Neuroscience and free will

Computers don't generate art.

https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-edit...uter-human

They execute algorithms.

https://sociable.co/technology/hack-huma...davos-wef/

I'm asking the same question over and over in response to the just-so claim that there is an indeterministic way of making nonrandom decisions.

Again, you've used a lot of words that are apparently loaded with some sort of indeterministic "creative free will" or something.


I'm not starting with any particular premise. At the risk of annoying you by repeating my question yet again: I'm just asking for a description of how we might make indeterministic yet nonrandom decisions. You can make that description as nonmechanistic as you like; I have no investment in mechanism. You can make it nondeterministic, nonrandom, and creative.

If we simply assume that some word like "creativity" involves this indeterministic yet nonrandom method of making decisions, then we are begging the question of whether there is such a thing.

~~ Paul

If you are not invested in, nor asking for a mechanism I don't have a clue what you are asking for. How feelings arise? How we ascribe meaning to them in order to make decisions? Please be more specific than repeatedly demanding "a description".  Perhaps start with what you mean by indeterministic. Are you saying that there is no such thing as novelty? Or spontaneity? Whims, irrationality, frivolity or, yes, "creativity"? How about inspiration or - dare I say - intuition? 

And what is it that you are invested in? A physical causal chain, corresponding to active components such as particle movements and energy states which, given a powerful enough calculator, could all have been determined in the first instant of the Big Bang? A bit of chaos thrown in to make things interesting, perhaps, but still essentially determined. If so, that all speaks to me of mechanism. If not, what?

https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-edit...uter-human

“We are focused on developing artificial intelligence and computer vision algorithms in the domain of art.” 

Again, computers execute algorithms. They are not sentient (ARTIFICIAL Intelligence). They don't have a concept of art. The observer - a human mind - has a concept of art.

Again, computers execute algorithms. They are not sentient (ARTIFICIAL Intelligence). They don't have a concept of art. The observer - a human mind - has a concept of art.

My second link addresses that.

My second link addresses that.

Sorry, I assumed your second link was a joke.

If you are not invested in, nor asking for a mechanism I don't have a clue what you are asking for. How feelings arise? How we ascribe meaning to them in order to make decisions? Please be more specific than repeatedly demanding "a description".  Perhaps start with what you mean by indeterministic. Are you saying that there is no such thing as novelty? Or spontaneity? Whims, irrationality, frivolity or, yes, "creativity"? How about inspiration or - dare I say - intuition?

Let's assume we agree I can make a decision that at least partly involves deterministic reasoning and possibly truly random coin tosses. That is not sufficient for libertarian free will, which is, by definition, incompatible with determinism. So there must be a third indeterministic component to that decision I made. I am asking for a description of how that third component works. Even a reasonable hand-waving description would be interesting.

And what is it that you are invested in? A physical causal chain, corresponding to active components such as particle movements and energy states which, given a powerful enough calculator, could all have been determined in the first instant of the Big Bang? A bit of chaos thrown in to make things interesting, perhaps, but still essentially determined. If so, that all speaks to me of mechanism. If not, what?

I think there is true randomness in the universe, so events are not determined by the Big Bang. I'm perfectly happy if you call this a mechanism. I'm perfectly happy if you refuse to call the third indeterministic component a mechanism. I'm asking for a description of the third component.

~~ Paul

Of course this won't get anywhere with committed reductive materialists (nothing will - that's what committed means), but a few thoughts:

In Buddhism, the primordial truth of the entirety of existence is that it is both there, but not solid, unknowable, but known. It is a conundrum. You can’t deny it, but neither can you grasp it and make it solid, saying it is this or that.

We don’t really know what consciousness is (all we know is what some of its attributes are) and all attempts to understand it fail, but we don’t deny it since the existence of our own consciousness is the only absolute certainty we have. Consciousness may be unknowable, but we don't deny it exists (except for some self-conflicted committed materialists).

We don’t really know that the Universe is real (every time we look closer and closer, there is less solidity to it, nothing is really there), yet we don’t deny it. The ultimate essential nature of the Universe may be unknowable, but we don't deny it exists.

The qualia of perception, and agency, are attributes of consciousness and we know they are real even though we don't really know what their nature is, because we experience them as integral parts of our own consciousness.

These things we know to exist but they resist all efforts to describe and analyze their essential nature. We just can't pin them down with any sort of intellectual understanding.

Similarly, we don't really know what free will and creativity are, but like qualia and agency we experience them as attributes of this probably unknowable consciousness, so free will and creativity are also real and existent but probably unknowable.

I feel that the closest we got to pinning down this question was in a discussion back on Skeptiko, starting here:

http://www.skeptiko-forum.com/threads/th...post-66284

Even so, the critical question was never answered (other than by renaming "determinism" with "intent" and "random" with "creative").

I wonder if "free will" represents "the degree to which we are willing to assume agency for the products of our mental states."

Linda

Let's assume we agree I can make a decision that at least partly involves deterministic reasoning and possibly truly random coin tosses. That is not sufficient for libertarian free will, which is, by definition, incompatible with determinism. So there must be a third indeterministic component to that decision I made. I am asking for a description of how that third component works. Even a reasonable hand-waving description would be interesting.

I think there is true randomness in the universe, so events are not determined by the Big Bang. I'm perfectly happy if you call this a mechanism. I'm perfectly happy if you refuse to call the third indeterministic component a mechanism. I'm asking for a description of the third component.

~~ Paul

I'm sorry but I have to ask you again to explain what you mean. You keep harping on about this third indeterministic component but I don't have a clue what you are looking for.  That's why I asked you to explain your idea of indeterminism - I wasn't being facetious, I just don't know how you think of it. I use the term mechanism because that seems to me to be what you are looking for. Clearly you prefer to use the term "third component of indeterminism" and clearly that is supposed to mean something to the rest of us as though it is what we are proposing. It might be but I can't confirm that if I don't know what it is. Meanwhile you ignore the efforts made by myself and nbtruthman to clarify our position(s) and continue to repeat your demand.