Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!laura From: laura@utzoo.UUCP (Laura Creighton) Newsgroups: net.philosophy Subject: Re: freedom and reason (attn russ, rich, & laura) Message-ID: <5364@utzoo.UUCP> Date: Thu, 28-Mar-85 01:13:45 EST Article-I.D.: utzoo.5364 Posted: Thu Mar 28 01:13:45 1985 Date-Received: Thu, 28-Mar-85 01:13:45 EST References: <362@aesat.UUCP> <5272@utzoo.UUCP>, <734@pyuxd.UUCP> <5312@utzoo.UUCP>, <766@pyuxd.UUCP> Organization: U of Toronto Zoology Lines: 168 Why are you trying so bloody hard to forcefit your notions of "without free will I wouldn't do any of these things". If your chemical makeup was such that you enjoyed and took pride in your work, you most certainly would. This is, of course, the question. The answer is, though, because I would have no reason to enjoy or take pride in my work any more. I could not help but do the things that I did. I don't take pride in *other people's* work, and I don't take pride in the actions of other people. If my behaviour is entirely determined, then I would view my own actions as I viewed the actions of other people -- and indeed, my way of viewing other people would change. Do you write lousy code? Today, I would criticise you for it. But, of course, if you couldn't help but write lousy code, then there is no reason for me to upbraid you for it, since you didn't choose to write lousy code. Are you an Identity Christian? Well, these days I will flame you into the ground. But, of course, if you were not free to not become an Identity Christian, it seems foolish of me to criticise you as if it were your fault, or your responsibility. Do I say I love you? Oh well, today I believe that it is because you and I share similar values and I admire you for having them. Of course, if you are in no way responsible for the values that you have, then it is foolish of me to admire you as if you had anythng to do with it. You just happened to be that way, but I could as easily love someone who shares none of my values, for they just happened *that* way as well. Gee, love seems kind of pointless. Gee -- *EVERYTHING* seems kind of pointless. I think I will pack it in now, now that I understand that there is no such thing as personal responsibility, I don't think that there is anything worthwhile any more. How can you say that life is ``as full as I make it''? What you have been telling me is that *I* *can't* *make* *it*! If I could, if I could really chose to make life more or less full, then I would have free will. But, if I can't, then no life is full -- some only appear more full by a standard that assumes that there is such a thing as personal responsibility. Without personal responsibility, all talk of a ``meaningful life'' is so much crap. Everybody gets what they were destined to get in life. Some people are destined to be called ``meaningful'' and others aren't. But who cares? It wasn't by their actions that they determined what they were destined to get -- what they were destined to get was determined even before they were born out of the equally destined lives of their ancestors. ===================================================================== Why are you asking me to prove something I don't believe? To what end? What is meaningful about knowledge if one cannot influence one's own actions? Knowledge is as meaningful as its usefulness, as useful as its application. Why should I care? Even without application, pure knowledge can have beauty. Again, why should I care? If the future, like the past, is fixed then why should the application of anything interest me? >> If I program a machine to ask the question, does it have free >> will? > Now, here is an instance where we must be careful of what we mean. > what do you mean by ``ask''? If you mean ``print out the question > on a terminal'' then I would say ``no''. On the other hand, if you > programmed a machine and then it spontaneously came up with the > question ``does man have free will'' then I would have to answer that > I do not know -- but I would be inclined to suspect that it does. What makes you think that human beings don't ask questions by simply going through a series of internal processes and then "printing out the question" or "asking it orally"? Straw man. What makes you think that humans "spontaneously" ask questions rather than going through such such processes as I describe above to do so? Rich, I have never said that human beings *don't* do that. I do not think that this notion of doing things is incompatible with the notion of free will. I do not know whether a machine can or can not have free will. When I used the term ``spontaneously'' I meant to distinguish it from the case where I (using the bourne shell) type: PS1="Does man have free will?" export PS1 There. My terminal will print out ``Does man have free will'' a lot, but I don't think that the 11/44 in the department of Zoology has it. On the other hand, if you wrote an AI program that produced a machine that passed the Turing test, and, if one day you walked by it and it typed out at you ``Does man have free will'' then I would have to wonder about it. > All I am assuming is that either men have free will or they don't, > and that the expression ``men have free will'' is meaningful. It is just an utterance of sounds. It is only as meaningful as its veracity. If it is false, then it is false. No. No. No. No. No. Veracity has nothing to do with meaningfulness. ``My father has blue eyes.'' This is a wonderfully meaningful statement. It is also completely false, since my father has brown eyes. In addition, I would contest that it is just an utterance of sounds. It must be more. I never spoke it out loud, and there is no reason to assume that you did either. You interpreted the string of letters in a certain way -- you saw that it represented certain concepts that you already had. I am not asking you to evaluate a string of letters, but rather the concept that that string represents. The point was that your statement claiming that because I am seeking knowledge I am using free will was totally erroneous, plugging in random words to suit the conclusion you want to reach. My asking questions to gain knowledge does not imply use of free will, but somehow you claim to reach that conclusion above. I am politely trying to say "What the hell are you talking about?" It is YOU who are playing Humpty Dumpty here. Any question I ask (about free will or about snerdfelb) have equal POTENTIAL meaning. Only the reality of the answer shows how meaningful the information obtained really was. Remember, though, that even asking a "stupid" question can result in useful information. You misconstrue what I am doing. I will try again. 1. ``Does man have free will?'' is a question. 2. To ask a question is to seek an answer. 2b. [This implies that the questioner thinks that the question is meaningful. If I ask you ``what is snerdfelb'' then I am assuming that this is a meaningful question even though I don't know what snerdfelb is -- I expect that you do. This may be foolish, in that snerdfelb may be meaningless, but, in asking a question I am assuming that it is meaningful.] 3. To seek an answer is to seek the truth. 3b [NOTE that this does not say that TO SEEK AN ANSWER is to seek that the ANSWER BE IN THE AFFIRMATIVE. If I seek the answer the question ``Does my father have blue eyes'' then I am seeking the answer ``no'' which is the truth.] 4. Big Question Time WHAT IS THE SIGNIFICANCE OF SEEKING THE TRUTH? Perhaps there is no significance to it at all, but the standard answer is that one can avoid making mistakes by knowing the truth. One learns what is true to avoid making mistakes. Therefore: [Big Conclusions Time] If ``truth seeking'' is significant, and it is significant because it enables one to avoid making mistakes, then it follows that it is possible to avoid making mistakes. But this assumes that choices are possible, that is that the future is not fixed as is the past, but rather that there are possible futures -- one in which a mistake is made and one in which it is not. It also follows that through one's own thought one can influence which of the possible futures is the one that becomes the present and eventually the past. This is all I want from free will. Therefore: [Little Conclusion Time] In asking the question ``does man have free will'' one is implicitly assuming that the answer to this question is yes. Do you get it *now*? If you don't, it is not because I am twisting words. I am trying to be as excruciatingly clear as I can. I don't know where it is that you are misunderstanding this, but maybe you could tell me -- go slow, because I find it very difficult to follow how you get from certain premises of yours to other conclusions. Laura Creighton utzoo!laura