Re: Free will as a kind of determinism.

Gina Dent wrote:
> I'm not understanding this conclusion, nor how these steps led you to
> it.  I am of the opinion that there has been a choice made in each of
> your examples, with different reasoning for each.  In the first the
> child chooses to wash the plates in lieu of continued beating.

Why does he not want a beating?

 In
> the second, the child chooses to wash the plates to avoid another
> beating.


Why does he not want another beating?

>The third is, in my educated opinion, is absurd since any
> child who has been truly beaten will never forget the beating, nor
> the person who levied that force.  The fourth makes even less sense
> to me.  Are you saying that if one enjoys doing something, he no
> longer has to choose to do it?

You miss the point. The choice is illusionary. The choice is based on
*prior* information, programmed by genes and memes.

Ask yourself why was such a choice actually made. When you discover that
why, than ask why that why. Its a never-ending progression of cause and
effect.

>
> Also, "determinism" is defined by Webster as "the philosophical
> doctrine that every state of affairs, including every human event,
> act, and decision is the inevitable consequence of antecedent states
> of affairs."  In other words, A+B=C.  For instance, a child grows up
> in a violent environment and becomes a violent offender when he grows
>

Does not follow. Determinism can easily inclde the notion, for example,
reciveing a beating might lead to taking steps not to do this oneself.

Determination is only about cause and effect. Just what effect follows a
cause depends on the situation.

> up.
> If you've been following other threads in this forum, you'll see
> that it is well-documented that while this is not the norm.

Yes, but this has *nothing* to with not being deterministic. A
correlation coefficient can be positive or negative. Only if its zero,
is there no causes or effect.

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Kevin Aylward
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"Understanding" itself requires consciousness,
therefore consciousness cannot be "understood"
without referring to itself for the explanation,
therefore the "hard problem" of consciousness,
is intrinsically unsolvable as it is self referral.