6 ms·

Is free will really "free"? Your actions can be predicted from your brainscan

10 points by Jun8 15y ago

Jun8 15y ago
"[A recent article in Nature] show that, prior to the moment of conscious choice, there are correlated brain events that allow scientists to predict, with 60 to 80 percent probability, what the choice will be." It's amazing how correct the Architect was and at the same time how limited: "But we already know what you're going to do, don't we? Already I can see the chain reaction, the chemical precursors that signal the onset of emotion, designed specifically to overwhelm logic, and reason." Evidently, at the neurological level, there is no "logic" or "reason" as he uses those terms.
brudgers 15y ago
"We must believe in free will -- we have no choice." Issac Bashevis Singer
jessriedel 15y ago
These neuroscientists are very confused if they think they can say anything useful about free will, or evil, or the like. Unless they are going to provide empirical evidence against determinism itself, there's nothing those brain scans are going to tell them about these issue. Will Wilkinson argues the point here: http://bigthink.com/ideas/40538 http://bigthink.com/ideas/40538
- joeyo 15y ago
  I must confess, I don't understand your argument, nor the one at the linked blog post. Why do they need to show evidence against determinism? There is a growing body of evidence that choices are "made" by the brain long before we are consciously aware of them. The most parsimonious explanation for these data is that the brain comes to a decision through a mechanistic process of integrating evidence and then the conscious self is informed of that decision. It's at this point that we feel that we have made a choice. One nice prediction of this theory is that brain disorders that disrupt the communication of the decision making circuitry and the parts of the brain that are normally informed about it should produce the impression that ones choices are being externally controlled. And indeed there are a wide variety of disorders with these features (schizophrenia, alien hand syndrome, etc). Some of the pieces are missing--what is this pathway and which brain structures are involved in the perception of agency--but I think it makes a lot more sense than believing in non-causal free will. EDIT: Another compelling piece of evidence comes from brain stimulation. When you electrically stimulate the surface of the brain (say, as part of a surgical procedure to localize a tumor) you will find areas that evoke movements of the arm, eyes, legs, etc. The experiment is: you do this without telling the patient exactly when it will happen and then afterwards ask them, "why did you move your arm?" Many people will confabulate and say, "I felt like it" or "you asked me to". This isn't always the case: sometimes people will report that their arm felt like it moved "on it's own", but I think it is very suggestive.
  - jerf 15y ago
    I am the thing making decisions. To the extent that the thing making decisions didn't exist exactly when and where either I or the neuroscientists thought it was, that's merely one in a very long list of things that we were wrong about, and that our definitions were wrong. Declaring that this disproves "free will" is really overdoing it; it's akin to declaring "gravity" disproved after astronomers established that gravity works in space as well as on Earth. Yes, sure, "gravity pre-better-astronomy" was disproved, but that did not cause things to start suddenly floating off the Earth. First you draw a dichotomy where there shouldn't be one, then you demonstrate the dichotomy doesn't exist, then you declare that the whole thing is all wrong; it's just "A -> B, not A, therefore C" when you get down to it. I am already well aware that the-thing-making-decisions is more than just the conscious mind itself, but while we have the words "subconscious" and "conscious" in reality there's no clean line between the two.
    - joeyo 15y ago
      > I am the thing making decisions. Well if that's your premise, then I think we're already done. If someone makes a decision, but doesn't tell you about it, is it your decision? What if they make a decision and then inform you about it later, is it yours now? Finally, what if they make a decision, tell you about it, and then you actually enact it? Can we even call this yours?
      - nooneelse 15y ago
        >Well if that's your premise, then I think we're already done. Why call one part of my brain me, but not the other part of my brain me? I took jerf's point to be that the part doing the awareness/recording can be different from the part deciding, but that doesn't mean the part deciding isn't me.
        joeyo 15y ago
        I don't personally think there is a single, unitary self-- a man in the head so to speak. It may be a convenient useful fiction but it probably misleads our intuition on these matters.
- sharkbot 15y ago
  I don't see many arguments in Wilkinson's article. All I see are assertions, spiced with a unsubtle comment that neuroscientists are fabricating their results. Neuroscience can shed light on the philosophical study of free will via empirical investigations, specifically the study of human brains. After all, if a philosopher wants to describe a property of reality, it must submit to empirical results. Philosophers can abstract away from reality if they wish, but they should come clean and rename themselves logicians.
  - jessriedel 15y ago
    None of the empirical facts relevant to the question of free will are disputed. See my response to joeyo.
Symmetry 15y ago
I'm just going to put this here http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Free_will http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Free_will EDIT: Ok, I'll just say that it's more useful when facing a difficult question like this that isn't even guaranteed to have a correct answer to first ask what causes the question. That is asking, "Why do we think we have free will", before going back to the question of whether or not it exists.

10 points by Jun8 15y ago

Jun8 15y ago

"[A recent article in Nature] show that, prior to the moment of conscious choice, there are correlated brain events that allow scientists to predict, with 60 to 80 percent probability, what the choice will be." It's amazing how correct the Architect was and at the same time how limited: "But we already know what you're going to do, don't we? Already I can see the chain reaction, the chemical precursors that signal the onset of emotion, designed specifically to overwhelm logic, and reason." Evidently, at the neurological level, there is no "logic" or "reason" as he uses those terms.

brudgers 15y ago

"We must believe in free will -- we have no choice." Issac Bashevis Singer

jessriedel 15y ago

These neuroscientists are very confused if they think they can say anything useful about free will, or evil, or the like. Unless they are going to provide empirical evidence against determinism itself, there's nothing those brain scans are going to tell them about these issue. Will Wilkinson argues the point here: http://bigthink.com/ideas/40538 http://bigthink.com/ideas/40538

joeyo 15y ago
I must confess, I don't understand your argument, nor the one at the linked blog post. Why do they need to show evidence against determinism? There is a growing body of evidence that choices are "made" by the brain long before we are consciously aware of them. The most parsimonious explanation for these data is that the brain comes to a decision through a mechanistic process of integrating evidence and then the conscious self is informed of that decision. It's at this point that we feel that we have made a choice. One nice prediction of this theory is that brain disorders that disrupt the communication of the decision making circuitry and the parts of the brain that are normally informed about it should produce the impression that ones choices are being externally controlled. And indeed there are a wide variety of disorders with these features (schizophrenia, alien hand syndrome, etc). Some of the pieces are missing--what is this pathway and which brain structures are involved in the perception of agency--but I think it makes a lot more sense than believing in non-causal free will. EDIT: Another compelling piece of evidence comes from brain stimulation. When you electrically stimulate the surface of the brain (say, as part of a surgical procedure to localize a tumor) you will find areas that evoke movements of the arm, eyes, legs, etc. The experiment is: you do this without telling the patient exactly when it will happen and then afterwards ask them, "why did you move your arm?" Many people will confabulate and say, "I felt like it" or "you asked me to". This isn't always the case: sometimes people will report that their arm felt like it moved "on it's own", but I think it is very suggestive.
- jerf 15y ago
  I am the thing making decisions. To the extent that the thing making decisions didn't exist exactly when and where either I or the neuroscientists thought it was, that's merely one in a very long list of things that we were wrong about, and that our definitions were wrong. Declaring that this disproves "free will" is really overdoing it; it's akin to declaring "gravity" disproved after astronomers established that gravity works in space as well as on Earth. Yes, sure, "gravity pre-better-astronomy" was disproved, but that did not cause things to start suddenly floating off the Earth. First you draw a dichotomy where there shouldn't be one, then you demonstrate the dichotomy doesn't exist, then you declare that the whole thing is all wrong; it's just "A -> B, not A, therefore C" when you get down to it. I am already well aware that the-thing-making-decisions is more than just the conscious mind itself, but while we have the words "subconscious" and "conscious" in reality there's no clean line between the two.
  - joeyo 15y ago
    > I am the thing making decisions. Well if that's your premise, then I think we're already done. If someone makes a decision, but doesn't tell you about it, is it your decision? What if they make a decision and then inform you about it later, is it yours now? Finally, what if they make a decision, tell you about it, and then you actually enact it? Can we even call this yours?
    - nooneelse 15y ago
      >Well if that's your premise, then I think we're already done. Why call one part of my brain me, but not the other part of my brain me? I took jerf's point to be that the part doing the awareness/recording can be different from the part deciding, but that doesn't mean the part deciding isn't me.
      - joeyo 15y ago
        I don't personally think there is a single, unitary self-- a man in the head so to speak. It may be a convenient useful fiction but it probably misleads our intuition on these matters.
sharkbot 15y ago
I don't see many arguments in Wilkinson's article. All I see are assertions, spiced with a unsubtle comment that neuroscientists are fabricating their results. Neuroscience can shed light on the philosophical study of free will via empirical investigations, specifically the study of human brains. After all, if a philosopher wants to describe a property of reality, it must submit to empirical results. Philosophers can abstract away from reality if they wish, but they should come clean and rename themselves logicians.
- jessriedel 15y ago
  None of the empirical facts relevant to the question of free will are disputed. See my response to joeyo.

Symmetry 15y ago

I'm just going to put this here http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Free_will http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Free_will EDIT: Ok, I'll just say that it's more useful when facing a difficult question like this that isn't even guaranteed to have a correct answer to first ask what causes the question. That is asking, "Why do we think we have free will", before going back to the question of whether or not it exists.