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From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Professor Wagstaff)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: Re: Rosen on reason, etc.
Message-ID: <616@pyuxd.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 3-Mar-85 16:44:13 EST
Article-I.D.: pyuxd.616
Posted: Sun Mar  3 16:44:13 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 5-Mar-85 02:55:26 EST
References: <147@ISM780B.UUCP> <5108@utzoo.UUCP>
Organization: Huxley College
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> What I thought Rosen was saying was that the notion of free will
> is linked to the notion of ``soul'' -- an ephemeral, non-physical
> ``self'' that is not influenced by physical things. This isn't
> what I thought that Torek was talking about. I think that the 2
> concepts are distinct.  [LAURA CREIGHTON]

Quite right.  Paul and I are in fact describing two different phenomena.
I have contended that the phenomena he describes has little or nothing to
do with "free will" except in that he gives it that same name.

> I also thought that Rosen implied that one had to freely choose to
> have free will -- something which I do not think Torek ever implied.
> I think that Torek implied that you are stuck (``condemned'' in
> Jean Paul Sartre's view) with freedom.

I neither said nor implied any such thing.  Besides, to be able to
freely choose (?) to have free will, one would have to HAVE free will.
The very fact that you ARE "stuck" with "freedom" (i.e., the decision
making apparatus that determines, based on any number of internal and
external factors) makes true free will impossible.

> I do not think that predictability (or lack of same) is the same as
> free will. For instance, it would be very easy for someone who knows me
> to predict that I will do laundry on Sundays -- I always do it then. However,
> I don't think that the predictability of this action means that I am not
> free to do laundry some other day or to not do laundry and wear dirty
> clothes. It may be meaningful to say that I am not free to buy new
> clothes and thus never do laundry nor wear dirty clothes (since I cannot
> afford this) or that I am not free to go to work nude (since I would
> face imprisonment) -- but that the probability is near 100% that I
> will do laundry Sunday does not seem to limit my freedom - as long as
> there are alternatives which I *could have chosen*. Are you saying that
> I could not have chosen otherwise but merely feel that I could have?

The question really is:  given what you are at a given moment, and given
your external influencing environment, it is predictable (though human
beings may themselves not have all the variables and information to do
such predicting) what action you will take.  One variable in the equation
is that you "always" do laundry on Sundays.  Another may be that you have
an event to go to this Sunday that will take all day, and you don't have
a thing to wear at this late date.  Another may be that it's raining, or
you're ill, or you want to watch Berlin Alexanderplatz and it's only showing
this Sunday and you have to spend the whole day watching it.  Insert all
those (and probably many many more) into the equation to get the "predictable"
answer.  From our perspective, such an equation may be unsolvable.
-- 
Anything's possible, but only a few things actually happen.
					Rich Rosen    pyuxd!rlr