Debate 6: Whether Truth Exists in a Deterministic Universe: Philosophy Forums

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Debate 6: Whether Truth Exists in a Deterministic Universe

Debate 6: Whether Truth Exists in a Deterministic Universe

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Posted 12/06/04 - 05:52 PM:	#1
It's been a while, but another debate is born. Debate Type: Standard Number of Rounds: 5 Socrastein will go first, and argue in the affirmative. Mariner will follow, taking the opposite position. Discuss this debate here. Edited by dreamweaver on 03/12/05 - 02:14 AM. Reason: changed link

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0 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 12/06/04 - 05:53 PM:	#2
The following was submitted by Socrastein: I shall proceed with my opening argument under the assumption that my opponent and I will be debating the most commonly held definition of truth, as both defined by Dictionary.com and applied by various people: "Conformity to fact or actuality". If my opponent finds this definition to be somehow unsatisfactory to his liking, then this will no doubt be addressed later in the debate, but for now I have no choice but to use what I see as most practical. The first thing that comes to mind when I think of truth in a deterministic universe is the concept of determinism itself, and the fact that it is founded on the idea of causality. Every event must dictate the state of further events in a predictable fashion so that everything is causally determined. Does not this mechanism of causality that creates the characteristic determination we speak of qualify as a truth in itself? Could not the most fundamental and indisputable truth of a deterministic universe simply be "Everything is causally determined"? It seems the opposing proposition contradicts the very definition we are discussing, for if everything is not causally determined, then we have a measure of indeterminancy, and surely no deterministic universe could allow for random happenings. So it seems that one need not delve very far at all to find truth, for it is in the very fabric of this reality we are supposing. A deterministic universe is causally determined, that is its supreme truth. Now if there is causality, then we must have some sort of logic in this universe under which this causal system is coherent. If logic was not a part of this reality, keeping all causes and events interelated and interdependent, then there could be no determinism. If we had causes that caused and didn't cause, or causes that weren't causes, or any other such logical absurdities, we wouldn't have much of a deterministic universe, but rather an impossible and truly random universe in every sense of the word. So already our deterministic universe must have logic to be so, and through this logic operates the causality that defines this universe as a deterministic one. In fact, I'm not even sure if an indeterminate world could have no truth to it. There may be no logic in such a world, for logic requires a degree of consistency that is by definition not necessary in such a world, but even in pure inconsistency, can we not find truth? How about that which most quickly and easily comes to my mind, and perhaps the mind of those reading this: There is no consistency in an indeterministic world. How can determinism and indeterminism even be classified as such if these basic truths, that the former is determined and the latter is indetermined, are not tacitly assented to? How can we even argue over any aspect of a deterministic universe if we do not even understand what we are speaking of? And how can we understand what we are speaking of unless we first understand that a deterministic universe is absolutely defined by its determinism? If we do not consent to this truth, then we do not consent to the definition, and if we do not consent to the definition, then what exactly are we bothering with a debate for? How can we debate any idea which we do not already understand and consent to the definition of? What good is a debate over anything if we need not consent to self-consistent truths and definitions. The truth and the definition of determinism seem tightly woven, and any effort to separate the two results in absurdity. Determinism is defined by its fundamental truth, that it is determinisitic. The definition rests on this very truth in such a way that denying this truth denies the definition. If my opponent must deny the definition of determinism in order to argue over it, then it seems he has lost before he even began. If he would somehow argue that the truth "A deterministic universe is necessarily determined" is not necessary for the definition of a deterministic universe, then it seems that this debate is destined to be my opponent's attempt to somehow resolve the issue of defining a deterministic universe without appealing to its inherent truth of determinism, all the while without falling into complete logical absurdity. Surely we can't hold a meaningful debate if the discussion is founded in absurdity. So in light of this analysis of the nature of a deterministic universe and its inherent necessitation of the truth of its own definition, it seems that my opponent cannot argue that truth is impossible within a deterministic universe without denying the very truth on which the idea of a deterministic universe is predicated - determinism. And if I am right in concluding that my opponent's position is a necessarily self-destructive one, i.e. any attempt to argue it brings his position down to the level of absurdity and denies its own integrity, then this debate will be a short one. However, rarely am I right in such matters - it seems that just as necessarily, the concept of "Socrastein's arguments" cannot be defined without appealing to the unfortunate truth that they are rarely correct As such, I find it far more likely that this opening post of mine will likely serve no other purpose than to bring to my opponent's attention the grievous mistake I have made, and facilitate a response that hopefully will bring me to my senses and bring this debate back into the arena of usefullness

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1 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 12/06/04 - 05:54 PM:	#3
The following was submitted by Mariner: I will be arguing for the negative of that assertion, that truth does NOT exist in a deterministic universe. (With thanks for Socrastein for inviting me and letting us work through this argument with more focus). There are two things that must be cleared when we examine the assertion, which are the definition of truth and the definition of a deterministic universe. I�ll address the definition of truth in this opening post, and leave the concept of a deterministic universe for later in the debate. As far as I�m aware � and my school about this has been mostly Philosophy Forums � there are two main contenders for a �theory of truth� out there, which are called �correspondence theory of truth� and �coherentist theory of truth�. Personally, I think that the former is the best way to define truth, and see many problems with the latter; I will therefore base my argument for the non-existence of truth in a deterministic universe on the correspondence theory. That does not mean that a coherentist theory would solve the incompatibility that I see between the existence of truth and a deterministic universe, but I think it would be good if we restricted the scope of the debate at this point; if Socrastein is willing to concede that truth as envisaged in a correspondence theory of truth is incompatible with a deterministic universe, then we can proceed to other theories to see if they can �salvage truth� in a deterministic universe. The correspondence theory is quite simple, and the best formulation in my opinion is still Aristotle�s � �to say the truth is to say of something that is, that it is, and of something that is not, that it is not�. In other words, truth would be a correspondence between statements (more strictly, propositions) and reality. What remains to be shown in this opening post is how this conception of truth is incompatible with a deterministic universe (as I said earlier, I won�t define this yet; I�ll proceed on the assumption that our definitions are fairly close, and I also imagine that Socrastein will explore this in more detail in his opening post). The first important characteristic of that definition of truth for our debate is that it applies to propositions, and propositions only. The second characteristic is that it allows for falsehood � if we say of something that is, that it is NOT, or of something that is NOT, that it is, then we are in error � we are not speaking the truth. I�ll attempt to show that a deterministic universe undermines truth on both of these accounts. The first way in which determinism is a problem for that notion of truth is that it would entail in a world in which all of our statements (including, especially, propositions) would be forced. But what, exactly, is a proposition? It is not just any statement. If we touch a hot oven, we say �ouch!�. That�s a statement. But it is clearly not a proposition. Our statement, �ouch�, can (perhaps�) be said to have been forced. But can propositions be forced and still retain their status as propositions? Let us consider this scenario: A person says �Bush is the current president of the US�, and if another person says �Kerry is the current president of the US�, then both of these statements were forced (in a deterministic universe). When faced with these statements, both persons will believe that one of these statements is false, because these two persons, Kerry and Bush (assuming that they are different) can�t both be the current president of the US, a position in which only one person fits. We immediately realize that there are many ways in which this contradiction could be solved without addressing reality itself. For example, one of the persons may refer to the president of the US as �Kerry�, regardless of who is occupying that position. If we discovered that this is the case, then the problem is not one of actual contradiction, but rather of mismatching definitions (both persons would be using the word �Kerry� in different ways). But if we ignore the sidetracks we may conclude from that scenario that one of the two persons is wrong. And we would go about solving this contradiction in the usual way, by looking at reality and ascertaining the identity of the president of the US. We couldn�t ascertain that identity by introspection, or logic � only reality will suffice. Now, what does the fact that the two statements are forced upon their speakers (which is a consequence of a deterministic universe) entail for their status as propositions? Person A is forced to say that Bush is the president; person B is forced to say that Kerry is the president. Assuming that Bush is the president, what is prompting the different response between the two persons? Whatever it is, it is forcing person B. But whatever it is, it is also forcing person A. Simply put, none of them could state that �I believe that��. For believing in something can�t be forced, without grave violation of the usual meaning of �belief� . That�s an important point, and I guess that the debate will revolve around it. In other words � when people state propositions as if they were true, they are believing in it. But a forced belief is no belief. There are no beliefs in the deterministic universe, and therefore in a very critical sense there are no propositions (or to be more precise, there are no statements that can express propositions). And the absence of propositions results in the absence of truth. The second way to see the problem is to realize that not only there are no propositions, but there is also no room for falsehood in a deterministic universe. Falsehood, we may recall, is saying of what is NOT, that it is, or of what is, that it is NOT. It is a characteristic of propositions, and of propositions only. The absence of propositions would then lead to an absence of falsehood. What this means is that both A and B, the people arguing about the president of the US, are neither right nor wrong, but are rather simply expressing through a string of words what is going on in their innards. And the meaning we may ascribe to their words is completely arbitrary, when they utter �Bush is the president of the US� they may mean �ship plus blue squared kick�. For the absence of logic (a result of the absence of propositions, which would include the laws of logic, for they are propositions as well) results in a complete disconnect between statement and meaning. The best way to summarize the argument is by a reductio ad absurdum. Consider the proposition: �It is true that this universe is deterministic�. 1. If the universe is deterministic, then this sentence was forced upon the speaker by the state of affairs that preceded the statement, in a purely cause-and-effect relationship (by definition of �deterministic�). 2. If the sentence was forced upon the speaker by cause-and-effect, a change in the cause should result in a change in the effect. 3. If a change in the cause of the statement results in a change in the effect, without any bearing on the universe � so that the same speaker, in the same universe, by a change of causes, utters �It is false that his universe is deterministic�, then the statement is completely unrelated to the universe, being determined by its causes. 4. Therefore, the sentence �It is true that this universe is deterministic� � in a deterministic universe � is just as related to the universe as the sentence �it is false that this universe is deterministic� (i.e., neither of them is related to �the universe� at all, except as products of the causes present in such an universe, and equally valid in that respect). In other words, the first sentence refutes itself by affirming its own contradiction in the same breath as it affirms itself. The only way out of this reductio would be to deny (2) � to say that this sentence is a special case, being an effect of any possible cause; that the sentence is a result of all possible states of affairs. To refute that, one must simply utter out loud its opposite . Even as regards the laws of logic, which are � presumably � apodictically true, one can state their opposite, and therefore they are not the result of any possible cause. That means that in a deterministic world, when one states, for example, the opposite of non-contradiction, (A & ~A), one is being forced to do so by the causes affecting that statement, just as much as those who state non-contradiction proper, ~(A & ~A); and we don�t have any grounds from which to choose among them, for they are both just as non-true and non-false as any statement in such a deterministic world. They are, in effect, secretions produced by blind mechanisms, just as fruits are �secretions of trees�. We don�t ask which is true, an apple or a banana. And we can�t ask which is true among two different statements if they are the blind result of impersonal, mechanical forces.

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0 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 12/06/04 - 08:51 PM:	#4
I must admit that after having read through my opponent's first post I am quite baffled. It would seem that one of us has gravely misundertood the topic that we are to be debating. I was under the impression that we are trying to discuss "Whether truth exists in a deterministic universe" and unless I'm mistaken, Mariner seems to be arguing "Whether human beings can believe in truthful propositions in a deterministic universe". These seem to be entirely different matters, and unless it becomes quite clear which one is the correct topic to be debating, I'm afraid that we will do no better than talk past eachother for the next few days. To resolve this problem, perhaps we should take a look at truth again, and see if it is actually fair to define truth as dependent on humans believing in the propositions they state. I would like to propose that truth is not dependent on any human propositions. I would say that a proposition only takes a preexistant truth and confines it into the realm of language, which we can then understand. I don't believe any human needs to say, for example, that hydrogen atoms contain one proton and one electron, for this idea to become truth. If there were no humans, the composition of hydrogen atoms would be the same regardless. 2+2 would equal 4, with or without an intelligent mind to propose such. There can be no truth propositions without there FIRST being a truth for them to describe. Saying Bush is the president means nothing unless there already exist the conditions on which such a proposition is based. So before propositions, there is truth - a proposition simply codifies this existent truth into a form we may understand as humans. It would be absurd to think that truth does not exist until someone postulates it in the form of a statement... what would that statement represent to classify as a truthful proposition if there were not already sufficient conditions and states of reality around which this proposition is formed? To say that without propositions there is no truth is an extremely limiting definition of truth, I should say. Many theoretical physicists are searching for a possible theory of everything, which many think might be as simple as one single equation, and inch or two long, that could describe every event in the universe. However, we have not discovered this truth, and thus we have not yet turned it into an equation, or a proposition. Does this mean this fundamental truth of reality does not exist until we do so? Of course not. It simply means that our minds and our language have not yet ascertained and then codified this truth - its still a truth of this universe however, even if we NEVER propose it as a statement. Energy was equal to mass times the speed of light squared before Einstein ever proposed this truth statement. If we take a look at Aristotle's statement in regard to correspondence truth, we will further see my point, I believe: �to say the truth is to say of something that is, that it is, and of something that is not, that it is not�. To say the truth. That is the key phrase, right there. To speak the truth, I think there must already be truth. If I said "To wave the bat....." then I am simply acting on an already existent object. To say that there is no bat until you wave it is akin to saying there is no truth until you state it. What are you stating if truth is ONLY a statement? You are simply codifying the truths of reality into language form for ease of understanding. You are not creating anything, truth was already there before you even spoke a word. If I'm sweating terribly, I'm hot whether I, or anyone else, ever proposes the statement "Matt is hot." It does not suddenly become true that I'm hot when someone points it out - they are merely pointing out what is already true! So it seems that all I can do at this point is await my opponent's response and trust that he will be able to ease my confusion and clearly explain why truth only exists when some human states it as a proposition. He must explain to me why it wasn't true that Bush was the president until someone said it, as though there would never be a president until someone pointed it out. He must explain what a statement represents if not truth, since he seems to be asserting that a statement IS truth, and nothing else can be truth than a statement. Until it becomes clear why there is no truth until someone blurts it out, I see no reason to go beyond this point and argue the rest of his post, which was predicated on this one 'proposition'
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1 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 12/07/04 - 04:21 AM:	#5
You see, I don't think we are talking past each other. Your opening post just fails to take note of some finer points of our definition of truth. It is good that we are basing our posts on the same definition of truth, though, so that at least we will not need to argue that point. Truth is "conformity to fact", you say. It is clear enough that, like Aristotle's definition, and indeed like any definition of a correspondence theory of truth, this is a definition that applies to propositions, and propositions only. Just what is conforming to fact? Why, propositions. Do you have any other suggestion of what might be a candidate for that position, of "conforming to fact?" Now, in your response to the opening post you think I am talking about human propositions, but I'm not. The problems I raised are typical of all and any propositions, be they stated by humans, rocks, aliens or gods. If I use human propositions as an example, it is because we don't have any idea of how those other beings would state propositions. But if they did, they would have the same problem. I agree with you when you say that truth is independent of the stating of propositions. Earth was the third planet from the Sun before anyone could state it, and it was NOT the fourth planet from the Sun before anyone could state that. But "anyone" there is misleading... for clearly it must have been possible for someone to state BOTH "Earth is the third planet from the Sun" and "Earth is the fourth planet from the Sun" for us to speak of the truth or falsehood of those statements. In other words, when we say that the statement "Earth is the third planet from the Sun" is true and has been true for a long time (at least since the solar system was formed in the present configuration), we are actually saying that if a being stated that before there were humans around, it would be true. A proposition must exist before being true. What makes a proposition exist is some being formulating it. Or, summarizing this point: "Unstated truths aren't true (or false)". To deny this, we will have to go into some Platonic discussion about how "existence" applies to propositions even in the absence of any kind of being that can state a proposition. You say that "to say the truth, it must exist in the first place", and I think this is misleading, because we never say "the truth", simply. We say the truth about something (conformity to fact). So that the actuality of "something" comes before the "actuality" (whatever that means) of "truth about that something". What is necessary for "truth about something" to exist are: 1) the existence (even if only as a concept, and we may get embroiled here for a while, but I don't think it is too problematical to speak of "existence as a concept", as for example in Santa Claus' case) of "something"; 2) Conformity of proposition to fact about that something. None of these points, alone, suffices for stated truth -- which is what we are talking about, "conformity (of what? propositions, unless you have some other candidate) to fact". Note that I am NOT, emphatically NOT, saying that truth is "only a statement", as you said. I am saying that "conformity to fact" requires a proposition, and propositions require beings that can formulate propositions... if we assume that humans are the only beings in the universe that fit that description and kill all humans, then that will be the end of propositions, and the end of truth. It won't be the end of facts, and therefore there will be room for truth in the universe, but without any being that can formulate a proposition, there is no truth (or falsehood). There has never been any truth without both a proposition and a fact. That much is quite clear by the definition of truth. Now, I must address your opening post. There are two important mistakes there which vitiate your argument: (1) that your account of truth in a deterministic universe leaves no room for falsehood and (2) that a non-deterministic universe would be an indeterministic universe. (1) is observed from your first paragraphs, and it should strike you as very odd. You say that a deterministic universe is one in which "Every event must dictate the state of further events in a predictable fashion so that everything is causally determined". Compare the two statements about the Earth and the Sun mentioned earlier. In your deterministic universe, they were both "dictated by the state of events in a predictable fashion". Which means that they were NOT dictated by the positions of the Earth and the Sun, unless you will ascribe some strange influence of the Earth and the Sun only upon the man who said that it was the third planet, while the same influence, by the same planets and upon a being very similar (another human being), was not felt. What that amounts to is that in a deterministic universe, the utterance of a falsehood is quite mysterious. The simple utterance (even if the speaker did not believe in what he was saying, like the example above about the Earth being the 4th planet) would already be problematic, but when we come to "utterance + belief" the problem becomes severe. How can a deterministic universe account for the event in which two persons, having the same abilities (intrinsic to all human beings) of logic and conceptualization, and aware of the same facts, disagree? In fact, how can we be having this debate? Debate assumes that one of us is wrong and the other is correct. We both are proceeding on that assumption. The statement "Whether truth exists in a deterministic universe" is quite clear, so there is (apparently...) no issue of misinterpretation at hand. If your position is "dictated by the state of events in a predictable fashion", so is mine. Which means that neither one is true (or false). In effect, a deterministic universe would prevent any kind of "conformity to fact" by eliminating the very things that "conform", propositions. Your arguments, and mine, would not be composed of propositions in any sense, they would be "secretions" of our body and personal history. Apples and bananas, as I said in my OP, are not "true" or "false". (2) is probably more of a problem of definition, hence the "apparently" used a few lines ago. If a deterministic universe is one in which "Every event must dictate the state of further events in a predictable fashion so that everything is causally determined", a non-deterministic universe is one in which that sentence is false. But the denial of that sentence is not "... everything is NOT causally determined", being rather "... something is NOT causally determined". If we have only one thing which is not being causally determined, it is enough to disprove the deterministic universe. One need not prove that every event is not causally determined. This seems to be the point of your assertion that "Determinism is defined by its fundamental truth, that it is determinisitic." But even granting that (which I don't, for it is clearly invalid...), you will have established the determinism of just one thing. Not enough to show the determinism of the universe. There is also a bit of a confusion when you say that I must "deny the definition" in order to debate determinism. Why should I need to do so? I don't, and I'm debating . We both agree on that definition provided above. What is required now is for you to overcome the contradiction inherent in the statement "it is true that my statement is the product of deterministic causation"; taking care to note that your explanation must account for the statement "it is not true that my statement is the product of deterministic causation". Your explanation must show how these two sentences can take place in a deterministic universe. I don't see any need to refute an argument by "denying the definition", and I think that you are doing the opposite mistake, arguing by "affirming the definition". Both are flawed. What I am doing is accepting the definition, and showing that it entails a contradiction. Which is enough to show that it can't be true.
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0 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 12/07/04 - 02:40 PM:	#6
Now that the matter of truth/proposition relations has been cleared up, I'd like to take a closer look at the one point Mariner and I disagree on thus far. We both agree that truth is a conformity to fact, and this conformity is in the form of a proposition's relationship to reality. So what truth is is no longer an issue in this debate. Once we have established what truth is, it must be debated whether or not such a thing can exist in a deterministic universe, the definition of which we both also agree on. Mariner says that you cannot have truth in a universe because you cannot have propositions. I won't go any further than that at the moment, but will rather say, as I am so fond of doing, "Why debate when you can define?". Rather than argue off the top of my head his definition and invalidation of propositions in a deterministic universe, let's go straight to where it counts: Dictionary.com Proposition # Logic. 1. A statement that affirms or denies something. 2. The meaning expressed in such a statement, as opposed to the way it is expressed. I predict no disagreement on the definition of affirm or deny, or something, but I think its important that we take a closer look at this definition of proposition by further defining the word state (Rather than statement, since that is simply defined as an act of stating, which doesn't help us very much at all) State To set forth in words; declare. So it seems that a proposition is nothing more than a statement of words which affirm or deny something. Curious how it does not even mention whether or not a proposition must be willfully and freely believed in by a being not in a deterministic universe It seems that the ONLY thing that matters is whether or not this statement conforms to fact, in regards to the existence of truth. If I programmed a computer to say "Bush is the president" then it would be speaking truth, by definition, regardless of the fact that nobody would argue it was not forced to do so. Going back to Aristotle's quote that Mariner himself proposed as an accurate description of correspondence truth, as well as what Mariner said shortly after quoting him: �to say the truth is to say of something that is, that it is, and of something that is not, that it is not�. In other words, truth would be a correspondence between statements (more strictly, propositions) and reality. First of all, let me direct both my opponent's and any reader's attention to the fact that Aristotle no more indicates the necessity of free belief in saying something for it to be true than dictionary.com does. Truth is a correspondence between statements (so long as they affirm or deny something) and reality. No where can I find a definition of statement or proposition that specifies the need for the being stating it to freely believe in it; nowhere of course, except for in Mariner's posts. So it seems that either Dictionary.com, my home dictionary which has nearly the exact same meaning, Aristotle, and everyone I've ever heard use the mentioned definitions of statement and proposition are wrong, or my opponent is arbitrarily redefining words for the sake of his position. As much as I respect Mariner, I don't quite like him enough to forsake everything I've ever heard or read on the definitions of proposition and statement and adopt his new definitions. If we are to look at the actual definitions of truth/proposition/statement/and fact, then it seems that one can hardly argue that truth does not exist in a deterministic universe. There's no reason I can see to deny that statement's exist in a deterministic universe, assuming there are deterministic beings capable of speaking/writing/etc. So if statements exist, we're only one step away from establishing truth: do said statements correspond to the facts of reality? Well, let us assume that this universe is a deterministic one, for the sake of argument. And I am a determined being. I say the following: "The average human has two legs." Now, let's also assume that this statement is true, as if it weren't already blatantly obvious. Presto! We have truth. It really is quite simple, I should think, and has only been complicated by Mariner's attempts to cleverly redefine the word proposition, which consequently redefines the word statement, in a way where truth is only possible if a being freely believes what he states. I see no reason whatsoever to accept this, and I see many reasons not to - such as the dictionary. I would understand if this was a debate on the existence of God if such troubles came in defining Him and His attributes, but this debate is not complicated in such a manner. The words we are using have clear, concise definitions, and the simple fact is that my opponent is not using them. This debate is quite pointless if arguments can be made by arbitrarily redefining and misusing the definition of common words. I already made this mistake when I tried to argue for the existence of truth outside of the presence of propositions - having realized that mistake, and that I was arbitrarily redefining truth and its relation to statements, I have stopped doing so and am now more properly using the English language. I can only hope Mariner would do the same, and realize that his redefinition of proposition is unjustified, and that he must somehow argue that statements cannot be made in a deterministic universe, in which case this debate will turn into: "Are sentient beings, capable of communication, possible in a deterministic universe?"
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1 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 12/07/04 - 04:47 PM:	#7
Once again, you fail to see the finer points of the definitions you yourself offered. We share the same definition of "proposition" (as we shared the definition of "truth"), but you prefer to dance around the real problem. And that is "the simple fact", as you so charmingly put it . A proposition, you (and dictionary.com) say, is a statement that affirms or deny something. I agree completely. You predicted no disagreement about the part of affirming or denying, and I don't predict any disagreement there either, but you don't realize what that entails. Let's take your computer which is "programmed to say 'Bush is the president' ". Is it affirming or denying that? Can you press him on that point? No, you can't. It is just stating. That computer is not affirming or denying the truth of that proposition. In effect, the output of the computer, in the eyes of the computer, has absolutely no relationship to reality, and it is not a proposition at all, since it does not "affirm or deny" anything. There isn't much difference between that computer saying that or a human being belching. That's what the "deterministic universe" entails, that all of our statements are belches. I beg you, let's consider, as propositions, only statements that affirm or deny something, as dictionary.com kindly defined for us, and get back to the real problem. You, by a little sleight-of-hand there, began using the conformity of statements (instead of propositions) to reality in the middle of your post -- and especially when you ask me, in the end, to "argue that statements cannot be made in a deterministic universe" -- but we have seen that this is flawed. A belch is "a statement". "Yes" is "a statement". "Ouch" is "a statement". They don't correspond to reality because they don't refer to anything. Propositions, on the other hand, do refer to something; that's why they can be true or false (unlike belches, and unlike facts, and unlike reality -- none of these can be "true" or "false"). Your problem is showing how, in a deterministic universe, propositions can refer to something which is NOT their direct causes. Your example is simple, and it shows the point clearly enough. "The average human has two legs". Is that the truth? How can you tell, in a deterministic universe? Because you can count your own legs? How is that the truth, instead of being the result of your mischievous brain blindly following causations and fooling you? Let's take an even simpler example; your example, even though you don't realize it, has a lot of problems, based on induction, perception, etc. etc. Let's take a logical law -- any law. Presumably, that is independent of induction, perception, etc. For example, "A=A". Now, one might argue that this is true "by definition", and I would have no quarrel with that. But the question is, can we use that proposition as a guide to studying reality? Is the universe logical? Most people would answer yes, instinctively, but there is no reason to believe so (is there? I'd like your opinion). However, if "A=A" (as your proposition about legs) is determined by prior states of affairs, as it must be in a deterministic universe, then a change in causes can result in a change of effects. (That follows from the definition of cause and effect). And therefore, other beings (aliens? cyborgs?) can say that A=A is false. Who should you trust? Can you ascertain who is saying the truth in this scenario (remember our definition of truth!)? If you can, then my argument is refuted and the debate is over, you win. So try hard . Summing up this point, a deterministic universe means that all propositions are the necessary result of causes; which means that two contradictory positions can't be compared "against truth", for the thing that we use to ascertain what is truth and what isn't -- logical laws -- becomes bereft of support. In a non-deterministic universe, we choose to believe them; in the deterministic universe, we are forced to believe them. And we would be equally forced to believe in their opposite, given the right circumstances (that led to the formulation of their opposite as logical propositions). Now, just to refresh your memory, I'll repeat the important question that you did not address in your last post: "What is required now is for you to overcome the contradiction inherent in the statement "it is true that my statement is the product of deterministic causation"; taking care to note that your explanation must account for the statement "it is not true that my statement is the product of deterministic causation". Your explanation must show how these two sentences can take place in a deterministic universe." That is, you have to show how to account for falsehood in a deterministic universe, and to show how to account for propositions, which are different from simple statements in that they refer to something, unlike belches or bananas. "Humans have two legs" only refers to something if someone believes that (so much for your criticism of my comments about belief...). At first, it must be believed to refer to something by the speaker (and that is a misleading title, for it must be believed to refer to something even before he speaks -- let's not be confused by our talk of "statements" to think that we're addressing "verbal language" in any sense, we are addressing meaning). After the speaker believed in it, and said it, it will only refer to something in the eyes of other people if they can understand the language rules and the meaning of each word. And for that process, both speaker and listeners require logic, so that any proposition that you suggest we take as example will ultimately fall under the basic question raised earlier, "why do we believe that logic explains/describes/accounts for (take your pick) reality?" While you don't address the issue of meaning and belief, your statements will remain being blind statements, just like the poor computer who actually spewed out a series of 0's and 1's only to see you interpreting them as "Bush is the president", while the computer hasn't got a clue about what "Bush", "president", "is", or "the" mean. You have to explain how you are different from that computer in your determinstic universe. It's that simple. *** Bad news, in the meantime. I'll have to go on a work trip Thursday, and will return on Friday night (I'm on GMT-3... I think). Since it's not long, I don't think it will be a great problem, but you guys should be warned. It is very improbable that I'll have time to post here, and even less probable that I'll have time to post here, in this thread .
_____________________ "In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don't." -- Blaise Pascal "The more I am by myself and alone, the more I have come to love myths" -- Aristotle in his later years

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0 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 12/08/04 - 02:33 AM:	#8
As I said earlier, and as my opponent notably agreed, a proposition is a statement that affirms or denies something. The important point to notice is that it is the statement itself that does the affirming or denying - nowhere in the definition does a proposition require that the person/thing making the statement be capable of believing/affirming/denying/defending the statement. The affirmation or denial a statement declares has nothing to do with the one speaking it. As far as the English language and proper definitions are concerned, it couldn't possibly matter less whether or not someone making a proposition actually believed, or could defend, or possessed any relation to the statement they were making at all! All that matters is that the statement itself is affirming or denying some aspect of reality. If a statement affirms something that conforms with reality (The speed of light is 300,000 km/sec), or denies something that doesn't conform with reality (The speed of light is 50 miles per hour) then this is a statement of truth. And a statement that makes an affirmation or denial in concurrence with reality is a proposition! When you have true propositions, you have TRUTH. My opponent's argument is resting on a clever straw man, where he distracts one's attention away from the fact that the definition of proposition speaks of STATEMENTS that affirm or deny something, and instead tries to argue that the definition of a proposition speaks of BEINGS that affirm or deny something. This straw man is further elucidated when one looks at Mariner's attempt to refute my example of a computer making a truthful proposition: Let's take your computer which is "programmed to say 'Bush is the president' ". Is it affirming or denying that? Can you press him on that point? No, you can't. It is just stating. That computer is not affirming or denying the truth of that proposition. In effect, the output of the computer, in the eyes of the computer, has absolutely no relationship to reality, and it is not a proposition at all, since it does not "affirm or deny" anything. All of this is one huge fallacious side-step of the fact that whether or not the stater can defend its point, or is forced to make its statement, or has any feeling toward its statement, or in fact any other fact about the stater itself is completely irrelevent. It is the STATEMENT itself we should be concerned with, not the conditions of the STATER. My opponent's entire argument hinges on this elaborate non sequitur - straw man fallacy, and as such holds very little weight as soon as the fallacy is recognized. Remember, a proposition is a statement that affirms or denies something. The phrase "that affirms or denies something" is the verb relating to the subject - statement. The statement itself is the subject of this sentence, and the action is "affirming/denying". So the definition leaves no room for Mariner's argument that the stater has to be affirming or denying, and as such, his trying to predicate this conflict on the conditions of the stater is nothing but smoke and mirrors. Do not be confused into thinking that the stater is relevent in any way, for to do so would be to ignore definitions and manipulate meanings as my opponent has. All that matters is the statement, and whether or not IT affirms or denies something in concurrence with reality. Once this condition is satisfied, there is truth. If a deterministic universe contains a being that utters a statement such as "It is currently raining" this being has created a statement, and so long as the statement affirms something (Which it does - the statement itself is affirming the existence of rain at the time of its being made) and this something is in conformity with reality (Rain is presently falling) then this is ALL that is required for truth. Forget about whether the person who says its raining truly believes it is raining, or is free to say its raining, or could defend this statement if "pressed", or anything else about the stater. All of it is erroneous. All that matters is the statement itself. Further, who cares whether or not you can tell or prove that a statement is true? Its truth is independent of all attempts at verification. Notice again that the definition is being ignored by my opponent, since he is arguing on the premise that you cannot have truth if two contradictory statements can be made and not validated against one another. Where in the definition of truth does it say that the conformity with reality has to be verifiable? There is no way for anyone to prove or disprove the existence of God, to my knowledge, but regardless of this fact, if I say that "God exists" and we assume that he does, then verification is moot - so long as my statement is concurrent with reality, and its affirmation conforms to the factual existence of God, then there is truth. If someone else states "God does not exist" it does not matter that there is no way to refute this proposition. It will either conform to reality or not, regardless of any attempts or ability to confirm its correspondence. Summing up this point, a deterministic universe means that all propositions are the necessary result of causes; which means that two contradictory positions can't be compared "against truth", for the thing that we use to ascertain what is truth and what isn't -- logical laws -- becomes bereft of support. In a non-deterministic universe, we choose to believe them; in the deterministic universe, we are forced to believe them. And we would be equally forced to believe in their opposite, given the right circumstances -Mariner All of the above, and anything else my opponent has said along the same lines, is pointless drivel. It is simply meant to distract you from the truth - that verification, forced beliefs, and determined contradictory statements are all superfluous arguments - they have no impact on whether or not a proposition is true, BY DEFINITION. If Mariner truly accepts the definition of the terms we are discussing as he says he does, then I see no way in which he can continue to manipulate and arbitrarily redefine them to create his straw man fallacies. If he accepts that truth is "Conformity to fact or actuality" then he must relenquish his erroneous arguments about the ability to verify this conformity. If he accepts that a proposition is "A statement that affirms or denies something" then his erroneous arguments about the conditions/motivations/beliefs/feelings/etc. of the stater must be seen as entirely irrelevent and consequently given up on. To sum up what I am trying to say clearly, concisely, and logically: 1. Truth is conformity to fact or actuality. 2. Propositions are necessary for truth, as they are what "conform". 3. Propositions are statements that affirm or deny something. 4. Whether a statement affirms or denies something is to be found in the nature of the statement, NOT the nature of the stater. 5. If a statement makes an affirmation/denial, and the affirmation/denial is in conformity to fact or actuality, then this, by definition, is truth. 6. Let us assume that a deterministic universe is capable of harboring beings that are themselves capable of making statements. 7. Let us further assume that some of these statements affirm/deny something. 8. Finally, let us assume that some of these propositions conform to actuality. -One will find truth in a deterministic universe. My entire argument above is built on the foundation of definitions, and a few very modest assumptions that I see no reason for Mariner to deny. If Mariner is truly using the same definitions as I am, as he stated, then he has no other choice than to accept that he has mistakenly misused said definitions by arbitrarily adding personal clauses and erroneous conditions to them, and thusly he will be admitting that truth is indeed possible in a deterministic universe. Mariner said that if I can demonstrate how it can be ascertained who is saying the truth in the scenario of two contradictory propositions, then his argument would be refuted and the debate would be over. However, if "A=A" (as your proposition about legs) is determined by prior states of affairs, as it must be in a deterministic universe, then a change in causes can result in a change of effects. (That follows from the definition of cause and effect). And therefore, other beings (aliens? cyborgs?) can say that A=A is false. Who should you trust? Can you ascertain who is saying the truth in this scenario (remember our definition of truth!)? If you can, then my argument is refuted and the debate is over, you win. So try hard I have done even better than simply rebut his argument - I have shown it to be entirely fallacious. Truth is not dependent on verification of propositions - whether a proposition conforms to fact or not has nothing to do with a being's ability to prove it. This is not a debate over "Whether or not truth is verifiable in a deterministic universe" but rather "Whether truth exists in a deterministic universe", and as such, Mariner's straw man argument that truth falls apart when one can't ascertain which of two causal and contradictory statements is a true one is invalid. And since he said that if I refuted his argument the debate would be over, I will declare that I have done exactly that, and that this debate is over. Unless of course my opponent would like to use his last posts to further confuse the definitions of these terms and arbitrarily add to them with fallacious conditions... -Edit: I would like Interlocutor to know that if my opponent fails to respond within the deadline due to the inconveniences he mentioned, I will patiently wait and see no reason why this debate should forfeit.
_____________________ "The time has come for people of reason to say enough is enough. Religious faith discourages independent thought, it's devisive, and it's dangerous." -Richard Dawkins

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1 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 12/08/04 - 03:02 AM:	#9
Well, you didn't try hard. You completely failed to address the question of meaning, which is central to the debate. You still speak of statements as if whether they mean something or not were a completely useless question. "Gobbledygook" affirms something. Good luck in showing that it is a proposition; and good luck in showing the difference between any proposition and that sentence above, in a deterministic universe. They are all belches, produced by direct cause-and-effect, without any reference to anything but themselves. You still are -- too hastily, of course -- ignoring some of the finer points of the definitions we are used. I suppose that's because you want to "win" the debate very hard (I wish we were debating for money ). And I thought you wanted to discuss the subject. It seems I was wrong; but if you'd rather proclaim that you are right and win by fiat, why bother debating in the first place? The big flaw in your 8 point argument is point 4/5, that the truth is to be found "in the statement", and that it can "affirm or deny" without it affirming something to someone. Sorry, but there is no statement without both a speaker and a listener -- even if hypothetical speakers and listeners. Truth is conveyed by the statement. "The Earth is the 3rd planet from the Sun" is a statement in English, for example. If you said that to a Chinese fellow in the 4th century BC, it would mean nothing to him. Would it be true in his eyes? Let me answer that for you: surely not. My argument -- still unaddressed amidst the claims of victory... -- is that all statements are like that, in your eyes, in a deterministic world. You can't tell whether any statement means what it says. It is just a string of chemical and physical reactions to causes. In such a world, you would be applying your own interpretation to the result of blind causation -- and your own interpretation would be the result of blind causation as well. All of your arguments in this thread would be the result of blind causation in your deterministic universe. They could be simply substituted by an apple. And they are as "true" as an apple is. Nope, friend, you still have to show how any proposition -- a statement which affirms or denies something, a statement which refers to something -- can exist in your deterministic universe. And you still have to account for falsehood in your deterministic universe (why is it that you never address any of the points I make? Are you debating with yourself?) Since the debate is over , I shouldn't say much more. It's good that it won't be hindered by my work trip.
_____________________ "In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don't." -- Blaise Pascal "The more I am by myself and alone, the more I have come to love myths" -- Aristotle in his later years

Socrastein
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0 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 12/08/04 - 09:11 PM:	#10
So, for my concluding post, let's hit the one last issue that I think is important to this debate: meaning. Anyone who has ever taken a speech course in high school is probably familiar with the various steps of communication. I will outline these steps, and parallel them with an example from the animal kingdom, which I believe will be a perfect way to demonstrate meaningful communication in a deterministic universe (Let's make the assumption that many lesser animals do not possess free will, if there even is such a thing, and I doubt that this is a difficult assumption to make) 1. Stimulus: Something has to stimulate the speaker into making a statement. A small monkey high in the trees sees a leapord approaching through the bush. 2. Encoding: The speaker must turn their thoughts into an unerstandable message. The monkey is instinctually equipped to turn thoughts of approaching danger into loud screams and jumping up and down, while pointing in the direction of the danger. 3. Transmission: Having been stimulated and having a form of encoding the message into an understandable message, the message is actually transmitted through some sort of medium, be it letters, sign language, typing, speaking, what have you. The monkey begins screaming loudly while jumping up and down on the branches, and points at the approaching leapord. 4. Decoding: Anyone who recieves the transmitted message must have the ability to decode the statement in order for communication to be established, and the decoding often serves as the stimulus to loop the process back again for continued communication. Monkeys are also instinctually equipped to interpret a fellow monkey frantically jumping up and down while screaming and pointing to mean that there is danger in that direction. 5. Feedback: While this step is not necessary, for a message can be transmitted and recieved without any response from the reciever, feedback further establishes the existence of meaningful communication by showing that the message was recieved, understood, and is either responded to or acted upon. The monkeys flee in the opposite direction of the warnings! Not a single one of these steps require "free will" or belief, but meaningful communication is certainly occuring. This is all communication consists of, and though these steps could probably be broken down further, that is not necessary, for these simple 5 are enough to fully explain what happens when communication is taking place. Even if all of these steps are "forced" that does not disrupt the fact that communication is still taking place. I used monkeys for an example because all 5 of those steps are completely instinctual, but they are still communicating. Now, to tie this into truth. When that monkey is jumping up and down after seeing the leapord, he is making a statement. More specifically, he is making a statement that affirms something - danger. So he is making a proposition! Not only is he making a proposition, but this proposition is completely forced by the causality of his environment (Approaching leapord) and his instincts. To translate into english, that monkey jumping up and down while pointing and screaming is saying "Look out fellow monkeys, there is danger that way!". The monkeys who seem him doing this and which way he is pointing, understand instinctually (As in it is completely deterministic understanding) that there is danger in that direction, and thusly they instinctually run away in the opposite direction. All of this can fit within a deterministic framework and lose absolutely nothing whatsoever. You still have communication, you still have statements and propositions, you still have 2nd party listeners who understand these propositions, and most importantly, you have propositions that correspond to reality! The monkey makes the proposition "There is danger over there" and if there is indeed a leapord ready to slaughter all those helpless little monkeys, then there is truth! Even monkeys are capable of truth! If monkeys are capable of truth with their instinctual communication, then there's every reason to assume that humans are also capable of communication, on even higher levels, with abstract ideas and what not. My opponent's argument is far too reductionistic. He says that since everything is determined, its all just belches. But this is nonsense. Sure, on a small scale everything is just colliding matter and interacting energy, but you can't focus on that to the exclusion of the bigger picture - that on large, complicated, and wonderful scales these simple interactions produce things like living organisms capable of communication! Saying that statements are just "secretions" is like saying Unreal Tournament 2004 is just 0's and 1's. The reductionism is destroying an important essence when you take it too far. There's no reason to equate statements with fruit - just because both are causally determined, doesn't mean they're both the same thing. Diamonds and coal are both made of nothing but carbon, but does that mean that there is no difference between them? Absolutely not. That monkey jumping up and down, communicating danger to other monkeys, and apples forming on a tree: sure, they're both causally determined, but that does not mean that there isn't a difference between them. One is a statement, one is a fruit. One DOES communicate meaning, while one does not. One CAN create truth, while the other cannot. Sure, you can't say an apple is true, or a banana is false, but you can very well say that the monkey's warning of danger is true or false. And my opponent says that in a deterministic universe you can't tell that a statement means what it says. I do not see the point in this point. Even if that monkey, for some assanine reason, means "Boy I wish I had some bananas right now", the fact is that he is still making the statement "There's danger over there!" and it will be understood that way. If someone says to me "Bush is president" and they meant to say "Oranges are delicious", in some huge Freudian slip or something, they've stated truth nonetheless. They transmitted a message, despite the fact that the encoding produced a different message than intended, and it was decoded by me to mean something other than what they meant to say. That doesn't matter, all that matters is that a meaningful proposition was made, and in it there is truth. As for falsehood, I still have yet to see how it is relevent. If a monkey hears a twig snap and mistakenly thinks there is danger, and starts jumping around and screaming, his proposition is a false one. So what? He's wrong, big deal. Communication took place, and the transmitted proposition didn't happen to correspond with reality. Or let's say the monkey jumps around, and for some reason another monkey sits down calmly and softly coos, communicating that there is no danger. If a leapord is coming toward them, then this monkey is clearly wrong, while the frantic monkey is right. So what? I see no problem here. Shit happens. So, would it be denied that communication takes place in the way I mentioned? How else can one possibly explain communication? There need by no more and no less steps to wholly explain the process of meaningful communication. So, would it be denied that deterministic beings are capable of such communication? There's no reason whatsoever why every one of those steps can't take place in a completely causal reality, and I even paralleled every step with an example that is dictated by instinct! So, would it be denied that truth is conformity to fact, or that a proposition is a statement that affirms or denies something? My opponent already agreed to these definitions, so this is just as undeniable as the previous two points. Or would it rather simply be accepted that communication can take place in a deterministic universe, and as such propostions can be causally made, and because these propositions will sometimes conform to fact, there is indeed truth in a deterministic universe
_____________________ "The time has come for people of reason to say enough is enough. Religious faith discourages independent thought, it's devisive, and it's dangerous." -Richard Dawkins

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1 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 12/10/04 - 06:50 PM:	#11
Well, the debate is ending, and we are unfortunately only scratching the surface of the issue here. I'm sorry to say, but your account of meaning is completely off the track. You could use the same concepts to describe the translation of information from DNA to protein, or indeed to address planetary formation. Perhaps "anyone who has taken a speech course in high school" would agree with your account, but high school accounts are rarely philosophical in nature . No, meaning is quite unrelated to all which you described there. You, in effect, assumed meaning from the beginning. You assumed that the monkey was meaning something with his call. You were, quite simply, anthropomorphzing, just because the monkey is quite similar to you. Would you say that "DNA shouts to the ribosomes, 'add this and this kind of aminoacid here, for we need some protein real fast!' "? I hope not. Your account of "communication" simply omitted the important stuff, awareness; you haven't examined the question of whether the monkey knows what he is doing, and what he is saying. Now, just to add some spice to the debate , I can say to you that it is quite possible that there is some incipient free will involved in those monkeys. And this is because they can do something that DNA can't do. They can lie. They know, and use, falsehood in their endeavours. (Perhaps you are not acquainted with the whole story, but here it goes: velvet monkeys have one call for "leopard" and one call for "eagle". The responses are different; and they have been observed using the "wrong call" in order to prompt responses that would favor them, individually -- like making all other monkeys run to a tree when the lying monkey found a cache of food he does not want to share). I hope you see what is the main ingredient of this "lying situation" here -- that the monkey knows the expected response of his fellows. But is this enough for us to conclude that we know what he is doing? Honestly, I don't know. Evolution could select for lying monkeys easily. They could be just following their good ole' programs. But I'm happy to leave the question in the open, because if we conclude that they are not following their programs, that they are purposefully lying, then we just extend the concept of free will to them -- by definition. Either they follow "lying programs", which are not lying at all since they don't aim at truth but rather at self-propagation, or they are free, and any conclusion suits me in this debate. DNA doesn't lie. Neither do biochemical pathways, which result in fruits like apples or bananas; neither do physiological reactions, which result in belches. All of these things "communicate" in the sense which you just explained -- none of them have any meaning. While you don't address the issue of falsehood, your account will remain vulnerable (a charitable word) to the argument that I described. There is also the "little issue" , still unaddressed, of how to determine truth at all if logical laws are effects of deterministic causation. Two issues that, quite simply, nullify any attempt at accounting for truth in a deterministic universe. It is quite easy to say that "if there is an actual leopard, then the monkey was saying the truth". Quite easy, and quite fallacious, for this is a logical reasoning. You have to establish the truth of "A=A" before drawing such conclusions; while remembering that in your deterministic universe, you wouldn't be able to tell "A=A" apart from "A/=A", for they would be equally "results" from deterministic causation. Indeed, the whole problem with the deterministic universe is that all propositions are self-referenced; none of them can ever reference anything but themselves. We can produce jumping monkeys in several different ways. All of them, by your own admission, "mean" "there is a leopard out there". What that means, Socrastein, is that you have a "proposition" completely disjointed from reality. Which is not a proposition at all, for a proposition, as we may recall, is a statement that affirms or denies something -- as opposed to nothing, which is the case here. You can't even say that a jumping monkey "means" anything, for they will all be observed in many different instances. There is, of course, the usual appeal to poetry in this kind of argument of yours -- "the universe is marvellously complex!". As if this solved anything. No, what you have to show is how a marvellously complex universe can account for meaning (which is clearly not by your 5-step reasoning, unless you want to imagine a universe in which photons and atoms "talk" to each other "meaningfully" -- and, of course, never lie, something which is also as yet unaddressed. Yep, we've barely scratched the surface of the topic, I wish we had a 20-round debate about this ). At the end of your post you become almost mystical. You say that if the monkey thought that he was "saying" "Boy I wish I had some bananas right now", he would still be making the statement "There is danger over there". Care to explain how can you be so sure of that meaning, especially if the speaker disagrees with you? That seems to me a wonderful way to simply nullify all arguments, including yours. How can you tell what I am meaning here, if you just do not care about what I want to mean? So you have some direct insight into what people are "truly saying" even if they disagree with you? People often use words equivocally, and language evolves. Your position would simply bash Aristotle's use of "Form" in opposition to Matter because "Form means shape", regardless of what Aristotle meant by it. The more extreme examples simply show something that is present with all speakers, and all words. One must make an active effort to interpret words as the speaker wanted them to mean; this is not passive, and indeed it requires free will. Otherwise, rational communication would fail to address its main function, which is conveying thought (instead of conveying what the listener already knew before listening ). Conveying thought. Which can be true or false, and which references something else besides itself, for it is usually thought "about something". Unlike anything in a deterministic universe; nothing is "about something" there. Unfortunately (for your position), meaning requires that the speaker is conveying something, purposefully. Otherwise, there is no meaning. Imagine a dysfunctional monkey that jumped. You would run for cover. He wanted bananas. What a marvellous communication you two had . The exact same thing happens with humans, much more clearly. A man wants bananas. He asks some bananas from you, using the words "Bush is the president". You congratulate him for speaking a truth. Does that make sense? It makes even less sense if the man wants to say that Kerry (or Teddy Roosevelt) is the president, by using the words "Bush is the president". For in this case, unlike in the banana case, the man is clearly stating something false, if you consider what he wants to say. But you still congratulate him on his saying the truth. How can anyone think that "communication" is taking place? Your account of the deterministic universe, as I can't avoid repeating, has no explanation for falsehood. It has an explanation for a mistake (not a very detailed one, "shit happens", but since the point I'm making is not based on the fallibility of sense-data, which is what you addressed, your explanation is also not germane), but not for disagreement assuming equal data. Yet, here we are, disagreeing, even though we are both humans who share equal data as regards the will . One of us is wrong. In your universe, none would be. I would be free, and you would not be free; or perhaps I would have the illusion of freedom, and you would have the illusion of determinism (This is called "absence of truth" ). One thing that surely could NOT happen is that you are not deluded while I am... and yet this is the core of your argument. That's, of course, why it is contradictory, and why there is no truth in your universe. If we are either both wrong or both right, where can there be truth? (And note that this applies to every proposition, including monkey propositions, if they exist). To summarize a long digression into one sentence -- you completely failed to grasp the intentional character of meaning. And here stands the focus of the whole debate. Finally, you end your post with the speculation that "because some propositions will sometimes comform to fact, then there is truth". Not only this undermines logic and hence truth itself (logic can't be "probabilistic", because probabilities are intrinsically logical; they require 100% accurate logic to work in the first place), but it also denies the possibility of propositions. You can never be sure of whether they affirm something or not. To say that "Bush is the president" is true, you would have to assume that this conforms to fact, even though you can't know anything about anything in that scenario -- and Kerry may very well be the president, without you being aware of it . (You are describing a sort of "pragmatic skepticism", but it is just skepticism, hence just wrong. To be pragmatic, it has to make several assumptions about logic and perception, and these assumptions require the denial of skepticism to work in the first place. You can't deny logic without all sorts of nonsense stemming from it, and to say that logic works "sometimes" is to deny it. Logic is either apodictic or zilch.). Summing up. The problems of incompatibility between truth and determinism are still as unaddressed as when the debate began (which is why I wish we had more posts). They are (cutting and pasting from earlier posts): "We both agree on that definition provided above. What is required now is for you to overcome the contradiction inherent in the statement "it is true that my statement is the product of deterministic causation"; taking care to note that your explanation must account for the statement "it is not true that my statement is the product of deterministic causation". Your explanation must show how these two sentences can take place in a deterministic universe." (This wasn't even attempted yet). "While you don't address the issue of meaning and belief, your statements will remain being blind statements, just like the poor computer who actually spewed out a series of 0's and 1's only to see you interpreting them as "Bush is the president", while the computer hasn't got a clue about what "Bush", "president", "is", or "the" mean. " Well, this has been addressed, but failed far short of the mark. The monkey account is just as useful to describe subatomic interaction. The intentional aspect -- quite salient in that quote, above, about the computer -- has been ignored. And that's it. While these problems remain, truth is -- quite clearly -- incompatible with determinism. If you can solve them (as opposed to "getting rid of them" , by ignoring intentionality), then truth becomes possibly compatible. Not before someone solves them, though.
_____________________ "In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don't." -- Blaise Pascal "The more I am by myself and alone, the more I have come to love myths" -- Aristotle in his later years

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