Determinism Is Self Defeating

[MindForgedManacle]

As others have pointed out Bennyboy, you seem to be making the mistake of confusing our epistemic situation regarding determinism with whether or not determinism is actually true. The reason scientists have a range with regard to their predictions is because there is technological limitations, coupled with inherent uncertainty when, say, measuring a system of quanta.


I should correct something I said earlier. While most philosophers are Compatibilists with regard to free will, that doesn't necessitate that they are determinists, because there is also the position one could take that says if determinism is true, so too would be compatibilism.

[bennyboy]

I think we've done this before: you are confusing what is reality and our knowledge of reality. The reason we use probability simply means we don't know all the relevant factors. Tossing a coin is the typical example: if we knew all the forces acting on a coin, we would be able to predict its outcome, instead we don't, and so we deal with this situation using the probability that it's going to be 50% heads, 50% tails. This is a reflection of our knowledge, not that reality is not deterministic. The alternative is to believe in magic, for lack of a better word. After 500 years of scientific investigation, there's not a shred of evidence that this universe functions on magic.

As with the Pi examples, there's the question of resolution: can you ever represent the reality of those forces in a non-lossy way for the purpose of your calculation? No. As soon as you represent your forces in (for example) the decimal system, you come up against that little scientific devil, degrees of precision. So not only do you need accurate information about those forces, you need infinite precision to guarantee correct results, especially for complex systems; and this is impossible except for whole-number values or simple ratios. So yes, it is possible that determinism is true; but no, you can't use science or math to prove it, because you can never fully represent complex systems accurately enough. As for magic, I think you are presenting a bit of a strawman there. Nature is nature, and is not magic, since magic is supernatural. Whether the universe is deterministic or not, there is no need to invoke magic.

For me, as you know, this comes back to the nature of mind-- is the universe purely material, with mind as a happenstance byproduct, or does mind "matter," pardon the pun? My main suspicion is still this-- that if the brain is purely a deterministic mechanism, there is no need for mind to exist. Ideas about the evolutionary advantage of a brain which is actually sentient, as opposed to a brain which just behaves as though its sentient, are pretty unconvincing unless mind itself provides a benefit that the brain does not.

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As others have pointed out Bennyboy, you seem to be making the mistake of confusing our epistemic situation regarding determinism with whether or not determinism is actually true. The reason scientists have a range with regard to their predictions is because there is technological limitations, coupled with inherent uncertainty when, say, measuring a system of quanta.

If you go back a few posts, you'll see that I'm specifically responding to the "weight of evidence" argument, where the ability to successfully predict the outcome of some systems serves as evidence for philosophical determinism in general. I don't accept this, because the negative: "systems which we cannot predict are evidence of non-determinism" is refused on grounds that we just don't have good enough data to do accurate predictions. In other words: Heads, I win; tails, it's a tie! It's a dirty trick, and I won't stand for it!

As for reality: well, who knows? We have ideas, and can either prove them or cannot. In this case, we cannot. We must take a philosophical position on the matter, and cannot take a mathematical or scientific one. My own position in philosophical issues is almost always one of staunch agnosticism: I don't know if the universe is deterministic, and I think "we don't know" is actually the only legitimate answer to the question. There are two kinds of people in philosophy: those who don't know, and those who are making things up.

[MindForgedManacle]

It's not just that we don't have good enough data but as I also said: There is inherent uncertainty with observations matching predictions because the act of observing changes the results because of how observation works in the first place.


It's not being unfalsifiable, as falsifying a prediction would be accomplished (in science) by showing that the results lie far from the range predicted. E.g. Refinement of our knowledge regarding the age of the universe didn't falsify the prediction exactly, because it fell well within the margin of error.

[bennyboy]

It's not just that we don't have good enough data but as I also said: There is inherent uncertainty with observations matching predictions because the act of observing changes the results because of how observation works in the first place.


It's not being unfalsifiable, as falsifying a prediction would be accomplished (in science) by showing that the results lie far from the range predicted. E.g. Refinement of our knowledge regarding the age of the universe didn't falsify the prediction exactly, because it fell well within the margin of error.

When I hear, in the same conversation, "There is instrinsic uncertainty in establishing the state of systems," and "Our best evidence points to the universe being deterministic," I have a problem with that.

[little_monkey]

but no, you can't use science or math to prove it

I believe I said that determinism presupposes science, not that science proves determinism. First you postulate determinism as a hypothesis, then you do science. And since science is pretty good at delivering results, then I can only conclude that the determinism as hypothesis is a pretty good working one.

[The Grand Nudger]

Ideas about the evolutionary advantage of a brain which is actually sentient, as opposed to a brain which just behaves as though its sentient, are pretty unconvincing unless mind itself provides a benefit that the brain does not.

Which sort of brain do you have-and how would you distinguish between the two? This is why you can't wrap your head around determinism, btw. Because you'd really like to -maintain some suspicion- you have about the mind. I don't need to tell you all the ways that this can go wrong do I? You're trying to argue -for- the unknown unknown - which is fine...but -will- leave you in a "heads I win tails it's a tie" position...as you mentioned.

When I hear, in the same conversation, "There is instrinsic uncertainty in establishing the state of systems," and "Our best evidence points to the universe being deterministic," I have a problem with that.

Why? Our best evidence -does- point to our universe being deterministic. Our best evidence also comes bundled with uncertainty. Whats the problem?

[Walking Void]

There is "free will" but everything is "determined". Does anyone catch my drift? The state of now determines what happens in t+1 (the future). There are no random variables, only variables that We do not understand, which are countless.

As such, I can try to creatively think myself out of determinism, but ultimately, my neural activities have decided what happens next at a large-scale, subatomic level.

[bennyboy]

There is "free will" but everything is "determined". Does anyone catch my drift? The state of now determines what happens in t+1 (the future). There are no random variables, only variables that We do not understand, which are countless.

As such, I can try to creatively think myself out of determinism, but ultimately, my neural activities have decided what happens next at a large-scale, subatomic level.

There are a lot of confident assertions here. In fact, you say them as though they are established fact. But they aren't; they are well-accepted theories. But we know from history that the popularity of an idea (and the confidence with which it is therefore asserted socially) and the truth of that idea often have little relation to each other.

The fact is that none of what you just said is proven or provable, at least now. So why are you spelling it out as a description of reality? Simple-- because that's what you believe.

[Walking Void]

The fact is that none of what you just said is proven or provable, at least now.

What I said is sincerely, that the future for anything can be predicted, the foreseer simply needs to understand what variables are factors in the product, and what behaviour do they take (eg mathematical functions).This essentially requires one to know what every single particle directly involved in the end result is doing. This would take a super super computer to handle countless calculations. We understand how things work for a large part, We just need to be able to apply our knowledge like I said in a "large-scale". Randomness must be proved false. Unknowns are what causes things to be random.

[bennyboy]

The fact is that none of what you just said is proven or provable, at least now.

What I said is sincerely, that the future for anything can be predicted, the foreseer simply needs to understand what variables are factors in the product, and what behaviour do they take (eg mathematical functions).This essentially requires one to know what every single particle directly involved in the end result is doing. This would take a super super computer to handle countless calculations. We understand how things work for a large part, We just need to be able to apply our knowledge like I said in a "large-scale". Randomness must be proved false. Unknowns are what causes things to be random.

You have a philosophical belief masked as scientific knowledge. It's pretty clear that you couldn't calculate, for example, the quantum states of all the particles in a thumbtack. There simply is no way to collect good enough data, and no computer that could ever (even theoretically, I'm guessing) calculate it.

Basically, you are stating determinism as a brute fact, aka begging the question, since this thread is ABOUT whether determinism is true.