You're special, just like everyone else.

All men are special, but some men are more special than others.

Its a serious question, as is the unicorn.

Of course those are empirical questions.

Then what was this. And you have yet to answer to the unicorn. I'm not going to try to drag it out from you.

Unicorns is also an empirical question: it's in principle possible to verify existence. But free will isn't.

Idk what questions you are answering but you are not answering the questions I asked.

I'm answering this post.

Newton's theory was empirical, as is the question of whether unicorns exist/existed. Whether it's libertarian free will or hard determinism is not an empirical question. The reasons are in this thread.

Care to summarize why you think the question of free will is not empirical? And if it is not empirical, what is it?

Also, would you consider ... I forget the term but like... second level empirical evidence as empirical evidence? Like if we say "if x, then we should see y more often than usual" and y is more often than usual, so good reason to believe x based on the empirical evidence of "y more than usual" ... in the category of empirical evidence for x?

Keep in mind for the duration of this back-and-forth that I dont know all the philosophical terms that you do, so I may be saying things at length that you can put in one or two words.

Ryan,
Describe an experiment that would allow you to determine whether a choice was made freely or not.

Also, it would probably be beneficial if you defined what you mean by "free will", because there are people who define it in such a way where it doesn't even mean anything. And if you're defining it like that and we start talking about chess computers and light bulbs again durka might start stabbing things.

For anyone who is interested I give the reasons why I consider free will and determinism are empirical in this therad (with the catchy title). Guess I could repeat them.

Ok key posts

Piers,
If the universe turns out to be indeterministic and the brain is based on physical principles that are inherently indeterministic (and choices are solely a consequence of brain function), then choices are inherently indeterministic.

Should the universe be shown to be deterministic and choices are solely a result of processes that occur within the physical laws of the universe than we can unequivocally state that choices are deterministic so free will (the coherent kind) does not exist.

If the universe is indeterministic it gets trickier and the question is underdetermined (I think that's the correct term and the one durka was using).

This is why the two issues are often combined and are not treated independently, I think.

As for those experiments, for the Libet one, it seems like based on the abstract it is basically saying: brain activity correlating to taking a motor action can come before actually being aware of wanting to take that action.

This doesn't seem surprising or all that problematic for free will. For example, say I'm hungry. Someone puts a hamburger in front of me. The part of my brain that says "mmm, hamburger" lights up. This correlates to me taking the motor action of picking up the hamburger. I become aware that a hamburger sounds awfully tasty right now. I pick it up and take a bite.

How does this imply I did not choose to pick up the hamburger and take a bite, or that I could not have chosen not to take a bite?

And as for the A and G experiment (going by your summary), I don't think it's surprising that one can induce, externally, an action and the person thinks it was their own choice. In particular, notice the term "influence" and "produce significant preference" in the abstract rather than "force absolutely 100% of the time".

As an example, someone puts a gun to my head and says "give me a nickel or I'm going to shoot you". I am being influenced realllly strongly to give him a nickel. It will produce a significant preference for me to give him a nickel over not giving him a nickel. I'll probably even give him one. This doesn't imply I didn't freely choose to give him a nickel or that it was physically impossible for me not to give him a nickel.

Similarly, I don't think it is all too surprising that it is possible someone could stimulate a region of my brain that would make me really want to choose my right hand over my left hand, thus having me choose my right hand most of the time and me "think" I made the choice on my own. Especially since maybe I did still make the choice on my own, I was just heavily influenced by your magnetic field.

This is why, I believe, the question is empirically underdetermined (if this is the correct term).

If I am not interpreting what was done in the experiments correctly or the conclusions the authors came to, I'll probably need to read the full text or a more detailed explanation of the methodology.

You appear to have the basic idea of the experiments.

I don't understand how exactly what you are saying here. Are you saying that we don't yet understand all the details of how our mind makes decisions? And more experiments are needed to improve our understanding? If so I don't think anyone disagrees.

The point I am making is that the issues are empirical. Meaningful conclusions can only come from doing scientific analysis of how the brain works. No science no advance. Everything about how we make decisions happens in the brain, the brain fits in a laboratory, we should be able to get there eventually.

The indeterminism or otherwise of the universe as a whole seems an entirely different area. Understanding the brain at the bimolecular level should be all that is needed for all issues concerning our decision making process to be resolved. Fundamentals of how the universe is structured probably needs 'sub quantum' considerations.

My basic instinct was that the universe is deterministic, however I have to accept the results of empirical evidence resulting in the uncertainty principle and allow that the universe is after all indeterministic.

However all indication are that the future only happens once. So retrospectively at least you can conclude that everything in the universe is preordained. So while the future might be indeterministic, I would claim it is never the less fixed and cannot be changed. OK, maybe this bit is underdetermined.

We can unequivocally state that computers are deterministic because we know how they work and it's not affected by indeterminism. Assuming that there's nothing "special" about the human brain that makes it supernaturally "different" from a virus, a calculator, or a car engine, then the same is likely true in principle for the brain as well.

That's begging the question Madnak...nothing you've said demonstrates that computers are deterministic.

If you're talking about quantum computers, I'm not. If you're talking about conventional computers, lol.

Conventional computers. Nothing you've said demonstrates that they are fully determined systems. It's begging the question. Any evidence of this underdetermines the question.

Even if you are sure as to how a computer will react to certain input, at any time a meteorite could impact with the computer and change that. You could claim that the meteorite is outside the system, however in the real world there is no outside.

This is irrelevant. The computer could still be fully determined whether the meteorite hits it or not: the computer and meteorite are part of the same system: the universe. This is not a serious objection at all.

Of course we can't be 100% sure that the computer output will be determined, but we know that this is the case most of the time, and typically a computer would fail to function if any indeterminate element were to enter play at the relevant level of abstraction. Getting anything resembling the expected output verifies that the process was determined.

It doesn't verify determinism at ALL! How can you possibly think this?

If the system is 99.99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999 9% probable to get the outcome you expect, then it's not determined but it will sure appear to be from your persepective. Show me an experiment that can distinguish between these two hypotheses.

My point is that the computer does not exist in isolation form the rest of the universe. Any model based on isolating the computer is going to be inaccurate. Even if it gives the correct prediction 99.99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999 9% of the time it still will be inaccurate if it does not factor in the rest of the universe. For example programs that take longer than the life time of the universe to run will be a bitch.

However all this is irrelevant if all we want to consider is the practical application of the operation of a particular program. The detail is too high. We don't need QM to determine how long to microwave a pizza, Deep Blue's next move or the mechanics of human decision making.

Your point is still totally irrelevant to the discussion. You should perhaps look up what a Straw Man Argument is. You're doing that: you're making it seem like we're making a claim that's crazy, when no one is.

Nothing is empirical by this standard, if we're talking about events that occur only 10^-whatever of the time, induction is inadequate. Thermodynamics can theoretically reverse itself at any time (with a small probability), but that doesn't suggest that the laws of thermodynamics aren't empirical.

This isn't a problem with induction. The hypothesis is unfalsifiable: it's NOT empirical.