[Wittrs] Re: Operation DuckRabbit (ongoing)
- From: "SWM" <swmirsky@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 17 Apr 2011 16:24:00 -0000
Trying to keep this short (if not sweet), I will only selectively respond
(partly by way of testing my access to this list again since two recent efforts
to post responses nearby have failed to materialize on the Yahoo list):
--- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, kirby urner <wittrsamr@...> wrote:
>
I wrote:
And here we run into the further problem that
unpredictability
> (needed to avoid determinism in its strictest sense) can be either the
result of
> incredibly deep complexity OR the absence of relevance of physical laws to
> mental phenomena.
>
To which you (Kirby) replied:
Yeah, we're not free to perform miracles that break the unbreakable laws of
physics, such as we've appeared to discover them. But how different is this in
principle from breaking an easy-to-break rule, such as "no jay walking"?
My response:
I meant by the comment I made above not that we are constrained in what we try
to do in the world by physical laws (which we are, of course) but that the
issue of determinism (contra-"free-will") hinges on a notion that what we are
(what we think, what we will, what we choose to do) is itself constrained by
physical laws, i.e., the way all the atomic parts of the universe interact.
On this view, if we could give a full account of all of THAT -- which we cannot
and have no reason to think we ever will be able to do -- we would discover
that everything we do, think, etc., is the outcome of some physical
interactions which have nothing to do with what we take into our consciousness
from what we observe or what we decide to think since even THOSE are thought to
be outcomes of the same physical interactions.
On such a view free-will" (free of external constraint) is denied. This is not
incompatible with our believing or feeling that we are free to do anything we
want. It's just that that belief or feeling is asserted to be false qua
delusion.
Kirby wrote:
I'm thinking these are philosophically immature positions (radical skepticism,
solipsism, idealism, determinism, materialism, reductionism) and that allowing
a concept as important as "free will" to get bogged down in these childish
sandboxes is a disservice to real philosophy, which cannot afford to be
bedeviled by such grammatical confusions -- it's an embarrassment for western
philosophy and pulls down the value of a PhD degree for all of us (because
"Doctor of Philosophy" becomes more like "Doctor of Clowning Around").
My response:
I don't think it's right to speak of these approaches as "immature positions"
(though they may be). In fact they are functions of our linguistic confusion
and recognizing that is the way in which we solve such problems, on the
Wittgensteinian view, rather than arguing their contraries.
Kirby wrote:
The above is not a Logical Positivist position, which sought to consign music
and art to the realm of nonsense, saving only logic and factual propositions
for the realm of sense. This was not, in fact, Wittgenstein's position as most
of us know, i.e. he was never a Logical Positivist, even though many in that
camp used the Tractatus as a kind of manifesto, at least when it first came out.
My response:
Yes, indeed. I think that's a mistake many non-Wittgensteinians make, i.e.,
they fail to interpret his early philosophy in accord with his own statements,
both contemporary and later and, especially, some may become attached to the
earlier work because of its pretty mysticism and thereby fail to see the
clarity and earthiness of his later thinking which puts the earlier work into
perspective.
> But the key here is the word "discovered" because, absent any new
information
> about how things work (is there evidence of disembodied minds, spirits,
ghosts,
> of continued consciousness after death?), nothing is changed by such
> speculations, whatever arguments may be deployed in favor of the
non-physicality
> of minds thesis.
>
Kirby wrote:
I'm not clear that ghosts, continued consciousness after death etc. would have
any bearing whatsoever on the free will discussion. The ghosts would be as
determined as everything else. Those that believe in their own freedom would
have no choice but to do so (that whale I mentioned is a ghost, but that just
means we welcome him in spirit).
My response:
Yes, one might suppose ghosts could be determined by the physical universe if
embodied minds are. But then the point is that if there were disembodied minds
it would be evidence of a failure of the physics we currently have to provide a
complete explanation of the universe and so that would be a reason to think
that minds are not physically determined after all and, hence, a basis for a
claim of absolute free-will (that minds are undetermined by the physics of the
bodies to which they appear to be "attached").
SWM
Other related posts:
