[MD] Free Will

[X Acto]

Hi Matt, Steve,

Matt:
> ... if determinism is the
> thesis that we are caught up in causal chains, then it is not
> destructive of moral reasoning because moral reasoning is
> something that occurs partly _because_ of causal chains.  Moral
> reasoning _needs_ causal chains.  And if that's the case, why on
> earth would determinism destroy moral reasoning?

Steve:
That's basically what Dennett said in the interview Ham and Craig
referenced, and it's a great point. Dennett reformulates free will as
the human capacity to play out scenarios in our heads before acting
them out and then asks, what good would free will be without
determinism? If we didn't think that our actions had at least somewhat
predictable effects (including effects on other people and what we
think they will do in response to what we do), what good would it be
to be able to choose among possible actions? Instead of free will
opposing determinism, free will depends on determinism.

As you point out above, the same goes for the notion of moral
responsibility. Moral responsibility cannot be threatened by
determinism when moral reasoning can only make sense in the context of
determinism.

In that interview Dennett also clears up confusion between fatalism
and determinism which I think have been confused in this thread.
Fatalism means that whatever we do we cannot avoid a given outcome
whereas determinism says that what we do matters. Different actions
have different consequences.

Then there is the issue of _pre_determination which I think is only a
concern if you imagine an omniscient super-being, (snip)


Ron:
I think this really places a finger on the problem in regard to the difficulty 
being
experienced in the discussion. I think it is pointless to carry on the arguement
any further until the air has been cleared on just what we mean by "determinism"
and how or if freedom or "free will" is concieved within this context.

Now, to say that free will vanishes the closer one looks at it , one must take
care as to what one means by using the term "free will" .

The linch pin statement that all involved should begin from is:

"what good would free will be without
determinism? If we didn't think that our actions had at least somewhat
predictable effects (including effects on other people and what we
think they will do in response to what we do), what good would it be
to be able to choose among possible actions? Instead of free will
opposing determinism, free will depends on determinism."

In the light of this statement, "free will" is as "real" as intellectual 
patterns
of Quality, so it does not do it justice to say that free will is a delusional
concept simply because it emerges from deterministic patterns of value.
But it does beg the question of "how free is free will?" and it does begin
a discussion on just what we mean by using the term in the context
of our community here on the discuss and the consequences of doing so.

To begin to reduce the concept of free will in this context is to begin to
trace the notion back to more restrictions on what we typically mean by
the term "free". But having said this, and having reduced it to the act of
prefference in a more metaphysical and physical explanation of experience
in broad general terms we find that static deterministic prefferences
emerge from a chaotic "free" state with freedom, absolute freedom, the kind
Steve seems to be arguing against as functional to our experience, is a purely
dynamic state and this is a good point to take up in the context of intellectual
meaning.

 Does that mean that Dynamic Quality is equated with chaos? if so Dynamic
Quality can not be equated with betterness in a purely metaphysical explanation.
Only within the context of static determined prefferences does the good emerge
from the chaotic. and within the context of what it means to "be" or to say 
experience,
does Dynamic Quality take on the meaning of the source of the good. In the 
practicality
as living beings it holds that particular meaning to us. So it is more useful to 
us as understood
as the source of the good rather than the good itself. 

What does that mean to the statement that all static patterns migrate toward 
Dynamic Quality?
In light of what was just stated, I believe this statement takes on greater 
meaning as static
patterns migrate toward the source of the good rather than dynamic freedom, 
which is to say
a chaotic state. The statement then has contextual meaning to a static being of 
experience
and less as a more objective abstract metaphysical explanation.



Great debate, to all who are involved, could have done without all the shit 
slinging..Steve but good
dialog despite.

Thanks

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