About this title: FREEDOM EVOLVES charts the compatibility that can exist between free will and determinism. Dennett, author of CONSCIOUSNESS EXPLAINED and DARWIN'S DANGEROUS IDEA, continues his philosophical inquiry into the workings of the mind and how it negotiates the realms of choice and scientific necessity.
Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Edition: Illustrated.
Binding: Hardback
Publisher: Viking
Date published: 2003
ISBN-13:9780670031863ISBN:0670031860
Description: Bargain Price New Book. SubTitle/Content: [Can freedom & free will evolve in a deterministic world? Draws on evolutionary biology, cognitive neuroscience, economics & philosophy] 2003, 347pp. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: PENGUIN BOOKS LTD Country = UNITED KINGDOM
Date published: 2004
ISBN-13:9780140283891ISBN:0140283897
Description: BRAND NEW PAPERBACK. 368 pages. (368 pages) shows that human freedom is not an illusion; it is an objective phenomenon, distinct from all other biological conditions and found in only one species-us. (Paperback) read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Allen Lane, London
Date published: 2003
ISBN-13:9780713993394ISBN:0713993391
Description: Very Good + in Very Good + jacket. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. 346pp. B/W charts and graphs. Very good plus-sl. bumping to boards at spine ends with no visible detraction to interior; d/j-some sl. edge creasing and sl. surface marking. read more
Edition: 1st Edition.
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Viking: New York
Date published: 2003
ISBN-13:9780670031863ISBN:0670031860
Description: Description: xiii, 347 p. : ill.; 25 cm. Subjects: Free will and determinism--Decision making. Fine cloth copy in an equally fine dw, now mylar-sleeved. Particularly and surprisingly well-preserved; tight, bright, clean and especially sharp-cornered. Literally as new. 1. pp. 347. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: ALLEN LANE
Date published: 2003
ISBN-13:9780713993394ISBN:0713993391
Description: Ex-Library Published by Allen Lane in 2003. Dust jacket. Number of pages: 368. Condition: Very Good. May show some slight signs of wear. Ex-library book (usual stamps and marks). Shipped from UK. Delivery is usually 2-3 working days from order by Royal Mail, International Delivery is by Airmail. read more
Description: New. Please note that deliveries to addresses in the UK and Europe will be in 4-14 business days. Other countries should refer to Alibris standard times. Daniel Dennett shows that human freedom is not an illusion; it is an objective phenomenon, distinct from all other biological conditions and found in only one species-us. He argues that it is only recently that science has advanced to the point where we can see how we came to have our freedom. ISBN10: 0140283897. read more
Description: New. PLEASE NOTE: All books are promptly shipped from our UK warehouse using Royal Mail or DHL. International Priority mail for non-UK deliveries. Delivery is typically 2-4 working days for UK delivery. Heavier or more expensive books are shipped with a TRACKING NUMBER. Professional and reliable bookseller (est.1987). read more
Edition: Illustrated.
Publisher: Viking Books
Date published: 2003
ISBN-13:9780670031863ISBN:0670031860
Description: Good. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Dennett, Daniel C., Viking, 2003, c2003, 1st Edition, 1st printing, boards & cloth (hard cover), remainder mark on bottom edge o/w near fine with near fine dj, 347 pp with bibliography & index, tall 8vo, ISBN: 0670031860, 'Drawing on evolutionary biology, cognitive neuroscience, economics, and philosophy, he demonstrates that if we accept Darwin's reasoning, we can build from the simplest life forms all the way up to the best and deepest thoughts on questions of morality and meaning, ethics and ... read more
Description: Very good. No dust jacket as issued. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 368 p. Contains: Illustrations. Audience: General/trade. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics)
Date published: 2004
ISBN-13:9780142003848ISBN:0142003840
Description: Good. Books have varying amounts of wear and highlighting. Usually ships within 24 hours in quality packaging. Satisfaction guaranteed. read more
Binding: Trade paperback
Publisher: Penguin Books
Date published: 2004
ISBN-13:9780142003848ISBN:0142003840
Description: Good. No dust jacket as issued. Uncreased and unmarked with small tear on cover from sticker removal. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 368 p. Contains: Illustrations. Audience: General/trade. Ships from US-NE. Support Independent Booksellers! Omahabooks offers same or next day shipping-satisfaction guaranteed. Priority, Expedited, APO, International may require additional postage-contact seller. read more
Edition: First Edition
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Viking Press, New York, New York, U.S.A.
Date published: 2003
ISBN-13:9780670031863ISBN:0670031860
Description: Near Fine in Very Good jacket. Philosophy. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. What kinds of freedom have evolved since the origin of life? The author discusses them at length. This book is in near fine condition and appears unread. There is a name and year written at the top of the first page. The dust jacket is in very good condition with just a little wear along the edges. The jacket is not price clipped and is in new clear protective covering. read more
"Dennett's virtue is that he looks at human behavior from an evolutionary perspective. His downside is his preoccupation with human choice as conscious, rational activity, ignoring the power that comes from millions of years of our animal past that guides choice. He looks at (freedom of) choice as "I want to do X" but not at the more relevant question, "why does one want to do X." The relevance of this type of re-formulation is that Dennett sees the future lying in our hands as rational animals, "reasoning together." That's one-half of our future. The other half is not trusting that reason alone is sufficient to preserve the social order. Dennett's title evokes promise but in the end he says little about freedom's evolution and why it occurred. He leaps from animals to man, saying we have it (freedom) and animals do not. Most know that. Dennett's other downside is that he goes over well-known ground, repeating what he and so many others have said before. It would be nice to see him new lines of thought."
"I was interested in this book because of the hypocritical inconsistency exhibited by many secular types who, reasonably enough, deny the existence of "God" but bristle at the prospect that we all live in a completely determined universe. They (and I include myself here) reflexively feel that while science rightly treats the entirety of the natural world as subject to the same universal (deterministic) laws, they must preserve an idea of human free will as an exception to the laws of physics, in exactly the same way that theists allow for intervention by "God". As Dennett puts it, this indeterminism insists that human beings are little godlets, or miracle workers, able to defy the otherwise universal laws of physics. Dennett understands that we want to believe that we are always "able to choose otherwise" in a given situation because, if we're not, there seems to be no basis for moral responsibility: praise and blame only make sense in relation to free choices, and why care about anything if we can never deserve praise or blame for whatever good or bad we do? His thesis, in short, is that it is unnecessary to invoke miraculous powers to solve this apparent problem. Thanks to natural selection, humans have more freedom than has ever existed in the history of the universe. Although this freedom is not exempt from the physical laws governing every particle in the universe, and is hence determined, it is only determined in the same sense that a coin toss is determined. That is to say our choices are determined by so many intervening variables that no observer can possibly know their outcomes. Dennett's view is that in the important sense of everyday life, humans make free choices. The key distinction here is between the physical level, the fundamental variables that determine the outcome of the coin toss, versus the design level, what agents are actually able to observe and experience. The latter is what matters to all of us, and the observable operation and evolution of freedom on that level--in our everyday experience--gives us a sufficient (Dennett argues, more well-founded) basis for moral responsibility.
All of this makes pretty good sense to me, despite my ingrained aversion to determinism. My only problem with Dennett, and I am still mulling whether I think it taints his whole philosophical outlook, is that he is utterly uncritical of his own implicit mainstream views of technological progress (which he presumes even now to be an inevitable, unstoppable impulse of human culture) and the state (which he presumes to be the only solution to organizing human society). He reaffirms these positions in his pejorative use of the terms "anarchy" and "Luddites" and in his praise of "civilization". "Science" is his main affinity, and those very institutions are prerequisite for its existence. It should not be a surprise then that they aren't in question here. What remains to be answered for me is, what is the benefit of a scientific deterministic worldview when we have concluded that the state system and the technological progress that created it (and that it demonstrably perpetuates in return) were not, are not, and cannot be desirable? Early in the book, (with none of his characteristic well-reasoned argument) Dennett parodies postmodern critics of science who characterize it as "just another in a long line of myths". But he proves himself, disappointingly, to be an equally simple-minded partisan of "science"; he sees history and the future going in only one direction, that of more elaborate guns, memes, and steel for which our "freedom" is evolving to help us to be prepared. The book leaves me more worried about the possibilities of a future with more science than about the question of my own free will. Personally, I hope that imperialistic science eventually becomes a detour, albeit an informative one, from which a freer, wiser humanity was able to return, instead of the dead end of absolute control which is its inexorable instinct."
"Quite the interesting discussion of the problem of free will which brings neuropsychology into the usual philosophical discussion. At the end of the day, Dennett's vote is "yes" and/or "it doesn't matter" since we act as if free will exists."
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