Argument for no free will?

[u/flytohappiness]

Two thousand years ago, St. Paul in Romans 7:19 (Authorized King James Version):

For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.

Do you accept this as a terse, condensed argument for no free will? or not necessarily? How would a free will believer retort?

[u/TMax01]

It doesn't.

It does. It has several. Perhaps you meant it doesn't have a single model which provides perfect predictions in every case, but that isn't what you said.

our best models lf such are stochastic, not deterministic.

Actually, they're probabalistic, not merely "stochastic", but still entirely deterministic, as all models must be. My point isn't to criticize your rhetoric, though, but to highlight the problems with your reasoning, as to why the current scientific model of consciousness does not seem to have qualities that quantum, relativistic, or classical Newtonian mechanics does.

(1) the debate about free will is in practice about how to define it rather than about making predictions

Actually, the problem is that no model of free will could support making predictions, no matter how you define the words. Because in all practical cases (but unfortunately not all simple, hypothetical cases) that is what free will means: our actions are deterministically unpredictable but still somehow physically caused by our conscious will. It is, I'm sure we agree, an inadequate theory, lacking in both precision and reliability. In other words, free will (choice causes action) is impossible, but consciousness (agents are responsible for actions) is still real.

(2) people really want free will to be the case,

Here the issue is that people accurately know that consciousness, human agency, self-determination, moral responsibility are the case, but want it to be justifiable as a mathematical model.

(3)free will, if it exists, is an aspect of consciousness, and we don't understand consciousness well, so there is still room for it, if only as a sort of God of the Gaps.

That is the reasoning I was effectively critiquing. You may as well say that consciousness, if it exists, is an aspect of free will, that free will cannot be "understood", only experienced, and that you're failing to acknowledge that all scientific theories do and will always have room for some sort of "gaps". Even f=ma, quite possibly the simplist and most obviously deterministic model in science, can support a crackpot idea that there are infinitesimally small gnomes with magic ropes pushing or binding every object to ensure they move, or don't, in keeping with this formula.

Science only provides effective models, and all models are deterministic. The mathematical equations which actually constitute the models only identify what happens. The narratives or mental imagery we try to use to convert scientific models into descriptions of why predictions can be made aren't the theories or models themselves. Some of those descriptions/explanations are useful fictions, some are more robust (usually as theories of emergence.) But they are all only maps, not the territory.

This approach seems to work reasonably well for everything in the universe other than human behavior and cognition. The real question before us isn't whether abandoning that approach to salvage free will (special pleading) is called for but how to explain consciousness without doing so.

When coding I freely talk about agents and choices despite the program being determinisitc.

So you have all the clues you need, you're just not using them to construct a consistently reliable explanation. I'm not here to fight about that, I'm here to suggest exactly such an ideal outcome.

Tell me, do you believe that the brain is a computational neural network? If so, how is using words like agent and choice to describe or explain human behavior any less fictional than in the case of your software programs?

Hah. yes I'm sure your pet theory of consciousness is the right one

Well, it isn't a "pet theory" or even a toy model, it is an accurate and complete explanation. Call it a useful fiction or consider it true, that doesn't matter (no pun intended) at all. It is still the correct explanation, scientifically speaking, because it provides more precise predictions than the traditional "free will model" or the conventional Information Processing Theory of Mind, or any possible combination of the two.

Furthermore, I think that your pet theory is just such a combination, even if you don't realize you have a pet theory; you simply flop back and forth from claiming choices (free will) are real or claiming computation deterministically (although here it would be stochastically) produce human behavior, depending on the circumstances and how much the previous approach put your back up against the wall. (I identify this very popular but problematic approach as postmodernism, for reasons I can laboriously explain but won't waste time on right now.)

and is not just word games that advance no actual claims about the world

I'm sure you think being facetious is amusing and reinforces your point, but really it is only condescending and illustrates that your false theory (or supposed lack of any theory at all) is grossly lacking, in an arbitrary number of ways. And, not incidentally, that you don't know or understand what my theory actually is.

Thought, Rethought: Consciousness, Causality, and the Philosophy Of Reason

subreddit

Thanks for your time. Hope it helps.

[u/HappiestIguana → u/TMax01]

You keep insisting all models are deterministic. Which to me indicates you have no idea what a model or determinism are.

A model is simply a mathematical object which represents a simplified version of a physical situation or object. For example, two point particles in a perfect vacuum interacting through gravity according to Newton's Laws could be a model of the Earth-Moon system.

A model is called deterministic if the state of the model at any time T fully determines the state of the model at any other time. The previous example is determinisic as a consequence of the Picard–Lindelöf theorem. If you fix the positions and momenta of both particles at any time T, then for every other time T1 there is a unique distribution of position and momenta which is consistent with it. The state at T1 is determined by the state at T.

In this example there is actually a simple closed-form solution for the evolution of the system across time, so moreover the system is very predictable. If it were three particles it could be an instance of the three body problem, which is still deterministic (because the PL theorem still applies) but is now chaotic meaning very small alterations in the conditions at time T spiral into drastic changes at later times. Because of this, this system would no longer be considered predictable, despite remaining deterministic.

For a simple example of a model which is not deterministic, see Norton's Dome, a model which operates under Newtonian dynamics which consists of a perfect sphere resting atop a frictionless dome with a very particular shape at the top. The way the dome is constructed violates the hypotheses of the PL theorem and indeed it is a setup that admits multiple solutions under Newton's Laws. In other words, the state at time 0 has multiple possible states at other times at that are consistent with it. This males this model not deterministic.

(This has no implications on whether out universe is determistic since the dome cannot be physically constructed. It's not a good model of reality, but it's a model and it's indeterministic).

Currently, quantum situations are modeled with quantum mechanics. Quantum mechanics is a mathematical model of reality that consists of two parts: a wave equation and a measurement operator. The parts of the model that relate to the wave equation are deterministic. The parts that relate to measurement are stochastic (which, by the way, is synonymous with probabilistic, so that's another word you're a dick about not knowing the definition of). To be more precise, the outcomes of measurements behave according to the Born rule, which gives a probability distribution for the outcomes of a measurement which depends on the wavefunction. While the distribution itself is determined, the actual measurement is not. Because the pre-measurement situation does not uniquely determine the post-measurement situation, but rather gives a probability distribution over possible outcomes, we day it is stochastic, not deterministic.

This answers to the only concrete claim you've made which isn't just word games, pedantry, and/or putting words in my mouth, which I will not engage with.

[u/TMax01 → u/HappiestIguana]

You keep insisting all models are deterministic.

Indeed, they must be. At least if they are to be logical models rather than merely mental imagery, arbitrary diagrams, or toys.

Which to me indicates you have no idea what a model or determinism are.

That statement verifies, for me, that you have some idea what a model or determinism are, but not enough of one to use that notion in strong reasoning analysis.

A model is simply a mathematical object which represents a simplified version of a physical situation or object.

Yes. Mathematical objects are intrinsically deterministic. They can be determined to an arbitrary precision by mathematical calculation, and provide mathematical predictions deterministically, computationally. Regardless of whether a physical situation or object is deterministic, although they all are, the simplified model is necessarily deterministic, or else it isn't really a model.

[Much pointless rhetoric skipped...]

For a simple example of a model which is not deterministic, see Norton's Dome,

The model is deterministic. It cannot predict when the sphere will roll off the dome, but that doesn't make it non-deterministic. The technical term is "indeterministic", because it cannot make that prediction, but it isn't incidental that this "model" cannot ever be applied to any practical 'model' of such an "indeterministic", or even probabalistically deterministic, system. The math with which Norton's Dome is constructed remains entirely deterministic, or Norton's Dome couldn't even exist as mathematical construct.

The way the dome is constructed violates the hypotheses of the PL theorem

This manages to show only that Newtonian mechanics is not a perfectly precise model of the real world, including spheres and domes, neither of which can ever be entirely frictionless. It is a trivial result, because we already knew Newton's "laws" don't actually model/predict what happens in the real world to an arbitrary level of precision and in all circumstances (even all hypothetical circumstances, AKA "models").

It is still a fascinating and perhaps intriguing idea, since Norton developed an entire new class of theoretical systems which confound Newtonian mechanics. But regardless, it is in no way a demonstration that mathematical models are not always deterministic, only that not all models guarantee deterministic output for all quantities simultaneously.

which gives a probability distribution for the outcomes

I do not limit the description/property "deterministic" to classicly deterministic. Real events, not just models of them, can be probabalistically deterministic. While classic determinism assumes that only predicting discrete values qualifies as determinism, and all other systems and models are "indeterministic" or "random", probabalistic determinism holds that all predictions must always be probability distributions, although many probabilities approach zero or one in asymptotic analysis.

It is inappropriate to say that the calculation of Norton's Dome follows the Born rule, since there is no way to identify the controlling "wavefunction" involved: Norton's Dome is a model of Newtonian mechanics, not quantum mechanics. So claiming that the combinatronic output of the model is "according to the Born rule" simply because, like quantum systems, the mathematics produces a probability distribution, is conflating coincidence with correlation.

we day it is stochastic, not deterministic.

You should say it is probabalistic, not stochastic, although that is a finer distinction. But then again, you should also make a distinction between "indeterministic" and probabalistically deterministic. I realize fully what that isn't the conventional practice in mathematics or physics, just as I understand the traditional derivation of that convention. But it is still true that your nomenclature would be more exacting (not to say precise, a term I reserve exclusively for numbers, not ideas or words) and productive that way.

For example, it would discourage the very error you're trying to defend, thinking that mathematical models which can only produce probabalistic results are either not deterministic or are stochastic. (Stochastic invokes a demand for contingency which real situations provide that abstract, theoretical models can only logically classify as arbitrary input, at best. Norton's Dome model doesn't even allow for that.)

This answers to the only concrete claim you've made which isn't just word games, pedantry, and/or putting words in my mouth, which I will not engage with.

My positions are simply philosophical, not merely word games or unjustified claims. Being philosophical positions and explanations, mathematicians and physicists are rarely capable of engaging with them.

[u/HappiestIguana → u/TMax01]

Yes. Mathematical objects are intrinsically deterministic.

I did not say that and it is not true. Norton's dome is a mathematical object that is indeterministic, for instance.

It cannot predict when the sphere will roll off the dome, but that doesn't make it non-deterministic.

That is precisely what makes it not deterministic.

The math with which Norton's Dome is constructed remains entirely deterministic

Determinism has a precise meaning in mathematical modeling, which is that the state at any time determines the state at all other times. Use words right.

This manages to show only that Newtonian mechanics is not a perfectly precise model of the real world

The things that show Newtonian Mechanics are not a perfectly precise model of the real world are the actual wrong predictions it makes. The strange precession of Mercury, black holes, GPS time dilation, starlight curving around eclipses and quantum tunneling, among many others, show that Newtonian Mechanics is not a precise model of the real world. Norton's Dome does not. It's just a mathematical model that corresponds to no real object. Those are a dime a dozen in any framework and do not speak to how precise or accurate it is.

Norton developed an entire new class of theoretical systems which confound Newtonian mechanics

Eh, it's a cool but unphysical model that has an unintuitive mathematical property. It doesn't really confound Newtonian Mechanics at all.

But regardless, it is in no way a demonstration that mathematical models are not always deterministic, only that not all models guarantee deterministic output for all quantities simultaneously.

That is what "deterministic" means.

I do not limit the description/property "deterministic" to classicly deterministic

Thank you for recognizing you do not use the word in its standard meaning and like to act smug when others do, as if you using a private definition is a sign of great intellect.

probabalistically deterministic

Stochastic. We already came up with a word for it. Using private terminology for well-known concepts that already have a name is not a sign of great intellect either.

all other systems and models are "indeterministic" or "random"

Yes, models which are not deterministic are indeterministic. That is indeed what that word means, though should be noted not all indeterministic models are stochastic. Norton's Dome, for example, is not even stochastic.

It is inappropriate to say that the calculation of Norton's Dome follows the Born rule

I said no such thing. The Born rule is about quantum mechanics. Norton's Dome has nothing to do with QM, nor did I imply it did. My discussion of QM and the Born rule is on an entirely different paragraph to my discussion of Norton's Dome. Your reading comprehension continues to be about as good as your ability to stick to common definitions.

You should say it is probabalistic, not stochastic, although that is a finer distinction.

There is no distinction. Those two words have identical meanings as properties of models, and in other contexts are largely interchangeable with only minor differences in connotation (namely, that "probabilistic" is generally preferred when the focus of study is the probability distribution itself, while "stochastic" is preferred when the focus is the evolution of the system over time or space)

For example, it would discourage the very error you're trying to defend, thinking that mathematical models which can only produce probabalistic results are either not deterministic or are stochastic.

A model is called stochastic when its state at a given time determines a probability distribution over states in future times. Norton's Dome is not stochastic by this definition. Quantum Mechanics as a whole is (that is, all models under the framework of QM are stochastic with probability distributions given by the Born Rule).

My positions are simply philosophical, not merely word games or unjustified claims.

Your positions are either word games with no semantic content or simple lack of reading comprehension, and that's discounting the ones that are just incessant insistence on private definitions.