Suffice to say you are not an honest interlocutor. — AmadeusD

:roll: :rofl:

It appears that you haven't read any Hume at all.
— Corvus

Suffice to say you are not an honest interlocutor. Take it easy.
6h — AmadeusD

Well it has been 25+ years since I studied philosophy at mcgill and ubc. And I used to be able to name drop and think that meant something….

I believe that most of my opinions are out of date, and am adjusting to trying to survive in this forum. will take a few months. Probably longer.

However - I would say that if you can’t say something without referring abstractly to other up to date known facticities circa 2024, I applaud your efficiency but laud the lack of a Socratic method ;)

And a forum… just seems the right place for the Socratic method.

However - I would say that if you can’t say something without referring abstractly to other up to date known facticities circa 2024, I applaud your efficiency but laud the lack of a Socratic method ;)

And a forum… just seems the right place for the Socratic method. — Metaphyzik

Unless I am totally misapprehending your meaning... Nice, heh.
Don't be put off. The insistent know-alls are few, in my experience. I'm still in the same boat you are (though, I'm not playing catch-up. Just playing).

Haha thanks

I am having second thoughts about your "dumb physical processes." Clouds making shapes are indeed a dumb physical process. However, brain activities are not dumb physical processes. The human brain is the product of billions of years of evolution. It doesn't function the way clouds do. It has responsive feedback systems that are self-correcting to make sure that the model of reality generated by the brain is accurate enough for the organism to survive and reproduce in the real world. If our brain worked only once in a blue moon the way clouds make numbers, we simply would not survive or reproduce or be able to look after children. I think that determinism does not remove the brain's credibility.

It's not possible to think freely. Can you think up everything there is to know about dark matter and dark energy? No, you can't. Can you think of a trillion thoughts per second? No, you can't. Our thoughts are determined and constrained by our genes, environments, nutrients, and experiences. — Truth Seeker

The reason we can not do those is because of lack of data to us, and our brain has limited capacity in thinking, not because anything is determined.

We are all prisoners of causality - doomed to suffer and die. I am all-loving but I am not all-knowing and all-powerful. I am so sad. I wish I never existed. — Truth Seeker

These comments are not factual objective descriptions of anything in the world, but just reflection of your psychology. You can change your beliefs and emotions by changing your reasoning and reading some philosophical textbooks. No one else can change your beliefs apart from yourself.

Hume and Kant were dualists. They are both wrong. You are also wrong about having free will. I am a materialist monist hard determinist because I am convinced by evidence. — Truth Seeker

Hume and Kant were dualists? There are different interpretations about them. It is not that simple. They are not wrong. They present us with deep and rich arguments on our mind and the world. You should try reading them first, and try to understand them. I am sure you will enjoy.

Why does our brain have limited capacity? Why aren't all living things all-loving, all-knowing and all-powerful? How do you know that someone could have done something else at the time and place of the doing instead of what was done? I am not convinced that anyone could have done something else but I could be wrong as I am not all-knowing.

Here is a MOOD SCALE that I use to monitor myself:

+5: Total loss of judgement, exorbitant spending, religious delusions or hallucinations.
+4: Lost touch with reality, incoherent, no sleep, paranoid and vindictive, reckless behaviour.
+3: Inflated self-esteem, rapid thoughts and speech, counter-productive simultaneous tasks.
+2: Very productive, everything to excess, charming and talkative.
+1: Self-esteem good, optimistic, sociable and articulate, good decisions and get work done.
0: Mood in balance, no symptoms of depression or mania.
-1: Slight withdrawal from social situations, concentration less than usual, slight agitation.
-2: Feeling of panic and anxiety, concentration difficult and memory poor, some comfort in routine.
-3: Slow thinking, no appetite, need to be alone, sleep excessive or difficult, everything a struggle.
-4: Feeling of hopelessness and guilt, thoughts of suicide, little movement, impossible to do anything.
-5: Endless suicidal thoughts, no way out, no movement, everything is bleak and it will always be like this.

Right now I am at -2 on the mood scale. Have you ever experienced what it is like to be at -2 or -5 or +5? I have. I have to take 600 mg of Quetiapine XL per night to get to -2 on the mood scale. If I didn't take it, I would be stuck at -5. Have you ever had hallucinations? If you haven't, you won't understand how scary and confusing it is to have one's reality warped by things that are not really there.

If you don't have Bipolar Affective Disorder, the descriptors above won't mean much to you. Words cannot accurately convey what it is actually like.

I also have CPTSD and chronic pain. If you don't have flashbacks and nightmares and intrusive thoughts you are not going to understand what that's like. If you don't live with chronic pain you won't know what that's like. There is no substitute for actual experience. No amount of reading will help you comprehend how painful pain is.

I will read Hume and Kant if I ever get to either 0 or +1 on the mood scale. Thank you for the recommendations.

Why does our brain have limited capacity? Why aren't all living things all-loving, all-knowing and all-powerful? How do you know that someone could have done something else at the time and place of the doing instead of what was done? I am not convinced that anyone could have done something else but I could be wrong as I am not all-knowing. — Truth Seeker

Good question. I wish I know the answers for the questions. Only thing I know is that there are things we know, and there are things we don't know. Most of the unknowability can never be cleared I presume. Humans are critically and sorely limited existence in time of life on the earth, knowing and thinking capabilities due to them having the biological bodies, and thinkings and knowings that rely on the biological brain.

There is no substitute for actual experience. No amount of reading will help you comprehend how painful pain is. — Truth Seeker

I have no knowledge or experience in the field of pains and clinical psychology. I am sorry that I cannot offer any info or advice on the situation. I hope that you will feel better and get back to your normal emotional state and physical health as soon as possible.

I will read Hume and Kant if I ever get to either 0 or +1 on the mood scale. Thank you for the recommendations. — Truth Seeker

You are very welcome Truth Seeker. Please take your time. If you open new threads with Hume or Kant topics later on when you feel better, I will definitely try to join and engage in discussions with you then. Take care, and thank you for engaging discussions with me for the interesting OP.

Thank you for your kind wishes. You are most welcome.

:blush: :pray:

fwiw I entirely second reading Kant and Hume. Ignoring Corvus and I's exchange, we both think that's a good idea - so, it probably is :P

Thank you for your recommendation.

It's assigned culpability as in 'part of a legal system'.
It's actual culpability as in 'part of Everything in Existence (what you call the universe).'

If everything in existence is subjected to the 'laws of physics', then there is no actual culpability.

On Earth, there is assigned culpability for beings capable of defending themselves in court. Hence humans and artificial intelligence.

How can the 'laws of physics' be subjected to themselves? They are not, they don't exist, they are simply a continuation of the Big Bang, which will result in the Big Crush, which is also a continuation of the Big Bang. Etcetera, etcetera.

Hence Eternity. Hence Eternal Recurrence. Hence Eternity.

Unless I'm wrong of course :rofl:

I agree with your statement about assigned culpability. I also agree that there is no actual culpability as the choices we make are determined by prior causes.

The term Big Bang is a misnomer. It should be renamed Tiny Silent Beginning as this is what actually happened.

I don't think there will be a Big Crunch because the expansion of the universe is accelerating. I think this universe will die from Heat Death. We will be long dead so it won't affect us.

I’ve got some reading to do ;). Will be fun!

Might take some time - am too busy these days on a software startup (in addition to my normal software job) …. But I like thinking about this stuff. Food for the brain ;)

Right now I am at -2 on the mood scale. Have you ever experienced what it is like to be at -2 or -5 or +5? I have. I have to take 600 mg of Quetiapine XL per night to get to -2 on the mood scale. If I didn't take it, I would be stuck at -5. Have you ever had hallucinations? If you haven't, you won't understand how scary and confusing it is to have one's reality warped by things that are not really there. — Truth Seeker

That's rough.

I will read Hume and Kant if I ever get to either 0 or +1 on the mood scale. Thank you for the recommendations. — Truth Seeker

I find secondary literature easier in the pit. Hope things get a bit more okay for you soon.

Thank you very much.

Source: https://www.quora.com/To-what-extent-are-our-choices-and-actions-considered-free

To what extent are our choices and actions considered "free"?

Are they really ‘ours’? If you look into it, you will see that there may be a sense of choosing but no actual chooser. One way to look at choice is as a process, which starts at the subatomic levels, going to the atomic and molecular and cellular and suddenly “I choose this!”

Who is this ‘I’? If you say, “Me, silly!”, then are you controlling the process of choice from your subatomic level throughout all the other levels? Are you controlling what your atoms, molecules and cells do? Because they’re doing a bunch of stuff before you reach the point of declaring your choice.

Are choices really made consciously? Psychologists would argue that many of them are unconscious. Who, then, is the chooser? I assume none of us have the experience of pulling choices from the unconscious level through to the conscious… Nope, these unconscious choices make themselves. Only after they are made, we may realize what lurked in our unconscious.

Libet’s experiment is quite famous. It showed that choices are made and we actually become conscious of them after they’ve been made. Then, there is a process in the brain of claiming the choice as ‘mine.’ This claiming makes it feel like ‘I’ made the choice, like ‘I’ was in charge the entire time. But, actually, the choice arose and then was claimed as ‘my choice.’

Another interesting angle is this: When I ask you to choose between coffee and tea, keep in mind that both coffee and tea require the entire evolution of the universe to exist. Without the birth of the sun and all the conditions that allow earth to produce coffee beans and tea leaves, and without humans to make beverages from them — that choice wouldn’t be available to you. So the choices you have, you didn’t choose to have them(!). Evolution did. You were born into a context, and all your choices take place within that context. And like you, those who came before were also born into a particular context and did not choose what choices they will have. They had completely different choices than you (depending how far back you go). Go all the way back to the first man, who made whatever choices were available to him. Who originally chose the choices that were available to him?

How free is our choice if we can’t choose what options we have? Our choice is very limited by our context and circumstance. And the mysterious thing is… who put it there? You may say God, you may say evolution. The first man didn’t choose to be, didn’t choose what options will be available to him, didn’t choose anything about himself or his environment. Once he found himself in these pre-existing conditions, he made whatever choices were available from his understanding of himself and the world. But before the first man, was there choice? If you answer that there was no choice in the universe before the first man, then why should choice have started with his appearance? If you there was choice before the first man, then who was it that chose? Randomness? Evolution? God? Either way, it wasn’t man - so at what point did man assume choice? You see, if all is evolution’s doing, then we have no choice whatsoever and never had. Everything is just happening, unfolding, perhaps by laws of nature, and we are one choiceless part of that unfolding. If it’s God, then we are moved as God wills only (and what we think of as our will is really His). Man appeared within a context that he never chose. Evolution or God chose (or randomness). At what point did choice become man’s? What makes us think that we have gained independence? Seeking for the birth of choice kinda makes you wonder if it has any reality to it at all. The fact that we, humans, appear in the universe quite late on, after so much has been established (galaxies and solar systems, and planets etc), and then we claim to be in charge of some part of a process that is so much larger than us and began way before us… This is the same as what I started with - the subatomic, atomic, molecular and cellular levels - only looked at from the side of all the things that we are within rather than they within us. Do you see, we are part of a chain. Can one link on a chain claim to be a true individual, moving as it wishes?

This leads us perfectly into the more Buddhist view, that is an alternative to the evolution/God-is-the-chooser view. It might say it is neither God nor evolution, but interdependence. The existence of any one thing depends on all things. Our movement is not separate from the rest of the universe. It’s all one inter-connected movement, and one has to wonder where, within it all, is there any room for individuality and free will. If everything depends on everything else, then it is all inter-dependent, and that necessarily means there is no independent choice.

But say you’re not convinced and you feel you might have just a tiny bit of free will anyway, to have and to hold. Well is it not quite obvious that our choices are but a result of our genes and up-to-date conditioning? Which are utterly out of our control. Genes, we were born with. Our conditioning is a result of all of our life experiences, and surely we didn’t choose all the life experiences we had. I mean, did you choose to get into that terrible relationship? Or did you simply not know better? It wasn’t in your programming (conditioning) at the time to be able to smell where this relationship was going… You lacked experience at the time. It was your conditioning to go into it. It was only after the relationship ended that, most likely, your conditioning changed. But you didn’t choose who you had become. It happened. Through life experience. Experience that, again, you didn’t choose to have. You thought you were going into a relationship that would make you blissfully happy… You thought that’s what you were choosing. So much for choice when we so often don’t even know what we’re choosing. You may choose to go to a concert to have fun, but you end up crushed by the moshpit, and leave bruised, pissed and miserable. That… wasn’t really your choice.

The truth is that the next thing comes, whatever it is, regardless of what it is you think you’re choosing for yourself. I remember in India always asking for no spice in my food, and receiving enough spice for 7 people in my dish anyway. I “chose” no-spice, life gave me extra spice. If we really had choice, we would feel in control of our lives and of ourselves. There would be no addictions. Things would go our way. Life wouldn’t surprise us with curve balls constantly. We would know exactly what we’re getting into every single time we made a choice - we would know what we’re choosing. But even that we don’t know. Our choices are much more like guesses. Maybe it will lead to what we want, maybe not.

Let’s face it, we’re not in control. And the process of decision-making only feels real, but is actually a result of a false sense of separation from the whole.

BUT… there are good news at the end of it all. You ready? The good news is this: It’s freedom we want, not free will. “What?,” you say, “they’re one and the same!” No, no, no, not at all. Free will - choice - is bondage. Being not-separate from the whole, is freedom. It is the sense of separation that makes you constantly desire something other than what is. This is rarely ever good enough, you want THAT (whatever your THAT is). And you hope that having choice will enable to get what you want. We think freedom is being able to have something, like have the life we want. But it is the desirer that is the cause of suffering to begin with. Wanting what isn’t rather than what is, it attaches to these desires, these outcomes - and suffers, for it decides it is not complete until the desire is satisfied. But, of course, the death of one desire is the birth of the next. And on it goes. And thus one feels never fully and truly satisfied. UNTIL… one sees the absurdity and is happy with what is, as it is. This is the realization of non-separation from life. The realization that there is no ‘you’ to choose anything, for ‘you’ are a part of the whole’s (life’s) movement. THIS is freedom. Not-wanting. Not being troubled by choice and the search for THAT rather than THIS, what is.

Choosing occurs. But no chooser there is. (In Yoda-speak).

In a way, everything is pointless. — Truth Seeker

This is a very human thing to say.

The universe does not have a "point". Existence is a given. We don't question the given, only our place in the universe. And even that question is a narcissistic notion. I say, live for the arts, the appreciation of beauty.

However, brain activities are not dumb physical processes. — Truth Seeker

Is a thought produced by dumb physical processes.

So are these:

The human brain is the product of billions of years of evolution. It doesn't function the way clouds do. It has responsive feedback systems that are self-correcting to make sure that the model of reality generated by the brain is accurate enough for the organism to survive and reproduce in the real world. — Truth Seeker

Even if we accept that the brain is evolved for survival (which is another thought resulting of dumb physical processes), then that wouldn't imply that our thoughts are accurate. We have no way of knowing the degree of correlation between accurate representations of the world, and evolutionary success, so we cannot assume from evolutionary success that our brains are accurate.

And on a simpler level: I do not think you can rationally think, if you are being FORCED to think things. Why is a cloud that spells "2+2=4" not rational? Because it did not choose to spell that, it was just the wind. Similarly, under determinism, I cannot call any thought rational, even if it happens to be accurate. I'm curious what you think. How can rationality arise from a bunch of irrational processes?


However I am also so interested in why you think the world is deterministic in the first place, especially given that science doesn't support the notion anymore as far as I can tell. You read the thought experiment with the cat and the gun. There is also a much clearer example:

In order to discovere quantum randomness, some scientist would have had to repeat an experiment and observe that he randomly got different outcomes correct?

What if that scientist (I am unfamiliar with the history so I wouldn't know who) just got unlucky, and got the same outcome every time he repeated the experiment.

Then the discovery of quantum randomness would have been delayed years. The discovery of quantum randomness is a huge macro event in itself if I've ever seen one, and it's borne out of randomness.

The workings of the brain create perceptions, thoughts, emotions, actions. None of these things are dumb physical processes.

We have no way of knowing the degree of correlation between accurate representations of the world, and evolutionary success, so we cannot assume from evolutionary success that our brains are accurate.

That's not true. If an organism's brain can't produce an accurate enough model of its environment it dies from environmental hazards or predation. The fact that I avoid environmental hazards and predators successfully shows that my brain produces a sufficiently accurate model of the reality I live in.

We can choose to think about a specific topic but the thoughts arise unconsciously. For example, the contents of this post are thoughts that occurred to me as a result of me reading your post. It is not dumb, it is responsive to stimuli.

We subject our thoughts to analysis to work out if the thoughts are rational or irrational. A cloud is not sentient. A cloud has no control over the wind. We are sentient and we can control which topic we choose to think about. A cloud can't analyse the shapes it forms to see if it has formed something irrational or rational.

Quantum decoherence stops quantum indeterminacy from creating macroscopic indeterminacy. At macroscopic levels, events are still deterministic. If you toss a coin, whether it lands on its head or tail depends on the forces acting on it.

I am quoting ChatGPT 4:

Quantum decoherence is a fundamental phenomenon in quantum mechanics where a quantum system loses its quantum properties, like superposition and entanglement, due to interaction with its environment. This process effectively makes the quantum behavior of the system unobservable, making it appear more classical. Here are some key factors that cause quantum decoherence:

Interaction with the Environment: Quantum systems are incredibly sensitive to their surroundings. Even minimal interactions with external particles or fields can cause a quantum system to decohere. This includes interactions with photons, air molecules, or even stray electromagnetic fields.
Loss of Isolation: Quantum coherence, which is the maintenance of quantum states like superposition, requires that the system be isolated from external influences. In practical terms, complete isolation is nearly impossible to achieve, and any exposure to the external environment can lead to decoherence.
Entanglement with the Environment: When a quantum system interacts with the environment, its quantum states can become entangled with those of the environmental particles. This entanglement leads to a redistribution of the quantum information into the environment in a way that can no longer be controlled or observed by examining the system alone.
Thermal Interactions: Temperature and heat are forms of kinetic energy associated with the motion of particles. At higher temperatures, the likelihood and intensity of interactions between the quantum system and its environment increase, leading to faster decoherence.
Measurement and Observation: The act of measurement can lead to decoherence. Measuring a quantum system often involves some form of interaction with it (like photons impacting electrons), which can cause the wave function to collapse to a particular state, effectively causing decoherence.
Decoherence is one of the major challenges in developing quantum technologies, such as quantum computing and quantum cryptography, as it limits the ability to maintain and manipulate quantum states over time.

I appreciate lots of things but what is ultimately the point of existence? If I could have prevented my existence, I would have done so a long time ago. I am upset about all the suffering, inequality, injustice, and death. I want to make all living things forever happy, but I can't.

I don't know. I'm not a physics scientist. To me the idea of Eternal Recurrence seems logical. And that in combination with a Big Bang & Big Crunch.

It's better than the idea of God. I recently lost my faith in God, after worshipping Him for as long as I can remember. It is hard. But these are good alternatives.

Also, ChatGPT recommends me to use philosophy to get through this difficult phase.

I understand how you feel. Like you, I used to be religious. Like you, I found leaving religion very difficult. If you want to talk more about it, you can send me a private message.

The workings of the brain create perceptions, thoughts, emotions, actions. None of these things are dumb physical processes. — Truth Seeker

"I am not sure that government official is very trustworthy"
"But look! He said he's trustworthy!"

That's what this sounds like to me. See why I don't find it convincing?

Note, that it's not that I think that our brains are unreliable, it's that I think that we have no reason to think they're reliable under a deterministic framework and we have reason to think they're unreliable under that same framework. Namely: Every other physical process is not rational, how come our brains just happen to be?

Again, I am not saying that our brains are irrational under a deterministic framework - which seems to be what you're arguing against - I am saying we have no basis for thinking they are, and some basis for thinking they're not. I would need you to argue that we have a basis for thinking our brains are rational, which you attempt to do by arguing that a rational brain would lend to better survival odds, but:

That's not true. If an organism's brain can't produce an accurate enough model of its environment it dies from environmental hazards or predation. — Truth Seeker

Perception requires some sort of energy. Sight, hearing, etc, all require different organs which consume energy. Which means evolution has to find what are the most beneficial things to perceive in compairson with how much they take to perceive. It's not like creating an omniscient being is just as "cheap" materially and in terms of food intake as creating something that sees much less. Spiders are almost blind and they survive just fine.

It is well known our brain doesn't perceive everything. We don't perceive UV, we don't perceive microwaves, we don't have that ability that birds have to detect the magnetic field produced by earth's core to know which direction is north (despite it being a very useful ability, considering how impactful compasses are).

Since we cannot perceive what our brain doesn't perceive (by definition), we cannot know how much we do perceive or how much it is altered by our brains (we know our brain alters perceptions, or else how would optical illusions arise?) So I don't believe the argument from evolution works when you take into account that there is a cost for exact perception which might not be worth the payment. What do you think?

We can choose to think about a specific topic but the thoughts arise unconsciously. — Truth Seeker

See, what's what I think, but you tell me there is no "choosing" at all.

We subject our thoughts to analysis to work out if the thoughts are rational or irrational. A cloud is not sentient. A cloud has no control over the wind. We are sentient and we can control which topic we choose to think about. — Truth Seeker

If you contend that we can control what we think about, then we can't be running deterministically right? How can we be in control if everything we think is predetermined?

I understand that there are compatibalist views which support both free will and determinism, but you stated multiple times that you don't believe in those, and that we'd need freedom to have any choice, and so any responsibility. For the last couple of paragraphs though you suddenly mentioned "choice" a dozen times. I'm confused...

Quantum decoherence stops quantum indeterminacy from creating macroscopic indeterminacy. At macroscopic levels, events are still deterministic. If you toss a coin, whether it lands on its head or tail depends on the forces acting on it. — Truth Seeker

Funnily enough, I asked ChatGPT the same thing earlier, but I don't think it is an adequate response. It descirbes what occurs in most quantum systems in nature, but I'm just curious how it meshes with the experiment I outlined.

I thought it was clear from my example that under certain setups quantum indeterminancy can cause huge macro effects (like determining the fate of a cat). I understand that these stetups would be extremely rare, but who is to say they never exist naturally. They definitely can exist in a lab.

I doubt the qualifications of ChatGPT as a physicist, but since you quoted it, here is what it has to say about my thought experiment:

What if we took the Stern-Gerlach experiment and extended it, so that when a particle's spin is up, a gun is fired at a wall, and when it is down, it isn't fired. Wouldn't that be an example of quantum indeterminance having macro effects?

ChatGPT:

Yes, that's a fascinating thought experiment! What you're describing is a hypothetical scenario where the outcome of a quantum event at the microscopic level (the spin of a particle in the Stern-Gerlach apparatus) directly influences a macroscopic event (the firing of a gun).

In such a scenario, if the particle's spin determines whether the gun is fired or not, and if the spin is truly subject to quantum indeterminacy, then the firing of the gun would indeed seem to be influenced by quantum randomness. If you repeated this experiment many times with identical setups, you would observe a statistical pattern where approximately half the time the gun fires and half the time it doesn't, mirroring the 50/50 outcome of the particle spin measurement.

This concept highlights the intriguing aspect of quantum mechanics where seemingly random and unpredictable events at the quantum level can potentially lead to observable effects at the macroscopic scale. It's worth noting that while this thought experiment is intriguing, actual implementation would be extremely challenging due to practical constraints and the delicate nature of quantum systems at the macroscopic level. Nonetheless, it serves as a thought-provoking illustration of the foundational principles of quantum mechanics.

It seems to agree.

I think that we have no reason to think they're reliable under a deterministic framework and we have reason to think they're unreliable under that same framework. Namely: Every other physical process is not rational, how come our brains just happen to be?

What reason do we have to think they are unreliable under a deterministic framework? There is nothing irrational about any physical processes e.g. clouds forming shapes. What shapes a cloud forms is entirely deterministic. It occurs due to the laws of physics acting on matter and energy. So, your claim “Every other physical process is not rational” is false.

Perception requires some sort of energy. Sight, hearing, etc, all require different organs which consume energy. Which means evolution has to find what are the most beneficial things to perceive in compairson with how much they take to perceive. It's not like creating an omniscient being is just as "cheap" materially and in terms of food intake as creating something that sees much less. Spiders are almost blind and they survive just fine.

Evolution is not sentient. It doesn’t plan and it doesn’t calculate the best option in terms of costs and benefits. It works through mutation – which occurs due to mistakes. We are all mistakes of nature. Nature doesn’t care if we live or die. This is why 99.9% of all the species to evolve so far on Earth are already extinct and the remaining 0.1% are also at risk of going extinct.

Sight is not the only way to create a model of one’s environment. Spiders have eight eyes which can detect light and darkness. Spiders are highly sensitive to motion. Which helps them survive and reproduce. Have you ever seen a human without any capacity to see, hear, touch, taste, and smell? Would such a human be able to survive without help from other humans? I have seen people in a coma. They were kept alive by machines and doctors and nurses. Without their help, the patients would die.

It is well known our brain doesn't perceive everything. We don't perceive UV, we don't perceive microwaves, we don't have that ability that birds have to detect the magnetic field produced by earth's core to know which direction is north (despite it being a very useful ability, considering how impactful compasses are).

Since we cannot perceive what our brain doesn't perceive (by definition), we cannot know how much we do perceive or how much it is altered by our brains (we know our brain alters perceptions, or else how would optical illusions arise?) So I don't believe the argument from evolution works when you take into account that there is a cost for exact perception which might not be worth the payment. What do you think?

I agree that our brain doesn’t perceive everything. It doesn’t have to perceive everything for humans to survive and reproduce. It has to perceive just enough about hazards such as falling off cliffs or getting eaten by lions to ensure our survival and reproduction.

See, what's what I think, but you tell me there is no "choosing" at all.

That’s not what I said. I said that our choices are determined and constrained by our genes, environments from conception to the present, nutrients from conception to the present, and experiences from the womb to the present.

To prove me wrong, you would have to do only the following:

1. Live forever without consuming any oxygen, fluids, or food.
2. Do things other organisms e.g. tardigrades, dolphins, chameleons, etc. can do.
3. Teleport everywhere and everywhen.
4. Prevent all suffering, inequality, injustice, and deaths.
5. Make all living things (including the dead ones and the never-born ones) forever happy.
6. Be all-loving, all-knowing, and all-powerful and make all the other beings also all-loving, all-knowing, and all-powerful.
7. Own an infinite number of universes and give all beings an infinite number of universes each for free.

Once you have done the above tasks, I will be convinced that your choices have no constraints but even then, your choices will still be determined by the variables (e.g. your experience of reading these words) that produced the choices.

If you contend that we can control what we think about, then we can't be running deterministically right? How can we be in control if everything we think is predetermined?

It is because we are running deterministically that we make the choices we make. I didn't say that our choices are predetermined. They are determined in the present by the interactions of four types of variables which are genes, environments, nutrients, and experiences.

Our choices are both determined and constrained by our genes, environments from conception to the present, nutrients from conception to the present, and experiences from the womb to the present. This is why banana trees don’t post on this forum and humans don’t do photosynthesis.

We don’t have complete control over everything we do. The amount of control we have is determined and constrained by our genes, environments from conception to the present, nutrients from conception to the present, and experiences from the womb to the present.

I do some things even though I don't want to do them. Here are some things I have done, currently do or will do even though I don't want to do them:

1. Breathe
2. Eat
3. Drink
4. Sleep
5. Dream
7. Pee
8. Poo
9. Fart
10. Burp
11. Sneeze
12. Cough
13. Age
14. Get ill
15. Get injured
16. Sweat
17. Cry
18. Suffer
19. Snore
20. Think
21. Feel
22. Choose
23. Be conceived
24. Be born
25. Remember some events that I don't want to remember
26. Forget information that I want to remember
27. Die

If I had as much control as I would like, I would never do the 27 things I listed.

I understand that there are compatibalist views which support both free will and determinism, but you stated multiple times that you don't believe in those, and that we'd need freedom to have any choice, and so any responsibility. For the last couple of paragraphs though you suddenly mentioned "choice" a dozen times. I'm confused...

We would need to be all-knowing and all-powerful to be able to do everything we want to do and to refrain from doing everything we don’t want to do and to have complete control over everything that exists. I am sorry that you are confused. Has reading everything I have said above helped you to understand what I am talking about? I have never said that we don’t make choices. I have said many times that we make choices and these choices are not free from determinants and constraints. These choices are determined and constrained by our genes, environments from conception to the present, nutrients from conception to the present, and experiences from the womb to the present.

Yes, your thought experiment about connecting the trigger of a gun to the spin of subatomic particles is interesting. However, that is not how the macroscopic world works. Quantum decoherence is the reason the macroscopic world does not exhibit the superposition, indeterminacy, and entanglement that exist in the quantum world. Quantum decoherence is the reason the macroscopic world is deterministic despite quantum indeterminacy.

I hope that I have explained everything clearly. If you have any questions, please ask. If you can prove me wrong, please do. Thank you.

There is nothing irrational about any physical processes e.g. clouds forming shapes. What shapes a cloud forms is entirely deterministic. It occurs due to the laws of physics acting on matter and energy. So, your claim “Every other physical process is not rational” is false. — Truth Seeker

What I meant by "irrational" is that we aren't justified in believing the cloud if it happens to spell "2+2=5". Or even if it spells "2+2=4". Are we agreed on that?

If so, what makes us justified in believing our brains? Even though they follow the same "irrational" processes.

Sight is not the only way to create a model of one’s environment. — Truth Seeker

You're right. But without it, the model is incomplete. And if we know that evolution can create creatures with incomplete models, why do you trust that it would create creatures with a valid or accurate rationality?

As far as I understand, you claimed that:

1- Our brains our products of natural selection
2- Natural selection would favor rational organisms that have accurate representations of their environments
3- Therefore our brain is rational and has an accurate representation of its environment

I am doubting #2. I do not see why it would be true apriori, and can think of circumstances where irrationality or inaccurate representations of reality can actually aid survival.

I agree that our brain doesn’t perceive everything. It doesn’t have to perceive everything for humans to survive and reproduce. It has to perceive just enough about hazards such as falling off cliffs or getting eaten by lions to ensure our survival and reproduction. — Truth Seeker

Exactly. We are evolved to reproduce. Not to be rational. So what makes you so sure we're rational?

A dualist doesn't have to deal with this issue, since they can maintain that rationality comes from the immaterial "mind" or "soul" or whatever they call it. Neither does an idealist. However a naturalist determinist does, since he has to concede that:

A- Atoms aren't rational (in the sense that we are not justified in believing any statement uttered or written by any random assortment of atoms... like a cloud for instance)
B- Somehow our brain (a collection of atoms) IS rational

The evolutionary argument you outlined is a good attempt. IF it is the case that Natural selection favors having accurate representations of the world, and rationality to boot, then we can reasonably think that our brains were naturally selected for so as to be rational and have an accurate representation of the world.

However, that premise itself needs to be proven, and I don't see how it can be as there are many examples of inaccurate representations of the world being more beneficial for survival, and thus being selected for. There are even examples of irrationality being more beneficial for survival, see cognitive biases such as sunk cost fallacy.

Yes, your thought experiment about connecting the trigger of a gun to the spin of subatomic particles is interesting. However, that is not how the macroscopic world works. — Truth Seeker

How do you know this? Have you examined every single physical configuration in the universe and determined that there is nothing akin to the thought experiment I outlined?

The way clouds behave and the way brains behave are due to their structure. A cloud can't assess whether 2+2=4 or 2+2=5 is true. We can. The reason we can assess it is due to the complexity of the human brain which is due to our genes, environments from conception to the present, nutrients from conception to the present, and experiences from the womb to the present. Dogs have brains, too, but they can't even read though dogs are alive and sentient. That's because dogs have different genes, environments from conception to the present, nutrients from conception to the present, and experiences from the womb to the present.

I didn't claim that humans are rational. Humans are much more emotional than rational. Billions of us believe in self-contradictory and mutually contradictory religions. It's not rational to believe in the religions we have on Earth. We evolved to survive and reproduce. That's why we are so bad at understanding quantum mechanics. Our brains didn't evolve to understand quantum mechanics or dark matter or dark energy. We still haven't figured out a Unified Theory of Everything because our brains didn't evolve to do such things. We still don't know what dark matter and dark energy are because our brains didn't evolve to do such things.

I didn't say that natural selection would favour rational organisms. Natural selection would only favour organisms that are good at survival and reproduction. That's why bacteria are the most successful type of organisms on Earth. They are the most numerous organisms on Earth. Also, they are the longest surviving organisms on Earth because they have been around for 3.5 billion years. Humans have been around only 200,000 years and there are only 8.1 billion of us alive right now. Human bodies have more bacteria cells than human cells. There are an estimated five million trillion trillion (10^30) bacteria alive right now.

Quantum decoherence is the reason the macroscopic world does not exhibit the superposition, indeterminacy, and entanglement that exist in the quantum world. Can you show me even one instance when macroscopic objects have exhibited superposition, indeterminacy, and entanglement? No, you can't. You can't because quantum decoherence makes it impossible. Your thought experiment is irrelevant to how the macroscopic world works.

A dualist doesn't have to deal with this issue, since they can maintain that rationality comes from the immaterial "mind" or "soul" or whatever they call it. Neither does an idealist. However a naturalist determinist does, since he has to concede that:

A- Atoms aren't rational (in the sense that we are not justified in believing any statement uttered or written by any random assortment of atoms... like a cloud for instance)
B- Somehow our brain (a collection of atoms) IS rational — khaled

What evidence do you have that souls exist? How does an immaterial soul grant organisms rationality? How does an immaterial soul interact with a material body? How would idealism make us rational?

I already explained that our brains are more emotional than rational. Do you see one-minute-old babies produce logical statements? No, you don't. But one-minute-old babies cry when they are cold or hungry. This is because their choice to cry is determined and constrained by their genes, environments from conception to the present, nutrients from conception to the present, and experiences from the womb to the present.

I used to be a baby. You used to be a baby, too. When we were babies we could not even read 2+2=4. Yet, now we are both capable of assessing that 2+2=5 is false and 2+2=4 is true. This is due entirely to our genes, environments from conception to the present, nutrients from conception to the present, and experiences from the womb to the present. If we were feral children nurtured by monkeys in the jungle, we would not be able to even read 2+2=4.

In my previous post, I invited you to prove me wrong but you failed to prove me wrong.

The way clouds behave and the way brains behave are due to their structure. A cloud can't assess whether 2+2=4 or 2+2=5 is true. We can. The reason we can assess it is due to the complexity of the human brain which is due to our genes, environments from conception to the present, nutrients from conception to the present, and experiences from the womb to the present. — Truth Seeker

How would you go about proving that our brain just happens to be set up such that it produces true statements (at least, often enough for us to have meaningful discussion)?

Complexity is not a good explanation. Why is a cloud incapable of assessing wether 2+2=4 but we are? When do atoms get "complex enough" to be rational? The city of Tokyo is very complex, but I don't think you'd say it's capable of rational thought, right?

The point still remains, that from my POV, under your brand of Materialistic Monism all I know is that there is a bunch of atoms doing a bunch of physical processes, and in the end producing that post you just wrote. Why should I believe a bunch of atoms? I don't believe the cloud atoms, why are your atoms so special?

Now what I ACTUALLY think is happening, is that whether through a soul, or something else, there is a part of you capable of choice, and thus is capable of choosing what to think about, and thus is capable of forming rational conclusions by consciously choosing to think rationally. Because, again, I do not think a thought can be rational if you are FORCED to think it, and cannot think of anything else (which is how all thoughts are under a deterministic framework). Frankly, I used to be a Materialistic Monist like yourself, but I don't know where I stand now, so my view may be full of holes, but I'm just pointing out why I no longer found MM satisfactory.

I didn't claim that humans are rational. — Truth Seeker

Well, we have to assume we're rational enough to at least have a discussion! Or else, there is no point in continuing! From now on, when I say "rational" I mean "rational enough to have a discussion" or "can access whether or not 2+2=4 is true".

Quantum decoherence is the reason the macroscopic world does not exhibit the superposition, indeterminacy, and entanglement that exist in the quantum world. Can you show me even one instance when macroscopic objects have exhibited superposition, indeterminacy, and entanglement? — Truth Seeker

I did not set out to show that macroscopic objects exhibit superposition. I set out to show that the world is not deterministic, even on a macro scale. In order to do this, I would need an example of a macro scale event, that is not determined by prior events, correct?

I think the cat shows that very well. There is a scenario where the death or life of the cat is NOT predetermined. Therefore the world we live in is not predetermined. What am I missing?

What evidence do you have that souls exist? How does an immaterial soul grant organisms rationality? How does an immaterial soul interact with a material body? How would idealism make us rational? — Truth Seeker

I didn't really argue for souls, although I believe in something like a soul. And I have no clue how they would interact with a material body. But the thing that all these beliefs can do is outright assume that the "soul" (or whatever they use) is rational. Which as far as I understand is what they often do.

Your brand of Materialistic Monism cannot do that, because it also has to contend with the fact that the atoms that make us up are not rational, AND that evolution does not necessarily favor rationality, AND that there is nothing more that makes us up or determines our behavior other than these irrational atoms. You have to believe that we got really, really lucky.

First we have to assume that a collection of atoms can be set up to have a good representation of the world it's in (this is not a given. Look up the "The Self-Referential Sentinel" paradox)

Then we have to assume that our particular collection of atoms happened to find one of those good setups, despite knowing that evolution does not necessarily favor these complex setups with accurate representations of the world, much less rationality.

To understand what you're saying better though: Do you believe that rationality is strongly or weakly emerged from our atoms?

The key issue here is not complexity. The key issue here is the structure. A baby's brain is complex but there is a huge difference in structure between someone's brain when they are a baby compared to when they are an adult. The structure of Tokyo is complex, too. However, it does not have the structure a brain has. The behaviour of brains depends on the electrochemical activities of the neurones. This depends on genes, environments from conception to the present, nutrients from conception to the present, and experiences from the womb to the present.

I recommend that you study neuroscience. In a previous post I gave you two links and you said you skimmed them because you didn't have the knowledge to understand them. The only way to remedy this is for you to study neuroscience. I know lots of neuroscientists who, like me, are happy to be materialist monists. I think your ignorance is getting in your way.

I agree that we are rational enough to have a discussion and assess whether 2+2=4 is true. This does not require the existence of souls. The capabilities of our brains are determined by our genes, environments from conception to the present, nutrients from conception to the present, and experiences from the womb to the present.

I did not say that events are predetermined. I said that events are determined in the present by the interaction of variables. Even in your thought experiment, what happens is determined in the present by the interaction of variables.

I have noticed something interesting about your posts. You frequently misquote me by claiming that I made statements I never made. I am not blaming you. If I had your genes, your environments from conception to the present, your nutrients from conception to the present, and your experiences from the womb to the present, I would have done the same thing. After all, we are not free from our determinants and constraints.

You keep making the same mistake. Atoms are not rational or emotional or perceptive or wise or ethical or anything else that you would attribute to a conscious being. These attributes are weakly emergent properties of the electrochemical activities of the brain. Please note that I said electrochemical activities of the brain. It is not enough to just have a bunch of atoms. The actual structure matters. You really need to study neuroscience for you to be able to understand this. An average human body is 65% oxygen, 18.5% carbon, 9.5% hydrogen, 3.5% nitrogen, 3.5% other chemical elements. It's not enough to just line up these elements in the correct proportion. They have to be in proper structure for a human body to be alive and functional.

The bodies and brains of all the extant species are good enough for survival and reproduction. Otherwise, they would have gone extinct.