[ExI] Free will was: Everett worlds

John Clark johnkclark at gmail.com
Sun Sep 13 14:58:07 UTC 2020


On Sun, Sep 13, 2020 at 10:03 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

 >> There is nothing mystical about a "decision", it was either made for a
>> reason in which case we call it a rational decision, or it was made for
>> no reason in which case we call it a irrational decision.  John
>
>

*> Please define 'reason'.  *
>

Please define "define".


> > You certainly cannot mean without a cause,
>

You are correct I don't mean that. Doing something without a reason,
without a cause, would be unreasonable. It would be random.


> > It also depends on what you call a 'decision'.
>

You're asking the wrong person, I generally don't use the word "decision"
in philosophical conversations, it's just not very useful in that context.
I will say there was either a reason you made the decision you did, or
there was not a reason for you making the decision you did. You may have
made the wrong decision because you had incorrect information, but it was
still made for a reason so you could say it was still rational, but if you
made the decision for no reason at all then it was irrational.


> > *Is a reflex drawing away from a fire a decision?  Are
> autonomic functions decisions?  I reckon not. You? *
>

I don't much care because this is just an argument over the meanings of
words, it has no philosophical substance.

John K Clark
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