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Studstill t1_j20r3mk wrote

Reply to comment by tokmer in An Argument in Favour of Unpredictable, Hard Determinism by CryptoTrader1024

I understand the situation you keep stating.

I'm not seeing how you are stating it as such.

Why would I go through the same door everytime?

What if one of the doors had an apple on it?

How are the atmospheric conditions always identical? (oh, because this is a simulation*, you said, my bad)

How does determinism apply to non-particle interactions, specifically how is this being stated?

Edit: Maybe I see, so this is simulation theory masquerading as "determinism".

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tokmer t1_j20ripp wrote

The question is why would you ever choose something different

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Studstill t1_j20tvkm wrote

Because choices are seemingly made from a near infinite pool of inputs, and due to local or hyperlocal conditions those inputs are not consistent.

Which means, without simulation fantasy, that we have two major problems:

  1. There is no way to differentiate whether I picked the door I was always going to or did I pick the other one.

  2. There is no way to determine how the door was chosen, so even if we could solve #1, it would still be an infinite trial and error.

Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems the argument is "well what if people were just like protons".

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tokmer t1_j20uyvi wrote

Do you think the idea of determinism is meant to be predictive of future behaviour?

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Studstill t1_j20vew8 wrote

Not exactly, but the thought experiment extrapolation (anti-free will/predestination) seems to be based on such.

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tokmer t1_j20vw3z wrote

I mean yes it could theoretically be predicted given infinite knowledge and understanding but the point is more about morals.

Like how can we morally punish someone for doing something they could never choose not to do?

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Studstill t1_j20w99n wrote

Idk, and at least that (morals) line of thought has real roots and real applications (diminished capacity, et al).

What irks me is still this "if physics is determinable, then ofc everything is predestined and free will is an illusion #ironclad".....

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tokmer t1_j22vkgj wrote

Well how a rock moves is deterministic what makes us any different?

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Studstill t1_j22xubf wrote

Ok, I've read a bunch more in this thread, thanks for bearing with me, but yeah, I think I'd say:

The rock is a uniform solid, just simple predictable matter. I don't think a snake, or hamster, or human operates that way. I don't think that, because I can either choose or be unerringly illusioned to choose X or Y.

It seems just as silly to argue we are the same as a rock, than to say things would always happen one singular way, even if we could run it again.

I thought determinism wasn't this silly, so maybe I'm wrong, I thought it meant that there was an XYZ% of given events, that a coin will 49.999% of the time land on heads, not that the coin will always be heads on a given flip. My understanding of QM seems to back this up, as well.

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tokmer t1_j22zxbr wrote

Firstly qm is on a quantum level not a macro level, yes things can get weird when we look at things at an atomic level and we may not know how all that works but on macro levels we do know.

The coin flip is a great example actually though because when you flip a coin all the physics for that coin is already involved and calculable you can KNOW how that coin is going to land and how many flips its going to do and how far its going to move in any given direction and how many bounces its going to have.

The math is very complex but its there and no amount of quantum mechanics are going to change that.

This isnt a 50% chance this is 100% knowledge.

With the decisions a person makes are much the same albeit much more complex but complexity doesnt change the nature of something.

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Studstill t1_j230esa wrote

Sure, hard agree on complexity/nature of things, and great point about the coin, if its all classical mechanics than I totally follow you, but QM's "chances" are almost exactly how I feel about me controlling my muscles to flip a coin, or a pool shot. I think that's part of what is getting me so bad here, I do shoot a lot of pool, and the idea that a game (or worse all shots) are predestined because we understand the physics at hand is like, idk just inconceivable to the million experiments that I've run personally. To me, once the physical fundamentals of the game are learned, whether a shot goes in or not is almost entirely up to your mental state, and I'm not saying it is too complex to nail down, but that its akin to QM's inability to say things with 100% accuracy such as your vacuum sealed machine controlled coin flip.

Fun note: Someone did some coin experiments and I think said its about 1/10000 that it will land on its side, lmao, this the 49.999 instead of 50.

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tokmer t1_j2324a7 wrote

But quantum mechanics doesnt effect things on a macro level like qm randomness is never going to make a change to the outcome of a coin flip or a pool shot.

But for the pool shot your mental state is also something thats predetermined, the chemicals that flow through your brain the structure of your brain itself all of that is something thats built for each individual moment of your life.

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Studstill t1_j23329a wrote

>But quantum mechanics doesnt effect things on a macro level like qm randomness is never going to make a change to the outcome of a coin flip or a pool shot.

Is this absolutely true?

>mental state is also something thats predetermined, the chemicals that flow through your brain the structure of your brain itself all of that is something thats built for each individual moment of your life.

Again, just to be clear, its not the complexity of it that stops me, its that I don't see the science governing those interactions, I see it being extrapolated but the underlying science is, as of now (and maybe I'm ignorant), not certain on all interactions, particularly fluid flows in adaptable pipes, i.e. the brain.

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tokmer t1_j234nbw wrote

I have no idea if its absolutely true its my understanding that its the consensus of physicists but i am not a physicist and have not done enough research to say any of that for certain.

I would imagine though if qm made such a huge difference on the macro scale our traditional models wouldnt work right? Like we dont see random things happening on a macro level we see very predictable things.

Again im not an authority on this though and i have no citations very very good chance i have some fundamental misunderstanding here.

The parts governing brain though are knowable, we know certain drugs have effects on the brain, we know certain structures have certain purposes, just because we dont have 100% knowledge of it how it all works right now doesnt mean we cant know it right?

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Studstill t1_j2370p8 wrote

Sure, I'm a layperson here too re: QM, perhaps I'll make it back with a refreshed opinion. Thanks!

>Like we dont see random things happening on a macro level we see very predictable things.

Right.

>because we dont have 100% knowledge of it how it all works right now doesnt mean we cant know it right?

Hard agree, but nonetheless I think it could be unknowable, these could be purely philosophical questions with this origin in determinism making it seem scientific.

Being able to smoke pot or know where a hippocampus is has no bearing on it, regardless of the "complexity" or our current "X%" knowledge, we might never be able to play back a memory or fully control functions. I assume deterministic thinking disagrees with this?

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tokmer t1_j239wdt wrote

I only see the memes about fucking up snails on reddit tbh but it seems like there are scientists trying to implant memories and shit right now.

Again though thats entirely from memes so huge grain of salt but yeah according to a determinist it would be possible to put memories into someone or implant desires or whatever

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