Is free will possible in a deterministic universe?

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To remind you of what you have said: "No, modern physics, itself, quite literally formulates time as a fourth dimension, on par with any dimension of space. As such, eternalism (where each direction of time is just as real as any direction in space) is the only theory of time that fits. To refute that is to refute a whole lot of modern physics." (post #1164)
Here you are explicitly stating that only eternalism fits (a whole lot of) modern physics (science), and that to refute eternalism is to refute a whole lot of science.
Thus you wrap the theory of time into what is science, as if something refutes that which is a scientific fact, it becomes scientifically falsified.
So no, it is not a straw man, just you unable to remain consistent.

Yet above you have been quoted as saying that only eternalism fits "a whole lot of modern physics".
Thus the others, as
You can't have it both ways, Vociferous.
Either you accept that science has nothing to say on the matter of theory of time, or only eternalism fits "a whole lot of modern physics".
Which is it?
Or are you going to remain contradictory?

Yet it remains irrelevant to this discussion, for reasons given and reasons which you remain blind to.
Just because science doesn't refute any of them does not make them relevant.
Resolve the issue of relevancy first, then, if relevant, we can discuss them in detail.

I am open to that.
But irrelevant matters don't become relevant just because they are part of the same school.
The burden is on you, has always been on you, to show how the theories are relevant to this discussion.
And you have yet to do that.

I have told you already that I do not favour any.
If you want to be taken with any seriousness then you will now show why the issue of the theory of time is relevant.
I'm still waiting on that front.
Got anything yet?

What a load of utter horse manure.
Seriously, I've never heard such drivel.
Almost every sentence of yours is wrong.

• "I've only told you what is most compatible with Relativity....": wrong, as every theory is equally compatible with Relativity, and if a theory was not compatible then it would be considered to be dismissed by science - thus making that philosophical theory as scientifically testable as relativity, and falsifiable - and making it science.

But then you haven't really settled on whether it is science or not, it seems, as you say one thing but then imply the other, as exampled here again.

• "... since you've precluded QM from the discussion.": wrong, as I didn't start this thread, and the thread title is fairly clear on the nature of the universe under consideration.
  "And you've finally seemed to understand the problem eternalism presents for your idiosyncratic definition of determinism.": several problems with this one as not only are there no problems with eternalism for determinism, the definition being used is not idiosyncratic - as it is the same that you are using, and the same that can be found pretty much everywhere in philosophy when discussing this issue.
  "These are the lengths I must go to in order to shirt your intellectual dishonesty...": with there being no such dishonesty on my part, and only your continuing reluctance to address the issue of the relevancy of the theories of time, I guess I'd put this in the category of you simply being mistaken.
  "...and you finally engaging the argument demonstrates its relevance.": seriously?

You think me having to continually sweep away an irrelevancy you have raised is to endorse its relevancy??
Seriously???
The only discussion on this so far is to show you how irrelevant it is!
That does not therefore make it relevant.
Or are you really so stupid?

Again, more errors in this paragraph:
First : I do not reject eternalism, any more than I reject any of the others, and for one who is so quick to use the term, you post enough strawmen of your own that you shouldn't really have an excuse for misidentifying them in others as you do.
Second: the definition of determinism being used works with all theories of time, whether time is of zero length (i.e. the atemporal nature of eternalism) or not, so you are offering nothing but a false dilemma.
You even acknowledge this: "...no theory of time alters the nature of determinism." (post #1167).
Third: you keep claiming that I am using an idiosyncratic definition of determinism, yet it is the same as yours, the same as found in literature elsewhere.
This was explained to you yet still you claim the definition to be idiosyncratic.
Have the honesty to set out what you think my definition is, if it is not the one I have stated it to be, and where the idiosyncracy lies.
Can you do that?

Yet more utter garbage.
If no theory of time alters the nature of determinism, as you have agreed, and if the question can be answered by analysis of that nature of determinism alone, then of what relevance is the theory of time?
Have the decency to actually address that for once.
Otherwise you are still trying to say that the colour of a car is important in discussing its speed, and that an engine needs to take the colour of the car into account.

Again with your lack of honesty: I am merely addressing the question raised in this thread.
How would discussing QM achieve that, given that it is indeterministic at the level of individual universes?
Or is it that you aren't simply content with raising one irrelevant matter?

You don't, then, recognise the dishonesty in asking for concrete examples of philosophical matters?
Of asking for an example of something when that something can only be an example if one adopts the philosophical position one is trying to example?
Or is that just more of what is become increasingly apparent is your lack of intelligence?

So you've raised an issue, had its relevancy refuted and been unable to counter that, accused me of making idiosyncratic definitions... that you offered up, and that is found throughout literature on this matter... that you also claim has been unsupported or has lacked citation... despite precisely that being given in post #1172.
And you accuse me of intellectual dishonesty?
Priceless.
Either you're simply too dishonest to concede the issue of relevancy, too dishonest to actually support its relevancy, or too stupid to recognise it as irrelevant.
Whichever it is, come back when you have something relevant to say, or is the colour of a car really the only contribution you have on a discussion about the performance of its engine?

 

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Yeah, your projection ain't helping your case any. Have fun with your endless question-begging and intellectual dishonesty.

 

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My case is fine, thanks, without the need for any projection, question-begging, or intellectual dishonesty.
I leave those to you, and your pathetic and increasingly whiny and contradictory efforts in defending that which you can't even demonstrate the relevance of.
So au revoir.
Do come back when, you know, you have something actually relevant to say.

 

Thanks for doubling down on the projection, removing any lingering doubts for any reader here.

 

As a reader here, I must say that one doubt I have is whether you, Vociferous, are going to address the seemingly valid criticisms raised against what you have written, notably the relevance of the theories of time? Instead you seem to prefer trying to psychoanalyse the critic, as if that somehow removes the criticisms. Whether he is projecting or not, and to be honest I don’t see any, his criticisms of what you have raised seem to remain. Maybe you should focus on that? Or are you removing all doubt for the readers as to your unwillingness and/or inability in that regard?

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A common misconception IMO.

• Space (voluminous dimension) can not exist with out time and time ( change) can not exist without the space to do it (change) in.
• With out matter (energy) space would be zero dimensional ( no time)
  
• Matter can not exist with out time nor can >0 d space.
• Distance and time are directly related.
• if delta t=0, d=0

 

False equivalence. The first part of that equation is incorrect. Space cannot exist without duration of continuity, which we measure as time. But note that you had to modify the second part in that; space has to exist prior to emergence of time as a measurement of duration of existence of space.

Correct. Without space there would be no time (duration). Time has no independent existence.

Correct, time emerges as a measurement of duration of existence of something.
Space is a product of 3 spatial dimensions, not as a measurement of a temporal dimension. (temporal dimension is unmeasurable)
Time is a product of measurement of 3 spatial dimensions, not as a measurement of temporal dimension (that's circular)

Correct, the measurement of distance equals duration, which we have named time.

Meaningless equivalence: d=1 --> t=1 is a unidirectional equivalence. Space is not dependent on duration of time. Time is dependent on duration of space.

All existence and continuation is measurable as duration of existence or change. This duration is an emergent measurable phenomenon along with existence or change, which we have named "time" (of duration).

Existence (space) itself does not require time for existence, it produces time by existing or changing.
Time itself is not measurable as a value, except as an emergent product of existence or change.
Its value equals the "duration" of change.

You are treating time as a causal mathematical pattern. It isn't. Time is a mathematical result (a by-product) of duration of a causal mathematical physical pattern.

Spatial "cause > effect" does not require temporal permission, it creates an emergent temporal duration.

 

No, I am suggesting that you can not have one with out the other.
It takes energy ( matter to expand dimensions from zero)
Don't worry I know this is alternative to mainstream thinking.

The question relates to ex-nihilo ....

• How do we get something from nothing?
• How do we get dimension if there is no matter to grant it such?
• Vacummous space offers no metric to measure with.
• With out matter or energy space is zero dimensional.
• Activated energy is time (change)

Thus dimension and matter must exists simultaneously.
You can not have one with out the other ( simultaneously. There is no before)

Cause and effect are arbitrary designations assigned by the human mind. There is no distinction between the two except via temporal assignment.
Try:
How far in the past is any cause of any effect?...
Answer: An Infinitesimal moment, infinitesimally prior to what is being arbitrarily determined to be the effect.

Empty space is unchanging and therefore has no time.

 

Wrong.
Existing empty space has duration of existence and therefore has an emergent associated time frame (space-time). Change merely means another measurement of duration. Increments of duration of individual change inside spacetime. (called time-lines)
Time has no existence in and of itself and is therefore timeless. Time emerges with any physical chronology of existence and/or change.

It's really not difficult. Space creates time. Time does not create anything, it is a result.

 

I think you are mixing the two common definitions of time. 1/ change and 2/ measurement of change.
I find it helpful to suggest that time not be considered as a horizontal linea ( past to present to future ) but as a vertical emergence of the ongoing present moment only.

so instead of past <=> present <=> future

you have simply the constantly emerging present or now.

Here is a thought experiment:
On a table there is an material object and a clock. They are both remaining stationary regarding each other and the table.

Q:
How far has the object traveled in a second?
How far has the table traveled in a second?
How far has the clock traveled in a second?
Then
How far have all three traveled in a second?

 

Note that you are making a measurement of the past, not the present, or the future. You cannot measure time which has not yet emerged as a product of duration. Only that which was in the past. That second you use to measure how far the object has travelled emerged as a result of duration of travel at a certain speed, not because that second made it travel that far.

A physical action has to have occurred from beginning to end before it can be measured as a completed increment of time. It can be measured during the event as an emerging set of increments, as yet fully undetermined , because it has not yet completed the action.

"past start => past end" measured from the present. If the event is still ongoing it cannot yet be fully measured as a measurement of time from start to completion.
Nothing happens "in time", things happen "in space", and their duration "creates time".

What you see as a dimension of time is a infinite set of individual time-lines. But only block time is associated with space itself. We do not measure time from the beginning of space time as the start of all subsequent event. We measure each event individually and where possible we bundle the individual time-lines into an era or epoch .

Time is irrelevant as a separate dimension, there is only space, with its own associated measurement of duration. BB => present => future ????....of space.

When I look to a distant star I don't look back in time, I look at "a past" event in space. I don't see that star go nova "in time" and no longer occupy the space it used to. I see it as was then "in space", never as it is now. This principle holds for any observation or measurement. We always look back to a memory of the past in space.

 

I never stated that the second made anything do anything.... a second is only a measurement of change, it has no intrinsic value other than that.
However the inertial frame of the material object, the clock and the table has traveled a distance.
The question is how far has it done so in 1 second?
( assume a universe that has only these three objects in it)
It is only a thought experiment, designed to expand the thinking..
hint: There can be no absolute rest
Perhaps another thread as this is off topic...
============
Regarding Cause and effect perhaps looking at it in the following way may help:
Try:
The effect is the sum of it's causation...
The effect is it's causation.

 

I agree that effect is the sum of causation, but ....:

Causation is spatial (physical) change. The effect (sum) of causation is spatial (physical) change plus an emergent temporal measurement of duration.

Spatial causation is a priori causal to both spatial and temporal change. There is no a priori Temporal causation. An infinity of time does not make space. It's an abstract concept associated with duration of measurable physical change. Without space there is no time.

Spatial change is omni-directional . Temporal change is only uni-directional, it is always an emergent result from a prior measurable spatial change in any direction.

I agree, we agree. The one thing we disagree on is the existence of time as an independent domension.
You say (if I understand you) that time is a pre-existing dimension in which 3D spatial change from A to B takes place, utilizing some of that pre-existing time.
I say there is no pre-existent time at all, there is only permission and time is an emergent bi-product (measurement of duration) of 3D spatial change from A to B.

 

and the effect (Now) is all that exists and can exist....
everything else is either a memory or a future fantasy...

 

I agree in principle, but our experiential observation of "now" is subjective and always of "a now" in the past. We see the sun as our now 8 minutes later than the sun's now. True objective "now" happens before we experience it.

I agree.....

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I can think of counterexamples of some of these assertions.

I can think of examples of time without space. My income (a thing with no location or space) has changed over the years.

This has nothing to do with the direction of time.

The Mandlebrot set is defined over space, and yet requires no time.

Change is not necessarily time. The air pressure changes with altitude.
See above for example of change without space.

Energy is defined in terms of space, so this is probably true.

I gave a counterexample above. Don't know what ">0 d space" means. You're saying space cannot have more than zero dimensions? Probably not, but that's what it seems to say.

Not so. My table is a meter wide. Time seems to have nothing to do with that.

This thread seems to have diverged significantly from the free will bit, but perhaps gratefully so.

 

Why are you using the term years when describing change?

An emergent phenomenon can only be uni-directional.

CDT (Causal Dynamical Triangulation ) is a function of the fractal unfolding of space over time.

This change of airpressure is a result of change in altitude, no? How else do you know?

They are wrong. You are assuming a completely static universe during the changes you identify.
The continued chronology of existence of anything alone and everything combined has an associated emergent measurable duration.

OK

I'm saying that space has only 3 dimensions. Time emerges with the continued existence of space. "spacetime"

How long has your table existed, since it came from the carpenter? Has it aged nicely?

One thing is established that time is deterministically associated with continued existence or change of space and everything within it. Everything physical object has an emergent associated individual or combined time-line. It's part of a mathematical universe. No miracles.

 

Cause => Function => Effect + time (of duration)

Easy and logical.

 

Because I'm giving an example of change over time without space.

Example please. No idea what you mean by this.

From replies I made to Q-Q:

This is relevant how? A square (a non-temporal thing) is an example of space without time, countering your assertion that space cannot exist without time.

Yes, not not a result of change in time. It is as simple as y=f(x) where x is not time. As x changes, so does y. The area of a circle changes with its radius. Time has nothing to do with that. Change is merely a difference when one variable is varied. Time is something more specific, and thus change and time are not synonymous.

Sort of. Static means (to me) not changing over time, whereas the examples I gave didn't mention time at all. If you mean my examples have no time, then yes, I agree. I was giving examples of change without time, so that was my intention.

You used the phrase 'continued cronology' there, so you're assuming time to conclude duration. That's begging. A square doesn't necessarily have a 'continued chronology'.

Our space does. Other space might have more or less.

That again is begging wording. I don't think you know what spacetime is.

It has aged nicely enough that its width has not been a function of time. It's width has never been otherwise. Yes, the table is a temporal structure since it is part of this universe, but the comment to which I was replying was not confined to this universe. Q-Q asserted that distance and time are directly related, in which case it should be reasonable to compute the duration of a circle of radius 2.

If by that you mean that determinism seems to be in conflict with the typical definition of free will, then I agree. But you seem to be asserting this determinism, (and a mathematical universe for that matter), but that's not known. I'm actually a fan of that model, but I don't go around saying it's a done thing, and my preferred interpretation of reality doesn't involve a deterministic future for myself.