Volitional Will vs Determinism

[Robert_Bumbalough]

Greetings Ayn Rand fans and fellow Objectivists.

I could not find a topic on this question. If there is a more appropriate location for this question, would the moderator be so kind as to move it there. Many Thanks.

I recently encountered a rather rude person who voiced an objection to O-ism from what was claimed as a fatal contradiction between O's Metaphysical Axiom law of identity and volitional will. The socialist/communists sympathizer asserted that minds cannot posses volitional will if reality's casualty results from the law of identity. I could not think of a way to counter that point, so now I respectfully ask:

How does an Objectivist philosopher reconcile the volitional nature of free will with the casualty of material existence given facts from neurophysiology showing mind is a function of physical brains so as to validate that will is indeed volitional as opposed to deterministic as would seem Prima Facie true (as opposed to a thoughtful Prima Secundae) under a=a casualty as applied to physical brains without regard to how minds actually work without seeming to appeal to mysticism or ignorance?

Best wishes and regards for your continued success; I hope you make huge profits from capitalism and free market enterprise.

[BaalChatzaf]

How does an Objectivist philosopher reconcile the volitional nature of free will with the casualty of material existence given facts from neurophysiology showing mind is a function of physical brains so as to validate that will is indeed volitional as opposed to deterministic as would seem Prima Facie true (as opposed to a thoughtful Prima Secundae) under a=a casualty as applied to physical brains without regard to how minds actually work without seeming to appeal to mysticism or ignorance?

With great difficulty.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Reidy]

This argument confuses a necessary condition with a sufficient condition or with an equivalence (both necessary and sufficient). You need a nervous system in order to be conscious, but that doesn't make the two the same. You need tires in order to have a working car, but four working tires aren't a working car. The standard and, to me, quite satisfactory way of distinguishing the two is to point out that we use entirely different predicates to talk about each. Physiological events have electrical properties or consist of the reaction of certain elements, for example, while thoughts have consistency, insightfullness or wit. The nature of the nervous system may be to follow physical laws, but this doesn't prove anything about its activities or capacities.

I didn't understand this until I studied data communications and learned what a layered protocol is. Consciousness is (is, not resembles or is analagous to) a layered protocol. It requires a working physical layer if the upper layers are to work, but the vocabulary of the lower layers is insufficient to explain the workings of the higher ones.

Nathaniel Branden wrote about this in "Volition and Causality" in The Objectivist in the mid-60s. I think the material found its way into The Psychology of Self-Esteem.

[Brant Gaede]

Greetings Ayn Rand fans and fellow Objectivists.

I could not find a topic on this question. If there is a more appropriate location for this question, would the moderator be so kind as to move it there. Many Thanks.

I recently encountered a rather rude person who voiced an objection to O-ism from what was claimed as a fatal contradiction between O's Metaphysical Axiom law of identity and volitional will. The socialist/communists sympathizer asserted that minds cannot posses volitional will if reality's casualty results from the law of identity. I could not think of a way to counter that point, so now I respectfully ask:

How does an Objectivist philosopher reconcile the volitional nature of free will with the casualty of material existence given facts from neurophysiology showing mind is a function of physical brains so as to validate that will is indeed volitional as opposed to deterministic as would seem Prima Facie true (as opposed to a thoughtful Prima Secundae) under a=a casualty as applied to physical brains without regard to how minds actually work without seeming to appeal to mysticism or ignorance?

Free will is determined in the same sense that a coffee cup determines the shape of the coffee in the cup.

--Brant

[Selene]

Free will is determined in the same sense that a coffee cup determines the shape of the coffee in the cup.

--Brant

Damn that sounds really profound!

Adam

[Peter]

Robert Bumbalough wrote:

“. . . minds cannot posses volitional will if reality's casualty results from the law of identity . . . How does an Objectivist philosopher reconcile the volitional nature of free will with the casualty of material existence given facts from neurophysiology showing mind is a function of physical brains . . . “

end quote

Peter Reidy responded:

This argument confuses a necessary condition with a sufficient condition or with an equivalence (both necessary and sufficient). You need a nervous system in order to be conscious, but that doesn't make the two the same. You need tires in order to have a working car, but four working tires aren't a working car. The standard and, to me, quite satisfactory way of distinguishing the two is to point out that we use entirely different predicates to talk about each. Physiological events have electrical properties or consist of the reaction of certain elements, for example, while thoughts have consistency, insightfullness or wit. The nature of the nervous system may be to follow physical laws, but this doesn't prove anything about its activities or capacities.

I didn't understand this until I studied data communications and learned what a layered protocol is. Consciousness is (is, not resembles or is analagous to) a layered protocol. It requires a working physical layer if the upper layers are to work, but the vocabulary of the lower layers is insufficient to explain the workings of the higher ones.

End quote

Robert, I have literally hundreds of pages of debates between Objectivists and Hard and Soft Determinists and I see no need to rehash them. Mr. Reidy’s answer is one of the best I have ever seen, and includes elements I have never seen before. I especially like the layered protocol description.

I wrote the following around ten years ago after viewing a show from UCSD on fMRI’s. It may be elementary for you but others might appreciate a little background:

So, the brain is not entirely pre-wired. Before birth, neuron connections are minimal, though there are sporadic upper level alpha, delta, and theta waves that are also found in adult humans.

However, soon after birth, a MASSIVE OVER-PROLIFERATION of new brain connections is produced in the Cerebral Cortex. This MASSIVE OVER-PROLIFERATION lasts for one year, before leveling off. Then, for a lifetime, we experience lesser New Connectivity. But New Connectivity does not disappear as we age!

So. "Are thoughts material?" Yes and No? (I was hammered by Mr. Reidy that last time I answered Yes and NO.)

"Does the learning of ‘immaterial' thoughts, physically affect the material brain?" Yes.

I used the phrases that Professor Stiles used: "Material" and "Immaterial." I think "Physical" and "Non-Physical" is better, but either phrasing may be OK.

My own thinking is that Non-Physical "thoughts" transform the electrical / chemical / physical brain- AS they are thought. When and if they are stored in memory, the physical brain is again changed, at another Physical location. Non-Physical Consciousness can then, remember and experience the Non-Physical thought again, utilizing what is physically stored in memory.

However, WHILE we are thinking or remembering (and re-thinking) a "thought," it exists in a Physical sense within the ever-changing brain, AND the "thought" exists in a buffer, intermediate Non-Physical state, within the Consciousness.

The "thought" can ONLY be directly discerned / felt / identified within the Consciousness experiencing the thought. The "Physical" and the "Non-Physical" thought are NOT the one and the same.

It is analogous, perhaps, to our Physical senses experiencing a ray of light in a sunrise. We are experiencing and sensing a physical ray that has traveled from the sun. The immediate experiences of sensing are physical. Our visual cortex is altered as the physical ray of light strikes the back of the eye and an image of the ray of light is carried via chemical and electrical means to our brains, for evaluation and possible storage.

Our "Perceptual" identification of the ray of light, and what we feel, is Non-Physical, while this Physical process is going on. The "Objectively acquired," Non-Physical feeling can then be Physically stored in memory for retrieval and Non-Physical appreciation in the future. There are no ghosts in the machine. Our identity, as humans, is Physical and Non-Physical.

This non-contradictory identification of the Physical Body and the Non-Physical Consciousness, both within Reality, is the basis for Ayn Rand's Psycho-Epistemology, and Science may be proving her right. One cannot exist without the other: thoughts cannot exist without a Consciousness to think them, and a Consciousness cannot exist without a Physical apparatus, the body.

A skeptic might say, no fMRI image is going to support the existence of the non-physical. Consciousness exists, and we are still studying its exact nature. However, we know Consciousness has Physical components and it has components of Energy. That is why I consider it a *life-force.*

Imagine yourself, as you fall into a dreamless state of sleep. Thoughts cease. The Physical Being is still there, but the Prime-Mover, Consciousness has, for a time, ceased to exist, in its "usual" form.

Compare sleep, to what must occur at death. At death, something has been destroyed. What would you call that, which is forever lost?

Obviously, I don’t have a science background. I would appreciate if anyone can tell me what has been happening lately, in layman’s terms.

It is a tough question Robert. As I think these thoughts it is coming from a material brain but my experience of the material is an energy, or an impression like perceiving a ray of light, or simply it is just “consciousness.”

I would appreciate any . . . er . . . thoughts on the matter.

Semper cogitans fidele,

Independent Objectivist

Peter Taylor

[Peter]

“She blinded me with science. SCIENCE!”

If thoughts are material, how much mass does a thought have? Is it composed of an element? Which element? An unknown element? If so what is thought's atomic mass? If thoughts are material does a “light bulb” of a sort literally go on over or inside a person’s head?

When we die, how much does our essence or “soul” weigh?

If thoughts are material, how much mass does a thought have? If a thought has mass, then does the weight of thoughts accumulate in the brain? No wonder my head is weary.

Wait a minute. A question on Jeopardy just now said the brain weighs about 3 pounds. When we die should it not weigh, oh say, 6 pounds? If not where does the mass go when we stop thinking a thought.

And come on! Star Trek transporters? Consciousness is shattered and then reconstituted at a distant site? You can lower your phaser, Jean Luc. I am not getting in the transporter.

If a person has big thoughts or ideas do they weigh more than a passing thought?

Please understand, I do not dispute Rand that reality exists and that consciousness exists. I just think the theories need more science.

I will be thinking about the *Volition* part of Robert’s question.

Peter

Edited October 20, 2010 by Peter Taylor

[BaalChatzaf]

Free will is determined in the same sense that a coffee cup determines the shape of the coffee in the cup.

--Brant

Is Free Will a liquid that assumes the shape of the vessel which contains it? I don't think so.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[rodney203]

Thanks for the quiz question. My copy of OPAR is at work right now. I think there is a chapter on "volition", which I will review. I'm sure another read of it will clarify me on it's strengths and/or weaknesses. Perhaps I'll post something concise later.

[rodney203]

I wrote:

"My copy of OPAR is at work right now. I think there is a chapter on "volition", which I will review"

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ok, it's as I thought. It's considered to be axiomatic. You just either see it or you don't.

Actually, this reminds us of how it is only ideas and concepts which must be "proved". Existents can't be proved, they just are; and "volition" is an existent (not an "entity", but an "existent").

[Brant Gaede]

Free will is determined in the same sense that a coffee cup determines the shape of the coffee in the cup.

--Brant

Is Free Will a liquid that assumes the shape of the vessel which contains it? I don't think so.

Ba'al Chatzaf

An analogy is not an argument. It is an illustration to help grasp an idea. In this case the vessel is the human being and free will is how he consciously directs the use of his mind.

--Brant

[Selene]

Free will is determined in the same sense that a coffee cup determines the shape of the coffee in the cup.

--Brant

Is Free Will a liquid that assumes the shape of the vessel which contains it? I don't think so.

Ba'al Chatzaf

An analogy is not an argument. It is an illustration to help grasp an idea. In this case the vessel is the human being and free will is how he consciously directs the use of his mind.

--Brant

Brant:

I disagree. It is a lower order of argument, in terms of its level of probative value. Similar to evidential probative values, it would be one of the lowest, but it is still an argument.

"In an argument by analogy it is claimed that if two things have certain characteristics (1) in common, then they are also probably have one or more additional traits (2) in common. When done well the argument can lead to an increase in knowledge. For example, Charles Darwin noted the similarities between animal and plant breeding (artificial selection) and natural selection in developing his theory of evolution. But when done poorly or deceptively it can mislead, and is a leading propaganda tool. Here is the basic form: Sam likes Bach, Beethoven, Brahms and Bruckner.

I now Sally likes Bach, Beethoven and Brahms. She will probably like Bruckner also, so I will buy this CD for her.

In many cases the additional trait(s) are simply implied. Calling pork "the other white meat" implies that like chicken and fish it is better for you than red meat. The advertisement can convince at least some of the viewers, without any data to support it."

"Analogical Reasoning The simplest variety of inductive reasoning is argument by analogy, which takes note of the fact that two or more things are similar in some respects and concludes that they are probably also similar in some further respect. Not every analogy is an argument; we frequently use such comparisons simply to explain or illustrate what we mean. But arguments by analogy are common, too.

Suppose, for example, that I am thinking about buying a new car. I'm very likely to speak with other people who have recently bought new cars, noting their experiences with various makes, models, and dealers. If I discover that three of my friends have recently bought Geo Prizms from Burg and that all three have been delighted with their purchases, then I will conclude by analogy that if I buy a Geo Prizm from Burg, I will be delighted, too."

I understand what you meant though. In my pyramid of arguments, it links a particular to another particular in an almost visceral manner. It is a kind of jump argument.

It can lead to a really brilliant conclusion or a really poor one.

Adam

Edited October 20, 2010 by Selene

[Starbuckle]

David Kelley's lectures on volition, part of the "Foundations of Knowledge" set, are the best explanations I have come across of this topic. However, I just checked the Atlas Society web site and its store doesn't appear to have the set. Kelley explores causality, why volition would have survival value and other interesting issues in his set of lectures.

The notion of causality posited by the rude acquaintance seems to be one unrelated to the nature of the acting entity whose causal powers are at issue. A volitional act is indeed caused; one's act of choosing among alternatives is one of the causes of one's action (but not the only cause). One can have motives to act one way and another set of motives to act another way, and then by an act of will choose to allow certain motives to be determinative. Only a notion of causality that would ban an entity from having certain attributes (like a self-regulatory consciousness) could support the conclusion that an entity "can't" be volitional.

That volition is a fact is what we start with. We know by introspection that we choose. We can observe ourselves choosing. That's not all there is to be said about it, but a theory is not auspicious which begins by denying the existence of a capacity in ourselves that we directly perceive, and that is evidently limited by our nature and nonmagical. The faculty of volition itself has (biological) causes, and the exercise of volition is a cause.

A principle of ausality does not have the power to rewrite the nature of things. A principle of causality is confused and confounding unless it is accepted as an implication of the nature of things. Volition is a different kind of trait from texture, color or shape. But being different doesn't mean it doesn't exist, or that it "contradicts causality."

Edited October 21, 2010 by Starbuckle

[Peter]

Starbuckle wrote:

Only a notion of causality that would ban an entity from having certain attributes (like a self-regulatory consciousness) could support the conclusion that an entity "can't" be volitional. Kelley explores causality, why volition would have survival value and other interesting issues in his set of lectures . That volition is a fact is what we start with. We know it by introspection. We can observe ourselves choosing. That's not all there is to be said about it, but a theory is not auspicious which begins by contradicting a capacity in ourselves that we directly perceive, and that is evidently constrained by our nature and nonmagical. The faculty of volition itself has causes, and the exercise of volition is a cause.

End quote

Excellent, Starbuckle.

The following news tidbit which I cut but forgot to get the attribution for, mimics the Scientific Determinist thinking:

“Black hole physics, in which space and time become compressed, provides a basis for math showing that the third dimension may not exist at all. In this two-dimensional cartoon of a universe, what we perceive as a third dimension would actually be a projection of time intertwined with depth. If this is true, the illusion can only be maintained until equipment becomes sensitive enough to find its limits.”

End quote

Free will is an illusion? I disagree.

Even lower “instinctual” animals can exhibit, “random” thinking and actions, not tied to a current stimuli. Watch a mother cat that has recently given birth. She is heavily under the influence of instinct and hormones, but can still choose to stop tending to one kitten, daydream, listen to a dog barking in the distance, then randomly select another kitten for grooming, etc. Causality changes because of the “willfull” actions of life.

Human Consciousness is self evident and axiomatic. We do in fact, raise or lower our conscious awareness “at will” and without any causal necessity. That ability is the start of *Volition.*

Independent Objectivist,

Peter Taylor

[BaalChatzaf]

Human Consciousness is self evident and axiomatic. We do in fact, raise or lower our conscious awareness "at will" and without any causal necessity. That ability is the start of *Volition.*

A change without a cause?

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Peter]

Ba'al Chatzaf wrote:

A change without a cause?

end quote

Fess Up Ba'al! What made you respond, a bowling ball rolling down your hallway, God, or aliens?

Or did you initiate the "cause?" I have always been amused by people who ignore the 800 pound gorilla in the room: *Volition.*

Peter

[BaalChatzaf]

Ba'al Chatzaf wrote:

A change without a cause?

end quote

Fess Up Ba'al! What made you respond, a bowling ball rolling down your hallway, God, or aliens?

Or did you initiate the "cause?" I have always been amused by people who ignore the 800 pound gorilla in the room: *Volition.*

Peter

I have no doubts at all about the existence of volition. I volit at least six times an hour. I just wonder what physical process makes it happen. Everything that exists is physical.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited October 21, 2010 by BaalChatzaf

[Brant Gaede]

Ba'al Chatzaf wrote:

A change without a cause?

end quote

Fess Up Ba'al! What made you respond, a bowling ball rolling down your hallway, God, or aliens?

Or did you initiate the "cause?" I have always been amused by people who ignore the 800 pound gorilla in the room: *Volition.*

Peter

I have no doubts at all about the existence of volition. I volit at least six times an hour. I just wonder what physical process makes it happen. Everything that exists is physical.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Well, obviously (?) it's neurogenic activity. And the brain basically functions apart from consciousness but makes consciousness possible. But where is consciousness? Could it exist somewhat outside the body in the same sense that some body heat exists outside the body? I know this doesn't answer you, btw.

--Brant

the world wants to know

Edited October 21, 2010 by Brant Gaede

[BaalChatzaf]

Well, obviously (?) it's neurogenic activity. And the brain basically functions apart from consciousness but makes consciousness possible. But where is consciousness? Could it exist somewhat outside the body in the same sense that some body heat exists outside the body? I know this doesn't answer you, btw.

If it exists outside the body, what is its physical nature? Is it a field? Does it consist of particles? If so, what spin and charge? Lots of things exist outside our body that affect our body. For example the gravitational field of the Earth.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Brant Gaede]

Well, obviously (?) it's neurogenic activity. And the brain basically functions apart from consciousness but makes consciousness possible. But where is consciousness? Could it exist somewhat outside the body in the same sense that some body heat exists outside the body? I know this doesn't answer you, btw.

If it exists outside the body, what is its physical nature? Is it a field? Does it consist of particles? If so, what spin and charge? Lots of things exist outside our body that affect our body. For example the gravitational field of the Earth.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Please, Bob, read carefully what I write. I said in the same sense some body heat exists outside our bodies. That heat originates inside our bodies. There is no consciousness as such inside the physical structure of a brain so the brain must generate consciousness, no?, in some sort of physical manifestation, perhaps electrical.

--Brant

[BaalChatzaf]

Please, Bob, read carefully what I write. I said in the same sense some body heat exists outside our bodies. That heat originates inside our bodies. There is no consciousness as such inside the physical structure of a brain so the brain must generate consciousness, no?, in some sort of physical manifestation, perhaps electrical.

--Brant

O.K. Now I understand.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Peter]

Rand wrote:

0“A process of thought is not automatic nor “instinctive” nor involuntary—nor infallible. Man has to initiate it, to sustain it and to bear responsibility for its results.”

End quote

Ba'al Chatzaf wrote:

I have no doubts at all about the existence of volition. I volit at least six times an hour. I just wonder what physical process makes it happen. Everything that exists is physical.

end quote

Glad to hear it Ba’al. Hard Scientists have no problem with Chaos or The Uncertainty Principle. Does Volition grate on your nerves at the rate of six times per hour? ) I hope not. That would be worse than urinating six times a night because you take a diuretic for high blood pressure.

I have always thought that Hard and Soft Determinists MUST supply a running list of what just made them say what they just said. Now that is a road to Freudian insanity. I do not think there is a “cause” for everything said, as in billiard ball causality, other than in the sense that human choice is a type of causality.

I am sympathetic to the argument that once begun, math, or a chain of logic leads to a particular answer once proposed, but those formulations are the product of volitional causality.

Brant wrote:

Well, obviously (?) it's neurogenic activity. And the brain basically functions apart from consciousness but makes consciousness possible. But where is consciousness? Could it exist somewhat outside the body in the same sense that some body heat exists outside the body? I know this doesn't answer you, btw.

End quote

My educated guess is that Consciousness is electro / physical / chemical. That *Entity* for physical reasons is confined to the body. Electrical extensions of the *conscious entity* can move it outside the physical confines of the body. Well at least our science of full immersion video games may be heading into that area.

Got to go. My granddaughters bed is in this room, and my wife is rocking her to sleep.

Independent Objectiiiiiviiiiist, (special ego-ist affects)

Peter

I grabbed some notes. There may be some overlap.

Causality

The law of causality is the law of identity applied to action. All actions are caused by entities. The nature of an action is caused and determined by the nature of the entities that act; a thing cannot act in contradiction to its nature . . . . The law of identity does not permit you to have your cake and eat it, too. The law of causality does not permit you to eat your cake before you have it.

Galt’s Speech, For the New Intellectual, 151.

To grasp the axiom that existence exists, means to grasp the fact that nature, i.e., the universe as a whole, cannot be created or annihilated, that it cannot come into or go out of existence. Whether its basic constituent elements are atoms, or subatomic particles, or some yet undiscovered forms of energy, it is not ruled by a consciousness or by will or by chance, but by the law of identity. All the countless forms, motions, combinations and dissolutions of elements within the universe—from a floating speck of dust to the formation of a galaxy to the emergence of life—are caused and determined by the identities of the elements involved.

“The Metaphysical and the Man-Made,”

Philosophy: Who Needs It, 25.

Since things are what they are, since everything that exists possesses a specific identity, nothing in reality can occur causelessly or by chance.

Leonard Peikoff “The Analytic-Synthetic Dichotomy,”

Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, 108.

Choice . . . is not chance. Volition is not an exception to the Law of Causality; it is a type of causation.

Free Will

That which you call your soul or spirit is your consciousness, and that which you call “free will” is your mind’s freedom to think or not, the only will you have, your only freedom, the choice that controls all the choices you make and determines your life and your character.

Galt’s Speech, For the New Intellectual, 127.

To think is an act of choice. The key to what you so recklessly call “human nature,” the open secret you live with, yet dread to name, is the fact that man is a being of volitional consciousness. Reason does not work automatically; thinking is not a mechanical process; the connections of logic are not made by instinct. The function of your stomach, lungs or heart is automatic; the function of your mind is not. In any hour and issue of your life, you are free to think or to evade that effort. But you are not free to escape from your nature, from the fact that reason is your means of survival—so that for you, who are a human being, the question “to be or not to be” is the question “to think or not to think.”

A being of volitional consciousness has no automatic course of behavior. He needs a code of values to guide his actions.

Galt’s Speech, For the New Intellectual, 120.

Man’s consciousness shares with animals the first two stages of its development: sensations and perceptions; but it is the third state, conceptions, that makes him man. Sensations are integrated into perceptions automatically, by the brain of a man or of an animal. But to integrate perceptions into conceptions by a process of abstraction, is a feat that man alone has the power to perform—and he has to perform it by choice. The process of abstraction, and of concept-formation is a process of reason, of thought; it is not automatic nor instinctive nor involuntary nor infallible. Man has to initiate it, to sustain it and to bear responsibility for its results. The pre-conceptual level of consciousness is nonvolitional; volition begins with the first syllogism. Man has the choice to think or to evade—to maintain a state of full awareness or to drift from moment to moment, in a semi-conscious daze, at the mercy of whatever associational whims the unfocused mechanism of his consciousness produces.

“For the New Intellectual,” For the New Intellectual, 14.

Reason is the faculty that identifies and integrates the material provided by man’s senses. It is a faculty that man has to exercise by choice. Thinking is not an automatic function. In any hour and issue of his life, man is free to think or to evade that effort. Thinking requires a state of full, focused awareness. The act of focusing one’s consciousness is volitional. Man can focus his mind to a full, active, purposefully directed awareness of reality—or he can unfocus it and let himself drift in a semiconscious daze, merely reacting to any chance stimulus of the immediate moment, at the mercy of his undirected sensory-perceptual mechanism and of any random, associational connections it might happen to make.

When man unfocuses his mind, he may be said to be conscious in a subhuman sense of the word, since he experiences sensations and perceptions. But in the sense of the word applicable to man—in the sense of a consciousness which is aware of reality and able to deal with it, a consciousness able to direct the actions and provide for the survival of a human being—an unfocused mind is not conscious.

Psychologically, the choice “to think or not” is the choice “to focus or not.” Existentially, the choice “to focus or not” is the choice “to be conscious or not.” Metaphysically, the choice “to be conscious or not” is the choice of life or death . . . .

A process of thought is not automatic nor “instinctive” nor involuntary—nor infallible. Man has to initiate it, to sustain it and to bear responsibility for its results. He has to discover how to tell what is true or false and how to correct his own errors; he has to discover how to validate his concepts, his conclusions, his knowledge; he has to discover the rules of thought, the laws of logic, to direct his thinking. Nature gives him no automatic guarantee of the efficacy of his mental effort.

Nothing is given to man on earth except a potential and the material on which to actualize it. The potential is a superlative machine: his consciousness; but it is a machine without a spark plug, a machine of which his own will has to be the spark plug, the self-starter and the driver; he has to discover how to use it and he has to keep it in constant action. The material is the whole of the universe, with no limits set to the knowledge he can acquire and to the enjoyment of life he can achieve. But everything he needs or desires has to be learned, discovered and produced by him—by his own choice, by his own effort, by his own mind . . . .

That which [man’s] survival requires is set by his nature and is not open to his choice. What is open to his choice is only whether he will discover it or not, whether he will choose the right goals and values or not. He is free to make the wrong choice, but not free to succeed with it. He is free to evade reality, he is free to unfocus his mind and stumble blindly down any road he pleases, but not free to avoid the abyss he refuses to see. Knowledge, for any conscious organism, is the means of survival; to a living consciousness, every “is” implies an “ought.” Man is free to choose not to be conscious, but not free to escape the penalty of unconsciousness: destruction. Man is the only living species that has the power to act as his own destroyer—and that is the way he has acted through most of his history.

“The Objectivist Ethics,” The Virtue of Selfishness, 21.

The faculty of volition operates in regard to the two fundamental aspects of man’s life: consciousness and existence, i.e., his psychological action and his existential action, i.e., the formation of his own character and the course of action he pursues in the physical world.

“What Is Romanticism?” The Romantic Manifesto, 100.

A social environment can neither force a man to think nor prevent him from thinking. But a social environment can offer incentives or impediments; it can make the exercise of one’s rational faculty easier or harder; it can encourage thinking and penalize evasion or vice versa.

“Our Cultural Value-Deprivation,”

The Objectivist, April 1966, 2.

A man’s volition is outside the power of other men. What the unalterable basic constituents are to nature, the attribute of a volitional consciousness is to the entity “man.” Nothing can force a man to think. Others may offer him incentives or impediments, rewards or punishments, they may destroy his brain by drugs or by the blow of a club, but they cannot order his mind to function: this is in his exclusive, sovereign power. Man is neither to be obeyed nor to be commanded.

“The Metaphysical Versus the Man-Made,”

Philosophy: Who Needs It, 31.

Because man has free will, no human choice—and no phenomenon which is a product of human choice—is metaphysically necessary. In regard to any man-made fact, it is valid to claim that man has chosen thus, but it was not inherent in the nature of existence for him to have done so: he could have chosen otherwise.

Choice, however, is not chance. Volition is not an exception to the Law of Causality; it is a type of causation.

Leonard Peikoff “The Analytic-Synthetic Dichotomy,”

Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, 110.

Man exists and his mind exists. Both are part of nature, both possess a specific identity. The attribute of volition does not contradict the fact of identity, just as the existence of living organisms does not contradict the existence of inanimate matter. Living organisms possess the power of self-initiated motion, which inanimate matter does not possess; man’s consciousness possesses the power of self-initiated motion in the realm of cognition (thinking), which the consciousnesses of other living species do not possess. But just as animals are able to move only in accordance with the nature of their bodies, so man is able to initiate and direct his mental action only in accordance with the nature (the identity) of his consciousness. His volition is limited to his cognitive processes; he has the power to identify (and to conceive of rearranging) the elements of reality, but not the power to alter them. He has the power to use his cognitive faculty as its nature requires, but not the power to alter it nor to escape the consequences of its misuse. He has the power to suspend, evade, corrupt or subvert his perception of reality, but not the power to escape the existential and psychological disasters that follow. (The use or misuse of his cognitive faculty determines a man’s choice of values, which determine his emotions and his character. It is in this sense that man is a being of self-made soul.)

Metaphysical vs. Man-Made

Any natural phenomenon, i.e., any event which occurs without human participation, is the metaphysically given, and could not have occurred differently or failed to occur; any phenomenon involving human action is the man-made, and could have been different. For example, a flood occurring in an uninhabited land, is the metaphysically given; a dam built to contain the flood water, is the man-made; if the builders miscalculate and the dam breaks, the disaster is metaphysical in its origin, but intensified by man in its consequences. To correct the situation, men must obey nature by studying the causes and potentialities of the flood, then command nature by building better flood controls.

“The Metaphysical Versus the Man-Made,”

Philosophy: Who Needs It, 27.

Things of human origin (whether physical or psychological) may be designated as “man-made facts”—as distinguished from the metaphysically given facts. A skyscraper is a man-made fact, a mountain is a metaphysically given fact. One can alter a skyscraper or blow it up (just as one can alter or blow up a mountain), but so long as it exists, one cannot pretend that it is not there or that it is not what it is.

“The Metaphysical Versus the Man-Made,”

Philosophy: Who Needs It, 31.

Nature, i.e., the universe as a whole, cannot be created or annihilated . . . it cannot come into or go out of existence. Whether its basic constituent elements are atoms, or subatomic particles, or some yet undiscovered forms of energy, it is not ruled by a consciousness or by will or by chance, but by the law of identity. All the countless forms, motions, combinations and dissolutions of elements within the universe—from a floating speck of dust to the formation of a galaxy to the emergence of life—are caused and determined by the identities of the elements involved. Nature is the metaphysically given—i.e., the nature of nature is outside the power of any volition.

“The Metaphysical Versus the Man-Made,”

Philosophy: Who Needs It, 25.

Man’s faculty of volition as such is not a contradiction of nature, but it opens the way for a host of contradictions—when and if men do not grasp the crucial difference between the metaphysically given and any object, institution, procedure, or rule of conduct made by man.

It is the metaphysically given that must be accepted: it cannot be changed. It is the man-made that must never be accepted uncritically: it must be judged, then accepted or rejected and changed when necessary. Man is not omniscient or infallible: he can make innocent errors through lack of knowledge, or he can lie, cheat and fake. The manmade may be a product of genius, perceptiveness, ingenuity—or it may be a product of stupidity, deception, malice, evil. One man may be right and everyone else wrong, or vice versa (or any numerical division in between). Nature does not give man any automatic guarantee of the truth of his judgments (and this is a metaphysically given fact, which must be accepted). Who, then, is to judge? Each man, to the best of his ability and honesty. What is his standard of judgment? The metaphysically given.

The metaphysically given cannot be true or false, it simply is—and man determines the truth or falsehood of his judgments by whether they correspond to or contradict the facts of reality. The metaphysically given cannot be right or wrong—it is the standard of right or wrong, by which a (rational) man judges his goals, his values, his choices. The metaphysically given is, was, will be, and had to be. Nothing made by man had to be: it was made by choice.

“The Metaphysical Versus the Man-Made,”

Philosophy: Who Needs It, 27.

A man-made product did not have to exist, but, once made, it does exist. A man’s actions did not have to be performed, but, once performed, they are facts of reality. The same is true of a man’s character: he did not have to make the choices he made, but, once he has formed his character, it is a fact, and it is his personal identity. (Man’s volition gives him great, but not unlimited, latitude to change his character; if he does, the change becomes a fact.)

“The Metaphysical Versus the Man-Made,”

Philosophy: Who Needs It, 31.

[One must] distinguish metaphysical facts from man-made facts—i.e., facts which are inherent in the identities of that which exists, from facts which depend upon the exercise of human volition. Because man has free will, no human choice—and no phenomenon which is a product of human choice—is metaphysically necessary. In regard to any man-made fact, it is valid to claim that man has chosen thus, but it was not inherent in the nature of existence for him to have done so; he could have chosen otherwise. For instance, the U.S. did not have to consist of 50 states; men could have subdivided the larger ones, or consolidated the smaller ones, etc.

Choice, however, is not chance. Volition is not an exception to the Law of Causality; it is a type of causation. . . . Further, metaphysical facts are unalterable by man, and limit the alternatives open to his choice. Man can rearrange the materials that exist in reality, but he cannot violate their identity; he cannot escape the laws of nature. “Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed.”

[BaalChatzaf]

I have always thought that Hard and Soft Determinists MUST supply a running list of what just made them say what they just said. Now that is a road to Freudian insanity. I do not think there is a "cause" for everything said, as in billiard ball causality, other than in the sense that human choice is a type of causality.

I am sympathetic to the argument that once begun, math, or a chain of logic leads to a particular answer once proposed, but those formulations are the product of volitional causality.

And what is the underlying physical process of this volitional causality. Whatever happens in the cosmos is a manifestation of physical process. Hopefully we have at least a rough idea of the physical laws that would describe these processes.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Peter]

Ba'al Chatzaf wrote:

And what is the underlying physical process of this volitional causality. Whatever happens in the cosmos is a manifestation of physical process. Hopefully we have at least a rough idea of the physical laws that would describe these processes.

End quote

I typed into Bing, “are thoughts material,” and came up with a site that started with the following poem, and then the site attacked my computer, with “malicious script.” I zapped that. I am not using Bing again. I will use Yahoo search.

Ralph “Where’s Waldo” EMERSON wrote:

"Go, speed the stars of Thought

On to their shining goals;

The sower scatters broad his seed,

The wheat thou strew'st be souls."

Feeling ticked off, I added the word “Where’s” to Waldo’s name.

What sort of evil mind would use a “spiritual” site to hack computers, and why?

Back to Yahoo search.

I typed in Physiology of Mind and got this. I won’t say anymore except to see it looks like the science is just beginning.

Peter

Amiya Sarkar

A doctor by profession, I graduated from R G Kar Medical College, Calcutta, and done MD in Physiology. I want to explain the basis of physiological mechanisms in simple yet elegant terms. You may contact me at amiya.sarkar@gmail.com

April 05, 2009

Capturing Thought, in Real Time

Wouldn't it be nice if we mapped how the thought processes traveled across our brain, in real time? That's exactly what Mazahir Hasan et al of Max Planck Institute for Medical Research in Heidelberg, have enabled us to view, when an action potential (AP) is underway in the central nervous system (CNS).

The researchers introduced fluorescent calcium indicator proteins (FCIP) into the brain cells of mice by means of viral gene vectors. Each time an AP was underway, a lot of ionic phenomena happened. For example, the fast Sodium channels (Na+) opened (letting positive charges to the interior of the cell) leading to depolarization, Potassium (K+) channels opened (to bring back the resting membrane potential to normal, since K+ egress out of the cells) and so on.

Next , the impulse is transmitted to the post-synaptic neuron through the agency of neurotransmitters. But, for this 'coupling' between the presynaptic and postsynaptic neurons to occur; Calcium ion (Ca++) levels in the synaptic knobs of the presynaptic neurons must rise for effective degranulation of the presynaptic vesicles. And that's precisely these researchers were banking upon.

Just before the degranulation of synaptic vesicles begins; calcium ion concentration surges. Such short calcium currents peak within milliseconds, making them the appropriate ions for studying fast neuronal activity. Previously scientists had measured such currents by using microelectrodes implanted within the brain; but this method was quite unsuitable in studying moving animals or for a longer time period. So, they went on to produce stable transgenic mouse lines responding to functional calcium indicators; (including 'inverse pericam' and 'camgaroo-2') using viral vectors. These transgenic mouse lines were under TET inducible promoter (tetracycline, a broad-spectrum antibiotic) control. The TET system offered the advantage of targeting combination of different neuronal cell assemblies. The other side of the Ptetbi (bidirectional promoter tetracycline) promoter was attached to the firefly luciferase gene. They were also sensitive to doxicline (another antibiotic belonging to the same category as tetracycline) in terms of regulation of luciferase, as well.

They then used a heteromeric sensor protein called D3cpv, which was made to produce in the nerve cells of the transgenic mice. Two subunits of this protein reacted to the binding of calcium ions in a way that when the yellow-fluorescent protein (YFP) lit up and the cyan-fluorescent protein (CFP) intensity diminished. When calcium was bound to the D3cpv complex; CFP (cyan fluorescent protein) and YFP (yellow fluorescent protein) came closer together bringing about FRET, in such a way that there was a visible color change, 'visually' or optically indicating the progression of action potential in real time. CFP and YFP are spectral variants of GFP linked together by a Ca++ sensitive linker.

They used 'two-photon imaging microscopy' to study this phenomenon. They excited thinned out rat skulls using two-photons simultaneously using 'mode-locked' Titanium-sapphire laser. They then amplified the signal using photomultipliers and analyzed them.

The resolution of the experiment was limited to less than 1 Hz (frequency of action potentials). They conferred that human thought processes might be mapped in much the same 'opto-physiologic way', in contrast to the usual electrophysiologic approach. Not only does the experiment throw light on the thought processes in real-time, but also, it is expected that it will be useful in the pathophysiology and treatment of Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease and Huntington's chorea.

FCIP-positive cells were found in the hippocampal CA1 and CA3 regions, mossy fiber areas of the dentate gyrus, neocortical pyramidal cells and olfactory receptor neurons, they remarked. They studied cortical pyramidal cell, olfactory and optical responses in the mice in their experiment.

Hasan, M., Friedrich, R., Euler, T., Larkum, M., Giese, G., Both, M., Duebel, J., Waters, J., Bujard, H., Griesbeck, O., Tsien, R., Nagai, T., Miyawaki, A., & Denk, W. (2004). Functional Fluorescent Ca2+ Indicator Proteins in Transgenic Mice under TET Control PLoS Biology, 2 (6) DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.0020163

[peterdjones]

A volitional act is indeed caused; one's act of choosing among alternatives is one of the causes of one's action (but not the only cause).

The act may be caused, but the decision cannot be (fully) caused, or it would not be free.

One can have motives to act one way and another set of motives to act another way, and then by an act of will choose to allow certain motives to be determinative. Only a notion of causality that would ban an entity from having certain attributes (like a self-regulatory consciousness) could support the conclusion that an entity "can't" be volitional.

An entity can't make an uncaused choice between motive-action pairs if there is no indeterminism. Volition is blocked off

be determinism, the nature of consciousness doesn't come into it.

That volition is a fact is what we start with. We know by introspection that we choose. We can observe ourselves choosing. That's not all there is to be said about it, but a theory is not auspicious which begins by denying the existence of a capacity in ourselves that we directly perceive, and that is evidently limited by our nature and nonmagical.

But causality is also held to be directly perceived.

The faculty of volition itself has (biological) causes, and the exercise of volition is a cause.

is a different kind of trait from texture, color or shape. But being different doesn't mean it doesn't exist, or that it "contradicts causality."

To make a free choice is to make an unforced choice, and that *does* contradict universal determinism.