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Free Will

Started by Mistre, March 29, 2012, 02:02:12 AM

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Mesozoic Mister Nigel

Quote from: ZL 'Kai' Burington, M.S. on April 24, 2012, 04:38:35 AM
Quote from: Cainad on April 06, 2012, 04:51:17 PM
Quote from: Nigel on April 06, 2012, 06:35:24 AM
I find it oddly even more romantic for being chemical; holy SHIT, look at what the physical world can do!

Some people think scientists are devoid of romance and are intent on stripping the world of its wonder. In my opinion, the opposite is true.

Yes, also this.

Feynman had a very appropriate comment on this.

He is so spot-on.
"I'm guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk," Charles Wick said. "It was very complicated."


EK WAFFLR

"At first I lifted weights.  But then I asked myself, 'why not people?'  Now everyone runs for the fjord when they see me."


Horribly Oscillating Assbasket of Deliciousness
[/b]

Mistre

#17
I heard of him, but I never saw one of his interviews, he seems really likable!
Uber Supreme Poobah of Pope-Groping™

He who acknowledges his own inability to answer a question is wise, he who does not seek one is stupid.

Placid Dingo

Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 24, 2012, 04:21:32 PM
Quote from: Placid Dingo on April 24, 2012, 03:45:59 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 24, 2012, 02:01:18 PM
Quote from: Mistre on March 29, 2012, 02:02:12 AM
Do we really decide by ourselves, or are we just being controlled by chemical reactions that run amok our brains, fucking things up and dictating what we should do, what we should eat, where should we go?

Both and neither.

Balls, on account of Papa Hemmingway.

I am more than a collection of perceptions.

You've said this a number of times to reject a lot of thin including the use of the MBPTI and memetics.

What exactly ARE we that is beyond these types of collections of perceptions or memes or traits? Even if you can link me to something if you've already explained yourself.

1.  I have NEVER rejected the use of memetics.  I have no idea what the hell MBPTI is, so I can't answer that.  What I DO reject is memetic false consciousness as the entirety of human existence.

2.  I am a human being.  What are you?

ETA:  http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php/topic,29003.0.html

Ok, sorry about the memetics thing. I did mean the idea of a person as a collection of memes. The MBPTI is the Myer Briggs personality test.

I'm reading through the whole thread you linked me and it does a good job of rejecting the idea that we are just a collectiOn of memes. If you think we are more than just memes, I would liketo know what about us is more than a competing collection of ideas. I don't have any stake in the answer, it's just that I've hear you saying 'we are more than this...' enough to wonder "why?"

To me it feels like the evangelical argument for the soul. Without a soul we are just animals. And you know, I think we are just animals but animals with incredible brains which opens up a vastly different conscious experience.

If we are more than memes, more than a collection of perceptions, what more is there to us that makes it so? A soul? Emotions? Self-concious?

Do you see what I'm trying to ask?

In response to the question, of course I'm a human being. I don't see that that's antithical to the idea of being a collection of perceptions though.
Haven't paid rent since 2014 with ONE WEIRD TRICK.

Telarus

Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 30, 2012, 07:23:45 PM
Quote from: The Freeky of SCIENCE! on April 30, 2012, 07:21:38 PM
Quote from: Cainad on April 30, 2012, 07:15:29 PM
Dogs seem to experience joy with an intensity that would probably shatter my mind. I am a little envious.

I am more than a little envious. 

Fuckin' dogs and their fuckin' ability to experience happiness in its entirety...

DAMN FRONTAL LOBES!   :argh!:
Telarus, KSC,
.__.  Keeper of the Contradictory Cephalopod, Zenarchist Swordsman,
(0o)  Tender to the Edible Zen Garden, Ratcheting Metallic Sex Doll of The End Times,
/||\   Episkopos of the Amorphous Dreams Cabal

Join the Doll Underground! Experience the Phantasmagorical Safari!

Doktor Howl

Quote from: Placid Dingo on April 25, 2012, 03:17:54 AM
I'm reading through the whole thread you linked me and it does a good job of rejecting the idea that we are just a collectiOn of memes. If you think we are more than just memes, I would liketo know what about us is more than a competing collection of ideas. I don't have any stake in the answer, it's just that I've hear you saying 'we are more than this...' enough to wonder "why?"

I'm me.  I am not a collection of viral ideas, of absorbed commercials and opinions. 

Why?  Because I am the sexiest Goddamn primate for miles in any direction.  I can wreck a car, fix that car, fuck up a county fair, and give women a fake orgasm from across the room.  I am the unverified alternative, the equally valid theory, the piss in your wheaties.

I don't have to explain why I'm not just a meat robot, because anyone who needs that explained is spending time pretending to be a meat robot.  A soul?  The only soul I'm sure of walks around in the form of George Clinton.  Like I said, I have no answers, but I am not a meat robot by the very act of not wanting to be one.

Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Dingo.  It's not like you have any choice.
Molon Lube

Doktor Howl

Also:

Quote from: Placid Dingo on April 25, 2012, 03:17:54 AM
The MBPTI is the Myer Briggs personality test.

Sort of like the Dewey Decimal System for people.

If you can be reduced to a 4 letter description, then you should probably stop thinking about it and go raise hell until you feel like a human again.
Molon Lube

NewSpag

Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 30, 2012, 08:50:39 PM
Quote from: Placid Dingo on April 25, 2012, 03:17:54 AM
I'm reading through the whole thread you linked me and it does a good job of rejecting the idea that we are just a collectiOn of memes. If you think we are more than just memes, I would liketo know what about us is more than a competing collection of ideas. I don't have any stake in the answer, it's just that I've hear you saying 'we are more than this...' enough to wonder "why?"

I'm me.  I am not a collection of viral ideas, of absorbed commercials and opinions. 

Why?  Because I am the sexiest Goddamn primate for miles in any direction.  I can wreck a car, fix that car, fuck up a county fair, and give women a fake orgasm from across the room.  I am the unverified alternative, the equally valid theory, the piss in your wheaties.

I don't have to explain why I'm not just a meat robot, because anyone who needs that explained is spending time pretending to be a meat robot.  A soul?  The only soul I'm sure of walks around in the form of George Clinton.  Like I said, I have no answers, but I am not a meat robot by the very act of not wanting to be one.

Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Dingo.  It's not like you have any choice.
:mittens:
QuoteOne day I realized life was pointless.  I've been celebrating ever since.
Quote
There's beauty in everything so lets destroy it all together.
Sometimes Always is Never.  For everything else there's Mastercard.

Cain

Using Khaneman's schema, I have a very basic idea of free will:

System 1 thinking is not free will.  System 1 thinking is all automatic.  Reading a simple sentence, turning your head to locate a sound, doing a very simple sum...all of these are System 1 activities.  System 1 runs constantly, whenever you are awake.

System 2 is free will.  System 2 involves use of memory, focus and complex tasks generally.  System 2 runs at a low level, in the background, and can be overtaxed by sufficiently difficult tasks.

Most psychology tests for "free will", I've noticed, involve some especially simple tasks, for various reasons.  However, simple tasks are likey to cause our System 1 responses to take over - and since that is virtually automatic, of course we make a decision before we are consciously aware of it.

This also implies free will is not something that applies all the time, and is something that takes work to cultivate.

Kai

Quote from: Cain on April 30, 2012, 11:12:30 PM
Using Khaneman's schema, I have a very basic idea of free will:

System 1 thinking is not free will.  System 1 thinking is all automatic.  Reading a simple sentence, turning your head to locate a sound, doing a very simple sum...all of these are System 1 activities.  System 1 runs constantly, whenever you are awake.

System 2 is free will.  System 2 involves use of memory, focus and complex tasks generally.  System 2 runs at a low level, in the background, and can be overtaxed by sufficiently difficult tasks.

Most psychology tests for "free will", I've noticed, involve some especially simple tasks, for various reasons.  However, simple tasks are likey to cause our System 1 responses to take over - and since that is virtually automatic, of course we make a decision before we are consciously aware of it.

This also implies free will is not something that applies all the time, and is something that takes work to cultivate.

Not only did you define free will, you pretty much clarified how to test for it. You are therefore better than millions of philosophers. :mittens:
If there is magic on this planet, it is contained in water. --Loren Eisley, The Immense Journey

Her Royal Majesty's Chief of Insect Genitalia Dissection
Grand Visser of the Six Legged Class
Chanticleer of the Holometabola Clade Church, Diptera Parish

Telarus

Bad ass, Cain. That sums up many of my thoughts as well, hitting at the heart of "it can run down/out" leaving you with System 1 responses until you can recuperate.

During my PeleKai / Kali-Escrima training this happened:

I spent 2-3 minutes wandering a room counting the "7 posters" after I stressed myself to totally exhausted on a heavy bag..... I was astounded to find out that there were only 5. But my sensei said "seven" (after the whole "keep hitting the bag!!!" chants) so my System 1 reflexes & previous trust had me stumbling around the room, nearly delirious, looking for 2 posters that simply didn't exist (and recounting the ones there 2 times over until I "got it" on the third try).

I love that my sensei mindfucked me to make that point.
Telarus, KSC,
.__.  Keeper of the Contradictory Cephalopod, Zenarchist Swordsman,
(0o)  Tender to the Edible Zen Garden, Ratcheting Metallic Sex Doll of The End Times,
/||\   Episkopos of the Amorphous Dreams Cabal

Join the Doll Underground! Experience the Phantasmagorical Safari!

navkat

Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 30, 2012, 08:52:16 PM
Also:

Quote from: Placid Dingo on April 25, 2012, 03:17:54 AM
The MBPTI is the Myer Briggs personality test.

Sort of like the Dewey Decimal System for people.

If you can be reduced to a 4 letter description, then you should probably stop thinking about it and go raise hell until you feel like a human again.

I'm an extroverted introvert who ignores her intuition to obstinately insist on focusing on only what can be measured even when the "tea leaves" are screaming a different message. I battle with logic but have too big of a heart to stick very hard to any "logical" solution if it means someone gets the shit end of the stick and I can never seem to make up my fucking mind about anything.

I broke their fucking test with my crazy.

Doktor Howl

Quote from: navkat on May 01, 2012, 02:05:18 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 30, 2012, 08:52:16 PM
Also:

Quote from: Placid Dingo on April 25, 2012, 03:17:54 AM
The MBPTI is the Myer Briggs personality test.

Sort of like the Dewey Decimal System for people.

If you can be reduced to a 4 letter description, then you should probably stop thinking about it and go raise hell until you feel like a human again.

I'm an extroverted introvert who ignores her intuition to obstinately insist on focusing on only what can be measured even when the "tea leaves" are screaming a different message. I battle with logic but have too big of a heart to stick very hard to any "logical" solution if it means someone gets the shit end of the stick and I can never seem to make up my fucking mind about anything.

I broke their fucking test with my crazy.

My last job had that test.  They kept asking me to retake it, because I "contradicted" myself and fucked the test up.  Funny thing is, I answered the whole thing honestly.
Molon Lube

navkat

I had a feeling you and I suffered from the same brand of non-brandedness from the start but the shit that clinched it for me was the Reality Tunnels. I do that shit. I don't even know who I am anymore...probably an amalgamation of all of Them.

navkat

I keep coming back to how they told you you contradicted yourself. Like, the test isn't broken, right? No, of course not.

I probably would have been able to suss out which questions were the "offenders" too, and narrowed them down to the simplistically generalized "categories" they were meant to poll about...you know, spirit of the thing versus letter of the thing. I might've even been tempted to change my answers to match what they wanted, just to get them off my back...until some other girl in my head screamed "No, FUCK them. THIS is what they ASKED, THIS is what I ANSWERED. I will NOT jump into one of their sorting bins and further validate this drivel."