My point was that is possible to avoid some contradictions. I'm surprised you missed that.
Well then your point was not to the point, for you were responding to my claim that <"
The relevant question is whether it is possible to avoid [self-contradiction]."> As I already said, <"
Responding to the claim that deterministic self-contradiction is impossible to avoid with analogies of self-contradictions that are possible to avoid is just more of the false equivalence I already pointed out.">
I don't deny that there exist possible contradictions that the determinist can avoid, and I never did. That is a very weak claim. My claim all along has been that the determinist will necessarily contradict himself, for it is not possible, even in principle, for him to avoid all self-contradiction.
I don't see a problem: you know what you want to happen, so you take an action with the intent that it will achieve what you want (typically beneficial). If it doesn't achieve what you wanted but something else, that something else was unintended.
I already explained the problem and you are not addressing it. You have two possible logical responses to my argument: 1) deny that the consequence premise is present, or 2) deny that the consequence premise involves counterfactual possibility.
Not really. At the time of the subsequent opportunity to do A or ~A, the entity evaluates the situation and decides whether, in the new circumstances, A is likely to be successful. If the evaluation is positive, they do A, if not, they do not do A.
I see two options here: 1) You are yet again failing to address the argument at hand, and are merely asserting that they magically choose between
A and
~A, or 2) You are talking about rats (in which case the words "evaluation" and "decision" are anthropomorphic word games). I assume you really are talking about rats here, no? Or did you intend this explanation to be beyond rats?
In any case, there is no problem with a deterministic entity evaluating both the potential outcome of doing A and the potential outcome of not doing A - or evaluating the potential outcome of many possible choices. Even hard-coded chess programs can do that.
Again, you'll have to answer the question about rats above. If we want to play word games and we are talking about rats (or qualitatively equivalent entities), then <There is no problem with a deterministic entity "evaluating" both the potential outcome of doing A
and the potential outcome of not doing A - or "evaluating" the potential outcome of many possible "choices."> If we don't want to play word games then yes, there is a problem with deterministic entities presupposing counterfactual possibility.
Even hard-coded chess programs can do that.
Let's use a simpler example. Suppose I write a very simple computer program to feed my dog. Each day when the dog steps on a large scale, the computer distributes 235g of food if the dog weighs more than 60 lbs, or it distributes 265g of food if the dog weighs less than 60 lbs.
Apparently you would say that such a program is "evaluating" and "deciding" and perhaps even "thinking." But these really are word games. The computer is a passive instrument, and is not in truth evaluating or deciding, for such terms imply activity. It would be similarly false to claim that gutter sieve systems, such as LeafFilter, "evaluate" and "decide" when to let things pass into the rain gutter, depending on whether they are leaves or water.
Computers make decisions no more than LeafFilter does. You are becoming confused by the idea of a metaphorical predication. Saying that a computer decides or a rat makes mistakes is like saying that LeafFilter evaluates or that a basketball jumps. Such is not a coherent case for determinism; it is just sloppy philosophy of language.
So, presumably, it's not a mistake if a rat eats rat poison mistaking it for food...
I'd say you're engaged in anthropomorphic word games, but it is helpful to know that you really do think rats make mistakes in the same way humans do. Apparently I was right all along, and you see humans as complex rats. As George MacDonald gestured, it is difficult to persuade a someone who has convinced himself that he is a beast, that he is in fact a man (or that men really do exist).