I do have a soft spot in my heart for pessimists.

The agent has many possible choices. Even durka has acknowledged that now. Those possibilities don't exist in the actual future, only in possible futures. But they are still clearly possibilities. That they are not the particular type of possibility you want them to be is irrelevant - no general definition of choice references a specific type of possibility, and all I'm concerned with is showing that deterministic choice fits those definitions.

I've already defined "choice." You are now equivocating. If you want to use a different (accepted) definition, fine. But your special definition of choice, based on your special type of possibility, is not a definition I care about.

Yes, both are dependent on initial conditions. If the significance of choice was based on independence from initial conditions, then my definition of choice would be arbitrary. But no accepted definition of choice I've been able to find makes any mention of initial conditions.

Initial conditions have nothing to do with choice. The only definitions of choice that include independence from initial conditions are specifically libertarian definitions - so this is a case of obvious equivocation. Choice is significant because it's an expression of our desires and of who we are, because it's an indicator of our patterns of action, because it's a clue to our psychological and experiential natures, because it's intensely private and personal, and because it's what makes us sentient beings.

Choice has all of these properties. Superglue does not. That's why choice is significant, and superglue isn't. Modalities and dependence on prior conditions have nothing to do with it.

But that's not true - there are multiple possible worlds and multiple possible future. The only form of possibility in which there are multiple possible futures under libertarianism and only one possible future under determinism is temporal possibility - which is a special class of possibility. That special class of possibility has nothing to do with choice or responsibility - at least not according to any definition of those terms I can find (outside of specifically libertarian definitions, which is pretty lol).

So the fact that determinism restricts this one special class of possibility is irrelevant. Most forms of possibility are unrestricted in determinism. And all general definitions of choice that even reference modalities in the first place (many do not), reference possibility in general, and not any special subclass thereof. Thus, choices under determinism fit those definitions just as well as choices under libertarianism. Temporal possibility is not a requirement for choice (according to any general definition of the term, and certainly according to the definition I gave) - therefore, temporal possibility is not relevant to the discussion of whether choice can exist under determinism.

Now durka claims there's another special type of possibility that is relevant, instead of possible futures we are talking about possibilities existing within the actual future - I think he's just playing word games. Regardless, the reasoning above holds. Making choice dependent on a special class of possibility is redefining the term "choice," it's pure equivocation.

What I "acknowledge" is that you need to equivocate on 'possibility' in order to say that future options are 'possible' or 'possibilities.' My argument has been that the sense which you require to make them real possibilities is irrelevant: it's not the sort of possibility required for responsibility/free will. It's not a matter of 'wanting' the possibilities to be a certain way: stop setting up straw man arguments and particularly characterizing them as some sort of appeal to emotion. Stop it.

The definitions that I'm arguing for are position-neutral. You aren't willing or able to understand or awknowledge that. I'm not suggesting some libertarian-biased conception of possibility. I'm arguing for a sense of possibility that makes sense of a difference between the libertarian and the compatibilist: yours does not.

Consider an analogy: Two theories have a number of properties. A has 5 and B has 6. B shares all of A's properties and therefore there is one that B has that A does not. Therefore, THIS is their difference.

Now, libertarianism can make sense of your definition of possibility, as can compatibilism; therefore, this isn't what distinguishes the two positions. Instead, it is the sense that I've been characterizing: that's the meaningful difference between them. You may deny that such 'possibilities' actually exist, but that's a different question. You need to beg the question in order to explain that this sense of open future possibilities in the actual world doesn't make sense...ducy? You need to assume the deterministic thesis to say that it doesn't make sense. Can you argue against my concept of possibility without assuming a position on the determinist or incompatibilist theses?

That's what you have to do in order to do good philosophy.

Yes. No transcendental numbers or other such painful stuff. Assuming the universe is 100% discrete. And that the relevant calculations are discrete along every step of the process, and of course the result too. VERY finite. Whole nine yards.

I don't see why this is so. As far as I can tell, if it needs infinite precision or infinite information then it will never reach a conclusion - therefore any such universe doesn't meet the criteria.

That ultimate outcomes cannot be affected by choices. Or from Wiki: "That actions are free, but nevertheless work toward an inevitable end."

No difference.

Compute the past. See above.

The rationals. Though probably the integers would work, or just the even integers, it doesn't really matter. We're talking unitless parameters, so the only relevant information is contained in parameter x relative to parameter y.

It doesn't need the vector space properties, but I assume it has them anyhow. I need to encode the list mathematically, and I don't know of any mathematical object that contains a list other than a vector (well, and a matrix, and a set I guess but I'm scared I'll screw something up if I try to do sets within sets within sets). The vector itself is a mathematical object, and so has all the properties of a "real" vector. But the Turing machine only looks at the Cartesian coordinate representation of the vector, and interprets each coordinate as a list element. So everything outside of those parameters is arbitrary.

Respond to my earlier post and then:

If you take your notion of possibility in terms of other possible worlds (and not the actual world) then how is the actual world not fatalistic?

Sure, had things been different, then you could have done otherwise...but so what? Things are the way they are (ie, the actual world) and you couldn't have done otherwise in the actual world; so, how is this not fatalism in the context of the actual world?

It's not a straw man. You just did it again. You said, "it's not the sort of possibility required for responsibility/free will."

Then find me a definition of "choice" or of "responsibility" that references a particular "sort of possibility" (and is not written by a libertarian). Show me you're not pulling this out of your ass.

You can say that the difference between libertarian free will and ordinary, garden-variety free will is that libertarian free will includes a different kind of possibility that normal free will does not include. That is a strong count against libertarian free will - it adds an unnecessary "sixth property," a special kind of possibility that typical free will doesn't include. Idea that include unnecessary elements are weaker than ideas that have the same value without including unnecessary elements.

But this is not the difference between libertarianism and compatibilism. Libertarianism involves the claim that choice and responsibility cannot exist in a deterministic universe. This is easy to evaluate - we look at the definitions of "choice" and "responsibility."

I mean, you're actually suggesting that because you made up an extra type of property, a special kind of "libertarian possibility," and then claimed by fiat that this type of possibility is necessary for choice, that you are on solid footing! Let me summarize the conversation we've had:


Me: My God has five properties.
You: Well, my God is better. My God has your five properties and a sixth property, superwingilishness!
Me: Superwhatishness? You made that up.
You: No I didn't, philosophers have recognized superwingilishness ever since Lewis.
Me: Fine, maybe they have. But the fact that my God doesn't have superwhateverness doesn't make him worse than your God.
You: Not only does it make him worse than my God, it means he's not even a God in the first place!
Me: What? My God is the supreme being, the ruler and creator of the universe - that's the definition of God, my God is so a God!
You: Uh, in order to be a God, he needs to be a supreme being, the ruler and creator of the universe, and he needs to have superwingilishness.
Me: Huh? Are you sure? Because in every dictionary I'm looking at...
You: Please, it's not going to be in the dictionary. That's the argument from ignorance, it doesn't matter whether it's in the dictionary. The fact is, when people talk about God, they mean a superwingilish being.
Me: No, they don't. Even if they did, the definition of God says nothing about supersomethingorother, my God fits the definition and is therefore a God.
You: That doesn't even make sense. Think of it this way, both our gods are supreme, both our gods created the universe, so there's no difference between our gods on those properties. The only difference between your God and my God is that my God is superwingilish and your God isn't. Since that's the difference between us, superwingilishness is obviously the property that matters! It would be absurd to talk about a property both our gods have and act like that matters. Also, my God has six and your God only has five. So, in short, your God isn't even a God and my God is awesome.
Me: You've gotta be kidding me...


Some people might fall for the whole "talk fast and pull a rabbit out of your hat" approach, but I'm not going to. There's no certain "sort" of possibility that applies to choice and responsibility (not a straw man, you made this exact claim in your post), and if there is then you should be able to find references to such. The only way that your "sixth property" is relevant is if it is a definitional criterion of choice and responsibility! Otherwise it has no bearing on whether choice and responsibility exist in a determinist universe.

That is a gross mischaracterization of my argument. I emplore you to try again and be a little more charitable. It's a good skill to learn when constructing someone's argument. Your God dialogue is wholly disingenuous...

"Fatalistic" is a reference to modalities. It is the suggestion that things "must" happen a certain way.

Modalities have no place in the actual world. In the actual world, either it is or it isn't. There's no "it could be" or "it probably is" or "it must be." In the actual future, the sun will rise tomorrow or it won't. Period. That's what makes it "actual," it's not a modal thing. It can be contingent in some sense - the future may not "actually" exist yet (I think it does, but for a libertarian that would make the problem of future contingents more or less unresolvable), but in that case it's not an actual future - it is a range of possible futures, one of which may correspond to what will become the actual future. But when we talk about possibility, we aren't talking about the actual world.

I can say "it's possible based on what I know...," but then I'm talking about my knowledge and not the actual world. I can say "it's possible based on these axioms...," but then I'm talking about a system of axioms, not the actual world. I can say "it's possible that if things had happened a certain way...," but then I'm talking about possible worlds and not the actual world. I can say "it's possible that if things will happen a certain way...," but then I'm talking about possible futures, not the actual world. I don't know what it would mean (or what I would say) if I were talking about possibility in the actual world.

And I can't see how it could ever be useful to talk about possibility in the actual world - unless you need to invent a new, superfluous mode of possibility in order to support a certain position.

Really? You mention a type of possibility I've never heard of, can't reference it, claim that it's accepted in philosophy even though there's no mention of it in the SEoP or on Wiki or anywhere, and then claim that even though using the ordinary human version of "possible" (and the one on SEoP) choosing differently is most definitely possible in a deterministic universe, it doesn't matter because it's not the right "sort" of possibility (the right sort is the special kind that you can't find any reference for), so it doesn't "count" as a "real" choice.

You yourself said it - the difference between compatibilists and libertarians is that libertarians have added an extraneous property to the compatibilist conception of choice.

Well, in the actual world everything is a box: necessity.

We're not talking about epistemic possibility; let's take that off the table.

You're not very precise in your understanding of modal logic...even in a fatalistic universe modal logic is still a valid system (everything is not-diamond or box).

I've told you precisely how it's meaningful to talk of possibility in the actual world: if the determinist thesis is false, then there is a meaningful sense of possibility in the actual world. Don't you see how you're begging the question by assuming that determinism is true in your analysis of "possibility in the actual world"?

Yes?

Modal logic deals in a particular range of modalities, like possible, probable, and necessary. None of which meaningfully apply to the actual world. Calling it "necessary" is redundant.

But since you just said everything in the actual world is necessary - then in what sense is it meaningful to call something in the actual world (in which everything is necessary) possible?

I am explicitly not assuming determinism is true in my analysis, I even describe a case in which many possible futures arise from the same past (an impossibility under determinism). They are still possible futures, not actual future until they happen (at which point they are no longer possible, they simple are).

So time is finite in both directions as well?

Great... now all you need to do is define an "ultimate outcome" (as compared to a "normal" or "regular" or "other" outcome) and maybe you've got an outside chance of making sense.

Edit: FWIW - You are trying to say to say that your position is "general determinism" and that any argument that I construct should be able to address it. But now you've also presented a type of determinism which is not compatible with your "general" definition. You've successfully created a self-contradiction in terms.

So you've now defined the universe as follows:

I'm content that I've now taken you to a place that you can understand (if you're intellectually honest with yourself) that your definitions are getting more and more pointless. You keep throwing out more words and ideas which you haven't taken the time to consider in advance (and apparently don't really know what it's all about), and it's just make your position look worse and worse.

(Edit: If you had just STARTED by saying this in the first place, I don't think you would have gotten much argument from anyone.)

Oh, no, not that "whole 9 yards." Actually, sure, why the hell not? But the Turing Machine only has to go from one state to one other, it doesn't have to process all times. And time could probably even be continuous.

How is this not compatible with my general definition?

Sounds good to me. Or rather, "a universe is anything that can be represented as such, given the Turing machine conditions described."

All of my definitions have been self-consistent, and far from not having considered this in advance, I've actually programmed universes of this variety. Like literally, on the computer. I don't know how to describe computational data objects mathematically, so using vectors and sets instead of arrays and lists may make it sound sloppy, but it's hardly arbitrary.

Because YOU TOLD ME IT WAS:

...

Once you have the universe condensed into a finite set of n-tuples, you don't even need a Turing machine. A finite function can be represented by a finite-state automaton. You have now set up a universe so that the there is no need to have physical laws to describe the system.

This probably plays into your "possible/actual universe" argument with durka, but I haven't been following that one very closely.

Yeah, so have I. I worked as a summer intern at LLNL as a high school student programming these things in FORTRAN many years ago.

But this doesn't mean that your definitions have any real coherence. Being able to program a universe and making philosophical statements about the universe are not the same thing.

SIR, it's only redundant if you assume determinism. Do you see why, or not? You are explicitly assuming determinism in that analysis.

You just broke your Turing machine.

Yup, you need everything to be discrete. Or capable of being translated into discrete states.

Oh yeah. Time has to be discrete, fair point.

You said:

If this is true (if everything in the actual world is necessary, which is what I assume you mean by that), then it is redundant to call something that exists in the actual world "necessary."

Dude...seriously?

That second quote of mine comes after I've explicitly said "if determinism is true" then everything is a box. (about 'future' options...of course)

But that's only if you beg the question that determinism is true.

So, please consider that and try again.

None of those are the general form of determinism. The general (broadest) form of determinism includes all of these versions. The fact that these subclasses of determinism are mutually contradictory doesn't imply that any of them contradict determinism itself.

Yes, my form of determinism contradicts other specific forms of determinism. It doesn't contradict determinism in general.

The most important thing is that it's possible (in theory) to compute pretty much the whole universe given any "slice" of information about that universe.

Do you deny that the programmed universe is deterministic?

So long as you don't, then in order to be consistent with your claim of incompatibilism you must also claim that choice is impossible in any such universe.

No. That quote was the very first thing you said in your post. I had no context to know that you were talking about "if determinism is true."

Then you're bad at picking up context because that first line was in direcct response to your misunderstanding of the implications of future options in a deterministic system for modal logic.

You had said that there are notions of possibility in a deterministic system wrt choices (which means future options) in modal logic. That's a misunderstanding. My response was that (implicit: in a deterministic system) every future option is necessary: possibility only applies to other possible worlds and not the ACTUAL world. In the actual world, for determinism, everything is a box (or not-diamond) whether the future or the past.

Try again?

The most important thing is that you make sense. I have laid out for you why your definition of "compute" in the context of a universe fully describable by a finite set of n-vectors is really just a gigantic look-up table. There are no "universes" that could not exist, and you're back to the Russel quote I presented earlier. You've managed to define yourself in such a way that you really don't say anything about the universe at all.

I do think that choice is impossible within such a universe. I don't even know what "choice" means to an n-tuple. And if you want to claim that I'm just an sub m-tuple in the universal n-tuple, that's fine. At least you're moving back towards something with consistent content. And once you see this, the whole domino analogy should make sense.