Determinism Is Self Defeating

[bennyboy]

pre-determiniation or fatalism is similarly non-deterministic. Good shit, eh? I wouldn't go so far as to say that denying determinism denies science though. That the world is knowable, that knowledge can be had - would more aptly, be the foundation of science.

If the universe wouldn't be deterministic, then it would contain lots of magic as it would not be governed by any laws, and such universe would not be understood under scientific scrutiny. Whether you want to admit or not, but the moment you do science you've already conceeded that it is deterministic. Determinism is a presupposition to any scientific enquiry. It's not something you can prove but it is a starting hypothesis. Scientific theories, scientific models are all based on the notion that the universe is ruled by laws, and therefore it is deterministic. If we know the initial conditions and all the relevant forces, we know exactly how the universe will behave in the future. All scientists have acted under that notion. That's why I said: deny determinism and you deny science.

I would have believed that right up until science adapted to light duality in less than 1 generation. Now, I think science will gloss right over any apparent fault by simply accepting its reality: "Oh yeah, of course now we know there are hidden variables (or free will, or ___). In fact, Dr. Eisenblatterhausen has proven that given system X, over time t, Y% of the variability is due to magic space monkeys."