Neuroscience and free will

Why is this important? Because we are trying to clarify what determinism means, especially to you, and, as I suggested to Linda in my immediately previous post, the conditions for a causal relation (law) could apply on a single occasion within the entire universe, and that causal relation (law) could still be deterministic. So, if you agree with that suggestion, then you would seem to be arbitrarily excluding certain (deterministic) causal relations from your conception of a physical law if you do not also accept (something like) Prof. Swartz's definition, which allows for a general law to apply in only one instance.

Can you accept this definition of physical laws after all?

I'm sorry, I don't understand this issue. What is the point of bastardizing the term law to pertain to a single event? It's a scientific term with a specific meaning having to do with discernible patterns in multiple events.

Perhaps if you would explain the point of this redefinition of the term, I could then agree with the idea and suggest a different term.

I don't think that that's justifiable though. Here's why:

Given that the described phenomena could only have happened differently if the laws had been different (since the laws are simply generalised descriptions of what actually goes on in the world), to drop the assumption that the phenomena could have happened differently would be to eliminate the possibility that the laws could have been different, which would make them necessary, which is essentially prescriptive, which contradicts our descriptivism. So, I don't think we'd be assuming anything; I think it's logically entailed.

All I'm getting at here is that even though a law is descriptive, it may in fact be describing phenomena that always follow the law.

You seem to be looking for laws of free choices that, per your understanding of laws, "describe a large class of phenomena". I suppose that there might be some, but I haven't thought deeply about nor looked carefully into it. Again, there's probably a wealth of material within psychology and psychoanalysis. We could probably come up ourselves with some general methods that people "freely choose to choose by", but I'm not sure how easy they'd be to formulate as physical laws.

I'm not really looking for laws, although that would be interesting. I'm looking for a simple logical description of the steps I take to make a free decision. I realize that "steps" sound mechanical, so feel free to substitute another word. There must be something like steps. If not, and the decision literally pops into my mind, then I claim that decision is random. I must somehow contemplate my memories and the current state of affairs to come up with a decision.

Also worth considering is that laws of free choice which described a "large" class of phenomena might tend to reduce the freedom of the agents participating in those phenomena, since they might limit the range of possibilities. I guess though that it would depend on the exact nature and scope of the laws.

But the range of possibilities is limited! The decision has to have something to do with the question at hand, no?

OK. So, you've agreed that physical laws are (or can be taken to be) conditional descriptions of events. I should make explicit what's implicit in that: that the descriptions are accurate, true, and correct.

Here's my next contention for you then: A true description of the world is necessitated by the way the world is; the way the world is is not necessitated by the true descriptions of it.

Agreed?

I don't agree with using the term law for the description of a single event. That's not the meaning of the word. The problem with this piecemeal educational approach to discussing the topic is that I don't know where you're going. Why do you need to talk about laws at all?

But let's keep going. I'll object to the word law if necessary. Yes, I agree that the world is not necessitated by true descriptions of it.

~~ Paul

I was struggling with the casual way "random" was being tossed around.  Max's recently distinction (with or without understanding) resonates with me.

I have a much harder time with the notion of "random" than I do with free will.

One problem with defining random as "without understanding" is that you're tempted to believe that someday there will be understanding.

I'm still not sure why people have so much trouble with defining pure randomness as events without causal precursors. Is it because people don't believe there can be such events?

~~ Paul

There are plenty of conditions which are identical, at all levels of scale. Examples...electrons are identical with respect to charge, the sun rises in the east, sugar tastes sweet, 1+1=2, etc.


Given that it is used to produce specific and consistent results, it seems the very definition of "determined".

Linda

OMG

1+1 = 2 is a logical condition, an abstraction.
East is a relative term and is not the condition of all sun "rises".  On the moon there is no sun rise.  On earth sunrise changes its "eastness" depending on date and location.
Sweetness is a subjective attribute.
Electrons being "identical" in charge is an abstraction.  It would be my humble understanding that electron charge is subject to random quantum fluctuations.

 Tunneling. Tunneling is a quantum mechanical effect. A tunneling current occurs when electrons move through a barrier that they classically shouldn't be able to move through. In classical terms, if you don't have enough energy to move “over” a barrier, you won't.

Charge is subject to random flucuations.

The conditions of the conditional are the specific (or general...) circumstances which define the event. e.g., For the event in which two objects are drawn together by a force, the conditions (circumstances) include that the two objects have mass.

Gotcha - that's a good working definition.

They are universal though in that they are true at all times and places - even when the conditions don't hold for a given time and place. I do get your point though.

But we can only express true confidence for the circumstances in which we observe the behavior working according to the laws yes?

I'm interested to understand better what you mean in the first place by laws being subject to chance... expound a little if it pleases you... (the root "contingency" I think I understand well enough).

If nothing is holding the laws in place, then it seems they are subject to change easily enough. They only hold by luck alone.

Of course this is just one issue with the laws and the dualist interactionism that would be required to make them work, and in that Talbott paper I mentioned in a previous reply to you I think it shows even then there would have to be something within the entities to which the law applies that is amenable to obedience.

So even if there are laws that can interact with substance, what stops the amenable aspect of the entities supposedly bound from "revolting"?

It's a crucial question, but not one I planned to ask in the first few steps, to clarify concepts and define terms.

What else is there?! ;-) (besides causally-efficacious conscious entities, I mean...)

Are you thinking of Hoffman's Idealism with that last line? Heh, well for Idealists I don't think there are any problems for free will save for problems of their own making - those who insist God knows the future, that Mind is bound by Jungian Archetypes, etc.

But even if we take the neutral road and just look at any causal event, there has to be some final delimiting aspect of the Ground (of Being). It is not like the horizontal axis of time where one can ponder if there is an infinite causal chain regressing indefinitely into the past. On the vertical temporal axis, which is an indication of the present moment, without some delimiter anything/nothing/everything could happen yet we know from observation of change that at least in our corner of reality this is not the case.

In a Penrose interview Will posted in the Orch-OR thread the physicist makes note of of this with respect to superposition:

As we probed the deeper implications of Penrose’s theory about consciousness, it wasn’t always clear where to draw the line between the scientific and philosophical dimensions of his thinking. Consider, for example, superposition in quantum theory. How could Schrödinger’s cat be both dead and alive before we open the box? “An element of proto-consciousness takes place whenever a decision is made in the universe,” he said. “I’m not talking about the brain. I’m talking about an object which is put into a superposition of two places. Say it’s a speck of dust that you put into two locations at once. Now, in a small fraction of a second, it will become one or the other. Which does it become? Well, that’s a choice. Is it a choice made by the universe? Does the speck of dust make this choice? Maybe it’s a free choice. I have no idea.”

Yet why just superposition, given as argued above there is a need for possibility selection in every causal instance? Combine this with arguments for ubiquity of consciousness (see here for one) and/or Idealism arguments (see Kastrup's writings as an example) and Gregg Rosenberg's argument that something very much like consciousness is needed as "carrier" for any causal interaction (a piece of which can legally be found here).

Now one doesn't have to take this route, there could be some other kind of carrier for causation, but [intentionality of all events] involves the only kind of "possibility selector" at the base causal level we have experience with - namely our own mental causation. And there's also the "top-down" delimiter to consider, namely the theistic arguments for God...

1+1 = 2 is a logical condition, an abstraction.

1+1=2 refers to the addition of two 'things'. So an example of multiple identical conditions would be the addition of two coins. No matter how many times you are given a US nickel and a US quarter, you end up with thirty cents (US).

East is a relative term and is not the condition of all sun "rises".  On the moon there is no sun rise.  On earth sunrise changes its "eastness" depending on date and location.

The "sun rises in the east" refers to Sol, the first appearance of Sol after nightfall (a period of relative darkness when Sol's position is beyond the curve of the planet) and it's progression across the sky (the portion of the planet's atmosphere visible by looking upward), on planet Earth (the planet we live on, not some other place co-incidentally called "Earth"), in the direction of the semi-circle of the compass designated "East" (which includes north-north-east, north-east, due-east, south-east, south-south-east, plus any minuscule division in between due north and due south on the east side of the direction circle you care to specify).

This leaves us with a series of identical conditions and outcomes of the sun rising in the east (as defined above).
 

Sweetness is a subjective attribute.

So what? It depends upon identical conditions - a chemical, a receptor, a neural system which presents a specific sensation to the subject. 
 

Electrons being "identical" in charge is an abstraction.  It would be my humble understanding that electron charge is subject to random quantum fluctuations.

The charge on an electron is always "-1". It is identical in every case.

Charge is subject to random flucuations.

Quantum tunneling is about position, not charge. The charge does not fluctuate. The wave function describes the probability of finding the election, not a smooth charge density. Wherever it is, it is a point charge.

Linda

 The charge on an electron is always "-1". It is identical in every case.


Quantum tunneling is about position, not charge. The charge does not fluctuate. The wave function describes the probability of finding the election, not a smooth charge density. Wherever it is, it is a point charge.

Linda

I guess you think that USD is "real money".  Watch Forex trading to understand that all moneys are varying second to second in value in actual practice.

I am not here to badger you.  However, the different between Materials Science where we know descriptive things comes first and foremost from measuring physical real-time objects, and how we think about their abstract versions (information) is at issue.  Abstractions can be fixed - real stuff is not.

A point charge is not a "real thing", such as is a repeated measurements of an actual electron's charge.  I don't think you are alone in your Idealized view of physics.

Point charge: an electric charge regarded as concentrated in a mathematical point, without spatial extent.

I guess you think that USD is "real money".  Watch Forex trading to understand that all moneys are varying second to second in value in actual practice.

Which does not matter to my example - a 5 cent coin is a 5 cent coin is a 5 cent coin, regardless of whatever it can be traded for from second to second. It could have been a marble and a toothbrush.

I am not here to badger you.  However, the different between Materials Science where we know descriptive things comes first and foremost from measuring physical real-time objects, and how we think about their abstract versions (information) is at issue.  Abstractions can be fixed - real stuff is not.

I gave you real-time physical examples of fixed conditions.

A point charge is not a "real thing", such as is a repeated measurements of an actual electron's charge.  I don't think you are alone in your Idealized view of physics.

An electron is a real thing. You're the one who tried to say something about it which was false - that its charge fluctuates. Yes, the explanation for why its charge does not fluctuate is an abstraction.

Why are you bringing up junk which is not relevant? If you don't have an answer to my or Paul's question, then just don't answer.

Linda

Maybe we could try this taking consciousness out of the picture.

What would a "free" event look like? How would its influence be known?

Is a butterfly flapping its wings a "free" event?

Linda

I can’t see how anyone can... I can’t. It may be that we just don’t yet have the right understanding of such observations, I don’t know, who does?  Take two carefully prepared Quantum entangled particles, I don’t understand how each of them can apparently be a complete individual, but always correlated over any spacelike or timelike separation, and that they cannot have had those correlated values before they were measured. We’ve ruled out hidden variables, or communications. Perhaps logic just breaks down at this level, perhaps there is a problem with our ideas of locality, perhaps there is some backwards causation affecting the source, etc... perhaps it’s all of these things, or perhaps none of them... and something quite different. Personally I think information is the most promising route for trying to gain some understanding of what underlies things like Quantum entanglement and Relativity.

So for me, random is best defined as “without understanding”, it’s not without some reasoning... quantum entanglement is a good example of something which behaves counterintuitively and is not well understood at a fundamental level, as I’ve explained above. It’s an example of the sort of thing that will require a major rethink, some new unification or generalisation. People are working on it.

They did have correlated values before they were measured, just not specific values. I don't know if I'd go down the "logic breaks down" path. That way lies madness.

I'm not sure what this has to do with the logical issue of what an uncaused event is like. I don't think we are going to discover that an uncaused event is actually somehow correlated with past events, yet those events have no causal effect on the final event. We might discover that some events we think are random are not, but that is different.

Anyhoo, it doesn't really matter. I'm happy to discard "random = not determined" for the sake of gaining an explanation of how these pesky free decisions are made. If someone wants to carve out of chunk of determinism and/or randomness to make room for free decisions, neither fls nor I will complain.

~~ Paul