[MD] Dennett & James' "Free will"

[MarshaV]

Hi Steve,

I've searched high and low for a video of the Tuft's Seminar, but didn't find any.  I didn't take Doyle's presentation as more than some kind of presentation of James's explanation of free-will.  It's not the end-of-the-story.  And I do not see that James's free-will fits well with RMP's explanation of "to the extent that one follows Dynamic Quality, ... one's behavior is free".  Here is a long video of Dennett on free-will at Edinburgh University.  (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKLAbWFCh1E)   

Free-wlll and all the many isms are intellectual static patterns of value: nothing more, nothing less.  


Marsha 



On Oct 1, 2011, at 9:03 AM, Steven Peterson wrote:

> Hi Marsha,
> 
> I watched all those videos this morning. Thanks for posting them.
> 
> I think this is the missing part 5:
> http://www.youtube.com/user/infophilosopher#p/u/34/jNQ_jRU0s6w
> 
> Bob Doyle sure seems to think he's got this problem licked. He seems
> more evangelist than philosopher at times.
> 
> The question I have about his two-stage model where first comes chance
> them comes choice is this: after indeterminism offers possibilities
> HOW does one make a decision among them? Isn't that the original
> question still sitting there in the back of the lecture hall? We can
> still look into what goes into making a choice and ask whether those
> factors are freely chosen or not (if we want to) and so on and so on.
> We are back to square one. Aren't we? Why would his model prevent us
> from looking for and finding causal explanations for choices?
> 
> Also, what is this "I" that claims to have freely chosen in his model?
> Why should this "I" be regarded as the final cause for the given act?
> It seems to me that we can always seek causal explanations on higher
> or lower levels of description. We can explain the choice as the
> desire of an individual and still ask, where do these desires come
> from? We can explain choices in terms of the function of a brain in
> response to casual laws or random quantum indeterminacy affecting
> neurons and lots of other ways without thinking it is meaningful to
> ask, which one of all the the possible ways of thinking about a given
> act is the ULTIMATELY correct level of description? What is the FINAL
> cause of the act in question? The incompatiblist approach to the
> question seems to presume that it is meaningful to point to something
> as ULTIMATE and other explanations as less real.
> 
> I would LOVE to see Dennett respond to him in that seminar at Tufts he
> mentioned. I don't think Doyle is offering any freedom that we want
> that we don't have in Dennett's compatiblism.
> 
> Best,
> Steve
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Sat, Oct 1, 2011 at 7:21 AM, MarshaV <valkyr at att.net> wrote:
>> 
>> 
>> Greetings,
>> 
>> I found the bundle of quotes below presented without explanation not very helpful.  Within the MoQ I do not understand how free-will and determinism (soft or hard) can be other than intellectual static patterns of value.  Regardless, here are some lectures that might, at least, explain James' free-will:
>> 
>> 
>> Marsha
>> 
> 


 
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