But in a determined world as I understand it you are explaining to her only what you were never able not to explain to her. There was no Jean around able of her own volition to explain to you what I'm explaining to you because I opted of my own volition "here and now" to think this instead of that. Convincing you not to think what you do now.phyllo wrote:If I'm explaining it to her then she didn't get aborted. She didn't get aborted in a deterministic world. She didn't get aborted in a free-will world.Again, I'll let you explain your point to Mary's daughter Jane who exists only because Mary's friend Jean was able to persuade Mary not to abort her.
If she got aborted, then I wouldn't be talking to her.
Jane didn't get aborted in a free will world because Mom was talked out of it. Mom was never going to be talked out of it in a wholly determined world so there was never any possibility of her being around for you to explain anything to her.
Now, in a wholly determined universe as I understand it if Mary aborts Jane there was never any possibility that she would have not aborted her. Jane's life was wholly determined to be conceived when a particular sperm fertilized a particular oocyte and together they formed a particular zygote. Jane's life was wholly determined to end at that point in time when Mary was wholly determined to abort her.
And she didn't get aborted because Jean was able to persuade Mary to change her mind. In a determined universe she was never able not to be conceived. But she was never able to be born either. And she would have to have been born and grown to the point you could discuss it with her.phyllo wrote: That's totally ridiculous.
If Jane exists, then she didn't get aborted.
Why? Because Jean's freely thought up argument was not persuasive enough for Mary of her own volition to change her mind. But in a wholly determined universe she was never able to not be aborted.phyllo wrote: Think about a free-will world. If Jane was aborted, then she would not exist. But if she was not aborted, then she might survive long enough to talk to me.
But in a free will world as I understand it, all the existential variables that came together enabling Mary to meet Jean created a context in which Mary was able of her own volition to hear Jean's argument and as a result of this change her mind about aborting Jane.
Again, all I can do here is to request that others make an attempt to explain your point more perspicuously. Mary's mother was never free to rethink her point of view and tell Mary that abortion is right. Mary is not able to think that through and of her own volition change her mind. Mary's Mom, Mary and Jane are just more dominoes toppling over as the laws of matter entail. And Jean here is no less toppling over on cue.phyllo wrote: Now switch to a determined world. Mary's mother tells her that abortion is wrong. She responds by not aborting.
Blah, blah. She was compelled not to abort.
How is that different from Jean's argument changing Mary's mind?
We just don't what that means because we don't fully understand all that unfolds given the points I raise here:
Anyone here thoroughly familiar with how the Big Bang brought into existence existence itself out of nothing at all evolving into stars exploding into supernovas creating the heavy elements that eventually evolved into more complex matter eventually evolving into living matter here on Earth eventually evolving into matter like us able to make the precise, empirical distinction between wanting a cream cake in a dream and wanting a cream cake in the wide awake world?
Please explain to us how this necessarily resulted in determinism in the dream and free will in the waking world.
Or, I suspect, as with phyllo, do you "just know" this? Or, perhaps, have faith that a God, the God is around to explain it?