Those darned Laws Of Physics

Darat

You mea.....:p

Jeremy

Indeed :) And I can see why for you the syllogism wouldn't hold - but what about if you were a Hard Materialist? Would it hold then - in your opinion?

I like the basketball analogy more now I understand it better :p

And leaps of faith or given axioms - wonderful phrases we would all do well to consider sometimes :p

Sou
 
Stimpy said:

..snip...

Perhaps I should clarify. When I say "materialism", I am referring to modern scientific materialism, which is both reductionist, and assumes a closed physical world. I cannot speak for any other forms of materialism, because I do not know of any other forms of materialism that are not incoherent.

...snip...

Stimpy - can you defend the assumption of "reductionism" in the "scientific materialism" you talk about.? Or is it one of the premises of "SM"? - Thanks
 
Originally posted by Soubrette
Indeed :) And I can see why for you the syllogism wouldn't hold - but what about if you were a Hard Materialist? Would it hold then - in your opinion?

Yes, I think so. And note that I don't insist that people aren't governed by some set of uber-laws of physics, either. In fact, I don't even consider that an unknowable question, like I do materialism as a whole. I believe it's possible in principle to test whether consciousness is a physical or metaphysical phenomenon, even though the means to do so probably won't be available for many, many years, even if they're practical for humans at all.

Jeremy
 
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I believe it's possible in principle to test whether consciousness is a physical or metaphysical phenomenon, ...
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Great guru, what is consciousness?
 
Darat,

Stimpy - can you defend the assumption of "reductionism" in the "scientific materialism" you talk about.? Or is it one of the premises of "SM"? - Thanks

Both.

First of all, the assumption of reductionism is an assumption of the scientific method. In that sense, you could think of it as a pragmatic assumption, rather than as a belief. In other words, you don't know whether it is true or not, but you pragmatically assume that it is, in order to apply the scientific method.

That said, the complete set of axioms of the scientific method form a falsifiable hypothesis. That is, if they are all true, then the scientific method should work. If the scientific method didn't work, we would never know which of the axioms were false. We would just know that at least on of them is not true.

This means that the success of the scientific method, the fact that it does, in fact work, constitutes supporting evidence for the hypothesis that its axioms are true. Not proof, just supporting evidence.

Thus the belief that scientific materialism is true is not just a leap of faith. For somebody who is unaware of the success of the scientific method, it would be, but for anybody who knows how successful the scientific method is, it is a belief based on overwhelming supporting evidence. Claiming that we don't know whether the assumptions of the scientific method are true or not, would be like claiming that we don't know whether the gravity will be turned on tomorrow.

Dr. Stupid
 
Stimpson J. Cat said:
…snip…



Thus the belief that scientific materialism is true is not just a leap of faith. For somebody who is unaware of the success of the scientific method, it would be, but for anybody who knows how successful the scientific method is, it is a belief based on overwhelming supporting evidence. Claiming that we don't know whether the assumptions of the scientific method are true or not, would be like claiming that we don't know whether the gravity will be turned on tomorrow.

…snip…

Whilst I totally agree that the scientific method has been and still is the singularly most successful tool humans have ever invented/created - it is still based on “unprovable” premises.

In other words the one “white crow” could bring the whole edifice crashing down to its foundations. No matter how successful it has been to date it is still based on assumption.
 
Darat,

Whilst I totally agree that the scientific method has been and still is the singularly most successful tool humans have ever invented/created - it is still based on “unprovable” premises.

In other words the one “white crow” could bring the whole edifice crashing down to its foundations. No matter how successful it has been to date it is still based on assumption.

That is exactly the point. Once you get beyond the inherently flawed notion of "absolute knowledge", the fact that it could be proven wrong becomes a strength, not a weakness. Our knowledge that the premises of the scientific method are true is not absolute knowledge. It cannot be proven in the logical sense. Only abstract logical tautologies can be "proven".

You can either reject the concept of knowledge completely, or accept the idea of probabilistic, provisional knowledge. All of our knowledge about "reality" is provisional and probabilistic. Hence my previous statement about the gravity being turned on tomorrow. I cannot "prove" that gravity will function tomorrow, but to claim that I do not know that it will, is nothing less than rejecting the concept of knowledge itself.

Dr. Stupid
 
Soubrette said:
c4ts

Actually I'd like to move away from the conclusions that Frank reaches beyond his syllogism and just concentrate on the it alone. I'm not interested at this point in time in Logical Deism, the goddess etc - all I'm interested in is that syllogism. I want to understand why it provokes such a strong response:) And I want to see why it doesn't provoke such a strong response in me - where am I looking at it differently compared to you :)

So you don't believe that the laws of physics affect the behaviour of people? And if you don't - what do you think does affect their behaviour?[/B]

Well, that depends on how you look at it. Things like levitation, teleportation, and walking through walls aren't part of human behavior, and laws of physics are used to explain why we can't do such things, so in that sense I can say the laws of physics are affecting behaviour. Also, things like emotions are biochemical reactions on a physical level, and emotions affect behaviour except when someone has enough self control to restrain themselves. But in the same way, desires affect behaviour, and desires don't seem to be explained by the laws of physics alone (the laws of biology or psychology aren't the same as the laws of physics). On a more straightforward level, if a tractor obeying the laws of physics flips over and crushes your spine because you did not operate it in a safe manner, it has changed your behaviour for the rest of your life (because you're paralyzed).

So I am not saying the laws of physics don't affect people's behaviour, but that they can affect people's behaviour only to a certain degree. It is certainly not the way commands affect behaviour. But I don't know what would constitute the rest of behaviour.
 
Stimpson J. Cat said:

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"Libertarian free will" is meaningless.
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Only if you can demonstrate that it is inconceivable that our actions can be anything other than determined, or a consequence of innate randomness, or some mixture of those two.
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That is a tautology. The definition of "random" is "non-deterministic". If you mean something else by the word "random", you need to define what you mean by it.


It doesn't mean non-deterministic if we believe in libertarian free will. Randomness means innately uncertain.

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Possibly the train of mental events leading to me choosing A rather than B is neither determined by physical laws nor is a consequence of incorrigible "mental laws". Rather the sequence of events may be influenced by the Will. By the Will I mean an intrinsic facet of the self which has the capacity to choose. Such an action inniated by the Will would neither be entailed by physical laws, "mental laws" nor be random.
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So all you have done is add another set of laws. The "will laws".

Crucially though what the Will decides is not determined from without, but is a spontaneous decision by an individual. Thus from one second to another second we do what we do because of what we are, but what we intrinsically are is not something imposed upon us externally, but is an elementary reality which cannot be further analysed. In other words what we do is a consequence of ourselves. But the self itself is self-determining.


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Obviously very difficult to define. But I would say that anyone who maintains that we can only act as a consequence of physical laws, mental laws, or randomness has the onus of demonstrating why this is so.
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Libertarian free-will is incoherent because it asserts that the will is not constrained by any natural laws. It literally asserts that the will is neither deterministic nor random. It must be one or the other.

No it mustn't. If you mean by deterministic, imposed from without, so that our behavior is circumscribed by physical laws or some sort of mental laws, then I do not see this as being necessarily true. Behavior could be determined from within. In this situation behavior might not exhibit any patterns which can either be captured by any physical laws or "mental laws", but nevertheless the behaviour isn't random in that the behavior is dictated by the Will and is in general accordance with how a person might be expected to behave in certain given specific circumstances.


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edited to add: btw it is perfectly possible for the Will to make an arbitrary decision and yet not at all be random.
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No, it isn't. If it is not random, then it is determined by something, which means it is not random.

ok but determined by the self whose decision is not compltely dictated by factors external to the self.
 
c4ts:
So I am not saying the laws of physics don't affect people's behaviour, but that they can affect people's behaviour only to a certain degree.
Everything a human thinks, does or experiences is governed by the laws of physics. At least, there is no evidence to the contrary.

In this sense, the conclusion of Franko's logically flawed jingle (properly interpreted), is correct.
 
DanishDynamite said:
c4ts: Everything a human thinks, does or experiences is governed by the laws of physics. At least, there is no evidence to the contrary.

In this sense, the conclusion of Franko's logically flawed jingle (properly interpreted), is correct.
True, but even so, this does not imply fatalism. The Franko character refuses to accept that some of the laws of physics are non-deterministic. The conclusion may be correct, but it certainly isn't what he meant.
 
DanishDynamite said:
c4ts: Everything a human thinks, does or experiences is governed by the laws of physics. At least, there is no evidence to the contrary.

In this sense, the conclusion of Franko's logically flawed jingle (properly interpreted), is correct.

So even though I can imagine things that do not follow the laws of physics, they govern my thoughts anyway? Or are you just talking about mental activity itself?
 
Tricky:
True, but even so, this does not imply fatalism. The Franko character refuses to accept that some of the laws of physics are non-deterministic. The conclusion may be correct, but it certainly isn't what he meant.
True. Our future cannot, even in principle, be predicted with 100% accurracy.

c4ts:
So even though I can imagine things that do not follow the laws of physics, they govern my thoughts anyway? Or are you just talking about mental activity itself?
The process by which you imagine things, is governed by the laws of physics. What you imagine, is not.
 
Eyes,

That is a tautology. The definition of "random" is "non-deterministic". If you mean something else by the word "random", you need to define what you mean by it.
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It doesn't mean non-deterministic if we believe in libertarian free will. Randomness means innately uncertain.

And that is different from "non-deterministic" how? If something is deterministic, then it is necessarily certain. If it is innately uncertain, then it cannot be deterministic.

Put simply, something that is random is clearly non-deterministic. If you are going to claim that non-determinism alone is not enough for something to qualify as random, then you need to explain what the additional criteria are.

So all you have done is add another set of laws. The "will laws".
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Crucially though what the Will decides is not determined from without, but is a spontaneous decision by an individual. Thus from one second to another second we do what we do because of what we are, but what we intrinsically are is not something imposed upon us externally, but is an elementary reality which cannot be further analysed. In other words what we do is a consequence of ourselves. But the self itself is self-determining.

Our decisions are clearly influenced by outside factors. Even if you allow for some non-reducible "will" that makes the decision, it is affected by outside influences. That will is either deterministic or random, and the mechanism of the influence is also either deterministic or random. Thus the overall process is either deterministic (if both are deterministic), or random (if either or both are random). Either way, Libertarian free-will goes out the window.

Libertarian free-will is incoherent because it asserts that the will is not constrained by any natural laws. It literally asserts that the will is neither deterministic nor random. It must be one or the other.
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No it mustn't. If you mean by deterministic, imposed from without, so that our behavior is circumscribed by physical laws or some sort of mental laws, then I do not see this as being necessarily true.

That is not what deterministic means.

Behavior could be determined from within.

Not completely. And even if it were, it would still be deterministic.

In this situation behavior might not exhibit any patterns which can either be captured by any physical laws or "mental laws", but nevertheless the behaviour isn't random in that the behavior is dictated by the Will and is in general accordance with how a person might be expected to behave in certain given specific circumstances.

This is contradictory. The will interacts with the physical and mental world. The laws that describe it are therefore necessarily a part of the natural laws describing the physical and mental.

If the will is not described by any natural laws, then nothing it interacts with can be either. If it can be, then those laws manifest in the laws describing how the will interacts with other things. Indeed, our decisions are those interactions. The will can be thought of as a black-box algorithm, with our environment as the input, and our decisions as the output. If the will is deterministic, then there is a set of rules that dictate what our decisions will be for any input. If it is random, then those rules are probabilistic.

No, it isn't. If it is not random, then it is determined by something, which means it is not random.
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ok but determined by the self whose decision is not compltely dictated by factors external to the self.

That is also contradictory. If the self is deterministic, then its state at any point in time is determined entirely by its initial conditions, and its external influences. What determines those initial conditions? Either they are random, or they are determined by something outside of the self.

You are asserting that there is something to the self which is not determined by anything outside of itself, and yet which is not random. That is contradictory. It must be one or the other.

Dr. Stupid
 
I do wish people would not call those three claims a syllogism. It's not. In fact it is not even an argument in the formal sense since its third statement (the alleged conclusion) does not follow by any rules of inference from the first two (the alleged premises)....

Unless "composition" is a valid rule of inference and not a formal fallacy, in which case all arguments of that form are valid:

All geometric figures are made of points.
Points have no dimension.
Geometric figures have no dimension.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled program.
 
Hmm, I thought geometric figures were also made up of lines between points...These have at least one dimension, yes?...Someone who knows about maths can explain to me how many points a circle has.

A revised syllogism for Franko:

The behaviour of what we call atoms is consistent with equations we have made up after observing the universe.
We are made of atoms.
Our behaviour is consistent with equations we have made up after observing the universe.

Can't say fairer than that, now can you? Not as punchy, though. Can't have everything.
 
:eek: curses to reality imposing limits on my virtual time :mad:

ok - a whole load of interesting ideas here :)

First to Tricky:

You talk about the fallacy of composition - am I understanding you correctly in that I think you are talking about the terms used being inadequate to convey the meanings behind them (obey, people are made of atoms etc). Or is there an actual objective fallacy of composition with the syll...sorry Whitefork - with the jingle? If the latter - could you explain in very simple terms - it may astound you to know (;)) that I've never done formal logic - all I know about it is what I've read on the boards.

Also I think I'm still going to take issue with the idea that the ultimate laws of physics being unreal because the knowledge of the them is probably unattainable. It doesn't matter if we can know them or if we cannot know them - they either exist or they don't, surely? If you say that they cannot exist because we cannot know them - then aren't you starting to sound a little like UcE?

Stimpy - could you explain in very simple terms why the two premises do not lead to the conclusion? I am assuming this to be the case even if we ruthlessly expunge the word obey from the jingle and use something like Win's alternative. (Although thinking some more on that I think Win was talking about our mathematical ideas of the laws of physics rather than the ultimate laws of physics.

c4ts - so would you consider yourself to be a modern materialist? If not - how would you categorise your beliefs?

And Whitefork - could you give me a little more detail as to why you feel that this jingle doesn't fit the formal pattern of a syllogism - or perhaps more accurately, why it doesn't follow as an argument in the formal sense - and I need it simple :)

and last - justsaygnosis - thanks for the link - I thought that one had died - but this discussion was started on another thread, not one of mine, I just want to see where it takes me really :)

Sou
 
Soubrette

Soubrette: Love the new avatar. :eek:

Tricky mentioned the Fallacy of Composition. What follows is a link to a great webpage describing some common Fallacies of Ambiguity. Composition is about halfway down the page.

Fallacies of Ambiguity

There it is.
 
Re: Soubrette

SpaceLord said:
Soubrette: Love the new avatar. :eek:

Tricky mentioned the Fallacy of Composition. What follows is a link to a great webpage describing some common Fallacies of Ambiguity. Composition is about halfway down the page.

Fallacies of Ambiguity

There it is.

Thank you :)

And thanks for the link too - I'll peruse it now :)

And please feel free to call me Sou - everyone else does and it's easier to type;)

Sou
 

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