Self-ownership

[Twilight Imperium]

That's ridiculous, though. It's like saying you could walk to the Sun if you could ignore gravity, heat tolerance, and the lack of air in space.

You don't get to handwave away something that basic to prove your points.

Unless free will is based on influencing quantum mechanics, which is really, really unlikely, the point stands.

Why shouldn't it be? It's the act of observing something that collapses a waveform, after all. Perhaps we should make that the standard of free will.

[Zottistan]

Unless free will is based on influencing quantum mechanics, which is really, really unlikely, the point stands.

Why shouldn't it be? It's the act of observing something that collapses a waveform, after all. Perhaps we should make that the standard of free will.

Because it has absolutely nothing to do with free will. It's random, sure, but it's not free will unless it's controllable. Newtonian systems are clockwork and quantum systems are random. You can't make control from a clockwork system collapsing randomness.

[Conscentia]

No, he couldn't have

Before the action.

because he didn't write anything else

After the action.
See: how time works.

The point was that what did happen is the only thing that could have happened, because there happen to be reasons why what happened did happen (ie. causes).

[Twilight Imperium]

Why shouldn't it be? It's the act of observing something that collapses a waveform, after all. Perhaps we should make that the standard of free will.

it's not free will unless it's controllable.

I'm going to need a source on that one. Also, there's no divide between Newtonian systems and quantum systems here - they influence one another because they're ultimately part of the same system. You can't just pick Newton's clockwork galaxy and dump the rest because it doesn't support your view.

[Zottistan]

it's not free will unless it's controllable.

I'm going to need a source on that one. Also, there's no divide between Newtonian systems and quantum systems here - they influence one another because they're ultimately part of the same system. You can't just pick Newton's clockwork galaxy and dump the rest because it doesn't support your view.

If you don't control your will, it's not free will. Duh.

You don't have freedom to choose when your actions are decided a)completely randomly or b)by cause and effect.

I'm dealing with a divide between the two because Newtonian physics is absolutely predictable and quantum mechanics is completely random. It doesn't matter whether there's a divide or not, because neither concept is compatible with free will.

[Twilight Imperium]

I beg your pardon?

If you don't control your will, it's not free will. Duh.

Ah, I gotcha. However, you can still make choices outside of a perfectly ordered system.

And that's kind of what we've been saying - it's not completely random or completely causal. The brain takes into account the various situational variables it has access to (and is influenced by several others) and generates outputs (1-x) where X is the upper bound of the number of choices.

Or phrased more simply, if you're ordering ice cream, you can pick any of Baskin Robbins' 31 flavors, or you can choose to rob the store, or do an elephant impression at the cashier (et cetera). But your more likely choices are bounded by situational variables - your preferences in ice cream, local laws, your adherence to social norms, the weather, et cetera. So while there is a component of randomness, there's still room for hard rules (maybe you're allergic to vanilla? maybe you're a chocoholic).

[Conscentia]

Give your brain the exact same choice between the exact same cookies, while it's in the exact same state, and it will choose the same cookie every time without fail. How could it not? It's processing the same information in the same way.

http://www.random.org/

From 1-100
First roll: 59
Second roll: 92

The source code has not changed even a single parenthesis, and yet there is still a 1/10,000 chance that the two numbers were the same.

Atmospheric noise isn't actually random. It appears that way to us because we have no way of predicting it. (See: chaos theory)
Chance is a convenient way of describing events that we have no practical way of predicting. It's not a description of reality.

[Zottistan]

If you don't control your will, it's not free will. Duh.

Ah, I gotcha. However, you can still make choices outside of a perfectly ordered system.

See the edit.

A system is either perfectly ordered or perfectly random, correct? If a single part of the system is fundamentally unpredictable, then its interactions with the clockwork parts are unpredictable, and thus the reactions of the clockwork parts are unpredictable. Agreed?

[Conscentia]

The dominoes in the body were toppled by the dominoes in the brain. The dominoes in the brain were toppled by the dominoes in the sensory organs. The dominoes in the sensory organs were toppled by the dominoes in the external world. The dominoes in the external world have been toppling eachother and toppled by eachother as long as there have been things happening.

Can you tell the future?

To some extent. The accuracy of our predictions will increase as our scientific theories are refined.

[Twilight Imperium]

Ah, I gotcha. However, you can still make choices outside of a perfectly ordered system.

See the edit.

A system is either perfectly ordered or perfectly random, correct? If a single part of the system is fundamentally unpredictable, then its interactions with the clockwork parts are unpredictable, and thus the reactions of the clockwork parts are unpredictable. Agreed?

No, not agreed. It's Schroedinger's Cat - essentially a machine with two "reactions" cat lives, cat dies. The quantum instability is unpredictable - you can't know whether it will decay or not. However, it's easy to predict the reaction of the ordered system. Cat lives, or cat dies. No system is perfectly ordered or perfectly random, it works in tandem.

[Zottistan]

See the edit.

A system is either perfectly ordered or perfectly random, correct? If a single part of the system is fundamentally unpredictable, then its interactions with the clockwork parts are unpredictable, and thus the reactions of the clockwork parts are unpredictable. Agreed?

No, not agreed. It's Schroedinger's Cat - essentially a machine with two "reactions" cat lives, cat dies. The quantum instability is unpredictable - you can't know whether it will decay or not. However, it's easy to predict the reaction of the ordered system. Cat lives, or cat dies. No system is perfectly ordered or perfectly random, it works in tandem.

You can predict how the machine will react based on the decay of the nucleus, but ultimately the actions of the machine are exactly as random as whether or not the nucleus will decay.

EDIT: Random selections of paths of order is still random.

[Conscentia]

Ah, I gotcha. However, you can still make choices outside of a perfectly ordered system.

See the edit.
A system is either perfectly ordered or perfectly random, correct? If a single part of the system is fundamentally unpredictable, then its interactions with the clockwork parts are unpredictable, and thus the reactions of the clockwork parts are unpredictable. Agreed?

Depends on the strength of the influence of the random element, and the resolution of predictions.
It's like weather prediction - the further ahead you look the vaguer the predictions get, but you can still be pretty sure if you predict rain within the next 5 hours.

[Twilight Imperium]

EDIT: Random selections of paths of order is still random.

True, but it's still not completely random. "anything could happen" is very different from "choose door A, B, C, or D".

[Conscentia]

See the edit.

A system is either perfectly ordered or perfectly random, correct? If a single part of the system is fundamentally unpredictable, then its interactions with the clockwork parts are unpredictable, and thus the reactions of the clockwork parts are unpredictable. Agreed?

No, not agreed. It's Schroedinger's Cat - essentially a machine with two "reactions" cat lives, cat dies. The quantum instability is unpredictable - you can't know whether it will decay or not. However, it's easy to predict the reaction of the ordered system. Cat lives, or cat dies. No system is perfectly ordered or perfectly random, it works in tandem.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWMTOrux0LM

[Zottistan]

See the edit.
A system is either perfectly ordered or perfectly random, correct? If a single part of the system is fundamentally unpredictable, then its interactions with the clockwork parts are unpredictable, and thus the reactions of the clockwork parts are unpredictable. Agreed?

Depends on the strength of the influence of the random element, and the resolution of predictions.
It's like weather prediction - the further ahead you look the vaguer the predictions get, but you can still be pretty sure if you predict rain within the next 5 hours.

Well, weather is deterministic, for all intents and purposes, I thought? That's not really what I meant. I mean something fundamentally unpredictable interacting with something fundamentally predictable.

So let's say the machine that kills or doesn't kill Schrodinger's cat reacts in a predictable fashion to the nuclear decay. If the nucleus decays, it behaves in a predictable fashion. But since the actual decay of the nucleus happens randomly, whether or not the machine kills the cat or not is completely random. The behaviour of the system is completely random, despite the fact that it contains ordered parts. That's what I meant. Any randomness at all in a system makes the system completely random.

[Twilight Imperium]

Depends on the strength of the influence of the random element, and the resolution of predictions.
It's like weather prediction - the further ahead you look the vaguer the predictions get, but you can still be pretty sure if you predict rain within the next 5 hours.

Well, weather is deterministic, for all intents and purposes, I thought? That's not really what I meant. I mean something fundamentally unpredictable interacting with something fundamentally predictable.

So let's say the machine that kills or doesn't kill Schrodinger's cat reacts in a predictable fashion to the nuclear decay. If the nucleus decays, it behaves in a predictable fashion. But since the actual decay of the nucleus happens randomly, whether or not the machine kills the cat or not is completely random. The behaviour of the system is completely random, despite the fact that it contains ordered parts. That's what I meant. Any randomness at all in a system makes the system completely random.

Except no, it really doesn't. The system is constrained by what brought it about - the machine kills the cat or doesn't. That's a finite set of results - the nucleus won't half decay and turn the cat into a dog or something. "quantum" doesn't mean "throw all the rules out the window", it just means "probability".

[Zottistan]

Well, weather is deterministic, for all intents and purposes, I thought? That's not really what I meant. I mean something fundamentally unpredictable interacting with something fundamentally predictable.

So let's say the machine that kills or doesn't kill Schrodinger's cat reacts in a predictable fashion to the nuclear decay. If the nucleus decays, it behaves in a predictable fashion. But since the actual decay of the nucleus happens randomly, whether or not the machine kills the cat or not is completely random. The behaviour of the system is completely random, despite the fact that it contains ordered parts. That's what I meant. Any randomness at all in a system makes the system completely random.

Except no, it really doesn't. The system is constrained by what brought it about - the machine kills the cat or doesn't. That's a finite set of results - the nucleus won't half decay and turn the cat into a dog or something. "quantum" doesn't mean "throw all the rules out the window", it just means "probability".

It being a finite set of choices doesn't make the result any less random.

The nucleus will decay within a measure of time, or it won't. Does that make it any less random?

[Conscentia]

Depends on the strength of the influence of the random element, and the resolution of predictions.
It's like weather prediction - the further ahead you look the vaguer the predictions get, but you can still be pretty sure if you predict rain within the next 5 hours.

Well, weather is deterministic, for all intents and purposes, I thought? That's not really what I meant. I mean something fundamentally unpredictable interacting with something fundamentally predictable.

So let's say the machine that kills or doesn't kill Schrodinger's cat reacts in a predictable fashion to the nuclear decay. If the nucleus decays, it behaves in a predictable fashion. But since the actual decay of the nucleus happens randomly, whether or not the machine kills the cat or not is completely random. The behaviour of the system is completely random, despite the fact that it contains ordered parts. That's what I meant. Any randomness at all in a system makes the system completely random.

People say it's random, but that would require a violation of causality. Why can't people just be honest and say they "don't know" how to predict it? As far as I know, these phenomena have not been proven to be fundamentally unpredictable. (In-fact, I don't know how one would go about demonstrating that.) The reality is that the idea that the phenomena are random is a hypothesis, not a demonstrated fact. There are interpretations of quantum physics that preserve causality.

[Zottistan]

Well, weather is deterministic, for all intents and purposes, I thought? That's not really what I meant. I mean something fundamentally unpredictable interacting with something fundamentally predictable.

So let's say the machine that kills or doesn't kill Schrodinger's cat reacts in a predictable fashion to the nuclear decay. If the nucleus decays, it behaves in a predictable fashion. But since the actual decay of the nucleus happens randomly, whether or not the machine kills the cat or not is completely random. The behaviour of the system is completely random, despite the fact that it contains ordered parts. That's what I meant. Any randomness at all in a system makes the system completely random.

People say it's random, but that would require a violation of causality. Why can't people just be honest and say they "don't know" how to predict it. As far as I know, these phenomena have not been proven to be fundamentally unpredictable. (In-fact, I don't know how one would go about demonstrating that.) The reality is that the idea that the phenomena are random is a hypothesis, not a demonstrated fact. There are interpretations of quantum physics that preserve causality.

Most of what I've read on it claims that it's fundamentally unpredictable, but I don't know enough about it to make an actual judgement on it. I know the models that treat it as fundamentally probabilistic have matched the experimental results very well.

EDIT: But anyway, for the sake of the hypothetical, let's say it's unpredictable. If it is, that makes the death or life of Schrodinger's cat completely random, correct?

[Conscentia]

People say it's random, but that would require a violation of causality. Why can't people just be honest and say they "don't know" how to predict it. As far as I know, these phenomena have not been proven to be fundamentally unpredictable. (In-fact, I don't know how one would go about demonstrating that.) The reality is that the idea that the phenomena are random is a hypothesis, not a demonstrated fact. There are interpretations of quantum physics that preserve causality.

Most of what I've read on it claims that it's fundamentally unpredictable, but I don't know enough about it to make an actual judgement on it. I know the models that treat it as fundamentally probabilistic have matched the experimental results very well.

Of-coarse they have. That's the point of probability.

Chance is a convenient way of describing events that we have no practical way of predicting. It's not a description of reality.

Using probability with dice rolls or coin tosses yields good results too, and those are subject to Newtonian motion.

[Twilight Imperium]

Except no, it really doesn't. The system is constrained by what brought it about - the machine kills the cat or doesn't. That's a finite set of results - the nucleus won't half decay and turn the cat into a dog or something. "quantum" doesn't mean "throw all the rules out the window", it just means "probability".

It being a finite set of choices doesn't make the result any less random.

The nucleus will decay within a measure of time, or it won't. Does that make it any less random?

Yes. The more constrained the system, the less randomness it contains, and vice versa. If the box depended on four separate nuclei, it would be significantly more random than the version with one. Bringing this back towards the earlier point for some clarity here -

Assume Brains A-D are (roughly) the same brain.

Brain A goes into an ice cream shop and orders vanilla, because that's its favorite flavor.
Brain B goes into an ice cream shop, but decided to order chocolate, because while vanilla is its favorite, it wants something different.
Brain C goes into an ice cream shop, and orders a maloberry sherbet because in that quantum branch, those evolved instead of vanilla beans.
Brain D goes into an ice cream shop and orders a BLT, because there, "ice cream" means "sandwich".

There's still randomness. There's still order. And there is still choice.

[Zottistan]

Most of what I've read on it claims that it's fundamentally unpredictable, but I don't know enough about it to make an actual judgement on it. I know the models that treat it as fundamentally probabilistic have matched the experimental results very well.

Of-coarse they have. That's the point of probability.

Chance is a convenient way of describing events that we have no practical way of predicting. It's not a description of reality.

Using probability with dice rolls or coin tosses yields good results too, and those are subject to Newtonian motion.

See the edit.

[Conscentia]

It being a finite set of choices doesn't make the result any less random.

The nucleus will decay within a measure of time, or it won't. Does that make it any less random?

Yes. The more constrained the system, the less randomness it contains, and vice versa. If the box depended on four separate nuclei, it would be significantly more random than the version with one. Bringing this back towards the earlier point for some clarity here -

Assume Brains A-D are (roughly) the same brain.

Brain A goes into an ice cream shop and orders vanilla, because that's its favorite flavor.
Brain B goes into an ice cream shop, but decided to order chocolate, because while vanilla is its favorite, it wants something different.
Brain C goes into an ice cream shop, and orders a maloberry sherbet because in that quantum branch, those evolved instead of vanilla beans.
Brain D goes into an ice cream shop and orders a BLT, because there, "ice cream" means "sandwich".

There's still randomness. There's still order. And there is still choice.

No.

Your scenarios demonstrate no randomness - just causality.

[Conscentia]

EDIT: But anyway, for the sake of the hypothetical, let's say it's unpredictable. If it is, that makes the death or life of Schrodinger's cat completely random, correct?

No, it just makes it unpredictable. It could be unpredictable because it's random, but necessarily because it's random.

The point of that thought experiment was to demonstrate that quantum mechanics and classical physics don't mesh together, so I don't see where you are trying to go with this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWMTOrux0LM

[Zottistan]

EDIT: But anyway, for the sake of the hypothetical, let's say it's unpredictable. If it is, that makes the death or life of Schrodinger's cat completely random, correct?

No, it just makes it unpredictable. It could be unpredictable because it's random, but necessarily because it's random.

The point of that thought experiment was to demonstrate that quantum mechanics and classical physics don't mesh together, so I don't see where you are trying to go with this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWMTOrux0LM

Isn't it random because it's unpredictable?

My point was that a system that has one fundamentally unpredictable/random element is fundamentally unpredictable/random.