It's not just imagined. Persons didn't exist at one point in the past. There was no logic. No logical possibilities. But there were metaphysical possibilities.
It's not logically possible for no intelligent beings to evolve.* If no intelligent beings evolve, there is no logic. You're assuming that logic is something other than a thing that intelligent beings do.
(*Prior to intelligent beings evolving, it's also not logically possible for them to evolve. Again, if there are no intelligent beings, there is no logic.) — Terrapin Station
Say it's 10 billion years ago or so.
Is it logically possible at that point in time for intelligent beings to evolve or not evolve? — Terrapin Station
If you want to say that the former requires there to have been a formal system of logic at the time then to be consistent shouldn't you also say that the latter requires there to have been a calendar at the time? — Michael
Why would that be meaningful but it's not meaningful to say that things occurred 15 (or 18 or whatever age you accept) billion years ago? — Terrapin Station
But it is one thing to say that there were things happening over some specified time frame in the distant past, and it is another thing to say that there was a "point in time" at some specified moment in the past. It's the latter that I can't make sense of. — Pierre-Normand
Right, so do you think it's meaningful to say that the first stars were forming at "some specified time frame" in the past? — Terrapin Station
So during those events--the first star formation, say, was there logic? — Terrapin Station
There was no logic, no music and no literature. — Pierre-Normand
Right. So during those events, was it logically possible for life to evolve? — Terrapin Station
Why is your statement of logical possibility tensed? — Pierre-Normand
Why are you having a problem answering whether during the first star formation, there was logical possibility?
If there's no logic, is there logical possibility? — Terrapin Station
If there is no logic then there is no logical possibility. — Pierre-Normand
Great. So an example of there being a metaphysical possibility that's not a logical possibility is that during the first star formation, it was a metaphysical possibility that life would evolve, but it wasn't a logical possibility. — Terrapin Station
The fact that there was nobody using logic doesn't make the scenario logically impossible from our perspective. — Pierre-Normand
Let's see a definition of free will and how it relates to determinism:
Free-will: The free-will doctrine, opposed to determinism, ascribes to the human will freedom in one or more of the following senses:
(a)The freedom of indeterminacy is the will's alleged independence of antecedent conditions, psychological and physiological. A free-will in this sense is at least partially uncaused or is not related in a uniform way with the agent's character, motives and circumstances.
(b)The freedom of alternative choice which consists in the supposed ability of the agent to choose among alternative possibilities of action and
(c)The freedom of self-determination consisting in decision independent of external constraint but in accordance with the inner motives and ideals of the agent. — FreeEmotion
I'm not talking about our perspective. — Terrapin Station
I'm talking about during the first star formation. It was a metaphysical possibility that life would evolve. It wasn't a logical possibility. So that's an example of there being a metaphysical possibility and that's not a logical possibility.
The task wasn't to give a "context-independent" example, and if that had been the task, I'd say that there is no such thing.
The first claim doesn't entail the second because logical possibilities don't have temporal boundaries anymore than they have spatial boundaries. — Pierre-Normand
Why are you having a problem answering whether during the first star formation, there was logical possibility?
If there's no logic, is there logical possibility? — Terrapin Station
And the truth of modal logical claims is not temporally limited anymore than it is spatially bounded. — Pierre-Normand
Again, I do not agree with this. Do you understand that I do not agree with it? — Terrapin Station
Of course, this is precisely why I present arguments as to why this claims that you are disagreeing with is reasonable and why your disagreeing with it leads to absurd results. If you are not agreeing with the idea that the truth of logical propositions isn't temporally bounded, then you must be agreeing with the defense provided by the author of the paleontological study. You must also be agreeing with the claim that scenarios that are logically impossible on Earth, those very same scenarios, are not logically impossible on Mars. If fact, they are not even logically impossible on the coffee table between us (assuming we would have had a conversation over coffee) since there is no logic literally 'on' the coffee table. — Pierre-Normand
Right, logical anything, including possibility and impossibility, is always to someone, and not only that, but it's also going to be only relevant to the particular logic that person is using at that time. Logical possibility and impossibility do not obtain outside of that. Not on a coffee table, or to amoeba in the ocean, or 3 billion years ago, etc. — Terrapin Station
They thus submit their putative discovery to a scientific journal and one reviewer sends an e-mail to the main author of the study pointing out that their main result has the form of a conjunction of propositions making up an inconsistent triad. That's just not logically possible. — Pierre-Normand
The main author replies that it may very well be that this would be logically impossible now,
but none of the three reported disjuncts are nomologically impossible, and it is irrelevant that their logical conjunction isn't logically possible now since it happened over 100 million years in the past, at a time when there was no logic.
So, that means that on your view, Professor Station was correct and the logical criticism of the conclusion of the study by the reviewer was misguided. — Pierre-Normand
The editor of the journal should publish the study without any revision since the result is scientifically valid.
It was not logically impossible that there were more triceratops than pterosaurs, more pterosaurs than velociraptors, and also, more velociraptors than pterosaurs. — Pierre-Normand
It gets complicated since God has already decided and has the final say.
— Rich
God, in their minds, does not decide what they will do, at least in the sense that precludes moral responsibility. God could determine actions, but refrains from doing so to preserve creaturely freedom. Again, the compatibilist thinks that moral responsibility and determinism are compatible with each other.
Unrepentant murderers do not go to heaven.
But not too worry, it's better than determinism that has us all killing each other because some gene it's obsessed with surviving.
— Rich
Not all determinists are materialists. And I do not see what this has to do with anything I said. It seems like you are just saying things to try to get a rise out of people — Chany
The reviewer should ask why whether they weren't logical impossible or possible at the time matters to the author in the context of the article. Did the article have something to do with whether there was logic 100 million years ago? — Terrapin Station
In our case, you asked for an example of a metaphysical possibility that's not a logical possibility, so I gave you an example.
There is nothing to say that a person cannot freely choose a predetermined path. Even in the case of a biological machine-brain, there is nothing to say that a person cannot choose exactly what his brain has been programmed to choose. — FreeEmotion
(b)The freedom of alternative choice which consists in the supposed ability of the agent to choose among alternative possibilities of action and
This is also a logical possibility since the possibility of live evolving from that initial state "(has nothing) to do with whether there was logic (billions of) years ago" — Pierre-Normand
<sigh> it's not also a logical possibility at the time in question.
At the time in question, it's only a metaphysical possibility.
This is because logic only exists once there are people. That's not the case with the world in general.
This is relevant to there being an example of a metaphysical possibility that's not also a logical possibility. I'm not saying that it's relevant to anything else. — Terrapin Station
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