I’ve not written philosophy or on philosophical matters (per se, I always try to write philosophically, of course) in quite some time. Recently my co-worker Mice has asked some tough questions about God, religion, and purpose at his site.
See posts on purpose here
I have worked to craft an answer to his questions and have posted them in Philolog.
April 26th, 2004 at 10:52 am
I read your article.
But it looks like nothing more than an exercise in circular logic.
Do you believe in ?free will??
Assuming you do not, what is the difference between saying the universe is Deterministic, and saying that the universe is Algorithmic?
Look, I am about to flip a coin, and I want you to call it for me.
Now, typically when I do this trick, the Atheist will tell me ? ?I would like to pick HEADs, but only a stupid ?inferior? Theist would be na?ve enough to pick HEADs. You see, there is no evidence that HEADs will land up when you flip the coin. Ergo it is only ?logical? to assume the coin will land TAILs up.?
April 26th, 2004 at 11:30 am
Mr. Serpent,
Please show me more clearly how I have engaged in a circularity.
From the context of the article I think it should be most clear that in an atheistic world one must believe in free will.
Please characterize a Deterministic versus Algorithmic universe. I should like to have definitions that I may better refine my position. Assuming that we share the same definitions could lead to imprecisions.
I’m afraid to say I don’t understand your flipping the coin story either. I don’t think I’ve ever implied that theists are inferior … I don’t understand the ‘logical’ angle on TAILs.
In other words, huh?
April 27th, 2004 at 7:01 am
STEVEN: From the context of the article I think it should be most clear that in an atheistic world one must believe in free will.
What is your empirical evidence for the existence of ?free will??
In other words, Why should I believe in your ?free will? any more than I should believe in your ?God??
Given enough Time and materials YOU could probably build a CAR ? correct?
And YOU could certainly DRIVE (i.e. Control) a CAR — right?
So does a CAR have any ?free will? relative to YOU?
April 27th, 2004 at 7:53 am
Mr. Serpent,
You have answered your own question:
SERPENT: In other words, Why should I believe in your ?free will? any more than I should believe in your ?God??
Uhm, what’s the thing doing the believing in that sentence? To believe is to choose to accept data, to choose to accept is the trademark of a being exercising free will. It seems to me that you are asking a circular question, no?
Haven’t you read The Meditations?
As far as the question on the empirical presence of free will, well, you’ve not established whether you mean empirical in the sense of ‘determined by practice’ (i.e. phenomenologically) or ‘empirical’ in the sense of ‘can be demonstrated by experiment’. I will refrain from comment until you have defined your terms more precisely.
And no, don’t be ridiculous, a CAR has no free will. It has no consciousness. It’s a well assembled machine.
April 27th, 2004 at 12:11 pm
STEVEN: Uhm, what’s the thing doing the believing in that sentence?
An Algorithm?
STEVEN: To believe is to choose to accept data, to choose to accept is the trademark of a being exercising free will.
So when a computer program accepts (receives) data it also has ?free will??
STEVEN: It seems to me that you are asking a circular question, no?
I guess that depends upon whether or not you believe that Algorithms have ?free will? or not.
So do computer programs also have ?free will??
Are you asserting that consciousness is a ?non-algorithmic? process?
How often does 2 + 2 not equal 4?
How often have you used your ?free will? to wear a dress to work, or run a ?RED? traffic light at a busy, unfamiliar intersection?
STEVEN: And no, don’t be ridiculous, a CAR has no free will. It has no consciousness. It’s a well assembled machine
Okay, so similarly:
TLOP made YOU.
And TLOP controls YOU.
Ergo relative to TLOP, YOU don?t have any ?free will?.
Or put another way:
The Behavior of atoms is completely controlled by TLOP.
You are made of atoms and NOTHING else.
Ergo YOU (all your thoughts, emotions, feelings, judgments, decisions, expressions, actions, etc.) are all completely controlled by TLOP.
If I have some test tubes filled with chemicals (atoms) and I mix the contents together and I get a chemical reaction would you say that reaction is the result of ?free will? by those chemicals (atoms) or is it just atoms doing what atoms do naturally (what they were programmed to do by TLOP)?
So what makes you assume it is ANY different for the chemical reactions (i.e. atoms) in your brain?
April 27th, 2004 at 12:40 pm
Mister Serpent,
My original question in the previous reply was to ask what that thing that did the sensing was. You replied an algorithm.
Let me first check with you, you are a human, no? You’re not a Turing automaton, are you?
Or are you trying to fashionably imply that your life is a deterministic outworking of the algorithm of creation (i.e. you are asserting a Game of Life model of existence)?
You then make the error of confusing the anthropomorphic convention used by programmers in describing ‘accepts data’ with the mental activity of a thinking being with consciousness. Your have erroneously conflated the two.
Now you could choose to battle this argument by conflating all verbs to reflect a programmers mentality. To believe is to have the property $believesInGod set to true or false. To “run” is to execute fork() etc. I think that’s avoiding the argument, but then again, if you clarify your position per my previous question this discussion would be much more clear.
Algorithms do not have free will. While I’m not talking about consciousness per se in this post, I’ll assert that I believe it to be heuristic and non-algorithmic.
2+2 not equalling four is a nonsensical supposition because if you accept the rules of ordinal math, 2+2 must be four. It’s like “how many times have you encountered a five sided square”.
I agree that there are norms (i.e. no dress to work, not inclined to run red lights) there are certainlny examples where those rules would be broken (dying man in my car, etc.) so by my will i would break the law and would be willing to face the consequences (i.e. a cop pulls me over).
I have no idea what a TLOP is.