Freedom Pact
Dr Robert Sapolsky reflects on debating the late Daniel Dennett on Free Will.
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Can you blame anyone for wanting to believe in free will? It's like God. It's a very comforting thought.
Of course he didn't change his mind on anything. The guy doesn't listen. He knows there is no free will and the most preeminent philosopher on free will isn't going to change his mind. His book is just bad. Nothing but assertions.
If free will isn't real, if it doesn't exist, give me an example of something that IS real and does exist.
I will never not be amazed by compatabilism. It seeks to rewrite the definition of free will in order to save the concept, but what it calls "free will" is still not sufficient to support the concept of just deserts. It's an error of metacognition, I think. Since we have a subjective, first-person experience of what it feels like for a neural network to process information and commit to action, we conflate that with "the ability to do otherwise." Realistically, we are deterministic processes that are playing themselves out with a layer of consciousness added on top. Not only is free will incompatible with determinism, but the idea of causal agents (within time at least) is incompatible with determinism. Just illusions of human perception.
Sapolsky is happy to criticize Dennett's views but he misrepresents them & now Dan is dead he can't rebut these straw man arguments.
How can Sapolsky become so well known without understanding the first thing about being a public intellectual??
Bob, you're supposed to tell us what WE WANT to believe, not what YOU believe! Any idiot can do that.
I'm less than half joking
Everything Sapolsky said doesn’t have any connection with Dennet’s ideas on free will
Clap trap.
Unfortunately, this is is a topic that most philosophers seem to struggle with.
Wow, this is straight up slander. Dennett was into magical thinking and intuitionism? Dan Dennett? Dennett who was relentless in questioning intuition and denying a role any thing spooky, magically, or even poorly explained. I suppose the majority of professional philosophers who have concluded in favor of compatibilism are similarly impoverished in their thinking? Sam Harris and the rest of the recently jumped up gang "neuroscientists" disproving "free will" in cash-grab copy-cats books are centuries late to the party and somehow think that they're the first ones to think clearly about the problem. The hubris is staggering.
I really enjoy Sapolsky. His lectures and publications have provided me with a significant amount of information and methods to apply that information that take advantage of on a daily basis and that have significantly contributed to my quality of life including financially; but I have never heard this argument of his that is persuasive. Who cares what happened in the past? Without any doubt, the past is what led you to this point, but the past CANNOT influence this point in time. Memory is not the past, and neither is chemical reactions that are occurring because of past conditioning. There may or may not be a thing we call free will, but the arguments of the past are immaterial.
I struggle to care about a debate that doesn’t seem to have any consequence on the world. People are convinced that free will is an illusion + immediately fall back into deciding things every day. So, what is the point?
It’s like arguing that blue doesn’t exist outside of your mind. Whether you’re right or wrong, we still collectively agree that’s an odd choice for hair color if you’re a grandparent.
So the main case against free will is determinisms which is a result of of our increasing understanding of physics yet in cutting edge theoretical physics space time is being called into question plus the elephant in the room which is the idea of emergence. Saying free will is an illusion is a edgy thing to say with no meat on the bone. All the neural correlates in the world don't mean much when you have the hard problem to deal with.
Free will? I didn't choose to write this comment, its what happens, that's all. The bigger question is whether there is even you or me? What exactly do we mean by those pronouns? It points to the body doesn't? But the body functions without us. The heart beats, the blood flows through the body. The hair and nails grow of its own accord, we can't speed it up or slow it down. We have no hand in it. And so is with everything else, IT'S WHAT HAPPENS.
Oh, these atheist (and others too) are so full of themselves, they seriously think they exist, that they were born and that they will die (the body that is). But none of them (with the exception of the very few) haven't even begin to explore what the consciousness is, since all are conscious beings.
Dennett had a different notion of free will from Sapolsky. Dennett's notion was a social construct and the two talked past each other.
Dennett thought Sapolsky's notion did not make sense and did not want to argue it. Dennett implicitly agreed with Sapolsky about that free will not existing. However, Dennett only disparaged Saoplosky's notion, and did not pursue the consequences and argued his own notion of free will. As a social construct it was not a question of whether Dennett's free will existed, because it was deemed to exist rather than being an innate capacity. It was a mechanism holding a person accountable for their own behaviour, rather than a justification.
Sapolsky's intuitionism criticism is still valid. Dennett, a determinist, attempted to evade the accountability consequences of determinism.
This debate is like two people arguing about how many electrons there are in the universe. A lot of irrelevant gobbledy-gook.
If you’re reading this and think Sapolsky is wrong, would you mind telling me (A) what do you mean by free will? and (B) can you give me a concrete example of you exercising it?
Free will clings on because we're capable of envisioning alternative choices post-hoc.
It's FREE WON'T not FREE WILL. We're not born free.
If Dennet couldn't get it, what hope do we have of convincing those who are less intellectually gifted? Do you think that perhaps his age had something to do with it? I'm referring to brain plasticity and confirmation bias.
Wow! Where do the buy those great philosopher beards and hair? Same store that sells guru robes and beads? 😉
First, howzabout a clear definition of what, exactly, a 'will' is?
Segundo, there is no longer any 'debate';
Free-will/Choice vs Determinism (and their bastard children 'compatibility and in-compatibility) is already a fallacy; a false dilemma.
That they are already a fallacy, it shouldn't be shocking that there is a superior theory.
The quote from Feynman at the end is the death knell of both 'free-will' and 'determinism' and their bastard children 'compatibilism and un-compatibilism!
But first, a definition;
"Free-will/Choice"; an egoically satisfying theory as to the meaning of a feeling/thought (ego). Get it?
Whether the concept of 'free-will/choice' is anything more than an egoic delusion seems to be simply answered by 'deconstruction'.
The punch line is that All is One! The Enlightened/Saved, Mystic know this experientially. Quantum physics certainly supports this.
So, starting from this point, One single Universe, in perfect balance…
One Truth perceived by Consciousness through infinite unique Perspectives (Souls), us.
Not anything is actually moving, time is the theory to 'splain the illusion of motion, and now there are concepts of a 'self' distinct from Self with the ability to alter the entire Universe to, most often, make their own little life a bit more comfortable. After all, if you could actually 'change' anything, in the great One, you'd have to also 'change' everything! Talk about an ego trip, a God complex, no wonder people believe in 'free-will/choice'.
Not to mention that everyone has the Godlike ability to alter the Universe for a Big Mac!
Is this not the very definition of 'chaos'?
The concept/belief does have quite the twitching support group, though. I suspect that the notion of free-will/choice is just another acquired belief virus. The symptoms of the defenders supports that theory.
So, deconstructing Truth, 'free-will/choice' is impossible, other than as a notion/belief/delusion.
Every moment of existence exists Now!
"The Laws of Nature are not rules controlling the metamorphosis of what is, into what will be. They are descriptions of patterns that exist, all at once… " – Genius; the Life and Science of Richard Feynman
All 'eternity' at once; Here! Now!!
Illustration;
When you get to the corner you are planning to turn right. You get to the corner and turn right and you take credit for your amazing manipulation of massive and unknown forces to manifest your godlike Will.
On the other hand, if you actually turn left, you can just forget the 'plan' and continue. Or blame someone else…
In either situation, the moment when the car turned in whatever direction, say left, for the entire duration of the Universe that moment exists as it is. It could never be 'otherwise'.
Free-will/choice implies making a moment 'otherwise'; no moment in Universal existence can ever be 'otherwise'.
at the end that is the idea this is nothing else but dialectic process at work well done mr sapolski
HELL if I know!
The poll at the beginning of their debate was bogus. It asked people t choose between determinism and free will, but as Dennett points out compatibilists are determinists. Dennett argued for determinism. The question is, are our concepts of human freedom of action and responsibility consistent with determinism.