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  1. LegionOnomaMoi

    Free Will Vs Determinism

    I’m not at all. You asked me to provide an example “that isn't just an approximation to a deterministic system.” The problem is you have it the wrong way around. The only theories we have that describe the fundamental constituents of physical reality and that are not approximations are quantum...
  2. LegionOnomaMoi

    Free Will Vs Determinism

    I should point out before going on that the above is not actually true. It is true that in textbook QM one typically finds a highly simplistic formulation of the Schrödinger picture: unitary and deterministic evolution of a given state on the one hand and on the other some projection postulate...
  3. LegionOnomaMoi

    Free Will Vs Determinism

    I don’t know of any examples of deterministic systems that aren’t approximations of indeterministic systems in more than one way. Firstly there is the trivial fact that classical systems are always approximations. But more importantly, even in classical physics the only truly deterministic...
  4. LegionOnomaMoi

    Zeus vs. God

    No. For one thing, the bible wasn't freely adapted and defined locally. For another, it wasn't used for primarily entertainment purposes as were the stories now commonly described as Greek or Roman mythology. In the Greek and Roman empires religion was not about myths or beliefs but...
  5. LegionOnomaMoi

    Free Will Vs Determinism

    Unicorns are more clearly defined than whatever "utter randomness" is supposed to be or how it is supposed to connect with the nature of actual randomness in mathematics or the sciences or even philosophy. There are many theories/models of causation. Determinism isn't one of them. Some...
  6. LegionOnomaMoi

    Free Will Vs Determinism

    As I said in an earlier post, better examples for the utter failure of the kind of physical determinism claimed in the OP are to be found in classical physics, particularly in classical statistical mechanics, thermodynamics, and relativistic physics. Quantum mechanics in particular is too narrow...
  7. LegionOnomaMoi

    Zeus vs. God

    I imagine the Greeks would be the most surprised, as their actual conception of deities differed drastically from the so-called Greek pantheon and the myths most of us grew up learning about that are called Greek. Most of what passes for "Greek mythology" was created in the 17th-19th centuries...
  8. LegionOnomaMoi

    Free Will Vs Determinism

    One cannot have deterministic indeterminacy. So if this is not random, then it is not true that everything is either determined or random, because it isn't deterministic or determined at all. Hence the original dichotomy "determined or random" can be seen as you write above to have clear flaws...
  9. LegionOnomaMoi

    Is Darwinism still fact after Science 02 Jan 1998: Vol. 279, Issue 5347, pp. 28-29?

    I think the point that is trying to be made is one that comes mostly from extreme positions in the philosophy of science building on the early to mid twentieth century post-positivism critiques, such as the Duhem-Quine thesis, Kuhnian paradigms, and in general the fact that it is theory that...
  10. LegionOnomaMoi

    Is Darwinism still fact after Science 02 Jan 1998: Vol. 279, Issue 5347, pp. 28-29?

    Theories need not be and are not necessarily facts or factual. They absolutely can be facts or factual, however. It is at least as incorrect or inaccurate to assert sweepingly that "theory is not fact" as it is to conflate "fact" with some theory that is as close to anything we might wish to...
  11. LegionOnomaMoi

    Free Will Vs Determinism

    They need not. Here, the problem is more than they are just not determined. They are indeterminate. Thus, for example, even if instead of trying to predict where electrons would be detected, you waited until after the electrons had interacted with the prism (had gone through one of the "slits")...
  12. LegionOnomaMoi

    Free Will Vs Determinism

    Ok, let's try going back to something very simple and something you already stated was fundamental: the randomness vs. determined dichotomy. I've brought visual aids. This will be quite simple and will not involve free will directly at all yet, merely examine how you would categorize a...
  13. LegionOnomaMoi

    Consciousness and the Brain

    You might compare it to near-death experiences instead, for which we have more evidence when it comes to conscious experiences (after all, people who brain dead still have functioning brains, and people who are put under sometimes report conscious experiences). Here there is scant evidence as to...
  14. LegionOnomaMoi

    Consciousness and the Brain

    We could, and many do, but it is fundamentally mistaken and misleading. After ~50 years of cognitive science going down wrong roads due to the computer-mind analogies, I think we have gotten all the mileage we can out of what similarities between brain and computer exist and should be focusing...
  15. LegionOnomaMoi

    Brains, Information, Consciousness

    1) That's the name of his book, and Hawking did propose some of the first arguments that seemed to show that information could be lost in a black hole, but in reality Susskind didn't argue with Hawking a large portion of the theoretical physics community (mostly quantum & particle physicists)...
  16. LegionOnomaMoi

    Brains, Information, Consciousness

    The technical term is "virtual particle" or "virtual process" for this kind of violation of mass/energy conservation in which matter and/or energy is created or destroyed. But as there is no a priori distinction between "real" particles and "virtual" particles (nor any empirical way, even in...
  17. LegionOnomaMoi

    How Did the Universe Come to Be?

    Exactly the same as that for the big bang. Quite literally. The big bang is the name Fred Hoyle gave to the idea that we should interpret this singular limit as some kind of physically meaningful origin point for the universe. You spoke of a "point" of infinite density. That "point" is called a...
  18. LegionOnomaMoi

    How Did the Universe Come to Be?

    This "singularity" is the big bang. That "point" of "infinite density/gravity" is called a singularity. The reason for the "infinite" is because singularities in this case are points at which the physical laws breakdown and yield infinities that cannot be dealt with using methods such as...
  19. LegionOnomaMoi

    Brains, Information, Consciousness

    Both are created and destroyed, and both are done so in ways that violate conservation laws. However, for the most part when "matter" or "energy" are created or destroyed, the "particles" of energy/matter that violate mass conservation or energy conservation (or the conservation of something...
  20. LegionOnomaMoi

    How Did the Universe Come to Be?

    "Despite the uncertainties, what can be confidently stated is that, at a time of the order of 14,000 million years ago, the Universe was much smaller and much more congested than it is at present. This observationally-based conclusion has led to the current theory that most, but not all...
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