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From: jim@ISM780B.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: Re: Redefining free will?
Message-ID: <156@ISM780B.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 16-Mar-85 01:29:17 EST
Article-I.D.: ISM780B.156
Posted: Sat Mar 16 01:29:17 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 17-Mar-85 23:33:43 EST
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Nf-ID: #R:spar:-12600:ISM780B:27500067:000:1225
Nf-From: ISM780B!jim    Mar 14 21:03:00 1985

>Well, maybe free will is a product of the quantum uncertainty of
>our neurons firing.

I think the biggest problem with thinking of free will this way is that
you have no argument that there is an agent that *controls* these quantum
events, thus the "will" in "free will" is void.  And the multiple worlds
view says that all the possible decisions that might derive from the
various combinations of quantum events get made, in one universe or another.
It seems to me that the notion of free will requires an agent that causes
without being caused, and is not consonant with random or all-cases-occurring
events.

>I have a side question: Must cause precede effect??

A friend did a lot of work in this area, and one of his conclusions was
that there is no coherent model of causality which allows for backward
causation.  That is, if you try to come up with a definition of causality
which subsumes common sense notions, inherent in that definition is always a
directed temporal flow between cause and effect.  I don't know how to to
state this is a way that convinces, but the basic way to determine an answer
to the above question with some degree of confidence is to *formally define*
the terms.

-- Jim Balter (ima!jim)