The Determinist/Free Will Debate - Freedomain Radio

Stefan Molyneux of Freedomain Radio takes on three determinists in a free-for-all video philosophy cagematch! :) http://www.freedomainradio.com

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• biology
• determinism
• free
• molyneux
• philosophy
• physics
• science
• stefan
• will

[proxyamenra]

The proponents of the determinist position in this discussion made this extremely painful to listen to.

[jozhikas]

I'm mid-video and I can't believe the determinist camp isn't comparing the human mind to a computer. 'But a rock falling somewhere can't be wrong' yea but a computer coming up with an output that does not coincide with reality can be defined by other fleshy computers as wrong and not to be acted upon if systemically imbeded incentives geared towards self-replication are to be followed. Nowhere did free will come in, but an action was still defined as false - wrong. What am I not getting?

[jozhikas]

Ugh. 24:50 if you could stop the rain from dislodging rocks atop your car, you would do that. Fleshbots don't like banged up cars, fleshbots go after whatever causes the cars to get banged up. You can't stop the rain, but having the information that other fleshbots don't like negative consequences, you can (and therefore are determined to withcaveatsblabla) inflict such consequences on those that deterministically cause banged-up-edness. Is that a possible determinist position?

[dartplayer170]

@marketanarchist2011 Of course not. But it's futile since you as a determinist understand that you may be wrong simply because of the circumstances that led to your decisions. This is self detonating. Inovation is also self detonating because afterall inovation means new idea. But in fact the idea always existed in the future. This is refered to as actualism. Actualism and hard determinism go hand in hand.

[marketanarchist2011]

@dartplayer170 Me debating with you is not me saying that I'm smart. After all, intelligence is the ability to have inovative ideeas.

[dartplayer170]

@marketanarchist2011 Once again self detonating. You may not agree that this is an argument but it is the point that Stefan is making. He is saying that if you want to take the position of determinist, fine. But in doing so you cannot deny that it is a self detonating position. Why? Because every aspect of thought is an illusion including intelligence. You think you're smart. You are lucky not smart. You are lucky that all the right stimulous and conditions made you think correctly!

[dartplayer170]

@MirageScience That is not the point. You're breaking initial definitions of determinism. Changing initial conditions can obviously change the outcome. But in the real world we cannot do this. The initial conditions are always the result of previous conditions. Unless you bring God into this, that is the determinist position. It is not possible to add rocks after the initial conditions without some miraculous intervention. All rocks in any given world are bound by determinism!

[dartplayer170]

@MirageScience Give an example. It is impossible for me to agree or disagree with such an ambiguous statement. I clearly see the cause of Stefan's frustration in this debate but no determinist ever gets this point. I find that amusing. Afterall, all humans have essentially the same ability to see logic. Yet, we cannnot agree on certain logical arguments based on initial stances in a broader argument.