Demystifying Determinism

[DBT]

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.

I am merely pointing out your prickly manner of interaction. That is what I am reacting to.

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.

Bloody hell, we know the simulation is a physical event. The point was that subject matter of the simulation may have no bearing on reality.....that it is what you are simulating, Superman flying through the air over Metropolis, shooting laser beams from his eyes, or whatever, is not reality, that there is no Superman flying over Metropolis, that the comic book city and Superman are purely fictional.

You either knew what I meant but decided to play dumb, or you really can't distinguish between fantasy and reality.

This is why I don't bother responding to your posts. I shouldn't have bothered this time. I regret it already.

 

[DBT]

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!

That is where you go wrong. I know what Compatibilists say and claim, yet despite what compatibilists believe, say and claim, determinism as they themselves define it doesn't permit alternate actions, hence 'things can be otherwise" is a false assumption.

To say that 'things can be otherwise in relation to determinism is patently absurd.

The stipulation is 'no deviation, fixed by antecedents,' which logically eliminates alternate actions and 'things can be otherwise"


''Determinism means that events will proceed naturally (as if "fixed as a matter of natural law") and reliably ("without deviation").
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

It's Saturday evening, going out, so that's all I have time for...in case you complain that I am avoiding something in your long repetitive post that's full of errors which have been addressed numerous times over the course of a year or more. Given the errors and attitude - ''DBT still doesn’t seem even to understand the compatibilist argument.'' - perhaps you should try reading more carefully?

 

[DBT]

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.''

Shrug away. That appears to be your only option (as it must be, given determinism). You never actually address anything that's said or provided.

Here's a bit more to chew on:

''The compatibilist might say because those are influences that are “outside” of the person, but this misses the entire point brought up by the free will skeptic, which is that ALL environmental conditions that help lead to a person’s brain state at any given moment are “outside of the person”, and the genes a person has was provided rather than decided.''

Dr. Robert Sapolsky: The basic theme is that we are biological creatures, which shouldn't be earth-shattering. And thus all of our behavior is a product of our biology, which also shouldn't be earth-shattering—even though it's news to some people.

If we want to make sense of our behavior—all the best, worst, and everything in between—we're not going to get anywhere if we think it can all be explained with one thing, whether it's one part of the brain, one childhood experience, one hormone, one gene, or anything. Instead, a behavior is the outcome of everything from neurobiology one second before the action, to evolutionary pressure dating back millions of years.''

 

[Jarhyn]

I am merely pointing out your prickly manner of interaction. That is what I am reacting to.

Reacting to by "whining about it". Be pricked of you're going to be lazy and argue with fallacies.

The point was that subject matter of the simulation may have no bearing on reality

And yet the subject matter of simulation MAY have strong bearing or weak bearing as well, besides the available 'none'.

How this is determined is on the basis of two things:
1. What is the error in terms of the simulation predicting the future to a blind? Can it "seal an envelope" with accurate predictions better than "random chance"?

This is a simple experiment: put together a Rube Goldberg construction. From static analysis, can the simulator identify final states without seeing the machine actually operate?

2. whether the initial conditions back-calculated from a goal-oriented final condition are achievable as a post-condition from the current actual condition IF certain actions are made (is it possible to make that happen based on what is happening here, assuming one actually wants that to happen?)

This is more a long the lines of whether a particular logic puzzle has a solution:
Bob objectively wants to go to Mars next week. Bob calculates that he needs a specific amount of delta-V and a vehicle capable of expressing that delta. Bob thinks of many such a things that would get him there, but all these things take more than a week and require materials nobody will let him have sufficient access to, so while Bob identifies that something is possible under certain conditions, achieving those conditions from his current condition is not possible. Therefore Bob is not even provisionally free to go to Mars next week.

Superman flying through the air over Metropolis, shooting laser beams from his eyes, or whatever, is not reality, that there is no Superman flying over Metropolis, that the comic book city and Superman are purely fictional

You are conflating simulations which have trivialized axioms with simulations with sound axioms.

Superman flying over metropolis is a phenomenally bad example because flying unpowered in the air over any city and shooting high power directed energy weapons from a fixture the size of an eyeball that also ostensibly collects data are as you mention purely fictional.

There is no truth to this system, nothing consistent about it's physics beyond "whatever series of words or images are placed arbitrarily in the series are in the series"; there is no reliable cause and effect.

This in fact separates comic books from reality insofar as if the writer says Superman fucks his mom and kills his dad, Superman fucks his mom and kills his dad even though they ostensibly blew up on Krypton the day he was born.

In reality, and in fact in any simulation reflecting it's laws even fairly badly, in any system which is capable of calling the shot to a sealed envelope it will recognize that "fucks his mom and kills his dad" is not in the cards for any actor for whom "dad and mom were killed the day he was born" unless that describes the day he was born, a day in the past.

And of course if the actor then identified a simulator that has a good track record at stuffing the envelope with statements that are true, or with low error, then we can determine whether free will is a thing fairly quickly: can a researcher control whether the predictions are accurate by exposing them to some actor with the instruction "invalidate this prediction"?

If the error of the prediction is dependent on nobody with conflicting goals being exposed to the prediction, then clearly individuals have leverage over the future.

As it stands, it may be necessary to make the decision on whether to open the envelope on the basis of some thing that the predictor does not have access to, but because there are locally isolated phenomena in our reality, it's not an unattainable feat.

 

[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.''

Shrug away.

Help me out please. Was your answer a "yes" or a "no"?

Do you or do you not accept that the conception of 'free will' defended by compatibilists on this forum is not the same as the conception of 'free will' rejected by incompatibilists on the grounds that it is incompatible with determinism?

 

[steve_bank]

My inner necessity is food, water, and shelter.

 

[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!

That is where you go wrong. I know what Compatibilists say and claim, yet despite what compatibilists believe, say and claim, determinism as they themselves define it doesn't permit alternate actions, hence 'things can be otherwise" is a false assumption.

To say that 'things can be otherwise in relation to determinism is patently absurd.

The stipulation is 'no deviation, fixed by antecedents,' which logically eliminates alternate actions and 'things can be otherwise"


''Determinism means that events will proceed naturally (as if "fixed as a matter of natural law") and reliably ("without deviation").
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

It's Saturday evening, going out, so that's all I have time for...in case you complain that I am avoiding something in your long repetitive post that's full of errors which have been addressed numerous times over the course of a year or more. Given the errors and attitude - ''DBT still doesn’t seem even to understand the compatibilist argument.'' - perhaps you should try reading more carefully?

Long repetitive post? Perhaps you could identify where the repetition is?

As to the rest, of course you’re avoiding the key questions! Do you think no one sees this?

You didn’t even bother to include them in your quoted material! That’s a sure sign you have no answer and are going to try to avoid the subject altogether.

Here, I challenge you to deal with the rest of my post that you ignored:

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.

Deal with it!

 

[pood]

It’s amazing how you can completely ignore all of the above, all the salient points, while yammering that you’ve ignored nothing!

 

[DBT]

I am merely pointing out your prickly manner of interaction. That is what I am reacting to.

Reacting to by "whining about it". Be pricked of you're going to be lazy and argue with fallacies.

Pointing out is not whining. You whine, I point out that you are whining. Nor is it that I am lazy. This has been running for over a year now and everything has been said and addressed.

Now it's just repeat mode.

Why do you ignore whatever is said and provided, only to persist with the same fallacies?

The point was that subject matter of the simulation may have no bearing on reality

And yet the subject matter of simulation MAY have strong bearing or weak bearing as well, besides the available 'none'.

How this is determined is on the basis of two things:
1. What is the error in terms of the simulation predicting the future to a blind? Can it "seal an envelope" with accurate predictions better than "random chance"?

This is a simple experiment: put together a Rube Goldberg construction. From static analysis, can the simulator identify final states without seeing the machine actually operate?

2. whether the initial conditions back-calculated from a goal-oriented final condition are achievable as a post-condition from the current actual condition IF certain actions are made (is it possible to make that happen based on what is happening here, assuming one actually wants that to happen?)

This is more a long the lines of whether a particular logic puzzle has a solution:
Bob objectively wants to go to Mars next week. Bob calculates that he needs a specific amount of delta-V and a vehicle capable of expressing that delta. Bob thinks of many such a things that would get him there, but all these things take more than a week and require materials nobody will let him have sufficient access to, so while Bob identifies that something is possible under certain conditions, achieving those conditions from his current condition is not possible. Therefore Bob is not even provisionally free to go to Mars next week.

So you can't grasp the distinction between the reality of the simulation itself and the fictional nature of its content? That a simulated voyage to Mars, though an actual simulation, is not a physical voyage to Mars?

You haven't grasped that a simulated interstellar voyage, though an actual physical simulation, is not an actual interstellar voyage, that this is something that may never happen?

 

[DBT]

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.''

Shrug away.

Help me out please. Was your answer a "yes" or a "no"?

Do you or do you not accept that the conception of 'free will' defended by compatibilists on this forum is not the same as the conception of 'free will' rejected by incompatibilists on the grounds that it is incompatible with determinism?

You should know the answer by now, Incompatibilists argue that the compatibilist definition of free will is, for the given reasons, flawed.

Incompatibilism is the opposite of compatibilism. Incompatibilists argue against Compatibilist definition of free will.

There is your answer. It is the Compatibilists definition of free will that is being questioned.

Yes, both sides are dealing with the same definition of free will.

Which is not to say that there are no other definitions of free will.

 

[DBT]

It’s amazing how you can completely ignore all of the above, all the salient points, while yammering that you’ve ignored nothing!

It's amazing that you ignore everything that has been said and provided as you do your periodical hit and runs. Maybe you should deal with that? Or are you going to pretend that nothing has been said or provided in the way of rebutting compatibilism?

Surely not.

 

[DBT]

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

You show that you have no integrity.

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.

Deal with it!

Another display of conceit, false claims and snide innuendo.

I'll point this out again: I am not with my own idea of determinism, but the definitions of determinism given by Compatibilists and articles that deal with the concept.

For example:

''Determinism means that events will proceed naturally (as if "fixed as a matter of natural law") and reliably ("without deviation"). 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.

''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.''

In other words, given the above;
''Determinism: given the state of the world at any moment in time, there is only one way it can be at the next moment.''

And again, this is not me saying it, stop your BS.

 

[The AntiChris]

Help me out please. Was your answer a "yes" or a "no"?

Do you or do you not accept that the conception of 'free will' defended by compatibilists on this forum is not the same as the conception of 'free will' rejected by incompatibilists on the grounds that it is incompatible with determinism?

You should know the answer by now, Incompatibilists argue that the compatibilist definition of free will is, for the given reasons, flawed.

Incompatibilism is the opposite of compatibilism. Incompatibilists argue against Compatibilist definition of free will.

There is your answer. It is the Compatibilists definition of free will that is being questioned.

Yes, both sides are dealing with the same definition of free will.

Which is not to say that there are no other definitions of free will.

This is thoroughly confused (and confusing).

I assume when you say "yes", you're saying you do agree that the conceptions of free will used by compatibilists and incompatibilists are not the same. This is confirmed when you say "Incompatibilists argue against Compatibilist definition of free will.".

Then you finish off with saying "Yes, both sides are dealing with the same definition of free will."!

I'd appreciate it if you could clarify precisely what it is you're claiming.

____________________

The reason I'm hammering away at this is because if you really do believe " both sides are dealing with the same definition of free will", then it would go a long way to explain why your criticisms of compatibilist free will so often appear not to bear any relevancy whatsoever to compatibilist free will as defended on this forum.

 

[Jarhyn]

Pointing out is not whining.

It is absolutely whining when you use excuses like "DBT doesn't have time" as a presented reason for not doing something.

Apparently you also don't know what whining is, or too many irresponsible adults let you do this for too long that you got the belief in your head that it was OK, when you were a child. Perhaps they were all too dumb for so long as to allow you to use such tactics.

Either way you are wrong about what whining is, abusing the term

Nor is it that I am lazy.

You have been exceedingly lazy.

This has been running for over a year now and everything has been said and addressed.

Yes, both sides are dealing with the same definition of free will

No, they aren't. You are arguing, have only ever argued, against some nonsensical concept of freedom from inner necessitation.

Compatibilists do not argue this. We argue that we as beings have truth of our systems (inner necessitations) that undergo some process that selects, on the basis of known laws of physics (the knowledge of which contains error).

Each of these outcomes is attached to the logical set of inputs that would lead to the outcome IF the person was going to make a decision to do that thing.

Then when the person's inner necessitation drives the selection of the "alternative" (really much like picking up one marble among five actual marbles at this point, the "alternatives" just being calculated objects), this action is set up to produce input towards inner necessitation.

The "alternative" is set up to relate to the engine of inner necessitation as "if the agent 'likes' some outcome 'most', then present 'precondition parameters' of the calculated will to the subsystem which executed wills".

Suddenly the fact that you liked this imagined future more than the others, as a product of inner necessitation, reveals this 'will' not as a "provisional outcome" but as a "real outcome".

Still, one must ask "if the simulation was inaccurate, will this actually happen?" This is equivalent to saying "but is the will free to with respect to it's resolution?"

It's an open question with a binary answer.

At no point here does inner necessitation take some kind of break. It's a participant in the process, and the primary one.

Nowhere here is randomness or actual variation happening. Nowhere here is in er necessitation ignored. Nowhere is libertarian free will required.

@DBT we are asking you to take the compatibilist definition of free will, and apply valid logical operations to it using only the assumptions of compatibilism as stated by compatibilists (rather than your straw men) until you have exposed an instance of libertarian free will. That is the task set to you to invalidate the compatibilist position.

You have not yet done this. Not once in all the time this thread has been open.

 

[bilby]

Yes, both sides are dealing with the same definition of free will.

Incompatibilists argue that the compatibilist definition of free will is, for the given reasons, flawed.

Incompatibilists appear to be contradicting themselves.

Either that, or they are arguing that their own definition of free will is flawed.

 

[pood]

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

Why are you telling lies? You know exactly who it was that mentioned the Big Bang. You know those who have given their definition of determinism. I have quoted them enough times.....yet you arrogantly trot out your false, snide remarks regardless.

You show that you have no integrity.

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.

Deal with it!

Another display of conceit, false claims and snide innuendo.

I'll point this out again: I am not with my own idea of determinism, but the definitions of determinism given by Compatibilists and articles that deal with the concept.

For example:

''Determinism means that events will proceed naturally (as if "fixed as a matter of natural law") and reliably ("without deviation"). 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.

''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.''

In other words, given the above;
''Determinism: given the state of the world at any moment in time, there is only one way it can be at the next moment.''

And again, this is not me saying it, stop your BS.

Oh, please stop whining and answer the damned questions for once!

Here is a simple agree/disagree question for you:

Howard Roark had NO CHOICE but to design a beautiful, flawless building.

Agree? Disagree?

If you don’t agree, then you concede you are wrong. If you DO agree, then answer the following question:

Who, or what, made ALL THE RIGHT CHOICES — thousands of them — to design this beautiful, flawless building? How did that happen? Magic?

Answer the damned question!

Of course you can’t answer either question — you’re not bright enough, it seems. You’re only bright enough to slur me as doing “hit and run posts” when I’ve posted hundreds of times in this thread, and to copy-paste bullshit you found on the internet, without even realizing that most the stuff you were copying were arguments against libertarian free will and NOT against compatibilist free will — in fact, a great many of the people you quote ostensibly in support of your postion are compatibilists.

Now answer my questions or eff off.

 

[DBT]

Help me out please. Was your answer a "yes" or a "no"?

Do you or do you not accept that the conception of 'free will' defended by compatibilists on this forum is not the same as the conception of 'free will' rejected by incompatibilists on the grounds that it is incompatible with determinism?

You should know the answer by now, Incompatibilists argue that the compatibilist definition of free will is, for the given reasons, flawed.

Incompatibilism is the opposite of compatibilism. Incompatibilists argue against Compatibilist definition of free will.

There is your answer. It is the Compatibilists definition of free will that is being questioned.

Yes, both sides are dealing with the same definition of free will.

Which is not to say that there are no other definitions of free will.

This is thoroughly confused (and confusing).

There is nothing confusing about it. It's quite simple really, Compatibilists claim that free will, defined as acting without force, coercion or undue influence is an example of free will.....while incompatibilists point out that this definition is insufficient to prove the proposition because it ignores inner necessity, that everything that happens must necessarily happen and nothing is freely willed. That determines actions must necessarily proceed without impediment as determined, not freely willed.

Consequently, in the words of the compatibilist definition of free will is a 'quagmire of evasion.' - Willam James

I assume when you say "yes", you're saying you do agree that the conceptions of free will used by compatibilists and incompatibilists are not the same. This is confirmed when you say "Incompatibilists argue against Compatibilist definition of free will.".

Then you finish off with saying "Yes, both sides are dealing with the same definition of free will."!

I'd appreciate it if you could clarify precisely what it is you're claiming.

____________________

The reason I'm hammering away at this is because if you really do believe " both sides are dealing with the same definition of free will", then it would go a long way to explain why your criticisms of compatibilist free will so often appear not to bear any relevancy whatsoever to compatibilist free will as defended on this forum.

There is nothing to 'hammer away at,' the failure of compatibilism has been thoroughly described.

 

[DBT]

Yes, both sides are dealing with the same definition of free will.

Incompatibilists argue that the compatibilist definition of free will is, for the given reasons, flawed.

Incompatibilists appear to be contradicting themselves.

There is no contradiction. Incompatibilism points to the given definition of determinism and says to the compatibilist that they are ignoring or neglecting a critical element in their definition: inner necessity. Which means that their definition is insufficient to prove their proposition. That acting in accordance, unimpeded, unrestricted, with one's will is not freely willed, it is a necessitated action, it must proceed as determined.

''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.''

”If the neurobiology level is causally sufficient to determine your behavior, then the fact that you had the experience of freedom at the higher level is really irrelevant.” - John Searle.

Either that, or they are arguing that their own definition of free will is flawed.

Who is arguing for free will besides Compatibilists, Libertarians, etc? I'm not. I'd say the term is irrelevant. It doesn't tell us anything about the nature and drivers of human behaviour, cognition, the decision-making process - which, if determinism is true is a matter of necessitation with only one possible outcome, etcetera.

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

 

[DBT]

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

Why are you telling lies? You know exactly who it was that mentioned the Big Bang. You know those who have given their definition of determinism. I have quoted them enough times.....yet you arrogantly trot out your false, snide remarks regardless.

You show that you have no integrity.

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.

Deal with it!

Another display of conceit, false claims and snide innuendo.

I'll point this out again: I am not with my own idea of determinism, but the definitions of determinism given by Compatibilists and articles that deal with the concept.

For example:

''Determinism means that events will proceed naturally (as if "fixed as a matter of natural law") and reliably ("without deviation"). 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.

''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.''

In other words, given the above;
''Determinism: given the state of the world at any moment in time, there is only one way it can be at the next moment.''

And again, this is not me saying it, stop your BS.

Oh, please stop whining and answer the damned questions for once!

Just look in the mirror, Sunshine.

Here is a simple agree/disagree question for you:

Howard Roark had NO CHOICE but to design a beautiful, flawless building.

Agree? Disagree?

Your wording needs to actually relate to determinism. Given determinism, Roak necessarily designed a beautiful building, but nothing is flawless.

If you don’t agree, then you concede you are wrong. If you DO agree, then answer the following question:

Who, or what, made ALL THE RIGHT CHOICES — thousands of them — to design this beautiful, flawless building? How did that happen? Magic?

So simplistic.

Roak is the architect, the thinker, the designer of buildings, Roak is a product of his time, place, education, life experiences, tastes, preferences, the way he sees the world and what he thinks is shaped by his environment and life experiences, where countless elements bring him to the point where he is not only able to design and build a beautiful building, but all these events must proceed without deviation or alternatives.

That is determinism as compatibilism defines it.

Compatibilism merely defines free will as acting without coercion, yet neglects to consider or include inner necessity.


''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.''

Answer the damned question!

It's been answered numerous times, Sweetie. Maybe you should read what has been said over the course of many months.

Of course you can’t answer either question — you’re not bright enough, it seems. You’re only bright enough to slur me as doing “hit and run posts” when I’ve posted hundreds of times in this thread, and to copy-paste bullshit you found on the internet, without even realizing that most the stuff you were copying were arguments against libertarian free will and NOT against compatibilist free will — in fact, a great many of the people you quote ostensibly in support of your postion are compatibilists.

Now answer my questions or eff off.

Everything has been answered, now you can go and get your knickers untwisted. And before you use the word 'slur' you really should consider your own abominable lack of decency. I did not initiate this, you are only too happy to dish it out, yet complain when it comes to a backlash.

 

[bilby]

Yes, both sides are dealing with the same definition of free will.

Incompatibilists argue that the compatibilist definition of free will is, for the given reasons, flawed.

Incompatibilists appear to be contradicting themselves.

There is no contradiction.

"We both use the exact same definition. Yours is flawed, and mine isn't." is the very essence of contradiction.