Why not do drugs? If all you want is good feelings, why play games? Just have sex all the time and eat luxurious food. Never do anything that's hard or challenging. Just do easy things that give out lots and lots of pleasure and never stop.
This is actually really sound advice imho.
In my book that is a perfect set of instructions on how to become a worthless human being deserving of no respect.
I'm pretty sure he's reading into it, and taking it to mean "Doing hard and challenging things is more rewarding than just seeking nothing but good feelings. If you only seek good feeling, it's pointless, simply completed by (List of hedonistic lifestyle choices) or any number of other easy, simple things that only give pleasure. Better to do the things that challenge you, the things you find hard, and gain the greater rewards, rather than just going to the cheap easy thrill."
EDIT: Ninja'ed, but nice to see I was accurate in my assessment.
Why not do drugs? If all you want is good feelings, why play games? Just have sex all the time and eat luxurious food. Never do anything that's hard or challenging. Just do easy things that give out lots and lots of pleasure and never stop.
This is actually really sound advice imho.
In my book that is a perfect set of instructions on how to become a worthless human being deserving of no respect.
I'm pretty sure he's reading into it, and taking it to mean "Doing hard and challenging things is more rewarding than just seeking nothing but good feelings. If you only seek good feeling, it's pointless, simply completed by (List of hedonistic lifestyle choices) or any number of other easy, simple things that only give pleasure. Better to do the things that challenge you, the things you find hard, and gain the greater rewards, rather than just going to the cheap easy thrill."
EDIT: Ninja'ed, but nice to see I was accurate in my assessment.
Close, but not quite. It's much more philosophical.
Animals seek pleasure. Humans also seek pleasure. That's the automatic biological program. The vast majority of people live their lives on cruise control. They automatically follow the path of least resistance and seeking pleasure.
Is there free will? Maybe not, but there could be. If not, then it doesn't matter what you do, since that's what you would have done anyway. On the off chance that there is, you have to exercise it to its fullest. I mean, what if there is only partial free will? Then you have to use every single bit that you get, right?
And because we do not know if there is free will or not, how do you know if you are exercising every bit you have, if you do in fact have it? You have to find evidence that the conscious decisions you are making are altering the path of cause and effect.
The only thing you have to grab onto is this fact that other biological beings like yourself seem to run on autopilot. If they have the capacity for free will, there is scant evidence that they are exercising it regularly. Their behaviors are incredibly predictable. They follow the same patterns. It would be very strange for so many people to freely follow such patterns given free will.
If your conscious brain has any power of free will, then intentionally deciding not to perform these automatic behaviors that your body wants to do is perhaps the only way to prove to yourself that you have free will. Doesn't prove anything to anyone else, but it helps you personally.
My body likes to do the same automatic pleasurable behaviors as everyone else. I have very strong feelings that make me want to follow the same patterns I see other people follow. I consciously decide not to partake in those behaviors to prove to myself that I may have free will. If I did not, then how would my conscious brain be able to override the other part of my brain?
It appears, to me at least, that the automatic program came first, chronologically, but its effect was canceled by my conscious decision. My conscious decision appears to me to have no source other than my will. My body then executes my conscious decision, and not the automatic program. That at minimum maintains for myself the illusion of free will, and could possibly be an instance of the real thing.
Since I can believe at least in the possibility of free will, I can also believe in the possibility that life actually matters. I can also believe that conscious decisions, thinking, problem solving, decisive actions, etc. can give a human being the power to direct the course of history, at least in a small way. And thus, I can believe that the things I consciously decide matter. And thus making the right decisions becomes incredibly important. Playing games of skill is the best way to practice making decisions without large consequences. Thus, a serious practice of games of skill becomes one of the most important things you can do. That is why I take games so seriously.
If that floats your boat and makes you happy, great, but what does it really matter in the end? When you're on your death bed, are you going to feel so much better because you denied yourself pleasure? I know you don't believe in an afterlife, so why are you so concerned about exercising the most free will? No one's counting. Why not try to have the best life you can?
If that floats your boat and makes you happy, great, but what does it really matter in the end? When you're on your death bed, are you going to feel so much better because you denied yourself pleasure? I know you don't believe in an afterlife, so why are you so concerned about exercising the most free will? No one's counting. Why not try to have the best life you can?
How can you not be? If you live your life in cruise control, you didn't really live a life at all. Your entire life was nothing but automatic responses to stimuli. Everything you did your entire life was controlled by things outside of yourself. You may as well not have lived.
You should look into simulation games. You get to practice making decisions, and you learn how to deal with real-world situations.
If I want to learn a specific skill like flying a plane, then sure. But games, that meet the game theory definition of game, really are the best simulation for general life decision making. You make a decisions, and the decisions that other people make are factored in when determining the results. Unless maybe you've invented a life simulator?
Close, but not quite. It's much more philosophical.
I get what you're saying, however, what I meant was "This is what he's probably reading into your comment" rather than "This is what your comment is."
If I want to learn a specific skill like flying a plane, then sure. But games, that meet the game theory definition of game, really are the best simulation for general life decision making. You make a decisions, and the decisions that other people make are factored in when determining the results. Unless maybe you've invented a life simulator?
While technically true, what the fuck does that have to do with the price of eggs? You're not playing games as defined within game theory in the first place, so why turn down simulation games on the basis of them not being Games as defined within game theory?
Maybe it is, much like the reason you've stated before that don't play Go, because you don't enjoy it?
Now, I'm not one to usually promote staying on topic in a thread, but since the topic has shifted from vijigames to deconstructing Scott (a topic that occurs all too often) perhaps it should move to another thread? The "Rules of Scott" thread, perhaps?
Agreed. So, what does everyone think of the demise of Japanese gaming?
There seem to be a lot of interesting theories about the decline. Was it a technological problem, as online play became the norm for most of the world? Was it a cultural problem, as America's gaming generation grew up while Japanese developers became old and crotchety? Was it a business issue, as XBox 360 and PC gaming rose and the tactical advantage shifted to America?
I think a big part of it can be traced to the release of the PS3/Xbox360. At the time American studios were far ahead in their experience with high-end 3D engines. (This was due to FPS being big here on PC at the time.) Japanese studios either avoided 3D altogether or decided to roll their own, which set them back a few years.
If that floats your boat and makes you happy, great, but what does it really matter in the end? When you're on your death bed, are you going to feel so much better because you denied yourself pleasure? I know you don't believe in an afterlife, so why are you so concerned about exercising the most free will? No one's counting. Why not try to have the best life you can?
How can you not be? If you live your life in cruise control, you didn't really live a life at all. Your entire life was nothing but automatic responses to stimuli. Everything you did your entire life was controlled by things outside of yourself. You may as well not have lived.
So, are you saying that the ideal life is one where at every point we can make a decision, we should make the more difficult and/or painful option to prove that we have free will?
If that floats your boat and makes you happy, great, but what does it really matter in the end? When you're on your death bed, are you going to feel so much better because you denied yourself pleasure? I know you don't believe in an afterlife, so why are you so concerned about exercising the most free will? No one's counting. Why not try to have the best life you can?
How can you not be? If you live your life in cruise control, you didn't really live a life at all. Your entire life was nothing but automatic responses to stimuli. Everything you did your entire life was controlled by things outside of yourself. You may as well not have lived.
So, are you saying that the ideal life is one where at every point we can make a decision, we should make the more difficult and/or painful option to prove that we have free will?
The ideal life is one where you achieve all of your goals, whatever they may be. The quandary is that how do you know your goals are actually your own goals?
If your goal is to eat all the yummy food, it was probably just your biology controlling you and making you want that to be your goal. How do you know it wasn't a goal that was programmed into you by marketing and engineering from the food industry? You can't tell if you are truly acting of your own will. Are being controlled by your environment or your biology, or are you in control of your self? If you aren't even controlling yourself, are you even living your life, or just watching it?
... all your goals are just biology controlling you. Hate to break it to you, but that's the nature of organic beings. The goals you set for yourself are ultimately just extensions of human utility function, aka security, comfort, and reproduction. If you are doing anything at all, it's because at some level your brain believes doing it will result in greater security, comfort, or chance at successful reproduction. Even suicide bombers exploding themselves do so because they have fooled their brain into believing the result afterward will be security, comfort, and reproduction.
Ah, that makes more sense now. I think you should deny yourself the pleasure of playing games you enjoy along the way, but I can at least understand where you're coming from.
Humans objectively have no free will, and in fact the concept of free will is a meaningless abstraction.
Quantum mechanics and quantum randomness show that the actions of a human being could never perfectly be predicted by any system. Thus, free will, here meaning the point at which an agent affects a (random to outside observers) decision of his or her own accord, might well in fact exist, and your statement that there is "objectively" no free will is close-minded and arbitrary; scientists and philosophers will probably never come to a conclusion about that.
Humans objectively have no free will, and in fact the concept of free will is a meaningless abstraction.
Quantum mechanics and quantum randomness show that the actions of a human being could never perfectly be predicted by any system. Thus, free will, here meaning the point at which an agent affects a (random to outside observers) decision of his or her own accord, might well in fact exist, and your statement that there is "objectively" no free will is close-minded and arbitrary; scientists and philosophers will probably never come to a conclusion about that.
At least not on our lives. All we can rely on is what is in our own brains.
I mean, the idea that you can make a choice contrary to your biology being bullshit. Quantum randomness doesn't fit the definition of "free will" any better than simple causality and isn't exactly a satisfying conclusion either. Fact of the matter is, our brains are physical things, physical things are governed by causality, and anything else is nitpicking.
Humans are just sacks of meat with computers plugged in, driving us to ensure the survival and duplication of the meat. We're deceiving ourselves if we try to assign any more meaning to our actions than that.
I mean, the idea that you can make a choice contrary to your biology being bullshit. Quantum randomness doesn't fit the definition of "free will" any better than simple causality and isn't exactly a satisfying conclusion either. Fact of the matter is, our brains are physical things, physical things are governed by causality, and anything else is nitpicking.
Humans are just sacks of meat with computers plugged in, driving us to ensure the survival and duplication of the meat. We're deceiving ourselves if we try to assign any more meaning to our actions than that.
Quantum things are physical things, but their causality is not not completely understood or straightforward, or always possible to predict.
On a higher level, if it is impossible to make a choice contrary to my biology, how do I do it so often? Right now my biology is very hungry. It's past lunch. Yet I have decided consciously not to eat until later. My biology also tells me to go to Chipotle. I have consciously decided not to go there today, and I won't. How is this possible if I am a slave to my own meat?
I'm going to come out and say I understand where Apreche is coming from. I could be totally wrong on that. His philosophy is sort-of like my philosophy in middle school and high-school. I heavily favored "higher" values over instinct and base joys. Everything involved introspection, "Why do I do thing?" and then resolving to try to commit to actions where those reasons had better inherent values than "it makes me happy" and such. I also had a whole "The only true form of motivation was self motivation, that motivation which you simply decide to have" that was (and is, though slightly less) important to me.
That said, years later and after a lot of philosophical delving my personal theories are way more muddled. I think that in-turn I was just fulfilling a different social/biological/instinctual role in humanity. I've got a totally intuition based theory that collectively we need a lot of different kinds of people, and people like I was then and Apreche is now are also fulfilling a similarly "deterministic" biological role within the collective of humanity. My theory is basically that a lot of the outliers that don't fall within the obvious normative behavior tree are actually important (or have been important in the past) to our collective success as a species. I think we're incredibly versatile, and I just happened to fall into that outlier branch for a time (and then drift around to others).
I've reached a point in my life where I feel pretty zen about everything most of the time. I know how to accomplish things, but I don't necessarily feel like I need to accomplish things in order to be satisfied. I'm alright doing whatever needs to be done at the moment and otherwise relaxing and trying to understand what else might need to be done and why. It feels pretty good "just to be" nowadays. I'm not totally without some silliness, desire, wants, and such. But I'm in a lot better place now than I was while I thought I needed to be optimal for my circumstances.
I mean, the idea that you can make a choice contrary to your biology being bullshit. Quantum randomness doesn't fit the definition of "free will" any better than simple causality and isn't exactly a satisfying conclusion either. Fact of the matter is, our brains are physical things, physical things are governed by causality, and anything else is nitpicking.
Humans are just sacks of meat with computers plugged in, driving us to ensure the survival and duplication of the meat. We're deceiving ourselves if we try to assign any more meaning to our actions than that.
As a biologist, I find your view of the immensely complex systems that govern us both shallow and ill-conceived.
You're only thinking macro. But you need to think small. Smaller than subatomic; string-small. On some level, it is impossible to determine the nature of what drives us. Who observes the positions of electrons in the brain? The uncertainty principle always is there, always working on even the most minute part of a cell. Deterministically, we might not have free will. But practically, we might as well. If what you said was true, it'd be relatively easy to simulate the actions of a person. In reality, the complexity of a biological system with sentience approaches the infinite.
We also don't know what defines observation in terms of the quantum positions in our own mind! Scott's right, our minds are all we can rely on, but they determine our input and output. If we can affect the systems within us like the observer of a photon changes the nature of the particle/wave superposition, what then? Is free will there?
I mean, the idea that you can make a choice contrary to your biology being bullshit. Quantum randomness doesn't fit the definition of "free will" any better than simple causality and isn't exactly a satisfying conclusion either. Fact of the matter is, our brains are physical things, physical things are governed by causality, and anything else is nitpicking.
Humans are just sacks of meat with computers plugged in, driving us to ensure the survival and duplication of the meat. We're deceiving ourselves if we try to assign any more meaning to our actions than that.
Quantum things are physical things, but their causality is not not completely understood or straightforward, or always possible to predict.
On a higher level, if it is impossible to make a choice contrary to my biology, how do I do it so often? Right now my biology is very hungry. It's past lunch. Yet I have decided consciously not to eat until later. My biology also tells me to go to Chipotle. I have consciously decided not to go there today, and I won't. How is this possible if I am a slave to my own meat?
Because your brain, while determinist, is capable of long-term planning. It knows you aren't in danger of dying from hunger, and it has worked out that long term security, comfort, and reproduction are better served arguing on the internet.
And WUP, adding greater complexity to a system doesn't detach it from causality. It just raises the complexity of the system you need to simulate it. Our brains are really complex, poorly organized conputers, but they are just computers. Making a computer more complex doesn't change how a bit flips, even if it makes a random flip from quantum bullshit more likely.
On a higher level, if it is impossible to make a choice contrary to my biology, how do I do it so often? Right now my biology is very hungry. It's past lunch. Yet I have decided consciously not to eat until later. My biology also tells me to go to Chipotle. I have consciously decided not to go there today, and I won't. How is this possible if I am a slave to my own meat?
Because biology is inherently more complicated than just any one singular desire. It might be closer to a democracy or a congress, but even that's probably not sufficient. Further, there's both the individual and the society. Shit gets complicated.
On a higher level, if it is impossible to make a choice contrary to my biology, how do I do it so often? Right now my biology is very hungry. It's past lunch. Yet I have decided consciously not to eat until later. My biology also tells me to go to Chipotle. I have consciously decided not to go there today, and I won't. How is this possible if I am a slave to my own meat?
Because biology is inherently more complicated than just any one singular desire. It might be closer to a democracy or a congress, but even that's probably not sufficient. Further, there's both the individual and the society. Shit gets complicated.
So complicated indeed. Would you not say that it is at least possible, if unlikely, that I have some will that has decided it through conscious thought and made it so?
I wouldn't argue that it isn't possible. I'm pretty skeptical of everything, and there's plenty of room for error. While I'm almost always arguing that "real free will probably does not exist", I certainly can't commit to it being non-existent.
I've never been able to get the concept of free will in general. Whether or not we're deterministic machines or influenced by quantum randomness or some other force I don't see where any meaningful 'choice' could come into play. Even if there was some seemingly free-willed conscious force working behind quantum effects, it would still just be pushing the question back to "how does this force make its decisions if it's not random or deterministic"
Its not so much that I lack evidence of free-will, but that I straight up can't comprehend the concept.
... all your goals are just biology controlling you. Hate to break it to you, but that's the nature of organic beings. The goals you set for yourself are ultimately just extensions of human utility function, aka security, comfort, and reproduction. If you are doing anything at all, it's because at some level your brain believes doing it will result in greater security, comfort, or chance at successful reproduction. Even suicide bombers exploding themselves do so because they have fooled their brain into believing the result afterward will be security, comfort, and reproduction.
Nice, evolutionary psychology!! The worst kind of psychology!!
I've never been able to get the concept of free will in general. Whether or not we're deterministic machines or influenced by quantum randomness or some other force I don't see where any meaningful 'choice' could come into play. Even if there was some seemingly free-willed conscious force working behind quantum effects, it would still just be pushing the question back to "how does this force make its decisions if it's not random or deterministic"
Its not so much that I lack evidence of free-will, but that I straight up can't comprehend the concept.
That's because the concept is pretty much a perfect illustration of the middle-world problem. It's something that at a high-level seems intuitively correct because we feel like we make choices, and see choices being made, but once you get down to the nitty gritty there isn't actually anything there. It's an abstraction made by our brains that is actually pretty much meaningless.
Nice, evolutionary psychology!! The worst kind of psychology!!
Oh, it's absolutely useless for making predictions on people's behaviors, because brains are complex and flexible things and very good at self-deception, and evopsych is mostly used by sexist shitlords trying to justify their backwards values with bullshit science. Such observations are only good for really abstract philosophical shit.
Well, it's impossible in the technical sense, as the meat itself makes the "decision" to ignore what the meat wants, thus making said decision intrinsic to the meat.
Comments
To eschew physical pleasure for challenging video games, to see them speed run before you, and to hear the lamentations of the forum posters.
EDIT: Ninja'ed, but nice to see I was accurate in my assessment.
Animals seek pleasure. Humans also seek pleasure. That's the automatic biological program. The vast majority of people live their lives on cruise control. They automatically follow the path of least resistance and seeking pleasure.
Is there free will? Maybe not, but there could be. If not, then it doesn't matter what you do, since that's what you would have done anyway. On the off chance that there is, you have to exercise it to its fullest. I mean, what if there is only partial free will? Then you have to use every single bit that you get, right?
And because we do not know if there is free will or not, how do you know if you are exercising every bit you have, if you do in fact have it? You have to find evidence that the conscious decisions you are making are altering the path of cause and effect.
The only thing you have to grab onto is this fact that other biological beings like yourself seem to run on autopilot. If they have the capacity for free will, there is scant evidence that they are exercising it regularly. Their behaviors are incredibly predictable. They follow the same patterns. It would be very strange for so many people to freely follow such patterns given free will.
If your conscious brain has any power of free will, then intentionally deciding not to perform these automatic behaviors that your body wants to do is perhaps the only way to prove to yourself that you have free will. Doesn't prove anything to anyone else, but it helps you personally.
My body likes to do the same automatic pleasurable behaviors as everyone else. I have very strong feelings that make me want to follow the same patterns I see other people follow. I consciously decide not to partake in those behaviors to prove to myself that I may have free will. If I did not, then how would my conscious brain be able to override the other part of my brain?
It appears, to me at least, that the automatic program came first, chronologically, but its effect was canceled by my conscious decision. My conscious decision appears to me to have no source other than my will. My body then executes my conscious decision, and not the automatic program. That at minimum maintains for myself the illusion of free will, and could possibly be an instance of the real thing.
Since I can believe at least in the possibility of free will, I can also believe in the possibility that life actually matters. I can also believe that conscious decisions, thinking, problem solving, decisive actions, etc. can give a human being the power to direct the course of history, at least in a small way. And thus, I can believe that the things I consciously decide matter. And thus making the right decisions becomes incredibly important. Playing games of skill is the best way to practice making decisions without large consequences. Thus, a serious practice of games of skill becomes one of the most important things you can do. That is why I take games so seriously.
Maybe it is, much like the reason you've stated before that don't play Go, because you don't enjoy it?
If your goal is to eat all the yummy food, it was probably just your biology controlling you and making you want that to be your goal. How do you know it wasn't a goal that was programmed into you by marketing and engineering from the food industry? You can't tell if you are truly acting of your own will. Are being controlled by your environment or your biology, or are you in control of your self? If you aren't even controlling yourself, are you even living your life, or just watching it?
Humans are just sacks of meat with computers plugged in, driving us to ensure the survival and duplication of the meat. We're deceiving ourselves if we try to assign any more meaning to our actions than that.
On a higher level, if it is impossible to make a choice contrary to my biology, how do I do it so often? Right now my biology is very hungry. It's past lunch. Yet I have decided consciously not to eat until later. My biology also tells me to go to Chipotle. I have consciously decided not to go there today, and I won't. How is this possible if I am a slave to my own meat?
That said, years later and after a lot of philosophical delving my personal theories are way more muddled. I think that in-turn I was just fulfilling a different social/biological/instinctual role in humanity. I've got a totally intuition based theory that collectively we need a lot of different kinds of people, and people like I was then and Apreche is now are also fulfilling a similarly "deterministic" biological role within the collective of humanity. My theory is basically that a lot of the outliers that don't fall within the obvious normative behavior tree are actually important (or have been important in the past) to our collective success as a species. I think we're incredibly versatile, and I just happened to fall into that outlier branch for a time (and then drift around to others).
I've reached a point in my life where I feel pretty zen about everything most of the time. I know how to accomplish things, but I don't necessarily feel like I need to accomplish things in order to be satisfied. I'm alright doing whatever needs to be done at the moment and otherwise relaxing and trying to understand what else might need to be done and why. It feels pretty good "just to be" nowadays. I'm not totally without some silliness, desire, wants, and such. But I'm in a lot better place now than I was while I thought I needed to be optimal for my circumstances.
You're only thinking macro. But you need to think small. Smaller than subatomic; string-small. On some level, it is impossible to determine the nature of what drives us. Who observes the positions of electrons in the brain? The uncertainty principle always is there, always working on even the most minute part of a cell. Deterministically, we might not have free will. But practically, we might as well. If what you said was true, it'd be relatively easy to simulate the actions of a person. In reality, the complexity of a biological system with sentience approaches the infinite.
We also don't know what defines observation in terms of the quantum positions in our own mind! Scott's right, our minds are all we can rely on, but they determine our input and output. If we can affect the systems within us like the observer of a photon changes the nature of the particle/wave superposition, what then? Is free will there?
And WUP, adding greater complexity to a system doesn't detach it from causality. It just raises the complexity of the system you need to simulate it. Our brains are really complex, poorly organized conputers, but they are just computers. Making a computer more complex doesn't change how a bit flips, even if it makes a random flip from quantum bullshit more likely.
Its not so much that I lack evidence of free-will, but that I straight up can't comprehend the concept.