Sexism, Racism, Etc.

[OrbWeaver]

Given that there is even less evidence to support a lack of free will, I think we can stick to the conclusion that free will is more probable.

 

"Given that there is no evidence to support the lack of existence of God, I think we can stick to the conclusion that God's existence is more probable". You need evidence to prove the existence of something, NOT the non-existence.

 

In fact, there is some evidence supporting a lack of free will, such as Libet's experiment. Is there a single piece of experimental evidence to support its existence? I am not aware of any thus far.

 

Both have been demonstrated in the real world, through quantum physics and chaos theory respectively. As we do not have a full understanding of the human brain yet, we cannot assume that these processes have no effect whatsoever on human thought.

 

Again, you are arguing from the "can't prove it doesn't happen" position, which is unscientific. There is no evidence that quantum processes affect brain activity, since the behaviour of neurons is fairly deterministic and quantum effects are too small to have a significant influence. Quantum effects are just a superstitious opt-out for people who need to find a way to introduce some kind of non-determinism into a system because they don't like the idea of their favourite piece of magic being explained by "ordinary science".

 

Furthermore, emergent behavior may be analogous to free will even though it may not be free will in a strict ontological sense. (I would argue that the difference is semantic, however.)

 

Being unable to predict one's own behaviour could certainly be said to give the illusion of free will, however I would not consider this actual free will since there is no "freedom" to act differently than what the natural brain processes determine.

[Maximius]

Why not? Can this be proven?

 

I think so. Science is only of limited use in describing consciousness and its aspects (the will, making decisions, descriptions of emotion) because of the standards of evidence demanded by science. Its great for figuring out cause and effect patterns in the >brain<, this chemical does this, that area of the medulla does that, etc. Those can be empirically tested and theoretically organized. But how do you measure cause and effect in the mind? Yes, the brain produces the mind, they are opposite halves of the same coin so to speak, there is no doubt. But that does not encompass the entirety of experience we have of mind. Or would you

 

Let me go another route. What proof do you have that your conscious? Why, the fact that you are conscious. Imagine you have to measure the length of something and your life depends on it. You have a ruler, but you have to insure that the ruler is accurate or its curtains for you. But if you only have one ruler, what could you compare it with to decide its the right ruler? The best scenario would be to have several rulers to compare and contrast but you only have one.

 

This is why science cannot fully answer the questions of consciousness. Because the only ruler by which to measure the mind, conscious experience, is the mind. You can isolate all the chemicals in the brain, describe all of the processes in hi-rez detail, compare them with other living thing brains, describe the chemistry, physiology, and biology all day long. And thats great and good work. But you will still not have provided any ultimate explanations for the experiences of our conscious lives.

 

What evidence is there that the "mental half" as you describe it, is actually anything but a consequence of the physical processes that govern our brains? We can understand computers in terms of transistors, so why not brains in terms of neurons?

 

First off, brains are not computers. Computers can be useful models for describing them in some ways but that models time has actually passed. Networks are a more recent model, the most current I know describes the mind as the interplay of the external environment, the brain, and the internal mental environment. I like this last one best.

 

The mental half is rooted in the physical but the physical does not completely describe the mental. Find me the neurons, the processes, that make me get all warm inside when I eat a bowl of Fruit Loops, cause it reminds me of being at my Grandmas house as a kid, the only place I got to eat those. Find me the processes that make me prefer cold, dead of winter days over the sunshine and warmth of summer, tell me what chemicals . Do you not experience similar things? Have you ever had conflicting ideas? Where is the conflicting idea organ in your brain? Where is the region that determines your dreams and then wheres the region that makes the "you" in your dream run in terror from a boogyman. And then, wheres the boogyman section of your brain that, by your rather mechanistic approach, you must have or you could not have ever experienced a boogyman. The only places things like this can exist are in the mind. The brain may produce such processes but we can only speak of them in terms of themselves, our mental experiences of them.

 

That sounds like a faith position to me.

When I hear people talking about "other kinds of truth" my woo detector starts making noises. Of course I know from previous discussions that you are not into superstitious thinking, but still this statement seems more a position of faith than evidence.

What are the fundamental differences? Either a method is scientific or it isn't, in my view.

 

 

Not at all. Faith requires the absence of evidence, but science is not the only evidential standard out there. Its great for many, many things, but things such as historical research, the humanities, philosophy, and even art provide us with different forms of knowledge. The scientific method implies certain standards of evidence, namely falsifiability, you have to be able to test your claims against the world. You cannot test historical claims completely against the world, you can examine documents all day long but thats only half the picture. You then have to try and create a story around those documents, the best story possible but its still a story. The humanities, say fiction writing, tells us things about ourselves such as the complexity of human motives, the depths of our evil and the heights of our goodness, as other arts reveal aspects of ourselves such as standards of beauty, strange twists of imagination, idealized expressions of emotions. The fact is, science is only a story itself, but its the most "concrete" story because its testable, although even those tests are up for debate.

 

One good way to think of human knowledge is as a bon bon with layers. The inner core of crunchy nuts is science, the most concrete knowledge system, with its ability to test its theories against the material world. Next would come the rich nougat of things like philosophy, history, the social sciences, which use the scientific method where they can but which use other standards of knowledge, logic, narratives, personal experience, historical interpretation to make other claims. Finally, the creamy, fudgey outer layer of the humanities and arts, the disciplines that tell us not what we are but who we are, the truths about ourselves, our wildest creativity, in some instances with almost no rules, no boundaries. (Think Jackson Pollack )

 

This is not "woo" Orb, this is how you deal with information about the world that is not testable in a way that scientific claims are. Have you not learned new things about the world with your work on the Mod, new beauties and new senses of horror? Can you reduce those to science? No, but they exist, so we must find another way to "know" such things, other languages with which to describe them.

 

My own position is that free will does not exist. Human minds are merely vessels which house a cacophony of competing thoughts, just like competing genes in a biological population. Sometimes one of these thoughts will "bubble to the surface" and influence an action, and while the actor will believe that "he" made a conscious decision to commit such an action, it was just a consequence of that particular thought achieving dominance at that particular time.

 

There is strong evidence that genes are not directly acted on by environmental pressures, its suites of genes, sets of characteristics. I can point you to a good paper on this by Sober and Lewontin, as well as a great book "The Case of the Female Orgasm." But thats an aside. Let me ask you, how does one thought dominate another? Whats the standard by which one becomes compelling enough to actually be one's will, what one not only wants to do but what one wants to do and actually does or at least intends to do? Whats the filtration method of this battle of the ideas in your head?

 

I think its because we can think thoughts, but also, we can think about those thoughts, thoughts about our thoughts. From this, we can produce reasons for action, thoughts that are finely tuned, specific to our wants and needs, and with these we can develop reasons that are compelling enough to be volitional, actually causing actions.

 

Its all deterministic as hell, its just that we can generate some of the determining factors as a result of the comparative natures of our minds, viewing the world and then looking back on those ideas we formed in a sort of feed back loop.

 

Given that there is even less evidence to support a lack of free will, I think we can stick to the conclusion that free will is more probable.

 

Only the strictest definitions of free will require non-causal thought. Most only require non-deterministic or undecidable processes. Both have been demonstrated in the real world, through quantum physics and chaos theory respectively. As we do not have a full understanding of the human brain yet, we cannot assume that these processes have no effect whatsoever on human thought.

 

Furthermore, emergent behavior may be analogous to free will even though it may not be free will in a strict ontological sense. (I would argue that the difference is semantic, however.) As emergent behavior is strictly non-reducible, prediction of another's actions cannot be reduced (although it could still be done faster).

 

 

My conception of free will is utterly deterministic though. But thats a debate for another time, however I would be careful of the use of quantum activity or chaos theory when looking for an indeterminate event to free up our determined minds. The biggest complaint against such a view is why should a totally random, non determined event be considered freedom producing at all? I agree completely with your second paragraph, Dennet describes a kind of freedom that is not free in any ultimate sense but which provides a great >degree< of freedom in will formation that is highly compelling.

[Maximius]

That's what I'm talking about.

 

The stuff oDD said about me is rubbish. He's entitled to his "opinion" - all I'm saying is that there isn't any scientific data to convince me.

 

And don't let the pot jab get at you, I smoke pot like Bob Marley and the Wailers combined. Its good for your brain, there is evidence that the powerful antioxidant properties of THC helps to slow down and possibly reverse the free radical damage associated with Alzheimers disease, its got anti-cancer properties, and its been shown beneficial in a number of medical conditions to ease pain and revive appetites.

 

What is more certain is that there are no long term negative health effects associated with it. I have the PDF of the largest marijuana use study ever done, 65K people over twenty years I believe, and the only health problem is a slightlyhigher chance of bronchial infections. THere is much talk of it lowering IQs, but those studies are inconclusive and there is some countervailing evidence as well.

 

I love the stuff, some of my best thinking is done high. Not hard, point by point analysis type thinking, thats best done sober, but imaginative, free association, creative thinking is boosted by it, in my experience.

[OrbWeaver]

Have you ever had conflicting ideas? Where is the conflicting idea organ in your brain?

 

That's exactly my point -- there is no "conflicting idea" organ any more than there is a "humans versus tigers organ" in the world. The ideas (or memes if you prefer the word) are simply emergent patterns that compete and conflict with each other just like the patterns in a game of "Life".

 

And then, wheres the boogyman section of your brain that, by your rather mechanistic approach, you must have or you could not have ever experienced a boogyman.

 

No, the boogyman is just an idea, like any other. It does not have its own special organ or place in the mind, any more than the "All your base are belong to us" meme has its own special place on the Internet.

 

Have you not learned new things about the world with your work on the Mod, new beauties and new senses of horror? Can you reduce those to science? No, but they exist, so we must find another way to "know" such things, other languages with which to describe them.

 

I can only speak for myself, but no, I have never experienced anything which cannot be reduced to science, hence the ease with which I can adopt a materialistic worldview. Of course our current understanding of science cannot yet completely document all of the relevant mental processes, but I see nothing to indicate that such process are forever beyond science's reach.

 

Let me ask you, how does one thought dominate another? Whats the standard by which one becomes compelling enough to actually be one's will, what one not only wants to do but what one wants to do and actually does or at least intends to do? Whats the filtration method of this battle of the ideas in your head?

 

If I knew that, I'd be a Nobel prize winner. How does one pattern in Life dominate another? I guess it is just a particular epiphenomenon that arises as a result of all of the preconditions combined with the deterministic logic that acts on those inputs.

 

But thats a debate for another time, however I would be careful of the use of quantum activity or chaos theory when looking for an indeterminate event to free up our determined minds. The biggest complaint against such a view is why should a totally random, non determined event be considered freedom producing at all?

 

Yeah, that's what I mean when I say that "It's quantum!" is just a get-out clause for believers. They need something -- anything -- that can introduce non-determinism into the system so they can believe in their magic, whether or not there is either a cogent theory or the slightest scrap of evidence suggesting quantum involvement.

[Maximius]

That's exactly my point -- there is no "conflicting idea" organ any more than there is a "humans versus tigers organ" in the world. The ideas (or memes if you prefer the word) are simply emergent patterns that compete and conflict with each other just like the patterns in a game of "Life".

 

So how do these ideas compete? Whats the weapon of choice? If its all just ideas bubbling up from the abyss, how does one idea come to dominate another? Whats the process? If we have no say in this process, why do we tend to do things that matter to us? Why do our actions appear to have intent? Is it utterly coincidence that all of these arbitrary events in our minds just happen to coincide with things we want? I don't believe so, I think we can influence these patterns, by reflecting on them and then forming new patterns, reasons, suites of patterns that conform with desires we hold.

 

 

No, the boogyman is just an idea, like any other. It does not have its own special organ or place in the mind, any more than the "All your base are belong to us" meme has its own special place on the Internet.

I can only speak for myself, but no, I have never experienced anything which cannot be reduced to science, hence the ease with which I can adopt a materialistic worldview. Of course our current understanding of science cannot yet completely document all of the relevant mental processes, but I see nothing to indicate that such process are forever beyond science's reach.

 

If you have ever read a historical account, a piece of philosophy, or a work of art, you have experienced knowledge that cannot be reduced to science. The simple existence of such things tells you something of human beings, let alone their content, but none of them can be fully understood in scientific terms. Its not a matter of needing enough time for science to catch up, its a problem of evidence. You cannot explain consciousness except in terms of consciousness. Therefore, you cannot test it, you cannot even begin to devise an objective measure because the only standard that exists is itself. If you cannot collect verifiable data with which to construct theories, how can you do science? You cannot. So these things, like the boogeyman, which certainly exist in our minds, which in turn exist in the world, are real but not real in a way that can be weighed or measured. We need another way to describe them, other than science.

 

Yeah, that's what I mean when I say that "It's quantum!" is just a get-out clause for believers. They need something -- anything -- that can introduce non-determinism into the system so they can believe in their magic, whether or not there is either a cogent theory or the slightest scrap of evidence suggesting quantum involvement.

 

I agree, its a desperate bid for a "non-causal" moment in which to try and insert an idealized instance of freedom. There is no absolute freedom, indeterminate freedom, there is only the freedom for human minds to create wills for very specialized determining factors, namely reasons.

[Domarius]

And don't let the pot jab get at you, I smoke pot like Bob Marley and the Wailers combined. Its good for your brain, there is evidence that the powerful antioxidant properties of THC helps to slow down and possibly reverse the free radical damage associated with Alzheimers disease, its got anti-cancer properties, and its been shown beneficial in a number of medical conditions to ease pain and revive appetites.

Heh, that's good to know - but I've never smoked a thing in my life and don't intend to start. I was an asthmatic as a child and ended up growing out of it - as if I'd push my luck.

[Maximius]

Heh, that's good to know - but I've never smoked a thing in my life and don't intend to start. I was an asthmatic as a child and ended up growing out of it - as if I'd push my luck.

 

 

Then try vaporizing it. I can tell you how to make a cheap vaporizer out of a lightbulb if you want. Or if you can afford it, eat it. The important thing is.......GET STONED! *<)

[OrbWeaver]

So how do these ideas compete? Whats the weapon of choice? If its all just ideas bubbling up from the abyss, how does one idea come to dominate another? Whats the process?

 

How does one pattern in Life dominate another? It is just an emergent property -- the particular pattern of neural firings combined with the particular pattern of interconnections combine to render one pattern likely to propagate and survive, while another pattern peters out. Beyond that, you're getting into implementation details which are way beyond my (and any of our) spheres of knowledge.

 

If we have no say in this process, why do we tend to do things that matter to us? Why do our actions appear to have intent? Is it utterly coincidence that all of these arbitrary events in our minds just happen to coincide with things we want? I don't believe so, I think we can influence these patterns, by reflecting on them and then forming new patterns, reasons, suites of patterns that conform with desires we hold.

 

You appear to be considering the concept of "we" separately from the patterns which make up the idea of self. I would argue that these are one and the same thing -- what "we" term the "self" is just another set of patterns (consisting largely of the narrative of our memory). The patterns don't correspond with our desires, they are our desires.

 

If you have ever read a historical account, a piece of philosophy, or a work of art, you have experienced knowledge that cannot be reduced to science. The simple existence of such things tells you something of human beings, let alone their content, but none of them can be fully understood in scientific terms.

 

Of course we can analyse these things scientifically. We can use the rules of evidence to deal with multiple historical accounts in order to synthesise a more accurate picture of what actually happened. We can use psychology to analyse the motives of the actors in the historical narrative, or to understand why particular ideas prevail and become popular (like religion). We can analyse the effects of experiencing the work of art on the brain of the viewer, and gain an understanding of the cultural vocabulary that is used in constructing such works -- why a particular colour tends to evoke a certain feeling, or how a particular artist is using the ideas of his predecessor. We can perform experiments with drugs or cerebral stimulation to gather information about the origins of certain artistic figures, such as a spiral which can be produced by linear patterns of stimulation in the visual cortex (because straight lines in the physical brain map to spirals in the visual field).

 

These might not be as rigorous as physics with its mathematical proofs and specifically testable hypotheses, but it is still valid and useful scientific analysis.

[Maximius]

How does one pattern in Life dominate another? It is just an emergent property -- the particular pattern of neural firings combined with the particular pattern of interconnections combine to render one pattern likely to propagate and survive, while another pattern peters out. Beyond that, you're getting into implementation details which are way beyond my (and any of our) spheres of knowledge.

 

But none of the entities in Life are reflective. Its usefulness as a model of human activities is quite limited. I tend to agree with your argument up to a certain point, you sort of can see human thoughts/ideas as bubbling up from this cauldron of conflicting wants, needs, thoughts, perceptions, what have you. (Correct me if this is a mischaracterisation of your POV.)

 

But again, reflection. Not only are your thoughts and actions the product of this sea of consciousness, if you will, but there is an additional component, namely the ability for you to not only reflect but to reflect on those ideas as well.

 

Lets say at time T you think of thought X. Lets ignore where X arises from originally, it can be as simple as a hunger pang or as complex as an appreciation of a wonderful piece of artwork. So now you have X in your head, but by virtue of your human ability to reflect upon even your reflections, you also can now have a new idea, an idea >about< X. Call this X1. Rather than your actions being the result of simply X, the "raw" desire that has manifested itself in your consciousness, your actions cannot now be helped but to be effected by X1. Even if you ignore X1, you cannot help but think X1, its only effect may be in fact to strenghthen X but the important point is that it comes to bear on X in some manner. If you experience idea X, then form X1 from it and X1 is compelling enough to be the idea that moves you to action, that is your will. Its not free because it appeared magically or due to quantum activity, its free because of the particular hierarchy of reflection, being able to think X and then to think about X and so create X1. Humans think things, as do many of the higher animals, but only humans appear capable of thinking about their thoughts and in turn producing new thoughts that are an amalgam of the original idea and their reflections on that idea. This is a degree of freedom in the world, freedom of will formation, the freedom to be determined by one's ideas but ideas that go through a "finishing process" of reflection that allows for very specific, complex *reasons* for action.

 

So lets say you are a dog and you experience hunger. As far as we can tell, that desire is translated pretty directly into action in a dog, it seeks out food and eats it. Now, its not a blind search, if a bear is eating the food the dog isn't fanatically driven to eat at the cost of its life. But it seems pretty straight forward, dog is hungry, seeks and eats food with attention paid only to those influences that may cause it harm or death. (To be fair, there's probably a lot more going on in the mind of even simpler animals but this is a good philosophical approximation.)

 

Now, you are a human and you are hungry. Probably a very similar impulse, stomach contracts, saliva runs at the smell of food, etc. But, unlike the dog, who is a sort of prisoner to those impulses, you have the ability to think "I'm hungry" AND you have the ability to think about what it means to be hungry, the various ways you would like to satiate that hunger, your worries about cholesterol levels and expanding waistlines, some fish and chips versus a veggie burger with mixed greens on the side, your distaste for a particular vegetable that a certain old aunt made you eat as a child and which brings unpleasant memories of your youth to the foreground. All of these are determined, utterly, but they are in part determined by this hierarchy of reflection upon your desires.

 

So, as a human you experience this simple desire called hunger but its immediately translated into a much more complex affair by virtue of our reflective natures. From this process, new ideas are formulated which in turn lead to new actions, OUR actions, actions highly specialized to match our complex, multilayered desires. Incredibly specialized, consider that humans can eat because they are hungry, because they are part of an experiment with food and eating habits, because they have an abstract superstition that eating at a certain time is beneficial, because they have a religious belief that demands it, because eating is a "woobie" blanket that makes them feel better about themselves. A multiplicity of reasons, conceivably all contained in the same mind. It is this multiplicity of possible reasons that allows us a space to claim a degree of freedom in the formation of our wills. I tend to think of consciousness, and most especially human consciousness, as a sort of feedback loop within reality. It can both experience reality firsthand and simultaneously it can experience its memories and abstractions of that reality. The space in between these two worlds is the "elbow room" for will formation, as Dennett calls it.

 

You appear to be considering the concept of "we" separately from the patterns which make up the idea of self. I would argue that these are one and the same thing -- what "we" term the "self" is just another set of patterns (consisting largely of the narrative of our memory). The patterns don't correspond with our desires, they are our desires.

 

I agree with this completely, those patterns and the patterns they sire by virture of the "finishing process" of our reflective abilities ARE us. Even as we think about freedom of the will, X, we must reflect on that idea and form new ideas, X1. I often laugh when arguing this with others, who try and tell me that those desires and ideas and such are fine but we cannot be free because they are imposed on us by our consciousness. So I ask, how many "yous" do you have in that head of yours? This process is you, I believe, a complex of ideas that come from a variety of places, our memories, our physical needs, our misperceptions, our creative thoughts, you name it, but with the crucial component of the ability to experience all those things and then reflect on that experience, to compare and contrast it with other ideas and from that process form an entirely new set of ideas, hybrids of X and our thoughts about X.

 

This is far from a black and white process either, but again, this is a philosophical model not a scientific construct.

 

Of course we can analyse these things scientifically. We can use the rules of evidence to deal with multiple historical accounts in order to synthesise a more accurate picture of what actually happened. We can use psychology to analyse the motives of the actors in the historical narrative, or to understand why particular ideas prevail and become popular (like religion). We can analyse the effects of experiencing the work of art on the brain of the viewer, and gain an understanding of the cultural vocabulary that is used in constructing such works -- why a particular colour tends to evoke a certain feeling, or how a particular artist is using the ideas of his predecessor. We can perform experiments with drugs or cerebral stimulation to gather information about the origins of certain artistic figures, such as a spiral which can be produced by linear patterns of stimulation in the visual cortex (because straight lines in the physical brain map to spirals in the visual field).

 

These might not be as rigorous as physics with its mathematical proofs and specifically testable hypotheses, but it is still valid and useful scientific analysis.

 

No, we can only analyze certain components of those things scientifically, thats a whole different thing from saying we can analyze all of those things scientifically. You can use the rules of evidence in history, but then you are only left with what is good evidence from bad. THEN you have to construct a historical narrative around that evidence. For example, you have a historical document such as the Magna Carta. You can scientifcally analyze its chemistry, you can use that to help determine where the document was constructed and when.

 

But then the historian takes over, constructing a story about the meaning and import of the document, the ideas behind its creation, key individuals and organizations in the process who have contributed their thoughts, beliefs, and dreams to such a document , the social trends at work in the society at that time, why it addresses this idea but ignores that one, etc. This is >not< a discussion that looks to science, it demands different kinds of evidence, namely historical argumentation clustered around the few concrete pieces of evidence at hand.

 

And to be clear, this is also how science works, its just that science can make far more concrete claims than other disciplines, because its mostly dealing with things that do not think for themselves. And even those that do have a harder time making claims about behaviour, a biologist has to insert a lot more grey area into her claims of the reasons for a particular behaviour of some animal versus a physicist or chemsit making a claim about the behaviour of an atom or molecule. But science, even phsyics, still depends upon narratives and argumentation, and these are and always will be "grey areas" where analytical claims of truth/not- truth cannot be readily applied, if at all. We have lots of physics knowledge of black holes, but much is still conjecture, albeit carefully formed and edited conjecture within the framework of physical knowledge.

 

Or lets take the arts as our example. You can conduct scientific studies of the arts, but they can only tell you so much. You can identify the parts of the brain that appear to be linked to the creative process, but that is only a part of the picture. That does not tell you why a particular color produces a particular emotion or why the open spaces of Edward Hopper makes my heart soar, why the emptiness, the nothingness he captures in his paintings means so much to me, why they make me lighthearted and happy. Science cannot tell me why I feel this, it never can because it can never process all of the variables involved in a scientific manner.

 

Sure, interview me, interview everyone who ever saw a Hopper painting. Thats valid research and very interesting, but as any pollster can tell you there are always grey areas that concrete analysis will never be able to melt away. At some point, you have to deal with emotions, meanings, perceptions, in other words consciousness. And again, we can only understand the experience of consciousness via consciousness, we cannot construct an objective standard with which to compare consciousnesses, not one rigorous enough for the claim of analytical science. But we can construct narratives, log personal stories, take field surveys, do comparisions with other artists and artforms, to try and sketch out a picture of the effect of Hopper on the human mind. That sketch is valuable and interesting, but in the final analysis its not science. It certainly uses science along the way, as it should, but the final product is not a body of scientific claims.

[OrbWeaver]

Lets say at time T you think of thought X. Lets ignore where X arises from originally, it can be as simple as a hunger pang or as complex as an appreciation of a wonderful piece of artwork. So now you have X in your head, but by virtue of your human ability to reflect upon even your reflections, you also can now have a new idea, an idea >about< X. Call this X1. Rather than your actions being the result of simply X, the "raw" desire that has manifested itself in your consciousness, your actions cannot now be helped but to be effected by X1. Even if you ignore X1, you cannot help but think X1, its only effect may be in fact to strenghthen X but the important point is that it comes to bear on X in some manner. If you experience idea X, then form X1 from it and X1 is compelling enough to be the idea that moves you to action, that is your will. Its not free because it appeared magically or due to quantum activity, its free because of the particular hierarchy of reflection, being able to think X and then to think about X and so create X1. Humans think things, as do many of the higher animals, but only humans appear capable of thinking about their thoughts and in turn producing new thoughts that are an amalgam of the original idea and their reflections on that idea. This is a degree of freedom in the world, freedom of will formation, the freedom to be determined by one's ideas but ideas that go through a "finishing process" of reflection that allows for very specific, complex *reasons* for action.

 

As you describe it, X1 is simply an evolution of X. You even admit yourself, "you cannot help but think X1" -- so how is this a form of "freedom"?

 

So, as a human you experience this simple desire called hunger but its immediately translated into a much more complex affair by virtue of our reflective natures. From this process, new ideas are formulated which in turn lead to new actions, OUR actions, actions highly specialized to match our complex, multilayered desires. Incredibly specialized, consider that humans can eat because they are hungry, because they are part of an experiment with food and eating habits, because they have an abstract superstition that eating at a certain time is beneficial, because they have a religious belief that demands it, because eating is a "woobie" blanket that makes them feel better about themselves. A multiplicity of reasons, conceivably all contained in the same mind. It is this multiplicity of possible reasons that allows us a space to claim a degree of freedom in the formation of our wills. I tend to think of consciousness, and most especially human consciousness, as a sort of feedback loop within reality. It can both experience reality firsthand and simultaneously it can experience its memories and abstractions of that reality. The space in between these two worlds is the "elbow room" for will formation, as Dennett calls it.

 

All you are describing here is the difference in complexity between a human and a dog. It does not follow from this that "free will" exists, only that the set of behaviours that follow from a particular stimulus is larger. It may seem to us that we have the freedom to ignore or dismiss the hunger stimulus, but this could just be an illusion -- the "I need to lose weight" or the "I don't like food X" thought pattern dominates the more primitive "feed self" pattern, with no need for freedom.

 

Sure, interview me, interview everyone who ever saw a Hopper painting. Thats valid research and very interesting, but as any pollster can tell you there are always grey areas that concrete analysis will never be able to melt away. At some point, you have to deal with emotions, meanings, perceptions, in other words consciousness. And again, we can only understand the experience of consciousness via consciousness, we cannot construct an objective standard with which to compare consciousnesses, not one rigorous enough for the claim of analytical science. But we can construct narratives, log personal stories, take field surveys, do comparisions with other artists and artforms, to try and sketch out a picture of the effect of Hopper on the human mind. That sketch is valuable and interesting, but in the final analysis its not science. It certainly uses science along the way, as it should, but the final product is not a body of scientific claims.

 

That is true today, but I do not accept that we will never be able to analyse consciousness in a more scientific way. Perhaps with suitable technology it will become possible to "transfer your consciousness" to a machine or another human body, or to model it in detail and be able to predict behaviour or induce arbitrary experiences. With sufficient evidence it may one day become possible to completely and objectively describe consciousness in scientific terms, down to the precise origin of every possible subjective experience.

[demagogue]

Well, as I studied cognitive science and philosophy of mind at university, how could I *not* jump in here.

It's long, though, I'm sorry. Read at your own discretion.

 

Ok, it looks like there are two issues here, (1) is consciousness amenable to scientific inquiry (and what kind of "science" would it be); OR, if it isn't, what kind of inquiry is it amenable to? And (2) what is the nature/reality of "free will", in (a) the actual operation of human decisionmaking and (B ) our experience of that operation (which may be two different things).

 

If I could recommend one very accessible book that deals with both of these questions, it would be Glimcher's Neuroeconomics, which argues strongly that the growing trend of modern neuroscience, which now encompasses the majority of working neuroscientists, is both that that

 

(1) cns is amenable to scientific inquiry,

 

(2) and that humans are "free" in the sense the brain has real agency, that is, that the Sherrington/Pavlov/Skinner dictum that "neurology is nothing more than the study of conduction (from source to response)", that is, *everything* is a "trained reflex" to stimulus in the end, is wrong. The brain is NOT a conduction machine in that the same stimulus will always lead to the same response. It is more like an "optimizing" computer that optimizes the agents position through behavior in whatever "game" it finds itself playing and based on whatever "considerations" are important to it. This includes the simulation of random behavior when it is optimal to do so (e.g., to reach the Nash equilibrium), something that is quite possible in conventional physical systems (e.g., computers do it all the time with sensitivity to the internalclock or something; no need for weirdo quantum effects).

 

Ok, I'm sort of going to combind these two questions at first, since they are related:

 

Here's some of the background. Before the 1980s, William James (184?-1910) was the last major naturalist thinker that took the subject of consciousness as a serious topic of scientific inquiry, and even he was pretty alone for his time. After 1910, you got the rise of positivism in science, which for psycholgy lasted for 80 years, where the only thing that was "real" was what you could mathmatically or logically "model" ... analytic philosophy (Frege, Carnap, et al) pushing the way in theory, and the weirdness of quantum physics (you have the math, but what's the reality??) pushing the way in the practice.

 

In psycology, you had Pavlov and then Skinner, who thought that cns could and should be written out of the scientific study of the mind. We only need to look at stimulus and behavior, and only need to crack open the head at most to find the pathway connections between afferent (stimulus carrying) neuron paths from the sense organs to efferent (behavior carrying) neuron paths to the muscles. They just assumed there was basically a one-to-one connection (sort of like the Laffer curve for tax) that they must just meet somewhere in the middle and trade information.

 

So they felt they could just focus on behavior -- and after the 1960s (when technology got better) they felt they could focus on just the pathway connections between afferent and efferent paths -- because all this time their theory of the mind was Sherrington's theory of conduction (an 1850s psychologist who first mapped reflexes by tracing the paths of neurons). That theory just says, for every type of stimulus there is a unique, final path to a behavioral reaction, and the job is just to find how those paths are categorized by stimulus type. The only thing that neurons do is carry the message from the stimulus to the behavior pattern, along paths that were either hardwired (reflexes) or learned (Pavlov and his bells and dogs). Neurons are good for nothing but "conduction", and all of the "experience" part just obfuscates that (you can probably see the political implications as well).

 

So this theory finally started getting blasted in the late 1970s, early 80s, largely spearheaded by one real visionary named David Marr (who had a very unfortunate early death in 1980, although his work was carried on by his lab). He introduced the competing idea that pathways are not *merely* conducting signals, but the signals are actually getting functionally processed towards a teleological end for the individual. So in his landmark study of the eye; he didn't just look at the parts and ask, how does this mechanically carry a signal to reach a final efferent path (like every neuroscientist for the last 200 years had)? He asked, what does this part functionally do for the organism; what's its purpose? It really smacked against the face of psychological positivism, who probably thought purposes were too religious sounding. But today it is by far the dominant position in neuroscience.

 

The reason Marr could get away with talking about "purpose", and why it could transform the whole field so quickly was not only because of the computer revolution helped them model mental processes (computer science is inherently functional), but more importantly because it wasn't until then that they really started connecting neuroscience to its biological roots, and taking evolution and natural selection seriously. Before, the brain was just *there* to study, and they got uncomfortable thinking about origins. But today, neuroscientists will want to know how such a process might have evolved through natural selection, which is a question of functionality.

 

Ok, what does this have to do with "freedom".

 

Economists and ecological biologists had long noticed that animals and humans normally act with agency to optimize their strategic position in whatever situation they are in. (They were uncomfortable with saying it was the "brain" that was manifesting that agency, they just looked at the behavior, but they couldn't deny it.)

 

One great study that exemplifies this work is animal and human behavior in the hawk/dove game. The game is that there is one piece of food, two birds want it; each one has a choice, do they play "hawk" and fight for it (risking serious injury if the other picks hawk, free food if the other picks dove) or "dove" and flee if the other fights (risking hunger) (if both are "dove" then the first one on arrival gets it, which translates as a 50% chance). So they added up all the pay-offs for each (food minus injury, times the likelihood) of the four options and computed the Nash equilibrium (the %-likelihood a bird *should* choose hawk versus dove strategy every time it sees food if it wanted to maximize its health over many games. The equilibrium %s are the optimal strategy to get the most food with the lowest chance of injury over time.

 

The punchline is that they observed birds hitting the Nash equilibrium perfectly time after time; and the same is true across many species in many different types of games (sometimes they are off a little, which leads them to think they are missing a variable, and then later they will discover the new variable). One important thing about these games is that the equilibrium doesn't work unless the behavior is totally unpredictable to the opponant, so the mechanism which computes the Nash equilibrium for the animal is geared to be almost perfectly random for each individual choice, but hitting the equilibrium % on the whole. And the observations match this. So now they had a model which confirmed our intuitions that even the *exact same stimulus* can lead not only to very different responses, but even *random* responses by the agent (e.g., to trick its strategic opponant, or according to some internal consideration important to that agent at that time, but not at other times).

 

The point is, all of these studies suggest that agency, innate randomness (on the level of individual acts, but not patterns of action), and optimization are key features to animal and human decisionmaking. The theory of conduction is now seen as an incorrect model that is misleading and gets in the way of all these features.

 

The clencher for the theory came with Glimcher's lab which "solved" (depending on if you agree with their conclusion) an old problem for the conductionists. They had managed to track the afferent signals from the retna (vision signals) and the efferent pathway to the eye-muscles to the exact place that the two signals met, an place called the LIP area (lateral intra-parietal). The question they couldn't figure out was whether LIP was afferent (signal carrying) or efferent (muscle-command carrying), because it was acting like both and neither at the same time! Glimcher came up with the perfect resolution, building off of Marr's work, that actually LIP was neither afferent or efferent. He changed his experiments not to look for the "signals" or "behavior" which matched its activity, but (on a hunch) based on economic variables such as what is the payoff for the monkey if he pushes the button when he sees the signal. The data brilliantly (IMO) tracked the payoff amounts almost exactly, so that the behavior-potential activity was greater the more the payoff went up.

 

The point is, the data was literally computing the relative expected utility for each kind of behavior based on the layout of the stimulus, and was sensitive to various "reasons" to do X as opposed to Y ... with the behavior with the optimal solution "winning" the REU contest and capturing the right to command behavior.

 

I know I just wrote a lot; I'm sorry about that. But *that* right there was IMO our first glimpse of what "freedom" really is at the lowest level of brain function. Freedom is the agency of the system to choose among a set of options the one option that is best for it (without other, external forces outside of it making that decision for it).

(NB, this is different from what people might "say" their freedom is; that has to do with later brain processes of reflecting on one's experience of decisionmaking and crafting a narrative, which may actually differ from how the brain is actually taking on the decision in another brain area. Right now I am focusing only on the decisionmaking itself)

 

This kind of freedom allows the agent to add as many relevant "considerations" to the decision as it "wants" which can make the decisionmaking very nuanced and sensitive to just what is important to the agent (and not things outside the agent).

 

Humans are "more free" than animals IMO only in the sense that humans are able to add higher levels of considerations to their decisionmaking through semantic understanding; they are sensitive to narratives that feedback into decisionmaking in a way animals aren't, although the basic decisionmaking mechanism (the "gut feeling" that this is the "right" thing to do) is about the same IMO ... only the variables to which it is sensitive to vary.

 

An important footnote is that agency does not necessarily mean total autonomy; agency and autonomy are different concepts. (Agency is the "self power" to make a decision; "autonomy" is the means to make a decision without sensitivity to outside interests.)

 

Agency certainly doesn't mean autonomy in the "external" or practical sense, because a person can easily be coerced through physical means (a gun to the head, locked up in prison), so that they aren't practically free to do what they want, although they can make the internal decision, they don't have the practical means to accomplish it.

 

There is a question about whether agency is limited in its "internal autonomy". Sartre famously didn't think so. I think they might be. While an individual may make a decision under their own "power" in just the way I described, they may filter that decision through the filter of narratives (e.g., culture) that shape the way a decisional issue is posed, e.g., in understanding what game the agent even finds itself playing. That is, decisions often use language to frame themselves, but language (and the culture that often goes along with it) is something given from the outside and can embed interests that aren't necessarily in the best interest of the agent, or even the society; powerful interests may just be keeping themselves in power through culture, etc. But as for how central this kind of possibility is to a person's "inner freedom" is a big debate, so I won't try to answer it here.

 

I know this was long. Was it helpful to the discussion, though?

(I realize I didn't answer the "is cns amenable to science" question.

That will have to await another post.)

Edited March 21, 2007 by demagogue

[OrbWeaver]

I know I just wrote a lot; I'm sorry about that. But *that* right there was IMO our first glimpse of what "freedom" really is at the lowest level of brain function. Freedom is the agency of the system to choose among a set of options the one option that is best for it (without other, external forces outside of it making that decision for it).

(NB, this is different from what people might "say" their freedom is; that has to do with later brain processes of reflecting on one's experience of decisionmaking and crafting a narrative, which may actually differ from how the brain is actually taking on the decision in another brain area. Right now I am focusing only on the decisionmaking itself)

 

This is exactly what I agree with -- the "experience" of freedom being an epiphenomenon of a decision-making process in the brain, rather than a "true" free will in the philosophical/religious sense.

[demagogue]

Yeah, that's the naturalist's position.

 

But don't miss the other point there I was trying to make (but maybe didn't fully express well).

 

The basic position from Sherrington (1840s) until Marr (1980) was that if decisionmaking was a brain process, it couldn't be "real" freedom, because it was "merely conduction" between stimulus and response, sense organs to muscles. There was no room for an "agent" between the two making meaningful decisions. IMO, for over 150 years they were throwing the baby (real, meaningful freedom/agency) out with the bathwater (anti-naturalism). Those religionists that kept arguing that human freedom really means something were corrent to be fighting for it the whole time IMO (although they did so for different reasons).

 

The great thing about the modern trend is that they've managed to give us back "real", meaningful human freedom and agency, but still safely consistent with naturalism.

 

I just didn't want that point to get missed. I believe that agency and freedom are absolutely central ideas in grounding human social relations and making meaningful decisions for one's own life, and that the scientific perspective really was way off track for many years in a very counterproductive direction (in dismissing real, meaningful human agency because of their over-zealous commitment to a naive naturalism), with all sorts of pernicious implications in authoritarian and nihilist directions. Naturalism is maybe the first step, but the road doesn't end there.

Edited March 21, 2007 by demagogue

[oDDity]

And don't let the pot jab get at you, I smoke pot like Bob Marley and the Wailers combined. Its good for your brain, there is evidence that the powerful antioxidant properties of THC helps to slow down and possibly reverse the free radical damage associated with Alzheimers disease, its got anti-cancer properties, and its been shown beneficial in a number of medical conditions to ease pain and revive appetites.

 

What is more certain is that there are no long term negative health effects associated with it. I have the PDF of the largest marijuana use study ever done, 65K people over twenty years I believe, and the only health problem is a slightlyhigher chance of bronchial infections. THere is much talk of it lowering IQs, but those studies are inconclusive and there is some countervailing evidence as well.

 

I love the stuff, some of my best thinking is done high. Not hard, point by point analysis type thinking, thats best done sober, but imaginative, free association, creative thinking is boosted by it, in my experience.

 

I don't like any sort of drug addicts, including people who drink alcohol. Nothing annoys me more than a drunk.

I will agree that given the choice I'd rather have people stoned than drunk, though they're still annoying, at least they're not violent.

I refuse to indulge in chemical dependency of any kind.

[Nyarlathotep]

Speaking as a drinker, I don't see quite the same problem with it as you do. However, the only point I differ with you on is what point it is considered a chemical dependency. First off, anyone who displays any of the classic symptoms of addiction is obviously over this line, but what about other people? For example, what about so-called "social drinkers," people who only drink around other people and then only in moderation (some would argue too much so)? They display absolutely no signs of dependency, and the only reason why they might possibly feel pressured to drink is simply to keep up appearances, as it were.

 

As written, your objection to drinking and such forth sounds as though the mere presence of alcohol in one's system marks a chemical dependency, which is simply untrue (key phrase: as written). I would like to first point out that a more moderate version of this view is quite acceptable, and one I hold myself. However, as is, the statement is highly fallacious. "Any chemical dependency" is a ludicrous standard to hold one's self to. Would you consider requiring medicine to cope with schizophrenia a "chemical dependency?" Or would you consider your own dependency on vitamins and proteins such an indulgent dependency? Hopefully not. (Although if you do, I'll see if I can't get you a Darwin award for your troubles.)

 

The key is moderation. The stumbling drunk trying to pick a fight with you is something to be irritated at--nay, to be pitied--but the guy who drinks one or two beers at a party is nothing to be annoyed about. The guy who enjoys the occasional blunt is nothing to be worried about, but the guy who constantly comes into work stoned is.

[Maximius]

As you describe it, X1 is simply an evolution of X. You even admit yourself, "you cannot help but think X1" -- so how is this a form of "freedom"?

 

Because of all the different ways you can conceive of new X1s. X1 is not merely an evolution of X, its your mind producing an entirely new set of possible influences of your future actions. Humans are determined, but are to a great degree and to a fine level of detail, self determining. The nature of our consciousness, the fact that we simultaneously experience both our external sensory world and our complex mental world allows us to conceive of reasons for actions, good reasons, ones that fit with goals both simple and complex, short term and long term. We can form our wills, they are not free as in undetermined but we have a great degree of freedom in their formation.

 

All you are describing here is the difference in complexity between a human and a dog. It does not follow from this that "free will" exists, only that the set of behaviours that follow from a particular stimulus is larger. It may seem to us that we have the freedom to ignore or dismiss the hunger stimulus, but this could just be an illusion -- the "I need to lose weight" or the "I don't like food X" thought pattern dominates the more primitive "feed self" pattern, with no need for freedom.

 

And why does it dominate? Because we can conceive of it and therefore it presents itself as a possible course of action. A dog can only conceive of so many of these possible options, while a human mind can conceive of essentially an infinite variety of responses. Then, it can act on those new responses, translating reasons into actions, with an impressive range of freedom as well.

 

None of this is free in the sense of "free from the world", we do not chose one of these options from on high, free from influence, above the gears and pulleys so to speak, but rather the choice, or rather choices, decisions, that are formed by a particular arrangement of these patterns that you have described is us literally. But these patterns are not completely from "outer space", they are far from entirely random, there is a feedback loop, they are intricately sculpted by our ideas and memories, they are formed by the "filter" of our consciousness that they must pass through.

 

That is true today, but I do not accept that we will never be able to analyse consciousness in a more scientific way. Perhaps with suitable technology it will become possible to "transfer your consciousness" to a machine or another human body, or to model it in detail and be able to predict behaviour or induce arbitrary experiences. With sufficient evidence it may one day become possible to completely and objectively describe consciousness in scientific terms, down to the precise origin of every possible subjective experience.

 

 

But the origin will never be the experience. You can find every neuron that does everything, but the experience of actual consciousness, what you are feeling at this second, can only be described in its own terms, not the terms of science. Transfer it to a water cooler, if its reflective of its own thoughts and desires it can form a will of its own and it owns a degree of freedom. Precise predictions of behaviour, fine, if you know every possible input you may be able to map every possible output. The point is, our minds allow us to take in inputs and produce a rich variety of outputs, thats the freedom of action brought about by the freedom to form our wills. Figured out how to induce any possible experience in the mind? Not a big deal, I wouldn't call that a free state at that particular moment of illusion creation but once the electrodes are pulled out and my consciousness is once again autonomous of that influence, its back to forming my will with a high degree of freedom.

[Maximius]

I don't like any sort of drug addicts, including people who drink alcohol. Nothing annoys me more than a drunk.

 

Drunks are no fun, but two drinks a day can lower your blood pressure. And not everyone who drinks gets blotto, I was at a beer tasting party at my local pub, people were feeling good but no craziness, whats wrong with that?

 

I will agree that given the choice I'd rather have people stoned than drunk, though they're still annoying, at least they're not violent.

 

You should see me attack a plate of my homemade oatmeal cookies, you would think differently!

 

I refuse to indulge in chemical dependency of any kind.

 

Why? When properly handled, they can be fun and rewarding. Im not being flip, I mean it. I could tell you stories of the whacky crap I have seen. I think its beneficial, stretches the brain in new directions. Care has to be taken of course, and certain trips are never worth the risks, but others are, they really are.

[oDDity]

Drunks are no fun, but two drinks a day can lower your blood pressure. And not everyone who drinks gets blotto, I was at a beer tasting party at my local pub, people were feeling good but no craziness, whats wrong with that?

Of course, there's nothing wrong with having a glass of wine with a meal, I'm talking about people who drink enough to become intoxicated. In fact, I'm talking about people who's main reason for drinking is to become intoxicated.

A very large number of people, all annoying fools.

Why? When properly handled, they can be fun and rewarding. Im not being flip, I mean it. I could tell you stories of the whacky crap I have seen. I think its beneficial, stretches the brain in new directions. Care has to be taken of course, and certain trips are never worth the risks, but others are, they really are.

Anything that can't be done sober, isn't worth doing. You get plenty of vivid 'trips' when you sleep at night. 20 a week at least, that's enough for anyone, I don't want to spend my waking state in gagaland as well.

Perhaps you'll give me some specific examples of what benefits you've had from no longer being in full control of your own thoughts.

I realise you're desperate to justify it, as is any drug user, and will say anything, so I'll have to demand solid evidence.

[oDDity]

Speaking as a drinker, I don't see quite the same problem with it as you do. However, the only point I differ with you on is what point it is considered a chemical dependency. First off, anyone who displays any of the classic symptoms of addiction is obviously over this line, but what about other people? For example, what about so-called "social drinkers," people who only drink around other people and then only in moderation (some would argue too much so)? They display absolutely no signs of dependency, and the only reason why they might possibly feel pressured to drink is simply to keep up appearances, as it were.

Social drinking is the worst kind. A bunch of idiots getting drunk together and acting like fools.

'oh , I only drink one or two, never enough to get intoxicated'

Why does the alcohol have any part to play in it at all unless it's affecting your brain to some degree?

Why not drink non-alcoholic beer then?

Can't have a good time without getting intoxicated first?

That's a sad state of affairs.

[Maximius]

I realise you're desperate to justify it, as is any drug user, and will say anything, so I'll have to demand solid evidence.

 

Not really, I feel no need to justify what I don't think is wrong. I enjoy the effects, I hurt no one doing so, and I like the positive side effects.

 

Lets talk smoking pot as our example. I enjoy watching movies while under its spell, certain movies like fantasies or animations are the best. The lines of meaning get blurred, the weirdness or strangeness of a particular scene or character is compounded. I watched that "Faustus" by Jan Svankmajer while ripped on some really good buds, I felt as if I had been sucked into my TV set for a few minutes there.

 

It send my imagination off into different directions, flights of fancy. Similarly with a good video game, I find the sense of immersion is deepened with a little buddha, especially a really scary or freaky T2 FM. Now could I prove this to you? No, its totally subjective, and it sounds like your subjectivity would not enjoy the experience very much.

 

And if you are ever interested in remembering all those dreams you have at night, I have the perfect little plant for you. Its a Xhosa dream herb, the dried and powdered roots are used to induce lucid dreams by West African shamans. My Xhosa is growing big and strong in the window as we speak. What I would really like to do someday is to try and model some of the things I see in my dreams.

[Maximius]

Yeah, that's the naturalist's position.

 

Dem, I have not had a chance to read your post yet, I will today.

[oDDity]

MY reality isn't so bad that I have to escape from it.

Yours obviously is, which is why you're in here begging everyone to start talking drugs along with you.

Unfortunately, we're all adults here.

You should start hanging around your local school gates, I'm sure you'll be able to turn a few of those kids onto it.

[Maximius]

MY reality isn't so bad that I have to escape from it.

Yours obviously is, which is why you're in here begging everyone to start talking drugs along with you.

 

Begging to start talking drugs? I was making a point, that recreational use of drugs is hardly the world threatening evil some Puritans like to make it out to be. I'd love to discuss it but I'm hardly losing sleep if it doesn't take off. Reality does stink sometimes, but smoking pot hardly makes reality go away. It just makes it a little groovier for a short period of time. Like having a beer. Its been my experience that people who claim they have no problem accepting reality on the face of it have pretty stunted views of what reality might really be. In place of drugs they have fantasies about this and that, how the world really works and how if only everyone would see it their way it would all work out just fine. Delusions, in other words. Give me a joint, at least the illusion it creates is more honest than self righteousness. And it goes away in a few hours.

 

Unfortunately, we're all adults here.

 

Thats highly debatable.

 

 

You should start hanging around your local school gates, I'm sure you'll be able to turn a few of those kids onto it.

 

Oh my, you sound like one of those goofball D.A.R.E. commercials they show over here. And why would I share my stash with a bunch of kids?

 

Listen, for the record, I have known a lot of drug dealers in my life, some very well. None of them, not one single one, was >ever< interested in selling to children. Why would they? Not a steady source of income, they talk too much, they can't keep secrets, if they get in trouble they spill the beans in a fast second. The dealer targetting children in a rare creature, I've known drug dealers who beat the shit out of dealers who sold stuff to children. Its another myth of the drug war, another distraction to keep folks confused and ineffective. If you want to see the real evils of drugs, take a look at some of the literature surrounding the pharmacutical industry. Now there is a real drug problem!

[oDDity]

Begging to start talking drugs? I was making a point, that recreational use of drugs is hardly the world threatening evil some Puritans like to make it out to be. I'd love to discuss it but I'm hardly losing sleep if it doesn't take off. Reality does stink sometimes, but smoking pot hardly makes reality go away. It just makes it a little groovier for a short period of time. Like having a beer. Its been my experience that people who claim they have no problem accepting reality on the face of it have pretty stunted views of what reality might really be. In place of drugs they have fantasies about this and that, how the world really works and how if only everyone would see it their way it would all work out just fine. Delusions, in other words. Give me a joint, at least the illusion it creates is more honest than self righteousness. And it goes away in a few hours.

Ahh, so now we're getting somewhere, you're admitting that you get doped up to escape grim reality.

My advice would be to sort out the problem(s) in your life that are causing you to want to escape from it for a while.

Fix the source of the problem.

The new problem is, that you're now so used to habitually running away from the problem by doping up or getting drunk, that it's going to be very hard to quit.

I'm the sort of person who, even when life is getting me down, I prefer to suffer it than escape. I could never become a drinker, or a drug user, or even become depressed, that just isn't me.

 

Listen, for the record, I have known a lot of drug dealers in my life, some very well. None of them, not one single one, was >ever< interested in selling to children. Why would they? Not a steady source of income, they talk too much, they can't keep secrets, if they get in trouble they spill the beans in a fast second. The dealer targetting children in a rare creature, I've known drug dealers who beat the shit out of dealers who sold stuff to children. Its another myth of the drug war, another distraction to keep folks confused and ineffective. If you want to see the real evils of drugs, take a look at some of the literature surrounding the pharmacutical industry. Now there is a real drug problem!

When I say 'school gates' I'm referring to late teenagers, 16 year olds etc. That's the perfect age to get them started. They'll immediately fall for anything that seems remotely risqué or kewl. You have to get them then, no one starts a drug habit as a reasoned, responsible adult, the seed needs to be planted early.

It's funny how all these kids acquire drug habits when all these angelic dealers you're talking about refuse to sell to anyone under 21, and ask for photo id.

[Maximius]

Ahh, so now we're getting somewhere, you're admitting that you get doped up to escape grim reality.

My advice would be to sort out the problem(s) in your life that are causing you to want to escape from it for a while.

Fix the source of the problem.

 

Ok Oprah, don't take my words out of context. Yes, there is no denying that being under the influence of a substance alters your perceptions of reality. That is the point, after all. But you are pretending its a black and white issue, when in fact it is a broad spectrum. As I pointed out, smoking a joint hardly makes one's problems disappear from ones mind, but it can push it to the side for a second or two. So what? If I was mainlining cocaine to escape my problems or huffing metallic spray paints, now those are dangerous forms of escapism. But smoking a dooby? Please, even you aren't that uptight.

 

The new problem is, that you're now so used to habitually running away from the problem by doping up or getting drunk, that it's going to be very hard to quit.

 

Fortunately, I have no intention of doing any such thing. Problem solved! Drugs are like anything else, a little bit can be enjoyable, even helpful. A lot can really cause you problems. Its a question of degrees. Don't condemn me if you know your sense of self control isn't strong enough.

 

I'm the sort of person who, even when life is getting me down, I prefer to suffer it than escape. I could never become a drinker, or a drug user, or even become depressed, that just isn't me.

 

Thats fine for you, but as I said, in my experience the folks who scream about "facing the world" and "dealing with reality" are usually the one's who don't know much about it. Its brave talk and makes for killer sound bites from cops and bureaucrats at anti-drug seminars, but I am well informed as to the state of reality, better than most people I would wager. When I get stoned, I don't forget the world, but I can put it on a shelf for a brief period of time.

 

When I say 'school gates' I'm referring to late teenagers, 16 year olds etc. That's the perfect age to get them started. They'll immediately fall for anything that seems remotely risqué or kewl. You have to get them then, no one starts a drug habit as a reasoned, responsible adult, the seed needs to be planted early.

It's funny how all these kids acquire drug habits when all these angelic dealers you're talking about refuse to sell to anyone under 21, and ask for photo id.

 

Jeez, this reads like the intro to "Reefer Madness." I started my habit as an adult, and I have more reasoning in my shirt pocket than most responsible adults carry around in their noggins. The majority of dealers to 16 year olds ARE 16 year olds, someone sells it to them sure but again, I tell you from personal experience, most adult dealers refuse to deal to kids. Now, is there somewhere in the world a dealer dumb and unscrupulous enough to sell to kids? Obviously. My point is that I've never met one and the dealers I've known considered dealing with children a poor business decision at best, an enormous risk at worst. Its not worth it, especially when there are plenty of adults to sell to.