DavidMcC wrote:

archibald wrote:Standard free will is the sort most people believe in. It's the commonplace, everyday version, where healthy adults can freely and consciously choose, if not externally coerced and they have time to deliberate, and are morally responsible for their choices because it is assumed they could have freely chosen otherwise. Jerry Coyne, in his video, cited a survey which showed that about 75% of people surveyed in several countries believed in this version (80% in the USA).

To me, it sounds a lot like 'biological free will'.

But you think it is a figment of everyone's imagination, right?

I is muddled about "externally coerced".

I still don't agree that free will can be all about deliberation. If you exclude spontaneity you rule out all thought and inspiration, but then what is your deliberation but a series of spontaneous thoughts? You can't deliberate on what thoughts you will have.

Deliberation gives you more time to choose the thing you would have chosen if you had more time to think about it.

GrahamH wrote:I still don't agree that free will can be all about deliberation. If you exclude spontaneity you rule out all thought and inspiration, but then what is your deliberation but a series of spontaneous thoughts? You can't deliberate on what thoughts you will have.

My point was that we cannot make a free-willed decision if we don'r know what our will is, and that often/sometimes requires a little thought.
Every point in the above post is wrong.
A. If you haven't thought about what you are doing, you cannot know what your will is!
B. Spontaneity applies to having the initial idea. Deliberation applies to assessing that idea before acting on it. Without that thought, you are not acting on your will, but on your whim!
C. When did I say we couild defy the laws of physics by deliberating on future thoughts?? You made that piece of nonsene up.

LucidFlight wrote:Deliberation gives you more time to choose the thing you would have chosen if you had more time to think about it.

Oh, not you as well! What I was trying to say (but oviously didn't get through) is that an action cannot be free-willed if you don't give yourself time to think before acting. Thus many actions are NOT free-willed, even though we have the capacity for them, under the right conditions. Capiche?

archibald wrote:

DavidMcC wrote:

archibald wrote:Let's do football free will next. That's when a player gets back in position without his manager shouting at him. This, of course, would be a different type of free will than for other sports.

You may mock, but you are only exposing your lack of understanding of biological free will, and why I proposed it. Instead, you remain mired in the past, like Graham and romansh, and continue to assume that I'm really talking about religious free will.
Onwe day, the penny will drop... maybe.

But what exactly is 'biological' free will? Could you explain it some time? How does it differ from, say 'Football' Free Will? Does home advantage make a difference in either case?

More to the point, how does it differ from non-religious 'standard' free will?

We'r getting into a muddle here. I coined the phrase "standard free will" to mean the oldest idea of it, which I thought was the religious version. (Though I could be wrong, and don't want to start a whole new row bout that!.)

DavidMcC wrote:

GrahamH wrote:I still don't agree that free will can be all about deliberation. If you exclude spontaneity you rule out all thought and inspiration, but then what is your deliberation but a series of spontaneous thoughts? You can't deliberate on what thoughts you will have.

My point was that we cannot make a free-willed decision if we don'r know what our will is, and that often/sometimes requires a little thought.
Every point in the above post is wrong.
A. If you haven't thought about what you are doing, you cannot know what your will is!
B. Spontaneity applies to having the initial idea. Deliberation applies to assessing that idea before acting on it. Without that thought, you are not acting on your will, but on your whim!
C. When did I say we couild defy the laws of physics by deliberating on future thoughts?? You made that piece of nonsene up.

Maybe you have to deliberate in order to "know what your will is", but I think most people will know that without deliberation. Deliberation may allow a shift in intent, but in many cases we simply apprehend the situation and see what we will do. Deliberation is a process of constraining options. Spending time excluding options may allow time for new spontaneous thoughts about new options, but how do you generate new options by deliberating? You might go round and round over the same small set of options that all seem unacceptable without increasing your freedom at all.

... Archi, I have already defined biological free will. It differs from your "football free will" mainly in being much more general - you don't have to be involved in football, or even watch it to sometimes be able to be free-willed in your actions.

GrahamH wrote:

DavidMcC wrote:

GrahamH wrote:I still don't agree that free will can be all about deliberation. If you exclude spontaneity you rule out all thought and inspiration, but then what is your deliberation but a series of spontaneous thoughts? You can't deliberate on what thoughts you will have.

My point was that we cannot make a free-willed decision if we don'r know what our will is, and that often/sometimes requires a little thought.
Every point in the above post is wrong.
A. If you haven't thought about what you are doing, you cannot know what your will is!
B. Spontaneity applies to having the initial idea. Deliberation applies to assessing that idea before acting on it. Without that thought, you are not acting on your will, but on your whim!
C. When did I say we couild defy the laws of physics by deliberating on future thoughts?? You made that piece of nonsene up.

Maybe you have to deliberate in order to "know what your will is", but I think most people will know that without deliberation.

Perhaps under most circumstances, that is true, so perhaps I should have complicated my FW theory by diostinguishing bet\ween cases wheer it is "obvious" and when it is "less obvious" which is the best action. The obvious cases "obviously" don't require much deliberation.

Deliberation may allow a shift in intent, but in many cases we simply apprehend the situation and see what we will do. Deliberation is a process of constraining options. Spending time excluding options may allow time for new spontaneous thoughts about new options, but how do you generate new options by deliberating? You might go round and round over the same small set of options that all seem unacceptable without increasing your freedom at all.

The possibility of a "shift in intent during deliberation are a complication that I was not concerned about.
I agree that there is a possibility of going in circles, unable to come to a decision, like the donkey that is half way between two identical food sources, and that this circumstance makes a free-willed decision take a very long time - perhaps too long!

DavidMcC wrote:

GrahamH wrote:

DavidMcC wrote:

GrahamH wrote:I still don't agree that free will can be all about deliberation. If you exclude spontaneity you rule out all thought and inspiration, but then what is your deliberation but a series of spontaneous thoughts? You can't deliberate on what thoughts you will have.

My point was that we cannot make a free-willed decision if we don'r know what our will is, and that often/sometimes requires a little thought.
Every point in the above post is wrong.
A. If you haven't thought about what you are doing, you cannot know what your will is!
B. Spontaneity applies to having the initial idea. Deliberation applies to assessing that idea before acting on it. Without that thought, you are not acting on your will, but on your whim!
C. When did I say we couild defy the laws of physics by deliberating on future thoughts?? You made that piece of nonsene up.

Maybe you have to deliberate in order to "know what your will is", but I think most people will know that without deliberation.

Perhaps under most circumstances, that is true, so perhaps I should have complicated my FW theory by diostinguishing bet\ween cases wheer it is "obvious" and when it is "less obvious" which is the best action. The obvious cases "obviously" don't require much deliberation.

Deliberation may allow a shift in intent, but in many cases we simply apprehend the situation and see what we will do. Deliberation is a process of constraining options. Spending time excluding options may allow time for new spontaneous thoughts about new options, but how do you generate new options by deliberating? You might go round and round over the same small set of options that all seem unacceptable without increasing your freedom at all.

The possibility of a "shift in intent during deliberation are a complication that I was not concerned about.
I agree that there is a possibility of going in circles, unable to come to a decision, like the donkey that is half way between two identical food sources, and that this circumstance makes a free-willed decision take a very long time - perhaps too long!

It was you that made deliberation the defining issue. Now you seem to accept that it's not a requirement.
If the donkey is deliberating is that free will? If it doesn't dither and just goes and eats a carrot is that not free will?

How can a donkey know its will is to eat a carrot if it doesn't think deliberate about it? But is that its free will or will-will we're talking about now?

GrahamH wrote:

DavidMcC wrote:

GrahamH wrote:

DavidMcC wrote:
My point was that we cannot make a free-willed decision if we don'r know what our will is, and that often/sometimes requires a little thought.
Every point in the above post is wrong.
A. If you haven't thought about what you are doing, you cannot know what your will is!
B. Spontaneity applies to having the initial idea. Deliberation applies to assessing that idea before acting on it. Without that thought, you are not acting on your will, but on your whim!
C. When did I say we couild defy the laws of physics by deliberating on future thoughts?? You made that piece of nonsene up.

Maybe you have to deliberate in order to "know what your will is", but I think most people will know that without deliberation.

Perhaps under most circumstances, that is true, so perhaps I should have complicated my FW theory by diostinguishing bet\ween cases wheer it is "obvious" and when it is "less obvious" which is the best action. The obvious cases "obviously" don't require much deliberation.

Deliberation may allow a shift in intent, but in many cases we simply apprehend the situation and see what we will do. Deliberation is a process of constraining options. Spending time excluding options may allow time for new spontaneous thoughts about new options, but how do you generate new options by deliberating? You might go round and round over the same small set of options that all seem unacceptable without increasing your freedom at all.

The possibility of a "shift in intent during deliberation are a complication that I was not concerned about.
I agree that there is a possibility of going in circles, unable to come to a decision, like the donkey that is half way between two identical food sources, and that this circumstance makes a free-willed decision take a very long time - perhaps too long!

It was you that made deliberation the defining issue. Now you seem to accept that it's not a requirement.
If the donkey is deliberating is that free will? If it doesn't dither and just goes and eats a carrot is that not free will?

The problem here is time-scale. I have not accepted that deliberation is not a requirement, only that it may not take more than a moment, perhaps because the circumstances are familiar, and the deliberation has been done before.

GrahamH wrote:

DavidMcC wrote:

GrahamH wrote:

DavidMcC wrote:
My point was that we cannot make a free-willed decision if we don'r know what our will is, and that often/sometimes requires a little thought.
Every point in the above post is wrong.
A. If you haven't thought about what you are doing, you cannot know what your will is!
B. Spontaneity applies to having the initial idea. Deliberation applies to assessing that idea before acting on it. Without that thought, you are not acting on your will, but on your whim!
C. When did I say we couild defy the laws of physics by deliberating on future thoughts?? You made that piece of nonsene up.

Maybe you have to deliberate in order to "know what your will is", but I think most people will know that without deliberation.

Perhaps under most circumstances, that is true, so perhaps I should have complicated my FW theory by diostinguishing bet\ween cases wheer it is "obvious" and when it is "less obvious" which is the best action. The obvious cases "obviously" don't require much deliberation.

Deliberation may allow a shift in intent, but in many cases we simply apprehend the situation and see what we will do. Deliberation is a process of constraining options. Spending time excluding options may allow time for new spontaneous thoughts about new options, but how do you generate new options by deliberating? You might go round and round over the same small set of options that all seem unacceptable without increasing your freedom at all.

The possibility of a "shift in intent during deliberation are a complication that I was not concerned about.
I agree that there is a possibility of going in circles, unable to come to a decision, like the donkey that is half way between two identical food sources, and that this circumstance makes a free-willed decision take a very long time - perhaps too long!

It was you that made deliberation the defining issue. Now you seem to accept that it's not a requirement.
If the donkey is deliberating is that free will? If it doesn't dither and just goes and eats a carrot is that not free will?

I was not attempting to extend biological free will to donkeys, because we don'tknow enough about what goes on in a donkey's head, though it is known that they form opinions about people - like horses, cats and dogs, and other intelligent mammals, they get to know individuals of various species that they encounter.
EDIT: I probably shouldn't have said anything about donkeys in the first place - it was asking for trouble here!

DavidMcC wrote:...The problem here is time-scale. I have not accepted that deliberation is not a requirement, only that it may not take more than a moment, perhaps because the circumstances are familiar, and the deliberation has been done before.

What I left out is that when little or no deliberation is required, then you have what I previously called "habit", which does not require thought, and is consequently not actually free-willed at the time, but is an expresion of what was free-will before the habit had been learned.

DavidMcC wrote:

DavidMcC wrote:...The problem here is time-scale. I have not accepted that deliberation is not a requirement, only that it may not take more than a moment, perhaps because the circumstances are familiar, and the deliberation has been done before.

What I left out is that when little or no deliberation is required, then you have what I previously called "habit", which does not require thought, and is consequently not actually free-willed at the time, but is an expresion of what was free-will before the habit had been learned.

None of which answers my point.
If you rule out spontaneous free will you cannot gain free will with deliberation.

DavidMcC wrote:
You may mock, but you are only exposing your lack of understanding of biological free will, and why I proposed it. Instead, you remain mired in the past, like Graham and romansh, and continue to assume that I'm really talking about religious free will.
Onwe day, the penny will drop... maybe.

If you do believe it's something technical and 'biological', then you should forthwith drop the use of the term 'free will', which is itself most assuredly 'mired in the past'.

"Will" is a philosophical term, not a technical or biological one. It doesn't refer to anything except the way the world seems to the person using the term. You haven't proposed anything: You've cribbed from neuroscientists who don't know any more about 'will' (or 'deliberation', for that matter) than you do.

You're not the only one in this 'discussion' that I'm picking on, either. You're just the one who keeps arrogantly yammering about what you say you've 'proposed', as if you were some kind of authority. You keep 'proposing' that if we just give ourselves the time to deliberate, we can exercise 'free will' (yeah, the 'biological' kind instead of the philosowibblical kind). How do we will ourselves to take the time to exercise our 'free will'?

The whole lot of you are chasing Will o' the Wisp so you can declare as 'proposals' how the world seems to you. It's to laugh.

GrahamH wrote:
If you rule out spontaneous free will you cannot gain free will with deliberation.

It's kind of a bootstrapping problem, isn't it?

DavidMcC wrote:

archibald wrote:Standard free will is the sort most people believe in. It's the commonplace, everyday version, where healthy adults can freely and consciously choose, if not externally coerced and they have time to deliberate, and are morally responsible for their choices because it is assumed they could have freely chosen otherwise. Jerry Coyne, in his video, cited a survey which showed that about 75% of people surveyed in several countries believed in this version (80% in the USA).

To me, it sounds a lot like 'biological free will'.

You have left out a crucial point, which is the conditions under which it applies, as I went to some length to make clear.

Offer is void where prohibited by law. Since we do not control the conditions under which it applies, you've seemingly got a sort of 'seize the moment' platitude lurking just offscreen. Or something so general and fuzzy that it is never going to apply to anyone in particular at any particular time. Seize what? The moment to deliberate?

Cito di Pense wrote:

GrahamH wrote:
If you rule out spontaneous free will you cannot gain free will with deliberation.

It's kind of a bootstrapping problem, isn't it?

That reminds me of the time I deliberated about eating a Twix Xtra, trying to use all my free will to engage my will power in order to prevent my free will in pursuing an option of eating a Twix Xtra - part of that option entailing spite towards the constraints upon my free will due to thoughts about healthy eating. In the end, my free will to not eat the Twix Xtra gave way to my free will to eat it.

LucidFlight wrote:

Cito di Pense wrote:

GrahamH wrote:
If you rule out spontaneous free will you cannot gain free will with deliberation.

It's kind of a bootstrapping problem, isn't it?

That reminds me of the time I deliberated about eating a Twix Xtra, trying to use all my free will to engage my will power in order to prevent my free will in pursuing an option of eating a Twix Xtra - part of that option entailing spite towards the constraints upon my free will due to thoughts about healthy eating. In the end, my free will to not eat the Twix Xtra gave way to my free will to eat it.

It's a good thing you dint just eat it. That would have been no free will at all, according to david.