(2020-11-09, 01:33 AM)Paul C. Anagnostopoulos Wrote: If we are going to give up on all this and just decide things happen for no reason at all, then things happen for no reason at all. I don't believe you can suddenly come up with some agent that effects things for a reason.
~~ Paul
You said free will is incoherent.
Why not just give the argument for why this is so.
Is it because you believe all causal events must be deterministic or random?
If so give us a proof of why that holds.
If there's no proof there's not much to discuss AFAICTell.
'Historically, we may regard materialism as a system of dogma set up to combat orthodox dogma...Accordingly we find that, as ancient orthodoxies disintegrate, materialism more and more gives way to scepticism.'
- Bertrand Russell
(I'm off to crash, but I'll be back tomorrow.)
If the existence of a thing is indistinguishable from its nonexistence, we say that thing does not exist. ---Yahzi
(2020-11-09, 01:36 AM)Paul C. Anagnostopoulos Wrote: I'm happy to accept "mind" as a causative agent. How does it cause things in an indeterministic way? (Again, "mind" is just a name for the source of free decisions, not an explanation of them.)
I have no idea why you think determinism implies that the conscious mind is epiphenomenal. But perhaps that is another conversation.
~~ Paul
Doesn't "free decision" mean indeterministic? You are happy to accept mind as a causative agent and mind is how we refer to the source of free decisions then you seem to be saying that you accept indeterminism.
I think I was saying that it is materialism that implies that conscious mind is an epiphenomenon. If you question that then there's hope for you yet.
I do not make any clear distinction between mind and God. God is what mind becomes when it has passed beyond the scale of our comprehension.
Freeman Dyson
(2020-11-09, 01:51 AM)Paul C. Anagnostopoulos Wrote: (I'm off to crash, but I'll be back tomorrow.)
Hopefully the apparently elusive proof of why free will is incoherent comes to you in your dreams.
Night!
'Historically, we may regard materialism as a system of dogma set up to combat orthodox dogma...Accordingly we find that, as ancient orthodoxies disintegrate, materialism more and more gives way to scepticism.'
- Bertrand Russell
(2020-11-09, 01:50 AM)Sciborg_S_Patel Wrote: You said free will is incoherent.
Why not just give the argument for why this is so.
Is it because you believe all causal events must be deterministic or random?
If so give us a proof of why that holds.
If there's no proof there's not much to discuss AFAICTell.
I cannot possibly give you a proof. This isn't mathematics.
All I can say is that without some description of the indeterministic nonrandom decision making method, I see no reason to believe there is one. This feeling is amplified by the fact that I cannot imagine a nondeterministic event is anything other than completely arbitrary. But that second point is one I'm happy to give up on for the sake of the conversation.
People can just assume that I'll give up on anything that sounds like dogmatic materialism or whatever. I'm looking for a description. I don't need to argue about materialism.
~~ Paul
If the existence of a thing is indistinguishable from its nonexistence, we say that thing does not exist. ---Yahzi
(2020-11-09, 01:52 AM)Kamarling Wrote: Doesn't "free decision" mean indeterministic? You are happy to accept mind as a causative agent and mind is how we refer to the source of free decisions then you seem to be saying that you accept indeterminism.
I think I was saying that it is materialism that implies that conscious mind is an epiphenomenon. If you question that then there's hope for you yet.
I accept indeterminism, but so far it's just random, arbitrary. What I'm looking for is an explanation of that nonarbitrary indeterminism.
I don't see why materialism implies that the conscious mind is an epiphenomenon. Can't the brain function that produces consciousness also affect brain state? It's clear that consciousness is not epiphenomenal, so if you could somehow prove that physicalism implies that it is, I'd suddenly no longer be a physicalist.
~~ Paul
If the existence of a thing is indistinguishable from its nonexistence, we say that thing does not exist. ---Yahzi
(2020-11-09, 01:56 AM)Paul C. Anagnostopoulos Wrote: I cannot possibly give you a proof. This isn't mathematics.
All I can say is that without some description of the indeterministic nonrandom decision making method, I see no reason to believe there is one. This feeling is amplified by the fact that I cannot imagine a nondeterministic event is anything other than completely arbitrary. But that second point is one I'm happy to give up on for the sake of the conversation.
Well I was thinking "proof" as in a philosophical argument.
So it doesn't matter to you that even a materialist like Thomas Nail can conceive of matter moving in a way that is non-predictable yet not random?
It seems to me this all comes down to your inability to conceive of non-deterministic events that are not arbitrary. That's fine, I can't conceive of events that happen for no reason at all whether they're deterministic or random...in fact as I noted I think determinism of this kind is just a special kind of arbitrary causal relation.
But all that comes down [to] is competing beliefs so I don't think we need another 75 pages on that.
That said, I do think you should at the least be able to give us an argument for why all events must be random or deterministic.
'Historically, we may regard materialism as a system of dogma set up to combat orthodox dogma...Accordingly we find that, as ancient orthodoxies disintegrate, materialism more and more gives way to scepticism.'
- Bertrand Russell
(This post was last modified: 2020-11-09, 02:03 AM by Sciborg_S_Patel.)
(2020-11-09, 01:53 AM)Sciborg_S_Patel Wrote: Hopefully the apparently elusive proof of why free will is incoherent comes to you in your dreams.
Night!
Oh, my dreams are never that interesting. Quite often they are about leaky plumbing.
I'm not sure why it's my job to prove that concept X is impossible, as opposed to the proponents' job to prove that it is possible.
But I just said that this is not mathematics and so I doubt either of us can prove our position. So, instead, I just ask for a description of a free decision.
~~ Paul
If the existence of a thing is indistinguishable from its nonexistence, we say that thing does not exist. ---Yahzi
(2020-11-09, 02:00 AM)Paul C. Anagnostopoulos Wrote: "... the brain function that produces consciousness ..."
~~ Paul
Isn't that the definition of an epiphenomenon? I looked up the definition and :
Quote:A mental state regarded as a by-product of brain activity.
I do not make any clear distinction between mind and God. God is what mind becomes when it has passed beyond the scale of our comprehension.
Freeman Dyson
(2020-11-09, 02:03 AM)Sciborg_S_Patel Wrote: Well I was thinking "proof" as in a philosophical argument.
So it doesn't matter to you that even a materialist like Thomas Nail can conceive of matter moving in a way that is non-predictable yet not random?
It seems to me this all comes down to your inability to conceive of non-deterministic events that are not arbitrary. That's fine, I can't conceive of events that happen for no reason at all whether they're deterministic or random...in fact as I noted I think determinism of this kind is just a special kind of arbitrary causal relation.
But all that comes down [to] is competing beliefs so I don't think we need another 75 pages on that.
That said, I do think you should at the least be able to give us an argument for why all events must be random or deterministic.
My argument is that neither I nor anyone else I've read or talked to has described such events. If there is a compelling description, you merely need to guide me to it. What does Nial mean by "non-predictable" that isn't covered by a simple lack of knowledge?
Can you explain your conception of one of these indeterministic nonarbitrary events?
~~ Paul
If the existence of a thing is indistinguishable from its nonexistence, we say that thing does not exist. ---Yahzi
