Aristotle's wheel paradox

[Peter]

Off on a tangent?  More about inspiration and common sense.

From Popper: The Problem of Induction (1953, 1974) by ??? . . . . A very different part of the commonsense view of the world is the commonsense theory of knowledge. The problem is the problem of how we get knowledge about the world. The commonsense solution is: by opening our eyes and ears. Our senses are the main if not the only sources of our knowledge of the world. This second view I regard as thoroughly mistaken, and as insufficiently criticized (in spite of Leibniz and Kant). I call it the bucket theory of the mind, because it can be summed up by the diagram overleaf. What allegedly enters the bucket through our senses are the elements, the atoms or molecules, of knowledge. Our knowledge then consists of an accumulation, a digest, or perhaps a synthesis of the elements offered to us by our senses.

Both halves of commonsense philosophy, commonsense realism and the commonsense theory of knowledge, were held by Hume; he found, as did Berkeley before him, that there is a clash between them. For the commonsense theory of knowledge is liable to lead to a kind of anti-realism. If knowledge results from sensations, then sensations are the only certain elements of knowledge, and we can have no good reason to believe that anything but sensation exists. Popper has argued (I think successfully) that a scientific idea can never be proven true, because no matter how many observations seem to agree with it, it may still be wrong. On the other hand, a single contrary experiment can prove a theory forever false.

. . . . (8) Neither observation nor reason is an authority. Intellectual intuition and imagination are most important, but they are not reliable: they may show us things very clearly, and yet they may mislead us. They are indispensable as the main sources of our theories; but most of our theories are false anyway. The most important function of observation and reasoning, and even of intuition and imagination, is to help us in the critical examination of those bold conjectures which are the means by which we probe into the unknown. Even where a term has made trouble, as for instance the term 'simultaneity' in physics, it was not because its meaning was imprecise or ambiguous, but rather because of some intuitive theory which induced us to burden the term with too much meaning, or with too 'precise' a meaning, rather than with too little. What Einstein found in his analysis of simultaneity was that, when speaking of simultaneous events, physicists made a false assumption which would have been unchallengeable were there signals of infinite velocity. The fault was not that they did not mean anything, or that their meaning was ambiguous, or the term not precise enough; what Einstein found was, rather, that the elimination of a theoretical assumption, unnoticed so far because of its intuitive self-evidence, was able to remove a difficulty which had arisen in science. Accordingly, he was not really concerned with a question of the meaning of a term, but rather with the truth of a theory. It is very unlikely that it would have led to much if someone had started, apart from a definite physical problem, to improve the concept of simultaneity by analyzing its 'essential] meaning', or even by analyzing what physicists 'really mean' when they speak of simultaneity. end quote

From: "George H. Smith" To: "*Atlantis" Subject: ATL: Aristotle on choice. Date: Thu, 2 Jan 2003 11:09:06 -0600: As I have noted before, one of the best treatments of "choice" ever written appears in Book III of Aristotle's "Nicomachean Ethics.* The following sketch of his basic points is from the translation by W.D. Ross in *The Basic Works of Aristotle,* ed. Richard McKeon (Random House, 1941). This summary is taken from Aristotle's introductory remarks on pp. 967-71, after which he explains and defends his views in more detail -- so please don't take this as a comprehensive statement. I encourage everyone to read Aristotle's discussion in its entirety, for two reasons. First, it exerted an enormous influence on subsequent advocates of "free will." Second, it is filled with insights, distinctions, and arguments that every volitionist (including Objectivists) will find of value, even if they take exception to some points.

Summary: Choice does not pertain to what is impossible. We can wish for something impossible (e.g., immortality), but we cannot choose it. An agent chooses "only the things that he thinks could be brought about by his own efforts." Wish relates the end of action, whereas choice relates to the means. For example, we can wish to be healthy but we cannot choose to be healthy per se, because this does not lie directly in our power. Instead, we choose *means,* or specific actions, that we think will make us healthy.

Choice "involves a rational principle and thought." This means that choice is preceded by deliberation. This distinguishes the realm of choice from the realm of the voluntary. All chosen actions are voluntary, but not all voluntary actions are chosen. Something is voluntary if "the moving principle is in the agent himself, he being aware of the particular circumstances of the action." Hence if we act spontaneously from a strong passion, this action is voluntary (i.e., it was not compelled by an external agent) but not chosen per se, because it was not the result of deliberation.

The same is true of habitual actions. These are voluntary but not chosen, since to act from habit is to act without conscious reflection or deliberation. We can, however, choose means that we believe will alter our habits; and it is also the case that our habits are the result of earlier choices. This notion of indirect choice (which is my characterization, not Aristotle's) plays a crucial role in Aristotle's treatment of virtues and vices, which are essentially good and bad moral habits.

(Aristotle's distinction between the voluntary and the chosen – which he discusses in far more detail than indicated here -- is relevant to the topic of soft determinism. He would maintain that the soft determinist confuses voluntary actions with chosen actions. Suppose that all of our actions are necessitated by antecedent causes. Although these determined actions can be described a "voluntary" (because the source of action lies within the agent), they are not a matter of choice. This is because choice presupposes deliberation, and we deliberate only about *alternatives* that we regard as both possible and within our power to do or not to do. )

Aristotle asks: "Do we deliberate about everything, and is everything a possible subject of deliberation, or is deliberation impossible about some things?" We do not deliberate about things that occur necessarily or by nature, nor about chance events. (These are other ways of saying that we do not deliberate about things that lie outside of our control.) For instance, we do not deliberate about solstices, droughts or rains, nor about the accidental finding of a treasure. Nor do we deliberate about every human action, but only about those things that "can be brought about by our own efforts."

In short, "we deliberate about things that are in our own power and can be done." This means that we do not deliberate about the conclusions of the exact sciences in which conclusions follow with logical necessity from evident premises. Nor do we deliberate about how the letters of the alphabet shall be written, for such matters have already been determined (by convention, in this case) and present no options. Deliberation is possible only when (1) alternatives are possible, and (2) these alternatives lie within our own power to do or not to do. "Deliberation is concerned with things that happen in a certain way for the most part, but in which the event is obscure, and with things in which it is indeterminate."

"We deliberate about ends but not about means." A doctor qua doctor does not deliberate about whether he shall heal, for this purpose is a defining characteristic of his profession. This end is assumed -- it is accepted as a given by the doctor qua doctor -- who deliberates only about the means appropriate to healing, when different options present themselves and a course of action is not absolutely dictated by logical necessity. (Aristotle obviously does not deny that one can deliberate about becoming a doctor, but in this case the profession is viewed as a *means* to some other end, e.g., a fulfilling way of life, a good living, or happiness.)

All deliberation is a type of investigation; to deliberate is to consider various means and to assess their relative desirability vis-à-vis a given end. And if, during the course of this investigation, we encounter an impossibility, we "give up the search" because we realize that something is not within our power. (e.g., "if we need money and this cannot be got; but if a thing appears possible we try to do   it.") Deliberation "is about the things to be done by the agent himself, and actions are for the sake of things other than themselves."

The object of deliberation in a particular case is the same as the object of choice, "except that the object of choice is already determinate, since it is that which has been decided upon as a result of deliberation that is the object of choice."  Again: "The object of choice being one of the things in our own power which is desired after deliberation, choice will be deliberate desire of things in our own power; for when we have decided as a result of deliberation, we desire in accordance with our deliberation."

(The term "deliberate desire" is very important. Aristotle denies that our choices are necessitated by our desires. True, we don't choose something unless we desire it in some sense, but can generate, and thereby control, our desires through deliberation, which is an intellectual process that a person has the power to initiate and direct. To put the same point in Randian terms, feelings are not a primary.) Ghs

[Peter]

From below: “Objectivism, you see, does not agree with the standard view of QM.” And what about psychology? Peter 

From: Ellen Stuttle <egould To: atlantis Subject: ATL: REFERENCE SOURCE: Key Searle Quote Date: Wed, 16 Jan 2002 22:39:46 -0500 [Those interested in the volition/determinism debate, please save this post.  I think that it pretty well captures the core of Searle's views on "the gap."  It also provides succinct statements which can be used to formulate the essential differences between hard determinists, soft determinists, soft volitionists, and hard free-willists.  (I'll highlight the key sentences in my next post.)  All italics are in the original.] ES ___ From:  *rationality in Action*, John R. Searle, 2001, Massachusetts Institute of Technology pp. 64-67 The simplest proof of what I am describing as the special causal and volitional elements of the gap is in the following thought experiment, based on the research of Wilder Penfield. (2)  He found that by stimulating the motor cortex of his patients with a microelectrode he could cause bodily movements.  When asked, the patients invariably said, "I did not do that, you did it" (p. 76).  So the patient's experience, for example, of having his arm raised by Penfield's stimulation of the brain is quite different from his experience of voluntarily raising his arm.  What is the difference? Well, to answer that, let us imagine the Penfield cases on a grand scale. Imagine that all of my bodily movements over a certain period of time are caused by a brain scientist sending electromagnetic rays into my motor cortex. Now clearly the experience would be totally different from normal conscious voluntary action.  In this case, as in perception, I *observe* what is happening to me.  In the normal case, I *make it happen*.  There are two features of the normal case.  First, I cause the bodily movement by trying to raise my arm.  The trying is sufficient to cause the arm to move; but second, the reasons for the action are not sufficient causes to force the trying.

If we put this under the magnifying glass we find that the action consists of the two components I described in chapter 2, the intention-in-action (the trying), which, when conscious, is a conscious experience of acting, and the bodily movement.  The intention-in-action is causally sufficient for the bodily movement.  So, if I raise my arm the intention-in-action causes the arm to go up.  But in a normal case of voluntary action, the intention- in-action does not itself have psychologically causally sufficient antecedent conditions, and when I say the whole action lacks sufficient conditions it is because the intention-in-action lacks them.  That is a manifestation of the gap of human freedom.  In the normal case, the experience of acting will cause the initiation of movement by sufficient conditions, but that experience itself (the experience of trying, what William James called the feeling of "effort") does not have sufficient p[s]ychological causal conditions in the free and voluntary cases.

In the first chapter I briefly mention a second argument:  I believe the most dramatic manifestation of the gap in real life comes out in the fact that when one has several reasons for performing an action, or for choosing an action, one may act on only one of them; one may select which reason one acts on.  For example, suppose I have several reasons for voting for a particular political candidate.  All the same, I may not vote for the candidate for all of those reasons.  I may vote for the candidate for one reason and not for any of the others.  In such a case, I may know without observation that I voted for the candidate for one particular reason and not for any of the others, even though I know that I also had those other reasons for voting for him.  Now, this is an amazing fact and we ought to ponder it.  There are several reasons operating on me, but only one of these is actually effective and *I select which one will be effective*.

That is, as far as my awareness of my own actions is concerned, my various beliefs and desires don't *cause* me to behave in a particular way.  Rather, I select which desire I act on.  I decide, in short, which of the many causes will be effective.  This suggests a fascinating hypothesis that will also come up in later chapters.  If we think of the reasons I act on as the reasons that are *effective*, then it emerges that where free rational action is concerned, *all effective reasons are made effective by the agent*, insofar as he chooses which ones he will act on.

When I say that we "select" which reasons to act on, or that we "make" reasons effective, I do not mean that there are any separate acts of selecting and making going on.  If there were, we could quickly construct vicious-infinite-regress arguments about making the makings and selecting the selectings. (3)  I just mean that when you freely act on a reason you have thereby, in that act, selected that reason and made it effective.

A third, more indirect way to argue for the existence of the gap is to note that rationality is only possible where irrationality is possible. But the possibility of each requires freedom.  So in order to behave rationally I can do so only if I am free to make any of a number of possible choices and have open the possibility of behaving irrationally. Paradoxically, the alleged ideal of a perfectly rational machine, the computer, is not an example of rationality at all, because a computer is outside the scope of rationality altogether.  A computer is neither rational nor irrational, because its behavior is entirely determined by its program and the structure of its hardware.  The only sense in which a computer can be said to be rational is observer-relative.

(2) *The Mystery of the Mind*, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1975, pp. 76-77.

(3) Gilbert Ryle is known for these types of regress arguments against traditional action theory.  See his *The Concept of Mind*, New York: Harper and Row, 1949.

From: Ellen Stuttle  To: atlantis Subject: ATL: Key Distinction Among Contending Views Date: Wed, 16 Jan 2002 23:35:52 -0500 Quotes are from:  *rationality in Action*, John R. Searle, 2001, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, pp. 64-65.

      "There are two features of the normal case [in voluntary action]. First, I cause the bodily movement by trying to raise my arm. The trying is sufficient to cause the arm to move; but second, the reasons for the action are not sufficient causes to force the trying."

Alright, here's an easy way to keep in mind the difference between hard determinism and all the other views:

Hard determinism says that the trying has nothing to do with the real causal sequence, that it's but an experiential after-effect of the real causal sequence. All the other views at least agree that the trying really is causally necessary in the sequence.

"If we put this under the magnifying glass we find that the action consists of the two components I described in chapter 2, the intention-in-action (the trying), which, when conscious, is a conscious experience of acting, and the bodily movement.  The intention-in-action is causally sufficient for the bodily movement. So, if I raise my arm the intention-in-action causes the arm to go up. But in a normal case of voluntary action, the intention-in-action *does not* [my emphasis] itself have psychologically causally sufficient antecedent conditions, and when I say the whole action lacks sufficient conditions it is because the intention-in-action lacks them.  That is a manifestation of the gap of human freedom.  In the normal case, the experience of acting will cause the initiation of movement by sufficient conditions, but that experience itself (the experience of trying, what William James called the feeling of "effort") does not   have sufficient p[s]ychological causal conditions in the free and voluntary cases."

Here's the central point on which the soft determinist differs from the hard free-willist: The soft determinist says, contra Searle, that the intention-in-action DOES have psychologically causally sufficient antecedent conditions. Ellen S.

From: Ellen Stuttle  To: atlantis Subject: ATL: Stepping Off the Fence (Part II) Date: Sat, 19 Jan 2002 19:24:23 -0500 (continuation) Yesterday afternoon, three strands of influence converged to bring me to realize that, yes, there is a factor which could -- which always could -- be different; a factor which I'm henceforth going to call (at least in my personal language) the "trying-to- attend" effort.  (Note in advance:  this is the same factor which Objectivism is getting at with the description "raising the level" of awareness, but there are reasons why I have never felt comfortable with that terminology and find that it interferes with my understanding instead of helping.)

The first two strands of influence which converged are a passage I quoted on the list this week from John Searle's *Rationality in Action* and Ellen Moore's often-used (in some variant or other) phrase "primary actions of consciousness."

Searle writes (pg. 64):    "...when I say the whole action lacks sufficient conditions it is because the intention-in-action lacks them.  That is a manifestation of the gap of human freedom.  In the normal case, the experience of acting will cause the initiation of movement by sufficient conditions, but that experience itself (the experience of trying, what William James called the feeling of "effort") does not have sufficient p[s]ychological causal conditions in the free and voluntary cases."

I pause to say here that I am a psychologist, not a praxeologist. And psychologists, I've come to understand from the list discussion, use language somewhat differently than praxeologists.  For instance, when Bill and George have been debating about "action," the result for me has been confusing because, as I now understand after an exchange with Bill, they mean specifically "choice" by "action," whereas I don't.  I mean any behavior, physical or mental, including involuntary behavior.  Furthermore, even when I say "voluntary," I don't necessarily mean "consciously directed."  I mean "using the voluntary nervous system and musculature" as distinguished from the involuntary nervous system and musculature.

Next, what Searle is talking about in the above passage is what *the psychologist* calls "voluntary behavior," a category which includes behavior to which the organism isn't paying any conscious attention.  With such behavior, the "trying" (James' "effort") might not be noticed even though it's there.  The point is that it's an *intention* which triggers the neural and resultant muscular activity.

Next, it is the case that I've noticed hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of times that there is in my cognitive activities something which seems to operate in the cognitive realm like the "trying" Searle is talking about operates in the voluntary-behavior realm.  There's the intention, the effort of attending, the "now- grasp-this" moment which is experienced as irreducible and which immediately upon being made changes the state of consciousness. It immediately brings to central (and it feels like, to "heightened" awareness) whatever material is being attended to while simultaneously relegating other material to periphery.

Next, I've puzzled and puzzled over Ellen Moore's use of "primary actions of consciousness."  *Sometimes* I've thought that what she's talking about is this effort of attending I've just described; at those times I've felt that I understood what she was saying. Other times she's included additional words which to me de-clarified instead of helping -- especially when she'd talk about "levels," a usage prevalent in Objectivist writing but one with which I've always had trouble because I happen to be someone with a very highly developed degree of visualization skills, and the word "levels" brings a picture to my mind which I find inaccurate. However, when I think in terms of a "state" change instead of in terms of a "levels" change, then I think I understand what

Ellen Moore is talking about -- and I think she's basically right. (There are details where I think she mixes up issues of "metaphysics" versus "epistemology" with issues of psychology; but that's another issue; I'll leave Roger and EM to debate that one).

Next, yesterday, while going about my chores, I kept thinking and thinking about what it is that always nags at me, that always feels "askew" in Roger's descriptions of human behavior.  Bill's descriptions get to looking so circular to me, I'm left unsure what he's even saying, but Roger's descriptions I can follow and relate to except...  except, I finally got it, what's being left out is exactly the "trying-to-attend" effort, an effort which has to be made in order for the person to *assess* the circumstances the person is in.

Now, it can be -- and indeed often is -- the case that this effort doesn't have to be RE-made about particular subjects of interest to a person.  It can even seem -- to me it often does seem – that particular subject matter acquires a life of its own and keeps going in one's thoughts without any need of a current effort to attend.  There can even be subjects which become troubling because they *won't let one alone* -- for instance, this whole volition discussion which I've experienced in the last weeks as consuming me, as giving me no peace, as being *there* ready to start as soon as I wake up and as being constantly at least on the edge of awareness no matter what else I'm doing.

But even here, even though a lot of the time I'm unaware of or hardly aware of it, there's always the possibility of *assessing* the circumstances, of *judging* whether the circumstances are such that it's ok to allow myself to be preoccupied or not.

So, to bring this to a conclusion:  what I realized yesterday at about 4:00 is that it's the "trying-to-attend" effort -- an effort which, like that producing voluntary motions, is irreducible, a "prime cause" -- which always *could* be different. And that it's this "trying-to-attend" effort which, when directed toward assessing a situation (even in cases where it's made without one's really noticing one is making it) allows one to *choose* the value(s) motivating one's behavior. Thus, in short, I concluded that, yea verily, there is "free" will in the sense that, yes, there always is something which *could* be different in what this-person-in-this-circumstance does.

Finishing the story of my day:  About half an hour after the above-described thought process, I had a bit of extra time before needing to get ready to go to the lecture, so I decided just to take a peek at the ATL mail.  When what to my wondering eyes should appear...?  A post by Ellen Moore addressed to me (titled: "Ellen S.'s confusions"), a post almost all of which I understood and agreed with.  (Thank you, EM, for the effort you made writing that!)

Then, there was the Jung lecture.  It was a lecture by a man named John Haule (pronounced Hew'el) who's been doing extensive research on the development of Jung's theories, including, most significantly, research on the influence of late-19th-century dissociation theory, an influence which pre-dated Jung's meeting Freud.  Since Freud was so prominent in 20th-century clinical thought, and since Jung was a close associate of Freud's for several years, the influence of Freud on Jung has been much talked about.  But an even stronger influence, one which hadn't been much researched, was the earlier influence of Janet, Flornoy, and others who studied dissociation.  Janet's theories, in particular, had an evolutionary perspective along similar lines to those Jung would develop.

The lecture was very well organized, and very clear:  Jungians, tending as they do to be mostly interested in the imaginal functions of the mind, often also tend not to be overly organized in their presentations; but John Hewle's an exception, someone able to convey the richness of symbol while at the same time making crystalline discursive sense.  Thus his lecture wove all the diversity of Jung's thought into a pattern which gave me, and a number of other people there who have been studying Jung for years, a feeling of seeing "the whole" better than we ever have before.

Hence, as I said at the start of this, "Yesterday was a big day for me, by the end of which I felt that I had as complete a picture of the psyche as I'm going to have at the moment."  And, given that my "steeping off the fence" re free-will was part of the day's adventures in comprehension, it was also a day at the end of which I breathed a grateful sigh of relief because now I can quit feeling "compelled" to pay daily devoted attention to the details of this current debate. Cheers, all. Ellen S.

From: Ellen Stuttle To: atlantis, Victor Levis <viclevis Subject: ATL: Hard/Soft Determinism--FWD for Victor (was: Free will is...) Date: Sat, 19 Jan 2002 20:54:36 -0500 Victor, you wrote: >In other words, Gayle, could you please lay out the differences not only between volitionism and soft determinism, but also between soft and hard determinism? This post might help you there.

ES

 ----------FWD------------

To: atlantis From: Ellen Stuttle  Subject: ATL: Key Distinction Among Contending Views Date: Wed, 16 Jan 2002 23:35:52 -0500 Quotes are from:  *Rationality in Action*, John R. Searle, 2001, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, pp. 64-65.

       "There are two features of the normal case [in voluntary action]. First, I cause the bodily movement by trying to raise my arm. The trying is sufficient to cause the arm to move; but second, the reasons for the action are not sufficient causes to force the trying."

Alright, here's an easy way to keep in mind the difference between hard determinism and all the other views: Hard determinism says that the trying has nothing to do with the real causal sequence, that it's but an experiential after-effect of the real causal sequence. All the other views at least agree that the trying really is causally necessary in the sequence.

"If we put this under the magnifying glass we find that the action consists of the two components I described in chapter 2, the intention-in-action (the trying), which, when conscious, is a conscious experience of acting, and the bodily movement.  The intention-in-action is causally sufficient for the bodily movement. So, if I raise my arm the intention-in-action causes the arm to go up. But in a normal case of voluntary action, the intention-in-action *does not* [my emphasis] itself have psychologically causally sufficient antecedent conditions, and when I say the whole action lacks sufficient conditions it is because the intention-in-action lacks them.  That is a manifestation of the gap of human freedom.  In the normal case, the experience of acting will cause the initiation of movement by sufficient conditions, but that experience itself (the experience of trying, what William James called the feeling of "effort") does not   have sufficient p[s]ychological causal conditions in the free and voluntary cases."

Here's the central point on which the soft determinist differs from the hard free-willist: The soft determinist says, contra Searle, that the intention-in-action DOES have psychologically causally sufficient antecedent conditions. Ellen S.

From: PinkCrash7 To: atlantis Subject: ATL: Bewusstsein Date: Sun, 20 Jan 2002 06:52:17 EST I have been reading a little bit more of John Searle and several other sources, including the Atlantis posts, and have some jumbled thoughts and questions regarding the whole thing of consciousness and free will.  I have been thinking about all this within the context of the neurobiological basis for the existence of consciousness --  especially after Ellen Moore's post on existence and consciousness in which she seems to convey that there is no necessity for the biological existence of living beings in order for consciousness to exist.  (I could have sworn this was an atheist group, but, okay, I can be open-minded...)

 John Searle refers to freedom of the will as operating in what he calls "the gap," which Ellen Stuttle has been posting on as well and including some quotes from Searle's, "Rationality in Action."  "The gap," as I  understand it, is basically the space in which free will is thought to operate.  Searle explains that there first is a gap between the various reasons that you might have for making a decision and the actual decision that you reach (because the reasons are not causally sufficient to produce a decision), a second gap between the decision and the action that you take (because, again, the decision is not causally sufficient to produce the action), then a third gap between the initiation of the action and its continuation to completion (because completion of the action requires voluntary effort; starting an action does not cause its completion).  All of that is pretty straight from his book.  I

 n Chapter 1, Searle writes, "...even though we have all these experiences, could not the whole thing be an illusion?  Yes it could.  Our gappy experiences are not self-validating.  On the basis of what I have said so far, free will could still be a massive illusion.  The *psychological* reality of the gap does not guarantee a corresponding *neurobiological* reality". As far as I can tell, John Searle's use of the term "gap" in regard to this space in which free will operates seems to be his own language.  I am curious to know if anyone knows if other writers defending the free will position employ the same or similar terminology in regard to free will.  I ask this because I did notice a similarity between John Searle's "gap" and psychologist Rollo May's "pause."   (Dennis, you're not related to Rollo, are you?)  In May's book, "Freedom and Destiny," he defines freedom as "the capacity to pause in the midst of stimuli from all directions, and in this pause to throw our weight toward this response rather than that one."  He then writes a whole chapter on this, called, "The Significance of the Pause."

He says, "The pause is especially important for the freedom of being, what I have called essential freedom.  For it is in the pause that we experience the context out of which freedom comes.  In the pause we wonder, reflect, sense, awe, and conceive of eternity.  The pause is when we open ourselves for the moment to the concepts of both freedom and destiny."

He further writes, "The word *pause*, like the word *freedom*, seems essentially to signify what something is *not* rather than what it is." Another interesting statement that he makes is that it is in the pause that people learn to listen to silence.  This is not exactly what Searle is referring to as "the gap," but there does seem to be some basic similarities in the idea there.

In thinking of Searle's use of the term, "the gap," I keep thinking of the phrase "god-of-the-gaps" in which theists have used gaps in understanding of natural causes or explanations to build a case for the divine intervention of God.  Much of that criticism of theists by skeptics has been well-deserved, but theists also respond that introducing imaginary forces and phenomena and passing them off as natural explanations without sufficient evidence is equally absurd and can forestall advances in scientific understanding as much as the god-of-the-gaps fallacy does in attributing the unknown to the divine intervention of God.

Attributing actions to causes that are insufficient to produce such actions -- as the determinsts do --  does seem to me a bit like that; the god-of-the-gaps fallacy except that, instead of inserting the supposed divine intervention of God into the gaps, they insert supposed antecedently sufficient causal conditions into the gaps -- but without any actual evidence to support their assertions that these really are causally sufficient and that whatever happened could not have happened otherwise.

Anyway... that's just my own mind wandering about.  I saw no reference to the god-of-the-gaps fallacy in Searle's book; it just amused me to think of it in the context of determinism since Searle uses the term "gap."

In the last chapter of his book, Searle makes the case for the possibility that there *could* be a neurobiological correlate to the gap.  This post is already too long in my meandering about and it will get even longer if I try to explain how he proposes this could be established -- and I have more meandering to do before I'm completed, so I'll skip over the details of this, except to note that proving a neurobiological correlate for the "gap," i.e., for the existence of free will, would have to be based on the prior assumption that consciousness is a biological reality; a product of the brain.

As I mentioned previously, Searle describes the existence of three gaps -- firstly, between the reasons and the decision, secondly, between the decision and the initiation of action, and thirdly, between the initiation of action and completion of that action.  Searle basically views these gaps as the space in which free will operates.  They are essentially psychological.  How he would prove whether or not biological reality corresponds to these psychological experience of free will would be to see if the neurological state of the brain during the first gap is causally sufficient to determine the brain state for the second gap and then if the brain state during the second gap is sufficient the carry through to the completion of the action. Searle says that if the answer is yes, then we have no free will; but if the answer is no, then we really do have free will.

He writes, "The problem of the freedom of the will is a straight problem in neurobiology about the relations of certain sorts of consciousness to neurobiological processes".

It appears to me that Searle is saying that if it can be shown that there are no neurobiological underpinnings for determination, then the reality of free will is proven by default.  But I started getting a little fogged up at that point (though I'm counting on Dennis May to have something to say about all this) so I skipped over to another book, "Invariances: The Structure of the Objective World" by Robert Nozick.  I should say that I understand almost none of this book thus far -- though I did note some interesting things he had to say about the neurological correlates of consciousness in regard to identity in his chapter, "The Realm of Consciousness."   I understood Nozick to say that consciousness may have features which are not paralleled in its neurological correlate.

That would seem to lend support for Searle's hope to prove the reality of free will by default -- by proving that one brain state during the gaps in the process of deliberation, decision making and action is not causally

sufficient to determine the  brain state of the next gap.   Well, that's what my first thought was, then I started thinking, on the other hand, perhaps such a view could be seen as support of psychological determinism in the absence of a neurobiological correlate as well. Either way, I wonder if Searle seems to depend too much on the reduction of consciousness to its neurobiological underpinnings.

Now back to Ellen M.'s, proposition that consciousness may exist without any biological reality at all.... Debbie

From: "William Dwyer" To: <atlantis Subject: ATL: RE: Bewusstsein Date: Sun, 20 Jan 2002 12:24:17 -0800 Debbie wrote, "In thinking of Searle's use of the term, "the gap," I keep thinking of the phrase "god-of-the-gaps" in which theists have used gaps in understanding of natural causes or explanations to build a case for the divine intervention of God.  Much of that criticism of theists by skeptics has been well-deserved, but theists also respond that introducing imaginary forces and phenomena and passing them off as natural explanations without sufficient evidence is equally absurd and can forestall advances in scientific understanding as much as the god-of-the-gaps fallacy does in attributing the unknown to the divine intervention of God.

"Attributing actions to causes that are insufficient to produce such actions -- as the determinists do -- does seem to me a bit like that; the god-of-the-gaps fallacy except that, instead of inserting the supposed divine intervention of God into the gaps, they insert supposed antecedently sufficient causal conditions into the gaps -- but without any actual evidence to support their assertions that these really are causally sufficient and that whatever happened could not have happened otherwise."

There is a difference between positing a ~specific kind~ of cause (such as divine intervention) and simply saying that there must ~be~ a causal explanation (i.e., a sufficient causal condition to explain the action), which is what determinism (as such) does with respect to our choices. In no area other than human choice do we eschew the need for (sufficient) causal conditions to explain an entity's behavior.  The attribution of free will to human choice is the only area in which the concept of a "gap" in causal necessity is tolerated (unless you want to include quantum physics, where even the Objectivists part company). The insertion of antecedently sufficient causal conditions into "the gap" is not an arbitrary postulate, but is based on what determinists understand to be the nature of the law of universal causation -- i.e., on their understanding of its logical requirements.

Debbie writes,  "In the last chapter of his book, Searle makes the case for the possibility that there *could* be a neurobiological correlate to the gap....  How he would prove whether or not biological reality corresponds to these psychological experience of free will would be to see if the neurological state of the brain during the first gap is causally sufficient to determine the brain state for the second gap and then if the brain state during the second gap is sufficient the carry through to the completion of the action. Searle says that if the answer is yes, then we have no free will; but if the answer is no, then we really do have free will. [...] "It appears to me that Searle is saying that if it can be shown that there are no neurobiological underpinnings for determination, then the reality of free will is proven by default."

Searle is saying, in so many words, that the failure to find a neurobiological underpinning for the necessity of human choice proves that there isn't any.  This wouldn't satisfy the determinists any more than to claim that, since scientific investigation failed to reveal a causal explanation for the strange behavior of subatomic particles, there isn't any. What we are dealing with here is a ~philosophical~ issue, not simply a scientific one.  I would have expected Searle -- a philosopher, of all people -- to have recognized this. Bill

From: PinkCrash7 To: atlantis Subject: Re: ATL: Re: Bewusstsein Date: Sun, 20 Jan 2002 20:02:40 EST >Dennis May wrote "His [i.e., Searle's] free will winning by default has got to be the biggest joke I've ever heard relayed to atlantis." >  >Sorry, Dennis, but Searle did not write that.  That was Debbie's exegesis.     -- Mike Hardy

Thank you, Mike.  I had thought earlier that I should have pointed that out. Searle indeed used no such words at all and very well may not even like such words as applied to what it was he was writing about.  I used those words because that's just  what it seemed like to me after reading his idea of how free will could either be proven or disproven as a neurobiological reality. I am not going to type out the entire 9th chapter, of course, but so Dennis and others (if there is even anybody else reading this, LOL) who do not have "Rationality In Action", here are a few sentences from pages 280 and 281 that are relevant to what I was thinking of when I used the words "free will winning by default":

"The problem of the freedom of the will comes down to this: assuming no further relevant external stimuli enter the brain, was the brain state at t1 [Note: Searle explained earlier in his example what he was denoting by t1. He was basically referring to the first gap which occurs in the process of decision making and taking action], neurobiologically described, causally sufficient to determine the brain state at t2 [the second gap], and was the state at t2 sufficient to carry it to t3 [the third gap]?  If the answer to those questions is yes, for this and all other relevantly similar cases, then we have no free will.  The psychologically real gap corresponds to no neurobiological reality and the freedom of the will is a massive illusion. If the answer to that question is no, then given certain assumptions about the role of consciousness, we really do have free will."

I'm not so sure that the above contains sufficient information to make a lot of sense to those who haven't read the chapter up to that point, but it at least shows what it was I was drawing from which I turned into the words "free will winning by default" (that is, in the case of the answer being no, that the neurobiological brain state at the first gap was not sufficient to carry it to the second gap, and so forth). Debbie

From: "William Dwyer To: <atlantis Subject: RE: ATL: RE: Bewusstsein Date: Sun, 20 Jan 2002 23:27:52 -0800 I wrote, "There is a difference between positing a ~specific kind~ of cause (such as divine intervention) and simply saying that there must ~be~ a causal explanation (i.e., a sufficient causal condition to explain the action), which is what determinism (as such) does with respect to our choices.

"In no area other than human choice do we eschew the need for (sufficient) causal conditions to explain an entity's behavior.  The attribution of free will to human choice is the only area in which the concept of a "gap" in causal necessity is tolerated (unless you want to include quantum physics, where even the Objectivists part company)."

Debbie replied, "I don't understand why you would apply laws of the physical world to the human mind in the first place.  There is no other area LIKE human consciousness.  What is the REASON you would supervene causal necessity on the human mind when all of our psychological experience as human beings plainly tells us otherwise?"

Because of how I understand the law of causality and what it requires. Rand holds that the law of causality is the law of identity applied to action.  According to her, the law of causality simply states that a thing cannot act in contradiction to its nature.  George has argued that this conception of causality is compatible with (hard) free will, because it does not require Joseph’s interpretation that the same thing act in precisely the same way under the same conditions.

But if we accept Rand’s view of causality as excluding Joseph’s interpretation, then how do we determine what actions are consistent with a thing’s nature?  By direct observation?

Well, we have “observed” subatomic particles acting in different ways under apparently identical conditions.  Are we justified in concluding from this observation that it is in the ~nature~ of these particles to act differently under identical conditions?  Or must we assume that there is some difference in the conditions to account for the difference in their behavior?

Ross Levatter apparently subscribes to the view that no causal explanation of their paradoxical behavior is required -- that these entities can behave differently under identical circumstances, because they appear to do so.  But if so, then on what grounds do we require a causal explanation for other kinds of anomalous behavior?

Suppose, for example, that we observe that an orange tree which produced a large crop of oranges last year is producing a smaller crop this year under relevantly similar conditions.  May we conclude that it is in the orange tree’s nature to produce different crops of oranges under relevantly similar conditions, or must we infer that there is some relevant difference in the conditions to account for the difference in the crop yield?

If we accept Rand’s conception of causality, is there any reason to believe that ~anything~ must act in precisely the same way under the same conditions, or is that premise entirely unwarranted?  The view that identical conditions must eventuate in identical actions is an a priori assumption, for we never can be absolutely sure of having identical conditions on any subsequent occasion.

So it seems odd to me that a principle of causality (understood as simply a logical corollary of the law of identity) could permit metaphysical freedom only in man and exclude it a priori in all others. And if it does not exclude it a priori in all others, then why does Objectivism say that absent free will, things could not have been other than what they were?

Objectivism, you see, does not agree with the standard view of QM.  (See David Harriman's lecture series, _The Philosophic Corruption of Physics_ Lecture 5, entitled "Quantum Theory:  The Physics of Nihilism."  Nor are Objectivists the only QM apostates.  See, for example, an article in the May 1994 issue of _Scientific American_ by David Z. Albert, entitled "Bohm's Alternative to Quantum Mechanics."  See also Albert's book, _Quantum Mechanics and Experience_ (Harvard University Press, 1992).

If there is nothing in ~the nature of reality~ which says that ~anything~ must act the same way under the same conditions, then how can we ever claim that an entity’s action is restricted in any way? Observation cannot tell us, because it cannot reveal all of the possible conditions that could be affecting a thing’s behavior.  How, for example, do we know if the lower yield of the orange tree is due to its power of producing a different crop under identical conditions, or to an undetected difference in the conditions?

The answer is we don’t – unless it is a logical requirement (a la the law of identity) that the same thing act the same way under the same conditions.  But if it is a ~logical requirement~ that the same thing act the same way under the same conditions, then there is no free will. That is why I superimpose necessity on human action, despite any alleged appearance of free will to the contrary.  I do not, by the way, believe that we have direct experience of free will, beyond a feeling that we could have acted otherwise, for we can never reproduce the identical conditions under which we acted in order to confirm the validity of that feeling.  And even if we could, the question would remain, is there an unseen cause for the difference in our behavior that we have to discover? Bill

[Brant Gaede]

On 9/16/2017 at 7:16 PM, BaalChatzaf said:

He is ask if there can be some twisting or torsion in the earth's crust.  The crust is going with a 1000 mph tangential velocity at the equator and 0 mph at the poles.  If the Earth's crust was completely rigid there would be no torsion.  By the way the sun's equator has a higher angular velocity than the sun's poles  so there is twisty torsion on the surface of the sun. That twists the magnetic field lines of force so much that eventually the magnetic lines of force give way hurl very large chunks of sun outward. This is a mass ejections and if it hits the earth it can cause all sorts of nasty things to happen with power lines and transformers. 

In 1859 the Mother of Mass Ejections hit Earth (it was described by a British astronomer Carrington).  This mass ejections cause telegraph lines to sparks and blew up batteries powering the telegraphs.  Hundreds of telegraphers were burned by sparks that jump from their  key sets.  Fortunately the world was not wired the way it is now,  so civilization did not come to a screeching halt because the onlyh electrical things at that time were the telegraph systems.  If a Carrington even hit the earth now  it would destroy our power grids and fry the transformers.  It would also destroy many of our satellites.  Kiss GPS goodbye for a while. It would take years for the world to put itself back together again. 

Beware.

--Brant

[Strictlylogical]

8 hours ago, Brant Gaede said:

Beware.

--Brant

Well, now a backup generator for our house seems even more like a good investment.

[Peter]

4 hours ago, Strictlylogical said:

Well, now a backup generator for our house seems even more like a good investment.

We have a small, 5000 watt, gas driven generator and a sprocket where we can plug it into our house's electrical grid but it is not enough to run our central heating and cooling unit. We have been considering getting a bigger, propane generator. 

Here are some questions I have for a generator dealer and installer. “Service Today” is a local company, as is a company that has "Generacs."

We want a generator that will power all of our appliances, heating and air conditioning system, water pump, and receptacles, though the washer, dryer, and oven could be excluded if they would cost much more. I think our house is 90 by 24 feet or around 2200 square feet. How does the Service Today’s system compare with Generac?

What are the costs for various wattages of generators? 

It will be powered by propane and located at a safe distance from the house. Where would be some good locations? What size propane tank should we get? The last and very recent power outage was around six hours.

A system with a warranty and guarantee and checked on by Service Today just as the heating and air conditioning are checked a couple of times a year. (And /or automatically checked too.)

Simple to operate. We would want the system to be automatic and to come on and off when the power goes off and then back on, and to NOT seep into the outside lines which might electrocute someone from Delmarva Power working on the lines.

Will we need a new receptacle box and circuit breaker? We think that might be a good idea, because we moved into this house in 1978, and the electrical box in the garage has been altered many times over the years. We no longer use the baseboard heat so that could be disconnected.

[Strictlylogical]

2 hours ago, Peter said:

We have a small, 5000 watt, gas driven generator and a sprocket where we can plug it into our house's electrical grid but it is not enough to run our central heating and cooling unit. We have been considering getting a bigger, propane generator. 

Here are some questions I have for a generator dealer and installer. “Service Today” is a local company, as is a company that has "Generacs."

We want a generator that will power all of our appliances, heating and air conditioning system, water pump, and receptacles, though the washer, dryer, and oven could be excluded if they would cost much more. I think our house is 90 by 24 feet or around 2200 square feet. How does the Service Today’s system compare with Generac?

What are the costs for various wattages of generators? 

It will be powered by propane and located at a safe distance from the house. Where would be some good locations? What size propane tank should we get? The last and very recent power outage was around six hours.

A system with a warranty and guarantee and checked on by Service Today just as the heating and air conditioning are checked a couple of times a year. (And /or automatically checked too.)

Simple to operate. We would want the system to be automatic and to come on and off when the power goes off and then back on, and to NOT seep into the outside lines which might electrocute someone from Delmarva Power working on the lines.

Will we need a new receptacle box and circuit breaker? We think that might be a good idea, because we moved into this house in 1978, and the electrical box in the garage has been altered many times over the years. We no longer use the baseboard heat so that could be disconnected.

All good questions.  Also where to stockpile all your fossil fuel before its all outlawed by the lefties.