My problem with Free Will

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Darrell,

Is there any way to verify that the universe is finite?

Or is that just a supposition, deducing reality from a principle so to speak?

Michael

[anthony]

"Evidence of the senses? Which one or more of the five senses do we use to discover this theoretical free will?"[FF]

Francisco, Yup, evidence of the senses. The same senses which you'd no doubt criticise the religionist for ignoring, are the same senses that the determinist ignores.

Senses=observation=the totality of one's experience; the percepts which integrate into concepts. If you will not accept the efficacy of introspection, then the sum of one's extro-spection dating back to one's childhood is undeniable: you would know that men can and do choose their own complex paths, randomly or purposefully and usually a mixture. 'Hear' from other people about their thoughts, feelings and experiences -and 'see' their actions. Observe, iow. It gets boring arguing for the self-evident.

Men make decisions moment by moment on reason, on whim, on self-interest, on the judgment of others, on instinct, and on all kinds of fears and desires - and yes, on a belief in pre-determinism too, as evinced by irrationalities such as racial supremacy, etc.(if and when they abdicate their independent mind). When one such 'choice' is followed by another and another, ad infinitum, the probabilities and permutations of outcome become incalculable. Nothing is predictable in the mind and existence of an individual, not to mention the inter-relationship of many together.

Determinism is predicated on the absurd notion that a person does not entertain and discard 100's of thoughts and impulses each day: simply, he changes his mind.

No, he is a "logician", like a chess-computer inexorably plodding towards one programed target.

I'm becoming more certain that this, the "predictability" a human yearns for, but also his Security, his Purpose, his Destiny, his Absolution, and ultimately his Perfection and the Meaning of Existence - all granted and directed by the Absolute Authority and Absolver, "Determinism"...is the fundamental, psychological premise of this anti-concept. It's God by another name, mysticism rationalized by the convenient law of Causality. 'Logical' scientism falsely applied to man's consciousness.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I'm becoming more certain that this, the "predictability" a human yearns for, but also his Security, his Purpose, his Destiny, his Absolution, and ultimately his Perfection and the Meaning of Existence - all granted and directed by the Absolute Authority and Absolver, "Determinism"...is the fundamental, psychological premise of this anti-concept. It's God by another name, mysticism rationalized by the convenient law of Causality. 'Logical' scientism falsely applied to man's consciousness.

Tony,

I made a post a while ago making this exact point in a more rhetorical manner, but I don't think too many people got it.

Whaddya call something so tiny it can't be perceived, even smaller than a subparticle, yet inherently holds capacity for the emergence of all the forms in the universe and even the universe itself?

God?

See?

Great minds think alike.

We just say it differently.

Michael

[Francisco Ferrer]

"Evidence of the senses? Which one or more of the five senses do we use to discover this theoretical free will?"[FF]

Francisco, Yup, evidence of the senses. The same senses which you'd no doubt criticise the religionist for ignoring, are the same senses that the determinist ignores.

Senses=observation=the totality of one's experience; the percepts which integrate into concepts. If you will not accept the efficacy of introspection, then the sum of one's extro-spection dating back to one's childhood is undeniable: you would know that men can and do choose their own complex paths, randomly or purposefully and usually a mixture. 'Hear' from other people about their thoughts, feelings and experiences -and 'see' their actions. Observe, iow. It gets boring arguing for the self-evident.

Men make decisions moment by moment on reason, on whim, on self-interest, on the judgment of others, on instinct, and on all kinds of fears and desires -

Yes, there is evidence that the senses exist, that one can observe, that one has experiences, that the experiences have a totality, that one forms concepts. But none of this necessitates the existence of something called free will.

In the past I have argued with theists who have told me that the fact that I can think and choose between good and evil is proof of God's existence. Talk to other people about God, they said, and hear about how they were enlightened.

You are basically using the theist's same argument to derive another non-entity called "free will."

and yes, on a belief in pre-determinism too, as evinced by irrationalities such as racial supremacy, etc.(if and when they abdicate their independent mind). When one such 'choice' is followed by another and another, ad infinitum, the probabilities and permutations of outcome become incalculable. Nothing is predictable in the mind and existence of an individual, not to mention the inter-relationship of many together.

Determinism is predicated on the absurd notion that a person does not entertain and discard 100's of thoughts and impulses each day: simply, he changes his mind.

No, he is a "logician", like a chess-computer inexorably plodding towards one programed target.

I'm becoming more certain that this, the "predictability" a human yearns for, but also his Security, his Purpose, his Destiny, his Absolution, and ultimately his Perfection and the Meaning of Existence - all granted and directed by the Absolute Authority and Absolver, "Determinism"...is the fundamental, psychological premise of this anti-concept. It's God by another name, mysticism rationalized by the convenient law of Causality. 'Logical' scientism falsely applied to man's consciousness.

Thank you for posting that comment for the "pre-determinists" and the racial supremacists on this thread.

Thanks also for criticizing those who believe in God and those who say that a person does not entertain and discard 100's of thoughts and impulses each day.

They all should be ashamed of themselves.

[anthony]

Thank you for posting that comment for the "pre-determinists" and the racial supremacists on this thread.

.

Man is determined, you say. By his DNA, etc. Do you wish to make an exception for determinism by race?

(Or gender, or nationality...)

If so, how and why?

[Francisco Ferrer]

Man is determined by his genetic material and by the environmental conditions of his gestation in the womb and his experiences and environment in the years that follow his birth.

Because humans are not raised in a lab, it is difficult to isolate such factors as gender and race and say with precision what role they play in a particular individual's personality and intellectual development. The factor of race is particularly problematic, for what is "race" exactly? There are differences in what people look like, but do variations in skin color and facial features account for thought and behavior by themselves? Doubtful.

Our lack of omniscience in being able to draw a detailed diagram of the exact forces at work--how every atom interacts with every other atom--in each human does not mean that there must be something else at work, an uncaused cause known as free will. Complexity does not prove the body's independence from the physical forces acting on it.

By comparison, we still do not know exactly how life originated on this planet. That does not mean we have to introduce an uncaused cause known as God, a "Prime Mover" (to quote one defender of free will on this forum), to explain it.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Causality as the Almighty God of Infinite Regress?

(Meaning Cause of Life will have its own Cause, which will have its own Cause and so on ad infinitum.)

Isn't the universe supposed to be finite for determinists?

Heh.

Michael

[Selene]

Thank you for posting that comment for the "pre-determinists" and the racial supremacists on this thread.

.

Man is determined, you say. By his DNA, etc. Do you wish to make an exception for determinism by race?

(Or gender, or nationality...)

If so, how and why?

Here we go.

If it is set in stone then Brave New World genetic breeding is next.

Correct?

Not addressing you Tony.

A...

[Brant Gaede]

Man is determined by his genetic material and by the environmental conditions of his gestation in the womb and his experiences and environment in the years that follow his birth.

And man is also not determined.

--Brant

mixed bag

[Darrell Hougen]

Darrell,

Is there any way to verify that the universe is finite?

Or is that just a supposition, deducing reality from a principle so to speak?

Michael

There is evidence of finiteness. Every object we encounter, for example, is finite. Certainly, every object that we encounter has a specific size. We have evidence of very large stars, but not infinite stars. On the other end, we have evidence of very small particles, but not infinitesimal particles. The universe, itself, could be unbounded, but I view that as a separate issue.

The principle in question is a special case of the axiom of identity. Everything that we encounter has a specific size at any moment in time just as everything has a specific nature. In the context of the current discussion, every object or system must have a finite number of accessible states or at least a finite number of stable states. I claim that this is a proper application of the axiom of identity. We can debate whether it is or not.

There is probably no way to prove that reality adheres to the axiom of identity. However, I think that there is plenty of evidence that it does.

Darrell

[Francisco Ferrer]

The universe does not have to be finite for determinism to be valid.

If man is not determined, then a baby with anencephaly could become a rocket scientist.

As for genetic breeding, is it ipso facto immoral for parents to pre-select their child's eye color, hair color, mental capacity, etc.? Who is the victim?

[Darrell Hougen]

If man is not determined, then a baby with anencephaly could become a rocket scientist.

The absence of determinism doesn't imply an ability to defy the laws of physics.

Imagine a small child trying to decide whether to jump over a crack in the sidewalk. In such a scenario, a child could only decide whether to jump or not. He could not decide whether he would make it or not. If he were standing in front of a crack in the sidewalk, it is likely that he could attain his goal by jumping. If he were standing in front of a wide river, he would face the same choice --- whether to jump or not --- but he would not be able to jump to the other side. The child's choice of goals and the methods he attempted to use to attain them would be his own, but his success or failure would be determined by the nature of existence.

Darrell

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

The universe, itself, could be unbounded, but I view that as a separate issue.

Darrell,

This, to me, is semantics.

Let's talk space. What's the difference between infinite and unbounded?

Michael

[Francisco Ferrer]

If man is not determined, then a baby with anencephaly could become a rocket scientist.

The absence of determinism doesn't imply an ability to defy the laws of physics.

Imagine a small child trying to decide whether to jump over a crack in the sidewalk. In such a scenario, a child could only decide whether to jump or not. He could not decide whether he would make it or not. If he were standing in front of a crack in the sidewalk, it is likely that he could attain his goal by jumping. If he were standing in front of a wide river, he would face the same choice --- whether to jump or not --- but he would not be able to jump to the other side. The child's choice of goals and the methods he attempted to use to attain them would be his own, but his success or failure would be determined by the nature of existence.

Darrell

All of our choices can be explained by factors which do not include the existence of free will. We do not need a "spirit," "soul," or "ghost in the machine" to account for why a child might jump over a crack, not jump over it or even pay attention to the crack.

[Darrell Hougen]

The universe, itself, could be unbounded, but I view that as a separate issue.

Darrell,

This, to me, is semantics.

Let's talk space. What's the difference between infinite and unbounded?

Michael

Hi Michael,

There is no difference in this context. Sorry, if my word choice was confusing.

I don't view space as a thing, so for it to stretch on forever doesn't violate the law of identity. Space doesn't have an identity because it doesn't exist. Two objects may be some distance apart so that there is "space" between them, but that is just a way of talking about a particular kind of measurement --- a measurement of distance.

The law of identity applies to things that exist. Notice that the distance between two objects is always finite, even if there are infinitely many of them.

Darrell

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Space doesn't have an identity because it doesn't exist.

Darrell,

This is the kind of statement that just doesn't make sense to me.

I think in terms almost like a painter, and I believe Rand's concept theory is similar. There's background and subject.

Rand's definitions (and I have already found these terms with Aristotle) are genus and differentia. This is abstraction, but I believe it reflects the way reality is.

I consider space to be the background where things exist and move around in.

I don't consider myself, for example as existing with a "space-like" field all around me that will provide measurements between me and other individual things all endowed with their own "fields." And my "field" will extinguish once I am no longer existing. Hell, it is still there for the vermin that will eat my corpse.

I prefer to call space a universal background for everything.

This is an excellent premise for a science fiction story, though. Imagine if individualized space-fields were the way reality works and some evil warlord or mad scientist invented a way to sabotage such fields. All hell would break loose.

Hmmmm... I might think about this.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

"Space" is only an idea. It's a shortcut way of thinking which too relied upon can create some confusion. Siting in my living room I observe the space around me, but what I'm actually seeing is distance between objects and between objects and me.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Brant,

How about outer space?

Wanna try that one on for size?

Hmmmm?...

EDIT: Just because an entity occupies space within it's very makeup, that doesn't mean space doesn't exist. I often see people declare space does not exist, but I never see any reasons that make sense to me.

Michael

[anthony]

Man is determined by his genetic material and by the environmental conditions of his gestation in the womb and his experiences and environment in the years that follow his birth.

Because humans are not raised in a lab, it is difficult to isolate such factors as gender and race and say with precision what role they play in a particular individual's personality and intellectual development. The factor of race is particularly problematic, for what is "race" exactly? There are differences in what people look like, but do variations in skin color and facial features account for thought and behavior by themselves? Doubtful.

Our lack of omniscience in being able to draw a detailed diagram of the exact forces at work--how every atom interacts with every other atom--in each human does not mean that there must be something else at work, an uncaused cause known as free will. Complexity does not prove the body's independence from the physical forces acting on it.

By comparison, we still do not know exactly how life originated on this planet. That does not mean we have to introduce an uncaused cause known as God, a "Prime Mover" (to quote one defender of free will on this forum), to explain it.

What you're relating recalls what I think of as hierarchy of origin (roughly).

Not that this constitutes 'proof' of free will.

It's just that (seems to me)although all mankind shares a single commonality of molecular composition, biology, and ancient origins and evolution(at the bottom of the hierarchy) and countless more shared or common influences (moving up)- to cut it short, by the time one gets to the individual level, the single man is differentiated by what seems small things, but which are also overwhelmingly original to his consciousness.

At individual level, the small things matter the most, iow.

As Rand had it, this is the difference between "the standard" of life (for all mankind) and "the purpose" of life (for each man, to be discovered by himself). The living individual here is at the tip of his hierarchy, and whatever determining factors there were contributing to his present existence, have become secondary, tertiary (etc.)-- in relation to the elements of free will shown by his parents' creation and nurture of him, first, and later the free will he can bring to bear alone.

Determinism could well be mistakenly derived from surveying early stages of man's hierarchical development, is what I'm trying to get at, badly. From that perspective it appears as though what is, is what had to be. (i.e. - determined).

On that broad view, there appears more similarity in causal outcome than there are distinctions. Until you arrive at the individual perspective (which transcends insignificant differentiae like gender or race) where each person is defined as being his own, causal agent. (A Prime Mover, for all intents and purposes).

[Brant Gaede]

Brant,

How about outer space?

Wanna try that one on for size?

Hmmmm?...

EDIT: Just because an entity occupies space within it's very makeup, that doesn't mean space doesn't exist. I often see people declare space does not exist, but I never see any reasons that make sense to me.

Michael

Same thing.

Are we having an argument?

--Brant

the world wants to know

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Brant,

Nah...

But saying space doesn't exist, however distance does is like saying water doesn't exist, but wet does.

We establish a standard of measurement in space using other existents, but distance is an attribute of space.

The problem is imagining space with nothing in it, but I posit there are patches of it, that is until we send a spaceship there.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

You can define space into physical existence, but then you've gone semantical.

--Brant

you cannot name one physical attribute of space for it has none; but there is something there, it's just not space--radiation for instance: properly speaking space is a void and is nothing unless you are using it to as a measure of distance (there is no void within the universe)

[dlewis]

This has become a heated discussion I’m a little tentative to join, but it is also very interesting are I hope I can add constructively to the conversation.

First, I don’t think most of the “determinists” on this thread are of the pure reductionistic strains--correct me if I am wrong--but most don’t believe that our minds/consciousness are only the product of external environment + genes (or more broadly, all our biologic/internal components), but has to be of some special context or pattern of chemoelectric processing to compose our thinking brains, invoking certain “higher” or more complex functionings, integrative abilities and responses. In other words, green is not just yellow plus blue, or certain browns minus the reds, but green also has its own special place on the pigment color wheel, with its own special effects—things just don’t reduce to their “simpler” or even more inclusive components, but have, create, or take on special emergent properties and effects in their more complex patterns and/or contexts.

I think Dean is right in post #231 when he states:

“One's ideas are embodied as the relationships between parts of one's brain. Its encoded in sensory and actuator neural signal streams that correspond with real observations/sensations and actions. Our brain can perform induction and deduction to abstract/compress/simplify our observations to improve memory storage efficiency. We can simulate reality and plan and change our worldview and do all sorts of things dynamically... We can make new conclusions about our situation in the world, and reevaluate our actions and character in order to increase one's goal attainment. Is this last process what you want to call free will or volition or consciousness? Do you claim that you are _cause_? You are causing? You are causal. You are determining? You are deterministic.”
___________________

With this in mind, I don’t understand how determinism has to threaten in any way, the idea of “free will.” I don’t think most of the people on here arguing for free will think it means we can do anything we want to do—unrestrained by any laws of nature (in general or human), our environment, genes or biologies. I just think most are saying there are some things (perhaps even very few things, but some), as beings (on whatever level) that come under our ability to control… or that we as wholes, more than any of our parts, most directly determine. I would ask the determinists—how are we not to some degree as wholes, as “I”s or “selves,” agents for change within this deterministic flux of existence? E.g. just like atoms to molecules, we as individuals influence our societies. Should we really be reduced only to external agents plus our “preprogrammed” or even fuller "deterministic" biologic, causal parts?

Michael gets to the point in post #237:

“I'm not speaking of the fact that consciousness can emerge from brain evolution, but instead that the state of consciousness as a form of existence only comes about that way. It's a subtle difference, but it's important. One is a speculation based on observation (one I share) and the other is a dogmatic proclamation.

For the record, it might be as in the dogma, but I don't think anyone can do more than speculate at the present state of human knowledge. From the volume of unexplainable evidence and personal accounts that keep cropping up, there is good reason to prefer a position that there a lot more to this mind stuff than just a deterministic byproduct of processing animated meat , and we have to keep looking to find out what it is.”
____________________________________

This same kind of issue came up in a contention I had with Darrell a while back (I think in the forum "Does Consciousness Affect Matter?"), along the lines of whether or not the brain/brain chemistry and the mind were really different things, or different ways of looking at the same things.

I think Peter, using William Dwyer and George H. Smith in #244, helps to clarify this difference:

“It is true that one cannot know, simply by looking at a certain part of the active brain (externally), that it is the organ that performs mental activity, just as one cannot know by engaging in mental activity that a certain part of the active brain is the organ performing it. Further study is needed to make the connection, just as further study was needed to make the connection between the morning star and the evening star, or between lightening and thunder. But once having made that connection, it is folly to deny it on the grounds that the brain's activity _appears_ different from a subjective perspective than it does from an objective one.”
-- Bill

and

“If you answer that the "it" is the physical brain, then this merely reaffirms what few would deny, namely, that physical brain activities cause a state of consciousness. But this "mind" may have emergent properties and abilities that make it much different than the physical causes on which it depends. The cause of X is NOT the same thing as X; if it were, the cause and its effect would be indistinguishable.”

Ghs

________________________________________________

So, I think it is important to think of wholes, or these connections, as different than just a collection of scientific parts/processes—the ”top-down” and “bottom-up” do congeal—form and content are integrally connected--but in thinking from the bottom-up there is a time-delay in the process of connecting all the parts and processes to make the whole, as well as gaps in information that likely occur in the scientific breakdown—such dissection may be more detailed and accurate at locating key parts, but can also be much less efficient to use in practice. So I think wholes, abstractions, connections, generalities, can have their own special properties and powers that can’t be fully mimicked by piecing them apart by science. Belief in "free will," "will," or "choice" (whatever it is), in general, just sums up our unique power as macroscopic beings, a power we don’t assimilate as well by trying to look at all the particular external and internal deterministic factors that may come to play upon our bodies and brains as humans.

So if we accept that cause and effect, i.e. "determinism," and "free will" do not really have to threaten one another, we can start to look at how they congeal and function more in depth. I think Peter helped us to understand the depth of this issue when he brought up in post #264,

“Just keep in mind that a silent break to consider the potential benefits of the situation is usually a good idea when (1) you're working on something you want to complete and (2) the difficulties are making you frustrated and tired. Or when (1) you're in a position when your attention is especially beneficial to you but (2) negative emotions are for whatever reason affecting your concentration.

Some of these things came to my attention when reading about artificial neural networks (computer science, artificial intelligence). In one of these models (NN using back propagation and two output nodes.), the output result of a consideration of several inputs is just a yes or no, and to which degree. If you have a set of correct answers, you feed it back to the network that produced the result. If it made an error, it will correct the specific path that produced the error, changing more where the influence was higher, all the way through the internal hierarchy up to the input nodes("senses"). By using a set of "questions and answers" you can train the net until it responds correctly to each question, assuming it can hold enough information.(Sometimes it learns the logic that leads a set of input to the corresponding answer, other times it just remembers all the combinations)

Similarly, in a brain, positive (emotional) feedback about a thought (such as pride of accomplishment), strengthens the paths that lead to that "result". For instance, a child feeling good about completing a math task using the logic of arithmetic, strengthens the "paths" that used that logic to solve the problem. Also, when faced with a similar problem, the child is more likely to solve it using the same method, and each time making the task more of a task for the subconscious (and memory). My point is that the positive emotion about the result might make the brain trace the result back to the problem, strengthening the "path" by which the result was made, as with the artificial NN. Of course, this is rather theoretical(and deterministic), but might serve as a useful model/analogy.

Keeping this effect of a positive emotion (or positive moral judgment) in mind, consider the following example: Why do you think so many speeches start with a joke? Because telling a joke in a speech not only gets the audiences attention, if also causes them to attempt to retain more information. This causes them to remember the content of the speech more easily, because the positive emotion in laughter causes strengthening of a "link", in this case attention to the speaker. At the other end of the emotional scope, is the characteristic flaw of forgetting facts that a person don't like. Uninteresting facts are easily forgotten. Theories to which you attach negative emotions are easily ignored. Lack of confidence in your ability to understand the theory has the same effect. An exception worth mentioning here, is that the pride of the accomplishment of a proper refutation of those ideas makes the theories easier to remember.”
________________________

This is interesting. It got me thinking about how volition may emerge from similar self-regulatory patterns down our biological chain. In life-based evolutionary processes, genetic (“core” internal) or early developmental changes are usually attributed to mutations in the womb (or seed, whether “random” or not—I want to address randomness later). Now these changes often seem instigated by reproductive/pregnancy “stress,” whether first more externally generated (e.g. by ingesting certain foods , drugs [e.g. fetal alcohol syndrome], or positively as some studies of musical stimulus seem to attest), or internally instigated from bio-emotional states of the female/mother (as some science seems to suggest--see http://www.schizophrenia.com/prevention/Stress.child.html ) E.g. autism may be a prime example of something dominated more by infections/ birthing stress than pure environmental or genetic factors ( http://bjp.rcpsych.org/content/195/1/7.long ). Autism is interesting because certain hyperfocuses/ savant-like capabilities can emerge in strains like Asperger’s – could this be a response to a mother’s mental stresses—a way a compensating by giving birth to a baby that can channel/focus mentally in certain ways more? I’ve read that although instances of Down syndrome can lead to higher rates of leukemia, the syndrome also seems to be a protector against solid cancers like carcinomas (which account for most cancers) later in life—I wonder if there is some relation here where the mutation is a reaction to a mother’s health, trying to protect the newborn from such cancers later on? I guess what I’m saying is that ultimately, this gestation and birthing “stress,” how environmental and genetic factors are recoded within the womb during this time, seems more a key in understanding evolutionary change, than any one contributing factor—e.g. even though we know it is a cell division creating an extra chromosome 21 that causes Down syndrome now, we are still left with WHY that cell division ultimately occurs. Because the chromosome offers protection against so many kinds of cancer, perhaps looking into cancer development in human history could give us a better understanding of how Down syndrome may have evolved? My point is, instead of the chromosome jut being slotted as a “random” mutation, it may be more advantageous to look at the natural ”intelligence” behind what we call a disability, to see why the change occurred from a systematic, more purpose-driven, perspective.

This is what I’m getting at with my idea of “cholce” vs “randomness” (though I prefer “probabilities”). I don’t discount that randomness/probability, as a philosophic/mathematic construct has uses (and as several [especially Darrell] have discussed, does not have to discount cause and effect), e.g. in quantum physics, game theory and some other statistical models, but I would like to suggest that it works better when less possibilities are available for an action—as in quantum physics—here I would think that probabilities can work well because the limiting factors for actions are less—shouldn’t quantum forms be more basic, their actions in general being more reduced than the macroscopic things they compose? But in macroscopic form… here is where I think things “self-contain” or close upon themselves (I describe this in my book as a loop or spiral-like motion, that can gradually increase its mass and “levels”). In doing this we suddenly have “external” and “internal” individual forms. Now the actions become self-contained and naturally can have some degree of separate self-regulation—the more complex these internalized systems build, the more internalized self-regulation occurs. This creates multi-functional beings that can direct or determine to some degree their own actions, however minute. I think giving a name to this process, (whether “cholce” or otherwise) will help us to understand complexities of cause and effect within multifunctional individuals, better than simple randomness/probability models—e.g. for wave and particle wave forms, there is likely not enough internal complexity for these things to act much outside of external factors in combination with their internal natures—here I think probability models suffice yet can be developed in their intricacy. Multidimensional individuals I think must have some control over what is going on inside them—otherwise in an infinite, entropic universe, I see no reason why they would continue to grow at all. How can more order come from chaos? Why evolutionary growth from an isotropic and homogenous self-similarity? To me cholce is a start to understanding this—one that focuses first on the natural actions/purposes within individuals rather than a scientifically reductive “bottom up” mechanical matrix. I don’t doubt that matrix exists and is important, but it is ultimately inefficient to understanding things as wholes. I think axiomatic structure and ideas like cholce are better for creative, systematic applications.

[Francisco Ferrer]

What you're relating recalls what I think of as hierarchy of origin (roughly).

Not that this constitutes 'proof' of free will.

It's just that (seems to me)although all mankind shares a single commonality of molecular composition, biology, and ancient origins and evolution(at the bottom of the hierarchy) and countless more shared or common influences (moving up)- to cut it short, by the time one gets to the individual level, the single man is differentiated by what seems small things, but which are also overwhelmingly original to his consciousness.

At individual level, the small things matter the most, iow.

This is good, this is true. There is a great deal of variation on the individual level. That is one reason why egalitarianism and socialism are fundamentally inappropriate for human societies.

As Rand had it, this is the difference between "the standard" of life (for all mankind) and "the purpose" of life (for each man, to be discovered by himself). The living individual here is at the tip of his hierarchy, and whatever determining factors there were contributing to his present existence, have become secondary, tertiary (etc.)-- in relation to the elements of free will shown by his parents' creation and nurture of him, first, and later the free will he can bring to bear alone.

On this point I will say even the individual himself cannot know every factor that has played a role in his psychological makeup. For example, lead, mercury, PCBs. arsenic, toluene, manganese, fluoride, pesticides and many other undetected chemicals may figure in the incidence of autism, ADHD, dyslexia and other behavioral problems, some of which may be too subtle to be diagnosed.

Each individual has to act in accordance with what is right for himself. You would say it is a matter of free will. I would say that the individual is only following a course set by his nature, a product of heredity and environment.

Of course, to the individual it feels like "will power" because even the most rational and self-analytical of humans has not time to ponder the rationale behind the trajectory of every move he makes, the depth of every breath he takes, and only an omniscient being could calculate the exact effect of his biological-environmental context on his thoughts, values and actions.

Determinism could well be mistakenly derived from surveying early stages of man's hierarchical development, is what I'm trying to get at, badly. From that perspective it appears as though what is, is what had to be. (i.e. - determined).

On that broad view, there appears more similarity in causal outcome than there are distinctions. Until you arrive at the individual perspective (which transcends insignificant differentiae like gender or race) where each person is defined as being his own, causal agent. (A Prime Mover, for all intents and purposes).

What is, has to have a cause. Ascribing particular choices to a faculty called "free will" does not explain the cause any more than the term "Mother Nature" explains why lightning struck my neighbor's house.

[BaalChatzaf]

What is, has to have a cause. Ascribing particular choices to a faculty called "free will" does not explain the cause any more than the term "Mother Nature" explains why lightning struck my neighbor's house.

Why, the cause is known: A sufficiently large potential difference built up on clouds and electricity was discharged Perhaps you neighbor's house had an ungrounded pointy conductor on the roof or there was a tall tree nearby that offered the electrical charge the path of least resistance to the ground.

Ba'al Chatzaf