Neuroscience and free will

"Indeterminate", or "random", as a scientific discovery, is about as far from a hand wave as you can get, given that the last 100 years have been spent in intensive philosophizing, theorizing and experimenting in attempts to find a cause or other explanation. As a category, it's markedly robust.

Linda

There seems to me to be a giant chasm between indeterminate and random.  Conflating them seems a giant hand wave.

I'm assuming you've read the thread carefully.  Paul seems to be comfortable, at least conceptually, with the concept of random going so far as to eliminate the possibility that the random phenomena in question does not have an "as yet not understood" cause.

On the other hand, he seems very uncomfortable with the concept of free will as he has not found a satisfying description of the logical steps that would entail one making a free decision.

My question is somewhat simple: What would a description be of the logical steps behind a random event?  Seems there will not be a logically satisfying description forthcoming.

So why the angst of being unable to describe the "process" for free will while having none of the same angst for the equally intractable description for random?

There seems to me to be a giant chasm between indeterminate and random.  Conflating them seems a giant hand wave.

I suppose it would to someone who by their own admission has difficulty understanding it.

I'm assuming you've read the thread carefully.  Paul seems to be comfortable, at least conceptually, with the concept of random going so far as to eliminate the possibility that the random phenomena in question does not have an "as yet not understood" cause.

Yes, I don’t think it makes much of a difference (for the purposes of understanding “free”) whether a phenomenon is really indeterminate or effectively indeterminate.

On the other hand, he seems very uncomfortable with the concept of free will as he has not found a satisfying description of the logical steps that would entail one making a free decision.

My question is somewhat simple: What would a description be of the logical steps behind a random event?  Seems there will not be a logically satisfying description forthcoming.

So why the angst of being unable to describe the "process" for free will while having none of the same angst for the equally intractable description for random?

First, I don’t think the description is intractable. I suspect the difficulty seen here is that people are looking for a space in which “free” may be hidden, which makes it desirable to withhold consent for any particular definition.

The description for indeterminate is here:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncertainty_principle
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Born_rule
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell%27s_theorem

Paul has repeatedly given an effectively indeterminate description of a random event - "flipping a coin".

The request for logic steps, or a description, or...something...is to get people to actually address what they are proposing in a way which is different from vague references to “it feels free” and “it feels like my will” and “it feels like there are alternative options”, and “determinism is complicated anyways”.

Linda

There seems to me to be a giant chasm between indeterminate and random.  Conflating them seems a giant hand wave.

Yeah it seems to me one could, as an abstraction, have events bound by something so that things happen by necessity. That we'd called determinism.

Then, OTOH, you have "hyperchaos", where anything could happen. That would be randomness in a genuine sense.

So you have this wide middle ground, a spectrum really of increasing degrees of freedom, and it's there that we can see the "indeterminate".

But then it seems quite obvious that there's a space in the middle ground that would be externally observed and judged to be of neither extreme. Of course none of this tells us anything about events as things-in-themselves but it avoids the confusion of thinking determinism and randomness, as usually thought of, are discussing the Real rather than a mere model.

My question is somewhat simple: What would a description be of the logical steps behind a random event?  Seems there will not be a logically satisfying description forthcoming.

Inner cause, or Final Cause. Also probably Material Cause, since the substance has to be of something that contributes to observed randomness.

See Feser's take -> Causality and radioactive decay

So why the angst of being unable to describe the "process" for free will while having none of the same angst for the equally intractable description for random?

I'm still trying to understand this myself, as I don't see the problem, though if the question is how [free will] fits into the space of the world I am waiting to hear what's wrong with Tallis' essays How Can I Possibly be Free? & What Neuroscience Cannot Tell Us about Ourselves.

Maybe Whitehead's process philosophy is the answer to the question of "process"?

Admittedly I suspect there is only mental causation so I'm at the other extreme in this conversation...

Nope, it is not fine... entanglement produces correlation between the measurements... at which point the particles are not entangled...

You're trying to say you know some information about the carefully prepared entangled particles before they are measured. That's not possible, they are undetermined, what you are saying is rubbish. The measurement changes the particles state... and it's that state which we find to be correlated... suggesting you know something about the particles information during entanglement (before you measure) is trying to force quantum mechanics into your classical view of the world.

Now you're just calling me a liar.

How can the measurement be correlated if the states are not correlated before that?

~~ Paul

I guess this is why I find Paul's struggle a bit nonsensical.  He struggles to give any credence to the abstract notion of free will because a logical description of it can not be provided.  How is that different than the abstract concept of "random", especially if one is unwilling to accept Max's "not yet understood" definition?

It is entirely straightforward to say that a random event has no causal precursors and so is arbitrary.

But, sure, let's say random means not yet understood. How does that help you produce a description of how a free choice is made?

I'm assuming you've read the thread carefully.  Paul seems to be comfortable, at least conceptually, with the concept of random going so far as to eliminate the possibility that the random phenomena in question does not have an "as yet not understood" cause.

Oh, I'm quite sure there are some random events whose cause we will eventually discover. But I very much doubt that, say, alpha decay will one of them. And even if we find a cause for every random event, I still need a description of how some of those could be free decisions on the part of some agent.

On the other hand, he seems very uncomfortable with the concept of free will as he has not found a satisfying description of the logical steps that would entail one making a free decision.

I haven't even heard anyone venture a description. But I remain alert.

My question is somewhat simple: What would a description be of the logical steps behind a random event?  Seems there will not be a logically satisfying description forthcoming.

Then why would I decide to believe in free will? See quote below.

So why the angst of being unable to describe the "process" for free will while having none of the same angst for the equally intractable description for random?

As random event is one with no causal precursors. Thus it is arbitrary, perhaps with some nonuniform outcome probabilities. As fls noted, we have decades of study of random processes, even using them for such things are selecting lottery numbers. We have not found any hints that alpha decay, for example, is nonrandom.

~~ Paul

You wish to claim that you know information about the entangled particles before you measure them, that is not possible, for anyone. It is the measurements of the particles which are found to be correlated. That measurement ends the particles entanglement and produces a change in the state of the particles, and it is this measured state that we find to be correlated between both particles.

I am making no such claim. I am saying that the quantum states of the particles are correlated, not the values of their properties. I've repeated this at least half a dozen times.

It's perfectly acceptable to say the measurements are correlated. It's not acceptable for you to say you know information about the singlet before you measure it. That is nutty. It's you who raised this issue, by attempting to correct me with claims that contain errors. It is you who is insisting on pursuing it, if you want to let it drop, it's fine by me.

Please quote me where I said that I know information about the particles before measurement. I corrected my initial statement (they did have correlated values before they were measured, just not specific values), which was admittedly confusing.

So, you didn't answer my question:

How can the measurement be correlated if the states are not correlated before that?

~~ Paul