Determinism

Philosophy Forums Philosophy
4461

Try this one: amazon.com/Decline-Fall-All … B00ONA7JVQ

On the other hand, as one reviewer noted:

[b]"The book is presented in an awkward style where the author presents imaginary conversations he’s having with people that he readily gets the best of. The other person then gushes enthusiastically about the authors reasoning. The prose and self glorification aren’t the only problems with the text though.

Lessan likes to present even his philosophical ideas as scientific validated theories.

However not all of them are even testable hypothesis, and the ones that are testable he never bothered to try testing, or apparently reading any research in the field that was available even at the time the book was written.

His first discovery regarding free will he claims will lead to a world in which no one can hurt another person. The caveat is that these ideas can only been tested when he first has complete compliance from the entire worlds population. This last part even requires a period of military action first where dissenters are taken care of.

His second discovery, being the most testable, proves to be the weakest. Here the author claims that he can perceive an event, in real time, over great distances, without the light from the object having to have first had time to reach our eye. That perception was a process occurring without light reaching the eye and at greater than light speeds.

The most famous of his examples is seeing our newly ignited instantly sun eight minutes before the first rays of its’ light can touch the earth.

The claims he lays out here are easily testable, don’t match any observation ever made, and defy everything known about light, optics, and physics.

This would be Lessans worst mistake if we didn’t get to his third discovery.

The third claim involves proving we are born again through an argument involving pronoun usage. The difference between people saying I or You and a person’s inability to say I any more after their death convinced him that one of those other You out there must now be I.

These are without a doubt one of the most poorly reasoned proofs I’ve ever seen collected in one book. Save your money."[/b]

4462

Back up the autodidactic pole to the stratosphere f objectivism.

Note to Nothing
Can you tell me what this even means?
I haven’t read it…but I know it is about nothing…nowhere…

Oh great god Nil.

4463

This guy never read the book. He didn’t like his observation regarding the eyes and left a negative review from a forum like this one. There was no verified purchase. I don’t think Amazon allows that anymore. You, of all people, who claim to be searching for truth would take this review (some 15 years ago and filled with inaccuracies) as some kind of proof he was wrong? You’re doing everything you can to discredit what you admitted you never read. What a fraud you’re turning out to be. :frowning:

4464

She doesn’t believe in “truth”. Truth, for her, is a human construct and is what the powerful say it is.
She wants truth to be a product of a collective compromise…a shared lie.
A proletarian lie.

Classic postmodernism.
Truth is whatever the majority says it is.
So she appeals to the audience…
Note to Others.
Truth is a lie…a lie is the truth.

Collectivization of responsibility.
Ergo, there is no free-will.
If Mary wants to go out, meet guys fall in love, or lust, get pregnant, then the collective ought o step in and share with the burden of her choices.

Neo-Marxism.
Abrahamism with a twister.

4465

This is insane. Who are you?

4466

I am insane?
It is what she, iamretarded believes… she never states it outright.
You’ve been conversing with an insane mind, in a world where insanity is the new norm.

But a brief look into your beliefs tells me you are also bonkers.
So, you two can converse until the cows come in…

Who am I?
I am…outis…known by many names.
OUTIS.

4467

Click.

On the contrary, truth is whatever he insists that the majority – in fact, everyone – must believe it is.

[size=50]hint: what he believes it is[/size]

4468

There is a difference between a belief and a fact. Sometimes it’s hard to decipher between the two. The majority of the world believes in free will. That does not make it true.

4469

No, the majority of the world assumes free will, without thinking about it enough to believe in it. If they examined the idea of free will they would probably talk of cause and effect versus preferences, which amounts more to fate. So, the answer seems more likely both free will and determinism are compatible, or that it all changes upon examination.

4470

Assuming free will or believing in free will are pretty much the same. The majority of the world bases their belief (or assumption) in free will because of their belief or assumption that a person who did wrong could have done otherwise and are therefore culpable for their wrongdoing and have to accept the punishment.

Well, the standard definition of determinism is that we are caused by antecedent events to do what we do which equals cause/effect. I’m not sure the idea of preferences amounts to fate. If someone dies from a car accident, looking back we can say it was fate ordained if there was nothing that could have been done, but that does not mean that before the fact, a person is fated to die that way. Free will and determinism are not compatible, by definition although this author challenges the conventional definition regarding the word “cause.” Nothing causes me to do something which implies the cause of my actions could be done against my will. This is a big problem in this discussion and has been for centuries.

4471

pretty much the same will have to do then

we like to think that preferences have nothing to do with fate, simply because we can’t fully consider all the things that contributed to forming that preference, which I contest is everything. Everything was a factor. One rain drop here, a landslide there.

4472

That’s just the point I was making. Cause/effect, according to the conventional definition of determinism, has caused confusion. Fate is another word that implies there is nothing that can ever change because whatever happens is preordained. It is true that whatever happens had to happen, but this does not mean that we are fated to sit by and do nothing. For example, if we see a child running into the street and a car is coming, do we throw up our hands and say, “oh well, it’s fated that the child gets hit,” or do we run out to prevent an accident in the making? Therefore, nothing is fate ordained beforehand, but we can call it fate after something happens that we had no control over.

It is also true that in forming our preference for one thing over another, we don’t always consider all the factors involved because we don’t have them at our disposal. Regardless of what we use to determine our preference, we are always moving in the direction of what offers us the best possible choice at that moment. For example, we may not think about what we want for breakfast because whatever choice we make doesn’t make that much difference to our overall happiness. We may have learned that eggs are healthier than a muffin, but we are in the mood for a muffin, so that’s what we choose. We may also decide to eat less carbs for dinner because we are counting our carb intake. I’m just giving you an example. When it comes to where we will go to college, we may take lots of time gathering as much information as we can so that we can weigh all of the pros and cons. We aren’t always contemplating options. Sometimes we just move from what feels uncomfortable to what is more comfortable. I just changed position in my chair because my leg was falling asleep. I didn’t have to hem and haw over should I or shouldn’t I? I didn’t have to contemplate what to do. Every movement in life is away from dissatisfaction to greater satisfaction. Sometimes all of our choices are not satisfying so we choose the least dissatisfying, or the lesser evil, so to speak. I hope that makes sense.

4473

It makes sense. But if you can merge assumptions with beliefs then I can merge fate with determinism. Otherwise, lets look at assumption of free will again. Assumptions can be taken for granted and thought of less than say a belief that you hold on to and remind yourself of often. I’m really just saying the compatibility of free will and determinism depend on examination. It changes when looked at.

Maybe a degree of definition doesn’t seem like much to you. But I could say, instead of wanting pleasure when you moved in your chair to a comfortable position you were avoiding pain and suffering. Were you suffering like torture, no. But suffering like dissatisfaction, yes.
So degree does matter. Is it both pain avoidance and pleasure seeking? More likely.

People assume free will mostly, because they don’t think I am choosing mcdonalds over burger king every time they “make a decision” they just do it. But if you ask them about cause and effect they’ll say its pretty obvious. They just don’t consider, nor can they, consider every cause of a cause.

Its both. But as far as your agenda with crime attribution, I steer clear of that. Don’t want to judge in that arena. Sorry if that’s your big sticking point.

4474

Hate to double post before you respond but how many people have bought the book? I wonder if you’ll be honest about that.

4475

I have nothing to be dishonest about. The author had no internet and was an unknown. This book was never widely distributed and the discovery remains in obscurity. :frowning:

4476

my book is obscure, too. Hey, obscurity is the way of the universe, according to the TAO

4477

I guess it depends on the meaning. Being inconspicuous? No problem. What if Einstein or Edison’s discoveries remained in obscurity? Just sayin! :slight_smile:

4478

True, but only to a certain extent. On a long enough timeline even the famous will be forgotten.

4479

It’s not so much about the people as it is about the contribution to our world.

4480

For a long time that was very important to me. Then I reached an age when I realized I wouldn’t have children, which forced me to look at what a contribution to our world really means. I can’t answer that anymore then I know why I’m here now, which I don’t.

If I don’t know why I’m here now, why do I care about what goes along? Its really odd when you think of it that way. Its no different than someone signing their name on a bathroom stall, I was here. Big deal really. Your father exists somewhere right now, no signature needed.

I only try to sway you into this way of thinking because it seems like you stress over the obligation to you dad, which is understandable on one level. On another level, you should try to cut you losses, effort versus the money you’ve lost trying to make a true product out of his discovery.

You asked me why I didn’t publish my book once. Truth is, I can handle not making money on it, it’s losing money on it that would be the insult to injury. I think a book cover alone would cost 300 bucks and I doubt I’d make even that back.

I thought I had something to important to say about the tech revolution. The world steams ahead without paying attention to my message. Cut your losses while you can. Save time, the money is lost. Your father would be proud you tried, yes?