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Author Topic:   The third rampage of evolutionism: evolutionary pscyhology
contracycle
Inactive Member


Message 211 of 236 (191439)
03-14-2005 11:36 AM
Reply to: Message 210 by Silent H
03-14-2005 8:43 AM


quote:
This appears to me to be an anthropomorphism, and not a real assessment.
I agree with that - except I suggest it is intuitively accurate. My point is that computers do behave in many ways like disembodied brains, and can be thought of in much those terms.
quote:
A computer is unlikely to come out of its freeze with a decision that it wants to have someone press the a button for a while and then go get a sandwich before it moves on to the next part of the problem.
Some hardware has priority over other hardware. This is managed by assigning important hardware an Interrupt Request channel or IRQ; any incoming message over that channel has priority.
Going off for a banana may well be a case of the stomach IRQ triggering the message "hungry" with such priority that it overrides the task at hand. Naturally, modern computers can't make THAT kind of decision becuase they do not have stomachs - nor do they have a sex drive. They are not alive - but that makes the similarities with the brain more striking, not less.
quote:
The drive to reassess and coordinate and then observe onesself, indeed "feel" some emotional (sensory) inputs regarding self, makes one autonomous.
Sure. It's still a programme though, and so it can still be said to be mechanically deterministic; its still rules-driven.
This is why IMO the term frtee will should be ignored. We are talking about whether an autopilot has free will to fly, in effect.
quote:
Although I cannot fully reject this possibility, I find it unnecessary to accept and rather hard to believe. How does quantum uncertainty (which will at best affect one atom on a nanosecond scale) come to be the major player in a complex multicellular process regarding decisions and selfhood?
Because if an electron vanishes out of a circuit channel when it should be flipping a bit-state it can cause an error. A hang. Most biology is, umm, hang-resistant through multiple redundancy, though.
quote:
I think I'd accept the influence of lunar gravitational effects as well as other stellar phemonenon on brain chemistry mechanics, before resorting to something that tiny and temporal in nature. Even fluctuations in earth's magnetic or gravitational field, would seem to have more bearing.
No those are quite easy to deal with, all circuit boards are "hardened" against local magnetic and many electrical fluctuations. Also, computers are often more dependant on tiny tiny channels with a handful of electrons in them. Its very delicate stuff.
But the point was more this: seeing as we ARe looking atlarge objects comprised of many atoms, in biology, I think some quantum uncertainty effects can be assumed in that mass. So even if I had a perfect snap shot of your brain a microsecond ago, becuase one or several or many of those states might have been flipped by non-apparent causes, I still can't make a hard prediction about what you will do next, I suspect. Only a probabalistic one.
quote:
I'm not sure if this is completely true, but it isn't really important to me. For a guy that says he doesn't find it it important you certainly seem to be concerned about it.
Only because people persist in using it, and I do not think they should.
quote:
Your argument is that none of these are actual options and none of the feelings I use to make my final decision are real, other than phantom images of the chemistry that forced me to make the final decision. Isn't that unnecessary given Occam's razor?
Occams razor is not particularly relevant, becuase biology is messy and mutliply redundant. That is, occams razor is a great thought-tool but it does not delimit the actual designs we will see in nature.
quote:
Why not rather accept that choice is real and find how a mechanical system would develop the ability to choose freely based on purely mechanical inputs?
Hmm, perhaps its hard to explain, but you can't say that. Because sans a mechanical input, you MUST be defaulting to some sort of supernatural spirit. If its not some sort of spirit, it must be mechanical. You cannot eliminate the supernatural AND THEN propose a "non-mechanical" system because the mechanical world is all there is. Whatever the system you develop, it has to be mechanical in toto.
I expect large amounts of decision-making are probabalistic and involve on or more random number generators, or similar. That would produce a mechanical but indeterminate system, that might APPEAR to make choices.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 210 by Silent H, posted 03-14-2005 8:43 AM Silent H has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 215 by Silent H, posted 03-15-2005 6:16 AM contracycle has replied

  
Syamsu 
Suspended Member (Idle past 5590 days)
Posts: 1914
From: amsterdam
Joined: 05-19-2002


Message 212 of 236 (191580)
03-14-2005 11:33 PM
Reply to: Message 208 by contracycle
03-14-2005 6:05 AM


You are not thinking Contracycle. In any case I can now safely conclude that actually you don't know the basic things about decision.
Your description of a coinflip realizing a chance that is in the past is simply wrong. At the start of the coinflip there is a chance about a futurestate. But as the coinflip progresses the initial state passes into the past, where it is a certainty, not a chance. There are no chances in the past.
Now try and find causes that are in the future, which effect the present.
It is of course no coincedence that you are a materialist, and that you don't understand that decisions pertain to future states. That is because materialists usually only describe in terms of past relating to present, and not future relating to present.
regards,
Mohammad Nor Syamsu

This message is a reply to:
 Message 208 by contracycle, posted 03-14-2005 6:05 AM contracycle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 214 by contracycle, posted 03-15-2005 5:21 AM Syamsu has not replied

  
Syamsu 
Suspended Member (Idle past 5590 days)
Posts: 1914
From: amsterdam
Joined: 05-19-2002


Message 213 of 236 (191590)
03-14-2005 11:52 PM
Reply to: Message 206 by Silent H
03-13-2005 12:06 PM


But you don't accept free will, in the way it is accepted in common language, you accept it in the way it is consistent with materialism.
Where is the point where it can go one way or another in your construct? It must be the "internal urge". That is rather vague.
Again I appeal to your common sense, and ask you to simply start with the point where it can go one way or another in your construct of free will.
regards,
Mohammad Nor Syamsu

This message is a reply to:
 Message 206 by Silent H, posted 03-13-2005 12:06 PM Silent H has not replied

  
contracycle
Inactive Member


Message 214 of 236 (191621)
03-15-2005 5:21 AM
Reply to: Message 212 by Syamsu
03-14-2005 11:33 PM


quote:
Now try and find causes that are in the future, which effect the present.
Sure. We build a time machine. Someone in the future sends us an email in 2020. We receive that email in 2005.
That is in fact just possibly plausible. But apart from that, there are no cases when a potential in the future deternmines something in the present or past. Your argument is purely semantic.
quote:
It is of course no coincedence that you are a materialist, and that you don't understand that decisions pertain to future states. That is because materialists usually only describe in terms of past relating to present, and not future relating to present.
cos thats the way the world works.
I cannot be expected to live by your weird supersitions.
This message has been edited by contracycle, 03-15-2005 05:22 AM

This message is a reply to:
 Message 212 by Syamsu, posted 03-14-2005 11:33 PM Syamsu has not replied

  
Silent H
Member (Idle past 5819 days)
Posts: 7405
From: satellite of love
Joined: 12-11-2002


Message 215 of 236 (191629)
03-15-2005 6:16 AM
Reply to: Message 211 by contracycle
03-14-2005 11:36 AM


Because if an electron vanishes out of a circuit channel when it should be flipping a bit-state it can cause an error. A hang. Most biology is, umm, hang-resistant through multiple redundancy, though.
I want you to set out a model where an electron flipping, or even a number of electrons flipping, will significantly change the operation of the brain (i.e. make a decision).
Electrons are small bits in extremely massive compounds. It just doesn't seem plausible to me that they have that significant a role in individual choice.
No those are quite easy to deal with, all circuit boards are "hardened" against local magnetic and many electrical fluctuations.
Humans are not. Even changes in air pressure can result in changes in mood and behavior. If we wanted to introduce some "random factor" my guess would be any individuals temoral position related to the moon at any given moment would be (or appear) pretty random.
Only because people persist in using it, and I do not think they should.
Well that is exactly why you see me talking about it here. I guess I would not go so far as to say it should not be talked about, but it really isn't productive for any professional applications in life.
Occams razor is not particularly relevant, becuase biology is messy and mutliply redundant. That is, occams razor is a great thought-tool but it does not delimit the actual designs we will see in nature.
I think you'll want to rethink this statement. It is a pretty overt support for ID theory.
Occam's razor certainly does have merit when we are discussing a theory regarding the existence of a phenomenon. While it might be possible that we are wired to believe we are actually making choices when we are not, only living purely as slaves to an existence which had to happen once the initial conditions of the universe began, this does require a more complex reasoning than that we actually have mechanisms for choice.
Because sans a mechanical input, you MUST be defaulting to some sort of supernatural spirit.
Well it doesn't have to be supernatural, simply unknown and perhaps nonmaterial. But I am not advocating that at all, I am accepting a mechanical system.
I am arguing that at a certain level of sophistication, layers and how the are wired to interact, autonomy is the result. It is not an illusion but a practical fact. Even if it boils down to one single uber-system which supervises and corrects lower systems in a rule based way which is "you", then fine. The fact that it can selfassess and redefine rules, means that it is not purely a-->b automation, which is how I would define machine brains from free will brains.
One can say they discovered the physical part of the brain that is involved with making a choice and it does not bother me one bit. The question is how did it handle the inputs to formulate the resultant action. Was it reassessing and not simply following a one set rule book, or spinning a wheel, or waiting for an electron to go haywire?
Rather than believing in a probability chart of action (which suggests some static form), why could it not be the assembly of probability assessments of success, and percentage assessments of coherency to past actions and understanding of self, then a portion of the brain looking for the best match between success and coherency?
Sometimes of course rules can change and success may not be the part chosen for or coherence, but that will be based on extenuating circumstances or layered perceptions. Our limited ability to handle all information as well as the time we have for making our decision, will of course come into play as affecting decision.

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)
"...don't believe I'm taken in by stories I have heard, I just read the Daily News and swear by every word.."(Steely Dan)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 211 by contracycle, posted 03-14-2005 11:36 AM contracycle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 216 by contracycle, posted 03-15-2005 8:28 AM Silent H has replied

  
contracycle
Inactive Member


Message 216 of 236 (191644)
03-15-2005 8:28 AM
Reply to: Message 215 by Silent H
03-15-2005 6:16 AM


quote:
I want you to set out a model where an electron flipping, or even a number of electrons flipping, will significantly change the operation of the brain (i.e. make a decision).
I'm afraid I can't, because we don't have a sufficiently good model of the brain. The point I was trying to make is that a decision must be a mechanical process of some kind, whatever that may be. Any given structure might suffer from external intervention, like putting an axe through a cable, or something.
Buty in a computer, yes, such events can cause crashes, hangs, and bad output.
quote:
Occam's razor certainly does have merit when we are discussing a theory regarding the existence of a phenomenon. While it might be possible that we are wired to believe we are actually making choices when we are not, only living purely as slaves to an existence which had to happen once the initial conditions of the universe began, this does require a more complex reasoning than that we actually have mechanisms for choice.
Not IMO, I'm afraid. Becuase I look at a beetle, and see very little in thew way of choice, and a great deal that looks like programming, and see that living things don't need a conscious "decision maker" at all. But please note nothing in my argument appeals to initial conditions of the universe or anything similar.
quote:
I am arguing that at a certain level of sophistication, layers and how the are wired to interact, autonomy is the result. It is not an illusion but a practical fact. Even if it boils down to one single uber-system which supervises and corrects lower systems in a rule based way which is "you", then fine. The fact that it can selfassess and redefine rules, means that it is not purely a-->b automation, which is how I would define machine brains from free will brains.
Well thats an adequate summary of my positionm, except I don't see any reason to think that mechanical brains will not achieve the same dgree of sophistication. The fact that our brains don't just automate is exactly what I was trying to get at with the argument to probabilistic decision making structures. Mechanical does not imply automation - it can also produce indeterminacy.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 215 by Silent H, posted 03-15-2005 6:16 AM Silent H has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 217 by Silent H, posted 03-15-2005 12:00 PM contracycle has replied

  
Silent H
Member (Idle past 5819 days)
Posts: 7405
From: satellite of love
Joined: 12-11-2002


Message 217 of 236 (191688)
03-15-2005 12:00 PM
Reply to: Message 216 by contracycle
03-15-2005 8:28 AM


But please note nothing in my argument appeals to initial conditions of the universe or anything similar.
If you are stating that human minds are completely mechanical, with no free will then every choice you make has pretty much been a result of initial conditions plus the accumulation of minor quantum variations, which is only a slight reset of initial conditions.
The concept of free will means that there is choice to move beyond simple input-->output models of behavior that are constrained by initial conditions.
except I don't see any reason to think that mechanical brains will not achieve the same dgree of sophistication.
Oh don't get me wrong. I am not saying mechanical rule systems will not one day be able to be as sophisticated as our organic rule systems and so achieve autonomy and free will. I can't say we'll ever get technically proficient to reach that point but it certainly does not seem impossible.
I am simply saying that human minds are not like the machines we currently use... not even close. They are great to analogize to for storage and processing, but the level of complexity of how it interacts with itself and the outside grants capabilities far beyond the best PCs we have.
HAL was a great idea by Clarke, and maybe we'll end up there some day. Clearly 2001 was not the date for achieving it. In any case, humans (and perhaps in some respects other animals) would be a couple steps beyond that.

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)
"...don't believe I'm taken in by stories I have heard, I just read the Daily News and swear by every word.."(Steely Dan)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 216 by contracycle, posted 03-15-2005 8:28 AM contracycle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 218 by contracycle, posted 03-16-2005 8:52 AM Silent H has replied

  
contracycle
Inactive Member


Message 218 of 236 (191886)
03-16-2005 8:52 AM
Reply to: Message 217 by Silent H
03-15-2005 12:00 PM


quote:
f you are stating that human minds are completely mechanical, with no free will then every choice you make has pretty much been a result of initial conditions plus the accumulation of minor quantum variations, which is only a slight reset of initial conditions.
Umm, I suggest an indeterminacy something like brownian motion. So we are not looking at the progression from one state to another state in a regularised manner - we are looking at an excited, mobile, variable system that is highly flexible. This is why I have had much of the term "probabalistic".
quote:
I am simply saying that human minds are not like the machines we currently use... not even close. They are great to analogize to for storage and processing, but the level of complexity of how it interacts with itself and the outside grants capabilities far beyond the best PCs we have.
Well I agree in the strict sense, that they are missing many features of our brains are probably only on the scale of insectoid intelligence at this point. But I disagree in a metaphorical sense, in that I think the computer is BEHAVIORALY very similar to a brain in a jar, and can be described as such realistically.
quote:
I want you to set out a model where an electron flipping, or even a number of electrons flipping, will significantly change the operation of the brain (i.e. make a decision).
I just wanted to come back to this possibly with a better simile. Imagine this happens: a stream of bits are sent down a channel to a processer. En route, one electron flashes out of existance and does not arive at the target. The target, as it happens, is a variable expecting a character-type data element entry (a variable defined as type CHAR). Unfortunately the single lost bit changed the character set number from say #58 - symbol "colon" - to #56, the "digit 9" symbol; this could happen by the initial bit stream appearing as "111010" and being changed to "111000" en route.
Now what happens is this. The variable of type CHAR expects a character-type value, which it would have received if the stream had not been disrupted. But what it gets is a numeric value, which it cannot interpret. This triggers an invalid type error, and the programme hangs.
Becuase information is necessarily conditional, its quite easy to find trivial inputs triggering catastrophic outputs. Now of course I have no idea of the brain uses anything like data type statements to establish variables, and therefore whether or not his kind of failure is remotely realistic in the brain. But I hope that illustrates how significant a single bit can be.
This message has been edited by contracycle, 03-16-2005 09:04 AM

This message is a reply to:
 Message 217 by Silent H, posted 03-15-2005 12:00 PM Silent H has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 219 by Silent H, posted 03-16-2005 6:05 PM contracycle has replied

  
Silent H
Member (Idle past 5819 days)
Posts: 7405
From: satellite of love
Joined: 12-11-2002


Message 219 of 236 (191990)
03-16-2005 6:05 PM
Reply to: Message 218 by contracycle
03-16-2005 8:52 AM


Umm, I suggest an indeterminacy something like brownian motion. So we are not looking at the progression from one state to another state in a regularised manner - we are looking at an excited, mobile, variable system that is highly flexible. This is why I have had much of the term "probabalistic".
Unfortunately brownian motion is not random, it only appears random to us. Remember things in motion tend to stay in motion unless acted upon. Nothing changes direction based on probablities, except perhaps entities at the quantum level.
I think the computer is BEHAVIORALY very similar to a brain in a jar, and can be described as such realistically.
Only in very loose analogies. The behavior of processing data and acting on an analysis is done by both brain and computer... beyond that I think behavioral ties vanish.
Now of course I have no idea of the brain uses anything like data type statements to establish variables, and therefore whether or not his kind of failure is remotely realistic in the brain. But I hope that illustrates how significant a single bit can be.
I was not questioning whether a single "digit" error can have an effect on a system. What I was questioning was the idea that a quantum fluctuation or "electron flip" would result in an "error" as far as a brain is concerned. I do not think it is remotely realistic.
I have some experience with the chemicals involved in brain activity, and my gf is working in psych right now so I've been perusing her texts on the physical structures of the brain. Even the smallest data reading/writing structures and the chemical data itself is massive compared to the level of "glitch" you are talking about. I just do not see how it could effect the functioning of the brain.
You are not the first person I have heard using that explanation, but I have yet to see anyone move beyond statements to showing it actually has merit. It looks like storytelling and handwaving to me... sounds good, but disappears under examination.

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 218 by contracycle, posted 03-16-2005 8:52 AM contracycle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 220 by contracycle, posted 03-17-2005 6:34 AM Silent H has replied

  
contracycle
Inactive Member


Message 220 of 236 (192081)
03-17-2005 6:34 AM
Reply to: Message 219 by Silent H
03-16-2005 6:05 PM


quote:
Unfortunately brownian motion is not random, it only appears random to us. Remember things in motion tend to stay in motion unless acted upon. Nothing changes direction based on probablities, except perhaps entities at the quantum level.
Right, but it was the quantum level you asked about, was it not?
quote:
Only in very loose analogies. The behavior of processing data and acting on an analysis is done by both brain and computer... beyond that I think behavioral ties vanish.
Spend more time with them, and you will find different machines have different personalities. IME, the analogies are very direct, given limits I have previously mentioned.
quote:
I was not questioning whether a single "digit" error can have an effect on a system. What I was questioning was the idea that a quantum fluctuation or "electron flip" would result in an "error" as far as a brain is concerned. I do not think it is remotely realistic.
Well, what was the problem with the example I proposed? It demonstrates exactly how a single electron changing the third character from 1 to 0 had exactly such an effect.
quote:
Even the smallest data reading/writing structures and the chemical data itself is massive compared to the level of "glitch" you are talking about. I just do not see how it could effect the functioning of the brain.
And that is EXACTLY the kind of error I described. You could have a hundred megabyte programme that just stops merely because a single cosmic ray hit a wire. That was precisely the point I was trying to make; for excample, that a cosmic ray damages a protein receptor, and this in turn causes some sort of cascading error that is totally disproportionate to the apparent input.
And even so, the only reason I am disucssing this is to provide a possible understanding for a complex dynamis in the brain that would not be visible as gross physical structures, thus allowing precisely the variability of human behaviour we see.
quote:
You are not the first person I have heard using that explanation, but I have yet to see anyone move beyond statements to showing it actually has merit. It looks like storytelling and handwaving to me... sounds good, but disappears under examination.
Yes well fucking forgive me with bothering trying to DISCUSS anything with you, it seems you want perfect ready made answers or nothing.
This message has been edited by contracycle, 03-17-2005 06:36 AM

This message is a reply to:
 Message 219 by Silent H, posted 03-16-2005 6:05 PM Silent H has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 221 by Silent H, posted 03-17-2005 9:13 AM contracycle has replied

  
Silent H
Member (Idle past 5819 days)
Posts: 7405
From: satellite of love
Joined: 12-11-2002


Message 221 of 236 (192097)
03-17-2005 9:13 AM
Reply to: Message 220 by contracycle
03-17-2005 6:34 AM


Yes well fucking forgive me with bothering trying to DISCUSS anything with you, it seems you want perfect ready made answers or nothing.
Honestly I have no idea where this sudden rage came from. I wasn't being sarcastic or condescending and was appreciative of the case you were trying to make.
I am sorry if you take the fact that I have not agreed to your position as being too demanding but I am being honest when I discuss the issues I have.
Well, what was the problem with the example I proposed? It demonstrates exactly how a single electron changing the third character from 1 to 0 had exactly such an effect.
Yes, in a 1 and 0 system where a flip would equal a change in a 1 or zero. I am understanding this.
You could have a hundred megabyte programme that just stops merely because a single cosmic ray hit a wire. That was precisely the point I was trying to make; for excample, that a cosmic ray damages a protein receptor, and this in turn causes some sort of cascading error that is totally disproportionate to the apparent input.
I am totally in agreement that damage or change in a receptor would equal change that might be disproprotionate to the apparent input.
A change at the quantum level simply will not result in a change at the level required for "damage" or "change" to a brain system.
Maybe I can show why that is true. You can run MRIs of brains which inherently align and flip in a much greater way, atomic level particles. If the theory of quantum fluctuations actually affecting thinking was true then people should not be coming out of MRIs and I believe even CAT scans unscathed.
What's more brain research is being run regarding influencing brain processes with EM fields. It does work and yet it is hardly the level of change you are talking about occuring from a much smaller alteration.
Here is a simple question, why is it not possible that our identities or 'centers of free will' are portions of the brain? That is to ask, why are we not the organ which assesses success of actions versus other criteria which it built up over time (an idea of identity or values) and selects from that? Why do our conscius perceptions have to be an organ which senses the illusion of making that same decision?

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 220 by contracycle, posted 03-17-2005 6:34 AM contracycle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 222 by contracycle, posted 03-17-2005 10:41 AM Silent H has replied

  
contracycle
Inactive Member


Message 222 of 236 (192116)
03-17-2005 10:41 AM
Reply to: Message 221 by Silent H
03-17-2005 9:13 AM


quote:
Honestly I have no idea where this sudden rage came from. I wasn't being sarcastic or condescending and was appreciative of the case you were trying to make.
I'm not making a "case" because I am speculating.
quote:
Maybe I can show why that is true. You can run MRIs of brains which inherently align and flip in a much greater way, atomic level particles. If the theory of quantum fluctuations actually affecting thinking was true then people should not be coming out of MRIs and I believe even CAT scans unscathed.
OK. Thats why I pointed out that modern computers are hardened against exactly that sort of interference. I further observed that biological systems appear to employ multiple redundancy to obviate this problem. So I do not see that MRI or CAT scanners pose a problem.
As an additional layer, you can build an information system to do error trapping; so even if anomolous results are encountered they do not necessarily ripple onwards to have observable effects; thats a solvable design problem.
Remember I said it was a SIMILE not a description.
quote:
What's more brain research is being run regarding influencing brain processes with EM fields. It does work and yet it is hardly the level of change you are talking about occuring from a much smaller alteration.
POTENTIALLY occurring. In addition, there are good reasons for thinking that only a portion of the brains activity is electrical, and that a substantial part is chemical. That would severely mitigate the influence that magnetic fields can impose, if certain statements are "written" into a hormone and released into the bloodstream. That also implies delays - so who knows, maybe the effects of exposure to EM fields are only observable a week after the effect, and thus hard to correlate with the event. And third, the photo-electric effect putrs hard limits on necessary energy quanta to make any changes at all, and so quite a few environmental factors may simply not arise to a significant threshold.
You see "quantum level fluctuations affect thinking" is NOT precisely the claim I made. The only reason they were mentioned at all was to provide a basis for saying that merely becuae the system is mechanical does not necessarily means it is mechanically deterministic in simple, cause-and-effect, correlatable manner.
quote:
Here is a simple question, why is it not possible that our identities or 'centers of free will' are portions of the brain? That is to ask, why are we not the organ which assesses success of actions versus other criteria which it built up over time (an idea of identity or values) and selects from that? Why do our conscius perceptions have to be an organ which senses the illusion of making that same decision?
IMO 99% of human functions can be carried out without the conscious mind being involved to any significant degree. Quite a range pf psychological problems may limit a persons communicative abilities, and thus severely limit socialisation, but they are often able to to feed themselves and might well, in an uncsontrained environemnt, be perfectly succesful in their own right without our complex thought patterns. Equally, if stone tools go back in the human lineage as far as we think they do, then they must have been made first by creatures significantly less "intelligent" than us.
And yet, if you sat down to learn the art of stone-knapping, you would very much engage your thinking mind for that purpose. Is that actually necessary, or an epiphenomenon of the act? That is what appears dubious to me in the orthodox causality of thought -> action.
I see many similarities in other animals - just today the news is reporting that cows get depressed, have conflict avoidance strategies, and generally appear to have quite a rich psychology. Many animals use tools in one form or another. So it is not clear to me that the very high level strategic functions we experience as our "self" requires a special organ or structure or facility that is not also found - to a lesser degree - in the dumbest critters. To me, it looks like an emergent property of a very complex substrate.
And that implies that the substrate must first change, and then the change will be relfected in the epiphenomenon. That does not imply that such changes - which amount to decisions - are totally unconscious, random, or senseless. The direction of apparent causality need not undermine the quality of decision. If you feel that you make the decision "to have the blueberry rather than the raspberry pie", I think that is a "conscious" reflection of a decision that was made mechanically. That is your self-status monitoring system reporting on your self-status, I think.
But I am not claiming that things happen in only one direction. If you can turn a wheel by turning an axle, you can turn the axle by turning the wheel. They are connected - and similarly I would think there is some facility for the "strategic command" element to push commands back down the chain in the other direction. That would be precisely why such a system would provide a survivability advantage. But I suspect that the range and scope of those commands is rather limited, under most circumstances - too many of the sub-systems are beyond the strategic elements' control to prevent feedback from the sub-systems determing some of the content of the strategic element itself.
The very idea of things, lessons, insight, being built up "over time" inplies that those lessons must be recorded somewhere. So, in as much as I am a product of my environment and circumstances, I am an object that other items in the world have acted upon, and I am changed by those actions. These changes compel my conscious thought to change with them, as they are converted into material data somehow, somewhere, in the brain itself, thus changing the substrate from which the epiphenomenon arises.
As I said, I am not trying to argue for a one-way relationship in which the conscious mind is merely an echo of unconscious process. All I am trying to do is attack a one-way process in the other direction, in which we conceive of ourselves as our "free will" and think of changes as being processed and accepted or discarded by that "analytical" organ. My model is one of endless interaction and iteration between the "conscious" mind and IM the far far larger quantity of automated functions. Thats why free will looks erroneous to me - it implies a mind free of impositions, which then chooses. I think we have to consider that this sense of identity is highly abstract, is probably not a single process or facility or organ but the emergent property of many such sub-systems, ands can itself to be subject to changes in the sub-systems regardless of the measn by which those changes come about.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 221 by Silent H, posted 03-17-2005 9:13 AM Silent H has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 223 by Silent H, posted 03-17-2005 3:20 PM contracycle has replied

  
Silent H
Member (Idle past 5819 days)
Posts: 7405
From: satellite of love
Joined: 12-11-2002


Message 223 of 236 (192158)
03-17-2005 3:20 PM
Reply to: Message 222 by contracycle
03-17-2005 10:41 AM


If you feel that you make the decision "to have the blueberry rather than the raspberry pie", I think that is a "conscious" reflection of a decision that was made mechanically. That is your self-status monitoring system reporting on your self-status, I think.
I agree that this can be the case, but also believe that a conscious choice may be made rather than a review of what happened. This depends on how "passive" one is being regarding the action.
As I said, I am not trying to argue for a one-way relationship in which the conscious mind is merely an echo of unconscious process. All I am trying to do is attack a one-way process in the other direction, in which we conceive of ourselves as our "free will" and think of changes as being processed and accepted or discarded by that "analytical" organ.
If you mean to say that we are more than just purely free will mechanisms, but are also the collection of mechanical routines we have no direct control over then I am in agreement.
My model is one of endless interaction and iteration between the "conscious" mind and IM the far far larger quantity of automated functions. Thats why free will looks erroneous to me - it implies a mind free of impositions, which then chooses. I think we have to consider that this sense of identity is highly abstract, is probably not a single process or facility or organ but the emergent property of many such sub-systems, ands can itself to be subject to changes in the sub-systems regardless of the measn by which those changes come about.
This does not sound far from my own model, so I am unsure why you took me to task so severely. I have said that my free will is bounded and that the free part is essentially a system of algorithms, which by the nature of their interaction, give us what is for practical purposes free will. Besides this collection there are plenty of other routine programs that run outside of that program. I am not sure how much but it could be much more than our "conscious" program.
In the end though, most of our actions towards others and in contemplation are free from those "unconscious" motor programs.

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 222 by contracycle, posted 03-17-2005 10:41 AM contracycle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 224 by contracycle, posted 03-18-2005 6:25 AM Silent H has replied

  
contracycle
Inactive Member


Message 224 of 236 (192265)
03-18-2005 6:25 AM
Reply to: Message 223 by Silent H
03-17-2005 3:20 PM


quote:
In the end though, most of our actions towards others and in contemplation are free from those "unconscious" motor programs.
Why?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 223 by Silent H, posted 03-17-2005 3:20 PM Silent H has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 225 by Silent H, posted 03-18-2005 8:58 AM contracycle has not replied

  
Silent H
Member (Idle past 5819 days)
Posts: 7405
From: satellite of love
Joined: 12-11-2002


Message 225 of 236 (192282)
03-18-2005 8:58 AM
Reply to: Message 224 by contracycle
03-18-2005 6:25 AM


Why?
I could just as easily ask why not. But I'll try to explain my original statement so it may seem a bit clearer.
When we contemplate, or deliberate, issues that is almost inherently drawing them from unconscious to conscious reasoning. We are choosing to fix our will on assessing something. It is especially hard for me to believe that contemplation of future acts or theoretical entities hinges on unconscious mechanisms that are preset, and we are simply looking at what thye have already determined.
Contemplation of past events, especially ones that we went through without much deliberation, may very well rely on simply rerunning our automated systems and reviewing them to find some sort of coherence or "story" to fit why we acted in the way we chose.
I suppose you could argue that "most of our actions towards others" may be an overstatement. I think most of our deliberate actions are thought out. I was not trying to refer to commonplace action-reaction events like someone cuts a person off and the other flips the middle finger in response.

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 224 by contracycle, posted 03-18-2005 6:25 AM contracycle has not replied

  
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