Determinism

Ecmandu posted a link to the local newspaper article about the guy.

Sculptor posted a link to one of the guy’s papers in the International Journal of Astronomy …

I don’t know why Sculptor would expect you to read that paper since it’s much too technical for most people to understand.

I read the article from the paper. Thanks for clearing that up. The point I was making is that sometimes science gets it wrong, but because of the stature of the individual (who is almost godlike), it is blasphemous to question whether the conclusions drawn may have flaws. It is very important for scientists to keep an open mind. Isn’t that what science demands? Often, a new understanding comes from a person outside of the field. My guess is they can more easily think outside of the box with no limitations put on them.

:laughing: :laughing:

Translation: “I fucked up and blamed you”, says Peacegirl

Peacegirl: I did not fuck up Sculptor, and I hope you’re joking about blame! :wink:

Human Freewill and Divine Predestination
Antony Flew untangles some confusion about David Hume, St Thomas Aquinas and the fiery fate of the damned.

Colloquial: “(of language) used in ordinary or familiar conversation; not formal or literary.”

Or epistemological.

As for "the artificial philosophical sense of ‘free will’, you tell me. Given a particular context, how would they be distinguished?

Ever and always this emphasis on “external coercion and constraint” when, given the manner in which some comprehend determinism, there is no external component at all. There are only the laws of nature.

So they tell you. On the other hand, for me, it’s still just a hopelessly problematic and jumbled labyrinth of scientific, philosophical and theological speculation all wrapped up in what really may well be the only possible reality in the only possible world. God, like all the rest of us, is just along for the ride. The ride itself being utterly and profoundly mysterious. Not unlike the existence of existence itself.

Right. Like he was himself ever able to actually demonstrate to the world that this is in fact true. Indeed, try to imagine historical figures like him being around today…dumbstruck at the progress science has made in understanding the world around us. What would they change regarding their own thinking, and what would stay exactly the same.

Peacegirl: Luther is correct when he says man (let’s leave out God for a second) doesn’t do evil against his will (as if being forced by the scruff of his neck), but does it of his own accord. In Lessans’ parlance, it gives him greater satisfaction. It’s really not as difficult as you’re making it. Going along along for the ride does not mean we aren’t given choices. It also doesn’t mean we don’t have autonomy which means freedom from outside influence. Autonomy does not mean will is free which words you conflate.

Iambiguous: Right. Like he was himself ever able to actually demonstrate to the world that this is in fact true.

Peacegirl: Obviously he could not not have demonstrated to the world that this is, in fact, true. But that does not make his explanation untrue.

Iambiguous: Indeed, try to imagine historical figures like him being around today…dumbstruck at the progress science has made in understanding the world around us. What would they change regarding their own thinking, and what would stay exactly the same.

Peacegirl: They would have confirmed Luther was right about the fact that we do things not against our will but because we want to, even if the choice is the least preferable of available options. They would have tried to understand why the misunderstanding of the term free will has set us back years. They may have been more receptive than today’s philosophers in trying to understand why determinism and it’s implications give us the best chance for a peaceful world.

A Metaphysics For Freedom by Helen Steward
We exercise free will this issue as Les Reid defends A Metaphysics For Freedom.
Book Review

Okay, if the laws of nature are entirely responsible for what you decide and choose, how then are the actions you take – settling – as an inherent/necessary consequence of that not in turn wholly subsumed in the laws of matter? No matter how “broad” you construe freedom it is only as broadly as your brain compels you to construe it.

Ever and always back to the mind-boggling matter that is the one of a kind human brain itself. And what may well be the stupefying attempts to explain it with it.

Imagine God trying to explain Himself.

Yes, what about those creatures that, like us, have brains but possess an “agency” that revolves almost entirely around instinct. What goes through the “mind” of a spider jumping to seize prey and how is it different from what goes through the mind of a robber “choosing”/choosing to jump someone for their wallet?

What does it mean for a spider to be devious if it merely jumps on cue autonomically to subsist. And how did matter manage to evolve such that it can create creatures like us who can think that they are being devious when they rob someone…when in fact their behaviors are completely on par with the spider’s.

How to wrap your mind around that…fully.

No grey areas for the spiders, right? But what about these creatures: thoughtco.com/most-intellig … ls-4157712

Nature’s “fantastically complex algorithms” that we argue about here…philosophically?

Iambiguous: No grey areas for the spiders, right? But what about these creatures: thoughtco.com/most-intellig … ls-4157712

Nature’s “fantastically complex algorithms” that we argue about here…philosophically?

Peacegirl: Algorithms are more complex when it comes to human behavior because it’s not linear. Agency (which humans have) cannot be predicted as easily as predicting a spider’s behavior. Does that mean we have free will? The confusion is astounding! Please tell me where free will enters into this? It’s really unfortionate to think that people have a choice and can therefore be blamed. It’s preventing a much better world from blossoming.

Human Freewill and Divine Predestination
Antony Flew untangles some confusion about David Hume, St Thomas Aquinas and the fiery fate of the damned.

That sound you hear is iambiguous moaning incredulously as he pulls out his hair.

Whether by God or nature, our actions are “causally necessitated”. But that is still completely consistent with our being agents with fee will.

Click.

Obviously, in a philosophy venue, this can only revolve around how “epistemologically” we define/encompass the meaning of “causally” and “necessitated”. Define them one way and they are compatible, define them another way and they are not. And then [of course] merely assume that the action of defining them itself is wholly consistent with our own definition.

Then take that to Mary agonizing over whether to abort Jane. The taking of it as well wholly in sync with our definition.

You know, if only theoretically.

Not unlike me requesting of the compatibilists much the same. Not unlike anyone here requesting of me that I provide this vital demonstration. Only here, of course, we are all in the same “gap”. And here the “gap” is particularly surreal because it revolves around using our brain to pin down what it mean to use our brain itself.

It’s just for some here [compelled or not] accepting this is easier to own up to than for others. Some here fall back on complex theoretical concoctions and author’s books to insist that they have in fact come at least the closest to demonstrating what all rational men and women are obligated to believe about free will.

One thing we can almost always count on though is that these assessments will more or less revolve around arguments like these:

What’s missing here? Aside from Mary and Jane.

Okay, it’s been years since I read Hume. So, for those here who are reading him now, what are some specific examples of Hume intertwining compatibilism as a philosophical subject and the actions that we choose from day to day in our interactions with others. And how might he have made his own distinction between the either/or and the is/ought world here?

Then it can only get all the more convoluted when we factor in the Divine:

Concept! Concept! Concept!

Vital of course in embracing philosophy as a discipline. But to what extent are they basically detached or not detached from the world of human social, political and economic relationships?

Given, for example, a particular context.

The only way they can claim consistency is if they are using the term “free will” to mean something different than freedom of the will. IOW, they are using the term in a qualified way (i.e., without external force or an internal compulsion such as OCD). This, according to their definition, makes freedom of the will and determinism compatible. But how can that be? How in the world can have no free will and free will simultaneously? I’m pulling my hair out because no compatibilist will admit to the incongruency.

Once again, definitions mean nothing where reality is concerned if the definition doesn’t match up to reality. Disagreement over definition does not mean there isn’t one correct definition. One plus one is not three, no matter who defines it as such.

There is no definition of morality that is objectively correct. It is a subjective choice based on one’s personal beliefs along with their present reality. Someone’s moral dictates as to what Mary ought to do (which is obviously based on their personal beliefs regarding abortion) — other than Mary herself — has no place when it comes to her decision.

I’m sure it could not be demonstrated because free will is nonexistent. How can they prove something that doesn’t exist? Pet scans of the brain can show some revealing features, but there are many things it cannot reveal. The study that showed the brain makes a decision before we are conscious of that decision supports determinism, but that is not the entire answer. That would be like saying my brain made a choice to shoot someone before I was aware of it, thus freeing me of responsibility. That doesn’t add up. So my brain was responsible, but I, the individual who houses my brain, was not? Hmmm. :-k

[i]https://www.wired.com/2008/04/mind-decision/[/i]

Neuroscience is able to learn many things about the brain and its workings, but insofar as free will and determinism, there is nothing in the brain that can be identified to prove we have free will, which means that we could have done otherwise once a choice is made.

I don’t know what books you’re talking about, but there is nothing theoretical about the book I came here to discuss. We either move in the direction of greater satisfaction (which does not mean we are always satisfied with our choice of options), or we don’t. If we do move in this direction (without exception), it is a one way street. We have no free choice at all.

I think what Mele and Beebee try to do is reconcile the fact that we can and do make choices that they then call “free”. It is true that humans are different than other species in that they can contemplate alternatives and make decisions. This is why it is so easy to assume in philosophical circles, and in the general population, that if we can make choices — without persuasion or external force — they must be free choices. The implications of this are huge because the belief in free will justifies blame and punishment, which is the cornerstone of our justice and penal system. Without free will, how can we blame or punish wrongdoers? When compatibilists say we are causally undetermined, I believe they mean that we are not caused by something external to us which is forcing our hand. IOW, what we do is not being done against our will, but because we have given permission to perform an action. This conundrum over the word “cause” (which in this debate denotes force) has been a sticking point for centuries.

The only thing that I see is that compatibilism allows for blame and punishment with the justification that although they believe in determinism, they also believe there is a case for ultimate responsibility since they rightfully believe we were not caused (by falling dominoes where we have no say) to do what we did —assuming that what we did has been judged by a moral code to be a criminal act — but because we had the free will to do other than what we did. Can’t you see the confusion here?

I think they were struggling, just as we are today, with trying to understand the nature of man with the hope of improving human social, political, and economic relationships in a practical sense. We haven’t come that far. The same arguments are circulating (each side having its own bias) and nothing has actually improved unfortunately.

1+1=10. That’s the definition that I’m choosing to use now.

As long as I use the same definition from start to finish, then I have no difficulties. I only get into trouble when I switch to some other definition in the middle of the process.

Tomorrow I might use another definition to solve a different problem.

The same thing applies here:

I can define compatibilist free-will as “free from external impediments and coercion” and act accordingly.

I can switch to another definition in the future. I can change to whatever suits me and the situation.

I’m not compelled to think only one way about it.

Thinking about a situation in terms of hard determinism may be useful. I don’t think that it is useful most of the time.

I will state again for your benefit that definitions can satisfy the need to create something useful but that does not make the definition reflective of the truth. Remember: Definitions mean nothing where reality is concerned. That should make people curious, at the very least, as to what this means. In all these years there is no proof of free will. People get up in arms by this because they believe without free will people can use the excuse to do whatever they want without fear of consequences. This is wrong. All the author asked is to keep an open mind.

Definitional logic is the best logic.

Then you use definitional logic to prove the person debating you can’t exist if the argument you’re making is false.

You meet none of those criteria…

Expand your mind PG…

youtu.be/VCjhQQq-J6M

We are not discussing logic here Ecmandu.

Again, in my view, he notes this as though in noting it the manner in which he understands any particular situation is the manner in which it is to be noted.

Whereas some note instead that from the start to the finish nothing that he notes about anything at all was he ever able to note any other way.

But the part I’m still fuzzy about is how this doesn’t really seem to matter to him.

Whereas – click – if down the road science is able to determine that in fact the human brain did acquire at least some measure of autonomy when lifeless matter evolved into biological matter evolved into us, that would be an astounding game changer for the species.

Yo I’m working on a radical new theory of freewill y’all. It goes like this: the individual has no freewill and cannot be a cause of what he does himself… but only what external objects do. Meaning, u are only a ‘cause’ in a relationship to things separated from your body by space. I can cause u to fall down or drop ur cheeseburger, but I can’t cause myself to fall down or drop my cheeseburger. Likewise, if I do, something external to me caused me to do it.

Eureka, right? I know. Like why didn’t I think of this before.

Perhaps if the conservative capitalist had read about Compatibilism. :smiley:

Compatibalism is nonsense and has nothing to do with my theory.

Wait a minute tho I gotta scratch my theory because it can’t be right. If my arm bumps my leg, my body has acted as a cause on itself. There is still no acausal Cartesian ghost in my body making things move tho.

Compatibilism is exactly what you described mate.

“1+1=3” and “1+1=10” are not definitions.