tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post5538986926578110537..comments2024-03-16T05:00:38.826-04:00Comments on Egnorance: When machines collidemregnorhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11431770851694587832noreply@blogger.comBlogger41125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-74387898442872280802014-01-05T23:01:43.176-05:002014-01-05T23:01:43.176-05:00Actually, the history of the medieval Catholic Chu...Actually, the history of the medieval Catholic Church is fascinating, and outdoes any modern soap opera. The loss of the hegemony of the Catholic Church wasn't due to the Reformation. <br /><br />It was due to the Schism, with France supporting the Avignon popes and England supporting the Roman popes.<br /><br />It resulted at the end of the 14th century with the popes having little political power, and France and England becoming major powers in Europe.<br /><br />Nationalism wasn't the result of the Reformation. It originated much earlier, in the 14th century, with the increasing dominance of kings over nobles.bachfiendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14752055891882312204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-54589419385892834582014-01-05T20:32:57.000-05:002014-01-05T20:32:57.000-05:00Ilion,
And your evidence that the denial of '...Ilion,<br /><br />And your evidence that the denial of 'free will' is the inescapable result of denying God?<br /><br />I'm an atheist. I could well accept that 'free will' exists, and it wouldn't affect my atheism in the slightest.<br /><br />'Free will' means that actions are initiated as conscious decisions. I deny free will because I accept that decisions are made subconsciously and for reasons we are largely unaware.<br /><br />If free will actually exists, then we still have to decide if it's an 'uncaused' conscious decision, independent of the individual's previous history and circumstances (strong free will) or whether the conscious decision is 'caused' dependent on the person's history and circumstances (weak free will).<br /><br />I'd be happy to accept weak free will, but not strong free will.bachfiendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14752055891882312204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-88587196709284724882014-01-05T17:22:04.092-05:002014-01-05T17:22:04.092-05:00Egnor,
Excuse me if I doubt your understanding of...Egnor,<br /><br />Excuse me if I doubt your understanding of history. The Reformation resulted from the corrupt practices of the Catholic Church to replace income from Catholic France's conflict with the Roman pope before Luther.<br /><br />The French Catholic kings wanted France to become the centre of Catholic world, including having the pope in Avignon. Much of the corruption was an attempt to pay for the pope to move back to Rome, which at the time was a ramshackle city.<br /><br />Corruptions such as the issuing of indulgences for sin.<br /><br />German nobles (and there were over 300 independent German states at the time of the 30 year war) realised that a lot of their wealth was going to Rome in the form of tithing and payment of indulgences. And they wanted to keep their wealth in their states.<br /><br />France had an interest in keeping Germany weak by paying Protestant Sweden to fight Protestant German states.<br /><br />France's desire to be the leader of the Catholic world continued well into the 17th century. The English Catholic King James II was an ally of the French Catholic King Louis XIV, whom the pope regarded with extreme distrust.<br /><br />When the English nobles invited William of Orange to invade England in 1688 (the Glorious Revolution, but actually, the last successful invasion of England) to replace James II, it's said that the pope lent money to William of Orange. And had a portrait of William of Orange in the Vatican (actually, I'm not certain whether the last two assertions are definitely true, but they're too good not to be :) ...)bachfiendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14752055891882312204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-21114270819960428932014-01-05T16:58:12.909-05:002014-01-05T16:58:12.909-05:00Egnor,
Excuse me if I doubt your ability to under...Egnor,<br /><br />Excuse me if I doubt your ability to understand whatever Benjamin Libet wrote after you misread his work on the brain backdating the awareness of sensory stimuli to the time the evoked potential reaches the brain. Not to the time the evoked potentials occur in the peripheral nervous system, as you've claimed and repeated several times.<br /><br />Decisions made with 'free will' and 'free won't' still belong to the person making them. Except with 'free won't' bad decisions are due to a failure of inhibition, not an active decision by the individual. And in some cases, that makes a person less culpable.<br /><br />A person with a frontal lobe brain tumour in a critical location wouldn't be regarded as a criminal for certain crimes of impulse. A person committing crimes under the voluntary intake of alcohol would be, because the alcohol ingestion was voluntary and its effects foreseeable. A psychopath committing a murder would almost certainly be locked away for life, although psychopathy is just as innate as anything else.<br /><br />And what evidence do you have that humans have souls and a fragment of God's free will? You're just repeating evidence free bullshit.<br /><br />Eugen,<br /><br />Unfortunately we don't have full freedom and self awareness. Our memories are faulty. Our perceptions aren't always accurate. It's dangerous assuming that we are perfect, when we are not. The human brain is very good, but not perfect.bachfiendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14752055891882312204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-4509884061383906102014-01-05T12:29:45.097-05:002014-01-05T12:29:45.097-05:00Just one more:
Jerry : (staring at his boot...Just one more:<br /><br />Jerry : (staring at his boot collection)<br />El Booto : What are you doing Jerry? <br />Jerry :Waiting for the chemicals to decide which boots to wear.Eugenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15513772766225981430noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-26908375910534867732014-01-05T10:07:25.183-05:002014-01-05T10:07:25.183-05:00[it's not that we *have* free will (in the man... [it's not that we *have* free will (in the manner that we *have* hands and feet), but that we *are* free wills.]<br /><br />I agree. I think it is a mistake to see free will as a "property" of our minds, rather than a characteristic of who we are, created in the Image of God, Who chooses freely. mregnorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11431770851694587832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-53758592883436327012014-01-05T10:04:59.444-05:002014-01-05T10:04:59.444-05:00Ilion:
I didn't intend to flare up the Protes...Ilion:<br /><br />I didn't intend to flare up the Protestant/Catholic divide, but nationalism was certainly one of the salient consequences of the Reformation. <br /><br />You are right that the French-- through Cardinal Richelieu-- were double-dealing and stirred up conflict for their own purposes. But much of the motivation for the Reformation, at least the motivation of the secular rulers who supported it, was to break away from the hegemony of the Catholic Church and strengthen national power and independence. Much of this took place via simple theft of Church property by secular rulers. This was a central factor in the German and English Reformation in particular. <br /><br />The undermining of Church authority fragmented Europe in unprecedented ways, and led in quite obvious ways to the rise of nationalism, liberalism, and atheism. <br /><br />This clearly was not the intent of many of the protestant reformers, who generally had bona-fide concerns about Catholic theology and practice, but it is very much the result. <br /><br />The Reformation began a process that gave us the modern world, for better and for worse.mregnorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11431770851694587832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-63449895378707010932014-01-05T08:55:32.034-05:002014-01-05T08:55:32.034-05:00... and to deny "free will" is simply an...... and to deny "free will" is simply another way of denying the reality of human selves -- ultimately, it (in both aaspects) is just another of the logically inescapable results of dening that God is. But, it is literally <i>absurd</i> to deny that one's self exists or one is a free will: ergo, it is absurd to deny that God is.Ilíonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15339406092961816142noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-55666925768105333772014-01-05T08:51:04.136-05:002014-01-05T08:51:04.136-05:00Properly speaking, it's not that we *have* fre...Properly speaking, it's not that we *have* free will (in the manner that we *have* hands and feet), but that we *are* free wills. To speak od the "free will" is just to speak of the self with a different focus.Ilíonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15339406092961816142noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-48548086644646206352014-01-05T08:47:24.983-05:002014-01-05T08:47:24.983-05:00M.Egnor: "The entire nationalist system arose...<b>M.Egnor:</b> "<i>The entire nationalist system arose from the Reformation, which was an open war on the Catholic Church, and the revolt against the Church led to the Thirty Years' War, the Napoleonic Wars and all of the horrors of the 20th century.</i>"<br /><br />Oh, please! do stop this idolatry of The One True Bureaucracy.<br /><br />The "entire nationalist system" was an eventuality of the Thirty Years' War, and Thirty Years' War was the result of the (French) Bourbon Dynasts -- Catholics, both King and Cardinal -- ginning-up war through-out Europe as part of the goal of centralizing the French State, increasing the power and scope of the Monarch, and projecting French/Bourbon Power far beyond the boundaries of France and over other dynasties.Ilíonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15339406092961816142noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-58347332879003252622014-01-05T08:33:09.890-05:002014-01-05T08:33:09.890-05:00Bachfiend
I was wondering about the difference b...Bachfiend<br /><br />I was wondering about the difference between us and animals. We are partially driven by instincts like animals, but we have full freedom and self awareness. That gives us huge power but with power comes responsibility.Eugenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15513772766225981430noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-52184436349214532262014-01-05T08:32:11.651-05:002014-01-05T08:32:11.651-05:00Eugen:
The question of free will in animals is an...Eugen:<br /><br />The question of free will in animals is an interesting one. Descartes thought animals were machines without souls. I think he was wrong.<br /><br />Animals (and plants) certainly have souls, in the Aristotelian sense of soul as the form of a living thing. <br /><br />Human beings have spiritual rational souls. I believe that human free will is the consequence of our spiritual powers (we are made in His image and share a tiny bit of His Will) and our rational powers-- we are able to freely choose based on reason (and on other factors of course).<br /><br />I see free will as a power of our spiritual soul, and free will is a particularly clear reflection of His Image in our soul. Animals don't have spiritual souls, although I do think they have a sort of free will, appropriate to them. mregnorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11431770851694587832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-32225001129018870002014-01-05T08:24:55.173-05:002014-01-05T08:24:55.173-05:00bach:
Libet emphatically endorsed free will. &quo...bach:<br /><br />Libet emphatically endorsed free will. "Free won't" was merely his play on words to describe the ability of a person to freely choose to carry out an act or not. <br /><br />Free will is obviously real in man. mregnorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11431770851694587832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-43225341141110943862014-01-04T23:27:35.801-05:002014-01-04T23:27:35.801-05:00Eugen,
We don't know how other species think....Eugen,<br /><br />We don't know how other species think. We do know that other species are self-aware - including chimps, gorillas, dolphins and elephants. They all pass the 'mirror test'.<br /><br />Do they have 'free will'?<br /><br />Other species often show highly sophisticated thinking. If you were given a long narrow container half filled with water with a treat floating on top of the water out of reach of your hands, and you were not allowed to tip the container but had access to any number of common objects including rocks and sticks, would you be able to get the treat?<br /><br />Caledonian crows are perfectly capable of solving the puzzle. They drop stones into the container raising the water level allowing the treat to float into reach of its beak. Intelligent, but how did it solve it?<br /><br />Because we can't know how other species think, we can't know whether they actually have a choice or whether everything is preprogrammed.bachfiendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14752055891882312204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-78350415648935731582014-01-04T23:00:40.827-05:002014-01-04T23:00:40.827-05:00Egnor,
Pope Benedict XV became pope on September ...Egnor,<br /><br />Pope Benedict XV became pope on September 3, 1914. By then, the war had been raging for a month. Germany had made large territorial gains in France. Both the French and Germans had suffered enormous losses. Britain was still to suffer its enormous losses with the virtual destruction of the few divisions it had committed, but at that time it was largely irrelevant.<br /><br />France didn't want negotiations, because it had suffered enormous losses in land and soldiers.<br /><br />Germany didn't want negotiations, because it had suffered enormous losses in men, but had gained a lot of territory.<br /><br />It was obvious that neither side could win quickly, but a return to pre-1914 borders would have been regarded as a defeat for both sides. So, any action by Pope Benedict XV was just irrelevant. Nothing he did, no matter how well-meaning, could have the slightest effect. Unfortunately.<br /><br />The time to have stopped the Great War was before it started. Before the Christian Kaiser Wilhelm II gave the Austrians the 'blank cheque' to take action against Serbia.<br /><br />Christians did run away from responsibility for the Great War. Christian politicians and soldiers responsible for the war occurring wrote memoirs after the war obfuscating their roles in the disaster.<br /><br />Anyway. Individual atheists, as well as Christians, have to accept responsibility for their individual actions. Atheists, as well as Christians, don't have to accept responsibility for the actions of other atheists or Christians.<br /><br />I was just noting that it was the actions of Christians, not atheists, who caused, directly and indirectly, the suffering of the 20th century.bachfiendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14752055891882312204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-68768268834671018072014-01-04T22:27:49.210-05:002014-01-04T22:27:49.210-05:00Egnor,
'Free won't' is Benjamin Libet...Egnor,<br /><br />'Free won't' is Benjamin Libet's concept. You know, the neuroscientist you completely misunderstood on page 72 of 'Mind Time' when he wrote that sensory perception is backdated half a second to the time the evoked potential first reaches the brain as meaning the brain backdates perception to the time the action potentials are first produced in the peripheral nervous system.<br /><br />As 'evidence' that the peripheral nervous system is self-aware. As are the nerve cells in the heart and the gut.<br /><br />The brain makes decisions subconsciously for reasons which are also subconscious. The decision and the reason are passed on to the mind which has the illusion it's made the decision, if the decision is carried out (although the motor activity necessary to carry out the action can be detected by electrophysiology before the person is aware of the decision).<br /><br />'Free will' doesnt 'strike at the heart of (my) metaphysics'. A person's decision is still that person's decision, even if it is subconscious and not 'free' to the consciousness. A person is still responsible for his or her actions because the person still has the power of veto.<br /><br />As I noted in my first comment, 'free won't' allows theodicy just as much as 'free will'. God allows suffering to occur because humans are given free won't and the ability to veto evil actions, or free will and the ability to commit evil.<br /><br />'Free won't' does, however, strike at the heart of dualists with their belief that the mind is separate and independent of the brain. Whereas it's just a product, a part of the brain. The brain makes all the decisions. The mind just has the illusion it makes all the decisions.<br /><br />Eugen,<br /><br />An example of 'free won't' - you're in a bar - your brain wants a beer, because it craves the alcohol. Subconsciously, it makes the decision 'give me beer', and also a reason 'I'm thirsty' and passes the decision and the reason to the mind, which turns the two around in sequence to 'I'm thirsty' and 'I want a beer' to give the illusion that the mind made the decision, even though its possible to detection the brain activity necessary for the person to get another beer such as waving to the barkeeper before the person is aware of it.<br /><br />'Free won't' arises when the person overrules the decision 'I want another beer, but I better not, I'm driving home'.bachfiendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14752055891882312204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-83443505998592448682014-01-04T22:12:47.138-05:002014-01-04T22:12:47.138-05:00Thanks Michael, I couldn't get the importance...Thanks Michael, I couldn't get the importance of the"free won't". Recently I talked to a very polite atheist philosopher who posts often on free will. He probably realizes how important this issue is. I wrote this comment on his blog but discussion didn't get too far.<br /><br /><br /><br />Say we observe single bacterium in the lab. Bacterium is pretty much chemical automated system at work. Specialized proteins-chemical sensors on the membrane are sensing for “food” molecules in the environment. When “food” molecule attaches to the “sensor” it triggers cascade of molecular changes inside the bacterium with a result of activating “propeller” motor to move bacterium in the direction of the “food” molecules. Does bacterium possess free will to choose between going after “food” molecules or not? Of course it doesn’t. It’s just a preprogrammed machine made of chemical components and as a whole just reacts to environment. It has no choice.<br /><br />Take a look at the spider in your garden. It is more complex creature with more complicated behavior than the bacterium. Can he decide not to build a net and relax instead? Does he just react to environment? Yes, it just follows “program”, it has no choice.<br /><br />Now look at couple of birds out of your window in the spring. They flew from the south and are now building the nest in the tree. Do they have a free will to choose not to build a nest and “take it easy” this year or maybe even stay down south instead of flying thousands of kilometers? No, they are preprogrammed to do this every year. They have no choice.<br /><br />When I compare these creatures with humans I see that we are made of same chemical units (cells). Difference is that we have a choice in everything because of our ability of self-awareness. The self-awareness gives us power of knowing what we are doing unlike bacterium, spider or a bird. Going to extreme, I can even choose not to eat or seek shelter if I’m suicidal. I have a choice, the other creatures don’t. It seems to me that humans are “free chemicals” as opposed to other creatures, the “preprogrammed chemicals”.Eugenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15513772766225981430noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-37660312661733217472014-01-04T21:06:38.060-05:002014-01-04T21:06:38.060-05:00The Great War was evil and atrocity and folly on a...The Great War was evil and atrocity and folly on an unimaginable scale. And obviously Christians bear some blame for it, because some Christians did it. <br /><br />Unlike atheists, we don't run away from accountability.<br /><br />I do observe that the Catholic Church tried desperately to stop the war-- Benedict XV called it "the suicide of civilized Europe". The Catholic Church was the one international organization that utterly opposed the war and tried heroically to stop it and to mitigate its horror.<br /><br />The entire nationalist system arose from the Reformation, which was an open war on the Catholic Church, and the revolt against the Church led to the Thirty Years' War, the Napoleonic Wars and all of the horrors of the 20th century.<br /><br />We tried to stop it. Don't blame the Church.mregnorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11431770851694587832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-91126813830663342742014-01-04T20:59:35.993-05:002014-01-04T20:59:35.993-05:00"Free won't" is just Newspeak.
Bac..."Free won't" is just Newspeak. <br /><br />Bach is trying to slime out of the very difficult position that the free will debate puts materialists in. <br /><br />We have free will. Everyone knows it. Materialists panic when the subject comes up, because free will strikes at the heart of their metaphysics. mregnorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11431770851694587832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-3164902760793810732014-01-04T20:44:22.466-05:002014-01-04T20:44:22.466-05:00I googled "free won't" but I still d...I googled "free won't" but I still don't understand what's the deal with it. Free "will not"?<br /><br />Would Bachfiend or someone have simple example why use it in discussions on free will or a link to simple explanation.? I must be misunderstanding something, English is not my first language.Eugenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15513772766225981430noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-23094750502608425412014-01-04T20:29:39.385-05:002014-01-04T20:29:39.385-05:00Egnor,
This year is the 100th anniversary of the ...Egnor,<br /><br />This year is the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the Great War, in which million-strong armies marched off to do battle for 'God, king and country'. War started by Christian leaders of Christian countries, by free will for transcendental reasons.<br /><br />All of the unfortunate events of the 20th century were the direct or indirect consequences of the Great War, including the bastardry committed by the Christian leaders of Germany in facilitating the transit of Lenin and fellow revolutionaries to Petrograd, just to make life difficult for Christian Russia and its Christian leaders.<br /><br />No Great War - no Soviet Union, no Hitler, no Second World War, no nuclear bomb, no Communist China, no Cold War, no North Korea... The list goes on and on.<br /><br />And only because Christian leaders of Christian countries, with free will and the Christian belief in the transcendental nature of humans, didn't use their 'free won't' and avoided war.bachfiendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14752055891882312204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-64235742249702784852014-01-04T20:13:24.939-05:002014-01-04T20:13:24.939-05:00:)
I've just realised I've left myself op...:)<br /><br />I've just realised I've left myself open to creationist quote mining.<br /><br />'Senile old fart. Yes, I am'. <br /><br />Not true. I might be a grumpy old man, but I'm not senile, not yet anyway.bachfiendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14752055891882312204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-32031778367570811452014-01-04T20:08:01.465-05:002014-01-04T20:08:01.465-05:00Big Rich,
And your point?
We don't live in n...Big Rich,<br /><br />And your point?<br /><br />We don't live in nature. We live in human societies, with a network of mutual obligations. 'Blood red in tooth and claw' (actually you mean 'nature red in tooth and claw', or you've modified it to read 'nature, blood red in tooth and claw') doesn't apply always to nature (cooperation instead of competition often occurs), and shouldn't apply in human societies with mutual obligations.<br /><br />The miscreant who dented Jerry Coyne's car had the option of engaging his power of free won't, not doing the easy thing and just driving away, and actually accepting responsibility.<br /><br />I'm certain Jerry Coyne would have had a much more benign attitude if the miscreant had accepted responsibility and offered to pay for the damage. Jerry Coyne would still have been wronged - he still would have the inconvenience of getting quotes for the panel beating, taking it to the panel beater, being without the car for a while, perhaps having to hire a car or taxis in the meantime... <br /><br />An immediate apology and acceptance of responsibility almost certainly would result in Jerry Coyne in 'forgiving' the miscreant the added costs, most of which are unquantifiable (how do you value lost time?)bachfiendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14752055891882312204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-89533765097990581142014-01-04T10:50:22.570-05:002014-01-04T10:50:22.570-05:00Senile old fart,
Yes, I am.Senile old fart,<br /><br />Yes, I am.bachfiendhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14752055891882312204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3555199390227912207.post-58643635205519949702014-01-04T10:48:47.712-05:002014-01-04T10:48:47.712-05:00jizzebel.com is a nonexistent site, Grandpa. Maybe...jizzebel.com is a nonexistent site, Grandpa. Maybe you read it, I surely don't.<br /><br />HooAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com