----- Original Message -----
From: "James W Stark" <stark2301@voyager.net>
> Jim's comment [about my replacement of the random number generator by
stockmarket movement for Sierpinski's Gasket}
> The analogy here is much better and, yes, those shareholders would have
> human free will. I doubt that their behavior follows the mathematical
> equations behind Sierpinski's gasket.
> end of this comment
Then you truly don't understand Sierpinski's Gasket. The behavior of the
market is not what makes the gasket. The random number generator is not what
makes the gasket. The gasket is made by a decision tree imposed upon a
randomly varying source function. There is no 'rule' in the random or
pseudorandom numbers. The rule comes into play in the decision tree for what
direction to move. All I need to produce the gasket is two independent time
series that I can use for making the decision.
> Jim's comment
> Thanks for including Penrose's views from The Large, the Small and the
> Human Mind. I only have two of his books, The Emperor's New Mind and
> Shadows of the Mind. However, that intelligence at this level would be a
> fixed smart program with designed reactions. It has no free will. It is an
> artificial intelligence.
> end of this comment
I wish you would provide some evidence for the above assertions. How do you
know that there is no free will in the paramecium? Have you talked to one,
or is this your prejudice. If you say that getting food is not 'acting
freely' then I would contend that we humans aren't free either. It is about
supper time and in a few minutes I will be forced, by these instinctual
pangs of hunger, to go feed by growing belly.
> Jim's comments
> Thanks again for the fill-in. Yes, randomness could enter the decision
> process here, but it would not be human free will. Your definitions of
free
> will and randomness appear to be just high order programs. These would not
> be non-deterministic. I see several levels of free will ranging from fixed
> programs to a non-programmable free will. Spiritual free will that humans
> use is a force not a fixed program.
> end of comment
If random processes 'would not be non-deterministic", which is what I see
you saying above, then please tell me the 5 lottery numbers for Wednesday's
Texas lottery. If they're not non-deterministic, then they must be
deterministic. So please determine them for me and I will give you a few
dollars as a token of my gratitude. :-)
What you are saying does not seem to be what I would expect from someone of
your background. How can a random number be deterministic? ARe you confusing
deterministic with naturallistic?
> Jim's comments [about Libet and Kornhuber's experiments]
> Your conclusion may be true, if you accept the face value of the
> interpretations. I have learned to be more skeptical. I find too much
> scientific reporting that is structured to "find" what the scientist
> intended to find. i.e. a deterministic free will. I will have to read
> Tipler's book and possibly Libet's. I am familiar with readiness potential
> but not with the concept of an Omega Point Boundary Condition.
Forget the Omega point--the Hubble constant revisions sank Tipler's mad
hatter dreams. What I was citing him for concerned Libet's work.
What you say above,is that you don't feel that you, as a mathmatician, have
to accept data that is out of your field. THis is what gets the YECs in
trouble all the time. What you say is something I hear from them all the
time.
Secondly, I will put this loudly. NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT A DETERMINISTIC
FREE WILL. IN MY VIEW DETERMINISM AND FREE WILL ARE ALMOST ANTITHETICAL AND
CAN ONLY BE UNITED VIA SOME SYSTEM LIKE THE GASKET. Why do you
ignore what I said about it in my last note? Maybe you don't understand
where I am putting free will into the gasket analogy--it is in the motion of
the dot, not the outcome of thousands of choices. Or is this a case where
you don't have to accept what someone says at face value?
> > Glenn says: But once again, how can we be free when we don't even know
what we
> > did?
>
> Jim's comment
> This depends on the situation. We use our free will to build [reaction]
> habits. That reaction can be outside our field of awareness. They can be
> triggered by our emotions. We use free will to make selections during
> conscious evaluations.
> end of this comment
And this is what I was saying with my interpretation of Libet's
experiments.
>
> >
> > Glenn continues: Free will must be tied to randomness. In this way God
limited
> > His knowledge as well as our knowledge. And because our knowledge is
limited,
> > He needed to come, in the form of the Messiah, to tell us about Himself.
> >
> > I would interpret Libet's experiments as follows: We are tied to some
> > randomizing agent. We inform this agent of what we want to do in the
> > future--bend our finger. Then that agent must act on our account before
we are
> > informed of his action. The person sitting at the experiment already
agreed to
> > bend his finger and then delegated the action to the randomizer.
> >
> Jim's comment
> The decision to move the finger was already made and delegated to a smart
> program agent. Action was committed to a random generator.
> end of this comment
we agree on this point.
> > I have been arguing all throughout this thread for a NON-DETERMINISTIC
model
> > of free will. How on earth can you possibly say that. Have I not said
over and
> > over that free will must be tied to randomness? That is certianly NOT
arguing
> > for a deterministic universe, unless your definition of deterministic is
> > totally different than any definition I have ever heard.
> >
> Jim's comments
> It is your association of free will to randomness that creates the
> impression
> of a deterministic worldview. So does the subject title.
First, don't blame me for the subject title. That was started by Burgy.
bad Burgy, bad, :-) ]
Secondly you are using deterministic in the most funny way I have ever seen
it used. Have you looked it up in a dictionary? I really think you mean
naturalistic.
The literature
> that you quote use deterministic arguments. Non-determinism demands the
> existence of human free will. Randomness does not. The lack of
> understanding lies in the meaning given to randomness. The meaning of
> randomness in science is not consistent. It may be seen as an indication
of
> either high order or low order. We need to realize that the meaning of
> randomness depends on its theoretical context. Ludwig Boltzmann locked
the
> definition of randomness for the microworld to an assumed equality for
> chance events so that he could create a statistical property of a
collection
> of molecules that would mimic entropy, a macroscopic property of gases.
That
> randomness was believed to be a state of low order. Yet, David Bohm saw
> randomness as an infinitely high degree of order. It would be a fixed
order
> that is unpredictable. If we look at random real numbers, we again see a
> correlation of randomness to high order, not disorder.
Using Yockey's terminology we see randomness correlation with high
COMPLEXITY. Order is sequences like:
010101010101010101010101010101010101010...
Randomness is very similar to highly organized. The last sentence is highly
organized but it is like a random sentence.
tsmfp,rdd od brtu do,o;st yp johj;u pthsmoxrf/ yjr ;sdy drmyrmvr od johj;u
pthsmoxrf niy oy od ;olr s tsmfp, drmyrmvr/
The last sentence is random right? (or at least pseudo random)?
Rudy Rucker in
> Infinity and the Mind tells us that "a sequence of digits is random if
there
> is no finite way of describing it."
Agreed.
A real number is random "if it has an
> irreducibly infinite amount of information." . Its order is very unique.
> Thus, randomness is equated with unnameability. It is a complexity of
high
> degree of order.
You are using a nomenclature that is very likely to lead you astray. Order
is the opposite of complexity.
Computer generated "random" numbers represent a very high
> order rather than no order. You seem to want both low order and high
order.
> The randomness of a smart agent in our brain uses a high order randomness.
> It has no free will (low order) in it.
You should look at Molecular Biology and Information THeory by Hubert
Yockey. He cleans up the nomeclatural problems.
> >> Jim's comment:
> >> You have more faith in quantum mechanics for spiritual answers than I
do.
> >
> > No, you misconstrue what I have faith in. I have faith in God and see
his hand
> > in quantum. I am interested in how he has used it to give us free will.
It
> > is not quantum that gives, but God.
> >
> Jim's comment
> Sorry, perhaps I should have used trust rather that faith.
And why shouldn't I have trust in quantum. It has brought about the digital
revolution, and indeed the computer on which you are corresponding with me
.is based upon quantum mechanics.
glenn
Foundation, Fall and Flood
Adam, Apes and Anthropology
http://www.flash.net/~mortongr/dmd.htm
Lots of information on creation/evolution
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