Determinism

[Johnnz]

I hold that idea till I realized there must be either a God or a spiritual plan.

Those are not mutually exclusive. 'Plan' is not a good term with its modern blueprint type connotations. Goals, purposes are better words to use, as they do not entail determinism.

An interactive God working out His overall purposes within the freedom he has granted to humanity (the 1st Commandment makes no sense if love is predetermined) fits best with the many times we see God requiring choices from people.

John
NZ

 

[MehGuy]

I was a hard determinist as well. I am going to assume you are a engineer as well, since usually logical minds come to this conclusion.

I hold that idea till I realized there must be either a God or a spiritual plan.

You assume that I am an engineer because I am a hard determinist? Lol, I'm not one. Also I don't think I'm very logical, but I try..

God and/or a spiritual plan= no hard determinism? Why would you assume there must be a God or a spiritual plan?

 

[Arthra]

We may well be "determined" in some ways... I mean our DNA and gravity as well as God's will can be determinants but there is still an area where we have choice...

and knowing a future isn't necessarily the same as to determine it... We know for instance the time there will be an eclipse of the sun but we ...that is our scientists... don't "determine" it.

 

[MehGuy]

We may well be "determined" in some ways... I mean our DNA and gravity as well as God's will can be determinants but there is still an area where we have choice...

and knowing a future isn't necessarily the same as to determine it... We know for instance the time there will be an eclipse of the sun but we ...that is our scientists... don't "determine" it.

Where is this area that we still have choice?

Knowing the future may not be the same as determining it, but it would certainly be an indication that things are predetermined. Otherwise there would be no way of knowing the future.

 

[Arthra]

Hmmmm...let's see.... when to post....when not to post... could be an area of choice? Nicht war?

 

[MehGuy]

What is the origin of free will?

How do you know you're the one even making the choice.. or even the thoughts for that matter..

Might be your brain making all of those decisions..

All we might be is just awareness..

 

[oi_antz]

It seems to me that the argument is really about whether we are free to make a choice, not that we do make choices. I mean, when we do things we have made a choice to do those things. Is anyone arguing against that?

Assuming not, then the argument seems to be whether we really have the opportunity to choose one option or another. About this, we should investigate what specific considerations go into the decisions that we make. What I see is that most of it is desire, and a part of that includes fear. Then our belief and understanding translates options into potential outcomes, which we assess for their suitability to satisfy our desire. Then we pick the decision that we think is going to satisfy the most important desires we have.

Whether we really can choose A or B in that situation seems to me to be mechanical. Some decisions we make are easy to make, we don't have to think twice about it, like opening the door before we walk through it. Other decisions we make might be more difficult because the potential outcome of each option could satisfy our desires that are considerably equal. However, because we can only choose yes or no, it seems reasonable that given the exact same situation with the exact same understanding and desires, we will always make the same decision. It cannot be proven though, since every person in every situation at every moment of time is unique. It cannot be reproduced.

The danger I see in this thread is people's attitude about this is generating some apathy, or carelessness toward their responsibility in decision making. It is important to keep in mind that every decision we make and every word we speak is going to bang that billiard ball which will change it's course. So take this statement and incorporate it into your beliefs, because the greatest value of a human life is the ability to act. The skill that we apply and the actions we take can improve and destroy the world. It is happening already, humans are making choices based on their desires that is polluting and destroying the planet. On the other hand, humans do have the potential to revive and populate other planets and take life across the whole universe.

 

[oi_antz]

If God is like a seer who, in a moment in time peers into the abyss of to foresee the future, then we could speak of all things as predetermined and God having predetermined it all.

But that all assumes a temporally-bounded deity acting like an omniscient seer.

At least in Christianity God is understood as atemporal, outside of time. God is not foreseeing events as one looking ahead, God is rather one looking within His now, and events are seen.

Let's put it this way, if I observe you walk across the road as you do it, have I predetermined that you would walk across the road? Of course not, I observed that you did it as you did it.

Likewise God's atemporality means that all moments in time occur in His eternal "now". God isn't predetermining you to walk across the road simply because He knows you do it when and as you do it.

-CryptoLutheran

I know you have used the word 'seer' in response to my view on this before. Still I think we are viewing it the same way, but our terminology can cause confusion. Let me see if I am right about that.

So when God is looking at the total of time, there is still a constraint of time that it is a record of change. So at any point in the process of that change, any observer can see that what has already happened cannot be altered, and what is yet to happen has not been recorded. Do you think that God is able to decide to act at any point of that growth, which will alter the path of change compared to what it would have been if He had not acted at that point in time?

 

[MehGuy]

Was I predetermined to have this stupid avy and sig?

Why would the universe want this?!

 

[BaconWizard]

Indeed, nothing actually exists except as perceived or conceived in awareness. So it doesn't have a function per se - all functions, and everything else, appears within it.

That's dangerously close to solipsism...

If you wanted to know how free will could exist in the context of the laws of physics, quantum indeterminism shows that physical reality offers degrees of freedom.

Yes 100% agree

 

[MehGuy]

If God exist then all things are predetermined since God knows all.

If God dose not exist then the universe is just a bunch of predetermined billiard balls knocking around in a pattern set since the big bang(maybe even before?).

So how do you come to terms with the fact that you are not in control of your life or even your emotions? If you meditate to feel better then you were predetermined to meditate. If you are depressed and cannot meditate then you are predetermined to not mediate.

I was predetermined to make this post since the Big Bang.

Everything seems rather absurd in that way.

Wow, never read the rest of the thread.. (pretty interesting..)

I did not seriously start contemplating free will and determinism until after I became an atheist. The thoughts were daunting at first. I quickly came to the conclusion that I was a hard determinist and that the thought of free will existing at any level was ludicrous. This thinking had/has very horrendous consequences.

It's not only that you're not in control of your emotions, it's also that you're not even in control of your own thoughts and words. What is coming out of your mouth is coming from your brain, and they thus lose all personal meaning. You are therefore reduced to mere awareness, with the ability to experience stimuli. The worst part of you is that everyone around you is in the same predicament as you are. The love you feel from your mother or wife, comes not from them but predetermined processes in the brain. Everything suddenly turns cold.

It's no longer that you don't have free will, it's that you're not even a unique being anymore, you're just mere awareness. Everything else is robotic. Which makes the question of what are we more interesting, and perhaps a little more clear. Are we interchangable with any brain? What separates us from one another? Do we all come from the same metaphysical source?

These are my thoughts at least, maybe I'm totally of base. I haven't really entertained the thought of free will and determinism since becoming an atheist, but this thread has reopened an interest in the subject.

 

[BaconWizard]

Why would the universe want this?!

Why would the universe WHAT?

 

[MehGuy]

Why would the universe WHAT?

The universe wants Fern imprinted everywhere! She is destined to have all of her energy and matter be solely used to make Fern images. Lol.

 

[SeventhValley]

That's dangerously close to solipsism...

What is wrong with solipsism? I think therefore I am. This is the closest to truth anyone can get.

 

[BaconWizard]

What is wrong with solipsism? I think therefore I am. This is the closest to truth anyone can get.

1) nothing wrong with it at all! But I am fairly sure Light, who I was addressing, is not a solipsist
2) "I think therefore I am" is not solipsism, or certainly nowhere near the full story.

 

[KnowtheSilence]

Wow, never read the rest of the thread.. (pretty interesting..)

I did not seriously start contemplating free will and determinism until after I became an atheist. The thoughts were daunting at first. I quickly came to the conclusion that I was a hard determinist and that the thought of free will existing at any level was ludicrous. This thinking had/has very horrendous consequences.

It's not only that you're not in control of your emotions, it's also that you're not even in control of your own thoughts and words. What is coming out of your mouth is coming from your brain, and they thus lose all personal meaning. You are therefore reduced to mere awareness, with the ability to experience stimuli. The worst part of you is that everyone around you is in the same predicament as you are. The love you feel from your mother or wife, comes not from them but predetermined processes in the brain. Everything suddenly turns cold.

It's no longer that you don't have free will, it's that you're not even a unique being anymore, you're just mere awareness. Everything else is robotic. Which makes the question of what are we more interesting, and perhaps a little more clear. Are we interchangable with any brain? What separates us from one another? Do we all come from the same metaphysical source?

These are my thoughts at least, maybe I'm totally of base. I haven't really entertained the thought of free will and determinism since becoming an atheist, but this thread has reopened an interest in the subject.

I also didn't start thinking about free will until I started questioning the existence of God. Eventually I settled in as a compatabilist, someone who thinks that determinism is true but also thinks that free will is a meaningful concept (although the free will that exists is not the same as libertarian free will).

I've been surprised at the number of determinists I've encountered who dislike compatabilism. It really seems that our biggest difference should be one of preferred language, but there seems to be something deeper that I can't quite put my finger on.

The way I see it is this: "I" am a construct comprised of my memories, thoughts, desires, personality traits, consciousness, etc., and when one or more of those things causes me to act in a particular way, "I" am the cause. The fact that all of those things are themselves causally determined by something outside my self is not important. We don't need to work our way back to some sort of "unmoved mover" every time we talk about one thing causing another, so why would it need to be different in this case?

Think of a Rube Goldberg machine. You could look at one action in the middle of the sequence, let's say a marble rolling down a pipe and knocking over a domino. You can say that the marble caused the domino to fall. You can also look at the entire machine as a whole and say the very first move in the sequence is what caused the domino to fall, as it also caused the marble to roll, and whatever took place before that. The very first thing is the cause of the very last thing, but when we're looking just at the scale of the domino and the marble, the movement of the marble causing the movement of the domino is not a trivial thing just because we don't invoke the "ultimate" cause of the sequence.

Similarly, our thoughts and actions could be described in terms of the movements of subatomic particles acting in a causal chain of events going back to the beginning of time, but we don't experience the world on that level. When a tree falls over in a windstorm, we say the wind caused the tree to fall; no one seems to think that we can't make a meaningful comment about causality unless we trace the tree falling back to the Big Bang, so why would it be any different on the level of our minds and our decisions?

 

[SeventhValley]

I also didn't start thinking about free will until I started questioning the existence of God. Eventually I settled in as a compatabilist, someone who thinks that determinism is true but also thinks that free will is a meaningful concept (although the free will that exists is not the same as libertarian free will).


I've been surprised at the number of determinists I've encountered who dislike compatabilism. It really seems that our biggest difference should be one of preferred language, but there seems to be something deeper that I can't quite put my finger on.

The way I see it is this: "I" am a construct comprised of my memories, thoughts, desires, personality traits, consciousness, etc., and when one or more of those things causes me to act in a particular way, "I" am the cause. The fact that all of those things are themselves causally determined by something outside my self is not important. We don't need to work our way back to some sort of "unmoved mover" every time we talk about one thing causing another, so why would it need to be different in this case?

Think of a Rube Goldberg machine. You could look at one action in the middle of the sequence, let's say a marble rolling down a pipe and knocking over a domino. You can say that the marble caused the domino to fall. You can also look at the entire machine as a whole and say the very first move in the sequence is what caused the domino to fall, as it also caused the marble to roll, and whatever took place before that. The very first thing is the cause of the very last thing, but when we're looking just at the scale of the domino and the marble, the movement of the marble causing the movement of the domino is not a trivial thing just because we don't invoke the "ultimate" cause of the sequence.

Similarly, our thoughts and actions could be described in terms of the movements of subatomic particles acting in a causal chain of events going back to the beginning of time, but we don't experience the world on that level. When a tree falls over in a windstorm, we say the wind caused the tree to fall; no one seems to think that we can't make a meaningful comment about causality unless we trace the tree falling back to the Big Bang, so why would it be any different on the level of our minds and our decisions?

Well I would say the wind has no will at all so then we have no will.

We are merely observers of this life we cannot act but our bodies are set to act on it's own. We are merely a web of thoughts and experiences that resides(are trapped until we can download ourselfs to a computer) in the brain.

 

[oi_antz]

Well I would say the wind has no will at all so then we have no will.

We are merely observers of this life we cannot act but our bodies are set to act on it's own. We are merely a web of thoughts and experiences that resides(are trapped until we can download ourselfs to a computer) in the brain.

The wind will never make a wheel.

 

[BaconWizard]

The wind will never make a wheel.

A human being will never do anything the wind can do, either.

 

[dlamberth]

Was I predetermined to have this stupid avy and sig?

Why would the universe want this?!

Because you needed to go through that as part of your path to awakening.

.