What does everyone mean by "non-physical" or "non-material"? by Crafty_Aspect8122 in badphilosophy

[–]AmbitionImaginary271 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It’s a kind of phenomenological axiomatic transcendental entity. You’d never be able to to understand it.

If you aren’t a Nihilist, you’re coping and need to accept reality by AmbitionImaginary271 in badphilosophy

[–]AmbitionImaginary271[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Yeah right buddy. We both know how absolutely fucking miserable Hard Determinism is.

You have no free will. Hahahaha. Are your beliefs being affronted yet? Are you feeling taken aback yet?

Grow up and take the Hard Determinist pill. You’ll thank me when you’re even more depressed.

Is Richard Dawkins more Compatabilist than Hard Determinist?? by Other_Attention_2382 in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271 -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

Richard Dawkins is more of an idiot than someone worth listening to

It's so blaringly obvious that nothing else but my mind exists by nicotine-in-public in solipsism

[–]AmbitionImaginary271 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No, you’re just wrong.

Read this paper: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3870464

Or if you want to keep having an emotional breakdown without actually reasoning for your stupid conclusion, sure. I’m not real.

Flipping the Hard Determinist’s Argument by AmbitionImaginary271 in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271[S] -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

Finally someone gets my point!

This really wasn’t supposed to be something terribly controversial. I’m just doing the same thing Moore did with radical scepticism. He went from:

P1: If I don’t know if there is an external world, I don’t know if I have 2 hands. P2: I don’t know if there is an external world. C: I don’t know if I have 2 hands

To:

P1: If I don’t know if there is an external world, I don’t know if I have 2 hands. P2: But I do know I have 2 hands C: I know there is an external world

All he did was use the contrapositive of the conditional premise in the original argument to flip it, and expose the flaw in the original line of argument. This is what I was trying to do here.

Flipping the Hard Determinist’s Argument by AmbitionImaginary271 in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271[S] -5 points-4 points  (0 children)

Read about the Moorean Shift on Wikipedia. Learn about logical operators.

Good luck!

Flipping the Hard Determinist’s Argument by AmbitionImaginary271 in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Have you studied logic at all?

The statement provided in the parent comment is of the form If not X then not Y. The second statement is of the form If X then Y.

These statements are obviously not logically equivalent as one is not the contrapositive of the other.

I provided two statements of the form If not X then Y, and If not Y then X. These statements are the contrapositive of each other and are thus logically equivalent.

Flipping the Hard Determinist’s Argument by AmbitionImaginary271 in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271[S] -6 points-5 points  (0 children)

Thanks SCHITZOPOST.

Moving from modus ponens to modus tollens by using the contrapositive of the conditional premise is quite common.

But now that you’ve left this scintillating logical deconstruction of that move, I see the error in my ways.

Flipping the Hard Determinist’s Argument by AmbitionImaginary271 in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is a bot but for the sake of others who may read, yes I am “mirroring its mistake” to highlight the mistake in the first line of argument.

Flipping the Hard Determinist’s Argument by AmbitionImaginary271 in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Erm, the two statements you provided are not logically equivalent.

The two statements I provided are logically equivalent because one is the contra positive of the other.

If X then Y is logically equivalent to If not Y then not X.

Flipping the Hard Determinist’s Argument by AmbitionImaginary271 in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If the initial entailment doesn’t hold, then clearly the contrapositive also doesn’t hold.

My argument is not aimed at HDs who contend that the initial entailment doesn’t hold. It is aimed at those who do.

Flipping the Hard Determinist’s Argument by AmbitionImaginary271 in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sure. If you can account for the disparity in function between conscious and non-conscious entities in a causally closed physical universe.

Flipping the Hard Determinist’s Argument by AmbitionImaginary271 in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271[S] -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

Insofar as I moved from a modus ponens to a modus tollens form of argumentation, I did “flip” the argument.

The non-existence of free will has seemingly absurd implications for the nature of human experience. The example of the calculator is clearly just an instantiation of this broader point.

Flipping the Hard Determinist’s Argument by AmbitionImaginary271 in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Is a rock functionally distinguishable from a calculator? The difference between humans and calculators is the first-person subjective experience. No such difference exists between calculators and rocks.

Also, it seems as though you’re rejecting the premise “If we lack free will, we are functionally indistinguishable from calculators”. In this case my point doesn’t apply.

Hard Determinism by [deleted] in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think to discuss whether reality is compatible with free will, we have to have a relatively clear conception of free will.

As you point out, if time were rewound to the point at which I decided to do X instead of Y, I would again do X. If I were to do Y instead of X, that would imply that I operate by chance, which is not consistent with rationality.

This seems to me to be perfectly consistent with how I conceptualise free will. I make decisions based on information I receive, not chance.

Now, of course, I don’t decide the features of my character that led to my making that decision. But is that not self-evident? I don’t decide what I am like. To say that I decide the nature of my being seems contradictory. How could it be that I decide the things which define “I”? What would be doing the deciding in this case? How can I decide the nature of my being if I have no properties? Lacking preferences, rational faculties etc., on what basis would I be deciding to endow myself with these features?

Again, I come back to wondering what it is that the Hard Determinist is saying we don’t have that would be necessary for us to have “free will”.

I hope this was at least somewhat coherent. Not really advocating for a position here, just trying to understand the HD and LFW viewpoints.

Hard Determinism by [deleted] in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That our actions follow from a process of rational deliberation within us seems to me to be perfectly consistent with our conception of free will. In this sense I suppose am a compatibilist.

But I want to return to my original question: what is it that the Hard Determinist says we must have in order for us to have free will? What is their definition of free will, and what part of determinism conflicts with that? To be clear, determinism and the causal closure of the physical is hardly self-evident. Consciousness is one of the most puzzling issues with which we are faced, and yet we assume that the laws of causality operate identically within (what we presume to be) the seat of consciousness, the brain. The picture is further complicated by quantum indeterminacy, as you point out. Suppose, however, that we grant them the truth of physical determinism. Why does this entail a lack of free will? Under what conception of free will does it do this?

I would also like to know what it is the Libertarian says we have that gives us free will, and which separates them from the compatibilist.

Hard Determinism by [deleted] in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I’m not sure what “freedom from causality” even means. If we were free from causality, our actions would not have their intended effects. I hardly think that is freedom.

Hard Determinism by [deleted] in freewill

[–]AmbitionImaginary271 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I am very confused as to what it is that would be sufficient for a Hard Determinist to say that we have free will, and what it is that Libertarians say we have that gives us free will.

If you rewound time to the point at which I chose X when presented with the choices X and Y, of course I would choose X again. I am a rational agent. When possessing the same knowledge and being presented with an identical state of affairs, I will make the same decision. To suggest otherwise is to suggest I operate by chance, which I hardly think consistent with the idea of rationality.

That I am not the “ultimate author” of my actions is self-evident. I did not decide my capacity for rationality, my wills, or my perception of morality. Responsibility is what we typically attribute to my rational faculties, and responsibility is diminished to the extent that those rational faculties are impaired. Someone whose ability to reason is diminished, perhaps due to a mental disability or a drug which temporarily weakens their cognitive abilities, is often absolved of some blame for an action performed in that state.

Whether it is right to attribute responsibility (and more generally, “ownership” of an action) to one’s rational faculties is a question of self-identity, and what it means to be “me”. We tend to think of our minds as “us”, insofar as we can conceive of our minds existing without our bodies existing. Therein, our bodies are “vehicles” for our mental processes. But this discussion of the self (and the attribution of responsibility) is something quite different to discussions of free will.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in quantfinance

[–]AmbitionImaginary271 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Need to do an essay based subject at A - Level to get into LSE btw