The Solution to the Problem of the Freedom of the Will

This seems related to the issue of free will and I find it interesting:

He uses the popular videogame Halo as a simplified analogy. 

But note that nowhere in his description of the analogy does he address the question of how decisions are made in the higher reference frame. If those decisions are not free, then the agents in the lower reference frame only have the illusion of being free. Is that satisfying?

~~ Paul

I haven't heard even the slightest attempt at a how. It's almost as if the inability to explain how it might work is the very thing that makes people believe it is indeterministic and free (yet somehow related to my wants and desires). If you cannot give a hint of an example of making such a decision, why would you choose to believe there is such a thing?

As far as a proof that random = not deterministic, I still take that as the definition of random. Again, until someone can explain how something can be not determined yet also not completely arbitrary, why would I abandon that definition? However, as I've said, I'm happy to suspend that definition for purposes of discussion. Then we are back to what I said in the preceding paragraph.

~~ Paul

Hmmm...well on Skeptiko we'd already been around this bend. Before someone needs to explain how something can be not determined yet also not arbitrary one needs to answer why anyone would think things are determined - by which I mean why causal relationships are indications of necessity in Nature rather than dispositions.

I can find the old convo and link back to it if you'd like? IIRC it contains Feser's points about causation coming from a Prime Mover and how this can explain both natural regularity and free will.

Hmmm...well on Skeptiko we'd already been around this bend. Before someone needs to explain how something can be not determined yet also not arbitrary one needs to answer why anyone would think things are determined - by which I mean why causal relationships are indications of necessity in Nature rather than dispositions.

I don't see why this has to be answered. To whatever degree an event is not determined, it is arbitrary. Using the term disposition doesn't help, except to act as a word in which to hide the proposed nonrandom indeterminism.

I can find the old convo and link back to it if you'd like? IIRC it contains Feser's points about causation coming from a Prime Mover and how this can explain both natural regularity and free will.

I don't recall anything interesting in the Prime Mover concept except that it acts as yet another word in which to hide the proposed phenomenon. However, if there is some particular passage from Fesser that you feel explains the phenomenon (as opposed to simply suggesting a source of it), why not post that passage and we can discuss it?

~~ Paul

I don't see why this has to be answered. To whatever degree an event is not determined, it is arbitrary. Using the term disposition doesn't help, except to act as a word in which to hide the proposed nonrandom indeterminism.

Sorry Paul but you're jumping the gun here. Why is any event not determined inherently arbitrary? Dispositional causation, versues necessity, actually makes a huge difference.

But we've had this exact conversation before...perhaps you could start by explaining what it means for A to be the cause of B?

I don't recall anything interesting in the Prime Mover concept except that it acts as yet another word in which to hide the proposed phenomenon. However, if there is some particular passage from Fesser that you feel explains the phenomenon (as opposed to simply suggesting a source of it), why not post that passage and we can discuss it?

Except accepting a Prime Mover as the answer to why there is causation removes the idea of determinism as something inherent to the natural order. All causation is then either set into place by the Prime Mover by instilling final causes or left up to conscious agents by the grace of the Prime Mover. 

But before we worry about a Prime Mover I'd like to know the explanation for causation that you have, starting with the above -> What does it mean for A to be the cause of B?

Sorry Paul but you're jumping the gun here. Why is any event not determined inherently arbitrary? Dispositional causation, versues necessity, actually makes a huge difference.

But we've had this exact conversation before...perhaps you could start by explaining what it means for A to be the cause of B?

It doesn't matter, because I said that I am willing to suspend my belief that random means not determined (up in post #30). I agree we have had this conversation before and I am trying to move on.

Except accepting a Prime Mover as the answer to why there is causation removes the idea of determinism as something inherent to the natural order. All causation is then either set into place by the Prime Mover by instilling final causes or left up to conscious agents by the grace of the Prime Mover.

Excellent. So by what method does a conscious agent freely decide which cause to produce? And if the effect is not bound to occur by that cause,* what other causes are involved?

~~ Paul

* By which I think we mean that the agent's cause is counterfactual.

But before we worry about a Prime Mover I'd like to know the explanation for causation that you have, starting with the above -> What does it mean for A to be the cause of B?

I'd rather discuss your model than mine. However, I would never say that A is the cause of B. There are various causes of B. It is almost surely impossible to list all the causes of B; that is, we cannot list the sufficient causes of B. We can certainly list some necessary causes, as is the case with counterfactual causes:

if A had not occurred, B would not have occurred

None of this addresses the question of what it means to have an event B with no causes. But because we cannot list the sufficient causes of B, perhaps we should not even suggest that there can be an event with no causes. That's fine with me. I'm happy to drop the entire question of random events.

However, none of this helps me understand what it means for an agent to make a free decision.

~~ Paul

But note that nowhere in his description of the analogy does he address the question of how decisions are made in the higher reference frame. If those decisions are not free, then the agents in the lower reference frame only have the illusion of being free. Is that satisfying?

~~ Paul

You evidently believe that consciousness is knowable through rational analysis and that it is the result of physical neural data processing (correct me it I am wrong in this).

Arvan believes that the essence of consciousness is probably unknowable by humans, a sort of mysterianism in philosophy. I think this is a reasonable position. It is certainly espoused by a number of leading philosophers starting with William James, and the mystery of free will is then part of that greater mystery of consciousness itself that can't be constrained by deterministic versus arbitrary randomness arguments and our other apparent logical dichotomies. 

Perhaps we inherently just can't know "what it means for an agent to make a free decision". In other words, this runs into an inherent limit to the insight of a conscious agent in trying to understand the innermost nature of its own being.

And there is no particular reason to suppose freedom of will on the part of the user or participator in the simulation (which is outside the reality of our universe frame of reference) is mere imagination, as there may be in the physical world with the apparent conundrum of seemingly having to choose between observed in physics determinism or observed random indeterminism (not considering for the time being the various other arguments against positing that forced choice).

Arvan proposes seven sub-hypotheses, and supports them with good arguments. The fourth is mind-body dualism: the hypothesis that the mind, or at least certain properties of it, is non-physical and fundamentally qualitative in nature, irreducible to structure.

He points out that there is presently some serious evidence for all of these sub-hypotheses including mind-body dualism, and describes some of that evidence. 

"Mind-body dualism has what appears to have an increasing number of defenders in philosophy, due to the simple observation that whereas all physical objects and properties appear to relationally definable (e.g. an electron is that which obeys certain equations, mass is that which warps space-time, etc.), properties of conscious experience (e.g. what red looks like) are so simple that they are utterly indescribable, nonrelational, and therefore a fundamentally different kind of thing than all physical objects or properties."
.......................................................................

"I do believe, however, that we can know the answer to one important question: which is that, if we are in a P2P simulation, there is one fundamental sense in which it differs from the kinds of simulations (P2P or otherwise) that we have constructed in our world: simulations such as Halo, Call of Duty, The Sims, and so on. Notice that all of these simulations are mere structure. That is, they are generated by quantitative data. The data and network coding that comprise, say, the online world of Halo are just that: programs.

Human consciousness, on the other hand, is – if philosophers who defend mind-body dualism are correct (and I think they are) – fundamentally qualitative in nature. It cannot be reduced to mere structure. Somehow, if we are living in an otherwise functional analogue to a P2P simulation, the qualitative features of human consciousness play a fundamental role in a way that has no obvious analogue in the simulations we have created." 

He concludes: 

"Finally, the P2P Hypothesis is falsifiable, thus qualifying as a legitimate empirical theory. It implies, at least in its present form, four distinct empirical predictions. It implies that:
(a) The Holographic Principle will be verified.
(b) Lattice quantum chromodynamics (LQCD) will be verified.
(c) We should observe minute and unpredictable violations of the quantum wavefunction in human brains (resulting from free choices in a higher reference-frame).
(d) There should be error-correction codes embedded in the fundamental structure of our world."

You evidently believe that consciousness is knowable through rational analysis and that it is the result of physical neural data processing (correct me it I am wrong in this).

I do, but it doesn't matter for this discussion.

Arvan believes that the essence of consciousness is probably unknowable by humans, a sort of mysterianism in philosophy. I think this is a reasonable position. It is certainly espoused by a number of leading philosophers starting with William James, and the mystery of free will is then part of that greater mystery of consciousness itself that can't be constrained by deterministic versus arbitrary randomness arguments and our other apparent logical dichotomies.

Perhaps we inherently just can't know "what it means for an agent to make a free decision". In other words, this runs into an inherent limit to the insight of a conscious agent in trying to understand the innermost nature of its own being.

I don't think the question has much to do with consciousness. I would like to hear a description of how an agent can make a free decision, regardless of whether that agent is conscious and regardless of what consciousness might be. I think this is a logical problem.

And there is no particular reason to suppose freedom of will on the part of the user or participator in the simulation (which is outside the reality of our universe frame of reference) is mere imagination, as there may be in the physical world with the apparent conundrum of seemingly having to choose between observed in physics determinism or observed random indeterminism (not considering for the time being the various other arguments against positing that forced choice).

I'm willing to consider a third possibility, other than determinism or true randomness. What I am waiting for is a coherent description of how such a third decision-making method might work. I don't need a flowchart. I'm just looking for some hand-waving that sounds plausible.

If all I get is, "well, we might not be capable of explaining it," then I don't see why I should go for it. Because, by that criterion, I should go for everything.

~~ Paul

I'd rather discuss your model than mine. However, I would never say that A is the cause of B. There are various causes of B. It is almost surely impossible to list all the causes of B; that is, we cannot list the sufficient causes of B. We can certainly list some necessary causes, as is the case with counterfactual causes:

if A had not occurred, B would not have occurred

None of this addresses the question of what it means to have an event B with no causes. But because we cannot list the sufficient causes of B, perhaps we should not even suggest that there can be an event with no causes. That's fine with me. I'm happy to drop the entire question of random events.

However, none of this helps me understand what it means for an agent to make a free decision.

~~ Paul

But a free decision isn't causeless? That would just be causally random, something I don't personally believe in as it's just arbitrary. However it seems to me that your assumption of determinism is just as arbitrary. I mean I don't understand why we can't list the causes of an effect? Unless you're saying Everything is the cause of Everything That Happens Next? But even then I don't see what fixes the state o Everything That Happens Next?

What is it about cause A (whatever you want to include in that set) that results in effect B? Why not effect C? Why not B sometimes and C sometimes?

It seems your assumptions are it's arbitrarily consistent or inconsistent, meaning this deterministic/randomness dichotomy is just taken on faith?

Rather than going down the same path to same conversation we've had at least once, if not more, I'd rather pin down what we're talking about when we talk about Causation.

I don't think the question has much to do with consciousness. I would like to hear a description of how an agent can make a free decision, regardless of whether that agent is conscious and regardless of what consciousness might be. I think this is a logical problem.

It has everything to do with consciousness. We are talking about the action of will in a conscious human being who makes a decision, whether it is free or not. This will is one of the properties of conscious awareness and intentionality, not of non-conscious mechanisms. "Will, generally, is that faculty of the mind which intentionally selects, at the moment of decision, the strongest desire from among the various desires present." (Wiki)
Decisions can also be made by non-conscious mechanisms like computers, but that isn't relevant.