Free will and omniscience

[dlorde]

I see what your saying, I put free in italics because it is a slippery word.

Ah, you mean poorly defined. So define it.

I see it on a sliding scale of influence from the environment. At one end of the scale the choice is essentially deterministic with a local impression or appearance of free will. At the other end truly free will is only experienced by an omnipotent god. Every thinking entity is somewhere on this scale.

No I am not saying free = random.

So it's not deterministic and it's not random?

You seem to have said what it isn't, without saying what it is. Please define it for us, explain what you think it is, if not deterministic or random. Describe where this sliding scale goes from determinism if not to randomness. Examples would help.

Surely random is imperfect and on a sliding scale likewise.

'Random is imperfect' is a non-sequitur, and there is no 'sliding scale' of randomness - something is either random or it is not; Unless you mean the degree to which random events affect a process.

 

[dlorde]

To say "You could choose X, but you choose Y", is like saying "this part of the painting could be blue, but it's green". What does "could" mean in this case? The painting is green. The painting is all there is. There's no other potentiality because this part of the painting is green.

This ^

 

[Belz...]

Sounds like you've got it all sown up.

It's a definition, punshhh. That's what the word MEANS.

Oh apart from the bit where I point out that we don't actually know what exists and therefore whether our particular brand of reasoning can address such an issue. Or whether our conclusion bares any relation to what exists.

Your posts do not alter reality.

 

[Belz...]

You keep saying that, but you don't demonstrate why it is so.

I've explained how choices free of coercion are meaningful even if the outcome is known.

It has been demonstrated. You just plug your ears and chant.

 

[AvalonXQ]

if it is known, your choice doesn't exist.

Yes, it does.

If it is known by god what you are going to do, then you are following a script.

You still haven't demonstrated why this must be true, and I don't agree that it is.

 

[Belz...]

This ^

Indeed. Bringing up probabilities is a good idea. When an event is not yet known, we can talk about probabilities, but once the event is passed, the only possibility left is the one that occured, with a probability of 1.

To an omniscient being, all is known and all has already occured, so there are no possibilities aside from those already known.

 

[AvalonXQ]

It has been demonstrated.

It has not.

Is there any chance someone can construct the argument as an actual logical syllogism? I would be interested to see if we can point out the background assumption that we disagree about.

 

[dlorde]

It means that he had the choice to open the liquor cabinet, rather than not having that choice.

Making the choice not to open the liquor cabinet is a different experience for my son than experiencing an inability to open the liquor cabinet.

So, my choice to constrain or fail to constrain my son has consequences, because a free will choice to do X is not experientially equivalent to encountering restraints that force X.

No; in a more relevant liquor cabinet analogy, whether the cabinet is locked or not, your son doesn't try to open it (presumably because you have brought him up so that the idea of doing so is anathema). So he never knows whether it is locked or not. For him, the two scenarios are identical. It's not a particularly helpful analogy.

You've done nothing to dispel the idea that your version of free will is simply the feeling that we can select any of a number of options, or that we have the physical capability to act in an according variety of ways. This is fine - it is very close to my own definition of free will, but the former is purely subjective perception, and the latter is trivially obvious.

It comes down to "if I felt like it, I could do X, or Y, or Z". No-one is arguing against that, they're arguing that if it can be said that it is certain that you will do X, then in this case your initial state must inevitably be such that you only feel like doing X and not Y or Z, and that, in this case, it means that the apparent choice is illusory. In theory, we could say that an individual in a well-defined state, given a set of options, will select according to his well-defined state - i.e. the selection is inevitable so the choice is illusory. In practice, we can't know what state the individual is in, so we cannot predict with certainty the selection he will make. For practical purposes, there appears to be a choice.

We can extrapolate from this that the concept of free will is a pragmatic social coping strategy to account for the inherent unpredictability of our responses as a result of our lack of sufficiently detailed knowledge of our state at any time and how it will develop.

 

[joobz]

You still haven't demonstrated why this must be true, and I don't agree that it is.

If god is omniscient, then he knows the script of the universe. (meaning he knows all actions and all things that happen)
If there is a script, then where is your choice?
If god knows all, he knows what your thinking was the even led up to the illusory choice. there is one and only one thought outcome.
there is one and only one decision.
there is one and only one action.
There is no such thing as "might have been"/"could have been".
The future is set as much as the past and present.

Even your consideration of what to choose is written in the script. That deciding step is part of the script....(again if god is real and is omniscient).

the only way we could have a free will is if 1.) there is no script or 2.) our actions actually DID impact what the script is. In the later case, this would only be possible if the script contained multiple time lines, like the choose your own adventure book and all alternate possibilities slough away as we move through time.

Now if there was an omniscient god, there couldn't be 1 as he would know all and hence there must be script.
Further, there couldn't be 2 as if he was omniscient he would know which in that choose-your-own-adventure script was the true path. In other words, all of the alternate paths were simply non-existent filler.

 

[Bill Thompson 75]

You're sincerely arguing that god can't tell time?

No, but I would sincerely argue that you can't tell a reasoned argument.

If someone argues that god's knowledge precedes a human action then I will argue that that is an incomplete description of omniscience and results in faulty conclusions.

The logic that says that god's knowledge before an action determines that action is the same logic that must conclude that god's knowledge after an action is controlled by the action. This puts a time sequence on omniscience which is directly counter to the standard definition of omniscience.

An omniscient being has knowledge of all choices, and that knowledge is outside of the temporal sequence of caused physical events and, therefore, is not the cause of physical events, such as choice.

 

[GeeMack]

You keep saying that, but you don't demonstrate why it is so.

I've explained how choices free of coercion are meaningful even if the outcome is known.

Goalpost moving noted. Oh, in case you hadn't considered it, moving the goalposts is dishonest. Also, the choices free of coercion aren't free will. The outcome is known. So you've failed, again, still. Unless, of course, you're going to apply your typical strategy of dishonestly redefining terms in order to support your position.

 

[Finster]

Yes, it does.



You still haven't demonstrated why this must be true, and I don't agree that it is.

Let's say god is going to create a man who will walk down a street and at some point turn either left or right. If god has decided on this scenario there are only two things he can do. Before god pulls the ethereal trigger to create he has to decide if he will create a man that will turn right or one that will turn left. Once god makes the choice the man cannot make a different choice. God is the one making the choice.

 

[H'ethetheth]

It means that he had the choice to open the liquor cabinet, rather than not having that choice.

That's simply a restatement. It doesn't help. What does it mean to have a free choice if there is only one possible outcome?

Making the choice not to open the liquor cabinet is a different experience for my son than experiencing an inability to open the liquor cabinet.

I agree, but that tells us nothing about whether or not he actually is able to choose to. It only tells us that he thinks he could.

 

[Bill Thompson 75]

Let's say god is going to create a man who will walk down a street and at some point turn either left or right. If god has decided on this scenario there are only two things he can do. Before god pulls the ethereal trigger to create he has to decide if he will create a man that will turn right or one that will turn left. Once god makes the choice the man cannot make a different choice. God is the one making the choice.

Let's say god is going to create a man who will walk down a street and at some point will be given the ability to make a choice on his own to turn either left or right. God has decided on this scenario that there are multiple things he can do. Before god pulls the ethereal trigger to create he has to decide if he will create the man with free will. Once god makes his choice the man can make any choice. Can god choose to allow free will?

 

[dafydd]

It's a definition, punshhh. That's what the word MEANS.

Punshhh will have his own definition of the word definition.

 

[dafydd]

Let's say god is going to create a man who will walk down a street and at some point will be given the ability to make a choice on his own to turn either left or right. God has decided on this scenario that there are multiple things he can do. Before god pulls the ethereal trigger to create he has to decide if he will create the man with free will. Once god makes his choice the man can make any choice. Can god choose to allow free will?

It's free will. I doubt if god has the time to monitor the billions of people walking down streets.

 

[Tricky]

(Jumping back in after missing most of seven pages).

Lots of attention is given to what "free will" means, but not so much to "omniscience".

If omniscience means "knowing everything that will ever happen", then free will cannot co-exist with a being that has this power. But maybe "omniscience" isn't quite so complete. Maybe it means "knowing everything that has ever happened", which would suggest that future events, while predictable to some extent with such vast knowledge, are not perfectly predictable. This would give an escape clause to those who would try to argue that perfect knowledge is still imperfect.

As an atheist, it's a moot point to me, but as a lover of logic, this at least allows some hedge room.

And while we're arguing semantics, what the heck is the difference between "free will" and just regular "will"?

 

[joobz]

(Jumping back in after missing most of seven pages).

Lots of attention is given to what "free will" means, but not so much to "omniscience".

If omniscience means "knowing everything that will ever happen", then free will cannot co-exist with a being that has this power. But maybe "omniscience" isn't quite so complete. Maybe it means "knowing everything that has ever happened", which would suggest that future events, while predictable to some extent with such vast knowledge, are not perfectly predictable. This would give an escape clause to those who would try to argue that perfect knowledge is still imperfect.

good point, but this doesn't apply to the god of the bible, which provides supposed end times predictions. He can't be ignorant of the future and simultaneously inform what events will come.

As an atheist, it's a moot point to me, but as a lover of logic, this at least allows some hedge room.

And while we're arguing semantics, what the heck is the difference between "free will" and just regular "will"?

about $5.

 

[Tricky]

It has not.

Is there any chance someone can construct the argument as an actual logical syllogism? I would be interested to see if we can point out the background assumption that we disagree about.

You want a syllogism? Okay, here's one.

Major premise: There is a being who knows exactly what I will do.
Minor premise: I can do something.
Conclusion: What I do must be exactly what the being knew I would do.

If you can find a situation where the conclusion is other than this, given the two premises, then the major premise is wrong. (Or the minor premise, that I "do something", but that's pretty silly to argue that I can't "do something".)

 

[AdMan]

And while we're arguing semantics, what the heck is the difference between "free will" and just regular "will"?

Maybe it's the difference between an actual ability to choose and the illusion of being able to choose (as with an omniscient god)?