Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site pyuxd.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!gamma!pyuxww!pyuxd!rlr From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen) Newsgroups: net.philosophy,net.religion Subject: Re: Is what Torek calls "free will" really "free"? Message-ID: <1230@pyuxd.UUCP> Date: Wed, 17-Jul-85 18:51:14 EDT Article-I.D.: pyuxd.1230 Posted: Wed Jul 17 18:51:14 1985 Date-Received: Thu, 18-Jul-85 20:27:24 EDT References: <6156@umcp-cs.UUCP> <1041@pyuxd.UUCP> <3@umcp-cs.UUCP> <1208@pyuxd.UUCP> <1043@ames.UUCP> Organization: Whatever we're calling ourselves this week Lines: 94 Xref: watmath net.philosophy:2059 net.religion:7250 >>> 1. No one chooses all the influences on her development. >>> 2. [implicit] Unless one has a choice in all the influences on >>> one's development, one's later actions are not free choices. >>> 3. Therefore, no one has "free will". >>> I deny premise 2. [TOREK] >>Good for you!! Your denying it doesn't change its veracity one bit. Since >>free means "independent of external influences, unfettered, etc.", and since >>you now seem to at least agree that such things directly influence later >>choices, THEY ARE QUITE SIMPLY *NOT* *FREE*!!! It's that simple. No matter >>how much you choose to use the word "free" to describe them. You put it >>very well yourself: Unless one has a choice in ALL the influences of one's >>development (and life), which one obviously cannot, one's later actions are >>NOT free choices! [ROSEN] > 'Scuse me for butting in, but I think I see the seeds of agreement > between the two of you in the above quote. If disagreement over premise > "2" is all that separates you, then perhaps I can help. > Rich, you seem to define "free" the way I'd define "absolutely > free" - i.e., if there are *any* constraints limiting one's choices in > any way, then that choice is not "free", by your definition. [BARRY] That's the definition. Any good dictionary will vouch for that. > Paul, you seem to consider a choice "free" as long as there is > any element of the choice that is not completely constrained by external > factors. Which elements might THEY be? The whole argument talks about how ALL the elements in the choices are (at the very least) indirectly constrained by their original external causes and influences! > Up 'til now, I had understood Rich to be arguing that there are > *no* elements of choice in any decision, that constraint was complete. > If this *is* your position, Rich, then never mind; your disagreement > with Paul is real, and I can't settle it, though I'd take Paul's side > in the debate. > But by contesting Paul's rejection of premise "2" above, I infer > that you concede that there can be undetermined factors in a choice, > but disagree that this is sufficient cause to use the label "free will" > to characterize such choices. Only complete freedom from constraint will > satisfy your definition of "free will". If so, then it seems to me your only > disagreement is over the proper definition of "free will", not its existence. > Using Paul's definition, you'd both agree it exists; using Rich's, you'd > both agree it doesn't. So, where's the beef? "My" definition is not "mine", as so many people seem to want to call it. It is the definition found in the dictionary, and it is also the definition about which philosophers have debated free will for centuries. If you want to change it to mean something else (say, Paul's definition), then that's a different story. I can get god to exist by changing the definition of god to "a VAX 11/780 computer system". (Or can I?) Furthermore, as I described above, the other so-called internal factors had been internalized through a non-free process: their incorporation of external information and experience into the brain, compounded AGAIN by the fact that the state of the brain AT THAT TIME influences the way in which the incorporation takes place. None of that qualifies as "free". > I can't resist adding that your definition of free will seems > unduly restrictive, Rich. Sorry. Tell that to those people thousands of years ago who defined the notion. The fact that the restrictiveness of a definition causes it not to represent a real thing doesn't mean you change the definition to "mean" a new thing so that you can claim that the term represents a real thing. It just means you accept the fact that the term does NOT represent a real thing AS IT HAD BEEN DEFINED, and you go on to something else, perhaps using a new term (like "rational evaluative analysis") that DOES describe something that DOES happen. > Were I to use an analogous definition of "random", > I would have to conclude that an honest roulette wheel is *not* random, > since it is constrained to come up with one of the numbers inscribed > on the wheel, and no other. If you had the ability to monitor all the conditions in the room, the starting point and speed of the wheel, the angle and position of the deposit of the ball, etc., it most certainly would not be "random", and in fact it is not. It is determined by a whole bunch of factors. We may be unable to use all those factors to analyze and make a determination, but that's rather anthropocentric to claim that because WE can't do it, it's "random". > In any case, I can't see the point of debating > free will ad infinitum if the only difference of opinion between you > is what the correct use of the term is. That's what I said six months ago. The debate since then has really revolved around Paul's new definitions of "free", which were discussed at length in other articles. It seems Paul equivalences "free" with "the ability to make rational decisions", and I honestly have no idea where that notion comes from, other than perhaps a desire to have free will exist at all cost. -- Anything's possible, but only a few things actually happen. Rich Rosen pyuxd!rlr