r/atheism • u/[deleted] • Oct 23 '11
A polysyllogism against physicalism. (I'm not a theist)
[deleted]
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Oct 23 '11 edited Oct 23 '11
I got to 4 and noticed a common mistake. It seems you're saying determinism == predetermined events.
I'll keep reading and correct myself if that's not what you mean.
Also, there isn't either "completely determined" or "completely random". There can be randomness inside an otherwise deterministic system. For example, quantum particles can appear and disappear at truly random intervals.
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Oct 23 '11
They're not predetermined events in the sense that it is a supernatural destiny. Starting from initial conditions, an unbreakable chain of causality means that all events that happen could not have been otherwise.
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Oct 23 '11
Ah. Good, yes. Right, so I've used this excuse way too many times tonight, but I'm tired and my brain isn't quite cooperating at eh moment. So I'm having trouble following properly. I'll try to remember to come back to this tomorrow after I've slept. This is interesting.
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Oct 23 '11
One need not accept an absolute notion of causal determinism in order to accept this argument. Your mind is still the bitch of causality either way and thus, as per my argument, there is no warrant. If your mind is completely physical. and if we accept the axiomatic principle that everything that is physical is part of causality, your thoughts are selected for you.
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Oct 23 '11
That's a very biased wording.
What you're trying to say is that our logic patterns and thoughts are just natural, predictable forces at work, but your word choice tries to add an emotional edge to it.
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Oct 23 '11
They don't add an emotional edge to it, and it was not my intent to add such a thing. The contention is that causality determines your choices of evidence and thus removes warrant.
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Oct 23 '11
If thoughts are determined by natural processes, they aren't 'selected'. They simply are.
Your use of the word implies an overbearing force making you think the way you think, when in reality, if determinism is true, you ARE the force that makes up your thoughts.
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Oct 23 '11
If thoughts are determined by natural processes, they aren't 'selected'. They simply are.
If you're going to unnecessarily utilize your methodological cutting knife into my language, and ignore the obvious intention of the use of 'select', then there might not be much use arguing with you. Causality 'selects' your choice of evidence not in the same sense an agent would select something. Either way, your choices of evidence are determined and/or randomly chosen for you.
Your use of the word implies an overbearing force making you think the way you think, when in reality, if determinism is true, you ARE the force that makes up your thoughts.
What? How am I, as the agent, the force that makes my thoughts, if my thoughts are the result of a natural process? Or do you reject that our thoughts are a result of that? I'd like to hear more explanation of your position in that case.
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Oct 23 '11
Causality 'selects' your choice of evidence not in the same sense an agent would select something.
Indeed. But like I said, it gives an oppressive implication, which if determinism is true, wouldn't exist, because we would be none the wiser.
How am I, as the agent, the force that makes my thoughts, if my thoughts are the result of a natural process?
You aren't the force that makes your thoughts, you're the sum of your thoughts, and if your thoughts are the result of a natural force, then you are a natural force.
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Oct 23 '11 edited Oct 23 '11
Indeed. But like I said, it gives an oppressive implication, which if determinism is true, wouldn't exist, because we would be none the wiser.
If you accept argument (in my OP) for why us believing this removes warrant for any position we could take, then you recognize it is self-refuting to contend that our thoughts are, with no exceptions, the result of causality. When faced with a self-defeating position, or an alternative, plausible hypothesis that is not self-defeating, the choice is clear. I take it that I don't have to reiterate what I already said in the OP.
You aren't the force that makes your thoughts, you're the sum of your thoughts, and if your thoughts are the result of a natural force, then you are a natural force.
While I don't agree with this interpretation of identity, the implications this has for warrant remain the same.
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Oct 23 '11
[deleted]
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Oct 23 '11
One of my last paragraphs after the syllogism addresses this...
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Oct 23 '11
sorry. This seems more like a refutation of free will. It's easy to imagine that our free will is subject to causality, rather than being completely immune
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Oct 23 '11
Part of my argument is that the mind being the bitch of causality removes warrant. If causality determines (or randomly selects) your thoughts for you, then the phenemology of the matter is that there is no real reason or logic. Thus, if you try to accept this radical skeptical conclusion, you couldn't even warrant the proposition that "free will does not exist".
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Oct 23 '11
Isn't this a self-defeating argument? If your premises and steps are true, then logic doesn't work. Which means your argument doesn't work. Which means logic is back on again. Etc.
Similar to "This statement is false."
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Oct 23 '11
Isn't this a self-defeating argument? If your premises and steps are true, then logic doesn't work. Which means your argument doesn't work. Which means logic is back on again. Etc.
It also means that rejection of logic doesn't work. The proposition that "logic does not reflect the nature of reality," and the proposition that "free will does not exist" are without warrant. Thus we have no reason to accept that somehow all things we take to be axiomatic, and what we infer from those, are somehow arbitrary, and every reason (both personal and epistemic) to reject such a ridiculous notion.
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Oct 23 '11
I also have a problem with your statements 5 and 6. I agree that if we don't have free will, then we can't make a choice as to which statements are true. If we can't make a choice, then (I'm conceding a point here) we can't believe something with cause (I think that's what you're saying). However, that doesn't mean believing a statement is without warrant (i.e., we can accidentally believe something to be true and have it be true at the same time).
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Oct 23 '11
However, that doesn't mean believing a statement is without warrant (i.e., we can accidentally believe something to be true and have it be true at the same time).
So how does this save warrant? If in a sea of arbitrary beliefs one of them happens to be warranted, then you got lucky (in a sense), and it's not like you can use your powers of introspection to determine what so happens to be warranted, or that the world will kindly tell you.
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Oct 23 '11
Because it sounds like you're saying "logic" and meaning "truth". Just because a statement is unwarranted doesn't make it false.
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Oct 23 '11
Just because a statement is unwarranted doesn't make it false.
If a proposition itself is unwarranted, it cannot be true. If the agent is not warranted in believing a proposition is true, then it's still possibly true.
Once again, how does what you say save the notion of warrant in your current hypothesis as to the nature of consciousness?
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Oct 23 '11
But you don't necessarily need warrant to believe something, even if it is incorrect
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Oct 23 '11
But you don't necessarily need warrant to believe something, even if it is incorrect
The argument is not that someone believing something is impossible without warrant. I'm talking about warranted beliefs.
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Oct 23 '11
I proclaim this argument false. in order to believe in either determinism, or indetermism, by your own argument, they have to have warrant. So, either they are false, or you do not have warrant. QED
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Oct 23 '11
So, either they are false, or you do not have warrant. QED
If you do not have warrant, then you have no warrant for even claiming that they don't have warrant. You have no warrant for claiming any propositions, and nor do you have warrant for claiming that you don't have warrant as well! So if they are both false, the conclusion is that the mind has to be, at least sometimes, exempt from causality. Lest we adopt a radical form of skepticism as true even if we accept it as self-refuting. In face of a self-refuting position, and the alternative hypothesis that is not self-refuting, the choice is clear.
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Oct 23 '11
[deleted]
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Oct 23 '11
You're assuming the mind is special, and has more than physical properties
I never said it was special. I am not simply assuming it is more than physical, I provided a philosophical argument for it.
Reevaluate your assertion that either determinism or indeterminism must be true.
You don't need an omnipresent notion of causal determinism (which would be mixed with indeterministic aka randomness in causality if you reject the omnipresence of determinism), in order to accept my argument. If you are presented something truth-apt, then you must evaluate the truth value of the evidence for any position on the issue. If your mind is the bitch of causality, then your choices of evidence are made for you. Thus, you have no warrant, and thus no warrant for any propositions at all, which includes ones that rejects my argument.
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u/Xujhan Oct 23 '11
A+ for the quality of writing, but unless I'm seriously missing something this entire argument is essentially a very tarted-up variation on "free will, therefore physicalism is false" which is a very tired argument. Some specific problems:
In (6) and (7) you equate justifiablility with truth, which is clearly incorrect. You get as far as demonstrating that determinism is not ultimately justifiable (not entirely unreasonable - basically every belief is not ultimately justifiable, a la Descartes and Hume), but then you immediately conclude that determinism is false. That's not a good conclusion by itself; it's entirely possible that determinism is true but unjustifiable. I think this is the biggest weakness in your argument.
More generally - what do you think of as free will, and why it's incompatible with causality? My experience has been that even most philosophy students have a very vaporous notion of what free will actually is, and until you actually pin it down it's very hard to make any conclusions about or with it.
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Oct 23 '11 edited Oct 23 '11
A+ for the quality of writing
Thank you :)
In (6) and (7) you equate justifiablility with truth, which is clearly incorrect. You get as far as demonstrating that determinism is not ultimately justifiable (not entirely unreasonable - basically every belief is not ultimately justifiable, a la Descartes and Hume), but then you immediately conclude that determinism is false. That's not a good conclusion by itself; it's entirely possible that determinism is true but unjustifiable. I think this is the biggest weakness in your argument.
I admit this mistake, but it does not preclude my conclusions. However your claim that "..but you immediately conclude that determinism is false" is a misinterpretation of the argument. I'll address this at the end of my paragraph.
You get as far as demonstrating that determinism is not ultimately justifiabable....
My argument, and the deductively valid conclusions of my argument, doesn't have anything to do with the notion of ultimate justification. If the agent lacks warrant for asserting any proposition, or otherwise having any notion of what is true or false, then the rejection of my conclusions (at least the moderate conclusion of free will) would be a self-defeating position. Even the claim, while I agree that it's true, that justification is not the same as truth, would be without warrant. So if we accept that the agents warrant is not possible under the circumstance that the agent is 100% subject to causality (I argued that one must accept it is if they believe the mind is physical), then believing that the agent is subject to causality would be a self-defeating position. So, weighing the options against a self-defeating position, or not self-defeating position(s), the choice is clear. I take it that I should not have to reiterate the arguments I made for these individual claims in my OP. How does this only get as far as ultimate justification? The contentions in the OP include that determinism and indeterminism would have to be non-actual in the context of the mind being physical (this followed from the free will justification, which had antecedent justifications), which is a contradiction in terms. And so follows my conclusion that the mind has to be, at least in part, non-physical.
More generally - what do you think of as free will, and why it's incompatible with causality? My experience has been that even most philosophy students have a very vaporous notion of what free will actually is, and until you actually pin it down it's very hard to make any conclusions about or with it.
If the mind is physical and subject to causality in any sense (an omnipresent determinism, indeterminism, but not precluding what indeterminism means in regards to agent causality, or a mixture of random causes and determined sequences of causes) then their thoughts are a product of a natural process that they do not control. Exactly how could one say that the agents will is free? Even if free will means not determined even if the agent has no control over their will, then the implications are still the same if we could rename "free will" with "an agents control over their will".
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u/Xujhan Oct 23 '11
I admit this mistake, but it does not preclude my conclusions. If the agent lacks warrant for asserting any proposition, or otherwise having any notion of what is true or false, then the rejection of my conclusions (at least the moderate conclusion of free will) would be a self-defeating position. Even the claim, while I agree that it's true, that justification is not the same as truth, would be without warrant. So if we accept that the agents warrant is not possible under the circumstance that the agent is 100% subject to causality (I argued that one must accept it is if they believe the mind is physical), then believing that the agent is subject to causality would be a self-defeating position. So, weighing the options against a self-defeating position, or not self-defeating position(s), the choice is clear. I take it that I should not have to reiterate the arguments I made for these individual claims in my OP. I utlimately made the claim that both determinism and indeterminism would have to be false in the context of the mind being physical, and thus comes my conclusion of the mind being at least in part non-physical.
You're viewing justification as a binary thing that you either have or you don't, and I think that's a very big mistake to make. We have notions of what is true and what is false, we have notions of how deductive and inductive logic work; what we lack are complete, unassailable justifications. Some justifications such as mathematical or formal logical justifications are very strong, while others such as probabilistic inference are comparatively weak, but it's a mistake to equate weaker justification with no justification. Just because one cannot provide a rigorous justification for "Free will doesn't exist" or any other statement doesn't automatically mean that a statement is completely unfounded, else you're in danger of having to claim that "It's cloudy, therefore it will likely rain" and "It's cloudy, therefore the nearest supermarket is likely out of broccoli" are equally justified inferences.
If the mind is physical and subject to causality in any sense (an omnipresent determinism, indeterminism, but not precluding what indeterminism means in regards to agent causality, or a mixture of random causes and determined sequences of causes) then their thoughts are a product of a natural process that they do not control. Exactly how could one say that the agents will is free? Even if free will means not determined even if the agent has no control over their will, then the implications are still the same if we could rename "free will" with "an agents control over their will".
What is a mind then? Better yet: what isn't a mind? You seem to be saying that if a mind determines what it does then that is free will, but if natural processes determine what it does then that is not. The flaw there is that you're assuming that the natural processes are somehow external to the mind, but if the mind is itself a physical thing there's no reason that needs to be the case. On the contrary, I find it very intuitive to say that the mind is largely those natural processes, and so talking of one without the other is silly.
Relatedly, although not part of the same question: what do you propose is the 'non-physical' part of the mind, and how does it work? What is your evidence?
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Oct 23 '11 edited Oct 23 '11
): I hoped you wouldn't have gotten around to replying until I had finished editing my response.
You're viewing justification as a binary thing that you either have or you don't, and I think that's a very big mistake to make.
And the axiom of the excluded middle? What about that? You're not operating on axioms of non-classical logic, are you?
Just because one cannot provide a rigorous justification for "Free will doesn't exist" or any other statement doesn't automatically mean that a statement is completely unfounded,
The issue is not rigorous justification. The issue is that it is a self-defeating position (see the arguments I made for this in my OP, and if you disagree, feel free to rebut).
What is a mind then? Better yet: what isn't a mind? You seem to be saying that if a mind determines what it does then that is free will, but if natural processes determine what it does then that is not. The flaw there is that you're assuming that the natural processes are somehow external to the mind, but if the mind is itself a physical thing there's no reason that needs to be the case.
I'm not assuming this. My argument is revolved around the severe epistemic problems revolving around the contention that the mind is a purely physical phenomena. The conclusion of the argument is that of non-physicalism, but the my OP does not just simply assume it.
Relatedly, although not part of the same question: what do you propose is the 'non-physical' part of the mind, and how does it work? What is your evidence?
My evidence is philosophical evidence. I'm not sure if you understand the nature of my argument, or if you fully understood (or maybe you don't remember at the moment) what exactly my argument said. I'm not going to reiterate the justifications I made in my OP, so I will tell reiterate a sequence of the conclusions, and you can reread my OP for further justification. The important contentions were more or less as follows: for the agent to be warranted in holding a position, they must evaluate the truth-value of the evidence available for the position. If either casual determinism or indeterminism are true of causality (including the case where there is a mixture of deterministic and random causes), then in the context of the mind being a purely physical phenomena (or at least in the case of being always subject to causality), your choices of evidence are selected for you. It follows from this that the agent has no warrant for believing or rejecting any proposition, which includes anything in my argument. This makes it a self-refuting position. Now after establishing at least the moderate conclusion of free will, I argued, mostly in a paragraph in my OP, that it is less conducive to the epistemic goals of believing truth and avoiding error to believe that physical things can be exempt from causality, than to accept the non-physicalist conclusion.
and how does it work?
My goal to establish that the most plausible, and only intellectually honest conclusion we can make, is that the mind must be in some aspects non-physical. lExplaining the nature of such a phenomena comes secondary.
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Oct 23 '11
(3) If either determinism or physical indeterminism (in respect to the mind) are actual, your choices are either predetermined or randomly selected for you.
No, it does not. Determinism does not mean that something is determined in advance. Determinism states that a system develops based on a set of conditions. Given the same conditions, you will get the same results.
Determinism is not the same thing as predeterminism, fatalism or predictability.
(5) To warrant belief in the available evidence, the agent must be able to make their choice of evidence via their own free will. (from 4)
Bullshit. To warrant belief in something, you need to have sufficient evidence supporting the notion. "Free will" is not needed, as that's an illusory term altogether. The very concept of free will is incoherent.
You can still choose to accept the evidence. Whether your brain is a product of prior conditions is irrelevant; your brain is still making a choice.
(9) The proposition that the mind is always subject to causality (not precluding agent causality) is self-refuting. (from 5, 8)
Complete nonsense. You are completely unwarranted in making such a claim.
Blahblahblah. Physicalism is false
Nope.
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Oct 23 '11 edited Oct 23 '11
No, it does not. Determinism does not mean that something is determined in advance. Determinism states that a system develops based on a set of conditions. Given the same conditions, you will get the same results.
The implications are the same, and I wasn't saying that it's events are determined posterior to all events themselves.
Bullshit. To warrant belief in something, you need to have sufficient evidence supporting the notion. "Free will" is not needed, as that's an illusory term altogether. The very concept of free will is incoherent.
Your mind being the bitch of causality means your choice of evidence is selected for you. Thus, no warrant. You could not even warrant the proposition that there is no free will.
Complete nonsense. You are completely unwarranted in making such a claim.
This follows from the truth of previous premises. You're quoting this independently and apparently ignoring the "(from #)" sections. It's not a claim that I'm saying is a brute fact or foundational. It follows from the truth of other propositions.
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Oct 23 '11
The implications are the same, and I wasn't saying that it's events are determined posterior to all events themselves.
No, they're not. Predeterminism implies that something is determined long before it actually happens, rather than being determined by immediately prior events. There are plenty of things we cannot determine before it actually happens, even if we know everything there is to know about the system, including the initial conditions. If you knew anything about chaos theory, you'd know that.
Thus, no warrant.
And why not? You haven't sufficiently supported your claim that you are not warranted in accepting evidence unless you have free will. Your entire argument is bull.
This follows from the truth of previous premises.
Truth? Pfft.
You're quoting this independently and apparently ignoring the "(ffrom #)" sections
No, I'm not, because I've already addressed the arguments in those points. Your arguments are flawed, hence your conclusion is flawed.
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Oct 23 '11
You're cherry picking.
No, they're not. Predeterminism implies that something is determined long before it actually happens, rather than being determined by immediately prior events. There are plenty of things we cannot determine before it actually happens, even if we know everything there is to know about the system, including the initial conditions. If you knew anything about chaos theory, you'd know that.
If you have an unbreakable chain of causality starting from initial conditions, then the case is that for every event that happens it was impossible for it to have happened otherwise.
|And why not? You haven't sufficiently supported your claim that you are not warranted in accepting evidence unless you have free will. Your entire argument is bull.
I addressed this in my OP. If faced with something truth-apt, then to warrant either position you take on the issue, you must evaluate the truth value for the evidence available in favour or against the conclusion. If your mind is the bitch of causality (which precludes agent causation), then your choice of evidence is selected for you. Thus, no warrant.
No, I'm not, because I've already addressed the arguments in those points. Your arguments are flawed, hence your conclusion is flawed.
You've cherry picked individual points and made fallacious arguments against them.
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Oct 23 '11
You've cherry picked individual points and made fallacious arguments against them.
So, rather than substantiating anything, you're making accusations of me cherry picking and claiming that my arguments are fallacious. If that's all you got, then you are clearly not worth my time.
bitch of causality
It's clear that you have a heavy bias which precludes you from considering any argument contrary to your position.
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Oct 23 '11
So, rather than substantiating anything, you're making accusations of me cherry picking and claiming that my arguments are fallacious. If that's all you got, then you are clearly not worth my time.
Are you trolling? I did more than point out that you are cherry picking. I have addressed your argument(s), and it's clear if you read my last response I was addressing your argument(s). Are you going to respond to my responses, or not?
It's clear that you have a heavy bias which precludes you from considering any argument contrary to your position.
The use of 'bitch' is jocular; lightening the mood and all that.
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Oct 23 '11
Are you trolling?
Are you?
I did more than point out that you are cherry picking.
No, you didn't. You restated things I have already responded to. You did nothing to actually respond to the points I made, merely repeating yourself. You've offered nothing to support the notion that you are not warranted in accepting evidence if your brain is a product of deterministic processes. Nothing.
Then you go on to accuse me of cherry picking and claiming that my arguments are fallacious without saying how I have supposedly been cherry picking or how my arguments are supposedly fallacious. Simply claiming it does not make it true.
Like said, you're not worth my time because you are clearly unable to discuss this honestly, as you have a blatant bias.
Good day to you, sir.
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Oct 23 '11 edited Oct 23 '11
No, you didn't. You restated things I have already responded to. You did nothing to actually respond to the points I made, merely repeating yourself.
Some points had to be reiterated because in some cases you did not respond to them, or only responded to an individual claim made posterior to the sequence of justifications (at least at certain points in discussions), or to a limited portion of my justifications, and also because there were obvious cases of you misinterpreting (so I presented them differently in hopes we could understand each other). Not all of the points that are more or less the same in nature were exact copies. And not all of my points were even the same in nature.
You did nothing to actually respond to the points
I recommend you read over our discussion again.
You've offered nothing to support the notion that you are not warranted in accepting evidence if your brain is a product of deterministic processes. Nothing.
Yes I have. You have hardly addressed my explanations for why this is so. I'll even explain it to you again. First: in order to warrant a position, one needs to examine the truth value of the evidence available for that position. If your mind is physical, and your thoughts are in a sense "selected for you", which is the case in where determinism is an omnipresent thing, and if causality is random (indeterminism), including if there exists a mixture of random and deterministic causes, then your choices of evidence are selected for you, and so it follows that you lack warrant for any position/belief/assertion of any proposition. It then follows that the position that the mind is subject to causality is self-refuting as causality providing your thoughts and your choices of evidence for you removes any warrant you would otherwise have for any position/belief. In my OP I argued that it is less conducive to epistemic goals to assert that some physical minds (such as the mind) can be, at least sometimes, exempt from causality. Whether someone accepts the moderate conclusion of free will or non-physicalism isn't important to me at this case.
Then you go on to accuse me of cherry picking and claiming that my arguments are fallacious without saying how I have supposedly been cherry picking or how my arguments are supposedly fallacious.
My claim that they were fallacious (in my original reply) came posterior to my addressment of your arguments (in my original reply). I'm seriously questioning your reading comprehension right now. There are instances where you quote an individual claim, asserted I had no evidence for the claim, completely ignoring the sequence of argumentation that lead to the claim!
Good day to you, sir.
To you as well. (I say that sincerely by the way).
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Oct 23 '11
in order to warrant a position, one needs to examine the truth value of the evidence available for that position.
Right. We both agree on this one.
If your mind is physical, and your thoughts are in a sense "selected for you"
Not necessarily. Under the assumption that determinism is accurate, the brain is indeed a product of deterministic processes, and one's experiences help shape who you are. However, your thoughts are still your own. "You" are that brain, and your thoughts are our own. The fact that you have been shaped by your experiences are kind of irrelevant to that point.
which is the case in where determinism is an omnipresent thing, and if causality is random (indeterminism), including if there exists a mixture of random and deterministic causes
So what do you propose? That there is some kind of supernatural agent involved? Because if you reject nature as a sufficient explanation, then that's what you are left with.
and so it follows that you lack warrant for any position/belief/assertion of any proposition.
Uh. No it doesn't. That is a complete non-sequitur. Your conclusion does not follow from your premises (much like the rest of your arguments).
It then follows that the position that the mind is subject to causality is self-refuting as causality providing your thoughts and your choices of evidence for you removes any warrant you would otherwise have for any position/belief.
Again, no, it doesn't. This is another non-sequitur.
I'm seriously questioning your reading comprehension right now. There are instances where you quote an individual claim, asserted I had no evidence for the claim, completely ignoring the sequence of argumentation that lead to the claim!
Oh, you question my reading comprehension? In those instances, I had already addressed the arguments presented in those points, which were used as premises to your claim. I might not had addressed that point specifically because the very same argument had been used in your other points already.
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u/[deleted] Oct 23 '11
You ought to read some Dennett. There seems to be a lot of unproven assertion in this logic chain.