Does this imply that you need actual options in order to have a choice?

Assume that choosebeans contains a choice, does this code loosely translate to free will if it would ever terminate?
While(true){
choosebeans()
}

madnak,
I skimmed your reply, will think about it in more detail when I have time. I think I understand your position, but I have an immediate question that pops into mind:

When a human player is playing black, and he/she responds to an opening move by white based on a memorized library of openings, by your criteria it seems like the human player is NOT choosing his/her opening move. Agree?

I used the original version of the function.

bean_count is a variable. The goal here was to remove all the variables.

Yes.

No! The subtractions are the models. When the computer subtracts one from three, it is simulating the action of removing one bean from a pile of three beans.

That's critical to the process of choice.

Specifically, Searle and others caused huge paradigm shift in psychology toward an interest in consciousness. It wasn't his actual theories that did this, I think. It was his critique of psychological theory and research ignoring and/or discounting consciousness.

And it didn't take long before there was a shift in psychology.

The problem is, I think, that philosophy must involve topics that are on the cutting edge of science or beyond current science. There are no philosophers today writing about gravity. This means that philosophers must often be wrong. That makes it easy (although incorrectly) to make fun of them.

Not "actual options" in the sense of "possible options."

If you're asking whether more than one action is necessary, I'm not sure. I can't think of a meaningful situation in which choice applies to only a single action. But is such a situation necessarily incompatible with my conception of choice?

I'm not sure. If we were to remove the -2 part of the program, but leave the -1 part, and call it a "choice," well... that feels awfully "weird" to me. But if we leave both the -2 part and the -1 part, it's comfortable for me to say the program is choosing.

And I defined choice as an evaluation of modeled actions, the plural "actions" seems to suggest that more than one action is being modeled and evaluated.

So while this is conceptually a gray area, I think defining choice on the basis of multiple actions is best for this discussion. I doubt that anyone will come up with a counterexample in which there is only one action, and I am still tempted to call the process "choice."

I'm not sure what you mean.

The computer running the program makes choices, regardless of whether the program terminates. Does it have free will? In the sense that free will is meaningful, yes. Is there any utility in considering the free will of such a computer? None that I can see.

This is a terminology thing. I'd have called it a parameter because it's a value given to the function as opposed to local variable. But whatever.

Agree, if this is the case then the player isn't choosing which move to make. The player may still be choosing how to make moves - for example, the player may be choosing whether or not to use the memorized openings.

If that's not true either, and the player is playing automatically from memory (with not consideration, deliberation, visualization, etc at any level of consciousness) then the player is not making choices at all.

(However, in general I assume that the player chose to put himself in the situation in the first place.)

I think of a parameter as a type of variable, but yeah, this is semantics. (Not the good kind, durka.)

This is the crux of the whole conversation regarding choice and determinism, at least as defined in the "usual" senses. What does it mean to have a choice if there's only one action? But this isn't *YOUR* definition of choice, so we'll go on.

This is why it's so important to be discussing the details. These are the details you cannot avoid if you want to have a meaningful conversation. And these are the questions you must face when you actually look into what you're actually trying to convey. The decisions here have implications, which should be pursued to see whether they still seem coherent.

So you would say that "3-1" is what "models" the action of removing one bean from a pile of three beans. And without this piece, it is impossible to have a model (for this game).

To me, this seems utterly arbitrary. I'll return to something I wrote over 100 posts ago:

Is there anything besides you which has the authority to determine whether something is or it not a model for something else?

Yeah, there are philosophers who work on things like gravity and realism/anti-realism about the entities that science posits.

Also, go look up the Pessimistic Meta-Induction for science. Science is basically ALWAYS wrong (it's basically a structural problem of being empirical).

madnak,
One more simple question...

If a human is hungry, and then "chooses" to eat, according to your definition of "choice" he/she is not really choosing UNLESS he's "considering, deliberating, visualizing, etc." the act of eating. Correct?

Not true at all. You've all been hung up on whether there is only one possible action, not whether there is only one action.

The latter objection makes some sense, the former is pulled out of a hat.

That's ridiculous. The details are generally irrelevant. You're focusing in on about 1% of the contexts in which the word "choice" is used, when virtually all of the utility of that word stems from the other 99% of the contexts.

That 1% is irrelevant, you could toss it all in or throw it all out and it doesn't change the logic of the position one iota.

OK, more questions keep popping up... sorry.

If I walk into a grocery store with the mindset: "If they have steak, I am going to buy a steak. If they do not, I am going to buy chicken."

I walk in the grocery store. I see that they don't have steak. I buy chicken.

I am NOT choosing according to your definition, right?

Yes. Rearranging computer memory to change a representation of "3" to a representation of "2" is an excellent representation of the logic of taking one bean away from three beans. It also preserves all the information relevant to the logic of the game itself.

What? No, there are probably an infinitude of ways to have a model for this game. That doesn't mean we can simply proceed without a model of any kind.

Not if we're determining how well something fits my conception of a model, there isn't. Not that it especially matters (see above).

Correct.

That mindset is not sufficient to establish that you are making a choice.

It doesn't preclude you making a choice, however.

If that mindset describes everything that your brain does in determining what to buy, then no, you are not making a choice.

This indicates that you are taking into consideration the utility of the word among the general population. In other words, we aren't just making up some random, arbitrary meaning for a word just so we can create an argument.


Me, madnak, and Aaron walk into a restaurant. Aaron says, "I am hungry, therefore I am going to eat. I haven't deliberated about the situation at all. I just know I'm going to eat because I'm hungry." I say, "ok, that's your choice." Madnak says, "No, he's clearly not choosing at all. You are crazy." I say, "No, he's definitely choosing. He is choosing to eat because he's hungry."

If we take a random sampling of people, do you think more would agree with your view or my view? i.e. do you think your conception of choice really captures the utility of the word when used in ordinary conversation.

I can't quite tell but it seems that Madnak has completed a 180 on the meaning of choice.

No, it's the utility of the word for me that's relevant here. And particularly the utility of the definition in encapsulating my conception of choice.

I don't think this scenario is possible. In a situation like that the human brain is always undergoing a process of deliberation.

I think that if I get to choose the scenarios and ask the questions, even Americans who are sodden with libertarian propaganda will agree with my conception.

Well, you're half right.

But... from your conversation with Aaron... it sure seems like the ordinary contexts of how words are used is relevant, no? If not, why are you not letting Aaron probe these other contexts? :

When you told Aaron it's ridiculous to consider these details because it's only used in contexts like this 1% of the time, what did you mean? Why is the context in which the word "choice" is used important if the only thing that matters is your utility for the word?

For that question, though. That one in particular. What % of people, roughly, will say "He's choosing." vs. what % would say "he's not choosing". Just curious what you think.

Relevant to some degree. In this case, he can probe however he pleases - I am the follower, he is the leader. He claims he can show inconsistency in my position, which means all I can do is answer his questions and wait for him to spring the trap. If he thinks that questions about this or that will help him to establish that my position is internally inconsistent, then he gets to go there. That's his advantage in this discussion, he drives.

My advantage is that it's my conception he needs to attack, and the onus is on him to do so. It's the basic offense/defense dichotomy. Overall I'm probably better at offense, but what got me heated up here was the claim of logical contradictions in the compatibilist position. So I'm stuck in a defensive role.

They're the same reason. Describing a bean program as making choices is not useful. Even if that meshes with my conception of choice, there's no utility in that distinction.

If I get to word the question, vast majority say he's not choosing. If you get to word it, the majority say he's choosing.