Philosophy Now Forum

Posted: **Tue May 18, 2021 7:54 pm**

RogerSH wrote: ↑Tue May 18, 2021 7:03 pm Divide the second Incompatibilist claim into two parts. (1) It is impossible for the mind to choose its own state at the time of choice. (2) The impossibility arises because prior causes in the world provide necessary and sufficient conditions to determine that state. I entirely accept (1): for the mind to choose its own contemporaneous state is certainly impossible, since whatever state it is in, it cannot be in any other state at that moment, so there is no alternative possibility to choose. In terms of the Meccano model, the length of the diagonal strut tautologically selects that length from any other length. However, I claim that (2) is false because the first conclusion does not require any assumption of determinism. Suppose the diagonal of the model is an elastic band rather than a rigid strut. This introduces an externally accessible freedom but not an internally accessible one: although the length can vary, at any instant the length that is willed is by definition the length it is. Whether the length/state of mind at that instant arises from external influences, internal processes, a quantum leap, agent causality, transcendent divine intention or whatever makes no difference: it still can’t choose to be other than it is at that instant.

The model still doesn't make a lot of sense to me--we'd need to clear up the questions I was asking you earlier (re how you're using "determined" and "free" in terms of the model), but aside from that, the idea of free will isn't that one is "choosing to be other than one is at time tx." The idea is that we can exploit ontologically free phenomena in order make a choice and/or to bring it to fruition.

Posted: **Sat May 22, 2021 1:41 pm**

RogerSH wrote: ↑Thu May 13, 2021 1:30 pm “Incompatibilism” is the claim that free will is incompatible with a deterministic world.

Take four similar Meccano strips (or equivalent) and bolt them loosely together at their ends to form a rhombus. Bolt a fifth strip between two of the opposite corners. The resulting assembly has no degrees of freedom: it is determinate. Note, however, that different lengths of the diagonal strip result in different shapes of the assembly.

Consider this as a model for a world containing at least one mind. The mind is modelled by the diagonal strip, and the length of the diagonal represents its will.

Then we conclude that this world is determinate, but ALSO that the will of the included mind is able to determine the state of the world. This apparent contradiction arises because the determinism of the world equates to an absence of externally accessible freedom, whereas the freedom needed for a will to determine what happens is internally accessible freedom – accessible to a will whose state is itself a variable of the world state. The model illustrates that it is a fallacy that a lack of externally accessible freedom necessitates a lack of internally accessible freedom. This is the first Incompatibilist fallacy.

The standard reply to this kind of argument is that in addition to the ordinary kind of freedom – the freedom of a free-range chicken, for example – “freedom of will” requires the ability of the mind to choose its own state at the time of choice. This is impossible, it is claimed, because prior causes in the world provide necessary and sufficient conditions to determine that state. Can anyone guess why I claim that this too is a fallacy?

I cannot guess.

In the definition of indeterminism it is said, “Indeterminism is the idea that certain events are not caused, deterministically. It is the opposite of determinism. It is highly relevant to the philosophical problem of free will.”

But that is backward. Free will leads to indeterminism. Indeterminism doesn’t lead to free will. If free will doesn’t exist, then neither does indeterminism.

As an example, when a spider chooses where to place her web, she is exhibiting free will. She is not exhibiting determinism nor indeterminism.

Incompatibilism is the view that a deterministic universe is completely at odds with the notion that persons have a free will.

No!

A completely deterministic universe does not exist now,

Posted: **Sun May 23, 2021 5:09 pm**

Terrapin Station wrote: ↑Tue May 18, 2021 7:33 pm
RogerSH wrote: ↑Tue May 18, 2021 6:52 pm No changes except the passage of time! That's surely quite a familiar concept?
It might be something people say and think makes sense, but it's incoherent. Again, time is IDENTICAL to change. If there are no changes, there is no time. Something has to be changing in order for there to be time. Time doesn't exist "on its own." It's simply the dynamic relations of matter.

So the whole point is that state A can't be identical to state B where state B is subsequent to state A...

Ah! I think I recognize that argument now. I see the point of it, since without change the passage of time could not be detected, which seems to imply it would have no meaning, (although not everyone would agree with that inference). But as I say, this doesn’t affect my argument because I only chose a static model to make it easier to visualise. (There is nothing incoherent about a static model, but I can see that a static universe can be problematic).

Posted: **Sun May 23, 2021 5:41 pm**

Terrapin Station wrote: ↑Tue May 18, 2021 7:54 pm
The model still doesn't make a lot of sense to me--we'd need to clear up the questions I was asking you earlier (re how you're using "determined" and "free" in terms of the model).

OK, here are some abstract definitions. Let us start from the definition that a system is fully determined/not fully determined if there is respectively only one/more than one possible subsequent state(s) of the system for any given antecedent state.

As it stands, this requires clarification of what is meant by “possible”. As we are speaking of a single system, even if it is an underdetermined system there cannot be two different possible states of it at the same time: so whichever state becomes actual at the subsequent time precludes all other states – they become counterfactual in hindsight. So the sense of the definition has to be that a system is / is not fully determined if there is not / is more than one subsequent state of the system that is not precluded by any facts about the antecedent state. Does that make sense?

Then a ‘choosing system’ A has choosing freedom with regard to a system B (which taken by itself is not fully determined and does not include A) if, of the subsequent states of B that are not precluded by any facts about the antecedent state of B, different states are precluded by different imaginable states of A.

A system B has external freedom if it is possible to imagine a choosing system A, wholly external to B, which would have choosing freedom with regard to B.

A system C has internal freedom if it is possible to partition it into two systems A & B such that A is a choosing system with choosing freedom with regard to B.

In the model, the five-bar structure represents C, the diagonal represents A and the rhombus represents B.

In this formalism, my argument is this: C corresponds to the world, A corresponds to a mind that is part of the world, so B by definition corresponds to all of the world except that mind. Then the fact that C is a fully determined system would not entail that B is fully determined, and hence would not preclude A from having choosing freedom with regard to B.

Posted: **Sun May 23, 2021 6:14 pm**

RogerSH wrote: ↑Sun May 23, 2021 5:09 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: ↑Tue May 18, 2021 7:33 pm
RogerSH wrote: ↑Tue May 18, 2021 6:52 pm No changes except the passage of time! That's surely quite a familiar concept?
It might be something people say and think makes sense, but it's incoherent. Again, time is IDENTICAL to change. If there are no changes, there is no time. Something has to be changing in order for there to be time. Time doesn't exist "on its own." It's simply the dynamic relations of matter.

So the whole point is that state A can't be identical to state B where state B is subsequent to state A...
Ah! I think I recognize that argument now. I see the point of it, since without change the passage of time could not be detected, which seems to imply it would have no meaning, (although not everyone would agree with that inference). But as I say, this doesn’t affect my argument because I only chose a static model to make it easier to visualise. (There is nothing incoherent about a static model, but I can see that a static universe can be problematic).

On my view it's not a matter of "detection." Change is what time IS. So you can't have any x if there is no x, obviously. It's not that we're using x to detect some y that's not identical to x.

Posted: **Sun May 23, 2021 6:21 pm**

RogerSH wrote: ↑Sun May 23, 2021 5:41 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: ↑Tue May 18, 2021 7:54 pm
The model still doesn't make a lot of sense to me--we'd need to clear up the questions I was asking you earlier (re how you're using "determined" and "free" in terms of the model).

OK, here are some abstract definitions. Let us start from the definition that a system is fully determined/not fully determined if there is respectively only one/more than one possible subsequent state(s) of the system for any given antecedent state.

As it stands, this requires clarification of what is meant by “possible”. As we are speaking of a single system, even if it is an underdetermined system there cannot be two different possible states of it at the same time: so whichever state becomes actual at the subsequent time precludes all other states – they become counterfactual in hindsight. So the sense of the definition has to be that a system is / is not fully determined if there is not / is more than one subsequent state of the system that is not precluded by any facts about the antecedent state. Does that make sense?

Then a ‘choosing system’ A has choosing freedom with regard to a system B (which taken by itself is not fully determined and does not include A) if, of the subsequent states of B that are not precluded by any facts about the antecedent state of B, different states are precluded by different imaginable states of A.

A system B has external freedom if it is possible to imagine a choosing system A, wholly external to B, which would have choosing freedom with regard to B.

A system C has internal freedom if it is possible to partition it into two systems A & B such that A is a choosing system with choosing freedom with regard to B.

In the model, the five-bar structure represents C, the diagonal represents A and the rhombus represents B.

In this formalism, my argument is this: C corresponds to the world, A corresponds to a mind that is part of the world, so B by definition corresponds to all of the world except that mind. Then the fact that C is a fully determined system would not entail that B is fully determined, and hence would not preclude A from having choosing freedom with regard to B.

That seemed to make a bit more sense, but I'm still not clear on the "internal/external" distinction you're making, and it's not at all clear to me how you're making sense of compatiblism in the light of this explanation.

Posted: **Sun May 23, 2021 8:17 pm**

I'm still not clear on the "internal/external" distinction you're making

Well, I've defined external freedom and internal freedom and they are are clearly not the same, so I'm not sure what else I can offer.

I guess I'll press on with the third & final part of this thesis.

Posted: **Sun May 23, 2021 8:20 pm**

Now let’s consider how Dualism comes into the Meccano model. Let’s represent the material world by green strips and the mental world by red strips. Let’s suppose that our existing model is just made of green strips. Now there are two cases to consider.

“Impotent Dualism”. This assumes that the material world is fully determined, and the Will exists in a separate mental world. So take the structure of five green strips, and fasten a red strip across the free diagonal. There is only one possible length for the red strip. So there is no Free Will.
I suspect that this is how the dogma of Incompatibilism arose, because it is the only case in which a lack of ontological freedom really does entail a lack of Free Will – because the Will in this case is external to the fully determined system, namely the material world. (The red strip is not part of the rigid structure of green strips).

But this is not what Dualists (of metaphysical essence) claim! Descartes had his pineal gland linking the two worlds. Modern dualists have some equivalent: some currently unexplained, maybe unexplainable, means by which choices in the mental world can effect outcomes in the material world; some incompleteness in the physical account of the world. So let us make a model of what Dualists really claim:-

“Potent Dualism”. This assumes that the material world may be fully determined except for some undefined influence from the mental world, in which the Will can be found; so in fact, is not fully determined. So remove the green diagonal strip, while keeping the red one. Then we have exactly the same consequences as in the original model: “The resulting assembly has no degrees of freedom: it is determinate. Note, however, that different lengths of the diagonal strip result in different shapes of the assembly… Then we conclude that this world is determinate, but ALSO that the will of the included mind is able to determine the state of the world.” Only the colour scheme has changed! Potent Dualism has no consequences for the possibility of Free Will. (The third fallacy of some Incompatibilists is to imagine that Compatibilism depends on some residual belief in Dualism. The reverse is the case!)

However, note that in this case the statement “this world is determinate” refers to the combined material and mental world. This is why most dualists consider themselves to be Libertarian Incompatibilists. They mean that freedom of a Will in a separate mental world would be incompatible with full determinism of the material world. But it is perfectly compatible with full determinism in the combined world.

The incoherent position for a Dualist is belief in Dualism AND Determinism of the material world AND Free Will. But that’s a problem for Impotent Dualism, not for Free Will.

Posted: **Sun May 23, 2021 8:41 pm**

RogerSH wrote: ↑Sun May 23, 2021 8:17 pm
I'm still not clear on the "internal/external" distinction you're making
Well, I've defined external freedom and internal freedom and they are are clearly not the same, so I'm not sure what else I can offer.

I guess I'll press on with the third & final part of this thesis.

Problems were that your definition of "external" repeated the word "external," and the definition of "internal" relies on a notion of partitioning where it's not clear just what would and wouldn't be partitionable and why. Not to mention that you're introducing the word "choice" where it's not clear what that would refer to when we're not talking about consciousness.

Posted: **Sun May 23, 2021 8:45 pm**

RogerSH wrote: ↑Sun May 23, 2021 8:20 pm Now let’s consider how Dualism comes into the Meccano model. Let’s represent the material world by green strips and the mental world by red strips. Let’s suppose that our existing model is just made of green strips. Now there are two cases to consider.

“Impotent Dualism”. This assumes that the material world is fully determined, and the Will exists in a separate mental world. So take the structure of five green strips, and fasten a red strip across the free diagonal. There is only one possible length for the red strip. So there is no Free Will.
I suspect that this is how the dogma of Incompatibilism arose, because it is the only case in which a lack of ontological freedom really does entail a lack of Free Will – because the Will in this case is external to the fully determined system, namely the material world. (The red strip is not part of the rigid structure of green strips).

But this is not what Dualists (of metaphysical essence) claim! Descartes had his pineal gland linking the two worlds. Modern dualists have some equivalent: some currently unexplained, maybe unexplainable, means by which choices in the mental world can effect outcomes in the material world; some incompleteness in the physical account of the world. So let us make a model of what Dualists really claim:-

“Potent Dualism”. This assumes that the material world may be fully determined except for some undefined influence from the mental world, in which the Will can be found; so in fact, is not fully determined. So remove the green diagonal strip, while keeping the red one. Then we have exactly the same consequences as in the original model: “The resulting assembly has no degrees of freedom: it is determinate. Note, however, that different lengths of the diagonal strip result in different shapes of the assembly… Then we conclude that this world is determinate, but ALSO that the will of the included mind is able to determine the state of the world.” Only the colour scheme has changed! Potent Dualism has no consequences for the possibility of Free Will. (The third fallacy of some Incompatibilists is to imagine that Compatibilism depends on some residual belief in Dualism. The reverse is the case!)

However, note that in this case the statement “this world is determinate” refers to the combined material and mental world. This is why most dualists consider themselves to be Libertarian Incompatibilists. They mean that freedom of a Will in a separate mental world would be incompatible with full determinism of the material world. But it is perfectly compatible with full determinism in the combined world.

The incoherent position for a Dualist is belief in Dualism AND Determinism of the material world AND Free Will. But that’s a problem for Impotent Dualism, not for Free Will.

???? Compatibilism/incompatibilism don't map to anything about dualism or hinge on anything about dualism.

Posted: **Tue May 25, 2021 2:36 pm**

Terrapin Station wrote: ↑Sun May 23, 2021 8:41 pm
RogerSH wrote: ↑Sun May 23, 2021 8:17 pm
I'm still not clear on the "internal/external" distinction you're making
Well, I've defined external freedom and internal freedom and they are are clearly not the same, so I'm not sure what else I can offer.
Problems were that your definition of "external" repeated the word "external," and the definition of "internal" relies on a notion of partitioning where it's not clear just what would and wouldn't be partitionable and why. Not to mention that you're introducing the word "choice" where it's not clear what that would refer to when we're not talking about consciousness.

OK, I agree this are key concepts so worth working through. “External” is in the logical sense, not the spatial sense, so the same as “additional”. System A does not overlap with system B, so on a Venn diagram its circle lies wholly outside the circle representing B. If B were to have a single degree of freedom, one could imagine it being supplemented by a system A whose state was a cause with an effect on B so as to make it fully determined.

Any system can be partitioned by definition – list a set of elements making up one sub-system, and all others belong to the second sub-system. It doesn’t follow, of course, that anything useful can be said about the relationship between them! But in some cases, like the diagonal bar and the rhomboid mechanism, the implications are very clear. Partitioning the world into a “mind” and everything else poses problems in practice of exactly where to draw the boundary, of course, but the claim is only that it is not impossible by logical necessity, so the exploitation of internal freedom as free will is not logically impossible. (Some neuroscientists suggest the entire thalamo-cortical system can usefully be regarded as the material location of decision-making. The problem in practice of going beyond this arises from the deep psychological problem of the nature of the will – but that belongs in another topic.)

For present purposes I am meaning “choice” in the very broad sense that a computer program (or even a mechanism like a thermostat) can make a choice, that is generate an output that serves as an input to another system. When I speak of “willed choice” on the other hand, I do mean that the means of generating the output involves consciousness. What makes the latter so very much more interesting & significant arises from the immense complexity of the process – but it is still a choice in the logical sense, and still has the same relationship to determinism.

Posted: **Tue May 25, 2021 2:38 pm**

Terrapin Station wrote: ↑Sun May 23, 2021 8:45 pm
RogerSH wrote: ↑Sun May 23, 2021 8:20 pm Now let’s consider how Dualism comes into the Meccano model....
???? Compatibilism/incompatibilism don't map to anything about dualism or hinge on anything about dualism.

That is my conclusion too, but a number of Incompatibilist sceptics (such as Sam Harris) - and probably most incompatibilist libertarians - do try to link the two debates. Of course, concepts like “mind” do map to different views about dualism.

Posted: **Tue May 25, 2021 6:59 pm**

RogerSH wrote: ↑Tue May 25, 2021 2:38 pm

Still trying to figure all of your comments out. Let me clarify this, too (and sorry if in your view you addressed this already, but I don't recall it): just what are you referring to with "freedom" in your comments? How are you defining what freedom would be?

Posted: **Wed May 26, 2021 11:30 pm**

Terrapin Station wrote: ↑Tue May 25, 2021 6:59 pm just what are you referring to with "freedom" in your comments? How are you defining what freedom would be?

It was a bit clumsy, I will try to reword it slightly, still aiming at precision rather than elegance...
In the context of a system A making a choice with regard to a system B which it does not overlap, system A has freedom to do so if there is more than one subsequent state of B that is not precluded by any facts about the antecedent state of B, AND of these states, different states are precluded by different imaginable states of A.

Posted: **Wed May 26, 2021 11:52 pm**

RogerSH wrote: ↑Wed May 26, 2021 11:30 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: ↑Tue May 25, 2021 6:59 pm just what are you referring to with "freedom" in your comments? How are you defining what freedom would be?
It was a bit clumsy, I will try to reword it slightly, still aiming at precision rather than elegance...
In the context of a system A making a choice with regard to a system B which it does not overlap, system A has freedom to do so if there is more than one subsequent state of B that is not precluded by any facts about the antecedent state of B, AND of these states, different states are precluded by different imaginable states of A.

Is there more than one subsequent state of B from the same antecedent state? And are we talking about states that immediately follow each other?

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