We don't get to choose which thoughts we'll have before we have the thoughts. They arise from something unconscious. They're trust upon us. The same goes with whatever occurs to us to choose. We're also at the mercy of our memory; we don't forget things on purpose. The case for determinism is solid.
@@MahonMcCann Wow... What an ignorant thing to say. I completely agree with Sam, and Sapolsky, so of course whatever I say on the subject will be some form of reiteration of what they've said.... Just as if two separate people describe gravity, they're going to inevitably sound the same. Way to avoid addressing what I've said 🤣 Attack me instead with an ad hominem! This video has nothing to offer.
@@naturalisted1714 the point is, you weren't born believing in determinism, you learned, you read, you came to conclusions, you're even making an argument right now? and point out fallacies in my argument! How can YOU do any of this if action is impossible? If intentional action is impossible there is no learning, discovering, arguing, in fact, verbs don't exist at all. So yeah, I don't take your position very seriously, mainly because it's completely self-contradictory, but for some reason you guys don't seem very bothered by that?
Thank you. I wish I had discovered you three months ago, at which time I felt that I was being battered by Robert Sapolky in every other recommendation given me by the RUclips algorithm. It actually seems like he’s the tent revivalist of determinism, and given his obviously brilliant career as a primatologist , why he veered off into the task of trying to convince the world that it, and no one within, had free will is puzzling. He’s gotten a lot of pushback, thankfully, including from this podcast, and I remain someone who recognizes the immensity of the ways in which I am determined, but still call myself a free man and citizen. Btw, I recommend Jessica Riskin’s “The Restless Clock,” which provides a fascinating couterarguement to the idea we’re just a bunch of machines, which Sapolsky out and out declares us to be.
34:03 this is great. So flipping the optimists dilemma opens the space that "free will is possible." I can see how the pessimist will see that as very weak and "practically inconsequential," though accepting Rick's move is philosophically profound in terms of its logical rigor justifying the metaphysical status of free will. Okay, but I would strengthen "possibility" with a cumulative story with iterated formation. Rick's book on meditation does relate to agency as a skill and not a binary feature, as such a thing as Olympian level mediators have higher skill, continence and such, compared to others. The metaphysical structure here is supported by Dennett's naturalist theory of competence and skill, which parallels pragmatists view of no such "first mammal" yet there can still be a real pattern that is "mammal" despite blurry distinctions at the edge cases (also Michael levins stance on cognition, also his cognitive light cones). In the same way, Rick's "possibility" metaphysics of agency can have a working model of actualized agency through an accumulation of skill such that the life history of an actual agent is one of magnifying possibility if self-reproducing and self-forming action. We begin as poor agents as infants, and due to circumstance and deterministic misfortune, may achieve a low skill level of agency. But every story of maturity is one of small improbable decisions at the beginning of self-control, leading to greater possibility of control each time until it is very adjacently possible in what we value as a mature adult that our legal and cultural norms of "free agent" can interface.
I've been debating with people for almost two weeks about this, lol. I would have to say "free" will is our ability to form a subjective interpretation of reality, and it's subject to everything that exists. It's a form of dynamics. It's dependent upon multiplicity, it doesn't, and can't exist in a vacuum. It's like Sapolsky is blaming the very thing it's dependent upon in order to work at all, which is everything but us, in order to prove it doesn't work at all. Physicalism simply doesn't explain consciousness. It doesn't explain the quantum processes in our brains nor things like the double slit experiment. The only problem I see with free will, is the terminology- it contains an absolute- "free", and nothing is free. Everything that exists, is subject to everything that exists. It's constrained will. It's like a spark that has the potential to become a fire. “At any moment, you have a choice, that either leads you closer to your spirit or further away from it.” ― Thich Nhat Hanh
Randomness can determine stuff, but cant be determined, Sapolsky said there are mysteries behind our choices. And these mysteries are determined by prior causes we can believe that we have free will, but in details there isn't any. Philosophers in our day and age can talk hours and hours about what kant and Hume said but there time has passed. The biology and neurobiology says otherwise.
That's a conclusion, not an argument. He needs to provide an account of causality, which in this case physicalist, but does not provide an argument for why physicalism is true - pre-supposing physicalism and concluding physicalism is not a valid argument. Being ignorant of Hume and kant just shows that he doesn't really understand the problem.
Biology is not all physicalist, in fact it's impossible to explain the causality of biology with a physicalist interpretation - what is much more successful are dynamically systems theory, cybernetics, predictive processing and Active Inference, and these accounts involve human agency. Sapolski concluding science has figured everything out is naive and untrue, and particularly the science he is referring to will be a thing of the past soon.
@@itachi_uchiha8783 sapolski is under thinking it. Human intentional action is the foundation of all morality, order, meaning, purpose and civilisation, so it's probably worth thinking about
These are important conversations but - as we can see from the view count - we are in the very early days of the next cultural evolution (God willing). I'm forwarding this to a young friend in university who completely gets this.
I recently researched your RUclips channel and I found your RUclips thumbnails to be good but they are not attractive enough to get people to click on your videos. As a graphic designer, I can make your thumbnail more attractive and clickable. So, can I redesign the thumbnail for you? Let me know.
We don't get to choose which thoughts we'll have before we have the thoughts. They arise from something unconscious. They're trust upon us. The same goes with whatever occurs to us to choose. We're also at the mercy of our memory; we don't forget things on purpose. The case for determinism is solid.
Your seem perfectly capable of thinking Sam Harris's thoughts? Why not your own?
@@MahonMcCann Wow... What an ignorant thing to say. I completely agree with Sam, and Sapolsky, so of course whatever I say on the subject will be some form of reiteration of what they've said.... Just as if two separate people describe gravity, they're going to inevitably sound the same. Way to avoid addressing what I've said 🤣 Attack me instead with an ad hominem! This video has nothing to offer.
@@naturalisted1714 the point is, you weren't born believing in determinism, you learned, you read, you came to conclusions, you're even making an argument right now? and point out fallacies in my argument! How can YOU do any of this if action is impossible? If intentional action is impossible there is no learning, discovering, arguing, in fact, verbs don't exist at all. So yeah, I don't take your position very seriously, mainly because it's completely self-contradictory, but for some reason you guys don't seem very bothered by that?
@MahonMcCann you didn't seem to grasp half of the ideas Repetti was discussing and you had no idea why you were agreeing with him lmao
Thank you. I wish I had discovered you three months ago, at which time I felt that I was being battered by Robert Sapolky in every other recommendation given me by the RUclips algorithm. It actually seems like he’s the tent revivalist of determinism, and given his obviously brilliant career as a primatologist , why he veered off into the task of trying to convince the world that it, and no one within, had free will is puzzling. He’s gotten a lot of pushback, thankfully, including from this podcast, and I remain someone who recognizes the immensity of the ways in which I am determined, but still call myself a free man and citizen. Btw, I recommend Jessica Riskin’s “The Restless Clock,” which provides a fascinating couterarguement to the idea we’re just a bunch of machines, which Sapolsky out and out declares us to be.
This is good- that was one of my points as well, that we are still capable of choosing even when we feel totally ambiguous about something.
34:03 this is great. So flipping the optimists dilemma opens the space that "free will is possible." I can see how the pessimist will see that as very weak and "practically inconsequential," though accepting Rick's move is philosophically profound in terms of its logical rigor justifying the metaphysical status of free will. Okay, but I would strengthen "possibility" with a cumulative story with iterated formation.
Rick's book on meditation does relate to agency as a skill and not a binary feature, as such a thing as Olympian level mediators have higher skill, continence and such, compared to others. The metaphysical structure here is supported by Dennett's naturalist theory of competence and skill, which parallels pragmatists view of no such "first mammal" yet there can still be a real pattern that is "mammal" despite blurry distinctions at the edge cases (also Michael levins stance on cognition, also his cognitive light cones). In the same way, Rick's "possibility" metaphysics of agency can have a working model of actualized agency through an accumulation of skill such that the life history of an actual agent is one of magnifying possibility if self-reproducing and self-forming action. We begin as poor agents as infants, and due to circumstance and deterministic misfortune, may achieve a low skill level of agency. But every story of maturity is one of small improbable decisions at the beginning of self-control, leading to greater possibility of control each time until it is very adjacently possible in what we value as a mature adult that our legal and cultural norms of "free agent" can interface.
I've been debating with people for almost two weeks about this, lol. I would have to say "free" will is our ability to form a subjective interpretation of reality, and it's subject to everything that exists. It's a form of dynamics. It's dependent upon multiplicity, it doesn't, and can't exist in a vacuum. It's like Sapolsky is blaming the very thing it's dependent upon in order to work at all, which is everything but us, in order to prove it doesn't work at all. Physicalism simply doesn't explain consciousness. It doesn't explain the quantum processes in our brains nor things like the double slit experiment. The only problem I see with free will, is the terminology- it contains an absolute- "free", and nothing is free. Everything that exists, is subject to everything that exists. It's constrained will.
It's like a spark that has the potential to become a fire.
“At any moment, you have a choice, that either leads you closer to your spirit or further away from it.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh
Randomness can determine stuff, but cant be determined, Sapolsky said there are mysteries behind our choices. And these mysteries are determined by prior causes we can believe that we have free will, but in details there isn't any. Philosophers in our day and age can talk hours and hours about what kant and Hume said but there time has passed. The biology and neurobiology says otherwise.
That's a conclusion, not an argument. He needs to provide an account of causality, which in this case physicalist, but does not provide an argument for why physicalism is true - pre-supposing physicalism and concluding physicalism is not a valid argument. Being ignorant of Hume and kant just shows that he doesn't really understand the problem.
Biology is not all physicalist, in fact it's impossible to explain the causality of biology with a physicalist interpretation - what is much more successful are dynamically systems theory, cybernetics, predictive processing and Active Inference, and these accounts involve human agency. Sapolski concluding science has figured everything out is naive and untrue, and particularly the science he is referring to will be a thing of the past soon.
@@MahonMcCann I think you and your host are just overthinking it.
@MahonMcCann I get where are you coming from that there is mind and body separation, but I think choices are just unsloved mysteries
@@itachi_uchiha8783 sapolski is under thinking it. Human intentional action is the foundation of all morality, order, meaning, purpose and civilisation, so it's probably worth thinking about
Standard Theory answers this question.
These are important conversations but - as we can see from the view count - we are in the very early days of the next cultural evolution (God willing). I'm forwarding this to a young friend in university who completely gets this.
Hey Ian thanks for watching and sharing! Yep need the good word to spread but hopefully the next cultural evolution is on the way
❤❤. 1:06:42. Rick. Chaos theory, micro things effects macro things, butterfly effect. That’s a Bluff. So, he claims free will?
I recently researched your RUclips channel and I found your RUclips thumbnails to be good but they are not attractive enough to get people to click on your videos. As a graphic designer, I can make your thumbnail more attractive and clickable.
So, can I redesign the thumbnail for you?
Let me know.
Promo*SM
I love sapolsky