alt Hacker NewsI personally think debating whether or not we have free will is the most onanistic thing one can do in philosophy, since if one of the two sides is correct, then the result of the debate is predetermined.
That being said, this article seems to advance the theory that even the most simple single-celled organisms have more agency than any algorithm, at least partly due to their complexity. This, to me, seems to significantly underestimate the complexity of modern learning-models, which (had we not designed them) would be as opaque to us as many single-celled organisms.
I see nothing in this article that would distinguish biological organisms from any other self-replicating, evolving machine, even one that is faithfully executing straightforward algorithms. Nor does this seem to present any significant argument against the concept that biological organisms are self-replicating evolving machines that are faithfully executing straightforward algorithms.
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> This, to me, seems to significantly underestimate the complexity of modern learning-models
One general impression I have, having read the reactions by biologists to stuff like Kurzweil and people who believe we're close to a computational understanding of biology is that all the computer science people massively, MASSIVELY underestimate the extent to which we still do not understand how even a single cell works.
Sure, we can model things stochastically, or fiddle with DNA and be able to predict the results, but there's a bunch of stuff in the middle that we only have a functional understanding of. We know with <xxx> input, you get <yyy>, etc..., but the how is still a mystery.
This is everywhere in biology.
If you think biologists are underestimating complexity, you have the sign wrong.
I agree with most of what you said. However it is not correct to say they are executing algorithms, just as it is not correct to say that a water fountain is executing an algorithm.
> debating whether or not we have free will
Free will is an abstraction. It's not something that's concrete enough to say it does or doesn't exist, but a tool for reasoning about certain systems that are to much of a pain to fully calculate.