Oh jeez, I'm confusedU WOT M8??
Why did you say that Lessans is crazy Stephen? Where did that come from?Pec thinks Lessans had some ideas which are not true and obviously not, I agree. He had other ideas which are true b.t.w. Pec has latched onto Swartz's meme because he thinks that's the way to get the sort of free will he wants. But Swartz is just as obviously wrong since he doesn't make a dent in the free will problem since it fundamentally is one of luck. The difference between Swartz and Lessans is Swartz presents his ideas in a more credible way + he's giving those who argue for free will incompatible with standard determinism what vaguely looks like an argument for it.
Spacemonkey and Peacegirl,
I moved the discussion about free will to this thread, because in Peacegirl’s ‘Revolution in thought’ thread the real discussion about free will was going under in the hic hac between you both (and a few others). Now you are repeating this here. Please let this thread be about free will only, and not about questions if Lessans was crazy or not, Peacegirl wants negative attention or not, and what all. Please constraint to argumentative postings about free will. For the topics that you both find so much more interesting use Peacegirl’s thread.
OK?
But in actuality this particular discussion is more than intellectual (as Stephen pointed out) because the implications are huge. There is a storehouse of knowledge that lies behind the door of determinism that no one has addressed until now. :gulp: This knowledge can change the quality of our every day lives, so this discussion does have extreme significance.:blank: Can you give a concise summary ? I suggest that you go to Amazon and read the sample. There is no way a summary will give you an idea of the impact on the world that this discovery will have, once it is recognized and applied on a global scale. http://www.amazon.com/Decline-Fall-All-Evil-Important-ebook/dp/B00ONA7JVQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1433157094&sr=8-1&keywords=decline+and+fall+of+all+evil
CHAPTER THREE THE END OF CARELESSNESS Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we never had to worry about people carelessly risking the lives of our loved ones, neighbors, and friends? Well, get ready for a miracle. I shall demonstrate, by applying this natural law, how it is now possible to change our environment and raise man’s conscience to such a degree that all carelessness, including automobile accidents, will be virtually wiped from the face of the earth because people the world over will do everything in their power to avoid the carelessness and risks responsible. Right now there are more people killed in car accidents than we can fully comprehend. These collisions take place only because man operates on 75% of his potential power which is insufficient to prevent what nobody wants, even though he is doing everything in his power to prevent it. By understanding what it means that man’s will is not free we plug in the extra 25%, and then have the power to prevent the unintentional tragedies that continue to plague our lives.What the fuck is that all about? :ahhh: Are you implying that actually says something of substance??? Please highlight what my take away message is supposed to be. It doesn't say much if you don't understand the discovery, which is in Chapter Two. You cannot know what a book of this type is about unless you read it carefully. I put this in because GDB was talking about car accidents and the need to have penalties. This knowledge prevents the need for penalties not because it condones behavior that society deems wrong, but because it actually prevents said behavior.
Why did you say that Lessans is crazy Stephen? Where did that come from?Pec thinks Lessans had some ideas which are not true and obviously not, I agree. He had other ideas which are true b.t.w. Stephen, you don't know whether his ideas are true or not. You have no idea whether his observation about conscience is correct, and you have no idea whether his claim about how the eyes function is correct. You are rushing to judgment like everyone else. Maybe that's why you have no interest in reading the book. You have already made up your mind. Does that justify calling him crazy? I'm disappointed that you would say such a thing. I would never think that would come out of your mouth.
Pec has latched onto Swartz's meme because he thinks that's the way to get the sort of free will he wants. But Swartz is just as obviously wrong since he doesn't make a dent in the free will problem since it fundamentally is one of luck. The difference between Swartz and Lessans is Swartz presents his ideas in a more credible wayShow me where. Show me exactly where he presents his ideas in a more credible way. I'm curious now.
+ he's giving those who argue for free will incompatible with standard determinism what vaguely looks like an argument for it.What does this have to do with Lessans' very clear and precise explanation of greater satisfaction, and what does any of this justify calling him crazy? You're just adding fuel to the fire in here, causing all of these people who are against me more ammunition to scoff at me. And for what??????
But in actuality this particular discussion is more than intellectual (as Stephen pointed out) because the implications are huge. There is a storehouse of knowledge that lies behind the door of determinism that no one has addressed until now. :gulp: This knowledge can change the quality of our every day lives, so this discussion does have extreme significance.:blank: Can you give a concise summary ? I suggest that you go to Amazon and read the sample. There is no way a summary will give you an idea of the impact on the world that this discovery will have, once it is recognized and applied on a global scale. http://www.amazon.com/Decline-Fall-All-Evil-Important-ebook/dp/B00ONA7JVQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1433157094&sr=8-1&keywords=decline+and+fall+of+all+evil
About the Author Seymour Lessans was born on September 29, 1918 in Newark, New Jersey. He was the third of four brothers. All through his life he had a tremendous thirst for knowledge, and after many years of extensive reading and studying he made a fantastic discovery about the nature of man. The rest of his life was devoted to reaching those who could help validate his findings, but he continued to hit stumbling blocks and closed doors at every turn. His loving wife stood by his side during these difficult years, knowing he had a mission to accomplish. His family and all those who knew him will always be inspired by his wisdom and perseverance in the midst of incredible odds. His dying words were, My day will come. He knew he wouldn't be here to see the great change this new finding would bring about, but he was comforted in the knowledge that no matter how long it took, his discovery would eventually be brought to light. It is with this hope in mind that his life's work (6 books from 1959-1976) was compiled into this final version. Almost 50 years after his discovery was originally made, it is our hope that there will be a breakthrough in reaching those who can confirm this discovery as undeniable truth, so that peace can prevail. This website is dedicated to the author for his incredible contribution to humanity.
Many theories as to how world peace could be achieved have been proposed, yet war has once again taken its deadly toll in the 21st century. The dream of peace has remained an unattainable goal — until now. The following pages reveal a scientific discovery regarding a psychological law of man’s nature never before understood. This finding was hidden so successfully behind layers and layers of dogma and misunderstanding that no one knew a deeper truth existed. Once this natural law becomes a permanent condition of the environment, it will allow mankind, for the very first time, to veer in a different direction — preventing the never-ending cycle of hurt and retaliation in human relations. Although this discovery was borne out of philosophical thought, it is factual, not theoretical, in nature. . . .Sorry not a very auspicious beginning. I've had a chance to be around too many big talkers, that never produced anything beyond vapors. Call me jaded, but that intro does more to repel than to entice curiosity. Maybe because I've lived my 60 years immersed in my own journey of discovery with an unquenchable thirst for learning about this world and our lives. And though I'm no genius, I dare say I've gotten a reasonable handle on things, and don't bite on others secret discoveries (especially of the Earth Shattering kind) too easily. Time is too precious and short, we must allot our attention accordingly. That tidbit doesn't smell right, so off I scamper trying to catch a good scent. ;-)
+ he's giving those who argue for free will incompatible with standard determinism what vaguely looks like an argument for it.What does this have to do with Lessans' very clear and precise explanation of greater satisfaction, and what does any of this justify calling him crazy? You're just adding fuel to the fire in here, causing all of these people who are against me more ammunition to scoff at me. And for what???{hmmm, that could be turned around: Why are you "against us" ? - }???
It doesn't say much if you don't understand the discovery, which is in Chapter Two. You cannot know what a book of this type is about unless you read it carefully. .But if it's a "very clear and precise explanation" than one ought to be able to summarize it. Besides I was curious about his great idea, not in buying his book, or even him, for that matter. just saying :blank: _____________________________________
+ he's giving those who argue for free will incompatible with standard determinism what vaguely looks like an argument for it.What does this have to do with Lessans' very clear and precise explanation of greater satisfaction, and what does any of this justify calling him crazy? You're just adding fuel to the fire in here, causing all of these people who are against me more ammunition to scoff at me. And for what???{hmmm, that could be turned around: Why are you "against us" ? - }???
It doesn't say much if you don't understand the discovery, which is in Chapter Two. You cannot know what a book of this type is about unless you read it carefully. .But if it's a "very clear and precise explanation" than one ought to be able to summarize it. Besides I was curious about his great idea, not in buying his book, or even him, for that matter. just saying :blank: _____________________________________ That's fine.
Swartz doesn't make a dent in the free will problem because the problem is that circumstances not chosen by me would have had to have been different for me to have done otherwise.That is exactly your dogma. You think that the categorical reading of CHDO is needed for moral responsibility. It is not, as I have argued already a few times. The hypothetical reading is enough. You could have done otherwise, if you had wanted to. 2 Situations: 1. Say we have two people, tied to a chair. Both have allergies against beans. Both are forced to eat beans, both get allergic shocks. 2. Two people, both capable enough to see the consequences of their action have the choice to eat beans: one takes them, the other doesn't. The first gets his allergic shock, the second of course not. In the second example, the first person cannot say he could not have done otherwise, because the other one has shown that in exactly the same situation he could. Being forced, as in the first example is definitely something different than being determined. And this is the relevant context of assigning somebody responsibility. 'Free will' and 'responsibility' get their meanings in a human context, not in a metaphysical. They get their meaning because of the living of subjects in a moral society, where society connects consequences to certain behaviours, and the subjects are aware of these consequences and includes these possible consequences in their considerations when they are acting. Anticipating that an act might be punished, and then expecting not to be punished when you do it is simply not responsible behaviour. CHDO in the categorical sense has simply nothing to do with it.
Swartz’s position is neither Libertarian nor Compatibilist. It is deflationary or eliminativist. It depends on acceptance of his regularity theory of physical law, as opposed to the necessitarian theory under which most people operate, and it requires also accepting the correspondence theory of truth (not everyone accepts this, either).
The necessitarian theory gives logical priority to “laws” that “govern” the world. The regularity theory, on the other hand, sees “laws” as merely descriptions of what happens. Under correspondence theory, propositions are the bearers of truth values. Since propositions are abstract entities, they do not exist in any particular place or time, but are timelessly true. (Of course, not everyone accepts that abstract entities exist, either.)
Combining the regularity theory of physical law with the correspondence theory of truth, Swartz is able to deny the “same past, same future” conception of hard determinism. As he writes in Chapter 11 of his book, “The Concept of Physical Law”:
The Principle of Determinism and the Principle of the Uniformity of Nature are different principles; the latter is a stronger principle in that it implies the former. The Principle of Determinism does not imply the Principle of the Uniformity of Nature (no more so than that it implies forecastability in principle). … The Principle of Determinism states merely that events fall under universal laws. It does not state that events can have only one possible outcome.)Let me also reiterate this quote of his:
The maximal amount of similarity possible, for the case under consideration, is another world, W’, identical in its history to the actual world Wa up to the moment t but in which at t I choose C. Both are worlds in which the Principle of Determinism is true: Their respective events are members of sequences that fall under physical laws. World W’, could have been our world, if only I had chosen C at t rather than B. In short, the Principle of Determinism does not entail “same history, same future," does not entail that a given history can have one and only one possible outcome. A given history cannot, of course, have more than one outcome; but which outcome it will have is not something predetermined by that history. True enough, the future of that world is logically implied by the description of its history together with that world’s physical laws. But, to repeat, there is no predestination in any of this provided those laws take their truth from what has happened, is happening, and is going to happen, and not from some other source. Provided the laws are not autonomously true, that is, are not logically prior to their instances, there is no predestination: Nothing ‘compels’ or ‘requires’ events to occur. In a categorical sense, within empirically discovered limits, we are free to choose from among a set of genuinely alternative actions.The bolded statement in the above is merely a recognition of the obvious fact that there is only one world -- only one complete history -- and, after all, the world has to be some way or other. It cannot be no way, and it cannot be more than one way. (This is true even if the Many Worlds Interpretation of QM is true, since each world on the universal wave function is a self-contained history and the different worlds do not interact, except at the microscopic level). When Swartz writes that the world is "subsumed" under physical law, he merely means to say that there is a timelessly true set of propositions that describe what happens, including what people (freely) do. The regularities in nature are accounted for by the principle of uniformity; some things happen regularly, indeed without exception (so far) and there are a set of propositions (charge on the electron, speed of light, etc.) that describe those regularities. Other propositions describe irregular events: Whether I choose to drink coffee or tea, what shirt I choose to put on, etc.) I think we can make the "same past, same future" objection to free will even stronger, and still rebut it. We can take it to its logical conclusion and see that it still fails. There are two competing theories of time, presentism and eternalism. Presentism is the thesis that only "now" exists. The past used to exist, but no longer does; the future will "come into" existence, but does not exist. Prior to relativity theory, presentism was the common-sense view. Relativity rules out presentism. So if relativity theory is true, we are forced to admit that the past, present and future all exist. Of course they don't all exist now, any more than all locations exist in, say, New York City (though of course, NYC, where I live, is the center of reality, as everyone knows). "Now," like "here" is an indexical. If the future exists along with the past and the present, then all of history, from beginning to end, is fixed. You can no more change the future than you can change the past. Most people would say that if the future is set in stone even before we "get there," then free will of any sort is definitively an illusion. I think this is incorrect. This assumption rests on the unfounded notion that in order to have free will, we must be able to change the past, present or future. But we cannot do this: we cannot, for instance, "change" the present. If I lift my hand, I have changed the location of my hand, but I have not "changed" the present. Rather, I have made the present be, just what it is. If it's true that my future selves exist alongside my present self and my past selves, then this means that I am not wholly located in the present moment. It means I am temporally extended just as I am spatially extended. Just as I have spatial parts, so too do I have temporal parts. Ten years from how, a future temporal part of me is deciding, once and for all, never again to waste time posting on Internet message boards. So even right now it's true that ten years from now, I will decide to quit posting on message boards. Does this mean I am unfree, because my future decision is already fixed right now? Of course not: no more so than the fact that today it's true that tomorrow a sea battle will take place, means that tomorrow the sea battle must take place. This is the modal fallacy again. If it's true today that ten years from now I will quit posting on message boards, it doesn't follow that I must quit, only that I will quit. If one protests that since I can't change this future outcome because it is fixed in stone, it therefore follows that I have no free will, then this again is to commit the cardinal error of supposing that one must be able to change the past, present or future, in order to have free will. Fixity is not fatalism. As noted earlier, the world, indeed the whole history of it, must be some way or other. It cannot be more than one way, and it cannot be no way at all, unless it ceases to exist. The issue isn't that the future is fixed, which it is under eternalism. The question is, what fixes it? Some of it is fixed by human free acts: by free will, because free will is subsumable under physical law provided we accept the correctness of the regularity theory of law (not everyone will do that, of course). Again, to say that the past, present and future are fixed, is not the same thing as saying "same past, same future." It's merely to note the truism that history has to be one way or another. If the hard determinist argues, "given antecedent x, then y must follow," he commits a modal fallacy. The repair is to say: "Necessarily, (given antecedent x, then y will [not must] follow)." This formulation is a logical statement of compatibilist free will. If everyone were to accept the repaired statement, then people could quibble over whether compatibislism is a free will worth having, or just a sham free will. However, if we accept the regularity theory of law in conjunction with the correspondence theory of truth, and also see that the principle of uniformity is different from the principle of determinism, then the alleged conflict between determinism and free will is simply dissolved. As Swartz notes, the alleged "problem" cannot even be coherently stated.
Swartz doesn't make a dent in the free will problem because the problem is that circumstances not chosen by me would have had to have been different for me to have done otherwise.That is exactly your dogma. You think that the categorical reading of CHDO is needed for moral responsibility. It is not, as I have argued already a few times. The hypothetical reading is enough. You could have done otherwise, if you had wanted to. 2 Situations: 1. Say we have two people, tied to a chair. Both have allergies against beans. Both are forced to eat beans, both get allergic shocks. 2. Two people, both capable enough to see the consequences of their action have the choice to eat beans: one takes them, the other doesn't. The first gets his allergic shock, the second of course not. In the second example, the first person cannot say he could not have done otherwise, because the other one has shown that in exactly the same situation he could. He could have done otherwise had he wanted to, yes, but he didn't want to, for whatever reason. It isn't that the choice to refuse the beans was an impossibility. It was one of the choices that he was given, and one that the second person chose. This does not in any way grant the first person the free will, once the choice was made, to have done otherwise just because the second person made the "right" choice according to your way of thinking. You don't know the first person's reasons, and that is what you are judging. He didn't do what you think he should have done. You are judging that his reasons were inappropriate because he should have chosen what most people would have chosen under a similar situation and therefore you judge him harshly. But you are not him and you do not know all of the considerations (including the knowledge that he might have a severe allergic reaction) that may have compelled him, at that moment, to make this choice.
Being forced, as in the first example is definitely something different than being determined.Not really. It just means that the choice to eat the beans at gunpoint (I'm assuming this is what you mean by "force" not that the beans weren't available) was the lesser evil than to get shot. The difference between the first example and the second is only one of quantity but they are qualitatively the same.
And this is the relevant context of assigning somebody responsibility.No GdB, this is society's way of assigning responsibility based on the idea of free will (whether it's the libertarian meaning or the compatibilist; doesn't matter they're both inaccurate), but in reality these examples are no different except in degree.
Free will' and 'responsibility' get their meanings in a human context, not in a metaphysical. They get their meaning because of the living of subjects in a moral society, where society connects consequences to certain behaviours, and the subjects are aware of these consequences and includes these possible consequences in their considerations when they are acting. Anticipating that an act might be punished, and then expecting not to be punished when you do it is simply not responsible behaviour. CHDO in the categorical sense has simply nothing to do with it.But it's not working GdB. All you are doing is defending your ideology when I am telling you there is a better way. I have said that the awareness that there will be severe consequences (as part of their considerations) is the very thing that is giving those who may be inclined to commit a criminal act the advance justification TO DO IT! This is the paradox. I also have said I understand why the need to punish is necessary in today's world, but THERE IS A BETTER WAY to prevent these anti-social behaviors before they occur. Wouldn't you rather have a world where people don't kill and maim instead of having to exact retaliation after the fact?
Swartz's position is neither Libertarian nor Compatibilist. It is deflationary or eliminativist. It depends on acceptance of his regularity theory of physical law, as opposed to the necessitarian theory under which most people operate, and it requires also accepting the correspondence theory of truth (not everyone accepts this, either). The necessitarian theory gives logical priority to "laws" that "govern" the world. The regularity theory, on the other hand, sees "laws" as merely descriptions of what happens. Under correspondence theory, propositions are the bearers of truth values. Since propositions are abstract entities, they do not exist in any particular place or time, but are timelessly true. (Of course, not everyone accepts that abstract entities exist, either.) Combining the regularity theory of physical law with the correspondence theory of truth, Swartz is able to deny the "same past, same future" conception of hard determinism. As he writes in Chapter 11 of his book, "The Concept of Physical Law":This whole explanation of yours in trying to defend free will is really no different than saying that determinism cannot make or force what you yourself don't want or will for yourself. If used in this way it is perfectly fine because laws are descriptive. They don't prescribe anything. But we cannot extricate ourselves from our own nature though, which is to make decisions based on what we think is best based on the knowledge we have available at the time. Having options helps us to determine which of those options is most preferable which is to say that only one option is possible at any given moment. That is the whole point of choice which is to compare meaningful differences otherwise there would be no point in comparing choices at all. In other words, it would make a mockery out of choice. To help soften the blow of determinism, you can say "I will (rather than must) make this choice over that one" if it makes you feel that you are not being coerced by the past, which you aren't. Lessans' second principle clearly states that there is nothing that can coerce you to do what you don't WILL to do. WILL being the operative word here. But again, to say that you did something of your own free will (by your definition) does not actually grant you freedom of the will. It only means that you acted upon your volition and by choosing that thing "freely" (as you defined it), the present unfolds as it must.The Principle of Determinism and the Principle of the Uniformity of Nature are different principles; the latter is a stronger principle in that it implies the former. The Principle of Determinism does not imply the Principle of the Uniformity of Nature (no more so than that it implies forecastability in principle). … The Principle of Determinism states merely that events fall under universal laws. It does not state that events can have only one possible outcome.)Let me also reiterate this quote of his:The maximal amount of similarity possible, for the case under consideration, is another world, W’, identical in its history to the actual world Wa up to the moment t but in which at t I choose C. Both are worlds in which the Principle of Determinism is true: Their respective events are members of sequences that fall under physical laws. World W’, could have been our world, if only I had chosen C at t rather than B. In short, the Principle of Determinism does not entail “same history, same future," does not entail that a given history can have one and only one possible outcome. A given history cannot, of course, have more than one outcome; but which outcome it will have is not something predetermined by that history. True enough, the future of that world is logically implied by the description of its history together with that world’s physical laws. But, to repeat, there is no predestination in any of this provided those laws take their truth from what has happened, is happening, and is going to happen, and not from some other source. Provided the laws are not autonomously true, that is, are not logically prior to their instances, there is no predestination: Nothing ‘compels’ or ‘requires’ events to occur. In a categorical sense, within empirically discovered limits, we are free to choose from among a set of genuinely alternative actions.The bolded statement in the above is merely a recognition of the obvious fact that there is only one world -- only one complete history -- and, after all, the world has to be some way or other. It cannot be no way, and it cannot be more than one way. (This is true even if the Many Worlds Interpretation of QM is true, since each world on the universal wave function is a self-contained history and the different worlds do not interact, except at the microscopic level). When Swartz writes that the world is "subsumed" under physical law, he merely means to say that there is a timelessly true set of propositions that describe what happens, including what people (freely) do. The regularities in nature are accounted for by the principle of uniformity; some things happen regularly, indeed without exception (so far) and there are a set of propositions (charge on the electron, speed of light, etc.) that describe those regularities. Other propositions describe irregular events: Whether I choose to drink coffee or tea, what shirt I choose to put on, etc.) I think we can make the "same past, same future" objection to free will even stronger, and still rebut it. We can take it to its logical conclusion and see that it still fails. There are two competing theories of time, presentism and eternalism. Presentism is the thesis that only "now" exists. The past used to exist, but no longer does; the future will "come into" existence, but does not exist. Prior to relativity theory, presentism was the common-sense view. Relativity rules out presentism. So if relativity theory is true, we are forced to admit that the past, present and future all exist. Of course they don't all exist now, any more than all locations exist in, say, New York City (though of course, NYC, where I live, is the center of reality, as everyone knows). "Now," like "here" is an indexical. If the future exists along with the past and the present, then all of history, from beginning to end, is fixed. You can no more change the future than you can change the past. Most people would say that if the future is set in stone even before we "get there," then free will of any sort is definitively an illusion. I think this is incorrect. This assumption rests on the unfounded notion that in order to have free will, we must be able to change the past, present or future. But we cannot do this: we cannot, for instance, "change" the present. If I lift my hand, I have changed the location of my hand, but I have not "changed" the present. Rather, I have made the present be, just what it is. If it's true that my future selves exist alongside my present self and my past selves, then this means that I am not wholly located in the present moment. It means I am temporally extended just as I am spatially extended. Just as I have spatial parts, so too do I have temporal parts. Ten years from how, a future temporal part of me is deciding, once and for all, never again to waste time posting on Internet message boards. So even right now it's true that ten years from now, I will decide to quit posting on message boards. Does this mean I am unfree, because my future decision is already fixed right now? Of course not: no more so than the fact that today it's true that tomorrow a sea battle will take place, means that tomorrow the sea battle must take place. This is the modal fallacy again. If it's true today that ten years from now I will quit posting on message boards, it doesn't follow that I must quit, only that I will quit. If one protests that since I can't change this future outcome because it is fixed in stone, it therefore follows that I have no free will, then this again is to commit the cardinal error of supposing that one must be able to change the past, present or future, in order to have free will. Fixity is not fatalism. As noted earlier, the world, indeed the whole history of it, must be some way or other. It cannot be more than one way, and it cannot be no way at all, unless it ceases to exist. The issue isn't that the future is fixed, which it is under eternalism. The question is, what fixes it? Some of it is fixed by human free acts: by free will, because free will is subsumable under physical law provided we accept the correctness of the regularity theory of law (not everyone will do that, of course). Again, to say that the past, present and future are fixed, is not the same thing as saying "same past, same future." It's merely to note the truism that history has to be one way or another. If the hard determinist argues, "given antecedent x, then y must follow," he commits a modal fallacy. The repair is to say: "Necessarily, (given antecedent x, then y will [not must] follow)." This formulation is a logical statement of compatibilist free will. If everyone were to accept the repaired statement, then people could quibble over whether compatibislism is a free will worth having, or just a sham free will. However, if we accept the regularity theory of law in conjunction with the correspondence theory of truth, and also see that the principle of uniformity is different from the principle of determinism, then the alleged conflict between determinism and free will is simply dissolved. As Swartz notes, the alleged "problem" cannot even be coherently stated.
Swartz doesn't make a dent in the free will problem because the problem is that circumstances not chosen by me would have had to have been different for me to have done otherwise.That is exactly your dogma. You think that the categorical reading of CHDO is needed for moral responsibility. It is not, as I have argued already a few times. The hypothetical reading is enough. You could have done otherwise, if you had wanted to. People believe we are ultimately morally responsible . I accept the compatibilist version. Swartz is obviously trying to get us free will we would not have if causal determinism as ordinarily understood were true... So he introduces new laws bring created when we make the choice. He does that to get us moral responsibility we wouldn't have if standard causal determinism were true.
Swartz's position is neither Libertarian nor Compatibilist. It is deflationary or eliminativist. It depends on acceptance of his regularity theory of physical law, as opposed to the necessitarian theory under which most people operate, and it requires also accepting the correspondence theory of truth (not everyone accepts this, either). The necessitarian theory gives logical priority to "laws" that "govern" the world. The regularity theory, on the other hand, sees "laws" as merely descriptions of what happens. Under correspondence theory, propositions are the bearers of truth values. Since propositions are abstract entities, they do not exist in any particular place or time, but are timelessly true. (Of course, not everyone accepts that abstract entities exist, either.) Combining the regularity theory of physical law with the correspondence theory of truth, Swartz is able to deny the "same past, same future" conception of hard determinism. As he writes in Chapter 11 of his book, "The Concept of Physical Law":The only free will we can have fits with same past same future determinism. Clearly Swartz thinks that would be a problem for free will or he wouldn't go to such lengths to redefine determinism. The problem is circumstances not chosen by me would have had to have been different for me to have done otherwise. That's what can't be overcome.The Principle of Determinism and the Principle of the Uniformity of Nature are different principles; the latter is a stronger principle in that it implies the former. The Principle of Determinism does not imply the Principle of the Uniformity of Nature (no more so than that it implies forecastability in principle). … The Principle of Determinism states merely that events fall under universal laws. It does not state that events can have only one possible outcome.)Let me also reiterate this quote of his:The maximal amount of similarity possible, for the case under consideration, is another world, W’, identical in its history to the actual world Wa up to the moment t but in which at t I choose C. Both are worlds in which the Principle of Determinism is true: Their respective events are members of sequences that fall under physical laws. World W’, could have been our world, if only I had chosen C at t rather than B. In short, the Principle of Determinism does not entail “same history, same future," does not entail that a given history can have one and only one possible outcome. A given history cannot, of course, have more than one outcome; but which outcome it will have is not something predetermined by that history. True enough, the future of that world is logically implied by the description of its history together with that world’s physical laws. But, to repeat, there is no predestination in any of this provided those laws take their truth from what has happened, is happening, and is going to happen, and not from some other source. Provided the laws are not autonomously true, that is, are not logically prior to their instances, there is no predestination: Nothing ‘compels’ or ‘requires’ events to occur. In a categorical sense, within empirically discovered limits, we are free to choose from among a set of genuinely alternative actions.The bolded statement in the above is merely a recognition of the obvious fact that there is only one world -- only one complete history -- and, after all, the world has to be some way or other. It cannot be no way, and it cannot be more than one way. (This is true even if the Many Worlds Interpretation of QM is true, since each world on the universal wave function is a self-contained history and the different worlds do not interact, except at the microscopic level). When Swartz writes that the world is "subsumed" under physical law, he merely means to say that there is a timelessly true set of propositions that describe what happens, including what people (freely) do. The regularities in nature are accounted for by the principle of uniformity; some things happen regularly, indeed without exception (so far) and there are a set of propositions (charge on the electron, speed of light, etc.) that describe those regularities. Other propositions describe irregular events: Whether I choose to drink coffee or tea, what shirt I choose to put on, etc.) I think we can make the "same past, same future" objection to free will even stronger, and still rebut it. We can take it to its logical conclusion and see that it still fails. There are two competing theories of time, presentism and eternalism. Presentism is the thesis that only "now" exists. The past used to exist, but no longer does; the future will "come into" existence, but does not exist. Prior to relativity theory, presentism was the common-sense view. Relativity rules out presentism. So if relativity theory is true, we are forced to admit that the past, present and future all exist. Of course they don't all exist now, any more than all locations exist in, say, New York City (though of course, NYC, where I live, is the center of reality, as everyone knows). "Now," like "here" is an indexical. If the future exists along with the past and the present, then all of history, from beginning to end, is fixed. You can no more change the future than you can change the past. Most people would say that if the future is set in stone even before we "get there," then free will of any sort is definitively an illusion. I think this is incorrect. This assumption rests on the unfounded notion that in order to have free will, we must be able to change the past, present or future. But we cannot do this: we cannot, for instance, "change" the present. If I lift my hand, I have changed the location of my hand, but I have not "changed" the present. Rather, I have made the present be, just what it is. If it's true that my future selves exist alongside my present self and my past selves, then this means that I am not wholly located in the present moment. It means I am temporally extended just as I am spatially extended. Just as I have spatial parts, so too do I have temporal parts. Ten years from how, a future temporal part of me is deciding, once and for all, never again to waste time posting on Internet message boards. So even right now it's true that ten years from now, I will decide to quit posting on message boards. Does this mean I am unfree, because my future decision is already fixed right now? Of course not: no more so than the fact that today it's true that tomorrow a sea battle will take place, means that tomorrow the sea battle must take place. This is the modal fallacy again. If it's true today that ten years from now I will quit posting on message boards, it doesn't follow that I must quit, only that I will quit. If one protests that since I can't change this future outcome because it is fixed in stone, it therefore follows that I have no free will, then this again is to commit the cardinal error of supposing that one must be able to change the past, present or future, in order to have free will. Fixity is not fatalism. As noted earlier, the world, indeed the whole history of it, must be some way or other. It cannot be more than one way, and it cannot be no way at all, unless it ceases to exist. The issue isn't that the future is fixed, which it is under eternalism. The question is, what fixes it? Some of it is fixed by human free acts: by free will, because free will is subsumable under physical law provided we accept the correctness of the regularity theory of law (not everyone will do that, of course). Again, to say that the past, present and future are fixed, is not the same thing as saying "same past, same future." It's merely to note the truism that history has to be one way or another. If the hard determinist argues, "given antecedent x, then y must follow," he commits a modal fallacy. The repair is to say: "Necessarily, (given antecedent x, then y will [not must] follow)." This formulation is a logical statement of compatibilist free will. If everyone were to accept the repaired statement, then people could quibble over whether compatibislism is a free will worth having, or just a sham free will. However, if we accept the regularity theory of law in conjunction with the correspondence theory of truth, and also see that the principle of uniformity is different from the principle of determinism, then the alleged conflict between determinism and free will is simply dissolved. As Swartz notes, the alleged "problem" cannot even be coherently stated.
Just isolating this from the ocean words
Lessans' second principle clearly states that there is nothing that can coerce you to do what you don't WILL to do. WILL being the operative word here. But again, to say that you did something of your own free will (by your definition) does not actually grant you freedom of the will. It only means that you acted upon your volition and by choosing that thing "freely" (as you defined it), the present unfolds as it must.weird perspective, but I'll chew on it. It's almost like in the background there's a notion of "you" (or "I") independent of the flow of the events-and-time we are embedded within. Sort of like asking tons of YES NO questions, when the situation is way too complicated for yes/no responses to provide adequate answers...
The problem is circumstances not chosen by me would have had to have been different for me to have done otherwise. That's what can't be overcome.And, quite clearly, Swartz refutes this. Your reply is wholly inadequate. You've dealt with none of the points that I have made, or my explication of Swartz's writing, which you clearly have not read. You talk like a broken record, repeating, over and over, talking points that have been challenged and rebutted. You are not interested in discussing philosophy. You're interested only in dictating it. You're not interested in having a discussion, or brooking any challenge to your indoctrinated world view. As you have quite clearly stated, you defend what you want to believe is true. Anyone like me, who defends what he thinks is probably true, is, according to you, a "fool." And people like Swartz, vastly your intellectual superior, is "crazy." Let me repeat: Swartz refutes the idea that "circumstances not chosen by me would have had to have been different for me to done otherwise." You may disagree that he refuted your claim. But you have not shown your work. You have not shown WHY you think he is wrong; you merely talk, again, like a broken record, repeating the same old empty, and empty-headed, mantra. You simply state that he IS wrong, without showing WHY he is wrong. Which is why you are not worth talking to.
When Stephen writes: “circumstances not chosen by me would have had to have been different for me to have done otherwise.” one must bear in mind that he has already stated, in this thread, that he defends only what he wants to be true. Anyone who does otherwise, he claims, is a “fool.”
So, Stephen, prove it. Prove your above claim.
Bear in mind that Swartz’s argument, and mine, together constitute a defeater for your claim, unless you can show otherwise. And showing otherwise does not mean merely saying otherwise.
But I know you’ll just hit the same save-get key and repost the same bromides.
Pec of Uliar,
imagine you are strolling along your favorite river walk, traversing under a bridge, you happen upon and come into conversation with a tramp, a homeless man of the streets bivouacking under said bridge, not your scholastic peer, for sure. Could you have a intelligent conversation with that creature? :coolsmirk:
Swartz's position is neither Libertarian nor Compatibilist. It is deflationary or eliminativist. It depends on acceptance of his regularity theory of physical law, as opposed to the necessitarian theory under which most people operate, and it requires also accepting the correspondence theory of truth (not everyone accepts this, either). The necessitarian theory gives logical priority to "laws" that "govern" the world. The regularity theory, on the other hand, sees "laws" as merely descriptions of what happens. Under correspondence theory, propositions are the bearers of truth values. Since propositions are abstract entities, they do not exist in any particular place or time, but are timelessly true. (Of course, not everyone accepts that abstract entities exist, either.)At first reading I was ready to make fun of all those fancy words, "deflationary" "eliminativist" "necessitarian theory" "Since propositions are abstract entities, they do not exist in any particular place or time, but are timelessly true." more Luftgeschäft i think but, but, I continued the "Many Worlds Interpretation of QM" was like a shot of Ipecac in the morning, fortunately, I realized it was an aside so with increasing fascination I read on . . .
There are two competing theories of time, presentism and eternalism. Presentism is the thesis that only “now" exists. The past used to exist, but no longer does; the future will “come into" existence, but does not exist. Prior to relativity theory, presentism was the common-sense view. Relativity rules out presentism. So if relativity theory is true, we are forced to admit that the past, present and future all exist.That started out interesting enough, then the last sentence lost me.
If it’s true that my future selves exist alongside my present self and my past selves, then this means that I am not wholly located in the present moment. ...here I get pissed. What the hey? What about being entities of something so much bigger than our little minds can comprehend. I mean it's just all so damned anthropocentric - as though the entire world revolves around us when in actuality we happen to be lucky bystanders, witnessing something beyond what our lazy self-centered imaginations can conceive. Then we'll be gone, with the same finality as destroying an ant colony, while the reality of "now" continues playing out on this planet of "ours"
If one protests that since I can’t change this future outcome because it is fixed in stone, it therefore follows that I have no free will, then this again is to commit the cardinal error of supposing that one must be able to change the past, present or future, in order to have free will.But most of what happens to us is the doing of world beyond our imagination or control. For example, Turning a corner and bumping into that Love of the rest of Your Life has nothing to do with you, Ahh - "Determinism of events beyond our scope" is there such a concept in the learned world?
Fixity is not fatalism.<span style="color:red]Then what is it?As noted earlier, the world, indeed the whole history of it, must be some way or other. It cannot be more than one way, and it cannot be no way at all, unless it ceases to exist. The issue isn’t that the future is fixed, which it is under eternalism. The question is, what fixes it? Some of it is fixed by human free acts"> What the hell is going on here? Are you and great philosophers supposing that because the past is fixed, somehow that means the future is supposed to be fixed? That seems like a non sequitur to me. ______________________________________________However, if we accept the regularity theory of law in conjunction with the correspondence theory of truth, and also see that the principle of uniformity is different from the principle of determinism, then the alleged conflict between determinism and free will is simply dissolved. As Swartz notes, the alleged “problem" cannot even be coherently stated.You can say that again :-S the alleged “problem" cannot even be coherently stated. As one who seeks some thing "coherent" about our place in the flow of time, during our particular time and place - lordie knows I'm still waiting for something coherent to come along. :smirk:
Thinking this over, it seems to me that Stephen’s position reduces to this: “Unless I have full control over everything that has ever happened since the dawn of time, I have no control over anything that I do, and I am responsible for nothing.”
Nice! Aaron Hernandez should have used that as his defense! :lol: