Determinism

I asked that precisely because we are in a philosophy venue and on a particular thread that is devoted to an exploration into determinism.

And over and over and over again, I make it clear that in regard to 1] the is/ought world in an autonomous universe and 2] in exploring questions this inherently problematic all the way our on the metaphysical limb, “I” can only note what “here and now” seems reasonable to me.

If that doesn’t seem reasonable enough to you, there is still the possibility that this exchange itself is unfolding only as it ever could. And if that is the case, how can either of us be held responsible for “choosing” only that which nature compelled us to?

In other words, for “choosing” anything at all!

So what? That doesn’t resolve the matter of whether in “choosing” to do this, you were exerting anything in the way of an actual autonomous will.

Simply unbelievable. Well, if not entirely determined of course.

Note an instance when I have argued that everyone is like me. I merely assume that in the either/or world – a world of human interactions embedded in some measure of autonomy – the laws of matter are applicable to all of us.

And that in a wholly determined universe, the laws of nature encompass the psychological illusion on the part of human minds, that the is/ought world is not as well also a necessary component of the laws of matter.

Everything would seem [to me] to be either/or in a determined universe. Including this exchange. Including what either of us “choose” to do in regard to it.

I merely point out that in speculating about all of this, I have no capacity to demonstrate that what I believe is true. Let alone true going all the way back to the most comprehensive explanation of existence itself.

And I am assuming that in a determined universe as I currently understand it nothing is not part of the only possible objective reality.

I’m merely compelled or not compelled to speculate that in a philosophy venue on a thread such as this one – and for all practical purposes – it seems reasonable to me “here and now” that until we can know for certain whether the things we choose we could have opted not to choose, is clearly a very, very important consideration for philosophers in a venue such as this.

1. your question was framed as incredulous that anything could be more important and framed as if importance was an objective quality. You didn’t ask what was important to us.

2. Further I answered your question, explaining what was more important to me and others. You did not respond to that, you acted as if this was me saying something about practical matters being autonomous.

You asked a question. I answered. My answers did not matter to you. You acted like I was arguing practical issues like the ones I raised demonstrated free will, when the context, with quotes, could not have been clearer.

Well, duh. Of course not. It is however relevent to the question

you

asked

You asked a question,

I pointed out the objecitvism implicit in your formulation of the question. I then answered the question.

LOL right there in what you quote is one, I pointed out twise. I pointed out two quotes, your question where it is implicit: what could possibly be more important that determinism? (objective speak and universal speak`

Then later when you say

There it is. We all, like you, think that answering this issue is crucial.

Right there in 'print´.

But you will deny this.

You’re damaged, either freely or via determinism.

REally damaged. I’m sorry. I should have realized this earlier. I thought you were fucking with us. Or something more intentionally pernicious or at least willing to deny things out of stubbornness or ill will. This feels very damaged.

I’ll leave you alone.

Here we go again.

The problem is me.

The solution is for others to recognize that the manner in which you are exposing me here is really all that matters.

Hoping that maybe, just maybe, we are actually in possession of the free will needed to have this confimed as in fact true. Both existentially and essentially. True because though others might opt for a contrary point of view in an autonomous world, they do so only at the risk…

Of!
Being!!
Wrong!!!

But, okay, let’s assume that you really can choose to leave me alone.

If that’s the case then really mean it this time.

All you are exposing [to me] in tantrums like this is just how effective I am perturbing your peace of mind.

I suspect that my arguments are beginning to really sink in. And, in your own repetitive way, you need to strike out at me because of this.

You are just one of many, many posters I have bumped into over the years that, convinced they see things as they really are, become really, really disgruntled when I and others don’t concur.

No, really, I can’t read your stuff more. You actually don’t know what you’re doing. It’s like I got in a scuffle with an abused child. I apologize. Perhaps you’ve even tried to tell me somewhere.

I’m compelled to say it: Whatever.

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

Here’s where I always get stuck. Beyond definitions – definitions it would seem all of us are compelled by nature to give to these words – the act of clumping these defined words together to make arguments like this one would in turn seem to be just another manifestation of nature. Only this time embodied in brain matter that compels these exchanges to unfold only as they ever can.

There is no real “revisionsism” here. Why? Because the one compelled by nature to revise the definition is interchangeable with the one compelled by nature to react to that revision only as he must.

Nothing would seem to escape the inexorable toppling of all matter over onto other matter as nature itself unfolds necessarily in sync with its own laws. The fact that this matter has now become conscious of itself as matter able to be self-conscious of itself as matter embedded in nature…well…how does that change things?

What earthly difference can it make if the conmpatibilist says one thing and not another if it was the only thing he/she was ever able to say? Just as we are compelled to react to what we hear being said as our own brain-matter compels us.

Instead, I can only assume that there are important points being made here that I keep missing. But, given how I understand determinism, others are then either compelled or not compelled to point them out.

More non-answers which avoid discussion rather than moving it along. Endlessly repeating the same idea.

Shifting away to economic systems. Why not stay on death camps and gulags and actually say something about it?
You can’t even say “death camps bad”?
So capitalism destroyed a lot of lives … Does that change the fact that people were killed in death camps?

Communist, fascists and capitalists were not able not to set up death camps??? They decide not to do it all the time. “Should we set up a death camp today? No, let’s not do that.”

You should consider not telling people what they are obligated to do and think. It’s annoying. You would have better conversations if you didn’t do it.

With any luck [for both of us] you were compelled by nature to respond to what I was compelled by nature to post above.

But if there is any measure of autonomy embedded in the choices that I make, I choose to respond to you in retort mode as I choose to respond to KT in retort mode:

All you are exposing [to me] in tantrums like this is just how effective I am in perturbing your peace of mind.

Though I suspect that, unlike KT, you will manage to stumble into the grave with your objective morality and your God still largely intact.

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

But: Even if both sides agree that moral behavior revolves around intention, what do they agree about regarding the extent to which intention itself does or does not revolve around the laws of matter?

If our brains/minds autonomically precipitate neurological and chemical interactions that become our intentions then how are “both sides” not wholly in sync with the only behaviors they are able to choose in their interactions with others?

How are all “cognitive agents” not just more of nature’s “living, breathing…thinking” dominoes? Or, if you prefer, nature’s own computers?

“I” and my “environment” would seem to be of one and only one inherent reality. The only reality possible given the laws of matters.

Which would necessarily take us back to wondering if we are in possession of just enough free will to explain mind as matter of our own volition. As a species on this planet in the vastness of all there is going back to an explanation for existence itself.

Really, isn’t this the option that, of our own free will or not, is all it takes to sweep questions of this sort under the rug?

Existentially as it were?

Then just go about the business of living our lives convinced that we call the shots.

Especially if, in our day to day interactions with others, we are awash in all manner of success.

Of course we call the shots! Let the losers fall back on a belief that their own miserable failures are derived solely from things that are totally beyond their control…rather than from their own willed weakness or stupidity.

Here’s the thing though. We’re not barbarians. Instead, we are among the very few folks in this modern world that do come into venues like this one. Men and women that do in fact take questions like this and grapple with them “philosophically”.

And pondering the extent to which we choose to do this freely is no small thing.

Right?

A new low.

Of course, if you want to talk to yourself, then this is the way to achieve that goal.

Let’s agree to call it a new low for both of us. And, just to be on the safe side, let’s agree that nature conspired to stage and then to sustain the whole thing.

In or not in league with God.

Look, in regards to either yourself or KT, I am more than willing to exchange posts that actually revolve around determinism.

It is only when I perceive either of you as being in what I call “retort mode” that I’m really not interested.

The bottom line is that I have a great deal of respect for the intelligence of both of you. Just not in retort mode. When you basically come after me, you may as well be one of the fucking Kids here.

But trust me: This post is no less an existential contraption. In no way, shape or form would I ever argue that all rational men and women are obligated to think like I do about you.

And then there is this part:

He was like a man who wanted to change all; and could not; so burned with his impotence; and had only me, an infinitely small microcosm to convert or detest. John Fowles

I think this explains a lot about me here, but I can never really be sure why. It’s buried down deep in dasein.

And, of late, godot.

No, I don’t agree to that. I had valid points.

Repeatedly saying “compelled by nature” is not a discussion of determinism. It explains nothing and it describes nothing.

It’s similar to this :

“Why is that airplane flying?” “It’s compelled by nature.”

“Why did that airplane crash?” “It was compelled by nature.”

Useless answers.

If the human brain is matter and matter obeys nature’s laws, how are our behaviors then not compelled by them? In other words, how are our behaviors not inherently, necessarily obligated to be in sync with the laws of matter?

How would you go about demonstrating that the laws of nature did not compel you to read these words?

How would you go about demonstrating that these laws do not explain and describe everything?

No, it is not similar to that at all in my view. The reason the airplane flies can in fact be demonstrated with a great deal of sophistication. Why? Because all of the parts that comprise it are wholly in sync with the laws of matter as we have come to understand them in the either/or world.

But what about “we” ourselves? What about the matter that comprises the brain, the mind, the self-conscious awareness of all those able to invent those parts and put them together to invent the airplane?

How is this matter the same or different from the clearly mindless matter that comprises the plane parts?

Is the answer to this something that philosophers have [using the tools at their disposal] been able to finally pin down definitively after thousands and thousands of years of contemplating such quandaries as “dualism”?

What, in your view, is the most “useful” answer?

I didn’t say that behaviors are not in sync with the laws of matter or that one is not compelled by the laws of matter.

I’m saying that the way you are referring to the laws of matter amounts to saying nothing at all. When any and every behavior has the same explanation “compelled by nature”, then there is no value to the explanation. You could just as well say “compelled by Pixies” and it would explain just as much as “compelled by nature”.

It’s similar because it accounts for the behavior of the airplane just as much as “compelled by nature” accounts for human behavior - not at all.

That’s why scientists and engineers don’t stop at “compelled by nature”. They look at the details, the patterns, the similarities and differences in situations. Therefore, you end up with a science of flight dynamics. And that’s a useful way of looking at airplane behavior.

If you do believe human behaviors are in sync with the laws of matter – laws that compel them – then what in your own view constitutes a discussion of this that enables someone to reflect something rather than nothing?

Cite some examples of this.

The point isn’t whether I say “compelled by nature” or “compelled by pixies”, but the extent to which one is able to demonstrate that human brains either allow or do not allow us the option to choose one rather than the other?

I must be misunderstanding your point. It is the fact that nature has evolved into life on earth evolving into the human species evolving into the human brain able to grasp the science of flight dynamics intertwined with/in the invention of the airplane that philosophers grapple with in trying to understand such things as dualism.

What are “the details, the patterns, the similarities and differences” that allow us to grasp the distinction between mindless matter and matter able to become conscious of itself as matter either compelled or not compelled by the self-same laws of matter to build airplanes?

The gap in our knowledge here may well be beyond the reach of the human brain.

Configuration of matter A causes behavior X, configuration of matter B causes behavior Y. Etc.

That’s where you actually relate laws of matter to real behavior.

For example, one sees it in studies which show that food intolerance causes behavior problems in children.

But good luck, trying to relate gravity, electromagnetism and the strong and weak forces to real behavior.

I’m not writing a PhD thesis or starting a cult or selling a product … therefore, I’m not going to be demonstrating anything. I will be putting out some ideas and examples - things to think about -that’s it.

I’m suggesting to you, and anyone who may be reading this, that there are better and worse ways of looking at these things. I’m suggesting that “compelled by nature” is not a particular good way because it doesn’t lead anywhere. It’s a dead end.

See for yourself how far you can get with it.

I’m not talking about evolution, dualism, or distinctions between matter conscious of itself and mindless matter. I’m talking about determinism and people making decisions.

Does it make sense to think of humans as merely “compelled by nature”? I don’t think so because we can’t relate the fundamental forces to human behavior. We need to think in more abstract terms. That is why it’s useful to think of agents who have choices and who make decisions. We can then figure out reasons for actions, motivations, compulsions that produce particular behaviors in people. This is where we can get meaningful results.

I think this is a good way of presenting a potential position. Here we are in situ, where experientially it seems like we are free, but we can also see ourselves affected by things and even notice that some ‘choices’ or choices seem automatic, even compulsive (a word with the same root as compelled.)

I cannot imagine nailing down a solution (that would convince all rational people, for example) as far as determinims vs. free will. Nor can I see, actually, what good it would do. So for me it is not an important issue.

I have my day ahead of me. I have to make a job related call that might give me some work I would like to have. Fortunately it is not a fully cold call. My way of thinking about this call is a muddle of thinking based on causation - I know they don’t have a lot of money right now and this will likely make them stingy - and me mulling over my options with an implicit belief in free will somewhere in there - as if several futures are possible, as if might go a number of different ways on the phone. I don’t need to make a decision about free will or determinism. I have a bunch of heuristics, just like everyone else, some would seem to indicate I am free - me planning my different options to different questions or obstacles I might meet in the phone call - and some that things are determined - especially when thinking about the callee.

Peacegirl thinks I will be a better person if I believe in determinism. I truly doubt that. I can see it helping on some issues, but also hurting on others. I think a consistant, all the time believing in determinism, will dehumanize. Obviously that doesn’t mean it is incorrect, in fact my concerns are about the believe causing certain negative effects. That the future is bascially laid out already I think will be depressing. Perhap it ‘should’ not be. But humans have tendencies to feel in ways that are not necessarily logical. We are life forms nnot pocket calculators. Some people believe that we will be nicer to criminals once we no longer view their choices as choices. I think the precise opposite effect could take place once we view them as broken machines or creatures with problematic chemical machines in their brains. Once we are seen as, essentially, robots or complicated ‘things’…wait that is often the way we are viewed today by governments,corporations and the pharmaceutial industry. Well, there’s a downside to that.

Perhaps there are good reasons most people more or less black box the issue and if we followed their thinking we would find a muddle of both models chugging along. (note: many of them claim that they believe in free will or deteminism, but I think if we watched their language and investigated their thinking, we would find that in fact they move between the two).

If someone can demonstrate that it is important for us to work it out finally AND can at least make it seem remotely possible, especially for us here, to work it out. OK, maybe then I’ll prioritize working out the solution to it. I suppose I’d be flattered they thought so highly of me ( and then also they think very highly of themselves).

This pops up over and again in these discussions and debates. The same word is being used by everyone, but not everyone “for all practical purposes” understands the meaning of the word in the same way.

That’s when some insist that in order to understand the true meaning of the word we must first pin down the one and only true definition.

Trust me: Five will get you ten that it’s their definition.

But as often as not five will get you ten that their definition makes little or no actual contact with those “for all practical purposes” interactions of flesh and blood human beings.

It becomes basically a dictionary definition that they then use to defend the meaning they give to all the other words they in their philosophical “analysis”.

And, let’s face it, the word “free” is a particular gnarly example of this.

Free in what sense? Ontologically given the understanding of existence itself? Morally and politically given ones value judgments in the is/ought world?

Or, in either context, is it always what the objectivists insist it is?

Okay, but how does that change [if at all] when the matter reconfigures from mindless to mindful. There are the laws of matter involved in the creation of, say, a tornado. These laws propel/compel the matter in and around it to behave only as the matter can behave.

But what of the laws of matter inside the brain of a meteorologist that cause her to predict the behavior of the tornado? Was she determined to to “choose” that forecast, or is there some element of actual free choice involved in opting for one rather can another prediction?

The behavior of the matter inside the tornado…how much more or less “real”/real is it than the behavior of the matter inside the meteorologist’s brain?

But the point of some would seem to be that the laws of matter are inherently intertwining both the biological interactions here in the child’s body and the sociological behaviors of that child interacting with others. Indeed, that our very reactions to those behaviors are no less but another necessary manifestation of the laws of matter.

On the other hand, I will always admit that I am still missing some basic point that you and others make here. I just keep coming back to whether I make it only because nature compels me to.

Exactly. Those scientists exploring the actual functional relationship between “I”, the world of the very, very large, and the world of the very, very small all intertwined in the “four fundamental forces of nature”, haven’t come to any definitive conclusion yet. Let alone alone being able in turn to explain the specific relationship between what “I” does “choose”/choose and a definitive understanding of existence itself.

Okay, but for those who “choose”/choose to take their speculations from the neighborhood bar to a philosophy venue, it would seem expected that they would at least attempt to intertwine those speculations with their own experiences or with what they have perused by seeking out the opinions of those who have attempted [using, say, the scientific method] to grapple with these things less speculatively.

It’s a dead end only because we reach that part where no one seems able to move the discussion to a path that finally resolves the perplexities involved.

But it is surely less of a dead end than suggesting that our behaviors are compelled by pixies.

Or, perhaps, by God?

And what on earth could the latter possibly have to do with the former?

We seem to be in two very different discussions here. Compelled by nature or otherwise.

But human brains are either wholly in sync with those fundamental forces or they are not. How could it not make sense to explore that? The only thing that can possibly make sense has to be in tandem with what in fact is true. And nothing either of us might opine here changes that, right?

Okay, then note particular examples of how discussions of abstract agents have in fact led to meaningful results in explaining the actions, motivations and compulsions relating to the actual behaviors chosen by flesh and blood human beings.