[Kim_Bruning]

> Computers, with computational determinism, don't have free will.

Define (the properties of) free will, if you will.

Depending on your definition, I might be able to come up with code that exhibits those properties to your satisfaction.

A lot of people believe that the choice is between deterministic and stochastic, while there's actually 3 different classes of deterministic behavior (static, periodic, and chaotic), one of which is most interesting indeed .

Basically a lot of interesting systems are chaotic, and have some similar characteristics. They are nominally deterministic as a prerequisite for being chaotic, but that's about as far as it gets. If you can get the exact same initial conditions twice then yes you do get the same exact behavior out of a chaotic system (due to the criterium that the system is deterministic), but in practice: good luck with that.

[FrustratedMonky]

The parent post had said there were two types of determinism and that they were not compatible.

I was just saying, a computer could be made to model a human and appear to have free will. And that would indicate that both types of determinism are the same.

Personally, I agree, a computer can be made to exhibit those properties.

I just take it further, since a human also has those properties, and can 'appear to have free will'. That any outside observer will have to accept that both have free will, or neither does.

There is no extra 'mystical essence' that gives a human agency, we are following our own programming. We need to eat, mate, get triggered, thoughts come un-bidden. Or another way, to your point, there are chaotic or stochastic systems at play, but those are not 'agency'. Somewhere in a human, maybe there is chaos, but that doesn't translate into a 'agency'.

[Kim_Bruning]

Ah! A subtle point.

I'd think that it's a question of definitions at this point. If two systems are both <sufficiently unpredictable>, I would ascribe "free will" and "agency" to both.

Your reasoning seems to be almost exactly the same and equally valid, except all the signs are flipped, so you ascribe those properties to neither.

Either way the two systems are equivalent.

[FrustratedMonky]

Yes.

Sometimes I like to frame it in the negative.

Because it rarely comes up as an option, that humans might not be 'conscious' either.

I don't mean in a solipsist way. More like in the 'controlled hallucination' framing from Anil Seth. We (human brains) respond to inputs, it is more of a Bayesian, math processing. We aren't really even aware of why we do things, we don't control what we think about. So are we really 'conscious'? And how can we say an AI wouldn't reach at least the same level of 'processing'.