Distractible - Wadey’s Wittle Phiwosophy Hour (Part 2)

Episode Date: November 4, 2024

Phiwosopher Wade has weturned with an even warger question to expwore: Do we have fwee will? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by McDonald's. Monopoly Double Play is back at McDonald's and it's easy to get into the win. There are millions of prizes to be won, including a new chance to win cash every minute in the app. Get into the game with Monopoly Double Play at McDonald's. While supplies last, 1 in 5 chances to win Game Peace prizes at outset. Chances to win Double Play prizes based on time of code entry, and draw prizes based on number of entries in each draw. See rules in app. Good evening, gentle listener, and welcome to Distractable. up. when Bob debuses ride, rejects determinism, and actively advocates for individual agency

from the will of God to Westworld. Heheheheh! It's time for Wadey's Whittlephilosophy Hour Part 2. Now sit back and prepare to be distracted and enjoy the show. and prepare to be distracted and enjoy the show Everyone welcome back to another episode of distractible. I'm today's host Wade and welcome to the show where there are three of us One of us host the other two compete for points over as those most points rather at the end What's the next episode? It is always by my friends and co-host Bob and mark. Hello. Hi. I'm sitting down I believe that standing is Against God. Yes Point I

Am choosing to lose all my hair. I believe that having hair is against God You get a ball Alright Never thought I'd get a bald point. Not until I went bald anyway. If you don't- if all your hair doesn't fall out in the next five seconds, I don't think that point should count. Pfft! Whoa! Whoa!

Editors! No one ever will tell us apart now. How you guys doing? Been- been on that edge of sleep grind, you know how it be. No. I never worked on it. Alright. Well, well, I- I watched it. I don't- I don't wanna spoil it. Like, I do wanna spoil it, but I'm not going to. But I watched it, and I enjoyed it and want more on it. All right. Well, I watched it I don't I don't want to spoil it like I do want to spoil it

But I'm not going to but I watched it and I enjoyed it and want more of it Well, you got to follow the plan and there was that one scene that I can't talk about and won't And then what happened which I could say there's no reason why I actually can't I'm just trying to be respectful people I haven't seen it yet. But hopefully if you watch this podcast you already seen it Yeah Who hasn't seen it yet unless they're outside the US and then they're shit out of luck Everyone who watches this podcast supports all three of us and all of our endeavors individually and together So I know they've all watched it already. Well, they better

I don't even have any endeavors so that there's a lot of extra bandwidth there to support you guys you post YouTube video That's not an endeavor. It's kind of an endeavor. That's a pretty low key endeavor. I endeavor to continue doing that. The bar doesn't have to be long to be a bar. That's true. Edge of Sleep good, people like and popular. I saw it got up, I saw it as high as number four in the charts, maybe got higher. Yeah, it got to number four and then all through the weekend it floated at five, so that's pretty good sustenance in my opinion yeah there's a lot of things to watch and that one stayed pretty high for probably still is up there but yeah I think it's eight today but this is like by the time people hear this it'll

probably be at number one if it gets the number one marks already naked I mean I'm holding that in the back pocket just in case I need it because I do have the Photos of what was supposed to be the third only fans drop I'm holding on to that just in case I need to bust out one last incentive to get it out there So we can make distractible number one again. Oh man, dude. I'm busy You know a task switching it's an ADHD thing I can't. I can only focus on task switching. It's an ADHD thing. I can't, yeah, I can't.

How dare you ask me? I think how good it would be for Edge of Sleep if Distractable was the number one podcast though. That'd be great. It would be incredible. There's probably a lot of crossover between platforms. Everyone knows jumping platform to platform is what viewers do best.

Nobody has ever been against following us from one platform to the next. No, never. They love that. That's maybe their favorite thing we do. Anything new? Anything exciting going on in your lives other than obviously edge of sleep being, you know, that's pretty big. Well, so I talked about it on this a fair amount multiple times and you know all that work I did on the Subaru and I was updating people and it's all undone now. Turns out it's way easier to undo all that shit than it was to do it in the first place. Oh cool! I spent multiple long days laying on my back under the car and doing... yesterday I

undid 95% of everything and the car is almost completely back to stock and I'm gonna sell it I thought you guys say the doors are off the hoods on the roof the bumpers in the street pants are long gone Yeah, it is a Subaru. So it's not long until it does that to itself. But for everyone never I mentioned in passing I'm selling the car. Yes, I'm selling cars. Sorry everybody I'm the only one in the entire house and Extended family that both Mandy and I have that can drive stick shift It just didn't make sense for me to have a car that no one else could drive like in case there's an emergency

Or if two people want to go to two separate places or you know So I I still have a fun car, but it's more of a family car now So if you want Bob's car come to Bob's auction and you can bid it up and pay 10 times the amount he paid for it I mean, yeah, I guess what a deal mark was in there once so, you know, all three of us were in there Mm-hmm. I got cool footage of it. You can use that on the selling page And we almost bought a theater from that car. We almost did. Do you think it's on sale? God, I hope so.

Maybe the auction fell through. Maybe it's back on the market. Maybe our time isn't passed. I wonder if the owner of whoever bought InVision afterwards figured out that I was only there to scout out to see if they were gonna go to business. They're our number one fan. Broke their hearts. Subaru, you want it, it might be for sale someday,

and you probably won't get it. It is will be, and probably not. Other news, you guys wanna know something random? I was in Virginia a while back, like in I think July with Bird and some friends I was playing a game Tyler actually Hanabi, which I think I've talked about it's like a firework building game You like get fireworks you try to like build them up super addicted love it They have a tile version, which is the version I played originally and it does not exist. I cannot find it I want it so bad and I cannot find it their websites. are like, you want the tile version? It's right here.

Click buy it, you can buy it. I click it and they're like, give us your email. Well, let's get your payment info. Hey, dude, silliest thing. It's actually out of stock. It's happened like four times. I'm so sorry. But everyone's got the cards. The cards blow, they suck.

Hanabi cards are like the worst thing I've ever played in my life. Fucking hate it. The tiles? God tier. Like I would sacrifice my firstborn for the tiles. Cards? No. What else would you sacrifice your firstborn for? I don't have one because I already sacrificed him. Okay, but if you didn't, yeah. Bob Subaru, would you sacrifice for that? Oh yeah, car? I don't have one of those. Some meat. Yeah, somehow you still don't have a car. Crazy how that happens. Free lunch, but for cards? No, not for the cards.

Hanabi cards, bottom, regret, they're terrible. Great game. Why are the, the cards shouldn't exist. Go back to the top, please, I need the tiles. They don't exist. Anyway, that's my rant. That's one of the greatest games I've ever played and that's the difference between just a physical tile

because of the ways you need to like keep track of what's on the tiles, because you can't see your own tiles. So you have to play based on clues that people give you. You need to be able to maneuver them a little bit. And whenever you're just holding cards in your hand, it's like, how do I keep track of all these pieces of information

whenever I can't really maneuver much? I can flip a card sideways, I guess, but like, I don't know. Anyway, I digress. Hanabi, if you're watching this, you're an MVP, play like one. You signed that big contract, you got the tiles out there, let's see it. Been a few years since you've been at your peak.

I believe in you. I'm trying to think of snarky stuff to say about this, but honestly, I appreciate your enthusiasm, and I hope that someday you get the tiles that you deserve. It's at the point where I'm trying to figure out if I can just buy like, dominoes or something like that, and then it's like, point where I'm trying to figure out if I can just buy like dominoes or something like that and then it's like okay I need to get like a sticker printing set and just print my own stickers put them over some dominoes and just make my own set and it's like god this is so much more complicated than if I could just find the thing that they have sold

twice that apparently a lot of people online are looking for and can't seem to why doesn't it exist anymore everyone wants it at least five people have gone to every website and commented the same thing actually you know it it is probably just Production is a bit difficult anytime you're making a physical physical product It's always gonna be a bit harder than anything else so I mean you can't really fault it right no I fault it I want it gimme yeah, you can't really fault it. I'm a consumer ism who lives under capitalism I need it, and I fault it. I want it. Give me. Yeah, you can't really fault it I'm a consumerism who lives under capitalism. I need it and I want it now All right, good small talk. I'm gonna give myself a point there. That was an easy point I put some passion in there, you know, I'm gonna get a passion point. Oh, are we only giving passion points?

Oh, I didn't say that. Oh Let me tell you a passion of the Christ is blowing you guys out of the water. A lot of passion in that one. Passion of the Christ 2, you mean? Passion of the Christ 2, Fast 2, Furious. You mean 9 Fast 9 Furious? Yeah, Passion of the Christ Resurrection. It's coming. I remember he came back and he was like, dudes, that sucked. And then we crucified him again. It's kind of a guns blazing thing. I hope they have like a passion 2 ginger dead man crossover. I can't not think of the I think it's a family guy joke where it's uh it's it's a trailer for passion 2 but then it's the guy from um oh rush hour not jackie chan but the

other guy what the hell is this chris tucker and it's him and jesus and they're like behind cover and the bullets are flying. And Jesus holds up a gun and is like, do you know how to use one of these? And Chris Tucker holds up a blunt and goes, do you know how to use one of these? If it's not that movie, I don't want to see it. Yeah, well, I think I think we can rest assured in the age of AI, if it's not that movie now It will be that movie I think South Park did a thing like that years and years ago were like

Jesus jumps out like takes bullets to protect Santa Claus or something. Oh So weird that you just had to do that right then oh, yeah. Yeah. Hold on. Hold on Are you smelling me flexing my nostril muscles. You know, no one ever really shows those up. Yeah, this is the greatest beginning of an episode ever. So, some of you have been asking, and by that I mean one very consistent person. This is for you.

Wade's philosophy corner is back. Who has been asking that? My alt account. It's been a while since I've made myself look really smart. And so I decided to put that off for another week and dive into a topic. I didn't really spend a lot of time studying in philosophy, but one that I think is interesting and that you boys might have some input on and maybe this will be a really short episode because you guys will just agree.

Maybe you'll surprise me. Maybe you'll have your own takes. But the question will be debating today is do we have free will? And I've got some info from smarter people than us. Oh, I thought you're you got some info from on high. I got Jesus in my left ear, Buddha in the right. And I'm going to be listening to all gods, uppercase and lowercase G's. No, I do have like, you know, some spark notes basically of actual moral theories. I was diving in before we started today

to read up on this a bit. So I've got some info there, but before I dive into things I've looked up, I'm just curious what your guys intuition is. What you think, why you think, or we can think through it, talk through it, debate. Is there free will? I think. Therefore you are.

Huh? You think, therefore you are. Oh, okay, you think, yeah, that's what I was going for. Thank you, I'll take my points. No, no, no, uh, I think, well, give me the points, but I think it's one of those questions. It's very, I mean, this is obviously philosophy, right? And moral theories and whatnot. It's like, it's very hard to end the debate because there, like what we talked about last time, there is really no way to objectively prove it because the objective point of view

is kind of beyond our ability to comprehend. You would need to have a bird's eye view of the branching path of your life if that exists. If you don't have free will bird's eye view of the branching path of your life. If that exists, if you don't have free will, then it's not a branching path. But you would need to have like that overview effect of the full course of it. And it's a perspective that we as people can't ever really achieve because we can only like kind of predict the future and then look into the past. Right. I'm a believer of that. We have free will.

And I probably as we continue to talk about, I'll probably push that a bit further. But it's it's also just because I kind of ascribe to that belief just because it helps me. And I mean, a lot of belief based systems come from a perspective of you. You rally under the banner that you feel personally helps you. It helps me move forward in my life to believe that there is free will because that coincides with what I want to believe. Right. And that's driven by the wants that I have in my life in general. So by wanting there to be free will and opposing the idea that there isn't, it helps align me with going forward and moving forward with my life. Whether or not that's a

true statement is whatever and I can and probably will eventually defend why I think it is. But at the end of the day, on a more objective standpoint, it's because it helps me. Okay. Bob, what's your initial reaction to the question? Hmm. It's douchey, but I'm going to stick with it. I love it. This is often my reaction to questions like this. My initial thought is, well, what exactly do we mean by free will?

If we're going to address the idea of whether or not we have free will. Obviously we live in a universe where there are, seem to be, like universal physical laws. Physics is kind of telling us that there are probably laws that they're still trying to work them all out. We don't understand how it works. But so if we do live in a world where physical laws are consistent, that basically means we live in a deterministic world, right? If

you could accurately simulate down to the minutest of details that that we can't even perceive right now, the world, theoretically, you could figure out what someone might decide, because you could have a model of their brain. And there are physical rules about how electronic impulses travel and how neurons work and how things in the brain interact like is that free will? Or is the free will the fact that humans, even if our thoughts may be dictated or influenced by things that are not conscious choices, not conscious free will, is the free will the part of how we choose to act and react to whatever our thoughts are, whatever our unconscious motivations are,

whatever stimuli we get from outside of our bodies. And that's kind of where I fall. What we think may not be completely conscious. You might not be able to consciously control how you react to things based on your life experience. You might not be able to consciously choose what you think or what you want to do, but you do get to choose when you do or do not do things, when you do or do not act on thoughts that you have. So I think it's an important distinction. Maybe this is reductive, but I feel like one of the things that the free will question, people who might think that or might want to say that we don't have free will like to use that as like, well, then we're not responsible, are we? If I don't have, you know, if I can prove we don't have free will, then no one's morally responsible for what they do, are they?

Because it's not their choice that they did that. They were made to do that by whatever thing, by God or the laws of physics or whatever, because we all have a fate or destiny. But I don't personally believe that. I kind of with you, Mark, it's what helps me get through the day. The idea that at least part of the world I have agency over and I feel like even if someone might want to say that our thoughts are dictated or predetermined in some way, what you actually do in the world to other humans, other living things, what you actually do or do not do is definitely still dictated by your free will, thus you are morally responsible for your actions, whether or not,

you know, maybe some people have thoughts that they can't get rid of that are bad, you know, universally everyone would agree that's a bad thought, you should not act on that. But if you don't act on it, it's just a thought, it's not a real thing. And so there's a line there that I feel like it's hard to define clearly, but I can kind of see it in my own head. And that's what that's what helps me feel like I have agency, even in a deterministic physical world. You know, it's funny you mentioned the thought experiment, like if you were able to map out every single thing and analyze every single particle in the universe, you'd be able to do it. I always think of that. And then I think of like the double slit experiment, which is where they fired an electron through

two slits and they were able to do it one at a time. And, you know, it created a wave pattern and they were like, okay, but how? And then they observed it or they took a measurement of which one it was going through. And that changed the outcome to be just two slits. So it changed from being a wave formation to like a very deterministic, it picks one or the other because we were looking at which one it goes through and it was like one or the other. And so I imagine a similar thing would happen if you tried to map out every single particle in the universe. The moment you do, they would change. And so I think it's almost a fallacy to believe that we it's a fallacy to believe we ever could map out every particle in the universe.

You'd have to have measurements on every single particle in the universe. And that's actually impossible. There is no way to do that. The only way that that could ever occur is if all of the particles in the universe were to collapse down into a singular black hole, because they've talked about this before of like, there's been videos and you know, Kurtzgesagt made a video and there's deeper, more accurate information out there about it. But accurate is only as far as our theories on how black holes work even go. But what that does is in a way, because of our current understanding of light and matter, the moment that it crosses the event horizon over there,

it's kind of like that particle obviously gets collapsed into the black hole, whether it's a singularity or not. But once it crosses there, it can never come back as it was. It's an effectively destroying the information of what that is. That's why it breaks physics a little bit, because it's just there's like laws of conservation of energy and information, because information is just basically the arrangement of those particles. And it kind of writes all that information on the surface of the event horizon. Theoretically, it doesn't literally it's just like, you know, hypothetically

or looking at it in an abstract way, it writes it, but that determines, okay, this particle is this forever. And therefore it will never change. And therefore it never moves. And therefore it's effectively dead. And so I think like with life and the universe in a greater capacity as it is right now and in a constant flux state that's probably a very poorly explained and poorly accurate way of scientifically going like there probably is free will because you know it's really hard for to determine anything and the moment you observe anything it kind of changes and things are so complex that we could never observe anything so I'm like yeah probably free will up until it all ends because that's the only not free thing we have all I want to go back to ask you a couple questions because

you seemed very because what I said was more interesting yeah got it thank you well you kind of you turned on a bit because it seemed like at first you were going very deterministic as far as like that's where you used, and which is actually a moral theory, determinism, but you kind of like at the end you're like, well, I don't want to let people off the hook for the decisions they make, the actions they do, so if they're going to be held accountability, there has to be some kind of free will, I think is where you ended. So are you team free will or are you team determinism or something else? Kind of what Mark just said, I guess.

I don't know if there's a definitive way to say if the universe is or is not deterministic. To me, it seems likely that it is. But also to Mark's point of where when you're observing something changes the nature of the thing as part of physics is confusing because I'm stupid. But even if there are like it is deterministic how physics works and

perhaps how people think is deterministic in a way that like we can't comprehend, but maybe it is. Maybe there's a way that minds work that is is figurable is understandable. It's not to me that doesn't get around free will because it's not deterministic what exactly you do or even if you do something that is a sort of unconscious reaction if you just blurt something out or if you take an action without considering it that's not the ultimate action that you have in this universe you can take subsequent actions, you can apologize, you can change your mind

I mean unless you are killing someone, which you can't undo, unless you're doing something that's un-undoable, there's a lot of action that you can take after even a, if you would say, oh, well, I was, I was beyond my control. It was, it was my destiny. It was my fate. I didn't choose to do that. You choose to do everything else that you do subsequent to that, I think. I don't know if it is, if the world is deterministic, but even if it is, I don't think that's necessarily what is or isn't free will. I think there is another component of free will, and it's more human and societal. And it has to do with, even if you do something and you feel like it was outside of your control, you still maintain the autonomy of how you continue to act once that thing has happened.

Once you've said or done something, you can continue to say and do other things. So like, I guess I was trying to get more at like, what is free will? Because I've seen arguments where it basically ends at some philosopher or physicist or someone is like, well, I'm pretty sure the universe is deterministic. So there can't be free will. That's it. Yeah. And like, I guess I don't buy that.

There is a lot of support for hard determinism, which is basically that there is no free will. That's it. Yeah. And like I guess I don't buy that. There is a lot of support for hard determinism, which is basically that there is no free will. And if you go that route, the conclusion is that if there is no free will, people can't be held accountable for their actions because they didn't choose them. They were destined to perform them or whatever have you. And then there's like metaphysical libertarianism, which has a few different aspects to it, that's basically team free will which is like hey people can and do veto actions that Causation would say they wouldn't do therefore. There's probably free will or there is free will causation doesn't make sense However, I think what you're approaching is compatibilism, which is there is causation there is determinism determinism

But they aren't externally constrained when they get to you you internally get to control that aspect so sure it's determined but you are the determining factor that's what makes you you which is still a form of free will yes there is causation that comes into you you process it and spit out action And the things in your life that have shaped you and made you, you determine what you're going to spit out. So it is determined, but the you that is you still determines it and therefore you are the agent responsible, you are the free will

and you are accountable for your actions. It's probably both. There's probably a moral theory like that, right? Literally it's like, it's both. Compatibilism is that? If you think, yeah, if you think of it from like a physics standpoint, a star will create a light particle. Its path is determined because no matter what, it's going to bounce against other particles. Yes. And that will change

its trajectory. But the moment that it's born, that path is set. And let's say that path sends it in a, once it gets out of the star, it takes a long time, it's out of the star and it's straight line, it's going to go. And whether it gets curved by a black hole, whether it gets, you know, impacted, it's going to hit something or, you know, maybe not, but it's going to go somewhere. Like that path is determined. So you could say from a physics standpoint, well, everything's determined. But also it's, I'm not 100% sure if that's true either,

because there can be determined things in a system, and then there can still be choices that affect it, because a light particle doesn't think, but also you break it down further. You're like, is thoughts just electrons falling down in your brain? And it it's like is the magic of the brain just collapsing those possibilities down into different particles or different deterministic moments at will is like it chooses when to make things

deterministic and in a weird way that's free will so it comes and goes or you can just look at it like we we're all going to die. We don't know when, and we don't know what choice we make, makes that hypothetical light particle that can kill, that will kill us. Let's just say it's just a, it's a light bullet that's coming straight for us.

We don't know when that's going to hit us, but you know, we live in a box. Even if it's the illusion of free will, it's a very convincing illusion And at the end of the day, what's the difference between that and reality? It's it's again it comes down to just what you believe and even if that's not a choice Then I believe it's a choice and therefore I think therefore I am This episode is brought to you by Coca Cola creations

What happens when the best drink and the best cookie in the world get together? The best become besties. Let's taste the new Coca-Cola Oreos, zero sugar, limited edition. Mark, do you have yours? Are you excited? They sent us these special, and then we're gonna try them.

I've been in an undisclosed location, kind of in a- Sucks to be you, cheers, Bob. Yeah. I actually haven't had like a tasty treat in a while. It's been- Ooh. It's like if Oreos was a drink honestly It's kind of unexpected flavor, but it's almost like kind of like the icing of an Oreo. What do you think mark? Editors yeah put in the sound of me glugging. That's great guys. So good

Try the new coca-cola Oreo zero sugar limited edition besties for a limited time. Taste it while it lasts. Ah! Copyright 2024, The Coca-Cola Company. Copyright 2024, Mondeliz International Group. I wonder, okay, I wonder if this will shape your guys' thoughts at all. The existence of God or just omniscience in general, if you know the past, present and future,

the fact that that already is determined in some way, does that eliminate free will? If someone can know the future? That goes back to what we were talking about before. That's the knowing where every particle is at any time. Because if you know that, if you had the ability to know where every particle, all the 10 to the 40 something power particles that are in existence, if you were to know where every particle, all the 10 to the 40 something power particles that are in existence, if you were to know where they are, you would know everything.

That is the definition of knowing everything. You have the information of every single particle and the assembly of it. It's relation to other particles around it because to know where something is, you have to base it on where everything else is around it and you effectively know everything. The amount of data that that is, is so unquantifiable to the human mind, you can't comprehend its magnitude. But if you knew that, that would be omniscience, right? Yeah. Literally be it. If you knew that, it would kind of go back to, well, would that just

collapse everything? Because like that same light particle, when you're moving at the speed of light, everything else is basically static. But to a light particle, when you're moving at the speed of light, everything else is basically static. But to a light particle, if it could think, its journey from where it started to where it ended, it would be instantaneous. It never existed to its perspective, so it could never understand its existence. And I think the moment that it does, it kind of starts to probably slow down, you know, just because it's, wait a minute, hold on, but it's over so fast for the light particle. It never, it never was, it basically, effectively never was to the particle,

but to everything else around it, observing it and the relativity of that, you know, it's, it's, it's, you know, it's just different. So omniscience, if it did exist, it would exist in a way that we could never understand. Do you think it would mean that free will is impossible? Or do you think that we can still have free will and they just know what will come, but if they already know what will come, do we really get to choose it? I guess. Honestly, I don't think it would matter because if there was something that was like completely omniscient, uh, to the point where it could understand everything,

like obviously like godliness and whatnot, it would exist like in a, in a higher perspective than we could understand everything. Like, obviously, like godliness and whatnot, it would exist in a higher perspective than we could ever appreciate. Ha! Ah! What you throwin' there, bud? There's a long cord and I pulled it in my speaker felt. I don't think, if that knowledge doesn't stop everything immediately,

then I don't think it matters for us inside the box because to us and our perspective and our experiences, all we have is the unfortunate circumstance of the very convincing illusion of free will. And therefore, all we do is think that we have free will, and therefore, there is no other. So, both is and isn't. Bob, you agree with that?

I agree. No, I actually have thought about this a fair amount in just to myself basically, but the notion of omnipotence existing is basically incompatible with the way that we understand the universe, I think. Like Mark is saying, if there was a being, some entity that had that. Not only would time lose all meaning to them in terms of like their existence, but literally like it's a thing that humanity can't really comprehend. It's an amount of information, nothing that we've ever invented or the human brain itself like can't contain or conceive of.

So it's just like even if it's the worst case of what Mark said, we still live in a world where as far as we can really tell, yeah, we basically do have free will because there's no amount of understanding we could gain that would get beyond that. At least unless like, unless our brains evolve, unless our species evolves, unless something changes dramatically, the way we are right now, it's inconceivable. It's really more of a concept, the idea of an omnipotent God or being or whatever, another species of some sort. And in a way to whatever you want to call it, energy or substance or power, whatever

it would take to know every particle is more than is in the universe itself, because it would take more than exists to know where everything is. Therefore, it would obviously exist outside of the universe. And I think that distinction is very important because if it does take more than what is within, then it has to be without. And therefore, they don't even exist in the system that they are saying is deterministic. Therefore, the perspective is not only just different, it's impossible to conflate with the experience within the system. So to them, we are also kind of both knowable and they will never know our perspective. They would probably have moral quandaries of whether we have free will or not, you know?

It's interesting. Do you think then that the mind and body are separate entities? Because a lot of the free will questions lead into what's called the mind-body problem. And if everything is physical, likely it can be determined by physical causes. But if the mind is separate and you have free will, unless you can find a way to rationalize having free will and it all being one thing, do you think the mind and body are truly separate things then, or are they one entity? And for those of you out there that know this subject well, this is a very rough, again,

approximation, so I apologize if I misconstrue something or don't get something exactly right or say the things you want me to say, but I'm trying to guide on a subject I'm not super familiar with. I have been saving this one because I actually had this in the chamber and while Mark was talking I did some Googling to make sure I remember enough facts to talk about it. I think neuroscience has done some interesting stuff to sort of speak to kind of what you're asking. Basically, there were some studies where researchers were taking an active scan of participants'

brains and then they were offered choices. And the summary, my summary of their findings is basically before the participants had a conscious understanding of what decision they were making, they could detect in their brain there was already a choice that was made neurologically. And I don't know the technical details, but basically they could tell from the brain activity that the participant's brain had already prepared to make the decision and had sort of done the decision process.

And this is called readiness potential, I think, in what they published. This research was considered by a lot of people to sort of debunk the idea of free will, that this is a demonstration, scientifically measured demonstration of determinism, because your brain is doing things before you're even consciously aware that you're

making a choice. And then you just feel like when you think about it consciously, you feel like you're making a choice, but it's already in there, right? But there were subsequent experiments that challenged this sort of finding and found basically that there's a difference between an important decision and an inconsequential decision. That the readiness potential only happens when you're being presented with some kind of choice that is not a huge deal. Like there an example of that is there is a you're given two options, one or two. You pick either one. And in a immaterial decision, it would be it's two nonprofits and they each get $500.

They just want you to pick one that you like the most. But like it doesn't affect the outcome, you're just making a choice. The unconscious readiness potential was found in decisions like that. But if they gave you a thousand, they said here's you were responsible for a thousand dollars and you're picking one or two and the thousand dollars goes to one, the one you pick and doesn't go to the other nonprofit. The unconscious decision-making that came before the conscious expression of it was not found in the scans they were doing. There's a difference between maybe some things kind of are predetermined. Maybe you make a lot of choices. I mean

everything you do is a choice, right? Over the course of a day of your life. But maybe there are some choices where you really choose to exercise your free will more assertively, or you just choose to bring out the free will. It of course begs the question, what in your brain decides whether a choice is or is not meaningful, because that is not objective. Things are or are not meaningful to different people for different reasons. But the researchers who did that research basically said, we're not trying to like just make the argument at a deeper level that there's still some deterministic thing that you don't have control over. Our argument would be that human brain is so

inscrutable, it's so complex that our science might never have the ability to fully comprehend everything that happens, but that there's clearly a complexity beyond either you are or are not making a choice. And so there's clearly some component of free will buried in all of these, you know, sort of esoteric scans and findings. But I just, I find that interesting because it is, it sort of gets back to Mark's point about if you really could know everything, you couldn't be part of the system. So there's no way humans are ever going to create a one-to-one simulation of the entire universe that would tell us all of the outcomes of everything. That's just resource-wise not possible.

No, it's much more of a God conversation with omniscience than it is us. It just makes me... It doesn't give me an argument. It just gives me the personal feeling of like, there has to to be free will there just clearly is some component of free will and I think part of that is that your mind and your body and the physiology and the physics of what happens in your brain and how you make choices is kind of inexorably linked and so like I think if you took a mind and put it in a jar, it basically isn't the same person. It could, you know, if you could do that, and it was the same brain with the exact same

thoughts and memories, it might be kind of the same person. But their experience of the universe and the way that their decision making functioned, their internal motivations, all of that would be affected by the fact that they are no longer the person that they were with the mind and the body that they had. Now they're a new thing. They're a new person. They will have the exact same types of motivations and reactions to things. In that case, if someone loses one of their senses, do you feel that they're a different person too? Versus them having that sense, like most certainly. Yeah. So if you're taking like, I'm just curious for Bob's point of view, if like, if you take a brain and put it in a jar, it's not fundamentally the same person,

but if you remove an aspect of that person, that's crucial to their ability to interact with the world as they had before. Does that also change their person B now, not person A? Yeah, 100%. The idea of a discrete self that I am me and I will always be me is, I think, comforting to people because you want to have every individual wants to have a concept of who they are and they want it to be something that's hopefully at least a little concrete because that's what a lot of your life is based around who you are and what you think is important. But I think the real answer

really is everything that happens to you kind of makes you a new person and some things change you a lot more than other things. Losing one of your senses that you were born with and had spent your whole life with that now you don't have definitely like makes you a different person but also important people in your life dying or leaving important experiences in your life will completely change who you are because they will completely change your internal motivations and perceptions of the world around you in, you know, a lot of ways. So like you're, it's not like you're not you anymore and you just like change your voice, look different. Like clearly there are parts of you that are still the same, you're still yourself,

but you're constantly a new person with every experience in the sense that I'm talking about. Yeah, it's, I think the probably the closest example of that we have of is twins, you know, they don't have the exact same brain, that's for sure, because they don't even have the exact same fingerprint. But it's pretty much a very similarly structured brain in a very similarly structured body and they have completely different experiences, different people, fundamentally different people for many. But when it comes down to our experiences, I know that when you call it the bicameral mind, it's not exactly pertaining to this, but I just love it how they say it in West World, the bicameral mind. Like I love them talking about this, but the two mind thing, if you want to distinct it as

the mind and the body, those are the two things. The mind, what we know as we as, is like the passenger. We are not in control in some of these theories because we just get the leftover scraps of all the data that is taken into the body, but it happens so quickly and so succinctly that we have a very persistent illusion of our experience. And this kind of goes with the not having free will kind of thing. But I don't think it's specifically about that, that we are just a passenger. I believe that the mind-body, if there is a separation, we're the tool for analysis further

than what the brain has the capability of doing. It's a tool that the entity that we are has and has evolved to this point. It's a very, very useful tool because if the instincts and the structure doesn't have the answer, it's the same thing as what goes on in thyroid. The thyroid is an amazing thing. It's part of the immune system.

And the way it works is whenever there's a virus in the body that it doesn't know how to deal with, the body can and will adapt to it. Not all of them, because there are certain viruses that kind of exist outside of it. But in the thyroid is an infinity engine of antibodies, almost infinite. But it cranks through random permutations at an incredible speed to try to find the answer to this virus.

And that's if it detects it, you know, and if, you know, if it's compatible with, you know, human human biology and stuff like that. But once it knows there's a threat, it will crank through these to get to it. And in doing so, there's a danger to that because sometimes the antibody will affect the human body. It'll be like it can kill this thing, but it'll kill things. So there's actually cells on the way out of these antibodies of human cells of all variety to test against.

So it not only gets an answer it then tests against everything in the body and if it does if it kills something in the body it's like well we shouldn't use that and it kind of scraps it out it doesn't make these decisions you know intentionally it does this automatically and so what we might be is kind of just a big mental thyroid is like we are there sitting as like a passenger in the sidecar, but when we're handed the controls, it's because the driving force of all this and it's the majority, let's be honest, I don't know what's going on in each cell. The brain doesn't, we, the mind doesn't even know

what's going on in the body half the time. Can't control it and shouldn't control it, but at the same time is still serving a very important role. And the mind that we have, even if it's mostly an illusion, might be the only scrap of free will that exists. Like free will might be an evolutionarily developed tool to kind of help the entire beings survive because it needs to have this imagination and planning for futures and kind of plotting out possibilities, even considering possibilities to enhance the entity's ability to survive.

So it kind of can be a both thing because you have the blueprint and the instincts therein and then you take in information and what it can answer quickly because the human mind you're thinking is not very fast compared to everything else and it's like we can't figure this out uh you go like we are the jesus that takes the wheel because the mind's just like i can't fucking figure it out do this and you're like all right okay ah i get it now you know and then um yeah that's that's probably what i i would probably think is a fun way to look at it is it also possible i guess this to both of you when we take the wheel. It's just a more complex Determinism so like I take a sip of water water enters my mouth. I swallow it I take a sip of water But there's like something chewy in there all of a sudden

It's like either chew it and swallow it or I take a moment spit it out I take a bite of food. I need to chew it, swallow it. Take a bite of food, my body rejects it, it starts to go down, throw it up. Like there are different reactions we have to something like that depending on other factors, right? We put something in our mouth, swallow, digest, goes out. Drink too much alcohol, eventually you start to feel sick, your body rejects it, later that night you are. Getting it out of your system. So with thoughts and things like that too, could it be a thing where like goes through this processing and it's like a splitter conveyor belt, something that doesn't matter,

let's just spit out a decision before we even think about it, done. Do we wanna give a thousand dollars to this one or this one? Okay, well, there's some consideration here. Let's send this to the more complex processor. And we're consciously aware of the more complex processor, but ultimately still a complex processor, like an eight ball. You have you have an eight ball you shake it it gives you one of like 10 answers that's our auto thing but then you have your aol instant messenger bot where you're like

hey what's your name do you have dreams and it has some a lot more options it can come up with that takes things that you say to give your answer could our brains just be that or is it actually free will? Probably the question boils down to how complex does determinism need to be to functionally be free will? Because at a certain point, the complexity reaches that inflection point where it crosses over to being like,

it's impossible for the entire system to fully map out every possibility. So not knowing that it's so complex could be. But I think one of the one of the ways that the mind does have a kind of not just passenger capacity is the mind is the driver of change in the body, the rest of the brain is changed by the mind's answers. It's it's changed. So it its deterministic processes are functionally changed because of the conclusions that you reach. This is how learning functionally works. Your nerves make connections that are driven by the patterns that your conscious mind takes in. It's offloading to the subconscious mind, but you learn and muscle memory exists because

it was driven by the this engine, whether this engine is deterministic or not. It's like a just more complex one. I think it's a fascinating and really interesting connection because it affects change both ways and it can break down. that's how like anxiety can cause extreme conflicts and lead to depression and like these these imbalances can cause like the balance is very very fragile between the two processes I believe this is all just conjecture I'm just like talking out my ass but I think that the fact that it's not just a one-way thing it's not just taking in but the mind can affect change on the rest of the system. Um, even if it's a system going, ah, that's in conclusion, I will change myself.

But I think, uh, I think it's more intertwined than that. And that intertwining of deterministic functions where I go like, how complex do these deterministic things need to be to become functionally free will. So almost like a parabolic curve. It's like approaching free will and it's so close that they might as well just be the same thing. Mm-hmm, yeah. Okay, we're going deeper than I thought we would.

I'm not gonna lie, it's interesting. Bob, any more thoughts on that one? No, just no. No. Don't wanna think about it anymore. Bob, your determined factory shut down. That doesn't look like much of anything to me. Is that a West, that's a Westworld reference, right?

Yeah. I've not seen Westworld. I need to see it. You should, you would love the philosophical discussion of the first season, then stop. Maybe watch a little of season two because you'll be curious, but then stop when you know it's time to stop. Also, doesn't it like not exist anymore? Didn't it get shelved? Shelved forever, removed from Max and...

Did it like go majorly downhill or something? There are four seasons and honestly the last season is okay, but the first season is the reason the entire show exists and is far and away the best and most interesting season. It is really nice. If it just existed as a one season limited series, it would it would be up there with one of the most fascinating series possible. It's also very much worth it to go and watch the movie that was made in the 60s. It's it's also called Westworld and it's very different from the TV series, but still very fascinating watch.

For anyone wondering it is an HBO show. So there's a gratuitous amount of nudity and sex. Oh and violence and violence But in a way, it's like those themes I I would never make a project with that much sex and nudity But the themes do tie in with those do tie in with the theme, but it's just so you know You had me you didn't have to keep selling then you had me a nudity a lot of nudity. Like some episodes are primarily nudity.

Alright, well that's the episode everyone. I don't know who won, but I gotta go start watching this Westworld thing real quick. Okay, we got a pretty good discussion in and I feel like this is a probably a decent wrapping point unless you all have any other final things you want to say. Did you have more subjects to talk about than just free will? No, no, I wanted to focus mainly on free will today. I had a lot of notes on it. Yeah, I'm trying to think if I have like a button thing

I want to put on here. I guess the conclusion that it is free will, even if we can see that maybe it's not, that it's just so complex, that it gets so close to free will, we might as well call it free will, is interesting. A lot of things I found when I was looking, it seems like a lot of people are more on team determinism. I think that want for free will is there, and then people can argue in and of itself that wanting something in and of itself is a sign of free will. I don't know, it's a complex thing to think about, and then mind-body stuff.

Mind-body is where I started to get like a bit in over my head in philosophy studying stuff like that was kind of like oh boy this is getting so in-depth because now we're talking about anatomy and brain chemistry and chemistry in general and physics versus also just really complex philosophical theories and trying to make them all make sense together so again this is a bit beyond my understanding but I thought maybe one of you would go. I thought Mark would probably be team free will. Bob, I wasn't really sure which way you would go with it. And you started off, I thought you were going pretty deterministic, but then you kind of like you found compatible ism, which is another theory in and of itself, which is cool. But I didn't know where you would go with this. You would like Westworld. It is basically this question in a show literally on the poster of Westworld is at the top. Free will is not free. Well, see, I liked morals and morals wasworld is at the top, free will is not free.

Well, see, I liked morals and morals was my real passion for philosophy was free will is an interesting question because it can touch on morality because if you don't believe in free will, you can't assign moral responsibility because it's like, well, if you didn't choose it, how can we hold you accountable for it? It's just who you are. I didn't go too deep into it, but yeah, I'll have to check it out. I've heard good things about Westworld, but I feel like I haven't heard anything in like years about it. Maybe that's why. Well, the last season came out a few years ago now, and the first season came out in like, 2018-19. So most of season two and three are just, in your opinion? Came out in 2016. I mean,

honestly, season two is watchable. Season three and four really go off the rails. Season two is watchable. Season three and four really go off the rails. Season two is fun because of where it takes place in a large part. And so like it's fun. The problem is season one ends in, you know, I think it was meant to be a one season kind of thing and they were like, this was so popular, let's make more. You know, they tried and it's not bad,

but it's hard to keep that going, especially if you're like, we need more seasons, especially more after. If it was also like just a second season, that's another different story of like, don't worry about continuing it. But I think like season one's ending is both open-ended and also conclusive. And I think that's where the trouble began. That's the philosophical discussion of it is like, you know, it's very interesting. Adam- Also, if you're looking for other media on the question of free will, Mandy and I literally last night watched the movie, 2014 movie, X matching Machina, X Machina,

which is about development of AI kind of an interesting, well-made movie with some really good acting about these sorts of questions and consciousness and free will and stuff. I don't know how I didn't see that because it's a movie I would have loved to watch when it came out, but 10 years later, finally saw it. I haven't seen that one either. Alex Garland is the maker of that movie, also made Annihilation and I think made Sunshine. So if you know what Sunshine is, I really like Sunshine. I got to rewatch it. It's kind of like a, I don't think it was too serially successful, but the sun needed a reboot.

So they sent a ship out to the sun. Think of a journey of a not journey to the center of the earth, but go down and let's put nukes in the center of the earth and restart the core. You know that movie? No. It's like that, but for the sun, but it's very the style of, of Sunshine.

I fucking love it. It's very, very pretty. And,. But it's very- the style of Sunshine, I fucking love. It's very, very pretty and I don't know, space, you know. You like space? Yeah, I like it. Space is cool, except for the moon. Apparently that movie you're referencing is called The Core. Oh, The Core, yeah, of course. There's a Reddit post about Sunshine I just looked up,

and it's like talking about how like, arguably one of the best sci-fi horror films of all time, but, and you know, it goes into detail, but the top comment is zero out of ten. No one says it's daylight savings time Dammit, I mean that is just right there. All right. Yeah, zero out of ten. I would agree honest I'm not seeing it, but man that does ruin it because that would be such a great one-liner Yeah, sorry to spoil it for everybody. All right. Let me go over the points. Hopefully y'all enjoyed this discussion I know it's a more serious episode, but I don't know people been wanting some philosophy Yes for you get it cuz I like it mark. I'm gonna go over your points first. Fuck man. This is determined I didn't have free will on this episode did I?

Well, I know no one would determine so if someone had to Alright mark, you got points for sitting is superior, brutal honesty, edging in sleep. He took the point. Yes, free will. Science and space, baby. Omniscience wouldn't matter to us. Twins? Omniscience?

Uh, and the parabola close to free will. Why are you saying twins like that? Twins! It's from uh, Austin Powers I think. Two girls walk out there twins, he just... Twins! Twins! I always say it like that.

Uh, Bob, you got points for Subaru Undo. Bald, looks like it says no oral, I'm pretty sure it says moral. Uh, deterministic world, moral responsibility is what it is. Compatibilism, free will as far as we know, neuroscience that then divulged into readiness potential and only happens for minor decisions. I got a point for Anabbi Passion, the firework game. No, I remember.

I was trying to find you a tiles version on eBay and I was searching international eBay's for it. I thought I found one in Russian, but it was just the card version with some misleading Google translate, I think. And tell me, man, I don't know how nobody is reselling it. No one is selling it. It's crazy. All right, Mark, you had nine points.

Good effort. Good effort. Bob, you finished with eight points. Plus. Bob promising you finished with eight points Despite giving marks points first mark one I finished with one point. Well, I didn't lose see I can also be Surprising and unpredictable do I speech just speech now. That's up to you if you have free will or not I got a lens cap. Oh Man, the late deduction before we

That's all right your winner speech you can lens if you want to it was determined that I would win this episode From the moment I was born to every decision leading up to here, which was illusions decisions more like Delusions, you know? So, we all are part of a orchestrated dance by no will of our own. Yeah, but I won, and so I feel good about that. So that's the only thing that matters. I don't care if it's deterministic. I feel great, and that is awesome. You know what else is great?

Drugs. They make you feel super good. So if you- if- if- why don't you just succumb to the- the- the decisions that were made for you already? Let's do drugs. Well said. I'm the winner. I can say whatever I want. That's true. That's the rules. That's allowed. It's immunity. It's immunity in this moment. I won. Uh, Bob, loser speech.

I feel good because I willed freely myself into second place today. I chose it on purpose because I can do that. You're like Dash and the Incredibles at the end. Just go for a second, make it close. Yeah, no, that's the- I have so much free will that I'm out here coming in a close second just to keep it realistic. That's how free my will is. You can have this one, Mark, because I gave it to you.

Good for you. Thanks. You determined my future. Yeah. Wait, what? I am the passenger to your deeper body. Together we are the bicameral man. Men? Man? Are we one man? Man. Hopefully you all had fun discussing this stuff. I know this is

usually more up my alley than yours. Some people like philosophy episodes. Hopefully everyone does, but sorry it was less comedy, but good interesting discussion. Maybe you learned a thing or two. Maybe you thought deeply about something today. Maybe you't in any case you can find us at our respective channels me at minion777 or lord minion777 bob at myskirm mark at markiplier check out edge of sleep it's out now you should have watched it already but if you have watch it again if you haven't i can watch it we have merch tractablestore.com stay tuned for the next episode where mark will lead us on some kind of journey until then podcast out