With determinism how can there be active voice?

LOVEthroughINTELLECT said:

If determinism is true then why do we use active voice so much?

If there is an agent, a, that is not determined by anything else then I suppose active voice would apply to it. At the beginning of time a caused b. But how can active voice be used for anything after that? Everything other than a is going to be an object. Only a can be an agent in a sentence. I do not see how we can say that b, c or anything else other than a does anything. It seems to me that, if determinism is true, we can only use passive voice--we can only say, "b was caused by a"; "c was caused by b"; etc.

If determinism is true, how can I ever say, "I did this yesterday"? It seems to me that I can only say, "a, b, c, etc. caused me to do this yesterday".

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Perhaps you could clarify -- what was the alternative?

You are part of the causal chain. Just like with dominoes, take one out and the results would be different.

LOVEthroughINTELLECT said:

If determinism is true then why do we use active voice so much?

If there is an agent, a, that is not determined by anything else then I suppose active voice would apply to it. At the beginning of time a caused b. But how can active voice be used for anything after that? Everything other than a is going to be an object. Only a can be an agent in a sentence. I do not see how we can say that b, c or anything else other than a does anything. It seems to me that, if determinism is true, we can only use passive voice--we can only say, "b was caused by a"; "c was caused by b"; etc.

If determinism is true, how can I ever say, "I did this yesterday"?

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I see no problem with entities doing something under determinism. Even non-determinists use active voice for entities of which they don´t think they are free agents.

What, however, I think should be reconsidered under determinism is the use of "choice/choose" and "decision/decide".

It seems to me that I can only say, "a, b, c, etc. caused me to do this yesterday".

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How did you get to using active voice for "a, b, c etc."? Doesn´t seem to go well with your argument.

LOVEthroughINTELLECT said:

If determinism is true then why do we use active voice so much?

If there is an agent, a, that is not determined by anything else then I suppose active voice would apply to it. At the beginning of time a caused b. But how can active voice be used for anything after that? Everything other than a is going to be an object. Only a can be an agent in a sentence. I do not see how we can say that b, c or anything else other than a does anything. It seems to me that, if determinism is true, we can only use passive voice--we can only say, "b was caused by a"; "c was caused by b"; etc.

If determinism is true, how can I ever say, "I did this yesterday"? It seems to me that I can only say, "a, b, c, etc. caused me to do this yesterday".

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Logically, you are correct. With one exception:

There is a. Then a creates b and assigned part of the nature of a to b.

So, there are something done by b which is not subjected to the control of a.

God creates human with some properties of God.

LOVEthroughINTELLECT said:

If determinism is true then why do we use active voice so much?

If there is an agent, a, that is not determined by anything else then I suppose active voice would apply to it. At the beginning of time a caused b. But how can active voice be used for anything after that? Everything other than a is going to be an object. Only a can be an agent in a sentence. I do not see how we can say that b, c or anything else other than a does anything. It seems to me that, if determinism is true, we can only use passive voice--we can only say, "b was caused by a"; "c was caused by b"; etc.

If determinism is true, how can I ever say, "I did this yesterday"? It seems to me that I can only say, "a, b, c, etc. caused me to do this yesterday".

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So? Even if you're right here (and I don't think anything you've said makes much sense) all this demonstrates is that maybe we've misidentified whether determinism is correct or not when formulating the language we use to describe our actions. Oh well, wouldn't be the first time folk psychology was incorrect.

LOVEthroughINTELLECT said:

If determinism is true then why do we use active voice so much?

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Do you mean logical determinism or causual, or both? Active voice is more practical as it makes the meaning of our sentences clearer and less "wordy." I am not sure the truth hood of determinism in either sense has any bearing on the truth hood or applicability of using the subject of a sentence as to perform the action described by the verb.

LOVEthroughINTELLECT said:

If there is an agent, a, that is not determined by anything else then I suppose active voice would apply to it. At the beginning of time a caused b. But how can active voice be used for anything after that? Everything other than a is going to be an object. Only a can be an agent in a sentence.

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I believe this is where you are mistaken. "Agency" is defined when there is something performing an action and when there is something being acted upon as to have consequences. So long as there is that sense of agency, things other than a could be an agent. It seems as if you're trying to associate being "un-caused" to agency when there may be no correlation at all.

LOVEthroughINTELLECT said:

I do not see how we can say that b, c or anything else other than a does anything. It seems to me that, if determinism is true, we can only use passive voice--we can only say, "b was caused by a"; "c was caused by b"; etc.

If determinism is true, how can I ever say, "I did this yesterday"? It seems to me that I can only say, "a, b, c, etc. caused me to do this yesterday".

Click to expand...

B is still a thing that can perform an action upon something as to have an end result. It does do something. If we only used passive voice, a lot of our sentences would be long and awkward. Passive voice is usually used when the agent performing the action is obvious or irrelevant, while signifying the action and what is being acted upon. Even in passive voice sentences there is an agent and a display of agency.

Activeness and passivity are matters of momentum, not necessarily indicators of human freedom. Whether or not you're speaking of determinism.

You nearly always choose an arbitrary place to start the explanation.

Explanations rarely go back to the beginning of the universe. Starting the explanation at the person is normally all we need.

Also, even with determinism, there is still a conscious subject, rather than an object.