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I think you must be careful about what belongs to 'philosophy of science' and to 'metaphysics'. Most points you mention would be from philosophy of science. Here I cite a part of Curious layman's citation: It is not everybody's beer of course. But sometimes these kind of questions pop up in discussions that can be important. E.g. the question 'Does every event have a cause?' can be relevant for the discussion of free will. And what one thinks about free will in its turn can be important how we treat criminals (do we punish or do we heal them?). So anybody who thinks nobody needs philosophy, read my disclaimer (just citing it here because I might change it one day): There is no such thing as philosophy-free science; there is only science whose philosophical baggage is taken on board without examination. Daniel Dennet, Darwin's dangerous idea And it is not just true for science, but also for art, morality, politics etc etc. Stick to Curious layman's definition. It is quite good, I think. And just to add: mistermack's viewpoint about metaphysics is as valuable as his viewpoint on climate change...

First I never heard of it. But thinking would it could mean, the answer of Curious Layman is very to the point.

Can you explain what this means? Maybe with a few real examples? (I hope these are positive questions...)

Of course I am not! This is the philosophy forum! Once entered a philosophical discussion, retraction is not allowed. Philosophical discussions end when: the discourse participants agree (but then comes a third one who does not agree, and...) at least one of the discourse participants dies (ideally both at the same time during the discussion) at least one of the discourse participants is insulted so much by the other one that they will never talk to each other again. OK, now serious. That is definitely a difference between us, and I think you are too stringent in your view. The way you see it there exists, seen from a naturalistic world view, no control whatsoever. We agree there is no soul (or more naturally said, no independent agent), so there is nothing in your position that exerts control. That also means that you always have to throw the concept of free will in your concept of control. I don't. Control is a necessary condition for free will, but by far not a sufficient one. Maybe I can explain this with your example: No, I would not say that. So I agree that 'control' is the wrong word here. I only would call it 'control' when there are at least two components: a component that reacts on the process and generates an alarm that a process is going out of bounds a component that takes this alarm as input, and changes the process in question so that is not out of bounds anymore So in your case, when there is a measuring device that checks how big the flow of water is; and something like a faucet that reacts on the output of the measuring device, and regulates the flow of water. That we have physical explanations of how these components work, and how they work together, does not mean that there is no control. The way the control works is explained, not explained away. Further I would never use the concepts of 'passive' or 'active' in this context. When we talk about a causal relationship, one could call the causing event (a) 'active', and the caused event 'passive' (b). But of course, the causing event (a) was also a caused event by some previous causing event (c). so is (a) active or passive? I think that concepts that are so much dependent on the accidental view we have should not be used in an explanation. They suggest more than what really is going on. Therefore I must also say I personally never use the concept of 'control' when explaining free will. But the topic pops up again and again, mostly because a 'free will skeptic' says something like 'we have no control over our determining factors'. In this case it was already in the question of the OP.

You said that 'striving for equilibrium' is something else than control. I am saying that the kind of equilibrium that keeps organisms alive needs a control mechanism. Please leave consciousness out of the game for the moment. These control mechanisms do not need consciousness perse. And that is simply the first point I am trying to explain: a system can have control over something even if we exactly know how the mechanism works, e.g. because we designed it our selves (the thermostat example). Of course there is no inner agent in a thermostat, even less a conscious one. Explaining the mechanism, as you do with the neural channels, does not mean there is no control. You only explain how it works. To keep up the healthy equilibrium in organisms, a lot of control mechanisms are needed. But that does not need necessarily an agent (i.e. somebody who consciously does the controlling). For short: there is no contradiction in saying that a system is in control of something, and that it is determined. So in your way of speaking: nothing enters the mix to be in control. And I am not saying that these mechanisms contradict the law of entropy: I am saying that without the control mechanisms the processes, parameters or substances which are controlled by that mechanism will find another equilibrium, and big chance that is not a healthy equilibrium for the organism... To give 2 opposite examples. The gravitation of the sun would compress it completely, if there was nothing else. But because of the heat produced by nuclear fusion, there exists an equilibrium. But there is no mechanism that continuously must probe the size and the temperature of the sun, and correct its pressure, or temperature or whatever. A Boeing 737 MAX 😕. Without the MCAS System, the plane would reach an equlibrium we do not like. Therefore MCAS corrects the angle of ascent so that the plane does not stall. So MCAS controls the angle of ascent when it gets to steep: that is what it is designed for. It is designed to reach another equilibrium, one which we prefer, which it keeps it flying in the air.

No. There are (at least) 2 kinds of balance: one is due to the law of entropy, the other one needs energy to be sustained. For the latter some mechanism is needed, and life provides such mechanisms. If it is pure internally (e.g. body temperature or pH of blood), or also externally (cow walking into the shade), without a mechanism that controls the environment, you would fallback to the first kind of balance, which in case of an organism is equivalent to death. And I also gave the example of a cat rolling downhill (but not for long of course). When a threshold is crossed due to temperature change and an electrical circuit gets triggered to activate a specific response pattern. Passing that threshold results in the circuit becoming complete I already answered my own question (maybe that is bad rhetoric, but it is a long time ago that rhetoric belonged to the philosophy curriculum...):

I know. But I give TakenItSeriously the benefit of the doubt. In one posting he was even trying to clear up where the viewpoints of the different 'discutants' lie. And as I said, you never know when somebody because of a certain formulation or explanation is seeing the light (redshifted or blueshifted...).

Well, TakenItSeriously is at least, well, serious. He argues with others, does not claim that we are all idiots, and does not refer to some conspiracy theory why physics hides the truth; and he keeps being polite. But he obviously has a blind spot in his understanding of relativity. I just chimed in in the hope that another formulation would help him to see his error. Others in this thread know relativity much better than I do. (For me, Janus' explanations are becoming legendary...) If people get tired, they can just stop reacting and reading the thread.

And I was reacting at: So what does the negative square root physically mean? Then you should realise that the Lorentz factor is dependent on v2, where the Doppler effect is only in the first order dependent on v. That means you must distinguish between Doppler effect and time dilation. So when I have a light source moving fast to me, 2 things happen: Due to its speed there is time dilation, so the frequency of the light source becomes less, i.e. we have a red shift due to its speed. Due to its direction to me, I have a blueshift You must consider both to get the full picture. You must distinguish between what Bob observes, and what he concludes. A blueshift does not mean that there is no time dilation. If Bob takes Alices blueshift in account, he concludes that her clock runs slower compared to his. And Strange reacted: Do you see this is correct? In the example the Lorentz factor is 0.6 independent of the direction. However, the Doppler effect is dependent on the flight direction. But then you said: On which I reacted with my post. What would be the physical difference wen you use the positive solution, or the negative? Again, what is longer: a stick with length 0.5L or one with a length of -0.5L?

But first, this is physics, not mathematics. One must always check if both solutions make sense physically. Second, the direction of the velocity has nothing to do with the choice of the positive or the negative result, as Strange already showed, because you must use v2. So third, what do you get if you take the negative value as possible outcome? Say you compare two sticks, one flying in the opposite direction of the other, with the same speed. Due to the length contraction, one stick has for you a length of -0.5L, the other +0.5L. Which one is longer? 😈 So what is the physical meaning of a negative length?

Ethan Siegel has a critical article about it.

Assuming that the world is deterministic, you mean nothing controls anything? Let's say a stone rolls down a hill. This is a simple deterministic process. But now consider a cat that momentary loses its balance on that same hill. In no time it will stand on its feet again. So the cat has control over how it moves downhill. Of course it is still a deterministic process, but much more complicated than the stone rolling down. As I said earlier, life is all about control. If it is the pH of blood, the closing or opening stomata of a leaf of a tree to regulate water loss, the walking of a cow into the shade of a tree to get less warm etc, are all examples of how organisms control their inner or outer environment. Somehow it seems to me you are thinking about control as absolute control. In this sense, I see a strong parallel with the Christian idea of the ultimate responsibility of the human soul. In your sense, something is in control only when it for itself is not under control of anything else (to specific, previous, causally related events), just as the human soul can be responsible only when it is not influenced by anything previous at all. So where does the control of a thermostat enter the mix? Well in the way it is built up, and the way it functions, namely as a negative feedback system.

First, I think you are just overstretching the word. As I said in some other posting, a thermostat also has control. But of course it is a very simple device, without consciousness, desires or beliefs; no mental events at all. And second, life is everything about control, of the inner and outer environment. With consciousness a new kind of control comes in: observing, anticipating possible futures, choice and action. That these processes are implemented in a (very complex) determined system does not change the fact that you have a certain level of conscious control. Determinism and control can perfectly go together. Every engineer of negative feedback systems could tell you that.

This is a bit speculative, but might be interesting. Key point to answer the question of why reality can be described mathematically is causality. Hard sciences approach reality as a causally related whole. But how do we get the idea that certain events are causally related? Hume gave a good point: we are inclined to 'see' causality if: there is only a short duration between the events there is only a short distance between the events we see the same relationship between events that are similar Latter point means more or less that there are regularities. Without observing any regularity, how could we propose a causal relationship between events? I do not see how. And then the next step is: can you think of a regularity that cannot be describe mathematically? Without any proof (I confess) I would say that every regularity can be described mathematically. But I am open to arguments against my idea...

Right. You've found where to locate free will: not in who you are (desires being components of who you are), but how to act, e.g. do not act according a desire, i.e. controlling it. Of course, you can only this by another, stronger desire. Example: quitting smoking. The immediate desire is obvious (light a cigarette!), but with enough will power, you can control it by your desire to stay healthy as long as possible. And as a remark on the whole discussion: 'control' is not an absolute. I can keep my breath when I want, but after less than a minute I feel so bad, that I give in to my desire to breath again. So I have a little control of my breath. And to add some (Buddhist) psychology: if we learn not to give in to certain desires, then the desire will get less strong, and might even disappear on the long term. So again, we have some control over our desires. It probably is: I do not think it is just my experience, but when I learned reading, I always read aloud. Now of course I do not do that anymore... Yep. But none of them is easy. Humans have not-so easily to overcome habits. Which e.g. makes it so difficult to do something against the climate catastrophe.

Well, that meat bag of mostly water and chemicals of yours. But the whole of it, not any part. 'You' is not some part of this meat bag. But it is true that the brain seems the most important part, but that is because it is the most important 'control centre' in the body. The 'you' emerges from the process as a whole. (No magic meant here: a traffic jam emerges from any individual cars.) Depends a little of what you mean: 'source' in the historical sense, or in the functional sense: historically the factors I already mentioned: genetic inheritance, biological history, culture and upbringing functional sense: somewhere in the meat bag. For discussing free will more nuances are not necessary. In daily life you (mostly) know what your wishes and beliefs are, and often you know how to act to achieve your goals. Exactly. And none of them, taken on its own, is 'you'. Trying to apply the idea of free will on the physical parts of the body is simply a category error. We do not need that kind of control. Important is that 'you' has control, and because you are the working whole, and not one of the things in your body, there is no way that 'you' can be forced to do something 'you' does not want. 'You' e.g. control your car when driving. When you loose control you get in an accident. Yes, we are (biological) robots, but nearly unimaginably advanced. E.g. we can reflect on our inner states ('I am hungry', 'I think Trump should be impeached'), and can anticipate on the possible (not actual!) consequences of actions I could do.

Yes, I did. I also said this: And then you tell me in how many different ways we are determined by our genetic heritage, and our biological, cultural and personal history. So my best answer would be: 'so what?'.

Read carefully again: nothing what you write here applies to what I wrote. Try again. I think that deprives the word 'indoctrination' of its contents. It would e.g. mean that if you are well informed about scientific results, you are indoctrinated by science. No, there I stick to my previous remark about indoctrination, i.e. that it must be willfully done by (an) external agent(s). And yes, there are grounds (sufficient or not, that is another discussion), to call advertising indoctrination. But it fits to my remark: it is intentionally done by others.

So free will according to you means being allowed to do everything, without anyone blaming you for bad behaviour? Why do you think such rules exist? Why would such rules be necessary if nobody has free will?

You are using as definition of free will 'the freedom to be who you are' instead of 'the freedom to act according your own wishes and beliefs'. No, doubt, who we are is heavily influenced by our genetic heritage, and our biological, cultural and personal history. So what we want and what we believe is strongly determined by these factors. How could it be differently? But that is not what free will is about. I would reserve the word 'indoctrinated' for willful indoctrination. Just growing up in a culture with a certain set of beliefs and values I would not count as indoctrination, otherwise we all are. I also hardly see reading newspapers as indoctrination.

I think it is easy to understand where 'climate skepticism' comes from: climate deniers are simply afraid that they have to step back in in the luxury they are used to, that others will tell what they are still allowed to do, and what not. (not talking about oil companies, where it is clearly they want to squeeze every bit of fossile fuel from the earth to prolong the time they can make easy profit.) Only a small minority of people are prepared to step back (a bit...) for the greater good of all. In this sense, I am afraid I am also a kind of 'bad guy'. I go to work with my car (a small car, not using much gas, but I can't deny it uses gas...), live my life as nearly anybody else. No, in this respect I am not proud of myself. It's a kind of herd behaviour, I am afraid: I do not want to live a life that is much more difficult than that of my friends and colleagues. So it is my conviction that only collective action works: on basis of voluntariness nothing substantial will happen. But then the denialists draw the trump (😨!) card of 'socialism': every law that impacts the freedom how to spend your money is called socialistic and thus bad. (I assume many Americans would call Europe socialist, if they only knew...). Fact for me is that we really live in a climate crisis, and in time of crisis all people should hold together for the greater common good. The problem is that the climate change is relatively slow (compared to a human life, not geologically), and not visible clearly in daily life. Only pictures of glaciers make a real visible case. For the rest we have statistics. When the crisis would be clearly visible, and threaten our way of life on very short notice, people would act. Think e.g. about Great Britain and WW II. The whole economy was transformed into a 'war economy'. And I am convinced that only a 'climate economy' possibly could save us. Thereby I am afraid we are already too late: we already passed several tipping points, like melting of tundras, glaciers and ice shelves, maybe even methane ice. Even if we would stop emitting CO2 today, I think global heating would go on. And so I am back at the article I linked to in the OP: I think the climate scientists of 25 years ago on one side could not believe what their (maybe still rough) estimates told them; on the other side they might have been afraid for plainly telling what their estimates say. Telling there is a crisis, and nearly nobody sees it, would have more or less disqualified them. One last point: mistermack calls climate science 'religion'. Fact is that many people see it that way. But those are the same who say evolution is religion, or even science as a whole. They simply do not (want to) understand the empirical basis of science, and that science develops as more and more evidence becomes available. I think that generally in such oppositions one can say that somebody who throws the 'religion' argument against established science is the one that argues religiously himself. They only see the 'world view aspect' of science, but not the substance it is based on. No, I am not very optimistic.

OK, I am a bit bored, so I looked at the video. Same kind of errors over and over again. At 2:15: 'The least controversial definition I could come up with: Free will is the capability to have acted differently'. Obviously he is unaware of the many pages of philosophical articles that are already written about this definition. There are (at least) two ways of understanding this: The strict metaphysical reading: in a determined universe everything is fixed, so every event happens, or happened exactly as it follows of causal conditions before. In this sense there is no way of 'acting differently' The modal (sometimes called 'iffy') sense, meaning that if the circumstances would have been slightly different, something else would have happened. One of these slight differences is our will. To give an example of the second reading: one day I go to a vegetarian restaurant, and the next day to a 'normal' restaurant. Is the sentence 'I could have ordered a beefsteak' true or false? Obviously there is no beefsteak on the menu of the vegetarian restaurant, so in this case the sentence is false. But for the 'normal' restaurant it is true: it was on the menu card. However, I took a vegetarian dish in the 'normal' restaurant. So the sentence is non-trivial true, even if I ordered something else. It was my will that decided differently. So really, in this sense, I could have ordered beefsteak. And it has next to nothing to do with determinism. Nearly all non-compatibilist determinists take the metaphysical meaning. At 2:30: The idea is that you are in complete control of your actions, and any decisions you make are determined only by your conscious self. First, he does not define what this 'conscious self' is. Is it a soul that can only observe and is completely powerless? And what is complete control? Does it mean control without determined history? That is nonsense too: a thermostat controls the temperature, but it is a completely determined system. There is no contradiction between being in control, and being determined. At 4:15 Can you choose not to want something? Another nonsense definition. Free will is at most being able to act according your own wishes and beliefs. 'Free will' does not mean 'free from influences': it means that a person can choose his actions, that she is 'free to act', not who or what she is. So, @Robert Wilson: why did you post the link? What do you think? PS. You should look at this: Free Will, Determinism and Choice, and its followups.

Talkorigins CB200

... the earth is heating faster. than anyone expected in the past. The New York Times

That we are thinking in the wrong way about it. We are still living with the religious concept of free will, meaning that humans can act completely independent of their (neural) physiology, which of course is pertinent nonsense. This concept was needed in Christian theology to make humans ultimate responsible for their actions. The problem was that otherwise God would be responsible, because He is almighty, all-knowing, and just. Now sure, this kind of free will does not exist. But it is also irrelevant in modern days. The modern concept of free will is different: a short version of it is 'being able to act according your own wishes and beliefs'. This definition is fully compatible with determinism, event stronger, without determinism free will would be impossible. It would break the connection between what you are and want on one side, and your actions on the other. Also, if you are striving for something, you'd better know the causality involved to get this something done. Without strict causality we would not be able to anticipate possible futures dependent on our actions, because we would simply not know what the consequences of our actions would be: without causality it could be anything.