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Not that I agree with the GP, but non-determinism doesn’t imply free will in the usual strong sense of the phrase (e.g. that there is some intrinsic notion that

Not that I agree with the GP, but non-determinism doesn’t imply free will in the usual strong sense of the phrase (e.g. that there is some intrinsic notion that humans can directly dictate their own actions). Non-determinism (as in QM non-determinism) still has deterministic evolution, since specifying the wave-function at any one point in time is enough to specify it for all of time via evolution by the Schrödinger equation. So, this notion would require something stronger than QM non-determinism, or a different definition of free will.

Erlich_Bachman 9y ago
> specifying the wave-function at any one point in time is enough to specify it for all of time via evolution by the Schrödinger equation. Scientifically this is not very correct when you consider the chaos theory, which has been widely accepted by physicists for many decades now. The problem is in practical application (and we live in a practical world, right?). The thing is that in theory, yes you can have some equation or elaborate mathematical model about the world and calculate everything. But once you start doing it, you immediately will see that it is impossible to calculate anything to such precision that this would work, the world is so big and complex that to calculate an X amount of world into the future, you would need Y (>X) amount of world to host those calcaultions. This is only the tip of the iceberg of why that is impossible. So in practice, it is impossible to "specify it for all of time". This is not just some logical trick, this is an important difference. It's the same principle that applies in the Turtle-Achilles paradox (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeno%27s_paradoxes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeno%27s_paradoxes). In the perfect logical world of perfect science and nice beautiful theories and equations - Achilles can never possibly reach the turtle. And yet in the physical reality that we live in it's obvious to anyone (and is truthful) that Achilles will easily reach and overrun the turtle. On a related note, what is your definition of free will? People with similar SamHarris-esque arguments seem so happy that they have proven that there is no "free will", and yet it seems they have a difficult time defining what it is they have proven? Isn't this a problem if they are trying to be scientific? Would a perfect scientist ever entertain such vague concepts? "intrinsic notion that humans can directly dictate their own actions" is very vague. Specifically, I can't see any place where even perfect determinism would conflict with this notion: a human is a very complicated deterministic neural network, that analyses the world and does some actions. This whole network processes information, and makes decisions based on that information. Based on that information it does directly dictate it's own actions. Of course those actions are going to be in part based on external information, but in part on the structure and form and function of the network itself. You're not going to find any single neuron that decides everything, but it's very clear that the whole network decides things. Do you have a disdain for the fact that actions are being based on external stimulus? That this somehow is a problem for free will existing? But of course we would want them being based on external stimulus, that surely must be a part of being sentient? Reacting to something that happens in the world, not just blindly "choosing" random things for the sake of choosing? And of course "based on external stimuli" - does not mean that the way it's going to react to them it "pre-determined" by something. The network can choose to react to stimuli from right now, or from yesterday, or from some other part of memory, or even from it's own thoughts or definitions. Those are also stimuli. It's obvious to any sentient human that sometimes we do react and act based on such things, not simply on currently active external stimuli.
- LolWolf 9y ago
  I'm... not really sure what argument is being presented here. There's some weird accusations of vagueness, yet I see no proposition for a definition of free will here (and in the original comment, there was never attempt to provide one, since it had little to do with the content of the comment as a response to a tiny claim made in a sentence or so), and I just see a lot of random attacks against a position I don't even hold ("People with similar SamHarris-esque arguments seem so happy that they have proven that there is no "free will"", "Do you have a disdain for the fact that actions are being based on external stimulus?" the latter of which I have no idea if I even understand). So what's the point? If you'd like to reason with me, at least give me a starting point, rather than accusing a comment I wrote in less than a minute of not being "scientific" because it doesn't define all of the terms it makes use of; even if the statement within it is correct with most definitions, discarding chaos theory and ‘practicality’ issues (which the statement above is totally unconcerned with).
  - Erlich_Bachman 9y ago
    Well I'm sorry you feel attacked. The arguments (even though written in a quite short form in your post) are indicative of a much bigger and broader discussion taking place right now in the intellectual/philosophical world. This gives people the ability to infer a lot of information from even small statements, because the exact forms and phrases that you use are used in exact same manner by other people who have gone much deeper into this discussion and have a lot of thoughts about these things. Sometimes on the internet one has to infer, because otherwise you would need every participant to first write a 100pages essay of all of their thoughts about the matter, before anything can be reliably responded to them without inferring. In this case it seems you don't wish to have a well structured and formulated position with deeply going implications into this matter, which I inferred from your post. I guess sometimes inferring just backfires. Coming back to having some kind of grounded argument, I would say that > Non-determinism (as in QM non-determinism) still has deterministic evolution, since specifying the wave-function at any one point in time is enough to specify it for all of time via evolution by the Schrödinger equation. is not really the case. Specifying anything in this matter (including evolution) works in theory and not in practice. There is no physically viable way to do this. Since science deals with physical reality first and foremost (math does not, but we talk about physics and the nature of reality, right?) - then scientifically that statement does not make a lot of sense. It is in fact not enough to specify the wave-function in such a way as to specify it for all time via evolution. This is the essence of Turtle-Achilles paradox and more prominently Chaos Theory, which has been an established paradigm of science for many decades now. You write that "discarding chaos theory the statement is correct". Well, yes perhaps. It's about the same as to say "discarding Einstein's relativity, one could easily travel faster than the speed of light". Chaos theory describes the real world, better in this regards than other theories we have. It's not enough to just discard it: you will end up with faulty reasoning...

Erlich_Bachman 9y ago

> specifying the wave-function at any one point in time is enough to specify it for all of time via evolution by the Schrödinger equation. Scientifically this is not very correct when you consider the chaos theory, which has been widely accepted by physicists for many decades now. The problem is in practical application (and we live in a practical world, right?). The thing is that in theory, yes you can have some equation or elaborate mathematical model about the world and calculate everything. But once you start doing it, you immediately will see that it is impossible to calculate anything to such precision that this would work, the world is so big and complex that to calculate an X amount of world into the future, you would need Y (>X) amount of world to host those calcaultions. This is only the tip of the iceberg of why that is impossible. So in practice, it is impossible to "specify it for all of time". This is not just some logical trick, this is an important difference. It's the same principle that applies in the Turtle-Achilles paradox (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeno%27s_paradoxes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeno%27s_paradoxes). In the perfect logical world of perfect science and nice beautiful theories and equations - Achilles can never possibly reach the turtle. And yet in the physical reality that we live in it's obvious to anyone (and is truthful) that Achilles will easily reach and overrun the turtle. On a related note, what is your definition of free will? People with similar SamHarris-esque arguments seem so happy that they have proven that there is no "free will", and yet it seems they have a difficult time defining what it is they have proven? Isn't this a problem if they are trying to be scientific? Would a perfect scientist ever entertain such vague concepts? "intrinsic notion that humans can directly dictate their own actions" is very vague. Specifically, I can't see any place where even perfect determinism would conflict with this notion: a human is a very complicated deterministic neural network, that analyses the world and does some actions. This whole network processes information, and makes decisions based on that information. Based on that information it does directly dictate it's own actions. Of course those actions are going to be in part based on external information, but in part on the structure and form and function of the network itself. You're not going to find any single neuron that decides everything, but it's very clear that the whole network decides things. Do you have a disdain for the fact that actions are being based on external stimulus? That this somehow is a problem for free will existing? But of course we would want them being based on external stimulus, that surely must be a part of being sentient? Reacting to something that happens in the world, not just blindly "choosing" random things for the sake of choosing? And of course "based on external stimuli" - does not mean that the way it's going to react to them it "pre-determined" by something. The network can choose to react to stimuli from right now, or from yesterday, or from some other part of memory, or even from it's own thoughts or definitions. Those are also stimuli. It's obvious to any sentient human that sometimes we do react and act based on such things, not simply on currently active external stimuli.

LolWolf 9y ago
I'm... not really sure what argument is being presented here. There's some weird accusations of vagueness, yet I see no proposition for a definition of free will here (and in the original comment, there was never attempt to provide one, since it had little to do with the content of the comment as a response to a tiny claim made in a sentence or so), and I just see a lot of random attacks against a position I don't even hold ("People with similar SamHarris-esque arguments seem so happy that they have proven that there is no "free will"", "Do you have a disdain for the fact that actions are being based on external stimulus?" the latter of which I have no idea if I even understand). So what's the point? If you'd like to reason with me, at least give me a starting point, rather than accusing a comment I wrote in less than a minute of not being "scientific" because it doesn't define all of the terms it makes use of; even if the statement within it is correct with most definitions, discarding chaos theory and ‘practicality’ issues (which the statement above is totally unconcerned with).
- Erlich_Bachman 9y ago
  Well I'm sorry you feel attacked. The arguments (even though written in a quite short form in your post) are indicative of a much bigger and broader discussion taking place right now in the intellectual/philosophical world. This gives people the ability to infer a lot of information from even small statements, because the exact forms and phrases that you use are used in exact same manner by other people who have gone much deeper into this discussion and have a lot of thoughts about these things. Sometimes on the internet one has to infer, because otherwise you would need every participant to first write a 100pages essay of all of their thoughts about the matter, before anything can be reliably responded to them without inferring. In this case it seems you don't wish to have a well structured and formulated position with deeply going implications into this matter, which I inferred from your post. I guess sometimes inferring just backfires. Coming back to having some kind of grounded argument, I would say that > Non-determinism (as in QM non-determinism) still has deterministic evolution, since specifying the wave-function at any one point in time is enough to specify it for all of time via evolution by the Schrödinger equation. is not really the case. Specifying anything in this matter (including evolution) works in theory and not in practice. There is no physically viable way to do this. Since science deals with physical reality first and foremost (math does not, but we talk about physics and the nature of reality, right?) - then scientifically that statement does not make a lot of sense. It is in fact not enough to specify the wave-function in such a way as to specify it for all time via evolution. This is the essence of Turtle-Achilles paradox and more prominently Chaos Theory, which has been an established paradigm of science for many decades now. You write that "discarding chaos theory the statement is correct". Well, yes perhaps. It's about the same as to say "discarding Einstein's relativity, one could easily travel faster than the speed of light". Chaos theory describes the real world, better in this regards than other theories we have. It's not enough to just discard it: you will end up with faulty reasoning...