You consider a number of choices. You judge them according to your decision criteria and choose the one that seems best. What difference does it make if some hypothetical omniscient observer could tell in advance which choice you’ll make? You’ll still choose just one, and you want it to be the best one.
In what sense is the unchosen counterfactual a real one?
You consider a number of choices. You judge them according to your decision criteria and choose the one that seems best. What difference does it make if some hypothetical omniscient observer could tell in advance which choice you’ll make? You’ll still choose just one, and you want it to be the best one.
You are portraying decision making as always having a determinate outcome, and that isn’t even true if computational decision making.
In what sense is the unchosen counterfactual a real one.
As examined before the… in the sense that if my decision making was indeterminate, then I could have decided differently, meaning that counterfactual was real in the sense that it could have occurred.
Unless you want to postulate some sort of branching-future superposition, there will be one eventual outcome. How do we disambiguate between objective indeterminacy in a nondeterministic world and subjective indeterminacy in a deterministic one?
It now occurs to me to wonder how antideterminists feel about books and movies. Does it diminish their enjoyment to know that the plot has already been determined?
Unless you want to postulate some sort of branching-future superposition, there will be one eventual outcome.
That’s not the point. Under determinism, the one outcome had to happen, had prior probability 1.0. etc. Under indeterminism, it didn’t have to happen and the alternatives had non-zero probability. You can’t infer from the fact that something happened to the conclusion that it happened inevitably and necessarily.
How do we disambiguate between objective indeterminacy in a nondeterministic world and subjective indeterminacy in a deterministic one?
I’m asking because I expect the two to be subjectively indistinguishable and your answer should help shed light on the nature of our disagreement.
I don’t expect them to be be objectively indistinguishable for reasons I’ve already stated, to do with Bell’s theorem and so on. (And even if they are not distinguishable, they have very different implications).
The books and movies question seems like a disguised argument. People don’t like reading the same thing over and over, and don’t like spoilers, so there is a case that the subjective surprise if the ending is what matters even if it is determined. But that doesn’t generalise to subjective indeterminism being the only kind that matters. Because people don’t just passively consume books and movies, people also try to change objective states of affairs.
Because people don’t just passively consume books and movies, people also try to change objective states of affairs.
Deterministic or not, we are the process by which change happens. I now wonder what kind of agency would satisfy your objection. Must our choices be uncaused causes? If not, what kind of causal influence is permitted?
Naturalistic libertarians usually appeal to mixtures of determinism and indeterminism, occurring in different parts of the brain or at different stages in the decision making process.
You consider a number of choices. You judge them according to your decision criteria and choose the one that seems best. What difference does it make if some hypothetical omniscient observer could tell in advance which choice you’ll make? You’ll still choose just one, and you want it to be the best one.
In what sense is the unchosen counterfactual a real one?
You are portraying decision making as always having a determinate outcome, and that isn’t even true if computational decision making.
As examined before the… in the sense that if my decision making was indeterminate, then I could have decided differently, meaning that counterfactual was real in the sense that it could have occurred.
Unless you want to postulate some sort of branching-future superposition, there will be one eventual outcome. How do we disambiguate between objective indeterminacy in a nondeterministic world and subjective indeterminacy in a deterministic one?
It now occurs to me to wonder how antideterminists feel about books and movies. Does it diminish their enjoyment to know that the plot has already been determined?
That’s not the point. Under determinism, the one outcome had to happen, had prior probability 1.0. etc. Under indeterminism, it didn’t have to happen and the alternatives had non-zero probability. You can’t infer from the fact that something happened to the conclusion that it happened inevitably and necessarily.
I agree and didn’t intend that to be the main thrust of my reply. Let me repeat:
I’m asking because I expect the two to be subjectively indistinguishable and your answer should help shed light on the nature of our disagreement.
I’d also like to hear your take on the books-and-movies question.
I don’t expect them to be be objectively indistinguishable for reasons I’ve already stated, to do with Bell’s theorem and so on. (And even if they are not distinguishable, they have very different implications).
The books and movies question seems like a disguised argument. People don’t like reading the same thing over and over, and don’t like spoilers, so there is a case that the subjective surprise if the ending is what matters even if it is determined. But that doesn’t generalise to subjective indeterminism being the only kind that matters. Because people don’t just passively consume books and movies, people also try to change objective states of affairs.
Deterministic or not, we are the process by which change happens. I now wonder what kind of agency would satisfy your objection. Must our choices be uncaused causes? If not, what kind of causal influence is permitted?
Naturalistic libertarians usually appeal to mixtures of determinism and indeterminism, occurring in different parts of the brain or at different stages in the decision making process.