(January 18, 2015 at 8:23 pm)bennyboy Wrote: No, not renders. I'm suggesting that if the entire universe's existence in time is immalleable from start to finish, then it's like a tunnel through which we move-- we see things "changing" around us, but in reality it is only our perspective which changes-- everything else is just sitting there. Remember when you were a kid, drawing little falling-man stick figures in the margins of your textbooks and flipping through them to see him "fall" ?

I see no evidence that time is an illusion, that the future exists "somewhere" in a tunnel or the Universe's version of a motion picture book or whatever those were called. None of your statements are justified on the mere grounds that the present moment is a continuation of past moments, and therefore effects of the present are causes of the (hypothetical) future, and were caused by the causes and effects before them.

(January 18, 2015 at 8:23 pm)bennyboy Wrote: It is in fact YOUR contention that free will is an illusion, due to the laws of determinism, so I find your statement a little ironic.

You're not simply contending that we view an obscure metaphysical concept, such as in the case of "free will," with a more comprehensive understanding of its previous states, but that we deny causality altogether! Determinism can make sense of the illusion of free will, I'm not quite so sure you've successfully done the same with "time."

(January 18, 2015 at 8:23 pm)bennyboy Wrote: We as human agents see the universe as a framework in which we may choose to act, and in which our actions have consequences. We constantly make decisions, and watch their real effects. And yet, after all this, you find determinism sufficiently convincing that you see all this active expression of the agency of self as an illusion. That paints the self as merely an observer in the inevitable, and entirely predictable, unfolding of the universe through time. Have I mistaken your position, in saying these things on your behalf?

The observer is a participant; from the subjective point of view it involves conscious and unconscious instincts and reasons, as in motives. From the scientific standpoint it's no different than causality on the level of brain chemistry, except that it's a third-person account.

(January 18, 2015 at 8:23 pm)bennyboy Wrote: I didn't say motion is an illusion of the mind. I said that in determinism, time is a dimension along which all events are arranged-- like frames of a movie or scenery along a roller coaster. Let me ask you, when you are riding in a car, do you not have the sensation that the trees outside the car are "moving" past you?

Yes, that's relativity, which doesn't render time illusory, just relative to a point of view. If one saw a "timeline" of...time, beginning, middle, and end would not include future events, as those don't exist in any real sense, but rather the beginning, the middle, and the ever-present.

I've used this one before. When we watch a magician "pull a rabbit out of a hat" we understand that it's not actually happening the way we see it. That it's an "illusion". To call it such does not imply that the magician isn't doing anything, or that the magician and the rabbit, in fact, aren't even there.

Suggesting that "free will" -as the unmoved mover of mind- is an illusion is to suggest something entirely similar. That what we experience might not be an accurate representation of the reality of whats happening. Not, that we're having an experience -about nothing-. It's suggesting that "free will" is potentially misleading terminology (with tremendous baggage) regarding a subject for which we have limited onboard means of perception, not that the the subject itself is an empty set. Something's happening regardless of whether or not we have the description right, wouldn't you agree? The magician and the rabbit and the hat exist, even if the magician isn't actually pulling a rabbit out of the hat.

(January 18, 2015 at 8:49 pm)Rhythm Wrote: I've used this one before. When we watch a magician "pull a rabbit out of a hat" we understand that it's not actually happening the way we see it. That it's an "illusion". To call it such does not imply that the magician isn't doing anything, or that the magician and the rabbit, in fact, aren't even there.

Suggesting that "free will" -as the unmoved mover of mind- is an illusion is to suggest something entirely similar. That what we experience might not be an accurate representation of the reality of whats happening. Not, that we're having an experience -about nothing-. It's suggesting that "free will" is potentially misleading terminology (with tremendous baggage) regarding a subject for which we have limited onboard means of perception, not that the the subject itself is an empty set. Something's happening regardless of whether or not we have the description right, wouldn't you agree? The magician and the rabbit and the hat exist, even if the magician isn't actually pulling a rabbit out of the hat.

There's definitely something going on. Sometimes i think the whole free will/determinism argument is a false dichotomy. But I have no idea what we might call a third alternative, or how we would determine what it was.

(January 18, 2015 at 8:39 pm)Pickup_shonuff Wrote: I see no evidence that time is an illusion, that the future exists "somewhere" in a tunnel or the Universe's version of a motion picture book or whatever those were called.

And what evidence do you see for the idea of philsophical determinism? The fact that every time you've gone back in time, things played out the same way again and again? No. It is because you cannot imagine a mechanism for free will that you discard it and choose determinism as the source of human activity. It's an argument from incredulity, and it implies determinism, so here we are.

You are content to claim that current state arises out of past states which do not exist. And yet, you are not willing to contend that the current state arises out of a need to reach a future state, which also does not exist (according to you). The past and future state, in determinism, are equally sure, equally-well defined, and equally identified with the current moment. So why this past-time bias? Why are you so sure that this "arrow of time" is something the universe is DOING, rather than just a change in perspective?

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(January 18, 2015 at 9:21 pm)Davka Wrote: There's definitely something going on. Sometimes i think the whole free will/determinism argument is a false dichotomy. But I have no idea what we might call a third alternative, or how we would determine what it was.

If we accept that paradox is one of the building-blocks of the universe, then you can just call the third alternative yin/yang. How about: "free determinism"?

(January 18, 2015 at 9:33 pm)bennyboy Wrote: How about: "free determinism"?

Marginally better than "expensive will."

(January 18, 2015 at 11:04 pm)Davka Wrote:

(January 18, 2015 at 9:33 pm)bennyboy Wrote: How about: "free determinism"?

Marginally better than "expensive will."

Nooooo. . . I can feel my deep philosophical thread transforming into a series of witticisms, followed by memes, then lol-cats, and ending with someone coming in after 10 threads with ". . . so God."

(January 18, 2015 at 9:33 pm)bennyboy Wrote: And what evidence do you see for the idea of philsophical determinism? The fact that every time you've gone back in time, things played out the same way again and again? No. It is because you cannot imagine a mechanism for free will that you discard it and choose determinism as the source of human activity. It's an argument from incredulity, and it implies determinism, so here we are.

Rather I find no sensible alternative to logical necessity which as far as I can tell, so long as A must precede B, and B must follow A, and B must precede C, and C must follow B, etc.---granted there is any motion, the present state follows necessarily from the preceding one.

(January 18, 2015 at 9:33 pm)bennyboy Wrote: You are content to claim that current state arises out of past states which do not exist. And yet, you are not willing to contend that the current state arises out of a need to reach a future state, which also does not exist (according to you).

Teleology is nothing new. I'm not sure why all of sudden you think change is directed by anything other than the present conditions.

(January 18, 2015 at 9:33 pm)bennyboy Wrote: "The past and future state, in determinism, are equally sure, equally-well defined, and equally identified with the current moment. So why this past-time bias? Why are you so sure that this "arrow of time" is something the universe is DOING, rather than just a change in perspective?

A past-time bias? As in there is historical information that presently exists which allows us to traverse the past through the subsequent events that determined the present, and which also permits us to predict the future in terms of events likely to happen (as they haven't yet occurred, as in the case of the past, and aren't presently occurring, as in now)? I don't understand how that is a "bias" other than the fact that what is real takes place in reality, and "the future," so long as it is never reached, does not and has not.

I think all this type of stuff is fascinating. But my conclusion recently is that the phrase "free will" is entirely useless. It's almost approaching "spirituality" in that respect in that everyone has their own definition. There is no right or wrong definition, so I think it's best avoided altogether as a label and that people should just state their scientific standpoint.

I'm actually leaning towards calling "free will" woo, as in a poorly defined, unnecessary and possibly unfalsifiable hypothesis. Jury is out on that one.

That's my evaluation so far

As the mind body organism we have no free will, can we control our heart beat, can we control our sugar levels when the are high in sugar levels, we as a human can only do what we can do, and that is all.

(January 19, 2015 at 12:16 am)Pickup_shonuff Wrote: Rather I find no sensible alternative to logical necessity which as far as I can tell, so long as A must precede B, and B must follow A, and B must precede C, and C must follow B, etc.---granted there is any motion, the present state follows necessarily from the preceding one.

Yes, and given the present state, none of those preceding it could have been different than they have been. In fact, we have not calculated that we've arisen out of the Big Bang-- rather, we have looked back through time in reverse, and inferred it. We have a back-directional view of the Big Bang. So this stuff about this being how we experience time really doesn't hold for events previous to our personal experiences.

This is (again) like the wave question: are the particles arranged roughly around a perfect (but not physically existent) "wave-ness," or is a wave just a name for how the particles happen to be arranged? So for time: is the current state an expression of the initial state multiplied by factors representing universal laws? Or are the initial state and laws determined by a necessary (and inevitable) end state?

Tell me, does lightning strike upward, or downward?