Volitional Non-contingent Reality?

[EduChris]

Who and what are we as human beings? Specifically, do we possess any measure of genuine volition—some causal mechanism which is not strictly reducible to the causal mechanisms of chance and necessity—whereby we can, in certain cases and in some degree, take ownership and responsibility for our thoughts and behaviors by intentionally using our volition to alter some causal chain?

If we do have some measure of genuine volition, as rational beings we will attempt to find some epistemologically justified explanation for it. What is the best epistemically justified explanation for volition? I believe theism is the best and only epistemically justified explanation.

For this debate, I will define theism as the claim that the explanation for all contingencies (including our universe and our selves) ultimately derive from some non-contingent reality which involves at least some volition. Since we cannot subject this non-contingent reality to empirical testing, and since we cannot know precisely what it is, we will wrap this non-contingent reality up inside a tool of logic known as a black box. There could be anything inside this black box, but for simplicity’s sake we will start with the following minimal definition of the contents of the black box:

1) It undergirds all contingent existence
2) It is not arbitrarily limited by any physical or spatio-temporal dimensions
3) It is not arbitrarily limited in the capacity to handle or process information
4) It is not arbitrarily limited in causal efficacy

I believe the above definition is both simple and capable of producing any possible world. If I am correct, then there is no need (and no epistemological warrant) to postulate additional entities inside the black box.

Question for debate: if some genuine volition exists within our universe, does theism—volitional non-contingent reality as defined above—provide the best epistemically justified explanation?

[brettra]

EduChris wrote:

There are always reasons for and against just about any choice. The question is, at the end of the day, is there an "I" who decides which reasons seem most compelling, or is there just a machine running a predetermined algorithm, with the result that moral agency and accountability are entirely reduced to a chimera?

We don't decide what's compelling. We are compelled. The compelling directs decisions, not the other way around. If we were to choose our compulsions, they'd no longer be compulsions by definition.

Whether one thinks of it as an "I" making decisions or a machine making decisions really makes no difference, the point is that the decisions/choices are ultimately made on certain bases that are not chosen. These bases are included in these reasons I referred to in my first post.

[EduChris]

...We don't decide what's compelling. We are compelled...

I am not talking so much about "compulsions" as about thoughtful, mindful decisions.

...The compelling directs decisions, not the other way around. If we were to choose our compulsions, they'd no longer be compulsions by definition...

If we are subjects, rather than objects only, then we can choose to attend to certain thoughts, and we can choose to pursue certain lines of inquiry.

...Whether one thinks of it as an "I" making decisions or a machine making decisions really makes no difference...

The difference is this: Am I an object only, or am I a subject also?

...decisions/choices are ultimately made on certain bases that are not chosen...

If that is true, then you are an object only, rather than a subject also. But since your claim seems to demand an element of subjectivity or agency, it seems as though your claim is self-refuting.

[scourge99]

...The compelling directs decisions, not the other way around. If we were to choose our compulsions, they'd no longer be compulsions by definition...

If we are subjects, rather than objects only, then we can choose to attend to certain thoughts, and we can choose to pursue certain lines of inquiry.

...Whether one thinks of it as an "I" making decisions or a machine making decisions really makes no difference...

The difference is this: Am I an object only, or am I a subject also?

...decisions/choices are ultimately made on certain bases that are not chosen...

If that is true, then you are an object only, rather than a subject also. But since your claim seems to demand an element of subjectivity or agency, it seems as though your claim is self-refuting.

There is no contradiction. You can be a subject which has thoughts and pursues certain lines of inquiry even if your thoughts and pursuits are dictated by conditions such that you could not have had different thoughts nor pursued different lines of inquiry.

[brettra]

I am not talking so much about "compulsions" as about thoughtful, mindful decisions.

One can feel compelled even when making thoughtful decisions. I don't mean to use "compulsion" as only some kind of impulse decision. I mean it just as a feeling or urge.

Am I an object only, or am I a subject also?

It depends on your answer to the following question. If choices are determined, would one who makes these determined choices be an object or a subject? The answer seems to rest on how one defines choice. You may think a "determined choice" is oxymoronic. It just depends on the definition one uses. You say subjects can choose to attend certain thoughts and pursue certain lines of inquiry. In everyday language, I'd say I could choose to attend certain thoughts and pursue certain lines of inquiry. You, however, may disagree with my claim because you see a determined choice as no choice at all.

All that said, it may be better for you to tell me, according to my beliefs stated above, if I see humans as only objects or if we are subjects also. I think there would be less confusion this way.

since your claim seems to demand an element of subjectivity or agency, it seems as though your claim is self-refuting.

Are you saying that me merely making some claim is self-refuting of the position I hold, or is something about one of my claims self-refuting? I'm just not sure what specifically you are referring to.

[EduChris]

...If choices are determined, would one who makes these determined choices be an object or a subject?...you see a determined choice as no choice at all...

If there is no actual "agent" capable of exercising conscious, willful, efficacious subjectivity in holding on to some reasons while dismissing other reasons, then there can only be an object.

since your claim seems to demand an element of subjectivity or agency, it seems as though your claim is self-refuting.

Are you saying that me merely making some claim is self-refuting of the position I hold, or is something about one of my claims self-refuting? I'm just not sure what specifically you are referring to.

I am saying that if some statement is made by a recording--and if there are only recordings in the universe, with no agents recording the statements--then that statement is meaningless (as are all statements in that scenario).

If you intend that your statement be meaningful, even while denying your own agency, then you are caught in self-referential incoherence.

[scourge99]

...If choices are determined, would one who makes these determined choices be an object or a subject?...you see a determined choice as no choice at all...

If there is no actual "agent" capable of exercising conscious, willful, efficacious subjectivity in holding on to some reasons while dismissing other reasons, then there can only be an object.

I don't see any reason to believe all forms of determinism are incompatible with an "agent capable of exercising conscious, willful, efficacious subjectivity in holding on to some reasons while dismissing other reasons. "

since your claim seems to demand an element of subjectivity or agency, it seems as though your claim is self-refuting.

Are you saying that me merely making some claim is self-refuting of the position I hold, or is something about one of my claims self-refuting? I'm just not sure what specifically you are referring to.

I am saying that if some statement is made by a recording--and if there are only recordings in the universe, with no agents recording the statements--then that statement is meaningless (as are all statements in that scenario).

If you intend that your statement be meaningful, even while denying your own agency, then you are caught in self-referential incoherence.

Are you under the impression that agency is incompatible with determinism? I don't believe agency and freewill are synonyms.

[brettra]

If there is no actual "agent" capable of exercising conscious, willful, efficacious subjectivity in holding on to some reasons while dismissing other reasons, then there can only be an object.

I'd say we both believe there is agency, we just differ in the explanation of the agent's choices. My explanation traces back to and attempts to identify the reasons for the choice. Yours stops at the choice and is only explained by the agency itself. It's almost the same as the choice having no explanation at all. Why stop there?

[brettra]

If there is no actual "agent" capable of exercising conscious, willful, efficacious subjectivity in holding on to some reasons while dismissing other reasons, then there can only be an object.

I'd say there is agency, we just differ in the explanation of an agent's choice. You seem to explain certain consequences by pointing to an agent's choice. I'd do that as well. But why no explanation of the agent's choice? Something results from an agent's choice, why avoid the explanation for the particular choice? The explanation of free will seems to avoid explanations rather than offer them. 

If you intend that your statement be meaningful, even while denying your own agency, then you are caught in self-referential incoherence.

I don't know if this is true or not. I'm not sure I'm denying my own agency either.  I see something similar has come up on another thread between Haven and Akithepirate. I'll have to think about that but don't have anything to put forth at the moment.

[Mithrae]

Effectual and not-wholly-restricted choice is something which all thinking humans experience hundreds of times through every single waking day. We choose to do something before we do it.

Alternatively we could say that effectual and not-wholly-restricted choice is a causal process which all thinking humans directly engage in hundreds of times through every single waking day.


As far as I've gathered, there are only two ways to disprove this overwhelming evidence.

-- Firstly we could deny validity of our experience of choice by showing through experimentation that pre-intention brain activity is both a necessary and sufficient cause for behaviour. However as I commented to Scourge, the experiments I've seen so far suggest that pre-intention brain activity down at least to -1.6 seconds are not a sufficient cause for behaviour, and examples like fast-paced sports show often in time-frames under a second that prior brain activity is not necessary for behaviour.

-- Secondly, one could show that all macro-level activity of 'physical' stuff occurs deterministically from prior causation. Trouble is that while as a presumption physical determinism is necessary, useful and constantly confirmed by observation, we never actually observe it. When someone kicks a football what we observe are two events occurring simultaneously in very close proximity - we don't observe causation. So as a grounds for denying the causation which we directly engage in on a daily basis, that's pretty shaky reasoning. Furthermore, from what I gather the four fundamental interactions (at the least) would have to be set aside as special exceptions to the prior causation rule; they are just how 'physical' stuff behaves according to its own properties.

Consequently, one would also need to demonstrate that there is not or cannot be any quasi-'physical' stuff (ie, currently not observed with instruments) whose behaviour is also a result of intrinsic properties, rather than prior/external causation. An emergent type of stuff from certain complex biological structures? An entirely distinct type of stuff which for some reason is drawn to certain complex biological structures? Without showing macro-level determinism to be valid, universal and definitely applicable to humans - rather than merely a very good presumption drawn from our common experience of non-biological stuff - this second approach to denying the validity of our effectual and not-wholly-restricted choices appears quite weak to me.

I'd say there is agency, we just differ in the explanation of an agent's choice. You seem to explain certain consequences by pointing to an agent's choice. I'd do that as well. But why no explanation of the agent's choice? Something results from an agent's choice, why avoid the explanation for the particular choice? The explanation of free will seems to avoid explanations rather than offer them.

Can you explain time? Can you explain mass? 'Free will' is a term used to describe what we observe and experience. Certainly many thinkers offer thoughtful and no doubt quite good explanations of time, mass, volition and so on; but I question whether a real or imagined deficiency in our descriptions or explanations of phenomena can be said to invalidate what we experience of them.

Especially since, as EduChris is arguing, the absense of this particular phenomenon could very plausibly be said to invalidate both everything we 'know' and pretty much everything we are or perceive ourselves to be.
Edit: Actually the same might be said of 'time,' though doing so would raise even more questions about what it actually is.

[brettra]

Mithrae,

First of all, I am making a presumption of physical determinism on a certain level. If someone has a beef with that, they may disregard my argument below. I'm not equipped nor particularly interested in debating that presumption right now.

Effectual and not-wholly-restricted choice is something which all thinking humans experience hundreds of times through every single waking day. We choose to do something before we do it. 

Alternatively we could say that effectual and not-wholly-restricted choice is a causal process which all thinking humans directly engage in hundreds of times through every single waking day. 

You seem to be recognizing certain restrictions while ignoring a huge one: the choice maker. What do you base your conscious choices on? Do they have a basis? Are they directed by you? If so, according to what?

The point is, our conscious choices are indeed made for reasons. If no reason existed to make a choice, a choice wouldn't be made. The restrictions lie in the reasons. What if I were to argue that your conscious choices were made according to your strongest wants or desires? Do you object to this? If so, could you give a scenario where this wouldn't be the case? If one could make a conscious choice against a want or desire, what would that look like and why would it be done?

If it is true that conscious choices are always made according to our strongest wants and desires, then I could say our strongest wants and desires determine our conscious choices. 

Now if we do not choose our wants and desires, could we not say that our choices are determined?