Is free will possible in a deterministic universe?

Capracus,
Do you believe you are being objective in your assessment of the issues?
If so please explain how you possibly can be, given your deterministic paradigm makes objectivity impossible?

 

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you are being lazy again...
call to authority doesn't wash ... sorry see post #540

 

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The rational explanation to support determinism is that."if all mathematical values and functions of a specific dynamic state (set of potentials) are known, the following state cannot be other than the result of the applied mathematics.
Universal Mechanics, 2 + 2 = 4, always.

 

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More than likely, the earthworms which were self-determining perished almost immediately. Wanna go for a stroll?....and then the early bird catches the worm.....and another one bites the dust......

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sure....
it describes a simple deterministic system, until that mathematics is being generated by an evolved actor, evolved because of that mathematics.

 

Do you believe your assessment is objective?
If so please explain how you possibly can be, given your deterministic paradigm makes objectivity impossible?

 

Becauses the system is simple in essence. Tegmark postulates 32 relative values and a handfull of mathematical equations is all that are needed for the universe to express itself as it does.

Why do you seek to make it complicated? Is that necessary?

Objectivity demands the application of a hierarchy of "mathematical orders", emerging patterns starting with and emerging from simple unstable systems.

Any mathematical "bells and whistles" are the result of evolutionary physical processes and only create a greater subjective understanding of the exponential powers of mathematics, which is useful to us. The fundamental universal mathematical properties are a timeless and transendent potential of the spacetime fabric itself. That is why we can translate all universal behaviors with mathematical symbolic equations. Man's greatest intellectual achievement!

IMO, human mathematics are a subjective symbolic application of universally objective potential "relative values" (GR) and "functions" (QM).

We cannot choose other than what is mathematically allowed in reality. Determinism.

 

You mean other than those already given?
Other than those you have so far ignored?
See posts #477, #508, #534 etc.

There is only one causally deterministic paradigm, and it is one, as already explained and supported, in which everything is predetermined from the outset.
That includes every action of any self-determining actor.
The causally deterministic universe that Cap and I (and others) are talking about:

• Is logically inclusive of all observed phenomena
• Allows for an objective reality that science requires
• Does not force freewill to be a supernatural phenomena - nothing is forced to exist if it doesn't
• And it does address the OP question - with a "no", and support for that answer?

I get that you don't like the answer, and it honestly seems you can't get your head around the answer, or the explanations, because you are still trying to force a self-determining actor into that universe that has the ability to manipulate what has already been predetermined.

"Failed version"?
When one talks of a deterministic universe there is only one version.
You can't cherry pick which bits about it you like and which bits you don't like.
If you consider it a "failed version" because it doesn't fit with the version you want, then perhaps you should take a closer look at what you are requiring of it, and try to understand why it isn't possible.

It's like you're premising a universe that is all blue, and then inserting something that is green, and then accusing those of sticking to an all-blue universe for having a failed version.

How absurd.
The question is still being asked because there are many different understandings of what "free will" is, not because of the premise of determinism.
If one has one type of understanding then the answer is quite clear: no freewill in a deterministic universe.
If one has another type of understanding then the answer is also quite clear: freewill does exist in a deterministic universe.
This has nothing to do with it being a "failed version of determinism", because there is only one version: causal determinism, which leads to the understanding that everything is predetermined.

To try and adjust what determinism is so that you can fit in something that you think shows freewill to exist is a flawed approach, because you are no longer sticking to the deterministic universe that is premised, and that is asked about in the OP.

 

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Which authority do you think I am appealing to?
Can you name him/her/them?

We have premised a deterministic universe.
Thus that determinism is all-pervasive.
It is not merely a deterministic container where the insides can do what they want.
The entire system - i.e. everything that constitues the universe - is deterministic.
No authority needed, just an honest sticking to what has been premised and asked about.

 

and all refuted ....see the relevant posts...

 

yes of course his name is Baldeee...

 

If you honestly think you have refuted the points made then the problem is somewhat deeper than your current flawed understanding of determinism and a deterministic universe, but stretches to an inadequate understanding of what it is to refute an argument.
C'est la vie, I guess.

Since I am not an authority, I can not be appealing to authority.
What you probably mean is that you think I am relying on confidence.
Aka appeal to confidence, not authority.
But since my position and arguments have been supported, this also wouldn't apply.
Am I confident?
Yes.
Why?
Because my position is supported (see my posts).
Whether you think that support is valid or not is open for discussion, but you would actually need to address the points to achieve that, not simply ignore them return to your misunderstood notions.

 

Baldeee
Just for your information, and I really shouldn't have to post this, but there are a number of versions of philosophical deterministic universe's.

An Image describing a taxonomy that is far from exhaustive:
It is missing my favorite unfortunately...

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Which one do you believe this thread is premised on?
Topic: "Is freewill possible in a deterministic universe"

 

Nope, your refutations generally and most often do not provide any argument other than to state your belief as fact.
You assume a version of determinism that prohibits freewill and argue at cross purpose as a matter of course. You appear to do this deliberately.
And you wonder why you are accused of relegating freewill to the realm of the super natural in the process.

You are not discussing the topic in good faith and this is obvious by your patronizing approach by deliberately debating at cross purpose.
So I will ask you again:
What form of Determinism are you premising your call to authority on?

 

The one at the top that says "Determinism".
The rest is a taxonomy of one's view of how free will and the nature of the universe (deterministic or indeterministic) fit together.
For example "Soft determinism" is nothing to do, per se, with the nature of determinism being discussed, but the view that human actions are completely determined by prior events, but that freewill exists when it is defined as the capacity to act according to one's nature.
This is a compatbilist version of freewill that CC described previously (notwithstanding his desire to remain unlabelled in this game he has opted out of).
Within that taxonomy is only one version of determinism: causal determinism.
It is right at the top, to the left of "Indeterminism", and is otherwise referred to just as "Determinism".

Maybe if you actually demonstrated you understood what you posted it might help any discussion with you progress more smoothly?

Other than the ones that clearly do provide argument, such as the ones I referred to above, the ones - especially post #534, that you have either accidentally ignored or deliberately done so.

I assume the version of determinism that is premised in the question of the thread: causal determinism.
I don't make up a version just to fit something into it.
That I consider freewill is incompatible with this version is the conclusion reached.
The only thing I deliberately do in this regard is follow the logic of the premises to reach a valid conclusion.

If someone wants to say that I am relegating to the supernatural something that I consider not to exist, that is on them, not me.
To me it simply doesn't exist in a deterministic universe, at least not the notion of freewill that requires genuine alternatives to be present.

Being patronising to you is unintended but stems from your seemingly wilful ignorance of the very premise this thread is focussed on.
There is certainly no bad faith involved.
On the contrary, I think I have given your posts far more credence and attention than anyone wishing to argue in bad faith would have bothered to do.
I am simpy trying to work out just what you are on about, but it is difficult to fathom given you want a "version of determinism" that you alone have come up with.
Rather than come up with a version of freewill that is compatible with the version of determinism that (nearly) everyone else understands and by the term "determinism" and that has been repeatedly explained to you, you seem to want to come up with your own version of determinism that fits with freewill.
Again, no bad faith involved on my side.

There is no appeal to authority, merely confidence in my understanding of what determinism is when being referenced in "deterministic universe", and what that determinism entails.
If you really want me to provide you with an authority, try Wikipedia as a start.
Then move onto the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

 

no you don't... for if you did then you would acknowledge at the very least that freewill may be possible in a deterministic universe.
The version you are premising this thread on is most likely Hard determinism with it's inherent fatalism.
If you wish to discuss how impossible freewill is for Hard Determinism... well good for you....but at least be honest enough to declare that is what you are discussing.

 

Are you saying that Compatabilism is not about a deterministic universe?
Again you are arguing the fatalistic hard determinist case and calling it the premise of this thread, which it is not.

Free will apparently is argued to exist in a compatabilistic deterministic universe.
It could also be argued , which as yet it hasnt been, that freewill is possible in a Co-determined deterministic universe.

It also arguably exists in a few other versions of determinism...

So why are you premising this thread on only one of them...

If you asked the question :
"Is free will possible in a fatalistic hard deterministic universe?"

The answer of course is no.... because that is what makes hard determinism eh... uhm.... "hard".
So really there is nothing to discuss if the thread is premised as you indicate.
Fortunately the thread is not premised on hard determinism. This is a good thing because this allows discussion and possibility.

You really have to think a bit deeper before you destroy any intellectual/ethical credibility you may have remaining.

 

and now perhaps you could get to the question you were attempting to address:

Do you believe your assessment is objective?
If so please explain how you possibly can be, given your deterministic paradigm makes objectivity impossible

 

As has been explained to you several times, that is irrelevant. It is completely beside the point.
You aren't paying attention.
Nobody here is discussing the free will of the universe as a whole. Nobody. Ever.
Nobody is bothering with "indeterminate" anything, since we agreed not to many months ago.

The discussion is about the nature of the human will, including the degrees of freedom and so forth available to a human being making choices from among their capabilities.

Why yes, he does. Still. After all this time and trouble trying to clear the debris of the supernatural assumption off the table.
We are attempting to deal with physical and theoretical reality, not fantasies of perpetual motion machines and identical rewinds and other theoretical (as well as practical) impossibilities. Real freedom, in the real world - the world of observation, experience, and theoretical possibility.

So?
For the purposes of this discussion, all of physical reality is. W e assumed that, months ago.

"Driver approaches traffic light" - - remember?
Human decision, human will, human choice, human capability, is the immediately dominant - almost sole - factor in many of the situations you describe as a "script". It is the direct and verifiable means by which the "universe as a whole" - in physical fact, in the real world - determines many aspects of that human being's future and the future of everything connected with that human being.

That's its "part" - that's what it does. No golf ball does anything remotely corresponding or similar.

The evaluation of a driver approaching a traffic light is not based on incomplete knowledge. At the time of assessment the driver is capable of both stop and go, simultaneously, and will decide between these two alternatives in the future - these are objectively observable, physical, facts. That is not an "interpretation", and it is not "subjective" - it's recordable via machine, for chrissake.

The simultaneous existence of various mutually exclusive (in the future) human capabilities is an observed, objectively established, repeatedly verified, and physically recorded fact. Future events do not affect the current status of present capabilities - causation does not act backwards in time.

You are screwing up the very notions of time and sequence you need for your causal determinism in the first place.

Yep. By producing a human being capable of making decisions, willing behavior, and choosing from alternatives for that behavior. So that's settled, ok?

Look: human decisions are physical events. The human mind exists in physical reality. Physical reality therefore includes "high" or "more inclusive" or "mental" organizations. Parts of it are capable of modeling, abstracting, and predicting the future of, other parts. Such high levels of logical organization, and the phenomena they produce in this universe, are at least as real as atoms (since atoms are an abstraction of the human mind, an analytical invention or tactic of the human mind, the mind is probably more real - that's another discussion). No golf ball can produce anything corresponding to a human decision, any more than it can open a pickle jar - it lacks the capability. It has no opposable thumbs, and no mind of its own. Human beings have both.

Human beings have minds of their own.

It's misplaced. You are in a state of confusion regarding what determinism "entails".
It does not, for example, "entail" an absence of nonsupernatural freedom of will. Only supernatural freedom of will is affected by assuming a deterministic universe.

 

Oh, and determinism makes you always pick subjectively wrong answers? Why so?

If you come to a red light at an intersection, will you subjectively assume it gives permission to not stop?

But I'm sure you do know that we constantly make wrong answers based on emotional determinism, for one.
That's why in science "subjective" answers are required to be accompanied by factual proofs.
Falsification establishes objective proof.