Free will is back, and maybe we can measure it • Hacker News Board

Re: Free will is back, and maybe we can measure it

#21

Post by ajuc » Tue, Oct 20, 2015, 9:51 AM UTC

nefitty wrote: post #17

Once you have a grasp of the fundamental mechanisms of the universe(cause/effect, logic, etc) you quickly see that certain, socially-defined terms are irreconcilable with the facts of reality. Namely they, the three major and thorny ones, are ideas of God or gods, supernatural phenomenon and ideas of free will. These three ideas just don't fit with the facts. If an entity was powerful enough to create everything, wha…

> These three ideas just don't fit with the facts. If an entity was powerful enough to create everything, what created IT?

That's exactly the same argument as "what happened before big bang created time and space".

The right argument is "big bang theory requires less assumptions than God, and gives better predictions, so let's use it (until we find even better theory)".

> Finally, if you accept that the universe follows certain predictable, immutable laws then you must agree that with enough information any future or past state could be predicted or recreated

According to our best understanding these laws have random generator in them, so for example we cannot predict exactly when a radioactive decay of an atom will happen. And it's not because our lack of knowledge, that uncertainity is a state of universe, it's inherent to the quantum mechanics. At best we can calculate the probability distribution.

Re: Free will is back, and maybe we can measure it

#22

Post by onion2k » Tue, Oct 20, 2015, 9:51 AM UTC

cLeEOGPw wrote: post #20

onion2k wrote: post #3

We desperately need a new way of thinking about free will. We really don't. The author of the article has written off hundreds of years of philosophical debate about determinist free will versus indeterminism and decided that his interpretation of free will, which falls firmly in the causal indeterminism camp, is the right way to think about things. Admittedly that's the nice one, because determinism is hard when it…

What is relationship between free will and ethics/morality?

If we don't have free will then we have no control over what we do. Consequently we can't be held to account over our actions if they weren't a choice.

Re: Free will is back, and maybe we can measure it

#23

Post by pjc50 » Tue, Oct 20, 2015, 9:53 AM UTC

onion2k wrote: post #8

narag wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ISTM that the hundreds of years of debate comes from a unfortunate misunderstanding provoked by many centuries of religious thought: that to be free we need some kind of "soul" apart from physical reality. (The article mentions that) But I don't fully understand why so many smart people, including non-believers, can't see the obvious: that determinism has nothing to do with free will. Free will is just a mechanism of…

that determinism has nothing to do with free will The theory goes that, on an atomic level, interactions between particles is a deterministic process - it's wholly and completely predictable because the outcome is determined by a knowable set of rules. Given the fact that our brains are just[1] a huge set of particles and chemical processes it should then follow that a perfect computer model of someone's brain would…

interactions between particles is a deterministic process

But this isn't even deterministic on its own terms. Particle decay is stochastic. Quantum tunneling is stochastic. There's a constant, silent rain of neutrinos that don't interact nearly all the time.

Fully deterministic analog electronic computing is impossible because we cannot eliminate Johnson noise and shot noise. Why do people then think that neural computing would be noise-free?

Re: Free will is back, and maybe we can measure it

#24

Post by mrob » Tue, Oct 20, 2015, 9:54 AM UTC

onion2k wrote: post #22

cLeEOGPw wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is relationship between free will and ethics/morality?

If we don't have free will then we have no control over what we do. Consequently we can't be held to account over our actions if they weren't a choice.

By the same argument other people have no choice but to hold them to account.

Re: Free will is back, and maybe we can measure it

#25

Post by cLeEOGPw » Tue, Oct 20, 2015, 10:02 AM UTC

onion2k wrote: post #8

narag wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ISTM that the hundreds of years of debate comes from a unfortunate misunderstanding provoked by many centuries of religious thought: that to be free we need some kind of "soul" apart from physical reality. (The article mentions that) But I don't fully understand why so many smart people, including non-believers, can't see the obvious: that determinism has nothing to do with free will. Free will is just a mechanism of…

that determinism has nothing to do with free will The theory goes that, on an atomic level, interactions between particles is a deterministic process - it's wholly and completely predictable because the outcome is determined by a knowable set of rules. Given the fact that our brains are just[1] a huge set of particles and chemical processes it should then follow that a perfect computer model of someone's brain would…

> The theory goes that, on an atomic level, interactions between particles is a deterministic process - it's wholly and completely predictable because the outcome is determined by a knowable set of rules.

That is not true. The quantum mechanics doesn't disprove determinism, but is clearly states the result can not be predicted, because an act of measurement changes the outcome.

That means it's not magic, but uncertainty that makes exact outcome of a system unpredictable. We can just know probability of the outcome.

Of course this unpredictability doesn't mean there's free will, it just means that we will never be able to find out with a 100% certainty what we will think even if we measured every little detail about the brain.

And if the argument is "But let's imagine we knew every little detail about a brain to atomic level, then we would surely know what he will think in the future" then we are talking about imaginary things. Magic knowledge doesn't exist.

Re: Free will is back, and maybe we can measure it

#26

Post by cLeEOGPw » Tue, Oct 20, 2015, 10:32 AM UTC

onion2k wrote: post #22

cLeEOGPw wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is relationship between free will and ethics/morality?

If we don't have free will then we have no control over what we do. Consequently we can't be held to account over our actions if they weren't a choice.

You have incorrect definition of accountability. Accountability is not true/false value defined by "if a person made a choice". Accountability is a percentage of electrical signals, originated from frontal cortex, that caused the action in question. That's why children, mentally ill and even women on PMS are less accountable - less of the electrical signals originated in frontal cortex.

Now, since we have cleared out what a "choice" is and there is no more argument about that, it is easy to show that frontal cortex output is determined by input that are prior experience (or electrical signals coming in), genetics (how it reacts to them and how it is initially wired) and chemical environment (drugs/hormones/others). So there's no room for any kind of free will.

So as you see there is no conflict between lack of free will and morals/ethics. We just need to accept that your frontal cortex is "YOU" and if it produced defective output (a crime for example), it has to be punished regardless of predetermination to do so. And accept that it is ETHICAL and MORAL to do that. That is all.

Re: Free will is back, and maybe we can measure it

#27

Post by cLeEOGPw » Tue, Oct 20, 2015, 10:34 AM UTC

yk wrote: post #16

narag wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ISTM that the hundreds of years of debate comes from a unfortunate misunderstanding provoked by many centuries of religious thought: that to be free we need some kind of "soul" apart from physical reality. (The article mentions that) But I don't fully understand why so many smart people, including non-believers, can't see the obvious: that determinism has nothing to do with free will. Free will is just a mechanism of…

Not sure why you are downvoted, for presenting what amounts to the leading theory of free will. ( Compatibilism, the view that free will is compatible with determinism is the most popular theory of free will among philosophers.[1]) [1] http://philpapers.org/archive/BOUWDP

Free will is flat earth of philosophy.

Re: Free will is back, and maybe we can measure it

#28

Post by Natsu » Tue, Oct 20, 2015, 10:37 AM UTC

spacehome wrote: post #14

Natsu wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That depends on exactly what idea of determinism you have. If you mean something like phenomena can be described by the standard model, that's fine, but if it's something like local realism, that's been busted pretty hard. This might prove more interesting than the linked article, though it was on HN previously: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v409/n6822/full/409791a... Local realism is the idea that objects hav…

The Many-Worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics is consistent with local realism.

True, but it makes Occam spin in infinitely many graves.

Re: Free will is back, and maybe we can measure it

#29

Post by jstanley » Tue, Oct 20, 2015, 10:37 AM UTC

This article is complete nonsense.

Just because it looks like animals are solving problems doesn't mean they have free will, any more than humans solving problems means humans have free will.

There is no reason these things can't come about through a deterministic universe.

Re: Free will is back, and maybe we can measure it

#30

Post by cLeEOGPw » Tue, Oct 20, 2015, 10:38 AM UTC

adrianN wrote: post #5

All discussions about free will are completely useless without first defining what exactly "free will" is. Is your definition of free will compatible with the assumption that the brain has to obey the laws of physics? Do you believe that free will is somehow magic?

"Free will" is the output of your fully developed (25+ years) frontal cortex (brain region operating on most abstract concepts) under normal chemical conditions (level of hormones, no affecting drugs, etc.) At least that's how legal system uses free will and I think it is pretty correct.