h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Once again, i've torn up my rough drafts and struck out with a better finished product. Please let me know what you think!

www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A502525

And thus in less than 1000 words you have settled an arguement that has been going on for the last several thousand years, by all accounts.

You are going to need to go back in and consider each of your arguments. First of all, your logic is flawed being based on postulates which you have not defined nor specificed.

Secondly, you have not considered the other side of the argument, using starting conditions as proofs in later steps as if they had been proven.

Thirdly, you do not exhaustivly examine either side of the argument and blithely ignore conditions which are part of the free will side which you 'refute' when used for the other side.

Fourthly, when you use these words as your conclusion:
"I think that we can all agree that we really aren't victims of causation and that we really do have the ability to choose our course of action. Wether we do this consciouly or unconsciously is a question for another day, and another article."

You are quite obviously wrong.

On the other hand, I really like your artwork, though there *may* be too much of it. And you have begun to think through what you have written, you just haven't thought far enough.

Tomorrow, I will be happy to go through your article point by point and demonstrate some of your logical fallacies, one of the first of which was thinking that you were entitled to use logic based on a simple assertion.


Barton

Yes, sorry, but there's a huge amount of stuff that is unsubstantiated. The guide either has to be actually factual, or factual in stating the various opinions that are around. You're not going to get factual in an entry about free will/determinism (if you are, go publish in major philosophy journals), and as it is, it's only one side of the story in opinions. There are also some factual problems - here's one that is at least debatable:

"There simply doesn't appear to be an example of an event that happened without a reason. Think about it for a second. Can you think of a single thing that you did today that did not have a cause? "

Any of the huge number of quantum mechanical events that happen every nanosecond? When (say) a uranium nucleus decays, it does it without any sort of warning signs. You can have a couple of them side by side, entirely identical in all respects, and these totally identical nuclei will decay at different, apparently random times. Things like Bell's inequality can, as I understand it, show us that there isn't even any possibility of something hidden inside the nucleus telling nucleus A to decay at some point and nucleus B at some other point. So yes, there are events (a nucleus decaying at a particular time) that appear to happen without a cause. (There is the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics that might get you out of this as an event without a cause, but it has far ranging consequences on the existence and meaning of what free will might be)

And one more quick warning. Do not introduce God into your argument if you can possibly avoid it.

Nearly by definition, God can do anything which places him completely beyond questions of causality, free will, or determinism.

Consider the old connundrum: Can God make something so big that he can't move it? Logic tells us that this is a paradox, but the flaw is in the hidden assumption that God is limited by the rules of logic. If God wants to limit himself then he can choose to do so and for the time that he chooses to limit himself in this way he will not be able to move it, but if he chooses not to limit himself then he can move it. so the answer is, in this sense and only this sense, yes and no.

You would also be wise to consider if you really want to assert that logic is binding on reality or whether logic simply seeks to emulate reality. Be aware that it is very difficult (I will not say impossible) to prove the former.

Also you must consider how it is possible to use absolute values in a relative universe.

You must carefully define 'free will' and 'determinism' and you must show that they are actually and diametrically opposed and absolute in nature such that you cannot have both to any degree.

You must refute quantum physics or prove that it has no bearing on the argument, particularly since causality or the lack of it seems to be dependent on the scale with which you view any event.

You must deal with the three major cosmological theories, big bang with constant exansion, big bang with cyclical expansion, and heat death, as well as the creationist or 'poof' theory of how things are. Unless you can prove that they don't matter.

There does not seem to be an answer to these issues and that can be a perfectly acceptable ending to your article, but you cannot end it with a statement on the order of "I believe . . ." You are not permitted to use the first person in edited guide entries except for very special situations.

And you must never, ever, ever assume that aeveryone agrees with your opinion. All it takes is one dessenting voice to completely collapse whatever structure you have built.

Barton

I must confess that I hadn't expected such a heated response. As it stands it appears to me that you are telling me it is virtually impossible to prove that humans have the ability to choose. If that truly is the case, I'll never get into the edited guide, because it will only take one person to get upset about it for it not make it into the guide.

Rest easy, I'm done with this project.

Perhaps heated is to strong a word. It seems that you've given this topic a lot of consideration, and I would like to know what your (Barton) personal philosophy is and why.

I've always thought that we had the ability to choose. And while events surely have causes, I've never believed that events were compeled by their causes. Influenced yes, certainly. Never if-then, and never any inbetween.

And, so I'll through the God thing out. However, I still feel its a perfect example of why determinism really bugs me. Why wouldn't God be bound by the rules of the universe really is a moot point when you consider that as a determinist, cause-effect relationship of the universe has already dictated those that will be called his. Using the christian point of view again for convience sake. How ridiculous then does the entire idea become when the entire reason for a church become moot, when you know that you are in essence powerless to have behaved any other way than you did, and will continue to be that way in the future.

I'll leave this alone for awhile, before I go off on a dennis miller rant.

You can't get into the guide on one opinion. You can get in on a near-comprehensive roundup of opinions from all sides, or possibly concentrating on one opinion but giving the relevant arguments both for and against it. If you don't want to do that then no, its not suitable for the edited guide, though of course its fine for unedited.

My personal belief is that while it may be impossible to know whether the universe is totally deterministic or not, that I seem to have volition and I must proceed as if that volition made a difference.

If all things are predetermined, then even my opinion about it must be predetermined, so whatever I do or think would make no difference and God, if there is one, must have totally different plans about the universe that have absolutely nothing to do with man, since man can make no difference.

In the Jewish faith, there is a strong contingent of Old Country Jews who belive that events are predetermined but among this same contingent it is also believed that a man may choose to follow the laws God set down or not. To them this suggests that while we are doomed to meet our ends in the way that God has determined we are free to meet them as we choose. (I think you can see from this that logic and religion have very little in common. Logic is limited in this respect because it is typically binary in natature, true or false. Introduce 'maybe' into logic which is to say not ternary logic but analog logic -- inequalities -- and it becomes much harder to come to a conclusion. While it is possible to carefully exclude certain possible answers, you are almost always left with ranges of answers rather than 'the' answer.)

There are still religions that maintain that everything is totally predetermined and that certain people are born for damnation and others are destined for Heaven and there is nothing they can do about it. I do not care to consider how they view human awareness of this situation.

My view, I consider to be a rational response to an irrational situation. I plan to maintain that view till someone solves the problem.

The whole thing, probably falls under the scientific maxim that a microscope cannot examine itself. That is we are part of the system that contains us and the only way to properly understand the system is to stand outside of it.

Logicians/Mathematicians have now proved that in any sufficiently complex system, there will be problems which cannot be answered. That is probably as close as we can come to proving that this problem cannot be resolved. However, that that does not mean that it makes no difference and that does not free you from having to reach a conclusion on your own.

So my advice is to write the article, express the possiblilites and the frustrations but do not be blinded by having decided before you begin your examination of the situation.

As a ressearcher you are not obligated to find a solution but you are obligated to explain as much as it is possible to explain. If you feel the need to mock certain parts of an argument then there are probably sound reasons to mock the rest. And that you are free to do. particularly since you will now be approaching the problem with the probable outcome that the bickering is futile.

Ah life!

Barton

Sorry to be a party pooper, but there's already a pretty good edited Guide entry on the Free Will problem, that *does* succeed in defining its postulates, presenting a balanced argument, etc. It's here :- http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A301122

Lucien, I suggest you take a look at that article, and if you feel you have anything to add to it make a posting at the bottom and bring it to the attention of the guy who sub-edited the piece.

All the best, Lear

Lear is correct it is a very fine article that I can't disagree with since It makes the same argument that I make.

However, it sets out to make it's argument in a way totaly different from the way that you have begun to approach the problem. You may very well choose to continue your work, particularly if you disagree with the conclusion of the article or if you feel you have more to add.

It should also be noted that that article as did you choose to start from the premise of a totally deterministic versus a totally free-will universe. You may choose to take up the guantlet from a different position, if you feel comfortable there.

Barton

I didn't much care for the article in the guide. I read it and still felt that something was missing in the explanation.

You know, the original intent of the writing was to explain my philosophy of free will. I realize that this would have simultaneously disqualified it from the edited guide as, it would be largley opinion rather that fact.

I seem to have slipped away from the original intent in an effort to cram it into the guide. Which, is relatively pointless I guess.

I certainly could define free will and then determinism without any opinions although I must say I have no desire to do that at this time. Maybe later.

So rather than beating a dead horse, thank you gentlemen (or possibly ladies??) for your help. I'm going to go back to my original idea, and if it makes it into the guide somehow, cool. If not I'll be happy to debate my philosophy and be free to believe in whatever I wish irregardless.


Again...thank you for your input!!!!

Barton

In contrast to Lear, I'd like to suggest that the edited entry on free will that is in the guide is unbalanced, and has huge logical flaws that have been deliberately skipped over, and is generally not good. It's a shame it got into the Edited Guide as is.

I'll agree with most others here that this entry is too much opinion, too personal, and so on and so forth. A great and well written entry for the unedited guide, and one that will likely provoke discussion - but it isn't suitable for the Edited Guide. This thread should probably be moved to the workshop as a result.

As requested, I've moved this duplicate thread to the entry itself, and the PR thread continues at http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/F48874?thread=105876