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From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: More ... definitions of free
Message-ID: <1274@pyuxd.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 21-Jul-85 22:25:59 EDT
Article-I.D.: pyuxd.1274
Posted: Sun Jul 21 22:25:59 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 24-Jul-85 20:57:41 EDT
References: <6156@umcp-cs.UUCP> <1041@pyuxd.UUCP>
Organization: Whatever we're calling ourselves this week
Lines: 47
Keywords: Definitions, definitions...

>>[...] You've claimed that
>>my "reductionism" doesn't show any flaws in the more "macro" level thinking.
>>But here, the fact that the baby's behavior is not freely chosen implies
>>that later behavior CANNOT be freely chosen.  When is the demarcation point
>>at which the baby's/child's non-freely chosen behavior suddenly becomes the
>>adult's freely chosen behavior?  There is no such point! [...]
>>the resulting [adult] actions/decisions/thoughts are dependent on all
>>of this [external influences on infant], and thus not free.

> I hate to beg the question, but since you started it... The demarcation
> point is the point where r-e-a is applied to behavior and to sifting out
> influences on oneself to be accepted or rejected.  It all comes down to the
> definition again...

(1)  There is clearly no such clear "demarcation point", since anyone who
has learned r-e-a does so over a period of time, gradually, and no one ever
gets it perfect, there's always the set of irrational things you've learned
from your parents/etc. that have their effect, and (2)  R-e-a is not a
universal.  It is a POTENTIAL capability that humans have, but it is NOT
exercised by everyone, and not exercised by ANYONE in its pure perfect state.
The ability to make decisions rationally and objectively is a learned thing,
and it is not learned by everyone.  What everyone has and does is make
decisions from stored knowledge accumulated from past experiences, and since
the content of those experiences determines the way in which you act (and 
sometimes the content results in a predisposition for IRRATIONAL choices),
that once again, is not freedom.

>>"Free" means "INdependent, UNfettered".  Just because one element of the
>>set of the factors involved internal things (freely created?), doesn't
>>make it free.  They'd ALL have to be "INTERNAL" factors for that to be true.
>>And since the internal factors themselves are not "freely created", even
>>that case is a wash.

> There's one other necessary condition for freedom beyond one element of each
> chain of causes being internal, namely that the internal factor not be some-
> thing which the person wants to be rid of but can't (such as a "compulsive
> desire" or mental illness, perhaps).  But given that condition, I think it
> does make it free.  Consider responsibility.  If one of the causes of a
> situation was "internal" to my volition, doesn't that make me responsible?

Not if many of the others are based on the way you've learned to react to
experiences.  If you've learned from your parents that the way to react to
an argument with your spouse is violence, are you "responsible" when you act
that way?  Do you "choose" to do so?  Is there a force you can exercise to
react differently?  Is your "choice" of reaction FREE?
-- 
"Do I just cut 'em up like regular chickens?"    Rich Rosen    ihnp4!pyuxd!rlr