Scientism

ZenMode said:
Ok. So, let's say I asked you to think of movie. Let's say you actually did it....I assume that you won't.

At the point that you start thinking, names of movies will start appearing in your consciousness. (Titanic....Half Baked.....Tombstone......Spiderman... On and on for 20 or more movies titles).

So, you spend a minute thinking "Well, I just saw Titanic last night, so I don't want to pick that. My son mentioned seeing the new Spiderman, but I REALLY like Tombstone, so I'll pick that one".

This would appear to be a very free choice, right? As we agreed, you're only limited by movies you've heard of.

Here's the question...were you free to pick a movie title that your brain didn't push into your consciousness? For example, surely you've heard of Grease, but the name didn't occur to you. Do you have free will to pick it?
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I think you are referring to memory. How the mind recalls something already present to it. This is different from free will.
 
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BidenPresident said:
I think you are referring to memory. How the mind recalls something already present to it. This is different from free will.
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In as much as our brains have a memory, which is to say they don't, it applies to everything we do. When you start a sentence, you're basically creating it on the fly as your brain pushes words to consciousness as it recreates past experiences. Memory is your brain recreating past experiences.

But, either way, you've heard of Grease but, in that moment, your brain didn't push the title of that movie into consciousness. Are you free to pick it?
 
ZenMode said:
Correct. We don't. Literally none.
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We? You, yourself and Irene?

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-we-have-free-will/
Why We Have Free Will
Neurons fire in your head before you become aware that you have made a decision. But this discovery does not mean you are a “biochemical puppet”
Most participants in the experiments seem to think that the hypothetical brain scanner is just recording the brain activity that is Jill’s conscious reasoning and consideration about what to decide. Rather than taking this to mean that Jill’s brain is making her do something—and that she has no free will—they may just be thinking that the brain scanner is simply detecting how free will works in the brain.

Why, then, do willusionists believe the opposite? It may have to do with the current state of knowledge. Until neuroscience is able to explain consciousness—which will require a theory to explain how our mind is neither reducible to nor distinct from the workings of our brain—it is tempting to think, as the willusionists seem to, that if the brain does it all, there is nothing left for the conscious mind to do.

As neuroscience advances and imaging technology improves, these developments should help reveal more precisely how much conscious control we have and to what extent our actions are governed by processes beyond our control. Finding resolutions for these questions about free will is important. Our legal system—and the moral basis for many of our society’s institutions—requires a better understanding of when people are, and are not, responsible for what they do.
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BidenPresident said:
This is confusing.
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I won't be able to explain as well as actual scientists, but when you experience something new, it creates new connections in your brain. We all have about 100 billion neurons, but the number of connections per neuron (synapses) more than doubles from birth to adulthood. Recalling a memory is done by the brain re-experiencing a past event by recreating the connections between specific synapses.

Here's a couple of blurbs from sites I found. There are good books out there, but not many good sites.

Your Brain is Not a Computer

It may seem redundant to say this, but your brain is not a computer. It never has been and it never will be. Your consciousness won’t be downloaded into a computer in your or my lifetime.

Computers are technology-based tools that only do what they are told (programmed) to do. Your brain, on the other hand, began life with a set of reflexes it was never taught. Your brain re-experiences things in order to for you to remember, but it doesn’t store those memories in anything that looks or acts like a computer’s storage device.

In short, your brain is not a computer. It’s time to put this misconception to bed.

https://psychcentral.com/blog/your-brain-is-not-a-computer#2

Memory: It’s All About Connections

When we learn something—even as simple as someone’s name—we form connections between neurons in the brain. These synapses create new circuits between nerve cells, essentially remapping the brain. The sheer number of possible connections gives the brain unfathomable flexibility—each of the brain’s 100 billion nerve cells can have 10,000 connections to other nerve cells.

Those synapses get stronger or weaker depending on how often we’re exposed to an event. The more we’re exposed to an activity (like a golfer practicing a swing thousands of times) the stronger the connections. The less exposure, however, the weaker the connection, which is why it’s so hard to remember things like people’s names after the first introduction.

“What we’ve been trying to figure out is how does this occur, and how do you strengthen synapses at a molecular level?” Huganir says.

https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/hea...ctions,cells, essentially remapping the brain.
 
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Doc Dutch said:
We? You, yourself and Irene?

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-we-have-free-will/
Why We Have Free Will
Neurons fire in your head before you become aware that you have made a decision. But this discovery does not mean you are a “biochemical puppet”
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I'm familiar with both studies. There's a good article about the same studies on Nature.com.

However, even if you question the studies ability to truly detect decisions being made before the test subject has signaled that they do, it doesn't change the fact that we don't control our thoughts. Even if our brain and our consciousness were in perfect sync, we still don't know what we're going to think until our brain tells us what we're going to think by pushing it into our consciousness. We still have no way to stopping our thoughts, filtering our thoughts or determining which thoughts are going to go into any given decision.
 
ZenMode said:
I'm familiar with both studies. There's a good article about the same studies on Nature.com.

However, even if you question the studies ability to truly detect decisions being made before the test subject has signaled that they do, it doesn't change the fact that we don't control our thoughts. Even if our brain and our consciousness were in perfect sync, we still don't know what we're going to think until our brain tells us what we're going to think by pushing it into our consciousness. We still have no way to stopping our thoughts, filtering our thoughts or determining which thoughts are going to go into any given decision.
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Dude, you're wrapped yourself around the "stopping our thoughts" idea as your proof that you're a meat robot. Fine. Go for it, but rape a woman or kill your boss, and you'll be having those thoughts in prison.
 
Doc Dutch said:
Dude, you're wrapped yourself around the "stopping our thoughts" idea as your proof that you're a meat robot. Fine. Go for it, but rape a woman or kill your boss, and you'll be having those thoughts in prison.
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Of course. A lack of free will doesn't make you any less dangerous or worthy of being locked up.

People just don't like believing that we don't have it, even though the realities of our brain/thoughts absolutely support it.
 
ZenMode said:
Of course. A lack of free will doesn't make you any less dangerous or worthy of being locked up.

People just don't like believing that we don't have it, even though the realities of our brain/thoughts absolutely support it.
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Meh. As long as you go to prison, the results are the same.
 
ZenMode said:
I won't be able to explain as well as actual scientists, but when you experience something new, it creates new connections in your brain. We all have about 100 billion neurons, but the number of connections per neuron (synapses) more than doubles from birth to adulthood. Recalling a memory is done by the brain re-experiencing a past event by recreating the connections between specific synapses.

Here's a couple of blurbs from sites I found. There are good books out there, but not many good sites.

Your Brain is Not a Computer

It may seem redundant to say this, but your brain is not a computer. It never has been and it never will be. Your consciousness won’t be downloaded into a computer in your or my lifetime.

Computers are technology-based tools that only do what they are told (programmed) to do.
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That is an old concept of computer, more like word processing. Artificial intelligence uses machine learning, where the program teaches itself new things.
 
BidenPresident said:
That is an old concept of computer, more like word processing. Artificial intelligence uses machine learning, where the program teaches itself new things.
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Possibly, but most people believe that our brain stores memories like docs on a computer hard drive.

The bigger point is that the brain recreates experience to "remember". That recreating is what would happen when you're "remembering" movie titles or someone's name or literally any consideration that would go into a decision. You're at the mercy of whatever your brain feeds into your consciousness.
 
ZenMode said:
Possibly, but most people believe that our brain stores memories like docs on a computer hard drive.

The bigger point is that the brain recreates experience to "remember". That recreating is what would happen when you're "remembering" movie titles or someone's name or literally any consideration that would go into a decision. You're at the mercy of whatever your brain feeds into your consciousness.
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I do not agree that we have no control over our minds.
 
ZenMode said:
Possibly, but most people believe that our brain stores memories like docs on a computer hard drive.

The bigger point is that the brain recreates experience to "remember". That recreating is what would happen when you're "remembering" movie titles or someone's name or literally any consideration that would go into a decision. You're at the mercy of whatever your brain feeds into your consciousness.
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Most of your points have to do with the technicalities of memory and recall. I don't see any real connection to free will.
 
ZenMode said:
I agree that thoughts bubbling up from our subconscious is not will. However, every deliberate action we make is determined by our thoughts - you're sitting on your couch, watching a football game and out of nowhere comes the thought "I'm thirsty". You didn't create that thought, the thought just appeared in your consciousness and you had no ability to prevent it from appearing in consciousness. Every subsequent thought that determines whether you act or don't act, like the initial thought, appears in consciousness beyond your control.

If you don't control your thoughts, yet your thoughts determine your every deliberate action, you can't have free will.
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Maybe my brain is just different than yours.

I feel like a lot of my thinking is deliberate, controlled, focused. Not all of it, but a lot of it.

I don't do a lot of sitting around, day dreaming and vegging out, and waiting for random and unexpected thoughts to pop into my head.
 
BidenPresident said:
Most of your points have to do with the technicalities of memory and recall. I don't see any real connection to free will.
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Summary: every decision you make is the result of your thoughts, but you don't control, in any way, your thoughts.
 
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Cypress said:
Maybe my brain is just different than yours.

I feel like a lot of my thinking is deliberate, controlled, focused. Not all of it, but a lot of it.

I don't do a lot of sitting around, day dreaming and vegging out, and waiting for random and unexpected thoughts to pop into my head.
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That's an excellent idea and is probably the reason why; you're normal and Mode has "issues" that prevent him from having free will.
 
Doc Dutch said:
That's an excellent idea and is probably the reason why; you're normal and Mode has "issues" that prevent him from having free will.
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I don't know how normal I am, but my mind tends to be active and focused on reading, writing, listening to audio books, researching, learning. Even when I am exercising, watching movies, listening to music I tend to be living in the moment, and I don't think my mind is typically drifting and deriving a lot of random, unexpected, and unplanned thoughts bubbling up.
 
Cypress said:
I don't know how normal I am, but my mind tends to be active and focused on reading, writing, listening to audio books, researching, learning. Even when I am exercising, watching movies, listening to music I tend to be living in the moment, and I don't think my mind is typically drifting and deriving a lot of random, unexpected, and unplanned thoughts bubbling up.
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In short, "normal". :)
 
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