Determinism means the future is determined which means there is only one possible future - if there was more than one possible future then it isn't determined.
I'm talking about philosophical determinism not scientific determinism. As I said, indeterminacy and determinacy in science are perhaps another matter altogether.
Determinism in science I believe refers to the predictability of the future, which has got nothing to do with philosophical determinism which just means that the future is fixed, determined, whether we can predict it at all or not. Philosophical determinism just means there is only one possible future.
Wikipedia: "Determinism is the philosophical view that every event, including human cognition, behavior, decision, and action, is causally determined by the environment. It is, in essence, the view that one's life is predetermined before one is even born. Determinism proposes there is a predetermined unbroken chain of prior occurrences back to the origin of the universe."
If the future is predetermined from the start and layed out, then by definition there can't be any more than one possible future: therefore there is one possible future. Only one possible future=determinism.
The way I define it as meaning "only one possible future" is how Daniel Dennett defines it by the way...
EvF
I'm talking about philosophical determinism not scientific determinism. As I said, indeterminacy and determinacy in science are perhaps another matter altogether.
Determinism in science I believe refers to the predictability of the future, which has got nothing to do with philosophical determinism which just means that the future is fixed, determined, whether we can predict it at all or not. Philosophical determinism just means there is only one possible future.
Wikipedia: "Determinism is the philosophical view that every event, including human cognition, behavior, decision, and action, is causally determined by the environment. It is, in essence, the view that one's life is predetermined before one is even born. Determinism proposes there is a predetermined unbroken chain of prior occurrences back to the origin of the universe."
If the future is predetermined from the start and layed out, then by definition there can't be any more than one possible future: therefore there is one possible future. Only one possible future=determinism.
Purple Rabbit Wrote:You can observe from this definition that it does not claim "one possible future"It doesn't need to though does it? It just has to imply it. And it absolutely does imply it: If the future is completely predetermined and fixed, then there is only one possibility of what it will be: the way it is fixed, predetermined, to be.
The way I define it as meaning "only one possible future" is how Daniel Dennett defines it by the way...
Quote:Determinism, according to Dennett, is the thesis that ''there is at any instant exactly one physically possible future''
EvF
