Demystifying Determinism

[Marvin Edwards]

We observe the people in the restaurant, each considering the many items on the menu that they can order, and each telling the waiter the single thing that they will order.

What 'can' be ordered cannot happen in any given instance if that order is not determined to happen in that instance, time and place by that customer. That is the point.

Either it can or it cannot be ordered. If it is on the menu, then it can be ordered. If it is not on the menu, then it cannot be ordered. Determinism does not change these facts.

Determinism is about what will happen. Only one of those dinners will be ordered by each customer, even though they can order any of the dinners on the menu.

Attempting to limit what the customer "can" order to what the customer "will" order creates a logical paradox. The choosing operation is the only way to reduce the menu of many possibilities to a dinner order. Choosing requires that there be more than one thing that we can choose. That's why the menu is there.

The notion that determinism eliminates anything from the menu of things we can choose is clearly false.

That the decision carried out is a matter of necessity or entailment rather than choice, which is the ability to take any option at any given instance of being presented with multiple options.

Choosing is deterministically entailed. Thus, it cannot be avoided. It must proceed, exactly as it does, without deviation. The notion that choosing is not happening is a self-induced delusion, created by figurative thinking. ("If only one thing will happen, then it is AS IF only one thing could happen.") But every figurative statement is literally (actually, empirically, objectively) false.

That, given determinism, is of course is an illusion formed through limited information on how the system, the world, our environment, is unfolding as it must according to how you define determinism.

But we actually do understand how the system unfolds. We actually observe the events unfolding in the restaurant and can describe them as they unfold. The choosing begins with the unfolding of the menu. The appearance of multiple possibilities causally necessitates that we must either make a choice, or go without dinner tonight. So, as events unfold, we consider the many options in terms of our own tastes, and our own dietary goals, and perhaps taking into account what we had for breakfast and lunch earlier. These considerations unfold into our choice for dinner, which we communicate to the waiter, "I will have the Chef Salad, please". There is no mystery here. Everyone assumes that events are reliably caused by prior events.

That's the essence of it. No realizable alternatives, no choice.

There is no basis for such claims! We saw exactly how the events actually unfolded, and there was a literal menu of realizable alternatives, and we considered them in terms of our own goals and reasons, and decided what we would order for dinner.

What happens must happen.

Of course. And it did happen, just as we observed it happening. There were realizable alternatives and we chose to realize one of them.

What you do, you must necessarily do regardless of the presence or absence of external force, coercion or undue influence.
The distinction being 'acting according to your will necessarily' or being forced or coerced against your will.''
The distinction is there, yet our will is not free in either case. It is just 'will' and action as determined.

Yes, the distinction is there, between a choice we make for ourselves versus a choice imposed upon us by coercion or undue influence. The choice we make for ourselves is free of coercion and undue influence. Fortunately, that is the only thing that free will requires.

So, again, free will, as freedom from coercion and undue influence, is compatible with determinism. It is a deterministic event in which we decide for ourselves what we will do. And it was causally necessary, from any prior point in eternity, that we would be making that decision for ourselves, of our own free will.

 

[Jarhyn]

I have been pointing out your errors for some time.

No, you've been pointing out things which you claim would constitute errors (you claim there are references which are violations of the requirement of "no randomness" or "no deviation), however you fail to actually point out where you believe I would be making those errors.

That the decision carried out is a matter of necessity or entailment rather than choice

"That the choice carried out is a matter of necessity or entailment rather than choice"

When we apply the synonym replacement, the silliness and contradiction in your thought process is laid bare. Every decision is a fixed, deterministic choice.

This does not ever prevent alternatives from being logically "realizable", it only prevents them from being immediately realized.

The fact is that if our universe is deterministic, it has a general set of laws which can in fact be represented entirely with human language, with a semantic structure, and that this implies the ability to look at those truth relationships with a goal in mind, and reverse through those truths to find a configuration one wishes to have, and then the truth of the human brain is entirely capable of using that as an input to produce an output which will provide the state necessary for creating a transition that yields the goal configuration.

For example, let's say the goal is to have the final output Z=1.

Let's look at some truths of a simple Deterministic system, where C is something whose value is not directly accessible as an output of the "solver" element in the machine, and D is an output of the "solver".

A B Z (Z = A && B)
0 0 0
0 1 0
1 0 0
1 1 1

C A (A = !C)
0 1
1 0

C D B (B = C XOR D)
0 0 0
1 0 1
0 1 1
1 1 0

This means, logically, to produce a Z of 1, both an A of 1 and a B of 1 are necessary.

Assuming A is 1, this means that one must look at the truth which determines B.

This means some things can be known about the state of the system: that C is 0, that D is currently 0.

This means a truth table of choice in D on AB for Z=1

A B D Success (Z=1)
0 0 D 0
1 0 1 1
0 1 D 0
1 1 1 1

as such as long as A and B are inputs to the solver, the solver can choose, as above, for Z to be 1, by applying the above heuristic, but only when A is already 1.

as such the re are situations where the will will be free (A=1) and situations where the will will be constrained (A=0).

This is of course a proof that regulatory control pursuant to choice of future states is possible within the laws of deterministic logic.

Note that phrase "deterministic logic"

"The universe is deterministic" in fact has a longer form, with more words, which are assumed by context here: "the universe functions by deterministic logic"

If you send logic up the river, you can't claim the universe is deterministic. If you claim the universe is deterministic, you accede that it is bound to a fixed logic.

Further, it is the case that it MAY be such that instead of absolute discretes, the universe functions on continuous scales, or that large confluences of such granular and so ultimately binary logic create apparent continuous logics, but this changes absolutely nothing about the above demonstrated capability of regulatory control in a system operating by deterministic logic.

Again we are left faced with the fact that given the demonstrated capacity for regulatory control within the scope of deterministic logic, that all remaining arguments against human free will must be founded on the much weaker argument "it is possible, it's just not happening within the human mind"

Of course the issue with that argument is that a human mind managed to construct regulatory control towards Z=1, as above.

 

[DBT]

I have been pointing out your errors for some time.

No, you've been pointing out things which you claim would constitute errors (you claim there are references which are violations of the requirement of "no randomness" or "no deviation), however you fail to actually point out where you believe I would be making those errors.

That the decision carried out is a matter of necessity or entailment rather than choice

"That the choice carried out is a matter of necessity or entailment rather than choice"

When we apply the synonym replacement, the silliness and contradiction in your thought process is laid bare. Every decision is a fixed, deterministic choice.

This does not ever prevent alternatives from being logically "realizable", it only prevents them from being immediately realized.

The fact is that if our universe is deterministic, it has a general set of laws which can in fact be represented entirely with human language, with a semantic structure, and that this implies the ability to look at those truth relationships with a goal in mind, and reverse through those truths to find a configuration one wishes to have, and then the truth of the human brain is entirely capable of using that as an input to produce an output which will provide the state necessary for creating a transition that yields the goal configuration.

For example, let's say the goal is to have the final output Z=1.

Let's look at some truths of a simple Deterministic system, where C is something whose value is not directly accessible as an output of the "solver" element in the machine, and D is an output of the "solver".

A B Z (Z = A && B)
0 0 0
0 1 0
1 0 0
1 1 1

C A (A = !C)
0 1
1 0

C D B (B = C XOR D)
0 0 0
1 0 1
0 1 1
1 1 0

This means, logically, to produce a Z of 1, both an A of 1 and a B of 1 are necessary.

Assuming A is 1, this means that one must look at the truth which determines B.

This means some things can be known about the state of the system: that C is 0, that D is currently 0.

This means a truth table of choice in D on AB for Z=1

A B D Success (Z=1)
0 0 D 0
1 0 1 1
0 1 D 0
1 1 1 1

as such as long as A and B are inputs to the solver, the solver can choose, as above, for Z to be 1, by applying the above heuristic, but only when A is already 1.

as such the re are situations where the will will be free (A=1) and situations where the will will be constrained (A=0).

Pure comedy. You have no understanding of your own definition of determinism.....which you contradict at every turn.

I've wasted enough time. There is no hope.

 

[DBT]

But we actually do understand how the system unfolds. We actually observe the events unfolding in the restaurant and can describe them as they unfold. The choosing begins with the unfolding of the menu. The appearance of multiple possibilities causally necessitates that we must either make a choice, or go without dinner tonight. So, as events unfold, we consider the many options in terms of our own tastes, and our own dietary goals, and perhaps taking into account what we had for breakfast and lunch earlier. These considerations unfold into our choice for dinner, which we communicate to the waiter, "I will have the Chef Salad, please". There is no mystery here. Everyone assumes that events are reliably caused by prior events.

That's the essence of it. No realizable alternatives, no choice.

There is no basis for such claims! We saw exactly how the events actually unfolded, and there was a literal menu of realizable alternatives, and we considered them in terms of our own goals and reasons, and decided what we would order for dinner.

What happens must happen.

Of course. And it did happen, just as we observed it happening. There were realizable alternatives and we chose to realize one of them.

Perception is not necessarily representative of how things are or how they work.

'No deviation' eliminates the possibility of any apparent alternative from happening. Determinism is a system where there is only one possible outcome.

Determinism: given the state of the world at any moment in time, there is only one way it can be at the next moment.

What you do, you must necessarily do regardless of the presence or absence of external force, coercion or undue influence.
The distinction being 'acting according to your will necessarily' or being forced or coerced against your will.''
The distinction is there, yet our will is not free in either case. It is just 'will' and action as determined.

Yes, the distinction is there, between a choice we make for ourselves versus a choice imposed upon us by coercion or undue influence. The choice we make for ourselves is free of coercion and undue influence. Fortunately, that is the only thing that free will requires.

The 'choice' we make for ourselves is not freely chosen, in fact it is not even a matter of choice, but an action that was entailed to happen long before we come to fulfill it.

All the events that bring us to that place and point in time determines that it must happen.

Entailment through antecedents is not a matter of choice.

We don't exist, think or act in isolation.

There is no such thing as free will. There is plain old will, the prompt or urge to act, which itself is formed by the underlying process of entailment.

So, again, free will, as freedom from coercion and undue influence, is compatible with determinism. It is a deterministic event in which we decide for ourselves what we will do. And it was causally necessary, from any prior point in eternity, that we would be making that decision for ourselves, of our own free will.

Nope, that's merely applying a label where it doesn't belong. False labelling. Slapping a beer label on a bottle of wine doesn't make it wine.....

 

[Marvin Edwards]

But we actually do understand how the system unfolds. We actually observe the events unfolding in the restaurant and can describe them as they unfold. The choosing begins with the unfolding of the menu. The appearance of multiple possibilities causally necessitates that we must either make a choice, or go without dinner tonight. So, as events unfold, we consider the many options in terms of our own tastes, and our own dietary goals, and perhaps taking into account what we had for breakfast and lunch earlier. These considerations unfold into our choice for dinner, which we communicate to the waiter, "I will have the Chef Salad, please". There is no mystery here. Everyone assumes that events are reliably caused by prior events.

That's the essence of it. No realizable alternatives, no choice.

There is no basis for such claims! We saw exactly how the events actually unfolded, and there was a literal menu of realizable alternatives, and we considered them in terms of our own goals and reasons, and decided what we would order for dinner.

What happens must happen.

Of course. And it did happen, just as we observed it happening. There were realizable alternatives and we chose to realize one of them.

Perception is not necessarily representative of how things are or how they work.

'No deviation' eliminates the possibility of any apparent alternative from happening. Determinism is a system where there is only one possible outcome.

Determinism: given the state of the world at any moment in time, there is only one way it can be at the next moment.

What you do, you must necessarily do regardless of the presence or absence of external force, coercion or undue influence.
The distinction being 'acting according to your will necessarily' or being forced or coerced against your will.''
The distinction is there, yet our will is not free in either case. It is just 'will' and action as determined.

Yes, the distinction is there, between a choice we make for ourselves versus a choice imposed upon us by coercion or undue influence. The choice we make for ourselves is free of coercion and undue influence. Fortunately, that is the only thing that free will requires.

The 'choice' we make for ourselves is not freely chosen, in fact it is not even a matter of choice, but an action that was entailed to happen long before we come to fulfill it.

All the events that bring us to that place and point in time determines that it must happen.

Entailment through antecedents is not a matter of choice.

We don't exist, think or act in isolation.

There is no such thing as free will. There is plain old will, the prompt or urge to act, which itself is formed by the underlying process of entailment.

So, again, free will, as freedom from coercion and undue influence, is compatible with determinism. It is a deterministic event in which we decide for ourselves what we will do. And it was causally necessary, from any prior point in eternity, that we would be making that decision for ourselves, of our own free will.

Nope, that's merely applying a label where it doesn't belong. False labelling. Slapping a beer label on a bottle of wine doesn't make it wine.....

Like the guy said, "I've wasted enough time. There is no hope."

 

[The AntiChris]

False labelling.

What's the source of your correct labels?

 

[Jarhyn]

You have no understanding of your own definition of determinism.....which you contradict at every turn.

I've wasted enough time. There is no hope

So in other words, you will not rise to my challenge. I have given you myriad opportunities to locate it and highlight it red, if there is such a contradiction.

Rather than find it and highlight it red, you have claimed without basis or defense, merely asserted (highlighted in a rather piss tone of yellow, re: Back to the Future).

False labelling.

What's the source of your correct labels?

It's peach shaped, but it's not a peach.

Be careful for that "pit" though...

 

[DBT]

False labelling.

What's the source of your correct labels?

The nature of determinism.

 

[DBT]

You have no understanding of your own definition of determinism.....which you contradict at every turn.

I've wasted enough time. There is no hope

So in other words, you will not rise to my challenge. I have given you myriad opportunities to locate it and highlight it red, if there is such a contradiction.

Rather than find it and highlight it red, you have claimed without basis or defense, merely asserted (highlighted in a rather piss tone of yellow, re: Back to the Future).

False labelling.

What's the source of your correct labels?

It's peach shaped, but it's not a peach.

Be careful for that "pit" though...

There never was a challenge.

You failed to grasp the implications of your own definition of determinism from the beginning, and nothing has changed since.

Your errors have been described too many times as it is. I could repeat what I said, I could quote all that I have quoted and cited, philosophers, neuroscientists, cognitive experiments, etc, etc....but it would not help in the least.

Why you may ask? Because you are either unable or unwilling to understand the implications of your own definition of determinism.

The reason for that is likely to be an ideological attachment to the idea of free will.

 

[DBT]

So, again, free will, as freedom from coercion and undue influence, is compatible with determinism. It is a deterministic event in which we decide for ourselves what we will do. And it was causally necessary, from any prior point in eternity, that we would be making that decision for ourselves, of our own free will.

Nope, that's merely applying a label where it doesn't belong. False labelling. Slapping a beer label on a bottle of wine doesn't make it wine.....

Like the guy said, "I've wasted enough time. There is no hope."

It's natural that you would feel that way.

Inevitable in fact. Yet something drives you on. Twelve months and counting and nothing has changed.

It works both ways, of course. I explain why the compatibilist definition is not sufficient to prove its proposition and you explain why it is.

This is repeated over and over with neither side accepting the others argument.

So who is right?

Based purely on the nature of determinism, no alternatives, no deviation, no choice, no freedom of will (mechanically fixed by prior states), it has to be incompatibilism.

Incompatibilism is justified, not by semantics, not by definitions, nor labels, but the hard reality of determinism.

 

[Marvin Edwards]

Incompatibilism is justified, not by semantics, not by definitions, nor labels, but the hard reality of determinism.

Compatibilism is justified by the simple observation of the customers in a restaurant, each deciding for themselves what they will order for dinner.

 

[The AntiChris]

False labelling.

What's the source of your correct labels?

The nature of determinism.

If this was meant as a serious answer, then you misunderstand determinism.

 

[Jarhyn]

There never was a challenge

Ok, this is either dishonesty or pigeon chess at this point.

I say that free will and choice are possible in deterministic systems.

You say "no that can't be because of the implications of determinism: no deviations no randomness".

This means necessarily that either it must be possible to find a statement that is synonymous with/implies "randomness happens" or "deviation happens" happens at some point in the formulation I present of such a choice.

You have not.

You have said my errors have been described. No, they have been asserted but never once described. I have in this post  described an error. I did it so you would have an example of how to do it.

Which makes this:

You failed to grasp the implications of your own definition of determinism

An unargued assertion.

 

[DBT]

Incompatibilism is justified, not by semantics, not by definitions, nor labels, but the hard reality of determinism.

Compatibilism is justified by the simple observation of the customers in a restaurant, each deciding for themselves what they will order for dinner.

Surface appearance.

If determinism is true, every action was inevitable before the customers even knew what they would order.

It is entailment, where all actions are entailed by the prior states of the system, of which we are aspects.

That is a long, long way from freedom of will.

 

[DBT]

False labelling.

What's the source of your correct labels?

The nature of determinism.

If this was meant as a serious answer, then you misunderstand determinism.

It is not I who misunderstand the nature and implications of determinism. Which I have been describing for some time now.....yet your objection suggests that this is the first time.

Talk about Groundhog Day. Why do you ignore everything that has been said?

 

[DBT]

There never was a challenge

Ok, this is either dishonesty or pigeon chess at this point.

Just look in your mental mirror and have an honest look at your own position.

I say that free will and choice are possible in deterministic systems.

What you appear to overlook, or perhaps cannot grasp is:

''Determinism entails that, in a situation in which a person makes a certain decision or performs a certain action, it is impossible that he or she could have made any other decision or performed any other action. In other words, it is never true that people could have decided or acted otherwise than they actually did.''

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.''

 

[Marvin Edwards]

Incompatibilism is justified, not by semantics, not by definitions, nor labels, but the hard reality of determinism.

Compatibilism is justified by the simple observation of the customers in a restaurant, each deciding for themselves what they will order for dinner.

Surface appearance.

If determinism is true, every action was inevitable before the customers even knew what they would order.

It is entailment, where all actions are entailed by the prior states of the system, of which we are aspects.

That is a long, long way from freedom of will.

And we may assume that every action was indeed inevitable before the customers even knew what they would order. The point is, this makes no difference. Each customer is still there in the restaurant, reading the menu, and choosing for themselves what they will order. And that is all that free will is.

This is the simple insight that the hard determinist fails to acknowledge.

 

[The AntiChris]

Why do you ignore everything that has been said?

This implies that you believe you've adequately justified your bizarre belief that the label 'free will' can only be applied to a self-contradictory concept and that apart from you (and your confused allies) the rest of the world is mistaken when they believe they 'choose'. You haven't.

You haven't even attempted to justify your bizarre beliefs - you simply declare that they inevitably follow from determinism - no justification at all.

 

[Jarhyn]

It is not I who misunderstand the nature and implications of determinism. Which I have been describing for some time now.....

Just look in your mental mirror and have an honest look at your own position

I have invited you many times to actually do the work you claim can be done, to back up your mere assertions.

You make myriad statements which you believe, like a pigeon which enjoys chess, makes your point.

The way actual argumentations works, something you have not done, requires actually finding some specific linkage or tether between what you claim makes me wrong, and the thing I said.

You have to find and explain why the thing I said necessarily implies randomness or variation for this to be a valid argument.

The issue here is that you have not. The issue here is that you cannot. It is not there. It does not exist.

 

[DBT]

Why do you ignore everything that has been said?

This implies that you believe you've adequately justified your bizarre belief that the label 'free will' can only be applied to a self-contradictory concept and that apart from you (and your confused allies) the rest of the world is mistaken when they believe they 'choose'. You haven't.

You haven't even attempted to justify your bizarre beliefs - you simply declare that they inevitably follow from determinism - no justification at all.

My beliefs? Saying that is an excuse. And quite bizarre given that the terms and conditions of determinism have been given by some of the compatibilists on this forum.

It is not my belief that determinism means that all events are fixed by antecedents. It is not my belief that all events fixed by antecedents excludes alternate choices and actions.

That is how a deterministic system works, not because I believe it, but how it is defined.

It is your objections that are bizarre.

Wake up, for the thousandth time, this is not 'my belief' -

''All of these 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.'' - Marvin Edwards.

Jarhyn - A deterministic system is a system in which no randomness is involved in the development of future states of the system.

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.''


''Determinism entails that, in a situation in which a person makes a certain decision or performs a certain action, it is impossible that he or she could have made any other decision or performed any other action. In other words, it is never true that people could have decided or acted otherwise than they actually did.''