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  1. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Help about light and productivity.

    You can buy 'daylight' bulbs and strips that approximate the spectrum of sunlight, if that's what you're after...
  2. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Biden goes back on his word.

    I wonder how much there is to find after James Comer's Oversight Committee just spent more than a year investigating the Bidens with intent to indict - with no result.
  3. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Biden goes back on his word.

    That is just poor lawyering. The case can't be dismissed as the defendant has already been tried and found guilty; it's no longer a Grand Jury indictment or a prosecution, it's a conviction. They can file a motion to have the sentence vacated on some equitable grounds in the interests of...
  4. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    I didn't intend it to mean Aristotelian teleology; it's usually associated with things we view as autonomous agents, i.e. that have internal goals. But where you draw the line is an interesting philosophical & semantic question - if it's a 'need', it could apply to all living things; if it's a...
  5. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    Ah, OK. When you said, "The autonomous car does not have free will because, with humans, "will" indicates desire", I took that to suggest that desire was necessary for free will. I'm not sure how else to parse it... If a door was selected, then either it was prompted by some preference or it...
  6. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    Apologies for the late reply. OK, so there's more to free will than the "possibility of choosing differently between at least 2 options". 'Desires' are necessary too. I would suggest that (in this context) a desire is a felt need for some future outcome and, for actionable outcomes, we could...
  7. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    A particular event in spacetime is unique. You can refer to it more than once, but it only occurs once.
  8. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    There's no 'may' about it. Similar circumstances can occur again, but not exactly the same circumstances (because, for example, that means occurring at the same point in spacetime). Not for biological organisms.
  9. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    I agree, with the caveat that the exact circumstances can only happen once, so it's kind of tautological...
  10. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    No, I don't think so - I think everything humans do is the result of prior events (including probabilistic quantum events which are themselves the result of prior events). To say it's determined by prior events is not to say that everything humans do is potentially predictable - because, true...
  11. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    I guess it comes down to what is meant by free will. Compatibilists typically define it in terms of an action not being coerced or constrained, i.e. the agent is free from outside interference. This seems like a reasonable view, although it does raise questions of what counts as coercion or...
  12. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    Apologies for the delay in replying. I'll try to keep it short. 1. Suppose an autonomous vehicle at a T-junction can either turn left towards a nearby recharge point, or right towards its next passenger pick-up point. It is physically capable of either action. It uses a learning algorithm, with...
  13. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    Apologies for not replying earlier, but I've been very busy out in the real world. I'm not sure what more I can add to what I've already said in terms of effective determinism, but to cut a long story short, the universe appears to be stochastic at the quantum level, but over the multiple...
  14. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    I don't think you can realistically expect to change someone's mind about such a fundamental belief with a few posts on a forum, but it's possible that you could prompt some deeper thought about the subject - but only if they're interested or willing to question their assumptions for the sake of...
  15. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    Not having a belief in free will doesn't make for unfeeling creatures without emotions; you still feel sympathy, empathy, love, anger, hate, betrayal, etc. There is still room for human rights and accepted norms of behaviour. People (generally) would have a sense of personal responsibility...
  16. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    I don't think certainty is possible (beyond the Cartesian 'cogito ergo sum'), but I'm inclined to prefer the simpler option, particularly when it accords with our currently accepted framework of knowledge and doesn't invoke ill-defined concepts. Sure, and? I am unaware of the causality of many...
  17. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    Yes, updating our credences of the situation as new information arrives is widely accepted as the most effective way to understand the world. Bayes' Theorem provides a mathematical foundation for doing this. From my POV, being enculturated in the UK, and brought up in a very Christian...
  18. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    The point is that while I am physically and mentally capable of picking any can, when I open the fridge and see 4 identical cans, my mental state at that moment (for that partiular visit to the fridge) will determine which can I select. For me, being a habitual sort, it would likely be the one...
  19. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    I agree - I don't think the compatibilist sense of free will is useful - it seems to reflect a need to give the perception of choice a name. But we give meaning to the world by dividing it up and categorising it, from quantum fields and atoms in the void to complex ecosystems and behaviours...
  20. FrumiousBandersnatch

    Free will and determinism

    That's partly true - I don't live my everyday life in a constant stream of rational thought about how I feel I have free will but in fact my actions are all determined. In practice, it makes no significant difference, I live my life as I always have, mainly on 'autopilot', occasionally stopping...
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