Freedomain Radio

from here:

http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=RX-Iq9a3uwA 

Seems like a strong argument against your complaint about determinism is that the concept of "life" could just be a human abstraction and that nothing is "alive" in any real sense.

my response:

aaa! zombie typing! aaaaaa!

I think what he means is that since we're all just made up from different chemicals who interact according to the laws of nature, there is nothing more "special" about a human body's chemical reactions than sulfuric acid's reactions are.
So, we're all just matter, and all of our thoughts are just chemical reactions in the brain following determined laws of nature...
We just choose to define certain reactions/matter as "life".

Or something like that. :)

I didn't really want to bring this up, but I work temp for janitorial services with the Styx ferry.

Hmm...some thoughts on this whole issue, for what they're worth:

As far as we can make out, all matter does seem to operate according to immutable laws (in his UPB book, Stefan argues that matter does behave in this way, though having read Hume and probably Kant as well, he should know why this isn't quite right).  Given that all our experiences seem to reflect a law-bound universe, we have no reason to believe that non-material, imperceptible, non-law-bound things like "souls" exist (Stefan seems to think that these things don't exist, but he has no grounds for saying so, since he necessarily can't perceive their nonexistence in any way, and he can't declare them to be conceptually contradictory for the same reason he can't say that all matter operates according to physical laws).  If everything that exists in fact operates according to laws, then we're pretty much stuck with determinism.

The metaphysical libertarian (no relation to the political philosophy paradigm) has to say that non-law-bound things actually do exist, in the form of human minds/"souls"/whatever (they don't have to be disembodied, like "souls" are often thought to be).  And as far as we don't know that all matter operates according to immutable laws, and we don't know that no non-law-bound things exist, this position does not self destruct (though it must necessarily rest on faith, since it's unclear how one could ever provide decisive or even convincing evidence for it).  But Stefan has specifically distanced himself from the two key components of the metaphysical libertarian position by saying that matter does operate according to immutable laws, and that we know that non-material, non-law-bound things don't exist.

And Stefan seems perfectly happy to distance himself from libertarianism.  But he also seems to dislike the deterministic position.  This strikes  me as odd, since it doesn't seem like there's really any alternative.  Either there are non-law-bound things or there aren't.  If there are (which Stefan denies in his UPB book), then it's possible that libertarianism is true, and if there aren't, then determinism is necessarily true (not fatalism mind you, but Stefan probably wouldn't be happy with the difference).

So why doesn't Stefan like determinism?  He accuses determinists of the fallacy of composition, because a whole is not necessarily the sum of the parts, and therefore the lack of free will on the part of any of a person's components does not entail that the person as a whole lacks free will.  But Stefan has stated that all matter must abide by immutable laws, and part of what it means to follow immutable laws is that the state of a material thing at time T is the direct result of its state at time (T-1), combined with any external influences that affected it in the interim period.  Think of it this way: no component in a car's engine produces horsepower, but an engine produces horsepower.  But producing horsepower does not require any of the car's components to violate the laws of physics.  If libertarian free will does exist, then the mind would have to be able to produce a non-law-produced change in at least one of the components of the brain.  And Stefan has argued that this is impossible.  So that takes care of the first part of his podcast.  I'm not sure if the next one offers any more reasons, but since I'm pretty sure Stefan's position actually entails determinism, I'm not sure that it's really necessary that I listen to it.  If that's not true, I'll do it, but...well...I just don't feel like it.

By the way, I haven't given up on the Molyneux Project; I just need a little bit of a break!  Oh, and being made from coal, all diamonds were once alive.

DonnywithanA:

...but he has no grounds for saying so, since he necessarily can't perceive their nonexistence in any way, and he can't declare them to be conceptually contradictory...

Yes, this is why I'm also very upset with him about his stance on Leprechauns and Wood Faeries.

I was shocked to see that Xom was the one that said that.  But then I saw his reply:

I'm not a determinist ;P I am playing devil's advocate.

 

Let me explain. When a volcano erupts, it would appear to an outside observer to have initiated its own course of action from seemingly no cause. But we of course understand that cause and effect relationships both within the volcano and outside of it did in fact cause the eruption.

Why couldn't life be the same?

Danny, did you watch the Free Will videos?

People get this false dichotomy going that it's either free will or determinism.  These are just my own thoughts on the matter but just like human perception as far as the senses are concerned relative to the amount of information that could be perceived, we have free will relative to the deterministic nature of causality in the universe as a whole.  I think that life also has free will relative to it's level of biological complexity.  Our free will is limited by that which is out of our ability to control.

This isn't a compatiblist position because compatiblists believe that life is purely deterministic yet morality is compatible with determinism - which is absurd.

DonnywithanA:

Hmm...some thoughts on this whole issue, for what they're worth:

As far as we can make out, all matter does seem to operate according to immutable laws (in his UPB book, Stefan argues that matter does behave in this way, though having read Hume and probably Kant as well, he should know why this isn't quite right).  Given that all our experiences seem to reflect a law-bound universe, we have no reason to believe that non-material, imperceptible, non-law-bound things like "souls" exist (Stefan seems to think that these things don't exist, but he has no grounds for saying so, since he necessarily can't perceive their nonexistence in any way, and he can't declare them to be conceptually contradictory for the same reason he can't say that all matter operates according to physical laws).  If everything that exists in fact operates according to laws, then we're pretty much stuck with determinism.

The metaphysical libertarian (no relation to the political philosophy paradigm) has to say that non-law-bound things actually do exist, in the form of human minds/"souls"/whatever (they don't have to be disembodied, like "souls" are often thought to be).  And as far as we don't know that all matter operates according to immutable laws, and we don't know that no non-law-bound things exist, this position does not self destruct (though it must necessarily rest on faith, since it's unclear how one could ever provide decisive or even convincing evidence for it).  But Stefan has specifically distanced himself from the two key components of the metaphysical libertarian position by saying that matter does operate according to immutable laws, and that we know that non-material, non-law-bound things don't exist.

And Stefan seems perfectly happy to distance himself from libertarianism.  But he also seems to dislike the deterministic position.  This strikes  me as odd, since it doesn't seem like there's really any alternative.  Either there are non-law-bound things or there aren't.  If there are (which Stefan denies in his UPB book), then it's possible that libertarianism is true, and if there aren't, then determinism is necessarily true (not fatalism mind you, but Stefan probably wouldn't be happy with the difference).

So why doesn't Stefan like determinism?  He accuses determinists of the fallacy of composition, because a whole is not necessarily the sum of the parts, and therefore the lack of free will on the part of any of a person's components does not entail that the person as a whole lacks free will.  But Stefan has stated that all matter must abide by immutable laws, and part of what it means to follow immutable laws is that the state of a material thing at time T is the direct result of its state at time (T-1), combined with any external influences that affected it in the interim period.  Think of it this way: no component in a car's engine produces horsepower, but an engine produces horsepower.  But producing horsepower does not require any of the car's components to violate the laws of physics.  If libertarian free will does exist, then the mind would have to be able to produce a non-law-produced change in at least one of the components of the brain.  And Stefan has argued that this is impossible.  So that takes care of the first part of his podcast.  I'm not sure if the next one offers any more reasons, but since I'm pretty sure Stefan's position actually entails determinism, I'm not sure that it's really necessary that I listen to it.  If that's not true, I'll do it, but...well...I just don't feel like it.

By the way, I haven't given up on the Molyneux Project; I just need a little bit of a break!  Oh, and being made from coal, all diamonds were once alive.

The car analogy is not very effective, because relative to the brain, it is incredibly simple.  Through this simplicity, it is possible for any layman to easily understand the workings of the car with minimal study.  The brain, obviously, is not such a simple device.

This is not to say that the human brain is so complex that it can violate laws of physics, rather we don't have the knowledge to understand the physics/chemistry involved at such a high level of complexity.  So when you say in the italicized portion that in order for free will (defined, as I understand it, to be the ability of an individual to consciously change their mind) to exist, the mind would have to violate the laws of physics, how do you know that non-law-produced change would have to exist in order to give the appearance of free will?
 

I think this guy beats it 

[youtube:SthbQdrxeLw]

Nathan, I'm not sure what you mean when you say that "we have free will relative to the deterministic nature of causality in the universe as a whole."  Free will is not a "relative" matter.  Either the mind does not abide by immutable and deterministic laws, in which case libertarian free will would be possible (but not necessary), or it does, in which case it would be impossible.

I'm going to ignore all slights against compatiblism that demonstrate a complete lack of understanding of what it says, and which take the form "I believe in morality, and I don't believe that morality is compatible with determinism, so therefore determinism is false."  I shouldn't have to explain why. 

Nexalacer, I'm not saying that if determinism is true, then we can predict human behavior.  A non-law-produced change wouldn't be necessary to give the appearance of free will, and even if determinism is true, it wouldn't be meaningless to talk about choices (if it's true, it's been true the whole time, and our discussions of choices haven't been meaningless, have they?).  Determinism only has to say that a choice can be entirely explained by the state of our minds at all times leading up to the choice, and that the state of our minds at all of those times can be entirely explained by the state of any minds at any time can be explain by its state, and all outside influences upon it, at all previous times.  So in other words, we choose, but we could not have chosen that which we don't choose.  Our choices were the necessary outcomes of our mental processes.  Put yet another way, we are not free to actively do anything which we do not choose to do, and our choices operate in the way that they must operate.

PCRS, that guy's video isn't right either.  Determinists don't need to say that we are "made" to do things by "chemicals in our brains."  It's simply that our brains operate according to laws, and so our actions are the necessary outcomes of law-bound processes.  And when we get up from the couch to go cook some food, there's no necessary "calculation" at play which "subconsciously" forces us to do what would be prudent.  We choose to get up from the couch by our own motivation; it's just that our motivation is the product of processes which had to operate the way that they did.  It's people like that who make people like Stefan feel the need to lash out against determinism.  The more plausible determinist would just coolly ask Stefan, "So are you saying that at some point, our brains do something that wasn't the necessary consequence of causal laws?"  And Stefan would need to either say yes, and abandon his stated position that all things obey causal laws, or no, and abandon his rejection of determinism.

By the way, I'm not a determinist; I fully embrace Kant's transcendental turn.

Aonny, slight misunderstanding. When I said this guy beats it, I meant :beats the wildest response of a determinism ever. This one is very passionately tries to change my deterministic mind to his deterministic position.

I am not known with Kant's transcendental turn 

Donny,

I made a similar argument in

http://freedomainradio.com/board/forums/permalink/108415/108365/ShowThread.aspx#108365

To clarify one thing, determinism is a metaphysical position.  Accepting it doesn't mean that you have to resign yourself to overt fatalism.  It's no more unreasonable for a determinist to try to convince someone that determinism is true than for a skeptic to try to convince someone that we don't have any reason for believing that other people exist.  If determinism and skepticism are correct positions, then they have always been correct, and they have are correct for everyone.  Recognizing that they are correct doesn't force someone to stop living; that's what compatiblism and epistemological contextualism are for.

Kant claimed that we can only have knowledge of "things-as-they-seem" and not "things-as-they-are," because we can never directly perceive the latter.  For example, I can see, feel and taste my coffee, but that perceptual content is necessarily mind-dependent.  If there really is coffee, I can't conceive of it in any way besides that which is informed by my senses.  The nature of the mind-independent coffee is necessary inaccessible to me.  The transcendental turn is the recognition that we can never have real knowledge of the nature of things-as-they-are, because we can never have knowledge which is not accessible to the senses.  In this context, taking the transcendental turn commits us to saying that we don't know the true nature of the mind, because it's not something we can have experience of.  As you can probably imagine, summarizing Kant is rather difficult, so I'm sorry if that didn't make any sense.  Suffice it to say that I don't know whether determinism is true, but if it is, I'm a compatiblist.