Is free will possible in a deterministic universe?

Yawn.
Of those who might conclude free will to not exist, none are claiming it nonetheless exists, and thus the supernatural remains excluded.
So your point is irrelevant.

You, on the other hand, are clearly answering the question of this thread ("is free will possible in a deterministic universe") by starting from the assumption that free will exists, because you, as evidenced in the vast majority of your complaints on the matter, consider anything that is concluded to not exist to be supernatural, thus ruling it out of the debate entirely.
So you answer "yes" to the question, because you premise as much.
Blatant question begging, not that you would recognise it as such.
Until you stop crippling yourself with this question-begging line, there is little hope of you making progress.

 

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The issue is whether a deterministic system allows for any freedom beyond the illusion thereof.
Merely referring to the illusion as though it is the genuine article and proclaiming "here it is" doesn't actually address the matter, but instead restricts yourself to discussing the illusion.

 

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oh ....but it is genuine freedom to self determine with in a closed system. No illusion necessary...

 

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As an aside and hopefully an aid in the understanding...
The time travel paradox ( causality paradox often discussed) can be averted only if the time line included the time travel to begin with.
That is to say that A can go back in time with out generating a causality paradox simply because if A didn't go back in time a causality paradox would be generated.
so...
If initial starting conditions predetermined the evolution of self determination with in a closed system then self determination is absolutely necessary to that closed system.
Remember, for a human to stay alive with out artificial support, he must self determine. He has no choice but to.

 

How is it genuine and not merely illusion?
And please, an actual explanation as to how it is such, given that in a deterministic universe everything is set in stone to occur as it will long before it ever transpires.
You will need to explain how something that is set in stone from the outset, and can not deviate from will transpire, can be considered free.

You misunderstand the paradox.
The time line can include time travel: person A goes back and kills their grandfather before A's father is born.
Thus A can never be born, thus A can never go back to kill their grandfather, thus A's father is born, thus A is born, thus A goes back to kill his grandfather before A's father is born...
Thus the paradox.

But feel free to come up with an example of a paradox that relies on the necessity of travel back in time.

Even if you could, all you're saying is that the time travel paradox can be averted if there is no paradox in the first place.
Similarly you can avoid your ignorance simply by not being ignorant in the first place.

Certainly some have argued that time won't actually allow such paradoxes, and will find some way for the A not to be able to kill his grandfather.
But it is only speculation.
As is such time travel itself.

And this just begs the question of what one means by "self determination" and whether it is actually free.
One can not equate a cat to freedom, claim the cat exists and thus freedom to exist, and not expect to be considered vacuuous.

 

If its freedom (the degrees of freedom necessary to a high logical level mental event) is part of what was set in stone, of course.

That would be investigated via observation and analysis, rather than presumption.

That makes no sense, taken as a whole. Did you delete a sentence or two by mistake?

Meanwhile, to address a couple of the parts thrown together there: Nowhere on this forum have I assumed anything about "free will" (a term I avoid, due to the confusion surrounding it) except that we have agreed it cannot be supernatural.

Nowhere on this forum have I considered, assumed, or deduced, that any such thing does not exist except what we have all agreed - deliberately and all together agreed - does not exist. The opposite.

My point was that only the supernatural remains excluded.

Hardly.
The point that natural freedom of will is not equivalent to supernatural free will appears to be directly relevant to that post of yours - you are once again attempting to draw that false equivalence
My point that your (and everyone's, by agreement) assumption of determinism excludes only supernatural freedom of will is still unacknowledged by you, has nothing to do with such claims by others
(my own claim of course flatly disproves your assertion - I might conclude that freedom of will does not exist, but instead observe that it appears to be common, so that's at least one not "none")
and seems to present you at least with considerable difficulty - It's hardly irrelevant if the discussion is still stuck on it, and prevented from considering natural freedom of will.

 

Look, ma, I've called my cat "freedom" - so it exists!
Degrees of freedom are found in orbiting Teslas.
But if that suffices, then I'll leave you to your illusion of genuine freedom, where you consider it "free" to do exactly as was stipulated eons ago.

It makes sense, taken as a whole, thanks.
No additional sentences needed.
What, particularly, are you having difficulty with?

You have assumed that "free will" exists.
Yes, we have agreed that it cannot be supernatural, but since you dismiss any conclusion that free will does not exist as being the result of an assumption that it is supernatural, you have implicitly assumed that free will exists.
Others, however, who are not so crippled by that approach, are able to reach different conclusions, where to conclude something does not exist is really just and only that: a conclusion that it does not exist.
Nothing "supernatural".
So yes, you have assumed much about "free will", even on just this basic issue, not to mention everything else your position assumes.

Of course you haven't, because you assume that it does exist.
Why, assuming as much, would you then consider, assume, or deduce it to not exist?
You may be many things, but quite so blatantly stupid you are not.

That is not the same as saying that everything that is concluded to not exist is therefore supernatural and thus to be excluded from discussion, as you have tried to do.

No, it really is.

Noone has raised any notion of "supernatural free will" - so your point remains irrelevant.
Claiming something doesn't exist is not the same as saying it is supernatural.

It has nothing to do with "supernatural" anything.
If one concludes that something does not exist, it ends there.
So your point remains irrelevant.
You are simply trying to beg the question by assuming it exists from the outset.
It's a shame you can't acknowledge that.

 

because that freedom is set in stone...
It is always a co-dependent system. A person conspires with the universe's determinism to co-determine outcomes.
this is set in stone...

Explain how it is not so?

 

and to claim something is an illusion is what?
Are you not assuming freewill exists to begin with but claim it to be merely an illusion.
Perhaps "begging a problem" might be a new way of phrasing the issue?

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Qu: Does the freewill problem exist?

Or is it a throw back to some sort of religious insecurity about who is in control. God or self?

 

"I live with my much loved wife whose only existence is determined by my stopping her fathers murder before she was conceived."
That is to say, that if I hadn't traveled back in time my wife would not exist. ( causality paradox 101 )

So if I don't travel back in time to do the deed, what happens to my wife?
Does she just vanish one day with out any trace or history etc?

To prevent a causality paradox I, MUST travel back in time and do the deed.

 

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Ah, the irony. Anything that is "set in stone" (using Baldeee's words) to happen can not be otherwise. It can not do anything else or be anything else. It can do nothing but follow the exact path set out from the beginning of time, with 100 percent accuracy, and zero possible deviation.
Freedom?
"You have the freedom to do what has already been determined you will do."
As said: irony.

Still spouting the "co-determinism" nonsense while never actually explaining how it is more than just a cog in a watch, I see. Just saying that you have freedom doesn't make it so. Next you'll be claiming that a square circle can exist because language allows us to come up with the term "square circle". After all, that's all you're relying on to support your "freedom".

 

That's not a paradox. That's just saying that something must happen for a given effect. It is no more a paradox than saying that I must throw a ball in order for someone to catch a ball that I throw. So as Baldeee seeming rightly says, you are saying that you can resolve a paradox by not having a paradox in the first place.
The same way that I can lose weight by not putting on weight in the first place, I suppose.
Do you not understand what a paradox is?

 

If every possible available choice is genuinely available due to initial starting conditions then what?
example: "Place a dot any where on a blank piece of paper or refuse to do it"
where it is placed is co-determined by the self determiner because he has the freedom with in the "free" range offered by the paper.

co-determined - paper and persons choice)
It is the learned ability to refuse or say no to those initial starting conditions that affords self determination. ( freedom)

I did think that mentioning co-determinism would bring you out of the woods...welcome back...
It is not my fault that you have no capacity to understand the nature of co-determinism. I could explain it to you infinitely and you still wouldn't get it...just like you don't get that a cog in a machine that has learned to self determines has freedom with in that machine...

obviously a hell of lot better than you do...

 

Exactly!
edit: On second thoughts... if you can't handle co-determinism you haven't a hope of handling causality paradox avoidance being the only way that time travel backwards could be logically possible.
If an actual causality paradox occurred the entire universe would be inevitably and ultimately disintegrated to oblivion ...unless another counter paradox occurred to remedy the first one.

 

No, I don't.

It doesn't. None of them are at the logical level of human will.

No, I have not.
As noted, that term seems to confuse people - which is why I avoid it.

To repeat: You have many times claimed that determinism - by which you (and the rest of us) mean a universe "set in stone" from the beginning, one determined by cause and effect and physical law etc - excludes "free will" (by which term you include freedom of will).

But obviously determinism of that kind (which we have all stipulated to and assumed) excludes only supernatural "free will" - a natural freedom of will, in agreement with physical law, established by cause and effect and emerging inevitably just as was set in stone from the beginning, would not be excluded by such determinism.

So the discussion of natural freedom of will remains on the table.

 

Yes, you do, for reasons explained ad nauseam.
Your inability to recognise that is crippling you.

Ah, the appeal to complexity without any substance behind it.
Yawn.

You have indeed assumed it, and for the reasons I have explained.
Your inability to recognise that is crippling you.
Or is this your attempt to avoid actually answering the question by claiming that you are actually answering an entirely different and unasked question?

That is the conclusion I, and others, have reached, yes.
Hence I answer the question posed in the thread title with "no".
I get that you don't agree with the conclusion.
But your criticism of it thus far, notably with your rather boring assertion regarding the supernatural, is crippled and made redundant by your own a priori assumptions, as detailed to you, to which you remain blind.

"Look ma, if my cat is called "freedom of will" and my cat exists, "freedom of will" therefore exists, right?"
"Sure, hon, why not."
But once again you are assuming a priori that "freedom of will" exists, by labelling any free will that you conclude not to exist due to determinism as being "supernatural free will".
Crippling.

As said from the outset, if you start with a different notion of what free will is, you'll possibly reach a different conclusion.
But the question will always remain whether what you are defining as "freedom of will" has any actual freedom, at least beyond the trivial kind found in orbiting Teslas.
For one, if the will, however it is defined, is not able to do anything that was not set in stone from the outset of time, if no "decision" or choice, or anyone's path can be adjusted from the one set in stone, how can that path be considered "free", when it is simply doing what it was always going to do, and has zero capability to do anything different?
Yes, it has the same type of "freedom" that any system has, in that given a range of inputs it can output a range of outputs.
The function of f(x)=x can do that as well: if x=2, y=2; if x=3 then y=3.
So y has "freedom", right?
Trivial.
Oh, sorry, I forgot to grant you your appeal to complexity.
Me bad.

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Sheesh, you do speak a lot of rubbish, don't you.
You have evidence to support your claim of "inevitably and ultimately disintegrated to oblivion" nonsense?
I'm interested to know what it is, as you wouldn't usually spout unsupported rubb...
Oh, wait, I've just remembered who I'm replying to.

 

You still see no "substance" in logical levels.
That explains a lot. If mental events have no "substance", their existence and nature must be invisible - so a discussion of their degrees of freedom is impossible for you even to conceive of. You have no purchase on the subject.

No, I don't. I assume instead that what you refer to as "free will" cannot exist in a deterministic universe, just as you claim. I agreed to assume that, long ago.

That is especially and easily visible in my continual recommendations of a moratorium on the very term, due to the confusion it inevitably drags into the discussion I keep requesting - of natural freedom of will.

You are wrong about that. I fully agree with your "conclusion". I even assumed it, long ago, explicitly, along with everyone else, just as you did - that established the grounds of discussion for this topic here.
Supernatural free will cannot exist in a universe deterministically bound by natural law, physical cause and effect, etc - agreed. Fully agreed.

I just think that assuming one's conclusion is invalid argument.

And I don't think that conclusions about the existence of supernatural free will (valid or invalid) exhaust the topic - or even address it, actually.

As agreed long ago, yes. Consideration of a nonsupernatural "free will", in particular, would establish a much different starting point than yours - but too many assumptions would be required, imho. It would beg the question.

Rather than begging the question like that, we could begin with the viewpoint that a notion of "free will" is a goal of discussion, not the start. The question of its existence would likely settle more easily, then.

Given that viewpoint, we could approach the topic by way of the physical reality of human will - its observed operations, the replicable and measurable and mechanically recordable mental events that it comprises in the natural world. That more scientific perspective, with the supernatural and all its conflicts with determinism set aside, seems more promising.

 

Where oh where has Sarkus gone...
He was here for but a minute and
now there is "noone"​

lol!

Perhaps you could address the issue of "begging the problem" ?
If not for the limitations you place on causal detereminism there is actually no problem to solve.

 

You’ll have to ask him.
Despite similarity of views in many regards, we are different people.

If you want to ask why the thread question is being asked, run along and ask it in another thread, rather than sidetrack the discussion at hand.
There’s a good boy.

You mean if we completely ignore what it means for a system to be deterministic?
That is the only limitation I place upon it, that the system in question is deterministic, as that is the question posed.
Sure, you could remove the problem by simply not discussing it in the first place, if that is your preference.