Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
I also think that free will is a meaningless concept, for many reasons. Like, let's say I'm in situation X and can choose A or B. What is it that could make me choose differently in an otherwise identical situation? Presumably my will. But the will has to be part of me to be my free will, thus I'm not identical, and the situation is not identical either. Then there are regression problems and the assumption behind free will that I'm a person who's traveling on a single path through time, so I can only pick A or B but not both. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Marty, Can you clarify the origins of the Lobian Machine? Does it arise out of the theorem of Hugo Martin Lob? Yes. I have often explained that theorem, years ago on this list (and elsewhere) and I can have opportunities to explain it again. You can see some of my papers where I explain it, including SANE2004. Löb's theorem is a generalization of Gödel's theorem. It is related to a funny proof of the existence of Santa Klauss, for those who remember. Löb's theorem is very weird. It says that Peano Arithmetic PA (and all Lobian entity) are close for the following inference rule. If the theory proves Bp - p, then the theory proves p. It makes the theory (machine) modest: it proves Bp - p, only when he proves p (in which case Bp - p follows from elementary classical logic). PA can prove its own Löb's theorem, and this leads to the Löb formula: B(Bp - p) - Bp. And this *is* the (main) axiom of G and G*. (Bp = provable p, p some arithmetical proposition (or its gödel number when in the scope of B). In particular the theory cannot prove Bf - f (f = constant false proposition), they would prove B(Bf-f), and by modus ponens and Löb's formula Bf, and by modus ponens again: f. Thus they cannot prove their own consistency (Bf - f = ~Bf = ~~D~f = Dt). This is Gödel's second incompleteness theorem. Löb's discovery is a key event in the mathematical study of self- reference. Is it shorthand for the lobes of the human brain? No. :) What is the difference between a lobian machine and a universal lobian machine? And how do they relate to the question of free will? Many thanks, It happens that universal machines become Löbian (obey Löb's rule, and prove its formal version: Löb's formula) once they know (in some very weak technical sense) that they are universal. So you can just keep this in mind: a lobian machine is a universal machine which knows that she is universal. It obeys to the Löb's formula and indeed of the whole of G and G*. It has the arithmetical Plotinian theology. Knowing that they are universal, they can study they own limitations, develop theologies (distinguishing proof and true), and develop free- will, from their own point of views. They can distinguish all the person-notions, the 8 hypostases, etc. They are also sort of universal dissident, i.e. capable to refute any complete theory about them. They provide a tool for demolishing all reductionist interpretation of reductive comp theories. Some reduction are not reductionist. Their existence is responsible for the mess in Platonia: the impossibility to unify in one theory the whole arithmetical truth. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Bruno, Thanks for this great refresher course. marty a. - Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Friday, March 19, 2010 5:59 AM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. Marty, Can you clarify the origins of the Lobian Machine? Does it arise out of the theorem of Hugo Martin Lob? Yes. I have often explained that theorem, years ago on this list (and elsewhere) and I can have opportunities to explain it again. You can see some of my papers where I explain it, including SANE2004. Löb's theorem is a generalization of Gödel's theorem. It is related to a funny proof of the existence of Santa Klauss, for those who remember. Löb's theorem is very weird. It says that Peano Arithmetic PA (and all Lobian entity) are close for the following inference rule. If the theory proves Bp - p, then the theory proves p. It makes the theory (machine) modest: it proves Bp - p, only when he proves p (in which case Bp - p follows from elementary classical logic). PA can prove its own Löb's theorem, and this leads to the Löb formula: B(Bp - p) - Bp. And this *is* the (main) axiom of G and G*. (Bp = provable p, p some arithmetical proposition (or its gödel number when in the scope of B). In particular the theory cannot prove Bf - f (f = constant false proposition), they would prove B(Bf-f), and by modus ponens and Löb's formula Bf, and by modus ponens again: f. Thus they cannot prove their own consistency (Bf - f = ~Bf = ~~D~f = Dt). This is Gödel's second incompleteness theorem. Löb's discovery is a key event in the mathematical study of self-reference. Is it shorthand for the lobes of the human brain? No. :) What is the difference between a lobian machine and a universal lobian machine? And how do they relate to the question of free will? Many thanks, It happens that universal machines become Löbian (obey Löb's rule, and prove its formal version: Löb's formula) once they know (in some very weak technical sense) that they are universal. So you can just keep this in mind: a lobian machine is a universal machine which knows that she is universal. It obeys to the Löb's formula and indeed of the whole of G and G*. It has the arithmetical Plotinian theology. Knowing that they are universal, they can study they own limitations, develop theologies (distinguishing proof and true), and develop free-will, from their own point of views. They can distinguish all the person-notions, the 8 hypostases, etc. They are also sort of universal dissident, i.e. capable to refute any complete theory about them. They provide a tool for demolishing all reductionist interpretation of reductive comp theories. Some reduction are not reductionist. Their existence is responsible for the mess in Platonia: the impossibility to unify in one theory the whole arithmetical truth. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Bruno, Can you clarify the origins of the Lobian Machine? Does it arise out of the theorem of Hugo Martin Lob? Is it shorthand for the lobes of the human brain? What is the difference between a lobian machine and a universal lobian machine? And how do they relate to the question of free will? Many thanks, marty a. - Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2010 1:30 PM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 17 Mar 2010, at 14:06, m.a. wrote: But is there a deliberate feedback (of any kind) between first person and UD? No. The UD can be seen as a set of elementary arithmetical truth, realizing through their many proofs, the many computations. It is the least block-universe fro the mindscape. (Assuming comp). How does the UD identify and favor our normal histories? Excellent question. This is the reason why we are hunting white rabbits and white noise. This why we have to extracts the structure of matter and time from a sum on infinity of computations (those below or even aside our level and sphere of definition). If we show that such sum does not normalize, then we refute comp. How do the lobian numbers affect the UD. (I think you've answered these questions before but not in ways that are clear to me. Please give it one last try.)m.a. Löbian machine survives only in their consistent extension. It is the couple lobian-machine/its realities which emerge from inside the UD* (the execution of the UD, or that part of arithmetic). The free-will of a lobian number is defined with respect to its most probable realities. They can affect such realities, and be affected by them. But no lobian number/machine/entity/soul (if you think at its first person view) can affect the UD, for the same reason we cannot affect elementary arithmetic. (or the physical laws, for a physicalist). Look at UD* (the infinite run of the UD), or arithmetic, as the block universe of the mindscape. Matter is a projective view of arithmetic, when viewed by universal numbers from inside it. Normality is ensured by relative self-multiplication, making us both very rare in the absolute, and very numerous in the relative. Like with Everett, except we start from the numbers, and shows how to derive the wave, not just the collapse. I just explain that if we take comp seriously, the mind body problem leads to a mathematical body problem. Bruno -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
- Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2010 2:29 PM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. Or, are you saying here that choices made by the (3rd person) UD tend to be influenced by one's life-history to the extent of (often) providing the very alternatives that the (1st) person would have chosen? Exactly. Except I would not say that the UD, or arithmetic, makes choices. But the first person did, and can realize her consistent choice. Our consciousness is related to the normal histories which makes us (the lobian numbers) having a relative partial self control with respect to our most probable universal history. That can be reflected in notion like responsibility, remorse, conscience, well founded feeling of guiltiness, badly founded feeling of guiltiness, etc.). In other term free will is more related to determinist chaos, or Gödelian self-reference, than to the abrupt indeterminacy provided by the 'matter' of comp or the 'matter' of quantum mechanics. But is there a deliberate feedback (of any kind) between first person and UD? How does the UD identify and favor our normal histories? How do the lobian numbers affect the UD. (I think you've answered these questions before but not in ways that are clear to me. Please give it one last try.) m.a. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 17 Mar 2010, at 14:06, m.a. wrote: But is there a deliberate feedback (of any kind) between first person and UD? No. The UD can be seen as a set of elementary arithmetical truth, realizing through their many proofs, the many computations. It is the least block-universe fro the mindscape. (Assuming comp). How does the UD identify and favor our normal histories? Excellent question. This is the reason why we are hunting white rabbits and white noise. This why we have to extracts the structure of matter and time from a sum on infinity of computations (those below or even aside our level and sphere of definition). If we show that such sum does not normalize, then we refute comp. How do the lobian numbers affect the UD. (I think you've answered these questions before but not in ways that are clear to me. Please give it one last try.)m.a. Löbian machine survives only in their consistent extension. It is the couple lobian-machine/its realities which emerge from inside the UD* (the execution of the UD, or that part of arithmetic). The free-will of a lobian number is defined with respect to its most probable realities. They can affect such realities, and be affected by them. But no lobian number/machine/entity/soul (if you think at its first person view) can affect the UD, for the same reason we cannot affect elementary arithmetic. (or the physical laws, for a physicalist). Look at UD* (the infinite run of the UD), or arithmetic, as the block universe of the mindscape. Matter is a projective view of arithmetic, when viewed by universal numbers from inside it. Normality is ensured by relative self-multiplication, making us both very rare in the absolute, and very numerous in the relative. Like with Everett, except we start from the numbers, and shows how to derive the wave, not just the collapse. I just explain that if we take comp seriously, the mind body problem leads to a mathematical body problem. Bruno -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 16 Mar 2010, at 02:55, m.a. wrote: Bruno, Another plea for understanding. For clarity I will delete some questions from previous pages leaving only the ones that continue to puzzle me, in bold type. By computer I assume you're referring here to the arithmetical universe of comp rather than to a silicone-based machine. It is preferable to see a computer , may be programmed, as a finite thing, a number, living (existing) in the arithmetical universe, once we assume comp. There exist an infinity of such universal numbers in the arithmetical universe. They verify that phi_u (, x, y) = phi_x(y). It is the golem: you write the finite things x and y on its front, and he do the work of the machine/number x on the input y. How can there be indeterminacy in comp when there are no material particles subject to Heisenberg's theory, only numbers? Is there an element of chance in the universal dovetailing of pure numbers? Of course. This results from the seven first step of UDA. There is a total 3-determinacy , which multiplies any of your state an infinity of UD-times, in an infinity of computations, which entails, from *your* first person point of view to a very strong form of indeterminacy. You cannot know in which computations you are, and the physical emerges from that statistics. Comp provides the stronger form of subjective, or first person indeterminacy. If I am machine I am duplicable. Cf the Washington Moscow self-duplication. You cannot predict in advance if you will feel to be the one reconstituted in Moscow, or he one reconstituted in Washington. Then, the way you quantify that indeterminacy does not depend on the time and delays of the reconstitutions, nor of the virtual, real, or eventually arithmetical reconstitution. So your future states depend on all the arithmetical consistent extension states, of your current state, existing in the UD platonic execution. The Universal Dovetailer (or just elementary arithmetic) generates you current states infinitely often, belonging to an infinity of possible computational histories. The physical laws have to be justified by that indeterminacy of your relative states/histories existing in arithmetic. You may (re)read cautiously the UDA (from SAN04). The key is that a third person determinacy (like the UD works) generates from the point if view of the subjects a very strong form of indeterminacy due notably on the fact that below their s-comp substitution level, there are an infinity of histories going through their states; and measurement at that level have to be given by a distribution of probabilities on the computations, as seen from inside (that is with respect of memories). The key relies in the understanding of the 1 and 3 person distincts points of view. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
- Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2010 8:13 AM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 16 Mar 2010, at 02:55, m.a. wrote: Bruno How can there be indeterminacy in comp when there are no material particles subject to Heisenberg's theory, only numbers? Is there an element of chance in the universal dovetailing of pure numbers? Of course. This results from the seven first step of UDA. There is a total 3-determinacy , By 3-determinacy I assume you mean 3rd person determinacy. which multiplies any of your state an infinity of UD-times, in an infinity of computations, which entails, from *your* first person point of view to a very strong form of indeterminacy. You cannot know in which computations you are, and the physical emerges from that statistics. So I gather from this (and what's written below) that first-person I cannot decide which alternative the UD will shuffle out of the deck. Therefore: no free will as we conceive of it. Comp provides the stronger form of subjective, or first person indeterminacy. If I am machine I am duplicable. Cf the Washington Moscow self-duplication. You cannot predict in advance if you will feel to be the one reconstituted in Moscow, or he one reconstituted in Washington. Then, the way you quantify that indeterminacy does not depend on the time and delays of the reconstitutions, nor of the virtual, real, or eventually arithmetical reconstitution. So your future states depend on all the arithmetical consistent extension states, of your current state, existing in the UD platonic execution. The Universal Dovetailer (or just elementary arithmetic) generates you current states infinitely often, belonging to an infinity of possible computational histories. The physical laws have to be justified by that indeterminacy of your relative states/histories existing in arithmetic. You may (re)read cautiously the UDA (from SAN04). The key is that a third person determinacy (like the UD works) generates from the point if view of the subjects a very strong form of indeterminacy due notably on the fact that below their s-comp substitution level, there are an infinity of histories going through their states; and measurement at that level have to be given by a distribution of probabilities on the computations, as seen from inside (that is with respect of memories). Or, are you saying here that choices made by the (3rd person) UD tend to be influenced by one's life-history to the extent of (often) providing the very alternatives that the (1st) person would have chosen? That would be close enough to free will for me. The key relies in the understanding of the 1 and 3 person distincts points of view. I'm trying to. m.a. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 16 Mar 2010, at 16:17, m.a. wrote: By 3-determinacy I assume you mean 3rd person determinacy. Yes. It is the content of the diary of an experimenter, teleporting some rabbits or guinea pig, perhaps human. As opposed to the first person view, which is the one described by the rabbits, or the human, being teleported. It is classical teleportation, to ease the thought experiments/ experiences. So I gather from this (and what's written below) that first-person I cannot decide which alternative the UD will shuffle out of the deck. Therefore: no free will as we conceive of it. Yes, you can! Because either the theory is wrong, or it gives a notion of normal accessible worlds. This can ensure that you may be able to choose between alternatives like with coffee, or with tea. It is because those normal worlds are lawful, and can sustain machines and organisms that free will can develop. The UD illustrates that in the comp setting indeterminacy does not add anything that self-determinacy can already offer to the will. Or, are you saying here that choices made by the (3rd person) UD tend to be influenced by one's life-history to the extent of (often) providing the very alternatives that the (1st) person would have chosen? Exactly. Except I would not say that the UD, or arithmetic, makes choices. But the first person did, and can realize her consistent choice. Our consciousness is related to the normal histories which makes us (the lobian numbers) having a relative partial self control with respect to our most probable universal history. That can be reflected in notion like responsibility, remorse, conscience, well founded feeling of guiltiness, badly founded feeling of guiltiness, etc.). That would be close enough to free will for me. In other term free will is more related to determinist chaos, or Gödelian self-reference, than to the abrupt indeterminacy provided by the 'matter' of comp or the 'matter' of quantum mechanics. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Bruno, Another plea for understanding. For clarity I will delete some questions from previous pages leaving only the ones that continue to puzzle me, in bold type. - Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Sunday, March 14, 2010 1:45 AM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. For a computer the input is man; for the brain the input might be God, chance, spirits or what have you. Both for the computer and man, the inputs are given by their most probable universal neighbor, emerging from a competition among all universal computer below their substitution level. Well, it is really the consequence of the UD Argument. If my relevant (at the right substitution level, or below) computational state is S, my next first person state, (my next OM) is given by a measure on all computations, executed (in arithmetic) going through that state S. But the UD generates all universal machines, and all executions of each of those universal machine, so it generates the state S infinitely many often, as S is generated by any universal machines (themselves generating S an infinity of times). By computer I assume you're referring here to the arithmetical universe of comp rather than to a silicone-based machine. Here I am not sure to follow you. The comp indeterminacy on all our incarnations in arithmetic, or in the universal dovetailing may on the contrary restrict that freedom, by making us live consequences of act we don't do. How can there be indeterminacy in comp when there are no material particles subject to Heisenberg's theory, only numbers? Is there an element of chance in the universal dovetailing of pure numbers? m.a. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 14 Mar 2010, at 06:55, Brent Meeker wrote: I could have said associated or attributed instead of attached. To say that a brain is conscious is a category error. My brain is not conscious (no more than a rock). The person who has that brain can be said to be conscious. So how does a person have a brain? Why does a computation need one? The basic computations does not need a brain or a computer, given that they already exists in the elementary (first order logical) relation between numbers. Now, a universal number can make computation relatively to another universal number, or relatively to an infinity of univesral numbers (according to the point of view). This makes it possible to develop a greater degree of relative autonomy, partial control, etc. with respect to its probable local universal histories. A person has an infinity of brains, all generated infinitely often by the UD. The same consciousness will be associated to that person in all computational histories going through the relevant brain's computational state. Obviously you are supposing that the brain's computational state does not entirely determine the its future states, e.g. different computations (in fact infinitely many) go thru the same state. But is this because of quantum indeterminancy or because of different external interactions (e.g. perceptions) or both. Comp indeterminacy, discovering that I belong to this or that type of histories. The state of my brain does not make it possible to predict if a meteor will strike the earth, etc. Now the relative measure is put on the histories (not the finite number of states), which makes a continuum of histories 2^aleph_0 in the limit space of histories. We have to take that limit space, because the first person is unaware of the delays in the UD-time- step. So we're taking the limit over computations, not over perceived time? Careful. This point is subtle. With comp, perceived (and thus first person) time and space is platonistically defined, in the third person way, by a sum on an infinity of computations. (Re)read (perhaps) uda step1-7. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Brent Meeker meeke...@dslextreme.com writes: So how does a person have a brain? Why does a computation need one? To the Hindu, for example, God didn't create the universe, but God became the universe. Then he forgot that he became the universe. Why would God do this? Basically, for entertainment. You create a universe, and that in itself is very exciting. But then what? Should you sit back and watch this universe of yours having all the fun? No, you should have all the fun yourself. To accomplish this, God transformed into the whole universe. God is the Universe, and everything in it. But the universe doesn't know that because that would ruin the suspense. The universe is God's great drama, and God is the stage, the actors, and the audience all at once. The title of this epic drama is The Great Unknown Outcome. Throw in potent elements like passion, love, hate, good, evil, free will; and who knows what will happen? No one knows, and that is what keeps the universe interesting. But everyone will have a good time. And there is never really any danger, because everyone is really God, and God is really just playing around. This quote from Warren Sharpe from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandeism pretty much answers the why, I think. Just being conscious without a universe to play in isn't much of an existence, is it? -- Mark Buda her...@acm.org I get my monkeys for nothing and my chimps for free. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 12 Mar 2010, at 21:53, m.a. wrote: I agree with you that quantum indeterminacy doesn't affect (free) will: Quantum mechanics is local and deterministic, and explains why it seems indeterministic to the 99,...% of the observers. (3/12/2010 7:58 AM), which is why I feel that your use of the words ability and develop when you say: the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion (above) can as easily refer to completely determined processes which introspection identfies as voluntary a split second afterwards ... as it can anything else. m.a. Are you thinking to Libet's experiences? Anyway, if Libet's experiences has been repeated and confirmed (which is quite plausible). It would demolish only a pseudo-mystic conception of free-will where a 'substantial soul' would somehow influence the brain, or why not, directly the arms, ... or the spoon. Some materialist used Mechanism, not to for formulating or solving, the mind body problem, but for eliminating the mind and its attributes. Mental things does not really exists, only matter. And so no free will, nor even consciousness for the most extremists. The general mistake here (imo) consists in believing that reducing higher order epistemological notion to lower order notions eliminates the importance or the existence of the higher order notions. Or more generally, that representing an unknown field in a known field, eliminates the unknown field. It may eliminate it from the primitive ontology, but this does not mean it is eliminate from the appearances or from the experiences. If that was true a materialist eliminativist would never take a pain killer. And if we are (apparently material) machine, then, if we are digital machine, we are immaterial or abstract, or higher order, machine or number. The whole coupling consciousness/realties emerge, and thus is reduced, to the additive and multiplicative structure of numbers. This does not make disappear neither consciousness, nor the first person (singular and plural) material perception of matter. Free will is just very hard to define. It needs consciousness, it implies a partial control of the self with respect to its most probable macro-histories (macro = above its comp substitution level). George Orwell said that freedom is the right to say that 2+2 = 4. I would say that free will is the will to say that 2+2 = 4. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Bruno, Thanks to your lucid explanation I begin to glimpse the beauty of comp. Please check my reasoning here. If materialism is correct, the brain can be compared to a computer which contains the programming for higher order languages (e.g. word processors, spreadsheets, paintbrush etc.) but requires an external input to implement the creative potential of those languages. For a computer the input is man; for the brain the input might be God, chance, spirits or what have you. Comp, however is already itself a higher language per se with the potential capacity to manipulate and implement higher order languages within itself and without external input. Since the brain could have developed higher order languages through five million years of evolution, it can be credited with the faculties of consciousness and decision-making. But free will is precluded by its basic material composition; its decisions are predetermined. Whereas comp, not being material, could also process consciousness, and understand decision-making AND have the ability to decide freely among alternatives and act accordingly. marty a. - Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Saturday, March 13, 2010 6:37 AM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 12 Mar 2010, at 21:53, m.a. wrote: I agree with you that quantum indeterminacy doesn't affect (free) will: Quantum mechanics is local and deterministic, and explains why it seems indeterministic to the 99,...% of the observers. (3/12/2010 7:58 AM), which is why I feel that your use of the words ability and develop when you say: the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion (above) can as easily refer to completely determined processes which introspection identfies as voluntary a split second afterwards ... as it can anything else. m.a. Are you thinking to Libet's experiences? Anyway, if Libet's experiences has been repeated and confirmed (which is quite plausible). It would demolish only a pseudo-mystic conception of free-will where a 'substantial soul' would somehow influence the brain, or why not, directly the arms, ... or the spoon. Some materialist used Mechanism, not to for formulating or solving, the mind body problem, but for eliminating the mind and its attributes. Mental things does not really exists, only matter. And so no free will, nor even consciousness for the most extremists. The general mistake here (imo) consists in believing that reducing higher order epistemological notion to lower order notions eliminates the importance or the existence of the higher order notions. Or more generally, that representing an unknown field in a known field, eliminates the unknown field. It may eliminate it from the primitive ontology, but this does not mean it is eliminate from the appearances or from the experiences. If that was true a materialist eliminativist would never take a pain killer. And if we are (apparently material) machine, then, if we are digital machine, we are immaterial or abstract, or higher order, machine or number. The whole coupling consciousness/realties emerge, and thus is reduced, to the additive and multiplicative structure of numbers. This does not make disappear neither consciousness, nor the first person (singular and plural) material perception of matter. Free will is just very hard to define. It needs consciousness, it implies a partial control of the self with respect to its most probable macro-histories (macro = above its comp substitution level). George Orwell said that freedom is the right to say that 2+2 = 4. I would say that free will is the will to say that 2+2 = 4. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Bruno, Would you comment on C.S.Soon et al, Unconscious determinants of free decisions in the human brain, Nature Neuroscience, 11, 543 - 545 (2008) ? In this paper, the split second becomes 10 seconds. Sorry if this has been addressed before in this list. William On Mar 13, 2010, at 3:37 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 12 Mar 2010, at 21:53, m.a. wrote: I agree with you that quantum indeterminacy doesn't affect (free) will: Quantum mechanics is local and deterministic, and explains why it seems indeterministic to the 99,...% of the observers. (3/12/2010 7:58 AM), which is why I feel that your use of the words ability and develop when you say: the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion (above) can as easily refer to completely determined processes which introspection identfies as voluntary a split second afterwards ... as it can anything else. m.a. Are you thinking to Libet's experiences? Anyway, if Libet's experiences has been repeated and confirmed (which is quite plausible). It would demolish only a pseudo-mystic conception of free-will where a 'substantial soul' would somehow influence the brain, or why not, directly the arms, ... or the spoon. Some materialist used Mechanism, not to for formulating or solving, the mind body problem, but for eliminating the mind and its attributes. Mental things does not really exists, only matter. And so no free will, nor even consciousness for the most extremists. The general mistake here (imo) consists in believing that reducing higher order epistemological notion to lower order notions eliminates the importance or the existence of the higher order notions. Or more generally, that representing an unknown field in a known field, eliminates the unknown field. It may eliminate it from the primitive ontology, but this does not mean it is eliminate from the appearances or from the experiences. If that was true a materialist eliminativist would never take a pain killer. And if we are (apparently material) machine, then, if we are digital machine, we are immaterial or abstract, or higher order, machine or number. The whole coupling consciousness/realties emerge, and thus is reduced, to the additive and multiplicative structure of numbers. This does not make disappear neither consciousness, nor the first person (singular and plural) material perception of matter. Free will is just very hard to define. It needs consciousness, it implies a partial control of the self with respect to its most probable macro-histories (macro = above its comp substitution level). George Orwell said that freedom is the right to say that 2+2 = 4. I would say that free will is the will to say that 2+2 = 4. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 13 Mar 2010, at 16:00, m.a. wrote: Bruno, Thanks to your lucid explanation I begin to glimpse the beauty of comp. Please check my reasoning here. If materialism is correct, the brain can be compared to a computer which contains the programming for higher order languages (e.g. word processors, spreadsheets, paintbrush etc.) but requires anexternal input to implement the creative potential of those languages. Locally, yes. You can run the UD though. But this is of no use relatively to you. It is a program without input, and without ouput. From outside it is like the empty function, also computed by the program do nothing. For a computer the input is man; for the brain the input might be God, chance, spirits or what have you. Both for the computer and man, the inputs are given by their most probable universal neighbor, emerging from a competition among all universal computer below their substitution level. Comp, however is already itself a higher language per se with the potential capacity to manipulate and implement higher order languages within itself and without external input. Well, comp is a theory. That is a belief, by humans or entities. But with comp, or just with Church thesis, elementary arithmetic is what you describe. It is a higher language per se implementing by itself all possible machine's histories. But this gives a super-fractal, and our consciousness is distributed on its border. Since the brain could have developed higher order languages through five million years of evolution, it can be credited with the faculties of consciousness and decision-making. But free will is precluded by its basic material composition; its decisions are predetermined. Locally. But this is not a threat for free will. Whereas comp, not being material, could also process consciousness, and understand decision-making AND have the ability to decide freely among alternatives and act accordingly. marty a. Here I am not sure to follow you. The comp indeterminacy on all our incarnations in arithmetic, or in the universal dovetailing may on the contrary restrict that freedom, by making us live consequences of act we don't do. So it is really determinism which allows us to develop at least a partial control on the universal neighborhood we bet on. Suppose you love daisies and I know that. Why would you feel less free to pick a daisy if I can predict you will do it. Free will comes from the fact that 1)*you* cannot predict in advance your choices, so that *you* will have to take a decision with incomplete information, and 2) *you* can reflect that ignorance, and thus learn to live with an open spectrum of possibilities in front of you. Real choice takes time and have to mature. It is something you live and do, and cannot be reduced to the behavior of your parts, because, by comp, you cannot be aware of those parts, without betting on a complex theory. You can only bet on a level, if you want a self-copy, which is, as an explanation, as complex than you. To explain your behavior at that level makes no more sense than using quantum field theory to taste a pizza. It would be like, with comp, to taste a pizza by building a copy of yourself, asking him how he tastes the pizza, and, incase he says oh, quite good, conclude that *you* personally find that pizza quite good. It will not work in any communicable way. You may read a text by Smullyan, in the book Mind'I (ed. Hofstadter and Dennett) about a guy who asks God to free him from free will. It is funny and up to the point. What happens, but this already the case with QM, and as a consequence of comp, is that we have many futures, and our will is reflected in or normal (Gaussian) worlds. I said once that when you are young, free will is the ability to start smoking cigarets. And when you are older, free will is the ability to stop smoking cigarets. At that time I concluded that free will did not exist! The will is always free, because if it is not, it is not your will. Bruno, in Sylvie and Bruno (lewis Carroll), put it nicely too: (from memory): '- What a chance that I hate spinach', '- Why? asks Sylvie, '- because in the case I would like spinach, I would ate them, and that would be absolutely horrible'. In that (non-)sense, will is not free. I guess free will is an ability to taste and use and defend freedom, imo, not much more, but it is already a lot. Bruno - Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Saturday, March 13, 2010 6:37 AM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 12 Mar 2010, at 21:53, m.a. wrote: I agree with you that quantum indeterminacy doesn't affect (free) will: Quantum mechanics is local and deterministic, and explains why it seems indeterministic to the 99,...% of the observers. (3/12/2010 7:58 AM), which
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Hi William, OK I found it on the net: http://www.socialbehavior.uzh.ch/teaching/semsocialneurosciencespring09/Haynes_NatNeurosci_2008_ext.pdf But my comment will consist in repeating what I am always saying about free will or free decision. The existence of free acts has nothing to do with the fact that such acts are determined, in advance or not. The article, relatively to what I try to convey preaches the chore. Given that free will is a high level self-referential ability, it would be astonishing that the brain has not a lot of work to do, and this including the transformation of the will into act. Given that mechanism is my working hypothesis, the will cannot, in no direct ways, influence any of my parts, say, at my substitution level. I am emerging from billions of amoebas (neuronal cells) which got the cables (axon), and without using drugs, I cannot interfere deliberately on this or that specific neurons. Also, I don't know if you have read my papers, but I do not attach consciousness to a working brain, only to an abstract person, which lives really in Platonia, and uses only its local brain to manifest itself relatively to me with some high probability. But the consciousness itself is attached to infinities of computations (existing through elementary arithmetic, or combinators, etc.). I mean, how, in the mechanist frame, a complex decision, like those based on the free will, could be done without the brain doing a vast set of relevant computations. That it can take 10 seconds is almost astonishing of brevity. In my life, the most free-will type of decision seems for asking years of brain processing :) It is not astonishing that for local quick decision we are deluded on their exact relative timing, but then we are deluded on time in general. Such kind attack on free-will criticizes just a sort of magical conception of the will. Not the one based explicitly on mechanist hypotheses. It is like the book by atheists saying that God does not exist, and then refers only to a notion of God, about which it is well known that scientific (modest, interrogative) reflexion has been banished since centuries. The position I take on free will is called compatibilism in the literature. It is just self-determinacy, with self mainly defined by recursion equations in computer science (+ intensional nuances). Self- determinacy takes computational time, that is normal. You may elaborate if you feel I am missing something. Bruno On 13 Mar 2010, at 18:19, L.W. Sterritt wrote: Bruno, Would you comment on C.S.Soon et al, Unconscious determinants of free decisions in the human brain, Nature Neuroscience, 11, 543 - 545 (2008) ? In this paper, the split second becomes 10 seconds. Sorry if this has been addressed before in this list. William On Mar 13, 2010, at 3:37 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 12 Mar 2010, at 21:53, m.a. wrote: I agree with you that quantum indeterminacy doesn't affect (free) will: Quantum mechanics is local and deterministic, and explains why it seems indeterministic to the 99,...% of the observers. (3/12/2010 7:58 AM), which is why I feel that your use of the words ability and develop when you say: the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion (above) can as easily refer to completely determined processes which introspection identfies as voluntary a split second afterwards ... as it can anything else. m.a. Are you thinking to Libet's experiences? Anyway, if Libet's experiences has been repeated and confirmed (which is quite plausible). It would demolish only a pseudo-mystic conception of free-will where a 'substantial soul' would somehow influence the brain, or why not, directly the arms, ... or the spoon. Some materialist used Mechanism, not to for formulating or solving, the mind body problem, but for eliminating the mind and its attributes. Mental things does not really exists, only matter. And so no free will, nor even consciousness for the most extremists. The general mistake here (imo) consists in believing that reducing higher order epistemological notion to lower order notions eliminates the importance or the existence of the higher order notions. Or more generally, that representing an unknown field in a known field, eliminates the unknown field. It may eliminate it from the primitive ontology, but this does not mean it is eliminate from the appearances or from the experiences. If that was true a materialist eliminativist would never take a pain killer. And if we are (apparently material) machine, then, if we are digital machine, we are immaterial or abstract, or higher order, machine or number. The whole coupling consciousness/realties emerge, and thus is reduced, to the additive and multiplicative structure of numbers. This does not make disappear neither
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Bruno, Thanks for your reply. Are your papers on your web site? William On Mar 13, 2010, at 10:55 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: Hi William, OK I found it on the net: http://www.socialbehavior.uzh.ch/teaching/semsocialneurosciencespring09/Haynes_NatNeurosci_2008_ext.pdf But my comment will consist in repeating what I am always saying about free will or free decision. The existence of free acts has nothing to do with the fact that such acts are determined, in advance or not. The article, relatively to what I try to convey preaches the chore. Given that free will is a high level self-referential ability, it would be astonishing that the brain has not a lot of work to do, and this including the transformation of the will into act. Given that mechanism is my working hypothesis, the will cannot, in no direct ways, influence any of my parts, say, at my substitution level. I am emerging from billions of amoebas (neuronal cells) which got the cables (axon), and without using drugs, I cannot interfere deliberately on this or that specific neurons. Also, I don't know if you have read my papers, but I do not attach consciousness to a working brain, only to an abstract person, which lives really in Platonia, and uses only its local brain to manifest itself relatively to me with some high probability. But the consciousness itself is attached to infinities of computations (existing through elementary arithmetic, or combinators, etc.). I mean, how, in the mechanist frame, a complex decision, like those based on the free will, could be done without the brain doing a vast set of relevant computations. That it can take 10 seconds is almost astonishing of brevity. In my life, the most free-will type of decision seems for asking years of brain processing :) It is not astonishing that for local quick decision we are deluded on their exact relative timing, but then we are deluded on time in general. Such kind attack on free-will criticizes just a sort of magical conception of the will. Not the one based explicitly on mechanist hypotheses. It is like the book by atheists saying that God does not exist, and then refers only to a notion of God, about which it is well known that scientific (modest, interrogative) reflexion has been banished since centuries. The position I take on free will is called compatibilism in the literature. It is just self-determinacy, with self mainly defined by recursion equations in computer science (+ intensional nuances). Self-determinacy takes computational time, that is normal. You may elaborate if you feel I am missing something. Bruno On 13 Mar 2010, at 18:19, L.W. Sterritt wrote: Bruno, Would you comment on C.S.Soon et al, Unconscious determinants of free decisions in the human brain, Nature Neuroscience, 11, 543 - 545 (2008) ? In this paper, the split second becomes 10 seconds. Sorry if this has been addressed before in this list. William On Mar 13, 2010, at 3:37 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 12 Mar 2010, at 21:53, m.a. wrote: I agree with you that quantum indeterminacy doesn't affect (free) will: Quantum mechanics is local and deterministic, and explains why it seems indeterministic to the 99,...% of the observers. (3/12/2010 7:58 AM), which is why I feel that your use of the words ability and develop when you say: the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion (above) can as easily refer to completely determined processes which introspection identfies as voluntary a split second afterwards ... as it can anything else. m.a. Are you thinking to Libet's experiences? Anyway, if Libet's experiences has been repeated and confirmed (which is quite plausible). It would demolish only a pseudo-mystic conception of free-will where a 'substantial soul' would somehow influence the brain, or why not, directly the arms, ... or the spoon. Some materialist used Mechanism, not to for formulating or solving, the mind body problem, but for eliminating the mind and its attributes. Mental things does not really exists, only matter. And so no free will, nor even consciousness for the most extremists. The general mistake here (imo) consists in believing that reducing higher order epistemological notion to lower order notions eliminates the importance or the existence of the higher order notions. Or more generally, that representing an unknown field in a known field, eliminates the unknown field. It may eliminate it from the primitive ontology, but this does not mean it is eliminate from the appearances or from the experiences. If that was true a materialist eliminativist would never take a pain killer. And if we are (apparently material) machine, then, if we are digital machine, we are immaterial or abstract, or higher order, machine or number. The whole coupling consciousness/realties
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 3/13/2010 10:55 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: Hi William, OK I found it on the net: http://www.socialbehavior.uzh.ch/teaching/semsocialneurosciencespring09/Haynes_NatNeurosci_2008_ext.pdf But my comment will consist in repeating what I am always saying about free will or free decision. The existence of free acts has nothing to do with the fact that such acts are determined, in advance or not. The article, relatively to what I try to convey preaches the chore. Given that free will is a high level self-referential ability, it would be astonishing that the brain has not a lot of work to do, and this including the transformation of the will into act. Given that mechanism is my working hypothesis, the will cannot, in no direct ways, influence any of my parts, say, at my substitution level. I am emerging from billions of amoebas (neuronal cells) which got the cables (axon), and without using drugs, I cannot interfere deliberately on this or that specific neurons. Also, I don't know if you have read my papers, but I do not attach consciousness to a working brain, only to an abstract person, which lives really in Platonia, and uses only its local brain to manifest itself relatively to me with some high probability. But the consciousness itself is attached to infinities of computations (existing through elementary arithmetic, or combinators, etc.). Could you explain that last. What does attached to mean? And is the infinity related to quantum infinities, e.g. the infinite number of paths in a Feynman path integral computation? or is it just the potential aleph0 infinity of successive possible classical states? Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Please see questions below (in bold). - Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Saturday, March 13, 2010 12:40 PM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 13 Mar 2010, at 16:00, m.a. wrote: Bruno, Thanks to your lucid explanation I begin to glimpse the beauty of comp. Please check my reasoning here. If materialism is correct, the brain can be compared to a computer which contains the programming for higher order languages (e.g. word processors, spreadsheets, paintbrush etc.) but requires anexternal input to implement the creative potential of those languages. Locally, yes. You can run the UD though. But this is of no use relatively to you. It is a program without input, and without ouput. From outside it is like the empty function, also computed by the program do nothing. For a computer the input is man; for the brain the input might be God, chance, spirits or what have you. Both for the computer and man, the inputs are given by their most probable universal neighbor, emerging from a competition among all universal computer below their substitution level. Could you please clarify this? Comp, however is already itself a higher language per se with the potential capacity to manipulate and implement higher order languages within itself and without external input. Well, comp is a theory. That is a belief, by humans or entities. But with comp, or just with Church thesis, elementary arithmetic is what you describe. It is a higher language per se implementing by itself all possible machine's histories. But this gives a super-fractal, and our consciousness is distributed on its border. Since the brain could have developed higher order languages through five million years of evolution, it can be credited with the faculties of consciousness and decision-making. But free will is precluded by its basic material composition; its decisions are predetermined. Locally. But this is not a threat for free will. Whereas comp, not being material, could also process consciousness, and understand decision-making AND have the ability to decide freely among alternatives and act accordingly. marty a. Here I am not sure to follow you. The comp indeterminacy on all our incarnations in arithmetic, or in the universal dovetailing may on the contrary restrict that freedom, by making us live consequences of act we don't do. How does this restrict freedom? The ability to imagine many alternatives and therefore make an informed choice among them seems to me the essence of free will. I thought that was what you were saying below: What happens, but this already the case with QM, and as a consequence of comp, is that we have many futures, and our will is reflected in or normal (Gaussian) worlds. So it is really determinism which allows us to develop at least a partial control on the universal neighborhood we bet on. What is partial determinism? Suppose you love daisies and I know that. Why would you feel less free to pick a daisy if I can predict you will do it. Free will comes from the fact that 1)*you* cannot predict in advance your choices, so that *you* will have to take a decision with incomplete information, and 2) *you* can reflect that ignorance, and thus learn to live with an open spectrum of possibilities in front of you. Real choice takes time and have to mature. It is something you live and do, and cannot be reduced to the behavior of your parts, because, by comp, you cannot be aware of those parts, without betting on a complex theory. You can only bet on a level, if you want a self-copy, which is, as an explanation, as complex than you. To explain your behavior at that level makes no more sense than using quantum field theory to taste a pizza. It would be like, with comp, to taste a pizza by building a copy of yourself, asking him how he tastes the pizza, and, incase he says oh, quite good, conclude that *you* personally find that pizza quite good. It will not work in any communicable way. You may read a text by Smullyan, in the book Mind'I (ed. Hofstadter and Dennett) about a guy who asks God to free him from free will. It is funny and up to the point. What happens, but this already the case with QM, and as a consequence of comp, is that we have many futures, and our will is reflected in or normal (Gaussian) worlds. I said once that when you are young, free will is the ability to start smoking cigarets. And when you are older, free will is the ability to stop smoking cigarets. At that time I concluded that free will did not exist! The will is always free, because if it is not, it is not your will. Bruno, in Sylvie and Bruno (lewis Carroll), put it nicely too: (from memory): '- What a chance that I hate spinach', '- Why? asks Sylvie, '- because in the case I would like spinach
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
William, On 13 Mar 2010, at 20:11, L.W. Sterritt wrote: Thanks for your reply. Are your papers on your web site? Yes. Most of them, except the first (pre-internet papers), and the lasts. The simplest in english is the one downloadable at: http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/publications/SANE2004MARCHALAbstract.html You can download the slides also, to have the 8 steps of the Universal Dovetailer Argument (UDA) in front of you. Best, Bruno On Mar 13, 2010, at 10:55 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: Hi William, OK I found it on the net: http://www.socialbehavior.uzh.ch/teaching/semsocialneurosciencespring09/Haynes_NatNeurosci_2008_ext.pdf But my comment will consist in repeating what I am always saying about free will or free decision. The existence of free acts has nothing to do with the fact that such acts are determined, in advance or not. The article, relatively to what I try to convey preaches the chore. Given that free will is a high level self-referential ability, it would be astonishing that the brain has not a lot of work to do, and this including the transformation of the will into act. Given that mechanism is my working hypothesis, the will cannot, in no direct ways, influence any of my parts, say, at my substitution level. I am emerging from billions of amoebas (neuronal cells) which got the cables (axon), and without using drugs, I cannot interfere deliberately on this or that specific neurons. Also, I don't know if you have read my papers, but I do not attach consciousness to a working brain, only to an abstract person, which lives really in Platonia, and uses only its local brain to manifest itself relatively to me with some high probability. But the consciousness itself is attached to infinities of computations (existing through elementary arithmetic, or combinators, etc.). I mean, how, in the mechanist frame, a complex decision, like those based on the free will, could be done without the brain doing a vast set of relevant computations. That it can take 10 seconds is almost astonishing of brevity. In my life, the most free-will type of decision seems for asking years of brain processing :) It is not astonishing that for local quick decision we are deluded on their exact relative timing, but then we are deluded on time in general. Such kind attack on free-will criticizes just a sort of magical conception of the will. Not the one based explicitly on mechanist hypotheses. It is like the book by atheists saying that God does not exist, and then refers only to a notion of God, about which it is well known that scientific (modest, interrogative) reflexion has been banished since centuries. The position I take on free will is called compatibilism in the literature. It is just self-determinacy, with self mainly defined by recursion equations in computer science (+ intensional nuances). Self-determinacy takes computational time, that is normal. You may elaborate if you feel I am missing something. Bruno On 13 Mar 2010, at 18:19, L.W. Sterritt wrote: Bruno, Would you comment on C.S.Soon et al, Unconscious determinants of free decisions in the human brain, Nature Neuroscience, 11, 543 - 545 (2008) ? In this paper, the split second becomes 10 seconds. Sorry if this has been addressed before in this list. William On Mar 13, 2010, at 3:37 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 12 Mar 2010, at 21:53, m.a. wrote: I agree with you that quantum indeterminacy doesn't affect (free) will: Quantum mechanics is local and deterministic, and explains why it seems indeterministic to the 99,...% of the observers. (3/12/2010 7:58 AM), which is why I feel that your use of the words ability and develop when you say: the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion (above) can as easily refer to completely determined processes which introspection identfies as voluntary a split second afterwards ... as it can anything else. m.a. Are you thinking to Libet's experiences? Anyway, if Libet's experiences has been repeated and confirmed (which is quite plausible). It would demolish only a pseudo- mystic conception of free-will where a 'substantial soul' would somehow influence the brain, or why not, directly the arms, ... or the spoon. Some materialist used Mechanism, not to for formulating or solving, the mind body problem, but for eliminating the mind and its attributes. Mental things does not really exists, only matter. And so no free will, nor even consciousness for the most extremists. The general mistake here (imo) consists in believing that reducing higher order epistemological notion to lower order notions eliminates the importance or the existence of the higher order notions. Or more generally, that representing an unknown field in a known field, eliminates the unknown field. It may eliminate it from
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 13 Mar 2010, at 23:15, Brent Meeker wrote: On 3/13/2010 10:55 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: Hi William, OK I found it on the net: http://www.socialbehavior.uzh.ch/teaching/semsocialneurosciencespring09/Haynes_NatNeurosci_2008_ext.pdf But my comment will consist in repeating what I am always saying about free will or free decision. The existence of free acts has nothing to do with the fact that such acts are determined, in advance or not. The article, relatively to what I try to convey preaches the chore. Given that free will is a high level self-referential ability, it would be astonishing that the brain has not a lot of work to do, and this including the transformation of the will into act. Given that mechanism is my working hypothesis, the will cannot, in no direct ways, influence any of my parts, say, at my substitution level. I am emerging from billions of amoebas (neuronal cells) which got the cables (axon), and without using drugs, I cannot interfere deliberately on this or that specific neurons. Also, I don't know if you have read my papers, but I do not attach consciousness to a working brain, only to an abstract person, which lives really in Platonia, and uses only its local brain to manifest itself relatively to me with some high probability. But the consciousness itself is attached to infinities of computations (existing through elementary arithmetic, or combinators, etc.). Could you explain that last. What does attached to mean? And is the infinity related to quantum infinities, e.g. the infinite number of paths in a Feynman path integral computation? or is it just the potential aleph0 infinity of successive possible classical states? I could have said associated or attributed instead of attached. To say that a brain is conscious is a category error. My brain is not conscious (no more than a rock). The person who has that brain can be said to be conscious. The same consciousness will be associated to that person in all computational histories going through the relevant brain's computational state. Now the relative measure is put on the histories (not the finite number of states), which makes a continuum of histories 2^aleph_0 in the limit space of histories. We have to take that limit space, because the first person is unaware of the delays in the UD-time-step. The border of the Mandelbrot set is a good illustration of what such a limit space, when made compact, can look like. I may say more on this in my reply to Marty. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 14 Mar 2010, at 03:35, m.a. wrote: Please see questions below (in bold). On 13 Mar 2010, at 16:00, m.a. wrote: Bruno, Thanks to your lucid explanation I begin to glimpse the beauty of comp. Please check my reasoning here. If materialism is correct, the brain can be compared to a computer which contains the programming for higher order languages (e.g. word processors, spreadsheets, paintbrush etc.) but requires anexternal input to implement the creative potential of those languages. Locally, yes. You can run the UD though. But this is of no use relatively to you. It is a program without input, and without ouput. From outside it is like the empty function, also computed by the program do nothing. For a computer the input is man; for the brain the input might be God, chance, spirits or what have you. Both for the computer and man, the inputs are given by their most probable universal neighbor, emerging from a competition among all universal computer below their substitution level. Could you please clarify this? Well, it is really the consequence of the UD Argument. If my relevant (at the right substitution level, or below) computational state is S, my next first person state, (my next OM) is given by a measure on all computations, executed (in arithmetic) going through that state S. But the UD generates all universal machines, and all executions of each of those universal machine, so it generates the state S infinitely many often, as S is generated by any universal machines (themselves generating S an infinity of times). Here I am not sure to follow you. The comp indeterminacy on all our incarnations in arithmetic, or in the universal dovetailing may onthe contrary restrict that freedom, by making us live consequences of act we don't do. How does this restrict freedom? The ability to imagine many alternatives and therefore make an informed choice among them seems to me the essence of free will. I thought that was what you were saying below: Exactly. That is why adding randomness limit my free-will, because it entails that some alternatives will be realized independently of my will. If I hesitate between going to Moscow and going to Washington, the fact that both alternatives are realized (in the same proportion, say) makes my happening to be in one of those places a random event, not the result of my informed choice among the alternatives. No need for duplication: if I decide to go to W or to M by throwing a coin, my choice is less free than if I make a choice resulting from information I get on W and M. So it is really determinism which allows us to develop at least a partial control on the universal neighborhood we bet on. What is partial determinism? A mixture of determinism and indeterminism. Like freely choosing between being duplicated in Washington and Moscow instead of being duplicated in Sidney and Beijing. Or like being duplicated in W and M, but being able to insure that I will have coffee in both places. Quantum mechanics, and statistical physics are always mixing indeterminacy and determinacy. Free will relies on the (self)- determinacy part. Indeterminacy adds unexpected events capable of preventing my will to be accomplished. Pure, total indeterminacy, gives total randomness, and I am no more able to predict anything, or to evaluate any form of likelihood, except for some global quasi-uniform white noise. Bruno -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 3/13/2010 9:17 PM, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 13 Mar 2010, at 23:15, Brent Meeker wrote: On 3/13/2010 10:55 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: Hi William, OK I found it on the net: http://www.socialbehavior.uzh.ch/teaching/semsocialneurosciencespring09/Haynes_NatNeurosci_2008_ext.pdf But my comment will consist in repeating what I am always saying about free will or free decision. The existence of free acts has nothing to do with the fact that such acts are determined, in advance or not. The article, relatively to what I try to convey preaches the chore. Given that free will is a high level self-referential ability, it would be astonishing that the brain has not a lot of work to do, and this including the transformation of the will into act. Given that mechanism is my working hypothesis, the will cannot, in no direct ways, influence any of my parts, say, at my substitution level. I am emerging from billions of amoebas (neuronal cells) which got the cables (axon), and without using drugs, I cannot interfere deliberately on this or that specific neurons. Also, I don't know if you have read my papers, but I do not attach consciousness to a working brain, only to an abstract person, which lives really in Platonia, and uses only its local brain to manifest itself relatively to me with some high probability. But the consciousness itself is attached to infinities of computations (existing through elementary arithmetic, or combinators, etc.). Could you explain that last. What does attached to mean? And is the infinity related to quantum infinities, e.g. the infinite number of paths in a Feynman path integral computation? or is it just the potential aleph0 infinity of successive possible classical states? I could have said associated or attributed instead of attached. To say that a brain is conscious is a category error. My brain is not conscious (no more than a rock). The person who has that brain can be said to be conscious. So how does a person have a brain? Why does a computation need one? The same consciousness will be associated to that person in all computational histories going through the relevant brain's computational state. Obviously you are supposing that the brain's computational state does not entirely determine the its future states, e.g. different computations (in fact infinitely many) go thru the same state. But is this because of quantum indeterminancy or because of different external interactions (e.g. perceptions) or both. Now the relative measure is put on the histories (not the finite number of states), which makes a continuum of histories 2^aleph_0 in the limit space of histories. We have to take that limit space, because the first person is unaware of the delays in the UD-time-step. So we're taking the limit over computations, not over perceived time? Brent The border of the Mandelbrot set is a good illustration of what such a limit space, when made compact, can look like. I may say more on this in my reply to Marty. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/%7Emarchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Hi Brent, We have discussed this a long time ago. Ah, perhaps it was on the FOR list. Free-will can only diminish when indeterminacy is added. It is a product of awareness of ignorance on oneself, that an high level construct. I appreciate infinitely both Kochen and Conway, but on free will they make the beginners' error, like Penrose makes the beginners error on Gödel. You can use the self-duplications iteration thought experiment to illustrate that indeterminacy is not needed, and even annoying if too big, to let free will develop itself. Or to let the will develop itself. free-will is an oxymoron. Do you believe in free free-will ? :) Bruno On 12 Mar 2010, at 00:04, Brent Meeker wrote: My apologies. I forgot that Lawrence National Laboratories no longer hosted the physics archive. I should have cited: http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0604079 The Free Will Theorem Authors: John Conway, Simon Kochen (Submitted on 11 Apr 2006) Abstract: On the basis of three physical axioms, we prove that if the choice of a particular type of spin 1 experiment is not a function of the information accessible to the experimenters, then its outcome is equally not a function of the information accessible to the particles. We show that this result is robust, and deduce that neither hidden variable theories nor mechanisms of the GRW type for wave function collapse can be made relativistic. We also establish the consistency of our axioms and discuss the philosophical implications. And here's a later, stronger version that uses some weaker premises. http://arxiv.org/abs/0807.3286 Brent On 3/11/2010 2:16 PM, John Mikes wrote: Brent, nice statement: But it's certainly not a deterministic universe I have to take your word, because the reference you gave said: NOT FOUND So what kind of a 'universe' is it? bootstrap, self reflecting autodidacta? Creator-made? John M On 3/11/10, Brent Meeker meeke...@dslextreme.com wrote: On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: Bruno and John, The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about: http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html (Excerpts) PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces. To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told PhysOrg.com. There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a. But it's certainly not a deterministic universe. _http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/quant-ph/pdf/0604/0604079.pdf_ Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything- l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything- l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 11 Mar 2010, at 23:14, Brent Meeker wrote: On 3/11/2010 1:56 PM, m.a. wrote: - Original Message - From: Brent Meeker To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 4:38 PM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: Bruno and John, The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about: http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html (Excerpts) PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces. To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told PhysOrg.com. There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a. But it's certainly not a deterministic universe. It looks like Cashmore would disagree about that.See above: completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces. Why would he? Being controlled by chemistry doesn't mean it's deterministic. Cashmore must know that chemistry is described by quantum mechanics. Quantum mechanics is local and deterministic, and explains why it seems indeterministic to the 99,...% of the observers. Comp is better, because it has much less assumption (elementary arithmetic, mainly), and explains both the qunat and the qualia, and the appearance of a gap between them. And Tononi's paper is 98% coherent with comp. Only its ending conclusion on Mary is magical ... Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
- Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Friday, March 12, 2010 7:51 AM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. Hi Brent, We have discussed this a long time ago. Ah, perhaps it was on the FOR list. Free-will can only diminish when indeterminacy is added. It is a product of awareness of ignorance on oneself, that an high level construct. I appreciate infinitely both Kochen and Conway, but on free will they make the beginners' error, like Penrose makes the beginners error on Gödel. You can use the self-duplications iteration thought experiment to illustrate that indeterminacy is not needed, and even annoying if too big, to let free will develop itself. Or to let the will develop itself. free-will is an oxymoron. Do you believe in free free-will ? :) Bruno I think the question, Do you believe in free will? could as easily be, Do you believe in Santa Claus or God or Fate and on and on. We loudly assert: I do what I want!! But without considering the factors that influence (determine?) our wants and desires. No.I don't suppose I 'believe in free will. On 12 Mar 2010, at 00:04, Brent Meeker wrote: My apologies. I forgot that Lawrence National Laboratories no longer hosted the physics archive. I should have cited: http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0604079 The Free Will Theorem Authors: John Conway, Simon Kochen (Submitted on 11 Apr 2006) Abstract: On the basis of three physical axioms, we prove that if the choice of a particular type of spin 1 experiment is not a function of the information accessible to the experimenters, then its outcome is equally not a function of the information accessible to the particles. We show that this result is robust, and deduce that neither hidden variable theories nor mechanisms of the GRW type for wave function collapse can be made relativistic. We also establish the consistency of our axioms and discuss the philosophical implications. And here's a later, stronger version that uses some weaker premises. http://arxiv.org/abs/0807.3286 Brent On 3/11/2010 2:16 PM, John Mikes wrote: Brent, nice statement: But it's certainly not a deterministic universe I have to take your word, because the reference you gave said: NOT FOUND So what kind of a 'universe' is it? bootstrap, self reflecting autodidacta? Creator-made? John M On 3/11/10, Brent Meeker meeke...@dslextreme.com wrote: On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: Bruno and John, The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about: http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html (Excerpts) PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces. To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told PhysOrg.com. There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a. But it's certainly not a deterministic universe. _http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/quant-ph/pdf/0604/0604079.pdf_ Brent -- You received
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Marty, I think the question, Do you believe in free will? could as easily be, Do you believe in Santa Claus or God or Fate and on and on. We loudly assert: I do what I want!! But without considering the factors that influence (determine?) our wants and desires. No.I don't suppose I 'believe in free will. You are right. Free will is a bit like God, Santa Klaus, or the primitive Universe. The main problem is that people have very different definitions, usually loaded with heavy connotations, and lot of emotional factors, wishful thinking, etc. To defend free-will, or at least responsibility, I often mention the lawyer who defend a murderer by saying that his client was just obeying to the Schroedinger equation. This obviously will not work, if only because the members of the jury can respond by we judge you fully guilty and ask jail for life, and then add, but don't worry, we are also just obeying to Schroedinger wave equation. Such explanation doesn't just lead to arbitrariness, but they are wrong, deeply wrong. No universal machine can know all its influencing and determining factors, and that is why, in complex environment, they will have to use shortcut in decision procedure, which invokes their conscience, and their notion of good and bad, and eventually have to engage their responsibility, in some large or small measure. Experts can debate infinitely on each individual cases, and can never be sure on this matter, and that is why in many law systems, a reference will be made on the judge intimate conviction. If we are determinate, we cannot live at the level where we are determinate. The soul (Bp p) of the machine (Bp) is really NOT a machine, from its personal point of view. So, some free will exists. And some feeling of guiltiness are founded, even if only god can know and judge impartially. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
- Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Friday, March 12, 2010 11:54 AM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. Marty, I think the question, Do you believe in free will? could as easily be, Do you believe in Santa Claus or God or Fate and on and on. We loudly assert: I do what I want!! But without considering the factors that influence (determine?) our wants and desires. No.I don't suppose I 'believe in free will. You are right. Free will is a bit like God, Santa Klaus, or the primitive Universe. The main problem is that people have very different definitions, usually loaded with heavy connotations, and lot of emotional factors, wishful thinking, etc. To defend free-will, or at least responsibility, I often mention the lawyer who defend a murderer by saying that his client was just obeying to the Schroedinger equation. This obviously will not work, if only because the members of the jury can respond by we judge you fully guilty and ask jail for life, and then add, but don't worry, we are also just obeying to Schroedinger wave equation. Such explanation doesn't just lead to arbitrariness, but they are wrong, deeply wrong. No universal machine can know all its influencing and determining factors, and that is why, in complex environment, they will have to use shortcut in decision procedure, which invokes their conscience, and their notion of good and bad, and eventually have to engage their responsibility, in some large or small measure. Experts can debate infinitely on each individual cases, and can never be sure on this matter, and that is why in many law systems, a reference will be made on the judge intimate conviction. If we are determinate, we cannot live at the level where we are determinate. The soul (Bp p) of the machine (Bp) is really NOT a machine, from its personal point of view. So, some free will exists. And some feeling of guiltiness are founded, even if only god can know and judge impartially. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ Bruno, What sort of short cut are you talking about? I don't see any short cuts here. I can see where people will find reasons afterwards to justify their decisions by consulting conscience and notions of good and bad, but that's all a posterior.marty a. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 3/12/2010 4:51 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: Hi Brent, We have discussed this a long time ago. Ah, perhaps it was on the FOR list. Free-will can only diminish when indeterminacy is added. It is a product of awareness of ignorance on oneself, that an high level construct. I appreciate infinitely both Kochen and Conway, but on free will they make the beginners' error, like Penrose makes the beginners error on Gödel. What error is that? They only purport to prove that the particles have the same free will as experiments - not that either one has it (whatever it is). You can use the self-duplications iteration thought experiment to illustrate that indeterminacy is not needed, and even annoying if too big, to let free will develop itself. Or to let the will develop itself. free-will is an oxymoron. Do you believe in free free-will ? :) Only in the legal sense of free from coercion, otherwise I think Dennett has it right in Elbow Room. Brent You can avoid responsibility for everything if you make yourself small enough. --- Daniel Dennett Bruno On 12 Mar 2010, at 00:04, Brent Meeker wrote: My apologies. I forgot that Lawrence National Laboratories no longer hosted the physics archive. I should have cited: http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0604079 The Free Will Theorem Authors: John Conway http://arxiv.org/find/quant-ph/1/au:+Conway_J/0/1/0/all/0/1, Simon Kochen http://arxiv.org/find/quant-ph/1/au:+Kochen_S/0/1/0/all/0/1 (Submitted on 11 Apr 2006) Abstract: On the basis of three physical axioms, we prove that if the choice of a particular type of spin 1 experiment is not a function of the information accessible to the experimenters, then its outcome is equally not a function of the information accessible to the particles. We show that this result is robust, and deduce that neither hidden variable theories nor mechanisms of the GRW type for wave function collapse can be made relativistic. We also establish the consistency of our axioms and discuss the philosophical implications. And here's a later, stronger version that uses some weaker premises. http://arxiv.org/abs/0807.3286 Brent On 3/11/2010 2:16 PM, John Mikes wrote: Brent, nice statement: * But it's certainly not a deterministic universe * ** I have to take your word, because the reference you gave said: * NOT FOUND* So what kind of a 'universe' is it? bootstrap, self reflecting autodidacta? Creator-made? John M ** ** On 3/11/10, *Brent Meeker* meeke...@dslextreme.com mailto:meeke...@dslextreme.com wrote: On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: *Bruno and John,* * The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about:* *http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html* (Excerpts) *PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces.* ** *To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told /PhysOrg.com/. * ** *There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a.* But it's certainly not a deterministic universe. _http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/quant-ph/pdf/0604/0604079.pdf_ Brent --
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 12 Mar 2010, at 18:34, m.a. wrote: What sort of short cut are you talking about? I don't see any short cuts here. I can see where people will find reasons afterwards to justify their decisions by consulting conscience and notions of good and bad, but that's all a posterior.marty a. I am not sure what you are talking about. You may elaborate what do you mean by free will, and why you believe it does not exist. But this has been discussed very often, notably on the FOR list. You may consult the archive. I am not sure free adds anything to the will. (Free) will is the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion. I think most animals have free will, and that such a notion has nothing to do with indeterminism of the mind (but has to do with self-indeterminacy). Like consciousness having free will is probably in the corona G* \ G. If true it is not provable. Bruno -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 12 Mar 2010, at 18:57, Brent Meeker wrote: On 3/12/2010 4:51 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: Hi Brent, We have discussed this a long time ago. Ah, perhaps it was on the FOR list. Free-will can only diminish when indeterminacy is added. It is a product of awareness of ignorance on oneself, that an high level construct. I appreciate infinitely both Kochen and Conway, but on free will they make the beginners' error, like Penrose makes the beginners error on Gödel. What error is that? The error of linking free-will with indeterminacy. They only purport to prove that the particles have the same free will as experiments - not that either one has it (whatever it is). You can use the self-duplications iteration thought experiment to illustrate that indeterminacy is not needed, and even annoying if too big, to let free will develop itself. Or to let the will develop itself. free-will is an oxymoron. Do you believe in free free-will ? :) Only in the legal sense of free from coercion, otherwise I think Dennett has it right in Elbow Room. Brent You can avoid responsibility for everything if you make yourself small enough. --- Daniel Dennett You can elaborate. As an honst materialist and mechanist, Dennett is close to consciousness eleminativism. Bruno Bruno On 12 Mar 2010, at 00:04, Brent Meeker wrote: My apologies. I forgot that Lawrence National Laboratories no longer hosted the physics archive. I should have cited: http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0604079 The Free Will Theorem Authors: John Conway http://arxiv.org/find/quant-ph/1/au:+Conway_J/0/1/0/all/0/1, Simon Kochen http://arxiv.org/find/quant-ph/1/au:+Kochen_S/0/1/0/all/0/1 (Submitted on 11 Apr 2006) Abstract: On the basis of three physical axioms, we prove that if the choice of a particular type of spin 1 experiment is not a function of the information accessible to the experimenters, then its outcome is equally not a function of the information accessible to the particles. We show that this result is robust, and deduce that neither hidden variable theories nor mechanisms of the GRW type for wave function collapse can be made relativistic. We also establish the consistency of our axioms and discuss the philosophical implications. And here's a later, stronger version that uses some weaker premises. http://arxiv.org/abs/0807.3286 Brent On 3/11/2010 2:16 PM, John Mikes wrote: Brent, nice statement: * But it's certainly not a deterministic universe * ** I have to take your word, because the reference you gave said: * NOT FOUND* So what kind of a 'universe' is it? bootstrap, self reflecting autodidacta? Creator-made? John M ** ** On 3/11/10, *Brent Meeker* meeke...@dslextreme.com mailto:meeke...@dslextreme.com wrote: On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: *Bruno and John,* * The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about:* *http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html* (Excerpts) *PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces.* ** *To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told /PhysOrg.com/. * ** *There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 3/12/2010 11:51 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: On 12 Mar 2010, at 18:57, Brent Meeker wrote: On 3/12/2010 4:51 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: Hi Brent, We have discussed this a long time ago. Ah, perhaps it was on the FOR list. Free-will can only diminish when indeterminacy is added. It is a product of awareness of ignorance on oneself, that an high level construct. I appreciate infinitely both Kochen and Conway, but on free will they make the beginners' error, like Penrose makes the beginners error on Gödel. What error is that? The error of linking free-will with indeterminacy. They just called it free will because that's what people attribute to experimenters and they wanted to be provactive - it's somewhat tongue-in-cheek. They only purport to prove that the particles have the same free will as experiments - not that either one has it (whatever it is). You can use the self-duplications iteration thought experiment to illustrate that indeterminacy is not needed, and even annoying if too big, to let free will develop itself. Or to let the will develop itself. free-will is an oxymoron. Do you believe in free free-will ? :) Only in the legal sense of free from coercion, otherwise I think Dennett has it right in Elbow Room. Brent You can avoid responsibility for everything if you make yourself small enough. --- Daniel Dennett You can elaborate. Elbow Room is Dennett's defense of a compatibilist view of free will. Brent As an honst materialist and mechanist, Dennett is close to consciousness eleminativism. Bruno Bruno On 12 Mar 2010, at 00:04, Brent Meeker wrote: My apologies. I forgot that Lawrence National Laboratories no longer hosted the physics archive. I should have cited: http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0604079 The Free Will Theorem Authors: John Conway http://arxiv.org/find/quant-ph/1/au:+Conway_J/0/1/0/all/0/1, Simon Kochen http://arxiv.org/find/quant-ph/1/au:+Kochen_S/0/1/0/all/0/1 (Submitted on 11 Apr 2006) Abstract: On the basis of three physical axioms, we prove that if the choice of a particular type of spin 1 experiment is not a function of the information accessible to the experimenters, then its outcome is equally not a function of the information accessible to the particles. We show that this result is robust, and deduce that neither hidden variable theories nor mechanisms of the GRW type for wave function collapse can be made relativistic. We also establish the consistency of our axioms and discuss the philosophical implications. And here's a later, stronger version that uses some weaker premises. http://arxiv.org/abs/0807.3286 Brent On 3/11/2010 2:16 PM, John Mikes wrote: Brent, nice statement: * But it's certainly not a deterministic universe * ** I have to take your word, because the reference you gave said: * NOT FOUND* So what kind of a 'universe' is it? bootstrap, self reflecting autodidacta? Creator-made? John M ** ** On 3/11/10, *Brent Meeker* meeke...@dslextreme.com mailto:meeke...@dslextreme.com wrote: On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: *Bruno and John,* * The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about:* *http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html* (Excerpts) *PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces.* ** *To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told /PhysOrg.com/. * ** *There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space,
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Brent: why should I accept opinions of (even respected!) scientists? I asked YOUR opinion. Old (ancient) savants based their conclusions on a much smaller cognitive inventory of the world than what epistemy provided up-to-date. Furthermore the basic worldview they think 'in' is mostly different from the one I use (accept). Don't forget that IMO chemistry (after my 38 patents in it) is a *figment*based on the 'physical worldview' - the explanational attempts of poorly understood phenomena - mostly on mathematical basis (which makes it a bit lopsided at best). I consider 'Quantum science' as an 'extension' (?) of physics, less pragmatic and less clear - with more (scientific) fantasy included. A segment in the 'totality'-view, what I would like to attain as an interrelated complexity of them all (known and unknown). Axioms? artifacts derived to make our (conventional) sciences valid. With different logic (worldview?) different axioms may be necessary. And to the view that so many people accept Q-Sci I think of times when almost ALL of the scientifically thinking people on Earth believed the Flat Earth (and other oldie systems as well, during the development of our cultural history). Science is not a democratic voting occasion. Respectfully John M On 3/11/10, Brent Meeker meeke...@dslextreme.com wrote: My apologies. I forgot that Lawrence National Laboratories no longer hosted the physics archive. I should have cited: http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0604079 The Free Will Theorem Authors: John Conwayhttp://arxiv.org/find/quant-ph/1/au:+Conway_J/0/1/0/all/0/1, Simon Kochen http://arxiv.org/find/quant-ph/1/au:+Kochen_S/0/1/0/all/0/1 (Submitted on 11 Apr 2006) Abstract: On the basis of three physical axioms, we prove that if the choice of a particular type of spin 1 experiment is not a function of the information accessible to the experimenters, then its outcome is equally not a function of the information accessible to the particles. We show that this result is robust, and deduce that neither hidden variable theories nor mechanisms of the GRW type for wave function collapse can be made relativistic. We also establish the consistency of our axioms and discuss the philosophical implications. And here's a later, stronger version that uses some weaker premises. http://arxiv.org/abs/0807.3286 Brent On 3/11/2010 2:16 PM, John Mikes wrote: Brent, nice statement: * But it's certainly not a deterministic universe * ** I have to take your word, because the reference you gave said: * NOT FOUND* So what kind of a 'universe' is it? bootstrap, self reflecting autodidacta? Creator-made? John M ** ** On 3/11/10, Brent Meeker meeke...@dslextreme.com wrote: On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: *Bruno and John,* * The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about: * *http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html*http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html (Excerpts) *PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces.* ** *To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told PhysOrg.com. * ** *There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a.* But it's certainly not a
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
- Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Friday, March 12, 2010 2:49 PM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 12 Mar 2010, at 18:34, m.a. wrote: What sort of short cut are you talking about? I don't see any short cuts here. I can see where people will find reasons afterwards to justify their decisions by consulting conscience and notions of good and bad, but that's all a posterior.marty a. I am not sure what you are talking about. You may elaborate what do you mean by free will, and why you believe it does not exist. But this has been discussed very often, notably on the FOR list. You may consult the archive. I am not sure free adds anything to the will. (Free) will is the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion. I think most animals have free will, and that such a notion has nothing to do with indeterminism of the mind (but has to do with self-indeterminacy). Like consciousness having free will is probably in the corona G* \ G. If true it is not provable. Bruno Reply: I agree with you that quantum indeterminacy doesn't affect (free) will: Quantum mechanics is local and deterministic, and explains why it seems indeterministic to the 99,...% of the observers. (3/12/2010 7:58 AM), which is why I feel that your use of the words ability and develop when you say: the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion (above) can as easily refer to completely determined processes which introspection identfies as voluntary a split second afterwards ... as it can anything else. m.a. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Doesn't free will imply that we live in a macroscopically acausal universe, where our neural networks can produce outputs with no physical input? Arguments about QM/randomness in the network seem to produce just that - randomness. William On Mar 12, 2010, at 12:53 PM, m.a. wrote: - Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Friday, March 12, 2010 2:49 PM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 12 Mar 2010, at 18:34, m.a. wrote: What sort of short cut are you talking about? I don't see any short cuts here. I can see where people will find reasons afterwards to justify their decisions by consulting conscience and notions of good and bad, but that's all a posterior.marty a. I am not sure what you are talking about. You may elaborate what do you mean by free will, and why you believe it does not exist. But this has been discussed very often, notably on the FOR list. You may consult the archive. I am not sure free adds anything to the will. (Free) will is the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion. I think most animals have free will, and that such a notion has nothing to do with indeterminism of the mind (but has to do with self-indeterminacy). Like consciousness having free will is probably in the corona G* \ G. If true it is not provable. Bruno Reply: I agree with you that quantum indeterminacy doesn't affect (free) will: Quantum mechanics is local and deterministic, and explains why it seems indeterministic to the 99,...% of the observers. (3/12/2010 7:58 AM), which is why I feel that your use of the words ability and develop when you say: the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion (above) can as easily refer to completely determined processes which introspection identfies as voluntary a split second afterwards ... as it can anything else. m.a. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything- l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
That depends on what you think free will means. If it means a neural network can produce non-random outputs with no input - the answer is yes. If it means you can't know the totality of the causes of your thoughts and actions the answer is no. If it means you actions arise from your biology and experience without coercion the answer is no. It all depends on what you mean. Brent On 3/12/2010 1:28 PM, L.W. Sterritt wrote: Doesn't free will imply that we live in a macroscopically acausal universe, where our neural networks can produce outputs with no physical input? Arguments about QM/randomness in the network seem to produce just that - randomness. William On Mar 12, 2010, at 12:53 PM, m.a. wrote: - Original Message - *From:* Bruno Marchal mailto:marc...@ulb.ac.be *To:* everything-list@googlegroups.com mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com *Sent:* Friday, March 12, 2010 2:49 PM *Subject:* Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 12 Mar 2010, at 18:34, m.a. wrote: What sort of short cut are you talking about? I don't see any short cuts here. I can see where people will find reasons afterwards to justify their decisions by consulting conscience and notions of good and bad, but that's all /a posterior/.marty a. I am not sure what you are talking about. You may elaborate what do you mean by free will, and why you believe it does not exist. But this has been discussed very often, notably on the FOR list. You may consult the archive. I am not sure free adds anything to the will. (Free) will is *the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion*. I think most animals have free will, and that such a notion has nothing to do with indeterminism of the mind (but has to do with self-indeterminacy). Like consciousness having free will is probably in the corona G* \ G. If true it is not provable. Bruno Reply: I agree with you that quantum indeterminacy doesn't affect (free) will: Quantum mechanics is local and deterministic, and explains why it seems indeterministic to the 99,...% of the observers. (3/12/2010 7:58 AM), which is why I feel that your use of the words ability and develop when you say: the ability of a person to develop personal goals and to satisfy them in absence of coercion (above) can as easily refer to completely determined processes which introspection identfies as voluntary a split second afterwards ... as it can anything else. m.a. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com mailto:everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/%7Emarchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com mailto:everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com mailto:everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Bruno and John, The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about: http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html (Excerpts) PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces. To put it simply, free will just doesn't fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic), Cashmore told PhysOrg.com. There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a. - Original Message - From: m.a. To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 3:42 PM Subject: Re: Free will Bruno, ummm...I don't follow this answer. Does your reply affirm free will, deny it or take some other tact? m.a. - Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 12:01 PM Subject: Re: Free will Marty, With the MWI, superluminal computers are particular case of quantum computer, as far as I guess correctly on what they are talking about. There is no transmission of information at speed higher than light speed, but in a single universe view, quantum weirdness exploitation (like quantum teleportation) may make it appears to be so. Looks a bit like Marketing. If someone know better.(here I assume QM, not comp, although comp should imply QM). Bruno On 11 Mar 2010, at 15:03, m.a. wrote: Bruno, In the light of the article presented below, I'm trying to remember whether you have committed yourself on this issue one way or another. marty a. http://www.kurzweilai.net/news/frame.html?main=/news/news_single.html?id%3D11909-- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: *Bruno and John,* * The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about:* *http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html* (Excerpts) *PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces.* ** *To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told /PhysOrg.com/. * ** *There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a.* But it's certainly not a deterministic universe. _http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/quant-ph/pdf/0604/0604079.pdf_ Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
- Original Message - From: Brent Meeker To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 4:38 PM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: Bruno and John, The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about: http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html (Excerpts) PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces. To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told PhysOrg.com. There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a. But it's certainly not a deterministic universe. It looks like Cashmore would disagree about that.See above: completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces. _http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/quant-ph/pdf/0604/0604079.pdf_ Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
On 3/11/2010 1:56 PM, m.a. wrote: - Original Message - *From:* Brent Meeker mailto:meeke...@dslextreme.com *To:* everything-list@googlegroups.com mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com *Sent:* Thursday, March 11, 2010 4:38 PM *Subject:* Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: *Bruno and John,* * The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about:* *http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html* (Excerpts) *PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, _completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces._* ** *To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told /PhysOrg.com/. * ** *There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a.* But it's certainly not a deterministic universe. It looks like Cashmore would disagree about that.See above: *completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces.* Why would he? Being controlled by chemistry doesn't mean it's deterministic. Cashmore must know that chemistry is described by quantum mechanics. Brent _http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/quant-ph/pdf/0604/0604079.pdf_ Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
Brent, nice statement: * But it's certainly not a deterministic universe * ** I have to take your word, because the reference you gave said: * NOT FOUND* So what kind of a 'universe' is it? bootstrap, self reflecting autodidacta? Creator-made? John M ** ** On 3/11/10, Brent Meeker meeke...@dslextreme.com wrote: On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: *Bruno and John,* * The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about: * *http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html*http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html (Excerpts) *PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces.* ** *To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told PhysOrg.com. * ** *There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a.* But it's certainly not a deterministic universe. _http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/quant-ph/pdf/0604/0604079.pdf_ Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.comeverything-list%2bunsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
My apologies. I forgot that Lawrence National Laboratories no longer hosted the physics archive. I should have cited: http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0604079 The Free Will Theorem Authors: John Conway http://arxiv.org/find/quant-ph/1/au:+Conway_J/0/1/0/all/0/1, Simon Kochen http://arxiv.org/find/quant-ph/1/au:+Kochen_S/0/1/0/all/0/1 (Submitted on 11 Apr 2006) Abstract: On the basis of three physical axioms, we prove that if the choice of a particular type of spin 1 experiment is not a function of the information accessible to the experimenters, then its outcome is equally not a function of the information accessible to the particles. We show that this result is robust, and deduce that neither hidden variable theories nor mechanisms of the GRW type for wave function collapse can be made relativistic. We also establish the consistency of our axioms and discuss the philosophical implications. And here's a later, stronger version that uses some weaker premises. http://arxiv.org/abs/0807.3286 Brent On 3/11/2010 2:16 PM, John Mikes wrote: Brent, nice statement: * But it's certainly not a deterministic universe * ** I have to take your word, because the reference you gave said: * NOT FOUND* So what kind of a 'universe' is it? bootstrap, self reflecting autodidacta? Creator-made? John M ** ** On 3/11/10, *Brent Meeker* meeke...@dslextreme.com mailto:meeke...@dslextreme.com wrote: On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: *Bruno and John,* * The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about:* *http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html* (Excerpts) *PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces.* ** *To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told /PhysOrg.com/. * ** *There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a.* But it's certainly not a deterministic universe. _http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/quant-ph/pdf/0604/0604079.pdf_ Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com mailto:everything-list%2bunsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
- Original Message - From: Brent Meeker To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 5:14 PM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 3/11/2010 1:56 PM, m.a. wrote: - Original Message - From: Brent Meeker To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 4:38 PM Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. On 3/11/2010 1:26 PM, m.a. wrote: Bruno and John, The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about: http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html (Excerpts) PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces. To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told PhysOrg.com. There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a. But it's certainly not a deterministic universe. It looks like Cashmore would disagree about that.See above: completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces. Why would he? Being controlled by chemistry doesn't mean it's deterministic. Cashmore must know that chemistry is described by quantum mechanics. Brent Why would he use words like completely controlled if he's talking about quantum indeterminism? m.a. _http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/quant-ph/pdf/0604/0604079.pdf_ Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
Re: Free will: Wrong entry.
I am a compatibilist. Free will necessitates determinism. It makes people choosing to do what their want, notably when choosing between alternatives. But they cannot choose what they want. This depends on many factors. Free will is a high level phenomenon. Adding indeterminacy is irrelevant, concerning free-will. Adding indeterminacy in a choice can only lessen the freeness of the will. Cashmore demolishes a naive notion of free-will which makes no sense at the start. We can do freely actions, even when our friends who know us can predict the action. Free will is the ability to choose, among alternatives, in gneral with incomplete information, the actions which maximize some self-satisfiability constraints. It is self-determination. Bruno On 11 Mar 2010, at 22:26, m.a. wrote: Bruno and John, The confusion is my fault. I copied the URL from a Kurzweil page heading when I should have gone to the article itself, so the wrong feature appeared. This is the one I requested comments about: http://www.physorg.com/news186830615.html (Excerpts) PhysOrg.com) -- When biologist Anthony Cashmore claims that the concept of free will is an illusion, he's not breaking any new ground. At least as far back as the ancient Greeks, people have wondered how humans seem to have the ability to make their own personal decisions in a manner lacking any causal component other than their desire to will something. But Cashmore, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, says that many biologists today still cling to the idea of free will, and reject the idea that we are simply conscious machines, completely controlled by a combination of our chemistry and external environmental forces. To put it simply, free will just doesn’t fit with how the physical world works. Cashmore compares a belief in free will to an earlier belief in vitalism - the belief that there are forces governing the biological world that are distinct from those governing the physical world. Vitalism was discarded more than 100 years ago, being replaced with evidence that biological systems obey the laws of chemistry and physics, not special biological laws for living things.“I would like to convince biologists that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism (or, as I say, a belief in magic),” Cashmore told PhysOrg.com. There seems to be an evolutionary rightness and inevitability to the idea that free will is taking its place as just another illusion like vitalism, religion, aether, absolute time and space, geocentric universe, single-galaxy universe and so on. But I think people will have an even tougher time dealing with the implications of strict determinism. It's an idea that could tear through the entire fabric of society even though acceptance needn't change one's behavior in the slightest respect. marty a. - Original Message - From: m.a. To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 3:42 PM Subject: Re: Free will Bruno, ummm...I don't follow this answer. Does your reply affirm free will, deny it or take some other tact? m.a. - Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 12:01 PM Subject: Re: Free will Marty, With the MWI, superluminal computers are particular case of quantum computer, as far as I guess correctly on what they are talking about. There is no transmission of information at speed higher than light speed, but in a single universe view, quantum weirdness exploitation (like quantum teleportation) may make it appears to be so. Looks a bit like Marketing. If someone know better.(here I assume QM, not comp, although comp should imply QM). Bruno On 11 Mar 2010, at 15:03, m.a. wrote: Bruno, In the light of the article presented below, I'm trying to remember whether you have committed yourself on this issue one way or another. marty a. http://www.kurzweilai.net/news/frame.html?main=/news/ news_single.html?id%3D11909-- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything- l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything- l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you
RE: Free will: Wrong entry.
Hi Fellow Everything Listers, I would like to confess a prejudice on this issue: I strongly suspect that 1) That the universe at its most basic level is quantum (Platonia would be a deeper level of course) 2) There is a quantum component to the brain and 3) that this component *can* act to select and/or bias aspects of the wave function such that there is a difference that makes a difference between Man and Rock. Now, having made such a confession I must admit that I am hard pressed to offer any concrete proof, other that hand waving references like there has to be some reason why I experience this particular 1-universe rather than some other. I realize that this puts me in a precarious position. ;) Onward! Stephen P. King From: everything-list@googlegroups.com [mailto:everything-l...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Bruno Marchal Sent: Friday, March 12, 2010 12:00 AM To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Subject: Re: Free will: Wrong entry. I am a compatibilist. Free will necessitates determinism. It makes people choosing to do what their want, notably when choosing between alternatives. But they cannot choose what they want. This depends on many factors. Free will is a high level phenomenon. Adding indeterminacy is irrelevant, concerning free-will. Adding indeterminacy in a choice can only lessen the freeness of the will. Cashmore demolishes a naive notion of free-will which makes no sense at the start. We can do freely actions, even when our friends who know us can predict the action. Free will is the ability to choose, among alternatives, in general with incomplete information, the actions which maximize some self-satisfiability constraints. It is self-determination. Bruno -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
