Illusion of free will: same conclusion, different means

Re: Is free will ‘compatible with what we know about the laws of nature’? This physicist says no (AlterNet)

Note before we start: physicists, like anyone, use language and logic to communicate their ideas. One does not need to be a physicist to evaluate the logic of how the ideas are presented. It does help, of course, to follow the substance of an article if you have knowledge of the subject matter, even rudimentarily.

Problem of logic

The physicist, Sabine Hossenfelder, does not argue that free will is an illusion, but the first sentence of the article is: “Is free will real?” The article goes on to use Ms. Hossenfelder’s statement as support to argue “No,” and that “the concept of free will could be nothing more than an illusion generated in the human brain.”

I agree with the overall idea of the article that free will is an illusion, but not based on the fallacy of division, where the parts are assumed to have the same characteristics as the whole. They quote Hossenfelder as saying:

Free will is often described as the possibility that one could have done otherwise. But this description stopped being useful with quantum mechanics because it’d mean that single particles also have free will.

The first sentence says “one could have done otherwise”, where “one” we take to mean a human (a system whose parts work together to give rise to emergent properties); then in the following sentence, she disassembles “one” (system) to particles.

If the “one” assumes only human agency, then we have constrained our thinking to ourselves as the measure of all things. Quantum mechanics allows for indeterministic behavior at the level of particles, and humans are just one tiny system within cosmic systems. The assumption corrupts the logic by neglecting the broader context of cosmic systems.

Quantum mechanics tells us that particles can exist in multiple states at the same time and that they can do things that are not possible in classical physics. Some can come in and out of existence; and they can do things that are unpredictable or unconstrained by determinism. Free will might extend beyond human consciousness and decision-making to include the indeterministic nature of fundamental particles.

That seems like a good foundation for “free will” without being free will in itself. Looking for “free will” in particles was a logical thing to investigate.

But it is not logical thinking to say that a property of a system of particles working together must also be found in the individual parts themselves. Should we also look for consciousness in the individual neurons of our brain?

Re-thinking free will

To be fair, Sabine Hossenfelder simply points out that if free will exists at the level of human beings, then it cannot be explained by classical physics, which implies that it may have something to do with quantum mechanics. I still think she’s looking for machinery, not emergent properties. How do you recognize “free will” apart from the ability to choose “to do otherwise”? It’s not a thing — it’s an effect. Emergence.

Thoughts on AI “plagiarism”

I recently just read a meme on Facebook about AI-generated art and plagiarism. I wasn’t impressed.

Here it is:

Let’s stop aggrandizing it by calling it “artificial intelligence,” and begin calling it what it really is: 𝗽𝗹𝗮𝗴𝗶𝗮𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗺 𝘀𝗼𝗳𝘁𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗲.

There is no artificial intelligence. It’s not creating anything, just copying existing work by existing artists and changing it enough to skirt copyright laws: there’s a reason why everything is all “in the style of Wes Anderson” or “in the style of Ernest Hemingway.” So don’t say “an artist generated these images using artificial intelligence,” but rather “𝘀𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝗺𝗮𝗱𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗽𝗹𝗮𝗴𝗶𝗮𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗺 𝘀𝗼𝗳𝘁𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗲.”

Don’t say “a marketing company utilized artificial intelligence to make this ad,” but rather “created by a marketing company using plagiarism software.”

By allowing the companies making the plagiarism software to call it “artificial intelligence” or “text algorithms,” you’re giving them newspeak to hide what they’re making, and what their users are doing: it’s just plagiarism. Nothing else.

The author apparently doesn’t know how algorithms work. And the use of the term ‘plagiarism’ is over-extended and misleadingly reductive.

Not to mention how poorly reasoned it is. Fallacies within fallacies:

1. Straw Man Fallacy: The argument presents an exaggerated and oversimplified view of artificial intelligence (AI) by claiming that it is merely copying existing work without any creative capabilities. This misrepresents the concept of AI, which involves the development of algorithms and models that can generate original content based on patterns and data.

2. False Dichotomy: The argument asserts that AI is either creating original work or engaging in plagiarism. It fails to acknowledge that AI-generated content can be a combination of both by using existing data to generate new and unique outputs. Of course, that includes data about patterns people use to create stuff.

3. Appeal to Emotion: The argument uses emotionally charged language, like “aggrandizing,” “hiding,” and “plagiarism,” to evoke negative sentiments towards the use of AI in creative contexts. Emotional appeals do not provide anything substantive to support arguments like this. Emotions in a logical argument are not evidence.

4. Sweeping Generalization: The argument makes a sweeping generalization by assuming that all AI-generated content is plagiarism without providing sufficient evidence to support this claim. It overlooks the diverse applications and capabilities of AI in different creative fields.

I suppose the oversimplification and sad logic are at least a place to start a conversation (although I wouldn’t waste my time with the author).

About patterns … in my graduate-level linguistics class, we were studying Chomsky’s transformational grammar. For my term paper, I did a statistical analysis of several comparable paragraphs from 3 authors and the transformational rules they used. The professor said he’d never seen something like that and posited, way back in 1979, that we could learn to “write like famous authors.”

Enter algorithms that take my statistical analysis much further (and faster).

Blind logic, arrogant conclusions

Conservative commentator Allie Beth Stuckey wrote about the death of Tyre Nichols on Twitter, “It is a warped worldview that can’t grapple with the fact that people of all races do bad things. Black police brutally beating a black man isn’t because of white supremacy, racism, or a system. They did it because people have the capacity to do wrong.”

Is she really claiming that people do bad things because they can do bad things, like they just can’t help themselves when the right occasion arises and no other factors need be present?

I understand that some smart people may struggle to share their ideas because they haven’t had the opportunity to learn or encounter similar concepts. So they approximate their meaning the best they can with the tools they have (either by talent or acquired skill). With that in mind and being charitable here, maybe when she says “they did it because people have the capacity to do wrong,” she just means that even good people can make bad choices. However, there are still problems even with that.

The plank in the eye is blinding

I find it sadly “funny” that extremists don’t see themselves as extreme, whether Muslim, Christian, or political.

From Erick Erickson, the “most powerful conservative” in the country as deemed by Fox News — here is what passes for logic by this Tea Party Patriot:

A publisher published something that offended. It mocked, it offended, and it showed the fallacy of a religion. It angered.

So the terrorists decided they needed to publicly destroy and ruin the publisher in a way that would not only make that destruction a public spectacle, but do it so spectacularly that others would think twice before publishing or saying anything similar.

The terrorist wants to sow fear. The destruction of an individual is not just meant to be a tool of vengeance, but a tool of instruction. It shows others what will happen to them if they dare do the same. It is generates self-regulating peer pressure. Others, fearing the fall out, will being to self-police and self-regulate. They will silence others on behalf of the terrorists. Out of fear, they will drive the ideas from the public square and society will make them off limits.

It is not because the ideas are bad, but because the ideas offend a group that can destroy and tear down.

So when a publisher published something that mocked and offended a group prone to offense at such things, something had to happen.

The terrorists did what had to be done to publicly destroy and ruin the offender.

So they demanded the Mayor of Atlanta fire the Chief of the Fire Department for daring to write that his first duty was to “glory God” and that any sex outside of heterosexual marriage was a sin.

And the terrorists won in Atlanta.

Notice, he sets a powerful stage provided by the tragedy in Paris; he raises a specter of extremism and imposition of extreme views on a society. Then he points to a religious zealot in a public job trying to create what the Fire Chief  believes is a righteous atmosphere and equates that to the monstrous picture he just painted.

The fallacy of false comparison is a type of logical fallacy that occurs when two things are compared as though they are similar, when in fact they are not. This type of fallacy is often used to make a point or argument seem more compelling by drawing a false analogy between two unrelated or very thinly related things. For example, comparing the actions of a religious zealot to the tragic events in Paris is an example of false comparison.

It illustrates perfectly how low the intellectual bar is. It is a manipulation of the audience by demagogues to detract from critical thinking. Critical thinking be damned — it’s for the “elite,” or at least people who don’t want to be conned.

This political leader is the same intellectual powerhouse that tweeted

Given how many people are raped in college, I’m amazed the President wants to send more people there.

Granted, he characterized this as a “joke” and told people who were shocked to “get over it.”

When a glass is jostled, whatever it is full of splashes out. This “leader” has no filter (or splash guard, as it were). And to dismiss a comment as a “joke” when really it supports a characterization he wants to make of someone (Obama), it’s insidiously funny. Insidious being the operative word here.

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