Harris's two assumptions are constructed so that nothing could satisfy them, which is why the argument always lands where it lands. Could have done otherwise with the entire prior state of the universe held fixed is not a test any concept survives. A problem centred approach seems more useful precisely because it asks what work we need the idea to do, deliberation, responsibility, reasoning that actually changes outcomes, rather than whether it clears a metaphysical bar designed to be uncleared.
Very few systems can create new coherent emergent phenomena. People can. New choices, as it were, with new effects that will not simply be washed away with time.
We error-correct towards things that are new, everything else error-corrects towards the spontaneous transformations of a dead universe.
1. Is the "hard" problem a genuine problem in the Popperian sense? (i.e. subjective experience arising from physical matter)
2. (Assuming our brains are made of purely physical stuff) At the precise moment of a creative spark or a choice being made, the very next state of our brain is dependent only on the state and the deterministic laws of physics. This is, I think, Sam's point - is this an interesting problem, or just at too low a level of explanation/abstraction?
Some people behave as if they don't have (much) free will.
Free will can be improved.
@Andrew George
Harris's two assumptions are constructed so that nothing could satisfy them, which is why the argument always lands where it lands. Could have done otherwise with the entire prior state of the universe held fixed is not a test any concept survives. A problem centred approach seems more useful precisely because it asks what work we need the idea to do, deliberation, responsibility, reasoning that actually changes outcomes, rather than whether it clears a metaphysical bar designed to be uncleared.
I had written smth about this just a week ago and you have improved my understanding just hours later, thank you
I think there’s plenty of Popperians (such as myself) who don’t believe in free will, so I’d be cautious framing it as an “us vs them” kind of thing.
Very few systems can create new coherent emergent phenomena. People can. New choices, as it were, with new effects that will not simply be washed away with time.
We error-correct towards things that are new, everything else error-corrects towards the spontaneous transformations of a dead universe.
Great piece, Brett, as always. Two questions.
1. Is the "hard" problem a genuine problem in the Popperian sense? (i.e. subjective experience arising from physical matter)
2. (Assuming our brains are made of purely physical stuff) At the precise moment of a creative spark or a choice being made, the very next state of our brain is dependent only on the state and the deterministic laws of physics. This is, I think, Sam's point - is this an interesting problem, or just at too low a level of explanation/abstraction?