According to my frame of mind, I have no way to ascertain this definitively. I merely make the assumption that in a wholly determined universe [as “I” understand it here and now], every thought, feeling, utterance and behavior on our part was/is/will be only what they could/can/will ever have been. And that would certainly include this exchange.
This computer technology that permits is to have this discussion doesn’t consciously choose to sustain it. It’s a piece of technology that was programed by someone consciously to sustain it. But: Was the programmer’s choice/“choice” not just a manifestation of nature having evolved into life having evolved into human brains that are in turn no less in sync with the laws of matter?
The mystery here is always matter as mind as matter. And how the dots are connected between that and the explanation for existence itself. Which, admittedly, I certainly have no capacity to grasp.
Thus:
If our brain is matter in sync with the laws that all other matter is in sync with then it is no less going along for the ride that is existence unfolding only as it ever can.
I never said it was no less going along for the ride that is existence unfolding only as it ever can. I know you could never not have thought about what I’m saying any differently, but my reaction to you also couldn’t have been different either.
How is this then “for all practical purposes” not you and I going around and around in circles? Up to this point in the exchange. By nature’s design though, not because of anything that we freely choose to do.
We are both moving in the direction of greater satisfaction. So why do you keep repeating this, as if there is disagreement? I hope others come forward who show interest in what I’m trying to convey because you won’t let me move to Chapter Two, not literally, but because your questions compel me to answer them in the same repetitive way, all in sync with the laws of matter.
There you go again [from my frame of mind], asking me why I keep repeating something that I was never free to not repeat in the first place. I don’t let you move to chapter two because I was [again, up to this point in the exchange] never able to let you.
But: Who knows what nature has in store for the future of this exchange.
But: whatever that is it won’t be because of anything that you and I choose autonomously to do. Right?
Unless, of course, we really do have some measure of autonomy here. And I’m certainly willing to speculate that this is in fact the case. But how do I determine that beyond all doubt?
A person could not freely choose to excuse or not to excuse herself about anything.
We both agree that nothing is freely chosen. Actually, under the changed conditions a person could not choose to excuse himself (for reasons you don’t understand because I haven’t been able to get that far), although that’s the problem many philosophers worry about. They believe that a person could misuse the knowledge of having no free will to his advantage. He could hurt someone and excuse himself by saying, “I couldn’t help myself because my will was not free to do otherwise.” Do you see the problem?
Misuse. Hurt. Choose. Believe. See. Excuse.
How are these not “action” words that you are compelled in a determined universe to put in this order? You typing them, me reading and reacting to them. Only as it ever could have been.
That’s what Johnathon Schooler’s experiment tried to show when college students were told their will isn’t free. But there is an interesting take on this which needs explaining.
And in this experiment were any of the thoughts, feelings, utterances or actions of any of the participants ever able to be other than what they were?
Of course not.
Of course of course not. And now we’re stuck again. But only because here and now we were never able not to be stuck. We can only hope that nature unfolds such that we are no longer stuck. Though even that will have nothing to do with anything that we freely choose to make us unstuck.
Maybe the idea that we have free will is because we have choice, and people don’t usually think beyond that unless they are interested in this topic and go deeper. Relinquishing the agent appears to be what you construe as determinism. I am saying that having agency does not negate determinism.
They go deeper or not only because they were not actually able to freely choose one or the other. The “choice” here is embedded psychologically in the illusion of autonomy. In the human brain, relinquishing or not is just another domino.
We actually do have choices. Are you saying that you don’t have a choice to be in this thread? Of course you have a choice. It’s just not a free one.
The circle again. The computer doesn’t consciously choose to sustain this thread, but, consciously, we do. But, as with the computer, we remain wholly in sync with the laws of nature.
The illusion is that superficially it appears that we can choose one thing over another EQUALLY, but this is impossible when there are meaningful differences. It could be a choice over what to eat for breakfast, or it could be a more significant choice such as what state to live in. Regardless of the seriousness of the choice, we are always choosing the option that gives us greater satisfaction.
And nature applauds us for choosing what she compels us to choose. Only nature here is embedded in the profoundest mystery of all: teleology.
Is there a “purpose” behind the laws of matter unfolding only as they ever can? Which most “choose” to call God?
Damned if I know.
Our quandary in a nutshell? What compatibilists call free will they are no less compelled to call free will.
They are no less compelled but that doesn’t make their definition of free will correct. Until they understand that there is a better way than to hold people responsible by defining the term “free” in a way that keeps the status quo of blame and punishment intact, then they will look no further (in accordance with the unfolding of natural law).
The circle on steroids? They can only understand what they are compelled to understand but their understanding is wrong because it is not in snyc with what you were compelled to understand.
But you seem to zero in on the fact that unlike the chess pieces they do choose – they do choose. Even though just as with chess pieces all of the moves that “I” make in the chess match were only ever going to be what they must be.
We make the chess moves, and all of the moves that “you” make in the chess match were only ever going to be what they must be AFTER THE CHOICE IS MADE.
This is the part that [over and over again] I keep missing. You are pointing out something very profound here that keeps going over my head; or I am reacting to it in even more profoundly…and that keeps going over yours. The moves are always going to be what they could only ever have been, but unlike with the chess pieces themselves, I am conscious of having made them. Even more problematically, “I” am then able to delude myself into thinking that the moves were all entirely of my own volition.
Thus when we bring this down to earth…
Gandhi was able to choose not to be killed (that was one of the choices available to him) but not at the cost of losing his freedom, and no ultimatum by his captors could make him do what he didn’t want to do when unafraid of death. I’m not sure where your comment regarding conflicting goods and political power comes into play. We know the capacity to choose freely is false even though it often appears as if we’re making a free choice.
What freedom in a wholly determined universe? If human history involving the choices that Gandhi made was always going to unfold as in fact it did, Gandhi was not able to choose not to be killed.
You insist…
You’re right, but that wasn’t the point being stressed. Nothing they did to him could force Gandhi, against his will, to surrender and be spared death when the choice to die rather than give up his freedom was the choice that gave him greater satisfaction.
And I’m back to those autonomous aliens noting the history of our species unfolding and marveling at how most of us are able to convince ourselves that our own part in it was more or less thought through and acted out autonomously. Meanwhile “in reality” Gandhi and all of those folks around him were intertwined in the historical necessity of matter unfolding only as it ever could have down on earth.
Because I’m explaining a more accurate definition of determinism, and yes, it’s the only reaction that I was ever able to have.
As though your explanation here is any less determined than your reaction.
It isn’t any different, but my explaining a more accurate definition is important for the purposes of this thread.
Again: Entirely per nature’s design?
How can you call one frame of mind here more accurate when both frames of mind were only what they were ever able to be? If I cannot not leave out the agent, and you cannot not note here that I do, what on earth does “accuracy” really mean?
There is no right and wrong when it comes to frames of mind.
And yet over and again [from my frame of mind] your frame of mind seems to suggest that in not “choosing” to understand all of this as you do, I am the problem here.
This part…
Again, one of us is missing something in the other’s argument. Not that we could ever have not missed it.
You are missing a lot of my points, not that you could ever have not missed them.
Note to nature:
Help me to understand this as she does. Either that or help her to understand this as I do. Or, rather, as “I” “think” “I” “do” “here and now”.
But we are not able to freely consider and then to choose options. The autonomous aliens note that we do in fact choose our behaviors, but they are the only behaviors that we are able to choose. Whereas the aliens could have freely chosen not to watch us interact at all.
And if their bosses insisted that they were obligated to watch us, they could be held responsible for choosing not to.
That’s how free will works. It’s being held responsible for not doing what the bosses insisted they watch. Sounds like us on Earth.
No, it sounds like interactions in their own autonomous world. Down on earth bosses go about the business of being bosses autonomically, all the while convinced that they are freely choosing to do what they have come to think is the right thing [or the profitable thing] to do. Their entirely illusory freedom.
…what does it mean to blame someone for pushing me if they were never able to not choose to push me? In a determined universe holding someone responsible would seem to be just another manifestation of that psychological freedom the human brain is able to propel us to believe is actually autonomy.
I can be autonomous in my choice to go on my own path without help from others. This doesn’t grant me free will.
Then we [continue] to understand determinism in different ways. Fortunately, we can both note that [up to now] we were never really free to understand it in the same way. Instead, we “chose” to understand it in conflicting ways.
To wit:
So we acquire knowledge that we were only ever going to acquire in order to change the trajectory of things that were only ever able to unfold as they do.
Right.
Here it’s like we are circling the circle that we are going around and around in itself. You say “right” as though that explains…what exactly? It is certainly beyond my grasping. While never able not to be so.
Your mind was made up, but you didn’t know what choice would be until it was chosen. It is true that we are predestined to do what we could not not do, but it’s exciting because we don’t know what those choices will be given all of the factors that will come into play on a day to day basis.
What difference does it make what I know here and now when what I finally do come to know is all that I was ever able to come to know?
That’s a fatalistic attitude. It makes a world of difference if what we do and come to know (although it was all that we were ever able to come to know) helps to make our lives better, more prosperous, and more peaceful.
Yes, the autonomous aliens note that the choices we make in our wholly determined segment of the universe do make our lives more or less better, prosperous and peaceful. But then they note that this has absolutely nothing to do with choices freely made. Instead, what we chose was in fact fated by the laws of nature.
And how is the feeling of “excitement” not just another manifestation of life on earth evolving into human brains able to feel excitement but not able to choose freely when and where to feel it. Or about what. Why does John feel excited about something that Jane views with dread? Did they freely choose any of this?
No they did not, but the desire for happiness and a sense of well-being is common to most of humanity.
Why? Because the evolution of matter on earth has culminated in human brains able to delude “I” into thinking it has some measure of autonomous control over these desires and feelings of well-being.
So, in some distant future that could only ever have been what it is, this new world will have progressed such that behaviors that you find unappealling will have given way to those behaviors that you do?
You’re getting warmer. What a thief may find preferable to steal in this world will be the least preferable choice in the new world. How this is accomplished I’m trying to explain.
But only to the extent that matter unfolding into the future allows for this. The thief [here and now or there and then] is literally just along for the ride. Preferences are just more dominoes toppling over in the brains of those convinced that they are really choosing freely here. But that too is entirely of nature’s design.
We just don’t why that is the case if that is the case.
Is that actually what you are saying? Even though as this all unfolds “we, as agents, have no say in what we choose.”
We do have a say in what we choose but it has to be in the direction of greater satisfaction. This world of peace and brotherhood could not be accomplished if our will was free because we could choose what is worse for ourselves when something better is available. But this is impossible.
So, out in the world that we live in here and now, the struggle between those inclined toward captialism as the font of greater satisfaction, and those inclined toward socialism, reflects what exactly?
If all are embedded in a future that will unfold only as it ever could unfold, what does it really mean to speak of satisfaction when the sense of satisfaction embedded in conflicting goods here was only ever going to be what it was too?
Everything we do is following the laws of determinism, which only means we must choose, out of necessity, what gives us greater satisfaction.
This makes sense to me given my own rendition of determinism.
I’m glad we’re in agreement.
Until we get to the actual existential implications of this when we choose our thoughts, feelings, utterances and behaviors. In my rendition everything – including the choices themselves – is wholly determined.
But I cannot even wholly determine if that itself is true. Then…
If you keep this in mind I can show you the extension of this knowledge, and why what gives us greater satisfaction will be altered due to beneficial changes in the environment.
This part does not. You will show me only what you were never able not to show me and I will react to that in the only manner that I was ever able to.
I am trying to explain that changes in the environment will elicit changes in human conduct. Does that make sense?
But you and I and all the rest of us here are inherently at one with this unfolding environment which is nature unfolding necessarily into a future that can only ever be given that time itself is but another manifestation of the laws of matter.
Nothing escapes it. Nothing transcends it.
So, until the day I die, everything that I think, feel, say and do is already embedded in the laws of nature. Okay, so how are these factors not also embedded in it?
“Embedded” implies that we have no say in the choices we make; it’s all done for us without our consent.
No, to me, embedded suggests this: that “the say we have”, “the choices we make”, “the consent we give” is inherently, necessarily in sync with nature unfolding into the only future the laws of matter permit. Then we can get into a squabble over whether or not this is “fatalistic”.
Fatalism: “the belief that all events are predetermined and therefore inevitable.”
Well, if the laws of nature propel all matter into a future that is necessarily in sync with these laws, and our brain is just another manifestation of this matter, how are our choices then not fated to be what they must be?
If the man is not free to make up his mind to either do or not to do something [or want to do or not to do something] this distinction makes no sense to me. At least not “for all practical purposes” in understanding human interactions. He must move in the direction of greater satisfaction and then when he does this somehow demonstrates his “absolute power” over…what exactly?
This is important to understand. Determinism implies that our past (whatever factors preceded our choice) made us choose a certain thing, but nothing can make us choose a certain thing unless we give permission for it to be chosen.
The factors that procede our choice make us choose what we do. So how is our permission to do something not but one of those factors in turn?
We can’t say “my past made or forced me to pull the trigger” because nothing has the power to usurp our choice not to pull the trigger and make us pull the trigger against our will, for over this we have absolute control. If you grasp these two principles, we can move forward.
But we can’t not say that if in fact we do say that, right? Again, it would seem [to me] that in a wholly determined universe all of the factors in our brain and all of the factors out in the world come together to compel us to choose only that which we are “fated” to choose by the laws of matter.
Nothing in his life could, is, or will be other than what it must be but…
But what?
True, but as I just explained, we have a choice to do or not do something. Once the choice is made (whatever choice that is), we could not have chosen otherwise.
I truly do appreciate your attempts to make me understand this, but it makes no sense to me given the manner in which I am trying to convey to you the manner in which I think of a wholly determined universe.