Argument against free will

[AerodynamicOwl]

Whilst clicking my stumble button, i came across a article entitled "A Simplified argument against free will."




There are two levers for controlling outcomes in the universe, and you must be able to consciously change at least one of these in order to have any active influence on the world:


The previous state of the universe
i.e. how the universe was configured at the moment prior to you making a decision.
The laws that govern the universe
The physical rules that will determine how the universe transitions from one state to another, namely from that previous-state to the next-state.

Quite simply, if you do not have any control over at least one of these you cannot be in control of any future state of the universe. This includes any outcomes related to yourself, i.e. your own decisions and actions.
Neither quantum randomness nor consciousness provide an escape from this reality. The reason for this is simple: in order to provide an escape, an actor must, necessarily, provide a means to pull one of the levers described above.
There is a counter to this argument that’s likely to surface, which states that as soon as a human arrives on the scene and starts observing the world and making “decisions”, the results of his actions will then propagate forward into the inputs of other humans, thus rippling free will permanently into all future decisions for everyone else.
There are two problems with this line:


Humans did not always exist. When they did not, they had zero control over the previous state of the universe. A rigorous explanation is therefore required for how the first human gained control over the previous state of the universe, as this is a prerequisite for affecting any outcome.
Furthermore, even if a previous human (say, in the very beginning of humans) did somehow gain control over the universe for a moment in order to have a genuine effect, this action would not propagate as free will to future human actors, but rather as a standard physical input. In other words, each person hoping to exercise free will requires access to the past-state lever, not just a single previous person.

Again, regardless of what we experience as humans, if we cannot affect either the universe’s previous state or the laws that govern the transition to subsequent states, we are no more than an observer of events–regardless of any feelings to the contrary. ::


I havent thought much about free will, and i am wondering others peoples thoughts on the matter, and also a second opinion on the IQ of the articles OP.

[Dean]

The primary problem with this is that it simply doesn't include the human creature as part of the equation. In other words, this dichotomy only works if you consider yourself to be "external" to the universe.

The fact that we can pinpoint certain laws of physics and change does not mean that we are "powerless." We must act within the context of these physical laws. But that doesn't mean that we don't have power - rather, we represent one of those entities which changes the universe.

[Belisarius]

i would just say: we do have free will, but it doesn't have a historical role. i can make my own choices, but these choices will only change the world or society as a whole, when they are part of a larger mass movement, which can only come into being by sociological phenomena.

[tophat]

"The fact that we can pinpoint certain laws of physics and change does not mean that we are "powerless." We must act within the context of these physical laws. But that doesn't mean that we don't have power - rather, we represent one of those entities which changes the universe. "

Dean, I think you are making a mistake. Yes, we do have an impact and affect on the universe; we are not external to it, no. However, that does not change the fact that our actions are the culmination of the cause-and-effect chain.

[Dermezel]

Any non-causal, non-materialist, absolutist conception of free will is obviously unscientific and extremely flawed. It is mystical hocus pocus usually presented as a justification for inequalities i.e. "they chose to support X company, buy X product, take X job, etc' (never mind this isn't technically a free choice but a dillemma, as free choice implies at least one good outcome, generally all choices under capitalism are bad, especially with regards to employment. )

However a materialist conception that limits itself to free will being a relative degree of conscious control over and recognition of causality has much merit, and is in fact, necessary in many respects to justify socialism, since we are arguing for giving society a greater degree of control over its own future.

To quote a great Philosopher on the subject:



Science shows us how. We achieve our wants always, not by the will alone, not by merely wishing them into being, but with action aided by cognition, by utilising the physical laws of reality. We move mountains, not by the mere movement of desire, but because we understand the rigidly determined laws of kinetics, hydraulics, and electrical engineering and can guide our actions by them. We attain freedom – that is, the fulfilment of our will – by obedience to the laws of reality. Observance of these laws is simple; it is the discovery of them that is the difficulty, and this is the task of science.


Thus, the task of defining liberty becomes still harder. It is not so easy after all to establish even a contemporary definition of liberty. Not only has the intellectual already had to decide to change bourgeois social relations, but he must now find out the laws of motion of society, and fit social relations into a causal scheme. It is not enough to want to be free; it is also necessary to know.


Only one scientific analysis of the law of motion of social relations exists, that of Marxism. For the understanding of how, physically, at the material level of social being, quantitative movements of capital, of matter, of stuff, provide the causal predictive basis of society, and pass via social relations into the qualitative changes of mind, will, and ideology, it is necessary to refer the bourgeois intellectual to Marx, Engels, Plekhanov, Lenin and Bukharin. Let us suppose that he has now done this and returns again to the difficult pursuit of liberty.


His causal conception of society will now enable him to realise that the task of making social relations produce liberty is as rigidly conditioned by reality as the task of making matter fulfil his desire in the form of machines. All matter – machinery, capital, men – and the relations which they exhibit in society – can only move in accordance with causal laws. This involves first that the old relations must be broken down, just as a house must be pulled down if we would entirely rebuild it, and the transition, putting up and pulling down, must follow certain laws. We cannot pull the foundation first, or build the roof before the walls.


This transitional stage involves the alteration of all the adherences between humans and the capital, machinery and materials, which mediate social relations. These must no longer adhere to individual persons – the bourgeois class – but to all members of society. This change is not a mere change of ownership, for it also involves that no individuals can derive profit from ownership without working. The goods are not destined to go the rounds of the market – the profit movement – but directly into use – the use movement. Moreover, this involves that all the visible institutions depending on private profit relations – laws, church, bureaucracy, judiciary, army, police, education – must be pulled down and rebuilt. The bourgeoisie cannot do this, for it is by means of these very institutions – private property (the modest income), law, university, civil service, privileged position, etc., – that they attain their freedom. To expect them to destroy these relations on which, as we saw, their freedom and the workers’ unfreedom, depend, is to ask them to go in quest of captivity, which, since liberty is what all men seek, they will not do. But the opposite is the case with the unfree, with the proletariat. The day they go in search of liberty, they revolt. The bourgeois, fighting for his liberty, must necessarily find himself in antagonism to the non-bourgeois, also fighting for liberty. The eventual issue of this struggle is due to the fact that capitalist economy, as it develops, makes ever narrower the class which really owns liberty until the day comes when the intellectual, the doctor, the petty bourgeois, the clerk, and the peasant, realise that they too are not after all free. And they see that the fight of the proletariat is their fight.

What, to the proletarian, is liberty – the extermination of those bourgeois institutions and relations which hold them in captivity – is necessarily compulsion and restraint to the bourgeois, just as the old bourgeois liberty generated non-liberty for the worker. The two notions of liberty are irreconcilable. Once the proletariat is in power, all attempts to re-establish bourgeois social relations will be attacks on proletarian liberty, and will therefore be repulsed as fiercely as men repulse all attacks on their liberty. This is the meaning of the dictatorship of the proletariat, and why with it there is censorship, ideological acerbity, and all the other devices developed by the bourgeois in the evolution of the coercive State which secures his freedom.

There is, however, one vital difference. Bourgeois social relations, generating the liberty of the bourgeois and the non-liberty of the proletarian, depend on the existence of both freedom and unfreedom for their continuance. The bourgeois would not enjoy his idleness without the labour of the worker, nor the worker remain in a bourgeois relationship without the coercive guidance and leadership of the bourgeois. Thus the liberty of the few is, in bourgeois social relations, built on the unfreedom of the many. The two notions dwell in perpetual antagonism. But after the dispossession of the bourgeoisie, the antagonism between the expropriated and therefore unfree bourgeois, and the inheriting and therefore free proletariat, is only temporary. For the owners of the means of production, being also the workers of that means, do not need the existence of an expropriated class. When therefore, the transition is complete, and the bourgeois class is either absorbed or has died out, there is no longer an unfree compelled class. That is what is meant by the “withering away” of the State into a classless society, after the transitional period such as is now taking place in Russia.

This, stated in its simplest terms, is the causal process whereby bourgeois social relations can change into new social relations not generating a mass of unfreedom as the opposite pole to a little freedom. We have purposely made it simple. A fuller discussion, such as Marx gives, would make clearer the fluid interpenetrating nature of the process; how it is brought about causally by capitalist economy itself, which cannot stand still, but clumps continually into greater centralisation, giving rise to imperialistic wars, which man will not forever tolerate, and to viler and viler cash relations, filling men with hate, which will one day become hate for the system. And as capitalism perpetrates these enormities, the cause of revolt, it gives the proletariat the means of revolt, by making them unite, become more conscious and organised, so that, when the time of revolt comes, they have both the solidarity and the executive ability needed to take over the administration of the bourgeois property. At the same time bourgeois social relations reveal that even their freedom is not real freedom, that bourgeois freedom is almost as imprisoning to its enjoyers as the worker’s unfreedom. And thus the bourgeoisie does not find itself as a solid class, arrayed against the proletariat, but there are divisions in its own ranks, a few at first, and then more and more. The revolution takes place as soon as the proletariat are sufficiently organised by their fight against bourgeois social relations to co-operate, sufficiently harried by their growing unfreedom to demand a new world at all costs; and when, on the other side, as a result of the developing contradictions of capitalism, the bourgeois themselves have lost their grip.

Let us, therefore, go deeper, and examine more closely the true nature of bourgeois freedom. Are H. G. Wells, Bertrand Russell, E. M. Forster, you, reader and I, really free? Do we enjoy even mental freedom? For if we do not enjoy that, we certainly do not enjoy physical freedom.

Bertrand Russell is a philosopher and a mathematician. He takes the method of science seriously, and applies it to various fields of thought. He believes that thoughts are simply special arrangements of matter, even though he calls matter mind-stuff. He agrees that to every psychism corresponds a neurism, that life is a special chemical phenomenon, just as thought is a special biological phenomenon. He is not taken in by the nonsense of entelechies and pure memory.
Why then does he refrain from applying these categories used everywhere else, to the concept of liberty? In what sense can he believe man to be ever completely free? What meaning can he attach to the word freedom? He rightly detects the idealistic hocus-pocus of smuggling God into science as the Life-Force, entelechy, or the first cause, for the sleight of hand it is. But his liberty is a kind of God; something which he accepts on faith, somehow intervening in the affairs of the universe, and unconnected with causality, Russell’s liberty and his philosophy live in different worlds. He has made theology meet science, and seen that theology is a barbarous relic. But he has not performed the last act of integration; he has not asked science’s opinion of this belief that the graduate of one of the better universities, with a moderate income, considerable intelligence, and some leisure, is really free.

It is not a question of whether man has in some mysterious fashion free will. For if that were the problem, all men would either would or would not have liberty. If freedom consists in having free will, and men have free will, we can will as freely under a Fascist, or proletarian, as under a bourgeois government. But everyone admits that there are degrees of liberty. In what therefore does this difference in liberty consist?
Although liberty does not then depend on free will, it will help us to understand liberty if we consider what is the freedom of the will. Free will consists in this, that man is conscious of the motive that dictates his action. Without this consciousness of antecedent motive, there is no free will. I raise my hand to ward off a blow. The blow dictated my action; none the less, I was conscious that I wanted to ward off the blow; I willed to do so. My will was free; it was an act of my will. There was a cause; but I was conscious of a free volition. And I was conscious of the cause, of the blow.

In sleep a tickling of the soles of the feet actuates the plantar reflex. Such an action we call involuntary. Just as the warding movement was elicited by an outside stimulus, so was the bending of the leg. None the less, we regard the second as unfree, involuntary. It was not preceded by a conscious motive. Nor were we conscious of the cause of our action. We thus see that free will exists in so far as we are conscious of the antecedent motive in our mind, regarded as the immediate cause of action. If this motive, or act of will, is itself free, and not forced, we must also be in turn conscious of the antecedent motive that produced it. Free will is not therefore the opposite of causality, it is the consciousness of causality. That is why man naturally fits all happenings outside him in a causal frame; because he is conscious of causality in himself. Otherwise it would be a mystery if man, experiencing only uncausality in free will, should assume, as he does, that all other things are linked by causality. If, however, he is only assuming that other objects obey the same laws as he does, both the genesis and success of causality as a cognitive framework for reality are explicable.

Causality and freedom are thus aspects of each other. Freedom is the consciousness of necessity. The universe as a whole is completely free, because that which is not free is determined by something else outside it. But all things are, by definition, contained in the universe, therefore the universe is determined by nothing but itself. But every individual thing in the universe is determined by other things, because the universe is material. This material is not “given” in the definition of the universe, but is exactly what science establishes when it explains the world actively and positively.

Thus the only absolute freedom, like the only absolute truth, is the universe itself. But parts of the universe have varying degrees of freedom, according to their degrees of self-determination. In self-determination, the causes are within the thing itself; thus, in the sensation of free will, the antecedent cause of an action is the conscious thought of an individual, and since the action is also that of the individual, we talk of freedom, because there is self-determination.

The freedom of free will can only be relative. It is characteristic of the more recently evolved categories that they contain more freedom. The matter of which man is composed is in spatio-temporal relation with all other matter in the universe, and its position in space and time is only to a small degree self-determined. Man’s perception, however, is to a less degree in relation to the rest of the universe; it is a more exclusive kind of perception that sees little not in the immediate vicinity of man, or in which it is not interested, and it is largely moulded by memory, that is, by internal causes. Hence it is freer, more self-determined, than the spatio-temporal relations of dead matter. Man’s consciousness is still more self-determined, particularly in its later developments, such as conscious volition.
http://www.marxists.org/archive/caudwell/1938/liberty.htm


Free will, if it is to have any meaning, is the recognition of, not denial of determinism. It is conscious knowledge of deterministic factors. If I know my own psychology, how my genes and my environment have influenced my behavior, if I know my own cognitive mechanisms, and I have knowledge of the evolutionary nature of my mind, I have more conscious control then I would have had otherwise over my own behavior.


I can recognize which of my actions are the result of maladaptive traits which served a purpose in my evolutionary ancestral environment. I can recognize my cognitive blind spots, biases and limitations, and thereby am better able to work on solutions so as to increase my volition.



Free will is the relative consciousness of determinism.

[Dean]

Dean, I think you are making a mistake. Yes, we do have an impact and affect on the universe; we are not external to it, no. However, that does not change the fact that our actions are the culmination of the cause-and-effect chain.

How does that have any consequences in terms of us being "free" or not? If your actions have distinct material reasons for their culmination, we are "chained"? In that case, the only "free" human actions would be wildly chaotic acts.

But "free will" is used to described unimpeded human activity. That doesn't mean that human activity is chaotic, because its very nature as human provides certain constraints and orientations. The closest, useful sense of "free will" is human spontaneity, which is quite possible as a state of existence.

[Meridian]

Dean, I think you are making a mistake. Yes, we do have an impact and affect on the universe; we are not external to it, no. However, that does not change the fact that our actions are the culmination of the cause-and-effect chain.
Do you really believe there is a chain like that?

That is a philosophy-imposed trap of the mind that has no bearing on reality what so ever.

So is the idea that there are "laws" of nature.

[Dermezel]

How does that have any consequences in terms of us being "free" or not? If your actions have distinct material reasons for their culmination, we are "chained"? In that case, the only "free" human actions would be wildly chaotic acts.

But "free will" is used to described unimpeded human activity. That doesn't mean that human activity is chaotic, because its very nature as human provides certain constraints and orientations. The closest, useful sense of "free will" is human spontaneity, which is quite possible as a state of existence.

Daniel Dennet proves that free will is neither free nor desirable:



Both determinism and indeterminism seem to rule out free will

The deeper philosophical issue of free will can be framed as a paradox (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox). On one hand, we all feel like we have free will, a multitude of behavioral choices to select among. On the other hand, modern biology generally investigates humans as though the processes at work in them follow the same biological principles as those in wasps. How do we reconcile our feeling of free will with the idea that we might be mechanical (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechanics) components of a mechanical universe (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universe)?

What about determinism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determinism)? When we say that a person chooses among several possible behaviors is there really a choice or does it just seem like there is a choice? Do people just (through the action of their more complex brains) simply have better behaviors than wasps, while still being totally mechanical in executing those behaviors? Dennett gives his definition of determinism on page one: All physical events are caused or determined by the sum total of all previous events. This definition dodges a question that many people feel should not be dodged: if we repeatedly replayed the universe from the same point in time would it always reach the same future? Since we have no way of performing this experiment, this question is a long-term classic in philosophy and physicists have tried to interpret the results of other experiments in various ways in order to figure out the answer to this question. Modern day physics-oriented philosophers have sometimes tried to answer the question of free will using the many-worlds interpretation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Many-worlds_interpretation) according to which every time there is quantum indeterminacy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_indeterminacy) each possibility occurs and new universes branch off. Since the 1920s, physicists have been trying to convince themselves that quantum indeterminacy can in some way explain free will. Dennett suggests that this idea is silly. How, he asks, can random resolutions of quantum-level events provide people with any control over their behavior?

[edit (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elbow_Room&action=edit&section=4)] Indeterminism is not a solution to the free will problem

Since Dennett wrote Elbow Room (1984) there has been an on-going attempt by some scientists to answer this question by suggesting that the brain is a device for controlling quantum indeterminacy so as to construct behavioral choice. Dennett argues that such efforts to salvage free will by finding a way out of the prison of determinism are wasted.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elbow_Room


Having a roulette will in your head controlling your actions is not any kind of free will we would want because it still does not lead to responsibility or autonomy. It simply means your actions are determined by a different kind of force, in this case, randomness. The solution to the paradox is to go beyond mechanistic materialism to dialectical. Free will, our consciousness, contradicts other aspects of reality to various degrees in its own self-determined causality. This is only relative, but the opposition between what I want to happen, and what reality would have happen without my consciousness being in play is real.

[Dean]

Having a roulette will in your head controlling your actions is not any kind of free will we would want because it still does not lead to responsibility or autonomy. It simply means your actions are determined by a different kind of force, in this case, randomness. The solution to the paradox is to go beyond mechanistic materialism to dialectical. Free will, our consciousness, contradicts other aspects of reality to various degrees in its own self-determined causality. This is only relative, but the opposition between what I want to happen, and what reality would have happen without my consciousness being in play is real.

This only makes sense if you assume that the human mind (or consciousness) is exterior to material reality. There can only be a "dichotomy" insofar as we are talking about two distinct mechanisms: the material world and our "consciousness" as some phenomenon outside of that world.

Now, I can't explain all of the nuances of our conscious being. But I see no reason to consider it to be exterior to all of the other mechanisms and phenomena of the material world. Besides, if you were talking from the edifice of dialectical materialism then I think you are missing some key elements of that tendency (namely, the notion that reality is defined by material existence!).

If, however, you are to take the materialist approach and hold that the mind is a material phenomenon, you must accept that it acts within that framework, and as much as something can be said to be free is respective of its essential characteristics, the human mind can be free insofar as it enjoys the elements and environment conducive to spontaneous, human defined action.

Where Dennet is concerned, I don't see any serious contradiction to either one of our arguments. I do think that what is being said of free will in Dennet's case is totally separate from the "dialectical" concept you bring up.

[Physicist]

The only physical justification I found satisfying for a defense of free will is a brief proposal about structural characteristics (or functions) arising from complicated, organic machinery that does not exist in smaller scales. But this still begs the question of how a system breaks the cause and effect dictum. Thus I remain skeptical about free will and in lieu of evidence settle for the simplest answer of mechanics: humans do not possess a "free" agency. I don't know if the position is falsifiable at the moment, but recent advances in psychology (such as being able to see what action you will take before it occurs) paint a picture of the human mind that looks a lot more like clockwork than Christian scholars think. Wired has a good piece for this at wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2008/04/mind_decision


Free will, if it is to have any meaning, is the recognition of, not denial of determinism. It is conscious knowledge of deterministic factors. If I know my own psychology, how my genes and my environment have influenced my behavior, if I know my own cognitive mechanisms, and I have knowledge of the evolutionary nature of my mind, I have more conscious control then I would have had otherwise over my own behavior.Yes, but this is still determinism, albeit of the "soft" variety. I think the author of this thread is interested in something entirely different. The repercussions of knowing that we are just complex machines would have startling consequences on our legal system (as it currently stands, law presumes the exact opposite), but calling knowledge about our own entanglements free "will seems" a bit dishonest.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

As I have shown here:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/freedom-state-mind-t56836/index.html?t=56836

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=894937&postcount=2

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1575116&postcount=1

the argument for and against determinism (or for and against 'free will') are based on a confused use of language, and make no more sense than to suppose one can be check-mated in Baseball.

[The New Consciousness]

How could there be free will? There is no such thing as an individual. The thinker is thought. The observer is the observed. There is only this, in constant flux, the end product of a infinite process of cause and effect. Material dialectics is totally foolproof. Decision making is totally conditioned. There is no primacy of ideas.

[Meridian]

How could there be free will? There is no such thing as an individual. The thinker is thought. The observer is the observed. There is only this, in constant flux, the end product of a infinite process of cause and effect. Material dialectics is totally foolproof. Decision making is totally conditioned. There is no primacy of ideas.
Then why do you appear as an individual on this forum? And why do you write those things, if the thinker is only thought? You couldn't have observed them, since the observer is the observed. Whatever that is supposed to mean.

And an infinite process can not have an end product.

[Physicist]

Then why do you appear as an individual on this forum? And why do you write those things, if the thinker is only thought? You couldn't have observed them, since the observer is the observed. Whatever that is supposed to mean.

And an infinite process can not have an end product.

Couldn't we see similar "individuality" in other organic life that we consider automatons, like fauna or prokaryotes?

[Meridian]

Couldn't we see similar "individuality" in other organic life that we consider automatons, like fauna or prokaryotes?
The point is that "individual" may mean different things depending on the context. Whether we see individuality in organic life or not depends on what we mean by individuality.

We sometimes use the word to refer to any one thing, regardless of what it is. Often to point out that it is one entity, not a group of entities, we are referring to. This is similar to the use of "identity" that philosophers like to employ. If The New Consciousness was using this type of "individuality", then it is clearly the case that he/she is an individual simply by virtue of me being able to point him/her out.

If The New Consciousness by "individuality" is referring to the ability to formulate thoughts, then it is also clearly the case that he/she wants us to believe he/she can do so. If he/she can do so, he/she has an individuality and therefore there is such a thing as an individual. Otherwise, we would have no choice but to overlook whatever it is it says in the posts created by an entity called "The New Consciousness". In any case, what he/she says does not hold true.

[ZeroNowhere]

I find that generally when people say, "There is no free will," they can make no sense out of the notion of 'free will', or the statement, "There is free will," which is supposed to be negated, and are usually just expressing an attitude or ethical position rather than making any empirical proposition. The same applies to saying that people 'could not have done otherwise', what are the criteria for them having been able to do so? What sense can be given to the statement as it is said in philosophy? I'm not sure there is any. Of course, in ordinary usage, 'I could not have done otherwise' has a very definite use in language, but not one which is metaphysically profound. Compatibilists seem to take the way we use 'free will' ordinarily, in statements like, "I was not on drugs, I actually did out of my own free will," and then pretend that they have more philosophical profundity, as part of the debate over 'free will', than they really do.

Of course, the same applies to 'philosophical libertarians', they know not for what they argue.

[The New Consciousness]

There is no-one writing this. This is simply happening. Everything is simply happening. Life doesn't require anyone to live it. It is spontaneous. Everything develops by itself. There is no division, so no individual, no separation, just oneness. Just this. To you it appears as text on a screen, this is still just this. When you read it there is no separation. The text appears, there is no-one reading it. That is an assumption. The observer is the observed, the thinker is thought, the writer is the written, the reader is the read. Oneness. Totally foolproof. Your direct experience will confirm it. Even your doubts are just a manifestation of it. There is no separate self.

[Hit The North]

There is no-one writing this....

We wish!

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

TNC:


There is no-one writing this. This is simply happening. Everything is simply happening. Life doesn't require anyone to live it. It is spontaneous. Everything develops by itself. There is no division, so no individual, no separation, just oneness. Just this. To you it appears as text on a screen, this is still just this. When you read it there is no separation. The text appears, there is no-one reading it. That is an assumption. The observer is the observed, the thinker is thought, the writer is the written, the reader is the read. Oneness. Totally foolproof. Your direct experience will confirm it. Even your doubts are just a manifestation of it. There is no separate self.

And your proof of all this quasi-mystical stuff is what...?

Or was this the spliff speaking?

[La Comédie Noire]

Is "free will" a bewitchment?

[ZeroNowhere]

There is no-one writing this. This is simply happening. Everything is simply happening. Life doesn't require anyone to live it. It is spontaneous. Everything develops by itself. There is no division, so no individual, no separation, just oneness. Just this. To you it appears as text on a screen, this is still just this. When you read it there is no separation. The text appears, there is no-one reading it. That is an assumption. The observer is the observed, the thinker is thought, the writer is the written, the reader is the read. Oneness. Totally foolproof. Your direct experience will confirm it. Even your doubts are just a manifestation of it. There is no separate self.
Polonius:
How say you by that? Still harping on my daughter:
yet he knew me not at first; 'a said I was a fishmonger.
'A is far gone, far gone: and truly in my youth I
suffered much extremity for love—very near this. I'll
speak to him again.—What do you read, my lord?

Hamlet:
Words, words, words.

Anyhow, what is the criteria for something having been written, and to what extent is your use of the word similar to the ordinary one, and if the answer is, "Not much," why is it more useful towards the various forms of life in which the original one is used, or towards some unspecified other form of life? What is a writer, and what is the written? Evidently, when you see somebody who is writing something down on some paper, say, you won't say that the person itself is identical with what is being written, so you must mean something else. I can't say what my experience can or can not confirm when you're not speaking the English language, any more than I can say whether, "El lanzador es fatuo," is true or false if I don't know a word of Spanish, or what the translation would be.

Edit:
Is "free will" a bewitchment?
The weird sisters, hand in hand,
Posters of the sea and land,
Thus do go about, about:
Thrice to thine and thrice to mine
And thrice again, to make up nine.
Peace! the charm's wound up.

What does that mean, then?

[La Comédie Noire]

I'm asking is the word "free will" a bewitchment? Like when people say "there is no free will" or "free will is an illusion" I don't really get what they mean by "free will" I think it's one of those concepts like "beauty" or "justice" that doesn't have any meaning when ripped out of context.


What does that mean, then? What point are you trying to get across?

[Action Johnny]

What about free will and suicide. Do some argue that we are programed to be self destructive?

[Physicist]

I'm asking is the word "free will" a bewitchment? Like when people say "there is no free will" or "free will is an illusion" I don't really get what they mean by "free will" I think it's one of those concepts like "beauty" or "justice" that doesn't have any meaning when ripped out of context.Or God, for that matter. I take a different approach towards ontological arguments than Descartes by stating that the ability to only vaguely comprehend a subject like "perfection" or "free will" means it likely does not exist as it's probably built off of opposition to real world truths. For example, we know when something is "flawed" (because it does not perform a certain function), and so we try to make an exact opposite to "flaw." Yet first we have to understand if there's such a thing as "perfectly flawed."

Free will conforms to this theory as no one can truly put their finger on what it means to be "free."

[ZeroNowhere]

I'm asking is the word "free will" a bewitchment? Like when people say "there is no free will" or "free will is an illusion" I don't really get what they mean by "free will" I think it's one of those concepts like "beauty" or "justice" that doesn't have any meaning when ripped out of context.

What point are you trying to get across?
I was just asking for clarification, and I think you have a point there. The three witches quote was just my natural reaction to any mention of witching, and can be safely ignored.

[mlgb]

how is a world in which we have free will meaningfully different from one where we do not? in the one case, actions are determined partially by innate nature and partially by accumulated experience. in the other case that is exactly as true. unless of course you are defining free will as the ability to act completely at random, indifferent to the world around you and your own past. which isnt so much 'free' as it is 'psychotic'.

[ChrisK]

There is no-one writing this. This is simply happening. Everything is simply happening. Life doesn't require anyone to live it. It is spontaneous. Everything develops by itself. There is no division, so no individual, no separation, just oneness. Just this. To you it appears as text on a screen, this is still just this. When you read it there is no separation. The text appears, there is no-one reading it. That is an assumption. The observer is the observed, the thinker is thought, the writer is the written, the reader is the read. Oneness. Totally foolproof. Your direct experience will confirm it. Even your doubts are just a manifestation of it. There is no separate self.

What proof do you have of this? My direct experience indicates completely otherwise.


Polonius:
How say you by that? Still harping on my daughter:
yet he knew me not at first; 'a said I was a fishmonger.
'A is far gone, far gone: and truly in my youth I
suffered much extremity for love—very near this. I'll
speak to him again.—What do you read, my lord?

Hamlet:
Words, words, words.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_qRvheXEYk

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Looks like far too many of you comrades are happy to remain stuck in this traditional and anthropomorphic approach to this pseudo-problem.:(

[anticap]

I haven't read this in a while but this thread made me think of it so I'll toss it into the mix: http://www.marxists.org/archive/beer/1907/01/free-will.htm

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

The above article falls flat on this claim:


There can be no other reply to this than that which Marx has given: Not abstract commandments, not abstract reasoning, fill our mental capacities with concrete social ideas and ideals, but material conditions and class positions of Society. The contradiction in which the determinists are involved is at once removed when we remember that a society, based on private property, is a class society with class notions, class ideals, class conflicts which must necessarily manifest themselves regardless of religion and natural science.

Which is, of course, abstract too!

Instead of unmasking the non-sensicality of both determinism and anti-determinsim (these are just two sides of the same pseudo-problem), this author simply rejects them based on a series of inconsistent claims, like the above.

[The New Consciousness]

No spliff, simple direct experience. In direct experience there is no individual, just this. Try it you will see, it is unfailing: it is the absolute truth. You will know if you are being obstinate.

[Outinleftfield]

If we had no free will then the same exact physical processes would still happen with us even if we were not experiencing them.

For example, the sun has no free will. The sun goes through a lot of physical processes but does it experience them? No.

Similarly, if everything is the result of strict physical laws unaffected by our will our bodies would do everything, get up out of bed, drive, walk, eat, drink, talk, ... all by themselves even if we didn't experience anything. We would physically interact with the world exactly the same as we do experiencing things.

So if we have no free will why do we even experience things? Why not just be inanimate objects if we would be doing the same things? Why are we even aware?

The fact that we do experience, that we are aware strongly suggests that there is a reason for this.

Needing to be aware so that we can exercise freewill is a possible explanation. In fact its hard to think of any other explanation so the evidence is good that free will exists.

EDIT: 2nd Argument

The problem with the original argument is that given what we know about the universe we could actually have access to the 2nd level. We don't know all the physical laws of the universe. What if conscious will is a factor in how the universe is run? Given quantum mechanics this is possible. What if its not completely random? If our will could remove or add a few quarks in a few atoms in our brain that would affect the physical processes and cause a "choice" to be made. Just because we're not aware that's how we're doing it doesn't mean that's not it. We're not aware of all the little chemical changes in our brain everytime we change what we're thinking about but it's happening and we're making it happen (if we have free will).

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

^^^I have shown that this way of seeing things is based on an anthropomorphic view or nature:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/freedom-state-mind-t56836/index.html?t=56836

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=894937&postcount=2

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1575116&postcount=1

[Outinleftfield]

^^^I have shown that this way of seeing things is based on an anthropomorphic view or nature:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/freedom-state-mind-t56836/index.html?t=56836

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=894937&postcount=2

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1575116&postcount=1

There's a lot to read there. But from what I read I think you are trying to say that determinists must see nature as having will of its own, but this is impossible because nature is not an agent. I agree.

In fact if nature has a will of its own that's the same thing as a "God". There's no way around that. Atheist determinism has a "god" it just doesn't call it that. For intelligent things to happen it requires an intelligence and if we are not deciding then something else is and that something else would be "God" by definition. I don't believe in "God" though I believe I am a free agent who makes his own decisions.

[The New Consciousness]

What proof do you have of this? My direct experience indicates completely otherwise

Wrong. Your mind does. In direct experience there is total oneness.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Outinleftfield:


In fact if nature has a will of its own that's the same thing as a "God". There's no way around that. Atheist determinism has a "god" it just doesn't call it that. For intelligent things to happen it requires an intelligence and if we are not deciding then something else is and that something else would be "God" by definition. I don't believe in "God" though I believe I am a free agent who makes his own decisions.

Well, we certainly use words connected with choice when we explain why we do things; and we say things like "I did this of my own free will" (meaning that no one forced us to do whatever it was we did), and if that's all you mean, no problem.

I just do not see the need to develop it into a theory.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

TNC:


Wrong. Your mind does. In direct experience there is total oneness.

This is just more of the same a priori dogmatism -- unless, of course, you have a proof that every 'mind' does this...:confused:

[ChrisK]

What proof do you have of this? My direct experience indicates completely otherwise

Wrong. Your mind does. In direct experience there is total oneness.

Sorry, but that reads like complete gibberish. And when arguments read like gibberish, there's usually something wrong with the argument.

[AerodynamicOwl]

-

[JoyDivision]

Whilst clicking my stumble button, i came across a article entitled "A Simplified argument against free will."



I havent thought much about free will, and i am wondering others peoples thoughts on the matter, and also a second opinion on the IQ of the articles OP.

This account is retarded because it is asking us to define free will as something that is outside the scope of not only human control but any reasonable definition of control that could apply to an organism in general. All this account has done is defined free will in a way that it is instantly ruled out as a possibility - defined it out of existence. Such a move occurs alot in the free will discussion because of all the various metaphysical conceptions of free will history has offered us. However, now that we are not ignorant of biological processes, we can actually pose the question of free will in a grounded way. That is, we can offer up a definition of free will that is not only reasonable, but that can actually apply to humans without imposing preposterous levels of control on ourselves. What is free will for humans?

Free will for us is going to be that thing within us that differentiates actions from events. The act of hitting someone versus the event of being forced to hit someone. The difference is that when I hit someone, all the processes are my own, and they are done in the relevant way. That these processes are subject to antecedent conditions is irrelevant because those antecedent conditions are presicely who I am. They contain everything about me. If my actions did not result from the antecedent conditions then they would not be my actions.

The point is that all that is necessary for free will is that I want/intend to do something, I do that something, and I do that thing precisely because I wanted to. What else could possibly be required?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Joy Divison, I think you are on the right lines in much of what you say, but you need to consider a much wider range of examples to arrive at a rounded conception of how we give expression to our capacity to make chioces, etc.

You'll find much more on this in Anthony Kenny's books: Action Emotion and Will, Anatomy of the Soul, and Will, Freedom and Power and in Elizabeth Anscombe's Intention.

[Dermezel]

As I have shown here:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/freedom-state-mind-t56836/index.html?t=56836

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=894937&postcount=2

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1575116&postcount=1

the argument for and against determinism (or for and against 'free will') are based on a confused use of language, and make no more sense than to suppose one can be check-mated in Baseball.

The problem with all your reasoning is that it is 100% circular.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

I'd like to see you try and prove this.

I mean, if a cappie showed up here and said:


The problem with Marx's reasoning is that it is 100% circular.

And that is all he/she said, we'd be right to treat this critic as an idiot.

Same with you....:(

[Revy]

Free will exists because humans can make choices. That is what free will implies. That when it comes to decisions made by people, it's their own.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

But, the alleged problem is: how is this 'will' connected with a person's character, somatic inheritance and class position?

If there is a connection, then it can't be 'free'.

The solution, of course, is to reject this classic pseudo-problem on the lines I suggest in the posts I linked to above.

[Dermezel]

The problem with Marx's reasoning is that it is 100% circular.


Does a human being have consciousness?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Dermezel:


Does a human being have consciousness?

On that off-topic subject, read my posts here:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/why-do-we-t98047/index.html

http://www.revleft.com/vb/consciousness-and-passage-t100438/index.html

And this essay:

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page_13_03.htm

[JoyDivision]

bears no relation to how these words are employed in ordinary speech.....Hence this word is normally used in relation to what human beings can do, can apply, or can bring about.First, before I explain why I think this is a cop out or a misdiagnoses it needs to be pointed out that 'determine' has multiple definitions, many of which do not contain the connotations of the definition you chose to focus on.

1. Bob determined the speed of the object through measurement - to ascertain through observation

2. "demand determines price - to bring about as a result"

Neither of these definitions of determine involve an anthropomorphism. If contemporary definitions of determinism even have anything to do with the definition of 'determine' to begin with, it is one of these definitions. Although, quite clearly, the descriptive statement that antecedent conditions along with the 'law's of nature tell the story of our behavior is not an anthropomorphism at all.

On the other hand there is a definition of determinism that dominated much of our investigations throughout history, and that definition does align 'determinism' with something like predestination. However, there is a meaningful distinction between predestination and AC+LoN, and once the distinction is made your argument only applies to the predestination side of things.


Now that that's out of the way, the question needs to be asked about whether it diagnoses the problem properly. That is, are there reasons to think that the philosophers who employed the anthropomorphic definition of determinism were doing it because they were confused by language, or because they were doing it for another reason. Well, most of the accounts, both theological and philosophical, that are going to claim that our actions are determined, in the since of determine you call a language misuse, understand human behavior in terms of a prior robustly metaphysical worldview. However, A Metaphysical worldview that sees nature as a meaningful creation or unfolding like a book is going to lend itself to the claim that if things are fixed by nature then they unfold according to a divine conatus. But, this is no new revelation, this is by any account child's play.

So I am left at this point asking myself where exactly language misuse enters the equation. What you call language misuse only occurs when nature is already metaphysical. And if nature is already metaphysical then there is often a will or an author of things in which "determined" can, in the oridinary definition of the word, be used to describe things. This is not language abuse, this is language used properly to preposterous results within a confused worldview.

I think you misdiagnose the problem, and this leads you to wrongly conclude that the entire free will debate is a farse because of this. When in fact, contemporary discussions of free will are just as robust as the historic debate, and all the metaphysics has been excised from it. I guess the point is that this doesn't do anything but point out that people who use determinism in the sense of a divine will or predestiniation, have already adopted a worldview that includes a divine will or predestiniation. This certainly does not get rid of the problem of free will and determinism, and any freshman could point it out.

What it does mean, however, is that the debate about free will and determinism has changed, and it is no longer a debate over whether a divine author is compatible with free will. The debate now is an investigation into what biological mechanisms within us can be identified as being responsible for what we now call 'free will'.

This was all very bizarre, and a waste of time. You framed it improperly and it does not do what you say it does.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Joy Division:

First, before I explain why I think this is a cop out or a misdiagnoses it needs to be pointed out that 'determine' has multiple definitions, many of which do not contain the connotations of the definition you chose to focus on.

1. Bob determined the speed of the object through measurement - to ascertain through observation

2. "demand determines price - to bring about as a result"

But how does this contradict my estimation that this word (normally) applies to what human beings can do, apply or bring about?

1. This is what the character worked out, the speed of a certain object. Or are you committed to the idea that this character's calculation actually made this object move?

2. Even here this relates to what human beings do. Or do you imagine that objects for sale decide their own prices, and that human beings have no part to play in putting prices up or down?


Neither of these definitions of determine involve an anthropomorphism. If contemporary definitions of determinism even have anything to do with the definition of 'determine' to begin with, it is one of these definitions. Although, quite clearly, the descriptive statement that antecedent conditions along with the 'law's of nature tell the story of our behavior is not an anthropomorphism at all.

They do if you think that objects decide for themselves, or that human thought can make things move. That is why the questions I asked in each case seem so odd (i.e., "Or are you committed to the idea that this character's calculation actually made this object move?", and "Or do you imagine that objects for sale decide their own prices, and that human beings have no part to play in putting prices up or down?").

In case one, I can't think of any situations in which this might happen, but I can imagine cases where this could happen with the second. Anyway, as I pointed out, even these two uses of this word relate to what human beings can do, apply or bring about.

So, I do not see how these create problems for what I have said in other threads.


On the other hand there is a definition of determinism that dominated much of our investigations throughout history, and that definition does align 'determinism' with something like predestination. However, there is a meaningful distinction between predestination and AC+LoN, and once the distinction is made your argument only applies to the predestination side of things.

I'm sorry, you lost me here. "AC+LoN"?


Now that that's out of the way, the question needs to be asked about whether it diagnoses the problem properly. That is, are there reasons to think that the philosophers who employed the anthropomorphic definition of determinism were doing it because they were confused by language, or because they were doing it for another reason. Well, most of the accounts, both theological and philosophical, that are going to claim that our actions are determined, in the since of determine you call a language misuse, understand human behavior in terms of a prior robustly metaphysical worldview. However, A Metaphysical worldview that sees nature as a meaningful creation or unfolding like a book is going to lend itself to the claim that if things are fixed by nature then they unfold according to a divine conatus. But, this is no new revelation, this is by any account child's play.

So I am left at this point asking myself where exactly language misuse enters the equation. What you call language misuse only occurs when nature is already metaphysical. And if nature is already metaphysical then there is often a will or an author of things in which "determined" can, in the ordinary definition of the word, be used to describe things. This is not language abuse, this is language used properly to preposterous results within a confused worldview.

In fact, as I point out in other threads (links below), but at much greater length in my essays, metaphysics and theology also find their origin in the systematic misuse of language, and this misuse has materialist roots in the preservation and reproduction of class power.

So, I follow Marx (in this quasi-Wittgensteinian comment of his):


The philosophers have only to dissolve their language into the ordinary language, from which it is abstracted, in order to recognise it, as the distorted language of the actual world, and to realise that neither thoughts nor language in themselves form a realm of their own, that they are only manifestations of actual life. [Marx and Engels (1970) The German Ideology, p.118. Bold added.]

You:


And if nature is already metaphysical then there is often a will or an author of things in which "determined" can, in the ordinary definition of the word, be used to describe things. This is not language abuse, this is language used properly to preposterous results within a confused worldview

It is if that metaphysical world-view is itself the product of a misuse of language.


I think you misdiagnose the problem, and this leads you to wrongly conclude that the entire free will debate is a farce because of this. When in fact, contemporary discussions of free will are just as robust as the historic debate, and all the metaphysics has been excised from it. I guess the point is that this doesn't do anything but point out that people who use determinism in the sense of a divine will or predestination, have already adopted a worldview that includes a divine will or predestination. This certainly does not get rid of the problem of free will and determinism, and any freshman could point it out.

Except this misuse of language has continued, even to this day. For example, I defy you to try to give an account of causation that does not descend into anthropomorphism at some point.

Which is why Marx also pointed out:

"The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force. The class which has the means of material production at its disposal, has control at the same time over the means of mental production, so that thereby, generally speaking, the ideas of those who lack the means of mental production are subject to it. The ruling ideas are nothing more than the ideal expression of the dominant material relationships, the dominant material relationships grasped as ideas; hence of the relationships which make the one class the ruling one, therefore, the ideas of its dominance. The individuals composing the ruling class possess among other things consciousness, and therefore think. Insofar, therefore, as they rule as a class and determine the extent and compass of an epoch, it is self-evident that they do this in its whole range, hence among other things rule also as thinkers, as producers of ideas, and regulate the production and distribution of the ideas of their age: thus their ideas are the ruling ideas of the epoch. For instance, in an age and in a country where royal power, aristocracy, and bourgeoisie are contending for mastery and where, therefore, mastery is shared, the doctrine of the separation of powers proves to be the dominant idea and is expressed as an 'eternal law.'" [Marx and Engels (1970) The German Ideology, pp.64-65.]

The 'ruling ideas' still rule.

You:


What it does mean, however, is that the debate about free will and determinism has changed, and it is no longer a debate over whether a divine author is compatible with free will. The debate now is an investigation into what biological mechanisms within us can be identified as being responsible for what we now call 'free will'.

This ancient debate has in fact become buried on the language that is still used to 'solve' this pseudo-problem. In fact, there can be no solution to a 'problem' born out of such antiquated confusions, since there is no problem of 'free will' vs 'determinism', as I have shown.


This was all very bizarre, and a waste of time. You framed it improperly and it does not do what you say it does

I submit that you have failed to show where I go wrong.

http://www.revleft.com/vb/self-t105849/index.html?p=1408653#post1408653

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1596520&postcount=20

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/Why%20I%20Oppose%20DM.htm

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%2012_01.htm

[JoyDivision]

The definitions I supplied only incidentally apply to what human beings do because of the chosen example, whereas the definition derived from those examples does not. And while the examples provided superficially tie them to human behavior, it is a wild abuse of "anthropomorphism" to suggest it is goig on. We are not attributing human characteristics to nature with either of those definitions. Humans were superficial to the definition of the word, and built into the example.

So let us get rid of this confusion. Change "demand determines price" to "the Height the rock fell from determined it's speed when it hit the ground". - to bring about as a result. The height it fell from was in relation to the speed it hit the ground with in such a way that if the height changed so would the speed. There is a causal relation between the two, and one definition of determine expresses this relation. It is too bothersome to go into potential energy, the nature of objects, the nature of forces ect. everytime we wish to express such a relation. Instead we say determine, and we mean only that the final result of the system was conditioned by its initial circumstances. Again, there is no anthropomorphism here, only a description that allows us to pick out what brings about what. We mean only, the events outcome was brought about by antecedent conditions(AC) along with the laws of nature(+LoN).



They do if you think that objects decide for themselves, or that human thought can make things move.

Ofcourse they can be anthropomorphised if there objects are,but that is a different thing than the definition of 'determine' itself being anthropomorphised. That's not really an argument for anything, we could do that to almost any word. I mean we could also anthropomorphise them if we talked to a schizophrenic that thought he was god and controlled everything. But, just like what you said, that is not an argument relevant to weather 'determine' is itself an anthropomorphism.



It is if that metaphysical world-view is itself the product of a misuse of language.

I honestly do not know what this means. Do you think language develops authentically in a cultural vacuum, and you can just impose modern definitions of words as timeless definitions? Do you think that the human tendency toward mysticism for the vast majority of our species lifespan points to a misuse of language across all cultures and languages, rather than picks out some bit of how our psychology works? I think you may find that what you call proper use of language was not possible throughout much of history because concepts and narratives were fundamentally different. Very bizarre, at a time when the world is mystical because we're ignorant of processes and have just emerged out of the primordial horde, you want to trace our worldview to a misuse of language.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Joy Division:


The definitions I supplied only incidentally apply to what human beings do because of the chosen example, whereas the definition derived from those examples does not. And while the examples provided superficially tie them to human behavior, it is a wild abuse of "anthropomorphism" to suggest it is going on. We are not attributing human characteristics to nature with either of those definitions. Humans were superficial to the definition of the word, and built into the example.

I'm sorry, what "definitions" were these?


So let us get rid of this confusion. Change "demand determines price" to "the Height the rock fell from determined it's speed when it hit the ground". - to bring about as a result. The height it fell from was in relation to the speed it hit the ground with in such a way that if the height changed so would the speed. There is a causal relation between the two, and one definition of determine expresses this relation. It is too bothersome to go into potential energy, the nature of objects, the nature of forces ect. everytime we wish to express such a relation. Instead we say determine, and we mean only that the final result of the system was conditioned by its initial circumstances. Again, there is no anthropomorphism here, only a description that allows us to pick out what brings about what. We mean only, the events outcome was brought about by antecedent conditions(AC) along with the laws of nature(+LoN).

Now, as soon as you try to tell us exactly how, for example, the height this from which this rock was dropped 'determined' its speed, you will have to attribute to gravity, or to height, or the rock human capacities.

And an appeal to 'laws of nature' is to no avail either -- [I]these were derived from an earlier anthropomorphism (or, rather, from the 'will of god')!

Now, in order to distinguish a 'law of nature' from an accidental generalisation, you are going to have to appeal to 'necessity' at some point, and if you are to give this word any explanatory bite, you are going to have to start saying things like 'Law L made event E as opposed to event F happen." But, Laws have no physical being and thus can make nothing happen; least of all can they make things happen 'of necessity'.

Again, I covered all this in the threads I mentioned earlier.


Ofcourse they can be anthropomorphised if there objects are,but that is a different thing than the definition of 'determine' itself being anthropomorphised. That's not really an argument for anything, we could do that to almost any word. I mean we could also anthropomorphise them if we talked to a schizophrenic that thought he was god and controlled everything. But, just like what you said, that is not an argument relevant to weather 'determine' is itself an anthropomorphism.

Well, I am using the word 'determine' as it is ordinarily used (not as it is used in traditional philosophy, or by scientists who try to do a little 'philosophising'), and that means that one cannot just use this word, or any word, any way one chooses.

And my claim is based on a challenge; as soon as you fill in the details, you will find at some point you have to anthropomorphise nature (or 'forces', or 'laws', or 'causation', or 'necessity') to make your claims work.


I honestly do not know what this means. Do you think language develops authentically in a cultural vacuum, and you can just impose modern definitions of words as timeless definitions? Do you think that the human tendency toward mysticism for the vast majority of our species lifespan points to a misuse of language across all cultures and languages, rather than picks out some bit of how our psychology works? I think you may find that what you call proper use of language was not possible throughout much of history because concepts and narratives were fundamentally different. Very bizarre, at a time when the world is mystical because we're ignorant of processes and have just emerged out of the primordial horde, you want to trace our worldview to a misuse of language.

In fact, as the history of traditional thought shows, metaphysics is based on the systematic misuse and/or distortion of language.


Do you think language develops authentically in a cultural vacuum, and you can just impose modern definitions of words as timeless definitions?

I think you are running together 'philosophical language' and the vernacular. The latter certainly did not develop in a vacuum, but we can go into that another time.

The former was deliberately developed to give voice to ruling-class ideologies (in their most abstract forms), and so developed in a separate social matrix from the latter.


I think you may find that what you call proper use of language was not possible throughout much of history because concepts and narratives were fundamentally different.

Well, I am not trying to impose current usage on the past, merely pointing out that at any stage in history since at least Ancient Greek times (in the 'west'), theorists had to misuse and/or the vernacular current at that time to make their 'theories' seem to work, as Marx notes.


Very bizarre, at a time when the world is mystical because we're ignorant of processes and have just emerged out of the primordial horde, you want to trace our worldview to a misuse of language

Well, I did not say anything about the origin of mysticism, nor did I try to relate it to the misuse of language, so the only 'bizarre' thing here is your attempt to saddle me with that idea!

[JoyDivision]

Now, as soon as you try to tell us exactly how, for example, the height this from which this rock was dropped 'determined' its speed, you will have to attribute to gravity, or to height, or the rock human capacities.

No, gravity is an attractive force, and in this instance the mass of the earth is such that it has a certain gravitational pull on objects, and that pull varies based on the size and distance of that other object. All this is description. Whatever was holding up the rock gave way, at which point the gravitational force of the earth was the main force acting on the rock, and it plummeted to the earth. Again, all this is description. Other things like inertia, wind resistance, and many other variable need to be taken into account, but none of these things have human capacity. We have an object being subjected to a series of forces, and these forces resulted in that object behaving in a certain way. Or, in a word, the speed at which the rock hit the ground within this system was determined by natural forces and initial conditions of the rock.

I don't know what you are trying to do here, or what conception of natural forces you are working from, but from my point of view all these forces are as simply 'there' as the rock. There is nothing special about them over and above the rock, and the rock is related to them because of what it is. If you want to know why things work this way, either it can be explained with more description or it cannot. If it cannot then it is outside the scope of what was initially being asked of me, and the discussion is now abusive.

And by the way, "laws of nature" is just a description of a collection of relationships between things that seems to endure between individual interactions. They are convenient ways of understanding the forces at play in nature, nothing more.



Well, I am using the word 'determine' as it is ordinarily used (not as it is used in traditional philosophy, or by scientists who try to do a little 'philosophising'), and that means that one cannot just use this word, or any word, any way one chooses.

Determine has multiple common definitions, and you don't just get to fiat one over all the others. Well, I suppose you can try, but it's just going to end in a straw-man with the other person thinking to themselves "what the hell are you talking about".



In fact, as the history of traditional thought shows, metaphysics is based on the systematic misuse and/or distortion of language.

Yep, that is your position. I think, but I'm not sure, if you repeat it one more time it automatically becomes true. Now, seeing as how you're clearly not going to offer anything but declarative statements on this line of the discussion, and I'm not going to subject myself to the abuse of reading another 'definitive' essay that is misframed and mischaracterized, I guess we'll just have to end our discussion here.

If you decide to actually engage instead of evade, you might start with explaining what exact conception of language is required to say things like "they misused language, but i'm not imposing my usage on them".


Well, I did not say anything about the origin of mysticism, nor did I try to relate it to the misuse of language, so the only 'bizarre' thing here is your attempt to saddle me with that idea!

Ofcourse you did, you said all metaphysics is the result of language misuse. Unless I'm missing something, mysticism, especially pre-civilization mysticism is based on a robust metaphysic.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JoyDivision:


No, gravity is an attractive force, and in this instance the mass of the earth is such that it has a certain gravitational pull on objects, and that pull varies based on the size and distance of that other object. All this is description. Whatever was holding up the rock gave way, at which point the gravitational force of the earth was the main force acting on the rock, and it plummeted to the earth. Again, all this is description. Other things like inertia, wind resistance, and many other variable need to be taken into account, but none of these things have human capacity. We have an object being subjected to a series of forces, and these forces resulted in that object behaving in a certain way. Or, in a word, the speed at which the rock hit the ground within this system was determined by natural forces and initial conditions of the rock.

As I pointed out, to make this work (philosophically), you have to either appeal to the regularity theory or the necessity theory of natural law. But, the regularity theory cannot tell you why, given cause A, B should follow as opposed to C or D. On this view, the fall of the rock (B) was not 'determined' by the forces you mention; something else could have happened (C or D).

If you now appeal to the necessitarian view, you will have to attribute to natural events human capacities (A made, or forced B to happen) -- but I have already pointed this out (and said more about this) in those other threads you seem not to have read very carefully.

Unless, of course, you know of a third alternative?

In fact, I have just remembered; I had another lengthy debate revolving around "force" and "law" (etc.) last year; it will, I think, answer many of your questions:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/true-concept-force-t109485/index.html


I don't know what you are trying to do here, or what conception of natural forces you are working from, but from my point of view all these forces are as simply 'there' as the rock. There is nothing special about them over and above the rock, and the rock is related to them because of what it is. If you want to know why things work this way, either it can be explained with more description or it cannot. If it cannot then it is outside the scope of what was initially being asked of me, and the discussion is now abusive

I'm not sure how this is relevant to anything I said.

And, you must know that these forces have all been edited out of the picture in General Relativity.


And by the way, "laws of nature" is just a description of a collection of relationships between things that seems to endure between individual interactions. They are convenient ways of understanding the forces at play in nature, nothing more.

Fine, but then that just removes necessity from nature, and with that goes 'determinism'.


Determine has multiple common definitions, and you don't just get to fiat one over all the others. Well, I suppose you can try, but it's just going to end in a straw-man with the other person thinking to themselves "what the hell are you talking about".

I do not; I just refer those with whom I am debating to how we use this word in everyday life. Any other use, if it's to do any real work (and not be mere ornamentation), will have to involve an appeal (implicitly or explicitly) to the connotations we already have for this word in the vernacular -- which is why I keep saying you risk descending into anthropomorphism if you try to use this word to depict/explain nature.


Yep, that is your position. I think, but I'm not sure, if you repeat it one more time it automatically becomes true. Now, seeing as how you're clearly not going to offer anything but declarative statements on this line of the discussion, and I'm not going to subject myself to the abuse of reading another 'definitive' essay that is misframed and mischaracterized, I guess we'll just have to end our discussion here.

I am not just repeating myself; I did post links to other pages here that explained my ideas in more detail. I just do not want to have to repost all that material here.

Here they are again:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/self-t105849/index.html?p=1408653#post1408653

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1596520&postcount=20

And in extensive detail here (this is in fact a PhD length essay):

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%2012_01.htm


and I'm not going to subject myself to the abuse of reading another 'definitive' essay that is misframed and mischaracterized, I guess we'll just have to end our discussion here.

Fine; stay ignorant.


If you decide to actually engage instead of evade, you might start with explaining what exact conception of language is required to say things like "they misused language, but I'm not imposing my usage on them".

Where am I not 'engaging'? I have already said several times I'm using the word 'determine' as it is employed in every day life, and not just by me. If you can think of another everyday use I have left out, share it with us.


Of course you did, you said all metaphysics is the result of language misuse. Unless I'm missing something, mysticism, especially pre-civilization mysticism is based on a robust metaphysic.

Why are you attributing to me ideas I do not hold?

Where have I equated mysticism and metaphysics, or even hinted I think the former is a sub-category of the latter (or vice versa)?

[JoyDivision]

Rosa, sweetie, I don't have "questions" that need to be answered. I have someone telling me that I am dedicated to a position because they say so, and then my responses explaining myself without said positions.



But, the regularity theory cannot tell you why, given cause A, B should follow as opposed to C or D.

Right, because "why" is outside the scope of description, which is the project being undertaken. You're asking me to offer a certain type of analysis that has a very limited scope, and then arguing that this analysis cannot account for things outside it's scope. Well, yeah, I'm describing events, not trying to offer a unified theory of nature. If you want to discuss being and existence and things like "why", then we need to completely shift gears into another discipline, but untill that happens, arguing that this description doesn't account for ontological problems is just bad philosophy.

An analogy is something like this: Discussing JTB and having someone say, "well that is problematic because it doesn't tell us why it is the case that A is true rather than not A".




If you now appeal to the necessitarian view, you will have to attribute to natural events human capacities (A made, or forced B to happen)

While I don't, this just isn't correct. One can most definitely think nature unfolds stictly deterministically without anthropomorphizing anything. I.e. the universe is a closed mechanistic system, so the initial conditions set in motion an unchangeable chain of events. This is not necessity from an ontological argument, this is necessity because of observations about the way things work. The initial conditions could have been different so everything could have been different, but after those initial conditions occured, the chain was in place. To say that "A made B to happen" within this theory is simply the statement that A and B are related by time and causal mechanisms, and A occurred before B in the causal chain. This is not ontologic necessity, this is causal determinancy, they are two very different things. So different that you chase a straw-man.



I do not; I just refer those with whom I am debating to how we use this word in everyday life. Any other use, if it's to do any real work (and not be mere ornamentation), will have to involve an appeal (implicitly or explicitly) to the connotations we already have for this word in the vernacular -- which is why I keep saying you risk descending into anthropomorphism if you try to use this word to depict/explain nature.

I'm not making up these definitions, they are well established and just as common as yours. Unless you are an etymology dynamo and were able to track the word to it's very first usage, then you have no ground to step on here. and even if you were able to do that, there is nothing that reserves that as the definition for all time. But, you are right, I probably do "risk anthropomorphism", but that is only because of the dual definition, and that is something completely different than it being an actual anthropomorphism.



Where am I not 'engaging'? I have already said several times I'm using the word 'determine' as it is employed in every day life, and not just by me. If you can think of another everyday use I have left out, share it with us.

I gave you two in my first damn post.


Why are you attributing to me ideas I do not hold?

Where have I equated mysticism and metaphysics, or even hinted I think the former is a sub-category of the latter (or vice versa)?

I didn't say you did, an I clearly didn't say you did. What I did say is that "unless I am missing something".... You see, if I say unless I'm missing something I am not saying "you said"....I'm saying that I think mysticism doesn't occur without metaphysics.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JoyDivision:


Rosa, sweetie, I don't have "questions" that need to be answered. I have someone telling me that I am dedicated to a position because they say so, and then my responses explaining myself without said positions.

Yes you do, you naughty little boy: you keep asking me questions.


Right, because "why" is outside the scope of description, which is the project being undertaken. You're asking me to offer a certain type of analysis that has a very limited scope, and then arguing that this analysis cannot account for things outside it's scope. Well, yeah, I'm describing events, not trying to offer a unified theory of nature. If you want to discuss being and existence and things like "why", then we need to completely shift gears into another discipline, but until that happens, arguing that this description doesn't account for ontological problems is just bad philosophy.

An analogy is something like this: Discussing JTB and having someone say, "well that is problematic because it doesn't tell us why it is the case that A is true rather than not A".

And yet I explicitly said that when you try to give an explanation here (that is, if you go beyond mere description), you will have to descend into anthropomorphism. And if you remain at the level of description, any use of 'determine' is devoid of content.

Now, if you want to eliminate all metaphysics from science, you'll find me on your side; but do you?


An analogy is something like this: Discussing JTB and having someone say, "well that is problematic because it doesn't tell us why it is the case that A is true rather than not A".

JTB?:confused:


While I don't, this just isn't correct. One can most definitely think nature unfolds strictly deterministically without anthropomorphizing anything. I.e. the universe is a closed mechanistic system, so the initial conditions set in motion an unchangeable chain of events. This is not necessity from an ontological argument, this is necessity because of observations about the way things work. The initial conditions could have been different so everything could have been different, but after those initial conditions occurred, the chain was in place. To say that "A made B to happen" within this theory is simply the statement that A and B are related by time and causal mechanisms, and A occurred before B in the causal chain. This is not ontologic necessity, this is causal determinancy, they are two very different things. So different that you chase a straw-man.

I have highlighted your use of terms which imply you are in fact undecided between the two options I outlined.

Your use of "unchangeable" suggests you are in the grip of the necessitarian theory, as does your use of "the chain", while your use of "the way things word" suggest you are closet regularist. This is because as soon as we ask "Why can those initial conditions produce a different outcome, why are they 'unchangeable'?" you are going to have to appeal to some form of 'natural necessity', or some form of 'control' of one even by another, so that no alternative event can take its place.

As I indicated, you are in the grip of the traditional approach, for in order to explain why cause A brought about event B, rather than C or D, you will at some point have to attribute a will to nature (as one even 'controls' another so that nothing else could have happened).

You just bury this is all that talk of 'initial conditions', 'the way things work' and 'unchangeable'.

As I also said, as soon as the details are filled in, which you either omit or ignore, you find you soon descend into anthropomorphism.


I'm not making up these definitions, they are well established and just as common as yours. Unless you are an etymology dynamo and were able to track the word to it's very first usage, then you have no ground to step on here. and even if you were able to do that, there is nothing that reserves that as the definition for all time. But, you are right, I probably do "risk anthropomorphism", but that is only because of the dual definition, and that is something completely different than it being an actual anthropomorphism.

Which 'definitions' are these?


I gave you two in my first damn post.

They are remarkably well hidden there too.



I didn't say you did, and I clearly didn't say you did. What I did say is that "unless I am missing something".... You see, if I say unless I'm missing something I am not saying "you said"....I'm saying that I think mysticism doesn't occur without metaphysics.

Indeed, you are missing something: a pair of glasses.

[JoyDivision]

Your use of "unchangeable" suggests you are in the grip of the necessitarian theory, as does your use of "the chain", while your use of "the way things word" suggest you are closet regularist. This is because as soon as we ask "Why can those initial conditions produce a different outcome, why are they 'unchangeable'?" you are going to have to appeal to some form of 'natural necessity', or some form of 'control' of one even by another, so that no alternative event can take its place.
Why can those initial conditions produce a different outcome, why are they 'unchangeable'?"

I just gave you an account devoid of natural necessity and control. Those initial conditions could produce a different outcome, because when someone who ascribes to this theory talks about those intitial conditions they are talking about the arrangement of nature. This means that those initial conditions are contigent, to think about them as being different does not violate an apriori rule nor does it create a logical contradiction. That is the test for necessity in this ontogologial sense of necessity.

Likewise, the conditions that maintain now do not fit this definition of necessity either, but they are causally linked to the initial contigent conditions. So, one would say, not that they are necessary, but that their is causal determinacy. If this theory is true, there is no control here and there is no philosophic necessity either. There is an initial set of contigent conditions that are identical to a system of causal determinancy. This theory does not need to say "control" and would wrong to do so, because the causal determinacy is, combined with other things, what the universe is.



And yet I explicitly said that when you try to give an explanation here (that is, if you go beyond mere description), you will have to descend into anthropomorphism. And if you remain at the level of description, any use of 'determine' is devoid of content.
So after all this time, after everything you've repeated over and over, your goal-post have now shifted to the claim that if I go beyond mere description I will be making anthropomorphic claims. That if I go beyond mere description I will have gone into ontology and metaphysics. Jesus, Rosa, all this hassle for such a simple thing, that a way of investigation notorious for being anti-metaphysical will have problems if it extends itself into metaphysics. Well, yeah. This naieve realism shit isn't exactly self-aware, and people who use it aren't trying to do metaphysics with it. All this, and it turns out your objection is that if we disipline shift from a form of analysis that denies the other disipline is meaningful, that same form of analysis won't be able to adequately answer the questions in that other disipline.

Sigh.


As a side note, I offer up an ontology that is not itself anthropomorphic and does not lead to an anthropomorphised nature: Will to Power.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JoyDivision:


I just gave you an account devoid of natural necessity and control. Those initial conditions could produce a different outcome, because when someone who ascribes to this theory talks about those initial conditions they are talking about the arrangement of nature. This means that those initial conditions are contingent, to think about them as being different does not violate an apriori rule nor does it create a logical contradiction. That is the test for necessity in this entomological sense of necessity.

Likewise, the conditions that maintain now do not fit this definition of necessity either, but they are causally linked to the initial contingent conditions. So, one would say, not that they are necessary, but that their is causal determinacy. If this theory is true, there is no control here and there is no philosophic necessity either. There is an initial set of contingent conditions that are identical to a system of causal determinancy. This theory does not need to say "control" and would wrong to do so, because the causal determinacy is, combined with other things, what the universe is.

As I pointed out, just as soon as you try to tell us why these events, with given initial conditions, are "unchangeable" you will have to appeal to some form of natural necessity, or to a term synonymous with it.

Of course, you can always refuse to say, but then the term "unchangeable" will be left with no bite at all, and will thus serve no useful purpose. You might just as well have used "changeable" for all the use it is.

However, I suspect that 'natural necessity' is buried in your use of "causal determinancy", but that depends on what you mean by this phrase.


So after all this time, after everything you've repeated over and over, your goal-post have now shifted to the claim that if I go beyond mere description I will be making anthropomorphic claims. That if I go beyond mere description I will have gone into ontology and metaphysics. Jesus, Rosa, all this hassle for such a simple thing, that a way of investigation notorious for being anti-metaphysical will have problems if it extends itself into metaphysics. Well, yeah. This naive realism shit isn't exactly self-aware, and people who use it aren't trying to do metaphysics with it. All this, and it turns out your objection is that if we discipline shift from a form of analysis that denies the other discipline is meaningful, that same form of analysis won't be able to adequately answer the questions in that other discipline.

No shift in the goalposts by me; I did say that if you remain at the level of mere description, then I'm with you -- but in that case your use of "causal determinancy" and "unchangeable" will need to be explained, and it is here that I suspect the hidden metaphysics in your account will come to the surface. Either that, or these are empty terms, of no use at all.


As a side note, I offer up an ontology that is not itself anthropomorphic and does not lead to an anthropomorphised nature: Will to Power.

I'm sorry this is far too brief and vague to do anything with.

[JoyDivision]

As I pointed out, just as soon as you try to tell us why these events, with given initial conditions, are "unchangeable" you will have to appeal to some form of natural necessity, or to a term synonymous with it.

Of course, you can always refuse to say, but then the term "unchangeable" will be left with no bite at all, and will thus serve no useful purpose. You might just as well have used "changeable" for all the use it is.I just explained to you what was meant by "unchangeable", and this either appealed to "natural necessity" or it didn't. I mean at this point there is nothing left to say, I showed you a conception of nature that includes causal determinacy that does not appeal to necessity, and it is either time for you to argue against why it does or accept my narrative. All this "you will have to" is just vacuous fronting that contains no argument.

Instead all the argument you can mount is "unchangeable" will be left with no bite. Well, no shit, that's what I just explained, and yet it was still meaningfully distinguished from changeable because causal chains. You're not even offering a position or an argument at this point, your just saying things that you have previously decided were true without any context or reference to what I have said.

Bye Rosa

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JoyDivison:


I just explained to you what was meant by "unchangeable",

I beg to differ. You certainly posted a wall of impenetrable text, but it contained no clear explication of this word, as you are using it.


and this either appealed to "natural necessity" or it didn't. I mean at this point there is nothing left to say, I showed you a conception of nature that includes causal determinacy that does not appeal to necessity, and it is either time for you to argue against why it does or accept my narrative. All this "you will have to" is just vacuous fronting that contains no argument.

Once again, you help yourself to "causal determinancy" and refuse to tell us more. Hence, my suspicion still stands: this is a surrogate for 'natural necessity'.


Instead all the argument you can mount is "unchangeable" will be left with no bite. Well, no shit, that's what I just explained, and yet it was still meaningfully distinguished from changeable because causal chains. You're not even offering a position or an argument at this point, your just saying things that you have previously decided were true without any context or reference to what I have said.

Well, my argument was brief, but it was at least perspicuous. Yours is a clear as mud.


Bye Rosa

I'm happy to accept your capitulation...

[anticap]

The above article (http://www.marxists.org/archive/beer/1907/01/free-will.htm) falls flat on this claim:


There can be no other reply to this than that which Marx has given: Not abstract commandments, not abstract reasoning, fill our mental capacities with concrete social ideas and ideals, but material conditions and class positions of Society. The contradiction in which the determinists are involved is at once removed when we remember that a society, based on private property, is a class society with class notions, class ideals, class conflicts which must necessarily manifest themselves regardless of religion and natural science.

Which is, of course, abstract too!

Instead of unmasking the non-sensicality of both determinism and anti-determinsim (these are just two sides of the same pseudo-problem), this author simply rejects them based on a series of inconsistent claims, like the above.

I don't have a problem with that passage. A society based on private property is a class society, and the conflicts inherent to that will manifest themselves, just as Beer says. Do you disagree, or do you merely have a problem with his use of the word "necessarily"? I haven't read your long posts explaining your position there, but from what I've gathered without having done so, you appear to be splitting semantic hairs.

When I speak of determinism, I speak of causality, meaning a chain of events. I don't see that as implying a universal will or mind. When I pull a trigger, a chain of events follows: hammer falls, primer and then powder ignite, gases expand, bullet is propelled. According to the nonsensical free-will doctrine, which posits that one particular species of ape somehow managed to step outside the causal chain, I am the ultimate cause of that bullet killing someone. According to reality, my pulling of the trigger was itself caused. That's it. There's nothing more to determinism as it applies here. Call it what you like, if it will keep you from cringing, but it's not a claim that the universe has a will of its own.

[anticap]

Rosa, sweetie....

Unless you would address a member with a traditionally male name as "sweetie," I'm going to assume that you've done so here under the assumption that Rosa is female, in which case I consider it sexist and would prefer that you not do it. (In any case, it sounds condescending.)

[JoyDivision]

Unless you would address a member with a traditionally male name as "sweetie," I'm going to assume that you've done so here under the assumption that Rosa is female, in which case I consider it sexist and would prefer that you not do it. (In any case, it sounds condescending.)


Yes you do, you naughty little boy

Wahhhh, wahhhhhhh, she's sexist..........douche bag.

[anticap]

Yes you do, you naughty little boy

Wahhhh, wahhhhhhh, she's sexist..........douche bag.

I missed that one. Rosa's comment was condescending, but not sexist. Condescension is sometimes warranted -- sexism never is.

[REVLEFT'S BIEGGST MATSER TROL]

Unless you would address a member with a traditionally male name as "sweetie," I'm going to assume that you've done so here under the assumption that Rosa is female, in which case I consider it sexist and would prefer that you not do it. (In any case, it sounds condescending.)

Philosophy isn't exactly the right forum for English education, but Rosa is a female name ;)

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

anticap:


I don't have a problem with that passage. A society based on private property is a class society, and the conflicts inherent to that will manifest themselves, just as Beer says. Do you disagree, or do you merely have a problem with his use of the word "necessarily"? I haven't read your long posts explaining your position there, but from what I've gathered without having done so, you appear to be splitting semantic hairs.

When I speak of determinism, I speak of causality, meaning a chain of events. I don't see that as implying a universal will or mind. When I pull a trigger, a chain of events follows: hammer falls, primer and then powder ignite, gases expand, bullet is propelled. According to the nonsensical free-will doctrine, which posits that one particular species of ape somehow managed to step outside the causal chain, I am the ultimate cause of that bullet killing someone. According to reality, my pulling of the trigger was itself caused. That's it. There's nothing more to determinism as it applies here. Call it what you like, if it will keep you from cringing, but it's not a claim that the universe has a will of its own.

Well, the problem is that theorists use words like "causation", "necessary" and "determine" as a shorthand to save them filling in the details. However, when these are filled in, their theory soon descends into anthropomorphism, that is, into attributing to nature a will.

Now, taking your example of the gun. Here we have a series of events, E(1), E(2), E(3),..., E(n). But as soon as we ask "Why does E(k+1) and not D(1) follow E(k)?" there are only a few possible answers.

1) It's just a fact about nature.

2) D(1) can't happen.

Now, if 1) is the case, then we have no explanation, just a description. This is the brick wall that JoyDivision kept hitting. Anyone who chooses 1) has no way of knowing whether nature will take a different course tomorrow, since our knowledge of it up to now has been based on a premature generalisation.

Any attempt to say why nature will not, or cannot take a different course tomorrow collapses into 2).

As far as 2) is concerned, the traditional response has involved an appeal to logical or metaphysical reasons why, say, D(1) can't happen, and E(k+1) must always happen (unless there is some countervailing cause at work).

These have involved an appeal to 'natural necessity', 'determining causes', 'laws of nature'..., or the one defending this tradition just thumps the table (which is where JoyDivision finally ended up).

But, as soon as we asked for details behind the use of these words, we are faced with certain events and/or abstract principles controlling events or nature.

However, when we then ask: How can one event control another, and why does the second always do as it is told? the only reply is either (A) to loop back to 1) above, or (B) it involves the use of terms that imply nature is intelligent, or that each event is a little mind pre-programmed to do what it was told to do (this was Leibniz's way out).

So, this is my challenge: every traditional theory that attempts to address this pseudo-problem either collapses into 1) or into 2).

Band that is why it has remained unsolved to this day (after over two thousand years of failed attempts) and why we are no nearer a solution than the Ancient Greeks were -- it's a pseudo-problem that as arisen out of a misuse of language.

Just as Marx noted...

Now, you introduce human choice in here, but this can't always be the case, for natural events are not always under our control.

But, let us take our example. Here your pulling the trigger becomes event E(0), and as soon as we ask "What were the events that preceded this that made E(0) happen?" we face intractable problems.

There can only be two answers:

3) There were none, and

4) Events E(-1), E(-2), (E-3),...,E(-n).

But, 4) collapses into 1) or 2) above, and 3) divorces the individual concerned from nature.

So, yours is no solution.

[Meridian]

Would it be feasible to use the term "patterns" when describing natural phenomena, where we talk about causes and effects? Because it seems to me that our recording of "cause and effect" is indeed observations of patterns of phenomena.

So, if we say, there is a pattern towards x and y happening after z...? This seems to me to be different than claiming "x and y will likely happen because of z" or even "z makes x and y happen".

[Dermezel]

Dermezel:



On that off-topic subject, read my posts here:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/why-do-we-t98047/index.html

http://www.revleft.com/vb/consciousness-and-passage-t100438/index.html

And this essay:

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page_13_03.htm

The evidence that we have consciousness is pretty much established by cognitive science (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_science) as well as subjective experience.

[JoyDivision]

Would it be feasible to use the term "patterns" when describing natural phenomena, where we talk about causes and effects? Because it seems to me that our recording of "cause and effect" is indeed observations of patterns of phenomena.

So, if we say, there is a pattern towards x and y happening after z...? This seems to me to be different than claiming "x and y will likely happen because of z" or even "z makes x and y happen".

This sounds a bit like Hume, only instead of pattern, he called it habit. I don't know if you are familiar with his argument, but he claims that we cannot see a necessary connection between events, and instead we see that certain events are constantly conjoined by certain other events. For example, the reason we think that striking a match will cause a flame, is not because the two events are necessarily linked causally, but because we have seen enough of that type of event to associate the actions. I don't know if this is what you are getting at, but Hume is going to claim that causation is not a concept that we see or derive from nature, but is more like a mental trick we use to create the patterns. This is basically what Rosa calls regularity theory of causation. Many people cannot accept it because it takes away any knowledge of cause and effect, and instead holds that we make it up because of habit.


Don't be confused by Rosa's equivocation, though. Here necessary does not mean ontological necessity, it means more like logical necessity. If you are familiar with the distinction between necessary and sufficient conditions, it is like that necessity. It is not attributing a power or control or anything positive to the things involved, it is only describing a relationship.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Dermezel:


The evidence that we have consciousness is pretty much established by cognitive science as well as subjective experience.

I deny both of these establish what you say they do, and for reasons I outlined in the threads to which I linked, and in that essay.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


Don't be confused by Rosa's equivocation, though. Here necessary does not mean ontological necessity, it means more like logical necessity. If you are familiar with the distinction between necessary and sufficient conditions, it is like that necessity. It is not attributing a power or control or anything positive to the things involved, it is only describing a relationship.

What 'equivocation'?

And, as I have shown above, your 'logical necessity' collapses alarmingly quickly into 'natural/metaphysical necessity'.

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1697156&postcount=65

[anticap]

Unless you would address a member with a traditionally male name as "sweetie," I'm going to assume that you've done so here under the assumption that Rosa is female, in which case I consider it sexist and would prefer that you not do it. (In any case, it sounds condescending.)

Philosophy isn't exactly the right forum for English education, but Rosa is a female name ;)


Nor is this the place for a lesson in reading comprehension, but I suggest that you give that quotation another whirl. ;)

[anticap]

Rosa:

With all due respect (and I do respect you a great deal), I think you're being pedantic. Since you seem to understand that those who use such shorthand don't intend to imply anthropomorphism, and never would do, why dwell on it? Presumably you have a concern that compels you. My concern is only that comrades not accept the nonsensical free-will doctrine (which, to my great horror, some appear to do). Whatever language enables me, with my limited vocabulary, to point out the absurdity of that doctrine, I will use. If I'm asked whether I mean to imply that the universe has a will, I'll reply in the negative, and that ought to suffice.

Still, if you've got any suggestions for a better way to point out the absurdity of so-called "free-will" (and it is important that we do so, in my opinion, because the implications of that silly belief run directly counter to our interests), then I'm all ears.

[JoyDivision]

However, when we then ask: How can one event control another, and why does the second always do as it is told? the only reply is either (A) to loop back to 1) above, or (B) it involves the use of terms that imply nature is intelligent, or that each event is a little mind pre-programmed to do what it was told to do (this was Leibniz's way out).See, this is the problem with the way you approach this, you just suppose the most ridiculous possible interpretation of any word when it clearly is not being used. I mean "one event control another" is not something any of us are saying and neither is "second one always do as it is told". You're stuck in this sort of anthropomorphic way of thinking, and cannot see beyond it. Such words apply to theologic or ontologic necessity, but not the type of necessity I outlined earlier.

Are you familiar with a watt governor, Rosa, it is often used as analogy for the dynamic model of the mind. It is a very elegant solution to the problem of moderating the amount of fuel an engine receives. It does this, not by having a mechanism of control, but it is an all in one system. The toilet bowl float is another example of this, but not quite as closed. Within the Watt governor the speed of the engine causally determines the flow of the steam and vice versa, not because they "make" each other, but because they are in relation to each other.
en.wikipedia .org/wiki/Centrifugal_governor

Under such a system things are being done, cause and effect is occuring, but there is no part that can be said to be controlling an other. They are in a dynamic relationship, and within this relationship they influence each other simply because of how it is arranged.

I find that this kind of dynamic model is a powerful way of thinking about nature and offesr a lot of explanatory coherence. Especially in comparison to what you seemingly propose when you harass everyone about anthropomorphisms. We do not suppose that nature is a collection of disconnected objects that are being imposed on by forces and other objects, we suppose that an object is dynamically related to other objects and forces. And combined we call this system of related objects and forces the universe. There is no room for "making" or "controlling" or any other incorrect fill ins you offer in place of "force and influence". We have purposely excised anthropomorphism from our conception of nature, and this is what we ended up with. Meanwhile, you are still telling us we mean the conception of nature we were using 5 iterations ago.



1) has no way of knowing whether nature will take a different course tomorrowYes, Rosa, we have no way of knowing the future. This is not an argument against anything.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


Yes, Rosa, we have no way of knowing the future. This is not an argument against anything.

1) I thought you had waved me 'goobye'?

2) But, that is precisely the point. So, your use of "unchangeable" is without content, as I noted.

[JoyDivision]

JD:
2) But, that is precisely the point. So, your use of "unchangeable" is without content, as I noted.

This is actually quite double faced. You're attacking us for anthropomorphisms, and then when we point out why this isn't the case, you attack us because what we say doens't have "bite" or "content". Implicit within that is that for something to have bite or content it has to be a metaphysical truth, which you claim always leads to anthropomorphisms. So, according to you, something can only have "bite" or "content" if it is an anthropomorphism. It's a nice little circle of bullshit, stopped you right in your tracks, and youv'e been reeling ever sense. You realized what Hume meant, and that was curtains for Rosa. No need to adjust how you frame things, right, you're just content stay right where you're at. Meanwhile, we think to ourselves "that's not quite right", adjust a few things, and we all float on.


1) I thought you had waved me 'goobye'?

I took my leave from you a while ago, now I'm just taking the trash out.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


This is actually quite double faced. You're attacking us for anthropomorphisms, and then when we point out why this isn't the case, you attack us because what we say doens't have "bite" or "content". Implicit within that is that for something to have bite or content it has to be a metaphysical truth, which you claim always leads to anthropomorphisms. So, according to you, something can only have "bite" or "content" if it is an anthropomorphism. It's a nice little circle of bullshit, stopped you right in your tracks, and youv'e been reeling ever sense. You realized what Hume meant, and that was curtains for Rosa. No need to adjust how you frame things, right, you're just content stay right where you're at. Meanwhile, we think to ourselves "that's not quite right", adjust a few things, and we all float on.

Not so; the point is that just as soon as you give your word "unchangeable" any content, it will become apparent that you are trying to account for the future. What else can this word mean, but that the future will behave as the past has done, given these initial conditions?


I took my leave from you a while ago, now I'm just taking the trash out.

Good to see, since you have contributed more than your fair share.:)

[REVLEFT'S BIEGGST MATSER TROL]

Nor is this the place for a lesson in reading comprehension, but I suggest that you give that quotation another whirl. ;)

:blushing: Oops

I think this debate is intresting.

[JoyDivision]

JD:
Not so; the point is that just as soon as you give your word "unchangeable" any content, it will become apparent that you are trying to account for the future. What else can this word mean, but that the future will behave as the past has done, given these initial conditions?

That's exactly what I'm trying to do, the only difference is, I am not of the opinion, like you are, that for something to have "bite" or "content" it has to be some sort of metaphysical timeless truth. This leads you into the "circle of bullshit" I outlined earlier. I know the limits of knowledge and this type of investigation just as much as you do. Where I differ with you,however, is that I don't have this dichotomy where metaphysical timeless truth is the only type of truth that has content. No, I know all to well, that the only truth, is the precarious truth that cannot actually prove what will happen in the future. I did away with metaphysical truths a long time ago, so the distinction of truth that has "bite and content" versus truth that does not, is meaningless to me.

The problem with you is that you know metaphysics is trash, but you still use it to judge things. You still frame things in terms of metaphysics. What you have represented in this thread, is a gutteral reaction to metaphysics that has not become self-aware yet.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


That's exactly what I'm trying to do, the only difference is, I am not of the opinion, like you are, that for something to have "bite" or "content" it has to be some sort of metaphysical timeless truth. This leads you into the "circle of bullshit" I outlined earlier. I know the limits of knowledge and this type of investigation just as much as you do. Where I differ with you,however, is that I don't have this dichotomy where metaphysical timeless truth is the only type of truth that has content. No, I know all to well, that the only truth, is the precarious truth that cannot actually prove what will happen in the future. I did away with metaphysical truths a long time ago, so the distinction of truth that has "bite and content" versus truth that does not, is meaningless to me.

But, in what sense is the series of events you mention "unchangeable"? Either you mean it cannot change (which implies some form of natural necessity), or it's an empty term.


The problem with you is that you know metaphysics is trash, but you still use it to judge things. You still frame things in terms of metaphysics. What you have represented in this thread, is a gutteral reaction to metaphysics that has not become self-aware yet.

In fact, the problem is that you have given your own word "unchangeable" insufficient thought

[Dermezel]

Dermezel:



I deny both of these establish what you say they do, and for reasons I outlined in the threads to which I linked, and in that essay.

Well creationists deny the evidence for evolution but that does not a whit to establish their "Earth is 6,000 years old" mantra as anything other then religious delusion.

Again you are a logical positivist who denies any heuristics at all, and such a world view is extremely weak because you cannot even say if a material reality exists outside your head or form basic inductions like whether or not the sun will rise tomorrow.

[JoyDivision]

But, in what sense is the series of events you mention "unchangeable"? Either you mean it cannot change (which implies some form of natural necessity), or it's an empty term.


There's the dichotomy again - Either it's metaphysical truth or it's nothing. I feel like I'm back in my freshman epistemology class. Anyway, you have fun marginalizing what we can do in reference to the fact that we cannot obtain idealized perfection. Don't let anyone else tell you different, harassing everyone based on a profound state of reaction is definitely good philosophy.

Dermezel, it's time to pack up and move camp, buddy. We've diagnosed the problem, addressed the symptom, but the cure lies within. Nothing we can do about that. I'll see you over at the Philosophy section of the philosophy board, we cleaned up what we could, and it's time to let the children play.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


There's the dichotomy again - Either it's metaphysical truth or it's nothing. I feel like I'm back in my freshman epistemology class.

Not at all; what I am saying is that your use of 'unchangeable' is empty unless you fill in the details, and when you do, you will have to appeal to natural necessity to give it content.
We can see this from the way that you refuse to tell us what work this word is doing in your answer.

And, there is no 'dichotomy' here, as you put it, since I have already said that if you remain at the level of description, I'm with you. But, in that case, the word 'unchangeable' is either out of place or it is mere ornamentation.


Anyway, you have fun marginalizing what we can do in reference to the fact that we cannot obtain idealized perfection. Don't let anyone else tell you different, harassing everyone based on a profound state of reaction is definitely good philosophy

Eh?:confused:


Dermezel, it's time to pack up and move camp, buddy. We've diagnosed the problem, addressed the symptom, but the cure lies within. Nothing we can do about that. I'll see you over at the Philosophy section of the philosophy board, we cleaned up what we could, and it's time to let the children play.

I'm sorry; us mere mortals did not know we were in the presence of a deity.http://www.smileyvault.com/albums/basic/smileyvault-worthy.gif

Except, you are so far above the rest of us, you can't make yourself understood -- always assuming there is something there to understand, to begin with...:rolleyes:

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Dermezel:


Well creationists deny the evidence for evolution but that does not a whit to establish their "Earth is 6,000 years old" mantra as anything other then religious delusion.

And what has this got to do with anything I have said?


Again you are a logical positivist who denies any heuristics at all, and such a world view is extremely weak because you cannot even say if a material reality exists outside your head or form basic inductions like whether or not the sun will rise tomorrow.

I'm not a logical positivist, and I defy you to find anything in anything I have posted here or at my site that even remotely implies this.

[JoyDivision]

We can see this from the way that you refuse to tell us what work this word is doing in your answer.I explained in some detail what was meant by this word in post 54, 56, and 58, in fact the entire point these posts was exactly to explain what unchangeable meant. To this you replied "impenetrable text", "my suspicion still stands", as well as "clear as mud". Which means your reply was basically "I dont' agree with you so whatever". While that's fine as a reply, it does not mean you get to come back 10 posts later and say I didn't explain it. Well, you can, but I'm rightly going to think you're just making shit up and in the last grasps of a failed argument.


natural necessity to give it content.Right, say you're not doing that, and then set up the dichotomy two clauses down in the same damn sentence. fuck me, this is ridiculous.


Really, Rosa, you have no worldview and all metaphysics is anthropomorphism and meaningless....LOL so unaware.

[Meridian]

I explained in some detail what was meant by this word in post 54, 56, and 58, in fact the entire point these posts was exactly to explain what unchangeable meant. To this you replied "impenetrable text", "my suspicion still stands", as well as "clear as mud". Which means your reply was basically "I dont' agree with you so whatever". While that's fine as a reply, it does not mean you get to come back 10 posts later and say I didn't explain it. Well, you can, but I'm rightly going to think you're just making shit up and in the last grasps of a failed argument.
The point is that the word makes no sense in this context, because using it only allows a defective line of thought -- no matter how much you try to change its meaning.

All your bickering over 'metaphysical truths', etc. is completely baseless as well.

[JoyDivision]

The point is that the word makes no sense in this context, because using it only allows a defective line of thought -- no matter how much you try to change its meaning.

The point is that the word does make sense in the context because it allows a coherent line of though - unless ofcourse you deny metaphysics while simultaneous making it the seed of "content and bite".


That was fun and not worthless, maybe you can tell us what else the point is.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


I explained in some detail what was meant by this word in post 54, 56, and 58, in fact the entire point these posts was exactly to explain what unchangeable meant. To this you replied "impenetrable text", "my suspicion still stands", as well as "clear as mud". Which means your reply was basically "I dont' agree with you so whatever". While that's fine as a reply, it does not mean you get to come back 10 posts later and say I didn't explain it. Well, you can, but I'm rightly going to think you're just making shit up and in the last grasps of a failed argument.

Ok, so let's have a look at your 'explanation'. Here's 54:


Rosa, sweetie, I don't have "questions" that need to be answered. I have someone telling me that I am dedicated to a position because they say so, and then my responses explaining myself without said positions.


But, the regularity theory cannot tell you why, given cause A, B should follow as opposed to C or D.

Right, because "why" is outside the scope of description, which is the project being undertaken. You're asking me to offer a certain type of analysis that has a very limited scope, and then arguing that this analysis cannot account for things outside it's scope. Well, yeah, I'm describing events, not trying to offer a unified theory of nature. If you want to discuss being and existence and things like "why", then we need to completely shift gears into another discipline, but until that happens, arguing that this description doesn't account for ontological problems is just bad philosophy.

An analogy is something like this: Discussing JTB and having someone say, "well that is problematic because it doesn't tell us why it is the case that A is true rather than not A".


If you now appeal to the necessitarian view, you will have to attribute to natural events human capacities (A made, or forced B to happen)

While I don't, this just isn't correct. One can most definitely think nature unfolds strictly deterministically without anthropomorphizing anything. I.e. the universe is a closed mechanistic system, so the initial conditions set in motion an unchangeable chain of events. This is not necessity from an ontological argument, this is necessity because of observations about the way things work. The initial conditions could have been different so everything could have been different, but after those initial conditions occurred, the chain was in place. To say that "A made B to happen" within this theory is simply the statement that A and B are related by time and causal mechanisms, and A occurred before B in the causal chain. This is not ontologic necessity, this is causal determinancy, they are two very different things. So different that you chase a straw-man.


I do not; I just refer those with whom I am debating to how we use this word in everyday life. Any other use, if it's to do any real work (and not be mere ornamentation), will have to involve an appeal (implicitly or explicitly) to the connotations we already have for this word in the vernacular -- which is why I keep saying you risk descending into anthropomorphism if you try to use this word to depict/explain nature.

I'm not making up these definitions, they are well established and just as common as yours. Unless you are an etymology dynamo and were able to track the word to it's very first usage, then you have no ground to step on here. and even if you were able to do that, there is nothing that reserves that as the definition for all time. But, you are right, I probably do "risk anthropomorphism", but that is only because of the dual definition, and that is something completely different than it being an actual anthropomorphism.


Where am I not 'engaging'? I have already said several times I'm using the word 'determine' as it is employed in every day life, and not just by me. If you can think of another everyday use I have left out, share it with us.

I gave you two in my first damn post.


Why are you attributing to me ideas I do not hold?

Where have I equated mysticism and metaphysics, or even hinted I think the former is a sub-category of the latter (or vice versa)?

I didn't say you did, an I clearly didn't say you did. What I did say is that "unless I am missing something".... You see, if I say unless I'm missing something I am not saying "you said"....I'm saying that I think mysticism doesn't occur without metaphysics.

Bold added.

Can anyone see an explanation of "unchangeable" in there? It's mentioned once, but never explained, as far as I can see.

So, what about 56?




Your use of "unchangeable" suggests you are in the grip of the necessitarian theory, as does your use of "the chain", while your use of "the way things word" suggest you are closet regularist. This is because as soon as we ask "Why can those initial conditions produce a different outcome, why are they 'unchangeable'?" you are going to have to appeal to some form of 'natural necessity', or some form of 'control' of one even by another, so that no alternative event can take its place.

Why can those initial conditions produce a different outcome, why are they 'unchangeable'?"

I just gave you an account devoid of natural necessity and control. Those initial conditions could produce a different outcome, because when someone who ascribes to this theory talks about those initial conditions they are talking about the arrangement of nature. This means that those initial conditions are contingent, to think about them as being different does not violate an apriori rule nor does it create a logical contradiction. That is the test for necessity in this entomological sense of necessity.

Likewise, the conditions that maintain now do not fit this definition of necessity either, but they are causally linked to the initial contingent conditions. So, one would say, not that they are necessary, but that their is causal determinacy. If this theory is true, there is no control here and there is no philosophic necessity either. There is an initial set of contingent conditions that are identical to a system of causal determinancy. This theory does not need to say "control" and would wrong to do so, because the causal determinacy is, combined with other things, what the universe is.


And yet I explicitly said that when you try to give an explanation here (that is, if you go beyond mere description), you will have to descend into anthropomorphism. And if you remain at the level of description, any use of 'determine' is devoid of content.

So after all this time, after everything you've repeated over and over, your goal-post have now shifted to the claim that if I go beyond mere description I will be making anthropomorphic claims. That if I go beyond mere description I will have gone into ontology and metaphysics. Jesus, Rosa, all this hassle for such a simple thing, that a way of investigation notorious for being anti-metaphysical will have problems if it extends itself into metaphysics. Well, yeah. This naive realism shit isn't exactly self-aware, and people who use it aren't trying to do metaphysics with it. All this, and it turns out your objection is that if we discipline shift from a form of analysis that denies the other disipline is meaningful, that same form of analysis won't be able to adequately answer the questions in that other disipline.

Sigh.

As a side note, I offer up an ontology that is not itself anthropomorphic and does not lead to an anthropomorphised nature: Will to Power.

Bold added.

Again this word is mentioned three times, but two of these are by me. Can anyone see an explanation of this word here? I can't...

Well, what about 58?



As I pointed out, just as soon as you try to tell us why these events, with given initial conditions, are "unchangeable" you will have to appeal to some form of natural necessity, or to a term synonymous with it.

Of course, you can always refuse to say, but then the term "unchangeable" will be left with no bite at all, and will thus serve no useful purpose. You might just as well have used "changeable" for all the use it is.

I just explained to you what was meant by "unchangeable", and this either appealed to "natural necessity" or it didn't. I mean at this point there is nothing left to say, I showed you a conception of nature that includes causal determinacy that does not appeal to necessity, and it is either time for you to argue against why it does or accept my narrative. All this "you will have to" is just vacuous fronting that contains no argument.

Instead all the argument you can mount is "unchangeable" will be left with no bite. Well, no shit, that's what I just explained, and yet it was still meaningfully distinguished from changeable because causal chains. You're not even offering a position or an argument at this point, your just saying things that you have previously decided were true without any context or reference to what I have said.

Bye Rosa

Bold added.

A few more mentions of this word, with a claim that it has already been explained, but still no explanation, as far as I can see. Maybe someone with a microscope can check these again...


in fact the entire point these posts was exactly to explain what unchangeable meant. To this you replied "impenetrable text", "my suspicion still stands", as well as "clear as mud". Which means your reply was basically "I dont' agree with you so whatever". While that's fine as a reply, it does not mean you get to come back 10 posts later and say I didn't explain it. Well, you can, but I'm rightly going to think you're just making shit up and in the last grasps of a failed argument.

No, what this means is that you haven't explained a thing yet. Perhaps you are having difficulties with "explain" to match the problems you are having with "unchangeable"?


Right, say you're not doing that, and then set up the dichotomy two clauses down in the same damn sentence. fuck me, this is ridiculous.

No dichotomy, since I am offering you [I]three choices: stay silent (your current ploy), remain in descriptive mode (and admit that "unchangeable" is devoid of meaning"), or admit that you are a closet metaphysician.


Really, Rosa, you have no worldview and all metaphysics is anthropomorphism and meaningless....

Where did I say metaphysics was 'meaningless'?


LOL so unaware.

Indeed, but not yet quite as bad as you.

Must try harder...:)

[JoyDivision]

A few more mentions of this word, with a claim that it has already been explained, but still no explanation, as far as I can see. Maybe someone with a microscope can check these again...



Explination: I just gave you an account devoid of natural necessity and control. Those initial conditions could produce a different outcome, because when someone who ascribes to this theory talks about those initial conditions they are talking about the arrangement of nature. This means that those initial conditions are contingent, to think about them as being different does not violate an apriori rule nor does it create a logical contradiction. That is the test for necessity in this entomological sense of necessity.

Likewise, the conditions that maintain now do not fit this definition of necessity either, but they are causally linked to the initial contingent conditions. So, one would say, not that they are necessary, but that their is causal determinacy. If this theory is true, there is no control here and there is no philosophic necessity either. There is an initial set of contingent conditions that are identical to a system of causal determinancy. This theory does not need to say "control" and would wrong to do so, because the causal determinacy is, combined with other things, what the universe is.




Explination: the universe is a closed mechanistic system, so the initial conditions set in motion an unchangeable chain of events. This is not necessity from an ontological argument, this is necessity because of observations about the way things work. The initial conditions could have been different so everything could have been different, but after those initial conditions occurred, the chain was in place. To say that "A made B to happen" within this theory is simply the statement that A and B are related by time and causal mechanisms, and A occurred before B in the causal chain. This is not ontologic necessity, this is causal determinancy, they are two very different things. So different that you chase a straw-man.
unchangeable chain of events: quite clearly what I have oultined above in very explicit terms is that unchangeable is meant to denote that in a purely mechanistic universe things unfold according to a causal series begun at the initial conditions of the universe. Causal determinancy....I don't know how to make it more clear. It is supposed that the universe is mecahnistic, it simply follows from that after the initial conditions happen there is a series of causal events that will occur in accordance with those initial conditions. I mean, if you set up the same dominoes in a vacuum the exact same way 50 times and push them over in the same way with the same force they are going to fall the same way. The only way you change how they fall given the set of initial conditions, is to take off the controllers, and allow outside influences to act on them. Since the referent "the universe" includes everything in existance, there can be no outside influence, so there is no way to change how it "falls", so it is unchangeable.


Anyway, if you cannot recognize my posts as explination of what "unchangeable' means, then there is a serious disconnect between us. It could be your reading comprehension, it could be my writing, it could just be that we think quite differently, but whatever the case is there is no point in proceeding if you cannot understand what is implied by saying the universe is mechanistic. So why don't you reread this, and let me know one way or another.

[JoyDivision]

No dichotomy, since I am offering you three choices: stay silent (your current ploy), remain in descriptive mode (and admit that "unchangeable" is devoid of meaning"), or admit that you are a closet metaphysician.

Your offering me options...LOL. You have quite clearly stated that you think the two possible explinations of nature are either regularity theory or necessity theory. In the analysis of the former your problem is that it has no "bite" and no "content". In the analysis of the latter your problem is that you think it leads to "anthropomorphisms". This has been borne out in our discussion the half dozen times you've repeated both objections. And both objections are spelled out quite clearly in the literature. From Hume on. What you have done, is set up a distinction where a non-metaphysical account has no "bite" or "content", but a metaphysical account does. You add nothing to the discussion, you just regurgitate the simplest unaware version that bifurcates a classic problem.

However, if one is going to rule out metaphysics, as you do, and further one is going to claim that necessity theory is metaphysical, then in what sense can you say regularity theory has no "bite" or "content". According to your claims, it follows that the strength of regularity theory, is not only the only strength possible, but also the only strength that could exist. What this means is that you do not get to judge it as having no "bite", because you've done away with everything you can judge it against. Yet, the frame you have set up, does lead you to judge it against the strength of metaphysical claims, and since you deny metaphysical claims, this means you are in a state of reaction.



Where did I say metaphysics was 'meaningless'?Is there another interpretation of claiming metaphysics is the result of the misuse of language by the ruling class, and that it's all anthropomorphism? A quick search of the forum yeilds various results including things like calling metaphysics "meaningless jargon" and the definitive "as meaningless as any other metaphysical notion". So, I have proven my suspecions, you are extremely intellectually dishonest, and I can no longer give you the benefit of the doubt in matters of taste. I layed out 3 options of why this disconnect occurs, the 4th options was that you are lack intellectual integrity, and that is the option that has been confirmed. I'm done playing your silly games, get to the point, as I will not indulge you playing dumb and dishonest anymore.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


Your offering me options...LOL. You have quite clearly stated that you think the two possible explanations of nature are either regulative theory or necessity theory. In the analysis of the former your problem is that it has no "bite" and no "content". In the analysis of the latter your problem is that you think it leads to "anthropomorphisms". This has been borne out in our discussion the half dozen times you've repeated both objections. And both objections are spelled out quite clearly in the literature. From Hume on. What you have done, is set up a distinction where a non-metaphysical account has no "bite" or "content", but a metaphysical account does. You add nothing to the discussion, you just regurgitate the simplest unaware version that bifurcates a classic problem.

Indeed, I am, since you seem to be rather unclear. And thanks for the above, but we are still waiting for you to tell us what you mean by "unchangeable".


Is there another interpretation of claiming metaphysics is the result of the misuse of language by the ruling class, and that it's all anthropomorphism? A quick search of the forum yields various results including things like calling metaphysics "meaningless jargon" and the definitive "as meaningless as any other metaphysical notion". So, I have proven my suspicions, you are extremely intellectually dishonest, and I can no longer give you the benefit of the doubt in matters of taste. I layed out 3 options of why this disconnect occurs, the 4th options was that you are lack intellectual integrity, and that is the option that has been confirmed.

Yes there is, and if you read my work, you'd know what I am saying about metaphysics. Now, you do not have to read it, no one has to, obviously; but only an idiot would pass comment on someone else's ideas without first reading what they had to say.

Now, I have indeed used phrases like "meaningless jargon", but you forget the distinction I have also drawn (one derived from Wittgenstein) between the sense of indicative sentences and the meaning of words. This is central to my criticism of metaphysics, and why I do not call it meaningless. In fact I call it non-sensical.

You can find more on that here:

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%2012_01.htm

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page_13_03.htm

Again, you do not have to read the above; you can always prefer to remain in outer darkness...:(


I'm done playing your silly games, get to the point, as I will not indulge you playing dumb and dishonest anymore.

You said something like this before, but back-sassed pretty quickly.

How can we believe you this time?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD, sorry, I missed this:


unchangeable chain of events: quite clearly what I have oultined above in very explicit terms is that unchangeable is meant to denote that in a purely mechanistic universe things unfold according to a causal series begun at the initial conditions of the universe. Causal determinancy....I don't know how to make it more clear. It is supposed that the universe is mecahnistic, it simply follows from that after the initial conditions happen there is a series of causal events that will occur in accordance with those initial conditions. I mean, if you set up the same dominoes in a vacuum the exact same way 50 times and push them over in the same way with the same force they are going to fall the same way. The only way you change how they fall given the set of initial conditions, is to take off the controllers, and allow outside influences to act on them. Since the referent "the universe" includes everything in existance, there can be no outside influence, so there is no way to change how it "falls", so it is unchangeable.

In here is buried much metaphysics, for you use terms like "causal determinanacy", which, as I have already noted, imply that things could not be other than they were.

Now, as soon as we ask why this is so, you either have no answer (which means the terms you have used are mere ornamentation, as I noted aboev) or they imply natural necessity.

As I pointed out to anticapitalist, who tried a somewhat similar ploy:


Well, the problem is that theorists use words like "causation", "necessary" and "determine" as a shorthand to save them filling in the details. However, when these are filled in, their theory soon descends into anthropomorphism, that is, into attributing to nature a will.

Now, taking your example of the gun. Here we have a series of events, E(1), E(2), E(3),..., E(n). But as soon as we ask "Why does E(k+1) and not D(1) follow E(k)?" there are only a few possible answers.

1) It's just a fact about nature.

2) D(1) can't happen.

Now, if 1) is the case, then we have no explanation, just a description. This is the brick wall that JoyDivision kept hitting. Anyone who chooses 1) has no way of knowing whether nature will take a different course tomorrow, since our knowledge of it up to now has been based on a premature generalisation.

Any attempt to say why nature will not, or cannot take a different course tomorrow collapses into 2).

As far as 2) is concerned, the traditional response has involved an appeal to logical or metaphysical reasons why, say, D(1) can't happen, and E(k+1) must always happen (unless there is some countervailing cause at work).

These have involved an appeal to 'natural necessity', 'determining causes', 'laws of nature'..., or the one defending this tradition just thumps the table (which is where JoyDivision finally ended up).

But, as soon as we asked for details behind the use of these words, we are faced with certain events and/or abstract principles controlling events or nature.

However, when we then ask: How can one event control another, and why does the second always do as it is told? the only reply is either (A) to loop back to 1) above, or (B) it involves the use of terms that imply nature is intelligent, or that each event is a little mind pre-programmed to do what it was told to do (this was Leibniz's way out).

So, this is my challenge: every traditional theory that attempts to address this pseudo-problem either collapses into 1) or into 2).

And that is why it has remained unsolved to this day (after over two thousand years of failed attempts) and why we are no nearer a solution than the Ancient Greeks were -- it's a pseudo-problem that as arisen out of a misuse of language.

Just as Marx noted...

Now, you introduce human choice in here, but this can't always be the case, for natural events are not always under our control.

But, let us take our example. Here your pulling the trigger becomes event E(0), and as soon as we ask "What were the events that preceded this that made E(0) happen?" we face intractable problems.

There can only be two answers:

3) There were none, and

4) Events E(-1), E(-2), (E-3),...,E(-n).

But, 4) collapses into 1) or 2) above, and 3) divorces the individual concerned from nature.

So, yours is no solution.

And the same can be said of your non-solution.

[JoyDivision]

In here is buried much metaphysics, for you use terms like "causal determinanacy", which, as I have already noted, imply that things could not be other than they were.Seriously, Rosa, you think causal determinacy implies things could not be other than they were, and you hassle me for 3 posts about defining "unchangeable". Good fucking god you are worthless.

Anyway, you have my response to your claim that a "causal determinancy" account of nature implies metaphysics above. At this point you can either respond to it or not. I really don't care at this point, but repeating the claim does not count as a legitimate response by any standard.

[black magick hustla]

While I don't, this just isn't correct. One can most definitely think nature unfolds stictly deterministically without anthropomorphizing anything. I.e. the universe is a closed mechanistic system, so the initial conditions set in motion an unchangeable chain of events. This is not necessity from an ontological argument, this is necessity because of observations about the way things work. The initial conditions could have been different so everything could have been different, but after those initial conditions occured, the chain was in place. To say that "A made B to happen" within this theory is simply the statement that A and B are related by time and causal mechanisms, and A occurred before B in the causal chain. This is not ontologic necessity, this is causal determinancy, they are two very different things. So different that you chase a straw-man.



This is the newtonian view of the world. Check Laplace's demon. I reject all those all encompasive philosophical narratives but even scientists today have a different world viiew. Quantum mechanical formalism prevents the idea of complete mechanical determinacy, because there is an element of randomness. In physics speak, there are numerous possibilities were a particle can be measured, but beyond the act of measurement, there is the unknown.

[JoyDivision]

This is the newtonian view of the world. Check Laplace's demon. I reject all those all encompasive philosophical narratives but even scientists today have a different world viiew. Quantum mechanical formalism prevents the idea of complete mechanical determinacy, because there is an element of randomness. In physics speak, there are numerous possibilities were a particle can be measured, but beyond the act of measurement, there is the unknown.

Are you familiar with the Bohmian or "De-Broglie-Bohm" interpretaion of quantum mechanics?

According to SEP, it is a causal interpretation of quantum mechanics that does away with the special status of the observer and offers a description that is just as strong as the Copenhagen interpretation.

Here's the link, it's an interesting read. I must admit, though, when they move from concept to math I simply do not understand.

Link in the next post

Anyway, I don't know your level of expertise on this subject, but do you know why one theory would be preferred over the other? SEP claims bohmian is actually preferred among experts, but pretty much every source(usually pop physicists) I find on the subject doesn't even mention the Bohmian interpretation.

[JoyDivision]

I had to wait to reach 25 to post links, and conveniently this is the 25th post, so cheers, and here it is:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-bohm/#hist

[black magick hustla]

I had to wait to reach 25 to post links, and conveniently this is the 25th post, so cheers, and here it is:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-bohm/#hist

I think it depends who do you ask. I think the orthodox position today is that the act of observation "creates" the measurement (collapses the wave function), rather than the measurement already being there. This is what I read in my quantum mechanics textbook and what my professors said. A lot of them take the copenhaguen interpretation too.

But it depends on the fields. I imagine experimentalists are more prone to the above than theorists. Wikipedia says that a survey of leading theorists said that most of them believed in the many worlds. I think experimentalists are generally more scientific than theorists so tbh I think they have a more sober interpretation.
\

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


Seriously, Rosa, you think causal determinacy implies things could not be other than they were, and you hassle me for 3 posts about defining "unchangeable". Good fucking god you are worthless.

Well, you certainly can't explain your 'theory' without implying natural necessity -- buried in terms like "unchangeable" and "causal determinancy".


Anyway, you have my response to your claim that a "causal determinancy" account of nature implies metaphysics above. At this point you can either respond to it or not. I really don't care at this point, but repeating the claim does not count as a legitimate response by any standard.

But your 'response' simply evaded the issues.

[JoyDivision]

Men and women of thought are going to look back at this moment with amazement. Because you did it Rosa, you found the magic number that transforms ad nauseam from an informal fallacy into a formal proof.

In other news:


But your 'response' simply evaded the issues. LOL, "evaded the issue". I was challenged with describing a causal account of nature without anthropomorphisms, and you describe my response as "evading". Did I evade because it wasn't an anthropomorphism, or for another reason. Haha. Maybe I evaded because when I explained what causal determinancy meant, you questioned what "unchangeable" meant, and then when I explained what unchangeable meant, you inexplicably went full circle and again asked me to explain what "causal determinacy" meant. And the concluded I was evading. Classic move, I think Plato described something like that in the allegory of the cave, I think that's what one uses to reach the sun.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


Men and women of thought are going to look back at this moment with amazement. Because you did it Rosa, you found the magic number that transforms ad nauseam from an informal fallacy into a formal proof.

I see, so you still can't tell us what you mean by "unchangeable", but in order to distract attention from that fact, you turn the debate personal.

Except you try this ploy once again:


LOL, "evaded the issue". I was challenged with describing a causal account of nature without anthropomorphisms, and you describe my response as "evading". Did I evade because it wasn't an anthropomorphism, or for another reason. Haha. Maybe I evaded because when I explained what causal determinancy meant, you questioned what "unchangeable" meant, and then when I explained what unchangeable meant, you inexplicably went full circle and again asked me to explain what "causal determinacy" meant. And the concluded I was evading. Classic move, I think Plato described something like that in the allegory of the cave, I think that's what one uses to reach the sun.

And yet, this 'account' implies you are a closet necessitarian, as I showed -- which you simply ignored.

[JoyDivision]

Rosa, you do realize, don't you, that your entire argument is "You're this, because I showed so previously".

Anyway, of course I turn the debate personal. Honest discussion did not stop you from simply repeating the same phrase over and over again, and generally being a dishonest rat, so naturally I had to try abuse. Nope, good old Rosa, just keeps telling us she's right without giving us a single point in support of it.

You're a preposterous specimen. Try to derail the discussion by referencing previous work, and then when that work is challenged, you just repeat that you are right over and over and over again. You are a forum Troll, no two ways about it.

Anyway, I'm out of maneuvers, if you actually have the information you claim to have, there sure is no way of extracting it. I won't pass judgement on which is the case, because it simply doesn't matter.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


Rosa, you do realize, don't you, that your entire argument is "You're this, because I showed so previously".

And if I did, so what?


Anyway, of course I turn the debate personal. Honest discussion did not stop you from simply repeating the same phrase over and over again, and generally being a dishonest rat, so naturally I had to try abuse. Nope, good old Rosa, just keeps telling us she's right without giving us a single point in support of it.

You're a preposterous specimen. Try to derail the discussion by referencing previous work, and then when that work is challenged, you just repeat that you are right over and over and over again. You are a forum Troll, no two ways about it.

Anyway, I'm out of maneuvers, if you actually have the information you claim to have, there sure is no way of extracting it. I won't pass judgement on which is the case, because it simply doesn't matter.

So, still no explanation from you what you mean by "unchangeable" (that does not imply you are a closet necessitarian), I see...:(

[JoyDivision]

I explained it, and your response was to go full circle and simply assert without explination, yet one more time, that "causal determinacy" has metaphysics "buried" in it.

Honestly, Rosa, do you think there is anything I can do with that in terms of continuing the discussion. You can't possibly.

As for calling me a closet "necessicistarian", well, in the initial post where I defended this position, I said I didn't necessarily agree with it, but I did think it was possible to argue a version of it that was not anthropomorphized. Toward that goal I made several posts, none of which you addressed, all of which you simply responded to by claiming you're right.


And if I did, so what?

It means your trolling this thread, and me acting like I have in this thread, is more than you deserve. You deserve to be ignored, but luckily for you, I was willing to work at cracking this nut, but now, whatever goodwill motivated that is now gone. That's right, it took good will to even attack you.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


I explained it, and your response was to go full circle and simply assert without explination, yet one more time, that "causal determinacy" has metaphysics "buried" in it.

As indeed it has -- or it's mere decoration and does no work.


Honestly, Rosa, do you think there is anything I can do with that in terms of continuing the discussion. You can't possibly.

As for calling me a closet "necessicistarian", well, in the initial post where I defended this position, I said I didn't necessarily agree with it, but I did think it was possible to argue a version of it that was not anthropomorphized. Toward that goal I made several posts, none of which you addressed, all of which you simply responded to by claiming you're right.

Which posts did I not respond to? If you are right, I'll correct that oversight, and apologise.


It means your trolling this thread, and me acting like I have in this thread, is more than you deserve. You deserve to be ignored, but luckily for you, I was willing to work at cracking this nut, but now, whatever goodwill motivated that is now gone. That's right, it took good will to even attack you.

It can't be trolling if I did indeed show what I claimed I showed.

It's up to uo to show I did not.

[JoyDivision]

It can't be trolling if I did indeed show what I claimed I showed.

It's up to uo to show I did not.

Given that you are claiming that all accounts of nature that involve a mechanistic conception of the universe are anthropomorphic, the obvious way in which one shows this is wrong is by providing such an explanation that is not anthrompomorphic. Toward this end I made several posts in which I attempted to excise anthropomorphisms. Now, standards of discourse would demand that you would then point out where in the account I gave anthropomorphisms occurred, and I would then defend them with more explination, and we would continue untill either I ran out of explinations or you could no longer find anthropomorphisms. This is the good faith progression of our discussion, however this did no occur.

You made your claim about all mechanistic accounts, I offered an account that I thought excised anthropomorphisms, and instead of arguing, like you ought to have, where anthropomorphisms occured in my account, you simply repeated your initial claim over and over again. Hence, your troll-like behavior.

At this point, it is not up to me to show you did not, it is up to you to either stop repeated your claim forever, or address my account and make a case that it has anthropomorphisms. For example, the fact that my account is popularly called a deterministic account, ought not be where a good faith argument attacks what I have said. As "deterministic" is a name holder, it is a general type of argument that holds the universe is causal.

That can mean many things, it can mean an anthropomorphised understanding of nature utilizing conatus, or it can mean that antecedent conditions plus the "laws" of nature are the whole account of nature's behavior within which the interaction of existents are simply tranfers of energy.

Obviously at this point there is the problem of induction, but inductions don't have to be anthropomorphisms by any standard. It could just be that I think induction is a viable form of reasoning when talking about observations since it is the only type of reasoning available.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


Given that you are claiming that all accounts of nature that involve a mechanistic conception of the universe are anthropomorphic, the obvious way in which one shows this is wrong is by providing such an explanation that is not anthropomorphic. Toward this end I made several posts in which I attempted to excise anthropomorphisms. Now, standards of discourse would demand that you would then point out where in the account I gave anthropomorphisms occurred, and I would then defend them with more explanation, and we would continue until either I ran out of explanations or you could no longer find anthropomorphisms. This is the good faith progression of our discussion, however this did no occur.

Where did I say this:


you are claiming that all accounts of nature that involve a mechanistic conception of the universe are anthropomorphic

Nowhere, that's where.


Now, standards of discourse would demand that you would then point out where in the account I gave anthropomorphisms occurred, and I would then defend them with more explanation, and we would continue until either I ran out of explanations or you could no longer find anthropomorphisms.

In fact, I challenged you to tell us what you meant by "unchangeable", and all you could offer was "causal determinancy", at which point I alleged that this is where natural necessity must creep in.

You have only to options available to you at this point:

1) Admit that your 'theory' does in the end depend on some form of natural necessity (and thus on the idea that nature is controlled by a mind or a will of some sort), or

2) Refuse to explain what these terms mean, which will leave them merely ornamental -- which in turn will mean that you haven't explained anything, merely described things (and in a prejudicial manner, too).


You made your claim about all mechanistic accounts, I offered an account that I thought excised anthropomorphisms, and instead of arguing, like you ought to have, where anthropomorphisms occurred in my account, you simply repeated your initial claim over and over again.

Not so; my criticisms apply to all forms of account, mechanistic and non-mechanistic.


Hence, your troll-like behavior

You keep saying this, but it is plainly based on a) misreading what I have posted (you think I am merely criticising mechanistic systems), and b) ignoring the above two options (which I have posted several times).

So, if anyone is trolling, it's you.


At this point, it is not up to me to show you did not, it is up to you to either stop repeated your claim forever, or address my account and make a case that it has anthropomorphisms. For example, the fact that my account is popularly called a deterministic account, ought not be where a good faith argument attacks what I have said. As "deterministic" is a name holder, it is a general type of argument that holds the universe is causal.

Yes, I realise that; this sort of account is popular among mathematicians (of which I am one) and physicists, but that does not make it anything other than descriptive, and thus not the least bit 'deterministic' -- unless we mean by this: a system by means of which we can determine what happens. But, then that just brings us back to my original point: that 'determine' applies only to what human beings can do, decide or infer. It cannot, therefore, apply to nature -- unless we attribute human characteristics to nature, as I alleged.


That can mean many things, it can mean an anthropomorphised understanding of nature utilizing conatus, or it can mean that antecedent conditions plus the "laws" of nature are the whole account of nature's behavior within which the interaction of existents are simply transfers of energy.

Obviously at this point there is the problem of induction, but inductions don't have to be anthropomorphisms by any standard. It could just be that I think induction is a viable form of reasoning when talking about observations since it is the only type of reasoning available.

Well, my criticisms do not depend on induction.

[JoyDivision]

you are claiming that all accounts of nature that involve a mechanistic conception of the universe are anthropomorphic Nowhere, that's where.

Right, so this is another problem with you, you are either blatantly deceitful which causes you to constantly derail the discussion, or you are blissfully unaware of the implications of what you say.

You have outlined above in quite explicit details that you think causal accounts of nature fall into two trends: regularity theory or necessity theory. You have then claimed, quite explicitly, that necessity theory forces one into an anthropomorphism. Mechanistic accounts of nature are causal accounts of nature, and they certainly do not fall under regularity theory, which means they fall under "necessity theory"(to be specific, they are a particular type of causal account that falls under the giant "deterministic" umbrella), so according to your own distinctions they are based on anthropomorphisms.

So yeah, you haven't written the words, but this entire thread has been you arguing for it. So, if you don't mind, quit being intellectually dishonest and actually address what I wrote for once.

Once you achieve this very basic goal, I will respond to the rest of your post.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


Right, so this is another problem with you, you are either blatantly deceitful which causes you to constantly derail the discussion, or you are blissfully unaware of the implications of what you say.

How can I be 'deceitful' if it's you who tells fibs about my ideas?


You have outlined above in quite explicit details that you think causal accounts of nature fall into two trends: regularity theory or necessity theory. You have then claimed, quite explicitly, that necessity theory forces one into an anthropomorphism. Mechanistic accounts of nature are causal accounts of nature, and they certainly do not fall under regularity theory, which means they fall under "necessity theory"(to be specific, they are a particular type of causal account that falls under the giant "deterministic" umbrella), so according to your own distinctions they are based on anthropomorphisms.


So yeah, you haven't written the words, but this entire thread has been you arguing for it. So, if you don't mind, quit being intellectually dishonest and actually address what I wrote for once.

So, you admit you fibbed.


Once you achieve this very basic goal, I will respond to the rest of your post

Can't wait...:rolleyes:

[JoyDivision]

Hey troll, if something is implied by what you say, then you are infact dedicated to the position. Hey troll, if something is implied what you have said, then you have implicitly claimed it.

Even when you're confronted with you intellectual dishonesty, you continue to be intellectually dishonest. This is as pathetic as it gets.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

JD:


Hey troll, if something is implied by what you say, then you are infact dedicated to the position. Hey troll, if something is implied what you have said, then you have implicitly claimed it.

Still fibbing, I see.


Pathetic.

Stop being so hard on yourself.:(

[A.R.Amistad]

The argument is confusing facticity and existence. There are some things, like our nationality, our current economic system, etc. that we cannot change by ourselves. Thats faciticty. But we still have free will. People do make choices based on their facticity and they do have consequences. Facticity can even be an obstacle to the choices of a person, but they choose nonetheless. And yes, physical limitations come into play, but physical limitations are material and therefore part of our existance. All that is needed is to adress and realise your physical limitations, understand the nature of your faciticity and go from there. There is no human nature, only a human condition. This is one of the many reasons I have chosen to be a communist. I believe that society should be put on a course tht leads them to a world free of subjective coercion, which is what a classless society would do. I also think that a person is reaching toward their highest potential when they seek to overcome themselves and challenge their facticity, in essence, become a Rebel (as Camus would've put it) and seek to work with other people in society (through a class, party, state, etc.) to change that facticity. Don't tell me what you are running from, tell me what you are running to. And in conclusion we are doomed to be free, so lets throw off our chains.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

^^^There is much here with which I agree, but that is only because your account by-passes the traditional approach to 'free will and determinism'.

[A.R.Amistad]

^^^There is much here with which I agree, but that is only because your account by-passes the traditional approach to 'free will and determinism'.

With what points do you disagree?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

For a start I'd avoid the use of the phrase 'free will'; it has far too many connotations that drift it into the traditional approach to this 'problem'.

[A.R.Amistad]

Could I instead use, say, Sartre's definition of "Freedom?"

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Why introduce Sartre, for goodness sake? He is marginally less confused than Heidegger.

[A.R.Amistad]

I still don't understand your criticism, I need something concrete here. You said you agreed with a lot that was said up there but that I should use a different concept than free will, yet I believe that our will is free, that we have the ability to make our own essence. What is your criticism?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

I have no criticism of what you posted, other than the one I mentioned.

[A.R.Amistad]

Well, I completely reject the idea of determinism as a way of giving meaning to life. I believe in "free will" insofar as it relates to the essence of life, ie, how people act, what behaviour people exert, goals that people make for themselves. I do recognize (as do all existentialists) that outside forces do play a role, and a major role, in how people choose, and to ignore facticity would be hopeless and ridiculous. But just because subjective and absurd forces do influence us doesn't mean we don't make the choice. My main thing is that I deny the existence of any kind of a "human nature," I do not believe we are born with inherent personality traits, I certainly don't think any sort of supernatural "creator" has made a plan for us and I don't think that life has a meaning in and of itself. For these reasons, I say that all life has the freedom to choose that which is subjective, but whatever they choose will be influenced by the material forces of existence and the subjective, non-material forces of facticity. That is how I view 'free will.'

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Well, that's not as good an outline as the first one you gave.

[A.R.Amistad]

To put it simply, people make their own history (free will) but they do not make it as they would like to (facticity)

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

As far as that goes, I agree.:)

Except, lose the 'free will'.:(

[anticap]

people make their own history (free will)

That doesn't resemble any definition of "free will" that I'm familiar with. But more importantly, it's completely useless as a definition. It reminds me of a theist defining "god" as "everything."

[A.R.Amistad]

The Existential philosophers give emphasis on the individual and how one relates to the world. They are interested in the subjective and inter-subjective experience of being human. Human beings are free to choose what to make of themselves; they are responsible in choosing their own course of action; they are limited in their finite world, yet, they can live their own meaning and interpretation; they live in an uncertain world which has limitations such as laws, codes of society, illness and death, yet, by recognising their individuality and potentialities they can choose to live authentically. http://flower888.tripod.com/id12.html

Maybe I'm confusing freedom and free will, but I don't think so. What we mean by freedom is that within the realm of life in the universe, we have the free will to make our own essence, to make of ourselves what we want to, to create our own history. It doesn't mean we have the power to fly.

[anticap]

Maybe I'm confusing freedom and free will, but I don't think so. What we mean by freedom is that within the realm of life in the universe, we have the free will to make our own essence, to make of ourselves what we want to, to create our own history.

That's a lot of pretty words. Too bad they don't make sense.

Here, let me try to rephrase: "Freedom means that the will, which is, ultimately, an expression of brain activity and therefore of particles, is nevertheless unlike every other particle in the universe, and is unencumbered by such inconveniences as causality; and that this supernatural faculty of ours (never mind from whence it came, just be glad we've got it, baby!) is able therefore to generate our own personal realities, which spring forth fully-formed from betwixt our ears, without regard for material reality."

Hey! I guess we do agree on the definition!

To me, "free will" implies that a magical being somehow managed to step outside the causal chain (Rosa will hate that wording, but I hope she'll forgive my limited vocabulary and remember that I don't mean to imply a universal "will"). This, to me, is literal nonsense. When we ask how this is supposed to have happened, what is it about Homo sapiens that allowed this amazing faculty to take root, the best we can expect is for some wiseass to suggest that we have "free will" because we can imagine it. Then, after a few moments of tittering, people begin to come to terms with the fact that they are apes, that they are not made of magic pixie dust, and that if their toenail clippings don't have "free will," then neither do they.

I'm big on freedom of the will, however, which, to me, means allowing a person's life to unfold, to the extent possible given the realities of communal life, unimpeded by forces that they don't welcome.


It doesn't mean we have the power to fly.

But of course, no denier of "free will" could ever believe that you would be so foolish as to make that claim, despite the blithering idiocy of the doctrine itself. So I can't see why you've raised it. It's certainly no straw man of mine. Perhaps you're projecting?

[Meridian]

Here, let me try to rephrase: "Freedom means that the will, which is, ultimately, an expression of brain activity and therefore of particles, is nevertheless unlike every other particle in the universe, and is unencumbered by such inconveniences as causality; and that this supernatural faculty of ours (never mind from whence it came, just be glad we've got it, baby!) is able therefore to generate our own personal realities, which spring forth fully-formed from betwixt our ears, without regard for material reality."That seemed like a lot of confused ideas. I don't think you could say that the will is an expression of brain activity. And by this I mean that we don't use the word "will" that way. If the will is only the expression of brain activity, what is the brain activity an expression of? I do not claim either, though, that will is something super-natural (whatever that is supposed to mean).

This is jumbled and hard to consider, because the words "will", "freedom", "causality", etc., have very different meanings depending on the context they appear in. However, when used functionally, and normally, they don't 'reveal' anything metaphysical.



I'm big on freedom of the will, however, which, to me, means allowing a person's life to unfold, to the extent possible given the realities of communal life, unimpeded by forces that they don't welcome.Which is the functional meaning behind the term "free will" (when it is not applied in a non-sensical way). Consider "she did it by her own free will" for example. It simply means what you stated, no metaphysics can be inferred from it.

[anticap]

That seemed like a lot of confused ideas. I don't think you could say that the will is an expression of brain activity.

Would you prefer "manifestation"? I'll readily concede that the English language sucks eggs for these purposes. One can hardly speak without appearing to affirm the supernatural. Let's roll with that then. So, what is the will a manifestation of? You can't answer "the will," because then you've gone in a circle. Is it a manifestation of lung activity? Of the volcanic activity on Venus? It's brain activity; "you" are brain activity.


And by this I mean that we don't use the word "will" that way.

But we do, in these threads. If all we're talking about here ultimately boils down to nothing more profound than the title of a Blind Faith song (http://www.oldielyrics.com/lyrics/blind_faith/do_what_you_like.html), then there's hardly reason for these threads to drag on for dozens of pages, as they inevitably do.


If the will is only the expression of brain activity, what is the brain activity an expression of?

Uh, whoops, I guess I jumped the gun before. Well I'll keep rolling with "manifestation," since it makes no difference as long as it's understood that I don't mean to imply a "universal will" or any such nonsense. The brain is a manifestation of life. (I'm no biologist.) Life is a manifestation of... primordial sludge? (Again...) And so on. Posit your favorite scenario, I don't care. The point is that the will is simply a piece of that puzzle, not something outside it all, as the free-will kooks claim (though they often smuggle it in under a veil of pseudo-science).


I do not claim either, though, that will is something super-natural (whatever that is supposed to mean).

Well that's a relief. :thumbup1:


This is jumbled and hard to consider, because the words "will", "freedom", "causality", etc., have very different meanings depending on the context they appear in. However, when used functionally, and normally, they don't 'reveal' anything metaphysical.

But again, that's not what we're doing here, are we?



I'm big on freedom of the will, however, which, to me, means allowing a person's life to unfold, to the extent possible given the realities of communal life, unimpeded by forces that they don't welcome.

Which is the functional meaning behind the term "free will" (when it is not applied in a non-sensical way). Consider "she did it by her own free will" for example. It simply means what you stated, no metaphysics can be inferred from it.

And yet again, that colloquial sense is not what these threads are about. They're about the nonsensical doctrine which claims essentially what I said, albeit with my own personal flair. :cool:

[Meridian]

Would you prefer "manifestation"? I'll readily concede that the English language sucks eggs for these purposes. One can hardly speak without appearing to affirm the supernatural. Let's roll with that then. So, what is the will a manifestation of? You can't answer "the will," because then you've gone in a circle. Is it a manifestation of lung activity? Of the volcanic activity on Venus? It's brain activity; "you" are brain activity.
No, I do not think "manifestation" differs much from "representation" here. In fact, "manifestation" may present more clearly the metaphysical idea at work. And I do not think the English language is at fault, more likely its use. I think it is misconceived to try and answer the question "what is the will a manifestation of?", because it doesn't make sense.

To be able to answer that question, we will need a concept of "the will". But the term only makes sense when used in a meaningful sentence, in which case we 'give' it sense. Therefore it is misconceived also to try and understand "the will", and to offer an account of what it is. The question "did she do it out of her own free will?" makes sense, but not the question "what is 'the will'?". It is like asking "how nine is red?".


And yet again, that colloquial sense is not what these threads are about. They're about the nonsensical doctrine which claims essentially what I said, albeit with my own personal flair.
And those who hold those ideas also misuse the term "will", etc.

[A.R.Amistad]

Anticap


Here, let me try to rephrase: "Freedom means that the will, which is, ultimately, an expression of brain activity and therefore of particles, is nevertheless unlike every other particle in the universe, and is unencumbered by such inconveniences as causality; and that this supernatural faculty of ours (never mind from whence it came, just be glad we've got it, baby!) is able therefore to generate our own personal realities, which spring forth fully-formed from betwixt our ears, without regard for material reality."

Hey! I guess we do agree on the definition!

To me, "free will" implies that a magical being somehow managed to step outside the causal chain (Rosa will hate that wording, but I hope she'll forgive my limited vocabulary and remember that I don't mean to imply a universal "will"). This, to me, is literal nonsense. When we ask how this is supposed to have happened, what is it about Homo sapiens that allowed this amazing faculty to take root, the best we can expect is for some wiseass to suggest that we have "free will" because we can imagine it. Then, after a few moments of tittering, people begin to come to terms with the fact that they are apes, that they are not made of magic pixie dust, and that if their toenail clippings don't have "free will," then neither do they.

I'm big on freedom of the will, however, which, to me, means allowing a person's life to unfold, to the extent possible given the realities of communal life, unimpeded by forces that they don't welcome.

Again, I don't really see any reason why we should be opposed on this issue of free will, or freedom of the will. When you make the comparison to stepping outside the casual chain, I don't really see free will as being that supernatural seeming. You make a good point is posing the question as "how" instead of "why." I have absolutely no problem with anyone explaining to me how the human condition came about, or how human existence even came to be. Its when people start telling me why it happened that sparks fly. If you are going to explain to me how the brain functions, what the scientific reasoning is behind how the brain works to produce things, thats cool. But it is just as absurd to try to say that the brain exerts some sort "happiness particle" or "greed particle" that is separate from ourselves. This is what I interpret from people who say they are anti-free will. They seem to think that every action and thought that we have can be captured like fairy dust and put in a test tube to be examined (such as objectivism). I am not saying that "if you will it, you can do it." I am saying that, in the realm of human emotions, actions and essence we have free will. But that free will is contained in a sort of cage that is facticity and existence.

[JoyDivision]

To me, "free will" implies that a magical being somehow managed to step outside the causal chain (Rosa will hate that wording, but I hope she'll forgive my limited vocabulary and remember that I don't mean to imply a universal "will"). This, to me, is literal nonsense.

I don't get this move. You start by defining free will as this unobtainable imaginary thing, point out that that unobtainable imaginary thing is in fact both unobtainable and imaginary, and then conclude that free will is literal nonsense. Why not put forth a genuine attempt at defining what human free will is, one that uses terms and concepts that fit your worldview?

This way in which you approach the subject is archaic, you are getting caught up in the same thing that Rosa is....defining the problem in terms of ancient philosophers with robustly metaphysical worldviews, when a grounded science based approach is available.

I mean, the question of free will is completely different today than it was when people were putting forth "magical beings". We are not not approaching the topic like Desartes, we are not asking what add-on to biology is necessary for us to have absolute control over that biology. Rather, we are saying that we think we are probably all biology, and given that assumption, what part of that biology accounts for this feeling of free will that we all have. Do you see how the question has changed? We don't have to approach it as a metaphysical question, because we have a pretty good scientific understanding of how biology works, so why do you still approach it as a metaphysical question only to outright reject it, when a grounded approach is available?



Freedom means that the will, which is, ultimately, an expression of brain activity and therefore of particles, is nevertheless unlike every other particle in the universe, and is unencumbered by such inconveniences as causality; and that this supernatural faculty of ours (never mind from whence it came, just be glad we've got it, baby!) is able therefore to generate our own personal realities, which spring forth fully-formed from betwixt our ears, without regard for material reality

Why would free will being true entail that causality no longer applies? Why again do you define things only to claim they don't exist. Why, rather, is free will not a conept that applies to the mental, even if that mental stuff is just physical stuff considered another way.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

^^^But we are still waiting for an explanation of "unchangeable".:(