I copied your words, as a matter of fact.

how did that string of words, "as a matter of fact" get in your post?

If you insist on games, the initial conditions at the Big Bang plus the laws of physics compelled me to write those words, and all the words I have ever written, obviously.

That is the argument: there is only one substance, and that physics is closed.

Okay, so we agree after all.

Yes, there is only matter and the laws of physics. Your "animals" and "design" are not real.

As far as I know determinism is an argued position. I think it's an argument from analogy. Everything around us seems to follow the laws of nature and that implies the past determines the present. Why should we be an exception?

The onus, it seems to me, of proving anything to the contrary lies with freewill enthusiasts.

There's a "good" reason to believe in determinism but I don't see any good counterarguments.

Quantum mechanics, I believe, suggests a non-determnistic subatomic world. Our minds could be quantum machines and, ergo, capable of freewill.

As for Eccles he ignores the above argument.

Everything around us seems to follow the laws of nature and that implies the past determines the present. Why should we be an exception? — TheMadFool

We know about the past because we use the present, and the laws of physics to infer it. That's how we discovered the big-band, galaxy formation, and how elements were made etc. The laws of physics work just as well backwards in time.

So, I'm not sure the laws of physics are sufficient to make the claim that there exists an inescapable causal chain from the past to the future, as, due to their time-symmetry, these laws don't really describe such a thing.

Didn't Hume write something pertinent to this, about his inability to discover "cause" in nature?

The onus, it seems to me, of proving anything to the contrary lies with freewill enthusiasts. — TheMadFool

Perhaps the initial conditions at the big-bang will lead, via inexorable causal chain, to such a refutation.

Why are we special? That's what needs to be proven.

One interesting thing that I'd like your opinion on is our ability to imagine alternatives.

We get into a situation and we, rather instinctively, come up with options. We make a graded list of alternatives. People could construe this as frewill at play.

However, we make our choices according to constraints that apply during our decisions. I mean we choose the best option first. If that is unavailable then we choose option 2 and so on.

So, the entire alternatives thinking and acting process is driven by constraints that are beyond our control.

I guess what I'm getting at is that to entertain options indicates an intelligent mind but not necessarily freewill.

Why are we special? That's what needs to be proven. — TheMadFool

Isn't this just Eccles's argument? If you are a determinist, then there really is no such thing as an argument that satisfies a rational agent, there are only atoms bouncing off each other. If you believe that arguments, proofs, reason, and rational agents exist, then how can you be a determinist?

One interesting thing that I'd like your opinion on is our ability to imagine alternatives.

We get into a situation and we, rather instinctively, come up with options. We make a graded list of alternatives. People could construe this as frewill at play. — TheMadFool

I confess I'm slightly confused by the idea that choices and alternatives are real, yet somehow determinism holds. i.e. I don't understand Compatibilism.

My understanding of "determinism" (i.e. the current conception of determinism) is isomorphic witht eh block-universe of relativity. The future already exists.

By his very belief in universal determinism, the determinist, if he is consistent, cannot interpret his opponent's sentence " I possess free will" to be an actual claim to possess an objective property. This is because if universal determinism is true then the only objective meaning the determinist can ascribe in his opponent's sentences are the physical causes that precipitated them. — sime

This makes no sense to me (and by the way I'm ignoring issues with "claims possessing objective properties" and the idea of objective meaning).

Two immediate problems with your comment spring to mind.

One, determinism doesn't necessarily imply physicalism (and neither does physicalism imply determinism for that matter).

Two, why couldn't the person believe that meaning is physical?

Yes, there is only matter and the laws of physics. Your "animals" and "design" are not real. — Inis

Then we don't agree. You keep using this term, "matter". I don't know what that is. I'd say that your distinction between "matter" and "ideas" is not real.

You keep using this term, "matter". I don't know what that is. — Harry Hindu

"Matter" = "chunks of stuff" basically. Like a piece of wood, leather, a pebble, etc.

Isn't this just Eccles's argument? If you are a determinist, then there really is no such thing as an argument that satisfies a rational agent, there are only atoms bouncing off each other. If you believe that arguments, proofs, reason, and rational agents exist, then how can you be a determinist? — Inis

Being rational doesn't mean we have freewill. Does it? We can program computers to be rational. In fact that's all they can be.

What are we left with? Emotions? That we've realized is hardwired. We don't choose to be sad or happy. Emotions are less within our conscious control than rationality.

What say you?

Let's look at Eccle's argument. If the world is deterministic then what we believe isn't within our control. The argument assumes that rationality is not possible in a deterministic world. But we have computers - perfect rational machines - and they don't have free will.

Let's look at Eccle's argument. If the world is deterministic then what we believe isn't within our control. The argument assumes that rationality is not possible in a deterministic world. But we have computers - perfect rational machines - and they don't have free will. — TheMadFool

You are reprising A.J. Ayer's argument in The Concept of a Person (1963):

The statement that one believes a given proposition on such and such rational grounds, and the statement that one believes it because such and such processes are occurring in one's brain can, both of them, be true. The word 'because' is used in a different sense in either case, but these senses are not destructive of each other... This is illustrated even by the example of a calculating machine. The way the machine operates depends on the way in which it has been constructed, but it is also true that it operates in accordance with certain logical rules. From the fact that its operations are causally explicable it does not follow that they are not logically valid. — A. J. Ayer

Note however that this argument only shows that causal determination does not preclude rationality. The argument that determinism is self-defeating usually makes a weaker claim: that there is no necessary connection between physical causality, which produces what we take to be beliefs and other mental states, and the attributes of truth, logic, reason, etc. that we would like to claim for our beliefs. If the physical world is causally closed, then truth, logic, reason, and other abstract things cannot have an effect on it. And if so, then any correlation between the two realms is either fortuitous or due to some inexplicable preexisting harmony. So the argument goes...

If the physical world is causally closed, then truth, logic, reason, and other abstract things cannot have an effect on it. — SophistiCat

Because . . . of an assmption that those things are not part of the physical world? Otherwise, the connection there would need to be explained better.

If logic, reason, etc. are physical things, then they're part of the causal closure in that case, and could indeed have an effect.

Being rational doesn't mean we have freewill. Does it? We can program computers to be rational. In fact that's all they can be. — TheMadFool

If you claim that rational processes exist, that reason is a feature of reality, that reason is causal, then have you not already stepped out of material determinism? Something other than the initial conditions and laws of physics causes the present to be the way it is.

Once you admit the causal power of abstractions, then you have let the cat out of the bag.

If logic, reason, etc. are physical things, then they're part of the causal closure in that case, and could indeed have an effect. — Terrapin Station

Right, that would be the identity thesis: the abstract, or the mental just is the physical, or somehow supervene on the physical (and then it's just the matter of "naturalizing" them if you wish to demonstrate the specific connection).

Right, that would be the identity thesis: — SophistiCat

Well, the identity thesis for someone who accepts determinism, yes. ;-)

Being rational doesn't mean we have freewill. Does it? We can program computers to be rational. In fact that's all they can be. — TheMadFool

Computers are neither rational nor irrational; they neither follow reasoned arguments nor fail to follow them, they merely execute instructions.

Suppose you have two computers, A and B; you program A to follow modus ponens, and you program B to follow the fallacy of affirming the consequent. A will appear to you to be rational and B will appear to be irrational, but in fact both A and B are just blindly following the procedure you programmed them with.

The conept of rationality simply does not apply to computers. Rationality requires understanding, and computers don't understand, they merely obey.

But although I disagree with your argument, I agree with your conclusion: being rational does not mean we have free will. Being rational is a matter of understanding the logical connections between ideas; free will (which personally I do not believe exists) is not a matter of understanding, but of being able to influence events.

Computers are neither rational nor irrational; they neither follow reasoned arguments nor fail to follow them, they merely execute instructions. — Herg

But, the output of the computer depends on the instructions. The instructions are real and causal, despite them being independent of their physical instantiation. A program in C will cause the same effect as a program written in Fortran, despite them being physically different. A program stored on punched cards will have the same effect as one stored on a hard disc.

It seems to me, that if you permit the existence of real causal abstractions - like instructions, knowledge, reason - then the future can't be determined by the laws of physics alone.

The conept of rationality simply does not apply to computers. Rationality requires understanding, and computers don't understand, they merely obey. — Herg

This is the claim that an artificial general intelligence is impossible. And it is just a claim.

But although I disagree with your argument, I agree with your conclusion: being rational does not mean we have free will. Being rational is a matter of understanding the logical connections between ideas; free will (which personally I do not believe exists) is not a matter of understanding, but of being able to influence events. — Herg

What is the constraint that allows certain abstractions to exist e.g. rational agents, but prevents others from existing, e.g. rational agents with free will?

If you claim that rational processes exist, that reason is a feature of reality, that reason is causal, then have you not already stepped out of material determinism? — Inis

Note however that this argument only shows that causal determination does not preclude rationality. The argument that determinism is self-defeating usually makes a weaker claim: that there is no necessary connection between physical causality, which produces what we take to be beliefs and other mental states, and the attributes of truth, logic, reason, etc. that we would like to claim for our beliefs. If the physical world is causally closed, then truth, logic, reason, and other abstract things cannot have an effect on it. And if so, then any correlation between the two realms is either fortuitous or due to some inexplicable preexisting harmony. So the argument goes... — SophistiCat

But isn't that assuming dualism of some kind? Reason has causal import but reason isn't an immaterial thing as of necessity. Right?

But isn't that assuming dualism of some kind? Reason has causal import but reason isn't an immaterial thing as of necessity. Right? — TheMadFool

Well, the argument doesn't explicitly assume any metaphysical stance on the nature of reason; it seeks to challenge determinists (in this context: those who maintain that our actions and thought processes are due only to physical causes) on their own ground.

This sounds somewhat like Popper's argument that says that physicalist (let's call it that to avoid confusion) ontology is too impoverished. But a physicalist need not limit herself to just the "objective" language of physical causes. At least I haven't yet seen a persuasive argument to that effect. — SophistiCat

The underlying dispute seems to be whether the determinist can consistently assert an objective distinction between reasons and causes. Such a distinction could only be objective if the truth-maker of a reason is transcendent of the proximal causes of it's assertion such that the reason isn't merely said to be true or false by linguistic convention.

How can the determinist consistently assert that "determinism is true" is neither made true by linguistic convention, nor by the proximal causes that provoked him to say it?

But matter is a thing, matter is when energy is organized into atoms. We don´t know what energy truly is, but whatever it is, it can solidify into atoms and those atoms behave with certain rules. Matter matters!

It seems that we are still in the same predicament. Matter is made of something that we don't know what it is. We could say the same thing about ideas. Are ideas made of energy?

It seems that we are still in the same predicament. Matter is made of something that we don't know what it is. We could say the same thing about ideas. Are ideas made of energy? — Harry Hindu

We don't need to know what matter is made from, all we need to know is how it behaves, how it interacts, and why. Of course, we do know most of the basic constituents of the universe, and we do know that these constituents are quanta of various types of field.

We also know, ideas aren't made of energy.

We don't need to know what matter is made from, all we need to know is how it behaves, how it interacts, and why. — Inis

We explain how matter behaves as a result of what it is made of - tiny particles called atoms.

We also know, ideas aren't made of energy — Inis

We do? What are ideas made of? If you don't know, then how can you say that you know they're not made of energy? and how do they establish causal relationships with matter?

We explain how matter behaves as a result of what it is made of - tiny particles called atoms. — Harry Hindu

Science has progressed a fair way beyond that.

We do? What are ideas made of? If you don't know, then how can you say that you know they're not made of energy? and how do they establish causal relationships with matter? — Harry Hindu

How does energy establish a causal relationship with atoms?

I'm trying to understand your position. If you're just going to "answer" a question with a question then I'm done here.

:up: thanks