bahman wrote: ↑Sun Nov 07, 2021 1:31 pm
Well, determinism simply means that the past defines the future. Fact (1), this means that you have one and only one option at any given time. But we have been in situations when there are at least two options available to us. Following fact (1), this means that one of the options is real and another one is unreal. You can, of course, choose the real option and follow but you are stuck when you choose the unreal option. We have never been stuck in any situation. Therefore, determinism is wrong when there are options available.
In logic and math, the concept of a "function" means that for any input (or set of them where simultaneous), one unique output can only exist to each input. As a more GENERAL set any possible set of inputs and outputs, including the capacity to invert inputs to outputs or vice verse, the term, "relation" applies. Many texts either opt to begin with general relations and then define specific types, of which a function is. But this is also taught by beginning with defining functions and then defining all relations
in terms of multiple functions.
Basically, "determinism" just implies that for some understood single output, like our particular experience in
this life, each reality has one and only one possible path. So you defined this correctly. HOWEVER, note that reality can and
does have real distinct different outcomes (or 'outputs' as I used it above). In fact, I can argue that how it must be the case using certain thought experiments. As for the 'hard' evidence, you just have to look at the slit experiment in physics to which regardless of which interpretation you favor, the pattern of interference proves that either options exist but 'collaspes' to one unique reality
or[distinctly] there exists a separate world for
EACH possibility. I favor the latter because for the possiblities to be real, there has to be 'proof' of this with respect to a God's-eyeview so to speak.
If you are not familiar with this, check out Veritasium's YouTube video, "
Parallel Worlds Probabely Exist. Here's Why."
I think he did a good job on explaining this. Others, like Brian Greene, have also done a good job on this. But for philosophy, Zeno's paradox of the 'Arrow' suffices and can be something that may help visualize why there has to be some logical relationship that assures both multiple possible outcomes
as well as multiple possible inputs. Let me try to explain this using our modern capacities that Zeno lacked in his day: one picture frame of a film strip.
If you imagine you have a single image of an arrow. Can you determine what the 'next' image will be without knowing anything else? As an extension to this problem regarding looking backwards in time too, can you specifically assert that only one possible prior image exists that can make a rational motion picture story?
[Note that Zeno argued that this was 'paradoxical' because he assumed it should have one and only one input and output 'storyline'. He argued that this imagined 'frozen still picture' as possibly representing someone dropping the arrow, so that, using my question above, you could argue that the prior image does not have to be coming from the apparent interterpretion of a arrow flying in one unique direction. Thus, he concluded that given you cannot "determine" this, the reality is realtively 'indeterminate', which is only a contradiction if you already know the set of images predeterminately. He concluded that 'motion' in this thought experiment instance could not be 'determined' as existing and so motion itself should not be possible. He, of course would not literally think this but it helps foster the foundational questions about motion that later scientists would embrace.]