…and this is a 
D'Souza dishes up more dreck
Category: Kooks
Posted on: November 18, 2007 5:56 PM, by PZ Myers
Zeno compares Dinesh D'Souza to Mark Twain. This exercise is much like comparing mouse droppings to our upcoming Thanksgiving feast, but I suppose it must be done. Note D'Souza's argument for free will:
I am sitting at my computer with a cup of coffee on my desk. I can reach over and take a sip if I choose; I can knock the coffee mug onto the carpet if I choose; I can just leave the cup alone and let the coffee get cold. Now I ask: Is there anything in the laws of physics that forces me do any of these things? Obviously not.
I had no idea that he was that stupid.
Comments
Wow - that's really novice-level thinking about free will.
Suppose I am a meat robot. Suppose I am programmed to think I make decisions. I can sit, like Dinesh, and blather on about how I decided or didn't to knock over a cup of coffee - but I'm still a meat robot.
Posted by: Marcus Ranum | November 18, 2007 6:04 PM
I am sitting at my computer laughing my head off.
Posted by: CalGeorge | November 18, 2007 6:06 PM
Hey, just because it's illogical doesn't mean it doesn't make any sense. Wait, what I mean to say is... ummm, how come there's still monkeys?
Posted by: Milo Johnson | November 18, 2007 6:06 PM
My cat got up to go to the litter box. It could have pissed on the rug. It could have pissed on my shoe....
Posted by: DAE | November 18, 2007 6:06 PM
How about the frequent experiences when I "will" to take a sip of coffee, but the cup actually spills on the floor, in utter defiance of what I had chosen?
An interesting study a year or so ago found that subjects' muscles and motor-cortex activity actually started 100msec or so before they were aware of willing the motion?
Of course, the existence of mathematical functions which are deterministic yet unpredictable may be apropos in this connection. One of them, the logistic equation, should be familiar to ecologists, if nbot to biologists.
Posted by: Olorin | November 18, 2007 6:08 PM
Is free will one of those beliefs that comes with religion??
Personally, I've never seen any avenue that leads to free will - the universe is either deterministic (in which case everything is predetermined based on initial conditions and "choice" is problematic) or it's non-deterministic (in which case free will problematic because my "choice" is controlled by quantum-level dice-rolling) Yet religion needs "free will" because otherwise you can't blame anyone for anything - and the whole soggy structure falls apart. The existence of free will is just assumed by the religiotards as "something god gave." Uh. Yeah.
Posted by: Marcus Ranum | November 18, 2007 6:17 PM
Ugh. Francis Collins has a blurb on the back of Dinesh's pile-o'-crap book:
"Responding to the current epidemic of atheist manifestos, Dinesh D'Souza applies just the right balm for the troubled soul. Assembling arguments from history, philosophy, theology, and science--yes, science!--he builds a modern and compelling case for faith in a loving God. If you're seeking the truth about God, the universe, and the meaning of life, this is a great place to look."
Way to go, dickbag.
Posted by: CalGeorge | November 18, 2007 6:23 PM
Collins? Say it isn't so.
Clearly, I have not been critical enough.
Posted by: PZ Myers | November 18, 2007 6:25 PM
Now I may be disinclined to think that we have free will, but I do know that John Stuart Mill, of his own free will, after half a pint of shandy was particularly ill.
Posted by: Ted D | November 18, 2007 6:27 PM
i laughed so hard i spilled over my morning coffee.
Posted by: toomanytribbles | November 18, 2007 6:28 PM
Marcus: "...or it's non-deterministic (in which case free will problematic because my "choice" is controlled by quantum-level dice-rolling)"
The non-determinism might be due to an input from something we currently know nothing about (and D'Souza knows nothing about, either, obviously), but which involves far more complexity and rule-like structure than just rolling dice. In other words, Cartesian dualism might be true -- I can't prove it's not true, can you?
Posted by: Sam | November 18, 2007 6:28 PM
And Stanley Fish! It's a party!
"The great merit of this book is that it concedes nothing. Rather than engaging in the usual defensive ploys, D'Souza meets every anti-God argument head on and defeats it on its own terms. He subjects atheism and scientific materialism to sustained rigorous interrogation, and shows that their claims are empty and incoherent. Infinitely more sophisticated than the rants produced by Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens, What's So Great About Christianity leaves those atheist books in the dust."
-- Stanley Fish
http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/1596985178/ref=sib_dp_pt/104-3344228-2958301#reader-link
Posted by: CalGeorge | November 18, 2007 6:29 PM
The wind is blowing the sole leaf left on yonder branch. It can cling to the tree, or it can fall to the ground. Is there anything in the laws of physics that forces it to do either of these things? Obviously not.
At least, it's obvious if you have absolutely no clue about the applicability of the laws of physics.
On the other hand, if you recognize that we know quite well that the laws of familiar physics are not going to be violated in leaf stems -- or in neural processes -- then you might think that the reverse is obvious: The laws of physics dictate whether the leaf will fall, and they also dictate how a person's hand will move.
D'Souza's argument is barely up to the standards freshman Philosophy 101. He fails to recognize that a person acts voluntarily whenever she does something because she wants to -- even if that desire is part of some deterministic chain of events. Here (from his article) he claims that determinism implies that actions are involuntary:
Soft determinists (compatibilists) have been tearing this sort of foolishness to shreds for centuries.
One of my favorite responses to people like D'Souza is to point out that even if determinism is false, it doesn't seem to help get the sort of "metaphysical free will" that they want. If and event isn't determined, then it is the result of chance. But there's no reason that we would be morally responsible for something that happens by chance.
Far better to take the common-sense view that we're responsible for things that happen because we want them to happen (because the actions follow from our desires and character) -- and this is perfectly compatible with a sensible view of everything being subject to the laws of physics.
Posted by: Physicalist | November 18, 2007 6:32 PM
"I am sitting at my computer with a cup of coffee on my desk. I can reach over and take a sip if I choose; I can knock the coffee mug onto the carpet if I choose; I can just leave the cup alone and let the coffee get cold. Now I ask: Is there anything in the laws of physics that forces me do any of these things? Obviously not."
Putting the coffee on the desk presupposes that he is going to drink it, so reaching over to take a sip is the most likely action to follow the first. If he was raised by a typical mother, he has been conditioned not to spill coffee on the carpet and would strongly avoid that option. Unless he gets caught up in something at the computer and "loses track of time" there by letting the coffee get cold, again, his effort to make it, put it on the desk and the tendency to prefer hot coffee is going to guide his actions. Not a lot of free will there.
Posted by: Phillp Moon | November 18, 2007 6:33 PM
"I had no idea that he was that stupid."
Isn't that a bit dishonest of you, PZ, or is it some sort of humor?
Nearly everyone who checks in here has been fully aware of the depth of D'Souza's stupidity. Also, he seems to be one sorry shit of a human being (proving Twain's comment about human beings to be absolutely true, BTW) in nearly every other way as well.
Posted by: darwinfinch | November 18, 2007 6:36 PM
I thought physicists were going find the Higgs boson first.
After which they were going to look for the field and the particle (and the physical laws regulating same) that mediates coffee-cup motion.
But I suppose the coffee-cup thing could be more important. Do we need a different collider for that?
/ehj2
Posted by: ehj2 | November 18, 2007 6:40 PM
shandy? isn't that some unholy mixture of beer and 7Up, or something? No wonder the poor guy got ill.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | November 18, 2007 6:44 PM
@ ehj2 (#16)
Exactly. There's a Nobel Prize (not to mention the $1M Randi Challenge) if these folks can show that the laws of physics don't apply inside our skulls. Anyone want to place odds on that happening?
Posted by: Physicalist | November 18, 2007 6:46 PM
Science Blogs needs a behaviorist (full disclosure--I am one).
This is a half-inch putt.
Posted by: Anon | November 18, 2007 6:50 PM
PZ said:
I've known D'Souza was that stupid for a long time. I've known it from the day he blamed atheists for war on terror.
Not only that I would bet that Mike Huckabee is stupid enough to agree with Dinesh D'Souza. Not only that I bet you could bait Vox Day into arguing for the D'Souza position on the grounds you can't prove brain actions are caused by anything physical.
Not only that, I'll bet that our president is that stupid.
Are you scared yet?
Posted by: Norman Doering | November 18, 2007 6:52 PM
Shandy, according to Wikipedia, "is beer flavoured with lemonade or another soft drink. Lemonade-based shandies are more common in Europe, and ginger ale is more commonly used in North America and the Caribbean." Which does sound unusually vile. I just hope that physical processes beyond my control never compel me to ingest the stuff.
Posted by: Ted D | November 18, 2007 6:53 PM
That's one I haven't heard of before.
Argumentum ad parco marcula
I avoid staining my carpet: therefore God exists.
Brilliant!
Posted by: Copernic | November 18, 2007 6:58 PM
Which does sound unusually vile. I just hope that physical processes beyond my control never compel me to ingest the stuff.
Actually, it's a really nice summer drink.
I remember buying it as a teenager in the stores in UK as a soft drink, it was a low enough alcohol content to not be controlled (I believe the "cut-off" was 3%). Regs may have changed since the time of the mammoths, though.
Posted by: Graculus | November 18, 2007 7:05 PM
DD'Sousa - shooting fish in a barrel for God.
PZMyers - shooting fish in a barrel for ~God.
ZZzzz
Posted by: CapitalistImperialistPig | November 18, 2007 7:14 PM
i like shandys.
Posted by: toomanytribbles | November 18, 2007 7:15 PM
Okay, I'll bite. It's been a few decades (! ouch) since I took Philosopy 101. Does anyone have some links to pithy discussions they like about Free Will and how we currently define it? Thanks.
Posted by: Scott | November 18, 2007 7:29 PM
Free will link. Not sure how good it is though.
http://www.galilean-library.org/int13.html
Posted by: Brian English | November 18, 2007 7:31 PM
Dinesh in S.F. Chronicle today:
It follows that there is an aspect of our humanity that belongs to the world of science, and there is an aspect of our humanity that is outside the reach of scientific laws. Simultaneously, we inhabit the realm of the phenomenal, which is the material realm, and also the realm of the noumenal, which is the realm of freedom. It is the noumenal realm, the realm outside space and time, that makes possible free choices that are implemented within the realm of space and time. Materialism tries to understand us in two dimensions, whereas in reality we inhabit three.
Kelly O'Connor rips him to shreds (at RichardDawkins.net):
Kant's philosophical ideology separates the world into the phenomenal and the noumenal. The noumenal world is essentially an agnostic one, but D'Souza would lead the reader to believe otherwise. He can't even contemplate the notion that just as we atheists cannot perceive the noumenal realm, neither can he. We don't have knowledge of every possibility in the universe; nevertheless, all major religions claim to have the corner on special knowledge of this supposedly unknowable world.
If he has three possibilities with his coffee, I don't see how that constitutes some kind of special area of freedom.
It's kind of limiting, if you ask me.
Posted by: CalGeorge | November 18, 2007 7:32 PM
Is that the one of "shooting Fish in a barrel" (© Language Log)?
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | November 18, 2007 7:36 PM
Simplistic, but I'm not sure I see why it's "stupid".
I debated such things when I was eight year old and concluded for all intents and purposes we had free will. I wondered a bit about the mechanics of the brain, which he doesn't, and to what sence I could claim I was in control of the mechanics (none) but if not what could possible be the "self" about whose free will I was debating? At eight, I figure I might as well difine myself as "the mechanics of the brain" and thus *I* (the mechanics of the brain) have free will. The mechanics of the brain may be utterly determined by kinetics but if so that is a level "beneath" the definition of "I" and at the level where "I" makes sense, "I" have free will, probably, but maybe not. If I do not have free will it's okay as I have the impression of free will, which means if I do not have free will, I was part of the deciding factors to determine what my non-free will would be. Hence, I concluded, at age eight, I may or may not have free will but for all "intents and purposes" I do.
But, what pray tell, does having free will to do with defining the soul or with Christianity? I did not make any connection between free will and "soul" before and I do not now.
Posted by: woozy | November 18, 2007 7:36 PM
Sam writes:
The non-determinism might be due to an input from something we currently know nothing about (and D'Souza knows nothing about, either, obviously), but which involves far more complexity and rule-like structure than just rolling dice. In other words, Cartesian dualism might be true --
If there's something other than randomness, it's got to be predictable - which goes back to making the universe completely deterministic.
Here's the problem: if the universe is completely deterministic, free will is meaningless. If the universe is non-deterministic, free will exists only if the non-determinism is somehow, or other, our will. Non-determinism that's too small (i.e: quantum effects) or not part of us - I don't see how those could give us free will. Put another way: suppose our brains are heavily affected by quantum randomness and that's what makes us feel we're making decisions, it's still hard to extend a subatomic coin-toss to the level of "we have free will." I wish it did.
I can't prove it's not true, can you?
I can't prove a negative, can you?
The notion of free will is very important in many ways, but there's not a lot of convincing evidence for it that I'm aware of. Or, I should say, none that isn't more compelling than the simpler assumption that we're meat robots programmed to think we have this thing called "free will."
One of my favorite nasty tricks when I find myself in bar-room debates about free will is to ask my opponent to "Pick a number from one to 10." When they do, I cheerfully announce, "See? I made you pick a number!" As silly as that sounds, it's a good illustration of how many things that the meat robot's software interpret as free will are actually initiated by external factors.
If you're willing to define free will as "the sense of choice" - rather than actual choice - then we're in agreement.
Posted by: Marcus Ranum | November 18, 2007 7:36 PM
Sam (#11):
Sure, dualism could be true, but we have absolutely no reason to believe that it is, and we have very strong reasons to believe that it isn't.
More to the point, though, the truth of dualism doesn't help poor D'Souza get the sort of freedom he wants. Consider, either there's a cause for the non-physical soul deciding to do what it does, or there isn't. If there's a cause, then the choice was determined (so not free, according to our confused D'Souza). But if there was no cause, then the "chosen" outcome was random (so, again, not free). This just shows that D'Souza's "libertarian" freedom is nothing but a confusion.
Posted by: Physicalist | November 18, 2007 7:42 PM
Doesn't he need to know what the final result SHOULD be to claim that he free willingly changed it to something else.
Let's say the deterministic world dictated that he should knock over his coffee, but he chose to free willingly change the course of events (break the cause-effect chain) to not knock over his coffee then he would say he has free will. But since he doesn't know what the final outcome SHOULD have been he doesn't know for sure if he has free will. May be it is deterministic that he not knock over his coffee...
Posted by: AAB | November 18, 2007 7:43 PM
woozy asks:
But, what pray tell, does having free will to do with defining the soul or with Christianity?
Christianity falls down around your ankles like underpants with a broken elastic if there's no free will.
God expects man to "choose" to submit to its laws, and assigns blame and guilt based on man's "choices" - without free will (rejection of the concept of "choice") then God looks pretty darned mean. If you're a strict determinist and there's no free will then God is this great big a**hole who created a deterministic universe and sends people to eternal hellfire for doing the stuff he programmed them to unavoidably do.
Since I have no free will I am going to go downstairs and have some Ben and Jerry's coffee heath bar crunch ice cream. There are advantages to being a meat robot.
Posted by: Marcus Ranum | November 18, 2007 7:45 PM
I could write a simple program for Dinesh's computer that chooses whether or not to spill a cup of coffee. Does that mean we should start fearing our computer overlords' free will?
Posted by: Chris R. | November 18, 2007 7:55 PM
Is there anything in the laws of physics that forces the computer do any of these things? Obviously not.
Posted by: Physicalist | November 18, 2007 8:02 PM
There is no free will according to D'Souza's version of Christianity. According to the tenets of his religion, long before the moment God injected his soul into this world and into combination of DNA inherited from his mother and father, God already knew if he drank his coffee, left it, or spilled it on to the floor.
The very act of creation performed an omniscient deity leaves no room for free will in those that are created.
Posted by: tacitus | November 18, 2007 8:05 PM
In the (admittedly distant) days of my youth in the UK, shandy was a girly drink, usually 50/50 of lemonade and beer. The lads would get rounds of drinks which would mean pints of bitter or lager for them and halves (half-pints) of shandy for the girls.
This was when there was little expectation of being able to do anything about the girls free will.
Posted by: Ian H Spedding FCD | November 18, 2007 8:12 PM
The whole thing is silly.
The coffee's obviously getting cold as he sits there typing his question.
So he has already made his choice: leave cup alone ("must type drivel!").
The real question should be:
What makes him type all this drivel when he could be spilling his coffee on the floor?
Posted by: CalGeorge | November 18, 2007 8:14 PM
#21 - In England, where the Shandy was invented, lemonade is not what we in North America think of as lemonade (lemon juice, sugar, water), it is closer to something like 7up.
Posted by: Doug Alder | November 18, 2007 8:24 PM
The sheer amount of ignorance contained in that single paragraph is astonishing. That's sort of like saying that we can solve national debt by printing more money: the speaker feels a flush of pride for showing up the intellectuals with good ol' common sense, and everyone else pauses and wonders whether explaining the vast idiocy of that idea will accomplish anything.
Posted by: Master Mahan | November 18, 2007 8:25 PM
Dinesh D'Souza and Stanley Fish should get a room where they can be stupid together and congratulate each other about it in private.
Posted by: J Myers | November 18, 2007 8:40 PM
While they are most certainly the result of physics on some level, I have a hard time with a simple meat robot model for Bach's Goldberg Variations or Bobby Fischer's greatest games. I wouldn't claim that there's good evidence for free will, but these great works are examples of complexity that you'd be hard pressed to predict from any understanding of neural chemistry. If complex interactions lead to emergent states that have no precedent, is it still deterministic? I don't know - I guess it's causal, just not predictable in any human sense.
Posted by: Heterocronie | November 18, 2007 8:42 PM
They drink a similar thing in Germany - called the Radler. It's really good! Don't knock it till you try it.
Posted by: madaha | November 18, 2007 8:46 PM
Oh, come on. D'Souza has been considerably stupider than that plenty of times. At least in this passage he didn't explain how a neo-classical economic utility function demands that he drink the coffee before it gets cold enough so that only an inferior person would drink it, but on the other hand, letting it cool would demonstrate the unscientific nature of Global Warming.
Posted by: James Killus | November 18, 2007 8:48 PM
Hey, shouldn't that be "D'Reck?"
Posted by: Milo Johnson | November 18, 2007 8:51 PM
@ Heterocronie (#43): It certainly is not predictable in practice. Once you get beyond the simplest atoms (hydrogen, maybe helium), you can't solve the fundamental physical equations without adopting approximations. Further, there's no way we could in practice know all the the physical details of a brain and its environment.
"Simple meat robot"? -- absolutely not. Amazingly complex physical system? -- yep!
"Is it still deterministic?" Well the practical impossibility of prediction certainly doesn't undermine its being deterministic. Although the fact that quantum theory is (standardly viewed as) an indeterministic theory might, to some degree. But this is irrelevant to the free will issue, as I've tried to indicate above.
Posted by: Physicalist | November 18, 2007 8:55 PM
Yes. And it's not difficult. Because, despite the myth, there are things that are amenable to negative proof.
The myth arises from the logical fallacy to which the principals of negative proof is often put.
That is, the proof can't be put in finite time. Or we cannot observe the entire universe. Or some other such condition that makes it impossible.
However, in a finite, fully-testable, non-supernatural universe, many times the negative can be proven through simple observation. We do this in many court cases - civil and criminal - as well as science.
Posted by: Moses | November 18, 2007 9:06 PM
Hmmm... surely the laws of physics _constrain_ what activities D'Souza is capable of taking? While he can _choose_ to, say, move at 3.5c relative to the cup's reference frame, or reduce the entropy of the cup's thermodynamic universe, or eliminate the charge on the electrons within the coffee, it doesn't mean he's going to be able to do it. Unless God directly intervenes, presumably.
Posted by: Snoof | November 18, 2007 9:09 PM
Looks like Dan Dennett is going to join the fray to take on D'Lousa.
Wikipedia:
Dennett will be debating Dinesh D'Souza at Tufts University on November 30, 2007 on the existence of a deity.
Woo-hoo!
Posted by: CalGeorge | November 18, 2007 9:17 PM
Physicalist (#32):
That sounds reasonable, but I want to leave open the possibility that the combination of "non-physical soul" and "cause" doesn't exclude the middle quite so thouroughly. It would be a big surprise if there were a third way, but science has surprised us before.
Posted by: Sam | November 18, 2007 9:21 PM
D'Souza's argument is barely up to the standards [of] freshman Philosophy 101.
As someone who has actually taught Philosophy 101 (or intro phil anyway), I have to say that by those standards this is B/B+ work at least. Not only is it composed of complete, grammatical sentences, the writer seems to have grasped the idea of giving reasons (however lame) for a stated thesis.
One of my favorite responses to people like D'Souza is to point out that even if determinism is false, it doesn't seem to help get the sort of "metaphysical free will" that they want.
Quite right. But at least he didn't drag quantum mechanics into it. (Boy am I sick of that move!)
Dennett vs. D'Souza will be interesting. Dennett is pretty good on free will. Check out the chapter called "Could have done otherwise" in Elbow Room (and I'm sure there's comparable material in Freedom Evolves, which I haven't read).
Posted by: Dave M | November 18, 2007 9:21 PM
D'Souza is proof of Dorothy Parker's maxim:
"You can lead a whore to culture. but you can't make her think"
The whore, in this case, being D'ouza.
He doesn't think--he just assembles pleasing stupidities for his paymasters.
Posted by: keyote | November 18, 2007 9:23 PM
"But there's no reason that we would be morally responsible for something that happens by chance."
Actually there is. The same reasoning applies to being responsible for something that happens for deterministic reasons. What's important is not chance or determinism but origination. Other factors play a role in determining moral responsiblity and all are not based on determinism or chance.
In fact, as far as I can tell, determinism isn't a falsifiable concept. Same with indeterminism. What possible test can one make to disprove either? What possible test could something within the universe do to tell whether or not the universe as a whole is deterministic?
What matters in deciding whether to "hold people morally responsible for their actions" is whether our response to their guilt is effective in effecting future behavior. What matters is if we reform or restrain the individual from future crime via punishment.
Why should a criminal who pick his victims by "chance" be held less accountable even if his decision module uses quantum indeterminism? Why should we hold him less responsible if his decision to commit the crime in the first place was ultimately influenced by chance? Don't criminal opportunities present themselves by chance to a certain extent?
Even when we believe that a criminals behavior is influenced by chance processes, either external or internal, we don't really care. What we care is that a punishment would be effective in correcting his behavior.
For those people who act randomly and for which corrective action doesn't work, well we call them crazy, don't hold them morally reasponsible, and don't punish them because it will have no effect. Instead we use preventative incarceration if they are likely to repeat the behavior in the future.
Posted by: Brian Macker | November 18, 2007 9:28 PM
I hate to defend the odious D'Souza here, but...
I wouldn't call those particular remarks stupid. He's largely right that there is no law (or laws) of physics that determines whether he will execute a particular action. By the same token- there are no laws of physics that determine whether it will be cloudy in 49 days time.
The world is consistent with the laws of physics, but that doesn't mean that the laws of physics dictate the actual choices and rolls of the dice that we make. We can't even predict the behavior of one particle in anything but a statistical sense.
In fact, the famous mathematician John Conway recently proposed that even particles have free will: http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0604079.
Posted by: Christianjb | November 18, 2007 9:39 PM
To paraphrase Dennett, Dinesh's brain has been hijacked by an idea that is trying to spread itself in humans.
Christianity is using Dinesh to perpetuate itself and it does that by convincing him that he has free will. That makes him happy. When he is happy he types more.
Simple!
Posted by: CalGeorge | November 18, 2007 9:43 PM
On this subject, like Locke and Voltaire, I am still waiting for a coherent non-compatibilist definition of Free Will. These two figures have pointed out to me that the very term "free will" is incoherent; Hume also points out that without determinism there cannot be a will. It's so pathetic that someone can pretend to be utilizing Kantian logic yet so unable to grasp these concepts taught to college philosophy freshmen.
Posted by: Gilgamesh | November 18, 2007 9:44 PM
Shit. I teach there. Suppose I should go, but my class gets out at about 6:00 and I usually want to start the hour commute home and get some dinner by then. I dunno if listening to D'Souza get crushed is enough of a reason to listen to D'Souza.
Posted by: MAJeff | November 18, 2007 9:47 PM
Christianjb writes:
The world is consistent with the laws of physics, but that doesn't mean that the laws of physics dictate the actual choices and rolls of the dice that we make.
Wait, before we go any further with this - let me just check. Are we talking about the same universe, here, or do you have your own?
Posted by: Marcus Ranum | November 18, 2007 9:50 PM
Marcus: Look at the double slit experiment. Quantum theory postulates truly random behavior for particles. A particle's behavior cannot be said to be determined by its past history. Also take a look at Conway's paper.
Posted by: Christianjb | November 18, 2007 9:57 PM
Dave M (#52)
Touché. But I was trying to focus on the content of the argument -- the reasoning -- rather than its presentation. I submit that most freshmen that have passed Intro to Philosophy can do better than assert the bald claim, "It's obvious that my knocking over the coffee cup wasn't determined!" (Or, with no qualification, that "determined acts aren't voluntary.") I'm inclined to agree, but I can't say that it seems like a better move simply to deny determinism with no explanation or support whatsoever.
Posted by: Physicalist | November 18, 2007 9:57 PM
The laws of physics, as presently understood, are not compatible with strict determinism(e.g, the notion that the future is determined in detail by the past and present). In fact it is difficult to even define strict determinism either in the context of quantum mechanics or classical mechanics. I doubt that either of those facts has anything to do with religion or irreligion.
Posted by: CapitalistImperialistPig | November 18, 2007 10:04 PM
D'Souza definitely forgets, as a number of people here have noted, that free will and determinism are compatible. I think woozy got it right in comment 30: we are the forces that "determine" us. I would go so far to argue that even if the world is deterministic, it is not pre-determined and set to a script, but is determined in real time. We are the agents of that determinism, as is the rest of the matter in the universe.
D'Souza also doesn't touch the idea that consciousness is only consciousness if it is an ordered process. There have to be some rules governing our brains, otherwise the results would completely chaotic and nonsensical. And even if chance determines our thoughts, that is still a form of determinism: the mechanism just changes from something predictable to unpredictable.
Posted by: ansuzmannaz | November 18, 2007 10:05 PM
Christianjb writes:
The world is consistent with the laws of physics, but that doesn't mean that the laws of physics dictate the actual choices and rolls of the dice that we make. We can't even predict the behavior of one particle in anything but a statistical sense.
Determinism and ability to predict aren't the same thing at all, I think that's what's confusing you.
The laws of physics absolutely control how a die is cast and which side lands up. But we're not capable of computing it - given the starting conditions, strength of the throw, wind, etc. because the problem of doing so with absolute accuracy winds up bringing too much into play. You can imagine a computer capable of computing such a thing as the weather in North America - but it'd be called "North America" and it would be bigger and more complicated than the subject it was simulating. To continue that example, to compute weather perfectly for North America you'd need to take into account weather on the entire planet - and solar flares, and, and, and. So to predict reality you need something at least as complex as the reality you're modelling. But the reality you're modelling does work (at this scale) following absolute rules that make it "predictable, but not by you."
Posted by: Marcus Ranum | November 18, 2007 10:08 PM
Brian Macker (#54)
Most physicists would tell you that not only is it falsifiable, it's been falsified. Bell's theorem shows that the predictions of quantum theory are incompatible with a local deterministic theory; and these predictions have been experimentally verified numerous times. So if you think that Einstein proved that nothing can go faster than light, then you've got experimental "proof" that determinism is false.
There's a lot more to be said about this of course; for one thing, there are non-local deterministic interpretations of quantum mechanics. Further, you can have effective determinism at the macroscopic level even if there's indeterminism at the microscopic level. But the bottom line is that we can have very strong evidence for the nature of the laws/processes that are responsible for some phenomenon, and we can have good reason to think that we understand the nature of these laws/processes.
Posted by: Physicalist | November 18, 2007 10:08 PM
Actually there is. The same reasoning applies to being responsible for something that happens for deterministic reasons. What's important is not chance or determinism but origination.
Origination is exactly the point in regards to determinism and chance. If the world is deterministic then we are compelled by outside forces to act and thus the action does not originate with us. With chance I think it is different, but the whole point is that if we lack the ability to not do something, which we do if our actions are determined by chance or a set of external physical processes, then there can be no moral responsibility. "Should" assumes "can."
Posted by: coathangrrr | November 18, 2007 10:09 PM
Marcus: You're wrong. Read up on the double slit experiment and get back to me.
Posted by: Christianjb | November 18, 2007 10:18 PM
Brian Macker (#54)
The "compatibilist" (soft determinist) argues (convincingly to my mind) that we're responsible for actions to the extent that *we* are the cause of those actions (i.e., to the extent that our character and desires lead us to act that way). If something is done because of something that we have no control over -- i.e., because of chance -- and *not* because we wanted it to, then there seems to be no reason that we should be blamed (or praised) for it.
The situation that you're considering is one in which the criminal has already decided to commit a crime (or perhaps is accepting that possibility) and then lets some chance event decide the precise nature of the crime. The point here is that his desires have already made that crime possible, and if he had different desires (i.e., if he were moral), then no crime would have been committed.
The position you're pointing to is the "hard determinist" position, which denies that we have free will and moral responsibility. I think this position is silly: a determinist has no problem asserting that we should be ethical.
Posted by: Physicalist | November 18, 2007 10:21 PM
I see D'Souza's new book is being published thru Regnery, big fucking surprise.
Posted by: Jake Boyman | November 18, 2007 10:27 PM
D'Souza definitely forgets, as a number of people here have noted, that free will and determinism are compatible.
There is controversy on that topic. :) Personally, I find the arguments of the compatibilists to be weak; they are mostly wishful thinking.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compatibilism - does a good job of briefing the issue)
Compatibilists basically say that free will is present when you're not forced to make a choice. The problem with that argument is that it tries to dodge around physical determinism by jumping up to the level of personal interaction. That's a cheap trick that worked for the ancient greeks - and we now know more about the nature of physical reality than Hobbes and Hume did. Heck, they probably believed in "souls" and stuff like that.
Compatibilism is bunk. Basically it's an attempt to assert that free will exists because the details of nature, nurture, neurology, reality, and physics that conspire to make your "choice" for you are so subtle that the meat robot isn't aware of them. Of course the meat robot isn't aware of them! It's not programmed to be aware of them! For crying out loud, the meat robot's got this software that makes it think it can see in 3D, that's optimized to see faces in burn-patterns on french toast. The compatibilists are essentially reaching for the "free will of the gaps" - just because they don't feel compelled, they had free will? Well... They can't help thinking that I suppose.
Posted by: Marcus Ranum | November 18, 2007 10:29 PM
@ Marcus Ranum: Christianjb is correct that quantum physics is (standardly understood to be) incompatible with determinism. (But DaveM is sick of people who drag quantum mechanics into the free will debate -- and he's right that it really doesn't help in the end.)
@coathangrrr: Your line of argument is better than D'Souza's, but I still don't find that an attractive road to go down. I've got to quit for the night, but the short version of the response is that you're not giving the right interpretation to the phrase "ability to not do something." The right reading of this phrase (I, and other compatibilists will argue) is this: "I could have refrained from doing this" just means "I *would* have refrained from doing it, *if* I had wanted to." This is compatible with determinism. Chance just isn't morally relevant.
Posted by: Physicalist | November 18, 2007 10:33 PM
So he doesn't spill coffee on the floor deliberately because there is a God.
Mr Shrek does not spill coffee on the floor deliberately because there is Bride of Shrek to deal with.
Ergo, in our household Bride of Shrek IS God.
Posted by: Bride of Shrek | November 18, 2007 10:33 PM
Physicalist(#64)
Sure, the probabilities obtained from solutions to the Schroedinger equation cannot simply be the surface manifestations of any (coherent) underlying deterministic facts. But does the Schroedinger equation describe the human mind?
Posted by: Sam | November 18, 2007 10:34 PM
Is free will one of those beliefs that comes with religion??
It's like a box of Cracker-Jack: you never know what toy you're going to get.
Posted by: David Wilford | November 18, 2007 10:37 PM
Marcus Ranum:
No, you don't seem to understand the compatibilist position. One's awareness of the determining factors is irrelevant. The morally relevant point -- the point that grounds free will -- is that some of these determining factors are ours. That is, we, as physical, determined beings, make a difference in the world. When our actions are the product of our choices (our character, deliberation, desires, etc.), then we're responsible for them. It's irrelevant that our character, desires, etc. are themselves determined by earlier states of the world.
No, feelings are irrelevant, and there's no gap argument here. You seem to think that the compatibilist means "indeterminism" when she refers to free will. That's simply wrong. No gaps. Determinism all the way down. But since we're physical beings, we're still responsible for some of the things that happen in deterministic chain of the physical world (leaving aside quantum indeterminacy, at DaveM's request).Posted by: Physicalist | November 18, 2007 10:45 PM
Not really. We infer that the negative is false using evidence. We don't prove it's false. Proving something is false amounts to showing that in every single imaginable scenario, the thing couldn't happen. And that's impossible.
To use your examples:
In a murder trial, does DNA evidence, a taped confession, and a video-tape of the murder prove that John killed Mary? No. I can imagine several scenarios off the top of my head in which all of those things would be true, and yet John would be innocent. That's where "beyond reasonable doubt" comes in.
Same thing for science. We can't prove that gravity is always attractive, because that amounts to showing that the entire universe is homogeneous, and obeys the same rules. We can infer that from tons of evidence, but we certainly can't prove it.
Posted by: Jon | November 18, 2007 10:46 PM
There's nothing intrinsically wrong with 'dragging' quantum mechanics into the free-will debate. The only problem is that most people and most biologists don't have much knowledge of QM and so it allows for people to get away with making stupid claims as long as they call it a quantum effect.
Personally- I believe that even a 'classical' computer of sufficient complexity could be intelligent and conscious. It would also have as much 'free-will' as any of us. However, if that computer is coupled to the rest of the universe through communication devices- then it becomes as unpredictable as any other part of the universe. Feedback mechanisms will quickly ensure that no amount of computing power can predict the choices the computer will make.
Conway and Penrose seem to think that QM is fundamentally tied into free-will. They may be wrong- but they've earned the right to be taken seriously.
Posted by: Christianjb | November 18, 2007 10:50 PM
Sam (#72), "But does the Schroedinger equation describe the human mind?"
We know the basic energy scales at which quantum electrodynamics is valid, and this lets us infer with great confidence that everything in our skull obeys these laws of Q.E.D. coupled with Newtonian Gravity.
This is exactly the same reasoning that we use to infer that the Standard Model and Einstein's General Relativity govern stellar evolution. So yes, we do know that the mind is governed by familiar laws of physics. (And now, I really am signing off for the night.)
Posted by: Physicalist | November 18, 2007 10:51 PM