Capt_Vofaul t1_j8j8o3a wrote
Reply to comment by JZweibel in “The principle of protecting our own thinking from eavesdroppers is fundamental to autonomy.” – Daniel Dennett debates the sort of free will it’s worth wanting with neuroscientists Patrick Haggard and philosopher Helen Steward by IAI_Admin
Autonomy, or "true autonomy" for me would require there to be conscious intentions behind (intentions behind) actions. And not doing so as a way to avoid punishment. Which of course is impossible (probably). Not "doing something part of me-as-a-whole tells me to do, because if I don't do it, I experience suffering of some form." When someone's pointing a gun at your head and suggests that your might get blown off if you do what they don't want you to do, and you do the thing they want you to do, is that an exercise in autonomy? We may distinguish the two when it comes to ethics, and you get less accountability from people for doing something in the latter case, but when talking about what's going on inside one's mind, I don't think there's as much meaningful difference between the two.
Suppose you get brain-washed by someone, and you now feel the urge to act like a pig, while still having your prior human preferences. Do you consider the pig part, which is now a part of "you" as a whole, you? Do you call it your "decision based on free will" when the pig instinct somehow wins, and you roll around in a pool of mud--even though the part of you who consciously thinks, writes and talks HATES doing that? Is that decision to roll around in the mud your exercise of agency? If you somehow think the pig instincts you acquired through brain-washing is an external imposition or something (what isn't), what if you were born like this to begin with, rather than acquiring these attributes later in life? It's always been a part of you, and "you" (the conscious you) always hated it, cause its goals doesn't align with "your" preferences. But conscious part of you-as-a-whole still cannot control it.
To me, "my" biological nature/instincts are like those pig instincts. I've examined my needs, drives, and reaction towards things (like the pretty/ugly face example for instance), and deemed they were primarily there due to my nature as a machine that's 'made' (not implying intention of someone/something) to live and reproduce. Both functions I see as something utterly stupid and pointless, lacking any utility in itself--this mechanism happened due to happenstance, and all it does is to do the same thing so it can continue to do the thing til the end of fucking time (why the hell should I continue my existence so I can continue to try to fulfill needs that constantly arise, which lack utility of its own (other than to serve the said stupid mechanism), despite my desire for them to stop bothering me)? It's not a result of conscious and rational thought process, let alone mine.
I see a human baby, and I feel the urge to protect them. Why's that? Because they are small and 'cute' (which causes me a certain kind of emotional and behavioral response)? Or helpless? Why do I want to protect that bipedal organism if it's small and cute? Because that's in the interest of this mechanism as a biological copy machine. "My" emotional response towards the cuteness and whatnot are not much more than a triggering mechanism. (Whether that response is also caused when I see a cute and small quad-pedal organism or non-organism is irrelevant to this. I also want to protect them so they won't experience suffering, but the same applies to this motivation as well)
When you think hard about those 'responses', get to the root cause of such things, and figure out that they are there to serve/to help achieve something ultimately (or that you deem, even if you are wrong) pointless, and if your conscious/rational preferences don't align with it, it no longer feels like a part of you. And it's like this way all the way down, what's "my choice", what's "my decision", when the sky's all clear and you can see where they come from--and that where isn't you.
JZweibel t1_j8jev7m wrote
Where’s this “you” with the gun to its head? Your argument implies that there’s something like a soul that is unfortunately tethered to a physical body and thus imprisoned by causality. It’s all just you. The body, the tethers, and the thing that feels like a soul.
Capt_Vofaul t1_j8lo321 wrote
This "gun" is referring to the aforementioned mechanism which makes us do useless stuff. 'Threat' (otherwise likely possibility) of hunger, thirst, loneliness, boredom, fear, so on. (Unless you were a machine that works on a different mechanism,) Would you be doing anything if it wasn't for that mechanism, of the threat of suffering?
I'm suggesting that if you look into your mind closely, this mechanism is not much different from the kind of "external coercion" that, when talking about ethics, usually makes us consider that the person 'wasn't acting voluntarily.'
Think of something you enjoy doing. Why do you do it-Why does that thing has any use to you? Is it because you feel good when doing it? Does it remove the tingly sense of "I wanna do this"? (which can turn into more of an irritating sense if you are unable to do it for long) Does it provide you some temporary distraction from suffering, whether it's on-going or imminent? Why do you need to satisfy the desire which doing the thing satisfies. Cause it makes you happy? Why do you need to be happy, what drives you to achieve that emotional state?
Essential component of any 'needs' or 'wants' is that they cause suffering of some kind if left unsatisfied. Otherwise, they'd be completely optional. Water is useful to us so long as we get thirsty (or it helps us satisfy our other needs). The fact that drinking it prevents us from experiencing thirst (further), the fact that it prevents (further) suffering makes it valuable to us. It doesn't have any value, utility, any "goodness" in itself.
Again, why do you do stuff you enjoy? What makes you do it/want to do it? And what kind of experience do you get if you can't do it?
JZweibel t1_j8lu63h wrote
I'm just not buying the assertion that the gun you're describing isn't just part of you. You're not a ghost in a shell, you are the ghost and the shell. I didn't even ask what the gun was, I asked what "you" were, but the answer is the same so I agree with you there.
"Voluntary" is also a much higher bar than "chosen" so I don't just go ahead draw the same line from A to B there at all.
You could stand to dial down the smugness by like 40% at least.
I do stuff because I choose to.
Capt_Vofaul t1_j8m4ipw wrote
Sorry if I'm sounding smug, it's just how I came to write these stuff. You can think of it as some kinda condition. And yeah, I responded weirdly (failed to address that question).
Voluntarily may not have been the best choice of word there, but I stand by the idea that in both cases you are doing something in order to avoid suffering.
And.. we do stuff because (usually) we choose to do that, sure. But why do you choose to do the stuff you choose to do, what motivates you to do that? And what function is there behind it?
JZweibel t1_j8n6eu7 wrote
Even if we only do stuff to avoid bad brain chemicals, which I don’t think is true, those bad brain chemicals are just as much a part of us as the part that will subjectively experience the negative affect brought on by them, so it can’t be coercive. You can’t coerce yourself, that’s just you being you.
As for the chemicals themselves, take the example of people who break drug addiction habits and stop using. They definitely aren’t getting more pleasurable brain chemicals as a result, at least not for a loooong time.
Capt_Vofaul t1_j8ojnng wrote
Why do you think it's not a coercion, if the cause of potential suffering is inside the organism which creates the conscious thoughts and experience of "it"? Sure, the distinction may be useful when discussing ethics in a court and we wanna decide the appropriate response to someone's action. But Dennett's not just talking about that. If it's inside you, does it not matter how ridiculous the needs/drives/etc. it causes are when contrasted to your conscious/rational personality/preferences? Even if you, the conscious, experience great disconnect between your preferences and the condition imposed by the rest of "you"? If someone was born in such a way that their conscious part has normal sensibilities, but the particulars of their brain makes it so they feel immense suffering if they don't eat human feces, would you still not call it a coercion, from the perspective of the conscious part/conscious experience (of thoughts and feelings) of the person?
If you, one day, suddenly develop a condition so that you experience unbearable suffering unless you do something you absolutely hate to do, (I don't know what your preferences are, but suppose it's the urge to hurt people and you don't like hurting people) would it not feel like you are 'being forced' to do something you (the-conscious, thinking and feeling part of you) have no good reason to be doing? Forget about how you'd see someone like that, as a thirdperson. How would it feel to be in that state?
JZweibel t1_j8p57sc wrote
It really just sounds like you’re subscribing to dualism, so we’re not having the argument we think we are.
Capt_Vofaul t1_j8qgtsv wrote
I don't subscribe to dualism, but you can call it anything. Meat of my argument is whether or not the kind of state of existence/experience I'm describing, where a person has the awareness of the absurdity of their own nature of existence & the lack of ability of their rational/conscious preferences to defy their own primary programmings, is something one should be happy that they have, or want to have. Sure, the experience may still be less awful than enslavement by other humans or some kinda aliens, but does this state sound anything close to the characteristics/images we associate with the idea of 'freedom.'
Is your idea of freedom being a robot and not having your execution of tasks obstructed by the environment? I mean, we are basically robots, but you seem to be saying that being a robot is free as long as no one's stopping you from carrying the box from point A to B, and your own computer is doing the calculation to decide the optimal route to get there.
JZweibel t1_j8qk1jx wrote
You say you don’t, but your previous comments constantly differentiate between “a person” and concepts like “their programming” and so I ask you: where’s that line? If you’re not drawing it on a mental physical divide then why are you constantly referring to situations as if an immaterial mind is being made unfree by its connection to a physical body? You have refused to address this any time I’ve pointed it out and just double down on this “we are trapped” narrative as if I’m supposed to have some existential epiphany and realize I’ve actually been deluding myself this whole time.
An unintelligent robot like you’re describing doesn’t have consciousness or a sense of self, or even the capability to recursively alter its own criteria on a meta-level via self-reflection and imagined circumstance, so now we are not “basically robots”The robot’s programming isn’t part of its identity because it doesn’t have one. It doesn’t even have will, so forget about free will.
I’m out.
Capt_Vofaul t1_j8r4x6x wrote
What's the point in distinguishing what you call "unintelligent" robot and us? Difference is in its complexity and how exactly each of them work, and that's minutia. Neither of them can defy what it is or the laws of the universe, and exist only as the process of the larger mechanism. What you are gonna choose is already decided by things before and outside of you. And I think I've gave my answer to that question, even if it wasn't perfect. The line I draw is between the conscious thinking part/its experience, preferences, etc. and the rest, because that's the part that thinks, feels and talks in response to the universe/its subjective experiences. It doesn't have to be immaterial for it to know whether it experiences ridiculous drives as a result of the body it's a part of.
And you haven't given an answer to the simple question of "how would it feel to be the person in that state" and if you'd call that experience "freedom worth wanting" or whatever. Is it that hard to imagine?
What are you but a machine made to do pointless tasks until you are no more? Eat, sleep, think, talk, entertain, all so we can continue to maintain the existence of this silly process. And we can't even get out of bed unless we delude ourselves into thinking there's some value or point to this farce. We have the capability to examine our own nature of existence, and know if it's stupid or not.
If you decide to respond one last time, just answer the question. How would it feel to be in that state, and would you call that "exercise of freedom" or "freedom worth wanting."
For people who might (somehow) read this back and fourth, or in case you revisit this thread, I have a thought experiment for you. Suppose I knew how you would react to certain inputs, and said just the right things, so you would respond the way I want you to. You are still deciding what you write using your own knowledge, criteria, etc. And you aren't making the choice based on some imminent possibility of harm. I only chose words so you'd pick certain choices. Would you call this a free choice?
[deleted] t1_j8rnwdt wrote
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