Demystifying Determinism

[DBT]

What exactly isn't clear?

Ok. Here's the question I asked:

Do you not accept/understand that they [compatibilism and incompatibilism] address different conceptions of free will?

I accept I may have missed it, but I honestly could not see a clear answer to this question in your response.

You made no attempt to address what I said. You just repeat your objection as if nothing was said. Why are you unable to respond to what is being explained?

I'm responding with a question which, for some unexplainable reason, you doggedly refuse to answer.

You ignore any and every answer I give. Not only what I happen to say, but everything I quote. Why is that? Why won't you address what is provided?

 

[DBT]

Given this state of affairs, it's obvious that there is nothing I can say or do to help you understand.

Yet you respond regardless.

That‘s not him responding, obviously. It’s the Big Bang. Remember your own position?

I saw your non-response to my architect scenario from about a month back. I’ll deconstruct your non-response as I find time.

Ahem, given that your hit and run comments typically miss, maybe you should take the trouble of getting your facts straight;

''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.

Hit and run comments? Go back and count how many posts I have made in this thread. Bear in mind I’ve got better things to do with my time than waste it on your time-wasting, quasi-religious inanities. And of course, in this latest little barb of yours, as always you elide the point. When you criticize AntiChris, you write: “Yet you respond regardless.” Did you forget that according to your own bizarre metaphysics, AntiChris has no choice but to respond to you? Did you forget that according to you, it was the Big Bang that responded, or the “system at large,” or whatever other euphemism du jour you come up with in place of the simple fact that it was AntiChris who responded and did so of his own free will? Seriously, have you suddenly forgotten your own position?

You are the King of Hit and Run.

If your time is being wasted, it is you wasting your own time.

Or can you not grasp the simple fact that your time is not mine to waste?

As for your accusation of 'bizarre metaphysics' - that is a bizarre accusation given that everything I say is related to the compatibilist definition of determinism.

Nor am I saying anything different to what the incompatibilists I have quoted are saying.

So, you essentially consider incompatibilism to be 'bizarre' - which given your beliefs, manner and attitude, is not surprising.

Frankly, it doesn't matter to me what you believe, or that you are wasting your time. That is your business.

 

[Jarhyn]

That has nothing to do with what I have said. You are off in your own little world

Are you serious? Your whole singsong refrain through this whole thing is "no deviation or Randomness mean the operation of choice is impossible" yet you fail to find the implementation of randomness or deviation in the operation of compatibilist choice.

If you cant understand how what you say has something to do with what you say, then you are lost.

You gave an example of your error just after I said I wasn't going to trawl back through the thread. I then pointed out why it is an error.

No you made yet another assertion without backing it up, as you frequently do, after you whined that you can't be arsed to argue your points in any way approaching valid even after I told you how, and pointed out how little actual trouble it is. You wasted more time to post this than it takes to actually so "trawl".

You seem very intent to DARVO this up.

Now you are back to ignoring what I said, with more whining

If you want to actually defend your position, you will actually highlight, in a description, the invocations of real "deviation" or "randomness" that you keep saying determinism implies are impossible and so invalidates the choice

AntiChris has been answering a question which you refuse to answer, which is essentially the same question I am asking:

Ok. Here's the question I asked:

Do you not accept/understand that they [compatibilism and incompatibilism] address different conceptions of free will?

I accept I may have missed it, but I honestly could not see a clear answer to this question in your response.

 

[The AntiChris]

You ignore any and every answer I give. Not only what I happen to say, but everything I quote. Why is that? Why won't you address what is provided?

I'm addressing what you provide by asking questions - that's how an exchange/understanding of ideas works on a discussion forum.

By refusing to answer questions you are simply sermonizing - you're just delivering an opinionated and dogmatic lecture.

 

[Jarhyn]

You ignore any and every answer I give. Not only what I happen to say, but everything I quote. Why is that? Why won't you address what is provided?

I'm addressing what you provide by asking questions - that's how an exchange/understanding of ideas works on a discussion forum.

By refusing to answer questions you are simply sermonizing - you're just delivering an opinionated and dogmatic lecture.

To be fair I offer a lot of lectures, too, but mostly they are thought out deconstructions, not repeated assertions, and quotations of "experts", some of whom are explicitly Compatibilist, others whom are functionally compatibilist, and yet others who only ever attack Libertarian Free Will, and whose errors have been pointed out.

I'll note, you should not have to spell this out, nor should I, but the answer to this, the answer that he claims not to have seen, is literally in every post in the thread by compatibilists: that libertarian free will, contracausal free will, is false; there is no freedom from cause and effect.

Of course the second blow here comes in the recognition that we don't have to be free from cause and effect to be participatory in causing effects, and that the actions we take in pushing thoughts, making decisions, and exercising leverage over ourselves is part of what makes us capable of growth and change, based on more exotic prerogatives as "make with sexual reproduction".

The metaphor of the cave (PDF link) is a powerful one.

 

[DBT]

That has nothing to do with what I have said. You are off in your own little world

Are you serious? Your whole singsong refrain through this whole thing is "no deviation or Randomness mean the operation of choice is impossible" yet you fail to find the implementation of randomness or deviation in the operation of compatibilist choice.

If you cant understand how what you say has something to do with what you say, then you are lost.

You gave an example of your error just after I said I wasn't going to trawl back through the thread. I then pointed out why it is an error.

No you made yet another assertion without backing it up, as you frequently do, after you whined that you can't be arsed to argue your points in any way approaching valid even after I told you how, and pointed out how little actual trouble it is. You wasted more time to post this than it takes to actually so "trawl".

You seem very intent to DARVO this up.

Now you are back to ignoring what I said, with more whining

If you want to actually defend your position, you will actually highlight, in a description, the invocations of real "deviation" or "randomness" that you keep saying determinism implies are impossible and so invalidates the choice

AntiChris has been answering a question which you refuse to answer, which is essentially the same question I am asking:

Ok. Here's the question I asked:

Do you not accept/understand that they [compatibilism and incompatibilism] address different conceptions of free will?

I accept I may have missed it, but I honestly could not see a clear answer to this question in your response.

Just more whining.

Maybe instead of going off into dreamland you can offer a relevant argument for compatibilism?

Or a concise rebuttal of incompatibilism?

I doubt it. It'll be more whining. Sounds like Tinnitus from here.

 

[DBT]

You ignore any and every answer I give. Not only what I happen to say, but everything I quote. Why is that? Why won't you address what is provided?

I'm addressing what you provide by asking questions - that's how an exchange/understanding of ideas works on a discussion forum.

Where have you addressed anything I said or provided? I must have missed it. Oh, wait, it never happened.

You just complain. Complaining is not addressing.

By refusing to answer questions you are simply sermonizing - you're just delivering an opinionated and dogmatic lecture.

I have been answering questions for over a year now, in case you haven't noticed......and all that you have been wailing that I don't answer questions.

Why do you ignore explanations, quotes, references, studies, arguments, etc, only to ignore whatever is being said and provided?

Is everyone I quoted also 'sermonizing?' Are all the philosophers, scientists, researchers that I quoted and cited 'sermonizing?'

Wow, you are scraping the crud off the bottom of your barrel.

 

[Jarhyn]

That has nothing to do with what I have said. You are off in your own little world

Are you serious? Your whole singsong refrain through this whole thing is "no deviation or Randomness mean the operation of choice is impossible" yet you fail to find the implementation of randomness or deviation in the operation of compatibilist choice.

If you cant understand how what you say has something to do with what you say, then you are lost.

You gave an example of your error just after I said I wasn't going to trawl back through the thread. I then pointed out why it is an error.

No you made yet another assertion without backing it up, as you frequently do, after you whined that you can't be arsed to argue your points in any way approaching valid even after I told you how, and pointed out how little actual trouble it is. You wasted more time to post this than it takes to actually so "trawl".

You seem very intent to DARVO this up.

Now you are back to ignoring what I said, with more whining

If you want to actually defend your position, you will actually highlight, in a description, the invocations of real "deviation" or "randomness" that you keep saying determinism implies are impossible and so invalidates the choice

AntiChris has been answering a question which you refuse to answer, which is essentially the same question I am asking:

Ok. Here's the question I asked:

Do you not accept/understand that they [compatibilism and incompatibilism] address different conceptions of free will?

I accept I may have missed it, but I honestly could not see a clear answer to this question in your response.

Just more whining.

Maybe instead of going off into dreamland you can offer a relevant argument for compatibilism?

Or a concise rebuttal of incompatibilism?

I doubt it. It'll be more whining. Sounds like Tinnitus from here.

I told you where and how to find them and then you ignored the post and continued to whine.

Never once have you answered or risen to highlight something in red.

I reposted the challenge repeatedly until @Marvin Edwards convinced me to stop, and now here you are whining that I won't repost it. You could not do the ONE task put to you: highlight error that you believe was happening in red.

Now go ahead and take the 3 minutes it would take you to go back in the reply chains, or the three minutes you would normally spend looking up words of others that you do not understand, and actually try to put together a valid argument maybe?

Even answering @The AntiChris 's question would suffice.

Do you need me to point out where it was asked for you?

It does not matter how much you spam the claim that libertarian free will simply does not work, because compatibilists do not rely on the libertarian conception of free will.

 

[The AntiChris]

You ignore any and every answer I give. Not only what I happen to say, but everything I quote. Why is that? Why won't you address what is provided?

I'm addressing what you provide by asking questions - that's how an exchange/understanding of ideas works on a discussion forum.

Where have you addressed anything I said or provided? I must have missed it. Oh, wait, it never happened.

You just complain. Complaining is not addressing.

By refusing to answer questions you are simply sermonizing - you're just delivering an opinionated and dogmatic lecture.

I have been answering questions for over a year now, in case you haven't noticed......and all that you have been wailing that I don't answer questions.

Why do you ignore explanations, quotes, references, studies, arguments, etc, only to ignore whatever is being said and provided?

Is everyone I quoted also 'sermonizing?' Are all the philosophers, scientists, researchers that I quoted and cited 'sermonizing?'

Wow, you are scraping the crud off the bottom of your barrel.

And still, you'd rather continue endlessly complaining than answer a simple question.

 

[DBT]

That has nothing to do with what I have said. You are off in your own little world

Are you serious? Your whole singsong refrain through this whole thing is "no deviation or Randomness mean the operation of choice is impossible" yet you fail to find the implementation of randomness or deviation in the operation of compatibilist choice.

If you cant understand how what you say has something to do with what you say, then you are lost.

You gave an example of your error just after I said I wasn't going to trawl back through the thread. I then pointed out why it is an error.

No you made yet another assertion without backing it up, as you frequently do, after you whined that you can't be arsed to argue your points in any way approaching valid even after I told you how, and pointed out how little actual trouble it is. You wasted more time to post this than it takes to actually so "trawl".

You seem very intent to DARVO this up.

Now you are back to ignoring what I said, with more whining

If you want to actually defend your position, you will actually highlight, in a description, the invocations of real "deviation" or "randomness" that you keep saying determinism implies are impossible and so invalidates the choice

AntiChris has been answering a question which you refuse to answer, which is essentially the same question I am asking:

Ok. Here's the question I asked:

Do you not accept/understand that they [compatibilism and incompatibilism] address different conceptions of free will?

I accept I may have missed it, but I honestly could not see a clear answer to this question in your response.

Just more whining.

Maybe instead of going off into dreamland you can offer a relevant argument for compatibilism?

Or a concise rebuttal of incompatibilism?

I doubt it. It'll be more whining. Sounds like Tinnitus from here.

I told you where and how to find them and then you ignored the post and continued to whine.

Never once have you answered or risen to highlight something in red.

I reposted the challenge repeatedly until @Marvin Edwards convinced me to stop, and now here you are whining that I won't repost it. You could not do the ONE task put to you: highlight error that you believe was happening in red.

Now go ahead and take the 3 minutes it would take you to go back in the reply chains, or the three minutes you would normally spend looking up words of others that you do not understand, and actually try to put together a valid argument maybe?

Even answering @The AntiChris 's question would suffice.

Do you need me to point out where it was asked for you?

It does not matter how much you spam the claim that libertarian free will simply does not work, because compatibilists do not rely on the libertarian conception of free will.

Your nonsense was never a challenge. The reason why I can't be bothered with dealing with your nonsense is your childish manner. All you do is whine.

Once again, the incompatibilist argument has been laid out more than enough times over the past year or more, descriptions, quotes, etc, by numerous authors. What I have described is in line with all of that has been provided. Nothing controversial. All related to how determinism is defined, etc,

Your fundamental error has been pointed out.

Just recently:

Jarhyn; 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.''


To which I pointed out:

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.''

Given that....''The literal meaning of choice is that there are multiple options, and the person selects one of them.

Thus, choice requires multiple possible outcomes, which is a no-no to determinism. To the determinist, the march of causality will make one outcome inevitable, and so it is wrong to believe that anything else was possible. The chooser does not yet know which option he or she is going to choose, hence the subjective experience of choice.

Thus, the subjective choosing is simply a matter of one's own ignorance - ignorance that those other outcomes are not really possibilities at all''....your claim ''I say that free will and choice are possible in deterministic systems'' is patently false.

In other words, you have no case. What you claim is falsified.

 

[DBT]

You ignore any and every answer I give. Not only what I happen to say, but everything I quote. Why is that? Why won't you address what is provided?

I'm addressing what you provide by asking questions - that's how an exchange/understanding of ideas works on a discussion forum.

Where have you addressed anything I said or provided? I must have missed it. Oh, wait, it never happened.

You just complain. Complaining is not addressing.

If you missed it, you have your eyes closed. You probably plug your ears for good measure.

Do some work, open your eyes, go back and see what has been said and quoted.

You can read my response to Marvin Edwards over the last year or so, which should give you a basic understanding of incompatibilism.

By refusing to answer questions you are simply sermonizing - you're just delivering an opinionated and dogmatic lecture.

I have been answering questions for over a year now, in case you haven't noticed......and all that you have been wailing that I don't answer questions.

Sure, nothing but complaints, while ignoring the given argument.

It's not that hard to grasp.

Just roughly:

''An action’s production by a deterministic process, even when the agent satisfies the conditions on moral responsibility specified by compatibilists, presents no less of a challenge to basic-desert responsibility than does deterministic manipulation by other agents. '


A mental illness or brain injury, as with normal healthy brain function, is a matter of non-chosen brain state and condition.

Neither is chosen or subject to 'free will,' regulation through desire, will, wish, hope, or willpower.

In other words, it's the cards that you are dealt, genetics, environment, circumstances, life events - all determined by the system as it develops or evolves without deviation that makes us who we are, shaping and generating our being, thoughts, feelings and actions.

That is determinism at work.

That is inner necessity at work.

That is the essential element that falsifies free will and compatibilism.

Acting without external force, coercion or undue influence is not sufficient to establish the idea of free will.

The compatibilist definition is not sufficient to prove the proposition because inner necessity is a far greater constraint on the notion of free will than external force, coercion or undue influence, and all actions - being determined by that inexorable process - are necessarily performed without restriction or impediment as determined, not freely willed.

What you do want to do is determined by prior causes;

''Wanting to do X is fully determined by these prior causes. Now that the desire to do X is being felt, there are no other constraints that keep the person from doing what he wants, namely X.''

No doubt that this too will be ignored, and tomorrow you'll complain once more that I gave no answer.

Groundhog day.

 

[Jarhyn]

Your nonsense was never a challenge. The reason why I can't be bothered with dealing with your nonsense is your childish manner. All you do is whine.

This is a whinge. Oh the irony.

Once again, the incompatibilist argument has been laid out more than enough times over the past year or more, descriptions, quotes, etc, by numerous authors. What I have described is in line with all of that has been provided. Nothing controversial. All related to how determinism is defined, etc,

And we have all, repeatedly, pointed out two things: one, that you rely on a genetic fallacy, as all these authors only manage to argue against libertarian free will, which is not the topic of discussion here. Two you rely on the modal fallacy, declaring not merely what will not happen but declaring that alternate scenarios cannot be logically simulated, not even approximately.

The bolded, italicized text above is a paraphrase. If you do not declare that alternate scenarios cannot be logically simulated approximately, then you are not declaring against compatibilist choice and wills and freedom.

This is why that question @The AntiChris keeps asking is so important.

What you have described is the same attack on Libertarian Free Will that we keep pointing out is insufficient to even begin to address compatibilist choice, will, and freedom.

It's not a big deal to recognize that the universe has consistent behavioral laws, and that having something whose behavior allows calculating results of those laws quickly with representatives that act in the same general ways but faster, to get "ahead" of the deterministic but slow behaviors of stuff with the deterministic but fast processes of our neurons, and doing so in a way that allows selection of the calculated result with "the best" outcome.

If there are problems with which simulated outcome is "the best" -- perhaps the series of actions treats folks with asymmetry -- then the mechanisms which identify such an outcome as "the best" may be modified in one of several simple identifiable ways.

 

[The AntiChris]

You ignore any and every answer I give. Not only what I happen to say, but everything I quote. Why is that? Why won't you address what is provided?

I'm addressing what you provide by asking questions - that's how an exchange/understanding of ideas works on a discussion forum.

Where have you addressed anything I said or provided? I must have missed it. Oh, wait, it never happened.

You just complain. Complaining is not addressing.

If you missed it, you have your eyes closed. You probably plug your ears for good measure.

Do some work, open your eyes, go back and see what has been said and quoted.

You can read my response to Marvin Edwards over the last year or so, which should give you a basic understanding of incompatibilism.

By refusing to answer questions you are simply sermonizing - you're just delivering an opinionated and dogmatic lecture.

I have been answering questions for over a year now, in case you haven't noticed......and all that you have been wailing that I don't answer questions.

Sure, nothing but complaints, while ignoring the given argument.

It's not that hard to grasp.

Just roughly:

''An action’s production by a deterministic process, even when the agent satisfies the conditions on moral responsibility specified by compatibilists, presents no less of a challenge to basic-desert responsibility than does deterministic manipulation by other agents. '


A mental illness or brain injury, as with normal healthy brain function, is a matter of non-chosen brain state and condition.

Neither is chosen or subject to 'free will,' regulation through desire, will, wish, hope, or willpower.

In other words, it's the cards that you are dealt, genetics, environment, circumstances, life events - all determined by the system as it develops or evolves without deviation that makes us who we are, shaping and generating our being, thoughts, feelings and actions.

That is determinism at work.

That is inner necessity at work.

That is the essential element that falsifies free will and compatibilism.

Acting without external force, coercion or undue influence is not sufficient to establish the idea of free will.

The compatibilist definition is not sufficient to prove the proposition because inner necessity is a far greater constraint on the notion of free will than external force, coercion or undue influence, and all actions - being determined by that inexorable process - are necessarily performed without restriction or impediment as determined, not freely willed.

What you do want to do is determined by prior causes;

''Wanting to do X is fully determined by these prior causes. Now that the desire to do X is being felt, there are no other constraints that keep the person from doing what he wants, namely X.''

No doubt that this too will be ignored, and tomorrow you'll complain once more that I gave no answer.

Groundhog day.

And the complaining continues. You're now responding to your own posts.

And still no answer to my question first asked a week ago in post #1,136:

Do you not accept/understand that they [compatibilism and incompatibilism] address different conceptions of free will?

 

[DBT]

Your nonsense was never a challenge. The reason why I can't be bothered with dealing with your nonsense is your childish manner. All you do is whine.

This is a whinge. Oh the irony.

Just pointing out what you do. It's a statement. I didn't expect you to look at your own behaviour.

Once again, the incompatibilist argument has been laid out more than enough times over the past year or more, descriptions, quotes, etc, by numerous authors. What I have described is in line with all of that has been provided. Nothing controversial. All related to how determinism is defined, etc,

And we have all, repeatedly, pointed out two things: one, that you rely on a genetic fallacy, as all these authors only manage to argue against libertarian free will, which is not the topic of discussion here. Two you rely on the modal fallacy, declaring not merely what will not happen but declaring that alternate scenarios cannot be logically simulated, not even approximately.

You can't see that your 'simulated alternate realities' is nonsense? ''Simulated alternate realities'' are no more a matter of real physical events than depictions of Superman flying over Metropolis shooting lasers out of his eyes.

Fantasy is not reality, simulations do not necessarily represent the world as it is, or how it works.

You may have become so deeply immersed in fantasy worlds and simulations that it's come to the point where you can't tell the difference between them.

It's too silly to deal with.

The bolded, italicized text above is a paraphrase. If you do not declare that alternate scenarios cannot be logically simulated approximately, then you are not declaring against compatibilist choice and wills and freedom.

This is why that question @The AntiChris keeps asking is so important.

What you have described is the same attack on Libertarian Free Will that we keep pointing out is insufficient to even begin to address compatibilist choice, will, and freedom.

The truth is far simpler: you failed to understand what was said. Compaibilism fails because redefining the terms of reference does not prove its proposition. Will has no agency beyond an urge or prompt to act milliseconds after information processing, and of course action must follow as determined. Nothing is freely willed.

Neural architecture is not freely willed, how information input interacts with the system is not freely willed, the thought processes that follow are not freely willed, and the action necessarily follows.

The process of cognition is not based on free will. The brain is not a free will generator, it does not function on the basis of free will.

There is no case to be made for free will. It's an ideology. Precious to some like a religion.

 

[DBT]

You ignore any and every answer I give. Not only what I happen to say, but everything I quote. Why is that? Why won't you address what is provided?

I'm addressing what you provide by asking questions - that's how an exchange/understanding of ideas works on a discussion forum.

Where have you addressed anything I said or provided? I must have missed it. Oh, wait, it never happened.

You just complain. Complaining is not addressing.

If you missed it, you have your eyes closed. You probably plug your ears for good measure.

Do some work, open your eyes, go back and see what has been said and quoted.

You can read my response to Marvin Edwards over the last year or so, which should give you a basic understanding of incompatibilism.

By refusing to answer questions you are simply sermonizing - you're just delivering an opinionated and dogmatic lecture.

I have been answering questions for over a year now, in case you haven't noticed......and all that you have been wailing that I don't answer questions.

Sure, nothing but complaints, while ignoring the given argument.

It's not that hard to grasp.

Just roughly:

''An action’s production by a deterministic process, even when the agent satisfies the conditions on moral responsibility specified by compatibilists, presents no less of a challenge to basic-desert responsibility than does deterministic manipulation by other agents. '


A mental illness or brain injury, as with normal healthy brain function, is a matter of non-chosen brain state and condition.

Neither is chosen or subject to 'free will,' regulation through desire, will, wish, hope, or willpower.

In other words, it's the cards that you are dealt, genetics, environment, circumstances, life events - all determined by the system as it develops or evolves without deviation that makes us who we are, shaping and generating our being, thoughts, feelings and actions.

That is determinism at work.

That is inner necessity at work.

That is the essential element that falsifies free will and compatibilism.

Acting without external force, coercion or undue influence is not sufficient to establish the idea of free will.

The compatibilist definition is not sufficient to prove the proposition because inner necessity is a far greater constraint on the notion of free will than external force, coercion or undue influence, and all actions - being determined by that inexorable process - are necessarily performed without restriction or impediment as determined, not freely willed.

What you do want to do is determined by prior causes;

''Wanting to do X is fully determined by these prior causes. Now that the desire to do X is being felt, there are no other constraints that keep the person from doing what he wants, namely X.''

No doubt that this too will be ignored, and tomorrow you'll complain once more that I gave no answer.

Groundhog day.

And the complaining continues. You're now responding to your own posts.

And still no answer to my question first asked a week ago in post #1,136:

Do you not accept/understand that they [compatibilism and incompatibilism] address different conceptions of free will?

I notice that you made no effort to address anything that was said. Instead, you focus on my behaviour. Look at your own. Look at what I am reacting to. The very thing I just pointed out.

I gave an outline on the failure of compatibilism to prove its proposition, with nothing to show for it.


As for your question you asked in post #1136: ''Do you not accept/understand that they address different conceptions of free will?''

My answer in post #1142 was;
''The issue is freedom of will. Compatibilism doesn't relate to or establish freedom of will, instead it is founded on actions performed according to will, without force, coercion or undue influence.

That is not free will, it is a label applied to acting in accordance with will, while ignoring inner necessity and that will itself is fixed by inputs and antecedents.''

So, I guess that tomorrow it'll be, ''oh, but you never give an explanation or an argument.''

Well, here are the basics....yet again.

Bruce Silverstein, B.A. in Philosophy;

''If Causal Determinism is true (i.e., accurately describes the state of the universe), then humans lack Free Will because the truth of Causal Determinism means that (a) humans lack the ability to think in a manner that is not 100% caused by prior activity that is outside of their control, as human cognition is simply a form of activity that is governed by Causal Determinism, and (b) there are no such thing as true “options” or “alternatives” because there is one, and only one, activity that can ever occur at any given instant; and
If Free-Will exists in its pure form, then Causal Determinism is not true because the existence of Free Will in its pure form depends upon (a) the existence of true “options” or “alternatives,” and (b) humans being capable of thinking (and acting) in a manner that is not 100% caused by prior activity that is outside their control.

As I understand Causal Determinism and Free Will, they are irreconcilably incompatible unless (i) Determinism is defined to exclude human cognition from the inexorable path of causation forged through the universe long before human beings came into existence, and/or (ii) Free Will is defined to be include the illusion of human cognition that is a part of the path of Determinism. As William James aptly observed:

“The issue . . . is a perfectly sharp one, which no eulogistic terminology can smear over or wipe out. The truth must lie with one side or the other, and its lying with one side makes the other false.”

I could write many pages describing the varied attempts of by Compatibilists to harmonize the irreconcilable concepts of Causal Determinism and Free Will, but it is unnecessary for me to do so, as there is an excellent discussion of this subject on-line at Compatibilism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy). It should suffice to say that none of the various arguments for Compatibilism courageously presented on the Stanford website is satisfying, and all suffer from the same flaw identified above — namely, a stubborn refusal to come to grips with the true and complete nature of Causal Determinism and Free Will. Or, as William James less generously observed, all efforts to harmonize Causal Determinism and Free Will are a “quagmire of evasion.”

 

[Jarhyn]

Just pointing out what you do. It's a statement. I didn't expect you to look at your own behaviour.

And yet I did look anyway, did identify that I'm a childish trollish sod, and then recognized that no matter how childish and trollish I am, you're still the one whining about it.

You are using my ascerbic nature as an excuse to not engage the weight of my arguments. That's whining.

You can't see that your 'simulated alternate realities' is nonsense? ''Simulated alternate realities'' are no more a matter of real physical events than depictions of Superman flying over Metropolis shooting lasers out of his eyes.

Simulation of an alternate reality is a real physical event.

Now, how tightly the laws of the simulation represent the laws of reality makes a huge difference in the validity of the simulation.

Superman flying over metropolis is not even a proper simulation. It's got vastly different enforcement (sometimes absent enforcement) of axioms. At best it is "a story", not a simulation.

FDI made a post full of more word salads than Marvin's diner wherein they tried badly to discuss isolating error in a simulation.

When a simulator behaves the same way reality does, it can train a fighter pilot. When a simulator does not behave the same way does, it can cause a fighter pilot behind the stick of a real plane to die.

The fidelity of the simulation with respect to the actual laws of reality matters here. Your use of a clearly "useless" "simulation" does not invalidate the usefulness of useful simulations with low error.

The lower the error of the simulation, the more powerful applying it becomes towards the end of usefully diverging from it's predictions towards an identifiable alternative outcome.

As an example here, let's assume we are playing a game of Tic Tac Toe.

You move first...

But I don't just play against you, I also simulate you, on a second piece of paper, acting against my move. I move somewhere and then I map the graph of all places you can move as a result of my move, and which ones collapse into a victory for you, which ones would collapse into a victory for me, which ones collapse into a draw.

I've already in fact simulated every single possible toc-tac-toe game repeatedly in the past; there are a small finite number of games, not counting rotations of the board or inversion of the moves and thus pieces as distinct.

So, while you can make mistakes, I can follow whichever available path that represents only draws for you and wins for me, and bar your will to victory in a way you cannot unless you also choose to simulate the system as I do.

Whereas if my simulations of the tic tac toe board did not enforce the same rules as the actual game, it would be useless, as you would imagine incorrectly that all simulation is.

As for your question you asked in post #1136: ''Do you not accept/understand that they address different conceptions of free will?''

My answer in post #1142 was;
''The issue is freedom of will. Compatibilism doesn't relate to or establish freedom of will, instead it is founded on actions performed according to will, without force, coercion or undue influence.

That is not free will, it is a label applied to acting in accordance with will, while ignoring inner necessity and that will itself is fixed by inputs and antecedents.''

DBT, you are engaging in a "no true Scotsman".

You are attempting here to say that the compatibilist "freedom" (the state of a will in the context of a system such that it shall reach a specific instruction) is not somehow sufficiently "valid" as a model.

You do not need absolute, or even ANY control over who you are to be what you are.

A printer does not need to print itself to print things.

A person does not need to will themselves to be so as to will other things.

A person does not need to have been free to choose elements of themselves to today freely choose on the basis of the self they are additional actions which shape them, which is to say to successfully apply change to their neurology.

The only quagmire of evasion seems to be your verbal vomit whenever presented with this simple fact that the compatibilist definition of freedom is different from the libertarian definition which you keep trying to attack.

 

[The AntiChris]

As for your question you asked in post #1136: ''Do you not accept/understand that they address different conceptions of free will?''

My answer in post #1142 was;
''The issue is freedom of will. Compatibilism doesn't relate to or establish freedom of will, instead it is founded on actions performed according to will, without force, coercion or undue influence.

That is not free will, it is a label applied to acting in accordance with will, while ignoring inner necessity and that will itself is fixed by inputs and antecedents.''

 

[Jarhyn]

As for your question you asked in post #1136: ''Do you not accept/understand that they address different conceptions of free will?''

My answer in post #1142 was;
''The issue is freedom of will. Compatibilism doesn't relate to or establish freedom of will, instead it is founded on actions performed according to will, without force, coercion or undue influence.

That is not free will, it is a label applied to acting in accordance with will, while ignoring inner necessity and that will itself is fixed by inputs and antecedents.''

Yeah. Like,  how is it  ignoring inner necessity? It's literally an identified operation of an inner necessitation. That's not ignoring, that's subordination of concept.

When systems work improperly, often it's because the task desired and identified is being described wrongly in a way repaired by "inversion of control".

DBT says "the system is buggy, therefore the concepts of it are all wrong."

Compatibilists say "that's because you are trying to declare freedom over necessitation rather than necessitation over freedom."

Then DBT refuses to compile the system the new way and continues to insist on it being buggy and ought be thrown away.

 

[pood]

Let’s go back to this post of mine.

And at the end of that post I noted, “Think, everyone: under hard determinism, Roark had no choice but to make a beautiful and flawless building!”

Here was DBT’s response:

pood said:

Where did the building come from?

But wait! Let’s examine Roark’s efforts from a hard determinist perspective. DBT has been telling us over and over that we have no choices at all — that anything that looks like a real choice is illusory.

If you understand incompatibilism - as outlined above - the nature of determinism and its consequences, you'd have your answer.

You'd know that it's not a matter of not being able to think, plan and act, but that what you think plan and act is determined, that everything must proceed as determined.

The builder thinks his thoughts and carries out his plans necessarily because his nature and all the circumstances of his life brought him to the point of planning and constructing his building. Given determinism - as defined by compatibilists - it cannot be otherwise.

Which is not to say that thought, planning and action is not possible. Nobody is even suggesting it. It's a simple thing; determinism means that whatever is thought, planned and carried out is necessarily thought, planned and carried out, and at no point during the process of thought, planning and carrying out actions are there alternate actions;

''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.''

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

Your challenge is a Red Herring.

Note, first, that someone does not know the meaning of the term “red herring.” A red herring is something designed to distract from the real issue. My post not only did not distract from the real issue, it is the real issue.

Note, second, how DBT writes:

Given determinism - as defined by compatibilists - it cannot be otherwise.

DBT still doesn’t seem even to understand the compatibilist argument. Under compatibilism, things can be otherwise — they just won’t be, given some arbitrary set of antecedent circumstances. We’ve all gone over this again and again, and he still doesn’t get the most basic argument. And he reprimands us for allegedly being dense!

Now let’s cut to the chase. DBT, do you agree with the following: “Roark had no choice but to make a beautiful and flawless building”?

Of course you must agree with it! It’s your whole argument in a nutshell.

So who or what, under DBT’s metaphysics, made this flawless, beautiful building that required thousands of i-choices, illusionary choices as DBT would have it, that all had to be the right choice out of many alternatives? Clearly not Howard Roark!

Notice DBT says:

Which is not to say that thought, planning and action is not possible. Nobody is even suggesting it.

Thought, planning, and action, I ask you, by whom? Thought, planning, and action presuppose choices. If there is no choice, there is no thought, planning or action! There is no need for a brain at all under hard determinism — how or why did brains evolve in the first place? DBT has never answered this oft-asked question of mine.

Who or what designed the damned building, and how?

Oh! The “system at large” (DBT’s latest silly euphemism) designed it! The Big Bang designed it! Or … something??

Events in nature are described (though not prescribed) by the statistical “laws” of thermodynamics. In a closed system events are likely (though not guaranteed) to become more disorderly (rising entropy). This is because there are vastly more ways for a system to manifest disorder rather than order.

Just as there are vastly more ways for a building to be bad, or not to exist at all, than for it to be flawless and beautiful. Yet DBT would have us believe that the blind chance of initial conditions at the Big Bang designed this beautiful building some 14 billion years later! Oh, he concedes that “thought, planning and action is possible” but note the telltale passive voice that he uses — you know, like how miscreants allow that “mistakes were made,” a backhanded way of not taking responsibility for the fact that they themselves are the source of the “mistakes.”

Nature does exhibit many examples of apparent design that actually has no mind behind the design at all. Evolution is the classic example.

But evolutionary theory has an explanation for how such apparent design came about with no planning or forethought. The principal explanation is natural selection.

There is no comparable explanation under hard determinism of how “thought, planning and action is possible” without a thinker, a planner, an actor, an agent — and thinking, planning, acting, and agency require genuine choices. Roark had to make choices. The blind, dumb, unthinking Big Bang and “system at large” cannot make these choices for him, and also lack any mechanism like natural selection to explain how a big, flawless beautiful building is somehow magicked into existence.

Hard determinism (as opposed to causal determinism, which is not the same thing) is therefore false, QED.

Hey, DBT, is this another of my “hit and run posts”? Stow your insults where the sun don’t shine, pal.

 

[Jarhyn]

unthinking Big Bang and “system at large” cannot make these choices for him,

Correct. They will not make these choices FOR him, they will make these choices AS him in that location. Which is to say he will make the choices according to the laws laid down in the big bang.

and also lack any mechanism like natural selection

Incorrect. the system at large is subordinate to the logical fact of natural selection being an unavoidable consequence of imperfect but still relatively functional replication.

to explain how a big, flawless beautiful building is somehow magicked into existence.

The action of such imperfect but relatively functional replicators evolving towards understanding and communicating discoveries of math as individuals explains it: the system optimized towards the emergence of representation theory across individuals in a system, and the naturally selected results of that muck managing to spark a strange fire resulted in structures optimized to the first thing that managed to isolate most of set theory.

It is "somehow magicked into existence" by the intersection of our location, nature, and how that location and nature interacts with the things which have set theoretic truths to their behavior: our fundamental fields, and the underlying base field.

Of course, that process involves us, making decisions not because we are willed unto them by fate, but because we as humans are capable of writing our own fates, and only ever moreso when we understand our agency and how to operate it, how to change ourselves as we see fit.