Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

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Immanuel Can
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

Post by Immanuel Can »

Eodnhoj7 wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 6:58 pm To say an event is uncaused is to say it is random,
No, it's not. Random events, as we know them, at least, are still caused.

The roulette wheel may issue "random" results; but it's a physical device, and the reason the ball ends up on any particular number has to do with ordinary physical causes like speed, centrifugal force, friction, gravity, and so on. The disposition of the ball is not "uncaused" or "acausal" at all.
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Terrapin Station
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

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Immanuel Can wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 7:05 pm
The burden of proof is on you. You're arguing that "acausal events" are logically possible,
You're arguing that acausal events are not logically possible. Why wouldn't the burden of proof be on you?
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

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Terrapin Station wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 7:10 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 7:05 pm
The burden of proof is on you. You're arguing that "acausal events" are logically possible,
You're arguing that acausal events are not logically possible. Why wouldn't the burden of proof be on you?
That's easy.

Because empirically, obviously we have a plethora of "caused" events.

So far, we do not have even one "acausal" event.
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

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Immanuel Can wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 7:23 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 7:10 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 7:05 pm
The burden of proof is on you. You're arguing that "acausal events" are logically possible,
You're arguing that acausal events are not logically possible. Why wouldn't the burden of proof be on you?
That's easy.

Because empirically, obviously we have a plethora of "caused" events.

So far, we do not have even one "acausal" event.
First off, empirical facts have no bearing on the logical possibility or impossibility of counterfactuals.
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

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Terrapin Station wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 7:39 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 7:23 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 7:10 pm

You're arguing that acausal events are not logically possible. Why wouldn't the burden of proof be on you?
That's easy.

Because empirically, obviously we have a plethora of "caused" events.

So far, we do not have even one "acausal" event.
First off, empirical facts have no bearing on the logical possibility or impossibility of counterfactuals.
They have a bearing on who has the burden of proof. So far, you've got nothing. Zippo. If you had anything you'd have trotted it out long ago, I expect.

So that means you're asking us depart from everything we DO know, in order to speculate on the "possible existence" of something NOBODY KNOWS, something for which NO cases exist, a thing which cannot even be coherently thought if generalized...like a universe in which all events are "acausal."

So you're going to have to forgive the skepticism; usually, people who have a reasonable idea come with some practical cases...or at least a concept that can be thought.
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

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Immanuel Can wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 7:51 pm They have a bearing on who has the burden of proof.
Why would they? Logical possibility isn't about what's actually instantiated empirically.
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

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Terrapin Station wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 8:13 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 7:51 pm They have a bearing on who has the burden of proof.
Why would they? Logical possibility isn't about what's actually instantiated empirically.
Well, "burden of proof" is decided based on which side has the default believability; and that's manifestly the side that supposes "acausal event" to be a nonsense term; for causal events are available on every side; but nobody's got even one example of the other. When something has never been seen, we are perfectly in court to ask what evidence the speaker has. And it's his burden to show he's got something; because we certainly do.

However, "logical possibility" is another issue. It's about "possibility," which means that if what you're suggesting is impossible, then what you're suggesting is simply irrelevant and absurd.

Now, even you have to admit that on the face of it, the term "acausal event" looks impossible. In fact, for a Physicalist especially, it has to be suspected of being a flat contradiction, as if it said "unphysical physical-thing." Likewise, I suspect it of being just that.

Show it's not. Show it's not impossible. Then we can entertain it. But otherwise, like Biden says, "C'mon, man." :lol:
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

Post by Eodnhoj7 »

Immanuel Can wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 7:08 pm
Eodnhoj7 wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 6:58 pm To say an event is uncaused is to say it is random,
No, it's not. Random events, as we know them, at least, are still caused.

The roulette wheel may issue "random" results; but it's a physical device, and the reason the ball ends up on any particular number has to do with ordinary physical causes like speed, centrifugal force, friction, gravity, and so on. The disposition of the ball is not "uncaused" or "acausal" at all.
But the roulette example is not random. A purely uncaused event, one that exists outside the order of causality, does not have a necessary order behind it as it is a causal. This lack of order preexisting behind the acausal event necessitates it as random.
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

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Immanuel Can wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 10:40 pm
for causal events are available on every side; but nobody's got even one example of the other.
Again you're conflating empirical facts, especially re what's actualized (and avoiding whether this is the case), with logic.

Apparently you don't believe this is a conflation? Otherwise why do you persist in doing it after the problem has been repeatedly pointed out to you?
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

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Nothingness is uncaused.

The emergence of phenomena from nothing necessitates order spontaneously occuring from nothing.

The manifestation of order from a previous order necessitates nothing, or the gap between events, being the point of differentiation between orders where one order differs from another order.

Variation is uncaused as what is caused is the repetition of order. Even order in new forms necessitates the new form as having some semblance of order from the prior order. Order repeated in new states is the maintenance of the old order with this variation and maintenance being the renewal of said order.
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

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Eodnhoj7 wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 11:20 pm A purely uncaused event, one that exists outside the order of causality...
Name one.
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

Post by Eodnhoj7 »

Immanuel Can wrote: Thu Jun 24, 2021 1:24 am
Eodnhoj7 wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 11:20 pm A purely uncaused event, one that exists outside the order of causality...
Name one.
The gap between one phenomenon and another as strictly Nothingness.

Nothingness is uncaused, but this does not answer your question as Nothingness is not even an event. All events have a causal order as one event proceeds another.

However an act of free will is uncaused given it is a spontaneous emergence from Nothingness. The choice between A and B, where A and B are both equal necessitates the choice as emerging from nothing given one set of events which lead to A or B do not have any elements which dominate over the other.
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

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Terrapin Station wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 11:41 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 10:40 pm
for causal events are available on every side; but nobody's got even one example of the other.
Again you're conflating empirical facts,
No, I'm not.

I'm pointing out that empirically is a way to set the burden of proof. I'm pointing out that the burden's on you, because we are rife with examples of caused phenomena, but no examples of an "acausal event" are presently known to exist. So the default supposition has to be that there are none...unless at least one can be shown. That settles burden of proof.

But there's a different question about "acausal events" as a concept, as logical -- actually, there are two questions here.

One is whether or not "acauasal event" is a coherent concept at all. And that IS how you settle the "possible worlds" issue. An item that could exist in no possible world is not possible at all. And there is no possible world in which no events are caused.

The other question is whether or not a rational Physicalist could believe that some events have physical causes, but that other events have no physical causes whatsoever.

He can't, if he wants to stay a Physicalist. That will make him a Dualist or Metaphysicalist of some kind. Instead of only "physical" items in his taxonomy, he will have "physical-caused" items, and other items that aren't "physical-caused" at all.
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

Post by Immanuel Can »

Eodnhoj7 wrote: Thu Jun 24, 2021 1:28 am
Immanuel Can wrote: Thu Jun 24, 2021 1:24 am
Eodnhoj7 wrote: Wed Jun 23, 2021 11:20 pm A purely uncaused event, one that exists outside the order of causality...
Name one.
The gap between one phenomenon and another as strictly Nothingness.
Do you hear yourself? :shock:

"No-thing-ness." It's not a thing. It's not a phenomenon, not an event, not an item. It's the absence of all of the above, the negation or lack of any of them. It's not a "thing."

You're going to have to find an example of an "acausal" event, phenomenon, item or thing. "Nothing" doesn't qualify, because it's none of them.
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Re: Free Will and Determinism Necessitate Eachother

Post by Eodnhoj7 »

Immanuel Can wrote: Thu Jun 24, 2021 1:40 am
Eodnhoj7 wrote: Thu Jun 24, 2021 1:28 am
Immanuel Can wrote: Thu Jun 24, 2021 1:24 am
Name one.
The gap between one phenomenon and another as strictly Nothingness.
Do you hear yourself? :shock:

"No-thing-ness." It's not a thing. It's not a phenomenon, not an event, not an item. It's the absence of all of the above, the negation or lack of any of them. It's not a "thing."

You're going to have to find an example of an "acausal" event, phenomenon, item or thing. "Nothing" doesn't qualify, because it's none of them.
The absence of being within another, which allows for differentiation, is uncaused. Acausality is purely negative and as negative can neither be proven or disproven. This absence of being can only be observed when one is observing nothing, thus not observing at all. Acausality is absence of observation hence an absence of forms which come with observation. The absence of one form in a another, thus differentiation, can be observed as acausal.
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