Free Will

[Dent]

Originally Posted by Mr. Mistoffelees

We can observe the state of a neuron, and there is no reason to doubt that in the future we can take a complete snapshot of the state of the brain, if we can't already.

Since when have we been able to precisely observe the state of electrons? doesn't Heisenberg say that you can't take a snapshot?

Here's the transcript from the video above

Wright: And you can say that we are future alterers at least in the sense that if we had not evolved with capacities we have for harm avoidance the future would have been otherwise.

Daniel Dennett: And you have to be very careful when you talk about future alterers. Because what are you going to change the future from what to what?

Wright: But you can talk about what it would have been had I not evolved my whatever it was I used to avoid harm. But of course the reply you get from people is: yes, but you are still saying that given the fact that I have evolved these things given the condition in which I wake up this morning, in the way my brain is inclined to use these things the future is inevitable... you certainly hear this as a reply.

Daniel Dennett: You certainly do but I am going to say: but what on earth do you mean by "the future is inevitable"?

Wright: If you knew that an omniscient being could predict what's going to happen today and there is no possibility that I will behave in a way that is going to falsify that prediction. That's what people mean.

Daniel Dennett: First of all that would be true, if I understand you right, in an undeterministic universe too.

Wright: No. In that universe the omniscient being would do the calculation and go I think this is gonna happen, but caprice enters the picture magically...

Daniel Dennett: No the omniscient being is going to know the future.

Wright: Well no, omniscient about the present I mean and the laws that govern the present.

Daniel Dennett: So you mean a laplacian genius?

Wright: Yes a laplacian calculator but, lo and behold, t + 1 after the prediction is made, caprice enters the picture from we know not where, that's the traditional conception of free will.

Daniel Dennett: That's A traditional conception of free will and what I'm arguing is that is gratuitous... The motivation people have imagined for it is simply mistaken. Allowing for quantum indeterminacy or shall we call it laplacian determinacy does not give you any more powers any more freedom any more avoidable any more evitability than you have in a deterministic world. It's just an illusion to think that it does.

0:24:48.000

Wright: You say in the book, and this is maybe one example, that free will lacks - your conception of the kind of free will that is viable - lacks some of the tradition properties associated with free will. have we already covered all the trad properties or are there other things that people are going to have to let go of?

Daniel Dennett: Other people may make that choice. What I claim is that all the varieties of free will that are wanting we can have in a deterministic world. I can define varieties of free will that are incompatible with determinism but they're pointless. They don't give you anything that matters. They aren't needed for moral responsibility. They aren't needed to give your life meaning. They are completely gratuitous, sort of bizarre metaphysical conceits they don't pull their weight, you don't need them, who cares.

Wright: I have to admit I have never been able to full conceive of free will even though it feels like I have it but if you try and draw a graph of it you will run into trouble. I can imagine determinism, I can imagine a determined system, I can kinda imagine a random one although that's actually harder than it seems but freewill is a slightly fuzzy concept.

0:26:09.000
But on the issue of quantum physics though, I wanted to raise a second dimension of quantum physics that might enter the picture. As I understand what you are saying about quantum physics and free will is .... first we should say that according to quantum physics there is such a thing as truly indeterminate. At the quantum level, very microscopic level, things happen that you could not in principle predict even if you have all the information in the physical universe.

Daniel Dennett: That's right.

Wright: As Richard Feynman put it: "Nature herself does not know what she is going to do next" at the quantum level. some people have tried to use that to bring free will into the picture because it is antideterministic. I think I agree with you that lots of random fluctuations even in the brain, if you are truly random, don't amount to what people usually mean by free will.

Daniel Dennett: Good! So we don't need randomness, or at least, randomness can't give us free will.

Wright: If it's true randomness you would think not. On the other hand I would say one thing about quantum physics is you can't really know if random is the right word if you don't know what is causing the thing.

Daniel Dennett: Well no but that's what random means in quantum physics. No hidden variables.

[THEINCREDIBLEdork]

Originally Posted by Dent

Since when have we been able to precisely observe the state of electrons? doesn't Heisenberg say that you can't take a snapshot?

Here's the transcript from the video above

A neuron is a cell in your brain. Well, maybe not in your brain.

electron /= neuron