Since we have no free will, what purpose does/did consciousness serve?

[Bender]

There is no reason to admit we don't know. It is trivial, so why bother? You can safely assume that I admit to not know anything for which there is no evidence.

 

It is perfectly possible to act under the assumption that something doesn't exist, yet hope the assumption is wrong at the same time.

 

e.g. I assume the EM-drive will not work, but I hope it does.

[nec209]

Exactly. My point was to define the concept of responsibility without coupling it with the concept of free will. Responsibility is ownership of a task or action. Whether or not we're a bag of chemicals following some determined path is irrelevant.

 

Are you saying people are nothing but drones that are nothing but run on emotion chemical drones with no free will and not responsible for action. Can you point me to some research studies and sources.

 

Can you give us some examples in case where the person has no free will.

 

Also are you confusing free will and nature. Where life forms on earth that face danger run and hide or fight.

 

If some one has no free will why is it some people can go on strict diet or days with out food or hunger strike. There no chemical overriding this.

 

Why is it some people live in poverty do crime and other do not. Should chemical or nature override animal survival.

 

You need to be more clear what you mean by lack of free will and give example.

[Thorham]

There is no reason to admit we don't know. It is trivial, so why bother?

 

It's apparently not so easy. You see this on this forum all the time (in some threads).

 

It is perfectly possible to act under the assumption that something doesn't exist, yet hope the assumption is wrong at the same time.

 

But why would you hope for something when you assume it doesn't exist? Isn't it better to assume nothing about things for which there is no evidence?

[Argent]

 

If some one has no free will why is it some people can go on strict diet or days with out food or hunger strike. There no chemical overriding this.

One might argue that their mental state, determined by prior experience and chemical balance drives them to take actions that are prejudicial to their survival. The strong instinctual drive in social species, such as humans, means that we can feel a great sense of shame for failing to act in a manner we feel appropriate. This can lead to acts of self sacrifice.

[iNow]

Are you saying people are nothing but drones that are nothing but run on emotion chemical drones with no free will and not responsible for action. Can you point me to some research studies and sources.

 

Can you give us some examples in case where the person has no free will.

The references in this article have become increasingly robust through the years. It's a great place for you to start since you seem to have an interest: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will

 

are you confusing free will and nature.

Nope.

 

Why is it some people live in poverty do crime and other do not.

That's a much longer conversation and is frankly irrelevant here.

[Bender]

It's apparently not so easy. You see this on this forum all the time (in some threads).

 

 

But why would you hope for something when you assume it doesn't exist? Isn't it better to assume nothing about things for which there is no evidence?

You seem to put too much weight into the act of assuming. I think there is hardly any difference, if any, between my assuming invisible unicorns don't exist and your not know whether they exist.

[Strange]

I think there is hardly any difference, if any, between my assuming invisible unicorns don't exist and your not know whether they exist.

 

 

The difference is that just saying "don't know" allows for the possibility that invisible pink unicorns do exist. And you would have to be insane to think that.

Edited February 24, 2017 by Strange

[Eise]

For me I think it's about considering free will and chemical reactions as the same thing or almost the same thing,

 

Are you sure? Say you have a dummy book (a book with empty pages) and a real book with text. Physically they are almost the same thing. But in the dummy is missing exactly that which it makes a real book. Even better, this essence is conserved if you convert into a completely different physical form, e.g. an ebook. The same with free will. Speaking of free will makes only sense in the context of other concepts, like motivations, actions, coercion, responsibility, culpability etc etc. Looking for free will on the level of chemical reactions, is looking at the wrong place. All these concepts describe higher order phenomena, which essence does not lie in its physical substrate.

 

I believe we have free will, but that it's almost impossible to understand what it is.

 

I think it is very easy to understand what it is: it is the capability to act according your own wishes and beliefs. What you probably mean is that it is almost impossible to understand how the brain can give rise to such phenomena. There I would agree with you.

 

But was that choice simply the result of a load of inevitable chemical reactions in our brain ending up at that decision.

 

The inevitability of chemical reactions has nothing to do with inevitability of events, when consciousness and will are involved. Remember the example of the stone, the rock and the cat I gave before.

 

The chemicals are our free will. But the chemicals are also us

 

Well, yes and no. If you equal our free will with chemical reactions, then every chemical reaction has free will? That makes no sense of course. It is an extremely special configuration, and in the light of above one can say that it is only the configuration that is really important. Every physical substrate that can implement such configuration might be said to have free will. Therefore we cannot exclude the possibility of conscious machines, with free will. (In fact they already exist: we are such machines).

 

Everything we do physically is controlled by chemicals (in muscles etc as well as nerve cells), but nothing else is known in science that could control those chemicals.

 

Again, you are looking at the wrong place. For free will we need a more or less deterministic physical substrate, no magical influence on chemicals.

Exactly. My point was to define the concept of responsibility without coupling it with the concept of free will. Responsibility is ownership of a task or action. Whether or not we're a bag of chemicals following some determined path is irrelevant.

 

But 'ownership' is not enough. I already gave the example of mentally retarded people.

It is simplest to say; For those things that have no evidence we can dismiss them with no evidence.

 

Exactly.

The references in this article have become increasingly robust through the years. It's a great place for you to start since you seem to have an interest: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will

 

From this article:

 

Thinkers like Daniel Dennett or Alfred Mele consider the language used by researchers. They explain that "free will" means many different things to different people (e.g. some notions of free will are dualistic, some not). Dennett insists that many important and common conceptions of "free will" are compatible with the emerging evidence from neuroscience.

 

I fully agree with them. The article is not about free will at all. It is about how the brain functions. It only disproves naive dualism, in which our thoughts, motivations, and beliefs have no causal history.

[iNow]

Are you now suggesting that we experience "free will" in a way that's wholly disconnected from underlying neural processes? I hope not, because you're an intelligent person and that's a very unintelligent assertion.

[Thorham]

The difference is that just saying "don't know" allows for the possibility that invisible pink unicorns do exist. And you would have to be insane to think that.

So, I'm insane now? Thanks for that Good thing you're not my shrink, or I'd be in trouble.

[Bender]

So, I'm insane now? Thanks for that Good thing you're not my shrink, or I'd be in trouble.

If you actually think there is a reasonable possibility that invisible pink unicorns exist, I misunderstood your position and have to retract my previous statement.

[Thorham]

If you actually think there is a reasonable possibility that invisible pink unicorns exist, I misunderstood your position and have to retract my previous statement.

 

Yeah, I think that, because I don't think that something's impossible just because it sounds ridiculous. How ridiculous do you think a Boeing 747 wold sound to someone from a thousand years ago? Probably totally bonkers.

[Eise]

Are you now suggesting that we experience "free will" in a way that's wholly disconnected from underlying neural processes? I hope not, because you're an intelligent person and that's a very unintelligent assertion.

 

So I suggest, read again.

 

Or answer this question: is the outcome of a calculation dependent on if you do it in your head, or using an abacus, program it in C++ or Basic, and run that program on a Mac or a PC with Ubuntu? Is the outcome connected to the underlying process? Or the other way round: does a small part of our brain have exactly the same configuration when we think about pink unicorns?

[iNow]

It depends entirely on the nature of the calculation

[Eise]

It depends entirely on the nature of the calculation

 

445 +675 = ?

 

Is the outcome dependent on the physical substrate used?

[Argent]

 

445 +675 = ?

 

Is the outcome dependent on the physical substrate used?

445+675 . . . . No.

 

445/675 . . . . Yes

[Itoero]

Yeah, I think that, because I don't think that something's impossible just because it sounds ridiculous. How ridiculous do you think a Boeing 747 wold sound to someone from a thousand years ago? Probably totally bonkers.

Our idea's concerning things which are impossible, evolve. Many things remain impossible while others become possible. It's perhaps better to use the term 'probable'.

100% proof does not exist so in a sense everything is probable/improbable and not possible/impossible.

 

Possibility refers to 'having the potential' while probability refers to 'what is likely to occur'.

[Eise]

445+675 . . . . No.

 

445/675 . . . . Yes

 

And? Is this relevant to the point being made? How?

[Argent]

 

And? Is this relevant to the point being made? How?

I have answered your question. Were you not looking for an answer?

[Thorham]

100% proof does not exist so in a sense everything is probable/improbable and not possible/impossible.

 

Some things are completely impossible. One example is being omnipotent and immortal at the same time. Impossible, because you could kill yourself (meaning you can die, and you're not immortal when you can die). Omnipotence in the sense of being able to do everything is impossible because it creates contradictions like the one I just mentioned.

[Bender]

 

Yeah, I think that, because I don't think that something's impossible just because it sounds ridiculous. How ridiculous do you think a Boeing 747 wold sound to someone from a thousand years ago? Probably totally bonkers.

And they would have been right, because a Boeing 747 did not exist at the time.

[Thorham]

And they would have been right, because a Boeing 747 did not exist at the time.

 

Obviously they would've been wrong, because a B747 is perfectly possible. An invisible pink unicorn on the other hand is of course not possible, because something that's invisible doesn't have a color.

[Bender]

Yet you think that we shouldn't assume they don't exist. I'm confused.

[Thorham]

Yet you think that we shouldn't assume they don't exist. I'm confused.

 

That doesn't apply to things which are in principle not possible. Those invisible pink unicorns are a good example that I didn't realize before. While a unicorn might not be impossible, an invisible pink one certainly is. All you need for a unicorn is a bubble universe with physics that looks like magic to us, so that certainly doesn't seem impossible.

[StringJunky]

 

That doesn't apply to things which are in principle not possible. Those invisible pink unicorns are a good example that I didn't realize before. While a unicorn might not be impossible, an invisible pink one certainly is. All you need for a unicorn is a bubble universe with physics that looks like magic to us, so that certainly doesn't seem impossible.

Or some genetic manipulation and a bottle of dylon.