On Sun, May 7, 2017 at 12:04 AM, Kip Ingram <kip.ing...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Free will seems to become the focal points of conversations like this much > more than it should, though. > I could not agree more! Free will is a idea so bad it's not even wrong. I don't think anything in either philosophy or criminal law has cause more muddled thinking than free will. > > The initial reply to this post stated the need to define free will before > seeking its origins. > Yes, some might think this is an obvious point but it seems to be a revolutionary idea to some philosophers that before you argue about the existence of something it might be helpful to know what you're arguing about. > > > > My own definition is "the injection of new information into a dynamic > system." Not the injection of randomness, but rather the injection of > *information*. > Information is the result of a calculation, it has a cause. If something has no cause then it's random because that's what the word means. > > > > As noted in other replies, the only avenue for the entry of anything > otherwise undetermined by the system's prior state is necessarily quantum. > The objection then raised is that quantum uncertainty is random. However, > we don't truly know that. > Yes we do know that. There are only 2 possibilities, a activity had a cause or it didn't. If it did then it was determined. If it didn't it was undetermined. And if was undetermined then it was random. Intelligent activity MUST be determined, that's why if someone behaves in a strange way that we don't understand we ask "why did you do that?". If they respond "I had no reason" we conclude the behavior was stupid. > > > Laboratory experiments on ensembles of identically prepared systems > typically show a certain set of statistics corresponding to solutions of > Schrodinger's equation. > Schrodinger's Wave E quation is 100% deterministic but no laboratory experiment can ever measure it, experiment can only detect the square of the absolute value of Schrodinger's wave because that is a probability and probability we can measure with experiment. > > > However, any given run of the experiment can make no prediction beyond > those statistics as to which of those possible outcomes will arise. > Yes. > > > The circumstances of life within which we exercise our free will occur > uniquely and cannot be repeated. > Hmm... free will .... what a odd term... whatever can it mean? > > > there is simply no way to completely rule out the possibility that quantum > processes within the brain serve as a conduit for the application of > intelligent, non-random > That's redundant, if it's intelligent then it must be non-random, and if it's non-random then it has a cause. > > > free will into > > our behaviors. > I very much doubt that quantum mechanics has anything to do with our intelligence behavior; but even if I'm wrong it wouldn't make any difference, it would still be true that everything has a cause or it doesn't. As for "free will", tell me what the phrase means and I'll tell you if I agree or not. The only definition of free will that I know of that makes any sense is the inability for a individual to always know what they will do next until they do it even in an unchanging environment. If that is what is meant then we certainly have free will, but I'm the only one I know of that uses that definition. Of course by that definition a Cuckoo clock has free will too so it's not very useful, but at least it's not gibberish. > > > > The simple presence of self-awareness is adequate to bring the key issues > to the surface. Though none of us can directly observe the self-awareness > of others, each of us can observe our own. > Yes and we're surprised by our own behavior, but that is no more mysterious than the fact that we don't know how much 934757332 times 658498266 is until the calculation is finish. > > The almost rabid antagonism that many seem to have toward the idea that > consciousness might be anything other than purely phsyical frankly baffles > me. > I have that rabid antagonism myself so I'll try to explain why. A change in the physical state of your brain changes your consciousness, A change in you consciousness changes the physical state of your brain. What more evidence do you need? What more evidence could there be , even in theory? I think philosophers would do much better i f they worried less about consciousness and more about intelligence. Figure out how intelligence works and consciousness will take care of itself. > > > I am an electrical engineer > Me too. > > > with specialization in digital and computer related systems by > profession. I feel *thoroughly* sure that the hardware of standard > computers offers no basis for self-awareness, > So what does a carbon atom in your brain have that a silicon atom in a computer lacks? > > > and I am almost as sure that software systems don't either. We completely > understand the physics of computers. > And that's exactly the problem, we completely understand computers but some people demand that the root cause of mind be mysterious. People insist on an explanation but when you give them one they say that can't be right because I understand it. > > No transistor has any "knowledge" of the state of any other transistor or > of any global patterns in the overall state of the system. > So what? Is it really surprising that a very small part of a system does not have all the properties of that the entire overall system has? If it did then as a engineer you must know that everything except for that very small part would be unnecessary. > > > Basically computers simply throw switches in a controlled, algorithmic > manner. Each switch (transistor) is either open or closed, and is in that > state due to voltages applied at its terminals. > OK let's assume you're right and those simple switches are insufficient to explain mind, but being the almost exact opposite of randomness *something* has to cause thought and the experience of living, let's call that something Process X. You don't seem a big fan of the supernatural , that is to say something we can never understand, so let's assume Process X is a perfectly rational principle that we just haven't discovered yet. If Process X is rational, that means we can use our minds to examine what sort of thing it might turn out to be. It seems pretty clear , considering the fact that computers can solve equations beat Chess and GO grand masters and win on Jeopardy , that information processing can produce something that's starting to look like intelligence, but we'll assume that Process X can do that too, and in addition Process X can generate consciousness and a feeling of self, something you were concerned about and believe mere information processing can never do. What Process X does is certainly not simple, so it's very hard to avoid concluding that Process X itself is not simple. If it's complex it can't be made of only one thing, it must be made of parts. If Process X is not to act in a random, incoherent way some order must exist between the parts. A part must have some knowledge of what the other parts are doing and the only way to do that is with information. But maybe communication among the parts is of only secondary importance and the major work is done by the parts themselves. It could be, but then the parts must be very complex and be made of sub parts. In general an explanation means showing how something simple can do something complex, and the simplest possible sub part is one that can change in only one way, such as on to off or zero to one. It's getting extremely difficult to tell the difference between Process X and information processing. The only way to avoid this conclusion is if there is some ethereal substance that is all of one thing and has no parts thus is very simple, yet acts in a complex, intelligent way; and produces feeling and consciousness while it's at it. If you accept that, then I think the most honest thing to do would be to throw in the towel, call it a soul, and join the religious camp. But I'm not ready to surrender to the forces of irrationality. > > > If all we had to do was explain the observed external behavior of > conscious agents, then I see no issue. > You're not the only one, Evolution had no issue with that either. Evolution can't even detect consciousness as well as I can (at least I can detect my own) and yet Evolution managed to manufacture at least one conscious being and probably many billions. But Evolution can detect intelligence and thus select for it, so either consciousness in a byproduct of intelligent behavior or Charles Darwin was wrong. > > > I feel sure that a sufficiently powerful (standard, deterministic) > computational system could emulate these behaviors to an arbitrary degree > of accuracy, if provided with enough sufficiently clever programming. But > that is not all we have to do > I disagree, I think that is all we need to do, good thing too because that's all we'll ever be able to do. - we also must explain our internal conscious experiences. No standard, > deterministic computer will ever have such experiences. Will a quantum > computer, if and when we develop one? I really don't know - > There is not a speck of evidence that the brain's thought processes involve quantum phenomena, and it's very hard to see how they could. It's difficult enough to get quantum algorithms to run even when you cool down the hardware down to minus 459F; the human brain works at plus 98.6F. John K Clark -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
