Daniel Dennett Explains Consciousness and Free Will | Big Think
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- Опубліковано 22 кві 2012
- Daniel Dennett Explains Consciousness and Free Will
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Daniel Dennett explains consciousness and free will.
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DANIEL DENNETT:
Daniel C. Dennett is the author of Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking, Breaking the Spell, Freedom Evolves, and Darwin's Dangerous Idea and is University Professor and Austin B. Fletcher Professor of Philosophy, and Co-Director of the Center for Cognitive Studies at Tufts University. He lives with his wife in North Andover, Massachusetts, and has a daughter, a son, and a grandson. He was born in Boston in 1942, the son of a historian by the same name, and received his B.A. in philosophy from Harvard in 1963. He then went to Oxford to work with Gilbert Ryle, under whose supervision he completed the D.Phil. in philosophy in 1965. He taught at U.C. Irvine from 1965 to 1971, when he moved to Tufts, where he has taught ever since, aside from periods visiting at Harvard, Pittsburgh, Oxford, and the École Normale Supérieure in Paris.
His first book, Content and Consciousness, appeared in 1969, followed by Brainstorms (1978), Elbow Room (1984), The Intentional Stance (1987), Consciousness Explained (1991), Darwin's Dangerous Idea (1995), Kinds of Minds (1996), and Brainchildren: A Collection of Essays 1984-1996. Sweet Dreams: Philosophical Obstacles to a Science of Consciousness, was published in 2005. He co-edited The Mind's I with Douglas Hofstadter in 1981 and he is the author of over three hundred scholarly articles on various aspects on the mind, published in journals ranging from Artificial Intelligence and Behavioral and Brain Sciences to Poetics Today and the Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism.
Dennett gave the John Locke Lectures at Oxford in 1983, the Gavin David Young Lectures at Adelaide, Australia, in 1985, and the Tanner Lecture at Michigan in 1986, among many others. He has received two Guggenheim Fellowships, a Fulbright Fellowship, and a Fellowship at the Center for Advanced Studies in Behavioral Science. He was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1987.
He was the Co-founder (in 1985) and Co-director of the Curricular Software Studio at Tufts, and has helped to design museum exhibits on computers for the Smithsonian Institution, the Museum of Science in Boston, and the Computer Museum in Boston.
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TRANSCRIPT:
Question: What is consciousness?
Daniel Dennett: Most people think consciousness, whatever it is, is just supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. It’s something so wonderful, wonderful, wonderful, wonderful, that we have to sort of divide the universe in two to make room for it. All in one side, all by itself and I understand why they think that and I think it’s just wrong. It is wonderful. It’s astonishingly wonderful but it is not a miracle and it isn’t magic. It’s a bunch of tricks and really is I’d like the comparison with magic because stage magic of course is not magic, magic. Its bunch of tricks and consciousness is a bunch of tricks in the brain and we’re learning what those tricks are and how they fit together and why it seems to be so much more than that bunch of tricks. Now, for a lot people the very suggestion that, that might be so is offensive or repugnant. They really don’t like that idea and they view it as in a sort of an assault on their dignity or their specialness and I think that’s a prime mistake. It’s a mistake because it means if you think that way, you’re going to systematically ignore the pads of the pads of exploration of research that, that might tend to confirm that and you’re going to hold out from mystery, you’re going to hold out for more specialness and it’s really there and some people just can’t help themselves. They can’t take seriously. They won’t take seriously. The idea, the consciousness is an amazing collection of sort of Monday and tricks in the brain. And they say, “I just can’t imagine it” and I say, “No you won’t imagine it. You can imagine it. You’re just not trying.”
Question: What scares people about this idea?
Daniel Dennett: I think, I think the hidden agenda and not so hidden very often for all of this is a concern about freewill. I think at the bottom of the barrel, what people are really worried about is that if we have an entirely naturalistic and...
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Free will is simply a poetic term for voluntary action, which is distinct from involuntary action. We have the ability to choose and make conscious decisions within the confines of any given situation. THAT is what most rational people mean by free will, not that we have some magical power to can do whatever we want.
+LIQUIDSNAKEz28 I like that definition. I've heard a hundred definitions of free will so I was starting to think of it more as a spectrum but I like your definition.
+LIQUIDSNAKEz28 That does not solve the problem of free will at all. You simply equate free will with voluntary action. But what do you define as voluntary action?
You might aswell say that you don't believe free will is a valid word or subject, and then start to talk about voluntary action. This is basicly the same strategy Dennett uses. Dennett ignores the subject about the existence of free will as humans experience as, and then talks about moral responsibility.
What humans experience as free will, and thus what this subject is all about, is that they experience the ability to act free from being predetermined to do what they do. We can predict peoples choices with neuroetechnological scientific methods before they are conscious with already 80% accuracy. In other words, choices are predetermined (that is, choices are done before they are conscious - if you even want to call that choice). Twisting the debate to something else is to neglect the human experience and to neglect why most people are interested in the subject at all.
prygler Every philosopher has a different definition of free will and they all argue that there's is the more correct definition. This goes way back. I wouldn't even bring it up if it weren't for the fact that this argument has already been going on since like the 1800's or something. I forget the name of the guy who first argued that we've been defining it wrong but you see my point, this is far from settled.
+Paul TheSkeptic I know that there are many definitions, and many thinkers have thought and written about it. However, that does not change anything about what I said. The reason why it is not settled is because it is so sensitive and many want to believe in free will. It is like religion.
+prygler agreed
Free will, that is, a consciousness that is immaterial, prevents infinite regressions. Determinism cannot work without an infinite regression.
Daniel Dennett is absolutely brilliant in making his moronic blather sound as if it had some reason, logic or substance to it. Pure genius! ...Thank God there is no Nobel Prize in Gibberish! :)
He seems to want to reject "magic" in the consciousness realm, but hold on to it in the free will realm.
Brilliant IdahoJake!
Fantastic comment !
If he didn' held it he would have to admit that he himself is a biological programmed machine, and so his thoughts are nothing more than what every machine is programmed to give by it's own design. But if his thougths are but the products of his software which he is designed to give a priori, why should we even hear what he has to say about free will and consciousness... so he keeps saying that free will exists though denies that concsiousness exists which is a clear absurdity since there is no free will without conciousness.
Does it strike anyone else as incredibly weird that this one particular species on this one particular planet sit around in suits and spectacles talking about whether they have free will, or whether a bigger a larger version of them created the universe, or so forth..?
... yes I'm stoned... how did you know that..?
I feel you, dawg. 🤗 ...and yeah, me too.
Existence is super weird. Why do we exist, why there is something, why do we aware, why are we alive at this second instead of being already dead or never existing at all? No one knows...
Serhan Ozulup These are among the most spellbinding and impregnable questions ever asked by sentient creatures. How and why is there anything at all? And how is it that some matter and energy can self-assemble in such a way as to become conscious? It’s hard to know how science could ever fully resolve these mysteries.
@@jeffwilken7241 It's just is. Fight for the goods of it; I think is worth it, so much.
Bigger larger version of themselves? If you're describing God, that's not a correct description lol
For those who wonder if material alone, by being configured in a specific way is able to be conscious, consider this: The human brain has about 100 billion neurons. Each neurons fires (on average) about 200 times per SECOND. And each neuron connects to about 1,000 other neurons. So... every time each neuron fires a signal, 1,000 other neurons get that information.
100 billion neurons x 200 firings per second x 1,000 connections each = 20,000,000,000,000,000 bits of info transmitted per second.
Its worth considering that consciousness, or continuous awareness, is simply the consequence of being the magnificently efficient processors that we are. Unlike computers we make, we can parallel process, which allows for a larger picture of what's happening, and is likely a great contributor to what makes for an experience.
The perception of duality contributes to thinking one has free will and having an experience.
I don't think ALL the neurons in your brain are ALLWAYS firing, except maybe when you have a seizure LOL :D So basically what you believe is that if we add enough transistors to the CPU consciousness will suddenly emerge. I think this is a silly idea.
I grew my beard that long once. My love for cereal forced me to shave. Free will had little to do with it. I gotta have my Pops.
@mateo77ish, I like to mix Pops with Fruity Pebbles. Half of each. Fucking delicious.
Was it your choice to want more cereal than your beard?? You can do what you want but you can't choose to want what you want
we're all in an oversized skinner box
I agree with his mechanistic theory of consciousness, but then in the end he failed to provide anything conclusive that how free will fits with it.
Yes, but the brain is complex. People are still trying to understand just how it works. Still, we can logically conclude that what he said is true.
If “consciousness is a bunch of tricks,” who is being tricked? I (my consciousness) must be real in order to be tricked, but if my consciousness is real, then it cannot be “a bunch of tricks.”
That's logic :)
Tell that to the Buffalo.
He doesn't mean that kind of tricks, he means tricks as in abilities or skills. He speaks of one at the end, the ability to represent to oneself the reasons that one acts, and thus the reason to choose one act over another as a response (and thus response-ability).
Certainly, by the end, he is saying something like that, but at that point (it seems to me) he is simply trying to have his cake and eat it too. Initially, he is making an analogy between consciousness and the illusions of a “stage magician.” He believes the first person perspective is an illusion.
That is at least a coherent way of putting it.
Misleading title. He doesn't explain Consciousness or Free Will
He explains them both in spades. The bulk of his work on these topics takes more than six minutes to be explained and absorbed.
If you think he answers the question of consciousness, you do not know what the question is. How has nature arranged pieces of matter in such a way that the brain they make up has a sense of its own existence and has subjective experience? He explains nothing.
Like most scientists speaking on a difficult subject, He doesn't actually explain anything at all and just does an intellectual Mexican hat-dance around the subject!!
Being in Love means Never having to say, "I'm sorry"....... Being a scientist means Never having to say, "I don't know"!!
David Belcher Huh? The entire enterprise of science is the pursuit of facts that scientists don't know.
The problem with materialism is that we don't know if matter exists. If you cut open a human brain, a materialist would say that he can't see a soul, whereas I'd say that I can't see matter.
then you are blind
"Consciousness... is not MAGIC. It's a bunch of TRICKS." Thanks for clearing that up.
Yeah, not clear at all
Dennet uses the analogy of a magic act to describe conciousness not some unexplainable power but a set of cheats the magician (ie the brain) uses to create the illusion of something mystical - all of which could be explained to a degree by neuroscientists, rather than being mysterious. Like how our sense organs percieve light, sound, smells and textures that are cues to help us navigate the environment and survive. 😑☕️
@@ronjaurigue2673 to say that the brain creates the illusion is not enough, you still need a spectator... that in my opinion is consciusness
@@faustoefulvio I think it could end with the brain itself otherwise you need to explain the spectator within the spectator and so on. I gather from Dennett it’s a committee of systems contributing to create the sense of self as an individual. Damage to the brain causes changes in behavior depending on the parts affected like the condition of losing all emotion towards loved ones thinking they’re all impostors. 😑☕️
@@ronjaurigue2673 I think we are machines that patterns use to replicate themselves, errors in the duplication lead to mistakes or createvity
Seems to me he explains nothing.
Kind of what you have to expect, though, since, so far, there really has been no explanation.
Don't make the mistake of taking UA-cam titles too seriously.
DD is a great exemplar for everything that is wrong in science; arrogance, narrow-mindedness, aloofness and dogmatism.
he stinky
I agree. He doesn't explain anything!
Would you please enable the video for additional translations? I would be very happy to help Mr.Dennett to be heard by other countries as Turkey.
Even if consciousness is NOTHING but a set of tricks my brain has developed to do with myself (through evolution), WHAT A POWERFUL SET OF TRICKS IS THIS...
It is SO powerful I simply cannot even figure out what I would be like for myself without any recurrence of an "I" or even an "I am in relation to X that I'm thinking right now". It's even impossible to grasp such ontological condition.
C'mon, "I am I", and "I am not X" are fundamental ontological assumptions we simply MUST do to be able to think and make any proposition about anything around us...
It's not the case consciousness is something 'magical' or 'non-material', or 'spiritual'. It's simply a ontological necessity of our own form of reasoning and (self)representation.
He lost me at 5:50 when he said that we have the obligation to think ahead and anticipate the out come of our actions...Isn't this "anticipation" it self is rooted in realms that are (more or less) out of our control? Isn't this "anticipation" and "calculation" ALSO bounded by the same factors which render us "freewill-less" in the first place?? i.e laws of physics, DNA, upbringing..etc?
Does Mr Dannett mean that this "anticipation" is independent from the factors that robbed us from free will in the first place???
Any one, please??
+Nathan B
Alexander Safir
So do you agree with my point of contention?
I don't know but the more I read and listen about this issue the more it seems that Sam Harris is right..
Once you arrive at this (fire wall) called the laws of physics, you're doomed. No more wiggling left to do really since this very act of "wiggling" is it self determined by the same thing...the laws of physics.
wouldn't you agree?
Martin Lewitt
Yes..yes I did drag you to this one :)
I'll watch it tomorrow. I've read a couple of his books on consciousness, but not his most recent one. The most contrarian theory I've read is "The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind"
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julian_Jaynes
Alexander Safir sorry but what are you referring to? :)
It seems to me that many philosophers today didn't really understand their classes on wittgenstein 's ideas... Dennett is playing language games at the highest level
+Dr.Manhattan This is some beautifully ironic shit.
+Dr.Manhattan There are three impossible freedoms: freedom from causation, from oneself, and from reality. Therefore "free" can never be rationally taken to imply any of these. Since it can't, it doesn't. All that is required for "free" to be meaningful is a single relevant constraint. In the case of free will that constraint is external coercion that forces you to choose or act against your will. When free from such coercion, we are free decide for ourselves what we will do. Thus "free" and "will". Can't get much simpler than that.
+Dr.Manhattan I discovered "Free Will" is an illusion by trying to figure out how it works, so I could prove someone wrong who said we had no such power. To my utter surprise, I discovered they were correct!
Here's how anyone can do it: start paying attention to your own motivations. Ask yourself, when a change in direction happens (physically, mentally, emotionally, etc.,) where did THAT just come from? What got me to do that? (It can be as simple as getting up out of a chair.) You will eventually discover that you always want to head in the direction of the strongest desire (or away from fear - the desire to avoid something.)
Why do we want to do anything in particular? Well, because we WANT to do that, more than we want to do something else. For example, right now, you are reading these words on your computer screen because of a stronger desire to do this, than anything else that's possible at this moment... right? Think about it...
But why do we ever WANT to do anything? Well, because of the arising in our consciousness of a desire to do it, which must come first before the doing (aside from autonomic nervous system responses.) And just like thoughts, we never know what the next desire will be before it shows up, so we don't know how it will affect us, until it does. First comes the feeling (desire) of wanting, and then the attempt to fulfill that want. Without the arising of desire, we would consciously "do" nothing. When you stop desiring to read these posts more than doing something else, then you will stop and start doing something else. Can you predict ahead of time exactly when that will be? No, but you will know when it happens, RIGHT THEN.
Although many people think that their desire IS their "choice." its important to remember that we don't really consciously create desire. The wanting to attempt to do that, itself, would already be a desire arising on its own. Our consciousness is late to the party, so to speak, always a bit behind the rising of all thoughts and feelings, including the desire that gets us to do whatever we do next.
It takes awhile to get this. My first experience was 10 yrs ago. Since then, in my search for what's behind what I do, I have yet to find one single decision, one choice, or one exercise of "Free Will," that I have consciously initiated, not even one! But before I started to honestly look, I was just like everyone else, believing I was initiating choices and running the show, called, "my life."
Now, most people, are not going to be persuaded by logic or any kind of intellectual argument. The belief in FW is too ingrained in our identity, being a big part of the education of our childhood. (As the communists used to say, "Give us a child for the first seven years of its life, and it will always be a communist.")
But prove me wrong. Choose right now to change your personal sexuality to another type. From whatever you are, pick another one - any one of the others...
What... you don't want to do that? Then just choose to WANT to do that. Right now, in this moment, just do it...
But alas, you can't, can you... How can anyone claim to have free will if they can only "choose" what they already want and not what they don't? If you can't choose what you don't want, then how is that a power we control?
It takes real, personal experience to realize the deepest truths of our nature. So you must actually look inside and find it for yourself. Belief or non belief just doesn't cut it.
+Dr.Manhattan I was thinking the same thing. Not specifically Dennett, but so many philosophical debates are still about the different definitions of a word
Bas K When you have the opportunity to choose between a meaningful and relevant definition and an irrational one, why not choose the one that makes sense?
It is irrational to insist that "free will" means "freedom from causation". Without reliable causation it is impossible to do anything. The will could never reliably implement its intent. That is why the word "free" never rationally implies freedom from causation.
Instead, every practical use of the word "free" refers to some specific constraint. A bird may be free from its cage. The prisoner may be free of his handcuffs. The slave may be set free from his master. And so on.
Free will refers to us deciding for ourselves what we "will" do, "free" from external coercion or other undue influence.
For example: The Boston Marathon bombers in 2013 hijacked a car and forced the driver at gunpoint to drive them and aid in their escape.
Because the driver was not acting of his own free will, he was not charged with "aiding and abetting" the crime. But the surviving brother was held responsible for his deliberate choice to set off bombs in the crowd with the intention of causing harm and death to people.
This is a simple, but important distinction to make when applying correction. To correct the driver's behavior all we need do is take the gun away from his head, and he'll continue to act as a law abiding citizen again. But a lot more may be required to correct the behavior of the bomber.
Those who recklessly suggest we should consider free will to be an "illusion" would destroy this distinction.
The moment he said 'magic' I thought of Alan Moore. They both specialise in consciousness. It would great to see these two gentlemen discussing this topic in a video of their own.
Thank you for explaining the active force.
Most people cannot define consciousness properly, they can only experience it because they are conscious themselves and scientist can only roughly observe how sensory motor functions are enterpreted for our consciousness to act upon. Yet they cannot explain how neurons syncronize perfectly, how memory and experience are stored and how most if not all of our mental processes are guided, they can only observe how these processes corelate with atomic functions on an atomic level, with only the equations of physical law as their conceptual framework. So if someone claims he has a full explination of an abstract concept such as consciousnesss, then he cannot be expected to be taken seriously especially if he claims that what he cannot explain is simply "a trick".
This man is the definition of an oxymoron.
Concsiousness, in the way most people usually refer to it, is simply the brain receiving and processing information.
However, there is Concsiousness beyond body/mind, and that's the real, true level of self. The body/mind is just a vehicle for that Concsiousness to experience this reality.
Consciousness means experience
Can we get some captions? I have this video for my philosophy class and need captions to understand him.
Wow. Many explain. So insight. Very interest. Wow.
I've never resonated with determinism, and the physicist point of view of our material world always bring described by it's antecedent. This works in physics, but we don't even know what consciousness is yet, how it works, or what generates it, etc.
Sure, we could reduce everything down to its physicality, and with perfect information of the present it might be true that we could predict the future perfectly as well.
But one interesting component of complex brains and minds is that they seem to be able to generate infinities of thought. As in, what is possible to think about is seemingly infinite, and the ways to approach thinking about anything are infinite.
So, how is it that physicists and sympathizers to determinism believe they can reduce the complexity of a conscious mind, and all of it's thoughts and actions, into the direct casual chain of physics?
Does awareness of the game, so to speak, change this (think of this in the context of the observer in quantum outcomes)? Is the future actually written in this view, even though the future doesn't exist?
I feel like we have too much to learn to settle on one or the other answer. But I'd have to say that it's not clear to me that that type of determinism applies at the level of a conscious creature living in the present moment.
No we cant have infinite thought. Only combine the data from our experience. Thats why we cant think of a new color or imagine it per se.
so his subjective experience of reality appearing in his consciousness has lead him to believe that consciousness isn't real, but the subjective experience appearing in it is? I mean does he not see how foolish that is?
I think the whole thing about consciousness is not about free will but about keeping alive the idea of a soul, so they have hope of an afterlife. Its all about the fear of death, every single person i have spoke to that believes the brain can't produce the mind(because the mind is too magical),they always propose a soul to explain consciousness.
We have no choice in what we do, nor do we have a choice in how we explain why we did it.
Victor Ouriques I don't have a sister and I wouldn't bring my mom to a sick fuck like you.
Now would I have ever said that if I didn't read your comment? Nope.
Joe Giuffre Why would I be sick? I have no control over what I say or decide to do! My brain has automatically decided to do that! Sadly yours also automatically decided to not bring your mama :(
Victor Ouriques Because that's how you were programed.
Ok, how about an analogy?
A nuclear device is set to go off in N.Y. at 3pm tomorrow. It's not the bomb's fault, but I'm going to go ahead and defuse it anyway.
Joe Giuffre The bomb doesn't sets itself up alone.It needs to be set up by a conscious being and also defused by one.How about that,what you think and do in your life doesn't think and do by itself alone,you need to consciously do your actions at some degree,whether it's deciding to do something or not,also arguing about why you should or shouldn't do it.The same with thoughts,you can choose to believe in them,and also points the reasons why you believe,think,
In fact,arguing about free will actually points towards the existence about it because arguing by itself it's contradictory.Sam Harris says the free will doesn't exist,but why do he criticize religious people? [sarcasm=on]Their brain were programmed to be religious! They didn't have a choice! Allahu Akbar,lets bow some children,it's all allowed,they have no fault over their actions,beliefs and retarded thoughts.[sarcarsm=off]
Mankind
Finds the Answers and makes the rest up, what a total waste of this guy's time the majority of your are, Christians and Atheist, or whatever, If an emotional response can unsettle your belief or "knowledge" then your probably not ready for the actual truth anyway, crying like babies but with none of the humility (yes, i am included in that analogy).
Anyone else get the feeling that this entire video was made for the sole purpose of making us feel "obligated" to share it. Also, I see a lot of injunctions to comment towards the end. Maybe Dennette has decided to design his own meme virus as an experiment to see how it evolves on UA-cam. After all, spreading his ideas is his prerogative and evolutionary purpose.
And yes I see the irony in my own comment.
"I answer that, Man has free-will: otherwise counsels, exhortations, commands, prohibitions, rewards, and punishments would be in vain. In order to make this evident, we must observe that some things act without judgment; as a stone moves downwards; and in like manner all things which lack knowledge. And some act from judgment, but not a free judgment; as brute animals. For the sheep, seeing the wolf, judges it a thing to be shunned, from a natural and not a free judgment, because it judges, not from reason, but from natural instinct. And the same thing is to be said of any judgment of brute animals. But man acts from judgment, because by his apprehensive power he judges that something should be avoided or sought. But because this judgment, in the case of some particular act, is not from a natural instinct, but from some act of comparison in the reason, therefore he acts from free judgment and retains the power of being inclined to various things. For reason in contingent matters may follow opposite courses, as we see in dialectic syllogisms and rhetorical arguments. Now particular operations are contingent, and therefore in such matters the judgment of reason may follow opposite courses, and is not determinate to one. And forasmuch as man is rational is it necessary that man have a free-will." Aquinas
Computers can think and reason as well. Do they have free will?
@@gideonwaxfarb They can't:))))
I think that having or not having conscious actions and reactions are more flexible in that we have times in our lives in which more or perhaps all of our actions come from our automatic or subconscious minds while in other times in our lives, we have chosen what we have done for some reason. This kind of thinking takes us away from the yes or no thinking and more into percentages. Right now, how in control do you feel? Then we have to wonder which core thoughts and triggers change how much control we have.
When I allowed my bipolar mind to control all of my actions and reactions, I did this because I had an addictive relationship with dopamine. I wanted more, no matter what the thought was, and so I looked for more of it. In this part of my life, I didn't have a lot of conscious actions or reactions. It was as simple as saying that I wanted something or I wanted to do something, so I needed to do it, which can be drinking, unhealthy amounts of sex with different people, or (especially for me) feeling like a genius because I lied and won because I lied so much. There isn't a lot of consciousness in this kind of thinking.
After my TBI (traumatic brain injury), I had to relearn every single skill I now have. I learned how to be calm and learned how capable and useful I am when I am calm. I learned how to see manic thoughts and can now choose to not use that manic thought. It comes and leaves in my river of thoughts, and that's fine. The idea is that I can always choose which thoughts I want to use. I can't control the thoughts that I have, but I can always choose which ones I want to use. Every day, I have manic thoughts, and I have to choose to not use these thoughts.
There are so many stories that have similar information, in which a person had less control and then learned how to control him/herself. I think it is always a percentage.
We live in a society were people are denying their own existance
I didn't notice any 'explanation' in the video at all! A lot of assertion, some description and a touch of evolutionary biology as a reason why consciousness might be useful... But none of that is an explanation of consciousness, especially if Mr Dennett wishes to distinguish between a physical material and 'an other' mechanism.
This makes us more complex, sentient and intelligent than a bird. Not more free.
There is a very simple way of dealing with the fact that free will as an absolute, cannot exist. You can sum it all up with the word "conditioned". We are conditioned. All our decisions are based on our conditioning, long term and short term. If our decisions were not a product of conditioning they would have no relevency to what we are making a decision about. You would have to be totally free from conditioning in order to make a free will choice. You could not have any knowledge, preferences or judgments, or your decision is a conditioned decision. There is no such state of mind as an unconditioned state of mind. What passes for the idea of free will is our reflection of what our mind decides. When we receive a decision from our mind, this then reflects back to our mind triggering another reaction. This new conditioned state might support or nullify our previous decision. This cyclic looping is what causes our sense that we are in control, when all that is happening is our conscious awareness is causing continual changes in what conditions are triggered in our mind. To take this one more step, how do you know you have decided. If you pay attentionn to the process you can witness that you feel or sense an acceptable feeling or you might just feel your time with this is done. Either way this is your mind signing the deal.
This video evokes a strong feeling of inspiration in me. Time to exert some free will
Ive listened to many talks by Dennett but all I hear is hot air. Seriously, i think he is very biased without having too many arguments to back his opinion.
When an education leads to arrogance, knowledge is an illusion.
yea it seems 99 percent of the world doesnt realize information is information theirs bullshit information and true information and trying to spread information effectively with a human mind is where it all fucks up
The illusion of being right is where someones wrong
Scientists are among the world's greatest bullshitters!! Ask them a simple question and they will talk and talk at length for hours about so many other things in hopes you don't notice they haven't actually Said Anything!!! It's a sort of intellectual misdirection..... They will go to ANY lengths just to avoid Ever having to say those three little words that bring them the Most pain.... those three dreaded words are: "I don't Know"!! . . . . Because they like to convince themselves that THEY know Everything about Everything and nothing could be further from the Truth!!!
No. That's not something scientists do necessarily more than other people (politicians?...).
What makes you think that?
I'll just say that the vast weight of the entire universe bearing down on all of us makes it highly unlikely that we can resist such environmental pressures with something called 'free will'
It seems that, given All Information about Everything in Existence (as well as all knowledge of prior states) and the necessary computational power to process all that Information, it would be totally possible to Predict *Everything* that will Ever happen ahead of time!! And this would negate the idea of "Free Will"!! However, it also *Seems* at times that we actually do have "Free Will" due to aspects of Reality we don't understand or even know exist!! Basically, I had thought for many years that "Free Will" is just an illusion resulting from OUR lack of ability to attain and compute the necessary Info in order to predict future events......but I'm really not so sure now.....maybe we do actually have Free Will....
Of course you're a product of the past environment, but you also create it now. You impose your own environmental pressure with every single movement you make. Your comment is thoroughly nonsensical.
I do it every day. If scientist say everything is predetermined, then I assume they can tell me what I am going to do next.
@@truthwarrior2149 that’s only if the scientist represented the universe. But I will say that if each individual had free will we would have power to disrupt the universe which is greater than us. At best you can say the universe presents us with choice A or choice B , But which ever one you choose, it will always converge into the answer the universe wants to give you
@@MrSanford65 it's a matter of perception. Either you perceive we are a bundle of particles or you view us as conscious agents. If you take the view, of which there is certainly evidence that we're just a bundle of particles. Then all our choices have been made for us long ago. But if you take the view that we're conscious beings, and that our thoughts, emotions and experiential existence are not computational and subject to the other physical laws of the universe, and I refer you to Nobel Prize winner sir Roger Penrose on that issue, then the issue of not having free will is laughable. It simultaneously has a wonderful grasp and misunderstanding of the obvious. All of our behaviors are predictable. Where my dad was concerned, if you gave me any fact scenario, I could tell you with pretty much 90% accuracy how my father would react to it. However, that never led to my conclusion that he did not have free will. He was an alcoholic, nothing destroys even the notion of free will more than addiction. Then he quit alcohol after many years. I didn't predict that. Nobody could predict that. The day that science can tell me what I'm going to do next, and the day my dad is going to make the decision to quit drinking, then I'll entertain this notion that I don't have free will. As of now I've heard zero competent evidence, that human beings dont have free will. If you say our decisions and future is set then I think it's Science's responsibility to prove that by telling us what our decisions are going to be and what our future has in store for us as a result. All these people are using some fairly bad science to try to persuade me that I'm living in an illusion.
Interesting thoughts. Seems like a whole lot of, "overkill" for, "evolution" to create consciousness if all we really need is to eat, drink, reproduce, and have shelter? Wouldn't we just need instincts if that were the case? So if I understand that correctly, my mind, not brain, is a construct of a chemical reaction, based on external conditions? What if someone was not affected by external conditions? Would they have or still develop consciousness?
Then chemically, according to this theory, consciousness should be easily replicated external from human recreation correct? If it is only a chemical make up, then the formula should be easily attained, replicated, and could then be asserted into anything? Perhaps even manipulated to create a perfect consciousness, and placed into something like a simple rock? Would that rock then understand it is a rock, calculate its place in the universe, and so on? Perhaps I am misunderstanding this?
i read and listened alot about Free Will, and one thing I'm ignorant about is,most of these philosophers don't realized the difference between Free Will and Free to Act. My will- if it is- tells me to fly in the air or see across the horizon with bare eyes,but in reality i can't, why? because there's problem,Assume something and to do it can't be treated alike.
The idea of consciousness being a "trick" is strange. Who is tricking what?
Paul Daniel's
The title of this video should be "Daniel Dennett justifies his views on Conciousness and Free Will". People are bound to be disappointed with the contents because of the misleading title.
exactly
100% because Dennett is not a serious philosopher but rather a militant atheist who tries to justify his ideas on consciousness as an "illusion".
Most serious philosophers are atheistic or agnostic. And Dan certainly isn't being 'militant' here. He's just explaining what he thinks and giving reasons. That's what philosophers do.
Justifying by providing arguments for his views. Arguments that you choose to ignore, preferring to attack the man.
Correct. Opinion, end of story. My opinion is, we’re completely clueless to the depths of consciousness. We can learn a truth but leave open truths that cannot be comprehended by the mind therefore cannot be explained at this level or dimension. I found it only slightly interesting and can see how much deeper each theory can go.
Determinism and Compatibilism actually agree on everything apart from the definition of free will. A determinist is someone who views free will as cosmological in scale - "how can I have free will when I didn't choose to be alive, I didn't choose reality to be real?" etc. A compatibilist, on the other hand, views free will as an emergent phenomenon that operates within the framework of the universe - "I can choose to do things more freely than a lobster can choose to do things. This is free will".
Both are right and perhaps we need different words to distinguish between the two definitions. When discussing free will with a religious person for example, the deterministic view of free will is handy to discuss as it shows the lunacy of hell. Why would a god send people to be punished when they are simply a cause and effect product of nature and nurture?
last question of this video was the best reply :)
If you want to study something, you first have to be able to look at it. Consciousness is beyond the mind. It can see the mind but the mind cannot see it. So you can never study it and so you can never "understand" what it is. The best you can do is meditate and only "experience" it existentially. End of the story.
Partially true. We can only study and explore and come to understand our own consciousness, but that's where we're limited; we can only share data by word of mouth. Also, everyone's consciousness is different to some degree, so we are unable to create appropriate scientific tests. Meditation is a form of study.
@@technomage6736 You do not really know if "everyone's consciousness is different to some degree ..." because you have no idea what anyone else's Consciousness looks like and there is no way that you can experience that. Meditation cannot really be called "a form of study" because to study anything, some framework has to exist. For example to study physics, you could not do it without the framework of physics. That applies to all branches of science and outside of science, studying is not possible. Meditation simply means to "know" who you are but not "understand" it. With all that said, meditation (actual meditation and not just anything that has been called meditation) is absolutely necessary for any human being otherwise you simply do not know who you are. It is very much required especially in this day and age where our human values are all tending towards the "outside". Inside has unfortunately been forgotten.
@@JohnRaschedian I suppose we could be just arguing semantics here. Is there a specific difference between consciousness and psyche? Or are they really 2 words to describe the same thing, but perhaps just used in different contexts? If so, then it logically follows that if we think, behave, and feel differently, then our consciousness is different to some degree.
Also I would argue that "knowing" and "understanding" are one and the same. To know is to understand, and to not understand is to not really know.
@@technomage6736 I cannot answer any of those questions because as I mentioned before, no framework exists based on which I could choose the right words. But to say a few words, no of course not: if we think, behave and feel differently, does it not mean in any possible way that our Consciousness are different, depending on how you define the word Consciousness. The reason is that Consciousness, the way I know it, or in other words, they way I know myself, has absolutely nothing to do with anything you see or perceive in the outer world. They are completely different phenomena. This could be an interesting discussion but unfortunately we cannot continue it because of the lack of the framework. Thank you for the reply though.
This guy is clearly confused about the free will debate. Of course we have the ability to make choices and this is generally termed as 'free will', but the real point is that 'free will' is predetermined by the time line of history which that individual brain has gone through, combined with it's 'present' surrounding environment. These two factors are 'ultimately' what cause that brain to make a decision. The concept of cause and effect is obviously very real. You can't just change the rules and deny it exists when a sentient being comes into the equation. That sentient being is made up of non-sentient atoms. Why do people not get this? I challenge anybody to provide an example of a decision an individual has made (human or animal) which was not been predetermined by either of the two factors I mentioned.
This guy is brilliant. Reading Consciousness Explained now, but what I'd really like to read so.time by Dan is Wiggle Room. I'm really curious how he maintains that free will is compatible with determinism.
It isn't. Every physicalist needs an "escape argument" that shows to their audience that life has some form of control and is thus worth living. For Dennett it's free will. For Dawkins and Harris its consciousness.
I have a friend who is almost always choses to go out from a two door room on a third door and this represents his free will which has no limits and totally independent from circumstances. Sometimes he even speeks languages he'd never learned. How do you do that? I ask sometimes. He has a simple answer: free will.
If determinism is true, then I have no choice as to what I believe, so stop trying to convince me otherwise.
nicely put.
the problem is that we can't stop either.
+Nathaniel Day Your mistake is not to realize that the act of "trying to convince" is simply response to a stimulus, that stimulus being other people - in this case you! It "feels" free and evolved because it helped our ancestors reproduce. But it is predetermined.
its not simply a response to a stimulus. It's an internal, self-determined process
I know this is a year old, but being convinced/not being able to choose what you believe doesn't go out of bounds with trying to convince you. If we assume that the world is entirely deterministic, then me trying to convince you that it is would then be processed by your brain and you would "believe" or "not believe" in it based on your brain.
For example, your reaction of "stop trying to convince me otherwise" would still fit with a deterministic view.
My reaction was like "hmm yeah this does make sense" and if we assume that the world is deterministic, then my brain made it make sense.
Now the real question is why I'm replying to a year-old comment.
Daniel Dennett deserves a lifetime achievement award for five decades of his majestic failure to explain consciousness. Moreover, he uses the term without even basic understanding of what it means. What he refers to as "consciousness" is in fact metacognition. So not only he fails miserably to explain anything... He describes a leaf, and insists it is a "tree".
descrbies a leaf and insists it is a tree, that's a good metaphor
It's like saying, "Chickens reproduce by laying eggs, because eggs contain the DNA that will become baby chicks along with the nutrients to sustain them until they hatch." Doesn't describe how the chickens are able to lay eggs. Similarly, saying people have free will and consciousness because they can represent in language the reasons for their actions is a tautology. It's a begging the question fallacy -- representing the reasons for one's actions is an expression of free will and consciousness.
Dear Daniel you have your beliefs and intuitions same as others who believe conscience is such a big “wonderful wonderful wonderful” thing.
What did he say at 6:15?
Great work Daniel. Everything so much clearer now :-) .Consciousness is a bunch of tricks in the brain.Nice work. How about plants, and bacteria who does not have a brain but still have a conscious response to environment? Where their tricks take place ?
Everywhere and nowhere?
Microtubules
Just because plants can respond to their environment, does that mean their response is conscious?
@@Kanzu999 وك يا سخيف انت ما بتميز بين انواع ردود الافعال التلقائية وردود الافعال المبنية على عملية اتخاذ قرار وتخزين نتيجتها لاستحضارها لاحقا بشكل تلقائي عند تكرر نفس الظروف.
النبات ما عنده قدرات اتخاذ قرار، فحياته تشبه حياة عضلة القلب او الكبد في جسم الثديات... هي اعضاء تقوم بوظيفتها لا اراديا، وعقلك لا يستطيع التحكم بنشاطها
Exellent example of a OPINION not exlanation.
The fundamental nature of language is it requires interpretation. I interpret the phrase "human consciousness" to mean a person's interpretation of reality, whatever that is.
Not anything could mean much if you didn’t have someone to share it with. So what you decide to share it with will set the idea on the ideal of what even power is.
So what Daniel Dennet believes in or what he is espousing is that nobody has free will, or free will is an illusion. So if he had no choice in the argument that he just laid out, why should anyone believe it as sound or true?
Well no, that is actually the stance of Sam Harris. I don't think Dennett himself knows what he believes about free will. He defines it in a way that doesn't make any sense.
As to why everyone should believe his argument to be sound or true, there is no reason to. But the deeper point is, the nonexistence of free will doesn't mean there aren't facts to be discovered about the fundamental nature of reality. Since there's no free will, should we not believe that water is two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen?
He literally said the opposite of that.
We're not talking about souls, specialness, God, or religion Dennett. We are talking about a substance that is obviously ontologically distinct from matter. It is not extended in space like matter. So, unless you want to change the definition of matter to encompass mind then we still have a problem Dennett, can't simply explain it away my friend. Can't deny the facts.
what do you mean?
+Adamo Leoni Dennett is claiming that people who say that consciousness (or being aware or subjective experience) is something that exists are only saying this because they want to prove we have a soul (consciousness was traditionally understood to be the soul). What I am saying is that Dennett is utterly wrong about this. People who say consciousness exists say it because they simply know they are consciousness not because what to prove the soul exists. Now if one wants to call consciousness the soul that is a separate matter. However one cannot reasonably deny that consciousness exists and that's why people say it exists - not because they are religious as Dennett asserts. In fact, one of the main proponents of consciousness existing (not that it needs any more proof) is David Chalmers who is an atheist.
+sgt7 you said something about matter and mind. what did you mean?
+Adamo Leoni I presume that you are asking what I meant when I said the mind is ontologically distinct from matter. I suppose another (less precise way) of saying it is to say that mind is not identical to matter. By mind I mean what most people mean when they use the term, that is consciousness; qualia; or subjectivity. I use "matter" in the same way physicists use it. So one implication is that pain (a form of mind) is not identical to c-fibres firing (a form of matter). I don't know if I answered your question.
You did. Thanks for the clarification . :)
I think of almost all the videosnin youtube about free will, this is the most reasonabke one.
The most reasonable and clear thinking person that I can think of, awesome way of expressing his intelligence I agree with everything he teaches it all comes together and makes sense.
6:15: on the contrary, Orcas and several other species have the ability to share their wisdom. They are also able to extract responses from new situations. The network is wider than we believe it to be.
I don't think Dan explained consciousness here. He said a few things about it, explain it he did not.
Consciousness, the experience is not a cheap trick, rather it is the most significant fact of existence as it allows existence to be experienced and acknowledged. As for free will that is tricky, quantum physics provides the possibility for consciousness to effect synapse firing making the brain closer to a radio tuning into consciousness (randomness is not free will, but will might effect apparent randomness) But the problem is that this just moves the problem of free will to another realm but does not explain how free will could exist or what it would mean. In the end I think the only thing that can explain free will is to define myself, or I as that which influences (even deterministically) my will such that it is my will, it is me and not something I have been saddled with. It isn't something that I have inherited, it isn't chance. This unique character is what I am, and free will is the expression of that thing. Therefore free will can be deterministic in a sense, the freedom is the degree to which my will can over-ride the additions, routine/programming, hangups, social and biological influences that attempt to override my free will.
Great food for thought. More people need to watch Big Think. I only disagree with the statement that it has to do exclusively with biological evolution and nothing to do with physics and its determinism: evolutionary biology (as with all other fields, for that matter) has everything to do with physics, so one necessarily follows the other. But I think he actually meant it in a different way, in the sense that physical properties did not evolve, and he should have left it there - the sentence just conveys (wrongly) a perceived decoupling of both fields.
Edit: cleared up the statement in question
You are wrong Santa.
Why ?
In Correct Its actually irrelevant. It doesn't change anythingm
lol 😂
Dennet needs to consider that research that "might tend to confirm" (his words) something isn't conclusive.
That type of thought can lead to error.
Actually, the research does not explain qualia, and while theorizing that it does is fair, stating that it does is a basic logic error.
To claim humans do not have free will one must assume the burden of proving so because the simplest, and in fact intuitive, interpretation of the human experience is that we are capable of choosing. This is not to say our experience of choosing is seemingly free from any and all influences and constraints, but free from complete determination by factors external to the choosing mind. That is all that is needed for free will. Also, I'm not saying we must have free will because it is the simplest explanation of our experience, but that if you make the extraordinary claim that the obvious is false, you must provide strong evidence.
Here (and elsewhere) Dennett makes the claim we do not have free will but provides no proof. What he does offer is a logically valid explanation that assumes materialist determinism to be fundamental to reality. As popular as this assumption is, there is a problem with it. Since the beginning of the 20th century, that is about 100 years ago, the cutting edge of physics already discovered that materialist determinism is no longer supported by the available experimental data.
I'm not saying Dennett's claim is ultimately right or wrong. I'm saying Dennett himself is wrong to conclude he knows the truth about free will. He doesn't. He BELIEVES there is no free will because he assumes materialist determinism is true (i.e. he BELIEVES in materialist determinism) even though modern physics aggressively challenges that assumption.
I attribute his confidence here to the Dunning-Kruger effect, which is an ironic claim to make of an obviously intelligent person.
Daniel Dennet's belief, as it appears, is that all things are natural. nothing else, and that everything stems from natural occurrences, incidences, consequences. as materialistic determinism suggests. But here there are many other philosophers who also cogently discussed about free will to be based on non deterministic forces, and it is here that I wish to discuss an alternative view.
The argument is what is the mind? Although the mind lives in a "brain" to house it in, that and appears in a momentary fashion, is where the mind moves through, known as thoughts, and perceptions, experiences, and emotions... in this respect there is something about being a human being that has its own identity, a mind emotion and will of a person, goes without saying that we are a mind with more depth, more intuition, more power, more mental acuity. the ability to logically rationalize and learn on a higher level. This ability I tend to think came not by reason of self reproductive experiences, (ie learning) nor by evolutionary gene constructionism. (if I could use the term) but by design, as a theist I believe, comes from being created by God and perhaps, is meant to be as such a person. is also another philosophical view about the soul, which for some might appear theological, and I grant this. all things being equal.
I am not saying this to prove this position, but show that there are other alternatives to thinking about mind consciousness scenarios. However, in view of the argument, the making of the human mind I believe is far more complex, ie the brain being necessary for physical life, the mind being the way in which that life is utilized. I would have to admit, is that ourselves, are a personal identity, more than just being "tricked" into being, We are after all self aware, and operating on that level. (note the reader might know, but there are some phenomenology arguments that share tenants from Sartre's existentialism theory, but this is why I am to essaying all this, is to allow the listener to observe that there are other views in philosophy that have other gates of introspection, and philosophical concerns, and routes, and that there is not just Bennett's interpretation about free will and consciousness .)
(btw I never have a tizy fit about what these natural deterministic are suggesting, lol....rule number one, don't let anyone write their own scripts about how you think or feel about their own opinionate philosophies!...stand for what you believe in, and don't let someone kid you. no one has a completed solution to this issue. only that one can be so persuaded.)
The question is not what is free will, because we know that free will truly exists in the first place, is even as Bennett suggests at the end of his comment. But if I had to say something about what is free will, it is that it stems from from two completely different things, The first being the set from which to choose from, that being what is housed in the brain, and the second is the actual agent for which chooses, one element or more, from that set to be chosen. The problem is that many will conflate the two to be as one thing or as a singly involved construct. one operandi. When in fact there are two operations going on. and thus two factors. each with its own characteristic.
No the question is what is the self identity in human beings that defines ourselves as having such a will? The self being as to who is the decider or the choosing agent? And where does such a conscious mind stem from? not from atoms and molecules. that is a no brainer. (no pun intended) What makes will possible, I would infer, is a degree of awareness, be it a nat, or a squirrel, or a fish, such that where there is no movement then there could not be any will at all. What allows the mind move from place to place is of course is the brain, it is the field lets say for the wind. But the brain is not the reason that moves it, but allows the mind to move or think. However in my view, the mind is not the brain, thought the mind needs to live in a brain. The brain I would say, is the rails for the train if you will, where the mind travels upon over and through, the landscape. making choices, by what the mind perceives.
Further, It is perhaps an easy thing to combined every consciousness to be that of the same fluid. same substance, the idea of mental moment, being the same electrical chemical impulses, but with different types of minds, though brains are rails, and minds are trains. Here one could also argue that different species have different levels of consciousness or awarenesses, different brains, different sense of being each to its own creature -ness.
Moreover, calling our own identities of the self "a trick or a set of "tricks", appears to me to be a rather easy to thing to suggest, being that this is tapping from lower animals how they think of themselves, more or less seeking to entertain us with the idea of trickery, rather than to inductively or deductively able to prove, where "tricks" would be impossible to prove anyway, we are left merely holding on to this bag and nothing else, seems rather inconsequential.
I believe that we philosophers should not reduce the meaning of the mind into this level of submission, here we should back it up a bit and put into focus how we are what we are. Having said, I tend to think that determinism, is more like seeing yourself as a switching mechanism from the get go, is at fault. and merely is putting the horse before the cart, making out that raw primitive forms of thinking is what first came into play, perhaps by evolutionary theory. (which I will not go into at this time) then such build upon that liquid concept, by writing up a story, eventually inferring that "mind" all it really is is a randomized computer, that had been "naturally" programmed, to think as it does. From the materialist point of view that everything is somehow reduced to foundationalistic like elements. is merely a desire on their part, not epistemological by their approaching the issue but is mainly an appeal to the metaphysical.
However, when all is said and done, I am persuaded that there is something more to the human mind, and that it exists more on a complex level, than just merely suggesting that we are a switching system that has somehow "tricked" you into thinking that you are a person. and then to suggest that such a perspective (being their own) is some kind of force to be reckoned with, herein lies the fault.
Materialism is dying. Here are the premises of material monism in a nutshell:
1. Your conscious perceptions exist.
2. The conscious perceptions of other living entities, different from your own, also exist.
3. There are things that exist independently of, and outside, conscious perception.
4. Things that exist independently of, and outside, conscious perception generate conscious perception.
Materialism is actually the philosophy that makes bigger leaps of faith than, say, ideal monism. Both Dualism and Materialism define themselves outside of the realm of investigation because of premise 3. But materialism actually requires more faith than dualism because of premise 4.
The only way materialism can survive is for one to deny premise 1 and prance around, as Daniel Dennett does, denying his own existence.
His beard looks like an optical illusion
After 6 months of writing this, you made someone laugh genuinely. I was starting at his beard at the beginning of the video and I couldn’t help but think of Leonardo Da Vinci and his fascination why the human hair curves in such a way and him trying to find a connection with universal themes or laws, and then I see your comment 🤣, amazing timing (after 6 months)
Free will is defined as - the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate.
Fate is defined as - events outside a person's control.
So, free will is the power or ability of acting without the constrain of necessity or events outside a person's control.
Everything we do is within the constrain of necessity or fate. We react to the environment. If there is no action there is no reaction. If the environment doesn't act on us we don't react.
It is as simple as that.
The act of choosing is defined as - pick out (someone or something) as being the best or most appropriate of two or more alternatives.
That selection can (in theory) be random or determined by various factors from genetics, education to life experience and probably many other unknown factors.
If the alternative we chose is dependent on determining factors free will is an illusion. If no such factors are considered the decision is considered random and free will is an illusion.
We are 'responsible' according to Dennett for the education we didn't get. for the genetics and lack of life experience , for all the events in our life that shaped the 'program' according to which we operate and so on. I don't see any logic and reason in that.
Dennett nailed it, but I had already figured it out. It is obvious if you really examine the subject. Start at a simple organism add evolution that rewards survival traits, wind up with specialized organs, then a controller (brain), then a more and more sophisticated brain. Mix in some lucky/special planet wide events. And then you have mankind as you see him/her now with consciousness and free will.
I've seen a few Dennett videos where he talks about consciousness and I'm fairly sure that he doesn't understand the basic idea of why explaining consciousness in the context of the brain is impossible.
Why do you think consciousness is impossible to explain in the context of the brain?
@@Kanzu999 Cause there is nothing about information transfer that gives lend to subjective perception of that information transfer. You cannot derive qualitative things from quantitative things.
@@pandawandas I'm not entirely sure what you mean by that. Can you give an example?
@@Kanzu999 One water pipe is not conscious, right? Now put a system of millions of water pipes, taps and switches turning on and off. Will that system magically become conscious?
@@pandawandas Not as far as we understand water pipes. That does however seem to be the case with the processes that are occurring in the brain, and there is lots of evidence to support that. But ultimately we don't know the answer to the hard problem of consciousness, so we don't know why consciousness arises, but it seems extremely likely that it has something to do with the processes occurring in the brain.
Can someone please explain to me why Dennett is perceived as important, I have yet to hear him say ANYTHING profound or memorable.
Well he thinks he doesnt exist. His insanity must be pretty profound and memorable shouldnt it
Free will means will that's free to go beyond the boundaries of the universe, because it is otherwise not free, but instead chained within these boundaries.
sure thing buddy👍
Daniel Dennett: triggering my anxiety, depression and existential crisis since 2006. Thanks for the Debbie Downer. I'm just a meat machine boop boop beep.
Heh... Same problem here. I don't think he tries to be evil though. He just wants answers.
Dennett is an idiot or maliciously vague when it comes to consciousness. He's far from the voice of reason on the matter. Listen to David Chalmers.
The no-free-will argument is plain silly, if for no other reason than being a big contradiction, both in believing it, and in arguing for it. If consciousness is an illusion, and free-will is an illusion, then so is believing that they're illusions. Does anyone have a choice to believe in free-will or not? If not, why would you make the argument--or DID you? Who pulls the strings? Maybe there are no strings.. Am I even typing right now? What? Who am I? I'm so damn confused.
I think I'm going to go sit in a corner until some predetermined physical impulses make me do something and trick me into thinking I want to do it. Later, guys...
Physics "pull the string". Free will might not be an illusion depending on how you define it. Bennett himself doesn't think there is no free will in any sense of the word . He just doesn't attribute it to any supernatural reality, and he doesn't reject determinism. Even if your decisions are set up in advance, you still make choices. The outcome of your decisional process can theoretically be predicted if given enough information about it. A computer also make choices when processing information and outputing values according to a set of rules putting the input in relation with the output. We are no different. We output choices according to a function of whatever information we have. The question "Should I eat now?" takes things like hunger, availability of food and other priorities as input, and output "yes" or "no" . You can define free will as the freedom to act according to our will. Which is kind of a tautology: you will always act according to your will.Even if you make a choice under threat, your choice will still be yours; the choosing function will now simply add as an input the predicted result of each choices, and whether those predicted results are desirable.
schok51 Anything can be defined using a tautology, but in that case you would not have truly defined it. Therefore, your objections to your tautological definition of free will do not amount to much, if your "will" is thought of as a necessary byproduct of various inputs which interact in a way that is beyond our control.
Free will as I define it is to have the mental ability to choose which of these inputs to prioritize. It entails being conscious of those inputs, even though there may be some other inputs that we may not be fully conscious of. It also implies that an alternative choice could have been made.
The way I see it, the "no free will" crowd can argue (by mere insistence) that we have no control over the "decision" process, that we're just as automatic as a programmed computer. Any semblance of choice and will-power is deemed "an illusion," because such experienced phenomena contradict their claim. Of course, I recognize that logically speaking, their position (though partially contrived) is consistent and potentially could be true. The only problem is that there is no way to prove it, and it goes against our experience and the way we inherently hold people accountable for their actions. It's like the argument that we are brains in a vat; it could be true, but why would we think that?
To illustrate how an argument can be insisted upon, one could make the opposite claim that nothing in the world is determined, even on a physical level (even if you can predict it with 100% accuracy), but rather that everyone and everything is making consistent choices, and even our perception in that case that matter follows determined physical laws is an illusion, whereas in reality each subatomic particle and force chooses to behave according to the same pattern. How can you argue against that claim?
Either side (free will vs determinism) can present a theory of reality that would be consistent with itself and potentially true from a theoretical standpoint. The problems arise when we consider human experience and realize that humans behave and think as though we have accountability for our actions because we do have the ability to choose our actions after considering the consequences. Arguing for human determinism has a way of eroding accountability and fostering fatalism. Furthermore, an argument for determinism would be utterly meaningless, because it argues that the process of making that very argument and hearing the argument and considering the argument and reasoning through it and deciding on its validity would all be determined according to inputs beyond human control. Should such an argument be taken seriously, if we have any choice in the matter?
amuslimguy Wasn't objecting to a tautological definition at all, merely recognizing it. I kind of agree with your definition(isn't really different from mine). As far as determinism goes, I don't see how it changes anything about what we should or will do. The future is not known yet. So a bit like Schodinger's cat, until we look at it, it is just as if there were no predetermined future(or all imaginable futures are possible). You may or may not be convinced of someone's position following a discussion on the topic. If determinism is true, then the outcome of the discussion(whether or not you will be convinced) is planned out in advance. Nonetheless, you need to be convinced for the predetermined future to happen. So there's no argument here about whether arguing a position matters. It matters regardless of the truth of determinism. And determinism is perfectly compatible with your definition of free will. The ability to choose exists regardless of determinism. However, determinism simply add the useless information that your choice, in this universe, is predetermined.
schok51 I don't agree. According to determinism, "choosing" a particular option becomes a robotic, programmed, necessary act, and the innate human feeling we associate with this (the feeling that we are in control of that choice, and that we could choose something else if we want) is labeled an illusion. If you wish to maintain that "choice" still exists in a absolute deterministic world, then you would be doing so only after redefining the word "choice" and stripping it of its essential meaning. You yourself stated that a computer "chooses," as well. I think it's obvious to humans that either computers cannot be said to have choice, or else you need to come up with another word to use for humans, because our choices are nothing compared to a computer's "choices."
I really think determinists end up foolishly asserting things that are unprovable and that defy basic human experience. In other words, they contradict the obvious. That is no way for a human to go through life.
amuslimguy How is that true? Explain to me how the fact that our choices and predetermined(without us which one is) means that they are "robotic". The feeling that we are in control might be an illusion to some extent(in that our conscious self is probably most often not the one making the decisions), but we still have choices(the ability to do one thing instead of another after having analyzed available options). And what things do determinists claim that are unprovable?
I maintain that form *is* important in addition to content. If the speaker speaks to me as if he is telling a fairytale to a kid; his words lose clout, no matter how illustrious a professor he is considered to be.
This problem occurs prevalently with Americans.
here for an assignment :)
If I knew I could be a famous philosopher by just repeating the same stupid argument like 200 years ago I would have done it long ago
Still not too late to repeat the same stupid argument and become famous...we’re still irrational and forgetful
Daniel Dennett explains nothing
+Joe Ruf
I find it hilarious that he can possibly think he has explained anything.
Sure, "fame in the brain" sounds like it correlates with how our consciousness works... but if you ask the question "Why should fame in the brain produce subjectivity?" You return to the hard problem of consciousness in full. Dan Dennett seems to be unable to even restate the hard problem of consciousness properly, let alone solve it.
emaster01 Yeah he really holds to the notion that if you change the definition that means you're correct. It really is like conversing with a child.
+Joe Ruf Philosophaster is the word
+Joe Ruf "Yeah he really holds to the notion that if you change the definition that means you're correct. It really is like conversing with a child."
Yeah, like conversing with a narcissistic, petulant child. He's the worst of the bunch! Cheers.
***** There is a rather embarrassing get together on youtube called "moving naturalism forward" and what he says is quite disturbing. I think when he talks he's just playing a character. like a wannabe 19th century Englishman.
How can blind random collapses or deterministic collapses of the quantum mechanical wave function and a bunch of deterministic natural laws acting on that allow for free will? Can there not be free will only in that scenario if the collapses of the quantum mechanical wave function are not blindly random, but controlled by free will?
Quantum mechanics not support free will! If quantum randomness somehow effect causal mechanics our level then everything is mess of random and causal effects and thats not give us freedom at all we then are just slaves of random processes!
The Protestant theologian John Calvin was certain that he knew the answer. Forest G. Wood is the author of “The Arrogance of Faith.” From that book comes the following ... Calvin argued in Institutes of the Christian Religion (1559 edition); “but eternal life is foreordained for some and eternal damnation for others.”
It seems that really smart people can still have dumb ideas.
***** Well the issue with freewill is that all the conditions that shaped your brain and all the other things that make you you, you had no part in. You dna, parents, society, everything. Where is the room for freewill?
***** Word salads aint my thing man. You can respond to what I said or we can go our separate ways.
***** Yeah I get that a lot. Like I said my question was pretty clear so go ahead or we can leave it alone.
***** That's what I thought. I will duck out of this one and you can have the last word. Take care :)
+Mihai RB What? Why you would believe what anyone says? Because you have built a general trust in humanity, most people dont lie about everything? How does a "truth statement", say the earth is round, violate determinism?
Anyone can watch their mind and observe the mysteriousness of choice making.
I had the same initial reaction as it seems everyone else did, but I stuck with it and halfway through the video he starts to actually explain his theory and its factual basis rather than merely prefacing it.
(I feel like I'm going to regret posting against the tide.)
(Shakes fist in anger and disagreement) :b
Consciousness is the awareness of your own existence and capacity to think, yes?
Yep
No arguments. No proof. No explanations. This is simply pointless babble.
It's OK to admit that you don't understand something.
Complete bs...he explains nothing.
not everything can be spoon fed. Sorry.
That's because he's full of shit and appeals to gullible people like you.
At least you don't believe some science guy's whacky ideas based merely on Blind Faith with absolutely NO *Real* reason to believe it otherwise!! If somebody buys into the bullshit here, there's No point even trying to have a real conversation with them!!!
Does anyone know what he is saying at 6:14?
"... and it's because we can share our wisdom, that we have a special responsibility. It's as the old [????????????] it's Noblesse Oblige. We have the power and that's what gives us the obligation."
There is only one impediment for me to accept the idea that we have no free will. Maybe someone can shine a light for me on the following: what happens when we are faced with oposing courses of action?
For instance, sometimes I do not know whether I should go to the gym or if I should stay at home. I might be lazy that day, which makes me want to stay at home and rest. However, whenever such dilema arises I have been able to sucessfully make myself go to the gym. This usually involves weighing the pros and cons of me going and of not going. This sort of reasoning with myself sometimes takes quite a chunk of time, there are days were i spend close to 1 hour trying to make myself decide for the best option. So i guess my question is: what am I doing when I'm enganged in that sort of argument with myself? Am I not excercising free will when I sucessfully talk myself into going to the gym despite my body not wanting to?
Marco T. Zahn
_"So i guess my question is: what am I doing when I'm enganged in that sort of argument with myself?"_
You're engaging in deterministic decision making: Evaluating options back and forth much like a computer might.
_"Am I not excercising free will when I sucessfully talk myself into going to the gym despite my body not wanting to?"_
It depends on what you mean by free will. Dennett would say that you are exercising free will, as would I, but we are both compatibilists and don't have a problem with the idea that a computer might churn around for an hour to produce the same result and make a robot body go to the gym also having free will - assuming the robot's reasoning process was sufficiently general.
Why is it that when someone argues for or against free-will, it usually involves them totally polarizing the issue(e.g. Sam Harris)?
Yes, where is the evidence that free-will isn't an ever-growing framework, a platform, and why can't it be a spectrum, even a moving one?
Lastly, why is the idea of free-will so closely tied with religion?? Does nobody remember the phrase "God has a plan for you"? Sounds quite like hard-determinism to me. Not only that, but the fact that god apparently knows everything, even future events. It is pre-determined.
Who was the idiot that first associated religion with free will? What a jackass.
The bible itsself argues for free will at some points, and contradicts that in others. But without free will, religion doesn't make any sense.
"where is the evidence that free-will isn't an ever-growing framework, a platform, and why can't it be a spectrum, even a moving one?"
What does any of that mean?
James Samsom What does "free will" mean in the western world? Is it a fixed thing? Or is it something to be improved, like a skill?
Bishamonten What does your definition of free will mean?
James Samsom You're asking me what I "mean", but you're not even sounding like you're trying to understand. It's a two-way bridge friend.
He didn't really explain anything
We tell so many stories, and get so worked up over them.
I feel like stories have a life of their own, they just use us as their hosts
Can't deny something without affirming its existence.
Just a bit shallow ):
so when someone goes on a hunger strike for weeks or commits suicide by setting themselves on fire, they did this because of a series of chemical reactions in their proteins, and the process of trying and weighing these decisions prior hand was just an illusion? GREAT! so next time I rob a bank, I will just tell the authorities there was nothing I could do and my 'robbing of the bank' was a result of chemical reactions happening in my proteins which I could not control...talk about mistaking the effect for the cause.
yeah spontaneous series of chemical reactions occur on multiple levels when we consciously make a decision. so what? we already knew that and it doesn't disprove anything. you can chose to not believe in a soul or free will or whatever, i don't care and don't have a problem with that, but stating that this belief is verified by scientific facts is just ridiculous and faulty logic. if you do believe in these concepts, this explanation fits perfectly into that belief as well as obviously there needs to be a physical counterpart to reflect the decision taken on the metaphysical level. when i move my arm, it's because i decide to move it, thus my brain sends out electrical signals. my brain doesn't randomly decide to move my arms and then i experience the illusion that i actually wanted to move it.
how about you let issues beyond material science remain so, and stop trying to answer existential, philosophical, or theological questions with the science of the tangible physical world?
why can't militant atheists just accept the FACT that you can't for certain prove OR disprove the existence of God, the soul, or other non-physical entities with the study of the physical world? if you don't feel like nature points you in the direction of concepts, then good for you don't believe in them. but stop acting like you can disprove or debunk such concepts.
again, making generalizations about "fears of people" that they would "realize life has no meaning" so they cling on to a belief of free will? what if i said all people who claim that "life has no meaning and there is no free will" because they are "afraid of finding out life has meaning and there are consequences for their decisions"?
...smh
'Why can't militant atheists just accept the FACT that you can't for certain prove OR disprove the existence of God, the soul, or other non-physical entities' - Why? Because this is irrelevant that's why. For example, you cannot prove there are no mermaids can you? Does that mean if I say they are real then the truth is simply a 50 / 50 split: 50% chance of truth or 50% chance of falsehood? No of course not. If I say that mermaids exist the burden of evidence rests entirely on my own shoulders & I have no right to expect you to prove me wrong. If anyone claims a god exists or even might exist it is their responsibility to demonstrate in no uncertain terms WHY not the atheist's responsibility to prove otherwise. Remember atheism isn't necessarily stating no gods exist, it is merely pointing out that no one has ever been able to demonstrate a god does exist so why assume one does? No one has ever been able to demonstrate mermaids exist either which is why they are not taken seriously. Why is a god different? Popularity? So what? Most people believed the earth was flat once.
Joe Mills, it shows you aren't cut out for science then. You don't study science to overthrow ideas - or support them. You study science to see what's true. Deciding the results before the study is done & shoe-horning your beliefs into them is the antithesis of science.
The relevance is you're trying to make the science fit your worldview not visa-versa. The problem is you think Dennett hasn't explained consciousness & your looking for something else but how can you find something if it isn't there (unless you make up answers)?
'With the belief that once the physical dies, then the mind goes with it, many have turned into hedonists and all around horrible people.' No.1 I can see you really aren't cut out for science because you don't see the importance of providing evidence for this claim & science is entirely about providing verifiable evidence. No.2 Are you seriously denying that people who DO believe in life after death don't ALSO get into alcoholism & drug abuse too? Or that they can also be horrible people? Here's another issue you need to understand about science - it is just as much about looking at disconfirming data as conformational data. But you don't seem to be interested in statistics at all - only anecdotes & you ironically talk about 'false presumptions!'!
Dude, that is not what he said at all. -_- Biology gave you the competence to decide. The decision matters: it is part of the chain of events that lead to your action. It is not an illusion.
You said it right Mr. Dannett, it's silly to take seriously stance "consciousness is bunch of tricks". It's an interesting thought experiment, no doubt. It has some merit in vacuum, but against a backdrop of reason and emotional experience, it just falls flat.
Still, its easy to see why you'd imagine yourself limited like so. It's that or nothing for the atheist in you. No matter how unlikely your position may be, you'd be willing to make compromises just to sustain that idea- much in the same way you point out how many religious people see your idea as repugnant, which it is. I think even you can see that.
Repugnancy of the idea does not reduce it's value in itself. Like the cold freeze as possible end of the universe, while repugnant, does not diminish it's likeliness given our current knowledge.
I agree with most of Dr Dennett's assumptions, except the anthropocentric idea that only humans can share their wisdom and learn from their mistakes. Chimps and bonobos (our nearest relatives in the animal kingdom) also display such properties as learning, planning and sharing of information - which can be considered a basic form of wisdom (which itself is subjective based on who you ask). Unfortunately for the animals, we don't have yet invented devices that can translate their language/vocal-sounds into something meaningful from our vocabulary, so the best we can do right now is just infer the basic ideas based on observing their behaviour and interactions with their environment (that includes the human scientists).