More to the point, here's how I like to look at it. Quantum theory has non-determinism embedded within it. Conway (I believe) is really talking about non-determinism rather than the more provocative "free will." So how does that apply to us?
Suppose that we have buried deep within our brains a non-deterministic idea/impulse generator. If unchecked the generated impulse would lead--through mechanical effects--to some action in the world. But we also have built into us inhibitors that monitor these impulses and prevent some of them from reaching the stage of real action. These inhibitors are also deterministic: once installed they do their inhibition work mechanically. Where do they come from? Many of them are built in as a result of evolution. But others are learned. How does that happen? We are capable of "programming" our brains. That's not so different (although I don't mean to imply that we are "just" computational devices) from programming any computer. So just as computers are able to be programmed to act in certain ways -- and yet still be deterministic devices-- we too are able to program ourselves to act in certain ways -- mainly by installing useful inhibitory (or anti-inhibitory) mechanisms. The bottom line is that the original impulses/ideas are random, not the result of free will. Whether or not they reach the state of realization is deterministic as a result of the "programs" we have installed in ourselves. The "programs" we install in ourselves is as result of the combination of our built-in tendency to install programs and the programs we happen to have installed in ourselves along the way. This seems to me to provide a reasonable way of thinking about how we behave and about how we seem to have free will yet to do so within the context of a materialistic universe. Also, it feels sort of right. We don't really have an idea on purpose. We don't have the "free will" to invent or create. That comes from a lower level mechanism. All we do is monitor what is generated and keep the good stuff. Our monitoring and selection skills are both built-in and learned. But they don't require what we normally think of as free will. (This is Dennett's message in *Darwin's Dangerous Idea*, that all creativity is the result of evolutionary processes: diversity generation and selection.) -- Russ On Sat, Apr 18, 2009 at 11:36 AM, Russ Abbott <russ.abb...@gmail.com> wrote: > That's the end of cheeriness. > > -- Russ > > On Sat, Apr 18, 2009 at 10:55 AM, Nicholas Thompson < > nickthomp...@earthlink.net> wrote: > >> This is the sort of thing that drives behaviorists to be tower >> murderers. >> >> *"It asserts, roughly, that if indeed we humans have free will, then >> elementary particles already have their own small share of this valuable >> commodity."* >> ** >> First, what kind of a syllogism is this? >> >> Second, valuable to whom? For what? >> >> Third, assertions of free will in anything .... even humans --are not >> consistant with materialism. Materialism is the doctrine that everything >> that is real consists of matter *and its relations. * >> >> Beyond materialism is only madness. >> >> Free will is just a legal doctrine that allows us to kill people when they >> do something we dont like. >> >> Nick >> >> >> >> Nicholas S. Thompson >> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology, >> Clark University (nthomp...@clarku.edu) >> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/<http://home.earthlink.net/%7Enickthompson/naturaldesigns/> >> >> >> >> >> >> ----- Original Message ----- >> *From:* Robert Holmes <rob...@holmesacosta.com> >> *To: *The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group<friam@redfish.com> >> *Sent:* 4/18/2009 8:28:20 AM >> *Subject:* [FRIAM] particles have free will >> >> According to Conway (Game of Life inventor), particles have free-will. >> See http://kk.org/ct2/2009/03/particles-have-free-will.php for a summary >> and http://www.ams.org/notices/200902/rtx090200226p.pdf for the paper. >> Seems that every time I turn Netlogo off, I'm committing murder.... >> >> Robert >> >> >> ============================================================ >> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College >> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org >> > >
============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
