Determinism

That was getting too long, so I distilled it down.

Suppose I intend to order chocolate, but then I overhear someone say they pissed in the chocolate, so some outside force has compelled me to change my mind.

I think what you’re getting at is the will cannot will want it doesn’t want to will. The will can be changed, but at the end of the day, the will still wills what it wants to will.

If I give someone a gift, do a favor, or even sacrifice myself for someone else, it can only be for a selfish reason because there is nothing I can do that I don’t want to do.

Selfishness in the cold sense is really just dimwitted in my opinion. That person doesn’t see that doing things for others is better for him. It’s not any more or less selfish, just dumber.

There are no laws, but only observed regularities.

The links were to help you accept probabilism. If you already accept it, then don’t worry about the links.

If you posit that you exist, then where is the line that separates you from not-you? This is not only problematic in space, but also time: when did you begin?

When I look at an animal, I see a bunch of luggage pushing a brain around, but then I realize the brain is just luggage too. Where is the animal? Alright, ok, so if the animal is the luggage, then what isn’t luggage? The animal needs food and water and a planet, so where does the luggage end? Obviously if the animal is the luggage, then there is nothing that is not the animal. So either there is no animal or there is nothing that is not the animal, but I cannot for the life of me see the animal as different from everything else.

So if there is no animal, from where is the will coming from? And if there is only the animal, on what is the supposed will exerted? The whole thing is just an illusion. There is nothing being determined because there is nothing there but abstractions.

I don’t have any problem with that since I believe nothing has a cause. There are no things or events, and the abstracted things that we call things are caused by random (causeless) chance.

And I could go further and claim that if there were causes and deterministic mechanisms, then there would be no point to the universe. But that requires a lot of unpacking. Essentially, purposelessness can be the only purpose.

Educating others helps me to live in a better world, so it’s not noble, but selfish.

I have literally tons and tons of books (and a Reader’s Digest collection going back to the early 1900s when staples were used in the spine to hold pages together), but I’m ashamed to admit that I’ve only ever read one book (that I can remember) from cover to cover. My father devours books just for fun, but for me it’s painful and I take a more utilitarian perspective that reading is a tool to learn. Dad reads for kicks, but I toil to achieve a goal. Anyway, I have oodles of books on queue awaiting whatever it is I’m missing so I can eventually attend to them, but it’ll probably never happen. My eyes are also getting worse which makes it that much harder.

If I were born in a time absent tv, radio, and youtube, perhaps I’d have developed an affinity for reading, but I find it an antiquated method of learning and far too inefficient in light of alternative mediums. I’m spoiled by progress. I don’t want to offend you or anything, but it would be a miracle if I ever found myself in a position where I didn’t have 10,000 things more pressing or exciting to do in order to snuggle up to a book. Most of my reading is done in waiting rooms where nothing else is possible. Likewise, I have the same problem in writing a book. Why write a book when the purpose of writing, as David Hare said, “writing is the act of discovering what you believe”? If I’ve already discovered what I believe, why rehash it when I could move on to more interesting things. Maybe someone will compile my work one day since I’m too poorly equipped to do it. I can’t even get around to compiling Alan Watts’ work, which is on my bucket list.

Usually a book is written surrounding a few key ideas. One starts with the ideas and adds fluff to make a book from it. Isn’t there a way to convey to me the nuggets without requiring me to wade through all the accessory fluff to find them?

The will is free in some senses and not in other senses, but within the context of one sense, it is either free or not. That’s closer to what I meant.

How does a computer make choices?

Yes, certainly the capability exists for you to choose chocolate or vanilla, but the choice you will make is not under your control because you cannot make yourself prefer one to the other.

Scientists can be aware of your choices before you are and by a margin of 7 seconds! wired.com/2008/04/mind-decision/

So if you’ve made your decision before you even knew it, then how could you be in control of making it? The you that you think you are lives in the past and is always last to know :wink:

I’m not sure which version they’re sending. I updated the book which is why I said to wait, but it’s not here nor there. The changes are minor. Let me know when you get it.

You’re repeating yourself over and over and over again. It is an established fact that everything we do could not have been otherwise, so why keep repeating it? We can’t make progress if you keep going around in circles iambiguous.

So what is your question?

A new grasp of what it means that man’s will is not free which has never been fully understood.

For purposes of this discussion, I don’t want to get into the difference between humans and computers. We make choices and those choices are determined not by force from a program dictating what we must obey, but by our desires and preferences which can only go in one direction. Please make note of that as we continue…if we do. We are not Terminators who are blindly doing what a program tells us to do yet our will is not free to do otherwise.

[quote="In a world where the meaning we ascribe to things is the only meaning we were ever able
to
ascribe to things…what does that tell you about this choice? Something different than what it tells me.

We still choose this meaning because we had no other choice but to choose this meaning. No one is disputing this iambiguous.

You definitely are missing what I am trying to convey. You obviously didn’t read any of the first three chapters which is why you are having problems understanding. If you don’t read because it doesn’t give you greater satisfaction to move in this direction, then obviously you couldn’t have done otherwise, but I hope you will be inspired to read the first three chapters so you will better understand what I am trying to convey. #-o

We are not removed from nature, but we are not dominoes or Terminators that have no say in the choices we make, although those choices are not free. In that respect we are part of the causal chain of life where everything that has been done or will be done could not be otherwise.

It means a lot iambiguous if you follow the extension.

True, but being that our will is entirely subsumed in nature does not take away from the fact that our will has absolute control to say “no” to a choice that we do not want to make. No domino can force a choice upon us, in other words.

No one made you pull the trigger. You had control over whether to pull the trigger or not. You pulled the trigger because the option to not pull the trigger was less desirable at that moment. This is not trivial and leads to an important observation.

Once again, no one made him do anything. No one has that power to force you to do what you don’t want to do. Keep this in mind because this IS the other side of the equation which leads to an amazing discovery about how these two laws of our nature bring about enormous changes in human conduct.

But that’s inaccurate. You cannot be free to do otherwise and not be free to do otherwise. You are trying to conflate different definitions of “free” like the compatibilists do to make it appear like a non-contradiction.

They don’t. They just follow the program. This is dissimilar to humans in the sense that humans do make choices and CAN SAY NO if a choice is not to their liking.

Because the “I” or “self” or “agent” has control over giving permission to follow through on an action. You cannot say, for example, my brain made me kill that person because in order for your brain to kill someone, it requires your approval.

The sub conscious mind that makes decisions is still part of you and in that respect you are still in control of them

The mistake is to assume all major decisions are made by the conscious mind simply because that is the only one we actually experience

amazon.com/Decline-Fall-All … 1553953304

Surreptitious, all major decisions involve the conscious mind in order to give permission for an action to be performed (based on that decision) or else someone could easily say, “I didn’t make that choice, my unconscious mind did.” Not only is that false, but how would that fly in a court of law?

I agree that the subconscious mind is still part of you and in that respect you are still in control of them. All major decisions involve the conscious mind in order to give permission for a choice to be made (even if the motivation for that choice involves subconscious factors), otherwise someone could easily use the excuse, “I didn’t give permission to pull the trigger, my subconscious mind did 7 seconds before my conscious mind agreed to it.” How would that fly in a court of law? Once again, that doesn’t mean there aren’t subconscious factors involved in making a choice, but the ultimate decision maker is the conscious agent whose job it is to decide whether there is justification to make the choice he is about to make. I am only trying to establish the “I” or “self” who is responsible for making a choice where someone, let’s say, was badly injured as a direct result of someone’s choice to run a red light. We are not talking about right or wrong here; just who is the responsible party.

Sleepwalkers are entirely unaware of what they do when sleepwalking [ even though they can demonstrate perfect motor function if knowledge
of it is in their memory ] and so if they commit a crime they cannot in principle be held responsible for it regardless of what it might actually be

The law however should not be changed to allow the guilty to blame their sub conscious every time they commit a crime
Although I was more interested in the question from a psychological / philosophical position rather than from a legal one

Maybe people would like to hear from the author reading from his book, Beyond the Framework of Modern Thought. I am so glad I was able to save his tapes from the 1970s, because these are all I have of him speaking. If you are interested in hearing more, please contact me because I am not taking credit cards at this time. I’m working on upgrading my site.

declineandfallofallevil.com/ebook/

If they didn’t have a clue as to what they were doing (like being under hypnosis) of course they cannot be held responsible.

From a psychological position, as we extend the corollary, Thou Shall Not Blame, that goes alone with determinism, we can see that nobody is morally responsible for what they do. But the interesting thing is that instead of decreasing responsibility, it actually increases responsibility, something philosophers down through the ages never understood.

I am entirely responsible for all of my moral choices made ever since I became an adult and therefore blame no one else for them
I refuse to look anywhere other than inside myself for any mistakes I have made since it is the only way I can actually self improve

You are way ahead of the game. :wink: What this corollary does is prevents a person’s ability to shift to someone or something else that which is his responsibility.

I am nothing special and have no wisdom to offer up which is the reason why I avoid giving advice
What I have learned took time but it is not something no one else could also learn for themselves

I have no real idea about most things and the older I get the less I know anyway but I try to have something I can hold onto
Just something that will make my temporary existence bearable before that which I cannot control actually finally happens

None of us are special and all of us our special, if that makes sense. You are like Socrates who was known for his wisdom because he stated that he knew that he didn’t know, whereas others didn’t know either but thought they did.

I think as we become older we become more humble. That’s one of the attributes of wisdom.

Talk about a stuck record!

Here you appear to be criticizing me for repeating myself, failing to make progress and going around and around in circles.

As though I was ever actually free not to.

[i][u][sombody explain this to me please…what on earth do I keep missing?][/i][/u]

It’s not a question. It’s a speculation about “I” confronting conflicting goods throughout human history. Even if
“improvements” were something we could choose freely to pursue, who gets to say what constitutes them?

Thus:

I have no idea what that has to do with the conflicts noted.

Yes, but, for all practical purposes, what are the existential implications of that — given the choices that are made by flesh and blood human beings in particular contexts?

Again:

Here we go again: I’m missing what I could never have not missed. I chose not to read the first three chapters because I could never have chosen to read them. But somehow [from my point of view] you still seem to hold me responsible for making the wrong choices.

Okay…

If I do have some measure of autonomy and your arguments here do begin to convince me, that might motivate me to read them.

That’s the best I can do for now. But: Is it actually the only think I can do?

The dominoes do only what they must do in toppling over. John does only what he must do in setting them up. You clearly see more of a distinction here than I do. The dominoes are mindless components of nature. The human brain is a mindful component of nature. Thus “everything that has been done or will be done could not be otherwise.”

The dominoes and John both being “natural” components of this. But nature in ways that are different in so many crucial respects.

How about the choices that our brains force us to make in dreams? In the dream I am utterly convinced that I am making the choices that I want to make. But we know better, right?

As long as John is not able to choose 1] not to set up the dominoes or 2] not to set them up as he does, it’s all matter unfolding in what may or may not be a set of immutable laws.

Again, the irony here [for me] is that this is precisely the sort of argument you would expect from someone who champions free will. Though I am more than willing to agree that the point is anything but trivial; and that the problem revolves around my not grasping it.

On the other hand, would you ever be willing to admit that the problem here revolves instead around your failure to understand my own points?

Could you ever be willing?

I am not criticizing you, but you will not let me move forward when you say over and over “as though you were ever actually free not to.” You’re right, we were never free not to do what was done, so let’s move on from here. If you still don’t get it, maybe somebody else can help explain what you’re not getting.

That’s a fair question. Many of the questions you have are answered in the economic chapter. The question of walls is irrelevant because there will be no need for walls. Abortion will be less and less a desirable option not because it’s morally wrong, but because people will have the kind of marriages where they will have economic security and will want the child if a pregnancy happens unexpectedly. Do you see how you’re jumping to conclusions without considering that these questions would be answered if you took the time to read the book?

Of course you don’t. How could you?

You are missing what I’m trying to convey because you refuse to read anything that I’ve offered. You’re making assumptions that flesh and blood human beings cannot alter their behavior when the particular contexts (or conditions) they find themselves in, are altered.

Pallleeease iambiguous, you’re playing games now. I am not holding you responsible for anything. If you don’t want to read the first three chapters, then don’t, but you can’t expect to understand this discovery if you don’t.

You can choose to read if you want to. You can choose not to read if you don’t want to. You have the autonomy to make that choice for yourself, and that choice will become the choice that you could not not have made.

The distinction is that we make choices. Dominoes do not. And although the choices we make are not free, we have the capacity to say “no” to a choice that we don’t want. Dominoes are not capable of this.

We know that it’s a dream when we wake up, at least most people do. Most people do not act out their dreams in real life.

But John IS able to choose, that’s just the point. Being able to choose (without external restraint) does not grant us free will. It is true that we are unfolding the way it had to be, but…under new environmental conditions we are able to veer in a different direction yet still be unfolding according to nature’s immutable law.

The reason it appears that I am championing free will is due to the fact that both of these ideologies are reconciled (i.e., an eye for an eye with turn the other cheek). Will is not free but responsibility for one’s actions is increased with this knowledge. Many philosophers down through the ages have thought that responsibility would be decreased with the knowledge of determinism. This book shows us why this is false, and why we can create a world of peace due to the fact that man’s will is not free. We could not achieve a peaceful world otherwise.

I’m reading your posts, aren’t I? I’m doing the best I can to answer your questions but you need to meet me halfway.

I didn’t say that. Surreptitious did.

But humans cannot choose what they like, so “their liking” is a programmed yardstick to evaluate choices the same as a computer uses code that it didn’t write to determine what it will freely choose.

You only moved the goal posts since now it’s a choice of whether or not to accept the brain’s choice which must again be decided by the brain. Whether or not you choose to accept the choice could also be discerned by scientists before you were aware of it yourself. It seems there is no way out of this one.

Sure, as long as “you” is defined as everything but your consciousness.

Yep, it seems the experiencing can’t guide the experience.