Co-Determinism and the Reality of Free Will

Discussion in 'General Philosophy' started by Quantum Quack, Apr 7, 2019.

  1. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    23,328
    ok but remember ... you asked for it...

    Seriously, you have a serious problem with "Relevance".
    It seems you feel compelled to post a whole heap of irrelevant information when you get stressed out by any refutation.

    What would be greatly helpful for you is to always post a paragraph or two under the heading "Relevance to topic" or at the very least seriously consider the issue of relevance before posting.
    I used a note pad originally during recovery with some basic rules that I try to adhere to.
    1/ relevance
    2/ soundness
    3/ selective bias
    and a few more
    but relevance, if not sound, is crippling your power to address the issue at hand.

    The final ambition is to achieve a sound objective position and belief.

    This can only be achieved with out the hubris most carry as baggage.

    I hope the above helps you solve the issues you are facing...and it is accepted in goof faith and will and respect.
     
    Last edited: Jun 18, 2019
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  3. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    Relevance? Proven by who? Do you need to ask this?
    Are you disputing the mainstream definition of "determinism"?
    Are you disputing the universal laws of "cause --> effect" and "necessity <--> sufficiency"?
    These are questionable fundamental philosophical tenets?
    This is what you are debating? This statement is correct in both Philosophical and Mathematical disciplines........

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    Just because you think of something original doesn't mean the thought was not formed before you became consciously aware of it. You have no way of knowing that you have free will 0r not.

    Don't forget that information communication occurs at many levels and may contribute to the eventual deterministic logical process.
     
    Last edited: Jun 18, 2019
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  5. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    Nope!
    Answer the question, who is responsible for the theory of cause and effectw and you will find it is not I that is disputing it but determinists that are.
    Or choose free of determinism,
    Is it valid or invalid?
     
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  7. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    30,994
    There aren't any others paying attention to this aspect of your argumentation - or their own - (QQ is making a related - also valid - point about "illusion") - and you can examine your own "logic" for yourself. It's your only realistic way out, as far as I can see.
    Various random distributions of data - Poisson, Gaussian, etc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_probability_distributions- are just as logical as any other distributions. According to quantum theory, "random" describes the fundamental nature of all data distribution from observations of physical reality.

    Meanwhile, notice the breakdown in the language - we are required to read our best guess of sensible meaning into "logical data", data that "is randomly distributes" (what is doing the distributing? itself, by nature? ), and so forth. English resists muddle.
    It's a wrong word. Dictionary time. American Heritage Third, the book not the net - recommended.
    So your claim that red is a hardwired warning signal, fight or flight, was false. And rather obviously false.
    So: What led you to post it?
    Or this:
    Necessary but not sufficient, sufficient but not necessary, are each and separately very common attributes of causes. Both necessary and sufficient, "if and only if", is a less common status by far. That is - once again, like a sweet red cherry - a completely ordinary and obvious fact of the physical world.

    This is not rocket science. Something is screwing up your thinking here, and Baldee's, and so forth. You have my evidence saturated and argument supported hypothesis in front of you - do you have another?
     
    Last edited: Jun 18, 2019
  8. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    For determinism to be real and not an illusion self determination is logically essential.
     
  9. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    30,994
    nnn
     
    Last edited: Jun 18, 2019
  10. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    20,069
    First of all, this may be a knowledge deficit on our part.
    But that statement suggests that the function produces two superimposed probabilities.
    But when the supeposition collapses the randomness is resolved and determinism is all there is.
    It's impossible to argue that effects from causal values are also random? I always thought that determinism was more orderly and predictable than that. It belongs in the discipline of Logic. Riddle me that.

    btw. Probability does not give a date or place when something may happen, but it gives the function by which it will happen.

    Are you dismissing the concept of logic altogether? And free will can override deterministic processes?
    That is impossible. It is a self-referential system.
    Cause=effect=cause=effect=cause.....ad infinitum.

    The problem is that the very variety of our existential human experience is already part of this hierarchical process, down to the most subtle levels and that's where determinism already dwells as a mathematical essence and physical potential of the spacetime fabric.
     
    Last edited: Jun 18, 2019
  11. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    According to who?
    If universe = illusion
    If self determined = real

    It's not hard once you work it out...
     
  12. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    20,069
    Take your pick from a few millennia of Philosophy and Cosmology
    No, Bohm calls it; The Holographic Universe:
    No. The best you could do in the absence of a self-referential matrix, is assign intelligence, but then we have a motivated causal actor and that suggests there is no blind, logically deterministic process that can yield predictable future results, but only the whim of the greater intelligence.

    That sounds fatalistic to me. Unless of course we can someday attain that very omnipotent status ourselves. We're already flexing our free will muscles.....

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    From your point of view it is very hard to acount for all the variables you are introducing as being extant in a state of "freedom", basically asking for exceptions to the rules of determinism itself.

    So far your argument has failed to persuade me, and I've really tried . Even gave you possible links that appeared to support your position.

    But I'll sit back and follow the conversation. It's a fascinating subject.[/QUOTE]
     
  13. iceaura Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    30,994
    No. Why are you changing the subject? The subject was observation - careful acquisition of data.
    Probability distributions do not very often give the function "by which" something will happen. Examples: coin flip. Light bulb burnout. Drivers deciding what to do at a traffic light.
    You are batting under 500, when making claims about physical circumstance - even very simple and completely voluntary ones.
    Why is this fifty times answered and dealt with misrepresentation and innuendo still coming up? You guys are not just slow on the uptake - you're stalled out.

    The requirement that "true", "actual", "genuine", non-illusory, non-trivial, etc etc etc freedom necessarily involve overriding deterministic process, defying determined outcomes, producing different outcomes from identical inputs in a deterministic universe, etc, is entirely you guys's. It's your assumption, not mine. I just labeled it - accurately, btw.

    Time to move on, one would think.
     
  14. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    Even Tegmark agrees with me but for different reasons...
    see,
    The illusion of determinism ~ Tegmark
     
  15. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    for over 3000 years this debate has been raging.... so you pick a single person who isn't subjected to the illusion generated by determinism...( if one holds to no self determination)
     
  16. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    20,069
    See, you just listed a bunch of mathematical functions (uncertainty, destructive, logical). Widen your horizons.
     
  17. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    20,069
    Thanks for the link.
    Two questions.
    At best this is speculative. Being that all living organisms exist by "adequately determined selection of the best action", also known as "natural selection", do all living organisms posses a measure of free will which fills a will (desire) to live?
     
  18. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    20,069
    That's a great link.....it's in my reference library now.....

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    I don't think that Tegmark necessarily supports the original link. He has his own axe to grind.


    I mentioned David Bohm earlier. He, as well as Tegmark have individual contributions which do not necessarily support the original link.
    http://www.informationphilosopher.com/solutions/scientists/bohm/
     
  19. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    Relevance?
     
  20. Baldeee Valued Senior Member

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    Everything is predetermined by the laws / rules that govern the deterministic universe.
    It is not the "self" that predetermined, because what you do was predetermined axons ago, long before life existed.
    Since no life existed yet it was already predetermined that life would begin, it can not be said that that life predetermined its own existence.
    Take any individual moment... this moment was predetermined by any other preceding moment.
    What you do was and is predetermined by every moment that has ever preceded it, via the laws/rules that govern.
    The "self" can not be removed from such predetermination and looked at separately.
    It is the universe that predetermines, and thus per your options, no freedom.
     
  21. Baldeee Valued Senior Member

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    2,226
    We have assumed determinism, though.
    We have no need to argue for or against it.
     
  22. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    You are presuming a "we" when in fact that is false....
    I could just as easily assume self determination to be the default premise...
    Objectivity demands that there be no automatic assumptions, or presumptions.
     
  23. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    23,328
    Refutation: .....And in doing so forces/makes any conclusion made by humans about said laws an illusion.... (circular logic that defeats the argument against self determination)
    Refutation: ... which demonstrably includes learning to self determine.
    Refutation: ... and it was predetermined that humans evolve the capacity to self determine.
    if one agrees that determinism itself is not an illusion then yes true... see previous post #413 .
    Refutation: already addressed see above...


    Just one question,
    What prevents universal predetermination from evolving the ability for humans to learn to self determine?

    Anything?

    Just curious how you can arbitrarily forbid/ban the predetermined evolution of human self determination so easily...

    Do you have a logical reason to do so?
    if so let's see it....
     
    Last edited: Jun 18, 2019

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