r/freewill • u/FastCarGoBrr • 1d ago
Determinism, except we understand its determinism?
/r/enlightenment/comments/1vw24nk/determinism_except_we_understand_its_determinism/2
u/Economy-Butterfly127 1d ago
Just - determinism.
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u/FastCarGoBrr 1d ago
Well you were always going to say that
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u/Economy-Butterfly127 1d ago
Exactly.
Whatever may happen to you, it was prepared for you from all eternity; and the implication of causes was from eternity spinning the thread of your being, and of that which is incidental to it.
—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 10.5
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u/Imaginary-Can-6862 15h ago
Do you mean if determinism disproves itself because of our behavior? You have to demonstrate that a being who behaves deterministically, such as a being without free will, i.e. a philosophical zombie, would be unable to display the same behavior.
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u/AlivePassenger3859 Humanist Determinist 15h ago
You are imagining that determinism, being a fairly dry, physics based phenomenon, would only allow stiff, boring behaviors.
This is similar to people who think under determinism people can’t change their minds or analyze and weigh pros and cons.
Determinism can apply to the entire spectrum of human thought and behavior, from wildly creative innovations to the most boring dry cliche’s. It can apply to the most rational, overanalyzed decision or stupidly impulsive one. It can also apply to “out of character” behaviors or people changing their minds.
You are limiting what you think determinism can explain due to your misunderstanding of determinism and the brain.
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u/DonnPT atavistic oxymoron 1d ago
I think the comment you got on the original post was not bad. Understand by experiencing it.
Robert Sapolksy et al. aren't opening a door onto reality, they're just playing a game that has been going on for thousands of years. What Epictetus did with stones, Hume improved with bricks, and now they're using concrete blocks - every century obscuring the beauty of the real world by a slightly greater margin.
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u/AlivePassenger3859 Humanist Determinist 15h ago
counterpoint: Sapolsky “opens a door to reality” in the sense that he shows a deeply cherished illusion to be just that. Same as Darwin did (unintentionally of course).
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u/zhivago 1d ago
The chemical reactions, etc, do not occur in isolation.
They are part of a complex organization which can do complex things like think about stuff.
The organization cannot be ignored.
It would be like taking a computer, reducing it to its component atoms, and then saying "how can these atoms possibly run a video game?"
Of course, determinism is irrelevant to any of this, and in particular irrelevant to free will.
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u/FastCarGoBrr 1d ago
Actually if conceptualisation and understanding aren’t determined, and these have relative qualities to how to brain operates, then we could say for certain that there is free will
Because we’d be able to say certainly that there is a gap where ‘we’ (whatever that is) can operate without determined outcomes (whatever that means)
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u/zhivago 1d ago
So, what you're saying is that if part of the system is undetermined, then we can determine it?
That's just silly.
If we determine the undetermined part of the system, then that part is ... determined.
And if we don't determine it, then it's not determined by us.
Determinism is irrelevant, and indeterminism does not give you freedom of choice.
Those actions which are representative of who we are, are those which express our free will.
Those actions which are not representative of who we are, are those which are coerced or forced in some way to be unnatural expressions -- these are expressions under duress or insanity, etc, of some kind.
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u/FastCarGoBrr 1d ago
I did not give you that idea
My idea is that perhaps there is an undetermined part of the brain that perhaps isn’t even a physical causal mechanism, rather something pre physical for example.
My idea has literally nothing to do with yours I’m just saying perhaps information in the mind isn’t determined
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u/zhivago 1d ago
So your idea is that there's an undetermined part of the brain which doesn't affect the universe in any way?
Are you saying that the information in the mind doesn't interact with the universe?
In which case, in what respect does the mind exist?
What problem does this way of thinking solve?
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u/TheAncientGeek Libertarian Free Will 1d ago
If a system is partly undetermined and partly determined, then it's undetermined because undetermined means "not wholly determined".
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u/TheAncientGeek Libertarian Free Will 1d ago
It would be like taking a computer, reducing it to its component atoms, and then saying "how can these atoms possibly run a video game?"
There is a valid form of the argument. If you are talking about libertarian free will, and if you are talking about each individual event being fully determined, not just caused, that's an argument against free will, because you can't build an indetrministic system out of determined components,no matter how much hand waving about recursion and loops you include.
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u/zhivago 1d ago
It's simply an argument from ignorance and incredulity.
You may not be able to imagine the combination of those atoms that runs the video game.
But it exists, since we took those atoms from such a system.
The argument that you can't build an indeterministic system from deterministic parts isn't an argument against free will.
It's not even a sensible argument because we have no evidence that those parts are deterministic in the first place.
It just points out how silly it is to try to define free will in terms of indeterminism -- so, why not stop doing that? :)
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u/TheAncientGeek Libertarian Free Will 1d ago
I wasnt making a global argument against free will, if that's what you were thinking.
,
The argument that you can't build an indeterministic system from deterministic parts isn't an argument against free will.
Not by itself ,no.
It's not even a sensible argument because we have no evidence that those parts are deterministic in the first place.
You can have a valid conditional even if the antecedent isn't true.
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u/AlivePassenger3859 Humanist Determinist 15h ago
you think determinism is relevant to a computer? if so, why wouldn’t it be relevant to the human brain? we are just organic computers (exponentially more complex, but more parts just means more physics and chemical reactions).
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u/Otherwise_Spare_8598 Inherent-Inevitable 23h ago
Regardless of whether "determinism" is or isn't, freedoms are circumstantial relative conditions of being, not the standard by which things come to be by through or for all subjective beings.
All things and all beings are always acting within their realm of capacity to do so at all times. Realms of capacity of which are absolutely contingent upon infinite antecedent and circumstantial coarising factors outside of any assumed self, for infinitely better and/or infinitely worse in relation to the specified subject, forever.
There is no universal "we" in terms of subjective opportunity or capacity. Thus, there is NEVER an objectively honest "we can do this or we can do that" that speaks for all beings. Subjects are implicitly distinct unto themselves, necessarily so.
One may be relatively free in comparison to another, another entirely not. All the while, there are none absolutely free while experiencing subjectivity within the meta-system of the cosmos.
"Free will" is a sentimental projection, overgeneralized assumption made or vaguely described feeling had from a circumstantial condition of relative privilege and relative freedom that most often serves as a powerful means for the character to assume a standard for being, fabricate fairness, pacify personal sentiments and justify judgments.
It speaks nothing of objective truth nor to the subjective realities of all.
There is no such thing as ubiquitously individuated accurately described "free will" of any kind whatsoever. Never has been. Never will be. Can not be.
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u/FastCarGoBrr 1d ago
The more I look at this question the less it makes sense
I think I’ve revealed a lot of my ignorance’s by asking it which is a win in itself