[FRIAM] Subjective experience & free will

[Jochen Fromm]

Such a "calculus of motivation" sounds interesting but complicated. It reminds me of Rodney Brooks, who is known in robotics for his "subsumption architecture". For example:• Level 1: Avoid Obstacles• Level 2: Wander around• Level 3: Explore unknown locationsIf we apply it to Sigmund Freud's distinct levels of ego, id, and super-ego (Ich, Es & Über-ich), then we get the following picture for normal people:• Level 1: Listen to super-ego - avoid breaking the law• Level 2: Listen to id - follow your emotions• Level 3: Listen to ego- explore unknown stuffFor narcissists and psychopaths level 1 and 2 would appear in the wrong order 2-1-3. Celibate scientists would be characterized by 1-3-2. A simple model that already explains some basic personality types.The "id" as the voice of our body/our genes is probably the most interesting part because it is slighty different for everyone. It changes over time and it is path-dependent, whereas the super-ego is similar for everyone, because it is the voice of society that tells us what to do. -J.
-------- Original message --------From: thompnickson2 at gmail.com Date: 2/28/21  00:09  (GMT+01:00) To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <friam at redfish.com> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Subjective experience & free willJochen,FWIW, I think free will is mostly a legal fiction used to determine who is responsible for the various calamities that we inflict on one another.  All behavior is either determined, or free, and there is no useful distinction to be made between free and determined action.   I have wanted for many  years to make a connection between the calculus and mental concepts like motivation.   Just as the derivative is a slope at a point, so a motive is the slope of behavior at a point.  Motives are the limits of behavioral differentials.  The only hard part of the hard problem is that I have a hard time seeing why people worry about it. NickNick ThompsonThompNickSon2 at gmail.comhttps://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/ From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> On Behalf Of Jochen FrommSent: Saturday, February 27, 2021 3:29 PMTo: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam at redfish.com>Subject: [FRIAM] Subjective experience & free will I am reading a book about Leibniz and started to wonder if the hard problem of consciousness could be the reason why we have the illusion of free will and can not predict how others will act. From the outside a person seems to have free will in principle. From the inside everybody feels something different and is controlled by emotions based on subjective experience, which is unknown to others, because the individual is not transparent and the history is not known.Once we investigate the life of a person, for example by a detective as part of a criminal investigation, or as movie viewers in a cinema, we start to understand why a person acts they way it does. The more we step into the footsteps of a person, the better we understand the feelings, goals and motives.Could it be that the same thing which  prevents us from understanding the subjective experiences of others also creates the illusion of free will? -J.   
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20210301/532f7924/attachment.html>