Determination or chance? Znthnk: Either depending on the context. I'm not convinced on a purely mechanistic deterministic universe, or a fully random one. CoIin: As I understand it, certain quantum events are now accepted as inherently random, and not due to our lack of understanding (as Einstein famously believed -- "He does not play dice" ). Events such as radioactive decay can be predicted statistically on a massive scale, but not at the level of any individual atom. The prevailing view these days seems to be that He DOES play dice, at least at the level of the very small. This would seem to fly in the face of classical determinism. The decay of any particular atom does NOT seem to be dependent on antecedent events. I'm not a physicist, so if I've gone wrong anywhere please let me know. Finally, before we start getting excited about "free will", quantum randomness would seem as inimical to free will as it does to determinism. Znthnk: We can only speculate as it would require omnicience, omnipresence, and infinite time to reach that conclusion to delineate infinite causes (forces, mass and energy). Classical mechanics does suggest determinism, quantum theory and entropy suggests randomness. CoIin: On a similar note, classical determinism does not necessarily imply predictability, if I understand it correctly. Darwinian evolution, for example, works on purely deterministic principles, but the results are unpredictable; again INHERENTLY unpredictable, not unpredictable because of our lack of understanding/technology. I believe "chaotic" systems are another such example.
Znthnk: "Darwinian evolution, for example, works on purely deterministic principles" How can you support this claim without knowing ALL influences at ALL times to establish ALL causalities? Science is a method that constructs theories. This is why it is often called Evolutionary Theory. CoIin: Ooops, I just did some checking.... Pre-Darwinian ideas of evolution tended to be deterministic but Darwinian evolution is NOT considered to be causally deterministic. Sorry! Chalk one more up for the Randoms.  devilsAdvocate2: How can you talk about the random or predetermined future when you still live in the past ?? Once you make decisions based on learned outcomes to your actions then noting is random any more and everything is controllable / control . Can you honestly say when given a big decision or small that you don't revert to prior experience. Having said that the proof that im right unfortunately lies in the way we allow our leaders all over the world to continually weaken us while we blissfully announce that it is our decision to allow this. Highly educated people make me laugh as the seldom see the grass for the field they stand in.  ColonelKusanagi: I don't know about everything and never will but for what i do know is that based on previous results i will deal with any random chance i encounter accordingly, but we will all occasionally come across the unknown. Its not black or white, still quite grey.  Ms_Mafdet_The Great: One simple point eliminates any discussion in either point of view: The fact that anything we perceive, sense, ultimately is processed through our brains by electrical signals, - therefore being subjective/relative to the observer/"feeler", hearer, etc. so is FALLIBLE. Therefore, not really "proof" of ANYTHING, no matter what any "research" says. (Can the one doing the "scientific research" in ANY experiment, actually come to the conclusion that the research iz objective and/or "proof" of anything outside THEMSELVES/their experience, when the scientist's own subjective point of view/perception itself is not "objective"/necessarily "factual" to anything/anyone else?) Or let me put it a different way: ( ) How does one "know" that, if one ceased to "be alive" that life would go on in spite of them "not being a part of it" ? (All life, all people, - the universe - "dies" with the observer)  Our scientist perceives what she calls reality, around her, (ppl, "evidence" of research done, ppl seeing the results of the research, etc.) but how is she to prove that ANY of these perceptions (like in the dream world) are "true" ? Point being, we really KNOW nothing. Like being in a dream, we just do what we do, until we wake up.. (Edited by Ms_Mafdet_The Great)  ghostgeek: Mafdet, are you talking about solipsism? Can we ever know if anything exists outside of ourselves? You may not exist, I really cannot tell but I have to presume that you do. It is the same with the world. Ms_Mafdet_The Great: Ghostgeek: Ask quantum theory - one "version" 'basically' says that 'there is nothing "out side" of ourselves, but rather, we PROJECT OUR REALITIES outward. Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle: In fairly short order, physicists studying the quantum level noticed some peculiar things about this tiny world. For one, the particles that exist on this level have a way of taking different forms arbitrarily. For example, scientists have observed photons -- tiny packets of light -- acting as particles and waves. Even a single photon exhibits this shape-shifting [source: Brown University]. Imagine if you looked and acted like a solid human being when a friend glanced at you, but when he looked back again, you'd taken a gaseous form. This has come to be known as the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. The physicist Werner Heisenberg suggested that just by observing quantum matter, we affect the behavior of that matter. Thus, we can never be fully certain of the nature of a quantum object or its attributes, like velocity and location. This idea is supported by the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics. Posed by the Danish physicist Niels Bohr, this interpretation says that all quantum particles don't exist in one state or the other, but in all of its possible states at once. The sum total of possible states of a quantum object is called its wave function. The state of an object existing in all of its possible states at once is called its superposition. According to Bohr, when we observe a quantum object, we affect its behavior. Observation breaks an object's superposition and essentially forces the object to choose one state from its wave function. This theory accounts for why physicists have taken opposite measurements from the same quantum object: The object "chose" different states during different measurements. Bohr's interpretation was widely accepted, and still is by much of the quantum community. (Edited by Ms_Mafdet_The Great)  lori100: We determine our lives consciously and unconsciously...------Seth by Jane Roberts-------'At a very simple level, for example, your consciousness leaves your body often in the sleep state. You communicate with people in other levels of reality that you have known, but far beyond this, you creatively maintain and revitalize your physical image. You process daily experience, project it into what you think of as the future, choose from an infinity of probable events those you will make physical, and begin the mental and psychic processes that will bring them into the world of substance.' | Philosophy Chat Room 18 People Chatting Similar Conversations |
