Searching for GOD...

[Nearly Sane]

I don't think that necessarily follows.

Not sure if Floo meant thus, but she is correct, in a deterministic universe, a controller could have set it off, rather like Calvinism. Other than that though, Alan would be right in theory, not that that is evidence or even an argument for anything else.

[floo]

Not sure if Floo meant thus, but she is correct, in a deterministic universe, a controller could have set it off, rather like Calvinism. Other than that though, Alan would be right in theory, not that that is evidence or even an argument for anything else.

Anything is possible, but without any evidence to support Alan's assertion it is only a matter of belief on his part.

[Nearly Sane]

Anything is possible, but without any evidence to support Alan's assertion it is only a matter of belief on his part.

You can't have a four sided triangle.

Not all things are possible

[Alan Burns]

Quote from: Alan Burns on Today at 02:33:32 PM

    In a deterministic universe there can be no control.  For control to exist anywhere, the cause and effect chain must be broken by the deliberate act of a controller.

I don't think that necessarily follows.

The secular view must deduce that from the instant of the Big Bang, every event is caused by the consequence of previous events.  This is determinism - in which scenario there can be no manipulation, interaction or control in any form since everything is pre defined by past events.  The only way we can have control, manipulation or interaction is to introduce conscious acts of free will eminating from a source outside the cause and effect chain.

I do not believe that God just lit the blue touch paper of the Big Bang and stood back to let it all happen.  God's will, and other God given sources of free will are in evidence in the abundant life we see on this earth.

[Maeght]

I can think of several good reasons - do you not wish to seek an explanation of who you are and why you exist, or are you completely satisfied that you are just part of the continuum of uncontrolled matter in this universe heading for oblivion?

I know who I am. As to why we exist, it would be fascinating to get more understanding of the natural processes which led to this, but have no need to believe in a purpose or overall controller - quite happy to accept that we are the latter.

[floo]

You can't have a four sided triangle.

Not all things are possible

I probably could being senile!

[Maeght]

I don't think that necessarily follows.

The secular view must deduce ...

What's it got to do with secularism?

... that from the instant of the Big Bang, every event is caused by the consequence of previous events.  This is determinism - in which scenario there can be no manipulation, interaction or control in any form since everything is pre defined by past events.  The only way we can have control, manipulation or interaction is to introduce conscious acts of free will eminating from a source outside the cause and effect chain.

Fine.

I do not believe that God just lit the blue touch paper of the Big Bang and stood back to let it all happen.

Nor do I.

God's will, and other God given sources of free will are in evidence in the abundant life we see on this earth.

You haven't ever been able to demonstrate that - only state it as a belief.

[Outrider]

You can't have a four sided triangle.

Not all things are possible

All triangles have at least four sides - at least one of them is the temporal edge, there may well be two of those.

O.

[Outrider]

The secular view must deduce that from the instant of the Big Bang, every event is caused by the consequence of previous events.

It doesn't have to - it's quite possible to think that some elements are entirely random - and that's not limited to secularists, there can be believers or atheists who think that who don't believe in the separation of church and state.

This is determinism - in which scenario there can be no manipulation, interaction or control in any form since everything is pre defined by past events.

Arguably that inevitable succession of natural laws is 'control', but I agree that there's no conscious control of the larger picture.

The only way we can have control, manipulation or interaction is to introduce conscious acts of free will eminating from a source outside the cause and effect chain.

Except that free will makes no sense. Still.

I do not believe that God just lit the blue touch paper of the Big Bang and stood back to let it all happen.  God's will, and other God given sources of free will are in evidence in the abundant life we see on this earth.

You have no evidence for this, nothing missing from the explanation of how things work to require an explanation this could be, and free will is still an oxymoron.

O.

[Alan Burns]

    God's will, and other God given sources of free will are in evidence in the abundant life we see on this earth.

You haven't ever been able to demonstrate that - only state it as a belief.

As I see it, the universe was designed to be experienced and manipulated by intelligently driven creative forms of awareness.  The forces of nature - light, heat, electricity, gravity, chemical reactions, even time itself are all there to be discovered, used, manipulated and experienced.

[Shaker]

You haven't ever been able to demonstrate that - only state it as a belief.

As I see it, the universe was designed to be experienced and manipulated by intelligently driven creative forms of awareness.  The forces of nature - light, heat, electricity, gravity, chemical reactions, even time itself are all there to be discovered, used, manipulated and experienced.

Short version: me, me, me.

[torridon]

Maybe we should wait and see if NASA or somesuch body finds evidence for God.  As humble members of the public we don't have those kind of resources at our disposal, also we probably lack the necessary dispassionate objectivity to discern between real actualities and self-induced beliefs born of our own inner desires.

'Why would God need a spaceship?'

I gather some elements within NASA and others have started taking seriously the Matrix idea, explains fine tuning and all that; 'God' can be seen as a very early take on the Matrix idea: our cosmos is an artifical reality constructed by some higher power, the higher power in this case, being 'God'.

[Maeght]

As I see it, the universe was designed to be experienced and manipulated by intelligently driven creative forms of awareness.  The forces of nature - light, heat, electricity, gravity, chemical reactions, even time itself are all there to be discovered, used, manipulated and experienced.

You haven't ever been able to demonstrate that - only state it as a belief.

[Nearly Sane]

'Why would God need a spaceship?'


I gather some elements within NASA and others have started taking seriously the Matrix idea, explains fine tuning and all that; 'God' can be seen as a very early take on the Matrix idea: our cosmos is an artifical reality constructed by some higher power, the higher power in this case, being 'God'.

I prefer the whole idea that we are the bleeding information from beyond the event horizon of a black hole incarnated as a holograms, since apart from anything else the Matrix God is a fairly lousy piece of philosophy for a number of reasons.


Kirk is right.

[Alan Burns]

... and free will is still an oxymoron.

The expression "free will" is not an oxymoron.  It simple means will which is free from the deterministic control of cause and effect in material behaviour.  You may choose to disagree about the possibility of this happening, but if our spiritual nature is free from the deterministic behaviour of material then we do have free will which eminates from the human soul.

[torridon]

The expression "free will" is not an oxymoron.  It simple means will which is free from the deterministic control of cause and effect in material behaviour.  You may choose to disagree about the possibility of this happening, but if our spiritual nature is free from the deterministic behaviour of material then we do have free will which eminates from the human soul.

Irrespective of its implementation, when we unpack it, 'will' is something that is unfree by definition; unfree, because it serves a purpose.  If it serves no purpose whatsoever, then it is pointless, purposeless, irrelevant, random. 'Will' is by definition purposeful and therefore unfree.

[torridon]

All triangles have at least four sides - at least one of them is the temporal edge, there may well be two of those.

O.

It could be argued that no triangles exist, not even three sided ones.  To exist,in the fullest sense, implies occupying three spatial dimensions and a temporal one.  Something that existed for zero amount of time, never really existed at all.  And even three sided triangles have only got two spatial dimensions.  So glad I'm not a triangle.

[Outrider]

The expression "free will" is not an oxymoron.  It simple means will which is free from the deterministic control of cause and effect in material behaviour.

Well, it actually implies that it's free of deterministic factors of any sort - I think there are only material factors, but you don't, as I understand it.

You may choose to disagree about the possibility of this happening, but if our spiritual nature is free from the deterministic behaviour of material then we do have free will which eminates from the human soul.

But if it's 'free' then it's just random - how does that constitute will? If it's not random, if it's determined by a combination of an underlying inherited nature and/or the experiences we've been exposed to, then how is it free?

It's either dependent upon something, material or otherwise, or it's random. It's either free, or it's will, but it can't be both.

O.

[Outrider]

It could be argued that no triangles exist, not even three sided ones.  To exist,in the fullest sense, implies occupying three spatial dimensions and a temporal one.  Something that existed for zero amount of time, never really existed at all.  And even three sided triangles have only got two spatial dimensions.  So glad I'm not a triangle.

Well, it's a concept in the first place, a defined region on a plane.

I'm glad I'm not a conc... I'd be glad I'm not just a concept, but I'm not sure that I'm not...



O.

[ekim]

The expression "free will" is not an oxymoron.  It simple means will which is free from the deterministic control of cause and effect in material behaviour.  You may choose to disagree about the possibility of this happening, but if our spiritual nature is free from the deterministic behaviour of material then we do have free will which eminates from the human soul.

As a Christian isn't your objective to relinquish 'self' will and surrender to God's Will?  If so isn't God then the determining agent, in which case your 'soul' is not free?

[Alan Burns]

Irrespective of its implementation, when we unpack it, 'will' is something that is unfree by definition; unfree, because it serves a purpose.  If it serves no purpose whatsoever, then it is pointless, purposeless, irrelevant, random. 'Will' is by definition purposeful and therefore unfree.

There is nothing random about free will - this is just confusing the issue.

I fully agree that "will" is purposeful and not random.  The question is whether our conscious awareness has the freedom to choose which purpose to fulfil.  The contention is that the choice has already been made sub consciously and we become aware of the choice after the event.  But most people's perception is that their conscious awareness has the freedom to make the choice - and this is what I understand to be free will.

If our conscious awareness is just an emergent property of the material brain, then it will be entirely defined by our material brain and subject to the deterministic nature of material behaviour - hence no free will, and our perception that we have free will is an illusion.

But if our awareness does have the freedom to invoke a conscious choice of action, then conscious awareness must comprise of something which is not restricted by the deterministic nature of our material brain and must be more than an emergent property.

[Gordon]

If our conscious awareness is just an emergent property of the material brain, then it will be entirely defined by our material brain and subject to the deterministic nature of material behaviour - hence no free will, and our perception that we have free will is an illusion.

This sounds like a more promising approach, Alan.

[Outrider]

There is nothing random about free will - this is just confusing the issue.

Ok, so there are no random components - I'd agree.

I fully agree that "will" is purposeful and not random.  The question is whether our conscious awareness has the freedom to choose which purpose to fulfil.

It's more about what is the nature of 'choice'. Given who you are at a given time, regardless of what's doing the choosing, a brain or a soul, it's dependent upon what's gone before: you've inherited (or been bequeathed?) an underlying character or nature, and experience has 'modified' that to make you who you are at a given point.

At that point, given who you are, is there any way for you to make a different decision than the one you do? In doing so would you not, in effect, be a different person than the one you are? It would require a different experience or nature to make different decision - it would require a different person.

The contention is that the choice has already been made sub consciously and we become aware of the choice after the event.  But most people's perception is that their conscious awareness has the freedom to make the choice - and this is what I understand to be free will.

We are more than adequately aware, though, that our perception is limited and not always reflective of reality.

If our conscious awareness is just an emergent property of the material brain, then it will be entirely defined by our material brain and subject to the deterministic nature of material behaviour - hence no free will, and our perception that we have free will is an illusion.

Yes, but beyond that regardless of what it is that's 'choosing', in order for it to be 'will', it has to be determined by prior events.

But if our awareness does have the freedom to invoke a conscious choice of action, then conscious awareness must comprise of something which is not restricted by the deterministic nature of our material brain and must be more than an emergent property.

If it's not 'deterministic' - regardless of whether it's material or spiritual - then, by your own account, it's not will, it's random.

O.

[Maeght]

There is nothing random about free will - this is just confusing the issue.

I fully agree that "will" is purposeful and not random.  The question is whether our conscious awareness has the freedom to choose which purpose to fulfil.  The contention is that the choice has already been made sub consciously and we become aware of the choice after the event.  But most people's perception is that their conscious awareness has the freedom to make the choice - and this is what I understand to be free will.

That may be most people's perception but that is not what the recent studies have shown. Early days on that of course. Even if our conscious awareness is making the decisions you would need to demonstrate that they are free.

If our conscious awareness is just an emergent property of the material brain, then it will be entirely defined by our material brain and subject to the deterministic nature of material behaviour - hence no free will, and our perception that we have free will is an illusion.

Absolutely.

But if our awareness does have the freedom to invoke a conscious choice of action, then conscious awareness must comprise of something which is not restricted by the deterministic nature of our material brain and must be more than an emergent property.

Yes - but there is no evidence for such a non material thing and if there was such a thing how would it make decisions which were free of prior events? By what process would it make any choice if not by reference to previous experiences and information?

[Alan Burns]

If it's not 'deterministic' - regardless of whether it's material or spiritual - then, by your own account, it's not will, it's random.

A conscious choice is not random.  Neither is a sub conscious choice.
You maintain that a conscious choice is entirely pre determined by past events, which in effect makes it no different to a sub conscious choice.

Any choice we make will be influenced by past events, but I maintain that a conscious choice is not entirely defined by past events.  There is the element of conscious freedom to make a choice, and it is not random but defined by whatever constitutes our self awareness.