It's obvious.

You are obvious.

It was obvious.

No, it's not. It is by title and definition for Jon`C. Therefore, this thread is about whatever Jon`C is interested in discussing. Which isn't you. Stop trying to make it about you again.

But won't Jon`C just want to discuss how awful a writer Koobie is? Then Jon`C's thread would be about Koobie again. I'm feeling trapped.

"I don't get it."
— Jon'C.

The thread by title is for Jon'C. I made a thread for Jon'C. For you, I have a flying cock. Therefore, you are about whatever the flying cock is interested in doing. Which isn't me. Stop trying to make it about me again.

A deterministic brain implies the same output is always produced for the same input on the same initial state. How is this consistent with any definition of free will? Under such a scheme there would be no freedom, since your behavior is strictly pre-determined, and neither is there will, since there is no significant mental force acting to effect change.

imo compatibilism is just a lazy out to reconcile the ethics of punishing criminals with the belief that criminals are scary un-people destined to a life of crime by the circumstances of their birth. I don't have a lot of kind words for it.

This definition is essentially meaningless. What do you mean by "make your own choices"? It's defined in vague enough terms that one could argue it isn't contradicted by determinism just as easily as one could argue it is simply impossible, as per my second paragraph.




I don't think you understood that he was summarizing your post. Are you trying to make an insufferable fool of yourself?

>>This definition is essentially meaningless. What do you mean by "make your own choices"? It's defined in vague enough terms that one could argue it isn't contradicted by determinism just as easily as one could argue it is simply impossible, as per my second paragraph.

"Make your own choices" means that you are free to choose whatever you wish regardless of what anyone else, be it a person or a supreme power, should such exist, thinks. Anything else would be an illusion of choice which does not equate to free will; compare a real mouse in a maze to a cyborg mouse. The cyborg mouse is operating via a program, which would always make the same decisions based on certain external stimuli ... the cyborg mouse thinks it has a choice to eat the cheese or not to eat the cheese, but in reality, it does not, because it had been programmed to eat the cheese within the parameters of the experiment. It simply does what it is programmed to do. The real mouse, though, can either eat the cheese or not eat the cheese. It has a real choice.

>>I don't think you understood that he was summarizing your post.

Think again.

Translation: no u

This thread is about philosophy. Thank you for your minimal participation, but I would appreciate it if you would stop trying to make it about yourself.

Thanks for your help, Antony. What would I ever do without you.
Jon'C, I would appreciate if you stop trying to make this thread about me, thanks.

Once again... Translation: no u

Here is a philosophical question, for you, Antony:

Dude, really, are you ****ing retarded?



*sigh*

Translation: no u

What I'm trying to say is that any definition of free will that is not compatible with determinism is also not compatible with a non-deterministic brain, since the 'coin flips' are also not determined by mental force.




Compatibilism is a position that is dependent on an arbitrary (and fairly useless) definition of free will.

But I also don't see how that could reconcile the ethics of punishing criminals. I mean, surely if someone is destined by circumstances of their birth, arbitrarily defining "free will" so that you can call their crimes acts of "free will" doesn't present any meaningful justification for their punishment.

Really, Koobie.. Pulling the "I know you are but what am I" when someone tells you to stop making the thread about you isn't funny, smart, or clever. It is simply just further proof that you possess writing talents and cognitive abilities inferior to EL James and Lennie Small, respectively.

Be sure to cross-post that as well.

Well, unless you define "free will" specifically as being able to make decisions non-deterministically, but that's another arbitrary and useless definition of free will.

What about genetics? Environmental factors? Mental illness?



The choice of the real mouse is determined by the state of its brain's neural network and chemistry, and other biological factors. These, in turn, are determined by its diet, genetics, and life experiences. In a way, it is just a much more complex 'program' than the cyborg mouse's brain, with a larger set of inputs.

If you program the cyborg mouse using artificial intelligence methods other than simple trigger-response, perhaps an artificial neural network that trains its behaviour over multiple maze runs, does it have free will? What if its decisions on whether to eat cheese or which way to turn are varied slightly using a Random.nextFloat() call?

This is an interesting thought; reminds me of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
I suppose the real answer to this depends on whether the expected outcome of the experiment dictates the actions of the cybernetic mouse, or whether the cybernetic mouse dictates the outcome of the experiment.
Good night.

This isn't some kind of rhetorical question with no clear answer. It just depends on how you define "free will", like I stated in my first comment, and if you can't define it coherently (which you didn't) you're not going to be able to draw any meaningful conclusions. This really isn't that hard, Koobie.

But then again, if you're the sort of person who'd sling offensive and flagrantly bigoted slurs around and then get all indignant when you're called out for being a bigot, I guess I shouldn't expect much.

חחח להתראות

oh my~

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How is "perceived randomness" relevant? It says nothing about determinism or free will.

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Well TBT I've been procrastinating on responding to Flirbnic's use of the multiple worlds interpretation since I didn't want to spend my Sunday afternoon writing an essaypost about the metaphysical problems with using the many-worlds interpretation in this way. In part. the fact that the worlds wouldn't be enumerable the way he wants to enumerate them, the problem it creates with personal identity (c.f. fission), and the fact that such a scheme really does contradict the existence of free will in deterministic brains since the result is still strictly a consequence of earlier external decisions (i.e. your brain's computation is a sequence point, so we can't really say a 'decision' is being made).

But also, the brain doesn't have perceived randomness. It has perceived determinism. Exercise: construct the common digital logic gates out of neurons. The trick for some gates is that you need to use neurotransmitter antagonists.

And also, randomness does not imply free will.

I'm interested in hearing what you have to say about it. Although, with that particular example I wasn't trying to make a point about free will, just randomness/determinism (it seems we're pretty much in agreement about free will though). Also, I don't see how identity should matter, since from my understanding, identity is a descriptive abstraction with no explanatory power.




Something being difficult to predict does not mean it isn't deterministic, though. So, "perceived randomness" does not exclude determinism.

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I did not forget.



Given the lack of comma in your sentence, I wasn't sure if you were addressing Jon'C (while being funny / ironic) or myself, but I'm 90% sure it was myself, in which case: no, I was not trolling, and yes, I could think straight.

But allow me to paraphrase my original reply.

This is what you've posted:



And this is what I said:



Here is my original reply, expanded:

>>Our eyes remained focused, it was now a battle of will, I had to force them to stay down, and with all my might I pressed.

This sentence alone demonstrates you are an amateur. Please do not take it as an offense. Perhaps it will win you accolades in the Literary School of Jon'C (Jon'C, please *do* take it as an offense, you narcissistic twerp), but from reading this sentence I do not know whose eyes remain focused. I do not know who "we" are. I do not know on what our eyes are focusing, or why it is important. You have a conflict (sort of), but you have no characters. When you say "I had to foce them to stay down" it is unclear for me who did the MC have to force to stay down? His eyes? His buddies, whose eyes are also focused?

>>I forced their sorry body into the planks, preventing them from any motion.

Many people but one body? Also, I have no sense of setting. Where is the action taking place? Not to mention ... who are these "they"?

>>By this time I had a suspicion, I was almost sure it was Gylsahm, but I needed to continue; out of principle.

The body belonged to Gylsahm? Also, what did the MC have to continue doing, focusing his eyes, forcing "them" to stay down (?), or pushing the sorry body into the planks? How can a body be sorry? How is pushing anything into wooden planks any good?

>>Indeed I was truly in control at this point, although it did not evoke happiness, instead it made me feel miserable.

If you want your readers to feel for your characters, don't say they are miserable. Show us their thoughts, explain that burning feeling in their dry throats and they search for the rights words to tell to their friends when they ask them what's up and fail, etc.

>>My jaw muscles lost their tenseness, and in that instant, I felt myself thrown backwards and my neck clamped, the very thing I had done to him was not being done to me.

"I felt myself thrown backwards" is passive. Who or what threw the MC backwards? What had he done to him (presumably, Gylsahm, who is now a sorry body)?

>>As I remained held down I could only feel fright and confusion, why would he do this to me?

Again, passive sentence struction & telling & no clear sense of what's going on. Again, the "he" is the sorry body?

At this point I've finished reading the first pargaraph, and I still have no idea of what is going on apart from a very faint notion that the story might deal with shapeshifters of one sort or another.

>>I placed my palm upon my jugular, crying to nature for forgiveness and redemption, to heal myself. Nature agreed with my final request, and soon natural energies flowed from within my hands to the injuries placed upon my delicate body.

What is this, "crying to nature?"

How about, "I put one hand on my throat and screamed a silent scream, sucking in the energies around me. It wasn't easy, but I've done it, somehow, I've done it; the pain was as intoleratable as ever, and yet I'd felt my wounds slowly close one by one, flesh mending flesh, as nature answered my desperate plea." Or something like that.

>>His neck bore similar to mine, and yet although my wounds were healed, seeing his made the pain come more intensely than they had before.

Bore wounds similar to mine? How can the MC see the enemy's pain if the enemy is asleep? Why is he asleep, anyway, didn't they just have a fight?

>>I fell forward, plunging my face into his blood, asking nature for the final time to heal, to prevent his potential suffering.

Two paragarphs in, and I still have no idea what's going on. What potential suffering?

Reid, you've mentioned you had some mental issues in this thread previously I believe, but you seem to be able to formulate sentences quite well in your posts; you should be able to do the same when writing fiction.

Simply find a book or two that you really like, and try to see, sentence by sentence, what the authors did -- and how they did it. See how characters come to life (usually because of a conflict or a change, whether internal or external), see how settings are described, and so on. And don't let me discourage you. Practice is everything.

Cheerio.

Identity matters. In brief the issue I have is that you're trying to make specific statements about specific but indiscernible things over an uncountably infinite group generated from a continuous probability distribution. I agree with the axiom of choice in a mathematical sense but I don't agree you can construct a deterministic universe out of a non-deterministic one in this way. The total energy of a branch must be infinitesimal, and in order to choose a single branch you'd need to know things about particles that you can't know.

Enzymatic processes are common knowledge: neurotransmitters, agonists, antagonists, and the syntheses thereof.

This thread is about philosophy. It's really pathetic that you can't stand to see a thread that doesn't have your writing hobby in it. Stop making every thread about yourself. This isn't cute, it's sad.

A man who is ostensibly a writer cannot express himself verbally and must use images created by others.

Being called narcissistic, annoying, stupid, amateurish and an incompetent teacher must have cut you awfully deep since you seem to be convinced that these insults are devastating when thrown back at us. They aren't. It's really funny to see you fail so hard at yet another writing endeavour, though!

Also it's really telling how you couldn't bear to reply to Reid's criticism of your work, but pinching off a brown loaf of a critique of someone else's work was apparently life goal #1 after getting unbanned. A critique which also illustrated your borderline illiteracy as much as your severe undiagnosed NPD, as you demonstrated genuine confusion about passages clear to anybody fluent in English.

I'd say "wow" but nobody is really surprised that self reflection isn't one of your "many" interests. ("Many" is in quotes because IRL the only thing you're interested in is yourself. The closest thing you will ever in your whole life get to self-reflection is when you masturbate while watching yourself in a mirror. You should be strapped to a table in a hospital somewhere, Koobie.)

ahahahahaha oh god what is in medias res​ help