thoughts on determinism

[Ichthus77 (Ichthus77 (formerly She™))]

Saying you are an agent of self-determination is the same as saying you have free will. Not radical free will, but radness is a straw man.

[iambiguous]

Free will, the Holocaust, and The Problem of Evil
David Kyle Johnson

Indeed, inspired by the failure of both of these objections [above], we can build into the original argument a kind of separate argument for the truth of premise (2), that uses the holocaust as evidence.

(1)If God existed, evil would not.
1* The holocaust occurred.
2* If the holocaust occurred, then evil exists.
(2) Thus evil does exist (from 1* and 2*).
(3) Therefore God does not exist. (from (1) and (2))
Let us call this argument “ the problem of the holocaust .”

This is where I interject and truly muddy up the morality waters. In other words, while most would indeed insist the holocaust is clearly an example of evil, others, instead, see it as an example of good. Adolph Hitler and the Nazis for instance. And unless it can be shown that they are, say, mad or insane, then their frame of mind is one conclusion that human beings can come to embrace as rational. That, either genetically and/or memetically, there is a “master race”. Indeed, we have those around still today [right here] who seem to argue that.

Whereas from my frame of mind in a No God world, there does not appear to be a definitive scientific or philosophical assessment that pins down deontologically that the holocaust is in fact essentially, objectively, universally evil.

I have my own rooted existentially in dasein moral and political prejudices rejecting and denouncing it. But how exactly would I go about demonstrating that all rational and virtuous men and women are obligated to think as I do? After all, unlike God, I am not omniscient. In the end, it basically comes down to me saying that “I just know it’s wrong!”.

Because premise 2 is not only obviously true, but denying it would require one to deny either that the holocaust occurred or that it was evil, premise (2) seems firmly established.

Really? Again, run it by the Nazis. Who really knows, maybe we are programmed genetically to make distinctions between those who [for whatever reason] are different from us. After all, that’s one possible explanation for why racism and sexism and heterosexism and classism, etc., persist centuries after the so-called Enlightenment.

And that’s why Gods and religions are so crucial. With them you almost always have access to an omniscient/omnipotent frame of mind that ever and always gets to decree what is ultimately good and evil on Judgment Day.

Or to argue that in a wholly determined universe good and evil are interchangeable because if you are never able to not think and feel and say and do other than what your brains compels you to, what does good and evil really mean?

The more common response to this kind of argument, therefore, is to deny premise (1)—to suggest that, for some reason, even if God did exist, evil still could occur.

The Harold Kushner Syndrome for example. Evil exists because God is simply not omnipotent. He set creation into motion and it just got “beyond My control.”

[iambiguous]

For Whom Does Determinism Undermine Moral Responsibility? Surveying the Conditions for Free Will Across Cultures
From Frontiers in Psychology

Thus, existing empirical evidence reveals that laypeople hold agents morally responsible, even while acknowledging that the agent could not have done otherwise, and did not originate the causal sequence resulting in action.

You know what’s coming…

Yes, some hold agents morally responsible even while insisting the agent could not have acted otherwise. But that is only because they were never able not to hold them responsible as well. That’s the critical thing for some determinists: Nothing at all is excluded from the laws of matter. And that includes the only matter with minds able to delude themselves that they are not deluding themselves.

However, past studies share an important limitation: With one notable exception, they have been administered only to relatively small and homogeneous samples of respondents in the United States. Since cultures differ considerably in their values and philosophical judgments, whether past findings generalize across cultures remains very much an open question

Nope, makes no difference. The fact that there are different cultures with different values is no less wholly determined by nature. After all, the biological brains of all homo sapiens are the same. And if brain matter is just more matter to nature, the fact that it is embodied in conflicting value judgments doesn’t make it any more autonomous. Look at nature itself. Biological life on Earth has resulted in what has been estimated to be millions of animal species.

Unless, of course, “somehow” the brains of the human species are in fact truly, truly extraordinary matter.

First, motivated by evidence of cultural variation in explanatory style, we examine whether Asians and Westerners differ in their reasoning about free will and moral responsibility. Numerous experiments on social attribution have shown that people typically allude to an agent’s internal characteristics, such as her skills, desires, or personality, when attempting to explain why and how she behaves – a tendency known as dispositionism.

Again, this assumes that if, on average, Asian and Western brains differ in regard to free will and moral responsibility that one or the other is closer to the actual truth. But what if they differ only because that is simply how brains evolved among human beings on Earth. They differ but they were never able not to differ. Neither in the East nor in the West are assessments of moral responsibility other than then what they could only have been.

Though, sure, I’ve got to figure that since the authors here themselves don’t raise that issue, perhaps I am simply unable to grasp why it is unreasonable for me to.

[iambiguous]

The Scandal of Compatibilism
TOM CLARK

It isn’t difficult to get people talking about free will. Just suggest they don’t have it, or that their conception of it is mistaken, and you’re in for a long, often entertaining and sometimes fractious discussion in which people’s fundamental ideas about human nature come to light.

Of course, if someone suggests to you that you don’t have free will doesn’t that mean that they lack free will in turn in suggesting it? We’re all stuck here regarding what we think and feel and say about it. None of us are really qualified to grasp the limitations of our own brains. Even brain scientists themselves go around and around in circles eventually.

Nearly everyone (in the West at any rate) has at least a vague notion that free will is tied up with justifying moral responsibility, so the serious ramifications of the question add urgency to what otherwise might be dismissed as a mere philosophical puzzle.

Then that part. Is it all really just something that puzzles philosophers in exchanges that can go on and on and scarcely make any references at all to the other part: our going about the business of actually living our lives. Lives that can and do come into conflict over right and wrong, good and evil. We “just know” that we have at least some measure of control over the things that we do. And that will do?

The discussion might reveal that opinions on free will are divided. Some people have strong intuitions that to have it, and thus be morally responsible, we must not be fully determined in what we do, in which case free will is incompatible with determinism. Free will is thus contra-causal (or libertarian, as philosophers often call it) in that it transcends, overrides or goes against the ordinary sorts of causation we suppose obtain above the level of quantum phenomena.

Intuition. That comes up time and again with some here. Okay, they might admit, they are unable to pin down scientifically or philosophically that they do in fact have free will. But really, really, really and deep, deep, deep down inside them they do “just know” that they do. As though intuition itself is not rooted existentially in dasein. After all, in regard to any number of moral conflagrations, those on both sides can insist that their intuition tells them abortion is “just wrong” or “just right”.

[b]Intuition:

…the ability to understand something immediately, without the need for conscious reasoning.
…a thing that one knows or considers likely from instinctive feeling rather than conscious reasoning.[/b]

Okay, where does this ability come from…God? Is it genetic? Or – click – as with our reasoning capacity, and our emotional reactions, isn’t it too the embodiment of our childhood indoctrination and our own uniquely personal experiences out in a particular world?

From my own frame of mind, some here like to fall back on intuition because they can then connect to their “intrinsic self”. Given either free will or determinism reconciled with moral responsibility, they need not defend their moral conviction beyond what they “just know” is true.

Again, it’s the perfect moral philosophy. Others aren’t you so how can they possible refute what you believe?

[iambiguous]

The Scandal of Compatibilism
TOM CLARK

Who’s right about free will, and how do we decide? If there were a clear, easy answer to this question, it would have been settled long ago. As it stands, the free will debate continues both inside and outside the academy, with perhaps more public visibility these days as science weighs in on human nature.

Of course, this frame of mind – my own – can be particularly vexing to some here. For me, it always comes back around to the gap between what any of us “here and now” think we know about the human brain and this…

All of this going back to how the matter we call the human brain was “somehow” able to acquire autonomy when non-living matter “somehow” became living matter “somehow” became conscious matter “somehow” became self-conscious matter.

Then those here who actually believe that what they believe about all of this reflects, what, the ontological truth about the human condition itself?

Then those who are compelled in turn to insist on a teleological component as well. Usually in the form of one or another God.

Meanwhile, philosophers and scientists and theologians have been grappling with this profound mystery now for thousands of years.

Either in the only possible reality in the only possible world or of their own volition.

We just don’t know.

Except, of course, for those among us who insist that they do know. Indeed, they might even explain to you how the existence of existence itself came about. Some skipping straight to God, others to all manner of No God intellectual contraptions. Defining and deducing free will, determinism, compatibilism into existence.

The empirical evidence is mounting that human beings are likely not causal exceptions to nature, so if you’re an incompatibilist (and many are), it’s getting harder to suppose we have contra-causal, libertarian free will.

Then those among us who seem to concur with this…but insist that nonetheless we are still morally responsible for our behaviors. Why? Because while we have no free will it is still us who “choose” to do what we could only possibly have done. In other words, no one puts a gun to our head. Unless, some determinists suggest, you count your brain.

If we don’t, this might mean that some beliefs having to do with moral responsibility need reconsideration.

Okay, but if we – i.e. our brains – are not causal exceptions then how would any reconsiderations on our part not in turn be wholly determined by those brains wholly in sync with the laws of matter?

The pressure from science might also be felt by compatibilists, since as the causal story of human behavior gets filled in the question about moral desert gets sharpened. Do people deeply deserve praise and blame, reward and punishment, for what they are fully determined to do? If so, why?

Science? Same thing. The pressure from scientists is no less compelled by their brains applying only the pressure that ever could have been applied. It’s then a question – profoundly mysterious – of how nature managed to evolve to the point where matter could become something as astounding as human brains.

Uh, “on its own”?

No, inisist the religionists, the obvious explanation is a God, the God, my God.

[iambiguous]

The Scandal of Compatibilism
TOM CLARK

Robert Kane (University of Texas) is an incompatibilist who defends philosophical libertarianism, the view that we have free will because determinism doesn’t hold full sway in our choosing and deciding; he claims there’s a crucial indeterministic element that makes us deeply and ultimately responsible for ourselves and our actions.

Yes, and what he must now do is to take this claim to the “hard guys and gals” and ask them to confirm it scientifically in regard to pinning down how the human brain functions chemically, neurologically and electrically to produce this “indeterministic element”.

Or, instead, as with most of us here, is that element merely “thought up” – defined and deduced – into existence? Ultimately coming down to something akin to “well, I just know I have autonomy”.

Derk Pereboom (Cornell), another incompatibilist, disagrees. He thinks it’s unlikely we are exceptions to determinism (and if we weren’t this wouldn’t help us be morally responsible), and so ends up in what he calls “hard incompatibilism.” He forthrightly, and in my view rightly, recommends that we should rethink some of our beliefs and practices related to moral responsibility since we aren’t free in the way such beliefs and practices require.

Same thing though ultimately. It’s what he has “thought up” philosophically that may or may not actually correspond to the functioning human brain. Thus when he recommends that we rethink some of our beliefs, even if we did we would have done so only because we were never able not to.

Then again [to me] the most surreal point of view of them all:

Oppositely, John Martin Fischer (U of CA, Riverside) defends a version of compatibilism (“semi-compatibilism”) which suggests we are justified in our moral responsibility practices even if determinism turns out to be true.

The only way this makes sense to me is that he thinks we are justified in our moral responsibility practices even if determinism turns out to be true because he was never able autonomously to think otherwise in this regard either. I’m just ambivalent myself here [compelled to be or not] because I admit I night not be thinking compatibilism through correctly…technically?

What matters is that human agents still have reasons-responsive control (“guidance control”) over their behavior, even if there are not alternative possible futures genuinely open to them.

Back to that again. We are the ones choosing our behaviors. No one is putting a gun to our head and really giving us no choice if we want to live. But from my frame of mind the brain itself is the gun. It’s only the psychological illusion of choosing freely. Or like when we “choose” in a dream.

As he puts it “a semi-compatibilist need not give up the idea that sometimes individuals robustly deserve punishment for their behavior, whereas on other occasions they robustly deserve moral commendation and reward”.

Or maybe one day his brain will compel him to give up on that conclusion.

[iambiguous]

Free will, the Holocaust, and The Problem of Evil
David Kyle Johnson

Varieties of The Problem of Evil

The kind of problem that the problem of evil presents is usually thought of in two ways: it’s either a logical problem or an evidential problem. If it is a logical problem, it suggests that there is a logical incompatibility between the existence of God and the existence of evil.

I don’t understand this. And perhaps that’s because when it comes to things like God and evil [intertwined or not] what on Earth does it really mean to be logical? Is the existence of God logical? Is a world without God logical? Is abortion logical or is it illogical?

God and evil cannot co-exist any more than a triangle can have four sides. Evil is deductive proof that there is no God.

On the contrary, if you “logically” believe that because God works in mysterious ways we mere mortals simply do not possess the capacity to grasp that these things…

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_earthquakes
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_l … _eruptions
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_t … l_cyclones
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tsunamis
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_landslides
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_epidemics
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_deadliest_floods
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_t … ore_deaths
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_diseases
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_extinction_events

…are not really evil at all, then that need be as far as it goes. After all, it’s not like anyone can prove that “logically” they are evil.

If it is an evidential problem, however, then the occurrence of evil is evidence that presents a sufficient reason to doubt that God exists. It does not deductively prove that God does not exist, but it does render belief in God irrational. Such versions usually add the words“ probably” or “almost certainly” to the conclusion.

“The evidential problem of evil is the problem of determining whether and, if so, to what extent the existence of evil…constitutes evidence against the existence of God, that is to say, a being perfect in power, knowledge and goodness.”

How is this not basically the same thing? How does one go about providing teleological evidence in regard to a God that is Himself beyond demonstrating evidentially? Since mere mortals have no complete understanding of why God chooses to do what He does how can it realistically be argued that it is irrational to believe in God? What we construe to be evil either logically or evidentially is merely the embodiment of the gap between us and God’s own loving, just and merciful Divine Plan.

It’s all only a problem for those unable to accept that “God works in mysterious ways” is all the justification the True Believer or one taking a “leap of faith” needs.

Same thing with reconciling an omniscient God with human autonomy. He’s God. He can do anything.

[iambiguous]

Yet again – click? – I’ll make an attempt to actually understand compatibilism…

Reconciling Determinism and Free Will: A Compatibilist Perspective
Innocent Ociti

Free Will vs Determinism

Compatibilism is a philosophical position that suggests that free will and determinism can coexist. In other words, people can have the ability to make choices and act freely, even if their actions are determined by prior causes or circumstances.

In a nutshell?

Well, for starters, in describing it as a “philosophical position” the first thing that pops into my head is, “okay, up in or down out of the intellectual contraption clouds?”

It’s one thing to argue philosophically that “people can have the ability to make choices and act freely, even if their actions are determined by prior causes or circumstances”, and another thing altogether to confirm this empirically by pinpointing how the behaviors we choose are both in sync with the brain as matter…and yet unlike any other matter which is wholly in sync with immutable physical laws. How exactly does autonomy come about in the brain? Unless, of course, you “argue” that “God puts it there”.

Whereas with No God, how exactly does Nature accomplish it?

According to compatibilists, free will is not the same as being completely unconstrained or free from external influences. Instead, they believe that free will is the ability to act according to one’s desires and motivations, without being coerced or forced to act in a particular way.

Of course, according to some determinists, the compatibilists themselves are duped psychologically by their brains into thinking this only because they were never able not to think it. As though one’s desires and motivations are “somehow” immune to the laws of matter. Then back to those like Schopenhauer: “A man can do what he wants, but not want what he wants”

Compatibilists argue that determinism does not necessarily negate free will because determinism only means that events in the universe follow a predetermined course based on previous causes and conditions. This does not mean that human beings cannot make choices or that their choices are predetermined.

This is the part that may well reflect the crucial point that I am simply unable to grasp “here and now”. Assuming, of course, that I possess the free will needed to, perhaps, grasp it one day. Especially in regard to moral responsibility.

I know that I make choices. And I know that in any number of ways those choices revolve entirely around the laws of matter in the either/or world. Excluding sim worlds or dream worlds or Matrix scenarios.

But what about the part where, like everyone else, I “just know” that “somehow” I am able to choose to do something other than what I am now doing. Me typing these words. You reading them. How to explain the part where I am more than just my brain…the part where my brain itself becomes something that I command.

[iambiguous]

Reconciling Determinism and Free Will: A Compatibilist Perspective
Innocent Ociti

Some compatibilists argue that free will can be understood as the ability to act by one’s desires and motivations while taking into account the constraints and limitations of the external environment. They suggest that free will is not a metaphysical concept but a practical one and that it is possible to have free will in a world that is determined.

Okay – click – let’s think this through.

Back to the aliens in the free will sector of the universe observing us in the determined sector.

They note that we think about things. They note that we desire and feel motivated about things. They note that we choose to behave in different ways.

But they also note this: that everything we think and feel and do is all derived entirely from the same brain. A brain wholly in sync with the laws of matter. It’s not like one part of the brain compels us to think while another part allows us to feel motivated “on our own”. And that “somehow” when combined there is at least a part of our behaviors that we command.

Unless of course they are able scientifically to demonstrate that in fact this is precisely the case.

However, not everyone agrees with compatibilism, and some philosophers argue that determinism and free will are incompatible. They suggest that if the universe is completely determined, then there is no room for a human agency or choice.

That’s me. Only over and again that is not me at all. On the contrary, just like most others here, I post on threads convinced that of course I am choosing to post what I do of my own volition. I “just know” I have free will. Soon I will stop typing these words, and I will put my pad thai dinner into the microwave. And how could I possibly really believe that this is only as a result of how, when matter came into existence along with the Big Bang, I was then fated and destined to do all of this.

Or that a God, the God is somehow involved. Instead, the more I attempt to think it through the more mind-boggling it is that I am even here at all!

[iambiguous]

Reconciling Determinism and Free Will: A Compatibilist Perspective
Innocent Ociti

For compatibilists, the key to freedom is the ability to act by our internal motivations, rather than being forced or coerced to act in a particular way by external factors. This means that freedom does not depend on the absence of determinism or the presence of indeterminism, but rather on the ability to act by our internal motivations and values.

Again, as though when mindless matter evolved into biological matter evolved into brain matter evolved into us, the brains of human beings “somehow” bifurcated “internally” into autonomous motivations and values…as opposed to all other matter that is entirely compelled by the laws of matter. Then back to that crucial distinction between merely believing this is true philosophically and demonstrating that it is in fact true scientifically.

Not counting those who posit a God, the God, their God. Or, sure, counting them if they can actually demonstrate that their God really does exist.

Overall, freedom from a compatibilist perspective emphasizes the importance of internal factors such as beliefs, desires, and values in the decision-making process, and argues that even if our actions are determined by prior causes, we can still act freely and take responsibility for our actions if they reflect our internal motivations and values.

Here of course it comes down to exactly what is meant by “determined by prior causes”. In other words, the extent to which what we think and feel and say and do is simply not determined by them in the manner in which all other matter is.

The profound mystery of mind itself. Minds of matter able to contemplate minds as matter when the only thing that is explaining it is the mind itself. The mind explaining itself while utterly oblivious regarding the explanation for the existence of existence itself.

And in a universe beyond grasping itself:
facts.net/universe-facts/
skyatnightmagazine.com/spac … -universe/
google.com/search?q=mind+bo … s-wiz-serp

Go ahead, fit human autonomy in there…objectively?

[iambiguous]

Reconciling Determinism and Free Will: A Compatibilist Perspective
Innocent Ociti

Free Actions in a Deterministic World

The question of whether there can be free actions in a deterministic world is a long-standing philosophical debate. Determinism is the view that all events, including human actions, are causally determined by previous events and conditions, and therefore the future is entirely determined by the past.

Then there are those – both here and there – who [to me] seem to concur with this – “we have no free will” – but then “somehow” “internally” we actually still do have free will. To the extent that, a few of them say, we can even create a future where evil itself is eradicated.

It all makes sense to them. But, in my view, that is only because how they think about determinism is in and of itself entirely determined by their wholly material brains.

To wit…

However, many philosophers argue that determinism does not necessarily rule out the possibility of free actions. They suggest that freedom does not require the ability to act in any way whatsoever, but rather the ability to act by one’s desires and motivations, without being coerced or forced to act in a particular way.

In other words “somehow” when it comes to our desires and motivations, our brains function differently. They can’t explain this scientifically or demonstrate it empirically or experientially. They just “thought about it” and figured it out “philosophically”. They defined and deduced free will into existence.

They “somehow” – of their own volition – can “suggest” certain things about the human brain. While others suggest that what they suggest they suggest only because they were never able not to suggest it.

In this view, a person can act freely even if their actions are determined by prior causes, as long as they are acting by their own will.

Uh, huh?!

Then I come in and muddy the waters all the more for some by suggesting that in the is/ought world our desires and motivations may well be autonomous but are still no less derived existentially from dasein. That, philosophically or otherwise, there does not appear to be a way to determine what all rational men and women ought to desire or to be motivated by in any particular set of circumstances.

[iambiguous]

Reconciling Determinism and Free Will: A Compatibilist Perspective
Innocent Ociti

Some philosophers also argue that determinism is compatible with the idea of “self-determination,” where a person’s actions are determined by their character and values, rather than external factors. In this sense, a person’s actions can be considered free if they are the result of their own autonomous choices, even if those choices are determined by their internal factors.

Back to the bifurcated brain. The brain parts that are wholly determined by the laws of matter and the brain parts revolving instead around character and values. “Somehow” here matter managed to reconfigure into autonomy. This mysterious “internal”/“external” argument that in a wholly determined universe as some are compelled to understand it is no less an inherent manifestation of the only possible reality.

Others argue that determinism does indeed rule out the possibility of free actions, as the causal chain of events leading up to a person’s actions means that their choices are ultimately determined by factors beyond their control. They suggest that free will requires the ability to choose between alternative possibilities and that this is not possible in a completely determined world.

Only they too are no less “stuck” here as well. For all they know, they really do have the capacity to argue this freely. They have just autonomously managed to think themselves into believing that they don’t instead. In other words, the whole surreal conundrum embedded in a brain trying to explain itself. And that brain is itself but one of billions of other brains on this unimaginably tiny slice of a unverse – Earth – that is in itself so unimaginably insignificant in the vastness of “all there is”.

Here, I’ll remind you:

Light travels at approximately 186,000 miles a second. That is about 6,000,000,000,000 miles a year.

The closest star to us is Alpha Centauri. It is 4.75 light-years away. 28,500,000,000,000 miles.

So, traveling at 186,000 miles a second, it would take us 4.75 years to reach it. The voyager spacecraft [just now exiting our solar system] will take 70,000 years to reach it.

To reach the center of the Milky Way galaxy it would take 100,000 light-years.

Or consider this:

“To get to the closest galaxy to ours, the Canis Major Dwarf, at Voyager’s speed, it would take approximately 749,000,000 years to travel the distance of 25,000 light years! If we could travel at the speed of light, it would still take 25,000 years!”

The Andromeda galaxy is 2.537 million light years away.

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.

Go ahead, fit your “free will” in there somewhere. Before you topple over into the abyss that is oblivion.

Not counting God perhaps?

[iambiguous]

Note to the clowns:

Okay, do your thing!

[iambiguous]

Reasons Why “No Country for Old Men” Is A Nihilistic Masterpiece of American Cinema
by Hrvoje Galić

Determinism; absence of free will

Events that happen in the movie are based on choices, but they are hardly choices based on free will. When a car hits Chigurh’s vehicle at the end of the film, it can be seen as a chance or a necessity; it is irrelevant whether the former or the latter is the case, as both phenomena show that there is no free will or rational plan behind events.

Yet again, this sort of thinking simply baffles me. It encompasses the “free will determinism” I come upon here time and again in which someone argues for determinism but only as someone seemingly convinced that the argument itself is “somehow” of their own volition. The car that hits Chigurh could never have not hit him. And whether one calls it a manifestation of chance or of necessity one calls it that because in turn one was never able to call it anything other than what the brain compels one to call it. No free will and all plans are rational from the perspective of Nature. But the mystery then revolves around whether Nature itself has a perspective. With God, teleology is built right into the relationship between I and Thou. But of Nature itself in a No God universe.?

When Chigurh tells the gas station proprietor that he married into his position in life, he meant that his marrying and living in that house was not an act of will. Just the opposite, it was not reflected upon; he just happened to be there by the act of marriage.

Okay, but when Chigurh points this out it is not in a matter-of-fact manner. The inflection clearly suggests some measure of scorn. As though to note the distinction between himself as the Uberman and the gas station proprietor as the Last Man. Whereas, again, in a wholly determined universe as some understand it the two are entirely interchangeable in the only possible reality.

According to active self-determinism, which Aristotle advocated, by being critical of ourselves and self-aware we can choose regardless of our conditioning. This theory opens up space for rationality and a degree of freedom, but also acknowledges that causes for action exist.

Yes, and that’s when I muddy up the waters philosophically by suggesting that in regard to value judgments in a free will world this revolves more around dasein than deontology.

[iambiguous]

Reconciling Determinism and Free Will: A Compatibilist Perspective
Innocent Ociti

Free Will and the Problem of Causal Determinism

The problem of causal determinism is a philosophical issue that arises in discussions of free will. Causal determinism is the idea that all events, including human actions, are determined by prior causes and are thus inevitable. If causal determinism is true, it would seem to undermine the possibility of free will, as our actions would be predetermined and we would have no control over them.

Bingo!

Only here [for some of us] there seems to be a rub: how far to take this? In other words, is every single thing that we ever thought, felt, said or did in the past, and every single thing that we think, feel, say and do in the present and every single thing that we ever will think, feel, say and do in the future entirely determined in the only possible reality going back to what we actually do not fully grasp at all regarding matter and its laws given the existence of existence itself. And when matter evolved into biological organisms evolved into us here on Earth, did our brains “somehow” acquire the capacity to be autonomous?

Or not?

No, not completely free to do anything and everything that we wanted, want and will want, but able at least to freely will some aspects of our lives. Like me typing these words in my now instead of, say, going to the food store and you reading these words in your now instead of, say, plotting a murder.

Okay, Mr. Philosopher and Mr. Neuroscientist, get together, figure that out and get back to us. Unless, of course, Mr. Theologian has the better answer.

The problem of causal determinism has been a central issue in debates about free will, with some philosophers arguing that free will is incompatible with causal determinism, while others argue that the two can coexist. Those who argue that free will and causal determinism are incompatible are known as incompatibilists, while those who argue that the two can coexist are known as compatibilists.

And let’s not forget this…

That this discussion and debate has been ongoing now for literally thousands of years. Going all the way back to the pre-Socratics in the West and, well, however far back it went in the East.

So, what is the final, most rational, most ontologically and teleologically sound resolution?

Do we or don’t we?

And, in regard to my own main interest here…moral responsibility…if Mary aborts Jane because she was never, ever at all able not to abort her, is she still morally responsible for doing so?

Yes?

Explain that please.

[iambiguous]

Reconciling Determinism and Free Will: A Compatibilist Perspective
Innocent Ociti

Incompatibilists argue that if our actions are predetermined, then we cannot be said to act freely, as we have no control over them. They argue that free will requires that our actions be undetermined so that we can choose to act in one way or another. This view has been defended by philosophers such as Immanuel Kant and John Stuart Mill.

Then the part where it is pointed out that the arguments the incompatibilists themselves make are no less but another inherent manifestation of the only possible reality. That’s what I come back to in regard to those here I call the “free will determinists”. They defend determinism. But their inflection conveys [to me] this sense that if you don’t agree with them then you are wrong. As though you should change your mind and think like they do…even though how all of us think is entirely determined by brains entirely in sync with the laws of matter.

Then this equally incomprehensible [to me] contention…

Compatibilists, on the other hand, argue that free will and causal determinism can coexist. They argue that even if our actions are determined by prior causes, we can still act freely and take responsibility for our actions. They argue that free will is not the ability to act in a way that is completely independent of prior causes, but rather the ability to act on our desires and motivations. This view has been defended by philosophers such as David Hume and Daniel Dennett.

As though when it comes to our desires and motivations, well, suddenly our material brain wholly in sync with the laws of nature in regard to “external” variables in our lives “somehow” switches over to autonomy in regard to these “internal” variables.

What we want and what we want to want are dealt with differently by our brains.

And, sure, God or No God, that might well be the case. But, from my own compelled or not compelled frame of mind, what some here do is merely to make that distinction philosophically. It is argued into existence by brains some determinists insist only argue what they could never have not argued.

[iambiguous]

Reconciling Determinism and Free Will: A Compatibilist Perspective
Innocent Ociti

Overall, the problem of causal determinism highlights the tension between our intuitions about free will and the scientific understanding of the world. While the issue remains unresolved, it continues to be an important area of philosophical inquiry, with implications for our understanding of human agency, responsibility, and moral accountability.

Intuition. Isn’t this by far the most intriguing and mysterious reaction that we have to “I” in the world around us? It’s not quite entirely rational, not quite entirely emotional, not quite entirely instinctive. It’s that deep down inside “I just know” punch in the gut that we end up falling back on time and again.

In other words, no matter how much my brain tells me it is quite reasonable to conclude that the human brain is just more matter and that all matter inherently obeys the laws of matter, there’s just no way in hell I can actually believe that I am typing these words right now without “somehow” having acquired at least some measure of autonomy.

Now, back up into the intellectual clouds…

Reasons-Responsive Compatibilism

Reasons-responsive compatibilism is a form of compatibilism that attempts to reconcile the apparent conflict between determinism and free will. According to reasons-responsive compatibilists, free will is compatible with determinism if our actions are responsive to reasons in the right way.

What actions? Given what particular set of circumstances? If you are a proponent of reasons-responsive compatibilism please note how that all unfolds in your head so as to bring about one set of behaviors rather than another. And “the right way” in regard to what? In other words, someone tabs you on the shoulder and insists that what you did is, instead, an example of “the wrong way” of doing things.

The basic idea behind reasons-responsive compatibilism is that our actions can be both determined and free if they are the result of our deliberation and are responsive to reasons in a way that reflects our values and desires. This means that our actions are not determined by external factors, but rather reflect our internal motivations and beliefs.

Of course: that truly mysterious part of our brain revolving around “values and desires” and “motivations and beliefs” that are “somehow” all our own. We “just know” intuitively that this is the case.

[iambiguous]

Reconciling Determinism and Free Will: A Compatibilist Perspective
Innocent Ociti

The Principle of Alternate Possibilities

The Principle of Alternate Possibilities (PAP) is a philosophical concept that states that a person is morally responsible for their actions only if they could have acted differently in the circumstances. In other words, if a person has no alternative options available to them, then they cannot be held morally responsible for their actions.

PAP is often used in discussions about free will and moral responsibility. It suggests that for someone to be morally responsible for an action, they must have had the ability to choose a different course of action. If a person was forced to act in a particular way or had no other options available, then they cannot be held morally responsible for their actions.

How about PAP not as a principle or as a concept but entirely in sync with an actual set of circumstances?

In other words, there are different ways in which to construe it “for all practical purposes”. On the one hand, someone puts a gun to your head, and tells you to do something that you believe to be immoral…or else. Or else you die.

On the other hand, no one puts a gun to head but your brain, wholly in sync with the laws of matter, compels you to do the same thing. But your brain in turn compelled you to believe it was immoral.

Critics of PAP argue that it is not always necessary for there to be alternative possibilities for a person to be morally responsible for their actions. For example, if someone is suffering from a mental illness and does something harmful to themselves or others, they may not have had the ability to choose differently due to their illness. However, they may still be held morally responsible for their actions because they had a duty to seek help or treatment for their illness.

Here, however, there are countless possible circumstantial permutations. Who is to say precisely when someone should have sought out treatment? Someone may be afflicted with a condition such that this was not even realistically possible. And even here the assumption is already made that we do have free will. Thus, enabling us to opt for treatment.

In other words, there may be no distinction at all between mental afflictions and determinism.

Overall, the Principle of Alternate Possibilities remains a topic of debate and discussion among philosophers, particularly regarding its implications for free will and moral responsibility.

Or, all told, this debate and discussion itself is unfolding in the only possible reality.

[iambiguous]

Reconciling Determinism and Free Will: A Compatibilist Perspective
Innocent Ociti

Frankfurt Cases

Frankfurt cases are a philosophical thought experiment introduced by philosopher Harry Frankfurt to explore the concept of free will and moral responsibility. The thought experiment involves a scenario where a person’s actions are predetermined and yet they are still held responsible for those actions.

Yes, a thought experiment. That way you only need a bunch of words telling you what another bunch of words mean. Unless, perhaps, there is a way empirically, experientially, experimentally, etc., to actually demonstrate out in the world that we live and interact with others in why we can be both determined to do something but still responsible for doing it.

Frankfurt cases are often used to challenge the idea that moral responsibility requires alternative possibilities, as suggested by the Principle of Alternate Possibilities (PAP). According to Frankfurt, the fact that the person was unable to choose the other action does not diminish their moral responsibility for the action they did take. He argues that moral responsibility is determined by factors such as intentions, character, and the ability to understand the consequences of one’s actions, rather than by the availability of alternative options.

Again, this is no less preposterous to me. All I can ever hope for then is that someday someone will actually be able to reconfigure the words above into an assessment that is actually not preposterous to me.

If Mary is unable not to abort Jane, perhaps that is because she was never actually able to possess the intentions, character, and ability to give birth. Again as though “somehow” when it comes these “internal” mental states, the human brain wholly in sync with the laws of matter is just…different?

Instead, the Harry Frankfurts of the world juxtapose that with “external” determinants. Mike puts a gun to Mary’s head and says “abort that baby or die”.

But to some determinists, Mike himself never had the intention, the character or the ability not to do that himself either.

[iambiguous]

Reconciling Determinism and Free Will: A Compatibilist Perspective
Innocent Ociti

Libertarianism and compatibilism

Libertarianism and compatibilism are two philosophical positions that offer different perspectives on the question of free will and determinism.

Okay, but don’t they both argue that we are morally responsible for what we do? The Libertarians by flat out rejecting a wholly determined universe. And, for many, God too. Instead, one by one, they take one or another leap of faith to a “human condition” that “somehow” resulted in autonomy given the evolution of biological life on planet Earth.

Libertarianism is the position that free will exists and that our actions are not predetermined by prior causes. According to libertarianism, we can act freely and make choices that are not determined by any external factors. This view is often associated with the belief in the existence of a non-physical soul or mind that is not subject to the laws of causality.

Again, in my view, there is not a Libertarian around who can actually go beyond defining and deducing human autonomy into existence. Or none that I am aware of. And, since many Libertarians are in fact also atheists, this autonomy [to them] is just “somehow” an inherent component of the evolution of life itself on planet Earth. Then that crucial speculation about the possibility of teleology in a No God universe.

Then this particular assumption again…

Compatibilism, on the other hand, argues that free will and determinism can coexist. According to compatibilists, even if our actions are determined by prior causes, we can still act freely and take responsibility for our actions. This position is often based on the idea that free will is not the ability to act in a way that is completely independent of prior causes, but rather the ability to act on our desires and motivations.

After all, what else is there? If our desires and motivations are in turn wholly compelled by brains wholly in sync with the laws of matter, what difference does it make what you actually desire and are motivated by?