claim is different--you say some claims about free will are false. So if millions or billions of people for thousands of years felt free to change their mind (the empirical basis of free will), the burden is on you to argue they weren't. [Steve] how do I know that a metaphysical entity called my will is what caused the act and further that this entity is free in some meaningful sense Since I don't know what a metaphysical entity is I don't think my will causes acts, I'll pass on these questions. [Steve] In the MOQ, what type of static pattern is the will? [Craig, previously] The will is the interaction of different spovs. [Steve] That interaction is either itself a pattern, a collection of patterns, or DQ. Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi dmb, On Wed, Jun 15, 2011 at 1:37 PM, david buchanan dmbucha...@hotmail.com wrote: Steve said to dmb: Resisting impulses and desires usually translates in MOQ terms as social and/or intellectual patterns sometimes trump biological patterns under certain circumstances. But there is no more freedom in such situations understood as the product of the freedom of an independent willing agent than there is in that biological patterns such as flying birds resisting the impulse to fall in acquiescence to gravity. dmb says: I don't follow your reasoning. First of all, falling is not an impulse. Since nobody thinks of free will as the freedom to defy gravity, I do not get your analogy. Steve: That no one thinks of a bird's defiance of gravity (a biological pattern trumping an inorganic pattern) as an example of free will is exactly my point. It is the analogy I am drawing to call into question why we would think of a social pattern trumping a biological pattern (say, resisting the urge to urinate in public) as an exercise of free will. dmb: Also, why does the question of free will have to be framed around an independent agent. Steve: Because independence is another name for freedom. If the so-called agent is dependent or causally related to other things, then it is not a free agent. dmb: In what sense is such agency independent? Why can't the issue be framed as agency within the whole range and context of static patterns? Steve: It can be, and Pirsig did. He reformulated the freedom issue in Lila. The idea of freedom that Pirsig talked about (DQ) is a resolution of the dilemma that is in no way an affirmation of either horn of the free will versus fatalism Platypus. It is a denial of both by denying the underlying assumptions of the question. He says not merely that free will is bunk but that the self that is supposed to be the locus of this free will is a fiction. Lila doesn't have values. Values have Lila. dmb: Einstein, by the way, believed in Spinoza's God, which was conceived as the substance underlying all of nature. Steve: He also had bad hair, but that doesn't have anything to do with his argument about free will, either. Einstein is noting that the feeling of willing a given action is something that everyone experiences, but in what sense does it mean anything to say this willing is free? Are we really free to will something other than we what we will? Is claiming to have free will saying that our acts are frequently accompanied by the feeling of having willed the act? If so, no one should disagree, but what more could someone possibly mean is unclear to Einstein who was quoting Schopenhauer (who had the same difficulties with the notion as Harris and I) since we don't have the feeling of willing our will. Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Craig, [Steve] isn't the burden of proof always on anyone who wants to convince another of something? We share that burden equally. Craig: No no. Craig: I don't see your folding of arms and leaning back in your chair as you claim that the burden of proof is on me is any different from saying that you are out of arguments other than that the latter claim would be more honest. [Steve] I am skeptical of your claim that you have free will as you are of my claim that free will is an unnecessary extra-added metaphysical ingredient with no empirical basis and no legitimate explanatory power. Craig: I disagree with Harris that talk about free-will is gibberish. He is like the marcher who says that everyone in the formation is out-of-step but him. Millions or billions of people have for thousands of years talked about free will, but Harris a few others think they're the only ones making sense. Your claim is different--you say some claims about free will are false. So if millions or billions of people for thousands of years felt free to change their mind (the empirical basis of free will), the burden is on you to argue they weren't. Steve: But we don't disagree that many of our acts are accompanied by the feeling of having willed them. I have this feeling often. The question is whether or not this willing we feel is meaningfully free. You haven't even made sense of what that could even mean let alone provided any good arguments in favor of it. Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
dmb to Steve: Also, why does the question of free will have to be framed around an independent agent. In what sense is such agency independent? Why can't the issue be framed as agency within the whole range and context of static patterns? Andre: This is what disturbs me about this incessant 'willing' to free will debate ( and I think Dan points to as well). The issue is taken out of any context or placed in a fabricated one. But, as dmb, Dan, the MOQ points out, we are not independent. We are not free to the extent that we follow static patterns of value.Call the act of choosing between static patterns 'free' if you like but that is meaningless. That has nothing to do with freedom. That is the trick, the joke that a substance- oriented world places upon us. It simply means that you have a choice. And, to really get the message home, the point is made that you are also exercising your freedom when you decide not to choose!Wow, what freedom! Meaningless crap! And since we're into examples...here's one: you have the choice between strawberry ice cream and chocolate ice cream!(that is all!!) Do you guys call that CHOICE?!! An expression of 'freedom? An exercise in 'Free will?. Come on!! Can we just stay on a pragmatic level here? Of course I can cite many more ridiculous examples but I assume you get the picture(what house do you want, what job, what book, what fridge, what woman, what holiday, what suit, what car, what TV program, what political party, what tree do you want to chop down?). The only thing the MOQ claims is that 'most of our lives are spent empirically verifying that something has higher value than something else. We have that flexibility, because of requisite variety. We are free also to follow Dynamic Quality...in the MOQ sense, the Zen sense, in which case I would warn you for static repercussions. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi again, Steve -- In the MOQ, every response is a valuistic one, but, whatever. Ham: Do you prefer coffee or tea? Do you like pop music or the classics? Are you more attracted to blondes or brunettes? Do you support liberal or conservative candidates? THESE are preferences, Steve. They are all based on your personal values. Steve: Sure, these are preferences, but I don't recognize any freedom to not value what I now value. I am a collection of such values. (I don't have such values, such values have me.) That's a Pirsigian parody on value which is deceitful, in my opinion. Value is a reciprocal attribute of existence. In a metaphysical sense, it is what binds us to the Source. From the existential perspective, value is what one wants, loves, or desires. Human beings don't come with a pre-packaged set of values, nor does value itself determine what one's preferences will be. Individual sensibility does this in the process of experiencing. ...I am not free to prefer tea over coffee. If my preferences change over time (which is to say, if the collection of patterns of value referred to as I changes over time), it will not be a matter of will but of having new experiences. You are free to choose coffee, tea, or bourbon, for whatever reason. Your personal preferences, however, are value-driven. That drive will be different for you than for me. Value-sensibility is prior to both will and action. Because each individual differentiates the range of values by his own sensible standards, what he values (or disparages) will vary from person to person. Thus, if you are thirsty (which may serve as a physiological example of hydration value) your will (i.e., intent) is to drink. The action you take in response to this value is your free choice, depending of course on the options available at the time. I actually want to like tea, especially iced tea since it is so often offered this time of year, but I just don't. That wouldn't even be a problem if I could just will myself not to want to want to like iced tea which I can't do even if I want to want to want to like iced tea. Do you see the problem of regress inherent in asserting freedom of will? Not really. I used to smoke cigarettes and suck on a pipe. It was a habit I enjoyed, until I developed a cough and willed myself to stop. I now smoke an occasional cigar, which I found more enjoyable and less cough-producing. But should this prove to be detrimental to my heath, I'm convinced that I could will myself off cigars, too. Einstein made the same point: Honestly, I cannot understand what people mean when they talk about the freedom of the human will. I have a feeling, for instance, that I will something or other; but what relation this has with freedom I cannot understand at all. I feel that I will to light my pipe and I do it; but how can I connect this up with the idea of freedom? What is behind the act of willing to light the pipe? Another act of willing? Schopenhauer once said: Der Mensch kann was er will; er kann aber nicht wollen was er will (Man can do what he will but he cannot will what he wills). Man cannot will what he wants, but he can will what he intends. I think there's a distinction to be made between wanting and willing that these men overlooked. Willing expresses intention but is not necessarily what we want. I may want to sleep past ten in the morning, but knowing that I have work that won't wait, I exercise my free will to set the alarm for eight instead. I may want to write more on free will, but my intention is to fulfill other commitments right now, so I bid you adieux. Thanks, Steve, Ham Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
On Jun 15, 2011, at 6:09 PM, david buchanan wrote: dmb says: Okay, now we're talking about the same thing. But I don't think free will is bunk so much as the metaphysical entity behind it. Same with the notion that reality itself is a series of causes and effects. That's very metaphysical too. These are the two basic metaphysical substances in subject-object metaphysics, of course. But, as you almost point out, the MOQ does not dispute the idea that freedom and constraint are real. The MOQ says DQ is the quality of freedom and sq is the quality of order. Without DQ nothing could grow or change and without sq nothing can last. Without static quality, DQ degenerates into chaos. With DQ, static quality would fossilize or die of old age. And it takes a living being to negotiate that balance. In that sense, freedom takes a lot of discipline. Static patterns don't determine what we will do but they limit what we can do. Marsha: Huh? This is almost a good as you explaining how patterns and objects differ. What nonsense... ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
On Jun 15, 2011, at 6:09 PM, david buchanan wrote: dmb says: Okay, now we're talking about the same thing. dmb: But I don't think free will is bunk so much as the metaphysical entity behind it. Marsha: What metaphysical entity woud that be? dmb: Same with the notion that reality itself is a series of causes and effects. That's very metaphysical too. Marsha: Any explanation come with this bit of wonderment? dmb: These are the two basic metaphysical substances in subject-object metaphysics, of course. Marsha: Which explains??? dmb: But, as you almost point out, the MOQ does not dispute the idea that freedom and constraint are real. Marsha: Huh? dmb: The MOQ says DQ is the quality of freedom and sq is the quality of order. Marsha: Please provide the quote... Or is it bit of wisdom snatched from another context? dmb: Without DQ nothing could grow or change and without sq nothing can last. Marsha: If you know this, please explain how this happens. dmb: Without static quality, DQ degenerates into chaos. Marsha: How do you know this? Did you ever experience chaos? dmb: With DQ, static quality would fossilize or die of old age. Marsha: Hahahahaha... dmb: And it takes a living being to negotiate that balance. Marsha: What do you mean by living being? dmb: In that sense, freedom takes a lot of discipline. Marsha: Statically speaking, of course... Sitting for hours and hours in zazen. You know about that too. Right? dmb: Static patterns don't determine what we will do but they limit what we can do. Marsha: Huh? This is almost a good as you explaining how patterns and objects differ. What nonsense... ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Steve] you are out of arguments It's okay if I am out of arguments. I only ever needed one. [Steve] The question is whether or not this willing we feel is meaningfully free. You haven't even made sense of what that could even mean I suppose it is like being red-green color blind. The person who is red-green color blind cannot make sense of the distinction between red green. For the normal person, that distinction, like free will, is experienced. [Andre] you have the choice between strawberry ice cream and chocolate ice cream!(that is all!!) Do you guys call that CHOICE?!! So how many flavors make the choice free? 3? 31 (Baskins-Robbins, anyone)? No, 2 flavors are sufficient for an example of free will. Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Steve, Steve said: What is your personal view on the matter of free will? Matt: My personal, fairly unphilosophical view is that it doesn't pay much to think about free will vs. determinism as a problem. In other words, I don't think about it much and I'm encouraged in that view by how boring the debate seems in the abstract and how disconnected the debate seems from moral philosophy when it is keyed at an epistemological level. The meat is much lower to the ground, and Nagel's challenge is really about how to reconceive our common moral intuitions about blame, praise, intention, and luck. _Nagel_ thinks there are some root paradoxes about human nature in there, but Nagel takes a pretty pessimistic view toward what we can do to ourselves by handling our concepts in different ways (a pessimism I don't think Pirsig shares). Occasionally, I imagine, we'll have to revise our moral intuitions, but for the most part I think a lot of our moral categories can be saved: we just need to think of them differently. For example, the notion of autonomy: this is the central Kantian notion that cues the free will debate. But if Robert Brandom's revisionary reading of Kant and Hegel is right, then autonomy is a perfectly suitable notion for value-first philosophers like Pirsig and the pragmatists. For at the heart of Kant, so argues Brandom, is the notion that conceptual activity is at its root normative. And having norms in play means values, valuing one thing and not another. What Brandom builds, and what a number of other philosophers have been concurrently working towards, is a story about _how_ normativity works, the mechanisms that need to be in place for values to exist. Ultimately, the story is that norms require the recognition of the norms as having authority: _you_ bind _yourself_ to be held accountable according to such-and-such a norm, rule, or value-standard. That's autonomy, the choice of what communities you're going to include yourself in. We're not making those decisions as children, of course, which is why people Bernard Williams writes books about shame and Thomas Scanlon about blame. Expressions of disapprobation, even when untied to, say, legal consequence have an important place in the mechanisms of society because expressing blame or resentment _is_ the norm-crossing consequence of behaving in a manner the community you belong to disapproves of. The trouble with Pirsig's metaphysical strategy, in specific relationship to the multifarious free will debate, is that his explanatory strategy is to treat Value as a primitive: you treat it as the only given, and explain everything else from that first step. That strategy is very successful on a number of fronts, but not in explaining what value is, or how it works. How could it? You've already been asked to cede its equipment as a given for explaining everything else. This is why Quality can remain, explanatorily speaking, undefined. The trouble with the concept of Free Will is that Freedom and the Will, whatever they are, are pretty central pieces of equipment for the concept of Value. You have to basically treat the problem of free will as a moot point, pretty much along the lines of the Humean compatibilist strategy Pirsig articulates in Lila. When you're bein' static, you be static; when you Dynamic, you Dynamic! The trouble with Pirsig's neat solution is that he never tells us how we are to know when a person is being controlled by static patterns or is following Dynamic Quality (the interestingly chosen verbs he modulates between). If you want to know whether a person is morally responsible for an action, based on his freedom of will, you are still in the same position as you were before. But answering that question doesn't seem to be Pirsig's quarry. (What is interesting is the Kantian position that Pirsig strikes right afterwards, that judgment is the root primitive of cognition.) I don't think there's anything incompatible with Pirsig's strategy and, say, Brandom's strategy (someone who doesn't take value to be a explanatory primitive). I also don't think there's anything incompatible between those who deny the existence of the concept of free will (based on redundancy arguments as you've been pressing) and Pirsig's value-first strategy. The trick is to specify, as in Daniel Dennett's phrase, the kinds of freedom worth wanting. The image of empty selves, making capricious decisions _because_ bound to nothing, is not one of them. In the Hegelianism I like, when it comes to freedom and autonomy, you gotta' give it to get it. You have to bind yourself before you can be free. Matt Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Excellent post Matt. I dont have the time to respond in any length but it has alot of content worthy of reflection. good stuff nicely written. -Ron - Original Message From: Matt Kundert pirsigafflict...@hotmail.com To: moq_disc...@moqtalk.org Sent: Wed, June 15, 2011 8:46:31 PM Subject: Re: [MD] Free Will Hi Steve, Steve said: What is your personal view on the matter of free will? Matt: My personal, fairly unphilosophical view is that it doesn't pay much to think about free will vs. determinism as a problem. In other words, I don't think about it much and I'm encouraged in that view by how boring the debate seems in the abstract and how disconnected the debate seems from moral philosophy when it is keyed at an epistemological level. The meat is much lower to the ground, and Nagel's challenge is really about how to reconceive our common moral intuitions about blame, praise, intention, and luck. _Nagel_ thinks there are some root paradoxes about human nature in there, but Nagel takes a pretty pessimistic view toward what we can do to ourselves by handling our concepts in different ways (a pessimism I don't think Pirsig shares). Occasionally, I imagine, we'll have to revise our moral intuitions, but for the most part I think a lot of our moral categories can be saved: we just need to think of them differently. For example, the notion of autonomy: this is the central Kantian notion that cues the free will debate. But if Robert Brandom's revisionary reading of Kant and Hegel is right, then autonomy is a perfectly suitable notion for value-first philosophers like Pirsig and the pragmatists. For at the heart of Kant, so argues Brandom, is the notion that conceptual activity is at its root normative. And having norms in play means values, valuing one thing and not another. What Brandom builds, and what a number of other philosophers have been concurrently working towards, is a story about _how_ normativity works, the mechanisms that need to be in place for values to exist. Ultimately, the story is that norms require the recognition of the norms as having authority: _you_ bind _yourself_ to be held accountable according to such-and-such a norm, rule, or value-standard. That's autonomy, the choice of what communities you're going to include yourself in. We're not making those decisions as children, of course, which is why people Bernard Williams writes books about shame and Thomas Scanlon about blame. Expressions of disapprobation, even when untied to, say, legal consequence have an important place in the mechanisms of society because expressing blame or resentment _is_ the norm-crossing consequence of behaving in a manner the community you belong to disapproves of. The trouble with Pirsig's metaphysical strategy, in specific relationship to the multifarious free will debate, is that his explanatory strategy is to treat Value as a primitive: you treat it as the only given, and explain everything else from that first step. That strategy is very successful on a number of fronts, but not in explaining what value is, or how it works. How could it? You've already been asked to cede its equipment as a given for explaining everything else. This is why Quality can remain, explanatorily speaking, undefined. The trouble with the concept of Free Will is that Freedom and the Will, whatever they are, are pretty central pieces of equipment for the concept of Value. You have to basically treat the problem of free will as a moot point, pretty much along the lines of the Humean compatibilist strategy Pirsig articulates in Lila. When you're bein' static, you be static; when you Dynamic, you Dynamic! The trouble with Pirsig's neat solution is that he never tells us how we are to know when a person is being controlled by static patterns or is following Dynamic Quality (the interestingly chosen verbs he modulates between). If you want to know whether a person is morally responsible for an action, based on his freedom of will, you are still in the same position as you were before. But answering that question doesn't seem to be Pirsig's quarry. (What is interesting is the Kantian position that Pirsig strikes right afterwards, that judgment is the root primitive of cognition.) I don't think there's anything incompatible with Pirsig's strategy and, say, Brandom's strategy (someone who doesn't take value to be a explanatory primitive). I also don't think there's anything incompatible between those who deny the existence of the concept of free will (based on redundancy arguments as you've been pressing) and Pirsig's value-first strategy. The trick is to specify, as in Daniel Dennett's phrase, the kinds of freedom worth wanting. The image of empty selves, making capricious decisions _because_ bound to nothing, is not one of them. In the Hegelianism I like, when it comes to freedom and autonomy, you gotta' give it to get
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Craig, On Mon, Jun 13, 2011 at 1:17 PM, craig...@comcast.net wrote: [Craig, previously] An eccentric magician invites you to play a game. The game consists of 2 boxes 2 buttons. He puts the same amount of money--either $0 or $1000--in each of the 2 boxes. If you push the right-hand button you get the money in the right hand box. If you push the left-hand button you get the money in both the right-hand the left-hand boxes. Before you play, he confides to you that he can read the minds of the players he lets you watch several rounds of the game. Each time he puts no money in the boxes, the player pushes the left-hand button each time he puts $1000 in both boxes, the player pushes the right-hand button. Now it's your turn. Which button do you push? [Steve] The right-hand button? Craig: This answer is irrational. If you think that you will get $1000 by pushing the right-hand button, then you should think you will get $2000 by pushing the left-hand button. Steve: But the magician would know if I were going to do that, and I only need $1000. [Steve] Do you see this power to choose as the possession of man but not other animals? Craig: Humans have a feedback mechanism. Steve: I agree that humans can consider past events and project into the future, and animals probably can't. But why think this ability is more free than a bird's ability to flap its wings and fly--something that humans can't do? A wider repertoire of behaviors doesn't imply more freedom unless that is all you mean by freedom of will. Craig: Once we form an intention/decide, we can consider the consequences of doing/not doing the action then are free to change our mind based on this feedback. Animals that cannot do this, do not have free will. Steve: You assert that we are free to change our minds upon reflection. How do I know that we have any choice but to change our minds upon reflection and to reflect in the first place if conditions dictate? Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Ham, Steve: Do you see this power to choose as the possession of man but not other animals? Ham: Yes I do, Steve. I suppose a case can be made for intentional behavior on the part of highly developed cerebrates. However, my personal view is that animal preferences are largely determined by instinct, which supports Nature's law of survival. Steve: How is the preference in intellectual preferences different in kind from biological preferences? I can't simply decide by force of will to prefer 2+2=5 over 2+2=4 any more than I can will myself not to bleed when stabbed through the heart. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi dmb, dmb says: Are you telling me that Harris and/or philosophers take psychological and historical factors cause our decisions in some law-like way, that they determine our will? That hardly seems plausible. Wouldn't one have to subscribe to worst kind of scientism and reductionism to believe that? Causal relations make sense within the fields of physics and engineering and such but it's not appropriate to extend causality into history, biography or psychology. Steve: If you go looking for causes, we find that they abound. Some effects may simply be random or otherwise unknowable, but that doesn't support the notion that such unexplainable outcomes by default ought to be attributed to a metaphysical entity called the will. dmb says: ...Isn't the controversy all about whether or not persons are moral agents? Isn't the whole question about whether or not the choices actually come from persons - as opposed to coming from causes beyond their control? Steve: Humans are moral agents because our actions have moral consequences, not because we can control our static patterns. We are our static patterns. dmb says: OH, come on. Agency doesn't imply control? My dictionary says agent is a noun meaning a person or thing that takes an active role or produces a specified effect. Isn't that exactly the opposite of what a determined person or thing would be? Steve: Ok then, we are moral beings but we are not agents in the way that is commonly supposed. The MOQ denies this as well. dmb: You seem to be saying that our will is determined by virtue of the fact that we are a complex forrest of migrating static patterns. Of course that would only be true if static patterns were determinative and that is exactly what I find so implausible. I mean, there are constraints and influences, impulses and desires to be sure. But this is just the context in which we make choices, this is what we make choices about. Steve: In the MOQ, what type of static pattern is the will? If the will refers to DQ and not any static pattern, then it is not the possession of any human. Also, you keep putting up some radical determinism as the only alternative to belief in a radically internal entity called the will. To deny free will is only to deny the existence of this entity. It is not to say that everything is already determined. Most things could just be random or just held to be of unknown cause. dmb: But to say we have no free will seems a rather drastic metaphysical position in which every factor exerts an irresistible causal force. If static patterns determine what we are and there are four levels of conflicting static patterns - plus DQ - then we are always being pulled in five directions at once. If all these conflicting demands HAD to followed like law of cause and effect, I suppose we'd explode or something. Steve: A denial of a metaphysical entity called the will can be regarded as a metaphysical position I suppose in the way that atheism could be thought of as a religion and not-collecting-stamps a hobby. dmb: Did you know that about half of all adult Americans subscribe to a different religious view than the one they grew up with? Steve: And by this fact I am to assume that these people simply willed themselves to hold different beliefs? Steve said: Playing the causation game doesn't depend on any particular metaphysics. But once you start looking for explanations in terms of causes, the serpent of causation is found to run over everything. To try to say the buck stops at the will fails since we then want to know what caused someone to will what she wills. There is an unavoidable regress once you go looking for causes. dmb says: I think every empiricist since Hume would tell you that causation is a metaphysical concept. If it's a serpent that run's over everything then it's still a metaphysical concept. And I'm not sure what the question even means. Why are we assuming the will has been caused by something in particular? The final cause of the will? We're supposed to trace the causes of our will back to the first cause? Sounds like bad theology. Steve: As soon as you ask the question about free will you are invoking the premise that causes exist. I am willing to accept that metaphysical premise for the sake of argument, but I am not tied to it. My point is that once you decide to go looking for causes as explanations of things, you'll find causes everywhere. Positing an extra-added metaphysical ingredient called the will as an additional cause that can inexplicably occasionally trump certain other causes fits nicely with our subjective feeling of acting out intentions and what you would like to believe about yourself but doesn't fit with what we are learning about the brain nor with the MOQ which calls this autonomous self a fiction. dmb says: We have free will in the sense that we can choose NOT to act on such impulses, to resist the
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Matt, About an hour before getting your post I experienced a felt intention to write to you to see what you thought about all this, so I was glad to see this: On Mon, Jun 13, 2011 at 8:45 PM, Matt Kundert pirsigafflict...@hotmail.com wrote: Steve said: Playing the causation game doesn't depend on any particular metaphysics. But once you start looking for explanations in terms of causes, the serpent of causation is found to run over everything. Matt: That's a good way of putting it. One of the most powerful, succinct statements of this view--that once you start playing the causation game the viewpoint of morality based on free will seems to disappear before your very eyes--is Thomas Nagel's Moral Luck. Nagel ultimately believes morality does need a notion of free will, but he nevertheless acknowledges how paradoxical the Kantian framework is (which he considers necessary to morality). The idea is that free will is flexed when you have _control_, and Nagel's point is that when you look too close, you don't have control over much. Steve: I'll try to look up some of your references. Thanks for providing them. What is your personal view on the matter of free will? Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Ron, On Mon, Jun 13, 2011 at 10:27 PM, X Acto xa...@rocketmail.com wrote: It is, again, the capacity for choice that makes us accountable for our own actions and states. Epictetus is particularly fond of exploring the implications of this essentially Stoic conception. In studying his usage it is helpful to remember that his favored term prohairesis refers more often to the capacity for choice than it does to particular acts of choosing. The word is variously translated; the rendering “volition” is adopted here as in Long 2002. The volition, Epictetus argues, is “by nature unimpeded” (1.17.21), and it is for this reason that freedom is for him an inalienable characteristic of the human being. The very notion of a capacity to make one's own decisions implies as a matter of logical necessity that those decisions are free of external compulsion; otherwise they would not be decisions. But humans do have such a capacity and are thus profoundly different from even the higher animals, which deal with impressions merely in an unreflective way... To quote The Dude, that's just, like...your opinion, man. I think we would be more loving compassionate people if we dropped the dubious notion of free will. Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Steve] This is sufficient for will, but what are you adding when you attach the word free? So: what is the difference between exercising your will exercising your free will? When an amoeba backs away from acid or a philadendron turns toward the sun, it is exercising its will, but it is not FREE to dive into the acid or turn away from the sun, so it is not exercising FREE will. [Craig, previously] Once we form an intention/decide, we can consider the consequences of doing/not doing the action then are free to change our mind based on this feedback. Animals that cannot do this, do not have free will. [Steve] I agree that humans can consider past events and project into the future, and animals probably can't. But why think this ability is more free than a bird's ability to flap its wings and fly Because it is the basis for your choice. [Steve] You assert that we are free to change our minds upon reflection. How do I know that we have any choice but to change our minds upon reflection and to reflect in the first place if conditions dictate? I feel I am free to change my mind, so the burden of proof is on someone who denies I am free to change my mind. That person is going to have a very difficult task. Of the millions or billions of people who for thousands of years felt they free to change their mind, every one of them would have to be wrong every single time. The odds are staggering. [Steve] I can't simply decide by force of will to prefer 2+2=5 over 2+2=4 Some things we decide, some things we prefer. That we can't always decide our preferences is irrelevant. [Steve] In the MOQ, what type of static pattern the will? The will is the interaction of different spovs. Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Steve -- On Tuesday, 6/14/11, 7:37 AM, Steven Peterson peterson.st...@gmail.com wrote: Hi Ham, How is the preference in intellectual preferences different in kind from biological preferences? I can't simply decide by force of will to prefer 2+2=5 over 2+2=4 any more than I can will myself not to bleed when stabbed through the heart. I'm not distinguishing biological preferences from intellectual preferences. Preferences are volitional responses to value sensibility. They can be emotional, physical, aesthetic, social, or intellectual. Mathematical values are a horse of a different color. We don't respond valuistically to numbers or equations any more than to the fact that Paris is a city in France, or that the sun rises in the morning. So, I fail to see why you would suppose that equations had any relevance to sensible value or personal preference. Why do you insist on complicating what amounts to exercising your will? Do you prefer coffee or tea? Do you like pop music or the classics? Are you more attracted to blondes or brunettes? Do you support liberal or conservative candidates? THESE are preferences, Steve. They are all based on your personal values. You may not be able to will yourself not to bleed, but you are free to choose how you will stop the bleeding. Indeed, you are free to decide what action to take on virtually any value option presented to you. The more typical agument is that whatever you do, however you act, is determined by prior causes, the implication being that you are not a free agent. Even if that were true, nobody knows what those causes might be, nor can they prevent you from exercising your free will or choice on the matter. So it's not as if you were acting out a motion picture, frame by frame, and HAD to act as the director choreographed it. And since your action is a response to your value sensibilities, rather than a biogenetic program, you ARE a free agent. In fact, you are the Choicemaker of your world. Enjoy your freedom in good health, Ham Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
On Sun, Jun 12, 2011 at 2:30 PM, craig...@comcast.net wrote: An eccentric magician invites you to play a game.The game consists of 2 boxes 2 buttons. He puts the same amount of money--either $0 or $1000--in each of the 2 boxes. If you push the right-hand button you get themoney in the right hand box. If you push the left-hand button you get the moneyin both the right-hand the left-hand boxes. Before you play, he confides to you that he can read the minds of the players he lets you watch several rounds of the game. Each time he puts no money in the boxes, the player pushes the left-hand button each time he puts $1000 in both boxes, the player pushes the right-hand button. Now it's your turn. Which button do you push? The right-hand button? Can you explain the point of this question? Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi DMB, Steve said: It's not the we don't have free will. It's that free will probably can't even mean anything. What does it mean to say that not only are you capable of acting out your will but that on top of that your will is free? Free of what? dmb says: I don't get it. How is free will different from the ability to act out your will? Steve: Free will is not generally understood to be the ability to act on one's will. Any animal can do that. Free will goes a step further than that to propose an extra-added ingredient that humans posses and animals do not . It says that the will is not determined by anything other than the soul or some something extra with which the self can be identified that exists beyond our biology and socialization and even our unique set of experiences. dmb: And the last question seems a bit odd since the question of free will hardly makes sense without some kind of determinism to oppose it. I mean, when we're talking about free will we are talking about the absence of physical, biological, psychological, theological determinism, etc.. We're talking about the causal factors that would constrain that freedom. That's what free will would be free from, no? Steve: Sure. And once you subtract a person's physical, biological, psychological, personal historical, and all other circumstantial aspects, what is left to refer to as the person? What could possibly determine what one wills if not these sorts of things? But none of these aspects of our past and present circumstances are within our control at the instant we make a decision. Steve said: Harris is not saying that we have no choice. The question is where do choices come from? dmb says: I don't get that either. Isn't the controversy all about whether or not persons are moral agents? Isn't the whole question about whether or not the choices actually come from persons - as opposed to coming from causes beyond their control? Steve: Humans are moral agents because our actions have moral consequences, not because we can control our static patterns. We are our static patterns. Steve said: Whether we like the consequences of believing in free will or denying it's coherence as a concept is beside the point of whether or not free will is intelligible. dmb says: I think freedom and constraint are both intelligible at the same time. I mean, experience isn't just one way or the other. The notion that we are determined and the question of freedom is traditionally generated by an all-encompasing worldview, particularly theism and materialism. But I can't quite see where Harris is coming from. He denies that his objection entails a materialistic assumption but we know that he's an atheist and a brain scientist and something like a moral realist. I just don't see how that adds up. Steve: Playing the causation game doesn't depend on any particular metaphysics. But once you start looking for explanations in terms of causes, the serpent of causation is found to run over everything. To try to say the buck stops at the will fails since we then want to know what caused someone to will what she wills. There is an unavoidable regress once you go looking for causes. dmb: I think that the MOQer would frame the issue around DQ and the four levels of static quality rather than a metaphysical premise like theism or scientific materialism per se. In the MOQ's moral framework we have all kinds of conflicting values and they each exert their pressures and demands... Steve: True, but this is a denial of the traditional concept of free will. dmb: If there is no free will, then there is no such thing as being responsible. If that were true, serial killers and philosophical novelists would be morally equal. How intelligible is that? Steve: This is the fear that people seem to have about giving up the notion of free will, but it is nonsense. All it means is that it makes more sense to focus on prevention, restitution, and rehabilitation than on punishment and revenge. See Harris's post, Morality without Free Will: http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/morality-without-free-will/ Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Ham, Ham: Free will is the power to choose. It is unintelligible only for determinists who believe that human actions, like all evolutionary events, are the consequence of prior causes. This would be true if human beings were controlled by their beingness, enslaved by their genetic propensities and biological instincts, or programmed by a moral universe. Statistical conglomerates pay tribute to deterministic forces. But this is not the case for singularities such as human beings who possess a unique, highly developed, and sensitive perception of diversity. This affords man the unique capability for enacting his intentions, which is the basis of his active intelligence and which, as James Fletcher Baxter says, makes man earth's Choicemaker. The singularity I allude to here is that man is created as a 'being-aware', an entity that stands apart from his Creator. As a free agent of the Absolute Source, man has an autonomy that transcends the laws of biological survival in the existential sense, as well as the packaged choices paradigm of statistical probability. This is why Protagoras declared that man is the measure of all things, (an axiom that, as Marsha reminds me, I incorrectly credited to Parmenides in my response to Ron yesterday). Steve: Do you see this power to choose as the possession of man but not other animals? Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Craig, previously] An eccentric magician invites you to play a game. The game consists of 2 boxes 2 buttons. He puts the same amount of money--either $0 or $1000--in each of the 2 boxes. If you push the right-hand button you get the money in the right hand box. If you push the left-hand button you get the money in both the right-hand the left-hand boxes. Before you play, he confides to you that he can read the minds of the players he lets you watch several rounds of the game. Each time he puts no money in the boxes, the player pushes the left-hand button each time he puts $1000 in both boxes, the player pushes the right-hand button. Now it's your turn. Which button do you push? [Steve] The right-hand button? This answer is irrational. If you think that you will get $1000 by pushing the right-hand button, then you should think you will get $2000 by pushing the left-hand button. [Steve] Can you explain the point of this question? It shows that not believing in free will is irrational. [Steve] The question is where do choices come from? My choices come from me, your choices from you. [Steve] Do you see this power to choose as the possession of man but not other animals? Humans have a feedback mechanism. Once we form an intention/decide, we can consider the consequences of doing/not doing the action then are free to change our mind based on this feedback. Animals that cannot do this, do not have free will. Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Steve -- On Monday, 6/13/11, 10:02 AM Steven Peterson peterson.st...@gmail.com wrote: Hi Ham, Ham: Free will is the power to choose. It is unintelligible only for determinists who believe that human actions, like all evolutionary events, are the consequence of prior causes. This would be true if human beings were controlled by their beingness, enslaved by their genetic propensities and biological instincts, or programmed by a moral universe. Statistical conglomerates pay tribute to deterministic forces. But this is not the case for singularities such as human beings who possess a unique, highly developed, and sensitive perception of diversity. This affords man the unique capability for enacting his intentions, which is the basis of his active intelligence and which, as James Fletcher Baxter says, makes man Earth's Choicemaker. Steve: Do you see this power to choose as the possession of man but not other animals? Yes I do, Steve. I suppose a case can be made for intentional behavior on the part of highly developed cerebrates. However, my personal view is that animal preferences are largely determined by instinct, which supports Nature's law of survival. Man shares this biological guidance system with the animal species of course; but his major decisions, creative works, and socio-cultural agendas are often based on choices that override or run counter to natural law. One can cite the invention of lighter than air craft, central plumbing, or electric power generation as examples. I believe what drives mankind is not instinct but aesthetic and intellectual values of which the animal species are oblivious. The soldier in battle who sacrifices his life for his country is certainly not acting in accordance with nature's laws. The ideas laid out in the Magna Carta and the Declaration of Independence are based on moral principles rationalized from man's value sensibility. Da Vinci's Mona Lisa' and Beethoven's 'Ode to Joy' express values that can be appreciated only by aesthetically sensible human beings. I also believe the power to choose has an intellectual corollary -- namely, knowing that one is capable of self-determination. Children start out in life indulging their natural appetites; if they mature normally, they acquire the intelligence to base their choices on more rational values like personal responsibility, justice, and concern for others. This is what has enabled mankind to establish the moral systems needed for peaceful co-existence and free enterprise. The moral precept here is rational, self-directed value, and it can only function where individuals realize they are, to borrow Milton Friedman's axiom, Free to Choose. Essentially speaking, Ham Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Steve said: Free will is not generally understood to be the ability to act on one's will. Any animal can do that. Free will goes a step further than that to propose an extra-added ingredient that humans posses and animals do not. It says that the will is not determined by anything other than the soul or some something extra with which the self can be identified that exists beyond our biology and socialization and even our unique set of experiences. ...And once you subtract a person's physical, biological, psychological, personal historical, and all other circumstantial aspects, what is left to refer to as the person? What could possibly determine what one wills if not these sorts of things? But none of these aspects of our past and present circumstances are within our control at the instant we make a decision. dmb says: Are you telling me that Harris and/or philosophers take psychological and historical factors cause our decisions in some law-like way, that they determine our will? That hardly seems plausible. Wouldn't one have to subscribe to worst kind of scientism and reductionism to believe that? Causal relations make sense within the fields of physics and engineering and such but it's not appropriate to extend causality into history, biography or psychology. dmb says: ...Isn't the controversy all about whether or not persons are moral agents? Isn't the whole question about whether or not the choices actually come from persons - as opposed to coming from causes beyond their control? Steve: Humans are moral agents because our actions have moral consequences, not because we can control our static patterns. We are our static patterns. dmb says: OH, come on. Agency doesn't imply control? My dictionary says agent is a noun meaning a person or thing that takes an active role or produces a specified effect. Isn't that exactly the opposite of what a determined person or thing would be? You seem to be saying that our will is determined by virtue of the fact that we are a complex forrest of migrating static patterns. Of course that would only be true if static patterns were determinative and that is exactly what I find so implausible. I mean, there are constraints and influences, impulses and desires to be sure. But this is just the context in which we make choices, this is what we make choices about. But to say we have no free will seems a rather drastic metaphysical position in which every factor exerts an irresistible causal force. If static patterns determine what we are and there are four levels of conflicting static patterns - plus DQ - then we are always being pulled in five directions at once. If all these conflicting demands HAD to followed like law of cause and effect, I suppose we'd explode or something. Did you know that about half of all adult Americans subscribe to a different religious view than the one they grew up with? Steve said: Playing the causation game doesn't depend on any particular metaphysics. But once you start looking for explanations in terms of causes, the serpent of causation is found to run over everything. To try to say the buck stops at the will fails since we then want to know what caused someone to will what she wills. There is an unavoidable regress once you go looking for causes. dmb says: I think every empiricist since Hume would tell you that causation is a metaphysical concept. If it's a serpent that run's over everything then it's still a metaphysical concept. And I'm not sure what the question even means. Why are we assuming the will has been caused by something in particular? The final cause of the will? We're supposed to trace the causes of our will back to the first cause? Sounds like bad theology. dmb said: ...In the MOQ's moral framework we have all kinds of conflicting values and they each exert their pressures and demands... Steve replied: True, but this is a denial of the traditional concept of free will. dmb says: Is it? Isn't will power the capacity to resist the demands of our lower impulses? We have free will in the sense that we can choose NOT to act on such impulses, to resist the pressure exerted by our instincts. The MOQ says we are not free to the extent that we follow static patterns. I think this is part of what Pirsig means by that. Social level morality comes with its own set of restraints but, as Pirsig says, they free you from the laws of the jungle and civilized life has done a fabulous job in moving us beyond mere biological necessity. The intellectual level, in turn, provides freedom from social constraints. The growth and development of each person is like climbing up through the whole history of evolutionary and both continue to be driven by DQ, by those little spur of the moment decisions. dmb: If there is no free will, then there is no such thing as being responsible. If that were true, serial killers and philosophical novelists would be morally equal. How
Re: [MD] Free Will
Steve said: Playing the causation game doesn't depend on any particular metaphysics. But once you start looking for explanations in terms of causes, the serpent of causation is found to run over everything. Matt: That's a good way of putting it. One of the most powerful, succinct statements of this view--that once you start playing the causation game the viewpoint of morality based on free will seems to disappear before your very eyes--is Thomas Nagel's Moral Luck. Nagel ultimately believes morality does need a notion of free will, but he nevertheless acknowledges how paradoxical the Kantian framework is (which he considers necessary to morality). The idea is that free will is flexed when you have _control_, and Nagel's point is that when you look too close, you don't have control over much. Bernard Williams paper of the same name (both appeared at the same time, as part of the same colloquium) is also useful on this issue, except Williams thinks that the Kantian framework is (therefore) bankrupt. His Shame and Necessity is a largescale attempt to fund our notions of ethical behavior without the notion of a will (he thinks will, which nearly comes attached with free, is ultimately a Christian vocable that is unnecessary for ethical behavior). Likewise, Iris Murdoch's first chapter to The Sovereignty of Good makes beautiful, quick work of this notion of an isolatable, _free_standing will that just decides to do stuff. She renders a wonderful, alternative phenomenological account of how we actually make choices. Nagel's Moral Luck is collected in his Mortal Questions. Williams's Moral Luck is collected in his Moral Luck. Matt Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Steve said: Playing the causation game doesn't depend on any particular metaphysics. But once you start looking for explanations in terms of causes, the serpent of causation is found to run over everything. Matt: That's a good way of putting it. One of the most powerful, succinct statements of this view--that once you start playing the causation game the viewpoint of morality based on free will seems to disappear before your very eyes--is Thomas Nagel's Moral Luck. Nagel ultimately believes morality does need a notion of free will, but he nevertheless acknowledges how paradoxical the Kantian framework is (which he considers necessary to morality). The idea is that free will is flexed when you have _control_, and Nagel's point is that when you look too close, you don't have control over much. Ron: Epictetus contributes much to this discussion. I think ethical development is the assertion of control in our lives. When we assert control we assert ourselves as reasoning human beings, when we look close we must take care that we must concern ourselves with that which can control, that ethical acts emerge from making such distinctions. as Stanford enclopedia of philosophy cites: The linchpin of Epictetus' entire philosophy is his account of what it is to be a human being; that is, to be a rational mortal creature. “Rational” as a descriptive term means that human beings have the capacity to “use impressions” in a reflective manner. Animals, like humans, use their impressions of the world in that their behavior is guided by what they perceive their circumstances to be. But human beings also examine the content of their impressions to determine whether they are true or false; we have the faculty of “assent” (1.6.12-22). Assent is regulated by our awareness of logical consistency or contradiction between the proposition under consideration and beliefs that one already holds: when we are not aware of any consideration, we assent readily, but when we perceive a conflict we are strongly constrained to reject one or the other of the conflicting views (2.26.3). Thus Medea kills her children because she believes it is to her advantage to do so; if someone were to show her clearly that she is deceived in this belief, she would not do it (1.28.8). Our hatred of being deceived, our inability to accept as true what we clearly see to be false, is for Epictetus the most basic fact about human beings and the most promising (1.28.1-5). . Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
It is, again, the capacity for choice that makes us accountable for our own actions and states. Epictetus is particularly fond of exploring the implications of this essentially Stoic conception. In studying his usage it is helpful to remember that his favored term prohairesis refers more often to the capacity for choice than it does to particular acts of choosing. The word is variously translated; the rendering “volition” is adopted here as in Long 2002. The volition, Epictetus argues, is “by nature unimpeded” (1.17.21), and it is for this reason that freedom is for him an inalienable characteristic of the human being. The very notion of a capacity to make one's own decisions implies as a matter of logical necessity that those decisions are free of external compulsion; otherwise they would not be decisions. But humans do have such a capacity and are thus profoundly different from even the higher animals, which deal with impressions merely in an unreflective way (2.8). It is the volition that is the real person, the true self of the individual. Our convictions, attitudes, intentions and actions are truly ours in a way that nothing else is; they are determined solely by our use of impressions and thus internal to the sphere of volition. The appearance and comfort of one's body, one's possessions, one's relationships with other people, the success or failure of one's projects, and one's power and reputation in the world are all merely contingent facts about a person, features of our experience rather than characteristics of the self. These things are all “externals”; that is, things external to the sphere of volition. . Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hello David, Steve, Dan, and All -- On Sat, Jun 11, 2011 at 9:42 AM, david buchanan dmbucha...@hotmail.com wrote: Steve said: It's not the we don't have free will. It's that free will probably can't even mean anything. What does it mean to say that not only are you capable of acting out your will but that on top of that your will is free? Free of what? dmb says: I don't get it. How is free will different from the ability to act out your will? And the last question seems a bit odd since the question of free will hardly makes sense without some kind of determinism to oppose it. I mean, when we're talking about free will we are talking about the absence of physical, biological, psychological, theological determinism, etc.. We're talking about the causal factors that would constrain that freedom. That's what free will would be free from, no? Steve said: Harris is not saying that we have no choice. The question is where do choices come from? dmb says: I don't get that either. Isn't the controversy all about whether or not persons are moral agents? Isn't the whole question about whether or not the choices actually come from persons - as opposed to coming from causes beyond their control? Steve said: Whether we like the consequences of believing in free will or denying it's coherence as a concept is beside the point of whether or not free will is intelligible. Later, Dan says: What choice does a traveler have but to follow the route? ...The world is Quality (morality), and there are differing degrees, high and low, that correspond to responsibility vs non-responsibility. ... But it doesn't necessarily follow that we are free, unless we follow Dynamic Quality, which is free of any patterns. Free will is the power to choose. It is unintelligible only for determinists who believe that human actions, like all evolutionary events, are the consequence of prior causes. This would be true if human beings were controlled by their beingness, enslaved by their genetic propensities and biological instincts, or programmed by a moral universe. Statistical conglomerates pay tribute to deterministic forces. But this is not the case for singularities such as human beings who possess a unique, highly developed, and sensitive perception of diversity. This affords man the unique capability for enacting his intentions, which is the basis of his active intelligence and which, as James Fletcher Baxter says, makes man earth's Choicemaker. The singularity I allude to here is that man is created as a 'being-aware', an entity that stands apart from his Creator. As a free agent of the Absolute Source, man has an autonomy that transcends the laws of biological survival in the existential sense, as well as the packaged choices paradigm of statistical probability. This is why Protagoras declared that man is the measure of all things, (an axiom that, as Marsha reminds me, I incorrectly credited to Parmenides in my response to Ron yesterday). So, although I haven't read Harris on this subject and don't know DMB's position with regard to determinism, David is justified in raising these important questions. dmb: I think freedom and constraint are both intelligible at the same time. I mean, experience isn't just one way or the other. The notion that we are determined and the question of freedom is traditionally generated by an all-encompasing worldview, particularly theism and materialism. But I can't quite see where Harris is coming from. He denies that his objection entails a materialistic assumption but we know that he's an atheist and a brain scientist and something like a moral realist. I just don't see how that adds up. ...You want to eat Boston creme pie every night for dinner but also want to be healthy. The question then is whether or not you really have a choice between these conflicting values or if they determine your decisions and acts. I mean, freedom is always going to be mixed in with constraints, a finite range of options. ... Which ever way he goes, the determinist seems to be saying that going left or going right was already decided and the traveler didn't really have a choice. I don't get that. On what basis is this common occurrence denied? How am I not free to decide on going left, right or backwards? Why can't I choose fish instead of candy for dinner? If there is no free will, then there is no such thing as being responsible. If that were true, serial killers and philosophical novelists would be morally equal. How intelligible is that? How intelligible, indeed, within the framework of the MoQ. The battle lines are being drawn as we speak, and I see this topic coming to a nasty climax in the near future. Thanks, gentlemen, and may Freedom prevail! --Ham Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/
Re: [MD] Free Will
Craig said ... the TERM we use for it is an intellectual static pattern, DQ itself is not. Dan had spent time on fingers and moons (again). But Dan had actually started in the quote Craig chose, with what is best. Craig's argument goes on forever in levels of reality and meta-reality, philosophy and meta-philosophy, language and meta-language, with meta-meta-whatever forever. Craig, please notice the it in your first clause and the itself in your second. You are already denoting concepts with (these) terms, before even discussing the terms we might use to denote them. You already have these its conceptualized before we start. You're both right (or wrong, if you prefer), but Dan is better, because he focusses on what is best. The question is what do you prefer, (what you would will) - arguments about linguistic right and wrong, or living ethical goodness and badness ? The free-will argument, and Pirsig's ironical focus on definitions in the church of reason are more of the same. At some point you have to stop defining right and wrong, freedom and determinism, language and DQ, and start doing - for better or worse, as they say. Choosing to point out linguistic flaws in someone else's (lingusitic) argument is one choice of exercising free-will. Another is to know the person and get on with it. Which is why Steve is reduced to calling Craig a dick. Ian PS What's so funny 'bout peace love and understanding ? Now, logic, definitions and understanding, ... now that is funny. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
On Jun 12, 2011, at 2:43 AM, Ham Priday wrote: The singularity I allude to here is that man is created as a 'being-aware', an entity that stands apart from his Creator. As a free agent of the Absolute Source, man has an autonomy that transcends the laws of biological survival in the existential sense, as well as the packaged choices paradigm of statistical probability. This is why Protagoras declared that man is the measure of all things, (an axiom that, as Marsha reminds me, I incorrectly credited to Parmenides in my response to Ron yesterday). Greetings Ham, My difficulty accepting your autonomy is that in the state of awareness there is no 'I' or objects. The self and other are patterns that are applied later. Marsha ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Dan: Fourth, I think the MOQ would say that the higher levels do offer a more expanded set of options from which to choose. But it doesn't necessarily follow that we are free, unless we follow Dynamic Quality, which is free of any patterns. Ron: Having the choice to follow DQ is freedom. So choosing from a more expanded set of options always includes the option of choosing to follow Dynamic Quality in each case on each level. Or change would never occur. Thnx Dan Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Dear Marsha-- Greetings Ham, My difficulty accepting your autonomy is that in the state of awareness there is no 'I' or objects. The self and other are patterns that are applied later. Which is why I ignored your protracted discussion on reification. How can the self be patterned after its own awareness? And what is the point of promoting existence as a 'smoke and mirrors' illusion? It undermines the individual, the meaning of life, and the philosopher's efforts to posit a rational theory of ultimate reality. Marsha, the world you and I live in IS the state of awareness. There is no existence without it. I think Mr. Pirsig would agree with that postulate. I don't want to be critical of anyone's personal beliefs, but I see no merit in advancing a worldview that there is nothing but reified patterns of goodness or quality, that existence accounts for nothing, and that we are all caught up in a nihilistic dream that has no basis in reality. Surely, this is not the philosophy that RMP had in mind. It doesn't take a philosopher or a theologian to realize that I am is what makes existence factual. When you deny the self, you are rejecting the agent of Value from which your reality is constructed. (Try to imagine that reality in your absence.) Philosophy starts with this self-evident premise and works toward a plausible conception of ultimate reality with the understading that nothing comes from nothingness. Even you would have to concede that the world of appearances is not nothing, that even a phantasmagorical reality has an ultimate source. And if the intelligent design of this universe is not worthy of metaphysical analysis, and your 'I' is no more than a dream pattern, why bother to explore philosophy? Sorry to be so harsh, Marsha, but you appear to be stretching Qualityistic idealism to the point of absolute nihilism. And that is a credo I cannot accept. If I'm wrong, please restore my faith in your intellectual judgment. Kindest regards, Ham Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
An eccentric magician invites you to play a game.The game consists of 2 boxes 2 buttons. He puts the same amount of money--either $0 or $1000--in each of the 2 boxes. If you push the right-hand button you get themoney in the right hand box. If you push the left-hand button you get the moneyin both the right-hand the left-hand boxes. Before you play, he confides to you that he can read the minds of the players he lets you watch several rounds of the game. Each time he puts no money in the boxes, the player pushes the left-hand button each time he puts $1000 in both boxes, the player pushes the right-hand button. Now it's your turn. Which button do you push? Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hello everyone On Sun, Jun 12, 2011 at 12:30 PM, craig...@comcast.net wrote: An eccentric magician invites you to play a game.The game consists of 2 boxes 2 buttons. He puts the same amount of money--either $0 or $1000--in each of the 2 boxes. If you push the right-hand button you get themoney in the right hand box. If you push the left-hand button you get the moneyin both the right-hand the left-hand boxes. Before you play, he confides to you that he can read the minds of the players he lets you watch several rounds of the game. Each time he puts no money in the boxes, the player pushes the left-hand button each time he puts $1000 in both boxes, the player pushes the right-hand button. Now it's your turn. Which button do you push? Dan: This is like saying I am free to sit here and write to you or I am free to get up and walk away in disgust. Freedom has nothing to do with patterns! It is synonymous with Dynamic Quality; the lack of patterns. Okay. Lets say I want to drive from Chicago to Miami. I am not going to choose a route that takes me through Sacramento, California. Not unless I have a practical reason for doing so. My determined destination precludes out-of-the-way detours like that. However! Lets say I decide to take a trip. Any trip. Any where. Now! I am free! I have no determined destination! I am following Dynamic Quality, the absence of all patterns. The fact whether I choose (or not) has no bearing on freedom. We must keep in mind though: ANY predetermined set of patterns we come up with all rely on preconditions that exclude Dynamic Quality, or the lack of patterns. Does this help? Or not? Dan Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Craig, previously] An eccentric magician invites you to play a game. The game consists of 2 boxes 2 buttons. He puts the same amount of money--either $0 or $1000--in each of the 2 boxes. If you push the right-hand button you get the money in the right hand box. If you push the left-hand button you get the money in both the right-hand the left-hand boxes. Before you play, he confides to you that he can read the minds of the players he lets you watch several rounds of the game. Each time he puts no money in the boxes, the player pushes the left-hand button each time he puts $1000 in both boxes, the player pushes the right-hand button. Now it's your turn. Which button do you push? [Dan] This is like saying I am free to... Yes, but which button do you push? Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hello everyone On Sun, Jun 12, 2011 at 4:30 PM, craig...@comcast.net wrote: [Craig, previously] An eccentric magician invites you to play a game. The game consists of 2 boxes 2 buttons. He puts the same amount of money--either $0 or $1000--in each of the 2 boxes. If you push the right-hand button you get the money in the right hand box. If you push the left-hand button you get the money in both the right-hand the left-hand boxes. Before you play, he confides to you that he can read the minds of the players he lets you watch several rounds of the game. Each time he puts no money in the boxes, the player pushes the left-hand button each time he puts $1000 in both boxes, the player pushes the right-hand button. Now it's your turn. Which button do you push? [Dan] This is like saying I am free to... Yes, but which button do you push? Dan: The delete button... Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hello Ham, To address my initial statement: In my experience, when in the state of awareness, there is an absence of self and other. These patterns come when awareness is dropped. On Jun 12, 2011, at 1:24 PM, Ham Priday wrote: Dear Marsha-- Greetings Ham, My difficulty accepting your autonomy is that in the state of awareness there is no 'I' or objects. The self and other are patterns that are applied later. Ham: Which is why I ignored your protracted discussion on reification. How can the self be patterned after its own awareness? And what is the point of promoting existence as a 'smoke and mirrors' illusion? It undermines the individual, the meaning of life, and the philosopher's efforts to posit a rational theory of ultimate reality. Marsha: Sorry, Ham, but I am in search of 'the way things really are', or more often aren't, not just some well put-together rational system. I find the MoQ a good explanation of reality, and it reflects my experience. Ham: Marsha, the world you and I live in IS the state of awareness. There is no existence without it. I think Mr. Pirsig would agree with that postulate. I don't want to be critical of anyone's personal beliefs, but I see no merit in advancing a worldview that there is nothing but reified patterns of goodness or quality, that existence accounts for nothing, and that we are all caught up in a nihilistic dream that has no basis in reality. Surely, this is not the philosophy that RMP had in mind. Marsha: A nihilistic view would be one where nothing exists. But we have a reality of conventional, inorganic, biological, social and intellectual patterns that are pragmatically evolving to something better. No reason to consider this a nihilistic perspective, at least not as far as I am concerned. We are here; that is goodness. The question becomes how to understand the awareness, and how will these new insights affect our understanding for the better. I disagree that the MoQ, or I, foster the attitude that existence counts for nothing. The more one becomes aware and understands patterns, the more one appreciates them, and appreciates that some patterns are much more valuable than others. And on evaluation, one appreciates that one does not always have to be possessed by them. Ham: It doesn't take a philosopher or a theologian to realize that I am is what makes existence factual. Marsha: I don't know what you mean by factual. I reject the notion of an autonomous controlling I that is calling all the shots for an individual's behavior. I find I am a highly repeated pattern. That doesn't make it meaningless; it just doesn't make it real in any independent, substantial or absolute way. Ham: When you deny the self, you are rejecting the agent of Value from which your reality is constructed. Marsha: I do not deny the individual, only an INDEPENDENT self. Ham: (Try to imagine that reality in your absence.) Marsha: Imagine? I do not get the point of the exercise. Absence? I do not understand exactly what type of imagination you wish me to apply. Ham: Philosophy starts with this self-evident premise and works toward a plausible conception of ultimate reality with the understanding that nothing comes from nothingness. Marsha: I believe the MoQ starts with the premise that Reality = Quality (Experience). In my experience, that is true. And for me, experience has proven to be either unpatterned or patterned. Ham: Even you would have to concede that the world of appearances is not nothing, that even a phantasmagorical reality has an ultimate source. And if the intelligent design of this universe is not worthy of metaphysical analysis, and your 'I' is no more than a dream pattern, why bother to explore philosophy? Marsha: What I concede is that reality = experience(unpatterned experience/patterned experience). In the MoQ, experience is Value, or Quality (Dynamic/static). Ham: Sorry to be so harsh, Marsha, but you appear to be stretching Qualityistic idealism to the point of absolute nihilism. And that is a credo I cannot accept. Marsha: I do not hold such a view. I do think that patterns have a relationship with consciousness. I have never said that Quality is ONLY a conceptual activity. Ham: If I'm wrong, please restore my faith in your intellectual judgment. Marsha: I hope I have at least corrected some misconceptions. Kindest regards, Ham Kindest regards to you too, Marsha ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
On Fri, Jun 10, 2011 at 10:49 AM, X Acto xa...@rocketmail.com wrote: Great topic Steve, I think Harris is drawing his conclusions based apon the application of the basic general primary explanation of the good, the act of preference to defend the notion that freewill is not present because we are composed of various levels of prejudical choices. Steve: It's not the we don't have free will. It's that free will probably can't even mean anything. What does it mean to say that not only are you capable of acting out your will but that on top of that your will is free? Free of what? Ron: Free of biological and social dominance, free to exercise dynamic choice. To a value based point of view but to a objectective or subjective point of view the concept of feewill is meaningless when coupled with the idea that all of our behaviour is determined. So you are saying that we do have freewill but it doesent mean anything. But That which doesent mean anything doesent exist. Ron: It seems illogical to base the assertion of no choice in the act of choice. If we exist in the eternal action of choice we exist in the eternal action of freewill. Steve: Harris is not saying that we have no choice. The question is where do choices come from? Ron: Harris suggests that choices come from learned behaviour and instinct and that it is an illusion to think that any of the choices we make are not dependant on those sets of values, and I say it leaves out the possibility for change and evolution. He is using the concept of evolution to reduce the meaning of freewill but reducing freewill undercuts the concept of evolution. The philosophic consequences are far reaching and I'm not sure Harris has weighed this out entirely. It weakens the explanation for change in experience and supports a static existential meaninglessness toward the good. Steve: Whether we like the consequences of believing in free will or denying it's coherence as a concept is beside the point of whether or not free will is intelligible. Ron: Beside the point? hell that IS the point, belief is action. To believe in it IS to render it intelligible. If all reality is a moral act, then freewill must be inteligible. Ron: Not to mention is seems to be detremental to the arguement of evolution and natural selection. Steve: How so? Ron: If all behaviour and choice is determined it does not leave much room for the ability to adapt to a changing environment. Determinism ignores the dynamic. ;;; Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Steve said: It's not the we don't have free will. It's that free will probably can't even mean anything. What does it mean to say that not only are you capable of acting out your will but that on top of that your will is free? Free of what? dmb says: I don't get it. How is free will different from the ability to act out your will? And the last question seems a bit odd since the question of free will hardly makes sense without some kind of determinism to oppose it. I mean, when we're talking about free will we are talking about the absence of physical, biological, psychological, theological determinism, etc.. We're talking about the causal factors that would constrain that freedom. That's what free will would be free from, no? Steve said: Harris is not saying that we have no choice. The question is where do choices come from? dmb says: I don't get that either. Isn't the controversy all about whether or not persons are moral agents? Isn't the whole question about whether or not the choices actually come from persons - as opposed to coming from causes beyond their control? Steve said: Whether we like the consequences of believing in free will or denying it's coherence as a concept is beside the point of whether or not free will is intelligible. dmb says: I think freedom and constraint are both intelligible at the same time. I mean, experience isn't just one way or the other. The notion that we are determined and the question of freedom is traditionally generated by an all-encompasing worldview, particularly theism and materialism. But I can't quite see where Harris is coming from. He denies that his objection entails a materialistic assumption but we know that he's an atheist and a brain scientist and something like a moral realist. I just don't see how that adds up. I think that the MOQer would frame the issue around DQ and the four levels of static quality rather than a metaphysical premise like theism or scientific materialism per se. In the MOQ's moral framework we have all kinds of conflicting values and they each exert their pressures and demands. You want to eat Boston creme pie every night for dinner but you also want to be healthy. The question then is whether or not you really have a choice between these conflicting values or if they determine your decisions and acts. I mean, freedom is always going to be mixed in with constraints, a finite range of options. One cannot choose to jump across the Atlantic no matter how much it's desired. But people come to a fork in the road every day and, despite Yogi Berra's advice, one can't go both ways. Which ever way he goes, the determinist seems to be saying that going left or going right was already decided and the traveler didn't really have a choice. I don't get that. On what basis is t his common occurrence denied? How am I not free to decide on going left, right or backwards? Why can't I choose fish instead of candy for dinner? If there is no free will, then there is no such thing as being responsible. If that were true, serial killers and philosophical novelists would be morally equal. How intelligible is that? Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hello everyone On Sat, Jun 11, 2011 at 9:42 AM, david buchanan dmbucha...@hotmail.com wrote: Steve said: It's not the we don't have free will. It's that free will probably can't even mean anything. What does it mean to say that not only are you capable of acting out your will but that on top of that your will is free? Free of what? dmb says: I don't get it. How is free will different from the ability to act out your will? And the last question seems a bit odd since the question of free will hardly makes sense without some kind of determinism to oppose it. I mean, when we're talking about free will we are talking about the absence of physical, biological, psychological, theological determinism, etc.. We're talking about the causal factors that would constrain that freedom. That's what free will would be free from, no? Steve said: Harris is not saying that we have no choice. The question is where do choices come from? dmb says: I don't get that either. Isn't the controversy all about whether or not persons are moral agents? Isn't the whole question about whether or not the choices actually come from persons - as opposed to coming from causes beyond their control? Steve said: Whether we like the consequences of believing in free will or denying it's coherence as a concept is beside the point of whether or not free will is intelligible. dmb says: I think freedom and constraint are both intelligible at the same time. I mean, experience isn't just one way or the other. The notion that we are determined and the question of freedom is traditionally generated by an all-encompasing worldview, particularly theism and materialism. But I can't quite see where Harris is coming from. He denies that his objection entails a materialistic assumption but we know that he's an atheist and a brain scientist and something like a moral realist. I just don't see how that adds up. I think that the MOQer would frame the issue around DQ and the four levels of static quality rather than a metaphysical premise like theism or scientific materialism per se. In the MOQ's moral framework we have all kinds of conflicting values and they each exert their pressures and demands. You want to eat Boston creme pie every night for dinner but you also want to be healthy. The question then is whether or not you really have a choice between these conflicting values or if they determine your decisions and acts. I mean, freedom is always going to be mixed in with constraints, a finite range of options. One cannot choose to jump across the Atlantic no matter how much it's desired. But people come to a fork in the road every day and, despite Yogi Berra's advice, one can't go both ways. Which ever way he goes, the determinist seems to be saying that going left or going right was already decided and the traveler didn't really have a choice. I don't get that. On what basis is t his common occurrence denied? How am I not free to decide on going left, right or backwards? Why can't I choose fish instead of candy for dinner? If there is no free will, then there is no such thing as being responsible. If that were true, serial killers and philosophical novelists would be morally equal. How intelligible is that? Hi Dave First, Yogi lived on a cul-de-sac, so either way you took at the fork brought you to his place. It was indeed predetermined. What choice does a traveler have but to follow the route? Second, I would think that being a serial killer or a philosophical novelist isn't a choice so much as a compulsion. Remember the part in LILA about telling the fat guy to stay out of the frig? Third, the world is Quality (morality), and there are differing degrees, high and low, that correspond to responsibility vs non-responsibility. Biologically, I like Boston creme pie every night for dinner but social custom dictates a broader diet, especially if I have a family. And intellectually, I know it is not a healthy choice. Fourth, I think the MOQ would say that the higher levels do offer a more expanded set of options from which to choose. But it doesn't necessarily follow that we are free, unless we follow Dynamic Quality, which is free of any patterns. Thank you, Dan Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
On Thu, Jun 9, 2011 at 9:33 PM, craig...@comcast.net wrote: [Einstein] Man can do what he will but he cannot will what he wills). If it is true that woman/man can do what s/he will, this is sufficient for free will. Craig This is sufficient for will, but what are you adding when you attach the word free? Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Great topic Steve, I think Harris is drawing his conclusions based apon the application of the basic general primary explanation of the good, the act of preference to defend the notion that freewill is not present because we are composed of various levels of prejudical choices. It seems illogical to base the assertion of no choice in the act of choice. If we exist in the eternal action of choice we exist in the eternal action of freewill. Only by encapsulating the good does Value or Quality cease to become an act of freewill and become an eternal absolute, once this is done, yes there is no freewill. The philosophic consequences are far reaching and I'm not sure Harris has weighed this out entirely. It weakens the explanation for change in experience and supports a static existential meaninglessness toward the good. Not to mention is seems to be detremental to the arguement of evolution and natural selection. What is good is always changing. Harris seems to maintain that what is good stays the same does not change and that the perception of mystic experience is an illusion. Quite the opposite of RMP who states that what is static unchanging and determined is illusion. To me what Harris points to and what RMP points to are two different meanings with huge differences in philosophical consequences. -Ron Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Ron, On Fri, Jun 10, 2011 at 10:49 AM, X Acto xa...@rocketmail.com wrote: Great topic Steve, I think Harris is drawing his conclusions based apon the application of the basic general primary explanation of the good, the act of preference to defend the notion that freewill is not present because we are composed of various levels of prejudical choices. It's not the we don't have free will. It's that free will probably can't even mean anything. What does it mean to say that not only are you capable of acting out your will but that on top of that your will is free? Free of what? It seems illogical to base the assertion of no choice in the act of choice. If we exist in the eternal action of choice we exist in the eternal action of freewill. Harris is not saying that we have no choice. The question is where do choices come from? Only by encapsulating the good does Value or Quality cease to become an act of freewill and become an eternal absolute, once this is done, yes there is no freewill. I don't follow. The philosophic consequences are far reaching and I'm not sure Harris has weighed this out entirely. It weakens the explanation for change in experience and supports a static existential meaninglessness toward the good. Whether we like the consequences of believing in free will or denying it's coherence as a concept is beside the point of whether or not free will is intelligible. Not to mention is seems to be detremental to the arguement of evolution and natural selection. How so? Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Ron -- After complimenting Steve on resurrecting this topic, you said: I think Harris is drawing his conclusions based apon the application of the basic general primary explanation of the good, the act of preference to defend the notion that freewill is not present because we are composed of various levels of prejudical choices. It seems illogical to base the assertion of no choice in the act of choice. If we exist in the eternal action of choice we exist in the eternal action of freewill. Only by encapsulating the good does Value or Quality cease to become an act of freewill and become an eternal absolute, once this is done, yes there is no freewill. This is the first time I've heard the notion that we are composed of various levels of prejudical choices. Is choice, or the ability to encapsulate the good, now about to become the MoQ's fifth level? I'm glad you realize that an encapsulated good (or what I would call universal or fixed goodness) obviates the need for free choice. I've been saying for years that the universe is amoral and that all moral systems are man's creation. Of course, if you don't accept Parmenides' principle that Man is the measure of all things, you deny man the agency of choice which is the very core of free will. This seems to be the general consensus here. We even have Steve asking: Free of what? If I were a conspiricist, I'd be inclined to think there's a concerted effort here to reduce the individual to an automaton of Nature. After all, if the universe makes man moral, the social level makes him a cognizant subject, and the intellectual level makes him wise, there doesn't seem to be much for man to do but play out his existence as programmed. When will we ever learn that subjective individuality is the only perspective whereby Absolute Value can be realized differentially and without bias? Essentially speaking, Ham _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ The philosophic consequences are far reaching and I'm not sure Harris has weighed this out entirely. It weakens the explanation for change in experience and supports a static existential meaninglessness toward the good. Not to mention is seems to be detremental to the arguement of evolution and natural selection. What is good is always changing. Harris seems to maintain that what is good stays the same does not change and that the perception of mystic experience is an illusion. Quite the opposite of RMP who states that what is static unchanging and determined is illusion. To me what Harris points to and what RMP points to are two different meanings with huge differences in philosophical consequences. -Ron Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Ham and All, Pirsig correctly saw that subjective individuality is indefinable DQ. Why isn't Absolute Value indefinable DQ. If it were DQ that certainly explains why we see through a glass darkly when discussing reality. Joe On 6/10/11 1:04 PM, Ham Priday hampd...@verizon.net wrote: When will we ever learn that subjective individuality is the only perspective whereby Absolute Value can be realized differentially and without bias? Essentially speaking, Ham Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi Craig, On Wed, Jun 8, 2011 at 8:01 PM, craig...@comcast.net wrote: [Harris] the concept of free will is a non- starter, both philosophically and scientifically. thoughts, moods, and desires of every sort simply spring into view—and move us, or fail to move us, for reasons that are, from a subjective point of view, perfectly inscrutable. Craig: Suppose I find a wallet with ID. I might keep it. That in the past I returned it to its owner, does not show I have free will, for those were different circumstances. But as I deliberate, I feel guilty decide to return the wallet. Then I rationalize: the owner was careless, why should I do them any favors? These thoughts are not inscrutable. Steve: The thoughts are not inscrutible. You aren't reading carefully. What Harris says is inscrutible from a subjective point of view are the REASONS we have such thoughts to begin with. Why do we have these thoughts, moods, desires, intentions, etc. and not others? Craig: More importantly, there is no reason to suppose that my decision is fore-ordained before I go thru the actual deliberation. Steve: I wouldn't use the term fore-ordained. There is no one who knows the future. Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Sam Harris is still going on about free will. I guess he can't control himself: http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/you-do-not-choose-what-you-choose/ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Craig, previously] Suppose I find a wallet with ID. I might keep it. But as I deliberate, I feel guilty decide to return the wallet. Then I rationalize: the owner was careless, why should I do them any favors? [Steve] You aren't reading carefully. What Harris says is inscrutible from a subjective point of view are the REASONS we have such thoughts to begin with. Oh but I am reading carefully. My reasons are scrutable. The reason I feel guilty from keeping the wallet, comes from my experience in losing something not having it returned. The reason I'm tempted to keep the wallet, is my greed my desire for something-for-nothing. True I can't identify each experience that leads to my guilt/greed, except in the uninformative All of them. But I know enough. Harris is at a tremendous disadvantage in this debate. He must argue that of all the billions of people who have ever lived on earth, none of them at any time in their life, exercised free will. I only have to argue that there was one case. Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Craig: Harris is at a tremendous disadvantage in this debate. He must argue that of all the billions of people who have ever lived on earth, none of them at any time in their life, exercised free will. I only have to argue that there was one case. Steve: No, examples and counter-examples won't serve either side. What you need to do is argue that free will is an intelligible concept against Sam Harris's arguments that it is incoherent gibberish. Einstein as quoted by Harris: Honestly, I cannot understand what people mean when they talk about the freedom of the human will. I have a feeling, for instance, that I will something or other; but what relation this has with freedom I cannot understand at all. I feel that I will to light my pipe and I do it; but how can I connect this up with the idea of freedom? What is behind the act of willing to light the pipe? Another act of willing? Schopenhauer once said: Der Mensch kann was er will; er kann aber nicht wollen was er will (Man can do what he will but he cannot will what he wills). Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Einstein] Man can do what he will but he cannot will what he wills). If it is true that woman/man can do what s/he will, this is sufficient for free will. Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Harris] the concept of free will is a non- starter, both philosophically and scientifically. thoughts, moods, and desires of every sort simply spring into view—and move us, or fail to move us, for reasons that are, from a subjective point of view, perfectly inscrutable. Suppose I find a wallet with ID. I might keep it. That in the past I returned it to its owner, does not show I have free will, for those were different circumstances. But as I deliberate, I feel guilty decide to return the wallet. Then I rationalize: the owner was careless, why should I do them any favors? These thoughts are not inscrutable. More importantly, there is no reason to suppose that my decision is fore-ordained before I go thru the actual deliberation. Harris has not shown why this doesn't give free will a foothold. Craig Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hello everyone On Wed, Jun 8, 2011 at 6:01 PM, craig...@comcast.net wrote: [Harris] the concept of free will is a non- starter, both philosophically and scientifically. thoughts, moods, and desires of every sort simply spring into view—and move us, or fail to move us, for reasons that are, from a subjective point of view, perfectly inscrutable. Craig: Suppose I find a wallet with ID. I might keep it. That in the past I returned it to its owner, does not show I have free will, for those were different circumstances. But as I deliberate, I feel guilty decide to return the wallet. Then I rationalize: the owner was careless, why should I do them any favors? These thoughts are not inscrutable. More importantly, there is no reason to suppose that my decision is fore-ordained before I go thru the actual deliberation. Harris has not shown why this doesn't give free will a foothold. Hi Craig You've basically ignored what Harris wrote: thoughts, moods, and desires of every sort simply spring into view... Instead, you've come up with a hypothetical scenario full of preconditioned responses, yet you don't seem to fathom that. In so doing, you fail to grasp what Harris is saying about how thoughts arise in the first place, and cling (precariously) to the notion of free will. I am guessing that if a learned man such as Harris doesn't sway your opinion, my words will have little effect; I wonder why I am bothering... Dan Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Craig, previously] Suppose I find a wallet with ID. I might keep it. But as I deliberate, I feel guilty decide to return the wallet. Then I rationalize: the owner was careless, why should I do them any favors? there is no reason to suppose that my decision is fore-ordained before I go thru the actual deliberation. [Dan]you've come up with a hypothetical scenario full of preconditioned responses But that's just what's at issue: given that I've never considered what to do with the wallet in exactly these circumstances, what reason do I have to suppose I'm not actually deliberating not just going thru preconditioned responses?[Dan] I am guessing that a learned man such as Harris doesn't sway your opinion Ah, but he does. Just as James, Kant, Mill, Locke, etc. sway it in the other direction. In the end, I rely on their arguments, not their authority. Craig Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi All, Here is Sam Harris's recent blog post on morality without free will: http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/morality-without-free-will/ Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi John -- Hello Ham, and greetings from Bozeman. I almost feel like I'm on my own Hajj. Hopefully I'll have time to share more of my experience later. I explored Yellowstone in the last century with my parents, but never got to Bozeman. It sounds like a recreational paradise. Have you done any skiing there? I do agree that Quality cannot exist in the absence of awareness. I disagree with the way you then conclude that Quality is subordinate to, or derivative of awareness. I see them as equally dependent, for you can't have awareness without some sort of valuation of things. Awareness is knowing yourself as the 'valuator' of experience. The way I see it, you can't have experience without valuing. Ham, previously: And, in the MoQ tradition, you believe the social level begets selfness, rather than the other way around. John: Correct. Although I don't derive this idea from the MoQ, I get it from Royce. Self is a socially - taught construct. A Quality Idea, on the social level. Self-awareness is self-evident, even without social intercourse. I would submit that the construct: learned from social experience is that your awareness is one among many; that is to say, relative to others. Ham: As the unwary subject of this analysis, perhaps you could explain why I come across to you as a cold, calculating half man who is locked away from the dynamic romantic side. Just what part of a human persona am I missing, in your opinion? John: I had a good friend, once. Steve Marquis. He and I used to have much the same kind of discussions. Steve is an engineer. He had a place for everything and was very uncomfortable with spontaneity. My perspective on you Ham, comes from a guy who is pretty much loosey-goosey and impulsive and given to romantic swoons. So if you seem rational-oriented to me, you have to take into consideration that I'm who I am. Yes, I know what you mean. A close friend I've known since high school, who became a biochemistry professor, can't understand why I use the word value to describe human interest and motivation. A life-long student and true stoic, he insists that value is only what's important. His idea of living a full life is to acquire as much knowledge as possible. Also, my thinking has been greatly influenced by RMP's writings, and I tend to classify people into categories of romantically and classically - oriented and you seem very classic to me. I do try and keep the appreciation that nobody fits into any category completely, and that we all evolve and change and influence one another in numerous ways so we cannot get stuck on just our past interpretations. I've gained in appreciation of you Ham, since I wrote that over two years ago, and some of those opinions I would revise. Well, I'm glad you feel there's still hope for me, despite that fact that my romantic nature was more evident during my first eight decades. Although I try to approach philosophy from a classical perspective, I am personally more passionate and impulsive than you may think. Ham: Always appreciate your insights, John -- even when they hurt. And that is a good thing about you Ham. For it is those who hide from hurtful insights (and aren't all insights, to an extent hurtful?) live fearful lives in hiding and never discover the real joy of life. Knowing how others see you is one of the principal values of social contact. But we must avoid measuring ourselves by the success of others, lest we find ourselves trying to keep up with the Joneses. The real joy of life comes from realizing its many values. Unfortunately for many, this is a distraction from the struggle to be successful. Thanks for the personal analysis, John. And enjoy your vacation. Cheers, Ham Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi John, On May 11, 2011, at 1:07 PM, John Carl wrote: John: I'm a skeptic too, Marsha. And that's why I was so attracted to Royce's take on absolute skepticism - when we come down to questioning everything, the one rock-solid foundation we find that we can use to build a Quality metaphysics is the indisputable fact that error exists. Marsha: Error exists might be like acknowledging linguistic inadequacies with saying not this, not that. I like radical skeptic. Marsha: As a skeptic it was because I didn't trust what went on in our heads that I came to this list. What do we know and how do we know it? Thanks for your response; it is always interesting to hear your take on these questions. John: And since error exists, it lies with us to do something about it. To figure out what is good, and what is not good. And to do this, we need people. And I am grateful to you, Marsha, for your efforts and participation as well. Marsha: I think I've started to enjoy the hot seat. It is not that I don't take the MoQ seriously, because I do. It just makes me laugh more. I keep remember Dan's words We're all degenerates. Period. John: Now to get on my bike and explore Bozeman! Marsha: I've often thought it would be great to take a year to travel around the country in an rv. I'm sure there are hardships, but you're found a way to live my daydream and get paid for it. Cool! I would definitely want to visit Bozeman. I hope you share with us some of your experiences. Marsha ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hello Ham, and greetings from Bozeman. I almost feel like I'm on my own Hajj. Hopefully I'll have time to share more of my experience later. Ham: I know you don't agree with my cosmology. You don't accept my epistemology that Value (Quality) doesn't exist in the absence of awareness. John: I do agree that Quality cannot exist in the absence of awareness. I disagree with the way you then conclude that Quality is subordinate to, or derivative of awareness. I see them as equally dependent, for you can't have awareness without some sort of valuation of things. Ham: And, in the MoQ tradition, you believe the social level begets selfness, rather than the other way around. John: Correct. Although I don't derive this idea from the MoQ, I get it from Royce. Self is a socially - taught construct. A Quality Idea, on the social level. Ham: So I went back to earlier statements of yours, hoping to learn the crux of our disagreement. Instead, I came across this curious analysis (character study?) of Ham you provided for David Thomas in February of 2010: I don't think Ham gets pissed. He's all cold, calculating and analytical all the time. He's not a whole man, ya know? But the half man he is, seems so formidible that I don't think I could even go there, it's like a baby wrestling an alligator, but the lopsidedness necessary for all that intellectual focus is it leaves the person as ignorant and helpless as a baby from the other side of being - the dynamic romantic side that looks ridiculous to the isolated intellect. And what does an anthropocentric cosmology portend? Intelligence locked in self-imposed prison, locked away from the roots of life and being. The ostentatious and self-creative self. It's not exactly child abuse as we normally call it, its rather the intellect's suppression and abuse of the child within. That is Ham's suffering. You nailed it, Dr. Dave. DQ is fun! As the unwary subject of this analysis, perhaps you could explain why I come across to you as a cold, calculating half man who is locked away from the dynamic romantic side. Just what part of a human persona am I missing, in your opinion? Be as candid as necessary, John; I won't get pissed. Knowing what others think of me will enable me to work on deficiencies that may have made my arguments less palatable in these circles. John: I had a good friend, once. Steve Marquis. He and I used to have much the same kind of discussions. Steve is an engineer. He had a place for everything and was very uncomfortable with spontaneity. My perspective on you Ham, comes from a guy who is pretty much loosey-goosey and impulsive and given to romantic swoons. So if you seem rational-oriented to me, you have to take into consideration that I'm who I am. Also, my thinking has been greatly influenced by RMP's writings, and I tend to classify people into categories of romantically and classically - oriented and you seem very classic to me. I do try and keep the appreciation that nobody fits into any category completely, and that we all evolve and change and influence one another in numerous ways so we cannot get stuck on just our past interpretations. I've gained in appreciation of you Ham, since I wrote that over two years ago, and some of those opinions I would revise. Always appreciate your insights, John -- even when they hurt. Best regards, Ham John: And that is a good thing about you Ham. For it is those who hide from hurtful insights (and aren't all insights, to an extent hurtful?) live fearful lives in hiding and never discover the real joy of life. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
I'm a skeptic too, Marsha. And that's why I was so attracted to Royce's take on absolute skepticism - when we come down to questioning everything, the one rock-solid foundation we find that we can use to build a Quality metaphysics is the indisputable fact that error exists. Marsha: As a skeptic it was because I didn't trust what went on in our heads that I came to this list. What do we know and how do we know it? Thanks for your response; it is always interesting to hear your take on these questions. John: And since error exists, it lies with us to do something about it. To figure out what is good, and what is not good. And to do this, we need people. And I am grateful to you, Marsha, for your efforts and participation as well. Now to get on my bike and explore Bozeman! Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hi John, On May 9, 2011, at 1:20 PM, John Carl wrote: John: What do you mean, Marsha? Don't you think cause exists at least in our own heads? Marsha: As a skeptic it was because I didn't trust what went on in our heads that I came to this list. What do we know and how do we know it? Thanks for your response; it is always interesting to hear your take on these questions. Marsha ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Pirsig] To say that A causes B or to say that B values precondition A is to say the same thing. [Craig, previously] In precondition A (proximity of a magnet to iron filings) the iron filings value B (movement of the iron filings toward the magnet). [Steve] I knew you could figure it out. If you're right, this is an important correction to Pirsig. Living things are aware of their environment, like the amoeba being aware of the acid it approaches. Humans are aware of their environment also have self-awareness. Could it be that the self is just what a human is aware of when it has self-awareness? Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Nagarjuna, in the MMK, replaces cause with conditions: The argument against causation is tightly intertwined with the positive account of dependent arising and of the nature of the relation between conditions and the conditioned. Nagarjuna begins by stating the conclusion (1: 1): neither are entities self-caused nor do they come to be through the power of other entities. That is, there is no causation, when causation is thought of as involving causal activity. Nonetheless, he notes (1: 2), there are conditions--in fact four distinct kinds--that can be appealed to in the explanation and prediction of phenomena. An example might be useful to illustrate the difference between the four kinds of condition, and the picture Nagarjuna will paint of explanation. Suppose that you ask, Why are the lights on? I might reply as follows: (1) Because I flicked the switch. I have appealed to an efficient condition. Or (2) because the wires are in good working order, the bulbs haven't burned out, and the electricity is flowing. These are supp orting conditions. Or (3) the light is the emission of photons each of which is emitted in response to the bombardment of an atom by an electron, and so forth. I have appealed to a chain of immediate conditions. Or (4) so that we can see. This is the dominant condition. Any of these would be a perfectly good answer to the Why? question. But note that none of them makes reference to any causal powers or necessitation. (Jay Garfield) ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
On Sun, May 8, 2011 at 10:06 PM, craig...@comcast.net wrote: [Pirsig] To say that A causes B or to say that B values precondition A is to say the same thing. The difference is one of words only. Instead of saying A magnet causes iron filings to move toward it, you can say Iron filings value movement toward a magnet. In Iron filings value movement toward a magnet. What is B, what is precondition A what is precondition A a precondition of? If you can't even give an explanation of what your position means, it's time to give it up. In the quote I supplied Pirsig explains himself as well as I can imagine explaining anything. I strongly suspect that you are just trying to be a dick and succeeding as spectacularly as ever. A= magnet, B= iron filings. Instead of saying A magnet [A] causes iron filings to move toward it [B], you can say Iron filings [B] value movement toward a magnet [A]. I don't see how that could be made any more clear. Perhaps you should seek help from others by starting a new thread. Or you could stop being a dick and just say what your point is in quibbling about Pirsig's reformulation of causation. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Greeings, Rather than a choice, is a pattern equivalent to a conclusion? Marsha ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Pirsig] To say that A causes B or to say that B values precondition A is to say the same thing. The difference is one of words only. Instead of saying A magnet causes iron filings to move toward it, you can say Iron filings value movement toward a magnet. [Craig, previously] In Iron filings value movement toward a magnet. What is B, what is precondition A what is precondition A a precondition of? [Steve] A= magnet, B= iron filings. Does not compute. A causes B would then be magnet A causes iron filings B, which is not correct. (Iron filings are caused by a file working on a piece of iron.) [Steve] Instead of saying A magnet [A] causes iron filings to move toward it [B], you can say Iron filings [B] value movement toward a magnet [A]. But the use of A B is inconsistent between these two formulations. A causes B is exemplified by A (proximity of a magnet to iron filings) causes B (movement of the iron filings movement toward the magnet). Iron filings value movement toward a magnet should be In precondition A (proximity of a magnet to iron filings) the iron filings value B (movement of the iron filings toward the magnet). Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Well Ham, your words thrill me and I agree with every word. You put it most excellently as well. I just can't understand how anybody would choose to not understand such plain and well-written rhetoric. Yours, John On Sun, May 1, 2011 at 12:36 PM, Ham Priday hampd...@verizon.net wrote: Hi Marsha (Steve quoted) -- On Sat, Apr 30, 2011 at 6:13 AM, MarshaV val...@att.net wrote: Isn't free will dependent on causation, and isn't causation, in the MoQ, an explanatory extension of a pattern? [Steve]: Yes, causation is understood as a stable pattern of preference, B routinely values precondition A. Further, B literally IS a set of such preferences. [Marsha, on 5/1]: I un-ask the question. Wherever those preferences lie, they do not inherently exist. Whoa! Hold on there, Marsha. You have a valid point that deserves a better answer than Steve provided. The causation argument is superficial at best, besides which cause-and-effect is only man's way of interpreting events as sequential in time. As a consequence, you have been led to the depressing conclusion that preference is deterministic. Nothing could be further from the truth. The very fact that the primary source (God, DQ or Essence) is hidden from us and regarded as undefinable supports the principle of Free Will. [Read the 'Hiddenness' essay on my Values Page at www.essentialism.net/balance.htm] Look at it this way: If you were suddenly granted total knowledge of past and future events -- including your ultimate destiny -- what freedom would you have? What choices would you make? If you think about it, it becomes obvious that in order to exercise free will, you must be innocent of Absolute Truth. That's why we humans are denied empirical evidence of metaphysical reality, proof of God's existence, or knowledge of the meaning and purpose of our existence. Such understanding would subvert and prejudice our role as the free agents of value. Moreover, we do affect the world we live in. The laws of nature are only a compilation of principles based on what has happened in the past, including events that our decisions and choices have produced or influenced. What we do now and in the future is a microcosm of these laws. Pirsig called experience the cutting edge of reality, by which he meant that the reality we create for ourselves is actualized by experience within the parameters of universal order. To say that everything is fixed as predetermined patterns of Quality is to ignore that we constantly remake the world in accordance with our value preferences. So ask Steve to put away those causal syllogisms. Free Will Lives! And you and I are living examples of this freedom. Thanks and best regards, Ham _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ From: Steven Peterson peterson.st...@gmail.com Hi Marsha, When Pirsig says, A causes be can be thought of as B values precondition A. I added that there is nothing more to B (whatever the collection pattern being thought about) than such preferences since preference is another word value and since in the MOQ everything identifiable is thought of as a pattern of value or collection of patterns. Best, Steve On Sat, Apr 30, 2011 at 7:19 AM, MarshaV val...@att.net wrote: On Apr 30, 2011, at 7:04 AM, Steven Peterson wrote: HI Steve, I don't understand the last part of your statement: Further, B literally IS a set of such preferences. Could you please elaborate. Thank you. Marsha Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Marsha: Rather than a choice, is a pattern equivalent to a conclusion? Marsha: The mind is fixated from moment to moment on static patterns (conclusions) which shape reality and establish certainty so life can be lived with some reliability. ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Marsha, I never read Hume, but I did hand in an essay to my SDA english teacher my sophmore year, on cause and effect, and he called it Humeian so I've always had a certain fondness for the guy who woke father Kant from his dogmatic slumbers. As you do for many! I'm sure. Marsha: Been a long time since I read Hume, but there still doesn't seem to be anything found to represent 'cause.' John: What do you mean, Marsha? Don't you think cause exists at least in our own heads? If we look in our heads, we'll find this thing, this concept, that we call cause, and we use this idea to form our world. Thus if you haven't found it, you've been looking in the wrong places. Look in your own head, and you'll find it quickly. Marsha Causal explanation is based on stable, predictable patterns. John: Causal explanation is an attempt to impose or understand a stable predictable pattern perceived out of the immediate flux of life. So yeah, based on is one way of pointing to that, I'd agree. But cause is volitional and taught. Babies learn about cause and effect through a social training and their conceptual scheme can even be screwed up by bad programming, but more fundamentally, the way we use cause is a choice we make in an attempt to achieve some quality in life. Marsha: There is no autonomous homoculus' John: Once again, I disagree completely. If you're talking about a self - a self certainly exists. Like cause and effect, it's a social creation that is only in your head, but that existence is just as real and immediate as any other existence you can think of or touch, and in many ways, more so! You seem to be using the argument that the self doesn't *objectively* exist, in a context that is ridiculous. Obviously the self cannot be defined in a SO paradigm, but that doesn't mean the self can't be defined in an MoQ paradigm. And in that paradigm, there certainly IS autonomous homoculuses. Yer dealin' with one in fact right now :-) Gonna send this, and then swap batteries. as always, John Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Steve] Instead of saying A magnet [A] causes iron filings to move toward it [B], you can say Iron filings [B] value movement toward a magnet [A]. But the use of A B is inconsistent between these two formulations. A causes B is exemplified by A (proximity of a magnet to iron filings) causes B (movement of the iron filings movement toward the magnet). Iron filings value movement toward a magnet should be In precondition A (proximity of a magnet to iron filings) the iron filings value B (movement of the iron filings toward the magnet). I knew you could figure it out. Yep, movement must be moved from A to B. Real tricky stuff. Now what was your point in playing dumb at first and taking Pirsig's statement too literally? Just demonstrating how small-minded you can be when you try? Was there another point that has anything to do with free will versus determinism? Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Greetings John -- Well Ham, your words thrill me and I agree with every word. You put it most excellently as well. I just can't understand how anybody would choose to not understand such plain and well-written rhetoric. Thanks for the kind words. I had ro reread that post (to Marsha) to see what thrilled you about it. But what was especially gratifying to me is that you agree with every word. That's a rarity in the history of my dialogues here -- including our exchanges, John. I know you don't agree with my cosmology. You don't accept my epistemology that Value (Quality) doesn't exist in the absence of awareness. And, in the MoQ tradition, you believe the social level begets selfness, rather than the other way around. So I went back to earlier statements of yours, hoping to learn the crux of our disagreement. Instead, I came across this curious analysis (character study?) of Ham you provided for David Thomas in February of 2010: I don't think Ham gets pissed. He's all cold, calculating and analytical all the time. He's not a whole man, ya know? But the half man he is, seems so formidible that I don't think I could even go there, it's like a baby wrestling an alligator, but the lopsidedness necessary for all that intellectual focus is it leaves the person as ignorant and helpless as a baby from the other side of being - the dynamic romantic side that looks ridiculous to the isolated intellect. And what does an anthropocentric cosmology portend? Intelligence locked in self-imposed prison, locked away from the roots of life and being. The ostentatious and self-creative self. It's not exactly child abuse as we normally call it, its rather the intellect's suppression and abuse of the child within. That is Ham's suffering. You nailed it, Dr. Dave. DQ is fun! As the unwary subject of this analysis, perhaps you could explain why I come across to you as a cold, calculating half man who is locked away from the dynamic romantic side. Just what part of a human persona am I missing, in your opinion? Be as candid as necessary, John; I won't get pissed. Knowing what others think of me will enable me to work on deficiencies that may have made my arguments less palatable in these circles. Always appreciate your insights, John -- even when they hurt. Best regards, Ham Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
That's interesting. On May 7, 2011, at 9:19 AM, X Acto wrote: I think to group reification with conceptualization is confusing the meaning of both terms leading to inaccuracies. - Original Message From: MarshaV val...@att.net To: moq_disc...@moqtalk.org Sent: Sat, May 7, 2011 3:44:28 AM Subject: Re: [MD] Free Will Greetings, I see it as conceptualization/language reifies whether it reifies, cause, preference, A. B or I. Marsha ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Craig, On Sat, May 7, 2011 at 11:53 PM, craig...@comcast.net wrote: [Pirsig] To say that A causes B or to say that B values precondition A is to say the same thing. The difference is one of words only. Instead of saying A magnet causes iron filings to move toward it, you can say Iron filings value movement toward a magnet. In Iron filings value movement toward a magnet. What is B, what is precondition A what is precondition A a precondition of? A is your thumb, and B is your ass. Why don't you tell me what your point is instead of making me jump through hoops? Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Steve said to Dan: Since the Cartesian self is denied, the free will is denied since there is no autonomous agent to posses the faculty known as free will. dmb says: I'm not so sure it follows. Does the denial of the Cartesian self also entail the denial of agency? It seems to me that freedom and the self are re-concieved, not eliminated altogether. Dan said: Note that he says the term cause can be completely done away with when we are describing reality, which seems to infer that the notion of causation can also be done away with in the framework of the MOQ, without any loss. He [Pirsig] goes on to say: The only difference between causation and value is that the word cause implies absolute certainty whereas the implied meaning of value is one of preference. [LILA] dmb says: That's just it. When we get rid of causality and replace it with preference we are getting rid of mechanical laws and replacing them with agency. If subatomic particles and iron filings can express preferences, and if biological evolution proceeds on the basis of spur of the moment decisions, then the expression of social and intellectual level preferences also involves some kind of agency. This kind of agency is not conceived as the rational decision-making of the will, a transcendental self or ego consciousness because these preferences go all the way down. The implication is that we've traded a mechanistic, unconscious cosmos for one that is alive and aware in every little corner. Nothing is inert or dead or automatic, which means nothing is determined and everything is mutable to some degree. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Marsha: In the MoQ, causation is replaced by preference, but it is still a pattern or an explanatory extension of a pattern. On May 8, 2011, at 10:52 AM, david buchanan wrote: Steve said to Dan: Since the Cartesian self is denied, the free will is denied since there is no autonomous agent to posses the faculty known as free will. dmb says: I'm not so sure it follows. Does the denial of the Cartesian self also entail the denial of agency? It seems to me that freedom and the self are re-concieved, not eliminated altogether. Dan said: Note that he says the term cause can be completely done away with when we are describing reality, which seems to infer that the notion of causation can also be done away with in the framework of the MOQ, without any loss. He [Pirsig] goes on to say: The only difference between causation and value is that the word cause implies absolute certainty whereas the implied meaning of value is one of preference. [LILA] dmb says: That's just it. When we get rid of causality and replace it with preference we are getting rid of mechanical laws and replacing them with agency. If subatomic particles and iron filings can express preferences, and if biological evolution proceeds on the basis of spur of the moment decisions, then the expression of social and intellectual level preferences also involves some kind of agency. This kind of agency is not conceived as the rational decision-making of the will, a transcendental self or ego consciousness because these preferences go all the way down. The implication is that we've traded a mechanistic, unconscious cosmos for one that is alive and aware in every little corner. Nothing is inert or dead or automatic, which means nothing is determined and everything is mutable to some degree. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Hello everyone On Sat, May 7, 2011 at 10:53 AM, Steven Peterson peterson.st...@gmail.com wrote: Hi Dan, Steve: I think Pirsig's interpretation of causality as B values precondition A renders the whole question of free will versus determinism moot for MOQers. At least it should. Choices are expressions of our values. We do not choose our values. We are our values. Dan: So you're basically saying we are our choices. That's an interesting way of putting it. Steve: Well, yeah. We are our value patterns. Dan: Yes, but choice and value isn't necessarily synonymous within the framework of the MOQ. RMP Annotation 29 begins... The MOQ, as I understand it, denies any existence of a self that is independent of inorganic, biological, social or intellectual patterns. There is no self that contains these patterns. These patterns contain the self. This denial agrees with both religious mysticism and scientific knowledge. Steve: Since the Cartesian self is denied, the free will is denied since there is no autonomous agent to posses the faculty known as free will. Dan: Better to say Dynamic Quality possesses us, that way it is clear we cannot possess free will. Still, it doesn't necessarily follow that free will is denied on account of the Cartesian self being denied. I think you recognize that yourself later in your post. Dan: I would think that RMP's B values precondition A isn't an interpretation of causation so much as it is a refutation of it: You can always substitute B values precondition A for A causes B without changing any facts of science at all. The term cause can be struck out completely from a scientific description of the universe without any loss of accuracy or completeness. [LILA] Dan comments: Note that he says the term cause can be completely done away with when we are describing reality, which seems to infer that the notion of causation can also be done away with in the framework of the MOQ, without any loss. He goes on to say: The only difference between causation and value is that the word cause implies absolute certainty whereas the implied meaning of value is one of preference. [LILA] Dan comments: When we make statements like: sunshine causes flowers to grow, we are implying that sunshine itself brings forth flowers. If we say rather: flowers value sunshine, we can take into account the whole gamut of value, not just sunshine. Steve: I think that is a good analysis. Since the MOQ denies SOM causality, it also denies determinism. The MOQ denies both horns of the free will/determinism dilemma. But then the MOQ also reinterprets the issue in MOQ terms as the difference between identifying with the patterns or the capacity for change... RMP continues... In Zen, there is reference to big self and small self Small self is the patterns. Big self is Dynamic Quality. Dan: Yes, an excellent quotation and right to the point. I overlooked that quote in my discussion with Ron... I think it might have helped him see what I was getting at in a better way. Dan: To say that the MOQ renders the free will vs determinism question moot is to disregard a good portion of LILA, not to mention the relationship of Dynamic Quality and static quality. Now, I am not a MOQer but I fail to understand how you can make this statement if you understand the MOQ properly. Perhaps you could enlighten me? Steve: Sure. To the extent that we identify the self with static patterns, the self is not free. To the extent the self refers to Big Self, it is free. It is DQ, the quality of freedom from static patterns and the generator of static patterns. Free will and determinism are both denied in a way and also both affirmed in a way. Dan: This seems like a better way of putting it... that free will and determinism are both seen as correct in the framework of the MOQ. Despite what Ron seems to think, I never said that free will doesn't exist. It just doesn't exist in the conventional static quality sense that he wants it to exist. I think we are in agreement, Steve. Thank you for taking the time to elucidate on your thoughts. Dan Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
[Pirsig] To say that A causes B or to say that B values precondition A is to say the same thing. The difference is one of words only. Instead of saying A magnet causes iron filings to move toward it, you can say Iron filings value movement toward a magnet. In Iron filings value movement toward a magnet. What is B, what is precondition A what is precondition A a precondition of? If you can't even give an explanation of what your position means, it's time to give it up. Craig Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Greetings, I see it as conceptualization/language reifies whether it reifies, cause, preference, A. B or I. Marsha ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
Or maybe state it more properly --- Conceptualization/language reifies: cause, preference, A. B or I. Marsha ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
Re: [MD] Free Will
I think to group reification with conceptualization is confusing the meaning of both terms leading to inaccuracies. - Original Message From: MarshaV val...@att.net To: moq_disc...@moqtalk.org Sent: Sat, May 7, 2011 3:44:28 AM Subject: Re: [MD] Free Will Greetings, I see it as conceptualization/language reifies whether it reifies, cause, preference, A. B or I. Marsha ___ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
