Demystifying Determinism

[Kylie]

The problem is that you assumed that when I said "the state of the universe" I meant simply the arrangements of objects within it. I did not.

And hence your problem, and hence my point: this is an inaccurate way of viewing the universe.

The whole thing cleaves cleanly between "systemic rules" and "current state". That interface is exactly what you are ignoring in the discussion: you can not view these sensibly as the same thing.

I meant exactly what you described as being flat-out wrong.

The discussion of free will happens specifically because you can mathematically separate a function and variables.

Trying to pretend the logic of the universe is so "fused" to the state is where you will start to confuse "can't" and "won't".

You say that I need to look at the state of the universe (how things are arranged within it) and the systemic rules (the laws of nature).

When I spoke of the "state of the universe" I was referring to both of these things together.

Don't tell me that my way of looking at things is inaccurate when it's the same way that you are using. The only difference is how we are phrasing it.

Would you prefer that I phrase it another way? Fine.

When I refer to the "condition" of the universe, then I am referring to both the "systemic rules" and "current state."

Now, let me restate my argument from post 602:

Take the condition of the universe at point in time T0. Then take the condition of the universe at a later point in time, T1. If the condition of the universe at point T1 was determined solely by the condition of the universe at point T0, then free will can not exist. In other words, if you can take the condition of the universe at T0 and extrapolate it forwards and figure out what T1 (or T2, or T48267768590) will be, then free will can not exist.

Sure it can, if one of the conditions at T_n is the exercising of free will, so as to create the conditions at T_n+1.

Ah, I didn't know we could do the subscripts. Cool.

The problem is that if free will is part of the condition of the universe at T_n, then it is impossible to predict the condition of the universe at T_n+1.

After all, if we could, then we'd be able to determine ahead of time the choices that people will make, and that means that the people making those choices MUST choose what we determined they would choose. And that contradicts free will.

And the reason for that is that if you were to rewind the universe back to T0 and let it proceed again, the same outcome must necessarily happen.

Well, obviously. Because that exercise of free will was both inevitable and necessary for the future state of the universe to be what it was inevitably going to be.

So it's like a movie. If I watch Jurassic Park, I KNOW the lawyer is going to run out of the car when the T-rex attacks. If I rewind and watch it again, he's going to run every single time. it is impossible for him to do any differently. His actions are set in stone. The lawyer does not have free will.

It's free will if it's a decision made within an individual's brain, without external coercion or force. That it will have an inevitable outcome is irrelevant, as long as the individual making the decision doesn't yet know what decision they will make.

However, the illusion of free will would work in exactly the same way. We have two explanations then, genuine free will and illusionary free will. One is actually free will and one is not free will, we just think it is. How do you propose we eliminate one explanation?

 

[bilby]

The problem is that you assumed that when I said "the state of the universe" I meant simply the arrangements of objects within it. I did not.

And hence your problem, and hence my point: this is an inaccurate way of viewing the universe.

The whole thing cleaves cleanly between "systemic rules" and "current state". That interface is exactly what you are ignoring in the discussion: you can not view these sensibly as the same thing.

I meant exactly what you described as being flat-out wrong.

The discussion of free will happens specifically because you can mathematically separate a function and variables.

Trying to pretend the logic of the universe is so "fused" to the state is where you will start to confuse "can't" and "won't".

You say that I need to look at the state of the universe (how things are arranged within it) and the systemic rules (the laws of nature).

When I spoke of the "state of the universe" I was referring to both of these things together.

Don't tell me that my way of looking at things is inaccurate when it's the same way that you are using. The only difference is how we are phrasing it.

Would you prefer that I phrase it another way? Fine.

When I refer to the "condition" of the universe, then I am referring to both the "systemic rules" and "current state."

Now, let me restate my argument from post 602:

Take the condition of the universe at point in time T0. Then take the condition of the universe at a later point in time, T1. If the condition of the universe at point T1 was determined solely by the condition of the universe at point T0, then free will can not exist. In other words, if you can take the condition of the universe at T0 and extrapolate it forwards and figure out what T1 (or T2, or T48267768590) will be, then free will can not exist.

Sure it can, if one of the conditions at T_n is the exercising of free will, so as to create the conditions at T_n+1.

Ah, I didn't know we could do the subscripts. Cool.

The problem is that if free will is part of the condition of the universe at T_n, then it is impossible to predict the condition of the universe at T_n+1.

After all, if we could, then we'd be able to determine ahead of time the choices that people will make, and that means that the people making those choices MUST choose what we determined they would choose. And that contradicts free will.

And the reason for that is that if you were to rewind the universe back to T0 and let it proceed again, the same outcome must necessarily happen.

Well, obviously. Because that exercise of free will was both inevitable and necessary for the future state of the universe to be what it was inevitably going to be.

So it's like a movie. If I watch Jurassic Park, I KNOW the lawyer is going to run out of the car when the T-rex attacks. If I rewind and watch it again, he's going to run every single time. it is impossible for him to do any differently. His actions are set in stone. The lawyer does not have free will.

It's free will if it's a decision made within an individual's brain, without external coercion or force. That it will have an inevitable outcome is irrelevant, as long as the individual making the decision doesn't yet know what decision they will make.

However, the illusion of free will would work in exactly the same way. We have two explanations then, genuine free will and illusionary free will. One is actually free will and one is not free will, we just think it is. How do you propose we eliminate one explanation?

I would eliminate the entire concept of "illusionary free will" as an incoherent concept. If you think you have free will, then you have free will.

Sure, all experiences are to some degree an illusion, but it's not valuable to take a solipsist's perspective.

I think, therefore I am, and I think I have free will, therefore I do.

You can stop me from thinking that I have free will by pointing a gun at my head or holding a knife to my throat, and telling me what choices I must make, or else.

You can stop me from having free will by physically constraining my options so that only one is available - If you put me in a room with one exit, I am not free to choose which door I leave through.

But you can't stop me from having free will by telling me that the choices I am freely making aren't really choices. If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, why would I accept your recommendation to assume that I am a brain in a jar, merely dreaming of ducks?

I think I have free will. I think I am typing this on an iPhone. I think I am one of billions of humans on planet Earth. All of these things could be illusions; But I have yet to find any way to test that notion, so I will continue to eschew solipsism, and act as though reality is real.

 

[Kylie]

The problem is that you assumed that when I said "the state of the universe" I meant simply the arrangements of objects within it. I did not.

And hence your problem, and hence my point: this is an inaccurate way of viewing the universe.

The whole thing cleaves cleanly between "systemic rules" and "current state". That interface is exactly what you are ignoring in the discussion: you can not view these sensibly as the same thing.

I meant exactly what you described as being flat-out wrong.

The discussion of free will happens specifically because you can mathematically separate a function and variables.

Trying to pretend the logic of the universe is so "fused" to the state is where you will start to confuse "can't" and "won't".

You say that I need to look at the state of the universe (how things are arranged within it) and the systemic rules (the laws of nature).

When I spoke of the "state of the universe" I was referring to both of these things together.

Don't tell me that my way of looking at things is inaccurate when it's the same way that you are using. The only difference is how we are phrasing it.

Would you prefer that I phrase it another way? Fine.

When I refer to the "condition" of the universe, then I am referring to both the "systemic rules" and "current state."

Now, let me restate my argument from post 602:

Take the condition of the universe at point in time T0. Then take the condition of the universe at a later point in time, T1. If the condition of the universe at point T1 was determined solely by the condition of the universe at point T0, then free will can not exist. In other words, if you can take the condition of the universe at T0 and extrapolate it forwards and figure out what T1 (or T2, or T48267768590) will be, then free will can not exist.

Sure it can, if one of the conditions at T_n is the exercising of free will, so as to create the conditions at T_n+1.

Ah, I didn't know we could do the subscripts. Cool.

The problem is that if free will is part of the condition of the universe at T_n, then it is impossible to predict the condition of the universe at T_n+1.

After all, if we could, then we'd be able to determine ahead of time the choices that people will make, and that means that the people making those choices MUST choose what we determined they would choose. And that contradicts free will.

And the reason for that is that if you were to rewind the universe back to T0 and let it proceed again, the same outcome must necessarily happen.

Well, obviously. Because that exercise of free will was both inevitable and necessary for the future state of the universe to be what it was inevitably going to be.

So it's like a movie. If I watch Jurassic Park, I KNOW the lawyer is going to run out of the car when the T-rex attacks. If I rewind and watch it again, he's going to run every single time. it is impossible for him to do any differently. His actions are set in stone. The lawyer does not have free will.

It's free will if it's a decision made within an individual's brain, without external coercion or force. That it will have an inevitable outcome is irrelevant, as long as the individual making the decision doesn't yet know what decision they will make.

However, the illusion of free will would work in exactly the same way. We have two explanations then, genuine free will and illusionary free will. One is actually free will and one is not free will, we just think it is. How do you propose we eliminate one explanation?

I would eliminate the entire concept of "illusionary free will" as an incoherent concept. If you think you have free will, then you have free will.

Would you care to support this claim?

A person can jump out of a plane and believe he is choosing to go downwards all he wants, but that doesn't change the fact that he's not going downwards of his own free will.

Sure, all experiences are to some degree an illusion, but it's not valuable to take a solipsist's perspective.

I think, therefore I am, and I think I have free will, therefore I do.

I think I am a millionaire, therefore I am.

That logic doesn't work.

"I think therefore I am" works because we need to exist in order to think anything. After all, things that don't exist don't do any thinking.

But if we do not have free will, it's still possible to THINK we have free will.

John walked into the room. "I have free will," he said, then sat down at the desk.

No matter how many times you read that, John is always going to sit down at the desk. He does not have the free will to do any differently. And yet he believes he has free will. The belief that one has free will can exist even if free will doesn't.

You can stop me from thinking that I have free will by pointing a gun at my head or holding a knife to my throat, and telling me what choices I must make, or else.

My position would be that in that situation, you can still freely choose. Sure, the choices are very limited, and not particularly appealing, but you still have free choice.

You can stop me from having free will by physically constraining my options so that only one is available - If you put me in a room with one exit, I am not free to choose which door I leave through.

Ah, so one door is inevitable!

But you can't stop me from having free will by telling me that the choices I am freely making aren't really choices. If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, why would I accept your recommendation to assume that I am a brain in a jar, merely dreaming of ducks?

If you take a position that directly contradicts free will, then you can't have both.

I think I have free will. I think I am typing this on an iPhone. I think I am one of billions of humans on planet Earth. All of these things could be illusions; But I have yet to find any way to test that notion, so I will continue to eschew solipsism, and act as though reality is real.

I'm not asking anyone to accept solipsism, am I?

I'm simply saying that the belief that we have free will is not sufficient to PROVE that we have free will.

 

[bilby]

The problem is that you assumed that when I said "the state of the universe" I meant simply the arrangements of objects within it. I did not.

And hence your problem, and hence my point: this is an inaccurate way of viewing the universe.

The whole thing cleaves cleanly between "systemic rules" and "current state". That interface is exactly what you are ignoring in the discussion: you can not view these sensibly as the same thing.

I meant exactly what you described as being flat-out wrong.

The discussion of free will happens specifically because you can mathematically separate a function and variables.

Trying to pretend the logic of the universe is so "fused" to the state is where you will start to confuse "can't" and "won't".

You say that I need to look at the state of the universe (how things are arranged within it) and the systemic rules (the laws of nature).

When I spoke of the "state of the universe" I was referring to both of these things together.

Don't tell me that my way of looking at things is inaccurate when it's the same way that you are using. The only difference is how we are phrasing it.

Would you prefer that I phrase it another way? Fine.

When I refer to the "condition" of the universe, then I am referring to both the "systemic rules" and "current state."

Now, let me restate my argument from post 602:

Take the condition of the universe at point in time T0. Then take the condition of the universe at a later point in time, T1. If the condition of the universe at point T1 was determined solely by the condition of the universe at point T0, then free will can not exist. In other words, if you can take the condition of the universe at T0 and extrapolate it forwards and figure out what T1 (or T2, or T48267768590) will be, then free will can not exist.

Sure it can, if one of the conditions at T_n is the exercising of free will, so as to create the conditions at T_n+1.

Ah, I didn't know we could do the subscripts. Cool.

The problem is that if free will is part of the condition of the universe at T_n, then it is impossible to predict the condition of the universe at T_n+1.

After all, if we could, then we'd be able to determine ahead of time the choices that people will make, and that means that the people making those choices MUST choose what we determined they would choose. And that contradicts free will.

And the reason for that is that if you were to rewind the universe back to T0 and let it proceed again, the same outcome must necessarily happen.

Well, obviously. Because that exercise of free will was both inevitable and necessary for the future state of the universe to be what it was inevitably going to be.

So it's like a movie. If I watch Jurassic Park, I KNOW the lawyer is going to run out of the car when the T-rex attacks. If I rewind and watch it again, he's going to run every single time. it is impossible for him to do any differently. His actions are set in stone. The lawyer does not have free will.

It's free will if it's a decision made within an individual's brain, without external coercion or force. That it will have an inevitable outcome is irrelevant, as long as the individual making the decision doesn't yet know what decision they will make.

However, the illusion of free will would work in exactly the same way. We have two explanations then, genuine free will and illusionary free will. One is actually free will and one is not free will, we just think it is. How do you propose we eliminate one explanation?

I would eliminate the entire concept of "illusionary free will" as an incoherent concept. If you think you have free will, then you have free will.

Would you care to support this claim?

A person can jump out of a plane and believe he is choosing to go downwards all he wants, but that doesn't change the fact that he's not going downwards of his own free will.

Sure, all experiences are to some degree an illusion, but it's not valuable to take a solipsist's perspective.

I think, therefore I am, and I think I have free will, therefore I do.

I think I am a millionaire, therefore I am.

That logic doesn't work.

"I think therefore I am" works because we need to exist in order to think anything. After all, things that don't exist don't do any thinking.

But if we do not have free will, it's still possible to THINK we have free will.

John walked into the room. "I have free will," he said, then sat down at the desk.

No matter how many times you read that, John is always going to sit down at the desk. He does not have the free will to do any differently. And yet he believes he has free will. The belief that one has free will can exist even if free will doesn't.

You can stop me from thinking that I have free will by pointing a gun at my head or holding a knife to my throat, and telling me what choices I must make, or else.

My position would be that in that situation, you can still freely choose. Sure, the choices are very limited, and not particularly appealing, but you still have free choice.

You can stop me from having free will by physically constraining my options so that only one is available - If you put me in a room with one exit, I am not free to choose which door I leave through.

Ah, so one door is inevitable!

But you can't stop me from having free will by telling me that the choices I am freely making aren't really choices. If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, why would I accept your recommendation to assume that I am a brain in a jar, merely dreaming of ducks?

If you take a position that directly contradicts free will, then you can't have both.

I think I have free will. I think I am typing this on an iPhone. I think I am one of billions of humans on planet Earth. All of these things could be illusions; But I have yet to find any way to test that notion, so I will continue to eschew solipsism, and act as though reality is real.

I'm not asking anyone to accept solipsism, am I?

I'm simply saying that the belief that we have free will is not sufficient to PROVE that we have free will.

Sure it is. It's all entirely a mental construct; Choosing is an action within the brain, and therefore choosing is a subset of thinking.

I think, and I choose. Both are illusions if you want them to be, but it's not really helpful to want them to be.

 

[Kylie]

The problem is that you assumed that when I said "the state of the universe" I meant simply the arrangements of objects within it. I did not.

And hence your problem, and hence my point: this is an inaccurate way of viewing the universe.

The whole thing cleaves cleanly between "systemic rules" and "current state". That interface is exactly what you are ignoring in the discussion: you can not view these sensibly as the same thing.

I meant exactly what you described as being flat-out wrong.

The discussion of free will happens specifically because you can mathematically separate a function and variables.

Trying to pretend the logic of the universe is so "fused" to the state is where you will start to confuse "can't" and "won't".

You say that I need to look at the state of the universe (how things are arranged within it) and the systemic rules (the laws of nature).

When I spoke of the "state of the universe" I was referring to both of these things together.

Don't tell me that my way of looking at things is inaccurate when it's the same way that you are using. The only difference is how we are phrasing it.

Would you prefer that I phrase it another way? Fine.

When I refer to the "condition" of the universe, then I am referring to both the "systemic rules" and "current state."

Now, let me restate my argument from post 602:

Take the condition of the universe at point in time T0. Then take the condition of the universe at a later point in time, T1. If the condition of the universe at point T1 was determined solely by the condition of the universe at point T0, then free will can not exist. In other words, if you can take the condition of the universe at T0 and extrapolate it forwards and figure out what T1 (or T2, or T48267768590) will be, then free will can not exist.

Sure it can, if one of the conditions at T_n is the exercising of free will, so as to create the conditions at T_n+1.

Ah, I didn't know we could do the subscripts. Cool.

The problem is that if free will is part of the condition of the universe at T_n, then it is impossible to predict the condition of the universe at T_n+1.

After all, if we could, then we'd be able to determine ahead of time the choices that people will make, and that means that the people making those choices MUST choose what we determined they would choose. And that contradicts free will.

And the reason for that is that if you were to rewind the universe back to T0 and let it proceed again, the same outcome must necessarily happen.

Well, obviously. Because that exercise of free will was both inevitable and necessary for the future state of the universe to be what it was inevitably going to be.

So it's like a movie. If I watch Jurassic Park, I KNOW the lawyer is going to run out of the car when the T-rex attacks. If I rewind and watch it again, he's going to run every single time. it is impossible for him to do any differently. His actions are set in stone. The lawyer does not have free will.

It's free will if it's a decision made within an individual's brain, without external coercion or force. That it will have an inevitable outcome is irrelevant, as long as the individual making the decision doesn't yet know what decision they will make.

However, the illusion of free will would work in exactly the same way. We have two explanations then, genuine free will and illusionary free will. One is actually free will and one is not free will, we just think it is. How do you propose we eliminate one explanation?

I would eliminate the entire concept of "illusionary free will" as an incoherent concept. If you think you have free will, then you have free will.

Would you care to support this claim?

A person can jump out of a plane and believe he is choosing to go downwards all he wants, but that doesn't change the fact that he's not going downwards of his own free will.

Sure, all experiences are to some degree an illusion, but it's not valuable to take a solipsist's perspective.

I think, therefore I am, and I think I have free will, therefore I do.

I think I am a millionaire, therefore I am.

That logic doesn't work.

"I think therefore I am" works because we need to exist in order to think anything. After all, things that don't exist don't do any thinking.

But if we do not have free will, it's still possible to THINK we have free will.

John walked into the room. "I have free will," he said, then sat down at the desk.

No matter how many times you read that, John is always going to sit down at the desk. He does not have the free will to do any differently. And yet he believes he has free will. The belief that one has free will can exist even if free will doesn't.

You can stop me from thinking that I have free will by pointing a gun at my head or holding a knife to my throat, and telling me what choices I must make, or else.

My position would be that in that situation, you can still freely choose. Sure, the choices are very limited, and not particularly appealing, but you still have free choice.

You can stop me from having free will by physically constraining my options so that only one is available - If you put me in a room with one exit, I am not free to choose which door I leave through.

Ah, so one door is inevitable!

But you can't stop me from having free will by telling me that the choices I am freely making aren't really choices. If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, why would I accept your recommendation to assume that I am a brain in a jar, merely dreaming of ducks?

If you take a position that directly contradicts free will, then you can't have both.

I think I have free will. I think I am typing this on an iPhone. I think I am one of billions of humans on planet Earth. All of these things could be illusions; But I have yet to find any way to test that notion, so I will continue to eschew solipsism, and act as though reality is real.

I'm not asking anyone to accept solipsism, am I?

I'm simply saying that the belief that we have free will is not sufficient to PROVE that we have free will.

Sure it is. It's all entirely a mental construct; Choosing is an action within the brain, and therefore choosing is a subset of thinking.

I think, and I choose. Both are illusions if you want them to be, but it's not really helpful to want them to be.

Now you're just talking nonsense.

You claim you have free will because you think you have free will, yet you also say that free will is an illusion. But when I say that determinism requires that free will is an illusion, you argue against me.

Are you just making this up as you go? Do you even know what you are thinking? Or are you just randomly mashing the keyboard, running a spell check, and then posting it?

 

[bilby]

You claim you have free will because you think you have free will, yet you also say that free will is an illusion.

No, YOU said that. I said that it wouldn't matter if it were.

It's not, though.

 

[fromderinside]

The arguments above depend on hierarchies claimed be true. They aren't on their face since sense does not determine whether what's seen, heard, etc are real. What is seen etc. depend on adaptation of local senses used to local conditions which are demonstrably, at best, conditions of the local world.

Two examples, one phenomenological and the other structural.

Weight on Mars is different from weigh to on earth is an example. Different plane masses result in different measures.

Whether matter can evolve into man is another. It can't on the sun, because the energy levels are way to high to permit the existence of even small assemblies of molecules.

The claims made obviously depend only on local conditions therefore they cannot be held up as examples.

 

[Jarhyn]

The arguments above depend on hierarchies claimed be true. They aren't on their face since sense does not determine whether what's seen, heard, etc are real. What is seen etc. depend on adaptation of local senses used to local conditions which are demonstrably, at best, conditions of the local world.

Two examples, one phenomenological and the other structural.

Weight on Mars is different from weigh to on earth is an example. Different plane masses result in different measures.

Whether matter can evolve into man is another. It can't on the sun, because the energy levels are way to high to permit the existence of even small assemblies of molecules.

The claims made obviously depend only on local conditions therefore they cannot be held up as examples.

Duane Gish would be proud, FDI.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

As usual, you miss the point that if a particular outcome is INEVITABLE, it cannot be avoided.

It actually can be avoided, but it won't be.

If it won't be, if it NEVER gets avoided, how could you possibly know it CAN be avoided?

We know it CAN be avoided because we can imagine DIFFERENT CIRCUMSTANCES under which it WOULD be avoided. Something that CAN happen is a possibility. Possibilities exist solely within the imagination. So, there are many things that CAN happen even though there is only one thing that WILL happen.

For example, in the restaurant I chose the Chef Salad instead of the Steak because I had bacon and eggs for breakfast and a double cheeseburger for lunch. I could have ordered the Steak anyway, of course, but my goal is to eat a more balanced diet, one with some fruits and vegetables. However, if I had a cantaloupe for breakfast and a salad for lunch, then I would inevitably have ordered the Steak for dinner.

To say that something CAN happen never requires that it actually does happen. It still COULD HAVE happened even if it NEVER WOULD happen.

What could have happened was just as inevitable as what did happen. It was inevitable that there would be two things that I could choose, A and B. It was inevitable that I would, for my own reasons, choose A, even though it was also inevitable that I could have chosen B.

So you are suggesting that there are two things that are equally inevitable?

There are two facts that were equally inevitable. It was a fact that I would choose A. It was a fact that I could have chosen B. These two facts do not contradict each other.

 

[Jarhyn]

Possibilities exist solely within the imagination

I dare say, it's entirely mathematically possible for possibilities to actually exist as virtual universes the same way that virtual particles exist.

I demonstrated an actual example (re: the dwarf) where not only does the "possibility" wherein "circumstances are different" exists, I can send you the copy of the actual possibility, of the reality, and the math for exhaustively accessing the possibilities of some particular event from the reality.

To say they exist solely within the imagination is a misnomer.

 

[pood]

If we assume their existence, a paradox ensues - but so what? Gods are known to be paradoxical.

I believe I have shown, or have tried to show, that there is no paradox generated by an all-knowing God knowing what you will do, before you do it. You still have compatibilist free will.

Your choice for breakfast is eggs or pancakes. God knows in advance you will choose eggs, and sure enough, you choose eggs, because God can’t be wrong. But so what? You still could have chosen pancakes. But had you chosen pancakes, God would have foreknown THAT fact instead. There’s no paradox here. In these circumstances, you are free to do as you wish, you are just not free to escape God’s prior detection of your choice.

I have very clearly described the paradox.

If God knows in advance that you will do A, then you will do A.

If you have free will, you are free to do Not-A.

To claim that you can do both A and Not-A is contradictory.

Tell ya what, here's another yes/no question.

God comes to me today and says, "Kylie, you're going to have eggs for breakfast tomorrow. This is absolutely guaranteed to happen because I am God, I am all-knowing, and I can't possibly be wrong." I decide to smash all my eggs and the following morning I sit down to a nice stack of pancakes.

Is there anything that will stop me from doing that?

Yes or no.

Good Gob, do you even read what I write??? I have answered your entire post to me above repeatedly. Why in the world should I answer this yet again? Is it that you skip posts, or skim them over, or don’t understand them, or what?

Maybe if you'd actually answer my question as I stated it rather than spout nonsense like, "If you choose to do X, God would see you do X, but if you used your free will and did Y, he'd see you did Y," and instead put cause BEFORE effect rather than effect before cause, I wouldn't have to keep asking.

Unsurprisingly, you don’t understand. We are not speaking here of a CAUSAL relastion between what God foreknows, and what you do. The relation is SEMANTIC, not causal. What I do does not retroactively cause God to know what I do. Rather, what I do supplies the TRUTH GROUNDS of that knowledge.

Have you read ANY of the supplementary links I have provided, which flesh this out in much greater detail? Yes? No?

Also, my 1,000th post here.

So you are saying that effect precedes cause.

What I do in the future causes God to know what I will do BEFORE I do it.

Quite apart from the fact that you've given no reason at all to assume that effect can ever precede cause, your claim would actually lock the future in, since if there is an effect, then there MUST be something that causes it.

To claim that there can be an effect before the cause of that effect, and seeing the effect can make it possible to change the effect means that we can have an effect with no cause whatsoever.

Because your position is that God can see what I'm going to have for dinner tonight, he tells me in the morning, and either I have something different (in which case the CAUSE of him knowing what I will have no longer exists, or I am bound to have what he knows I will have (in which case the cause remains, but I do not have the free will to alter it). Now, the second option is entirely consistent with determinism, but it requires us to abandon any concept of free will.

No. You are completely cofused on this point.

I ask again, did you read any of the supplementary material I linked you to?

Particularly Foreknowledge and Free Will.

Excerpted from the above:

In exercising my free will tomorrow (to wash the family car) have I retroactively changed the past? Have I changed the truth-value of some proposition from true to false and of some other proposition from false to true?

Semantic relations are not causal relations: Again, the English language confuses us. We say that what we will choose to do tomorrow ‘makes‘ some proposition true. And we might add, what I choose to do tomorrow (namely wash the family car) ‘makes‘ the car clean.]

But these are two radically different senses of “makes”. The first use of “makes” refers to the semantic relation of “truth-conferring”. My washing the car tomorrow ‘confers’ truth on the proposition that on such-and-such a day, I wash the family car.

But an event’s ‘conferring truth’ on a proposition is not a causal relation. Causal relations occur between two events (or occurrences, or states). The event of my washing the car brings about the state (or the event that lasts several days) of my car being clean.

The event of my washing the car tomorrow doesn’t retroactively cause the proposition that I wash the car tomorrow to become true, nor does it change the truth-value of that proposition. The proposition that I wash the car tomorrow (that is, on such-and-such a date) simply describes what happens tomorrow. If I do wash the car tomorrow, then that proposition was, is, and forever will be, true. If I do not wash the car tomorrow, then that same proposition was, is, and always will be false.

‘Some persons find it easier to understand the concept of the semantic relation of ‘truth-making’ if the example concerns a past event rather than a future one. Consider the proposition (which is still being debated by scientists) that the dinosaurs on earth perished as a result of an impact of a huge meteor at Chicxulub, on the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico, about 65 million years ago. If there was such an impact, and if it caused the demise of the dinosaurs, then the proposition is true (or, more specifically, always was, is, and always will be true). If, however, there was no such impact, or if there was an impact but it didn’t cause the death of the dinosaurs, then the proposition always was, is, and forever will be false.

 

[fromderinside]

The arguments above depend on hierarchies claimed be true. They aren't on their face since sense does not determine whether what's seen, heard, etc are real. What is seen etc. depend on adaptation of local senses used to local conditions which are demonstrably, at best, conditions of the local world.

Two examples, one phenomenological and the other structural.

Weight on Mars is different from weigh to on earth is an example. Different plane masses result in different measures.

Whether matter can evolve into man is another. It can't on the sun, because the energy levels are way to high to permit the existence of even small assemblies of molecules.

The claims made obviously depend only on local conditions therefore they cannot be held up as examples.

Duane Gish would be proud, FDI.

Nothing even remotely Gishy in my post.

Sense is limited by our ability to use molecules sensitive to wavelength, molecular movement, molecular shape, muscular tension etc. All of the above are limited to local conditions around and in the being.

It takes independent measurements of material to establish the realities of matter and energy of which we think the world consists.

Humans survive based on 'good enough to remain alive, not exactly a requirement for establishing reality. None of them are ever considered means for establishing reality. They are just there because they have been found to to provide sense of what's about us which we can use to remain alive. Vipers have better sense for the nature of the universe in that they can sense changes in radiated energy arriving from space.

What did Gish say of such things? Certainly not what I wrote.

 

[Jarhyn]

FDI, everything about it is gish gallop. First you start lamenting being trapped in Plato's Cave and how you think THAT prevents objective reality from being observed without whatever x-ray vision goggles you happen to purport are necessary.

The you jump to talking about weight on Mars as if anyone would be so foolish as to think this has a thing to do with anything.

Then you talk about evolution as if THAT has anything to do with it (dwarves did not evolve, nor did they need to, to have free will and transistive processes capable of calculating on vectors).

Nothing of it has any coherent thread in it, and it bounces all over on red herrings.

The fact that you don't see the gish gallop makes me glad you are retired.

 

[DBT]

As usual, you miss the point that if a particular outcome is INEVITABLE, it cannot be avoided.

It actually can be avoided, but it won't be.

If it won't be, if it NEVER gets avoided, how could you possibly know it CAN be avoided?

We know it CAN be avoided because we can imagine DIFFERENT CIRCUMSTANCES under which it WOULD be avoided. Something that CAN happen is a possibility. Possibilities exist solely within the imagination. So, there are many things that CAN happen even though there is only one thing that WILL happen.

For example, in the restaurant I chose the Chef Salad instead of the Steak because I had bacon and eggs for breakfast and a double cheeseburger for lunch. I could have ordered the Steak anyway, of course, but my goal is to eat a more balanced diet, one with some fruits and vegetables. However, if I had a cantaloupe for breakfast and a salad for lunch, then I would inevitably have ordered the Steak for dinner.

To say that something CAN happen never requires that it actually does happen. It still COULD HAVE happened even if it NEVER WOULD happen.

What could have happened was just as inevitable as what did happen. It was inevitable that there would be two things that I could choose, A and B. It was inevitable that I would, for my own reasons, choose A, even though it was also inevitable that I could have chosen B.

So you are suggesting that there are two things that are equally inevitable?

There are two facts that were equally inevitable. It was a fact that I would choose A. It was a fact that I could have chosen B. These two facts do not contradict each other.

If something has not been determined to happen at a specific time and place, it cannot happen in that specific time and place regardless of such an event happening at a different time and place.

That is the point. That is how determinism is defined. No alternatives in any given instance in time regardless of "what - can - happen."

 

[Jarhyn]

If something has not been is not determined to happen at a specific time and place, it cannot will not happen in that specific time and place

There's this fatalism again.

There is no fate. You have a burden of proof if you want to use language like that in this conversation to justify it's use or to accept the first correction.

Again, just like Kylie, you fail to observe that the discussion of "will not" is U(this+n), and "cannot" is U(that+n).

To say there is no logical/mathematical (that+n) has been shown repeatedly to be false, and in fact would require you to disprove "Last Thursdayism", or accept the second correction.

For the record, Last Thursdayism is non-disprovable.

After that, your tautology is tautological.

 

[Kylie]

As usual, you miss the point that if a particular outcome is INEVITABLE, it cannot be avoided.

It actually can be avoided, but it won't be.

If it won't be, if it NEVER gets avoided, how could you possibly know it CAN be avoided?

We know it CAN be avoided because we can imagine DIFFERENT CIRCUMSTANCES under which it WOULD be avoided. Something that CAN happen is a possibility. Possibilities exist solely within the imagination. So, there are many things that CAN happen even though there is only one thing that WILL happen.

Oh, absolute garbage.

Just because we can imagine something does not mean it can happen. I can imagine jumping into the air and flying away. Does that mean it CAN happen? Of course not!

So you are suggesting that there are two things that are equally inevitable?

There are two facts that were equally inevitable. It was a fact that I would choose A. It was a fact that I could have chosen B. These two facts do not contradict each other.

You are butchering the English language in order to make it say what you want it to say.

 

[bilby]

I can imagine jumping into the air and flying away. Does that mean it CAN happen? Of course not!

Well, not with that attitude it can't.

 

[fromderinside]

FDI, everything about it is gish gallop. First you start lamenting being trapped in Plato's Cave and how you think THAT prevents objective reality from being observed without whatever x-ray vision goggles you happen to purport are necessary.

The you jump to talking about weight on Mars as if anyone would be so foolish as to think this has a thing to do with anything.

Then you talk about evolution as if THAT has anything to do with it (dwarves did not evolve, nor did they need to, to have free will and transistive processes capable of calculating on vectors).

Nothing of it has any coherent thread in it, and it bounces all over on red herrings.

The fact that you don't see the gish gallop makes me glad you are retired.

Let me put a topper on your float. GIGO.

 

[Jarhyn]

FDI, everything about it is gish gallop. First you start lamenting being trapped in Plato's Cave and how you think THAT prevents objective reality from being observed without whatever x-ray vision goggles you happen to purport are necessary.

The you jump to talking about weight on Mars as if anyone would be so foolish as to think this has a thing to do with anything.

Then you talk about evolution as if THAT has anything to do with it (dwarves did not evolve, nor did they need to, to have free will and transistive processes capable of calculating on vectors).

Nothing of it has any coherent thread in it, and it bounces all over on red herrings.

The fact that you don't see the gish gallop makes me glad you are retired.

Let me put a topper on your float. GIGO.

And then all you had was nonsense and dismissal.

Gish Gallop is all you and DBT seem to have.

 

[DBT]

If something has not been is not determined to happen at a specific time and place, it cannot will not happen in that specific time and place

There's this fatalism again.

There is no fate. You have a burden of proof if you want to use language like that in this conversation to justify it's use or to accept the first correction.

Again, just like Kylie, you fail to observe that the discussion of "will not" is U(this+n), and "cannot" is U(that+n).

To say there is no logical/mathematical (that+n) has been shown repeatedly to be false, and in fact would require you to disprove "Last Thursdayism", or accept the second correction.

For the record, Last Thursdayism is non-disprovable.

After that, your tautology is tautological.

It's determinism, just as you yourself define it. If any number of things can happen, it's not determinism as you yourself define it. You are contradicting your own terms and references.