Ritesign

I'm tying not to make the same mistake twice, so correct me if I'm wrong, but has the concept of determinism doesn't appear to have been argued yet.

There are many types of determinism that could be examined. In order to avoid the issue of God, I would like to exlude theological determinism, since it presupposes God's existence. That determinist theses I would like to discuss are logical determinism, causal determinism, and bio-environmental determinism (combining biological, cultural, and psychological determinism in order to avoid the nature vs nurture debate).

Who feels fated, who feels free?

Ch'i

Ritesign

...I don't think that's a related topic.

asaris

I assume at least some of our actions carry genuine moral weight -- that is, they are genuinely praiseworthy or blameworthy. Now, it is clear that for us to be responsible for an action, we have to be the cause of that action. I can't justly be blamed for something someone else does. But we generally extend this thought even further -- if someone is coerced, we usually think of the person coercing as the one really responsible. The simplest way we can think of this is that we are only responsible for an action if it is "up to us." Whatever makes an action up to us is what I mean by free will.

I generally think that this requires some form of libertarianism -- that is, for an act to be free, the agent must be genuinely able to choose to perform an action or refrain from performing an action (note that it does not mean that both choices have to be equally open). But the analysis in the first paragraph is, for me, the more fundamental analysis.

(And, yes, I know we've discussed this before. But it's been a while, and we have some new people floating around here.)

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"Die Deutschen meinen, daß die Kraft sich in Härte und Grausamkeit offenbaren müsse, sie unterwerfen sich dann gerne und mit Bewunderung:[...]. Daß es Kraft giebt in der Milde und Stille, das glauben sie nicht leicht."

"The Germans believe that power must reveal itself in hardness and cruelty and then submit themselves gladly and with admiration[...]. They do not believe readily that there is power in meekness and calm."

-- Friedrich Nietzsche

Hektore

Your title seems to indicate a Determinism vs Indeterminism subject, but the OP seems to want to address different types of determinism, where are you going with this? Maybe share what you think to help give the rest of us a bit of direction so that we can respond in the way you are looking for.

Also, why exclude theological determinism? All forms of determinism come with presuppositions that are necessarily true or the arguments fall apart. Why is the presupposition of god worse, or at least not as worthy of discussion, than the presupposition, for example, that causality truly exists in the way that the majority of people understand it?

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Ritesign

You're right Hektore, I'll try to explain it better. I wanted to discuss the possibility of those different types of determinism and the possibility that we are free. Why not theological determinism? I figured the thread would get hijacked, the focus would become God, or, <a href="http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthread.php?t=114624">someone would get a fork in the eye.</a> But in good faith (THE F WORD!), I guess it would be appropriate to include theological determinism in the discussion.

Hektore

I'm going to deal with each of these determinism one at a time so I don't have to write a monster post, and spend all day responding to this one topic. I'm going to tackle logical determinism first. If I understand this correctly, logical determinism states that because factual statements about the future must be true or not true, then the future must already be decided today. For example, if I use the proposition "Tomorrow it is going rain.", the proposition must be either true or not true. More importantly it is true or not true today, when I make the statement. Therefore, the future (tomorrow) must already be decided to make the statement true or not true.

What we are dealing with, from what I've read is the "law of the excluded middle" which claims that a statement like "Tomorrow it will rain or it will not rain" (A or not A) is necesarily true simply by the form of the statement. The statement "A or not A." is true because it encompases all truth values for A, it does not make a claim to the truth value of "A" or "not A" only that one of them must be true. This is because logic supposes that "A" combined with "not A" encompass all possibilities that exist in the universe and that all statements have a truth value.

Why is it supposed that all statements have a truth value?
I see no reason for this assumption. When there is no absolute definition for a word (ex. tall) then there is no absolute truth value for a statemnt that uses the word (ex. "Jon is tall"). These statements are what we call opinions, because opinion explicitly means a statement that does not have an absolute truth value. Predictive statements fall into the same category, they can not said to be true because the future has not happened yet, there is no absolute truth value that exists for predictive statemtents in the present.

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Dilbert1234567

I think we only have the illusion of free will; this is because of cause and effect, if we were to sum up all that came before accurately, we can predict what will come. However, this is so massively complex that it is impossible to sum it up, we would need a second universe of equal or greater size to calculate our universe, so essentially we don’t have free will, but even though we don’t it’s a mute point.

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asaris

The problem with that, Dilbert, is that it means our actions aren't up to us. If every action is bound up in cause and effect the way you describe, then my actions are caused by something beyond my control. For example, say I perform action p. However, if a stegosaurus had died five days before he actually did, I would perform action~p. But since when the stegosaurus dies is not up to me, then my actions are not up to me. But, since it's clear we are responsible for some of our actions, this cannot be the case.

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"Die Deutschen meinen, daß die Kraft sich in Härte und Grausamkeit offenbaren müsse, sie unterwerfen sich dann gerne und mit Bewunderung:[...]. Daß es Kraft giebt in der Milde und Stille, das glauben sie nicht leicht."

"The Germans believe that power must reveal itself in hardness and cruelty and then submit themselves gladly and with admiration[...]. They do not believe readily that there is power in meekness and calm."

-- Friedrich Nietzsche

Dilbert1234567

actually it can. in your example, i doubt there would be any change, however, if that stegosaurus died 5 miles east and was discovered by a man, say your neighbor, it may have changed you life entirely maybe inspiring you to be an archaeologists, that would have effected you life in major ways. the likely hood that an event many years removed would effect you is nearly mute. i believe that our actions are not under our control, however, since we are incapable of understanding the complexities that dictate our actions, essentially we do have free will, although it is truly just the illusion of.

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DaveOrion

Dilbert seems to subscribe to the generative philosophy, cognitive sciences, or evolutionary psychology side of determinism. This states that free will does not exist, it is merely an illusion. This illusion of free will is experienced due to the generation of infinite behaviour from the interaction of finite-deterministic set of rules and parameters. Thus the unpredictability of the emerging behaviour from deterministic processes leads to a perception of free will, even though free will as an ontological entity does not exist.

I don't agree with this philosophy, or perhaps I don't want to. I would prefer to believe that our future is what we make of it. Inanimate matter may follow the rules a physics, but we are living beings capable of making our own choices. I suppose I adhere to several philosophies, in the Buddhist doctrine of Dependent Origination, which states that every phenomenon is conditioned by, and depends on, the phenomena that it is not. In simpler terms , everything is affected by every other thing that has life. If you could travel back in time, one minute action would seem to affect everything to follow.

Biological determinism seems to be likely also, since my father was an alcoholic, and two of my sisters seem to be the same way, I would have to say that genetics also play a role. You may be more likely to behave in a certain manner depending on your genetic make up, at least partially deciding your future.

In the end it may be a combination of infinitely complex factors, thrown together with chaos theory, which seems highly likely. I still agree with the notion that the future is made up partially of the sum of your decisions today, combined with the chaos factor, or wild card anomalies. Its a strange mix of genetics, anomalous factors, and the sum of your decisions, IMHO.

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bluepolaski

We are as free-willed as can be, so far as the government will allow us to be, anyhow. I think the determinism argument comes from generations of submission to greater powers, be they government, class, religion, et al. Being that people are oppressed by such higher powers, they begin to feel like they are assigned an unfortunate fate which they are unlikely to change.

Precognition is a strange occurrence which in a way supports determinist theories, but I say the future is malleable and therefore if one knows of a future event, then one may act in the present to prevent or otherwise change the future.

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Ourcrazymodern?

I feel free and I always tell the kids we make our own paths. So far I've found no evidence to the contrary. The powers that be outside ourselves have their effects but how we respond to them is completely up to us.
I find the concept of determinism depressing.

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Dilbert1234567

it's only as depressing as you let it be. If you examine all the variables, you can find the outcome. life is just bigger than any other system out there, so it is impossible to examen it.

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asaris

You're familiar with the idea of a butterfly effect, right Dilbert? That's the though I was relying on in my example with the stegosaurus. Clearly I could pick a more plausible example closer in time.

I'm not so concerned with what I'd prefer to believe in as what I'm required to believe in, given my premises. So my question to Dilbert is whether he believes we are responsible for our actions, and, if so, how that's possible under his deterministic picture.

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"Die Deutschen meinen, daß die Kraft sich in Härte und Grausamkeit offenbaren müsse, sie unterwerfen sich dann gerne und mit Bewunderung:[...]. Daß es Kraft giebt in der Milde und Stille, das glauben sie nicht leicht."

"The Germans believe that power must reveal itself in hardness and cruelty and then submit themselves gladly and with admiration[...]. They do not believe readily that there is power in meekness and calm."

-- Friedrich Nietzsche

Dilbert1234567

yes i do feel responsible for my actions. this is because they are my actions, we are responsible for what we do. even though we are not really i still feel responsible because they are the sum of my experiences being expressed by my actions.

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asaris

Wait, "we are responsible for what we do, even though we are not really"? I'm not following.

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"Die Deutschen meinen, daß die Kraft sich in Härte und Grausamkeit offenbaren müsse, sie unterwerfen sich dann gerne und mit Bewunderung:[...]. Daß es Kraft giebt in der Milde und Stille, das glauben sie nicht leicht."

"The Germans believe that power must reveal itself in hardness and cruelty and then submit themselves gladly and with admiration[...]. They do not believe readily that there is power in meekness and calm."

-- Friedrich Nietzsche

Dilbert1234567

you misquoted me, and twisted my words, please don't.

the concept of the illusion of freewill is a tough one, bear with me.

even though deep down i know i am not in control, that everything is just a series of events caused by what came before, I still live as if i had control, and do my damnedest to be the best person i can. we have the illusion of free will, we can never know what we will do because the conditions are to complex to fathom, this does not mean that the conditions dictating our lives don't exist, they are just beyond everyone.

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Ourcrazymodern?

uh-oh! Free will gets thwarted again.

Damn free wiil for being too weak for everyone to recognize it.

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Xiangsu

First of all I am a follower of determinism, of course not by my own free will , and I made a post regarding this but it was more specific. Reading this thread made me want to bring some issues to light.


So far, it would seem that we cannot change the past. The past is set in stone as they say. So, in two days from now, tomorrow will be the past. Therefore, all events in time become set in stone. You don't know now whether its going to rain or not, but whatever it is, it is the logical outcome of the universe. It is unchangeable.

It is instinct to resist determinism because it takes away control of your life. I don't blame you for not wanting to think of the world in such a way, but its very possible that this is the nature of the world. It reminds me of the Matrix trilogy. Neo didn't like the idea of fate, because it took away his control. However, time and time again in the movie, you see that everything happened according to fate. Those movies were probably the best examples of fate and determinism ever. I especially like the conversation with the Merovingian.




As far as illusion of choice goes it reminds me of a quote:

"A man can surely do what he wills to do, but cannot determine what he wills."

You make the choices in your life, but you don't decide who YOU are. It all comes to things outside of your control. Who you are is determined by genetics and environment. These will ultimately influence every decision in your life. Don't come to me saying how you grew up in the same family as your brother and you have roughly the same genetics, yet he turned out to be a bum and you turned out fine. There is no way to account for life experience. While the environment and genetics are roughly the same, the conversations and interactions will be mostly different.

I feel that if you go back in time the beginning of your life and you changed nothing, just observed. Everything would happen the same way. Which means even if we go back 20 years from now and your dead, if nothing is changed it will all happen the same way. If nothing is changed, there is no reason why you would have changed your life in any way.

We are all bound by fate, but no one knows what the future may hold. So, while I know that my existence is dependent on every prior event leading up to this moment, because if one minor change occurred I might not exist, and I also know that every decision I make is only because that is what is in my nature or is what I was taught, I still enjoy life. I ride the wave of the universe and I act according to what I have come to understand is the best way. Its all I can do.

It also allows you to look at people differently. For example, in theory, it erases hate. If a man grows up to a point where he deludes himself into thinking that he can kill himself and 32 other people and still compare himself to Jesus. I know that he is a monster, but one that is still a product of the world.

I cannot expect the families grieving to be able to understand that he is in a sense just as much a victim as anyone else, if I were them I would probably hate him for a long time. It is human nature, not matter how much I use reasoning, it would be hard to overcome those guttural reactions to have someone to blame.

Anyhow, I'm getting off topic. If some of you come to realize that determinism may hold some truths, and this bothers you. Don't let it. Just realize that you are a part of the universe and a lot of chains of cause and effect lead to you being the moment your in right now. If one variable was off in the equation, you wouldn't exist. As the late great Kurt Vonnegut says, "Everything is alright, and everybody has to do exactly what he does."

hiredgun

The whole question of fate vs. freedom is one that can only arise out of the human attempt to look back at life and extract some kind of meaning out of it.

The question of whether we are 'determined' has no bearing on the decisions that each of us make every day in real-time. We are free to make choices, yes. We are part of a physical world that behaves according to natural laws, also true. Those natural laws don't negate our ability to make choices that have meaning - they only describe how we do, in fact, behave.

Xiangsu

Would it be true to say that the terms behave and choose are interchangeable in this case?

Yakk

If you cannot predict the future, then it hasn't been determined.

If you cannot predict the past, then it isn't fixed.

Claims that the universe is deterministic are non-functional philsophy: they make claims about things, and cannot produce the evidence required to back those claims up.

If it is determined what I do tommorrow, tell me now. You cannot?

Ok, make a testable prediction that would be true if it was determined what I will do tommorrow, and false if it isn't determined what I will do tommorrow. Demonstrate the connection.

You cannot? Then why are you wasting time with that nonsense?

The model of humans as "free-willed" actors is a better, more accurate, model of the universe we are experiencing at this point than the model of the universe where human actions are determined solely by their inputs.

Now, does this "free-will" work all the way down? At the lowest levels we can reduce the world to, Q-M kicks in, and the future is not determined. At medium levels of moles of particles, statistical predictions can be made on unorganized piles of particles, but not for sufficiently complex systems. Chaos theory can be used on complex systems: given a system of the complexity of the human mind/body, are Q-M fluxutations sufficient to produce nondeterministic behaviour after a period of time T? I don't think even that question has been answered.

At the sociological level, the best we can do with predicting human behaviour is statistical. This is less prediction and more description of tendencies.

Much as when modelling a room of near-ideal gas, you use ideal gas laws and thermodynamics, when modelling human behaviour, the free-will model works pretty damn well.

I don't believe (A or ~A) is always true. I don't have a use for that hypothesis.

Given that you cannot predict the results of something, claiming that they are predictable is a meaningless claim. Bio-environmental determinism is thus bumpkis.

Causation breaks down in our universe, first because of Q-M, and second because we don't have a model of the universe accurate enough to describe it to the levels required.

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Last edited by JHVH : 10-29-4004 BC at 09:00 PM. Reason: Time for a rest.

filtherton

Yakk, i don't think you can use human created models of reality to debunk the notion of determinism - the claim can always easily be made that any perceived randomness is the result of uninformed observation.

I also don't understand what you mean when you say that the free will model works better than the deterministic model when modelling human behavior. Works better for what?

hagatha

What about the concept that we have free will to a point, but we cannot control the will of others and their impact upon our lives. Our actions determine events in our lives and the lives of others. We are guided by cause and effect and for every action there is a reaction. There is no set life plan, but the way we have acted in the past can in a sense determine what our future will look like (especially if we don't change our current behaviors).

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Yakk

Yes, you can create a model that doesn't have any predictive value. You can even be Xiangsu, and take a model with zero predictive value -- that makes zero claims about which experiences you will have, and which you will not -- and pretend it has consequences about how you should think and how you should act.

But I discard useless models. Well, I keep them around, to see if they will have any use.

Produces a better fit, explains more with less complexity. The free will model, that each human is an actor whose actions you cannot predict.

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Last edited by JHVH : 10-29-4004 BC at 09:00 PM. Reason: Time for a rest.

filtherton

How does determinism lack predictive value? Are you saying that the notion that all events happen as a direct and theoretically predictable result of previous events has no predictive value? I guess i'm confused by how you predict things.

Even if it lacked predictive abilities, which it doesn't, so what? Why would that make it an invalid model of reality?

Tell me about these things which can be predicted by free will which cannot be predicted by determinism. Do they have to do with evolutionary psychology, where the claim is that personality traits are evolved things? Do they have to do with contemporary psychology, where people are treated as products of their past experiences? Do they have to do with neurochemistry, where we're all just reduced to bags of meat with chemical receptors?

I'm curious, being the person of strict scientific rigor that you are, where you have found evidence of free will? The last i heard, the jury was still out on whether consciousness was more than just a complex chemical reaction.

Ourcrazymodern?

Hasn't everybody who's posted chosen their words? Go figure.

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Dilbert1234567

nope.

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