Determinism Is Self Defeating

[bennyboy]

The point that I'm making is that as a theory determinism can only be proven by making accurate predictions, the rock rolling down the hill for instance.
Until that time it can only be regarded as a hypothesis.

Or are we just going to toss the concept of scientific scrutiny out the window?

The burden of proof would be in your hands. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Prove non-determinism. Show us the non-material hand altering the path of the billiard balls.

Try re-reading what you posted, while replacing "determinism" with "evolution"... and you might see how your position looks to a determinist.

The BOP hot-potato game is a cop-out. So is the red-herring of dubbing opposing opinions "extraordinary claims." There's nothing extraordinary in supposing that since many systems cannot be calculated, either they are not deterministic, or at least cannot be proven so.

Particularly annoying (and wrong) is the following logic:
Determinist: I can predict what time the sun will come up. This gives at least some evidential support for determinism.
Non-determinist: Okay, predict where the sun's spots will be this time next year.
D: I could, if I knew the states of all the particles in the sun, and had a powerful enough computer.
ND: That represents a statement of faith, and is probably not knowable even theoretically.
D: That's an argument from ignorance. What evidence have YOU got? BOP on you, since I've at least provided SOME kind of evidence for my position.

The problem with this is that D is arguing a GENERAL theory with specific examples that don't generalize well; in other words, they are anecdotal. There's no reason to think that predicting the sun's rising time has any relationship to predicting market trends 10 years from now, or where the sun's spots will be. Or how a person's decision processes (which seem fairly deterministic in the short term) will arrive at a certain state of being a few years (or even a few days) from now.

Nor is there any reason to believe that it is physically POSSIBLE to achieve a computer that will have the power to calculate such complex systems. The only computer theoretically capable of calculating all the influences of ALL the particles in the universe (gravity, anyone?) on each other is the universe itself.

Physicists, question for you: is it possible to predict exactly when/where particles pop into existence from "empty" space, and what their attributes will be when they do so?