Free will is defined in terms of the ability to choose freely. — TheMadFool

That is popular yet not suitable for an elaborate discussion about the subject.
I'll argue it is more accurate to think of that, which sets purposes. This is important insofar as this is different from choosing means.
A decision tree is indeed a good illustration for formal freedom of decision. But even if there is only one decision it is easy to see and say that you can want to do so or not.
Kant's categorial imperative for example really is meant to concretize itself in the form of purposes no rational being could not want. This is when it's free will, as it is free and rooted in pure reason, is at the same time it's duty. He never says you could not act in a way that, with a lillte more thought on it, would have turned out to achieve a diametral outcome. The other way around there may be a hypothetical situation where your will, as it is at the same time your duty, does not leave any choices.

Freedom of choice is a formal freedom. Content-wise it does not make sense to say one could have decided otherwise as this would imply to choose what one did not want to choose and hence negate free will.

But more fundamentally, the fact of the matter is that it's just Pooh-Bear sitting on my couch, not John, and that's that. — Aaron R

But how can you be sure of that? It might be John who just looks and behaves like Pooh-Bear under some special condition. As if you could be sure to be in error if you cannot be sure about the world!

Yeah - never explain things that exist by other things that exist. That is what science does.

The impossibility of unifying the perceptual/sensual diversity of things into individual 'ones' forces us into the structure of explanation - explaining perceptual reality as the outcome of behind-the-scene forces. But then the same conceptual tendency that wanted - but failed - to unite the variety of perceptions into single 'things' leads to us to point to a united 'thing' in the invisible suprasensible realm. — csalisbury

The problem is that one cannot wait for something not to happen. The diversity is assumed to be infinite and anti-theses to be arbitrary while they are not. With such assumptions the realm of reality is already left behind and finally the conclusion made that nothing could be said about it.
It is not that Descartes had problems synthesizing concrete view-points. He failed because of counter-arguments that were never made. It is like with numbers: There can only be so and so many of them in reality due to lack of material but one can think of infinitely many of them by just adding one more ad infinitum. This is what Hegel calls "bad eternity".

I'm drawing on Hegel here, but it feels like what's happening is that a general structure of explanation ( 'seems y because is x, under circumstances z')is precipitated from the vast variety of local, specific explanations. Once this general structure crystallizes into view, and we become conscious of it, we mistakenly treat it as itself something to be explained, rather than as the immanent texture of knowledge — csalisbury

Hegel pointed out the thing-in-itself to be an abstraction. What gets abstracted away is every concrete form of existence leaving the mind with an existence-operator without any predicates following. It is nonsense that this empty form of existence would make up for reality. It is a consequence of contradictions between reality and assumptions that were made. From this the mind extrapolates that any assumption could come into conflict with reality and ends with: nothing. But this extrapolation - again - is not real, it is thought.

Problems only arise when falling back after conclusions. Descartes was sure about his existence. Hence there must be a way to explain appearances, illusions and notions of reality from existence instead of thought.

Harry, I simply think you are falling behind.
Whenever someone talks about the world your statement is "Ah, you are referring to your thoughts". Cheap enough, everone knows there is a particular noumenon whose only content is to be no noumenon. Harry: "Ah, that's a noumenon." Okay. Right. But then Harry, who just pointed out that if ppl talk about things they are talking about their mental images, goes on and tries to explain something talking of "actual things". Wait! Didn't he just make up the identity of thing and mind. You did not mean to talk about your actual mental representation there, right? As benevolent readers we can slip over this. No problem at all. A noumenon saying "I'm not a noumenon". - Hahaha. How funny. You are pretty inconsistent there, Harry.
Go on! I'm done.

You think that you can talk about things without having any mental representations of those things — Harry Hindu

Of what? Words aren't things either. So "mental representation" does not mean all that much - if anything when I start thinking about it. It is m, e, n, ...
Do you know Eliza?

Well, there is some discussion about those things throughout the time. Arguments are made, arguments are refuted. Seems quite natural to assume some kind of progress there. Otherwise we could stop talking if it wasn't to fight boredom.

What about slavery then, Samuel, the moral rule 'slavery is wrong' didn't exist objectively 2000 years ago, but it does now? — ChatteringMonkey

And - would you call the morality 2000 years ago equally far developed as today?

There may be a difference between what ppl deem right and what is right. Such a statement implied the idea of the good as being. If one's criterion of the moral good was just "whatever people deem right", this is nihilism.

Samuel, there no one criteria for what would be a good argument, it's contextual. — ChatteringMonkey

No offense intented: Isn't this nihilistic? You are basically saying that the one is as good as the other. And both are nothing.

Here you are merely using a language shortcut to refer to the person. You are actually saying, "This is a picture of <insert some name here>." — Harry Hindu

I do not see how the dialectic of form and content will save you here. The very existence of the shortcut should tell you something. You know the Kantian thing is in and of itself. When trying to communicate with others we strive to talk about the same piece of reality. We have to do so, because we want to talk about the same thing.
You will not get out of the affair when we talk about "Harry". Nor will the person shown on the picture.

- Much more likely to occur is an event that makes other events impossible — Devans99

The problem with infinity: No matter which point on the time-line, there has always been an infinitely long period before that.

It's just that your mental image is the only access you have to the real world, so what else could you refer to other than your mental representations of the world? — Harry Hindu

To both of course as the Kantian thing encompasses both: The real thing and it's mental image.
This is already clear if I was to ask whereof the mental image is. This is an intrinsic reference.
If I make a statement about Harry I make a claim about you, not any mental image. I would need to explicitely distinguish that I only meant my imagination if I did not make such a claim.

I suppose Harry might have some variation of Kripke's causal chains of reference in mind; but it would be a long and odd stretch to say that causal chains of reference referred to mental images. — Banno

You can be wrong in statements about Harry because I understand such statements making a claim about something that is not inside your head. But reality is of negative nature.

Apart from solipsism I'm not aware of any philosophy where a statement about the world would not refer to something outside the mind.

If you know a better explanation why Nietzsche called Socrates a decadent I'd be interested to hear that. I was not reviewing Platon.

Nietzsche was after 'pure reason', abstracted from societal context — ChatteringMonkey

This sounds more like Marx. Nietzsche stressed that reason has to serve the wellfare of the individual or has lost it's own purpose. In ideals he saw a mirror of the conditions of existence of groups of individuals. He concluded that negative ideals (like that of doubt) could only be made by people that needed to fight against the establishment. Or by people that didn't know where they stood - and this is where decadence, in the sense of not being able to distinguish what is good or bad for yourself, comes into play.

I am sure human reason has its limits. But for things where reason is applicable, reason is infallible. — Samuel Lacrampe

This is not quite the point Nietzsche was going for. He was not a skeptic when it came to the use of reason.

Thus if Socrates was able to rationalize against the norms of the day, then he was right to do so. — Samuel Lacrampe

This comes closer. Just "being able to do so" is not a sufficient reason to actually do it. Socrates is symbolized by knowing to know nothing. Nietzsche's point being, that, if this was the result of socratic philosophy, then something must be horribly wrong with it. It is of no use to know nothing.

All you have to do is go back an re-read my post to see that your reply is pointless. As I stated before, your words do refer to your mental image because your words are an inaccurate description of the actual "Harry Hindu" — Harry Hindu

What shall "actual Harry Hindu" mean? The actual mental image?
If someone shows a picture and says "This is <insert some name here>" it is clear that he means the "actual" person.
If someone says "Harry is floating in front of his computer while writing his posts" it is again clear that he is joking - just because of that.

I wonder about linking Rosen's Paper :

The most natural approach to take seems to be the following: let f:A —> *B be an arbitrary mapping. If f is to be physically realizable, it is no restriction to take A and B to be countable sets.

The realization Rosen talks about is not a system that operates on symbols but is a "mapping" like you take 10 baskets, put a few apples into each and then have realized the first 10 members of it. Using the laws of mathematics to manipulate symbol-systems is very different from this. A computer printing the infinity-symbol on a sheet of paper is not a realization of infinity.

I'm not sure why you think the first remark is funny - I didn't find anything particularly amusing about this paper — MetaphysicsNow

I do. Introducing time into mathematics is really funny. Like "2+2=4, but only if you answer in less than 3 seconds. It's 5 otherwise."
And then I write 2+2=4 - is this the correct answer for the 2+2-problem?

The question has two possible outcomes so we should initially assign a 50% probability to each outcome. — Devans99

The interesting question in my eyes is if this proposition is very clever of very dumb. Could be both. The naive dumbness assigns 50% just because there are two options - either you win in the lottery or not. Or - the clever alternative: You exactly know that there is no necessity that would speak for either alternative and hence people's answers could correctly be interpreted as coin-flips...

and the implications of that would be...??? — TheMadFool

No need to search for the garden inside the house.
A scientific investigation on the matter would be possible.

Because, like, where would we be if a clam or an orangutan could become Buddha? — Bitter Crank

Yes, it's about hierarchy. Those have to reincarnate as humans first and then may become Buddah.

Maybe the decision making is hard wired so that choice is nothing more than a serious of switches being thrown. — Bitter Crank

Nice post all in all but I'd say it is a popular category error to say this would contradict free will.
You can be feeling cold although you are fevering.

I guess one could call it a decision whether to fight or not. A dinosaur likely is a genius considering a whole lot of things when compared to paramecium.

I just wanted to point out a possibility. In my eyes the initial question mixes up to very different fields of observation: the reflection of nature and self-reflection. From this point of view one does not have to ask or search for self-reflectory entities in natural processes and this - evolution. The theory of evolution will easily point out the significant role of increased mental capabilities in the genesis of the homo sapiens. The question - with which I want to point you and anyone else thinking about this specific matter to a certain direction - is: What if you simply do not get the one without the other?

Dinosaurs were imminently successful by all counts for 100 million years and, as far as we know, they didn't have free will. — Bitter Crank

You really know such things?

But if the meaning of "Harry Hindu" is my mental image, and not the actual Harry, then I can't be wrong. — Banno

Really? That is Harry?

I just wanted to hear what people made of the possibility that free will could (must, in my opinion) evolve as a survival tool. — TheMadFool

Maybe it has got to do with you being made of matter, so the matter cannot simply think for itself but you have to do it...

There is quite a gap between the atomic happenings in nature and the reasoning of human minds - one may choose the appropriate model depending on the situation. For example the simple rule that you may not steal as you would get punished is made to people viewing them as subjects of their own decisions. It would be quite hard to show the purely physical effect of that letters on a piece paper causing most people not to do so. This is explained in other terms: Who would decide to do so desipte of the punishment? It is a different level of understanding.
When it comes to the consequences it is not such a big difference between calling criminals morally corrupt or simply disfunctional.

--

If watching two people playing chess they sit there and think about their moves. At the very least they think they are making a decision there. This is free will. They do not just sit there, looking at the board and suddenly see their hand move a piece.
The abscence of subjectivity - and hence free will - is something associated with extraordinary or clinical conditions of the human mind like being drunk, drugged, shocked or more generally: the perceived loss of self-control.

If showing people a sheet of paper - half white and half black - they will recognize a difference between both halves. This cannot be explained without relocating the source of the observed difference into the external world: If there is an observed difference there must be something which causes it. Whatever that might be.

Free Will is a precondition to recognize human beings as subjects. The phrase "to make a decision" already acknowledges subjectivity. Otherwise it would be a mere reaction on circumstances.
For an in-depth study of this problem I'd suggest Kant's critiques as literature.

There is clearly many gaps in our understanding, most likely due to the limitations of the human mind, no matter how versatile it may be. — TogetherTurtle

On the other Hand mental products are the kind of things we can assign a definite truth value on. Like mathematics: We just define something to be true or false and conclude from there. And - of course - your initial statement that we can do this for all statements is the natural stance we take towards matters to organize them. But there is a degree of freedom which point of view to take towards things. This is reflected in phrases like the application of mental models.
There is do discordance over the measurement having shown a certain value but how to interpret it.
If we are at the point where "preference" is the right criterion there must be many equally appropriate models to chose from.

AI is exciting only when one cannot forsee what it will do.

But it certainly couldn't make that story. The story, the hypothetical possibility-story, was already there, as a system of inter-referring abstract facts. — Michael Ossipoff

But this assumes a similarity between the simulation and the world. In a matrix-like scenario humans might be some kind of giant octopus in the real world and what you call "sense" just some random noise in some curcuits which "you" - whatever that would mean then - are making sense of.
A simulation of nerve-impulses fed into your ganglion might be the whole thing. In this scenario the simulation is something outside the "simulation".

Paradoxes are interesting. Consider "This sentence is not true."