[Wittrs] Re: "free will" versus "willing to be free"
- From: "SWM" <swmirsky@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 14 Apr 2011 20:44:22 -0000
--- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, kirby urner <wittrsamr@...> wrote:
>
<snip>
> > > 'Philosophical Investigations' is full of "back to rough ground" exhibits,
> > > where he'll take a philosophical conundrum, such as "other minds",
> > > and transport us to some actual vista. Like Scrooge with some
> > > ghost of Xmas past, present or future, LW grabs his philosopher by
> > > the arm and escorts him to a Real World where people still use
> > > Ordinary Language....
> > >
> >
> > This isn't in dispute though.
> >
> > > "Am I free?"
> > >
> >
> > Precisely and there we have to investigate the various ways we use a word
> > like "free" -- and recognize that merely because we apply the same word in
> > different cases doesn't mean that we have in mind the same thing. That
> > "freedom" and "free-will" both contain "free" doesn't mean that we are
> > talking about the same sense of free in both cases. Yet we are often led
> > astray by the recurrence of such a term and may think that its recurrence
> > is evidence of some underlying single notion. THAT is what Wittgenstein
> > taught us to attend to -- and avoid.
> >
> I guess the gist of it here is you're seeing some rigid compartmental
> structure walling off this meaning of "free" from that meaning of
> "free" whereas I see more of a swirl, and think it's more than just
> happenstance that language, a glue, happens to have this topology.
> It's no accident that lawyers (rule followers, ley men) file and
> follow (execute) the wills of the deceased. They're best in a
> position to know ("gnosticism") and are closer to that ancestral
> "center of authority" where the judges confer and render their
> opinions (which seem to count for more, if you're 33rd degree or
> whatever religion -- the idea of a "weighty Friend" (a Friend with
> gravitas)).
>
You show here how soft and fungible our usages are. But that doesn't mean that
they can all simply glom onto one another without regard to intent or context
or practice of the speaker(s). Meaning need not be fixed or walled off for it
to be precise in context or for slipping contexts to produce unneeded ambiguity
and, hence, confusion.
> Indeed, historically and etymologically, the "free will" debate has
> rarely been engaged in outside a discussion of "God's will" in
> contrast, at least not since St. Augustine. In any hierarchy, you
> have this sense of concentric circles with authority concentrated
> towards its center. Yes, I'm painting with broad brush strokes, but
> my point is those with the most authority have often claimed their
> "will" is not theirs alone, but that of some overarching spirit
> (monarchs are known for giving voice to this view).
>
Yep. But hardly relevant to a question of whether by "free-will" we mean the
same as "freedom" in a polity.
> Even individualized egos with their independent degrees of freedom
> have been known to talk about doing the will of God in a business
> meeting setting, with something like consensus ("unity") an abiding
> goal (what one steers for). That's what our recent AFSC corporation
> meeting was like, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
>
Okay . . .?
> > > "Free Will? Not if You're Him".
> > > (c) Americans for the Advancement of Philosophy
>
> > > Remember, I'm the guy who applies Wittgenstein's PI to
> > > advertising. I never really appreciated what 'Pepsi' could
> > > mean until I plumbed the depths of the PI.
> > >
> >
> > That seems pretty strange to me. I am familiar with your advertising meme
> > (as with your propagandizing meme) from our past discussions. As you may
> > recall, I think that's mistaken. Not, that is, that one cannot approach
> > philosophy in a way that applies that analogy but in the sense that one
> > cannot simply replace philosophy with either propaganda or advertisements.
> >
>
> I like that this seems pretty strange to you, as in alien, weird.
> Make Portland Weirder is one of our bumper stickers, an advance on
> Keep Portland Weird (Austin TX has a similar campaign).
>
Well to each his own, I say.
> Wieden+Kennedy is here, and we once had a Museum of Advertising (maybe
> just a website nowadays?).
>
> You should maybe think of me as a "mad man" (like from Madison Avenue,
> HQS of Mad Magazine) crafting messages for TV. I have Wittgenstein
> open on my desk, as here's a tool box from doing detective work,
> investigating a campaign to see what makes it tick. "Wow, those guys
> were pretty good at PR" I think, remembering what Artificial
> Intelligence was in vogue (less so nowadays, though perhaps finding a
> new niche in "smart house" and "smart grid" design).
>
Now you've lost me.
> So *of course* I have this twisted view of philosophy, given my
> profession. I'm some kind of Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) for this
> philosophy business involving coffee shops and charitable giving by
> games of gambling and skill. Our CIO actually works in a NavAm casino
> and we plan to practice our philosophy on "Indian" reservations. Girl
> scout math and all that -- picture disaster relief training for triage
> medics and para-medics. A lot of the teachers are tribal members
> (AFSC / Friends and native tribes go way back).
>
We've wandered far afield now from the original questions of "free-will", both
whether we have it and whether the term is even meaningful.
> >
> > > Richard Stallman . <snip> . > > > is one of our greatest living
> > > philosophers, up there with
> > > Bertie Russell and Frege,
<snip>
> > >
> >
> > I count great philosophers a bit differently. I think the concept has
> > nothing (or at least very little) to do with reaching the masses and almost
> > everything to do with producing new and powerful ways of understanding
> > things, new insights. On that score I think Wittgenstein qualifies as one
> > of the great ones. Bertrand Russell? Not so much.
> >
>
> Yeah, in our WSC (Wittgenstein Study Circle), Frege was getting the
> most credit for advancing the logic, which I see as mostly
> prototypical of what would come next: the computer languages.
>
> That's where all the boolean logic and propositional operators, such
> as found in the Tractatus, finally found their real home. In the rear
> view mirror, it's easy to see the lineage, through Turing, Babbage,
> Ada, Godel, Escher, Bach, Martin Gardner... not that we call all of
> these people philosophers, just that there's an arc, a storyline, and
> philosophers do occur along it.
>
Okay . . .
> Richard Stallman helped develop gcc and emacs, premier tools in
> machine executable logic, the precise workaday stuff that working
> coders use for real. Without gcc, there'd have been no Linux and no
> explosion in computer literacy in places like South Africa.
>
> University philosophers have tended to cut themselves off from
> computer science, much to their disadvantage going forward.
>
Some do, some don't. Many on lists like these have a day job in programming and
abiding interest in things philosophical though.
> Anyway I agree with Walter Kaufmann that a "university philosopher" is
> mostly an oxymoron anyway, until we get to the Global University idea
> (a synonym for Spaceship Earth), at which point we get philosophers in
> all walks of life (as it should be).
>
I find the technical problems of philosophy of interest, mainly. How to live
one's life not so much . . . at least as being a question of philosophy (as
opposed to one's philosophy).
> The quaint / archaic usage of "Doctor of Philosophy" for the PhD
> degree has continued to legitimate a lot of westernized "salary men",
> a kind of suited wage slave of an unfree sort, a kind of drone.
>
> Given worlds in collision (many cultures, diversity), we're
> encountering other ranking systems (other hierarchies) which run
> counter to the western degree system.
>
Seems we humans can't easily get away from ranking systems and hierarchies.
> This is not really a new development of course, as you've always have
> these bossy people in military uniform insisting on their rights to
> recruit from the same student body.
>
Why shouldn't they? No one forces any student to sign up. Why shouldn't
recruiters have the ability to offer the option?
> That's kind of what I was talking about a few posts back, where this
> PhD anthropologist was getting $100K a year to be lipstick on a pig,
> and he quit for philosophical (ethical) reasons.
>
Must have missed that then!
> I posted a link to his blog and I think mentioned the panel
> discussion, and the fact that anthropologists, more than academic
> philosophers, were showing some backbone. STEM + Anthropology = STEAM
> (as in full steam ahead!).
>
> I bring up anthropology advisedly. In our latest meeting of the Study
> Circle, we talked about Nietzsche opening the space for psychoanalysis
> by allowing for a genealogy of morals that helped one "second guess"
> (or otherwise "counter") some of the theological hierarchies of the
> day. Psychoanalysis blended with Marxism in some circles, in that
> both were encouraging "reading between the lines" to find "secret"
> power relations, class relations.
>
I'm inclined to think docrtines of secret power relations, class relations
rather forced, actually, a kind of reification we'd all be better off without.
> More generally, Wittgenstein's philosophy has a strongly
> anthropological flavor
Yes.
> in that we're encouraged to put distance
> between ourselves and our own language games, that we might
> investigate them clearly. This new kind of self-awareness is
> characteristic of the linguistic turn. Some conflate that with
> postmodernism and Derrida but I'm more of the school that we went
> towards transcendentalism (Wittgenstein, Norman O. Brown, Bucky
> Fuller, Richard Stallman, Werner Erhard... (the latter traces his
> lineage to Heidegger in some ways)).
>
I used to agree that Wittgenstein had a transcendentalist element but I don't
think so anymore, at least nothing TRANSCENDENTAL, you might say. Maybe in
lower case though.
> Alex is amazed how little material we have regarding LW's views
> regarding Hitler, Marxism or any number of ideologies sweeping the
> globe during his lifetime. William Bartley III seemed to hint at
> having more sources than the usual Wittgenstein scholar, when making
> some allegations about his social life in Vienna. Is there still a
> corpus of papers we don't know about?
>
> http://www.amazon.com/Wittgenstein-William-Warren-III-Bartley/dp/B000MBTZ5S/ref=sr_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1302804607&sr=1-5
>
Yes, Bartley has been highly controversial and disputed by others. Who knows?
None of us were there.
>
> > > Yeah, nowhere. So let's rescue "Free Will" from the larvae
> > > (the nerds) and restore it to adult use.
> > >
> >
> > It's a different concept from "freedom" and if we want to say "free-will"
> > is a false idea or a misleading one or a nonsensical one, we cannot do it
> > by collapsing it into a term that it isn't.
> >
>
> I'm saying it's a nonsensical one, so lets stop beating on that very
> dead horse and rescue "free will" from it's existence as a mere
> carcass, crawling with flies and maggots.
>
The thread had to do with whether we have or don't have free-will, whether
determinism is true or false. Claiming it's a nonsensical question is another
sort of answer. But then supporting that by collapsing it into another concept
doesn't do the necessary work. It just adds confusion to the issue by changing
the subject without being explicit about it.
> Lets restore some healthy level of respect for philosophy and stop
> allowing it to be run into the ground by people who don't know enough
> computer science (i.e. have little grasp of contemporary logic).
>
I don't see that as a problem here. There are lots of philosophical views, lots
of different approaches, some better than others, some that speak to some of us
more than others do. That's what makes horse races -- and debates.
> > I happen to agree with Sean's assessment. It seems to me that questions
> > about "free-will" are finally pseudo questions.
> >
>
> << snip >>
>
> >
> > Might be useful as long as the distinction between free societies, free
> > beer and free will can be maintained. If it fails to keep these notions
> > adequately separate, then confusion will push out whatever clarity is to be
> > hoped for.
> >
>
> If "free will" is already down the drain, then I think it's ready for
> recycling. Let's have it mean something again! <-- more an
> exhortation than a command in battle
>
We already have the terms "freedom" and "liberty". Why take another term that
means something different in ordinary discourse and assign it the same meaning?
>
> > Not my position, of course. But here the question of "free" slides into the
> > moral/ethical sphere, an area I no longer think philosophy can contribute
> > much to.
> >
>
> This is where we differ I think. The medical profession is paying MDs
> to be "medical ethicists" these days, which I think is a good thing
> (my friend Deb is one of these).
>
> Philosophy, if its to be a profession, will need to concern itself
> with ethics, I think, or else lets just let them all go, hand 'em a
> shopping cart and say "go find your way" (these pensions are
> expensive). Would that be ethical? No, of course not. Many
> philosophers would be helpless if we didn't feed them and pay their
> electric bills. They're not in any shape to help with disaster relief
> and probably won't be teaching girl scout math any time soon. They
> don't even know computer languages, yet pose as "logicians" (chuckle).
>
Okay, so what's the philosophical solution of the problem of why we should care
about others? Or why we should refrain from harming others? And so forth?
> > So you still haven't given up your decision to mix "free will" with
> > "freedom" after all this?
> >
>
> After all what?
>
> I'm helping rescue philosophy from an intellectually squalid, even
> sordid chapter. Yay me.
>
> Students will be getting a better education, as many will spend more
> time reading Stallman than Quine, thereby getting a stronger grasp on
> logic.
>
Quine can be dense and somewhat dry but he's worth reading in spite of that.
> > > Sometimes you need poster art, TV commercials, a look and
> > > feel, in order to develop the position you wish to defend.
> >
> > Yes, your propaganda meme again. I agree that it is a factor in human
> > discourse and, therefore, in philosophical discourse, too. But I don't
> > agree that it has a legitimate role to play in philosophical discourse.
> > Just being a factor doesn't mean it belongs in the mix.
> >
>
> Remember when, in the history of philosophy, the introduce the
> Skeptics, the Stoics, the Hedonists... etc?
>
> It'd be fun to distill each to a 5 minute recruiting commercial, a
> synopsis for that school.
>
Could a commercial do them justice?
> I'd say philosophies that don't know how to advertise, to participate
> in the marketplace of ideas, are hardly worthy of the name
> "philosophy".
>
> Is Zen a philosophy or a religion by the way?
>
My view? A religion, albeit in the larger sense that embraces those well beyond
the Western tradition. Walter, however, may tell you it's a philosophy as I
think that's his view. But then he will have to speak for himself as he doesn't
much cotton to others describing his positions.
> Can a philosophy have a business as a part of its self expression?
> I'd think opportunities to walk one's talk, to show what one means,
> would be integral, so yes, of course.
>
Of course what?
> > > Having the
> > > Guard overseas under NATO is hardly what the States
> > > envisioned. It's like the USA has been conquered and
> > > commandeered by some Unfree State, some prison-industrial
> > > complex (a psychological complex, the focus of many a
> > > Jungian these days).
> > >
> >
> > I don't see this connection at all. I suppose it's a function of your
> > particular political thinking but it doesn't seem to be an issue to me.
> >
>
> I see young idealists volunteering to serve their country and being
> shipped away from their loved ones to murder strangers.
>
Fighting wars isn't what's usually meant by murder. Moreover, if "young
idealists" volunteer for something oughtn't they to be allowed to take
responsibility for what they've done?
> If the big one hits, mom and dad will be washed away or will starve
> while junior is stuck holding a gun in some desert, a fool of the
> Unfree State.
>
I'm not going to debate your political views. I acknowledge them, however.
> > > I'm into bypassing the "court of appeals" and continuing with maneuvers,
> > > consolidating, tipping scales, tilting odds in our favor.
> >
> >
> > Sounds like a recipe for endless argument to me! How can a society hope to
> > get anything done in that kind of environment?
> >
>
> Seems to me it's the environment we're in.
>
Your proposal would make it a hell of a lot worse.
> >
> > No one is required to enter into any discussion that doesn't interest them
> > as far as I can tell.
> >
>
> Like in 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest', if you don't participate in
> the discussion, and take your meds, you might get points off in the
> hierarchy.
>
> Many discussions (meetings) have this coercive flavor. The drones
> want to interrogate, to be in charge, to at least be consulted.
>
Many human interactions of all types have a coercive element.
> > You're probably right on that. I tend to agree that "free-will" is
> > something of a meaningless notion. The only thing that matters is that it
> > looks to us like we are capable of acting autonomously according to our own
> > dictates (within certain recognizable parameters). So why should it matter
> > whether at some superduper theoretical level the universe is all
> > predictable (or not) down to the itty-bittiest little particle or wave
> > fluctuation? What's that to us? Unless one can discover the causal laws
> > that may exist at that level and use them to unerringly predict occurrences
> > on the level of human choice, then whether it's all just a matter of
> > incredible complexity or indeterminateness hardly matters. And there seems
> > to be no reason to ever expect such discoveries or predictions, short of
> > achieving God like status!
>
> >
> > He was a good rhetoritician and Roman intellectual but he was a second rate
> > philosopher at best.
> >
>
> Like Marcus Aurelius?
>
Sure.
> > I don't view philosophy as a game of tricks ("cheap and dirty" or
> > otherwise). Therefore a move that intentionally conflates meanings to
> > redirect a discussion to one's preferred path or conclusion strikes me as
> > stepping outside the bounds of philosophical rectitude. If you meant to do
> > that, I would have to say we are on very different wavelengths. If you did
> > it without intending to redirect (because, say, you didn't notice the
> > conflation) then I should think that calling it to your attention should be
> > enough.
> >
>
> I think it includes rhetoric. Watching my daughter climb the ranks in
> debating (Lincoln Douglas style) to become the best high school
> debater in Oregon (one of two or three) has been instructive. She's
> always consulting the philosophers. She appreciates how they control
> the argument (the narrative).
>
A good skill to develop.
> >
> > I think we see philosophy somewhat differently -- as we always have, even
> > back on the Wittgenstein-dialognet list.
> >
>
> Yes. I enjoy how these threads help us chisel away at our own busts
> as it were, sharpening the features.
>
> Kirby
>
> > SWM
> >
>
So now we know one another better than we did I guess, eh?
SWM
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