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From: schwadro@aecom.UUCP (David Schwadron)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Redefining free will?
Message-ID: <1294@aecom.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 19-Mar-85 22:11:43 EST
Article-I.D.: aecom.1294
Posted: Tue Mar 19 22:11:43 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 24-Mar-85 01:02:56 EST
References: <156@ISM780B.UUCP>
Organization: Albert Einstein Coll. of Med., NY
Lines: 34

> >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)

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Thanks Jim.
Just one question, defign "will". The "free" can be defigned as an
event without a cause, but what about "will". That the decision was
made because the agent wanted to make it???
				michab
			A Fugue in One Voice

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