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From: minsky@ml.media.mit.edu (Marvin Minsky)
Subject: Re: A New Theory of Free Will -- continuation of an Open Letter to Professor Penrose
Message-ID: <1996Feb7.202949.21893@media.mit.edu>
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Date: Wed, 7 Feb 1996 20:29:49 GMT
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In <4f8onj$4mr@bud.shadow.net> Michael Cervantes <cervante@shadow.net> writes:
>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. 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. The fact of this debate 
>invalidates determinism. Only creatures with automatic forms of knowledge 
>could be deterministic. Humans possess almost nothing in the way of 

[snip]

I knew you'd say that.

--mm




