[FRIAM] falsifying the lost opportunity updating mechanism for free will

[Frank Wimberly]

I know there is a ghost in the Cartesian machine because I am he.  But you
knew that.

---
Frank C. Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz,
Santa Fe, NM 87505

505 670-9918
Santa Fe, NM

On Thu, Jun 18, 2020, 6:31 PM <thompnickson2 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Russ,
>
>
>
> I think he is saying the former.  And I think you and I agree that it
> follows from what he is saying that there is no ghost in the cartesian
> machine.  I predict he will assert that he is agnostic on that point.
> Let’s see.
>
>
>
> Nick
>
>
>
> Nicholas Thompson
>
> Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology
>
> Clark University
>
> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com
>
> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
>
>
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> *On Behalf Of *Russ Abbott
> *Sent:* Thursday, June 18, 2020 6:26 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <
> friam at redfish.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] falsifying the lost opportunity updating mechanism
> for free will
>
>
>
> So you are defining a mechanism that by definition is mechanistic (perhaps
> with some randomness sprinkled over it) and then saying that it may look to
> some people like it seems to have free will? If that's what you're doing,
> what are you claiming that demonstrates? If that's not what you're doing,
> I'm afraid I still don't understand.
>
>
>
> -- Russ Abbott
> Professor, Computer Science
> California State University, Los Angeles
>
>
>
>
>
> On Thu, Jun 18, 2020 at 2:44 PM ∄ uǝlƃ <gepropella at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Exactly! That's the point of the exercise. Marcus and Jon have pointed out
> that discussions of free will get bogged down in all sorts of meandering
> extra stuff. This is an attempt to have a discussion about it that doesn't
> go that way. The objective is to build a machine that might *look* as if it
> has free will.
>
> The system does not *decide* to produce A or B, it simply produces A or B.
> The individual branch point (and the path taken) is *not* what I'm mapping
> to free will. (Yes, I've already been WRONGLY accused of redefining the
> term.) I'm saying that the aggregate phenomenon we mean when we say "free
> will" *might* be generated/simulated by this mechanism. I'm not mapping
> free will to one small part of the mechanism. I'm mapping it to the *whole*
> mechanism, multiple processes, including individual branch points, the
> composer, the memory, etc.
>
> To answer specifically, a process can take branch A or B purely
> deterministically (with a rule like "always take path A"), pseudo-randomly
> (where it will always take branch A if the seed is the same), or actual
> randomly. Those are all options we can play with. But I'm not proposing any
> of those (by themselves) map to what we call free will. The whole mechanism
> is what I'm trying to map to free will, to simulate free will with.
>
> On 6/18/20 2:29 PM, Russ Abbott wrote:
> > Variables taking on values isn't something I normally associate with
> discussions of free will.
> >
> > Although since you mentioned it, how does the system decide whether to
> process A or B? Isn't that what you want to explain?
>
> --
> ☣ uǝlƃ
>
> - .... . -..-. . -. -.. -..-. .. ... -..-. .... . .-. .
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam
> un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
>
> - .... . -..-. . -. -.. -..-. .. ... -..-. .... . .-. .
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam
> un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20200618/3930ad66/attachment.html>