Believe Determinism 100%

Note the follow forums:
Determinism: http://able2know.org/topic/15508-1
Free Will: http://able2know.org/topic/152015-1

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@Pronounce,

Even if things are determined would it matter? Either I don't believe it and act as if I have free will. Or I do believe things are determined and act as if I have free will. Actions have consequences determined or not and that is what we base our choices on.... well that and ideology.

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@GoshisDead,

OK, makes sense. So GoshisDead do you know of any value in hashing philosophical theories like determinism?

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@Pronounce,

There is value in philosophy of religion, because many religions have free will/sin as a core doctrine. There is value in bio-cultural and bio-social studies because an issue like this if firmly established would change the way people studied and understood biology and culture. Legally this is a big deal, if no one is ultimately responsible for their acts how can they be punished for them. But considering that it is unlikely that we could ever know, then there is no real value other than fulfilling curiosity

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@GoshisDead,

Well said. I agree with you there there is need to discuss such topics in terms of culture and law.

I'm curious about whether you think an individual would find any benefit from coming to some firm resolution about free-will, or not. It would seem that for individuals to have an opinion about ethical issues there would need to be some sort of resolution on this topic. I suppose it could be tentative while they work out the details.

Oh, and thank you for your replies (BTW), as it seems others aren't that much interested in this topic.

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@Pronounce,

Well as i stated most decision made under the guise of free will are decisions made from a set ideology or reasoned from a specific set of consequences or from a set of experiential inferences. We are a cultural species a social species. There are norms and frames and standards all of which can be violated all demonstrating that there is an alternative. We make the choices based on those. We assume free will because we have perceive choices. If there is not free will we can likely never know it because we perceive a choice. We do not have the information of the cosmos leading to the recognition of a potential non-choice. So even were we to determine that there is no free will, we would still treat is as if there were because we have choices. A person may think that they benefit from believing there is no free will by freeing themselves of guilt (this is questionable, mostly because guilt comes from acting not in accordance to one's own internalized ideals and the simple existence of culture determines the existence of ideals). However they would still be subject to shame for making choices that did not conform. It would make little demonstrable difference.

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@GoshisDead,

GoshisDead wrote:

Legally this is a big deal, if no one is ultimately responsible for their acts how can they be punished for them.

Those who administer the punishment would be no more responsible than anyone else, so there is no legal issue.

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@Pronounce,

Pronounce wrote:

Is there anyone who is absolutely convinced of determinism?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determinism

We just had a 100+ page thread on determinism.

In fact, it's still active. Why don't you just go post in there.

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@Zetherin,

I think the thread you're referring to was noted above in my second post. I have a problem with long threads because they become too convoluted and hard to follow. Be phrasing my question this way I was hoping to get a synoptic list of those who are absolutely sure that reality is determined. This would be beneficial for people who are new to the community, because they don't have to dig through 1000's of posts to understand a person's position.

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@Zetherin,

I just read ughaibu's post. http://able2know.org/topic/152015-101#post-4305372 And between the two threads "Defense of Freewill Against Determinism" and "Absolute determinism and the illusion of free will." his comment and yours are well taken. I can see how this thread could become redundant, and not produce the narrow focus I was hoping for.

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@GoshisDead,

You're hitting on points that I hadn't considered, but in considering your points I've got a lot more questions to ask. To do so in this thread would broaden the topic beyond my vision of what I was trying to do. My main chafe with a2k (and other such sites) is that threads tend to get "topically corrupted". Does that make sense? Wikis don't seem to suffer from this issue, but maybe they don't offer the communal environment a forum does.

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@Pronounce,

Pronounce wrote:

Is there anyone who is absolutely convinced of determinism?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determinism

It would be hard to be convinced of determinism when quantum physicists universally agree that determinism is false on the microlevel.

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@GoshisDead,

GoshisDead wrote:

Even if things are determined would it matter? Either I don't believe it and act as if I have free will. Or I do believe things are determined and act as if I have free will. Actions have consequences determined or not and that is what we base our choices on.... well that and ideology.

First of all, I don't see why it would not matter if free will is false, because it matters whether we believe what is false. Unless, of course, it does not matter to you whether you believe what is false.

Second of all, it is a confusion to believe that determinism and free will are incompatible. What are incompatible are compulsion and free will. And it does not follow that because my choice, or my action are determined (whatever that means) that either is compelled. Suppose that what determines whether I visit a certain restaurant is that it was recommended to me by a friend so that unless he had recommended that restaurant, I would not have visited it. Was I compelled to visit that restaurant by the recommendation? Of course I wasn't. I did not have to visit the restaurant because my friend recommended it. So, why would my visit not be made of my own free will?

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@kennethamy,

From the Copenhagen Interpretation of QM you're correct in saying that determinism is false, but not all physicists agree with that view.http://www.c2.com/cgi/wiki?QuantumPhysics

Quote:

Be very careful about the CopenhagenInterpretation of quantum mechanics because it is deprecated, fundamentally anti-scientific and only gained popularity because of an error John von Neumann made in his "proof" that the universe is "non-deterministic".

If those who's life goal is to understand a subject like QM can't agree. Then I, as an outsider to their discussions, can't believe I can validate the issue one way, or another.

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@kennethamy,

Your comments remind me of Compatibilism. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compatibilism

I'm reserving my judgement if this is possible, or not, because I tend to see things from the perspective that I'm too finite to know the whole of Truth.

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@Pronounce,

There's really no point in talking about free will/determinism unless it's in the context of ethics. If I am determined to pick up this fork or if I have free will to pick up this fork, it really doesn't matter, since it all ends up the same: I pick up the fork. Now, if I pick up the fork and stab you in the eye with it, then it may make an ethical difference if I had no choice but to stab you in the eye. So the question -- or, really, the only interesting question -- about determinism is the one that involves the dispute over compatibilism/incompatibilism.

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@joefromchicago,

joefromchicago wrote:

There's really no point in talking about free will/determinism unless it's in the context of ethics. If I am determined to pick up this fork or if I have free will to pick up this fork, it really doesn't matter, since it all ends up the same: I pick up the fork. Now, if I pick up the fork and stab you in the eye with it, then it may make an ethical difference if I had no choice but to stab you in the eye. So the question -- or, really, the only interesting question -- about determinism is the one that involves the dispute over compatibilism/incompatibilism.

Whether determinism is true is a different issue from how it matters to morality whether determinism is true. And, whether determinism is true is a separate issue from whether free will is true. Otherwise, all discussions about free will end up in discussions about whether determinism is true, and free will just drops out.

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@kennethamy,

That may be true, but, as I said, whether determinism is true or false isn't really an interesting question outside the context of ethics.

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@joefromchicago,

joefromchicago wrote:

That may be true, but, as I said, whether determinism is true or false isn't really an interesting question outside the context of ethics.

I think that interest is, like beauty, in the mind of the beholder. Hume certainly thought that whether every event must have a cause was interesting enough to write quite a lot about it. And quantum physicists seem to have a lot to say about it too.

1 Reply

Believe Determinism 100%

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