Split from AI sentience

[iNow]

2 hours ago, Eise said:

just a silly question: does a thermostat control the temperature in a room? If not, can I then just do away with it? Does the fact that a thermostat is pretty simple device that can easily be understood, resp built, defy its function to control temperature? 

No, thermostats don’t control the temperature of the room. They have mechanisms which send an electrical impulse to the HVAC unit. When the HVAC unit turns on, it moves air in a way that heats or cools it, and in parallel turns on a fan to push that air through ducts and out through vent registers. That air newly entering the room controls the temperature of said room. 

Of course you could do away with the thermostat. It’d be less convenient, but you could manually turn on and off the furnace or AC, or rely on other features like open windows, fans, fireplaces, or space heaters to achieve the same end. 

The thermostat detects temperature and then sends on/off signals once certain thresholds are crossed. That is all. 

2 hours ago, Eise said:

Does 'control' mean 'absolute control', even over itself?

In this example, no. You’re switching reference frames. You discussed control of the room temperature by the thermostat. Control over itself is meaningless IMO since it’s inanimate. 

2 hours ago, Eise said:

What does it mean, when the police reports that the accident was due to the driver losing control of his car?

It means that the car became subject to physical forces which the driver was unable to overcome and correct for through manual intervention. Those forces then resulted in a collision of some sort.

[Eise]

OK, if you deny my examples of 'control': can you give an example of something being in control of something?

[iNow]

5 hours ago, Eise said:

OK, if you deny my examples of 'control': can you give an example of something being in control of something?

Electrical impulses control the movement of our limbs, and can even control that movement for some period of time after death is declared. 

 

https://helix.northwestern.edu/article/experiment-shocked-world

Quote

In his back garden, all of his equipment lay ready. The lightning rod was installed. A frog corpse lay on the table. A storm was coming. All that remained was the final touch: connecting the lightning rod to the frog. Then, after making the connection, it was time to wait.

At long last, the storm came. Whenever lightning flashed nearby, energy coursed down the rod and the frog’s leg twitched!

The scientist, Luigi Galvani, must have been ecstatic. Over the past several years, he had come to believe that electricity was linked to movement. He had already shown that his static electricity generator made frog legs twitch in controlled laboratory conditions. Here was a piece of evidence to improve his theory: a connection between naturally occurring electricity and movement.

 

[dimreepr]

This thread seems to be on the threshold between science and philosophy, which relatively speaking makes you both right; until science learns more.

[Eise]

29 minutes ago, iNow said:

Electrical impulses control the movement of our limbs, and can even control that movement for some period of time after death is declared. 

No, that does not work: in the example you cited, it is the lightning that creates a small current in the frog's leg, which on its turn causes (via a few other steps) that the leg moves. What you give is an example of causation, not control; just the way you analyzed my working of the thermostat. 

[iNow]

11 minutes ago, Eise said:

No, that does not work: in the example you cited, it is the lightning that creates a small current in the frog's leg, which on its turn causes (via a few other steps) that the leg moves. What you give is an example of causation, not control

Can't agree with your assessment. The rod conducts the electricity. It's essentially a pipe, much like one in plumbing through which water flows. The electricity, however, does the controlling (whatever that means).  It's not the pipe...

The electricity is the one consistent variable throughout each of the intervening steps you cite, regardless of the medium. Even at the cellular level, it's what triggers the depolarization and initiates the action potential cascade... the exchange of sodium and potassium ions through gates... those trigger all movement.

In this case, the electricity is both controlling and causative, and those are not mutually exclusive in the way you seem to suggest.

Also, TBH... "control" is too fuzzy of a word to be helpful here. It's not crisp or precise. It muddies waters we're seeking to clarify.

[Sensei]

54 minutes ago, iNow said:

Electrical impulses control the movement of our limbs, and can even control that movement for some period of time after death is declared. 

...maybe he meant that somebody ("director") "pressing button" which is turning on/off electricity which passes or not through dead frog leg has control over dead frog..

Electricity is just "messenger" of will of "director".

[iNow]

1 hour ago, iNow said:

Can't agree with your assessment. The rod conducts the electricity. It's essentially a pipe, much like one in plumbing through which water flows. The electricity, however, does the controlling (whatever that means).  It's not the pipe...

The electricity is the one consistent variable throughout each of the intervening steps you cite, regardless of the medium. Even at the cellular level, it's what triggers the depolarization and initiates the action potential cascade... the exchange of sodium and potassium ions through gates... those trigger all movement.

In this case, the electricity is both controlling and causative, and those are not mutually exclusive in the way you seem to suggest.

Also, TBH... "control" is too fuzzy of a word to be helpful here. It's not crisp or precise. It muddies waters we're seeking to clarify.

I'd like to slightly amend this response (can no longer edit). My mention of lighting rod has no place here. 

The core question is, how is my mention of electricity different from your mention @Eise of lightning? Are they not equivalent for purposes of this example?

I'd also like to explore your suggestion that it's causative but not controlling. As Sensei's comment above makes clear, your distinction is anything but. I know you're not suggesting a director, so what are you suggesting?

[dimreepr]

2 hours ago, Sensei said:

...maybe he meant that somebody ("director") "pressing button" which is turning on/off electricity which passes or not through dead frog leg has control over dead frog..

Electricity is just "messenger" of will of "director".

Maybe for Shelley or...

[Eise]

18 hours ago, dimreepr said:

This thread seems to be on the threshold between science and philosophy, which relatively speaking makes you both right; until science learns more.

No, it is not. I fully accept the science (even a bit more: I assume for the ease of the argument that we are completely determined). The question is if the concept of free will as we use it daily, where we can distinguish between free and coerced actions, has anything to do with libertarian free will (which I agree with iNow, does not exist). Science cannot answer that question.

17 hours ago, Sensei said:

...maybe he meant that somebody ("director") "pressing button" which is turning on/off electricity which passes or not through dead frog leg has control over dead frog..

Electricity is just "messenger" of will of "director".

Definitely not.

17 hours ago, iNow said:

Also, TBH... "control" is too fuzzy of a word to be helpful here. It's not crisp or precise. It muddies waters we're seeking to clarify.

Yep, but you introduced it...

Still, many people say this: we are not in control of our behaviour because it is all (physically) determined.But that is a wrong assessment of what 'control' means. 'Control' means that a system strives for a certain output that is 'desired'. 

You are partially right with your critique on my thermostat example: so I extend it with the heater in the room. The system of heater and thermostat works so that it keeps the temperature in the room between certain limits. So in a true sense, heater and thermostat control the temperature in the room.

Secondly: life is nothing but control. Organisms try to control their environment, by changing it, or by moving to another environment where circumstances are better than the present environment. But as in the heater/thermostat example, that does not mean that those systems are not working in a determined way. Same with us: we are incredible complicated 'control-systems'. But the fact that all the processes together on which this control is based are determined does not change the fact that these 'bags of water and proteins' have certain control.

16 hours ago, iNow said:

The core question is, how is my mention of electricity different from your mention @Eise of lightning? Are they not equivalent for purposes of this example?

It is not a huge difference: what I argue for is that you implicitly seem to say that everything that has a cause cannot be in control, so I just moved the cause of the movement of the frog's leg 'one cause earlier'. I used your thought pattern (something cannot be in control when it is causally related to previous events) to show that it simply does not work: that a system is causally determined does not imply that control is impossible.

[iNow]

3 hours ago, Eise said:

Control' means that a system strives for a certain output that is 'desired'. 

You are partially right with your critique on my thermostat example: so I extend it with the heater in the room. The system of heater and thermostat works so that it keeps the temperature in the room between certain limits. So in a true sense, heater and thermostat control the temperature in the room.

Secondly: life is nothing but control. Organisms try to control their environment, by changing it, or by moving to another environment where circumstances are better than the present environment. But as in the heater/thermostat example, that does not mean that those systems are not working in a determined way. Same with us: we are incredible complicated 'control-systems'. But the fact that all the processes together on which this control is based are determined does not change the fact that these 'bags of water and proteins' have certain control.

Well written, and we appear to agree. My bone of contention, however, is not with the idea of control. It’s with the assertion of freedom, admittedly an even fuzzier and more ambiguous term. 

[Eise]

2 hours ago, iNow said:

Well written, and we appear to agree. My bone of contention, however, is not with the idea of control. It’s with the assertion of freedom, admittedly an even fuzzier and more ambiguous term. 

Yes, the concept of 'free will' is a bit fuzzy. Therefore philosophers have given different concepts of it different names, to make them more precise. 

I think this is one of the tasks of philosophers to reconstruct the meaning of concepts, as they are used in daily life, science, or any subculture. Often, even if the words are the same ('free will') the concepts behind them are not. The concept of free will that you and I deny is libertarian free will: the idea that for a will to be free it cannot be caused by previous conditions.

However, this is not the kind of free will we use in daily life: in daily life we use the idea that free will means, simply formulated, that we can do what we want. In judicial terms, for a defendant to be 'guilt-capable', he must have done his crime as a free acting person, which means that a few conditions should apply:

• the defendant can reflect his reasons for acting
• the defendant had the knowledge what the consequences of his crime would be, or at least he should have known
• the defendant was not coerced to his actions by somebody else
• the defendant had other options than the action he in fact did

None of these conflicts with the fact that we are a determined system. Therefore a defendant cannot defend himself by saying he has no libertarian free will. Compatibilist free will, the kind of free will I am defending here, is enough, and that is what we normally really have. It is so to speak a condition to be treated as a full and responsible member of our society.

[iNow]

So, you're effectively saying it's all just semantics?  

 

On 4/13/2019 at 6:02 AM, Eise said:

PS The first one who tries to stop the discussion with 'it is just semantics' gets a negative reputation point from me...

 

[MigL]

I don't believe in determinism as that implies a 'clockwork' reality.
Up to a century ago, your stick could hit a cue ball at a specific speed, to hit the 8ball in a specific position, and send it into the corner pocket. W Heisenberg changed that paradigm.
After QM, if you hit the cue ball to give a well specified speed to the 8ball, you have no idea where the 8ball is. And if you are sure where the 8ball is, you have no idea how hard to hit it so that it drops in the corner pocket.
( OK, I exaggerate a little to make my point )

The message is clear, at a basic level there is no determinism.
And I've had this discussion with Eise before, but what are your thoughts on how this relates to 'free will' ?

[iNow]

The uncertainty you reference seems limited to tiny scales and has not been observed at the macro level.

The pool ball still goes into the pocket when I strike it, even though QM suggests it might instead fly off into another reality where we keep pterodactyls as pets. 

I’m sure there’s some randomness in the ion exchange at the neurobiological level that QM might help us better model, but like a drop of piss in the ocean suspect it can be rightfully ignored. 

[Eise]

15 hours ago, iNow said:

So, you're effectively saying it's all just semantics?  

Yes and no. When we make a rational reconstruction of what we mean with 'free will' in daily and judicial use, we discover that it is something else as the neurologists mean, and this use does not contradict determinism. The daily and judicial use of 'free will' is not touched by this neurological 'discovery' at all.

And no, I do not want to stop the discussion, so I do not earn a negative rep point for that.

11 hours ago, MigL said:

I don't believe in determinism as that implies a 'clockwork' reality.

Ah, you do not have to believe it. There are 2 ways to see this:

1. Many people think that we are determined, and therefore we have no free will. Compatibilism however shows that they can go together. So just for the sake of the argument we can assume that we are determined, and then show that in the way we use 'free will' in daily life is not touched by determinism at all.
2. The stronger form of compatibilism: without sufficient determinism, free will would be impossible, i.e. we need determinism to be free. If one sees free will as 'being able to do what you want' then it would be impossible if there is not a more or less causal relationship between 'what we want' and 'what we do'. How would this be possible if e.g. my actions have nothing to do with my preferences, motivations, feelings, beliefs, knowledge etc. E.g. the more random the relationship between my will and my actions is, the less I can do what I want.

And the latter is of course the reason why QM does not help in 'giving' us free will. Random events only disturb the relation between my will and my actions. That is the reason that I sometimes use the phrase 'sufficient determism'. I think the confusion lies in the idea that free will implies unpredictability. But that is simply wrong. Of course you can keep your motivations secret, but somebody who knows you well, might still be able to predict what you will do. And as was mentioned in another thread, there are experiments that show that under very special circumstances neurologists can predict what you will choose.

Neurological networks have quite a big tolerance against local disfunctioning. And further there are estimates that even in the synapses quantum effects are averaged out, so we can treat the neurological system as a classical system, in which determinism holds.

[MigL]

The 'clockwork' reality I'm considering, means that the elementary particles that make us up have determined paths once the initial conditions are specified, and at any time thereafter, their positions can be computed, like clockwork.
If you want to consider the particles making up your brain, then specifying initial conditions, one would be able to calculate ( with an extremely powerful computer ) every future position, interaction and path, and from that, every thought that you may have. Even the thought that you should change your mind.
So when you say that you have the 'free' will to choose differently, although circumstances favor a specific decision, that is already pre-ordained by the initial conditions. IE it is not free will at all.

What QM does, more specifically the HUP, is destroy the 'clockwork'.
You can no longer compute the future position, interactions and paths of the elementary building blocks of your brain.
Any decision made is not necessarily based on previous conditions, and information.
Now, you could say this is just the appearance of free will, as we still have no control over the decision we ultimately make.
But that's probably as close as we're gonna get.

[Eise]

11 hours ago, MigL said:

What QM does, more specifically the HUP, is destroy the 'clockwork'.
You can no longer compute the future position, interactions and paths of the elementary building blocks of your brain.
Any decision made is not necessarily based on previous conditions, and information.
Now, you could say this is just the appearance of free will, as we still have no control over the decision we ultimately make.
But that's probably as close as we're gonna get.

Well, I think this argument supposes that free will implies the impossibility of predictability. Something I pertinently do not agree with. 

QM only can disturb free will, in the sense that it introduces a random element in what I do. If there is a random element between what I want and what I do, then it reduces my capability to act according to my motivations, and so I am less free: sometimes I could do things I factually do not want, just from thin air (= HUP)

12 hours ago, MigL said:

So when you say that you have the 'free' will to choose differently, although circumstances favor a specific decision, that is already pre-ordained by the initial conditions. IE it is not free will at all.

Pre-ordained or not has nothing to do with it. The question if somebody acted from free will lies only in the relationship between his motivations and his actions. So also here you mixup free will with predictability. 

For the sake of argument let's take QM out: then we have a clockwork universe, and a clockwork brain. Then it is sure that if we would replay the universe, exactly the same would happen, so I would also choose for exactly the same action, simply because the environment is exactly the same, and my brain is exactly the same. So you would want the same and act the same, because what you want, and so your choices are free. 

I think it is important to see that choices, even in a strictly determined universe, are real. Say, you must catch a train that leaves in 20 minutes. If you walk, you will be late; a taxi would take 5 minutes but is expensive; a bus would take 10 minutes, and every 10 minutes a bus is coming. So walking is not really an option, because if you would walk, you would not catch your train. If you would take the taxi, you would have to pay $20. And if you would take the bus, you have to take the risk that you miss your train. These are the informations you have: modal sentences that are true, but do not describe what factually happens (yet). These are called contra-factual sentences, and they can be true or false, independently of they describe events that really happen in the universe, and also independent of the question if the universe is determined or not. (But the universe better be determined, otherwise you could not even be sure of your information about your choices...) Again a reason why we need a determined universe in order to be free.

Now, of course your brain is determined also, so what your choice will be is determined too. But it is determined according the options you see, so you are really choosing. Yes, your choice is fixed, but not without your evaluating the real, available options. So your decision for one of the options (e.g. you take the taxi) determines your action (calling a taxi). That I would definitely call free will. 

[MigL]

What seems to be the problem is our differing definitions of 'free will'.

From my POV, if everyone can determine my choice/reaction to a stimulus, then that reaction is not free, but dictated by circumstances.
The unpredictability allows ( or forces ) you to make a choice/reaction not dictated by circumstances; And that is 'free will'.

From your POV, the ability to think " I was going to do this, but choose, instead, to do that" is 'free will'.
But how do you know that thought process isn't part of the 'clockwork' and you were always going to choose to do 'that' ?

[dimreepr]

42 minutes ago, MigL said:

What seems to be the problem is our differing definitions of 'free will'.

From my POV, if everyone can determine my choice/reaction to a stimulus, then that reaction is not free, but dictated by circumstances.
The unpredictability allows ( or forces ) you to make a choice/reaction not dictated by circumstances; And that is 'free will'.

From your POV, the ability to think " I was going to do this, but choose, instead, to do that" is 'free will'.
But how do you know that thought process isn't part of the 'clockwork' and you were always going to choose to do 'that' ?

Edit, thinking again.

Edited May 10, 2019 by dimreepr

[MigL]

Didn't say anyone was 'guilty'.
Just that we are using differing definitions.
And although I defer to Eise when it comes to philosophical matters ( such as this ), I wanted to introduce my opinion and receive other members reactions to it.

Edit:
Ok then. Disregard 1st two lines

Edited May 10, 2019 by MigL

[dimreepr]

1 minute ago, MigL said:

Didn't say anyone was 'guilty'.
Just that we are using differing definitions.
And although I defer to Eise when it comes to philosophical matters ( such as this ), I wanted to introduce my opinion and receive other members reactions to it.

I know, that's why I edited. 

But ultimately the question of guilt is inextricably linked to free will and where, on the spectrum of consciousness, it exists 

[Eise]

30 minutes ago, MigL said:

From your POV, the ability to think " I was going to do this, but choose, instead, to do that" is 'free will'.
But how do you know that thought process isn't part of the 'clockwork' and you were always going to choose to do 'that' ?

I think the answer is in my previous posting.

3 hours ago, Eise said:

Now, of course your brain is determined also, so what your choice will be is determined too. But it is determined according the options you see, so you are really choosing. Yes, your choice is fixed, but not without your evaluating the real, available options. So your decision for one of the options (e.g. you take the taxi) determines your action (calling a taxi). That I would definitely call free will. 

So yes, it is part of the clockwork, but it is the whole process of evaluating what to do next that is part of the clockwork. But even in the clockwork, you can see which actions are based on free will, namely those that are according your motivations, and those that are not, namely those that are according the motivations of somebody else, against your own motivations.

[dimreepr]

10 minutes ago, Eise said:

So yes, it is part of the clockwork, but it is the whole process of evaluating what to do next that is part of the clockwork. But even in the clockwork, you can see which actions are based on free will, namely those that are according your motivations, and those that are not, namely those that are according the motivations of somebody else, against your own motivations.

Not to mention the motivation of something else.

Where do think free will resides on the bell curve? 

[Eise]

1 minute ago, dimreepr said:

Where do think free will resides on the bell curve? 

Which bell curve?