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From: jqb@netcom.com (Jim Balter)
Subject: Re: A New Theory of Free Will -- continuation of an Open Letter to Professor Penrose
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Date: Mon, 12 Feb 1996 16:59:42 GMT
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In article <4f8onj$4mr@bud.shadow.net>,
Michael Cervantes  <cervante@shadow.net> wrote:
>Aaron Boyden <6500adb@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu> wrote:
>>The definition of determinism states no such thing.  Determinism merely 
>>states that every event is causally determined by prior factors.  As 
>>there is no equally clear definition of free will to be had, it is you 
>>who are mistaken in so confidently asserting that free will is 
>>incompatible with such determinism.  A long line of very able 
>>philosophers have disagreed with you.  It's quite possible that they were 
>>wrong, but you make them out to have been idiots, which they clearly were 
>>not.
>>
>No they weren't idiots, they were just wrong.

You are quite confused.  Philosophers who argued that determinism does not
contradict free will are certainly not rebutted by a demonstration that there
is no determinism.  The quality of discussion here would be helped immensely
if people would pay more attention to the direction of implications.  But
then, probably the most common lay logical error is to confuse a proposition
with its converse.

Additionally, compatibilist notions of free will cannot be wrong as a matter
of *fact*; compatibilism is fundamentally indifferent to the facts of physics
and human cognition.  One can debate whether it is *appropriate* to use the
phrase "free will" to describe what compatibilists mean by it, whether it
reasonably matches common, historical, and intuitive uses of the phrase.  This
debate is inherently philosophical, not factual.  Of course, this confusion is
easy to understand, since the linguistic nature of philosophical debate is not
widely recognized.

>The fact of human volition 
>entirely refutes the theory of determinism. The existence of the concepts 
>of validation, truth and proof show, absolutely, that volition is 
>incompatible with determinism. If my thought process were deterministic, 
>I would have no  ability to question it.

If your thought process is deterministic, you would have no *choice* but to
question it.  (It is fascinating how resistant people are to deconstructing
personal pronouns, even when their construction is the heart of the matter.)

>Only creatures with automatic forms of knowledge 
>could be deterministic. Humans possess almost nothing in the way of 
>instinct. Perhaps a gerbil's responses to situations are pre-determined 
>by their genetic pre-dispositions or prior experience, but we can see 
>humans in the act of evasion of reality and uncertainty, neither of which 
>is compatible with determinism. In fact, the whole of conceptual 
>consciousness is at odds with determinism, as humans don't even have 
>pre-formed concepts.

All this says is that, if human behavior is determined, it is determined
by external forces.

Anyway, we already know by QM that the future is undetermined.  But that
non-determinism is not related to free will, is not caused by free will, and
does not provide room for free will to operate.  If you want free will, it
should be the sort worth wanting, as discussed by Dennett in _Elbow Room_.
His discussion of the issues should be quite enlightening given the apparent
lack of familiarity with them displayed here.
-- 
<J Q B>

