New Discovery

Doesn’t that support his position that you are not really making a choice?

But he says that he’s not making a choice.

That’s the point that he keeps repeating which seems to directly negate your ideas about choice, decision, responsibility, etc.

How can you cross that fence between you?

Yeah. I’m used to this.

You hammer on the same thing over and over. Then when someone addresses that consistent message, you shift entirely.

Of course, you could never not respond in this way. And you will always respond in this way until you don’t.

You can think of yourself as an actor with choices or you can think of yourself as a domino without choices.

Why pick one over the other? What are the advantages and disadvantages? Can you switch around from one to the other? Are you better off adopting one view?

You hit the nail on the head. It’s difficult when there are only one or two participants because it seems to shut off any further curiosity by others. It surprises me that there has been so little interest in this discovery.

Why pick one over the other? Because one is true and one isn’t. Of course, if you are pushed down like a domino and hit another person who also falls down, this is not what we are talking about. This falling down is not of your own volition because something is being done to you due to physics. Choice, although not free, does exist. We choose every single day of our lives. Can you think of a day where you don’t deliberate over options to decide which one is the most preferable in your eyes?

I don’t know if I can cross that fence between us because he defines determinism as being forced, by nature, to say, act, and do. He is just a domino with no autonomy or free will. I keep telling him that nothing (not heredity, background, nature, parents, or God himself) has the power to force a person to do what he does not want to do, for over this he has mathematical control. It is okay to say I was compelled, of my own free will, to do what I did if it means I did something of my own volition because this is what I desired. This does not mean will is free although many philosophers define free will in this way. When I bring this up he back peddles to include the fact that he does have a choice which is embedded in natural law. He vacillates back and forth on a whim saying one minute he is a domino with no choice, and the next minute he says he has a choice which would mean he has some kind of autonomy. This doesn’t jive either since someone can have autonomy (independence) and still be under the control of determinism.

Autonomous, if I am wrong about any of my interpretation, please correct me. I don’t want to state anything that is a misrepresentation.

I think that discussions of determinism and free-will have little value. You end up making the same decisions , using the same process, no matter what label you stick onto life. Nothing really changes.

Well, no. Both are maps used to navigate through life. Both are true in some ways and false in others. Both are simply tools which can be picked up, used and discarded.

You can think of yourself as not deciding anything … the universe is deciding. You can think of yourself as not even being here. If there is no ‘you’, then there is nobody making decisions.

You are 100% incorrect.

[i]Decline and Fall of All Evil

Since my discovery
would bring about the greatest change in all of history, it appeared
that this man would be willing to let me explain my findings. By
convincing him on the phone that it was now possible to put a
permanent end to all war as a result of my discovery, he agreed to
meet me on a Sunday afternoon in Washington, D.C. Our
conversation went as follows:

“I’m really not a scientist, Mr. Lessans, and in all probability you
should be talking to someone else. Your claims are absolutely
fantastic, but I want you to know that even though I wrote an article
about science, I am not a scientist. Besides, after you hung up I
became more skeptical of claims such as yours because they not only
sound impossible but somewhat ridiculous in view of man’s nature.
Frankly, I don’t believe your claims are possible, but I am willing to
listen if it doesn’t take too long and if I can see some truth to your
explanation; I do have another engagement but I can devote at least
one hour. Would you get right on with it?” I then told him the story
about the earth being flat and he smiled at this, and then told him
that a theory exists regarding man’s nature that is accepted as true by
98% of mankind, and I pointed out that this theory is actually
preventing the decline and fall of all evil because it has closed a door
to a vast storehouse of genuine knowledge.

“I will be as brief as possible, Mr. Johnston, but in order for me to
reveal my discovery it is absolutely necessary that I first show you its
hiding place because they are related to each other.”
“What is this theory?” he asked.

“You see, Mr. Johnston, most people believe consciously or
unconsciously that man’s will is free.”

“What’s that? Did I hear you correctly? Are you trying to tell me
that man’s will is not free?”

“That is absolutely right, Mr. Johnston. I don’t believe it; I know
this for a mathematical fact. My discovery lies locked behind the door
marked ‘Man’s Will is Not Free,’ just like the invariable laws of the
solar system were concealed behind the door marked ‘The Earth is
Round’ — until some upstart scientist opened it for a thorough
investigation.”

“I have always believed it to be free, but what difference does it
make what I think; the will of man is certainly not going to be
affected by my opinion, right?”

“That part is true enough (do you recall the comparison), but if
the will of man is definitely not free isn’t it obvious that just as long
as we think otherwise we will be prevented from discovering those
things that depend on this knowledge for their discovery,
consequently, it does make a difference. The opinion of our ancestors
that the earth was flat could never change its actual shape, but just as
long as the door marked ‘The Earth Is Round’ was never opened
thoroughly for an investigation by scientists capable of perceiving the
undeniable but involved relations hidden there, how were we ever to
discover the laws that allow us now to land men on the moon?”

“Your door was opened many times through the years by some of
the most profound thinkers and never did they come up with any
discoveries to change the world.”

“It is true that determinism was investigated by people who were
presumed profound thinkers, but in spite of their profoundness none
of them had the capacity to perceive the law that was hidden there.
Most people do not even know it is a theory since it is preached by
religion, government, even education as if it is an absolute fact.”

“Mr. Lessans, I don’t know what it is you think you have
discovered but whatever it is, as far as I personally am concerned, it
cannot be valid because I am convinced that man’s will is free. Thank
you very much for coming out but I’m not interested in discussing
this matter any further.” And he would not let me continue.
[/i]

We can deny anything or believe anything. We can even believe we’re worms thinking we’re people. There has to be a solid basis of communication or there’s no way a sensible discussion can take place.

One needs to understand the other person’s POV in order to communicate or discuss effectively.

That’s certainly possible.

I hope you keep an open mind. That’s all I am hoping for. If not, I will move on because there seems to be very little interest. It’s okay to be skeptical, but to think that there is nothing more to be discovered is a killer of new knowledge.

Again, there’s my bottom line here and yours.

Mine: how we define determinism in a wholly determined universe is how we could only ever have defined it. Just as any gap between how we define it and the way it really is reflects nature’s way.

Yours: that I’m still trying to grapple with.

From my perspective: There you go again!

We were never really free not to have been through this. But somehow the natural fact of it is still the embodiment of my flaw and not yours.

Now, I’m not arguing that we are either free or not free. I’m merely pointing out that here and now I don’t have access to either an argument or a demonstration that convinces me one way or the other. Why? Because, like you, I don’t have access to a complete understanding of existence itself.

So, everything that we do is necessarily in sync with nature’s way. But, unlike dominos, we “choose” to be in sync with nature. Even though that “choice” must in turn be subsumed in everything.

And how would the “definition that you are using” – “choosing” – not also be subsumed in everything?

The laws of nature would compel particular brains to define determinism “normally”. Just as the laws of nature compel my brain not to. Just as how your brain defines an “accurate” definition of determinism is compelled by whatever set into motion the laws of nature.

My brain is wholly determined by the laws of matter. And that would seem to include my brain ignoring your important adjunct. My brain cannot freely choose to lead the horse to water. The horse’s brain cannot freely choose to drink the water.

Instead, nature unfolds such that I was never not able to lead it to water and it was never not able to drink or not drink it. Only the horse’s brain is not able to reconfigure its “choice” into a philosophical quandary like mine “chooses” to.

If you could never not say that 2 + 2 = 5, and someone else could never not correct you, and you could never not have appreciated it…

We’re just stuck here. I am still – necessarily – at a loss regarding your own – necessary – rendition of determinism defined.

Nor does it take away the fact that any correction that is made was only ever going to be.

And the only reason I was not able to understand how you are using the term “responsibility” was because I was never able to understand it. Nature had other plans. Plans that are reflected only in her immutable laws. Laws that we still have no complete understanding of.

In either context, what this person knows is a natural fact.

Thus:

That is how I would put it. We veer or do not veer because we must. We want or do not want to injure someone because we must. The consequences are what they are because that is quite simply nature’s way.

Nothing at all that unfolds is other than as nature compelled it to.

Bingo. If I could allow you to show me…". But: however I want to sustain what I construe to be my greater satisfaction here is all at one with nature itself.

Then back to you concuring with me…

There is no final analysis here other than that which is necessarily in sync with nature unfolding as it must. “I” am just along for the ride.

Again, from my own necessary frame of mind you have yet to demonstrate to me that this “knowledge” is anything other than an argument – a world of words – wholly in sync with the internal logic of its own assumptions. Not only am I compelled to “choose” not to read it but I am compelled in turn to note that your own assumptions regarding “peace and brotherhood” in the future are just existential contraptions, rooted in dasein and conflicting goods. And, as well, in the assumption that we do have some measure of autonomy in choosing to understand them as we do.

I think of myself as unable to determine [conclusively] what I ought to think of myself as here. If my “I” is but an adjunct of my brain is but an adjunct of the laws of nature then these very words that I am “choosing” to type here and now I was never able not to type here and now.

Only my attempts to wrap my head around that are in turn wholly in sync with nature. Or there is some aspect of “I” as “mind” which is somehow able to transcend the laws of nature in a “dualistic” universe where [either through God or No God] “I” am [up to a point] able to choose certain things of my own volition.

Either because I pick only that which I could never have not picked or, given some degree of autonomy, I pick that which here and now seems more reasonable.

And being better off depends on my own existential understanding of a particular situation construed subjectively from the perspective of “I” as dasein.

It’s not a flaw to say determinism in a wholly determined universe is how we could only ever be (let’s leave the definition out for a second). But the problem is you keep repeating it, as if I am denying this fact.

It is not a prerequisite to be all knowing. What you are implying is that we will never know the truth of our nature because no one can ever get close to understanding the meaning of existence itself.

Nothing. We are all obeying the law of greater satisfaction when meaningful differences between two or more alternatives are compared.

We don’t choose to be in sync with nature, as if we have a choice not to be in sync. We can’t help but be in sync with nature. It’s beyond our control.

It is. I am only clarifying two things. One, we are always moving in the direction that pushes us away from a dissatisfying position to a more satisfying position every single moment of our lives. This means we can’t choose what we, not others, believe is worse for ourselves when something better, in our eyes, is offered as an alternative. Two, nothing but nothing can force us to do anything against our will, or without our consent, not nature, not God, not anything therefore it is incorrect to say “I was made to do something against my will” because nothing has the power to do that.

That’s true, your brain is compelled to define determinism one way, and mine another, but they are not that different in the most important sense (i.e., could not do otherwise) and do not have to create a stumbling block.

The horse’s brain can’t freely choose to drink the water, but he also can’t freely choose not to drink the water. The only adjunct is that the horse can’t be forced to drink the water (barring being forced physically by being held down, which is not what I’m referring to) if he doesn’t want to. There is nothing inconsistent here.

That is true. Life moves in one direction only (toward greater satisfaction even if it’s just scratching an itch), which is why no living creature has a free choice.

Nothing could not be as it is. I was only saying that most people, when shown they are incorrect about something will want to know how to correct their mistake. Their desire to fix their error would give them greater satisfaction than not fixing it.

No one is disputing this.

We do have an understanding of determinism. We don’t have to have a complete understanding of all of nature’s immutable laws to understand some of nature’s immutable laws. Determinism, the way it’s accurately defined, is one of them. What lies beyond this understanding is fantastic because it has the power to prevent war, crime and poverty on a global scale.

Regardless of what a person believes regarding nature’s purpose, the cars piling up and the human brains that brought this situation (apart from dominoes crashing where there is no choice whatsoever) will be prevented from coming into existence as part of the “unfolding as they must” deterministic process.

True, and as we understand how to prevent conflict and create cooperation, this unfolding is also nothing other than as nature compels it to be. Today, some want to injure as they must. Tomorrow, they will be compelled to not injure as they must. Same nature, but veering in a different direction as it must.

I’m having difficulty with this because what you are saying in so many words is back to having no choice because nature (as if nature is something other than ourselves) is forcing our choices. Obviously, the future is a continuation of antecedent events, our heredity, and our experiences.

We are just along for the ride but we do play a part in how nature unfolds. None of the unfolding “as it must” is of our own free will but that does not mean we simply do nothing, nor does it mean we don’t find great satisfaction in finding a sense of purpose based on our talents and what we’re called to do.

There are no assumptions here, and this is not logic.

Man has the ability to think, to create, to observe, and to discover. Call it autonomy if you like. The label you give it doesn’t matter. It’s the reality behind the label that counts. I’m not sure why you call the claim that peace and brotherhood are within our reach, just assumptions. You have no basis for this comment other than your opinion and your belief that peace is impossible. You are dead wrong.

No, the problem is that, given my own understanding of determinism, I can never not keep repeating it as long as repeating it is wholly in sync with the laws of matter.

So “flaws” are merely built right into this exchange. Whereas in an autonomous universe flaws result from you and I having the actual capacity to get something right…but one of us still keeps getting it wrong.

I’m merely pointing out the obvious: That, here and now, neither you nor I can connect the dots between the truth about determinism and the manner in which cause and effect itself is wholly explanable given a complete understanding of existence.

Then the part about the future here is either going to be what it could only ever be or [somehow] human brains/minds have the inherent capacity to shape that future one way rather than another.

Then it is back to be rephrasing that and you being entirely in agreement:

As though our “greater satisfaction” is not in turn a necessary aspect of nature unfolding like clockwork – with or without a clockmaker.

It’s “beyond our control” to be in sync with nature. We “can’t help it”. But somehow that’s not the same as a domino being in sync with it because dominos can’t “choose” to be.

If there are stumbling blocks how are they not entirely of nature’s making? Again, they are not stumbling blocks in the manner in which autonomous human beings view them. Why? Because autonomous human beings are able to actually get around them of their own volition. They accomplish this, whereas entirely determined men and women merely “accomplish” it.

Hmm. That sounds familiar. Just as the points I raise sound familiar to you. So, the “stumbling block” here is either within our capacity to move beyond or it’s not. Meaning that if one of us does make a breakthrough and the other finally “sees the light” it was only because that was always going to be the case.

Nature prevails! Again!!

If determinism is embedded in that which explains a complete understanding of all of nature’s immutable laws, how can we have a complete understanding of one without a complete understanding of the other? That makes no sense.

Here I keep coming back to this:

It turns out that roughly 68% of the universe is dark energy. Dark matter makes up about 27%. The rest - everything on Earth, everything ever observed with all of our instruments, all normal matter - adds up to less than 5% of the universe.

This continues to boggle my mind. All this stuff about “free will” in a universe where the “immutable laws of matter” relect less than 5% of the universe.

Or the multiverse?

Sure, shrug that part off. That’s what all folks who have these grand understandings of all things do, in my view.

For example:

From my frame of mind, it is the believing in things like this itself that propels you into the future. A whole new progressive world if only others would grasp the author’s points. Or, perhaps: If only others could grasp his points. In a world where nature and nature alone decides these things. Ultimately.

How we both agree and disagree about the very same things! That’s what fascinates me. In many ways, you reflect what I imagine a wholly determined universe is. But then we imagine the consequences of it in very different ways.

The future is as it must be but it must be more progressive if nature compells enough people to read the author’s book. This makes sense to you in a way that does not to me. I’m not saying that you are wrong, only that I still have no capacity [autonomous or not] to grasp it here and now.

Thus:

I’m not arguing that men and women here on earth don’t choose behaviors that propel the future in one or another direction, only that in a determined universe as I understand it here and now, they have no option, no capacity to actually choose anything other than what nature’s laws compel them to “choose”. At least in our 5% of the universe.

From my frame of mind, to say that human beings have the capacity to think, to create, to observe, and to discover is merely to acknowledge that you were compelled to think, feel and say that here and now. And that, in turn, how I and others react to it is no less compelled by the laws of nature. And that whatever I call it I was never able to not call it. And thus the “basis” for all of this is determinism.

And I’m not saying that peace is impossible. I am merely pointing out that it will be predicated on those who have the capacity to enforce particular sets of behaviors in particular contexts.

Hitler might have conquered the world way back when and the world war would have been over. Peace would prevail.

Not what some would call a “progressive” peace, but peace none the less.

But in an autonomous universe we would at least have the capacity to judge that peace from conflicting moral and political narratives. Whereas in a wholly determined universe Hitler was no more flawed in his thinking than those who fought against him.

The Holocaust simple was what it could only ever have been.

And it is the implications of this that [I would imagine] most deeply disturb the free will folks among us.

duplicate

you probably ought to stop reading that book, peacegirl, because if it’s responsible for putting into your head this confusing version of compatibalism that you seem to be espousing (without knowing it), you’re going to either a) remain in a state of confusion indefinitely, or b) hit yourself in the head once/if you finally understand how all this is nonsense, and curse yourself for the time you wasted.

what iambiguous is saying is nauseatingly simple to understand and i can’t imagine why you aren’t getting it. all these factors which you introduce as things free from causality, i.e., ‘desire for greater satisfaction’ or ‘desiring one choice over another’, are just as much subject to casually sufficient antecedent conditions as anything else in the universe. if determinism is true, NOTHING is ‘free’… not your desires, not your particular conditions for greater satisfaction, not your deciding one choice over another. everything going on in your brain is compelled to be in a particular state, a particular way, by the state of events that preceded it, and so on to infinity (or a first cause, if you want to go that route… but i wouldn’t).

so when you think to yourself ‘gosh i think i should choose x rather than y because it would lead to greater satisfaction’, you aren’t free to decide you would be more satisfied by choosing x. you have become conditioned to be more satisfied when x, and those forces that engendered in you the experience of satisfaction when x, were never under your control… much less a matter of you choice.

this book your are reading is pushing a compatibalist idea that was refuted a hundred years ago or more, and there is nothing new or groundbreaking in it, i can promise you (without even reading it).

a much more interesting subject would be a politically oriented discussion about what would happen, and how it would happen, if the doctrine of determinism were literally taught in schools and became as commonplace as the belief in gravity. that’s what would catch my eye; the nervous fervor of the world that would result from the official abolition of the belief in freewill. i’d buy a ticket for that event in a minute. imagine the mayhem that would ensue (hopefully). it’d be the kind of monumental paradigm shift that would literally shake civilization. something that would force radical political changes or usher in a return to barbarism. in either case, we’d finally get some action worthy of attention.

let’s assume a ‘type physicalism’ approach to the matter of volition. all mental events are correlated to physical events in the brain. this is a common sense empirically sound position, but there’s problems with it. one of which is the question; do physical events in the brain cause mental events, or are they merely contiguous to them (we ask this because of hume, the inglorious bastard with his induction fallacy). if we supposed they were only contiguous (or parallel), we’d have to replace one kind of causality with another since we’d still have to explain what ‘made’ the mental event happen.

hold that question for a moment and look at the model we now have. we are postulating two kinds of ontologically distinct substances; one is the physical world, and the other is… whatever human ‘agency’ is made of. each distinct substance would be operating by its own kind of causality… but these two kinds of causality couldn’t ever intersect, couldn’t ever affect each other. we have a ball that gets put into motion by physical force x, and we have a human being that is put into motion by ‘agency’ force x (that somehow mysteriously ‘touches’ the brain to make a mental event occur which then causes you to raise your arm). even though there are two different forces working here, there are still forces operating… so whatever compels the ‘agency’ force to happen is just another kind of causality. in that case, the ‘agency’ isn’t free either… even though it isn’t affected by the physical causality operating in the world.

see what’s just happened? we’ve found a problem with emergent materialism regarding the nature of the causality through/by which the ‘agency’ acts. so even when we don’t reduce mental events to effects of physical events, we still have to explain how the mental events come about, as well as the mysterious causal connection the mental event has with the physical substance of the brain.

because of hume, we can’t logically deduce that causality is happening (one event follows another, that’s it. doesn’t mean one ‘caused’ the other). okay fuck it. we’ll let hume have that one. but now watch what happens when you take the indeterminist position; every single event that occurs, occurs spontaneously and without being conditioned by anything else. but here’s the kicker. it keeps on happening like this. it’d be one thing to say a finite set of spontaneous events occurred and then stopped… but quite another to watch a series of indeterminate events occur over and over and over again. something must be causing this series to occur, and the cause can’t be from any of the individual things happening. it’d be a cause that oversees the entire system of indeterminate events.

does hume really want to take this position? i doubt it. so i think kant’s synthetic a priori category of causality is the best we can do. we can’t ‘experience’ causality, but at the same time, if it isn’t real, we’ve got a whole nuther set of conceptual antinomies to contend with. so we logically infer kant’s synthetic a priori category of causality to avoid this mess.

so we’re back at type-physicalism because now we can logically infer that physical events cause mental events. now we’ve got to ask; are mental events epiphenomena? that is, can mental events cause physical events. wait… that’s a trick question. remember, we just concluded that there aren’t mental events, only physical events, a certain type of which we call ‘mental’ events. so then this is a non-problem at this point.

all that’s left to do is explain how freewill is impossible in the model we are using now. we know that all mental events (thoughts, feelings, notions, whatever) follow physical events in the brain. we might as well say ‘are caused by’ so we don’t get caught up in that indeterminist problem pointed out earlier. well then it’s simple. ionized potassium particles travel along an axon and charge an action potential in a dendrite that either fires and produces a muscle contraction, or not… and you don’t ‘choose’ whether or not it will. if it does fire, you raise your arm and think ‘hey i just chose to do this’, and that mental event is also part of the set of physical events that involved the action potential that resulted in the raised arm.

nothing is random here, nothing is indeterminate, nothing is free.

That’s where you’re confused. You can stop repeating it as long as you want to stop repeating it, in the direction of greater satisfaction. It is giving you greater satisfaction to say the same thing over and over. You are using this as an excuse by saying the repetitiveness of your posts has already been embedded with the laws of matter, preventing you from making another choice. This is false.

You are incorrect. You and me may not be able to communicate, but that does not mean the truth of determinism cannot be understood. I maintain that this concept is not only wholly explainable but extremely significant.

We have the inherent capacity to shape the future because we are able to analyze, compute, and develop our world, but this capacity is not free since we can only move in one direction.

We are part of nature and its laws. We cannot escape from it, which is why will is not free. But that does not mean it is correct to say we were caused, for example, to shoot someone since nothing has the power to make us do this without our permission, or desire.

[i]The fact that will is not
free demonstrates that man, as part of nature or God, has been
unconsciously developing at a mathematical rate and during every
moment of his progress was doing what he had to do because he had
no free choice. But this does not mean that he was caused to do
anything against his will, for the word cause, like choice and past, is
very misleading as it implies that something other than man himself
is responsible for his actions. Four is not caused by two plus two, it
is that already. As long as history has been recorded, these two
opposing principles were never reconciled until now. The amazing
thing is that this ignorance, this conflict of ideas, ideologies, and
desires, theology’s promulgation of free will, the millions that
criticized determinism as fallacious, was exactly as it was supposed to
be. It was impossible for man to have acted differently because the
mankind system is obeying this invariable law of satisfaction which
makes the motions of all life just as harmonious as the solar system;
but these systems are not caused by, they are these laws.

“Can you clarify this a little bit more?”

“Certainly. In other words, no one is compelling a person to work
at a job he doesn’t like or remain in a country against his will. He
actually wants to do the very things he dislikes simply because the
alternative is considered worse and he must choose something to do
among the various things in his environment, or else commit suicide.
Was it humanly possible to make Gandhi and his followers do what
they did not want to do when unafraid of death which was judged,
according to their circumstances, the lesser of two evils? Therefore,
when any person says he was compelled to do what he did against his
will, that he didn’t want to but had to — and innumerable of our
expressions say this — he is obviously confused and unconsciously
dishonest with himself and others because everything man does to
another is done only because he wants to do it, done to be humorous,
of his own free will, which only means that his preference gave him
greater satisfaction at that moment of time, for one reason or
another; but remember, this desire of one thing over another is a
compulsion beyond control for which he cannot be blamed. All I am
doing is clarifying your terms so that you are not confused, but make
sure you understand this mathematical difference before proceeding
further.”
[/i]

That’s what I just said. We can’t help but move in the direction of greater satisfaction which is why our choices are beyond our control.

The end result is the same (we have no free will), but you can’t use the excuse that nature forced a choice on you like a domino falling down with no will of its own. IOW, a person can’t say he shot someone since his choice was wholly embedded. Only looking back in hindsight can a person say he had no choice, not before.

They are of nature’s making. I am just pointing out that this stumbling block is causing problems because you don’t seem interested in any other definition but the conventional one, which is causing a lack of understanding. I will repeat: Once you make a choice, it could not have been otherwise, but nothing has the power (not nature, not God, not your mother, not your father) to force a choice on you, therefore you cannot say that nature caused someone to rob a bank. He robbed a bank because he wanted to; it gave him greater satisfaction under his circumstances. This is an important distinction which you won’t understand until it is explained.

We cannot separate ourselves from the laws of our nature. There is no way we can escape our heredity, environment, experiences, predispositions, life circumstances, where we were born, our culture, etc. which in turn influence our choices each and every moment of time. But you cannot say that these things “caused” you to make a choice. They created the conditions that led you to desiring one choice over another.

Obviously!

As it always has! :slight_smile:

You’re right, it makes no sense. Who in the world said that determinism is that which explains a complete understanding of "all of nature’s immutable laws? It is true that the universe is not a free for all, but again the understanding of what this means in terms of our nature does not mean we are not free to choose that which we want, not what nature (as you place it) demands or forces upon us.

I’m not shrugging it off; I just don’t know how it negates what has been observed on planet Earth, which to me is more important than any other theory about multiverses or life on other planets, or even what the universe is made of. You’re throwing in everything but the kitchen sink.

We decide things. Nature is what we are a part of. Please stop separating nature from our ability to choose, as if it’s a separate entity that we have no say in.

Nature meaning ourselves. Nature unfolds the way it is compelled to, which only means our choices unfold in the direction of greater satisfaction, which is nature unfolding as it must.

The consequences are part of the stream of nature’s law, but due to the fact that we are not dominoes, we can change our course and still be subjected to nature’s law. I don’t quite understand what you disagree with.

It’s very simple. It is what it is. People will move in the direction of interest or they won’t, all in keeping with deterministic law. Nature cannot compel you to read the book anymore than Gandhi could have chosen to give up his fight for freedom. :-k

That is true iambiguous, but we are not dominoes that have no choice. It seems like you close your ears to anything I’m saying and you revert right back to the same refrain over and over and over and over and over and over and over again. The repetition doesn’t change the fact that we get to choose, although our choice is never free.

That is true but why keep repeating it? You’re preaching to the choir.

I get that. It’s not a matter of being flawed in the deepest sense knowing that the Holocaust had to occur based on the
sign of the times. The world was ripe for such a happening. Hitler has now become a symbol for evil. The truth is that he
could not have chosen any differently than what he did. The author of Decline and Fall of All Evil was a Jew yet he was
quite clear in his understanding that Hitler and his philosophy of hatred against the Jews was based on his
ability to find a scapegoat.

[i] The same nature that permits the most heinous crimes, and
all the other evils of human relation, is going to veer so sharply in a
different direction that all nations on this planet, once the leaders and
their subordinates understand the principles involved, will unite in
such a way that no more wars will ever again be possible. If this is
difficult to conceive, does it mean you have a desire to dismiss what
I have to say as nonsense? If it does, then you have done what I tried
to prevent, that is, jumped to a premature conclusion. And the
reason must be that you judged such a permanent solution as
impossible and therefore not deserving of further consideration, which
is a normal reaction, if anything, when my claims are analyzed and
compared to our present understanding of human nature. War seems
to be an inescapable feature of the human condition which can only
be subdued, not eradicated. But we must insert a question mark
between the empirical fact that a feature is characteristic of human
life as we know it, and the empirical claim that this feature is a
sociological inevitability. Another reason that war is viewed as an
unfortunate and intractable aspect of human existence is due to
suffering itself, which sadly robs its victims of the ability to dream or
have the breadth of vision to even contemplate the possibility of peace.
The evil in the world has so constricted man’s imagination that his
mind has become hardened, and he shows contempt for anyone who
dares to offer a solution because such claims appear ludicrous and
unfounded.

[/i]