Freewill as a retrospect

[Whitedragon]

Although there's already a topic on freewill, I create this topic to introduce a new idea.

They say we don't have freewill and that we live in a deterministic universe. I agree with that to an extent, by adding, freewill is a retrospect. By retrospect I mean how we look back on our past experiences and memories to make decisions in the present. If retrospect is part of determinism, continuing to evolve and grow, able to take any course, I say retrospect is our freewill, rather as to say we have an endowed provided knowledge for new or strange situations.

Is freewil a retrospect?

[psyreporter]

Doesn't retrospect require a preceding position? Then, how can free will 'be' a retrospect?

The notion 'able to take any course' (based on retrospect) would deviate from determinism.

If determinism is true, the future is determined and known beforehand. There is no 'choice' to make, i.e. 'a course to take'.

You indicate that a choice based on retrospect would be evidence for free will and your specific theory is that retrospect is all that a choice can be based on, as an attempt to find compatibility with determinism's causality.

When causality is taken to the extreme, one will ultimately be required to wonder how a 'choice' can have occurred at the root of causality. If free will resides in causality (retrospect) then there must have been a moment in which there was nothing to retrospect on and it would be at question: how is that possible? If it is considered absurd then that implies that it is equally absurd that causality without choice has resulted in free will.

[Terrapin Station]

By retrospect I mean how we look back on our past experiences and memories to make decisions in the present.

"Free will" is about the "make decisions" part. If there is no free will, it's not actually possible to make a decision (despite appearances that suggest otherwise).

[Whitedragon]

Doesn't retrospect require a preceding position? Then, how can free will 'be' a retrospect?

The notion 'able to take any course' (based on retrospect) would deviate from determinism.

If determinism is true, the future is determined and known beforehand. There is no 'choice' to make, i.e. 'a course to take'.

You indicate that a choice based on retrospect would be evidence for free will and your specific theory is that retrospect is all that a choice can be based on, as an attempt to find compatibility with determinism's causality.

When causality is taken to the extreme, one will ultimately be required to wonder how a 'choice' can have occurred at the root of causality. If free will resides in causality (retrospect) then there must have been a moment in which there was nothing to retrospect on and it would be at question: how is that possible? If it is considered absurd then that implies that it is equally absurd that causality without choice has resulted in free will.

In this case determinism includes the present impact on the organism. The past is remembered, therefore in the present and in a sence none temporal. I could make the mistake of thinking determanism only applies to the organism. Determinism for both environment and organism is taken into account, hence causality is multi directional and retrospect or memory is none temporal. In a sence the past is held clear enough in the memory as to be seen as present.

[CIN]

Although there's already a topic on freewill, I create this topic to introduce a new idea.

They say we don't have freewill and that we live in a deterministic universe. I agree with that to an extent, by adding, freewill is a retrospect. By retrospect I mean how we look back on our past experiences and memories to make decisions in the present. If retrospect is part of determinism, continuing to evolve and grow, able to take any course, I say retrospect is our freewill, rather as to say we have an endowed provided knowledge for new or strange situations.

Is freewil a retrospect?

Retrospecting might give you access to information that would enable you to make better decisions than you would otherwise have made. However, if the universe is deterministic, the fact that you are going to retrospect and get that information is already predetermined, so retrospecting would not enable you to escape from the straitjacket of determinism; you were always going to retrospect, you can't help but retrospect, and you have no control over the choice you make as a result of retrospecting. If, therefore, you mean that retrospecting gives us a degree of freewill, this is not true; and if you mean that retrospecting deserves somehow to be called freewill, this is not true either.

[Whitedragon]

There is an interchange between environment and organism. There is also an interchange between different parts of the brain, freewill does for this reason exist not inside the organism or the environment, I agree. It rather exists as a third effect between the environment and the organism. If this effect is observed the third pole, if we call it that, can be studied a bit more objectively by a third party. Different knowledge or memories can also be a third pole and be measured by different perspectives of the brain.

[LuckyR]

By retrospect I mean how we look back on our past experiences and memories to make decisions in the present.

"Free will" is about the "make decisions" part. If there is no free will, it's not actually possible to make a decision (despite appearances that suggest otherwise).

Exactly. Many forget that all objective evidence (but no proof) is consistent with animal decision making. Determinism and especially predeterminism are theories or thought experiments that propose that what we perceive as decision making is an illusion. That's fine, but it bears reminding ourselves that there is no objective experience that supports this idea, it is purely theoretical.

[Whitedragon]

By retrospect I mean how we look back on our past experiences and memories to make decisions in the present.

"Free will" is about the "make decisions" part. If there is no free will, it's not actually possible to make a decision (despite appearances that suggest otherwise).

Exactly. Many forget that all objective evidence (but no proof) is consistent with animal decision making. Determinism and especially predeterminism are theories or thought experiments that propose that what we perceive as decision making is an illusion. That's fine, but it bears reminding ourselves that there is no objective experience that supports this idea, it is purely theoretical.

The value of retrospect, as defined here, is that it changes all the time, whereas a simple machine only has its parts, an organism has thoughts that change all the time. In other words it's more mutable than other matter. We are a combined mass of memory and thoughts. When we interact with other objects animate or inanimate we can observe what kind of impact our retrospect has on the situation or object. Both object and and organism often change, hence there is analysis in the process.

What is analysis in an organism and why does it also change? If both organism and object is fixed in their nature or determinism, there is no freewill.

Does interaction and adaptation not complicate or refine the concept of determinism more? Then determinism isn't fixed?

If determinism isn't fixed is there room for freewill?

[Terrapin Station]

By retrospect I mean how we look back on our past experiences and memories to make decisions in the present.

"Free will" is about the "make decisions" part. If there is no free will, it's not actually possible to make a decision (despite appearances that suggest otherwise).

Exactly. Many forget that all objective evidence (but no proof) is consistent with animal decision making. Determinism and especially predeterminism are theories or thought experiments that propose that what we perceive as decision making is an illusion. That's fine, but it bears reminding ourselves that there is no objective experience that supports this idea, it is purely theoretical.

Exactly.

[Whitedragon]

By retrospect I mean how we look back on our past experiences and memories to make decisions in the present.

"Free will" is about the "make decisions" part. If there is no free will, it's not actually possible to make a decision (despite appearances that suggest otherwise).

Exactly. Many forget that all objective evidence (but no proof) is consistent with animal decision making. Determinism and especially predeterminism are theories or thought experiments that propose that what we perceive as decision making is an illusion. That's fine, but it bears reminding ourselves that there is no objective experience that supports this idea, it is purely theoretical.

Exactly.

Can decision making be part of determinism? In other words is determinism reactant to multiples, does it exist in things or is it a universal force that has a unique effect on everything?

[CIN]

If determinism isn't fixed is there room for freewill?

No, there isn't. Free will cannot exist, because it requires two contradictory things to be true at the same time.

Suppose you are driving your car, and you come to a junction where you can (apparently) turn either left or right. Suppose you turn left. Was this an exercise of free will?

The answer is 'yes', provided two things are true:
(A) you could have turned right instead
(B) turning left was your choice, not something imposed on you or something that just happened to you by chance.

Unfortunately, these conditions are mutually exclusive, and cannot both exist in the same part of a choice or action at the same time.

Suppose, first, that the universe is 100% deterministic. In that case, your turning left was caused by prior events over which you have no control. (B) can be true, because those prior events did not occur by chance and may have occurred within you, rather than being imposed on you (e.g. by someone else turning the wheel); but (A) can't be true, because your choice was determined by a series of causes going all the way back to the beginning of the universe.

Suppose now that the universe is 100% non-deterministic: all events are random, and are not determined by prior causes. In that case you could have turned right - it just randomly happened that you turned left - so (A) could be true. However, (B) can't be true, because if the choice was just a random event, then it wasn't your choice, it was something that just happened to you by chance; for a choice to be your choice, it has to be caused by something in you, and not be merely a random uncaused event.

If the universe is in the middle - party deterministic and partly non-deterministic - then any part that is deterministic may assist in (B) but will also assist in preventing (A), while any part that is non-deterministic may assist in (A), but will also assist in preventing (B). (A) and (B) necessarily exclude each other wherever they occur.

Could your action of turning the car be partly determined and partly undetermined? It could, but that wouldn't allow your action to be an exercise of free will, because the parts of the action that were determined would be parts that you couldn't have done any differently, and the parts that were undetermined weren't parts that were caused by you, they were parts that just happened to you by chance.

Conclusion: free will is impossible in any universe, whether deterministic or not.

[Whitedragon]

If determinism isn't fixed is there room for freewill?

No, there isn't. Free will cannot exist, because it requires two contradictory things to be true at the same time.

Suppose you are driving your car, and you come to a junction where you can (apparently) turn either left or right. Suppose you turn left. Was this an exercise of free will?

The answer is 'yes', provided two things are true:
(A) you could have turned right instead
(B) turning left was your choice, not something imposed on you or something that just happened to you by chance.

Unfortunately, these conditions are mutually exclusive, and cannot both exist in the same part of a choice or action at the same time.

Suppose, first, that the universe is 100% deterministic. In that case, your turning left was caused by prior events over which you have no control. (B) can be true, because those prior events did not occur by chance and may have occurred within you, rather than being imposed on you (e.g. by someone else turning the wheel); but (A) can't be true, because your choice was determined by a series of causes going all the way back to the beginning of the universe.

Suppose now that the universe is 100% non-deterministic: all events are random, and are not determined by prior causes. In that case you could have turned right - it just randomly happened that you turned left - so (A) could be true. However, (B) can't be true, because if the choice was just a random event, then it wasn't your choice, it was something that just happened to you by chance; for a choice to be your choice, it has to be caused by something in you, and not be merely a random uncaused event.

If the universe is in the middle - party deterministic and partly non-deterministic - then any part that is deterministic may assist in (B) but will also assist in preventing (A), while any part that is non-deterministic may assist in (A), but will also assist in preventing (B). (A) and (B) necessarily exclude each other wherever they occur.

Could your action of turning the car be partly determined and partly undetermined? It could, but that wouldn't allow your action to be an exercise of free will, because the parts of the action that were determined would be parts that you couldn't have done any differently, and the parts that were undetermined weren't parts that were caused by you, they were parts that just happened to you by chance.

Conclusion: free will is impossible in any universe, whether deterministic or not.

How does super determinism factor into this? (Quantum entanglement).

[CIN]

How does super determinism factor into this? (Quantum entanglement).

I'm no physicist, but on a cursory reading (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superdeterminism) it looks to me as if superdeterminism is another name for what I've called 100% determinism.

[Whitedragon]

How does super determinism factor into this? (Quantum entanglement).

I'm no physicist, but on a cursory reading (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superdeterminism) it looks to me as if superdeterminism is another name for what I've called 100% determinism.

Thank you,
With good retrospect, can it be said that determinism functions more in our favour than those with less developed retrospect?

[LuckyR]

"Free will" is about the "make decisions" part. If there is no free will, it's not actually possible to make a decision (despite appearances that suggest otherwise).

Exactly. Many forget that all objective evidence (but no proof) is consistent with animal decision making. Determinism and especially predeterminism are theories or thought experiments that propose that what we perceive as decision making is an illusion. That's fine, but it bears reminding ourselves that there is no objective experience that supports this idea, it is purely theoretical.

Exactly.

Can decision making be part of determinism? In other words is determinism reactant to multiples, does it exist in things or is it a universal force that has a unique effect on everything?

No. Determinism states that for every antecedent state there is a single resultant state. No decision making (as the result will always be the same). When you "decide" to have pancakes for breakfast, that is an illusion, based on your state when the idea of breakfast popped into your head, it was always going to be pancakes, even if you pondered eggs. The decision was an illusion within your mind.

If you "choose" to have eggs tomorrow, that is because your state tomorrow is different than today, consistent with eggs. Not a different choice, a different state of mind.