Determinism

I’m compelled to say it: Whatever.

A Compatibilism / Incompatibilism Transformation
By Trick Slattery
From the “Breaking the Free Will Illusion” web site

Here’s where I always get stuck. Beyond definitions – definitions it would seem all of us are compelled by nature to give to these words – the act of clumping these defined words together to make arguments like this one would in turn seem to be just another manifestation of nature. Only this time embodied in brain matter that compels these exchanges to unfold only as they ever can.

There is no real “revisionsism” here. Why? Because the one compelled by nature to revise the definition is interchangeable with the one compelled by nature to react to that revision only as he must.

Nothing would seem to escape the inexorable toppling of all matter over onto other matter as nature itself unfolds necessarily in sync with its own laws. The fact that this matter has now become conscious of itself as matter able to be self-conscious of itself as matter embedded in nature…well…how does that change things?

What earthly difference can it make if the conmpatibilist says one thing and not another if it was the only thing he/she was ever able to say? Just as we are compelled to react to what we hear being said as our own brain-matter compels us.

Instead, I can only assume that there are important points being made here that I keep missing. But, given how I understand determinism, others are then either compelled or not compelled to point them out.

More non-answers which avoid discussion rather than moving it along. Endlessly repeating the same idea.

Shifting away to economic systems. Why not stay on death camps and gulags and actually say something about it?
You can’t even say “death camps bad”?
So capitalism destroyed a lot of lives … Does that change the fact that people were killed in death camps?

Communist, fascists and capitalists were not able not to set up death camps??? They decide not to do it all the time. “Should we set up a death camp today? No, let’s not do that.”

You should consider not telling people what they are obligated to do and think. It’s annoying. You would have better conversations if you didn’t do it.

With any luck [for both of us] you were compelled by nature to respond to what I was compelled by nature to post above.

But if there is any measure of autonomy embedded in the choices that I make, I choose to respond to you in retort mode as I choose to respond to KT in retort mode:

All you are exposing [to me] in tantrums like this is just how effective I am in perturbing your peace of mind.

Though I suspect that, unlike KT, you will manage to stumble into the grave with your objective morality and your God still largely intact.

separate morality from free will
by Phil Goetz
at the lesswrong website

But: Even if both sides agree that moral behavior revolves around intention, what do they agree about regarding the extent to which intention itself does or does not revolve around the laws of matter?

If our brains/minds autonomically precipitate neurological and chemical interactions that become our intentions then how are “both sides” not wholly in sync with the only behaviors they are able to choose in their interactions with others?

How are all “cognitive agents” not just more of nature’s “living, breathing…thinking” dominoes? Or, if you prefer, nature’s own computers?

“I” and my “environment” would seem to be of one and only one inherent reality. The only reality possible given the laws of matters.

Which would necessarily take us back to wondering if we are in possession of just enough free will to explain mind as matter of our own volition. As a species on this planet in the vastness of all there is going back to an explanation for existence itself.

Really, isn’t this the option that, of our own free will or not, is all it takes to sweep questions of this sort under the rug?

Existentially as it were?

Then just go about the business of living our lives convinced that we call the shots.

Especially if, in our day to day interactions with others, we are awash in all manner of success.

Of course we call the shots! Let the losers fall back on a belief that their own miserable failures are derived solely from things that are totally beyond their control…rather than from their own willed weakness or stupidity.

Here’s the thing though. We’re not barbarians. Instead, we are among the very few folks in this modern world that do come into venues like this one. Men and women that do in fact take questions like this and grapple with them “philosophically”.

And pondering the extent to which we choose to do this freely is no small thing.

Right?

A new low.

Of course, if you want to talk to yourself, then this is the way to achieve that goal.

Let’s agree to call it a new low for both of us. And, just to be on the safe side, let’s agree that nature conspired to stage and then to sustain the whole thing.

In or not in league with God.

Look, in regards to either yourself or KT, I am more than willing to exchange posts that actually revolve around determinism.

It is only when I perceive either of you as being in what I call “retort mode” that I’m really not interested.

The bottom line is that I have a great deal of respect for the intelligence of both of you. Just not in retort mode. When you basically come after me, you may as well be one of the fucking Kids here.

But trust me: This post is no less an existential contraption. In no way, shape or form would I ever argue that all rational men and women are obligated to think like I do about you.

And then there is this part:

He was like a man who wanted to change all; and could not; so burned with his impotence; and had only me, an infinitely small microcosm to convert or detest. John Fowles

I think this explains a lot about me here, but I can never really be sure why. It’s buried down deep in dasein.

And, of late, godot.

No, I don’t agree to that. I had valid points.

Repeatedly saying “compelled by nature” is not a discussion of determinism. It explains nothing and it describes nothing.

It’s similar to this :

“Why is that airplane flying?” “It’s compelled by nature.”

“Why did that airplane crash?” “It was compelled by nature.”

Useless answers.

If the human brain is matter and matter obeys nature’s laws, how are our behaviors then not compelled by them? In other words, how are our behaviors not inherently, necessarily obligated to be in sync with the laws of matter?

How would you go about demonstrating that the laws of nature did not compel you to read these words?

How would you go about demonstrating that these laws do not explain and describe everything?

No, it is not similar to that at all in my view. The reason the airplane flies can in fact be demonstrated with a great deal of sophistication. Why? Because all of the parts that comprise it are wholly in sync with the laws of matter as we have come to understand them in the either/or world.

But what about “we” ourselves? What about the matter that comprises the brain, the mind, the self-conscious awareness of all those able to invent those parts and put them together to invent the airplane?

How is this matter the same or different from the clearly mindless matter that comprises the plane parts?

Is the answer to this something that philosophers have [using the tools at their disposal] been able to finally pin down definitively after thousands and thousands of years of contemplating such quandaries as “dualism”?

What, in your view, is the most “useful” answer?

I didn’t say that behaviors are not in sync with the laws of matter or that one is not compelled by the laws of matter.

I’m saying that the way you are referring to the laws of matter amounts to saying nothing at all. When any and every behavior has the same explanation “compelled by nature”, then there is no value to the explanation. You could just as well say “compelled by Pixies” and it would explain just as much as “compelled by nature”.

It’s similar because it accounts for the behavior of the airplane just as much as “compelled by nature” accounts for human behavior - not at all.

That’s why scientists and engineers don’t stop at “compelled by nature”. They look at the details, the patterns, the similarities and differences in situations. Therefore, you end up with a science of flight dynamics. And that’s a useful way of looking at airplane behavior.

If you do believe human behaviors are in sync with the laws of matter – laws that compel them – then what in your own view constitutes a discussion of this that enables someone to reflect something rather than nothing?

Cite some examples of this.

The point isn’t whether I say “compelled by nature” or “compelled by pixies”, but the extent to which one is able to demonstrate that human brains either allow or do not allow us the option to choose one rather than the other?

I must be misunderstanding your point. It is the fact that nature has evolved into life on earth evolving into the human species evolving into the human brain able to grasp the science of flight dynamics intertwined with/in the invention of the airplane that philosophers grapple with in trying to understand such things as dualism.

What are “the details, the patterns, the similarities and differences” that allow us to grasp the distinction between mindless matter and matter able to become conscious of itself as matter either compelled or not compelled by the self-same laws of matter to build airplanes?

The gap in our knowledge here may well be beyond the reach of the human brain.

Configuration of matter A causes behavior X, configuration of matter B causes behavior Y. Etc.

That’s where you actually relate laws of matter to real behavior.

For example, one sees it in studies which show that food intolerance causes behavior problems in children.

But good luck, trying to relate gravity, electromagnetism and the strong and weak forces to real behavior.

I’m not writing a PhD thesis or starting a cult or selling a product … therefore, I’m not going to be demonstrating anything. I will be putting out some ideas and examples - things to think about -that’s it.

I’m suggesting to you, and anyone who may be reading this, that there are better and worse ways of looking at these things. I’m suggesting that “compelled by nature” is not a particular good way because it doesn’t lead anywhere. It’s a dead end.

See for yourself how far you can get with it.

I’m not talking about evolution, dualism, or distinctions between matter conscious of itself and mindless matter. I’m talking about determinism and people making decisions.

Does it make sense to think of humans as merely “compelled by nature”? I don’t think so because we can’t relate the fundamental forces to human behavior. We need to think in more abstract terms. That is why it’s useful to think of agents who have choices and who make decisions. We can then figure out reasons for actions, motivations, compulsions that produce particular behaviors in people. This is where we can get meaningful results.

I think this is a good way of presenting a potential position. Here we are in situ, where experientially it seems like we are free, but we can also see ourselves affected by things and even notice that some ‘choices’ or choices seem automatic, even compulsive (a word with the same root as compelled.)

I cannot imagine nailing down a solution (that would convince all rational people, for example) as far as determinims vs. free will. Nor can I see, actually, what good it would do. So for me it is not an important issue.

I have my day ahead of me. I have to make a job related call that might give me some work I would like to have. Fortunately it is not a fully cold call. My way of thinking about this call is a muddle of thinking based on causation - I know they don’t have a lot of money right now and this will likely make them stingy - and me mulling over my options with an implicit belief in free will somewhere in there - as if several futures are possible, as if might go a number of different ways on the phone. I don’t need to make a decision about free will or determinism. I have a bunch of heuristics, just like everyone else, some would seem to indicate I am free - me planning my different options to different questions or obstacles I might meet in the phone call - and some that things are determined - especially when thinking about the callee.

Peacegirl thinks I will be a better person if I believe in determinism. I truly doubt that. I can see it helping on some issues, but also hurting on others. I think a consistant, all the time believing in determinism, will dehumanize. Obviously that doesn’t mean it is incorrect, in fact my concerns are about the believe causing certain negative effects. That the future is bascially laid out already I think will be depressing. Perhap it ‘should’ not be. But humans have tendencies to feel in ways that are not necessarily logical. We are life forms nnot pocket calculators. Some people believe that we will be nicer to criminals once we no longer view their choices as choices. I think the precise opposite effect could take place once we view them as broken machines or creatures with problematic chemical machines in their brains. Once we are seen as, essentially, robots or complicated ‘things’…wait that is often the way we are viewed today by governments,corporations and the pharmaceutial industry. Well, there’s a downside to that.

Perhaps there are good reasons most people more or less black box the issue and if we followed their thinking we would find a muddle of both models chugging along. (note: many of them claim that they believe in free will or deteminism, but I think if we watched their language and investigated their thinking, we would find that in fact they move between the two).

If someone can demonstrate that it is important for us to work it out finally AND can at least make it seem remotely possible, especially for us here, to work it out. OK, maybe then I’ll prioritize working out the solution to it. I suppose I’d be flattered they thought so highly of me ( and then also they think very highly of themselves).

This pops up over and again in these discussions and debates. The same word is being used by everyone, but not everyone “for all practical purposes” understands the meaning of the word in the same way.

That’s when some insist that in order to understand the true meaning of the word we must first pin down the one and only true definition.

Trust me: Five will get you ten that it’s their definition.

But as often as not five will get you ten that their definition makes little or no actual contact with those “for all practical purposes” interactions of flesh and blood human beings.

It becomes basically a dictionary definition that they then use to defend the meaning they give to all the other words they in their philosophical “analysis”.

And, let’s face it, the word “free” is a particular gnarly example of this.

Free in what sense? Ontologically given the understanding of existence itself? Morally and politically given ones value judgments in the is/ought world?

Or, in either context, is it always what the objectivists insist it is?

Okay, but how does that change [if at all] when the matter reconfigures from mindless to mindful. There are the laws of matter involved in the creation of, say, a tornado. These laws propel/compel the matter in and around it to behave only as the matter can behave.

But what of the laws of matter inside the brain of a meteorologist that cause her to predict the behavior of the tornado? Was she determined to to “choose” that forecast, or is there some element of actual free choice involved in opting for one rather can another prediction?

The behavior of the matter inside the tornado…how much more or less “real”/real is it than the behavior of the matter inside the meteorologist’s brain?

But the point of some would seem to be that the laws of matter are inherently intertwining both the biological interactions here in the child’s body and the sociological behaviors of that child interacting with others. Indeed, that our very reactions to those behaviors are no less but another necessary manifestation of the laws of matter.

On the other hand, I will always admit that I am still missing some basic point that you and others make here. I just keep coming back to whether I make it only because nature compels me to.

Exactly. Those scientists exploring the actual functional relationship between “I”, the world of the very, very large, and the world of the very, very small all intertwined in the “four fundamental forces of nature”, haven’t come to any definitive conclusion yet. Let alone alone being able in turn to explain the specific relationship between what “I” does “choose”/choose and a definitive understanding of existence itself.

Okay, but for those who “choose”/choose to take their speculations from the neighborhood bar to a philosophy venue, it would seem expected that they would at least attempt to intertwine those speculations with their own experiences or with what they have perused by seeking out the opinions of those who have attempted [using, say, the scientific method] to grapple with these things less speculatively.

It’s a dead end only because we reach that part where no one seems able to move the discussion to a path that finally resolves the perplexities involved.

But it is surely less of a dead end than suggesting that our behaviors are compelled by pixies.

Or, perhaps, by God?

And what on earth could the latter possibly have to do with the former?

We seem to be in two very different discussions here. Compelled by nature or otherwise.

But human brains are either wholly in sync with those fundamental forces or they are not. How could it not make sense to explore that? The only thing that can possibly make sense has to be in tandem with what in fact is true. And nothing either of us might opine here changes that, right?

Okay, then note particular examples of how discussions of abstract agents have in fact led to meaningful results in explaining the actions, motivations and compulsions relating to the actual behaviors chosen by flesh and blood human beings.

It doesn’t change. Matter produces some sort of behavior in a billiard ball. Matter produces some sort of behavior in a human.

If you are saying something meaningful, then you are describing the relation between matter and behavior.

Again, calling it a “manifestation of the laws of matter” is not saying anything useful. Everything is a manifestation of the laws of matter. So what?

If you aren’t getting anywhere by looking at it that way, then look at it another way. Change your approach.

I’m suggesting things which I learned from my own experiences and from other people. I’m not pulling fictions out of my ass.

You don’t need to think about it very long before you realize that you are not getting anywhere. What result do you have? Anything at all?

What does determinism have to do with people making decisions???

You can look at determinism as involving entirely mechanical interactions where people are essentially the same as billiard balls or dominoes. In that case, they have no choices and make no decisions.

Or you can look at determinism as involving both mechanical interactions(inanimate objects) and agents who have choices and who make decisions. I think that this is the more useful approach.

But you don’t explore it. You don’t go beyond repeatedly saying “compelled by nature”. Exploring requires getting into details.

Really? You have never heard of psychology?

People are able to apply different levels of abstraction fairly easily. They move seamlessly from “big picture” to various levels of detail and back to “big picture”.

People also usually don’t use binary (true-false) logic. They use multi-state logic where statements have some probability of truth. When presented with contradictory statements, one statement will just be seen as more likely to be true than the other one.

That allows for flexible approaches. One is not committed to only one way of handling a situation. One does not have to “nail it down”.

Yes, one does not have to know answers 100% to live or act in the world. It might be nice to have the answers, but one does not have to wait until one has perfect knowledge to move through life, make choices (or be compelled to act) or say no or yes to things. Unless someone has evidence that we should withdraw from life if we don’t know for sure how we should act or if we are free, we get to participate in life sans a secular or religious Bible that everyone should read and follow.

And sometimes it does not matter. If I found out today perfect proof that determinism is the case, I can’t see how I would look back on the last months and say - oh, damn I did those things - in a sense I am precluded from that concern by deteminism: it had to go that way. And if I found out free will was the case, to 100% certainty, I am not sure at all what the last month would look like to me. I can’t see I would feel regret: oh, I should not have done X or Y. I would merely now know that I could have done other things, which is what it seemed like at the time. And since I am not in this enlightened state I feel no pregret that I will continue to live and strive for what I want (or ‘strive’ for what I want, should striving turn out to have been in some ultimate sense illusory.

Thus knowledge of the world and myself are vastly more important to me than resolving this issue. And yes, that knowledge or even guesses about what is true on a more day to day level about the world and my own inner workings is not binary, it is often what seems to be the case with some probability.

And yes, this leads to mistakes but unless one has a Jesus complex or the like, mistakes are a part of life and I do not think I must be perfect to be entitled to live.

Right. Sticking a label on alters nothing about life. But that seems to be the view of the minority on this site.