“Reality Goes Beyond Physics,” and more

[pood]

See, it’s right here!

 

[peacegirl]

PRE-determinism denies that it is as yet undetermined that …

Pre-determinism is not the same as determinism.

If pre-determinism is not the same as determinism, or if pre-determinism is not a variety of determinism, then is the distinction supposed to be that according to determinism (at the level of and in the context of human experience) there are matters that are (meta)physically undetermined? Does undetermined mean something other than not determined? If something is (meta)physically undetermined, does that mean there is - and it is an instance of - (meta)physical indeterminateness? Is the (meta)physical indeterminateness which humans sense ever an actual (meta)physical indeterminateness according to determinism? If that sensed/experienced indeterminateness is not actual according to determinism, then how is the determinism/pre-determinism alleged distinction at all relevant? If the sensed/experienced indeterminateness is actual (meta)physical indeterminateness according to determinism, then what is determinism other than the claim that what humans do is undetermined - a (meta)physically indeterminate matter - until humans resolve the indeterminateness?

Determinism means events reliably follow causes. This means an event is determined at the time of its cause. How else could it possibly be?

I mentioned somewhere that the hard determinist and biologist Jerry Coyne, at his blog, once recounted how he told an improv jazz musician that he didn’t compose his piece — hard determinism did. As Coyne relates it, the musician got so angry at this that he nearly attacked Coyne, until Richard Dawkins intervened to prevent fisticuffs.

I repeatedly cite this example because it is difficult for me to believe how anyone can believe what Coyne believes. If the improv jazz musician did not compose his piece, who or what did? Was it composed by the big bang, at the big bang?

How?

The hard determinist owes an answer to that question.

Of course it was composed by the composer, based on deterministic inputs that offered him a vast menu of options to choose from in composing the piece. You can say he composed just that piece because of just those antecedents, and — so? How else is he to compose the piece, except from determined antecedents? Out of thin air? By flipping a coin? Sure, had antecedents been different, he would have composed differently, because of different inputs, different choices offered, etc. But he composed the piece the way that he did, because that is how he wanted to compose, based on the antecedents that actually prevailed.

Determinism is neither hard or soft.

Do you agree with fellow hard determinist Jerry Coyne that the improv jazz musician did not compose his piece?

This response is so inadequate it makes me wonder where this is coming from. No determinist says this Pood. You cannot get away with this false representation of what determinism means!! It's crazy and is ruining progress!

Again, I must ask, can you even read, or read for comprehension? I mean, look at the sentence! No determinist says this? The hard determinist Jerry Coyne said just that! And I am asking the hard determinist DBT whether he agrees with Jerry Coyne!

You seem to be purposely misconstruing his argument. No determinist that I know of says that we can leave out the middle. The jazz musician composed the piece but he didn't do it of his own free will. By definition, determinism excludes any kind of free will, including compatiblism, or it wouldn't be determinism. Compatibilists are trying to make free will compatible by a bait and switch definition that holds people accountable. How can you hold someone accountable (theoretically) if they could not have done otherwise? However you choose to define free will, if you believe in determinism (which compatibilists say they do), free will cannot be used to defend "could have done otherwise." You will say "could have done otherwise" is not needed for proof of free will. Incorrect.

Jerry Coyne says: The term “free will” has so many diverse connotations that I’m obliged to define it before I explain why we don’t have it. I construe free will the way I think most people do: At the moment when you have to decide among alternatives, you have free will if you could have chosen otherwise. To put it more technically, if you could rerun the tape of your life up to the moment you make a choice, with every aspect of the universe configured identically, free will means that your choice could have been different.

 

[DBT]

determined by your proclivities

So, according to our own wants and desires. For which we are responsible. Because responding to them effectively eliminates or changes said provlivities (to the same extent responding to their precursors will in turn also eliminate, change or build proclivities).

The point being that today, they are not their preconditions but the proclivities themselves, and are part of the event of our choosing.

And when what we are doing is aligned not to our proclivities but the proclivities of something or someone else... We call that situation differently from the situation where there is no such leverage over is. One is constrained. The other is free.

Such is determined by the extent actions along with proclivities and by those proclivities others may discount or encourage us.

And when we lack the proclivity to filter our behavior based on whether our actions align with the proclivities of others, we say someone lacks personal responsibility, the ability to be a first responder not merely to others but self... And when this is the case, we act as if someone is incapable of moral action since they cannot preemptively filter their behavior to that end.

Relative responsibility. We act, but if determinism is true, our actions are inevitable. Given the terms of a deterministic world as defined by compatibilism, it cannot be any other way.

Compatibilism doesn't define free will as the ability to have done otherwise in any given instance of action.

 

[DBT]

When DBT repeatedly brings up “inner necessity” to claim we do not have compatibilist freedom, I simply ask again and again: What kind of “necessity” is he talking about?

It cannot be logical necessity, for reasons I have given. So what IS this necessity of which he speaks? I hold that it does not exist — that the only form of necessity is logical necessity.

But it is true, of course, that people use language in a loose and often slipshod manner, so we might say, for instance, that it is “necessary” to eat a big breakfast if you are doing to do a hard day’s work. But it’s not necessary at all; it’s just advisable.

I have explained what I mean by inner necessity multiple time: determinism. It just means that the brain as the means and mechanism by which decisions are made determines what is decided in any given instance of decision making.

That decisions being determined by neural information processing are just as much a restriction on freedom of will as the external terms defined by compatibilism; being forced, coerced or unduly influenced.

So are you saying there is no distinction between a proposition like, “Today I chose Coke over Pepsi” and “all triangles have three sides”?

It's a false analogy.

The issue lies in the distinction between selection and choice.

That, given determinism, a distinction is to be made between decision making and choice. Whether a decision that is necessarily made - determined - is a matter of choice.

This has nothing to do with triangles.

Freely choosing requires the possibility of taking an alternate option in any given instance of decision making.
Determinism does not permit alternate actions in any given instance of decision making, consequently, decisions that are made within a deterministic system are not an example choice.

So it’s not logically necessary that I choose Coke over Pepsi?

The terms of determinism have you deciding the option determined by your proclivities in relation to your circumstances and the options being presented.

Right.

A decision is made, but being inevitable/determined, a decision within a deterministic system is not a choice.

That is according to your constant conjunction, where each event is set by its antecedents, which includes the thought process that leads to the decision you make in any given situation.

So my choice is/is not logically necessary? If it is not, what other kind of “necessity” is it, because words like “inevitable” and “determined” are not synonyms for “necessary.”

Given determinism, your thoughts and actions - being an inseparable parts of how the system unfolds without deviation - are physically necessary. Literally, nothing other than what is determined to happen can happen. No deviations, no alternate choices.

This is according to constant conjunction, which you endorsed.

 

[Jarhyn]

We act, but if determinism is true, our actions are inevitable

No, and we keep correcting you on this: "inevitable" and "pre-determined" are fatalistic, and indeterministic concepts.

Nowhere does the blockiness of a block universe actually prevent us from making choices and nothing prevents us from insulating those choices against external influences other than events which overcome that resistance.

Our actions are not "inevitable" but rather "determined by this course only and exactly where and when it is so determined."

Physics is a structure which constrains what happens to some general and mostly uniform manner of resolving events. It says nothing about the starting condition, because the starting condition is different everywhere.

There is nothing we have found as a species that says we cannot find an infinite and random but deterministic universe where 'all possible events' can be found at some reference frame, and where the very possibility of some event can be derived from understanding the general laws of physics, and where we can say "nowhere in the universe does this happen" or "somewhere in the universe this happens, is happening, and will happen."

Clearly yet again these are sensible concepts in determinism, and they have value because they tell us what conditions are like where certain possibilities reify, so that we can reify those conditions and thus the possible outcome our understanding of physics gives a recipe for.

 

[DBT]

We act, but if determinism is true, our actions are inevitable

No, and we keep correcting you on this: "inevitable" and "pre-determined" are fatalistic, and indeterministic concepts.

Nowhere does the blockiness of a block universe actually prevent us from making choices and nothing prevents us from insulating those choices against external influences other than events which overcome that resistance.

Our actions are not "inevitable" but rather "determined by this course only and exactly where and when it is so determined."

Physics is a structure which constrains what happens to some general and mostly uniform manner of resolving events. It says nothing about the starting condition, because the starting condition is different everywhere.

There is nothing we have found as a species that says we cannot find an infinite and random but deterministic universe where 'all possible events' can be found at some reference frame, and where the very possibility of some event can be derived from understanding the general laws of physics, and where we can say "nowhere in the universe does this happen" or "somewhere in the universe this happens, is happening, and will happen."

Clearly yet again these are sensible concepts in determinism, and they have value because they tell us what conditions are like where certain possibilities reify, so that we can reify those conditions and thus the possible outcome our understanding of physics gives a recipe for.

You haven’t corrected anything. The error is yours. This somewhat persistent error lies in failing to account for the terms and conditions of determinism as defined by compatibilists, which is a definition that clearly does not permit alternate actions, therefore alternate thoughts (being a physical process of a brain that is inseparable to the system at large) leading to alternate choices being made, which, to repeat, the given terms do not permit.

You try to circumvent the terms. It doesn't work. Which is the reason why compatibilists must stick to ''acting without being forced, coerced or unduly influenced" as the foundation of their notion of free will.

 

[Jarhyn]

does not permit alternate actions

Look to your left. There is an action there.

Look to your right. There was a different action there.

Clearly reality is full of alternate actions.

 

[DBT]

does not permit alternate actions

Look to your left. There is an action there.

Look to your right. There was a different action there.

Clearly reality is full of alternate actions.

Oh, boy.....you must realize that alternate action in relation to determinism does not mean that different can't happen, but that there is no possible alternate action for anything that does happen.

 

[Jarhyn]

no possible alternate action for anything that does happen

Clearly the thing that happens to your left does happen.

Clearly the thing to your right does happen.

Clearly these are alternatives, and both are possible, each relative to the other.

 

[DBT]

no possible alternate action for anything that does happen

Clearly the thing that happens to your left does happen.

Clearly the thing to your right does happen.

Clearly these are alternatives, and both are possible, each relative to the other.

You miss the point....the alternate actions performed by independent actors, you select coffee while your partner orders tea, is not a case of alternate actions being performed by either party. When you select coffee, that is the your determined action and in that instance their is no alternate action open to you, and the same for your partner, when they decide on tea, there is no possible alternate decision in that instance.

If you believe that alternate actions are possible in any given instance of decision making, you contradict the given conditions of determinism.


What Does Deterministic System Mean?
''A deterministic system is a system in which a given initial state or condition will always produce the same results. There is no randomness or variation in the ways that inputs get delivered as outputs.''

 

[Jarhyn]

you select coffee while your partner orders tea, is not a case of alternate actions being performed by either party

Yes it is, and you have offered zero argument as to why it isn't. You've just said "that's not what I mean" with no actual justification because you don't want it to be true.

But it's true: those are alternative possibilities happening and existing clear as day right in front of you.

Alternate actions don't need to happen "at the same place and time". That's not even a sensible way to define them because even in a 5d system they still would be happening at different places, and the system is still block deterministic in 5d.

If you think this contradicts determinism, you don't understand determinism.

 

[DBT]

you select coffee while your partner orders tea, is not a case of alternate actions being performed by either party

Yes it is, and you have offered zero argument as to why it isn't. You've just said "that's not what I mean" with no actual justification because you don't want it to be true.

If that was the case, you are not talking about determinism. You seem to be arguing for Libertarian free will.

But it's true: those are alternative possibilities happening and existing clear as day right in front of you.

It is clear that people can decide and act. But given determinism, what a person does in any given instance has no possibility of an alternate action.

That there are people doing different things has no bearing on that. Each and every person is different in terms of life experience, needs and wants.

Alternate actions don't need to happen "at the same place and time". That's not even a sensible way to define them because even in a 5d system they still would be happening at different places, and the system is still block deterministic in 5d.

If you think this contradicts determinism, you don't understand determinism.

The whole point of determinism is that each and every thought and action is determined by antecedents, proclivities, needs, wants....where different can and do happen at different times, but this is completely irrelevant to the fact that each and every decision that is made excludes alternate actions.

 

[peacegirl]

you select coffee while your partner orders tea, is not a case of alternate actions being performed by either party

Yes it is, and you have offered zero argument as to why it isn't. You've just said "that's not what I mean" with no actual justification because you don't want it to be true.

If that was the case, you are not talking about determinism. You seem to be arguing for Libertarian free will.

But it's true: those are alternative possibilities happening and existing clear as day right in front of you.

It is clear that people can decide and act. But given determinism, what a person does in any given instance has no possibility of an alternate action.

That there are people doing different things has no bearing on that. Each and every person is different in terms of life experience, needs and wants.

Alternate actions don't need to happen "at the same place and time". That's not even a sensible way to define them because even in a 5d system they still would be happening at different places, and the system is still block deterministic in 5d.

If you think this contradicts determinism, you don't understand determinism.

The whole point of determinism is that each and every thought and action is determined by antecedents, proclivities, needs, wants....where different can and do happen at different times, but this is completely irrelevant to the fact that each and every decision that is made excludes alternate actions.

DBT, I hand it to you! The endurance it takes to show that determinism by definition excludes any free will is an exhausting endeavor. Every possible avenue Jaryn and others try to prove is not in keeping with their own definition of compatibilism that states no other option is possible. It’s a glaring contradiction that is ignored. You are a warrior for the truth and I commend you highly. Thank you for keeping up the fight for truth!

 

[pood]

lol. No, compatiblism does not state that no other option is possible, only that one option will be realized. But I have explained how this works again and again, both as a matter of physics and logic.

 

[peacegirl]

lol. No, compatiblism does not state that no other option is possible, only that one option will be realized. But I have explained how this works again and again, both as a matter of physics and logic.

Then admit that could not have chosen otherwise at that exact moment in time Pood, not at another 5d block time or anything else. If you beat around the bush, that will be enough proof that you have no leg to stand on than any other fiction that ino more possible than pink flyong elephants.

 

[pood]

You seem to be purposely misconstruing his argument. No determinist that I know of says that we can leave out the middle. The jazz musician composed the piece but he didn't do it of his own free will. By definition, determinism excludes any kind of free will …

No, it doesn’t. That’s the hard determinist definition, which begs the question by assuming what it must demonstrate.

… including compatiblism, or it wouldn't be determinism.

You are so obdurately misinformed. Compatibilism IS determinism — soft determinism. Your whole “argument,” such as it is, is to exclude soft determinism as determinism by definition, which is not how science or philosophy works. It’s how sophistry works.

Compatibilists are trying to make free will compatible by a bait and switch definition that holds people accountable.

It’s got nothing to do with “holding people accountable,” and in fact I oppose retributive justice. In any case, if one denies compatibilism simply because they don’t like what they perceive to be the consequences of it, that’s the fallacy of appeal to consequences and has no place in science or philosophy.

How can you hold someone accountable (theoretically) if they could not have done otherwise?

They could have done otherwise, they just didn’t. I have explained how this works, logically and physically, again and again.

However you choose to define free will, if you believe in determinism (which compatibilists say they do), free will cannot be used to defend "could have done otherwise." You will say "could have done otherwise" is not needed for proof of free will. Incorrect.

No, I did not say that.

Jerry Coyne says: The term “free will” has so many diverse connotations that I’m obliged to define it before I explain why we don’t have it. I construe free will the way I think most people do: At the moment when you have to decide among alternatives, you have free will if you could have chosen otherwise. To put it more technically, if you could rerun the tape of your life up to the moment you make a choice, with every aspect of the universe configured identically, free will means that your choice could have been different.

Yes, your choice could have been different, it just wasn’t. Had circumstances been different, your choice would have been different. I skipped breakfast this morning because I had a big dinner last night. If I had not had a big dinner last night, I would have had breakfast this morning. In neither case — the factual or the counterfactual case — were my acts in any way compelled or forced, and above all they were not necessary. Necessary is a truth that obtains at all possible worlds, regardless of circumstances, and it’s clear you will never understand the meaning of the word necessity.

So, now, we are back to the old question — I don’t know if DBT has answered this yet, because I have not read all the latest responses. Does DBT agree with fellow hard determinist Jerry Coyne that the content of the jazz improv piece was determined in advance of him actually writing it? If so, when, and how, was it determined, and by who or what? Does the big bang write jazz improv pieces, design buildings, write, novels, etc? That is some new religion you have, if you think that, and in fact it differs little in substance from Calvinistic predestination.

 

[peacegirl]

You seem to be purposely misconstruing his argument. No determinist that I know of says that we can leave out the middle. The jazz musician composed the piece but he didn't do it of his own free will. By definition, determinism excludes any kind of free will …

No, it doesn’t. That’s the hard determinist definition, which begs the question by assuming what it must demonstrate.

… including compatiblism, or it wouldn't be determinism.

You are so obdurately misinformed. Compatibilism IS determinism — soft determinism. Your whole “argument,” such as it is, is to exclude soft determinism as determinism by definition, which is not how science or philosophy works. It’s how sophistry works.

Compatibilists are trying to make free will compatible by a bait and switch definition that holds people accountable.

It’s got nothing to do with “holding people accountable,” and in fact I oppose retributive justice. In any case, if one denies compatibilism simply because they don’t like what they perceive to be the consequences of it, that’s the fallacy of appeal to consequences and has no place in science or philosophy.

How can you hold someone accountable (theoretically) if they could not have done otherwise?

They could have done otherwise, they just didn’t. I have explained how this works, logically and physically, again and again.

However you choose to define free will, if you believe in determinism (which compatibilists say they do), free will cannot be used to defend "could have done otherwise." You will say "could have done otherwise" is not needed for proof of free will. Incorrect.

No, I did not say that.

Jerry Coyne says: The term “free will” has so many diverse connotations that I’m obliged to define it before I explain why we don’t have it. I construe free will the way I think most people do: At the moment when you have to decide among alternatives, you have free will if you could have chosen otherwise. To put it more technically, if you could rerun the tape of your life up to the moment you make a choice, with every aspect of the universe configured identically, free will means that your choice could have been different.

Yes, your choice could have been different, it just wasn’t. Had circumstances been different, your choice would have been different. I skipped breakfast this morning because I had a big dinner last night. If I had not had a big dinner last night, I would have had breakfast this morning. In neither case — the factual or the counterfactual case — were my acts in any way compelled or forced, and above all they were not necessary. Necessary is a truth that obtains at all possible worlds, regardless of circumstances, and it’s clear you will never understand the meaning of the word necessity.

So, now, we are back to the old question — I don’t know if DBT has answered this yet, because I have not read all the latest responses. Does DBT agree with fellow hard determinist Jerry Coyne that the content of the jazz improv piece was determined in advance of him actually writing it? If so, when, and how, was it determined, and by who or what? Does the big bang write jazz improv pieces, design buildings, write, novels, etc? That is some new religion you have, if you think that, and in fact it differs little in substance from Calvinistic predestination.

Pood, you keep bringing the idea that hard determinism determinisms your choices before you make it as in fatalism. Your choice could NOT have been different and, more importantly, you can’t prove that given the same exact conditions requires reversing time which is an impossibility. Admit that free will is a theoretical construct that is manmade!

 

[pood]

And the irony of you praising DBT as a “warrior for truth,” in your typical melodramatic and overblown fashion, is that your author’s position on why we have no free will and DBT’s position on the same subject actually have nothing to do with each other. If you actually understood your author’s work, you would know this, but you have never understood what he was saying, which is why you can never explain it. And, beyond the determinism/free will thing, if you actually understood how utterly ludicrous his claims about light and sight are, you would cringe with embarrassment.

 

[pood]

In sum, DBT argues that the present is produced by a series of falling dominoes from the past. Your authors says the present is all we have, and the reason we have no free will is not because of the past, but because of an inner compulsion of our nature. Your author was not a hard determinist.

 

[peacegirl]

And the irony of you praising DBT as a “warrior for truth,” in your typical melodramatic and overblown fashion, is that your author’s position on why we have no free will and DBT’s position on the same subject actually have nothing to do with each other.

They actually do. Regardless of his way of explaining it, the common denominator is that we have no free will. The author just explains it in a different way. He is constantly correcting you by going over and over the fact that inner necessity is just as important as external force but is ignored in compatibilism.

If you actually understood your author’s work, you would know this, but you have never understood what he was saying, which is why you can never explain it. And, beyond the determinism/free will thing, if you actually understood how utterly ludicrous his claims about light and sight are, you would cringe with embarrassment.

Why are you bringing up light and sight to support your version of compatibilism when you scolded me for bringing it up. Why are you doing this? Are you that hard up that you have to play these disingenuous games?