Despite
David Hume's critical attack on the logical
necessity of causes, which should have made us all skeptics about the logical necessity for causality, many philosophers embrace strict causal determinism strongly. Some even identify causality with the very possibility of logic and reason.
Few commentators note that Hume's view that we all have an unshakeable
natural belief in causality, despite the impossibility of a logical proof of causality or a successful attack on his logical skepticism.
Hume's philosophy is based on the rather tenuous notion of validity to human experience as 'fact' —no, actually, I should say, the validity of human conception and descriptions of their experience as substantive. Been there, done that. I even reject 3 arguments of "Aquinas' five ways" for the same mistake: You can prove nothing by "we say", "we think", "we see", unless to show that what we say doesn't mean much. Aquinas should have said, "If we see, (say, think), 'such and such', then we must think (admit, suppose), 'this and that'."
If "we see" is sufficient reason, then empiricism becomes fact in our minds, (but even atheistic scientists know better than that), but, as I started to say before so rudely interrupting myself,
if empiricism is sufficient reason, then our experienced law of causality has been proven well enough, over the foolish self-contradictions presented to oppose it. 'Causation' has a much more solid base than mere 'chance' as a substantive logic. If you reject causation as absolute logic, what are you left with?
Bertrand Russell said "The law of causation, according to which later events can theoretically be predicted by means of earlier events, has often been held to be
a priori, a necessity of thought, a category without which science would not be possible." (Russell, External World p.179)
Now the assumption of
deterministic causation underlies most successful scientific theories, with the critical exception of quantum mechanics.
Might be a good reason to reject some of the claims people think are implied by quantum mechanics, and perhaps even some of the assumptions upon which the continuing development of quantum theory is based. I'm not the only one, and there are others a lot more educated on the matter than I, who see(s) a problem with building a non-cause-and-effect-assuming theory from a necessarily cause-and-effect-based scientific pursuit. As I have said before, the fact that 'we don't know' does not imply 'it could be'. That is only how we talk. "Chance" is a shortcut for, "I don't know".
Some major objections to the causal determinism implied by Newtonian laws of motion are the claim that
- The complete predictability of future events is possible in principle (Laplace's Demon)
On its face, (to me, of course), this, and some of the below, if true, supports exhaustive causal determination. I haven't studied Laplace much, but a quick review of what he says, and a cursory glance at rebuttals and further refutations for both (or the several) sides of the matter, looks to me like they all, (even Laplace himself, at times, in his responses), slide into, "we say", or "this is how we think".
But anyway, I'm guessing, (hoping), you wrote these down, not as intending independent "major objections", but a logical sequence of thought. Or maybe as things Newtonian causal determinism claims that are the things most objected to? I don't know.
- There is only one possible future, even if it is unpredictable
- There is only one possible future, even if unpredictable
- The laws of motion are time reversible
I agree with all four of the above, the last (time reversible) only in theory, of course.
- Given enough time, all the positions and motions will recur
This, to me, is not implied in Newtonian Physics. A pattern, a waveform, even, might be inferred instinctually, by the principle described: "An action produces and equal and opposite reaction, but I don't see it recurring without some degree of entropy.
Information philosophy shows that all these objections can be removed by admitting a modest form of indeterminism into the world, at the microscopic level of quantum mechanics.
Yes, of course. In other words, "'Chance' is only a substitute for 'I don't know'." The fact we admit the substitution into our thinking only means that we are in a hurry to complete the formula. The conclusion necessarily will still contain that lack of definition.
The core idea of
indeterminism is an event without a cause.
Both of which are logically bogus. Sorry. (Yes, I know, that is MY opinion.) If somebody can show me an event without a cause, that is not First Cause himself, I welcome it. Again, the fact we don't know the cause, means nothing.
Quantum mechanics does not go so far as to say that events have absolutely no causal connection with the events (the distribution of matter and motions) of the immediate past). What it does do is introduce events with a statistical cause. And quantum mechanics makes extremely accurate predictions of the probabilities for the different random outcomes.
In other words, it produces good
guesses about future events, based on past events.
So we can have an adequate or statistical causality without strict determinism, which otherwise implies complete predictability of events and only one possible future.
Well, no. We can
assume an adequate causality without strict determinism. We have no reason to believe it is actually so, but only useful to us to derive guesses.
An example of an event that is not strictly caused is one that depends on chance, like the flip of a coin. If the outcome is only probable, not certain, then the event can be said to have been caused by the coin flip, but the head or tails result itself was not predictable. So this causality, which recognizes prior events as causes, is undetermined and the result of chance alone. It is statistical causality, actually the only kind of causality we have.
Exactly. "It can be said to..." Not, "it is".
uncaused events can start new causal chains
Of course, (if there was such a thing). But we have no examples of 'uncaused events', except God himself (if he can even be said to be 'an event'). The idea of anything being uncaused, except God, is a bogus notion. Building math upon it may give us further predictions, but it is still only a guess.
We call this "soft" causality. Events are caused by prior (uncaused) events, but are not completely determined by prior events in the causal chain back to a primal first cause. That Aristotelian chain (ἄλυσις) has been broken by the uncaused cause. Uncaused events start new causal chains.
Aristotle himself called these events "new beginnings" or archai (ἀρχαί).
I call it bogus causality. Divergence from a strict-one-cause-to-one effect is only a divergence, and most results that become causes have many results, innumerable to us, most of them even interacting (entangling?) with other chains. But how does our inability to be Laplace's "Demon" (or God) make those numerous effects, numerous unknowns? —they are known to God. I often say, but it keeps getting misunderstood, "Only one thing ever happens —and that one thing is, 'whatever happens'". Those numerous effects that diverged from each cause, are that one thing that happened. "Yep, that's what happened!", might suffice for the obvious statement I'm trying to get across to you. I'm linking
@Josheb here, hoping that he peruses this site sometimes. He repeatedly seemed (to me) to misunderstand what I meant by that statement. You might be surprised to hear what he says about "exhaustive determinism".
Most events are "adequately determined." No events are
pre-determined in the
Laplacian or theological senses.
Only as part of the notion you called "soft determinism". You have no theoretical proof of any lack of predetermination, unless you presuppose "chance", which, I say, renders that line of logic bogus.
Determinism is critical for the question of free will. Strict determinism implies just one possible future. Chance means that the future is open and unpredictable. Chance allows alternative futures and the question becomes how the one actual present is realized from these potential alternatives.
All true. But "any thing caused by chance" is only human speech/conception, and not reality. It is a self-contradictory notion.
I'm hoping, at this point, that you are still only defining terms and not making claims/ arguments.
Even in a world that contains quantum uncertainty, macroscopic objects are determined to an extraordinary degree. Newton's laws of motion are deterministic to the limits of observational error. Our
Cogito model of a "Macro Mind" makes it large enough to ignore quantum uncertainty for the purpose of the reasoning will. The neural system is robust enough to insure that mental decisions are reliably transmitted to our limbs.
Huh? Sounds like equivocation, to me. The fact that (to us) macroscopic determinations can be made to an extraordinary degree, doesn't imply validity to "quantum uncertainty". Quantum uncertainty can't even begin to be uncertain to God.
we can have causality without determinism
You have only said so. You have not shown how such a construction is real.
We call this kind of determinism, limited as it is in extremely small structures, "
adequate determinism." The presence of quantum uncertainty leads philosophers to call the world "indeterministic." But
indeterminism is seriously misleading when most events are overwhelmingly "adequately determined."
What you call it does not give the notion merit.
There is no problem imagining that the three traditional mental faculties of reason - perception, conception, and comprehension - are all carried on essentially deterministically in a physical brain where quantum events do not interfere with normal operations.
There is also no problem imagining a role for randomness in the brain in the form of quantum level and thermal noise. Noise can introduce random errors into stored memories. Noise could create random associations of ideas during memory recall and the important process of memory consolidation.
The concept in physics that goes by the term, "noise", is only "random" or can cause "random" results, only as the same shortcut we use to attribute substance to mere "chance". Noise is numerous causes, more than we are able to assess. WE call it random, but to God it is not.
I'm not following you here. What does human actions (or the lack of them) have to do with whether microscopic quantum fluctuations are amplified to the macroscopic level?
Our Macro Mind needs the Micro Mind for the free action items and thoughts in an Agenda of alternative possibilities to be
de-liberated by the will. The random Micro Mind is the "free" in free will and the source of human
creativity. The adequately determined Macro Mind is the "will" in free will that de-liberates, choosing actions for which we can be morally
responsible.
A nice-sounding construction, but if true —that is, if what you say there is necessary (that. "The random Micro Mind is the "free" in free will and the source of human creativity."— then the notion of this level of "free will" is bogus. There is no such thing as "random" except in our way of thinking.
Causality must be disambiguated from its close relatives
certainty,
determinism,
necessity, and
predictability.
Why?
Free will
libertarians have imagined exceptions to causality that they call "
agent-causality" and "
non-causality."
As one fellow of our mutual acquaintance would say, "Sophistry". They are made-up in the mind, as you said here, "imagined". Not real.
The first agent-causal libertarian was Aristotle, followed by
Epicurus, and then
Carneades. In more recent times, prominent agent-causalists have been
Thomas Reid in the 18th century, and
Roderick Chisholm,
Richard Taylor,
Keith Lehrer,
Timothy O'Connor, and
Randolph Clarke in the 20th century.
The author of "non-causality" is
Carl Ginet. He maintains that no cause is needed for human decisions. We can summarize the positions of these libertarians, all of which admit some indeterminism, in a diagram, part of the
taxonomy of all free will positions.https://www.informationphilosopher.com/freedom/causality.html
hope this helps !!!
Again, you imply here that if the agent causes, that it he is not caused to do so. That remains unproven, but only convenient, to think that way.
). There is no NEW principle exterior to God that God did not, one way or another, cause.
