Philosophy Now Forum

What is a Law of Nature? by Erwin Schrödinger, 1922; against the “dogma of causality.”

davidm wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 5:16 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 3:04 pm
Fair enough?

No, sorry, not fair enough.

First, even if this is true, so what? An appeal to negative consequences is a logical fallacy. Just because some fact may have unpalatable consequences, does not make the fact false.

I didn't say that it did. There are many unpleasant realities.

What I was writing about is what rationalizes with Materialist Atheism. "Rationalizes" means, "makes logical sense in conjunction with," not "is pleasant." We can leave aside entirely for the moment whether or not we like the consequences.

But logical consequences they are.

But what you write is indeed false.

That is, your view of causal determinism is wrong. This is not causal determinism. This is Laplacean determinism, and it’s wrong. We know it’s wrong because: quantum mechanics.

Quantum mechanics doesn't help at all. The reason is that you're mistaking the claim "we don't know how it works" for "because we don't know, therefore it's free-will." This is not logical.

The compatibilist...

Simply tries to have his Determinist cake, and eat his Free Will cake too.

However, this smuggles in a metaphysical presupposition: that the laws of nature govern the universe.

You're splitting hairs and misrepresenting the point. I was not resting anything on the word "govern." Check and see. Moreover, if you substitute "pertain to" if you like, and you'll get exactly the same logical result: ironclad Determinism.

Laws of Nature, by Norman Swartz.

Persons who believe that there is a problem reconciling the existence of free will and determinism have turned upside down the relationship between laws of nature on the one side and events and states of affairs on the other. It is not that laws of nature govern the world. We are not "forced" to choose one action rather than another. It is quite the other way round: we choose, and the laws of nature accommodate themselves to our choice. If I choose to wear a brown shirt, then it is true that I do so; and if instead I were to choose to wear a blue shirt, then it would be true that I wear a blue shirt. In neither case would my choosing be 'forced' by the truth of the proposition that describes my action. And the same semantic principle applies even if the proposition truly describing my choice is a universal proposition rather than a singular one.

To make the claim even more pointedly: it is only because Necessitarianism tacitly adopts an anti-semantic theory of truth that the supposed problem of free will vs. determinism even arises. Adopt a thoroughgoing Regularist theory and the problem evaporates.

henry quirk wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 5:48 pm Okay...I will, once you show me the fire.

And: I'm not seeking escape...just not inclined to give over easily and without a damned good reason, which no *religionist, of any kind, has offered me in 54 years.

Well, would first-hand experience do for you?

#

"To a person disposed to disbelief, there's pretty much no way to provide evidence"

*ahem* "with God all things are possible"

However, I am not God. There are limits to what I can do on His behalf.

"you never develop a friendship or a companionship or partnership with anyone unless you're willing to predict that they are a good person"

That's call gamblin', which -- in context -- is synonymous with living.

I have to agree. But it's not really gambling, is it? After all, in gambling, you really don't have any reason to expect one outcome rather than another. Every die has six sides, and every roll is a new roll. The cards come up, or they don't. The wheel goes red or black, and always has the same number of slots every time.

Are all relationships just gambles, then? Or is it possible to know something about a person that greatly increases your "odds"?

Faith got nuthin' to do with it.

Not with gambling, no. But with relationships, yes.

davidm wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 6:14 pm Laws of Nature, by Norman Swartz.

Persons who believe that there is a problem reconciling the existence of free will and determinism have turned upside down the relationship between laws of nature on the one side and events and states of affairs on the other....

This is mistaken. Swartz has begged the question of how "choice" can arise in a purely-material universe. Then he's actually proposed that this mysterious force can actually dictate causality itself.

That you "chose" is either a product itself of material preconditions, or it's not. But if it's not a product of material preconditions, then Materialism itself isn't the view you're positing, because Materialism holds that there are no non-Material (matter-energy-laws, etc.) type explanations for anything.

Will itself, choice itself, are material entities, in that case. The blue or brown shirt was fated after all.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 6:08 pm Quantum mechanics doesn't help at all. The reason is that you're mistaking the claim "we don't know how it works" for "because we don't know, therefore it's free-will." This is not logical.

This is not even a coherent response to what I said. But I'll try to unpack it. You seem to be implying that the indeterminism of QM is a function of our ignorance of what is going on "behind the scenes" -- i.e, hidden variables. There are no hidden variables in QM, as demonstrated by Bell's Theorem. It means that at bottom the world is indeterministic. Nor did I say that QM entails free will. I said nothing about free will in the quoted sentence. What I said is that QM rules out the Laplacean determinism that you erroneously ascribe to the materialist view of the universe,

Simply tries to have his Determinist cake, and eat his Free Will cake too.

That's an assertion and not an argument. Do you have an argument against compatibiism? If so, present it. That would be on-topic for a change. My own view is the regularity theory of natural law renders compatibilism superfluous.

You're splitting hairs and misrepresenting the point. I was not resting anything on the word "govern." Check and see. Moreover, if you substitute "pertain to" if you like, and you'll get exactly the same logical result: ironclad Determinism.

I wasn't specifically addressing anything you said here, I was talking about how the misconception that the laws of nature "govern" the universe leads to supposing that there is some necessary incompatibility between these "laws" and human free will. There isn't. For this reason, and because of QM, there is no "ironclad" (Laplacean) determinism. Yours is an outmoded conception of both science and philosophy,

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 6:26 pm

davidm wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 6:14 pm Laws of Nature, by Norman Swartz.

Persons who believe that there is a problem reconciling the existence of free will and determinism have turned upside down the relationship between laws of nature on the one side and events and states of affairs on the other....

This is mistaken. Swartz has begged the question of how "choice" can arise in a purely-material universe. Then he's actually proposed that this mysterious force can actually dictate causality itself.

That you "chose" is either a product itself of material preconditions, or it's not. But if it's not a product of material preconditions, then Materialism itself isn't the view you're positing, because Materialism holds that there are no non-Material (matter-energy-laws, etc.) type explanations for anything.

Will itself, choice itself, are material entities, in that case. The blue or brown shirt was fated after all.

Come, come, now, this is utterly dishonest debating. You did not read the article -- you did not have time to do so, given the small interval of time between my posting the link, and you responding. 'The pull-quote was meant as a teaser -- sort of like a movie trailer -- to entice people to read the whole article. After all, surely someone here wants to have a debate about free will and determinism -- else why this thread?

The pull quote is a conclusion based on a set of arguments that are presented in the body of the article, which you did not read.

Even if you read it (which I predict you will not), you will read it through the filter of your ironclad preconceptions and hence you will not read it honestly.

Also see Schoredinger's essay, which you will also not read.

davidm wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 7:33 pm pull-quote was meant as a teaser...

I did not recognize that. Where did you say it?

I thought you were presenting what you regarded as the pith of the argument.

Were you not?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 7:51 pm

davidm wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 7:33 pm pull-quote was meant as a teaser...

I did not recognize that. Where did you say it?

I thought you were presenting what you regarded as the pith of the argument.

Were you not?

I linked to the entire article. Why would I do that, if not inviting others to read it?

As noted, the pull-quote was intended in the nature of a teaser or movie trailer -- and this should be obvious. Otherwise, I would not have linked to the full article.

Mannie,

First hand experience allows me to act accordingly, with a measure of confidence.

Anecdotes leave me hanging.

#

Gambling is, to me, calculated risk...I jump from rooftop to rooftop, assessing distance and exhaustion the entire way...once the risks of falling weigh too heavily against me, I stop jumpin'.

Faith, to me, is leapin' off the ten story roof, into pitchblack below me, no clue as to what's there.

As I define things: I'm a faithless gambler.

davidm wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 6:14 pm Laws of Nature, by Norman Swartz.

Persons who believe that there is a problem reconciling the existence of free will and determinism have turned upside down the relationship between laws of nature on the one side and events and states of affairs on the other. It is not that laws of nature govern the world. We are not "forced" to choose one action rather than another. It is quite the other way round: we choose, and the laws of nature accommodate themselves to our choice. If I choose to wear a brown shirt, then it is true that I do so; and if instead I were to choose to wear a blue shirt, then it would be true that I wear a blue shirt. In neither case would my choosing be 'forced' by the truth of the proposition that describes my action. And the same semantic principle applies even if the proposition truly describing my choice is a universal proposition rather than a singular one.

To make the claim even more pointedly: it is only because Necessitarianism tacitly adopts an anti-semantic theory of truth that the supposed problem of free will vs. determinism even arises. Adopt a thoroughgoing Regularist theory and the problem evaporates.

I read the article and I find that regularists and necessitarians are both right. They are both right because , as Spinoza says, there are two aspects to nature ;natura naturans and natura naturata. The former aspect is that which is viewed by necessitarians and the latter aspect is that which is viewed by regularists. The necessitarian sees that the last moa bird could not have been otherwise than it was because the time and manner of its death are attributes that partly define this last moa bird. The regularist sees the manner of death of the last moa bird as a separable event from the last moa bird.

I wonder if you could comment on the following. The usual illustration of Hume's constant conjunction observation about causations is the collision of two billiard balls: we see the collision but we never see the cause which intervenes between one billiard ball causing the other one to move along. In actual fact we do see the cause, which as I am not a physicist I can describe only as an exchange of energy between billiard ball one and billiard ball 2. Something to do with electron exchange, if I am not mistaken.

Only reason -- in-game -- the ball moves is cuz someone with a cue decides to try to make that ball go in a certain direction, at a certain speed, with the intent of scoring a point.

That is: an agent (the player) imparts momentum (initiates an event).

That is: I move my body in a certain way to transfer energy (the capacity to do work) from myself to the ball, using the stick as focusing tool.

That is: a whole whack of electro-chemistry is directed by me to direct some lent solar energy to a chunk of matter.

That is...er...you get the drift.

The point: within the context of the game, the player is 'cause'.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 6:17 pm

henry quirk wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 5:48 pm Okay...I will, once you show me the fire.

And: I'm not seeking escape...just not inclined to give over easily and without a damned good reason, which no *religionist, of any kind, has offered me in 54 years.

Well, would first-hand experience do for you?

First hand experience for who? I've seen the "fire" and I assume that Mannie has seen the "fire" But I would guess that Henry has not. Unfortunately first hand experience for one individual can easily be hand waved away by another individual. This brings up an interesting question, what is good for God, is it to remain in this life with the associated suffering, or would it be better to accomplish some goal for God and then be taken home (to die)? It brings me to ask a question that I have not asked for many years, Henry why are you raising your Nephew and not his parents? I will assume that they are no longer in the picture, but that does not tell me what happened. If they are gone, did they accomplish God's purpose and so were taken home? I'm sorry if I am prying into personal affairs, but it is something that has been on my mind for many years, but I didn't want to pry.

davidm wrote: ↑Mon Jun 05, 2017 8:19 pm
As noted, the pull-quote was intended in the nature of a teaser or movie trailer -- and this should be obvious. Otherwise, I would not have linked to the full article.

Maybe. The other interpretation would be that you first linked the article, then decide to give the pith of the point. How would we know?

I'll go look at the article.

The article substitutes statisticality for regularity. That might look like a difference, but it's not really going to help.

Dave, you attributed to me a shortcut I never took...namely, the jump from "law" to "Lawmaker." I was surprised, actually: I certainly was not going that way, and maybe that's why you thought redefining "law" would help...I can't think of why else you regarded it as important to question the word "law"...but really, I was only borrowing terms from a Materialism in which I do not believe, in order to speak in the terms recognizable by those who subscribe to the idea of "natural laws," which is rather a lot of people, actually. But it's not a construct upon which I was looking to build, but one which I was showing to be Deterministic and narrow in implication.

If I understand you aright now, you would agree with that; but you would also think that the angle taken by the article is an answer, and somehow makes "free will" of some kind return to the situation. That seems to me to be a misreading of the logical implication of that argument.

In any case, it seems to me that it really doesn't change the fundamental problem. "Free will" is quite a different from both statistical averages and any conception of natural "laws." Why? Because being at the mercy of a regularity or a statistical probability makes no difference. Either way, you're still at the mercy of forces that have nothing to do with will. It's not your identity, volition or intention that is contributing anything new to the situation; it's just a different kind of prior causality...equally ironclad, but just different in detail. The individual is still a slave, but simply to a master with a different name.

Here is that point made by someone else, in a short, entertaining format. Look in particular at what he says the end about the probabilistic framework. See what you think.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hXbxeIYcZ4&t=8s