All events, including my choices, were causally necessary from any prior point in time. And they all proceeded, without deviation, from the Big Bang to this moment.
Choosing is a causal mechanism. It is a both a logical and a physical process that causally necessitates our deliberate behavior. Thus, it cannot be excluded from the series of events that causally necessitate our actions.
Determinism means that everything that ever happens will be reliably caused by prior things that have happened. All events will metaphorically "unfold" in precisely one way.
Yes, all well and good, but then you throw 'choosing' into the definition, which based on the given terms and conditions of determinism, is an error.
It would be an error to exclude any real causal mechanism from determinism. You have pointed this out yourself, every time that you bring up the unconscious neurological processes that produce our conscious experiences.
Choosing includes all of those unconscious and conscious neurological activities that accomplish the human brain's decision-making function.
This decision-making function is invoked by every customer in the restaurant as they choose from the menu of what they will order for dinner.
I didn't "throw choosing in" to the definition of determinism. It has always been there, by the implication that all events are reliably caused by some deterministic mechanism. Choosing is one of those deterministic mechanisms.
And you are attempting to "throw choosing out". If we throw it out, our determinism becomes an incomplete, and false version of determinism. So, we cannot throw it out.
They were never possibilities.
A possibility is a logical token used by the decision-making function. It is part of the
machinery. We cannot throw out parts of the machinery without breaking the decision-making function.
Choosing is a logical operation, just like addition and subtraction. Choosing inputs two or more things that we
can do, evaluates these options by some appropriate criteria, and then outputs a single choice, the single thing that we have decided that we
will do.
These "things that we can do" are possibilities. And there must always be at least two real possibilities before choosing between them can begin.
Thus, it would be silly to say that "they were never possibilities". They must be real possibilities, by logical necessity, just as a triangle must have three sides, by logical necessity.
All events proceeding without deviation is equivalent to nothing else can happen.
No. As has been explained repeatedly, all events proceeding without deviation is equivalent to nothing else
will happen.
It can never imply that nothing else "can" (present) or "could" (future) or "could have" (past) happened. These words invoke the context of possibilities, and the context of possibilities is built into the logical machinery of planning, choosing, inventing, evaluating, etc. The context of multiple possibilities cannot be destroyed without destroying those functions of the human brain. So, let's try not to do that.
We may imagine all sorts of things that do not and cannot happen, Superman flying through the air, Zeus hurling lightning bolts down from Mt Olympus.....
Of course. Our imagination is capable of entertaining impossibilities as well as possibilities. And the decision-making function would screen out impossibilities from our menu of options whenever making real choices. Real possibilities are things that we can actually do if we choose to do them. That's why we stick to the restaurant menu when deciding what to order for dinner. All of the items on the menu are presumed to be real possibilities, items that we can actually have for dinner if we choose them.
Once we know what our real possibilities are, we can proceed to choose between them. That's how the logical machinery works.
A real possibility in determinism is something that must necessarily happen.
That's obviously incorrect. If we took that literally then we would feel compelled to order every possibility on the menu! That's kind of silly, don't you think?
What we imagine as being a possibility has no bearing on whether it happens or not.
Oh, but it does! If an item is not on the menu of possibilities, then it will not happen. (With the exception of my little sister, who is a vegetarian, and will negotiate with the restaurant staff to satisfy her requirements consistent with theirs).
If it doesn't happen, given your terms and conditions, there was never a possibility of it happening, just the perception that it might have.....which is an illusion formed by insufficient information.
There is a difference between a logical object and a physical object. A logical object is, of course, represented via neurological events that take place in the physical brain, so it is not divorced from physical reality, but it is only observed from within the brain.
A real possibility is a logical object. It is the concept of something that can happen or that we can do, under realistic circumstances. In the restaurant, all of the items listed on the menu are real possibilities. They are not "imaginary" possibilities or "illusions" of possibilities. They are as real as any possibility ever gets to be. (When adding 3 to 4 to get 7, 3 and 4 are logical objects that are fed to the addition function to produce the sum of 7. Our possibilities on the restaurant menus are just as real as 3, 4, and 7. The numbers are not "illusions" of numbers, nor are they "imaginary" numbers. They are "real" numbers. The same applies to the possibilities on the restaurant menu.)
The possibility of having the Salad for dinner, and, the possibility of having the Steak dinner, are both real possibilities. We can choose either one of them. The choosing operation will be deterministic, of course, and every step of the process will be causally necessary from any prior point in time.
This means that the possibilities will be guaranteed to show up, as real possibilities, by causal necessity as well as by logical necessity.
