Determinism Debunked | PhD Student Responds to Cosmic Skeptic
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- Äas pĆidĂĄn 9. 07. 2024
- Debunking determinism as a theory of human action and establishing a metaphysical grounding for freewill.
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00:00 - Intro
01:19 - What is Determinism?
03:02 - Material Determinism
04:53 - What is an object?
07:05 - Idealism
10:09 - Why Psychology is not a science
15:48 - Determinism debunked
17:34 - The Problem of Indeterminism & free will
19:13 - The Inauthentic life
23:06 - What is freedom?
27:56 - The problem of ideology
31:10 - Cultural Hegemony
33:17 - The long march to freedom
42:33 - Conclusion
45:35 - Summary
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Given your fundamental error of placing mind at the bottom I see no reason to suppose I would learn anything worthwhile in your webinar.
Am I the only one who has no conceptualization of what this guy is talking about? Am I just dumb? Alex's point is easily more comprehendable
No, you're not alone. ;)
Let me see if I can break it down into some key points. This is as much an exercise for me than anything else but you may get some value from it?
PP argues for Idealism, and states that while there may in fact be a reality 'out there' beyond our senses, what we perceive in our minds is an abstract representation of the data received from the outside world, filtered through a sort of conceptual lens. We don't see what is 'out there' as it actually is, but construct a conceptual reality which cannot be escaped. This is why when we look at the sky we don't just receive a 1-1 mapping of 'reality' into our consciousness, but rather we see concepts which allow us to understand the world. We don't see 'raw sense data' when we look at the sky, rather we see 'the sky', 'the moon', 'the stars' as separate concepts. We cannot escape this fact. We could take the moon and deconstruct it into its physical matter, understand its chemical composition and break it down to the atomic level, and then to the fundamental energy which comprises the atom. But these are still concepts and we can't escape that fact. What we see at the basis of reality is conceptual. It is mind.
So if determinism is the thesis that every effect can be attributed to a prior cause, including the effects of humans taking actions, thinking, and having 'mind events' of different sorts, then that doesn't square with the idealism we just discussed. This is because, if we break down the causal structure of reality to its most granular level, we still don't see simple material causes, rather we continue to see conceptual ideas. We see mind.
If we try to assert that there is a cause prior to mind, we realise that the cause is itself mind. This means that we are positing an effect which would become before itself, which isn't possible. So determinism creates a contradiction and is debunked.
So we are free then right? Not exactly. We need to understand exactly what freedom actually could be first.
Satre believed that because he was thrown into the world with ready-made concepts, structures of meaning, and language, he was living in bad faith because he didn't freely create these frameworks himself. This is effectively what Cosmicskeptic is saying when we argues that he can't 'want what he wants', so in what sense can we be free?
But then PP argues that the structures of meaning, language and understanding which we all adopt naturally aren't the thing that is stopping us from being free, but rather they are the very things which enable us to be free at all.
Imagine for a moment that you have no structures of meaning, no method for understanding the world, and no desire to understand or interpret the world at all. How would you act? How could you make a choice to act at all? You would have no basis upon which to even understand the validity of thinking at all, let alone make a choice. You would be like a single atom balancing perfectly on an infinitely sharp point. Which way does the atom roll off the sharp point? It doesn't, because it has exactly nothing to compel it to move in any particular direction.
But once you've adopted the structures of meaning and understanding which Satre points out we haven't authored, you begin to be able to reason in the first place, and can start to make choices with respect to reason itself. Choice, therefore is a process of reasoning. If we can articulate and understand our choices with respect to the reasons for those choices, we are free in making said choices, we are agents.
PP goes onto talk about the concepts of negation and alienation, by which we understand ourselves with respect to other individuals, and can become further free by our relation to reasoning with others and having our concepts validated by an external source. Hegel believed freedom to be a collective enterprise between individuals which would ultimately culminate in his Absolute Spirit.
But that doesn't mean there aren't things which can threaten our freedom. Ideology is one such thing. PP talks about the way in which ideology can disrupt our reasoning process and bring into it deterministic structures which negate our freedom. If we are ideologically motivated then we are only able to see the world through a lens which colours our view of the reasoning process, and causes us to think in a way which is not as free as it could be. It's worse than that actually, because ideology is so deeply embedded, it colours our very way of life, the example PP gives is capitalism.
So how do we escape ideology? PP discusses the hermeneutic process of analysis which allows us to understand through the analysis of language how ideology is embedded, which begins a struggle to unpick its influence upon our lives and identities. This is an ongoing, ever-evolving struggle in which there are many pitfalls and difficulties, thereby making us free, but with various caveats which inhibit our freedom.
So to sum up:
1. Idealism is true, so determinism must be false, as mind cannot be caused by itself
2. In the state of nature we are unfree as we must adopt certain frameworks of desire and understanding, however these are the prerequisites for true freedom
3. Through reason, collective endeavours of understanding the world and our ideologies and language, we can become ever freer
I'm sure you are not alone but I for one follow what he is saying and understand his points, and not struggling anymore here as I do with anyone else. I think he is a logical thinker, naturally, and speaks in a deductive manner(you have to follow, it's not evidently clear without further thought). I think your nature is probably not like his (I think more than half the population are rational, accept as told thinkers, wheres the rest are logically deductive), you may be more of a consensus rational who likes complete thoughts deposited to you, and you probably don't take them apart. You probably take them as they are when you hear or read em. Where's he probably cuts thoughts apart, thinks about why it's said, how it's said and what can actually be said from what's said.
This is the difference, between listening to someone who has a PhD in philosophy and someone who doesn't. To be fair, I donât have a great deal of philosophy ground, but I could comprehend the meaning behind some of his words. Determinism is just self-contradicting. I have to install some additional brain cells to understand the rest of his lecture, he has a very bright mind.
I understand the discussion on idealism and the idea that what we perceive is concept and not data, but I donât see how that invalidates determinism. So long as we grant that our sense data is at least provisionally trustworthy, we can still observe that the world is governed largely by cause and effect, and I donât see why this wouldnât continue to be true in the absence of minds.
We need a debate between Lewis and Alex
@@Bianca-pw5cn Really? I'm not aware of this. Please send a link to a direct quote or source video where he states this. Thank you.
@@Bianca-pw5cn I'm not at all familiar with Armin Navabi or the podcast but it's actually important that I find out the context and truth of that because I'm planning on eventually amending my will and leaving my estate assets to the most promising young animal activist or activists. I had put Alex in my tier 1 pool of candidates to reach out to as potential beneficiaries of my estate......contingent on some criterias I'm still working out and drafting a questionnaire on. So if you do find a link, please forward it to me. In the meantime, I will do some research to see if I can find that specific point you are asserting.
Thanks for any help you can provide me.
@@Bianca-pw5cn Might this be the convo you are
referring to: czcams.com/video/1AA5160yE7o/video.html ?
@@Bianca-pw5cn Thank you......i really do appreciate your help.
@@Bianca-pw5cn If that YT video I linked to is the one, do you remember if the part where Alex may have expressed that position is somewhere in the first half, second half....can you pinpoint it to a general portion of the discussion?
06:00 - "There is no such thing as a star, a moon, a cloud in reality."
"Reality is _just as much_ an idea, as it is physical and material."
*So, is there no such thing, or is it "just as much" an idea as physical and material? This appears inconsistent, but a confusing phrasing at least.*
*But, yes, as beings with apparent specific limitations and parameters to our perception, the way things **_appear_** to us can't be expected to represent exactly how they are.*
08:40 - "So at the bottom of normativity, of science itself, of this objective investigation, we will see consciousness. We will see thought."
*This isn't very clear either. Using the phrasing "at the bottom" comes with implications. Thought is necessarily part of it all, but to say it's "at the bottom" sound like it is the foundational thing, when thought couldn't form **_about_** the thing, without the thing. That is, if you are actually acknowledging the existence of the thing, which isn't clear to me.*
10:00 - "So how could it be prior? How could it have caused mind to exist, when its existence has been caused by mind?"
*You haven't shown that to be the case. You haven't even really made an argument for that. How has its existence been caused by mind? The interpretation has been made by mind, but that is distinct from saying its "existence" has been caused by mind. It's also still not consistent with the phrasing implying mind merely plays a role.*
*Also, not that this makes your claim incorrect, but this is a position supporting solipsism, as your perception of other minds is "causing them to exist", from this approach.*
10:50 - "There can never be a law-like generalization placed upon human behavior."
*Why not? The perception of a thing does not negate the reality of the thing (and you even said yourself, ambiguously, that the perception of the thing is just part of the whole). Again, this approach would support solipsism, as the perception of "other minds", even the possibility of other minds, is constructed by your mind, on this view.*
12:00 - "Wheel invention."
*The fact that an individual could not predict when an original thought would occur to themselves, does not entail that this event was unpredictable, and didn't have the components required for predictability.*
*Again, the fact that you yourself can't know what is going to occur to you next, is a limitation of your own perception, but does not entail that it was not knowable what you were going to think next, merely that this information could not be something available to you.*
16:16 - "But what these unpredictabilities have shown is that these are logically impossible to be predicted."
*I disagree. What you have explained is that some things are unavailable to the individual, from the individual's perspective. A limited individual not having the ability to predict something for themselves does not entail that the components of predictability did not exist.*
*I also think the word "predictability" makes the concept loaded.*
20:00 - "Other minds"
*But using the approach you were using earlier, you are just perceiving other minds, and at the "bottom" of that is your own mind. So other minds only exist by way of your own mind, so you're causing their existence, as you have framed it earlier. So using your approach, their judgment is actually your judgment, because you are causing it to exist.*
26:00 - "Freedom"
*This is just a redefining of freedom, which has been pointed out about Compatibilism for some time. There is nothing "wrong" with this, but it's a simple discussion if it is approached clearly and honestly. It comes down to acceptance of the use of a word, which you are bound to.*
*How are you not bound to it?*
44:27 - "...they have the option to accept or reject it."
*And they are bound to whatever option they are compelled toward.*
1. I said if we take reality to be the unconditioned experience. Then went on to talk about symbolised reality
2.When I say at the bottom I mean metaphysically. as in objects are expressions of idea.
3. I am arguing for existentialism, in other words any object including a law would be the result of human conceptualisation.
4. This does not imply solipsism, it implies existentialism. We can share a common domain via language.
5. It is logically impossible to predict thinking of something which has not been thought of prior, because the prediction would invent the concept.
6. What I have shown is that any theory which attempts to predict human action will modify human behaviour and that human behaviour can never be predicted since there is no ontological grounding to establish a causal explanation of said behaviour. In other words, no such thing as essence prior to existence.
7. No in fact this runs counter to the point. The existence of otherminds is necessary for our experience of the world and so cannot be denied.
8.The definition of freedom I used was Hegelian and I would argue the most fitting.
9. They can choose rationality or not, that is the basis of their authenticity.
@@PerspectivePhilosophy I appreciate the response. I have several questions right from the initial glance, but I am too busy to respond. I'll get back to you soon.
@@PerspectivePhilosophy Can we have a voice chat? I would pay you for the opportunity.
@@cloudoftime you can join his discord and dm him there, he does usually respond
What I'm getting from this is that you aren't arguing against determinism you're arguing against humans knowing or being able to comprehend our actions because it is too complex. The very basic argument of determinism is if we knew everything about the physical world, we could determine with 100% accuracy what everyone and everything would do. I will admit this argument may turn into a 'God-of-the-gaps' fallacy of 'we must go deeper' or in this case smaller.
The undeniable and unavoidable argument for determinism is that we have a human brain which can be predictable if we understood it, which we do not in great detail. The only argument which is feasible against that is if there was something more than the physical world as we understand it.
Humans being able to invent a new idea is begging the question, there are many unknown qualities of the brain which we do not know, but worse still the individual may not be aware of. They could have seen something or thought they saw something which leads to them thinking unpredictably unless we could see what was happening inside of their brain. This argument asserts that ideas can come from no-where and can be completely original, which is completely untrue.
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exactly
Thatâs assuming consciousness comes from the brain tho you have first prove physicalism before even proving determinism like hell Iâm not a physicalist yet I still am trying to see how I can have free will although I reject we make things up rather we discover like Math for example I think we use arbitrary symbols and letters to communicate it but we discover it rather I feel like thatâs what we do with a lot
The great lie of physicalism is we will understand consciousness by understanding the brain thatâs just hysterical at best because thatâs we will get correlation not causation
@@lebronbrady6638 not really: you would need to define consciousness before you even attempt to examine how it correlates with the brain - unless you can define what consciousness is, your objection becomes meaningless
Why are we conflating predictability with causation? The lack of a technical capacity to analyze a cause has never undermined the reality of cause and effect.
why pretend like causation and predictability arenât literally inter-related concepts? there is no observation of causations without prediction. prediction is the foundation of how we make causal observations.
@@templecreations2351 get 3 or 4 simple processes with well understood, predicable causative properties together in a system and let them do their thing at large scales for a while and the system will produce unpredictable emergent results. This is because even though you might be able to look at any one of those interactions and accurately predict it's outcome there are too many factors, too many data points, to consider in the system at scale.
This is why we can't predict the weather. You wouldn't say that the wind and rain defy causation just because we can't predict them. You wouldn't say they have free will.
@@templecreations2351 the foundation for reality is not our ability to apprehend reality in a model. You are conflating causation as a concept and the fact of causation outside of our ability to comprehend it. Causality exists regardless of our minds.
The fact that we cannot understand how cause and effect function until we understand how it functions doesn't effect the reality of cause and effect before our ability to model and understand it. Concepts are not the fabric of reality.
Our modeling is not reality.
The map is not the territory. You can't eat the menu. You can only use menus to order meals. Use maps to navigate. But the thing is not the representation of the thing. You're just offering a slight of hand.
@@zeroclout6306 oh but it is, its like the analogy trying to see oneâs eye with your own eyes. ltâs not possible. so for all intents and purposes the foundatipn of our reality is the ability to model it with our senses. even you studying deterministic functions and causal chains can only be done through those models.
@@templecreations2351 no that's the foundation of our knowledge about reality. Reality itself is not equivalent to our knowledge of it. Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away.
At 16 37 (ish) you have a quote from McIntyre up which you say shows the "unpredictables" to be incompatible with a strong view of determinism. The actual quote up on the screen however does not say incompatible. It says compatible. What am I missing?
So, one of your main arguments against determinism (from about 10:00 to 16:00) relies on the idea that it's impossible to predict your own future / the future of a system on which you can act, because then you would have to infinitely predict your own prediction because the knowledge of your prediction would affect your actions in the future, rendering that prediction invalid.
I think you missed the core idea of determinism, which is not that the future of everything is predictable in the sense that an entity residing in the universe or having an effect on the universe could predict it, but that it is determined: that there is only one way things can go, based on the mechanics of the universe and the way it began.
To show that to be the case though you would either have to prove Idealism to be false, or, at the very least show how mind can be predicted in principle. The point I am making is that mind could never be predicted even in principle which makes determinism an unfalsifiable claim.
â@@PerspectivePhilosophy You mean unprovable right? (because if you meant unfalsifiable then you'd run into issues trying to debunk it).
I don't really get what you mean by "in principle". If something is impossible in practicality, is it also impossible in principle? If not, here is an example of an experience which could almost completely prove determinism, if we had the kind of processing power and storage space which we will probably never have. First we need an enclosure, something that is completely 100% cut from the outside world but habitated. Then, we scan everything inside that enclosure, such that we know the position of every single particle. Then, we run a simulation of the enclosure from outside of the enclosure, based on where every single atom is at a precise moment and our knowledge of the mechanics of the universe. If the simulation from then on shows exactly the same thing as what we observe at a later point, determinism is extremely likely.
â@@cthulhu8976 Well to debunk something can be to show its hollowness or lack of truth. What I am arguing is that determinism posits an impossible to verify or falsify causation and so cannot be said to be true, its wrong in that its contradictory in origin when physical, but there is also theories of pre-determinism via God to consider which rely upon the metaphysics of a creator. My point is that determinism in any of its forms relies upon the objectification of an non-experienceable reality and so it cannot be done.
The value of saying in-principle is to show that its not that we don't have the means, its that it is logically or empirically impossible. Its not simply a matter of our capacity at a given time but whether it could ever be done.
in reference to your experiment it would not prove determinism. 1. Even physically this is impossible, our understanding of the universe provides us with knowledge of Q.E.D and we know that there is "randomness". 2. Even if we understood Quantum mechanics to the point we could somehow predict these changes there is no single part of the universe that would be isolated. 3. Lets assume all of what you said actually could occur, what metric would you use to determine the behaviour of the inhabitants? Remember Determinism is a theory of Human behaviour not physical causality, I certainly don't argue against all the natural sciences. 4. What would you scan that would give you the information necessary to show the past, present and future thought patterns of an agent, what would your hypothetical analysis require for its predictive powers to extrapolate behaviour?
â@@PerspectivePhilosophy "My point is that determinism in any of its forms relies upon the objectification of an non-experienceable reality and so it cannot be done." That's not the part I object to, I mean not right now. The part I object to is between 10:00 to 16:00.
This is sort of going in many directions (I'll take the blame for that) and it really doesn't need to. What it comes down to is that I don't think our current or future inability to predict the future means it is not determined.
In fact I don't think determinism and predicting the future have anything in common except for the fact that determinism would have to be correct in order to predict the future. The reasons why we can't even attempt to predict the future have nothing to do with determinism (unless we're talking about quantum physics which is its own argument).
@@PerspectivePhilosophy We've literally seen the brain make decisions before the conscious actor is aware of those decisions. That itself verifies that decision-making is a product of neurological processes, which are themselves driven by the laws of physics. Determinism is not just about human behavior, it's a claim about the nature of causality itself. Determinism vs indeterminism is a debate that can just as easily apply to a universe in which no subjects exist; determinism vs indeterminism is even debated on the level of quantum mechanics, in which no human behavior enters the picture. I think you're just fundamentally misrepresenting determinism; you're conflating it with the potential for an actor within a given system to predict the progression of that system. But even on that level it falls apart, because an actor with sufficient knowledge of the system can still predict the progression of that system. The problem of predicting your own thoughts isn't even necessarily a problem; if that actor is bound, gagged, and can only act upon that system by breathing and receiving sustenance through a tube, their lack of knowledge about their own thoughts will not make anything about that system unpredictable except for their own thoughts. And if thoughts and decisions are caused by physical processes in the brain, which they empirically are, then an actor with perfect knowledge of the current state of the system would be able to predict every single thought they would have and every event that takes place in that system. It would be an infinitely self-referential series of thoughts, but they would still be predictable. Especially because that knowledge and their predictions would include the act of prediction as part of the factors which give rise to the prediction.
Your argument in this video was basically compatibilism with extra steps, and just like compatibilism does you redefine determinism to reach your conclusion.
Hi, BA in philosophy here.
First, I think you may have misquoted Macintyre. He said that unpredictability is (you say "isn't") compatible with hard determinism. This is why he brings up the example of computers that portray human behavior and yet, despite being mechanistically determinate and explicaple, still fall victim to unpredictability. All I did was read the paragraph though, not yet the book nor the chapter even. So, perhaps I'm not understanding some larger context. Just thought this was worth putting out there just in case.
On a more important note, I have a disagreement with your version of idealism. First, you make a distinction between the phenomenal and the real. However, if what you mean by the real is that without concept, then you have undermined your own position--for designating it as "the real" is understood in terms of the concept. If it is not the concept, then it is other to the conceptual and thus a negation. Thus, it is determinate. Thus it is finite. And on and on we go down the Hegelian string of concepts. This so-called real must therefore be inherently conceptual, the opposite of what it was supposed to be. You cannot posit what you want to posit. Thus, your position falls into unintelligibility. You've fallen victim to abstract notions of thought without looking into their own internal validity. Hegel did something similar to Kant in showing that what was supposed to be being-in-itself had to be being-for-other.
Lastly, and this is perhaps the crux of the issue, because you say "Kant was the first to show," it seems that you agree that starting with foundational epistemology as your method is correct. However, foundational epistemology assumes a separation between knowing and its object, a presupposition which automatically cuts knowing off from ever claiming its object whether you concieve of cognition as a medium or an instrument (confer Hegel's intro to the Phenomenology). But this content is assumed by the method and is hence just as dogmatic as the naĂŻve empiricism it aims to critique. If this is where you start, then of course the logical endpoint will be an ontological remainder that is unintelligible while thought on its side is likewise cut off and only subjective and mental.
This was a pleasantly informative video with a lot of good arguments, however, I believe the argument only works for determinists who also believe in Idealism, as I see it the majority of skeptic determinists do not. For instance, I have a particular problem with your premise about objects: science is wrong a lot of the time because we do not have a direct empirical connection with "reality" of the true nature of the universe as we know it, rather it is approximated through our senses, and scientific measurements. But your conclusion to this premise is that reality must therefore be part conceptual, i.e. part ideal, which determinists will disagree with most of the time. Determinists, or at least I, see it as such: We cannot experience reality as it truly is because the mechanisms we are using to define the universe are crudely made up by our evolutionary background, which does not possess the proper perceptual tools to 100% define the universe. However, we are very lucky to have some of the best perceptual tools the Earth has produced which is why we are in the place we are. Our biology forces us to see things in terms of objects because that is how our "internal software" is programmed, however, like you said, these objects do not actually exist in reality. We might never be able to actually predict future human interactions because we may be too complex as a body of matter to do so, but that does not mean that a hypothetical 4000 AD artificial intelligence could not do so, or even a close to omniscient being could. A quick response to Alasdair MacIntyre if there would be a true prediction of human behavior it would include their conceptualization of it, they would never need to conceptualize the future because them conceptualizing the future would be included in the prediction.
I'm going to subscribe though because I've been looking for some good Philosophy CZcams channels, great content, and ask me questions if you need any clarifications on my stance.
Oh I would absolutely agree the point of contention between me and most determinists would be on idealism, Its a debate id certainly be willing to have. Macintyre discusses the AI hypothesis on pages 93-94 of after virtue I believe. The point is that the AI would end up attempting to predict itself within a game theory circumstance, he also raises more objections, I would recommend reading the section if you get the chance!
I'd agree to an extent about science, but just because someone senses something or experiences it doesn't make it real. That's the libertarian position, but consider if we were both looking at the color blue. I see what is supposedly objective blue, but you see what I think of as objectively red, but I still call it blue because that is what you call it and I have no reason to call it anything else because that is the agreed upon social label given to the color I am observing. I may be color blind in this scenario btw. Thus Science isn't just about guessing about phenomenon. It's about observing something that we can agree upon the definitions of and repeating the results through peer reviewed studies to make our observations and conclusions about this and other phenomenon more accurate. It doesn't mean that we don't experience the universe as it is, it just means we view it through a lens like how socially developed ideas become agreed upon. We may disagree on a certain thing (very unlikely and I don't see the circumstances we may besides psychology tricks like "What do you hear from this one sound" and there are like 5 different ones that you can hear them all when you look at them. I'm not saying our perceptions always accurately depict reality, but when we can find common observation in these things and agree upon their definition or "nature", whatever you want to call it, then we can properly observe the "universe"
No matter how sophisticated technology may be 4000 years from now, it still comes after mind, meaning that it was created by humans. We can never experience reality outside of phenomena any technology created will be an extension of our senses. Determinism is still debunked.
Idealism is increadibly flawed. A fool is a person existing in reality whether they understand it or not. I am not saying you are a fool just to be clear. I am reducing the premise to absurdity. 'Insert Jack Sparrow "Well if I wasn't this probably wouldn't work." clip'.Take that reference on any level you want.
The abstractions that a mind uses do not change the fabric of reality, else people believing an untruth of reality could change it. Unaided flight by will alone is not posible.
If all physical particals obey cause and effect, then anything made from physical particals in any structure will obey cause and effect. The mind is a physical thing with physical processes. The neural net is a genetic structure and experiences are enviorment influenced, therefore all foundations to the mind and all decisions are determined by the limiting factors of means (cognative and physical), motive (internal preferances and external stimuli) oportunity (location, difficulty, availability) ect. These are all causal and the responding action is the effect we call a decision. Thoughts flow like water. They follow the path of least resistance. Hence why conditioning works as a discipline method. Why practice works in application. Why people are creatures of habit. Finaly why so many bad decisions are made.
16:48 I'm curious about your interpretation of the quote. Isn't Macintyre clearly saying that these four sources of unpredictability ARE compatible with determinism?
What do you think about integrated information theory.
I think it shouldn't go without noting the phenomenon of changing your desires, or learning to desire 'better' things. Or the act of replacing one desired thing, or set of desired things for another. In psychology it's pretty much referred to as adaptive preference, and largely associated with the ego, and guilt as a means of avoiding pain, or discomfort. It's interesting to explore how far knowledge, and reason can take us from our primal instincts, or whether they even do at all once you've untangled all of their levels of sophistication. As for reality I don't necessarily think that awareness, or observance of laws and principles changes the nature of said laws in any way (as in our interactions with nature), but simply opens up a myriad of windows of perceptions, and different ways of defining said interactions.
With your discussion on conceptualizing I almost felt as if you were advocating for bundle theory in regard to reality in this video. We invent properties with the use of language, but our interactions with nature exist regardless of our consciousness of them, and because our interactions exist the things do as well -- as in there is nothing we wouldn't otherwise think to call food, or act we would describe as eating, because we would still be doing these things as that is part of the set of laws that define our existence. The physical aspect of those interactions doesn't change, as our basic needs remain the same; however with consciousness we could modify how we interact with a thing -- however consciousness is just a cause (knowledge), and effect (feeling), thus determinism is still applicable. And the fact that there are limitations on how we could modify the thing demonstrates that the thing has its own set of laws, and exists in the world unrelated to us -- a hard, physical reality with limits on how we could choose to interact with it. In terms of determinism it's easy to conceive of it in relation to cause and effect in a linear, or finite sense. Lately I've been thinking of it not so much in terms of cause and effect, but in terms of a finite set of patterns we have to live out, and repeat in regards to all of the choices, and trajectories we seemingly have to follow in the universe (be it infinite or not) -- how eventually we will reach those ends, and start again.
Let me know what you guys think of the structure!
Great video, poor sound mixing. Work on that for next time :)
Easily one of your best videos yet in terms of production and explanation of difficult ideas. :) keep it up buddy
Letting you know before I watch, I disagree. Will update after. Cheers!
â@@mindlander How did you find it?
You forgot to include the simulacrum
What are your thoughts on Jungian analytical psychology? Ideas such as archetypes, collective unconscious, Shadow etc.
Another way to debunk Determinism is with Eventualism - the principle that whatever humans can do, they will do. People who believe in determinism will inevitably find the resources and knowledge to create a computer that can predict the entire future based on the idea that all things result from prior cause. Given enough time, a human will use the computer to see a choice they have yet to make, and it is inevitable that someone will test what happens if they contract their fate. However, the machine will predict that they intend to do so, and will reappraise its prediction accordingly. The human will know the machine can predict their change of mind, and so the machine fails, as it only has 50% chance of being right. Essentially, knowledge of your future changes your future.
What if the machine predicted that the human would use their future knowledge to lead a life of complete pleasure. We can say it is possible a person would deny themselves ultimate happiness to test a theory but why would a human go against it's nature? Humans are not logical beings, but emotional beings with hard coded genetic drives that use logic as a tool. You basically saying that a human would reject "heaven" despite every human ever fantasizing about and constructed myths/ideologies around how to progress to a "heaven state".
Basically, a human, being a human with fundamental drives, would see a future predicted for them that they would never try to avoid because their future would be a future of person empowered with the ability to achieve all their deepest and biologically fundemental desires/drives.
Idk, just a thought
For the wheel example, couldn't I respond with "the external situation dictated the conceptual creation of the wheel" meaning it wasn't freely conceptualised and that then logically follows that all concepts are situationally determined?
Also, why does the inability to predict that which is determined a problem? Just because I or even we as a species can not predict everything at all times right now doesn't mean that we can't eventually create, conceptually, a set of laws that predict our behaviour.
The problem highlighted is that any set of laws that predict behavior then interact with it and thus modify our further behavior rendering the original laws useless
@@sovereignstudies1369 oh I see, so the game theory example is the rebuttal to my inability to predict point. Thank you.
@@veryfitting No worries :)
@@sovereignstudies1369 I feel like I understand what you're saying, but I'm having trouble seeing exactly where the original predictions are voided, does it boil down to the predictions not being able to account for their own place in the system? Or am I thinking about it wrong
â@@sovereignstudies1369 I don't think I understand. They are changing their actions based on new input, their genetics and other environmental factors. They require the prediction to be able to act. Sounds like determinism with extra steps, or am I not getting it right?
Perhaps I misunderstood, but you're putting an undue burden on the determinist. You require that it be possible to predict human behavior and thought *exactly*, but we do not even put this requirement on the hard sciences, such as physics, or chemistry. Such sciences use approximations all the time. Given much less stringent requirements, human behavior is predicted all the time. We see this with advertisers and governments. Such things are not intractable, and given enough time, it is possible we will be able to predict human behavior with great accuracy.
The other problem is that we wouldn't expect a determinist to do this. Our minds may have flawed interpretations of reality, but our minds seem to arise from reality. If I destroy my brain then it's assumed that my mind would cease to exist. Similarly, if I alter my brain with drugs, surgery, damage, sleep or other then I most certainly know that my mind is altered as well.
The issue I have with his argument is that it seems to root itself in idealism. He doesn't just seem to be saying that minds are the root of our understanding of reality but that reality is based on mind. Otherwise his argument wouldn't really make sense as causation is fundamentally divorced from our minds' understanding of it.
He could have also meant that reality is created by our minds and therefore reality does not exist. However, he clearly says that he thinks science has a use and that we can make some approximations of the real, but if he thinks that there is some reality apart from our minds then his argument seems to be a bit weaker than if he made an appeal to pure idealism.
Yeah. Thanks for articulating this comment, I was thinking along the same lines.
The fact that you can predict human behaviour to a certain extent does not prove the deterministic nature of thought. That predicteability comes from the programmed nature of human beings and the fact that our intelligence is very limited. For example you can predict the behaviour of a chicken with much more precision than that of a human because the intelligence of a chicken is even lower. For example you don't need a very sofiaticated fence around them and you can predict that they won't escape with minimal effort. However when something starts to think and use its intelligence it creates conscious which is by definition what breaks the eventual deterministic nature of the universe. I say eventual because quantum theory may be evidence of the undeterministic nature of the universe.
@@antoniobento2105 Okay, so the universe is either deterministic or indeterministic (quantum field theories are not the fundamental theories to explain the universe, they're just the furthest humans have reached yet in the quest, so determinism is neither confirmed nor refuted).
Now if we make a 1st assumption that the universe is indeterministic fundamentally, still I don't understand how would that lead to free will. The fundamental phenomena still act according to the laws that they follow and those then lead to matter particles, atoms, molecules, cells and so on to form a brain. So after adding an insane level of complexity, unless there is a completely inexplicable step in the leading up to forming the brain, I don't see how free will can be explained. At the end (again with assumptions that I made above for the things we don't know) the experience of being conscious is still a process of the universe, regardless of whether it is deterministic or not.
@@harryevans4513 My view changed a lot since this. My current theory is that higher Intelligence will allow higher levels of consciousness and therefore bring us closer to free will. Example: a chicken is conscious but it's so cognitivly weak that its free will is almost negligeable. (We can predict their in a cage behaviour very easily). However if you put an orangutang in a cage, his level of free will increased because of his increased cognition, making it harder to predict his actions. (They could even pick locks and open the cage door, which happened once in a zoo).
Determinists claim you could, in theory predict everything that has happened and will happen from the beggining of the big bang if we had an infinite understanding of reality. But I say that if we had infinite Intelligence they wouldn't be able to do that.
My argument is that we may never fully achieve free will, but we are getting closer and that's all we need.
what do you think of the following to thoughts-at-a-glance:
1.) you could never know determinism (since it's determined).
2.) if thoughts stand in the same relation to the brain in which gall stands to the liver, then it is not more permissible to distinguish between true and untrue ideas than it is between true and untrue gall.
Choice in free will debates is often portrayed as simplified yes, no binaries. I don't think most choices are actually like that. For example, if we look at these 'wants': Usually the things I want are in conflict with other things I want. Just to take an example... On the one hand, I would want to travel to experience other cultures (plus a long list of other considerations); on the other hand, I don't want to travel to avoid air travel pollution (again, plus a long list of other considerations). This means that I can't just be a slave of these wants, but some other mechanism must influence the prioritization of these wants... That is deliberation, which is open to conscious influence. I'm saying influence here instead of control. I don't think free will is about control at all, but about the ability to influence future action.
Great video! Did any response or conversation happen with alex after this?
I never understood âyou cannot will what you willâ you ARE the will lol!! You and the will are the same! You and the variables that influence and control you ARE YOU. Itâs like saying âyouâre completely determined by YOU.â Theyâre one and the same weâre addressing the question as though âyouâ and âthe willâ are separate entities. I donât think humans are determined or have âfree willâ because neither makes sense because we ARE the will! We ARE the variables!
I partially disagree, self-identity, will, and your essential self, are not all necessarily the same thing.
@@EugenTemba I find it frustrating that those that take the ânon-dualistâ anti-kantian approach presuppose a dualist-like distinction to say your will is predetermined, or determined. If you take the non-dualist approach, there canât really be a distinction between âyouâ and âthe universe.â They kind of just flow into eachother.
I think the best solution to the problem relates to subjective experience. For instance, every feeling inside I have that relates back to my past, or my interests or whatever that motivates my actions⊠thatâs all me, so long as I am feeling them and nobody else has access to those feelings or are less impacted by those variables. That is all âyou.â I find it hard to seperate out the concepts you specified from a non-dualist point of view.
I'm not a philosopher so bare with me. Wouldn't this all depend on how or where we define the 'I' of our consciousness? Couldn't something surely influence our body's actions prior to us being conscious of the idea or conceptualising it?
influence is just as it sounds like. an influence, not a direct cause by any means of the imagination. How something external will influence you, and how that exact thing influences me are not predictable, it would be at best an inductive likelihood that we'd both be influenced at least 10% to act on said influence within the next hour or so. Again, these are terrible bad inductions at best and this is what psychology is, this is what the strawman appeal of determinism is comprised of. In my implied example of what induction means, I presupposed 10% influence from that exact thing to have on us exactly the same. There are already a few absurd presuppositions made here, entirely sand inductions. There could be, sure are an infinite amount of influences in the piechart that influences you to different degree as it does anyone else. Although that event is assumed to hold exactly 10% influence over what we do next, there is still 90% left in the piechart of infinite influences varying on .000001 to 1 and etc. Then furthermore after somehow we gotten over that logistical impossibility, then we are presupposing all limits and some exact mechanical understanding and measurement for all relation to concepts. Other than no one with any decent knowledge and working job in the field thinking this is possible, literally no one of importance is thinking they can do other than random average joes on the street. I suggest yet still researching the probability calculator, the existence of a universe however infinitely unlikely it may be, is more likely to be real than our ability to determine human thoughts
I'm probably missing something since this is way beyond my education, but it seems to me that the fact that nobody can predict something does not mean that that thing is not inevitable.If we can accept that existence must have had a beginning, that beginning would have to be the trigger of all that comes after (what else could be the trigger?) . Free will implies there is some other trigger that somehow was not created by the beginning of existence. Where would it come from? It seems just as likely that everything (including our perceptions and feelings) is all like the playback of a recording, where there can seem to be drama and uncertainty, but the reality is the script determines all we see, hear, do, and feel.
Causality would be a concept of the mind.
Ge
@@RunRunRun1901 A concept that acurately reflects reality.
@@Cookiekeks, yes why is that relevant?
@@RunRunRun1901 Because if causality happens in the world outside of our minds, the argument above would work.
This is a wonderful video, I'm continually baffled by your output & quality oml
I mean I'd argue that if Laplace's demon existed it could predict everything under the deterministic model. Isn't it just that we are incapable of acquiring and processing the information required to do such a thing? Although if it were that classical causation itself wouldn't hold then idk about that. Some people argue that it already doesn't whilst citing some quantum physics stuff but there are multiple interpretations and under the many worlds interpretation it still does still hold. So yeh all in all determinism still seems to be holding up from my pov.
I'm having trouble tracking the argument about indeterminacy. In the first section of the video, you show that perfect determinacy is a contradiction, and that therefore determinism must be untrue. This point makes sense, given the way the idea of determinism is being considered, here.
However, the later points about free will seem to rely heavily on a type of indeterminacy not demonstrated previously. It could easily be the case in my understanding, for example, that a very slightly softer determinism, under which the notion of free will is almost vacuous, poses no contradiction at all.
Basically, I don't see how the impossibility of perfect determinacy implies the sort of indeterminacy necessary for the latter two thirds of the video to work. Would somebody mind clarifying?
5:20
"This conceptualization is actually the foundation for the entire universe. [...] This means that the material universe is fundamentally dependent upon human idea"
Seems to me to be a big assumption. Isn't it really the other way around though, that the human ideas are fundamentally dependent on the material world? How can I have an idea, without a brain?
8:55
By inductive reasoning, you can measure things and data, and then create a descriptive theory, no? Doesn't have to be normative. You can then try to hypothesize based on that data, which would be a kind of normative, yes.
11:40
Did Einstein not predict general relativity before he proved it? He needed "descriptive" evidence in order to prove his theory. He technically only described what was already there all along, but he predicted it. So you can predict something, before it's "invented". And after that, Hawking predicts Black Holes and later on we find them. Seems to me in the example of the wheel, he predicted it, then proved it. The proof isn't in the prediction itself; Prediction and proof are separate things.
12:30
Well, I'm gonna predict that I'm going to feel hungry and start thinking about food; Let's see if that comes true.
some very good arguments. i agree with them :)
you can have idea without a brain, if it only depended on the brain you wouldnât have the capacity to create ideas.
@@justaguywithaturban6773 Why? The brain is enough for consciousness, unless you're assuming you need a 'soul' or something along those lines; Of which there is no evidence for. So working human brain = idea. No brain = No ideas.
@@clxvii_
Yeah Iâm assuming you need a soul and there is evidence for the existence of soul but the methodology is against the current scientific dogma so yeah, evidence exists, soul exists.
@@justaguywithaturban6773 Yeah, you can't prove that you can have an idea without a brain; neither can you prove that a soul can have an idea. Since there is no interaction between the hypothetical soul and our reality. So we're just gonna agree to disagree
Why did I get an audio test at the start of the video?
No idea, I don't have that.
15:50
Something being difficult to predict doesn't mean it's logically impossible.
@@novinceinhosic3531
I agree.
Also, I noticed at 16:20 he misreads Allister Macintyre's quote.
The quote itself supports the possibility of determinism, but he says "incompatible" with strong determinism when it actually reads "compatible"...
â@@novinceinhosic3531 I think the libertarians and compatibilists argue that there's an aspect of our consciousness that transcends the laws of nature, and therefore is not bound by causal necessity.
But to me causal necessity is a feature of logic, not nature, much like other laws of logic like the necessity of identity; something can't be both what it is and at the same time what it's not.
No amount of transcendence can unbound us from logical necessities, and the same applies to causality in my view.
Ex nihilo nihil fit, from nothing nothing comes, everything that begins to exist must have a cause.
Therefore something must be eternal and able to cause everything that happens, like a movie on a loop on a dvd.
Yes, but predicting, say, a new concept is not metaphysically impossible, but logically impossible, which makes determinism incoherent.
I disagree with a lot of the fundamentals in this, but i think its a great video. like the new format.
What you disagree with?
@@ifollowtheantichristandthe9218 his entire argument is like a bad AI strung words together, such that syntactically and linguistically sound, even locally semantically sound, but makes no global sense.
@@StevenWernerCS so, you think he is wrong, and free will doesnt exist?
@@ifollowtheantichristandthe9218 correct.
I'm a computer scientist with a masters in neuroscience.
pause time, rewind before you commented, continue time. why given a second first chance would you typing anything else?
why didn't you 'choose' that the first time?
chemically you have no choice, and quantum physics is still even just probabilistic and could only give you random narrow possibilities. so that results you in being deterministic or random, no choice either way
@@StevenWernerCS The reason we have free will is because the metaphysical structure of the universe is not mechanistic.
To Perspective Philosophy. Thank you for the video.
Are determinism and predictability the same?
Is "science is a body of knowledge" the same as "science is the analysis of objects"?
If not, how do you get from "science is a body of knowledge" to "science is the analysis of (material) objects"?
Can / could there be agreement between science and the world as we think it is?
Is there a similarity between determining that an object is material and that it is a limestone?
How do you decide that the universe is material?
Where is biological evolution in these thoughts / this video?
Regards Uffe
13:32 - If you have played chess or watched top players play chess, you will see them predicting what happens next. On top of this in many sports people predict actions. It's near impossible to predict every out come, because there is too many variables, that is chaos theory in which that one little action can change the outcome of everything, but in this we can predict the effects of a collection of actions and then make a choice, so for example if you know a lot of things have to happen for something to happen, it might be hard to see when the little thing will spark a large thing, but it's not hard to see all the variables coming together and then stop some of those variables in order then say prevent a tornado, that is if it's a flap of ones hands, this is because big changes depend on many variables, and so just as easily as you can do an action to prevent those variables coming together that create a massive effect. You could see the outcome of a viral video leading to a negative outcome and stop it before it got big for example. That is if you collect the data and see the predictions. So point being it's hard to predict little changes, but it's easy to see how taking out certain instruments from an entire orchestra would lead to a completely different sound. So point is some factors are predictable enough that one can do actions to change certain outcomes or influence certain outcomes. There is a certain amount of determinism in each little action, and not enough random events to say that determinism is impossible. As in not enough in the world that is so random that it can't be predicted in some way. Maybe not perfectly accurately, but enough to make accurate estimations.
So free will is real not a illusion by non conscious neurons and chemicals but at the same time there is little determinism through a certain point of view. I think these 2 can coexist.
@@justaguywithaturban6773 If you're on a river and the river is pushing you along, you can still redirect yourself in that river. You can even do acts which totally get you out of the river. Maybe not always in this life time, but you can make choices which in the future lead to being a totally different way. Lets say a being works out how to transfer consciousness in to something else, or even shape ones own consciousness then that to me shows free will exists. Maybe there will always be some constraints, but that doesn't mean the choices we are capable of aren't ours simply because it seems like the world or universe is pushing us in a certain direction, like a person on a boat.
As a thought experiment, what if a hypothetical machine were to be made, such as an adversary set of AI, to interpret raw data and make predictions of future sets of raw data ever improving in its predictions without the need of conceptualisation that a mind requires. If all parameters are known and the prediction rate is fully accurate. Would it not be the case that the actual set of raw data has been determined from the previous states. This would in itself not require the use of concepts or a mind per se.
I donât believe an AI could do that actually. Not with perfect accuracy. If you had a married couple for example, and a computer is tasked with determining how their marriage with go. If this computer is basically omniscient and knows everything about the couple it would probably be correct 90% of the time but I feel like in another 10% of the time the computer would be wrong or uncertain. The couple might completely be in love now but in the future some butterfly effect could disrupt everything so unless that AI literally knew the future thereâd still be uncertainty.
Also that AI would still technically be an extension of mind and perceived by mind. Someone had to create it, someone has to input the data etc. Though I feel like the whole mind argument is more of an interesting technicality than a debunking of determinism as a whole. I donât think I can perceive food into existence when Iâm starving.
Agreed
I would love to see you guys debate this that would be epic.
What does it mean that a mind could construct an object that could come before it? And why is this not possible?
This will be an interesting watch for sure. Like you both. đ
Am I missing something or did he misread the quote at 16:30. Unless he messed up the wording on the screen, Macintyre is saying that unpredictability IS compatible with determinism.
If one chooses to define "reality"- as you have- as "containing mind", it will contain mind. But there is no reason to define it in this way beyond arbitrary personal preference.
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It's just as easy to define reality as that which exists, regardless of our perception or lack of perception, of "it". This makes more logical sense, in my opinion. My inability to accurately perceive reality does not denote any subjectivity of reality, therefore.
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Your section "what is freedom" highlights the issue of the whole discussion; freedom is an essentially folk-science concept, and is unintelligible when placed under close scrutiny. Thus people feel the need to redefine "freedom" in order to make it intelligible. But in doing so, they have stacked the deck. If you get to define what reality is and what freedom is, you yourself dictate the outcome of the question "is freedom compatible with reality".
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Of course, you didn't decide how to define these terms in the conventional sense of the word "decide". You were driven to select the definitions you "chose" due to unconscious pressures exerted due to the prior cause of your genetic endowment interacting with the environment in which you found yourself. At least that's my take. Enjoyed your video! But I didn't choose to enjoy it.
Things don't need to be intelligible in order to be true. Past a certain point, it's also unintelligible why a ball rolls when I kick it. It's still true that the ball will roll though, even if you can't say anything more about it than "it's just the way it is"
His definition of reality makes more sense, what you want is not to think deeper and look at the truth, you only want observation.
If our tools of percieving reality are unreliable and we don't see the "real thing", don't we ultimately only have our minds to work with? We can pretend like there is an objective reality but it is not truly known.
best comment
@@nikkan3810 We can see the real thing, just not with 100% accuracy.
I wish i knew what you were on about because I didn't track this argument at all :P
It's very abstract.
Its not a good argument, that is why.
â@@jasonsimmons4319Just because you don't like ?
Finally heâs back! Where did u go?
gooner4lifeize he was working on this video
The mans simultaneously working on his phd, give him some slack
You do not have to worry about terminology, itâs about being aware of the conceptual landscape. I will show why âfree willâ is incoherent under any definition, whether possession, compatibility, required-for-free-will, in/determinism questions etc.
Thoughts are either determined by prior causes (principle of sufficient reason/ cause and effect) in which you do not control them, or they are random (quantum indeterminacy)/ a mixture of both, in either case you do not control them.
Every particle (further divisible to the wave function or possibly strings) in the universe, obeys the laws of physics, and your brain which constitutes of matter is no different; following the 4 fundamental forces, in which you do not control that was set off at a brute fact (the big bang) or infinite regression.
Libertarian free will proponents insist that their choices are made for reasons, but also that those reasons do not determine their choices. Or that those reasons are not themselves determined, but also not a matter of chance, this is a contradiction.
If itâs a false trichotomy, then what are the other options? Agent causation (of the soul)? But again, does something cause the agent to act, or does the agent act for no reason?
Even if you have an immaterial soul, it only makes sense to say that soul is making decisions if its actions are causally determined by prior soul-states. Otherwise, its actions are uncaused, and uncaused events are, by definition, random. If you are acting randomly, thatâs not really decision making. Itâs only if your actions are done for reasons which cause those actions that youâre really making decisions. Youâre not making decisions if youâre just doing things for no reason.
A mixture of chance and determinism? Part of the decision-making process involves causal influences, and the rest has no prior cause. This doesn't solve it. Free will, described by its advocates imply a person has control over their decisions. If my decisions are predetermined; how do I have control over them? If my decisions have no cause, and occur for no reason, then how can I control them?
What does it mean to say that âwe are free and in control of what facts and ideas the mind focuses onâ? When I choose to focus on an idea, does something cause me to choose to focus on that idea? If the answer is yes, then I'm not really in control of that act of focusing. If the answer is no, and there is nothing that determines what I will choose to focus on, the act of focusing on anything is no different from a chance event, which by definition are not controlled by anything.
So, does something cause a person to focus and think, or does the personâs choice to think and focus happen for no reason? Or is it partly causally influenced and partly chance? I donât see how responsibility or control fits into any of these options, and I donât see what other options there are.
I can choose 'x' or 'y', however, everything that makes up that choice is caused by both internal and external variables in which you did not pick. E.g., genetics, brain electricity and chemistry, physics of your own atoms and that around you, parents/ who raised you, where you were raised, what you were taught.
These make up your beliefs, thoughts, impulses, emotions, knowledge, memory.
True free will would be walking off a building and willing your atoms to defy gravity. In the same way your body cannot defy that fundamental force, your brain cannot defy the other 3 forces which makes up your thoughts. You are just matter and energy reacting to the laws of physics.
Surely, you are not implying despite have either different biology, or environmental factors, that you would have all the exact same beliefs? If you agree, itâs a contradiction to believe in free will. However, if you disagree, it is still a contradiction to free will, as it means your actions were set in stone and you couldnât have done otherwise.
Like Alex said, you can only do things because you want to or are forced to.
As for theism;
God is omniscient, meaning he knows every detail and outcome of every possible scenario.
E.g., He knew everything about Satan and what that specific arrangement of particles (it doesn't matter he's nonmaterial, but whatever he is) called "Satan" would do before he created him, and still decided to make Satan the specific way he was which resulted in him doing exactly what he did. You cannot blame a car for being faulty, if an engineer beforehand purposely created a faulty car, knowing he could have done otherwise. Therefore, God knew and purposely designed Satan to rebel, everything is Gods fault, including evil. God could have altered him so he wouldn't rebel. He's omnipotent so he could have, and omnibenevolent so would have. But he didn't, therefore God wanted Satan to rebel. Therefore, God is responsible for all suffering and is malevolent. And if every variant of Satan was âfreelyâ evil regardless of how you designed him, then God shouldn't have created Satan to begin with. There were angels like Michael Demiurges that knew and did not rebel that he could have replaced him with or just leave blank.
It seems like God created the problem and takes credit for fixing it, even though it would never have occurred if he didn't allow or want it to.
Divine Foreknowledge: The argument is not that God predetermined what he knows ahead of time, it is that in order to infallibly know what will happen in the future, what will happen in the future has to be written in stone. Even if itâs not written in stone by God, it still has to be written in stone in order for God to know it infallibly. Knowing something will happen, even infallibly doesn't deterministically cause it to happen. The point is that in order to infallibly know that an event will happen, that event has to be predetermined. It doesn't have to be predetermined by the knowledge you have, but in order to have that knowledge infallibly, the event cannot be free to not occur. To say that an event is free to occur or not occur is to say whether it will occur or not cannot be infallibly known. There is no coherent scenario, not even hypothetically in which these events do not occur.
Even if God is outside time, and our future actions are retroactively causing God to know about them infallibly in the present, then they also lock us into committing them inescapably, otherwise we could defy God's foreknowledge. This would mean that I am predetermined to take every action I will ever take. If we aren't free to act differently, in the future, from how he, presently know we will act, because from his perspective it's already happened, then we have no more freedom to change the future, that we have to change the past.
Theists claim he has hypothetical, or middle knowledge, and everything he knows, is innately; itâs simply his nature to know all truths. This contradicts the assertion that our free decisions cause God to know about them. Which is it? Do our free decisions cause God to know about them (even before we make such decisions) or does God know them innately, without anything causing him to know about them? If Godâs foreknowledge tracks your choice like an infallible barometer. The barometer doesnât determine the weather even though chronologically the reading of the barometer may be first. So, does Godâs foreknowledge âtrackâ your decisions, or does it know them innately? It canât do both because these are contradictory assertions. Barometers react to barometric pressure. They donât know the pressure innately. Barometric pressure causes the barometers to give the readings they do. If our choices cause God to know about them, then he does not know about them innately.
4:25 fuck man that sequence is so funny, wasn't expecting it at all đ€Łđ€Ł
Determinism = planning = design = a measurable Universe = simulation = a creator = a beginning = no coincidences = no randomness = inevitability = predictability = no choice = no free will.
In games, you are given limited options, therefore games are predictable, meaning that the outcome of a game is determined before the game begins. This is most evident, but not limited to, video games. The same reasoning can be applied to actual physical games and to life itself, proving determinism.
Predictability isn't about being able to predict what each and every human is going to do, it's about determining the outcome of certain actions already taken. You come to a crossroad. Depending on which road you take, you will either end up here or there. You have limited options, therefore, your outcome can be predicted based on which road you chose. That's predictability.
Inventors often envision what it is they want to invent before that invention actually exists. This is how invention works. A mind can construct an object before the object exists.
The idea of free will is that we live with the illusion that we are able to make our own decisions without the effects of other forces. You are given two options, which one will you choose? You may feel like you are making the choice without outside influence, but are you sure about that? The truth is that you will make the choice that you always would have made because that's just the way you are. You are at the point in your life because of all of your past decisions that you have ever made. All decisions you make from this point going forward are determined by all your past decisions because they can't not be. You already made your past decisions, there is no going back to change your mind for a decision that has already been made. You can try to trick yourself by making a decision that you feel goes against what you normally would have made, but in reality you are still making the decision you already would have based on your past decisions. Everything happens the way it is supposed to and when it is supposed to because that is how and when they DID happen. There is no going back to change them. You do not have free will. This is determinism.
I'm a little disturbed by how you are calling this video a response to Cosmic Skeptic when you hardly show him in the video at all. I feel like you would do well to have an actual debate with Alex himself. I look forward to that.
Freedom to PP as "supporting our action with reason" seems to suggest that certain actions are necessitated by objective reason, doesn't this make us discoverers of our place in an intersubjective machine rather than the author of our own meaning
there seems to be an odd typo or error in the slide at 16:42. You say incompatible, but the text says compatible, this changes the meaning of the text significantly.
Unable to comprehend the info yourself?
I keep returning to this video and find it more and more compelling each time, but equally find Alex's view on things to be highly intuitive. I feel like my worldview depends on the two of you debating this subject (and metaethics)!
Alex has soulless eyes
There will never be a point where we can predict all human behavior?
That may be true because we don't understand all the factors and circumstances that lead to a certain behavior and when you have to consider the multitudes of people interacting with each other that further complicates the ability to predict human behavior not to mention the changing environment around us. The task of predicting human behavior is too daunting for any human being to fathom. This doesn't prove determinism is false.
I really need an actual debate version of this, because this isn't making much sense to me. I don't see why the fact the we perceive the world thru a conceptual lens should lead us to believe that reality can't be reduced to a series of material causes and effects. The way I think of it (from a non mind-body dualist perspective) there is just the reality, which exists, and from which we construct a subjective perception of it based on our conceptual structures. then our conceptual structures themselves are also a part of material reality, which has been caused by prior material realities. (like mental states and ideas and stuff supervene on observable neural processes.)
How could a construction of mind be prior to mind? Well the construction from our mind isn't what's prior to mind, rather some underlying reality that we can't access directly existed prior to mind. Just like any observable cause-effect we analyze, our constructs of object x and object y are not really the reality of the causal process, they are just a perception of it.
predicting a concept: Yeah I see this as a problem for science and human efforts to predict things and stuff. But determinism isn't about whether we can practically predict things, but about whether an omniscient being could, just based on physical laws. It's easier the imagine if you take that omniscient being to be an observer external to our reality, to avoid the paradox. back to the practical world, yeah I can see the issue but it doesn't change the fact that It seems like when we invent a new concept, it's just stemming from neural processes which are easy to understand as causal by the laws of physics. then yeah, I have the same kinda issue with the other paradoxes and stuff in this section. I don't see the limits of practical predictability as an issue for determinism. It feels like you've made a good case against the possibility of anyone ever predicting the future with full understanding of what they've predicted, But It just doesn't mean reality isn't fundamentally built on cause and effect, with outcomes essentially written in stone. Knowing the future is just a feature of reality our minds can never access because our minds can't work that way.
I'm not sure I understand your positions still. Like it kinda feels like you just said nothing existed before conscious observers existed. So like, (lets just assume for simplicity that aliens don't exist) before our planet ever developed life, was there nothing? like actually? and nothing caused life? and nothing caused our minds? this just seems incoherent to me. I don't get it. But also I'm not sure this is what you meant.
actually the more I think about it. I'm not so sure predicting a concept is actually so paradoxical. Like let's say for example in some reality some guy is trying to predict stuff. By having access to an insane amount of live neurological, sociological, and psychological data, pertaining to a small test group, he manages to predict them inventing a new concept called a Zigobow. Now, It seems like a paradox because by predicting the invention of the concept, he invents the concept. But then maybe we should just remove the extra meaning we are attributing to the event. the "invention" aspect. altho then, I still open us up to an infinite regress of predicting of concepts. Is that an issue?
This video is so packed with value that i find myself coming back to it again and again. Very thought provoking. I am sure it takes a lot of work, but I would love to see more videos like this! Thank you
Hey Perspective Philosophy, have you ever taken a psychedelic?
Unpredictable and undeterminable are not interchangeable here.
Right!! He is confused between these terms if we are incapable of predicting something, it doesn't mean it is not determined.
I loved this video and while I don't think it disproves Alex's video, but it's definitely the most challenging one that I've heard
*_"Cause and Effect: Belief in a strictly materialistic Darwinian Evolution leads one to believe, albeit falsely, that there is no Free Will. And if there is no Free Will, then there is no Right and Wrong and no Moral Law. However, this belief is completely contrary to everything that is practiced and observed in nature, humanity, and the cosmos regarding cause and effect. This line of reasoning is what led to the atrocities of Hitler, Stalin, Mao, etc and is the hidden underlying ideology / worldview justifying and directing many countries' Social Darwinian based foreign and domestic policies to the present. The Social Darwinian Materialistic Ideology / Worldview (Survival of the Fittest among nations, i.e. the continuous lawless struggle for resource wealth and world rule without regard to human moral / ethical standards or International / U.S. Laws) is the Root Cause of modern era World Wars and Perpetual Wars."_* --- Rod Dacanay
Correct me if I'm mistaken but not being able to connect the dots doesn't prove free will exists it just means that we don't have the capability to see the whole picture i'm not trying to be rude or anything in fact I'm new to this topic and I'd like to understand how it works I started reading about classical conditioning and I ended up trying to learn about determinism and I think i like it there's not much I can read about determinism in Mexico and my English is not that good but I think i understand most of what you're saying
You are correct but what I am arguing is that there can be no mechanism at all which is to be understood and the unpredictability is the result.
I think the first couple parts is sensible as critique of Materialism, but determinism or a belief that free will doesn't exist, doesn't require perfect predictability, that's an absurd criterion.
I didn't say it did. I was demonstrating the source of unpredictability is ontological
Ever got into Deleuze&G, ĆœiĆŸek, Land, Reza...?
The inverse of the idealist dialectic (the materialist dialectic) metaphysically allows for determinism; reality (or, as one might more eloquently put it, the concrete-real) isn't an expression of thought and action per se, ideology as our perception of our relations to reality is, and while everything we perceive or otherwise "know" is an ideological construct based around best-guesses and assumptions based on perception of sensory input and prior assumptions, the essence of the issue you present ("how can we be determined by something that we determine") resolves rather quickly in the face of this abandonment of idealism.
Hegel argues for determinism and free will.
Touches on the ideas of beau lotto and how perception is everything for human agency
This does not debunk determinism. It's true that the mind/conceptualization is what determines the way in which we describe the experiences that we perceive around us. But those experiences occur regardless of the way we conceptualize them.
If I don't conceptualize "death" to mean "loss of life", does that mean that I will never die? ...well, I might never experience something that I conceptualize as "death" but I might still experience what, under a particular conceptualization, would be considered "death" ...it's just that I would not conceptualize it that way.
The way we set abstract boundaries and definitions that differentiate the world only affects the language we use to describe the events we experience and the way in which we abstract reality, it does not change the inputs we receive, only the way in which we interpret them. And that doesn't make them non-deterministic, since the way we interpret them is not just casuality.
- About the unpredictability: note what determinism postulates is that all events have a cause. It does not necessarily mean that it must be viable to predict it, or that it's possible at all to have the knowledge to every predictable event. Something can be theoretically predictable in the sense that its traceable in a chain of cause-consequence, and at the same time be practically impossible for mere humans to predict. So the "4 modes of unpredictability" are missing the point entirely. Those do not debunk determinism either.
Note that the opposite of determinism is not "indeterminism" but rather, "non-determism". Something can be indetermined but still deterministic... when something is "non-determined" what it means is not that we are unable to determine it, but rather that it's dettached from a chain of causality... that it's random... that it has no reason. Determinism is "causality" whereas non-determinism is "casuality".
- About being "slaves to what we want": the point here is that what we want does not come from nothing. From psychology we know that what we want can be controlled by external factors. You can actually cause someone to feel hunger and want food if you subject them to a particular environment and you have brought them up in a particular way. The "I am what I am" is not something incompatible with determinism... because what I am is determined by the external circumstances from my upbringing as well as the external circumstances of my evolutionary history.
- About defining "freedom" as the "reasons why we choose something". Well, under that definition then yeah, freedom exists. But so does determinism. Since that "freedom" is determined by external factors. When you choose to make a decision you do it based on the information you have.. it's never really random, even when you believe you are choosing randomly, there's always some underlying level of decision-making in your conscious attempt of choosing how to make it random. Even if you throw a dice, the dice is determined by the momentum of your throw, which will be determined in how you choose to make your hand move. You might not be doing a conscious choice, but you are making a it's you the one who determines the outcome and that "you" is determined by your circumstances.
I wish this was a more direct response to Alex, rather than an interesting exploration of 'freedom of the will' within continental philosophy.
I'm afraid that this won't serve as a very good short video 'debunking determinism' that people can link others to whenever the discussion comes up online.
Hmm I fear you are right but at least it'll expose people to alternative positions.
@@PerspectivePhilosophy That's why I like your channel, you consistently take a step back to try to understand things from a meta-perspective. I do hope nonetheless that this gives some of Alex's fans pause in their basic assumption that determinism is true.
Finally a new video! Nice time stamps.
The idea of creating a wheel does not bring the wheel into existence, especially in the case that wheels are unrealizable (which happens not to be the case, but it is the case for perpetual motion machines- for example)
10:09 the quote said that no law can ever be applied to consciousness, not that human behaviour never follows laws and patterns.
But how am i free if the actions that are rational are only a few options big? Am i not more free if i had the option to also not choose from the rational choices but instead from the irrational ones too?
You can choose to be irrational, but for you to do that you would have to acknowledge that you where wrong for choosing it. Which is why Hegel argues we are obligated to punish the criminal in order to respect their subjectivity.
@@PerspectivePhilosophy How is punishing someone showing respect to someone?
@@PerspectivePhilosophy How could one choose to be irrational?
@@cloudoftime It would be more like, choosing out of caprice and self entitlement and then punishment is to reconcile the individual with their poor reasoning.
@@PerspectivePhilosophy So, rationality is irrelevant, and the punishment stems from some concept of _moral_ reasoning.
21:48 Why not both, though?
Correct me if i am wrong, but from your perspective consciousness must be an emergent property from the particles that make our brain?
@ How do non-living particles create a living being?
@@captainbeefheart5815 *living does not equate consciousness*
@ Did I say that living equates to consciousness? Are you having trouble understanding the analogy?
@ Okay, so you failed to understand the analogy. In the same way that non-living particles can create a living being, inexperiencing particles can create an experiencing mind. Life and consciousness are both emergent processes.
For a logician, you're remarkably bad at logic.
@ Again, you've missed the analogy. I never *equated* life and consciousness. I merely compared them in that they're both complex processes that are the result of particles which lack the phenomenon they create. Living things are made up of non-living particles. Conscious minds are made up of non-conscious particles.
Your comment implied that you believe that conscious minds can't be created through non-conscious particles. This is as dumb as believing that living beings can't be created through non-living particles.
Your argument boils down to an argument from ignorance. We don't know exactly how non-conscious particles can create consciousness; therefore, they can't create consciousness.
And by the way, boldening every word in your response is kind of dorky.
To your wheel analogy: You'd just have to rephrase the prediction as "in 10 years humans will come up with the concept of a wheel" and it'll work.
It won't, because it would have been conceived at that very moment of prediction.
er, not being able to predict what a person will do doesn't mean what they do isn't determined, i don't know how you can claim it is just from that. in my view if you have a reason for an action then you don't have the free will to do other than what you do, saying an action is unpredictable is the same saying it's random, but random action isn't free will either, it's the same as someonw else making a choice for you. and there are no "choices" only options, once you have decided "cheese roll" the option of "chupa chups" is off the table - there was no "choice"
until we can use time machines the past took one path, the future will take one path also. i don't see how you can use ALL of your options.
The argument isn't an appeal to indeterminism but an epistemic argument on the origin of causality itself. I have heard this interpretation a lot so I will need to make a follow up to explain the position more concisely.
Thank you for your comment.
I just finished an intro to philosophy paper about how the determinist position is more plausible than libertarianism though you could make the case for compatibilisms like consequentialism. IMO, even hard core determinism like the fatalist position is more reasonable that radical libertarianism. This should be a good video.
Awesome. Now dilate.
so whats your thoughts?
I have to disagree with Hard Determinism because there has to be an objective morality. Without objective morality, all moralities are subjective and have no real meaning.
Just for arguments sake, if determinism is true than there is no free will. With no free will, you can't evaluate other people's moral actions. So Hitler would always be Hitler and there is no reason to judge him morally since he had no agency. Therefore, using morality is entirely worthless since everyone is forced by determined forces to commit certain actions.
I have to disagree because in order for us to make moral judgements we need to have an objective moral framework, based on logic and deduction not God. If we can't make moral judgements, then there is no reason to make morally good choices and all we would be doing is making choices based on our biological desires.
â@@shuheihisagi6689 If hard determinism is true (which it is) we need to replace our idea of morality with a concept that serves the same purpose (preventing destructive behaviour) but doesn't rely on free will and agency to exist.
We can collectively come to the conclusion that murder is something we should prevent and punish without disregarding the causal chain of events that lead to the act.
@@SaudiHaramco If we collectively come to a consensus about murder, that would have to involve using logic to make a universal law that could be used anywhere and still be true. Without sometype of objective rules based on universal logic, any type of punishment system is going to be subjective and based on contemporary culture.
How do we make a framework that encourages certain behavior and punishes others without it becoming a form of morality? Even an egoist, who only does things that benefit themselves consider that their form of morality. Morality is just a framework to punish and reward behavior and to place value on things.
@cosmicskeptic would love to see a video on materialism vs idealism
Maybe it's a good idea to make a video that goes over Macintyre's arguments in detail but with relatable examples and simpler language than he uses (in his papers that is, I'm yet to read or listen to his (audio)books).
Because it seems from the objections some raise in the comments that the part on Macintyre's points has not hit the mark.
Two points on exact laws:
1. A margin of error in measurement does not affect the predictability of a natural law, just the margin of error of a calculated result.
2. And those 'mystical' constants in physics are just unit converters for units that we subjectively choose.
People often misrepresent these two features of exact science usually to save some pseudoscience from well earned criticism.
Advertisers collect consumer data to influence consumer behavior. They do not use laws that predict the behavior of a single consumer or an entire consumer base.
Governments need intelligence services and law enforcement, precisely because they cannot predict human behavior reliably, but they certainly have OP means to alter it.
The impossibility of laws of human behavior does not prevent you from making educated guesses, plotting contingencies, registering or influencing human behavior.
Evidently you can.
So, if everything, scientific or not, isbased in human conceptulization and therefore will be flawed, why do we belive anything to be true in the first place? Is there anything i could read up on to get an answer to this question? Also, thanks for the video, definitely changed my mind on determinism! Very well done, friend!
It's epistemological error. Truth is that which is best validated by evidence as if now, not some future hypothetical ultimate validation.
I know I'm definitely late to the party, and I absolutely loved the video, but I believe your "debunking of determinism" can be "debunked" with the help of pointing out your somewhat misunderstanding of MacIntyre's quote, you read it as incompatible when it shows on the screen as compatible. Whether or not I can predict what number the die will land on doesn't mean the forces applied on it can't be explained, and no regardless of if any human can predict what it will land on, doesn't mean the number it lands on wasn't determined by many other factors.
Anyways, I'm a new subscriber and I've been enjoying your videos so much
I'm later then you, but have the same thought. it seems like a weak argument...
If you'll use that argument in a dialog with a Determinist, he'll just reply: "ok, I agree...every step we make is predictable, but we lack the ablity to make such complicated calculations.." and that's a reasonable reply. We know world class chess players can calculate 25-30 moves ahead and that's amazing - but the possibilities they face are less than all the possibilities in the world that you want the Determinist to face and give you a presise calculation.
If we will have a super-ultra-mega-godlike computer who can gether all the data that ever existed in the universe - is it odd to asume it could predict every event to come?
In conclusion - the question is whether all events are completely determined by previously existing causes, or not. and not regarding our epistemic capabilities.
Iâm very late as well and also a new subscriber as I Love watching debates and lectures on philosophy, religion, science and more that Iâm forgetting on this list
Playing semantics and obfuscating simple concepts doesn't make determinism false , I'd like you to 'debunk' it with alex
I don't think you have adressed the primary claims of material determinism. Material determinism says that if we knew the direction of every particle in all of existence at a certain point in time, we could theoretically predict everything that comes after that. So the claim is that it is theoretically predictable, when that neanderthal would come to some new idea based on the evolution of his genetic code and his lived experience (lived experience would also be depending on his genetic code and his environment). At least the determinists I spoke to never claimed that determinism means that a human could predict something, but that everything is predictable in theory and that we just aren't at that point of development, yet - or, maybe, will never be. Game theory is actually a great example for that. There is an expectation for people to e.g. buy as much as possible in the supermarkets because you can expect some small amount of people to buy a lot of goods in fear of a corona lockdown. Now they could also do something different in reality, but that theory is only based on a small set of data and that lack of data is also the reason for incorrect predictions. If we look at an election for example, you get to see statistics that are not based upon the actual material state of the universe, but you analyse the outcome based on how the outcomes have been in the past, derivations, etc. There is a meaningful destinction between a statistical analysis and a material prediction based on our laws of physics. And all that is to say that we know that we don't currently have access to the final laws of physics, but are still expanding our theories all the time instead.
Now I personally believe that there is no way for humans to have access to knowledge about wether material determinism is the correct theory or not, but it seems like the amount of things we can predict is increasing over time, instead of decreasing so I can understand why so many people start to lean towards determinism. Now there is probably a debate to be had on wether people should believe in determinism even if all of existence behaves deterministically, but debunking determinism seems just as impossible, as proving it because the arguments are based on assumptions.
It sounds like the difference may be between the approach a materialist may take and the approach an idealist may take. Agent causation and event causation are distinct.
@@LtDeadeye yes, that's exactly what i meant. Thanks for the fitting words, I am only a hobby-philosopher and so I still struggle to find those expressions
At about 16:40, you were reading a quote from Macintyre, and you misread a seemingly crucial word: you said "incompatible" where the text actually said "compatible". The text is reproduced below, with the misread word bolded:
"We have then four independent but often related sources of systematic unpredictability in human life. It is important to emphasize that not only does unpredictability not entail inexplicability, but that its presence is *compatible* with the truth of determinism in a strong version".
I haven't read this book, so I don't have the full context of the Macintyre quote, so I may be mistaken, but it would seem to me that your mistake here would actually imply the opposite of what Macintyre meant. Again, you said "incompatible" where Macintyre actually wrote "compatible".
It is possible that this doesn't matter, and the point overall stands on its own, but it seemed like an important mistake that I should at least point out. Let me know if it was merely a "stumble" in your speech as opposed to an actual misinterpretation of Macintyre's point.
For those who think he may just have typed up the quote incorrectly, I actually checked the primary source text myself. The text on screen is indeed accurate, the reading of it is indeed not.
Lewis. I have some observations that might be interesting but I don't know if you still read this. If you do, let me know. Don't want to waste my time writing it all down for nothing.
I get that we construct reality, but there is still that which we are constructing, and itâs that which starts the causal chain. The world is, we perceive it, and that perception causes what comes next.
I think this is missing the point of determinism. If you were to rewind to the big bang and hit play again would it all happen the same way?
Whether "it" and the way it "happens" are constructs are not surely are irrelevant.
Cool video thought, got me thinking
Really great response just subbed.
I don't see determinism as a philosophical question as much as a physical question. Listening to your arguments is almost enough to convince me of determinism, at least in a philosophical sense, which doesn't say anything about how the real world works.
9:45-10:08, Does this not only mean that our conception of ''that which caused mind'' is created by our mind? This does not prove that there is not something that caused mind, right?
What it means is that we cannot prove determinism and our grounding must start from an indeterminate basis.
I doubt Schopenhauer would have a problem or Alex if he agrees with his subjective idealism.
@@PerspectivePhilosophy Yes, should have watched the video a bit longer before commenting. Liked your convo with Destiny btw.
His approach also seems to support solipsism, which is fine, but that's what you get.
@@cloudoftime It supports weak solipsism. Something i think most people agree on.
@@wowjack8944 Right. I was relating that to your original point.
I get that the general idea is that science is dependent on our minds, but do we not have a very good reason to believe that our minds do arise from physical reality (and not the other way around)? Why would you choose to believe mind is first despite the mountains of scientific evidence to the contrary?
What is wrong in taking physical reality as an axiom?
There are clearly many schools of thought on this topic, first and foremost and this summarises most of this vlog is that the nature and purpose of language is always and is purposed to be by its very nature an attempt to convey abstract information in order to understand our external environment. So put this very basic metaphysical 101 concept behind us and move forward. What is most important is this, with our knowledge of agreed language in order to convey the world around us, where are we at with respect to expressing 'truths' of the things which we observe. Now on this point the presenter is absolutely correct in his assertions. In fact this has been established for quite some time now. It is just not understood by most because it is still within the realm of esoteric knowledge. It is so important that the general public understands that determinism is false is properly disproven and needs to be made known that the consensus of this is scientifically validated. Ilya Prigogine was awarded a Nobel prize for this. So wake up ffs wake up.
What consesus is there on determinism being false? Do you have any prove for that? Your comment is just vaguely saying the video is correct and everyone else is wrong
I donât think that the idea of determinism is predicated on our being able to predict the causes themselves, but understanding that there are prior causes that create our minds behavior. It does seem correct that we will never be able to prove determinism though.
what you think is you changing your desires is actually just another more complex automated process.
you have goals and so you problem solve and your priorities line up with what your end goals are. but every goal we have is related to our evolution and nature.
When I change my mind about a decision, it is because I am processing new information, or reprocessing old information. I dont choose to think about stuff.
Ok I just tried to choose to think about something. I thought about puppies. That was still cause and affect and predetermined. even though there are no puppies here I thought about puppies but it's not an exercise of free will.
You made a point that you can invent a desire without it being forced onto you.
I was given the desire to make a counter argument.
I then gained the belief that using a similar example and explaining why it isn't free will would make a good counter argument.
Thinking about something random would be a good example.
I thought about puppies because I have seen puppies before. Maybe even because "puppies" is a common go-to "random" thought.
So this video caused me to think of something, and society caused it to be puppies. I was not acting as an independent agent, my environment acted on me.
â@@TheElvenKeys You are the thinking and I would say you do choose the contents of your thoughts. Sometimes we make choices we repress and avoid but the unconscious is not a second mind providing us with content, its the fundamental ways in which we think. The structures of meaning and patterns we endorse in the act which through training can be modified.
I really appreciate the video and you insight on the topic
Your printscreen of Macintyre says "compatible" but you speak of "incompatible" đ€š
Itâs chaotic physics or magic. Take your pick. We will judge you accordingly.
Physics Magic is just a Scientific technique
Define "magic"
Yes. And...an idiots opinion and judgement matters not. đđ
It sounds like to give determinism credence you think we would be able to measure a persons complete biology as well as every single experience they have had to personally determine someones upcoming actions and since we dont have those tools the determinism is false. Also how does someone freely and rationally come to wanting to pursue rationality without a certain set of influences that push someone to value that?
10:45 Meaning that it does not exist out there?
If "mind" limits how we perceive "reality" and it cannot be overcome, then that means we are determined by it. We still lack free will whether our bodies are built to (absolutely) perceive "reality" or not.
@@carnivorous_vegan OK, thank you for clarifying that for me.
It seems to me that deterministic causation is only even possible given an indeterministic framework, or in other words, it's only possible given indeterministic causation.
Whys that?
If reality is undefinable, how do you *define* reality, as 'that which is undefinable'?
Also, I'm an Idealist, but also a determinist; and to me causation just is logical necessitation of abstracta... So determinism is compatible with idealism
17:44
It's about perception.
There are many ways to view the world and toggling your view into only one of a thousand types of perception is I think a fundamental flaw. If the Universe is infinite to the extent that we can understan, why is our thinking so finite? Where do new ideas come from if this isn't the case? One could see an accumulation of pre-recorded data plugged into a new system, but determinism is a very strict way of thinking that requires one to be so rooted in reality that it doesn't allow you to question what goes on beyond your five senses. Is not exploration and discovery about the venturing into the unknown? The venturing into what you have no idea about anything, and continuing to step forward regardless? Are we too afraid to really look into our our minds because it may scare us beyond reasonable belief that we are not JUST physical? Is it that we don't WANT to know?
If you believe there is no more to life than waht you feel, then you ignore a fairly basic principle in the activity of exploration because you inhibit yourself to the locations that you already know.
Determinism does posit that all events are the result of prior causes, but this does not mean that events can be predicted. In fact there is a logical impossibility: even if all factors could be known, the act of knowing all factors would create a new factor that could alter the outcome. Some people think that inherent randomness (if it exists) refutes determinism, but all it does is refute the possibility of prediction.
Scientific determinism does however reject idealism or dualism as mystery stories in which magic happens.
The point about determinism is that it is a sufficient explanation; it does not require any additional agency beyond physical forces and fundamental constituents of matter. Falsification of determinism would be to authenticate an event that requires such an additional factor. Real blood from a stone, for example would falsify the causal basis of determinism. That accounts of this sort were once given more credit, but with wider acceptance of scientific determinism are now discounted.
I disagree with the psychology part cause it would seem it rely upon psychoanalysis while paychology is larger than that
Im currently procrastinating so ill make this quick and my apologies if ive misinterpreted your video. I wish to make a case against your "why psychology is not a science" section.
Theories developed in psychology often are inadequate in explaining why we do things, behave, or think. Further more do not accurately predict future outcomes (at least to a strong degree). And while the proportion of variation may possibly be explainable by "free will", the study of human behaviour is multifaceted and its impossible to control for variables as uniquely, everyone has different predispositions tuned into different experiences and its ultimately impossible to predict exactly what is going on in a battle between nature and nurture.