How much free will does a monkey have? A cat? A fish? An amoeba? A virus? A vapor bubble in a boiling pot? A raspberry shoot jockeying for a sunny spot? An octopus arm? A solar flare? A chess bot?
Hint: the same amount as a human.
Answer: We just happen to have a feeling of free will that is an artifact of some optimization subroutine that runs in our brains and is not fully available to introspection. Do octopuses have that feeling? Chess bots? That question might get answered one day once we understand that how the feeling of free will is formed in humans.
Right, good point, I think it’s very close. I guess when you are a professional philosopher stating the obvious it often comes across as profound.
Though I’m trying to do more than to just state it, but to construct a model of the meta-problem: that it is a side effect of the specific optimization computation. I wish I could tease out some testable predictions from this model that are different from alternatives.
How much free will does a monkey have? A cat? A fish? An amoeba? A virus? A vapor bubble in a boiling pot? A raspberry shoot jockeying for a sunny spot? An octopus arm? A solar flare? A chess bot?
Hint: the same amount as a human.
Answer: We just happen to have a feeling of free will that is an artifact of some optimization subroutine that runs in our brains and is not fully available to introspection. Do octopuses have that feeling? Chess bots? That question might get answered one day once we understand that how the feeling of free will is formed in humans.
FWIW, sounds like you’re pointing at what Chalmers calls the meta problem of consciousness: why do we think there is a hard problem of consciousness?
Right, good point, I think it’s very close. I guess when you are a professional philosopher stating the obvious it often comes across as profound.
Though I’m trying to do more than to just state it, but to construct a model of the meta-problem: that it is a side effect of the specific optimization computation. I wish I could tease out some testable predictions from this model that are different from alternatives.
We are free to think we are free. Freedom is the opiate of the optimists, so be sour and you will be free of freedom.