5 ms·

I have to say that I'm shocked that some of the early comments here complete dismiss what I consider to be the greatest and possibly most important of mysteries

I have to say that I'm shocked that some of the early comments here complete dismiss what I consider to be the greatest and possibly most important of mysteries we are confronted with. If not great and important, at least the subject of who are "you" is a deeply and profoundly intimate question to ponder. I distinctly remember first learning some basic laws of Newtonian physics in high school, and leaving school that day dumbfounded. If all particles behave in a deterministic fashion, how is it that these particles bouncing around in my head can lead to the perception of free will and agency? It was a question that would pursue off an on for most of the rest of my life. Arriving at college, I dove into psychology with a passion, hoping that understanding the biomechanics of the brain would give me some clues. I turned to computer science and was instantly drawn to AI. I read everything I could get my hands on on the subject, with Daniel Dennett and Douglas Hofstadter being favorites of course (I still revisit Godel Escher Bach from time to time). I even experimented with various psychedelics looking for that elusive insight that would explain things. Now I'm in my 40's and of course I still don't have "the answer". I'm not as consumed by the question anymore, focusing instead on just enjoying my days on earth here with my family and friends. But how on earth anyone can belittle the question of consciousness blows my mind, so to speak. :)

sliverstorm 12y ago
I don't know if this helps the argument for free will, but physics still has randomness. Radiation, for example, is to my knowledge completely random. So at least from a mile-high view, you can't actually perfectly predict the outcome of everything, even if you could model perfectly.
- duaneb 12y ago
  The universe is not deterministic. However, this was used to say that "there is still free will!!!" (e.g. Penrose). So, there is "hard" and "soft" determinism—the universe may not be determinstic, but that doesn't mean we're any less determined by physical processes.
  - AnimalMuppet 12y ago
    But quantum uncertainty is not the same as me having free will, because my will does not control the quantum uncertainty. Quantum noise may influence the atoms that control the neurons that control my brain, but that just makes me not a perfectly-determined machine. There's noise at the bottom layer of the machine, but that noise is not the same as me having free will.
- macspoofing 12y ago
  >I don't know if this helps the argument for free will, but physics still has randomness. It doesn't help at all with Free Will. How can you have free will if you're a victim of random events out of 'your' control?
  - sliverstorm 12y ago
    It's at least a step away from "everything can be predetermined with physics". If I could perfectly predict your actions (with a physics model), most people agree free will is impossible. It doesn't mean free will exists, of course. It's just less improbable?
    - macspoofing 12y ago
      >It's at least a step away from "everything can be predetermined with physics". You'll never get away from that. We are material beings, made out of the same material as everything else in the universe and hence subject to the same fundamentals laws. >If I could perfectly predict your actions (with a physics model), most people agree free will is impossible. If that's the case, there should not be a problem. Even in a fully deterministic universe we'll never be able to run a simulation to predict the actions for anyone anyway. You're a product of not only the actions of the trillions of particles that make up you, but also of the countless of particles in the environment over your entire life-span, that of your parents, your grandparents, all the way to the big bang. We'll never be able to simulate the trillions of particles that make up any specific body, much less that body's environment using fundamental equations. So if predictability of particles is how you measure free will, then we have free will. Things get muddled a little because we may be able to get a 'good enough' prediction of someone's behaviour just by analyzing his/her neurons with a fMRI or something. This is akin to the difference between knowing tomorrow's weather EXACTLY by simulating every particle of the atmosphere vs. knowing the weather tomorrow to some degree of confidence by analyzing higher-order patterns like air pressure, cloud coverage, temperature etc. So your definition is too weak. Most people would say we don't have free will if we live in a universe with deterministic laws. Whether anyone can actually use those laws to predict your actions is not that relevant. >It doesn't mean free will exists, of course. It's just less improbable? Not really. Think about, let's say every decision you made was determined by a (quantum, full random, totally unpredictable) coin toss. That doesn't get you one step closer towards a libertarian-type of free will. Sure your actions are, in principle, much less, predictable to those around you, but that's not the yard-stick we use to measure free will by anyway. Your actions are already unpredictable in a deterministic universe anyway. You merely traded being a slave to deterministic laws of physics to being a slave of random coin toss. Second, it's an open question how much quantum randomness actually affects your day-to-day actions. Quantum effects are only pronounced on very small scales. At the scale of groups of atoms, molecules and cells, Newtonian physics, chemistry, and biology, and neurology can be substituted without loss of precision.
tachyonbeam 12y ago
For one, quantum physics are not deterministic. The world you live in, and you, are predictable, but not quite deterministic. I personally think that if we create robots with a sufficient understanding of the world, they will necessarily be self-aware and "conscious". Those are just emergent properties of a sufficient understanding of the world, it seems to me. You might think that's not true. Asimov's robots are purely "logical" (but not reasonable) and don't seem conscious, they don't have free will... But robots like that might never exist. They'd be too rigid to deal with the complexities of this world in any kind of useful way. For robots to be sufficiently capable, they'll need a more fluid, more "natural" and less "predictable" kind of intelligence.
- jabgrabdthrow 12y ago
  I don't buy this at all. Robots can just simulate your brain, and use thermal noise to imitate quantum randomness. You have to believe that quantum randomness is a channel through which some higher intelligence sends signals, which is pure mysticism IMO.
  - gus_massa 12y ago
    I agree, but you don't need thermal noise to simulate the effects quantum randomness. You can use actual quantum randomness! The number of photons absorbed in a photodetector is determined by quantum randomness, because some of them are absorbed and some of them pass trough. IIRC a camera with a CCD is enough to measure individual photons. (Nevertheless, in my opinion neither of this is necessary to simulate consciousness, a good PRNG would be enough, but we should wait a few years until this is confirmed.)
deeviant 12y ago
You'll have to be a bit more specific in terms of what exactly people are saying that "belittles the question of consciousness", I haven't see anything in this thread that I took as such. As to your other statement, Newtonian physics was wrong. It broke down under certain circumstances which are not (largely) encountered under daily live, so our intuition was useless to deceive the faults in it's laws, yet this did not stop people of the time from thinking it was the end-all-be-all set of rules that described physical reality. Newtonian physics is certainly not the branch of physical that would help you understanding free will and agency. Then Einstein came around, and amended (some of) Newtons problems. Then Quantum Mechanics came around and filled in some gaps in Relativity. QM and Relativity still don't play nice together so in the future, someone else will most likely make further amendments and get us closer to the answer. But anyways, what I'm getting at, is there seems to be a reaction, perhaps innate to the human psyche to ... hmm... blow a fuse, when faced with an problem perceived to be intellectually intractable. But progress comes, inevitably. Sometimes slowly, and sometimes quick, but always inevitable. My own thoughts on consciousness is that, of course its generated by the brain, of course it is caused by things that remain solely in the realm of physical reality. Of course (assuming we don't blow ourselves up or the like, as this may take quite some time) we'll not only understand what's going on in the brain, but will be able to build conscious machines, machines which we will quickly find resemble us more closely than machines and at this point will see that the amazing phenomenon we call consciousness is the not the sole domain of humanity, but just the sole example(let's exclude other animals from this thought for simplicity) of such up until that point. It might take awhile though, evolution took a billions of years to get consciousness to this point, I think it's only fair to give humanity a bit more time before we call it a lost cause.
- thoman23 12y ago
  > You'll have to be a bit more specific in terms of what exactly people are saying that "belittles the question of consciousness", I haven't see anything in this thread that I took as such. When I first opened the comments, the first few comments I saw were: dominotw 58 minutes ago | link[-] > i can't take anyone who uses the word "consciousness" seriously, given noone has any idea what it actually means. Marazan 57 minutes ago | link[-] > Predicated on the concept that the Hard Problem of Consciousness is actually a problem. crimsonalucard 44 minutes ago | link[-] > How can we solve a problem about a word that isn't clearly defined? Regarding my other comments, I focused on deterministic Newtonian physics because that is what first sparked my interest in the question. Yes, since that time I have learned a bit of quantum mechanics and relativity. Around the time that I found myself trying to grasp string theory is when I gave up the physics thread (pun intended). I'm not a physicist, and frankly I'm not smart enough to fully grasp modern physics. For what it's worth, I'm in the "emergent property" camp. I certainly don't think there is anything non-physical necessary to explain consciousness. I just think it's a fascinating topic and was shocked at the early dismissiveness I saw. Even in the original article, there's at times an undertone of "consciousness is an illusion and therefore not interesting". Just because we don't need to resort to the supernatural to explain consciousness doesn't make it less interesting. To me, that's exactly why it is interesting.

sliverstorm 12y ago

I don't know if this helps the argument for free will, but physics still has randomness. Radiation, for example, is to my knowledge completely random. So at least from a mile-high view, you can't actually perfectly predict the outcome of everything, even if you could model perfectly.

duaneb 12y ago
The universe is not deterministic. However, this was used to say that "there is still free will!!!" (e.g. Penrose). So, there is "hard" and "soft" determinism—the universe may not be determinstic, but that doesn't mean we're any less determined by physical processes.
- AnimalMuppet 12y ago
  But quantum uncertainty is not the same as me having free will, because my will does not control the quantum uncertainty. Quantum noise may influence the atoms that control the neurons that control my brain, but that just makes me not a perfectly-determined machine. There's noise at the bottom layer of the machine, but that noise is not the same as me having free will.
macspoofing 12y ago
>I don't know if this helps the argument for free will, but physics still has randomness. It doesn't help at all with Free Will. How can you have free will if you're a victim of random events out of 'your' control?
- sliverstorm 12y ago
  It's at least a step away from "everything can be predetermined with physics". If I could perfectly predict your actions (with a physics model), most people agree free will is impossible. It doesn't mean free will exists, of course. It's just less improbable?
  - macspoofing 12y ago
    >It's at least a step away from "everything can be predetermined with physics". You'll never get away from that. We are material beings, made out of the same material as everything else in the universe and hence subject to the same fundamentals laws. >If I could perfectly predict your actions (with a physics model), most people agree free will is impossible. If that's the case, there should not be a problem. Even in a fully deterministic universe we'll never be able to run a simulation to predict the actions for anyone anyway. You're a product of not only the actions of the trillions of particles that make up you, but also of the countless of particles in the environment over your entire life-span, that of your parents, your grandparents, all the way to the big bang. We'll never be able to simulate the trillions of particles that make up any specific body, much less that body's environment using fundamental equations. So if predictability of particles is how you measure free will, then we have free will. Things get muddled a little because we may be able to get a 'good enough' prediction of someone's behaviour just by analyzing his/her neurons with a fMRI or something. This is akin to the difference between knowing tomorrow's weather EXACTLY by simulating every particle of the atmosphere vs. knowing the weather tomorrow to some degree of confidence by analyzing higher-order patterns like air pressure, cloud coverage, temperature etc. So your definition is too weak. Most people would say we don't have free will if we live in a universe with deterministic laws. Whether anyone can actually use those laws to predict your actions is not that relevant. >It doesn't mean free will exists, of course. It's just less improbable? Not really. Think about, let's say every decision you made was determined by a (quantum, full random, totally unpredictable) coin toss. That doesn't get you one step closer towards a libertarian-type of free will. Sure your actions are, in principle, much less, predictable to those around you, but that's not the yard-stick we use to measure free will by anyway. Your actions are already unpredictable in a deterministic universe anyway. You merely traded being a slave to deterministic laws of physics to being a slave of random coin toss. Second, it's an open question how much quantum randomness actually affects your day-to-day actions. Quantum effects are only pronounced on very small scales. At the scale of groups of atoms, molecules and cells, Newtonian physics, chemistry, and biology, and neurology can be substituted without loss of precision.

tachyonbeam 12y ago

For one, quantum physics are not deterministic. The world you live in, and you, are predictable, but not quite deterministic. I personally think that if we create robots with a sufficient understanding of the world, they will necessarily be self-aware and "conscious". Those are just emergent properties of a sufficient understanding of the world, it seems to me. You might think that's not true. Asimov's robots are purely "logical" (but not reasonable) and don't seem conscious, they don't have free will... But robots like that might never exist. They'd be too rigid to deal with the complexities of this world in any kind of useful way. For robots to be sufficiently capable, they'll need a more fluid, more "natural" and less "predictable" kind of intelligence.

jabgrabdthrow 12y ago
I don't buy this at all. Robots can just simulate your brain, and use thermal noise to imitate quantum randomness. You have to believe that quantum randomness is a channel through which some higher intelligence sends signals, which is pure mysticism IMO.
- gus_massa 12y ago
  I agree, but you don't need thermal noise to simulate the effects quantum randomness. You can use actual quantum randomness! The number of photons absorbed in a photodetector is determined by quantum randomness, because some of them are absorbed and some of them pass trough. IIRC a camera with a CCD is enough to measure individual photons. (Nevertheless, in my opinion neither of this is necessary to simulate consciousness, a good PRNG would be enough, but we should wait a few years until this is confirmed.)

deeviant 12y ago

You'll have to be a bit more specific in terms of what exactly people are saying that "belittles the question of consciousness", I haven't see anything in this thread that I took as such. As to your other statement, Newtonian physics was wrong. It broke down under certain circumstances which are not (largely) encountered under daily live, so our intuition was useless to deceive the faults in it's laws, yet this did not stop people of the time from thinking it was the end-all-be-all set of rules that described physical reality. Newtonian physics is certainly not the branch of physical that would help you understanding free will and agency. Then Einstein came around, and amended (some of) Newtons problems. Then Quantum Mechanics came around and filled in some gaps in Relativity. QM and Relativity still don't play nice together so in the future, someone else will most likely make further amendments and get us closer to the answer. But anyways, what I'm getting at, is there seems to be a reaction, perhaps innate to the human psyche to ... hmm... blow a fuse, when faced with an problem perceived to be intellectually intractable. But progress comes, inevitably. Sometimes slowly, and sometimes quick, but always inevitable. My own thoughts on consciousness is that, of course its generated by the brain, of course it is caused by things that remain solely in the realm of physical reality. Of course (assuming we don't blow ourselves up or the like, as this may take quite some time) we'll not only understand what's going on in the brain, but will be able to build conscious machines, machines which we will quickly find resemble us more closely than machines and at this point will see that the amazing phenomenon we call consciousness is the not the sole domain of humanity, but just the sole example(let's exclude other animals from this thought for simplicity) of such up until that point. It might take awhile though, evolution took a billions of years to get consciousness to this point, I think it's only fair to give humanity a bit more time before we call it a lost cause.

thoman23 12y ago
> You'll have to be a bit more specific in terms of what exactly people are saying that "belittles the question of consciousness", I haven't see anything in this thread that I took as such. When I first opened the comments, the first few comments I saw were: dominotw 58 minutes ago | link[-] > i can't take anyone who uses the word "consciousness" seriously, given noone has any idea what it actually means. Marazan 57 minutes ago | link[-] > Predicated on the concept that the Hard Problem of Consciousness is actually a problem. crimsonalucard 44 minutes ago | link[-] > How can we solve a problem about a word that isn't clearly defined? Regarding my other comments, I focused on deterministic Newtonian physics because that is what first sparked my interest in the question. Yes, since that time I have learned a bit of quantum mechanics and relativity. Around the time that I found myself trying to grasp string theory is when I gave up the physics thread (pun intended). I'm not a physicist, and frankly I'm not smart enough to fully grasp modern physics. For what it's worth, I'm in the "emergent property" camp. I certainly don't think there is anything non-physical necessary to explain consciousness. I just think it's a fascinating topic and was shocked at the early dismissiveness I saw. Even in the original article, there's at times an undertone of "consciousness is an illusion and therefore not interesting". Just because we don't need to resort to the supernatural to explain consciousness doesn't make it less interesting. To me, that's exactly why it is interesting.