“You might as well say that you can’t possibly choose to run into the burning orphanage, because your decision was fully determined by the future fact that the child was saved.”
I don’t see how that even begins to follow from what I’ve said, which is just that the future is fixed2 before I was born. The fixed2 future might be that I choose to save the child, and that I do so. That is all consistent with my claim; I’m not denying that anyone chooses anything.
“If you are going to talk about causal structure, the present screens off the past.”
If only that were true! Unfortunately, even non-specialists have no difficulty tracing causal chains well into the past. The present might screen off the past if the laws of physics are were asymmetrical (if multiple pasts could map onto the same future)---but this is precisely what you deny in the same comment. The present doesn’t screen off the past. A casual observation of a billiards game shows this: ball A causes ball B to move, hitting ball C, which causes ball C to move, hitting ball D, etc. (Caledion makes the same point above).
I’m not sure how long your willing to keep the dialogue going (as Honderich says “this problems gets a hold on you” and doesn’t let go), but I appreciate your responses. There’s a link from the Garden of Forking Paths here now, too.
“You might as well say that you can’t possibly choose to run into the burning orphanage, because your decision was fully determined by the future fact that the child was saved.”
I don’t see how that even begins to follow from what I’ve said, which is just that the future is fixed2 before I was born. The fixed2 future might be that I choose to save the child, and that I do so. That is all consistent with my claim; I’m not denying that anyone chooses anything.
“If you are going to talk about causal structure, the present screens off the past.”
If only that were true! Unfortunately, even non-specialists have no difficulty tracing causal chains well into the past. The present might screen off the past if the laws of physics are were asymmetrical (if multiple pasts could map onto the same future)---but this is precisely what you deny in the same comment. The present doesn’t screen off the past. A casual observation of a billiards game shows this: ball A causes ball B to move, hitting ball C, which causes ball C to move, hitting ball D, etc. (Caledion makes the same point above).
I’m not sure how long your willing to keep the dialogue going (as Honderich says “this problems gets a hold on you” and doesn’t let go), but I appreciate your responses. There’s a link from the Garden of Forking Paths here now, too.