Curious how many have changed their opinion regarding the free will/determinism debate?

I’ve studied this stuff for years and ultimately I think there is a lot of credibility in non-dualism.

The Adviata Vedanta is a mind f—k, but…whew….uh..that’s all I’m sayin’. lol

We do not know how the human mind works. We know that its processes are driven, at the most fundamental level, bu quantum mechanics. We do not know whether quantum mechanics is strictly deterministic, or to some extent truly stochastic. So we cannot give an hones, rational answer to this question yet.

They go hand in hand, all that you will do is already determined.
The past came out of the future and goes back to it.
The future came out of the past and goes back to it.
Eternity is where they meet and it rules over both.

The variance between free will and determinism is only apparent. It is due to an inability on our part to properly phrase the question and to see the sum total of reality. The universe as a whole is non-dualistic.

I believe they are all possible.

Fascinating For Good Reason podcast on this very topic.
http://www.forgoodreason.org/

I still believe as I did before, and even more so.

I don’t believe we have as much free will as we think we do but I believe we have some. However I also believe that the past and the future are part of a larger timeless moment in which everything exists simultaneously, or rather, outside of time. These two ideas appear to be mutually exclusive and I don’t know how to reconcile them.

flutherother
This age is the product of the mixture of all things on the top side and nothing on the bottom side , it is suspended in the midst of the two and is temporal.
This created the cycle of light and darkness or night and day which is time.

The purpose of this age is primarily for cleansing so that there is purity in all things,
and as such we see that the things that belong to nothing will be attracted to themselves While the things that are all things will ascend unto all hings in purity because they have placed the things of nothing in it’s proper place.

You will also find that reality within you.
So while in you there are many questions (false and ignorance), you will also find that the Answers( Truth and knowledge) are already within you.
When this realisation comes’ You are now born again and will prepare yourself to ascend unto all things purified.

And when your duality becomes singularity you are what is popularly known as Son of God.

@kess

Fascinating! Sounds like Hinduism. : )

@kess Thanks for the reply. There are so many things I don’t understand.

To believe that your life is predetermined is to give yourself an excuse for lack of fulfillment.
Free will exsists because we exsist and those who are brave enough to exercise such will find great rewards. Plus it doesn’t hurt to be sexy:p

LMAO @thekoukoureport

I think the truth is somewhere in the middle. Some things are within our own control, and over those things we have free will. Other things are out of our control and over those things, we don’t. I certainly don’t believe in fate/destiny/god or anything like that, but I do believe that there’s a great deal of our lives that is simply beyond our control (mainly because it is at the control of others).

I used to be muh more of a determinist than I am now. And much more of a pessimist. I think the two were related.

I think they’re related too! : )

I was a believer in free will and now I’m agnostic about it. Whether or not it exists, on a functional basis it appears to exist and has utility. Maybe it doesn’t but within my scope of existence behaving as if it does makes sense. Kinda like how no one’s abandoning Newtonian physics even though its been shown that they break down after a point. Until quantum physics and determinism become more applicable to the scope of my life I’ll live as if I do have free will.

Like logic I can not prove it, but it is a useful frame by which to process this world.

@fundevogel

Right. Act ’ as if’ and surrender to what is.

At least I could decide to believe strictly in determinism is I wanted to. I just don’t want to.

@ETpro

Wise choice. : )

I did when I first heard about

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Libet#Implications_of_Libet's_experiments

@mattbrowne The simple ability to refuse to act, as outlined in the article you linked to, is sufficient to indicate the presence of free will.

@ETpro Ah but why don’t you want to believe in determinism? You don’t ‘choose’ to believe in free will or determinism as if you were tossing a coin and getting heads or tails. You decide these things by examining your own mind and seeing what already exists there in terms of your experiences and your desires and your modes of thought. These factors already determine that you don’t want to believe in determinism.

Upon reading this you might think. Well I am going to prove that I have a free choice and I am going to choose to believe the opposite of what I first thought. Here again, someone with full knowledge of the cast of your mind might have predicted that you would react in precisely this way.

I am free to determine everything I can. I am determined to free everything I can.

@flutherother I won’t be dragged into an argument with someone who thinks they aren’t free to decide. You had just better decide to drop it because that is how it is.

@ETpro But they may not be able to make that choice. All variables may compel @flutherother to do that very thing. Perhaps I was hopelessly compelled to make this comment and what seems to be a choice to make it is just an illusion born of my inability to recognize the complex variables that made it inevitable.

Wow, how annoying is that. I’m not fond of arguing about things that are beyond the present scope of human understanding.

@fundevogel Precisely, No one can prove I do not have free will and neither can anyone prove we do. Until a proof comes along, I chose to just believe what feels right, understanding that it may at some date prove not to be true.

@CaptainHarley – When I changed my opinion I realized that the issue is not that simple. Libet’s experiment is not a proof either way.

@mattbrowne

Well, GOOD for you! Heh!

I’m pretty sure my heading out for mexican food is pre-determined.

There are no accidents and this includes having 5 mexican restaraunts within a 20 mile radius of my house. lol

I still conclude that there is technically no free will. Choice seems like a good word to describe a moment in a person’s life. Similar to how a movie has an intro, a climax, several dilemmas, and a conclusion. A person’s life has several moments of choice. But the movie always ends the same way and the person’s choices will always be exactly as they prefer in those exact and specific instances.

@fundevogel said: “Until quantum physics and determinism become more applicable to the scope of my life I’ll live as if I do have free will… Like logic I can not prove it, but it is a useful frame by which to process this world.”

For me, I’ve found that sometimes it’s useful to snap back into the assumed free will idea for smaller things but for bigger decisions determinism seems more practical/realistic.

@ETpro said: “At least I could decide to believe strictly in determinism if I wanted to. I just don’t want to.”

In actuality, if you could believe in determinism by choice, it would prove free will. It’s the fact that you can’t believe in determinism simply by choice that demonstrates the requirement of precedent evidence/events to cause your new belief.

(thanks for the replies guys!)

uhhh… is this Q turning into debate?

so far i think we’ve kept it pretty discussiony and not very debatey.. why do ya ask? :)
if you’re looking for persmission to throw some rocks.. go ahead! haha

Well, like I’ve said so many times before, nothing can be determined without a code to determine it upon. So when someone finds a code to the universe, then I will gladly believe that creation, and all there after was determined. Until then, I must allow free will to rule the day.

@ninjacolin “For me, I’ve found that sometimes it’s useful to snap back into the assumed free will idea for smaller things but for bigger decisions determinism seems more practical/realistic.”

I’m curious how determinism helps you make decisions. Shouldn’t the knowledge of forces guiding your decision be irrelevant to decision-making so so long as the forces are consistent? Or are you trying to pull some kind of Heisenberg juju [1] and change the outcome with observation?

Alternatively, why bother to make any decisions at all? Let the universe make them for you! : )

@CaptainHarley That isn’t really what determinism means. The universe doesn’t decide for you, instead your action is inevitably determined according to all factors in play, making the impression of choice illusory.

It’s been a while so I’ll say a bunch of crap and you guys can feel free to do with it as you please. I’m really not good at keeping things out of debate territory I don’t know why you guys trusted me in the first place, lolol:

@RealEyesRealizeRealLies why isn’t “cause and effect from one moment to the next” a good enough code for you? I don’t know in what way you want this code to manifest itself.

@fundevogel my latest understanding is that determinism is just a single truism. Similar to how atheism isn’t an entire system of beliefs so much as it is just a single premise: That no gods exist. Determinism is just a single premise as well: Everything that exists, must have been caused. You can express this in a number of meaningful ways:
– Anything that I want to exist, has to be caused somehow.
– I can’t just have whatever I want it first has to be possible for me to acquire it.
– People won’t like me without my giving them reason to.
– People won’t believe me without sufficient reason for them to believe me
– I can’t be full unless I eat
– I can’t finish my term paper unless I work on it
– There won’t be a city unless someone builds it
– Attitudes toward pollution won’t change unless people are informed/convinced/moved
– Attitudes towards determinism won’t change unless people are informed/convinced/moved :)

Things like that. Everything that anyone can possibly want in this world has to be payed for through achievement. Nothing is free. Things only come from other things. They don’t come out of nowhere.. in fact the only things that are caused by nothing are involuntary consequences.

If you’ve ever been in a position where some device, maybe even your car, wasn’t working properly and maybe you put it off for a time when finally one day you got fed up and decided to take a closer look only to find the solution was quite simple.. then you might agree with me that observation does in fact change the outcome of your actions. Only when you realize what’s really going on with the broken device do you finally have the motivation to fix it. So, yes, I like your Heisenberg judo concept. Observation, or rather Information, changes the outcome that you will be capable of: If you don’t know what a solution might be you won’t be able to fix it. Knowing more about the intricacies of cause and effect as they impact our thoughts and emotions gives us more power to do more in any given situation. Being able to cause ourselves via the intake of information to excel at whatever we want.. I’d say this is important.

@CaptainHarley I see determinism quite exactly as you suggested: The universe does make all your decisions for you. Everything I’ve ever done or will do in the future is caused by the past. Everything that ever occurred in the past was caused by the past of the past. The past, collectively, determines the present.

Who taught you english? You mom, your dad, your teachers, your friends, your tv, news, and book writers along with a whole bunch of other people. Because of their influence in your life, you now speak english instead of caveman. What are those people? They’re a part of the universe. Who taught them english? Other people.. Were those people a part of the universe? Yep. So, who invented english to start with? I know who: People! And those people were a part of the universe. Who made you dissatisfied with the last dissatisfying thing your government did? People!

Essentially, the universe does/causes everything. I can imagine this seems like an overstatement.. but hopefully you can see clearly how it’s really just a basic understanding of reality.

How can cause and effect be a “good enough code” when it’s not a code at all? Cause and effect are not the same as Thought and Affect.

Thought and Affect are required to Determine.

Determinism is a ridiculous attempt to Personify a thoughtless Universe. It’s a faulty premise right out of the gate.

“Determinism is a ridiculous attempt to Personify a thoughtless Universe” – no no.. determinism is a statement to the tune of: “Everything that we know of was caused.”

There’s no personification involved. Everything including thought. Thoughts are caused by non-living things. Just as seasons are caused/determined by planetary rotations.

“Thought and Affect are required to Determine.” – So, who’s thoughts “determined” that water particles would float while frozen? Who’s thoughts determined that the earth would be the 3rd planet from the sun? Do you imagine it was a person who conceived and determined these rules? And if so please explain what observable evidence there is to support this. (I’m only speaking from a sciency persepective. I can’t debate non-observable phenomenon. It may very well be that a flying spaghetti monster created the universe, but that spaghetti monster isn’t observable and hence has no useful place in such a discussion)

@ninjacolin It is quite true that I cannot simply will myself to believe something or not believe it. I currently do not either believe or disbelieve that all thought is deterministic. I know that I do not know. I know that research is underway that may tilt the probability in one or the other direction, but that data being unavailable to me right now, I don;t either believe or disbelieve. It seems to me the probability is about 50/50.

Well I sure am grateful for whomever determined that memory foam would make a killer mattress. Zzzzzzzzzzzzz

“who’s thoughts “determined” that water particles would float while frozen? Who’s thoughts determined that the earth would be the 3rd planet from the sun? Do you imagine it was a person who conceived and determined these rules?”

I don’t believe those things are determined. There’s no reason for anyone to believe that any of those things are determined. Just because something happened, or that something is the way it is doesn’t automatically mean that it was determined to be that way. How can anyone claim they are determined until they find a code which predetermined them? I see a building, I cannot claim it was determined until I also see the architectural plans (code) which predetermined it’s existence before it ever existed.

The genetic code predetermines blue eyes before the blue eyes ever exist in physical reality. Refer to the code and confirm determinism.

The musical score predetermines a flat G note before the note ever exists in physical reality. Refer to the code and confirm determinism.

There is no code that predetermines 3rd planet from the sun. It could have been the fourth, or the second. That’s not determinism. That’s chaos.

It is a sad day in science when Chaos is conflated as Determinism. The crowning jewel of paradoxical contradictions. Especially when there is a proven time tested repeatable consistent mechanism to check whether something is actually determined or not. That tool is Code, the existence of which demands us to acknowledge that an object was determined to exist before it ever actually exists in reality.

Cause/Effect does not equal Thought/Affect.

Cause/Reaction does not equal Thought/Action.

I was recently admiring the clever avatar of @meiosis. It illustrates my view that the current wave of modern science claiming that there is Order in the Universe is merely a regurgitation of the age old Determinism philosophy.

It is impossible to conclude that @meiosis avatar is Ordered or Determined unless a set of plans was produced that demonstrated the face to have been conceived of in a mind before, or as it was actually constructed. As most materialists would agree, this concoction, given enough time, might easily have formed on its own just through the random processes of chaos. It may take a few billion years, but it could have been the result of pure chance. And chance cannot and never will Determine. It is a contradiction of terms to say the least.

But when a human observer views the object, we place order upon it because it is recognizable to us. We have a recognition point, and this is no different than a mathematician having a recognition point of prior mathematical knowledge to observe and describe the universe. Order is placed upon objects at the point of describing them. Order, and Determinism require Mind.

Failure to recognize this leads many to believe that Order is everywhere in the cosmos. And there in lies the justification to erroneously claim that since there is perceived order, then Determinism is, and must be at play. This is faulty logic. And it leads science down the wrong path of ultimately personifying that which has no personage. The final conclusion of which is to suggest that the Universe is Mindful.

It’s very easy, and very tempting to create false gods. We should be more careful.

@RealEyesRealizeRealLies how can we know that you were the child of your parents instead of the child of pure chaos?
GA btw.

When asked by Boswell what he thought of Bishop Berkeley’s theory that matter may not, in fact, exist, Samuel Johnson kicked hard at a stone and stated, “I refute him thus!”

If I decide to kick a stone hard enough to break my big toe, that is sufficient refutation of determinism for me. This would be a decision I made at that moment, and no amount of philosophical sophistry will change my mind. : )

“How may we know?”

Check the code. Mine says, 50% mom and 50% dad.

“If I decide to kick a stone hard enough to break my big toe, that is sufficient refutation of determinism…”

IF – you “decide to kick a stone hard enough…”

THEN and only THEN – you have determined to “kick a stone hard enough”.

“Decide” IS Determine.
___________________________

The problem with these discussions is that the word Determinism has been coined to describe what otherwise is known as Causation. A comet can fall from the sky. It need not be Determined. All it needs is a Cause, and we would be silly to think it did not. No mind is necessary for Cause. Chaos will suffice for Cause.
___________________________

I’m not refuting that Determinism exists. It does. For I determined the comments on this reply. You may verify that with the code you see before you. Determinism is an act of Free Will. The mechanism used to accomplish determinism is Code authoring.

Causation, on the other hand, requires no mind. Now if someone would like to present an argument for Causation to explain every phenomenal activity in the cosmos, including my current comments, then you’d be on much more logical footing.

I think I see an inconsistency or two:

“Check the code.”

But you said code has to be authored. If the ordering of the position of the planets wasn’t code, why is genetics considered code? The laws governing gravity are just as serious as the laws governing fertilization. What mind determined that your genes would splice together the way they did? Must’ve been the same mind that determined the position of the planets.. or lack thereof.

” Just because something happened, or that something is the way it is doesn’t automatically mean that it was determined to be that way. ”

Yes it does. If a thing physically could have been different, it would have been. The only reason that a thing isn’t another way is because it couldn’t be another way. For example, why weren’t you born as the opposite gender? Is it because your sperm and egg chaotically arrived at your gender? Or is it because your sperm and egg could only produce your gender? If it were possible for you to be the opposite gender, why aren’t you the opposite gender? I dare say it’s impossible for you to have been born the opposite gender.

“The problem with these discussions is that the word Determinism has been coined to describe what otherwise is known as Causation.”

Don’t blame me. That’s just what determinism is supposed to mean. Your claim that determinism is an act of free will isn’t accurate. If you would like to redefine the term that’s one thing but the official definition and the one we’ve all been working with is this: Determinism (specifically causal determinism) is the concept that events within a given paradigm are bound by causality in such a way that any state (of an object or event) is determined by prior states. Hence “determinism” is the name of a broader philosophical view that conjectures that every type of event, including human cognition (behaviour, decision, and action) is causally determined by previous events.

As for Mind… a mind isn’t a magical decision making device that defies the laws of physics. A mind is simply a complex and intricate physical formation that does stuff. It’s more complex than a virus. It’s more complex than a volcano. But it’s just a physical object just the same. It has no magical properties that we know of.

@CaptainHarley Samuel Johnson kicked hard at a stone after he was asked a question. That is, his action was a reply to a precedent event. The event was the input of information into his brain via his ears. A bunch of sound waves exited the mouth of his interviewer, bounced around his eardrum, sent a signal to his brain, triggered his memories and imagination then erupted as his action of kicking a stone.

Cause and effect.

“If the ordering of the position of the planets wasn’t code, why is genetics considered code?”

Because the genetic code is called a code for very specific reasons. It fulfills Purlwitz, Burks, and Watermans formal definition of code being probability space A mapped to probability space B. It pre-determines an event prior to the actual event. I’m not saying the order of the planets wasn’t encoded for. But we can’t claim it actually is until we find that code. We haven’t.

“The laws governing gravity are just as serious as the laws governing fertilization.”

There is no law of gravity other than what humans author to describe gravity. Gravity is a force, not a law. We describe the observable characteristics of that force and call that The Law of Gravity.

Gravity is not a code either. Nothing about gravity tells us in advance if the spaceship will enter orbit on an elliptical path or a parabolic path. We observe and describe the path, and attach those labels afterwords. But code will tell us well in advance if a person has blue eyes or not. Forensics will confirm that in spades.

There is no Law of Fertilization either. Fertilization is determined by the co-joining of two sources of information. Thus, it abides by the rules of information, similar to a computer updating a program with another program.

“What mind determined that your genes would splice together the way they did?”

I make no claims to know the mind of an anonymous author. I only claim that where there be code, there must also be an author who wrote it. Many programs are written to allow them to re-author themselves based upon interactions with external stimuli. But in every case, they are created with this faculty from the very beginning by a sentient author.

“Must’ve been the same mind that determined the position of the planets..”

Purely speculation.

“I dare say it’s impossible for you to have been born the opposite gender.”

One quick change to the code and it would be very possible.

“Don’t blame me. That’s just what determinism is supposed to mean.”

I’m not. My mission is to return the word to its original meaning, sans the subjective leniency of loose tongued philosophers hijacking a word, changing its meaning to suit their position, and then propagating that meme throughout society to the extent that it confuses the issue.

”...specifically causal determinism…”

It’s good to define terms before discussing them. The word determinism doesn’t even need to be a part of Causality. It only personifies what shouldn’t be.

Causal determinism is the topic. The original word that you want to go back to was abandoned out of utility. We’re discussing causal determinism because there’s a case that can be made for it. I’m certainly not interested in discussing a misnomer.. know what I mean? There are new ideas that have yet to be understood and appreciated. Causal determinism is one of them. Out with the old and all that. :)

What I want to tell you is that determinism no longer personifies anything. If anything it de-personifies persons before it personifies non-persons.

“I dare say it’s impossible for you to have been born the opposite gender.” – One quick change to the code and it would be very possible.

But there was no change to the code! That’s why you must have been your gender. because things were the way they were, they weren’t any other way. It was impossible for you to be the opposite (or any other, for that matter) gender because all other possibilities were ruled out leaving only one possibility: your gender!

There are laws to the universe. Many thousands of years ago you could think maybe there was magic that made things happen but no more. You’re right that we don’t know all the codes, laws, and rules that govern the universe.. but we do know for a fact that everything seems to operate with some codes, laws, and rules. We know of absolutely nothing that operates without them.

The size of the earth, the position of the earth, the rotation of the earth.. all these things are set at their limits by previous states/events that forced them to be exactly as they are. Just like how your gender was selected for through a strict physical process of elimination that literally prevents you from being the opposite gender right this very second, the properties of the earth were selected for. Determined, not in the old way, but in the new way. They were caused by the laws and codes and rules that govern reality.

Reality is governed by very specific rules. We don’t understand them all, but we know the are real and binding. We’ve never been able to defy those rules ever. We’ve never observed the rules being defied. We have no evidence to suggest that perhaps there is room for defying those rules.

All other possibilities ruled out?

Who ruled this? Are you claiming that a WHAT can rule? Where is the court that determined this ruling? Where are the laws that govern that court?

”...determinism no longer personifies anything”

Causality doesn’t personify. But I refuse to allow the word Determinism to be a part of that conjunction. The point is made without the word Determinism. It’s worse than redundant. It’s static, and only serves to confuse the issue. What I want to tell you is that Determinism is Determined by a Determiner. And I have provided a mechanistic solution to confirm that statement.

“It was impossible for you to be the opposite…”

Will you now have me disregard Potentials too? What do you mean “impossible”?

Your friendly neighborhood geneticist would gladly have a wack at your code, cleverly rearrange the sequence, and show you just how possible it is. The genome is quite pliable, if in fact, one Determines it to be so.

“There are laws to the universe.”

Where? Where may I read these laws?

“we do know for a fact that everything seems to operate with some codes, laws, and rules.”

Oh raally… fact? A fact supported with hypothesis? It’s supposed to work the other way around. Show me the laws which support the facts. Laws, must be written as code. We should not confuse Observable Phenomenon with Laws.

“We know of absolutely nothing that operates without them.”

I look at the cosmos and see nothing but static. What code, laws, rules does static produce?

”...things are set at their limits by previous states/events that forced them to be exactly as they are”

How does a “previous states/events” set a limit? Did it draw a line in the sand and say, “Don’t cross that line… or else!”? More needless personification of the dumb cosmos… No need to invent another god… pah-leeze!

“They were caused by the laws and codes and rules that govern reality.”

No, they were simply Caused by Reacting to external pressures. Cause/Reaction does not set limits. Thought/Action does.

“Reality is governed by very specific rules.”

Please just show me one of these rules and I’ll buy it.

“We’ve never observed the rules being defied.”

Well, assuming for a moment to entertain your premise that there are rules (which they aren’t) but to satisfy the statement, we know very well that molecules at the quantum level react differently to the force of gravity than we otherwise would have expected them to. If gravity “obeys” laws, and we somehow know of these “laws”, then why does this surprise us to see the quantum state react differently? Are they breaking the law?

I propose there are no laws being broken whatsoever. For there are no laws to break. Humans observe and describe, and thereby create laws ourselves. Further observation provides further description, which allows us to author newer improved laws from newer improved observation techniques. But we don’t read any laws. We author them ourselves. The cosmos does not speak. And if it doesn’t speak, then we cannot possibly be receiving any information from it whatsoever.

The totality of the universe has converged perfectly over this way for me today, replete with a dressy dinner event, manifesting the perfect outfit and even the designated driver.

Yep, all the planets have lined up splendidly in my little cosmic cafe. haha

Rule: The sun is not twice as large as it was yesterday. There’s a rule that limits the sun to being it’s approximate size. What the rule is, who can say.. but indisputably for the past 17 and half years (at least!) the sun has not been twice it’s size and it has not been a quarter of it’s size. Why? Because it hasn’t been POSSIBLE for the sun to be any other size than it has been.

Fact? Yes. These are facts. It is a fact that the sun has not engulfed the earth with it’s mass or shrunken to the point of decimating life on earth. Not in the past 17 and a half years (at least!). This is observable (and observed) fact.

Molecules react consistently in an unconsistent way with our understanding of gravity at the quantum level. Why? Because the “rules” of the universe seem to consistently dictate that they must elude our greatest physicists.

I can’t accept your statement that there are no rules to the universe. There clearly are. This chaos that you refer to is nothing less than order.

“Will you now have me disregard Potentials too? What do you mean “impossible”?”

Rather, I would have you disregard hypotheticals. By impossible I mean.. lacking potential to become reality. When a human sperm has two xx’s and it hooks up with an egg.. the zygote lacks the potential to develop into a male. That is, it is impossible for that zygote to develop into a male fetus, child, adult. (And the reverse is true for xy’s that hook up with eggs)

If you jump off a cliff with no safety equipment (parachute, bungee cord.. etc..) there is 0 potential for you to fall upwards. It is impossible. If you don’t believe me, ask someone to try it. Ask millions of people to try it. Let’s see which of them can fly. There is order to the universe, not chaos. Things work one way, not any way. That way is what I would call “The laws of physics.”

“The sun is not twice as large as it was yesterday.”

That’s not a rule. That’s an observation. The “rule” is authored by humans when describing the phenomenal observation.

“This chaos that you refer to is nothing less than order.”

You don’t see the contradiction in that statement? It’s ordered because humans give it an order.

Confirm this by taking the viewpoint of an alien spacecraft sitting off the coast of Neptune. From their perspective, earth is not the third planet from the sun. From their perspective, earth is the sixth planet from their spacecraft. They have authored our solar system in a different order. That’s because the order doesn’t come from the cosmos. Order comes from the mind of an intelligent being. It’s the same state of a system, yet two separate orders have been placed upon it.

”...the “rules” of the universe seem to consistently dictate…”

So now the Universe “dictates”? I think the key term in your statement is “seems”. What Dawkins called “Apparent Design” to illustrate something that “seems” designed, but isn’t, is very appropriate to your position. You’re suffering from a common case of “Apparent Dictation”.

Dictation is a type of codified communication of information. To demonstrate that the Universe can dictate, you must first identify a genuine code that the dictation is being transmitted upon. Then you must identify how that code (let’s call it CosmoTalk) is translated into English so that we might interpret it.

“By impossible I mean.. lacking potential to become reality.”

If both xx and xy exist in reality, then the potential for each to manifest does in fact exist. It is a valid potential, nothing hypothetical whatsoever.

I think you and I have very different perspectives on time. That’s all I can say at the moment.

@RealEyesRealizeRealLies

Then why do we exist? Life can exist only within the very narrow parameters of a relatively large number of variables, all of which seem to be preset for our existence. How did that happen, and why?

The argument of Designed for Life is a pretty unstable premise to justify promoting a Godly creator being. If a God is truly a God, with all the Godly powers attributed to a God, then God could have made life possible in any circumstances, including those far away from what we consider inhabitable for human life.

God itself is not limited to living in our finely tuned Universe. That should be proof enough for the Theist to understand that life could exist beyond what we know.

But don’t get me wrong. You should know by now that I do belief in an omnipotent Creator for both the Universe and life on Earth. I just don’t accept the traditional concept.

“Then why do we exist”?

I’ve made that argument here. We have Lucifer to thank for our existence. Were it not for the Prideful Fall, then there would have been no reason whatsoever for the material realm to have been created.

“How did that happen…”?

I do not purport to know or understand how an immaterial being with Godly powers is capable of producing an entire physical universe from a nonphysical realm of pure thought. I do not know “How”, but I have no doubt that it is perfectly natural for such a being to be capable of accomplishing such a thing. Nothing miraculous about it whatsoever.

The problem is not that it requires a miracle… there’s no such thing as miracles or supernatural. The problem is that such an event seems miraculous to humans, but only because we don’t fully understand what the Natural actually is. I cannot explain the “How” of the Natural Universe.

But as to life, we have only to look to the Code to explain the “How”. The old belief that life is a matter of “just add water” is rapidly coming to an end. Life is a matter of “just add information”, and most contemporary scientists would readily agree with that statement.

This begs the question of “How” information is created. And the only known source of information is the process of a Mindful Sentient Being authoring Code.

Voilà!… The birth of Dualism.

Perhaps we need to nail down exactly what we mean by “dualism?” To me it is “ontological dualism,” something that has been disproven by quantum mechanics. Mind arrises out of the physical brain and thus is inseparably entwined with the structure of the universe… mind cannot “stand outside what is” and see reality en toto.

Any image/object relationship is Dualism. Thus when the image of code represents an objective thought, Dualism is at play. The arrangement of letters you see are just pictures. And these pictures are representative of something else besides the alphabet. They represent my thoughts.

The thoughts of my mind are not reducible to the pixels and letters on your computer monitor.

Notice I said, “thoughts of” as opposed to “thoughts in”. I cannot claim that Mind has an IN or an OUT. Thoughts and Minds don’t spill onto the floor during brain surgery. It comes as quite a surprise to me that anyone could possibly believe that Thoughts and Mind are physical objects. And I’m unfamiliar with any settled research on the matter suggesting “Mind arises out of the physical brain”.

Last I heard, a genome is formed before a brain is formed. The genetic code, being a code, is a physical representation of a Thought of Mind. Therefor the “physical brain” is a product of Mind. The code is what instructs a brain to form. The brain is just a medium. But the medium is never the message.

So where does the mind come from if not generated by the brain?

As stated in the other thread, the mind is either a part of the proto-mind of an immaterial Godlike being, which has always been, and we are part of it, or, the authoring of a new genome is actually the expression from the original author to create a new mind.

I have thoughts on both. But no time currently to go deeply into it. You may find more food for questions on the other thread. I fear this one is running astray from the OP. Perhaps not.

A bit convoluted and difficult to follow, but I think I understand what you’re driving at. This strikes me as being more the relm of metaphysics, or even of belief, than anything else.

As far as experimentation can carry us, we have determined that without brain, there is no mind. Even though we may suspect otherwise, we have no proof.

Sure we do. It’s just overlooked.

If thoughts can remain in existence after a person dies, then I suggest that a mind can continue to exist as well. For thoughts are nothing more than the expression of mind. All we need do is prove that thoughts can exist beyond the person.

So let me ask you. The words on this screen do one thing, right? They represent my thoughts, right? And they do it regardless if I’m active on fluther or not, right? And these words will represent my thoughts next week, next year, and even long after I’m dead… right?

I can kill my computer and yet you and a thousand other servers still have my thoughts intact. We can kill 99.999% of all of the servers and hubs in the world and yet my thoughts will still be intact. If destroying 99.999% of the mediums doesn’t affect the integrity of a thought, then why should be suppose that destroying all mediums would affect the integrity of a thought?

I’ve used this example before but it is appropriate to this discussion and hopefully hearing it again might cause it to sink in better to those who would revisit it.

Bono writes a song called Sunday Bloody Sunday. It starts out as a thought of his mind. He initially represents his thought as a scribble on a notepad. As his thought develops, it is scored to music (another thought) and lyrics are completed. That thought is represented as a codified description in a notepad, but the code is soon mapped to sheet music, and then mapped to vinyl grooves, and CD, and MP3, and DVD, and MTV, and Live Performances. The disks are copied and now there are millions of representations of the thought of Bono’s mind.

Get that. All of those mediums are representing one single thought. They are not millions of different thoughts. This illustrates that a thought is not tied to any one particular medium. Thus you can burn your U2 collection and I can trash mine, but we have in no way affected a change upon the original thought of Bono. Destroy all mediums except for one, and the thought remains intact with all the integrity of its origin. I have no reason to expect that destroying the last medium would affect a change either. Thoughts exist beyond physicality. And therefor, since many thoughts build a mind, I propose that mind exists beyond physicality as well.

Find an ancient manuscript that has been lost for a few thousand years. Deciphering it, mapping it to English, you are in the presence of the thoughts of someone who physically died long ago. Yet the thought transcends space and time. Thoughts are non physical. You can know the mind of Socrates in this very hour.

I would think you can “know the mind of Socrates” as filtered through the written Greek as translated into written English. That’s several filters and chances to get it wrong.

But you also have a chance to get it right, for yourself, if you are so inclined to research the original manuscripts and glean a personal meaning of how they relate to you.

It’s no different than seeing a news story. Many chains of interpretive perspectives, even within the same language.

There are many safeguards natural to languages that go a long way in preserving the original intended essence of meaning. Error correction, redundancy, noise reduction… all in place to ensure the meaning is transmitted and received accurately enough.

Alas, there are times when we simply cannot get the signal, be it bad radio reception, or a tattered ancient manuscript, or even a faulty DVD player. Sometimes the message does not come through. Yet that in no way suggests that the thought has been compromised in any way. Only our ability to receive it is compromised.

Such is the realm of deception and entropy. That’s all those devils do. That’s all they can do. Entropic forces serve one purpose, and one purpose only… they put noise on the line in any given signal, thereby attempting to prevent Truth from being received.

Interesting. It’s late here, and my mind is balking at further thought, but I shall return! : ))