BigMike wrote: ↑Sun May 18, 2025 10:59 pm
Darkneos wrote: ↑Sun May 18, 2025 10:36 pm
BigMike wrote: ↑Sun May 18, 2025 10:13 pm
Darkneos—
Quick correction:
I didn’t cite Sapolsky. That was Gary Childress. I responded to Gary’s post, just like I’m responding to yours.
That said, if you're going to reject determinism, then at least confront what it's actually saying, not a caricature of it. Saying “will doesn’t exist under determinism” is like saying digestion doesn’t exist because it’s caused. Of course will exists. What doesn’t exist is
uncaused will—will as some ghostly force exempt from physics. But will as a process? As something built out of drives, inputs, memories, goals? That’s real. That’s just how complex systems behave.
You can keep calling me stupid or fake, or whatever else helps you feel in control of the debate—but none of that refutes the core point: if will exists, and it causes anything, then it operates through physical interactions. And physical interactions obey conservation laws. No one escapes that—not you, not Sapolsky, not anyone. So either your “will” is part of physics, and therefore caused—or it’s outside physics, and therefore irrelevant to everything we can observe.
That’s not “trust me bro.” That’s reality.
You did, along with another person.
What you're advocating isn't determinism, it's a weird hybrid where you want your cake and to eat it too. I'm telling you what it is straight up and gave examples proving it. Will does not exist under determinism, definitionally. There is no choice under determinism therefor no will. Will is part of the "folk psychology" it tries to dismiss.
Again you want your cake and to eat it too.
The thing about will is that there is no evidence that proves free will either exists or doesn't, the data is mixed. Hence why I'm largely agnostic on it, but I acknowledge the benefit belief in it has.
That is trust me bro, that's your whole argument. No good ever came from society treating it's people like machines, but again under determinism people are just physics, not people. So your counterpoint ends up proving mine.
But you are incorrect that if it exists and it causes anything that it operates under conservation laws, which we cannot know. Again you are treating models as final says when they're not. So free will can exist and it can "not" be due to physics. In fact we don't have any real data showing that so it's up in the air. Also what we can observe is not "reality" it's only what we have to our senses.
In short, too much is unknown for you to make half the claims you do.
But again, if free will doesn't exist then people and agents don't exist because then it's just physics taking it's course. I cited Susan Blackmoore (a well known psychologist in the field) to explain it.
Again you want something that is incompatible with your worldview. THAT is reality.
Darkneos—
Let’s clear a few things up quickly.
First, again, I didn’t cite Sapolsky. Gary Childress did. I responded to Gary. You keep repeating this as if it bolsters your point, but it’s just a factual error.
Second, you say I’m not advocating determinism—that I’m pushing some “weird hybrid.” No. I’m advocating exactly what determinism is: that all events, including human decisions, are the result of preceding causes. This goes back to Leucippus some 2500 years ago. I’ve said consistently that “will” exists as a shorthand for the decision-making process of a physical brain. Not some ghostly chooser. Not a metaphysical wildcard. But a
caused process. Saying “that’s not real will” because it’s not magic is like saying a car’s motion isn’t “real” unless it moves itself without fuel.
Third, you keep insisting free will “might not be due to physics.” But any time something
causes something else to happen—whether a thought, a muscle twitch, or a moral decision—it has to exchange energy or information. That's not just a belief. That’s a requirement of
every single law of physics we use to model anything at all. And those laws? They’re all built on
conservation principles. Every genuine law—aside from definitional identities like F = ma—is an expression of one or more conservation laws. If something escapes that structure, it isn’t just “unknown.” It’s
inaccessible to interaction. Which means it doesn’t do anything. It might as well not exist.
Lastly, you repeat that determinism “eliminates people”—that if we’re just physics, we’re not real agents. But this is category error. It’s like saying hurricanes aren’t real because they’re just air pressure. People are what minds look like when arranged in certain ways. They’re not eliminated by being explained. They’re
understood.
That’s not me having cake and eating it too. That’s you demanding the cake be made of ghosts—or else calling it fake.
Reality doesn’t owe you metaphysical comfort. It owes you structure. And structure is what we’ve got.
You did and I made a post showing that with you in it.
Will isn't shorthand for the decision making process of the brain, as it is understood it is the ability to make a choice, in this case we liken it to agency. As people commonly understand it it is a "metaphysical wildcard", or "ghostly chooser" you're changing the definition to make your argument work.
Again, stop invoking magic, no one is saying that. You keep drawing back to strawmen.
Moral decisions are based on belief, rooted in words that we assign meaning to. That's not physics. Physics only models particle interactions and forces, not social situations or moral decisions. You are making a category error here, appealing to a field of knowledge that has no bearing on the topic.
Physics is a mental construct, a model, same with cause and effect. Both are based on our limited senses and reasoning ability. It is possible for something to escape that and still have interaction with everything else, again you are appealing to perfect knowledge that does not exist. Something can "escape that structure" but still exist and impact everything else. Again, we don't have total knowledge, only models rooted in evidence from the senses. Free will might not be due to physics the same way consciousness might not be, but both still have an impact. Who knows.
Determinism eliminating people is not a category error. Our idea of people is agents with the ability to act and make their own choices and determinism takes that away. When everything done is not by you then to what degree can we say there is an agent? It's all physics, "just stuff happening". People aren't "what minds looked like arranged certain ways", that's you grasping at straws to make your case work. Under determinism "mind" is just superfluous folk psychology. You want to appeal to physics being all there is, which by extension means matter is all there is, therefor there is nothing beyond the physical. The would include mind, emotions, anything else.
People are eliminated under determinism THROUGH explanation. Your case of people being machines proves that point, and again...we have evidence for how people treat machines (again, factory farming is due to humans regarding animals like that).
It is you having your cake and eating it too, and everyone on here can see that (even the nutbars).
Reality doesn’t owe you metaphysical comfort. It owes you structure. And structure is what we’ve got.
This is also wrong. Reality owes nothing and cares for nothing, we do. We care about comfort and structure, reality does not owe you structure. Structure is what humans project on the world around them so they can navigate it, I proved that with the link about how our brains work. Heck some evolutionary biologists go so far as to argue that we see none of reality, because evolution evolved us to survive and not for truth (I don't buy that one). Thousands of philosophers came to similar conclusions as well.
Reality does not care if you believe in god or free will or anything, appealing to "it" offers nothing to you. Though it is weird you're arguing we aren't gods apart from causation and yet arguing about "you" and "reality" as if they are two distinct entities...
Again...you're just wrong.
You really know and understand nothing don't you? You think you are in reality when you're really not which is why you get AI to write your stuff or ignore all the evidence I gave proving your words wrong.
You're delusional.
