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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Mar 26, 2015 - 05:29pm PT
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Moose,
the only ones who think the issues surrounding "free will" are not resolved are the noobs... in other words, the "weekend" opiners.
Might as well get used to it, I have. The topic is just hard enough that the public confusion is likely to be with us for a long time to come. Esp as each generation gives rise to ever more noobs. Kinda like, Where is the spleen? or Where is Moldova? and of course it brings with it (the completely understandable) overlays... the angst, despair, confusion, denial, ambiguity, etc......
I've been saying it for years... if evolution as a crux is 5.8... then our automated biology (in terms of physics, chemistry, cell biology, physiology, you know the rest...) as a crux is 5.11. Yeah, right, the public's going to be quik to get around that one. /sarc
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WBraun
climber
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Mar 26, 2015 - 07:46pm PT
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Fact: Consciousness is produced by the brain. It “materializes” after the brain is “turned on”.
Fact: You are as usual completely wrong .....
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Mar 26, 2015 - 08:51pm PT
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the only ones who think the issues surrounding "free will" are not resolved are the noobs... in other words, the "weekend" opiners.
you're reading comprehension leaves a lot to be desired... perhaps you might re-read the piece in the link I provided up above...
by Galen Strawson
http://www.rep.routledge.com/article/V014
he is not a "weekend opiner""
The facts are clear, and they have been known for a long time. When it comes to the metaphysics of free will, André Gide’s remark is apt: ‘Everything has been said before, but since nobody listens we have to keep going back and beginning all over again.’ It seems that the only freedom that we can have is compatibilist freedom. If – since – that is not enough for ultimate responsibility, we cannot have ultimate responsibility. The only alternative to this conclusion is to appeal to God and mystery – this in order to back up the claim that something that appears to be provably impossible is not only possible but actual. The debate continues; some have thought that philosophy ought to move on. There is little reason to expect that it will do so, as each new generation arises bearing philosophers gripped by the conviction that they can have ultimate responsibility. Would it be a good thing if philosophy did move on, or if we became more clear-headed about the topic of free will than we are? It is hard to say.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Mar 26, 2015 - 08:56pm PT
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Sorry, brah, I guess it's not obvious but the ONE subject I've specialized in since I was 25 years old is "freewill" in all its (conceptual) manifestations.
I'll say again: What led me into neuroscience - and 30 years ago now it is - and into the work I do now is this very subject.
In this matter even you are out of your league. Sorry, just gotta call it as I see it.
btw, your post buttresses my stance on the subject. lol!
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Mar 26, 2015 - 08:59pm PT
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you've spent 25 years thinking about this and you can't come up with a cogent, coherent description of what it is you've been doing and what you've learned?
In spite of the fact it would blow your avatar cover, have you published anything anywhere? and can you reference it?
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Mar 26, 2015 - 09:02pm PT
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"you've spent 25 years thinking about this and you can't come up with a cogent, coherent description of what it is you've been doing and what you've learned?... In spite of the fact it would blow your avatar cover, have you published anything anywhere? and can you reference it?" - Ed H
Go back to 2010 when I put more due diligence into my posts, I thought I was pretty clear. Start with chemistry and cell biology.
Talk about reading comprehension.
Normally I don't speak n such manner among fellow scientists toward such. But let's keep in mind you started it here.
PS... Read Dawkins Selfish Gene yet? Deign so "low" yet?
.....
You know, it's widely known Carl Sagan got a lot of criticism from his cohorts for trying to bring science to the public in the 60s and 70s, for trying to popularize science before the masses. I could be totally wrong here, and perhaps I am, but your posts (esp regarding scientists who have chosen to write popularly) have always struck me as reflecting just the kind who was of that group. Again I could be totally wrong but that's the intuition I've acquired. Of course, today, times are quite a bit different and popularizing science is "in". Just a personal observation this evening.
I still remember one of my earliest questions to you, trying to learn a bit more about you and your philos of science, your take on the world. I simply asked you if you were more a Steven Weinberg guy or a, I believe it was, a Tipler or Penrose guy, and you couldn't meet me half way with a straight answer. Sometimes facilitating a conversation means reading between the lines, giving somebody the benefit of the doubt, even playing along.
"...have you published anything anywhere?" -Ed H
Hold that thought, I predict one of us is going to end up eating the proverbial crow.
And I can't resist... What the hell would inspire such a silly absurd post on your part anyhow? I'm in total agreement with your quote if that's what he in fact said. Moreover, I'm in total agreement with his dad on the subject. So there.
It's enough at this point to know that years spent in chemistry (biochem, mol bio) and electronics and neuro (yes there is this oppo in the world) is a suberb teacher in mechanistic nature which rules out so-called libertarian free will - a major variety, pop and popularized via Abra religion, I allude to as false or illusory. Perhaps it's you on these finer subjects that needs to bone up? (After all I am wise enough not to enter your wheelhouse, aren't I.) Food for thought.
Further, I think insofar as you havent read a "popular" work - throwing this out there - like Selfish Gene, Cosmos, Demon Haunted World, God Delusion, End of Faith, How the Mind Works, The Stuff of Language, Blank Slate, The Beak of the Finch, Sacred Depths of Nature, Encountering Naturalism, The World's Religions (H Smith), Breaking the Spell, Amythia - it speaks volumes one way or another.
PS
Further, you'll find many of those books at the intersection where science, philosophy and religion meet the humanities. To what school in academia do I go to earn a degree in that venue from which I could publish (to meet apparently your criteria)? 25 years ago I didn't have an answer. But perhaps that was only because 25 years ago my path didn't cross yours where you could've set me straight?
ref: "you're reading comprehension leaves a lot to be desired.." -Ed H
Posting this because a similarly derogatory statement (just as absurd) was made several years ago (re: failing to contribute or some such ) only to be deleted later leaving a page or two of conversation of non sequitors (eg, posters talking to themselves).
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feralfae
Boulder climber
in the midst of a metaphysical mystery
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Mar 26, 2015 - 09:16pm PT
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Thank you Moose, for your forbearance and patience, and for your excellent statement of your pattern of thought which led you to your conclusions.
I take it, then, that you see yourself as a part of a deterministic universe in which you, being a part of that deterministic universe, have no free will, although you have self-awareness and decision-making capabilities within a narrow corridor of possibilities.
I am particularly taken with your statement concerning the "turning on" of the brain of a human (infant?). Do you envision the sub-conscious structure of the mind being (at least) partially programmed for its "human-ness" prior to this "turning on" of consciousness? There is an elegance in your pattern of thought that I had not considered. Thank you.
It gives rise to the image of a hard-wired organism with an adaptable and learning OS arriving on Earth, then having software loaded according to the local culture, habitat, mores, and lares and penates.
I, too, think the brain is a purposefully-designed problem-solving, organic structure of remarkable efficiency. And I think evolution remains in action. Further, I think that with our present human capabilities and increasing understanding of the function of the brain, we have more opportunities to update our software. We now know that thought habits can be altered, rerouting the neural patterns. We are also learning that intentional consciousness (such as meditative states and guided imagery) enables us to reroute neural patterns more efficiently than most people realize.
Thank you again for you patience and carefully-worded explanation.
feralfae
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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Mar 26, 2015 - 09:43pm PT
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Summary: Even if the world is non-deterministic, free will does not exist!
Well, Moose, humans have reserves of doubt and confusion that more than make up for the nonexistence of free will.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Mar 26, 2015 - 09:52pm PT
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Yeah, that's it, Teacher.
(You can delete now, Teacher. I won't even waste 10 seconds trying to preserve such ignorant hauteur.)
My only regret re supertopo is that it resides at the intersection of (a) my passion for climbing and (b) my passion for Science / Belief (yes, my work).
Then again, don't get me wrong, it's got its silver linings, too. It serves as a reminder, if not daily, where a unique cross-section of people are and what they think.
tvashfruit, lol!
as if our styles or lexicon are even remotely similar, lol!
grade f, Teacher. :)
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Mar 26, 2015 - 10:02pm PT
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BTW, I believe our world is non-deterministic...
Moose, with all due respect, there's mechanical determinism (in terms of rules, properties; not newtonian mechanical, not quantum indeterminant either) and predictive determinism (in terms of ability by a mind or Omniscient to predict). Your statement is really meaningless at depth unless you distinguish them.
There is no part of us that is "unyoked" from physics and chemistry. Not at the cellular level, not at the tissue or organ level, not at the biochemical level, not at the biophysical level.
Where in anyone's physics or chemistry or biology textbook does it point to a part or a piece of hardware or to a chemical or protein or a protein constituent or to a brain nucleus to say - There! There is the part that is free, there is the part that is not constrained by the underlying rules of physics or chemistry?!
Free will? Free of demonic influence or possession by the devil of the Christian universe? Yes, and that's about it. (Other than the social "free" of the coercion sort, the gun to the head sort.)
Now the subject of moral sense and moral responsibility (alluded to by Hartouni's post) is an entirely different one. And the public in mixed company is nowhere near mature enough to deal with that in this era. Certainly not in any game changing way, I mean. Sad truth.
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WBraun
climber
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Mar 26, 2015 - 10:12pm PT
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HFCS just bit the dust.
His false ego is so huge he can't see how that just happened.
Sully he's not Tvash.
Tvash revealed himself a long time ago, unlike HFCS ......
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Mar 26, 2015 - 10:14pm PT
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If I bit the dust, Oprah, it's only this evening dealing with the turons. They can be a bit much at times. Yet like I said, they can be instructive too informing something (or someone) what it's up against. This can be valuable.
Aside: tvash posts out of Seattle, does he not? to know me is to know there is zero chance, absolutely zero chance, Zero, that I could live in such a place with so little sun. So there's that, too, Teacher.
FAIL.
Back to your F. Scott Fitzgerald now.
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feralfae
Boulder climber
in the midst of a metaphysical mystery
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Mar 26, 2015 - 10:17pm PT
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Ed, I do not find a necessary contradiction between the MWInterpretation and indeterminism, as indeterminism embraces the possibilities of both causality and chaos. (see below)
Other views[edit]
Against Einstein and others who advocated determinism, indeterminism — as championed by the English astronomer Sir Arthur Eddington — says that a physical object has an ontologically undetermined component that is not due to the epistemological limitations of physicists' understanding. The Uncertainty Principle, then, would not necessarily be due to hidden variables but to an indeterminism in nature itself.[37]
Determinism and indeterminism are examined in Causality and Chance in Modern Physics by David Bohm. He speculates that, since determinism can emerge from underlying indeterminism (via the law of large numbers), and that indeterminism can emerge from determinism (for instance, from classical chaos), the universe could be conceived of as having alternating layers of causality and chaos.[38][/quote]
I might add, "or as having alternating points of causality and chaos."
Thank you.
feralfae
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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Mar 26, 2015 - 10:26pm PT
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What led me into neuroscience - and 30 years ago now it is - and into the work I do now is this very subject (HFCS)
I assume your work consists of writing a blog somewhere on the web. If not, then what is it you actually do? Perhaps you can frame your answer in such a way as to maintain your anonymity.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Mar 26, 2015 - 10:32pm PT
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jgill, why is it necessary? Tell me why it's necessary. As many have pointed out over this thread and others, appeal to authority is irrelevant. Should be. At least in this day and age of science, the internet, education. Instead: "Just the facts, ma'am." I'm alright with that.
jgill, if you or others don't mind, where I make claims, please point out where they are incorrect. Let's just go with the facts, here.
For starters, the claim: No where in science, up or down its many and variegated branches is there evidence, any, that anthropes (man, human) in their functioning (esp in the basics, in terms of physics, chemistry and cell bio) are exempt from the rules governing the rest of the animal kingdom.
You don't need to know what i do for work (at this point) to embrace or reject that claim. Or do you?
.....
I'll give you this much preserving anonymity. Writing a blog somewhere? no. Research and development (no publishing high energy physics papers, Ed, sorry, you got me there) at the intersection of science, religion and belief (which btw I've stated many times now to it seems the willful disregard by many of you), yes. For now, that's going to have to be good enough. If you're so inclined to doubt my background as I've stated it, that's your choice, so be it. But in the end, facts are facts and they can stand on their own at least in the venues that interest me. Our mechanistic nature (our automated biology) as revealed by science being one. The implications, many grand and sweeping, of this "mechanistic nature" being others.
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WBraun
climber
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Mar 26, 2015 - 10:43pm PT
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Science is NOT anonymous nor has it ever been anonymous nor will it ever be.
It is not impersonal but complete and full in all personality including all all opulences.
The greatest of all opulences is that it is conscious of everything ......
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Mar 26, 2015 - 11:00pm PT
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This bears repeating...
http://www.rep.routledge.com/article/V014
How IN ANY WAY does this contravene my stance or anything I said?
In fact this link is an excellent description of exactly the state of the art today.
That you would post this link as part of a response to me is an absurd non sequitur at a minimum.
(You must still have your panties in a bunch over the ohm's law post. Beta: Move on.)
http://www.rep.routledge.com/article/V014
.....
Though this is clearly something of a cop-out here...
"Libertarians answer ‘Yes, Yes’ to questions (1) and (2). They hold that we are indeed free and fully morally responsible agents, and that determinism must therefore be false. Their great difficulty is to explain why the falsity of determinism is any better than the truth of determinism when it comes to establishing our free agency and moral responsibility. For suppose that not every event is determined, and that some events occur randomly, or as a matter of chance. How can our claim to moral responsibility be improved by the supposition that it is partly a matter of chance or random outcome that we and our actions are as they are?"
The number one category of "libertarian" is the traditional (fundamentalist) Christian or Muslim. (It is the elephant in the room that the piece doesn't address.) The traditional religious person (we know many) thinks we are ensouled by Jehovah Yahweh at conception or birth - the proverbial ghost in the machine - and this ghost, or more popular nowadays "spirit" - is the free agent empowered with free will by God Jehovah and thus morally responsible. This religious model of "body and spirit" is the number one driving force for (belief in) indeterminancy and (belief in) free will by the masses - and yet the piece doesn't address it at all at least in such terms. Thus something of a "cop out" as I stated.
This is clear to anyone who has spent much time at the SRB intersection. Just as I suppose the base of El Cap is clear to WB (aka Oprah) by dent of his time spent THERE over the years.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Mar 26, 2015 - 11:17pm PT
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I am too limited to make the time to read popular works on science these days. Perhaps when I slow down a bit I might, and perhaps I'll even write some.
But on the publication front, you missed my point. First, if you had written anything, I would be interested in reading it because I believe you are too hasty in your posting to this thread, and having taken the time to write something, it might be a better representation of what you've been thinking.
Second, I always find that writing a formal paper helps to organize what I've been working on, and requires that the logic of the arguments be worked out in sufficient detail that someone else could follow them. Often I find my logic lacking, or my work incomplete in the sense that some part of the argument hasn't been supported.
Writing is not only a means of communicating, but also an aid to developing ideas that can be articulated clearly. Writing doesn't mean shooting off defensive responses on this thread.
For instance, you claim there is no authority in science and then you hold up these scientists who you greatly admire for their popular writing and insinuate somehow that I find that wrong, or distasteful. I never met Sagan, but I know a lot of people who had, and while we are a critical bunch (at least the physicists are) I think the sniping about the popular work had more to do with Sagan's ego than with the science. I've used some of Sagan's papers and found them interesting and useful. I think I know a lot more about him by working through the science he published than watching him gush about "billions and billions."
As far as ego goes, you might watch Cosmos for his abbreviated history of astronomy, he sorts of skips from Hubble to Sagan, forgetting a few important people in between. And not only that, but their unmentioned astronomy greatly exceeded his own.
As far a my views, they are a muddle, no doubt. I think it is easy to say that life has a physical explanation, but it is a surmise based on a world view. I happen to think it is a very good one, but the proof is in the pudding as they say. In an audience of thoughtful people who have reached another conclusion, stating that there is "proof" when you have none (nor can their be) and beating everyone on the head that disagrees with you doesn't strike me as a "meeting some one half way" or "playing along" in the conversation.
But my muddled state is a good one, I think, because it derives from the fact that I cannot answer many of the questions definitively, I don't have a physical model of "the mind" that I can roll out, make predictions and compare with experiment. I don't know anyone that does at this time. If you are going to be a scientist, you have to deliver the goods... while I believe that this will happen, it hasn't happened yet, and there is plenty of opportunity to be completely surprised, hopefully you'll live long enough to see it, I don't think it's happening in my lifetime.
Wolfgang Pauli heard from colleagues who had been to a Werner Heisenberg seminar where Heisenberg reportedly let it be known that he and Pauli had "essentially solved" nuclear physics, all that was left, the reports went, was to fill in the details.
Pauli wrote to Heisenberg, and in the letter he had a picture, a frame with a blank canvas, the caption was "this painting demonstrates that I can paint like Picasso, all that's left is to fill in the details."
There are a hell of a lot of details to "fill in." It's nice to read the popular science and gloss over all those details, no editor would publish a book that didn't have a very understandable narrative, and science in the making doesn't possess that narrative, in the end the victors write the history.
I am perhaps in a cranky mood tonight, sorry to have provoked you. My experience is that it's not too hard to provoke you, all I have to do is state something counter to those science authorities you so respect. I'm just relating what I think.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Mar 26, 2015 - 11:20pm PT
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So far...
you claim there is no authority in science
This is simply incorrect, I've made no such claim. Absurd.
Next...
I think the sniping about the popular work had more to do with Sagan's ego than with the science.
Not as Ann Druyan tells it.
Next...
than watching him gush about "billions and billions."
He never gushed about "billions and billions." In fact, he himself later said, he never used that phrase. It was a phrase attributed to him, perhaps initially by Johnny Carson, and... he rolled with it.
As far as ego goes, you might watch Cosmos for his abbreviated history of astronomy, he sorts of skips from Hubble to Sagan, forgetting a few important people in between. And not only that, but their unmentioned astronomy greatly exceeded his own.
Here you once again have opportunity to laud Sagan yet you downplay him. Just an aside observation, no biggie.
PS I know his Cosmos well. In his defense he was limited to 13 episodes.
Next...
My experience is that it's not too hard to provoke you...
What you do is take potshots at random. Ones that, quite frankly, aren't very coherent or called for. In the morning I could give you a list.
Lastly for the night, it's getting late, more tomorrow....
You're sure you are not confusing Cosmos with some other? Your description seems awfully inaccurate...
"for his abbreviated history of astronomy, he sorts of skips from Hubble to Sagan, forgetting a few important people in between." -edh
Anyone can watch the series and see for themselves that this is inaccurate if not petty. He opened with Eratosthenes and Aristarchus, he lauded at length Newton, Huygens, Kepler, and Humason (Hubble's assistant); and I've probably missed a few more.
This is what you nitpick. And we're not even out of Sagan and Cosmos yet. What about all the other topics let alone details at the Science, Religion and Belief intersection that bridges to the humanities.
You think we might have any more agreement there? lol!
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Mar 26, 2015 - 11:27pm PT
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I'm not reporting what I read, I'm reporting what I talked to people about... that's all. I'm not going to try to refute published statements by proponents or opponents.
You are aware that Sagan was a real liver person who interacted with other real live people, aren't you? and that talking to those persons might provide some more parallax on Sagan then the rather narrow view we get from reading his popular work and watching him perform.
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