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July 14, 2019 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
01:20:41
The Determinist/Free Will Debate - Freedomain Radio
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Alright, well thank you for joining us.
This is a debate from Freedomain Radio with an exciting panel of galactic experts known as the Predetermined Council of Giant Brainheads.
And they have been chatting away on the Freedomain Radio board at freedomainradio.com on the question of determinism.
And I guess we're going to have a chat about it because it can be a little bit of a back-and-forth, whirly-gig brain kaleidoscopic fest to get definitions of free will and determinism squared away and to make progress.
This is a conversation that has gone on at Freedomain Radio for about subjectively 300,000 years – Objectively, about three years.
And we're no closer to making any resolution or getting any particular, making any progress in the conversation.
So I thought it would be worthwhile getting some of the best and brightest in the pro-determinist camp.
I myself am not a determinist, but as far as I understand it, from the three gentlemen to my right, that's not my fault.
But I was wondering if we could go forward and if you guys could...
I don't know if you want to say anything about yourself.
And Tyrell, if you might want to flip on...
I don't know if you're trying to be incognito, but you're kind of in a low-light situation.
If you take your hat off or something, it looks like you are on the run from Mossad.
And I don't think that you are.
Oh, wait. You should be a determinist.
You should not be a determinist based on the...
That's very good because I'm not a determinist.
Compatibilist on the...
Paul and Peter, not only are you the beginnings of a fabulous folk rock duo, but I do believe that you're a more hard determinist.
Is that right? Yes, I think that's right, yeah.
Okay, great. So...
I've already had the opportunity to put forward my free will position in a variety of podcasts.
And just remember, if you could mute, if you're not talking, we do get a bit of an echo.
So I've already had the opportunity to put forward, and if people want to know my positions on free will and how I define it, what it means, then you can – there's a free will series on YouTube if you want to see the videos, or you can go to freedomainradio.com forward slash search, type in free will, and you'll see all the podcasts. or you can go to freedomainradio.com forward slash search, type
So I don't think that I need to go into any particular details about my position as far as this goes, but if we could go sort of in order from hardest to most soft core determinist, I think that would be helpful so that I could get a sense of the range of positions that we're starting from.
So, Paul, you're a hardcore robot head determinist.
Is that fairly accurate?
Yeah, that's right, yeah.
Okay, so would you like to lay out the position and help me to understand what I've not been able to understand for the past few years?
Yeah, I can try.
Actually, I don't think it's that complicated.
Everything we know about matter and all these other things can be, when we only look at it closely enough, predicted.
For example, there will be no doubt when we take a quite primitive organism like a worm or a slug.
We can... Understand its neural network, the way it's built, and if we somehow find a way to measure what's going on in this neural network, we will be able to perfectly predict what this worm is going to do next.
And since, due to Darwin's theory of evolution, we developed from The same things, like these worms, without any leaps in a chain of events.
Do you get what I mean? We're just way more complex than a worm.
If I understand it right, it's not like every organism except man developed according to the same pattern or path.
But... So man is not outside the continuum of nature or physics, which is what the religious position would be, that what differentiates us from fish and fowl is God's soul, which gives us these remarkable and amazing and, and of course purely fictional capacities relative to all other living creatures.
So we're part of the Darwinian continuum, subject to all the same laws of physics and not possessed of any supernatural or non-material abilities.
Is that what you mean?
And I of course fully agree with that, but I just want to make sure I understand that's what you mean.
Yeah, thanks.
That's exactly what I was trying to say, yes.
Okay, no, and you said it very well.
I just wanted to make sure I understood it well.
Thanks. Yeah, so, now that we look, if we can understand the one, we can, with a better computer, we can understand the human brain and we can predict humans' behavior perfectly.
So, there is no room for free will when looked at from the outside.
It appears from our perspective, from the perspective of the human minds, that we have free will.
But it's merely an illusion because we cannot understand how complex our own brains are.
So, yeah.
Right. So, if I understand this correctly, and I use this metaphor on the board, I'm sorry for repeating it here, but when I feel I have a good metaphor, I like to milk it until it turns inside out.
But primitive people, primitive tribes would look at the weather and they would believe that the weather was controlled by the gods and therefore they would pray to the gods or in a sense have a debate or argue or supplicate or reason with or pray to the gods to get rainfall crops or whatever and that is imagining that there's a kind of ghost in the machine because the weather of course is a highly complex system And the only reason we can't predict it with perfect accuracy is we lack information,
not because there's a God in there whose will we cannot divine, so to speak.
And so from the determinist position, the free will position is the position that there's a God in the rain cloud, and it's entirely false that there is a God in the rain cloud.
And so when human beings understand that the weather Is not controlled by the gods, then what they do is cease debating with the weather, because it would make no sense to debate with the weather.
You simply attempt to predict it and you work with what is, but you don't sort of shake your fists at the rain clouds for raining on your wedding day or anything like that, or feel that Zeus or Set or Baal has betrayed you by punishing you with rain.
And if that metaphor is off, certainly let me know.
I did not completely understand your metaphor, sorry.
You mean they would just stop praying because they know that it makes no sense?
Yeah, we don't pray for weather because we understand that weather, although it's too complex for us to predict with perfect accuracy, does not have choice or free will.
It is not a conscious choice.
Entity with the ability to make choices and act on preferred behavior and so on.
It is simply a highly complex system and we can predict it with generalities and that's in the same way that an economist say can predict things with generalities.
In other words that if a Porsche is on sale for a dollar that the demand will be very high and it will sell very quickly but you can't predict with perfect accuracy Only because you lack particular knowledge of the variables, in the same way that we can predict general trends within weather, but we can't predict exactly when the rain is going to start, how many raindrops there are, but only because we lack information in the complexity of the system, not because the system has choice and free will.
Yeah, exactly. If we knew all the determinants that control our weather, then we could predict it, and I'd say one day it'll be possible.
It will be possible to perfectly predict your behavior because we will have the computing power and know all of the variables or at least enough to predict what someone's going to say next, what they're going to do next.
In a sense, the future is like we're a train on a train track.
We're not a guy ambling around a field, right?
We're on a train track of obeying the laws of physics and biology and so on.
Is that fair to say?
Yeah, that's correct, yes. Okay.
And so for you, there's no such thing as an ego or personal responsibility, right?
That would be an illusion in the same way that we would not assign personal responsibility to the weather.
Events simply unfold like a rock bouncing down a hill has no control, even though we don't know exactly where it's going to land.
It's only because we lack variables or knowledge of the variables or computing power in real time.
We don't know where that rock's going to land, and wherever it's going to land is not the responsibility, so to speak, of the rock.
Is that fair to say? Yeah, concerning the Rock, it's fair to say, but I wouldn't say there's no ego.
There are different ways of viewing humans or life in general.
So, what I'm trying to say, you cannot...
The ego or things like consciousness or free will, they don't exist in the scientific view of reality, okay?
You get what I mean? Sorry, the ego doesn't exist in a scientific view, is that right?
Yeah, exactly, but we still experience it as real.
Well, sorry, we have to differentiate the sciences here, because I'm no expert on physics, and I can't speak to the physics of this, but certainly psychology is in the sciences, along with biology, and psychology certainly recognizes the ego.
Okay, yeah. So physicists may not, chemists may not, but psychologists certainly would, and they would be counted within the sciences.
Okay, true. I'll put it another way.
Okay, so I'm saying there are two different perspectives on reality, and from these two different perspectives result two different ways of describing this reality, okay?
And I think the main problem in our debate is we constantly switch between them and mix them up.
Okay, and what are these two ways of describing reality?
The first one is I am a natural scientist in my lab and on the objects I'm studying I have a third-person perspective, I'd say.
It's a third-person perspective because the observer and the thing that he is observing are not identical.
But when a scientist, we try to investigate the neuronal basis for a mental phenomenon like consciousness, like free will, The scientist will inevitably investigate himself too.
So he observes neural processes from the third-person perspective as a scientist, but as a human being, he inevitably experiences the phenomenon from a subjective first-person perspective.
And so these perspectives have, like I said, different ways of describing different languages.
Right, so let me just make sure I understand what you're saying just before we move to the next point.
If I am pointing a spectrograph at the red wall behind me, I'm going to get a certain wavelength back.
But at the same time, when I'm looking at that wall, I will also see the color red.
And is that what you mean?
That there's something that you're measuring and then there's your direct experience of that?
And of course, you're talking about more of an internal state, but I'm just trying to understand the general distinction that you're talking about.
Well, yeah, that sounds correct.
Yes, yeah. Okay. So, go on.
So, if I understand you right, then the determinists are describing the spectrograph and the wavelength, whereas people who are free will advocates are describing the subjective experience of consciousness, is that right?
Yeah, that's right. It's a huge misunderstanding, so to say.
Well, I don't know that it's a misunderstanding.
I mean, I can be wrong.
Because the people who are describing free will If they're putting an irrational ghost in the machine called free will or consciousness or whatever that has choice, then they are committing an error, right? No, they're not really committing an error.
From their perspective, they're not committing an error because they cannot understand the complexity of their own mind.
Well, sure, but they can say...
Like, I can't understand the complexity of the weather, but I can say it's not controlled by the gods, right?
I mean, if I say the weather is controlled by the gods, I'm speaking in error, right?
Even if I'm not a meteorologist and I don't understand why the rain happens or precipitation or cold fronts or anything like that, even if I don't have any clue why the weather happens...
I still would be erroneous or it would be a false statement to say it is controlled by the gods, right?
Yeah. So it doesn't require a knowledge of the brain in order, if determinism is true, then it doesn't require a knowledge of the brain to say that there's no such thing as free will, that that is just an illusion, the way that there are gods in the rain clouds is an illusion.
Right, yeah. Okay, so there really aren't two perspectives, right?
There's a true perspective, which is that we don't have free will, and there's a false or subjective perspective, which is that we do.
Is that what I think you're saying?
Yeah. I mean, if I were to say, I feel like I have free will, that's one thing, right?
Or if I were to say, I believe that there are gods in the rain clouds, that is a true statement because I'm saying, well, yes, I believe it, but it's not a true statement to say there are gods in the rain clouds.
So I could say, I experience free will, but there's no such thing as free will.
Yes. Okay, so free will is still an erroneous position.
It's not just two perspectives.
It is a subjective and false impression, like if I look out at the world and say, well, the world is flat because that's how it looks.
It's true that it looks flat to me, but it's not true that it is flat, right?
Yeah, that's right. It's like, you know, when you're saying the sun rises in the east, okay?
It looks like it's right, but it's wrong.
The sun doesn't rise in the east.
We have planets circling around, and no one's rising anywhere.
So that's what I'm trying to say, the difference between it.
It's the way we experience reality.
But it's false, right?
Yeah, of course. Okay, I think I understand that.
Peter, did you want to add anything in?
Yeah, I mainly agree.
And I would add that if you believe that causality is universal, that everything is caused, every effect is caused by something else, then free will is a logical contradiction with that.
Because you argued that free will is a property that can occur when you aggregate stuff that does not have the property of free will.
But I think that the problem with that is, and that is indeed true, I mean, you can take two liquids that are transparent and mix them and you get a liquid that has a property yellow or something.
So that is perfectly correct.
But I think that is not possible with causal stuff.
You cannot take causal building blocks that operate determined As a cause and effect, and you aggregate them to something that is not causal.
So, therefore, no matter how complex you make it, it will always be determined.
And self-free will cannot be possible.
Right, okay. So, and I just, before we, I'm sorry, did someone have something they wanted to add?
I thought I had someone. Tyrell, did you want to jump in with the compatibilist viewpoint, which I have a tough time understanding, but maybe you can elucidate it a bit for us?
Yeah, sure. I'm not exactly sure that I really am a compatibilist, so I just picked the term because it seems to be the closest to the way I'm interpreting things.
So the way that I perceive it, the argument as a whole, is it seems like there we have We have this idea that, you know, causality equals predetermined future, which I don't agree with, and I think you can show that a causal universe excludes a predetermined future.
So I kind of look at the debate as a seesaw back and forth.
We have two perspectives which both seem to be true.
One is that the future is not predetermined.
And secondly, that you can't have any effects without causes.
Causality is universal.
So we have this sort of seesawing back and forth over this, what I believe is a false belief that causality equals predetermined future.
So the determinist side say, well, we can't break causality.
Causality equals predetermined future.
Therefore, we live in a determined universe.
And from the free will perspective, we have, well, we don't live in a, the future is obviously not predetermined.
Causality equals predetermined future.
Therefore, causality must be broken somehow.
And I mean, that's my perspective.
That's my perspective on the debate.
I'm not sure if that's exactly how everybody here aligns or if that's how you align, but that's my generalized perspective.
Okay. I think I understand that.
Okay, and is there anything you wanted to add at the moment to that?
No, I'm not burning to add anything right now.
Okay, so I think if I understand this right, we can remove the criterion of complexity is irrelevant To the question of free will versus...
In the deterministic universe, the question of complexity becomes irrelevant, right?
So the fact that the human mind is obviously highly complex...
And creative or seemingly creative and so on, that that simply creates like a magician's illusion of choice, but complexity is irrelevant because fundamentally we are the same in terms of caused neural firings as a worm, right? I mean, we're a complex worm, but the complexity is irrelevant.
Is that fair to say from the perspective of the determinists?
I would agree with that.
In fact, if the complexity wasn't there, it would be a lot easier because we wouldn't...
I don't think worms can use voodoo because of a lack of disposable thumbs.
So, when we...
Oh, sorry. If someone can just mute, we're getting an echo.
If... So, then it is fair, I think, to take simple examples and we don't have to worry about whether they accord with humanity because humanity is nothing more than a complex example of these simple things.
So... So when we have a rock bouncing down a hill, which is a perfect metaphor, in fact it's directly analogous to human life, we have a rock bouncing down a hill, there's no possibility that the rock can fall in the, quote, wrong place,
is there? Well, if a human makes a statement, and this statement is, the rock will fall over there, And the rock falls somewhere else, then, in that sense, he makes a wrong statement.
He has a false belief. Well, unfortunately, that doesn't work in the deterministic universe, though, because the human being is just another rock.
And what is happening when the rock is falling down is the rock is simply following causality.
And the human being who says the rock should fall over there and not over there is also following causality equally and has no alternate A statement to make and therefore I'm not sure how I understand how the possibility of error conceivably exists within a predetermined universe.
Because to me it's like saying a rock, and forget the human being, we just talked about the rock.
A rock bouncing down a hill can't land in the wrong place.
It just lands wherever it lands, right?
That is true, yeah.
But a human being making a statement, it is true that he could not have made any other statement and his statement was bound to be false.
If a rock can't fall in the wrong place, a human being can't make a wrong statement because we've already agreed that the complexity is irrelevant, right?
If a rock can't fall in the wrong place, a human being cannot make an incorrect statement because there's no possibility of anything else occurring, right?
It would be like an error compared to what?
Compared to some other place where a true statement was made, but that other place doesn't exist because we have this iron law of causality, right?
No, I would not agree with that because I'd say that the error is that he says the rock falls over here and the rock fell over there.
So it is not compliant.
His beliefs are not compliant with reality.
And in that sense, he can be in error.
But there would be no other way that he could have been in error.
Sorry, he had no possibility whatsoever of making a correct statement, right?
Correct statement. That's correct.
So clearly he's not responsible for his error at all, right?
No, you would have to redefine responsibility, yeah, that is true.
Well, look, the rock is not responsible for where it lands, right?
Yeah. I mean, if the rock landed on my car, I wouldn't take it to court, right?
And say, well, that was just malicious, right?
That's correct. It's correct what you say, Steph, but the rock is not just falling anyway.
Somebody threw it, okay? When we have an effect, we have a cause.
We just want to be with the rock because we've already said that complexity is irrelevant.
So we can't bring human beings in as confusing and irrelevant because the complexity of the human mind is irrelevant.
We're just looking at a rock. Let's just say it accidentally dislodged and landed on my car.
Clearly, I can't, you know, rail against the rock for nastily destroying my car and take it to court, right?
Yeah, no, no, sorry.
You can't just look at a falling rock.
If the falling of the rock is an effect, there has to be a cause, okay?
Right, let's just say there was some rain and it dislodged the gravel that supported the rock.
It comes down the hill, it lands on my car.
There is a cause, of course, right?
But there's no possibility that it was never not going to happen.
So clearly I can't blame the rock.
That would be illogical, right?
That would be like getting mad at the weather because I think there's a god in there, right?
Yeah, but the rain is a little more to blame for the rock to come down because it's weakened up the ground.
What I'm saying is that it would be completely illogical to take either the rain or the rock or the wind or anything To court or to shake my fist at it and say, you nasty person or you nasty rock or you nasty rain or whatever, because clearly it would just be the unfolding of cause and effect.
It would make no sense whatsoever to say that there was any responsibility of any entity involved or any object involved, right?
Yeah, yeah, you're right, but taking to court and Who to blame or what to blame, it's easy, but it's not that easy, okay?
You can't put the blame just on one factor, okay?
Unless there's just one factor, unless there's just one single cause, then you can blame that single cause.
It doesn't matter how many causes there are, right? It doesn't matter how many causes there are because everything is...
They all come together to one effect.
Sure, but no cause is responsible, right?
Because it's just what happened, right?
It's what the unfolding of cause and effect and causality has resulted in, right?
And what I'm saying by that is that there's no possibility of responsibility.
And this doesn't mean that determinism is true or false.
Please understand me. I'm not trying to disprove determinism by saying that this is the case.
I'm just trying to understand determinism.
I'm not trying to trick you or trap you or say, aha, well, now it's false.
I'm just trying to say that a human being is morally indistinguishable from a rock, and there's no possibility of error.
Right or wrong or true or false because there's no possibility of alternate states, of alternative states, in the way that there's no possibility that a rock falling down a hill can land in the wrong place or be responsible for where it lands or anything like that, right?
Yeah, you're right. From the objective third-person perspective, a human being is absolutely not responsible for its actions.
But we as humans, most of the time, we look at the world from a first-person perspective.
And therefore, from this perspective, clearly a criminal is to blame.
Well, no, but that's an error, right?
I mean, saying that a criminal is to blame for his actions would be an error.
Because he's not. Yeah, but he's still...
Yeah, he's not to blame in a...
It's like he decided to do that.
But he's still, in our social or cultural system of values, he's still a dysfunctional machine.
If we want our society and our culture to keep on going this way, we don't want these dangerous elements to come up.
Well, sorry, again, it's just because maybe I'm misunderstanding the position.
So you're saying, if we want our society to be safer, then we should make the choice to throw these people in jail.
No, no, no, no, no. We should educate them.
I didn't think you were saying that. No, no, no, no, no.
No, no, no. Then it's too late, but there's always a chance to re-educate them, okay?
To show them, to carve the right behavior into their brain.
I mean, that's why it's so important.
You mean if you don't like the fact that there are criminals, you will choose to re-educate them or banish them or find some way of ameliorating their behavior?
Is that right? Yeah, that's right.
So I would say the right behavior gets chosen by the free market and the quality, the properties of the free market get, sorry for the word, determined by the human beings that have to interact with each other.
Okay, now, how do we understand?
When you say that the right behavior is chosen, it seems to me that you would be using the language of free will there.
Yeah, I have to.
I'm human. It makes it easier to understand, like I said.
No, we can talk about the weather without talking about gods, right?
Okay. Yeah, okay.
I get it. So there's no such thing as right behavior and there's no such thing as choosing, right?
And again, this doesn't disprove determinism.
I'm just making sure I understand the position.
Maybe you're right. Maybe there isn't any such thing as right behavior and maybe we can't choose anything.
Maybe you're completely right that causality is true and it's all an illusion.
I just want to make sure I understand the position.
I think the problem with this line of reasoning is that you try to find something out about the laws of nature and how nature behaves by introspecting into your feelings and into how you interact with other human beings.
But you cannot determine how an atom bounces into another atom by looking at how people Regards their own, their feeling that they have a choice, the feeling that there is morality, that there is a responsibility.
No physicist would use that as an argument that matter behaves in a certain way because, yeah, it must be so because we feel responsible.
So, yeah, I have a bit of a, it is an interesting thing how to redefine all these These things like morality and responsibility and blame and punishment, considering that everything is deterministic.
But the first thing to realize is that either everything is causal and it is universal, and there cannot be free will, or there is free will.
Then things are not all causal, and then, yeah, you open the door to religion.
Do you understand that?
I have a lot of statements there that I wouldn't necessarily agree with, and I don't think that you open the door to religion at all by saying that there is choice in the world.
But you said that there was a problem with my perspective, right?
But clearly...
I don't have a choice about my perspective and I am not responsible for my perspective, right?
So I'm not sure what you mean when you say there's a problem.
That's like saying that it's bad where the rock landed when it bounced down the hill.
Sure, you have no choice in the interaction with me in this debate.
We're kind of like two television sets talking to each other, right?
There's no possibility of choosing better or worse outcomes, right?
No, because a TV is only output, and we have inputs as well, and I try with my argument...
The outputs are as predetermined as the inputs, right?
Sorry to interrupt. Yeah, right, but I will...
What you and I are going to say next in the outcome of this debate is determined ahead of...
There's no possibility of it going a different way.
It's like a rock going down a hill, right?
Yeah, that is the result of universal causalities.
Right, so how is it that my perspective could be problematic, given that it's like a rock coming down a hill?
Well, that is the whole thing with truth.
If you say that truth falls completely into the water because there is no other alternative, then you're right.
Then there is nothing wrong with no proposition.
But I would say that truth is a belief that is in accordance with what happens in reality.
And then you can still have full truth and falsehood, even though there would be no other way than a person having a false belief.
Okay, but we have to, because we already agreed that we were going to ditch complexity, so tell me how a rock bouncing down a hill, from the perspective of the rock, is true or false, right or wrong, correct or incorrect?
No, there's nothing true or false or right or incorrect with that.
Okay, and since human beings are more complex rocks, the same criteria would apply, right?
Or not apply, so to speak.
Yeah, but if they have an idea, the idea is not in reality.
The idea they have about reality can still be wrong.
No, it can't.
Because if a rock can't be wrong, then a human being can't be wrong, because we already established that the complexity of the human mind is irrelevant to the question at hand, right?
If you say 2 plus 2 is 5, then it is still wrong.
I mean... It's not wrong. It's not wrong because there's no possibility of an alternative situation, right?
If a rock can't be wrong, and you're...
I mean, I asked that friend, you know, what is...
And we went through to make sure I understood the determinist position, right?
So, if a rock...
And we said that a rock is exactly the same as a human being, but just less complex, but the complexity is irrelevant, right?
We went through that. Therefore, everything which applies to the rock or to the weather also applies to a human being, because, as we've said, there's nothing special about a human being, right?
We are just a more complex form of life, but subject to all of the same laws as everything else, right?
So that which occurs within weather, that which occurs to a rock bouncing down a hill, will be identical to that which occurs for a human being.
We obviously have different subjective viewpoints and so on, but that's irrelevant because those would, I mean, from the free will standpoint, those would just be erroneous and should be corrected and so on.
But we can't apply any special judgments or criteria to a human being that we would not apply to any other object or entity within the universe because it's cause and effect and all subject to physics, right?
Yeah. I would say that the same thing applies for reality, for matter and for energy, but not for concepts.
A concept can still be wrong.
So, wait, wait, sorry. So, because as far as I understood it, you said human beings are the same as everything else, but now you're saying that there's something called a concept which is not subject to the laws of physics in a deterministic universe?
Yeah, or theory. Theory is an abstract thing.
So we're of the same opinion?
We are. Oh, good.
Okay, so there is a possibility of chosen, preferable, alternate states for concepts or ideas or propositions or theories within the human mind.
And that's how we're different from rocks.
Yeah. Okay, and how does that not...
Do you feel that having one set of truth criteria or responsibility criteria or ethical criteria or whatever and simply applying it to human consciousness and particular aspects of the human consciousness or the frontal lobe, the higher functioning because somebody who's had a frontal lobotomy we would generally not consider morally responsible.
So out of all of the universe, we're going to apply just these particular concepts to frontal lobe possibilities within the human mind, which would seem to indicate that there is something different about the human mind, because we don't debate with the weather, we don't debate with the rocks, and we certainly don't believe that a raindrop falling down a window pane is going to be problematic or correct or incorrect.
These terms are reserved for the human mind, which indicates that there is something different.
And quite opposite, in a way, between the human mind and all other entities that we have encountered.
Well, the human mind is certainly very special, I wouldn't deny that, but not able to break the laws of causality.
So then it's like a rock?
It's not like a rock, it is a rock, it's just a complex rock, right?
And therefore it can't be correct or incorrect, right or wrong, because there's no possibility of ultimate states.
But it can have theories, and as far as I know, a rock cannot have theories.
Yes, but we've already agreed, and we really have to get this one fixed in our minds, we've already agreed that there's no difference whatsoever between the human mind and a rock, except complexity.
And the complexity is irrelevant.
In fact, the complexity simply confuses people into believing they have free will.
The complexity is a source of error, not of accuracy.
Like, for instance, if I have a simple raindrop in a still room, I can measure that with fairly close to complete accuracy if I get down at the quantum level.
And that gives me really close to 100% accuracy about where it's going to land, just to take something simple.
But when you put all of that stuff together with gravity and drags on the atmosphere and wind and rain and birds flying and airplanes, you get the weather.
Now, I would not say that a single raindrop falling in a room is fundamentally different.
It's just that the weather has a lot more variables, but the weather doesn't get some magical new property.
It's just really, really complex.
So when we talk about causality, we can talk about the drop of water in a room and then extrapolate that to the weather, right?
and it's not like the weather gets consciousness because it's more complex so it gets moral responsibility or choice, right?
May I ask a question?
For me, it's getting a little confusing right now.
I think we are having these problems right now with the rock and the human mind because what would happen if we would think or assume that this concept of true and false, this concept of correct and incorrect is...
Something that comes from our first-person perspective and not from the scientific one.
I mean, because when we're talking about cause and effect, there is no right and wrong.
In the universe, there is no right and wrong.
There just is.
So, maybe the mistake we're making when we're asking if the rock is falling in the right place or in the wrong place is simply that we're asking the question.
Well, but we talked earlier, if you remember the metaphor about the God in the thundercloud, we said earlier that free will is an error, right?
And from the free will, I mean, this is the sort of paradox that we get into, which is why these debates at least are hard to resolve, right?
Free will is an error in the same way that believing Zeus controls the rain is an error.
And so we can't go back to first-person perspective and say, well, there's some subjective perception of truth and falsehood or whatever, because that would be an error according to the determinist position.
But then, unfortunately, within the deterministic universe, there is no such thing as truth or falsehood, error or falsehood.
Or accuracy, correctness or incorrectness.
Certainly no such thing as morality.
And so we have the problem that the deterministic viewpoint says that free will is an error, but unfortunately within the determinist worldview there is no such thing as error, and that's the problem.
That seems very hard to resolve, at least from the determinist position.
I mean, to me, if a determinist says, well, there's no such thing as error, then that makes sense, right?
Like, if I say that Zeus does not control the thunder, then I stop praying to Zeus to control the thunder, right?
And if determinists believe that there's no such thing as error, then it would make sense to not correct anyone.
But they do, and therefore that's the paradox that lies at the heart of determinism, which is the belief...
That the human mind is exactly the same, though more complex, than a rock falling down a hill.
And no sane human being would stand at the bottom of the hill when a rock is bashing down at the side, say, go left, go right, do this, do that, oh, you fell in the wrong place, go back and start again.
Right? I mean, that would be ridiculous.
But determinists will say the human mind is exactly the same, but then engage in debates with the human mind attempting to correct it.
that's the paradox that I have real trouble understanding.
From the things you just said, I don't really see the paradox – I mean, clearly we're humans.
We have to think in our first-person perspective.
We can only create this some kind of artificial, some kind of, not artificial, some kind of a little more objective language that science employs, okay? But it's still...
It's still a language of our human minds.
Even mathematics, for example, it's as logical as we can get.
But we cannot guarantee that maybe an alien that looks completely different like we do and thinks completely different like we do would understand what we mean by this stuff.
We will assume that it does because this is all we can imagine, but we cannot be sure.
We cannot be sure that this way of thinking is the only way of thinking, but we have to because we can't imagine anything else.
Okay, so if we can't imagine anything else, then there's no possibility of alternate beliefs and therefore there's no possibility of error, right?
These alternate beliefs, they come far, far later.
First, there's the consciousness, and then this makes up alternate beliefs.
But I understand this is kind of like a switch that you're pulling on me here, right?
I mean, just to be frank, right?
Because you're saying, well, the human mind is exactly the same as a rock.
And then when I point out the logical consequences of that, you jump back into the free will subjective mind and say, well, yes, but there's our subjective experience, and we have to respect that.
And it's like, well, no, we don't, actually.
As philosophers and as scientists, we certainly do not have to respect people's subjective experiences, right?
If I said that God's controlled the weather, you would correct me, right?
If I said that God's just banana-shaped, you would correct me, right?
You wouldn't say, well, you know, that's your subjective experience and therefore we have to respect that and speak in that language and so on, right?
Because when I say there's such a thing as free will, you correct me, right?
That's why this debate is occurring, right?
So you can't then say, well, Steph, you're wrong about free will, and then when I point out the logical contradictions of determinism, you say, well, but we have these subjective experiences, because you can't say, Steph, you're wrong about free will, and then say, well, we have to respect the language and subjective experience of free will, because that's not what you're doing on the board, right? And I'm not saying it's bad that that's not what you're doing, but you can't then switch to this argument, right?
Yeah, I'm not switching to this argument.
I'm... Okay, Peter, sorry.
Yeah, you were talking, but I'm just thinking that I have a bit of a problem with the remark complexity does not matter.
Because... It doesn't matter.
In a sense it does matter.
I mean, a big computer is different from a hand calculator.
For some properties it matters, for some properties it don't.
When you say you don't debate a rock, And you do debate a human, then I would say complexity does matter in this area because a human has, you know that it has ears and Eyes and senses can take in information.
This information can change the brain state and the beliefs and cause different behavior.
So, in that sense, complexity does matter, not for the causality of the behavior.
So, you cannot say complexity does not matter for everything.
That is the refinement I want to make.
Is that clear? Well, sure, but the determinist would say that complexity does not create free will, right?
Sorry, you just lost your audio.
Yeah, yeah, I muted it.
Okay, so the complexity of the human mind does not give it any possible way of choosing or being responsible for its behavior or what it does, right?
Any more than a rock chooses where it bounces down a hill, right?
Yeah, in that sense, complexity cannot break causality.
Right, so complexity doesn't matter in terms of whether a human being is fundamentally like a rock bouncing down a hill.
Not for causality, but for communication purposes it makes a big difference.
I'm sorry, I don't understand that.
I mean, if I don't believe that Zeus is in one rain cloud, does it make sense that I say Zeus is in a hundred rain clouds?
I don't say that Zeus is...
If a human being is, if the insight of determinism is that human beings are exactly the same as rocks going down a hill, I don't understand what it means to say, yes, but human beings have...
Eyes and ears and so on.
You could say, well, a computer takes input and provides output, but we don't debate with our computers, right?
Yeah, but we give our computers input to change their behavior, and we give a human being inputs to change their behavior, and we know that the causal path exists, the causal path between their inputs And their muscles and their outputs.
So it makes sense to debate with them.
To debate with computers? Sorry.
To debate with humans.
But it makes no sense to debate with computers, right?
No, you treat each piece of matter in a way that it works, causally.
But they all work causally.
But a rock bouncing downhill is also causally, but the only way to change its behavior is to push it aside with a bulldozer.
And the only way to change the computer's behavior causally is to type on a keyboard.
And the only way to change human beings The use of the word change here is a little confusing, and this is what I find problematic with determinants.
All due respect to all of your obvious intelligence, and again, I could be completely wrong, But when you begin to press determinists on the question of error and responsibility and so on and debating, you all begin to switch to the language of free will, right?
So we would understand that two computers hooked up on a network could not change each other's behavior, right?
They would not be, in a sense, there would be no breaking of causality.
They would just do what they would do.
They'd send a couple of IP packets back depending on their programming, the keep-alive stuff or whatever.
But they would not...
I would say they do change each bit.
I would say they do change each other's behavior, yes.
Right, but there's no responsibility or breaking of causality in that interaction, right?
No. So you don't have any capacity to change my behavior because you don't have any capacity to change your own behavior, right?
No, it is all causally.
Right, so you don't have any...
You can't use the word change, right?
Because change implies an alternate state and a preference which simply doesn't exist, right?
Right. You can use the word change.
If I say I change the billiard ball in direction, then it's a change of direction.
If a planet orbits a sun, then it's continuously changing direction.
Oh, I see, yeah.
It's changing position.
Like rain going down will change the squiggle down the window pane or something like that.
But it's not change like a free will person would describe change, right?
Which is appealing to truth and so on, right?
It's not changing in terms of truth or falsehood because there's no such thing, right?
It's not changing from the causal effect chain, no.
Okay, so maybe we could just go back to the point that I had earlier, which is that in the deterministic universe there is no such thing As preference or ideal states, there's no such thing as truth or falsehood because there's no such thing as alternate states.
And this is the problem I have.
When a determinist comes along and says to the free will person, you are incorrect.
I just need to understand, if you could help me, how that is different.
Ben, complexity is irrelevant, as we've now said three times.
How is that different from debating with Iraq?
How do you say? Preferences do not exist.
If I have a preference for tea instead of coffee, I didn't choose that.
I got born with that.
So, what do you mean with preference?
Preferences do not exist?
Well, a preference for truth over falsehood is a preference that has no meaning, right?
Because there's no possibility of alternate states.
Like, I may look at the car bouncing down towards my rock, and I might prefer that the rock did not hit my car, but I would not tell the rock to go left or right, right?
Yeah, but... The error you're making, I think, is that you're trying to talk to the rock.
That doesn't make sense.
That's like you were trying to have this debate with us in ultrasound, okay?
We wouldn't understand you. The rock doesn't understand you when you talk to it.
But you could go and grind off some sand from the rock and then it's...
Not round, not spherical anymore, so it can't roll down the hill anymore.
It rolls somewhere else.
That's what we're trying to do when humans interact.
We try to change each other.
We try to grind off something.
But help me understand, again, back to this change thing.
You can't change my behavior because you can't change your own behavior, right?
We are rocks bouncing down a hill.
We all understand. Because if we can't establish that, then there's no possibility of debating anything sensible, right?
If the perspective is that causality cannot be broken, we are all rocks bouncing down a hill, then we cannot choose to change each other's behavior, right?
I cannot change your past and I cannot change your current behavior, but I can change your future behavior.
Can you change your own behavior?
No. Okay, so you can't change my behavior if you can't change your own behavior, right?
Because that would be to say you have more effect on me than you do on yourself, which would be illogical, right?
That's like saying you can move my finger, but I can't, right?
No, no, that's not right.
You are one rock rolling down the hill, and I'm another rock.
And sometime, and some place, we meet and hit together, okay?
And from you, a piece falls off, and from me, a piece falls off.
So we've changed the way we will behave in the future, okay?
I've changed you, and you've changed me, because we've met.
The rock can't change where it's bouncing down, right?
Right. But it always interacts, okay?
It always interacts with the environment.
I understand that rocks bouncing down a hill will hit each other and break off.
But that still doesn't indicate that there's any such thing as preferred interactions.
We can't say, well, one rock should have hit the rock at the other side at a different angle.
This rock should not be bouncing here, but should be bouncing over there.
There's no possibility of preferred state if there's no possibility of changing one's own behavior, particularly with reference to a conceptual ideal or theory like truth and falsehood and so on.
You could still say, I prefer the rock falls not on my car, And instead of it falling on my car...
But we would recognize that as an irrational preference, right?
Like it does not change anything.
No, but it's a sensible preference, I would say.
Yeah, but it still would be irrational.
That's like praying that it doesn't rain.
Of course I'd prefer that it doesn't rain, but I can't change anything about that, right?
No, I don't think that...
Right, but the point of a determinist viewpoint is to overcome error, right?
But then the problem is that in a determinist universe there's no such thing as error.
That's where the paradox arises, right?
Would they establish now that there is preference still when you consider deterministic universe?
There is a subjective experience of preference in the way that people used to believe that you should pray to gods to control the weather, right?
But the determinists would recognize that preference is a state to be overcome because it indicates that you would like something to happen, but you have no control over your behavior, over other people's behavior, over anything in the universe, and therefore preference would be an illusion to be overcome, right? Yeah, but it's still there.
You hope you catch the prey so you have something for dinner.
That is still your preference that you will succeed.
Yes, but you would overcome that using determinism, right?
In the same way that if I were religious and I started to have doubts, I might still prefer for there to be a God, but I should overcome that feeling or desire as an error, right?
Yeah, I think you're right. When we agree that there's no correct and there's no incorrect in our determinist universe, then clearly there's no preference.
Well, there is preference as a subjective irrational state, but we should overcome it as well, right?
No, I'm not saying we should overcome it.
That's like I was saying we should overcome mankind and become more superhuman stuff.
I don't know. No, no, no, no. Wait, wait, wait.
Because you're telling me I should overcome free will, right?
Because it's an error, right?
So you can't suddenly say, well, now I don't think we should overcome our human nature and our human desires.
You see, that's a kind of switch, right?
Because for years on the board, right, people have been saying to me, well, Steph, you can't break causality.
It's either causality or randomness, and there's no free will, and you should give up this idea.
It's an illusion. It's false, even though it's your subjective experience.
And now when I'm pointing out some of the logical problems with determinism, you're falling back on, well, we should respect our preferences, and we're human, and, right, you see, you can't have it both ways, right?
I mean, not reasonably, at least not in my universe, where there is free will.
I can't negate...
The fact that I'm human, of course, but...
Are we talking about human minds?
That's what I meant. We have to know what we're talking about.
Are we talking about matter and everything that is made of the matter, or are we talking about the special case of our human minds?
And that is what we have to...
According to, again, what we talked about earlier, there is no special case, because there's no exception for the human mind from the realm of causality, right?
That's right, but unfortunately we experience it to be a special case, even though it's wrong.
No, come on, come on, come on. You've got to stop.
I mean, with all this, I'm getting a little impatient here, right?
Because for years determinists have been telling me that I'm in error about free will, right?
And now when I'm pointing out a very core logical contradiction, which I have pointed out before, In determinism, we're coming back on, well, we can't overcome our human nature and we have a desire for choice and preference and truth, even if it's not real and so on, right?
So you can't say that it's an error when I do it, but it's fealty to human nature when you do it, right?
I mean, that's not very consistent, if you don't mind me saying.
Like, no one has said to me, Steph, yeah, it makes total sense to me that you would believe in free will.
That's your subjective experience, and, you know, good for you, right?
More power to you, right?
People would be saying, no, no, no, no, you subjectively experience free will, but it's incorrect.
Right? And I'm saying, well, you say that there's a preferred state of behavior called your, you know, not breaking causality.
Or whatever. And I say, well, human beings are like a bunch of rocks rolling down a hill.
Then there is no such thing as preferred behavior.
Right? We can't do all stuff about, well, subjectivity versus the universe and so on.
But can we at least understand whether you agree with me or not?
And I'm not saying you have to abandon your positions.
But you do get contradictions from the determinism that are that Free will.
You give up your position on free will because it's...
The idea of truth, falsehood, and preferred state of behavior is meaningless.
Nothing comes back. It's a logical problem.
Maybe there's a logical way to...
Of course, that's...
I think we have come across a logical problem now or later.
we have a logical problem, right?
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry, I didn't get the laws.
There was a whole bunch of breakups.
Okay, let's at least acknowledge that we have encountered a logical problem, which doesn't mean determinism is false or free will is true or anything like that, but we have encountered a logical problem, which is that there is no possibility of a preferred or truthful state in a deterministic universe, but determinants correct other people with the goal of moving them closer to the truth, right?
Yeah, you communicate...
If we're all rocks bouncing down a hill, it makes no sense that there's a better or preferred or truer state for those rocks to be in, right?
And complexity is irrelevant because the human mind does not break causality, and therefore telling other people that they're wrong and should correct their perspective is a logical contradiction within the determinist position.
Now, it doesn't mean maybe there's a way to solve it I've never thought of.
I'm just, can we at least acknowledge that there's a logical problem we can't solve at the moment?
Okay. Now that I get what your contradiction in determinism is, it's actually pretty obvious, obviously easy, at least to me.
We are designed to do so.
Please, go ahead. I'd love to have it solved.
Yeah, we're simply designed to correct each other.
That's all. Well, that doesn't solve anything, sorry.
But now you're going back to, well, it's a subjective state.
It feels like the world is flat and therefore we have to respect that.
But that's not what you do. When you debate with the free willers, right?
No, I'm sorry.
Then I didn't get what you were saying.
I thought you were saying the logical contradiction is...
If we are all rocks, bouncing down a hill, crashing into each other, clearly there's no preferred state in that scenario, right?
Right. There's no right, there's no wrong, there's no better, there's no worse, there's no responsibility, nothing like that, right?
The concept of right would not exist in that scenario, right?
Right, yes. Okay, so if we substitute rocks bouncing down a hill with human beings debating, nothing changes.
There's still no right or wrong in that situation because everything is predetermined and there's no possibility of alternate states because there's no breaking of causality, right?
I think it's worth looking at the idea of natural selection in this context.
Sorry, I'd love to talk about natural selection, but I feel like we're two opposing magnets, right?
We're trying to get to this point, and it's like, kaboom!
We jump off somewhere else, right?
I'll stand back for a second.
No, just for a second. Please hold your thought.
I do want to hear about natural selection, but I just wanted to try and get this issue.
I still have a problem with there not being preferred states.
I mean, I build chips for mobile phones, and if you receive data, there are errors in it, and the chip has to try and correct these errors in the data.
Yet everything is determined, but there is a preferred state, that is, that the checksum is okay coming in.
Right, just help me understand, right, because we can go into all these computer analogies, but we do have this rock bouncing down a hill, which we've established as a valid analogy for human interaction.
We understand that rocks bouncing down a hill and crashing into each other do not have, there cannot be a preferred state for that, because that is all obviously predetermined, right?
I think the misunderstanding here is preferred by who?
No, there's no such thing as a preferred state.
Can we at least admit that with the rocks bouncing down a hill and crashing into each other, there's no preferred state?
They're preferred by who?
The rocks themselves. The rocks don't prefer a state, of course.
No, they don't. They don't know right.
They don't care about right. They, the rocks themselves, don't.
Okay. Right. Now, a human being may experience a preference, right?
But that preference is exactly the same as a rock coming down a hill.
That feeling of, I prefer for X, Y, or Z, is itself exactly the same as a rock coming down a hill because complexity is irrelevant, right?
So it doesn't mean anything that I feel that the rock doesn't want to land on my vault or whatever, because that feeling itself is just another rock bouncing down a hill, right?
That feeling is not correct or incorrect, right or wrong, it's just another unfolding of a predetermined set of events that could never be altered in any way, shape or form, right?
When you say that feeling does not matter, then does not matter to who is the question again?
Well, in the same way that if I prefer that there is a God, that feeling does not create the truth that there is a God.
So the fact that I feel a preference does not create a preference in the world, right?
It would be an illusion, right?
Like, believing or wanting there to be a God is an illusion that we would say is false, right?
So the feeling does not ontologically create a different state in the universe, right?
The fact that I believe in Zeus does not put a guy with a big beard on a mountain, right?
No, and the fact that you feel that you have a preference that the rock does not fall on your car does not change the root of the rock, whether it will fall on your car or not.
And that preference is just another rock falling down a hill.
It just happens to be in my mind.
There's no possibility of changing it.
There's no possibility of altering.
So there's no possibility of alternate states Or preferred behavior in a deterministic universe.
We may have that feeling, but there's still no possibility, because even that feeling is just another rock bouncing down a hill, right?
Yeah, I still have...
There is no chance for preferred behavior.
I still come back to preferred by who?
If it's preferred by you, then...
It doesn't matter who it's preferred by.
It really doesn't. There's no possibility of alternate states within a determined universe, because you can't break causality.
It is all rocks... Pounding down a hill, bouncing into each other, right?
So there's no correct or incorrect or right or wrong state in that universe, right?
The word prefers implies a preferrer, someone who prefers.
If you don't mention the preferrer, then you have a problem.
Okay, let's drop the preference because that obviously is confusing.
There's no correct or incorrect state or outcome from a bunch of rocks bouncing down a hill and hitting each other, right?
Yeah, right. Correct according to a theory or correct according to someone's opinion.
But there is no such thing as correct, right, in that situation.
Let's say I don't have a theory.
Let's just say there is no such thing as there is a right or wrong way for those rocks to bounce down a hill and hit each other, right?
Right according to who?
I mean, you need a viewpoint to determine right or wrong.
You need a theory to match it against.
Let's break it down even more simply.
Let's say that you and I are sitting here watching all of these rocks bouncing down the hill, right?
If I turn to you and say, those rocks are bouncing incorrectly, what would that mean to you?
Would that be a meaningful statement in any way, shape or form?
No, that would be nonsense.
But we can apply exactly...
That's exactly what I'm saying, right?
Yeah, it's like you're saying...
If you come and say to someone you're incorrect, you're exactly the same as me turning to you and saying the rocks are bouncing the wrong way down a hill.
No, no, exactly. No, no, no.
You're not. Like saying when we have one rock or two rocks bouncing down the hill, they cannot be right or wrong.
Just like the... I don't know an exact number, but it's 10 to the power of whatever, how many atoms we consist of, okay?
It's like saying these carbon atoms are wrong, these hydrogen atoms are wrong, or they have preferred behavior, or I prefer...
You know, that's...
Yeah, it would be meaningless, right? We are made of many, many rocks.
Right, but it would be meaningless to say these rocks are bouncing down the hill the wrong way, right?
Exactly, yes. Right.
So when determinists come and say, Steph, you are believing the wrong things and you should believe something else, that is exactly the same as saying the rocks are falling down the hill the wrong way because the behavior of the rocks are predetermined and I don't get any special exemption by having a human consciousness because that is entirely predetermined as well.
But if we sit on the top of the hill and we look at the rocks, then you cannot say they're bouncing down the hill the wrong way, but you can only say it if one has a theory that they will land over there and they land over here.
Then you can say that theory is wrong.
No, no, because the theory is just another rock bouncing down a hill.
There is no exception in the deterministic universe to rocks bouncing down a hill.
Everything! It's a rock bouncing down a hill.
We established that at the very beginning.
So you can't create a special exception for theories.
I certainly can because I believe and I've made that argument.
But the deterministic viewpoint simply can't.
The theory is not made of matter.
It's not made of energy and atoms.
Wait, wait, wait. The theory itself.
Wait, wait. So you're saying there's an aspect of consciousness that's not subject to causality because it's neither matter nor energy?
A theory, a mathematics, is not made of matter and energy, no.
Okay, so an idea within the mind is supernatural?
No, I think what an idea is supernatural.
Wait, no, no, I'm trying to make sure I understand.
If it's not made of matter and energy, then it's not such as...
Of course it's made of matter and energy.
Oh, it is? Okay, so it's matter and energy, so then it's a rock bouncing down a hill, right?
It's not exactly like a rock bouncing down the hill.
It's many rocks bouncing down the hill.
Complexity doesn't matter.
That's complexity. It doesn't change the fundamentals of the situation in any way.
Because the deterministic viewpoint is that complexity simply creates the illusion of choice where there isn't, right?
No, the complexity of the system determines the way the rocks will end at the bottom of the hill.
The more rocks you get, the more they crash into each other and they form different piles of rocks.
Sure, but none of those can be incorrect, right?
No, of course not.
Right.
So I have rocks bouncing around in my head, right, called I believe in free will, but that cannot be incorrect.
Any more than rocks bouncing down a hill can be incorrect because I am made of the same matter and subject to the same laws and principles as the rocks, right?
I don't get to escape causality.
I don't get to have responsibility for my thoughts, right?
According to the deterministic viewpoint, everything is rocks bouncing down a hill.
And if things – if rocks bouncing down a hill can't be incorrect, a human being cannot be incorrect.
I mean this is just your logic, right?
I mean I can't – I'm not trying to trap you here.
This is just what you have argued.
The theory can be incorrect, I would say.
My logic is...
I cannot blame the carbon atoms you are made of for what you're doing.
Okay? But as a human, I can blame you.
No, no, you can't. That's the matter of perspective.
Yes, I can. Because we said, complexity doesn't matter, right?
Yeah, that's why you're...
I went through this right at the beginning.
I said, can we... Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Complexity doesn't matter, right?
So the fact that I'm... You're absolutely right.
Complexity... I'm still rocks bouncing downhill, right?
Right, right. You're many rocks bouncing down the hill, but when I say as a human being, I mean the perspective.
I judge you as a human.
I cannot, it makes no sense to judge your rocks, but I judge from my perspective as a human being.
But you're abandoning the determinist position if you're creating special cases for human beings.
You're saying everything is subject to causality, but I'm going to treat human beings as completely outside of causality for the sake of interacting with them.
Not completely, but at least somewhat outside of causality, because I'm going to apply truth and falsehood, right and wrong, to human beings, which I would never apply to everything else in the universe, like rocks spawning down a hill, or rain coming down a windowpane, or any other complex, or Brownian, or whatever you like motion, right?
If you're going to create special rules for a human being, that's fine, but then you've just said that human beings are not subject to causality.
Because if you're going to treat human beings as different or having opposite properties than anything else in the universe, then you're not a determinist.
No, that's not right. I treat human beings differently than a single...
I treat billions of trillions of whatever millions rocks in a different way than one single rock because I cannot predict its behavior.
To me, it looks totally random.
Sorry to interrupt you. We already went through this at the beginning, and we said we can't predict the weather, but that does not mean it has consciousness, and we do not treat it as if it does.
Complexity doesn't matter. Lack of predictability doesn't matter.
Yeah, but if we could, we would try, we would influence the weather.
And we can influence humans, okay?
That's why we have eyes and ears.
So why shouldn't we do that?
Well, again, we've already said that if you can't change your behavior, you can't, if you can't even influence your own behavior, then you can't influence my behavior, right?
Any more than rocks bouncing.
Oh, no, I can, I can, I can.
No, no. We established that rocks, too, rocks can influence their behavior, their future behavior by crashing into, grinding something off from each other.
Yes, but there's no such thing as right or wrong, true or false in how they crash into each other, right?
No. Right, so...
But they crash into each other.
There's no such thing as right or wrong, true or false in human beings or interactions, right?
No. Good.
Okay, then it makes no sense to correct the free will, right?
Sorry, yes. Oh, so there is rising wrong for human beings, but not for rocks.
Yeah, for human beings. It's a matter of perspective.
From... Can I break in for a sec?
Yeah. So, we...
I think that it's worth looking at, I guess, I don't know, this is kind of a strange interlude, but it's worth looking at natural selection.
So we have our rocks rolling down the hill, right?
They're bouncing along down the hill.
And say the hill is really long, right?
And some of them fall off the side, right?
And some of them keep rolling, keep rolling, keep rolling, keep rolling, keep rolling.
And if we take this analogy over to humans, We can kind of look at holding people responsible and taking responsibility as ways of keeping the rocks on the hill.
That if we don't do these things at some point in our lives, whatever, they just fell off the hill.
Like, at some point in, you know, human evolutionary history or whatever, when, you know, society starts arising, we have this, we, like, I would say that there is some argument from, I would make some argument from complexity, that That we have memory, that we have the ability to make predictions about the future, which is, you know, different from rocks, right?
They can't look into the future, they can't remember things from the past, right?
So we have this ability to kind of make comparisons with what's going on now versus what, or what's going on in some chain of time that we can kind of store in our memories versus things that have happened in the past, and kind of project those things out into the future, quote unquote, the future.
We kind of, we developed this in the sort of disastrous struggle to, you know, survive, you know, evolutionary history, right?
The animal king, terrible, right?
So we have this, we get past the point where we are able to produce food to survive, and we have leftover resources and whatnot.
And I think it kind of centers around this idea of being able to make predictions, right?
Like human beings can make predictions, and if they're correct, they get a bonus, right?
A bonus in energy.
You get this feeling of efficacy.
You get this feeling of capability to do things, and that happens, right?
So if you put things off for now and you make sacrifices in the present for long-term gains, you get Not only the resources that you were shooting for, for whatever reason, but you get a feeling of efficacy in return as well.
So we kind of, we change the game once we're no longer competing for resources, we change the game from getting resources to getting this sort of emotional increase, like this feeling of efficacy, this happiness that comes along with being correct in predictions, right?
So The rocks bouncing down the hill, like holding people responsible and taking responsibility, is just the way the rocks keep bouncing down the hill, in a matter of speaking.
If you don't do that, then you sort of stop bouncing down the hill.
There is an evolutionary advantage to tribes that believed in God, because they would fight to the death with the expectation of heaven, which gave them a military advantage.
Whatever, right? Like you could say that there's an evolutionary advantage, if I understand what you're saying.
And that's why we have ended up with this belief in choice or responsibility or consequence for debate.
And tell me if I'm wrong.
I just want to make sure I understand what you're saying.
Well, like, yeah, again, this thing comes down to predictions, right?
Like, we can... I don't believe that there is a predetermined future, right?
There's no, like, someplace out in the world or someplace in the universe where there's, you know, like, this predetermined future where we...
I don't know what exactly that means, but...
What it means to have a predetermined future, but we do have the capability to make predictions, right?
And we can make multiple predictions, realize that these predictions are going to be competing with our time, and choose among them.
So I don't think that that's an illusion.
Like, I think that we do go through that process from an objective viewpoint.
Like, we do recognize that things can happen in the future, that different things can happen in the future, and that we can select between them depending on whatever, you know, resource We believe we want, whether that's in our best interest or not.
I don't think it's an illusion.
You're saying we have the capacity to balance long-term, short-term gains, weigh things on, and so on.
I would certainly agree with you.
I think that the essence of choice or free will is the ability to compare statements to abstract ideals.
But that having been said, I know that we've gone for almost an hour and a half, and I have to get back to some parenting duties And relieve my wife of our baby who is wailing about the inevitability of her future as we speak.
So I'm going to stop now, but I really did want to thank you so much.
It has been very illuminating for me, and I really do thank you for taking the time.
I've had some difficulty.
And of course, seeing that we've been going for an hour and a half with some very intelligent and verbally acute and smart people, we've been unable to come to any kind of resolution.
I think is important because this would have been about another year on the board.
So it's much more efficient to not agree in 90 minutes than spend a year not agreeing on the board.
So I just wanted to thank you guys for your time and for helping me to understand more of where the determinist position is coming from.
And thanks again so much and I will talk to you guys soon.
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