171–180 of 279 posts
Imagine, you're a complicated machine implemented in Game of Life. The game is another not so complicated machine in Game of Life and you start exchanging messages. As soon as you understand how the game works, you can simulate the internal state in your mind. This way, you can reach any score you like. So the result becomes invalid.
Whee, I did pretty well against it, managed to be at around 30%. https://imgur.com/a/GmaE45k (And no, I didn't write a Perl script, or have multiple goes to game the score, I just “tried not to do what I thought it'd think I'd do”.)
Highest it got to was 25% briefly.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I believe, it's possible to choose What exactly do you mean by choose ? Are you saying there are actions that have no discernable cause? That there's a state in the brain that is unrelated to the state of the brain a brief moment ago? If so, is that a type of telekinesis?
Do you believe it's all about the brain?
Just use your freewill.
Delightful.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The prediction algorithm is actually very straightforward[1]. It's a fun exercise to write a sequence generator specifically to defeat it. if you are inspecting the prediction algorithm, and you want to specifically defeat it, doesn't that mean copy the prediction algorithm and throw a "not" on it? It's the old halting problem trick...
It is an exercise of free will to overcome the imposed barriers of some test.
I just spammed F and randomly hit D and it pretty much never predicted the D.
Which I think captures a fundamental flaw in algorithms vs humans. Humans know how to mask their signals within noise. I'm inclined to believe the generalization that algorithms that aim for accuracy are highly susceptible to being manipulated by humans who are allowed to have free will over the inputs.
Asking the question "do we have free will" is really just an encoded way of defending your sense of ego. Even if you answer "no, there is no free will," it still presupposes the concept of "I".
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> it is accurately predicting what you won't press That is not what it's predicting. You have changed the definition of predict so that an incorrect prediction can be misinterpreted as a correct prediction.
If you have two choices ... and I always predict the wrong one ... another way to say that is: "I always predict the one you won't choose." If I can't actually predict which one you choose, then statistically, I should be right 50% of the time.
In what way is being unpredictable considered "free will"? Of course it's just being clickbaity but worth mentioning. I've seen this better used to show that humans are poor sources of randomness. Is there a difference between non-determinism and a free will choice? The latter seems to be a contradiction. A choice implies a reason which would be a cause, thus determinism. This test is asking to make random 'choices'.…
It's hard to come up with a scientifically valid test for something as wide and vague as 'free will'. So what happens is that the tests are designed to test for very specific things that are then used to reason better about vague things like 'free will'. What this test is actually focused on is decision making. The participant in the test is asked to randomly press either button A or B. The cognitive/mental experienc…
The implicit assumption here is that we are not dictating and directing our thoughts just because the outcome of the process of dictating and directing our thoughts may be predictable. This just doesn't follow.
Consider this analogy: a computer program dictates and directs the state of computer memory, but if I'm able to semi-reliably predict the state of computer memory at any point, then that disproves that the computer program dictates and directs the state of computer memory.
Of course that argument is obviously nonsense, no such test can disprove the fact that the program literally dictates and directs the state of computer memory. I also claim by analogy that no such test can disprove that the process of deliberation that we view as free will actually happens, even if that deliberation is deterministic. Determinism and free will are compatible (see Compatibilism).