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From: mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: A reall strange notion about the utility of words
Message-ID: <1219@umcp-cs.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 14-Aug-85 10:36:40 EDT
Article-I.D.: umcp-cs.1219
Posted: Wed Aug 14 10:36:40 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 18-Aug-85 21:59:37 EDT
References: <262@frog.UUCP> <1484@pyuxd.UUCP>
Organization: U of Maryland, Computer Science Dept., College Park, MD
Lines: 40

In article <1484@pyuxd.UUCP> rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen) writes:

>>>It is true that the meaning of the word unicorn as commonly used
>>>has been in existence for a long time.  However, that meaning
>>>is entirely useless!!  It does not describe a real thing that
>>>exists!  Thus, let's change the meaning of the word unicorn so
>>>that it becomes "useful".  Let's, say, make it equivalent to
>>>"horse".  There now we have unicorns.  And we all WANT to have
>>>unicorns, just like we want to have freedom, right?  So it must
>>>have been the "right" thing to do... [ROSEN]

>Exactly.  Free will as originally and continually defined and used in
>human discourse, like the word "unicorn", does not represent a real
>object.  We don't go changing the meaning of "unicorn" to "get" unicorns
>to exist.  The same with any other word.

By the same token, then, no one can talk about Newtonian mechanics, since
the theory is demonstably wrong?

I find this to be getting altogether silly.  First of all, it is not
established fact that human behavior is completely determined.  Second,
even if it were, there is great utility in wrong concepts.  The symbolic
value of unicorns is in fact of great import to psychology.  Newtonian
mechanics is wrong, but how it is wrong is quite well known, allowing it
to be used as an approximation.  Absolute determinism is almost certainly
wrong, but it is useful to talk about causes in most circumstances.

The whole problem with language here seems not to be with "freedom" but with
"will".  People have gotten in the habit of thinking of the Will of a person
as an object.  This almost immediately leads you into a metaphysical notion
of the Will, and thence into souls and spirits.  I think, however, that this
is an outmoded restriction upon the nature of Will.  It's entirely possible
that the Will (if you choose to believe in such a object) is purely a
process, which certainly accepts inputs from the outside, but which may or
may not have a core of information which is entirely self-derived.

Whether or not this is true, or even scientifically verifiable, is a subject
in a different discussion.

Charley Wingate    umcp-cs!mangoe