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Block-Universe Determinism vs. Causal-Chain Determinism
Contents
Armchair causal-chain determinism
vs. timeless mystic determinism..
Causal-chain vs. block-universe
determinism
Against causal-chain determinism
Wikipedia entries about types of
Determinism
Determinism vs. timeless, pre-set,
frozen-future fatedness
Horizontal chain of causality vs.
vertical chain of causality
Bad science, bad religion, and bad
philosophy
There are 3 frameworks serving as conceptual filters one could look through; modes of thinking, or interpretive frameworks:
o The freewillist mode of thinking
o Timeless block-universe mystic-experiencing determinism (vertical determinism; crystalline causal interlocking)
Also:
o The causal-chain ordinary-state determinist mode of thinking (armchair determinism; horizontal in-time determinism; domino-chain determinism). Like Reformed theologian-moralists, this is freewillist thinking with a lump or layer of determinism barely affixed, hanging off the side like an afterthought.
The causal-chain determinist view is a fleeting modern half-baked version of determinism and not of great interest. Most interesting is contrasting the freewillist conceptual framework with the mystic-determinist conceptual framework.
When understood from the armchair speculative philosophical determinist mindset that retains a freewillist core, the *concept* of egodeath remains an illusion that remains actively in force throughout almost the entirety of one's thinking; the conceptual understanding of egodeath is woven from ordinary-state ratiocination that still incorporates the present egoic-styled mental dynamics the thinker is accustomed to, including the sense-feeling of time's passage, and the sense-feeling of being a power-wielding personal agent.
These accustomed feelings prevent clear and complete thinking about the nature of time, self, control, and will, resulting in a thin, emaciated version of determinism that, for example, is unable to recognize that the higher or inner layer of world religion is centrally concerned with and concerned about determinism.
When experiencing of mystic determinism and ego death is lacking, neither can the purely or merely conceptual understanding of determinism flourish to full development; without maximizing the experience of determinism, the conceptual or book knowledge of determinism is also stunted, remaining below the critical threshold for realization; and likewise, without maximizing the conceptual or book knowledge of determinism, the actual experience of determinism is stunted, remaining below the critical threshold required for mystic climax, crisis, rebirth, and lasting ascension.
When everyone these days talks about visionary plants as not providing "lasting" enlightenment, that indicates that they don't realize initiation has always been a series of initiations, with only the final couple initiations producing a lasting enlightenment -- escaping the round of rebirth into vulgar bodily incarnation, meaning egoic thinking, with the delusion of freewill control agency. In Catholic terms, one is still in purgatory, not yet having burned away all one's mortal sins.
What is the metaphorical expression of "This repeated method hasn't provided lasting enlightenment" in Protestant terms? Protestantism is relatively mysticism-challenged, despite Boehme; where is their series of initiations leading finally to perseverance of the saints? Protestantism has regeneration but I don't see a *series* of initiatory purifications there, offhand. There isn't much myth available in mainstream Protestantism, so initiation has become oversimplified into an unachievable and unrealistic "all at once" regeneration.
Full regeneration does happen all at once, but only after a series of partial, temporary glimpses of the higher interpretive framework (mental worldmodel of time, self, control, and will). When did the clueless, mystically challenged modern era begin? At the Reformation, when the surface mythic metaphorical symbols of the initiation path were smashed and discarded, leaving only the canon of scriptures. So the question "Where is the series of initiations in Protestantism" becomes, "Where is the series of initiations in the Protestant scriptural canon?"
Where does the Bible reveal a series of initiations? Catholicism had to import such a series, Purgatory, from outside the canon. As valuable as scripture-only systematic theology is, it is inadequate to convey a series of initiations, which is part of the reason why modernity -- the age of Protestantism -- has been mysticism-challenged. We do have, in the canon, Paul's ascension to halfway up the Hermetic/Gnostic or Jacob ladder, meeting Jesus who came halfway down from heaven to meet him and pull him up outside the deterministic cosmos.
There is some hierarchy in the New Testament, but it is too muted to be ergonomic. Restriction to the scriptural canon of Bible-only has just not been ergonomic enough to support mystic discovery -- the Bible isn't that *effective*, when the psychoactive sacraments are hard to recognize and discover as it is.
Armchair determinists wish to divide the world into Determinists vs. Religionists, but the mystic determinists (full-range experience-based determinists) know that the key division is between lower philosophers and lower religionists on the one hand, both with the bulk of their thinking being the freewillist conceptual framework, and higher philosophers and higher religionists -- perhaps "higher philosopher-religionists" -- on the other hand, with the bulk of their thinking modified in some deep and thorough sense, able to use both modes, both conceptual frameworks: the freewillist style of thinking and the no-free-willist (or determinist) system of thinking.
Einstein leaves Newton 99% intact and yet at the same time, profoundly shifts and modifies the entire Newtonian framework. Similarly, experience-based determinism leaves one's freewillist thinking 99% intact in some sense, and yet at the same time, profoundly shifts and modifies the entire Newtonian framework -- whereas armchair determinism, typified by speculative causal-chain determinism, never really profoundly integrates into and deeply changes one's thinking.
Armchair determinists are like Lorentz: they calculate the equation of determinism and follow out some of its implications, perhaps even a somewhat large quantity of theoretical implications, but don't rise above the threshold where all concepts can be simply reconfigured and recognized in perennial myth-religion and pre-modern Philosophy, which was based on speculation about experience from the mystic state as well as from the ordinary state (characterized by tight binding of cognitive associations). Mystic determinists, in contrast, cross that threshold.
http://www-gap.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/HistTopics/Special_relativity.html -- "Despite Lorentz's caution the special theory of relativity was quickly accepted. In 1912 Lorentz and Einstein were jointly proposed for a Nobel prize for their work on special relativity. The recommendation is by Wien, the 1911 winner, and states "While Lorentz must be considered as the first to have found the mathematical content of the relativity principle, Einstein succeeded in reducing it to a simple principle."
The armchair determinist can discover some logically implicit implication of a kind of ego death or something almost tantamount to an ego death concept and theory, as when pointing out that technically no one is metaphysically a responsible agent.
But such a conceptualization of ego death remains an abstract, theoretical, calculated concept which pictures a remote underlying determinism that lies completely outside the realm of direct conscious experiencing, and certainly outside the realm of the feeling of controllership; the armchair determinist calculates and hypothetically constructs a model of some determinist ramifications for personal agency, but does not experience and can hardly imagine experiencing determinism.
The *experience* of ego death is actively, intensely, and deeply destructive or self-destructive of deluded misconceptions about time, control, self, agency, and will; it is not an experience that was intended; more like accidentally and fatally seeing something one didn't want to, while poking around looking for increased personal power.
The experience of ego death comes as a complete surprise to the egoic conceptual framework, and is based outside egoic conceptual framework, which is based on familiar, armchair, accustomed and limited range of experiencing, based strictly in the mode of cognition characterized by tight associative binding.
The timeless frozen iron-block universe model of space, time, control, agency, self, and will has all the capabilities the armchair determinist can manage to pull together in forming a theoretical conceptual model of determinism and ego death.
But in addition, the mystic state suspends the sense-feeling of free will and of the passage of time, and thus actively and deeply contributes to the revision of the egoic mental worldmodel, producing the transcendent mental worldmodel that considers time to be viewable as moving or as frozen, and personal agency power as powerful or impotent and empty.
Because the breadth of experience is greatly increased, including many aspects of experiencing that are relevant to no-free-will, such a mind is able to more quickly, easily, and ergonomically construct a full and robust and sturdy theory of determinism -- not limited to the speculation that one time-slice state mechanically causes the next, but perhaps rather all spacetime points are timelessly interlocked in all spacetime directions.
And because the theoretical model of determinism can thereby be assembled and fleshed out so quickly and thoroughly, *experience* of determinism is thereby assisted and brought to a full realization more quickly and repeatably than those spiritualists who err in the direction of disparaging theoretical knowledge all in favor of restricting one's mind to mystic experience.
A major part of forming an ergonomic system of fully realizing determinism is to surpass a threshold: you must rise above a critical threshold quickly in the area of theoretical mental model-construction *and* rise above a critical threshold quickly in the area of mystic-state (loose cognitive association binding) experiencing; when the critical threshold is crossed on both fronts, then significant progress can be made quickly and easily, ergonomically.
Ancient
hiemarmene/Necessity/Fate isn't based on the assumption of causal-chain
determinism, but rather, on timeless, pre-existing future, frozen
block-universe determinism. There are
two different models of determinism; block-universe determinism doesn't rely on
the hypothesis of an earlier state "causing" a later state.
Instead of
that in-time, along-time idea of causality, ancients put the emphasis on
vertical timeless causality: the One, Ground of Being, or God, is the cause of
all, and is "first cause" in a vertical, timeless sense. The One causes and creates all events at all
points in time, from a place outside or beyond or above time.
The
Creation didn't happen a long time ago -- the absent watchmaker model of
domino-chain determinism (causal-chain determinism). Instead, the Creation happens at all times, timelessly. All events at all times were (and are and
will be) created all at once.
Causal-chain
determinism has been dominant in the modern era, which is ignorant of religious
experiencing. Thinkers influenced by
religious experiencing hardly think of causal-chain determinism, which rests on
abstract speculation and on the sense of time experienced in the ordinary state
of consciousness.
Causal-chain
determinism is based on the lower, mundane, inexperienced, and unenlightened
way of thinking about time, and experience of time.
Block-universe
determinism is based on the higher, transcendent, mystically experienced, and
enlightened way of thinking about time, and experience of time.
The model
and idea of determinism one has before the mystic state and enlightenment is
the egoic, unenlightened model, which is causal-chain determinism; afterwards,
the emphasis is placed instead on block-universe determinism.
Not only
is there a strong tendency to switch from freewillist thinking to no-free-will
thinking upon experiencing time in the intense mystic altered state, there is
also a tendency to switch from the in-time, causal-chain model of determinism
to the timeless block-universe model of determinism with vertical rather than
horizontal causality.
This
change in thinking about determinism is due to moving from the lower experience
of time as flow, to the higher, mystic experience of time as timelessly created
and caused at each moment from above, below, inside, or outside, rather than
being caused by the previous time-slice.
Rather
than experiencing one time-slice causing the next (horizontal ordinary-state
experience of causality), the mind in the mystic state experiences each
time-slice as independent of the others, each one being caused vertically by
the hidden Creator, with the entire set of time-slices being created
harmoniously all at once, timelessly.
Book list:
Tenseless time, eternity, and timelessness
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/listmania/list-browse/-/CYO513ZOJFHM
_______________________
Michael
wrote:
>>>Nietzsche's
view of freedom might be close to my model of timelessly frozen, pre-existing
future, block-universe determinism, especially if one emphasizes
a positive
transcendent freedom in addition to metaphysical unfreedom. He seems to loathe the hypothesis of
causal-chain determinism as much as I do, in
addition
to rejecting the hypothesis of metaphysical freedom that underlies responsible
moral agency.
>>I
want to understand your idea of block-universe determinism as opposed to
causal-chain determinism.
>>Are
you saying that everything has already happened?
Future
events are like remote places: future events exist as much as past events
exists, without needing to refer to any particular "now". A far location exists, even though it is far
relative to here. Events in the past
and future exist, though they don't exist now at this point in time. The problem with the word 'already' is that
it is customarily taken to imply a tensed model of time, whereas when I say
"the future timelessly already exists", I am postulating a tenseless
model of time.
http://www.google.com/search?q=%22tenseless+time%22
http://www.qsmithwmu.com/new_theory_of_time_contents_page.htm
http://www.qsmithwmu.com/the_new_theory_of_time_general_introduction_by_quentin_smith.htm
General
Introduction: The Implications of the Tensed and Tenseless Theories of Time --
QUENTIN SMITH
>>Why
do you think that everything has already happened?
Because
that is what mystics report as an experience in the mystic state of
consciousness, and because the timeless frozen block-universe model is simple
and elegant.
>>If
time is an illusion then what does "already" mean?
A word has
a meaning only within a network of other words, forming a network of words with
meanings. To say the future already
exists means that the future is as existent and as established and as single as
the past. There is not one past and multiple
futures; there exists a single past and a single future.
To our
present knowledge, there are multiple so-called "possible" futures,
but in reality, there is only a single possible or actual future, the one that
was timelessly created as part of the set of all time-slices. The set of all time-slices is created all at
the same timeless time, the moment of creation, which did not happen a long
time ago in linear flowing time, but rather, happened and happens eternally,
from a dimension perpendicular to the time axis.
>>Does
the block-universe model of determinism have different implications than the
causal-chain model of determinism?
There are
different experiential implications in block-universe determinism compared to
causal-chain determinism. When one
holds the block-universe model of determinism in mind, the future is thought of
differently than when holding the causal-chain model of determinism in
mind. The differences are systemic;
it's a matter of two different perspectives and ways of thinking, but not
necessarily implying different content, different events in the future.
The mental
model of block-universe determinism (with timelessness and pre-existing single
future) is a different way of *thinking about* events in the future -- it's not
so much a matter of changing to different *events* in the future. The block-universe model of determinism is a
way of thinking that is informed by and experienced within the mystic
state.
There is a
difference in the mind's thinking, which constitutes a different event than
continuing the conventional causal-chain, in-time way of thinking. There is a different perspective on the
world, self, time, and control, and thus there are different implications
subjectively than if one retains the default, ordinary-state, causal-chain
model of determinism.
>>If
you've posted about this before, maybe you could point me to what you've
already written.
From
around 1997:
http://www.egodeath.com/intro.htm
- Introduction to the Cybernetic Theory of Ego Transcendence -- section
"Block-Universe Determinism and Autonomous Control"
http://www.egodeath.com
- major section "Block-Universe Determinism" contains pages:
Practical
Freedom versus Metaphysical Freedom
Timeless
Block-Universe Determinism -
http://www.egodeath.com/blockuniversedeterminism.htm
The
Illusory Nature of Change
Pre-Set
Choice, Will, and Control-Thoughts
Cross-Time
Self-Control
More
recent writings (2001-2003), as postings, are throughout the egodeath
discussion group archives. But the
first postings to read are the ones I posted in the Determinism discussion
group going back to perhaps a month or two ago. The egodeath discussion group has focused on no-free-will in
religion (and other aspects of religion), with only a few postings spelling out
the block-universe model of determinism and contrasting it to the causal-chain
model of determinism.
http://www.naturalism.org/tenetsof.htm
>>>We
do not have the capacity to act outside the causal connections that link us in
every respect to the rest of the world.
This means we do not have what many people call free will, the ability
to cause our behavior without being fully caused in turn.
I favor
that description, which implies tenseless-time block universe determinism -- a
hierarchy or web of causality.
>>We
do not have the ability to cause our behavior without being caused in turn,
which was caused by earlier causes and caused before that and before that. There has to be series of linked causes
leading up to it.
I reject
that description, which implies temporal causal-chain determinism. I reject horizontal series determinism --
it's unnecessarily complicated and makes too many assertions about metaphysics
of how no-free-will is implemented.
Vertical
determinism is a more defensible and robust view -- it makes fewer postulations
about how no-free-will is implemented.
There is no free will because time is an illusion, not because each
snapshot of the worldstate somehow causes the next, different snapshot
worldstate in a determinate way.
We don't
know that each snapshot of the worldstate somehow causes the next, different
snapshot worldstate in a determinate way -- but we do know that time is an
illusion and that freewill is a superfluous redundant theoretical
addition. It may be fair to say that
timeless block-universe determinism -- with frozen, single, preexisting future
-- is the result of a scientific logical observation in the mystic altered
state.
The
ancient philosophers used the mystic altered state to think about Heimarmene
and came up with the conclusion of timeless block universe determinism -- likewise,
if we use the mystic altered state, we will repeat the same experiential
observations and recognize the beautiful elegant coherence of the timeless
block universe determinism perspective, and in contrast, the beastly monstrous
illogic behind the freewill agency worldmodel.
We may
also see the raw and crude half-baked, half-coherent quality of the notion of
temporal causal-chain determinism. Per
Hume, causality is a huge mysterious assumption. How do we know that worldstate A leads always to worldstate
B? We don't -- it's a sheer assumption
with weak foundation. There exists a
far more sound, robust foundation for no-free-will: the atemporal point of
view.
Whether or
not worldstate A has some mechanical causal link to always cause worldstate B, whether
or not there is any sort of causal relation between them -- whether repeatable
or variable -- we can make the assumption that there is a single future,
already timelessly existing, with time as a space-like dimension and thus an
illusion.
In this
rather simple solution -- covered the first week of a modern physics course --
we can say that there is an elegant, simple worldmodel that explains
no-free-will with fewer or less arbitrary assumptions that the baseless
assertion that worldstate A if repeated would always lead to worldstate B. By this irrelevant focus on a hypothetical
rigid causal mechanism leading from worldstate A to B, causal-chain determinism
misses the main essence of no-free-will.
Tenseless-time
block-universe determinism as a model and a mystic-state experience and
perspective is the main argument for no-free-will, and causal-chain determinism
is a minor footnote next to the argument from sentence-truth (the sea-battle
argument).
The
chain-through-time model is not sufficient to provide a full, robust,
insightful mental model of no-free-will.
It's only one of several arguments, and is not the strongest argument --
it's a narrow, uncompelling, tottering base.
Timeless block-universe determinism with a single preexisting frozen future
leapfrogs over the in-time domino-chain picture to get to the main point.
The
conceptually clearest and most robust conception, and deservedly main model of
no-free-will, is based first of all on timeless single-future block-universe
determinism. The causal-chain way of
thinking is just a minor supplemental perspective within that model, only
slightly more important than the argument from sentence-truth (the sea-battle
argument).
The
causal-chain takes a whole way of thinking about time completely for
granted. It's not so much wrong, as
narrowly informed and misleading in that it blocks from seeing even better
arguments for no-free-will.
Causal-chain determinism is a failure at convincing people, and has
permitted much lasting confusion. The
block-universe model powerfully clears up confusion and relates to an available
realm of experiencing.
We cannot
experience causal-chain determinism, but we can vividly experience and easily
visualize timeless block-universe determinism.
Causal-chain determinism has completely taken over the field and is
harming its own cause by being mistaken for the best argument and the best
visualization for no-free-will, but those who use it as their main and only
argument and mental picture need to broaden their philosophical awareness.
There is a
book on the history of the free-will argument, but alas, what we really need is
a history of no-free-will -- the subject is broader and more interesting and
profound than one would assume based on the narrow range of argument and
conceptual models coming from those who treat causal-chain determinism as the
best, or rather the only, way of defending, advocating, and describing
no-free-will.
No-free-will
can be seen as the central topic in the history of philosophy and religion, yet
the advocates of the causal-chain model are snoozing, missing out on huge
realms of discussion and experiencing, in a kind of oblivious reductionism of
what should be the most broadly rich and interesting subject: no-free-will,
conceived of in ways besides only adhering to the one way of thinking about it,
the one argument, of causal-chain determinism.
>>The
sensation of oercoming the barriers between the individual and the Absolute,
the sensation of Absolute Unitary Being is experienced by Buddhist monks during
meditation and Franciscan Nuns in prayer.
Mystic altered state experiences occur frequently.
Mystic
altered-state experiences happened all the time, almost boringly routinely, in
the era of the mystery-religions.
Today's
spiritualists, such as most readers of the magazine What Is Enlightenment?,
want to have their cake and eat it too: they want no-separate-self, combined
with metaphysical free will moral agency -- though no-separate-self directly
implies no-free-will. Instead of just
the usual talk about "no-separate-self", pair it with
"no-free-will". In the peak
of the mystic altered state, it is common to experience
no-free-will/no-separate-self.
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Block_time
- time as a spacelike dimension
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determinism
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_will
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causality
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compatibilism
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpretation_of_quantum_mechanics
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_determinism
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Many-Worlds_Interpretation
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copenhagen_interpretation
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bohm_interpretation
<-- block universe determinism
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Types_of_religious_predestination
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jansenism
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predestination
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustine_of_Hippo
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predestination_(Calvinism)
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calvinism
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Process_theology
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Theism
I'm
getting the impression that the Catholic church said "Let freewill be
anathema!" and then later said "Let determinism be anathema!"
Jansenism:
Catholic Resistance to Authority from the Reformation to the French Revolution
(Studies in European History)
William
Doyle
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0312226764
Says that
the Church's offical later rejection of Augustine's determinism was at the
central core of culture.
God Owes
Us Nothing: A Brief Remark on Pascal's Religion and on the Spirit of Jansenism
Leszek
Kolakowski
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0226450538
There are
a couple recent theology books debating about Augustine's determinism being
"pagan" and thus possibly undesirable:
Beyond the
Bounds: Open Theism and the Undermining of Biblical Christianity
John
Piper (Editor), Justin Taylor (Editor), Paul Kjoss Helseth
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1581344627
Determinism
is usually defined as the ability in principle to *predict* the future. I dismiss that emphasis as
"predictionism". That
emphasis reflects the bizarre convention of defining science as "that
which enables us to predict" -- surprisingly, most definitions of science
amount to such predictionism. Why this
obsession with prediction? I wanted
self-control and personal mastery, first of all, and later, sought knowledge of
transcendent truth -- but never lusted after science as a way to predict
things.
Another
common aspect of conventional definitions of determinism I reject is the
"domino chain" way of thinking about how events are connected across
time. The kind of determinism
encountered in the mystic altered state is not at all a way of perceiving
causality playing out from one moment to the next like a chain of dominos
falling. Rather, the altered state
shows the frozenness of all time, including a single frozen future. I only use the term "determinism"
because it is more familiar than "fatalism" or the "iron block
universe" (William James).
My real
interest, the concept that is actually relevant to transcendent perception, is
frozen-future fatedness, in which the future in some sense already exists. Stop and notice what I said -- *the*
future. People say this without
thinking, yet the real point of contention in free will and determinism and
Quantum Mechanics is the very question of whether there is a single,
"the" future, or whether the future should be thought of as a single
*region* that contains infinite branching possibilities. When you say "the" future, the
singleness of the word "the" can be taken in either of two drastically
opposing senses.
A single
open future, like a single huge possibility space, or instead, just a single
necessary actual future, which is just a thread -- a single thin, narrow,
particular worldline.
When I say
"determinism" I usually say "my version of determinism" or
"determinism as I understand it" -- which is frozen, single, fixed
future fatedness. That is, a
particular, thin, single, exclusive worldline.
By "worldline", as far as mystic *experiencing*, I
particularly mean a series of mental constructs. The mind's future series or chain of mental constructs is already
set, down to the last detail, frozen into the spacetime block.
Consider
this pre-set, frozen, timelessly existing worldline of a mind's future mental
constructs. A person's life is like a
train track of mental constructs frozen into the spacetime block. Rudy Rucker's book The Fourth Dimension
diagrams this. Is that pre-set future
chain of mental constructs predictable in principle? I say maybe, maybe not, and it doesn't matter as far as
transcendent knowledge and ego death.
The
fatedness I describe is completely independent of the issue of whether the
future is predictable in principle.
Similarly, this fatedness is independent of the idea of the domino-chain
way of thinking about determinism.
Domino-chain predictionism *is* the conventional notion of
"determinism". Thus the
correct answer to the free will vs. determinism debate, an answer that is much
more sturdy and relevant, is a third alternative, which also has nothing to do
with conventional notions of "compatibilism".
Fate/necessity/providence,
correctly understood as some ancients understood it, is similar to determinism,
with without any particular emphasis on prediction-in-principle, or
domino-chain causality. In domino-chain
causality, the usual assumptions and point of view are that the future doesn't
exist yet, and is still open, though the dominos will surely eventually fill
that future with a particular content.
In complete contrast is the timeless perspective of mystic experiencing,
in which the future already exists because time is essentially an
illusion. From the timeless point of
view, the future has whatever content it does because of the same reason
anything exists in any pattern across time: when things at all points in time
were created, they were created such that nearby points in time have similar
content -- producing the apparent result of smooth, continuous movement through
time.
But there
is nothing in the timeless perspective that insists that a previous action
causes a later action in a determinate way.
Even if we discover that a previous action does not cause a later action
in a determinate way, frozen-future fatedness remains standing tall, and mystic
perception of timelessness remains the same as ever. If causality is somehow discovered to be indeterminate,
conventional determinism and prediction-in-principle immediately falls into
complete ruin, but timeless frozen-future fatedness remains strong as ever of a
worldmodel.
>How
about a concise definition of your idea of "determinism"?
>>determinism
\De*ter"min*ism\, n. (Metaph.) The doctrine that the will is not free, but
is inevitably and invincibly determined by motives.
>>determinism
n. A philosophical doctrine holding that all events are inevitable consequences
of antecedent sufficient causes; often understood as denying the possibility of
free will.
>The
quick lie is put to determinism then, by positing a hypothetical action which
has several motives. Chose one!
..... End of determinism.
>This
is an elegant proof that determinism is a bankrupt philosophy, no?
Those
definitions suck, and miss the main insights that more forcefully contradict
the free will hypothesis. Those are
standard definitions, especially the second definition. The only way the second definition could
suck even more fully is if it included the cliche dogmatic definition
component, of the future being predictable-in-principle. Free will is certainly a confused, vague,
and unstable notion, but standard versions of determinism seem fixated on
irrelevancies, so they don't provide an alternative worth rallying behind. Standard determinism takes a certain
unspoken model of time for granted, and focuses exclusively on a picture of
causality based within that model of time.
Such
"determinism" would be more accurately named
"temporal-causal-chainism".
It emphasizes change and movement, whereas a stronger opposite of
freewill would emphasize the illusory nature of change. The conventional model of determinism is set
in a spacetime metaphysical paradigm that is biased in favor of freewill and
the freewill worldmodel of spacetime and the open future. Such determinism implies that the future is
open but it will become closed in a particular way with a particular
outcome. I, instead, deny that the
future is open at all except in the most limited of senses: it's only our
*knowledge* of the future that is open.
Time
present and time past
Are both
perhaps present in time future
And time
future contained in time past'
If all
time is eternally present
All time
is unredeemable.
What
might have been is an abstraction
Remaining
a perpetual possibility
Only in
a world of speculation.
What might
have been and what has been
Points
to one end, which is always present.
(T.S.Eliot)
>>That
interesting idea doesn't make sense to a true determinist, because it lacks the
true determinist's standard emphasis on causal effects and continuity.
The poem
doesn't take the view of *modern* determinists.
Modern
determinism is the view of determinism and the version of determinism which is
always assumed in all the modern philosophy books. The modern version of determinism, the causal-chain view of
determinism, doesn't consider also the vertical-chain determinism. The classic and pre-modern version of
determinism puts a distinctive emphasis on the timeless hierarchical chain of
being -- vertical causality.
Compared
to vertical causality, or the vertical chain of causality, the horizontal
in-time chain of causality has a relatively strong characteristic of practical
freedom and is not far from the freewillist mode of thinking, which is also
in-time and grounded in the sphere of practical experiencing.
__________________________________
Pre-modern
philosophical thought, which included mystical philosophy, has always drawn a
comparison between two different types of causal chains:
o The horizontal in-time causal chain: the
stimulus happens first in time, and then the response happens in the next point
in the sequence of time slices. This
way of thinking, feeling, experiencing, observing, and perceiving is natural to
the ordinary state of consciousness.
The Modern view emphasizes the horizontal type of causality.
o The vertical timeless causal chain: the
stimulus happens first in the transcendent realm, with the One as the prime
mover at the higher (or more underlying) level of being, and then the response
happens in the lower level of being.
Picture a transcendent god (often conceived of as operating from outside
of the prison of cosmic determinism) making a human dance on puppet strings;
the stimulus comes from the prime mover, and the response is the action of the
secondary mover, which is the human. This
way of thinking, feeling, experiencing, observing, and perceiving is natural to
the mystic (loose-cognition) state of consciousness. The Hellenistic and pre-Modern view emphasizes the vertical,
hierarchical type of causality.
Neither
conception of causality -- horizontal in-time causality or vertical timeless
causality -- is new; both are as old as Philosophy itself. The Hellenistic era emphasized vertical
causality, while the Modern era emphasized horizontal causality. The Modern view, which emphasizes the
horizontal type of causality, is relatively new, dating from the era of
postulating "God as the absent watchmaker" who wound up the universe
a long time ago and left it to run on its own over time. Ecstatically based Philosophy instead
emphasizes the continuous act of creation of the world; Genesis happens and
originates at all points in time. The
watchmaker or hidden puppetmaster is equidistant from all points in time.
For more
about feeling and experiencing the hierarchical, vertical, timeless causal
chain of stimulus/response, rather than the linear, horizontal, in-time causal
chain of stimulus/response:
http://www.egodeath.com/intro.htm - section "Moral Agency,
Theology, Levels of Control, and Delusion"
Temptation
for modern determinists is the urge to frame the freewill debate as freewillist
religion vs. determinist science. But
the real divide is not between science vs. religion, but rather, between
freewillist and determinist versions of these. Bad science is Copenhagenism, an anti-rational interpretation of
quantum physics that is covertly driven by the project of propping up the power
of human freewill. Copenhagenism is
freewillist science.
Good
science is the hidden-variables QM interpretation advocated by Einstein and
Bohm, favoring the deterministic and relatively visualizable model of QM, with
Einstein specifically repudiating freewill.
Philosophy and Theology also have venerable determinist emphases
together with modern-era upstart movements such as Openness theology or the
philosophical freewillists, fighting the tide.
Determinists
shouldn't be for science and against religion -- they will awaken to find
themselves in bed with anti-determinists such as Bohr (a Copenhagenist). That upstart camp has managed to take over
science, declaiming against the bad old determinist science and putting down
Einstein as "outdated and unable to keep up with recent
developments".
The
freewillist popular view of QM is a distorted and misguided story: "Science
used to be determinist, with Newton, but now with QM, science has become
freewillist, emancipating us all from the horrors of the clockwork
universe."
Science
for such a popular crowd is held as good, for the exactly most bad reason: they
see modern science as having granted victory to freewill indeterminism,
rescuing our freedom from evil machine determinism. Determinism is portrayed like the Borg, with the fleshy and
humane Copenhagenists coming to the rescue, saving the power of mind over matter,
which becomes synonymous with saving the power of freewill.
Those who
hate religion largely because they see it as freewillist ought to, by the same
token, hate modern science for selling its soul to freewillist Copenhagenism.
Freewillism
is a minority view in mystic religion, in Theology, in Philosophy, and in
Science, and yet in the popular view, these have ample room for freewillism;
those who are not on the inside of one of these fields sees the field in its
most freewillist form, because that's how the masses want to see all
fields. They look to science, religion,
and philosophy with the hope of finding support for freewill and thus for
metaphysically independent personal power.
I'm
cautious about revealing to people the nonhistoricity of Jesus and Paul, or
about the entheogenic (visionary plants) nature of religion, but what worries
me the most is telling people about determinism. It's the opposite message than many people want to hear, since
they all lap up the marketing of, simply conceived, "increased
freedom" -- and determinism cuts far deeper these days into people's
psyche than the remote and interesting but indifferent topics of nonhistoricity
of ancient figures or exotic plants.
Religion
is thought of by all in this society as something outside of them, and
visionary plants is a controversial yet again external seeming subject, while
determinism is commonly perceived as having immediate, intense core
ramifications for one's very personhood, even though a familiar
intermediate-level complaint is that it makes no difference.
Determinism
provides greatly increased freedom, in some Stoic or existential practical
sense. Determinism goes with
rationality, and rationality provides greater practical freedom than
irrationality.
According
to modern values, Science is the queen of the fields of knowledge, Physics is
the queen of the sciences, and quantum physics is the queen of physics
subfields. When quantum physics sells
its soul to freewillism (via Copenhagenism), we ought to be concerned and dismayed
about "modern science" as a whole and the spirit and motives driving
it.
Physics is
no longer about following truth where it leads according to the most clear and
distinct interpretation; now Physics has become a tool for freewillists to
steer and manipulate to support their confused, garbled, and non-visualizable
hopes and wishes. The same monstrous
haze and logical chaos that characterizes the concept of freewill has taken
over quantum physics, the crown jewel of modern knowledge.
Tentativeness
and ever-revisability of human knowledge is a basic axiom of modern
epistemology. My whole theory of
transcendent knowledge and mystic experiencing rests on a basis of a type of
determinism, so I am highly committed to determinism, yet I'm careful to state
that for practical mystic experiencing, the important thing is not whether
block-universe determinism is true, but that a strong commitment or grasp of
block-universe determinism is the easy, ergonomic, lightning-fast path to a
most-intense mystic experience, an experience which matches the reports of
world mysticism over the ages.
Determinism
is a fast way to accomplish an intense kind of crossing-out of the ego, unlike
the freewillist view. The essence of
the ego delusion is freewill-premised control agency.
Home (theory of the ego death and rebirth experience)