Determinism

More from our tireless wordmeister…

The idea of free will. And that’s always his point. Ideas are ever and always a bundle of words that define and defend other words.

And here he uses words to “prove” that the determinists [religious or secular] are wrong to claim that human interactions are preordained by the laws of matter. All they really do is trick us into believing it is by insisting it’s determinism all the way down.

Instead, his own autonomous brain is presumed to be in possession of the ultimate “will to power”. He is able to grasp nature itself. His own rendition of genes and memes trumps any and all renditions from others.

How does he demonstrate this?

Well, up in the clouds of abstraction. He invariably wallows in the sort of “general description” arguments and assessments that make his ilk so utterly irrelevant regarding how all of this scholastic, academic stuff plays out in the world that we actually live in.

So, how does accomplish that? Of course: he merely “argues” it to be true.

I challenge anyone here to reconfigure this particularly godawful intellectual contraption into an argument that bares at least some resemblance to the actual choices that flesh and blood human beings make in to course of interacting with others from day to day.

On this thread, however, it’s not a question of whether freedom is absolute, but whether it can finally be demonstrated once and for all that the human brain allows for actual freedom at all.

^ a great example of one of the many ways philosophers use the word ‘absolute’ in abstract statements which can demonstrate nothing, and certainly don’t disqualify the meaning of ‘absolute’ in the many ways we use the word unphilosophically.

ever read the wiki article on: the philosophical meaning of the word ‘absolute’? these knuckleheads can’t even agree with each other… neither the philosophers arguing for, or against it. so if there is clearly a problem with what this word means, why can’t they agree on what that problem is? maybe because there is no problem?

“Philosophers constantly see the method of science before their eyes, and they are irresistibly tempted to ask and answer questions in the way science does. This tendency is the real source of metaphysics, and leads the philosopher into complete darkness.” - wittgenstein

okay, let’s take for granted what’s said in that quote above. would i be wrong to say it is absolutely the case that things are changeable, divisible, and pluralistic? such a use of the word ‘absolute’ would not be nonsensical, and nothing has changed about its meaning… only the things that are meant with its use. the question then is not ‘is the concept of ‘absolute’ meaningless’, but rather ‘where can the word be used meaningfully as a matter of fact, and without any conceptual difficulty.’

‘this cake is absolutely delicious!’

philosopher: ‘stop! not only is that cake changing as you chew it, but the ionized potassium particles that cause the dendrites to fire, creating the sensation of ‘good taste’, are also undergoing entropic change, so the resulting qualia of ‘good taste’ isn’t the same as it was a moment ago. in fact, the cake is now not absolutely delicious, and you’re an insufferable liar! and that’s not to mention the fact that because it’s logically possible for the cake to taste better than it does, it can’t ever be absolutely delicious, you imbecile!’

‘but i… i was just enjoying the cake, man. jesus christ.’

“The essential thing about metaphysics is that it blurs the distinction between factual and conceptual investigations.” - wittgenstein

and yet if you approach a philosopher with this insight, he’ll charge you with playing word-games. lol! unbeknownst to him, he is so completely submerged in a word-game that he is unable to recognize anything but word-games.

A Compatibilism / Incompatibilism Transformation
By Trick Slattery
From the “Breaking the Free Will Illusion” web site

This is just an example of how far down these discussions can go in introducing complex elements into the debate that can only really be understood to the extent that everyone is in sync regarding what the words themselves mean.

To date no one is able to bring a good reductionist and a greedy reductionist into the lab, perform a set of experiments with/on them, and demonstrate why one rather than the other is closer to the whole truth regarding determinism and free will.

Besides, why can’t it simply be argued that whatever you consider yourself to be here in regard to “reductionism”, it is only that which nature compelled your brain matter to espouse?

If everything does reduce down to brain matter wholly in sync with the inexorable march of nature into a necessary future nothing noted in discussions like this changes that.

Thus “cranes” and “skyhooks” were “destined” to become a part of our universe going all the way back to whatever set in motion the laws of matter themselves.

We just [still] have no idea what the hell that could possibly have been.

mm-hm. the further you stray from a rudimentary language into philosophy, the greater is the demand that you structure a logically perfect language to avoid this very problem. the analytical philosophers and logical positivists tried this by identifying axiomatic sets of atomic propositions (i have no idea what that means but i kinda do) from which all complex propositions are built. they failed. well wittgenstein failed, revoked his own tractatus, and replaced it with the theory of language games. now check this out. if, and this is a very big IF, language cannot be reducible to, and founded on, a set of stable and unconditional rules, philosophy cannot produce a body of doctrine, and can only be an activity.

‘i distrust all systematizers. the will to a system is a lack of integrity (to integrate)’ - N

in addition to this rather inconvenient fact for patrons of the sesquipedalian arts, they’ve got derrida’s concept of ‘deferral’ to contend with now, too. not to mention the metaphorical origins of the logocentric concepts in the philosophical discourse (i have no idea what that means, either).

needless to say philosophy is in a bad way today, hombre. it’s been on its last leg for like a hundred years now, and still the last two generations kept pumping out philosophers like there was anything left to be said. nothing new has been said though… and worse, what was said badly by philosopher of old was said even worse by philosophers of new. yeah i know. it doesn’t sound possible, but it happened, and is still happening at a forum near you.

there’s only one kind of sage who has remained steadfast in this swirling maelstrom of nonsense, biggs, and that’s the epistemological nihilist. fist bump

separate morality from free will
by Phil Goetz
at the lesswrong website

This sort of thinking continues to baffle me. In order to confront “the already-difficult-enough problem of what actions and values are moral”, we would first have to determine if the confrontation itself is embedded in at least some measure of autonomy. Otherwise we will never really know if that which we do “choose” to confront is not only that which we were never able not to choose to confront.

So, I might suggest here that we can only take a subjective leap to autonomy. But: never really knowing if I was never able not to suggest that. Why? Because what I think is subjective here is but another necessary component of the objective reality embedded ever and always in matter unfolding only as it ever can and must and does.

First and foremost, I need a way to determine if “I” have any capacity to choose freely. Otherwise, I have no way in which to be certain that this very post is not but another inherent component of the very fabric of reality itself.

But only to the extent that it can be determined definitively that, of his own volition, Kant might have come to a different conclusion can we determine if Goetz in turn might have opted freely to argue the opposite.

Again, as though even our reaction to this may not be the only reaction that nature accords us.

Then it’s just going around and around in circles depending on which set of assumptions you either were or were not free to choose.

“Defending Free Will & The Self”
Frank S. Robinson in Philosophy Now magazine

So, the human brain evolves to be in sync with what matter had already evolved into before. But how to explain this “extra layer of cognition” going all the way back to the time when the universe is described by the folks at CERN by noting that…

“It took 380,000 years for electrons to be trapped in orbits around nuclei, forming the first atoms. These were mainly helium and hydrogen, which are still by far the most abundant elements in the universe. 1.6 million years later, gravity began to form stars and galaxies from clouds of gas.”

So, in a determined universe, we go from matter that is just electrons trapped in orbits around nuclei, to atoms, to mostly hydrogen and helium, to clouds of gas, to stars, to super novas exploding and producing all of the heavier elements that managed to become living matter that has evolved on planet earth into a species compelled to have this extra layer of cognition.

And this extra layer now includes a human psychology that, in having the capacity to choose among alternatives, is also able to delude itself into thinking that it can do this of its own free will.

What’s wrong with this picture? Or, more to the point, how do we demonstrate what’s right with it? Other than in the manner in which over time nature compels us to. If nature doesn’t compel us to destroy ourselves first. Or if nature doesn’t compel one or another aggregation of mindless matter to commence the next “extinction event” here on earth. One that this time includes us.

Freedom evolves. That’s a good way to put it. We just don’t know if it was ever able not to evolve as it did. Or to evolve as it did because we had an actual say in in choosing the direction.

But: Sans God there would be no advantages or disadvantages in the evolution of matter. That would imply some manifestation of teleology. Matter evolving one way rather than another in order to achieve some purpose or a goal.

From my frame of mind, it seems that compatibilism was compelled by nature [re human psychology] because this extra layer of cognition allows “I” to make that crucial peacegirlian distinction between participating in the evolution of matter in a way that mindless matters [like dominoes] cannot. Even though nothing at all could or would ever be other than what it must be.

After all, it’s not like Mother Nature actually does exist as an entity pondering the advantages and disadvantages of a big brain and then freely opting herself to choose the one we’ve got.

The uncertainty of any divisive ness implies that quantum time considers events as signals rather than measurable sign posts.

The subjective manifestation of this cam not enter into a cosmological certainty, as, discussed above while Peacegirl was still involved in the discussion of the present moment.
Any positivist addirmatio negating this ultimate constructed object therefore, does not predicate an intentional pre-created objective, without compatibility with the transcended reality which has been subscribed by philosophers of all ages.

That is to say, a big brain does prove little, since huge elephantine brains cam not evolve by virtue of their size.
Rather the schematic points to miniaturization toward more and more inclusive content in less and less space, sans the time it takes.

The necessity to jump out of this loop is only a pleasant to those who believe an exclusive quantitative substance.

At the smallest level known to exist - the quantum - there are zero minds and the world of human interaction simply does not exist in any shape or form
But without the quantum world the world you and I and everyone else experiences could not exist as everything is ultimately dependant upon that world
You may not be at all interested in that world when contemplating the nature of human interaction but you cannot deny the causal link between the two

Why would anyone deny it? I must be missing your point.

From the tiniest bit of quantum matter to the reality that encompasses “all there is” in what may well turn out to be a multiverse, there are either causal relationships wholly in sync with the laws of matter or there are not.

And, as well, on top of that profoundly enigmatic relationship is the part where the matter here…

“It took 380,000 years for electrons to be trapped in orbits around nuclei, forming the first atoms. These were mainly helium and hydrogen, which are still by far the most abundant elements in the universe. 1.6 million years later, gravity began to form stars and galaxies from clouds of gas.”

…evolved into living matter that, over billions of years, evolved into human minds able to discuss it as/in the embodiment of “I”!

From zero minds to this exchange. And how it all became possible going back to a complete understanding of existence itself. And then going forward to how those of own species thousands of years into the future will clearly be more informed than we are now.

But: informed autonomously?

Will that finally be resolved once and for all?

And what does it mean to resolve anything at all in a wholly determined universe?

More from our Mr. Abstractionist.
By way [of course] of Mr. Assumptionist.

In other words, in any and all contexts that any and all of us might find ourselves in, this is true because…he says so?

Then let him focus in on one context in particular. Let him describe for us how power unfolds between two conflicted minds that he is, in turn, able to demonstrate are wholly aware of their options as autonomous beings.

Instead of just presuming [in a world of words] that this is the case.

Indeed, how fascinating it might be to follow an exchange between him and peacegirl in regards to how in fact “choice”/choice actually does play out in regard to human interactions.

Therefore, if, compelled or not, you concur with the definition and the meaning that he gives to the words he “chooses”/chooses in this particular intellectual contraption, it’s all settled.

But, again, we will need an actual context in which to explore what makes one of us a “higher organism” in regard to whatever on earth it means for an entity to “mentally and willfully usurp its genetic impulses, and its automated reactions to stimuli.”

More from, well, you know…

Yet another assertion regarding determinism that refuses to acknowledge the fact that he has yet to demonstrate that this assertion in and of itself is not but a necessary manifestation of “natural law”.

In other words, he merely makes the assumption that his own general description assertions here are the product of his free will. A free will predicated in turn on the assumption that it is far, far superior to the free will of all those who refuse to toe his own genes-all-the-way-down line.

And how ironic is that?

It’s genes, you see, until it comes to his own particular “I”. Then somehow there is some mysterious “phenomenon” unfolding in his own brain that allows him to reconfigure the laws of matter autonomously into an actual entity able to “transcend” them. Willfully as it were.

And in a matter that his own will to power makes him one of the…ubermen?

Just don’t ask him to prove this empirically…such that all rational men and women are obligated to share his point of view. Well, other than in the manner in which the laws of nature compel everything that we think, feel, say and do.

You know, if that’s true.

In no way, shape or form, however, does he offer us an argument that is able to be tested. An argument able to be confirmed neurologically, chemically, scientifically.

And then going back to that which I doubt he considers at all: the relationship between what he thinks he knows here and now and all that there is to be known [ontolgically, teleologically] about existence itself.

Again, the point isn’t what one claims about the past, present and future, but the extent to which one can demonstrate that one’s claim is verifiable. And a claim not able to be falsified.

Other than as encompassed in an argument – an intellectual contraption – such that verification revolves around the definition and meaning that one gives to the words used in the argument itself. The argument here being a particular understanding of determinism.

And in which falsification revolves around insisting that his argument is wrong because another’s definitions and meanings constitute a truer understanding of the matter.

And who could that possibly be other than God Himself? Awareness here being embodied in omniscience. But what of mere mortals? What can they be aware of regarding the future? And how is it to be determined that their awareness of being aware of anything at all is not as necessary in their waking hours as it clearly seems to be in their dreams?

The brain as matter embodied in the laws of nature creates our dreamscapes. But: does it stop there?

I’m at least willing to acknowledge that “I” have no capacity to know this for sure.

But then I’m not an objectivist.

See how it works? This is merely asserted to be the case. Where is the substantive evidence to actually back it up?

In fact, one suspects that his only recourse here [as with mine and probably yours] is to Google those folks who are in fact exploring this experimentally, scientifically, phenomenologically etc., and extracting the arguments most in sync with his own particular subjective prejudice.

Seems clearly true.

Sure. There would be greater freedom to act.

Some people definitely see it that way.

Yes. It makes sense to distinguish past, present and future. It’s more useful than seeing then as essentially the same. Past actions are fixed and unchangeable but nothing is yet fixed about the future.

Yes. That’s the difference between a person and a rock.

Yes, but what of my own reaction to that:

Or are we to presume that because you presume that you possess the autonomy to profess that his point seems clearly to be true that makes it so.

Because you say so?

Why don’t you provide us with a context in which to explore these general descriptions.

Yes, presuming that you are able to provide us with a definitive argument that establishes beyond all doubt that this freedom to act is not in fact merely a manifestation of the psychological illusion of autonomy built into human consciousness built into the human brain wholly in sync with the laws of matter.

Also, as I noted above:

Why don’t you take a stab at what this might mean out in the world of actual human interactions.

Yes, but as I noted above:

All I can come back to here is this: Why don’t you and I bring this down to earth?

Okay, now react to the point I made above in regard to this:

Of course, his frame of mind here is embeded in a No God world. A world where the ubermen become the closest thing to God. Naturally as it were.

Not only that but rocks don’t dream. And neither do dominoes, right? They don’t even get to “choose”. Then we are back to the manner in which you and peacegirl and our perceptive gentleman are either able to or not able to demonstrate that in fact we do get to choose. Freely, as an autonomous “I”.

And when I suggest instead that…

You bluntly assert that this is not the case. Why? Because, indisputably, of your own volition, you say so.

The Perceptive Gentleman made what appear to be correct statements about the nature of freedom and choice.

I don’t require “a definitive argument that establishes beyond all doubt that this freedom …” to agree with his ideas about what is considered freedom. Let doubts and uncertainty remain. Let revisions take place at a later date.

Perhaps rocks and dominoes do dream. I don’t know. But I do know that rocks and dominoes are unable choose to act on those dreams as humans and animals are able to act. A rock on a hill moves where gravity pulls it. But even an ant can choose to move in a direction other than where gravity pulls it - it can choose to go up or to the side of a hill. Is there something more that needs to be demonstrated?

My autonomy or lack of autonomy don’t enter into any of this.

You address none of the points that I rasied. Either my points to him or my points to you.

For all practical purposes we are – compelled or not – in two very, very different discussions.

Assuming some level of autonomy then, why waste each other’s time?

You posted quotes from someone who is not here and who is not able to defend himself. That’s not how you have a discussion.

Your comments were completely inappropriate.

For example :

What kind of shrill comment is that?

Obviously he thinks it’s true and lots of people will agree as a result of straight observation of human behavior.

You don’t provide any examples of where it is not true or any reason to think that it is not true. You don’t provide any contradictory contexts.

If there is a conflict, then the more powerful person gets to choose what happens from his available options.

Then this :

The meaning of the words is fairly clear to anyone with an average understanding of English. And there’s nothing outlandish about the ideas. A lot of people/philosophers would consider it to be obviously true.

We don’t need a context to explore it.

You characterize it all as intellectual contraptions and “worlds of words” without actually showing that any of it is not true or that it’s not based on valid observations.

You don’t have any counterarguments.

He has content, you have none.

Two points:

1] As you might recall, in our early exchanges at KT, he booted me out of the agora, assuring that I would be unable to respond to him
2] He permitted me to post only in the dungeon. And yet I have often suggested to the powers that be here that we create an equivalent at ILP — thus allowing him to post again here in that forum.

And let’s not forget that he is unable to post here because in having utter contempt for those who don’t share his own point of view – the morons, the chimps, the desperate degenerates – he often violated the posted rules for particapating here.

Again, all of this providing that we do have some measure of autonomy. And I have never argued that we don’t. Only that, from my frame of mind here and now, it seems more reasonable that, given the assumption the human brain/mind/consciousness are wholly in sync with the laws of matter in a No God world, “I” possess only the psychological illusion of “choice”.

Right, and at no time has he or you ever stooped to being “shrill”.

You know, whatever that means.

I can only leave it to others to decide for themselves if my reaction to him is appropriate. I’m certainly not insisting that they are actually obligated to if they wish to be thought of as ever and always correct. That’s his thing.

Or, with respect to points of view regarding your reaction to things like Communism, your thing.

But my point revolves around him being able to demonstrate this beyond the claim itself. And beyond the intellectual contraptions he invariably falls back on.

Straight observation of human behaviors? In other words, assuming that the observations themselves are necessarily autonomous. Why? Because he argues that they are.

That’s the part about me acknowledging I’m in the same boat that you and he are.

This part:

In no way, shape or form am I attempting to argue that my own point of view here isn’t in turn an existential contraption. A subjective/subjunctive vantage point rooted in dasein rooted and in the conflicting [though often quite reasonable] assumptions made by those on both sides of the scientific and philosophical divide. And going back now literally thousands of years.

In other words, they would agree with the definition and the meaning that he gives to words that then defend the definition and the meaning he gives to other words. None of which are connected to actual human interactions other than by way of assumming that an understanding of human interactions are necessarily in sync with the definition and the meaning that he gives to the words to describe human interactions in general.

We’ll have to agree to disagree about that then. Sure, we can just assume that Mary was free to choose an abortion; and that in choosing to have one, she either was or was not behaving morally.

And that if others don’t flat out share our own assertions about this, they are morons or desperate degenerates.

My argument is this: that if the assumption about human behaviors and the observation of human behaviors is but the embodiment of nature having evolved into living matter having evolved in human minds wholly in sync with immutable laws of matter, this very exchange is just another inherent component of that.

But I have no way in which to demonstrate this myself.

Note to others:

So, that settles it – settles all of it – right? :laughing:

Can something that profound ever be truly resolved to the satisfaction of all ? For will there not always be some philosophical objection to it ?
Also a wholly determined Universe cannot be possible because randomness is an observable feature within it so it is only partially determined
[ Randomness here does not mean absolutely anything happening by chance but only possible outcomes having an equal chance of happening ]

"It took 380 000 years for electrons to be trapped in orbits around nuclei forming the first atoms . These were mainly helium and hydrogen which
are still by far the most abundant elements in the universe I . 6 million years later gravity began to form stars and galaxies from clouds of gas

… evolved into living matter that over billions of years evolved into human minds able to discuss it as / in the embodiment of I !

From zero minds to this exchange . And how it all became possible going back to a complete understanding of existence itself . And
then going forward to how those of own species thousands of years into the future will clearly be more informed than we are now

But : informed autonomously ?

Will that finally be resolved once and for all ?

And what does it mean to resolve anything at all in a wholly determined universe"

{{{{{{{{Yes it can become autonomously sourced, because the referential temporal/spatial inductive gap will approach to an undifferentiable limit.

In other words, the technological/technical memory will reduce general-field multi function devices to few specific ones, where autonomy will be thus generated. ]]]]]]]]]

So talk to him in the dungeon.

If you are going to post his statements here, then at least counter them instead of dismissing them as “worlds of words”, “intellectual contraptions” and “not demonstrated”.

That’s what’s being discussed … the meaning of ‘choice’. And your take on it is different from his.

Obviously you know what ‘shrill’ means since you just accused him and me of being shrill sometimes.

It looks to me like his claims can be seen in ordinary human behavior. Now, you can try to demonstrate we are wrong about those observations.

Autonomy has nothing to do with. It’s a description of human behavior. It’s true or false whether we are autonomous or not. It’s like saying “people hit tennis balls with tennis rackets”. One can analyze how often it happens if at all, who does it and where.

So by not providing a demonstration , you are demonstrating that demonstrations are not possible. Is that it???

It seems that he is correctly describing human behavior. That’s the bottom line as far I’m concerned. I don’t care if you call it an existential contraption. That’s basically an empty label.

He didn’t make up the meanings of the words … they are listed in the dictionary. And those words and meanings were created based on human experiences. I don’t see the lack of connection to human interactions. Which words are you claiming are disconnected?

Mary has choices. She chooses one which she has the power to enact and acts. There are consequences to her decision.

That’s not really an argument against what he is saying is it?