I'd still like a response to #518 from Zetherin though. I can admit when I'm wrong but can he?

Using your admittance of being wrong as a weapon to scold others doesn't become you. For the future, don't admit you're wrong just so you can hold some sort of self-righteous stance to make others look less humbling, or inferior in some way. I'd rather you be stubborn than have to deal with that nonsense.

Using your admittance of being wrong as a weapon to scold others doesn't become you. For the future, don't admit you're wrong just so you can hold some sort of self-righteous stance to make others look less humbling, or inferior in some way. I'd rather you be stubborn than have to deal with that nonsense.

Right, care to address #518 instead of using this as an opportunity to scold me? Double standard.

Right but the question is, which reflects which? Does the statement become true based on what color shirts I wear or does what color shirt I wear depend on the truth of the statement?

How is that?............

Well this may be a matter of perspective, but it is somewhat sobering for me to realize that we are subject to the unwilled, causal regularities of the universe in which we live. It reduces my sense of individuality to know that human history and its agents were deterministic animals that were reacting to environmental causes and internal stimuli responses that were regulated by the law of natural selection, an unconscious lawlike regularity. I still, however, see some type of majesty in it all.

Well, that perspective may be only a consequence of a misunderstanding of the nature of natural laws. Natural laws do not compel people to do anything, so they do not interfere with our free will.

I wasn't saying that natural, deterministic laws interfere with our free will. I just don't see free will as existing outside of natural, deterministic laws. Natural regularities do not compel us in the same sense of one person forcing another person to commit an act in spite of their own personal desire, but do natural regularities not cause or pressure agents to act in certain ways?

What is the difference between a deterministic conception of free will and the more simple concept of agency?

1. Night Ripper never wears yellow shirts.

I think you will agree that the truth of (1) reflects what color shirts I wear. If I choose, tomorrow I could wear a yellow shirt for the first time and make (1) false or I could never wear a yellow shirt and make (1) true. The truth or falsity is based on whatever I do.

2. No mass ever accelerates faster than the speed of light.

Likewise, the truth or falsity of (2) reflects how mass actually behaves. If some mass were to accelerate faster than the speed of light then (2) would be false. However, since (2) is true, mass never does that. It doesn't mean that it can't do that, since it could and make (2) false. Remember (2) is true or false based on how mass behaves. It doesn't control or govern the behavior of mass.

I agree.



I don't know what you are saying would control or govern. There are reasons why (2) is true, if that's what you mean. And, again, you must watch how you use "can't". If by, "It doesn't mean that it can't do that", you mean "it's logically possible that it can do that", then I agree. But if by "It doesn't mean that it can't do that", you mean "it's physically possible that it can do that", I disagree. Don't forget the distinction between logical impossibility and physical impossibility (as if we haven't beaten that horse dead).

Do we disagree on anything?

But if by "It doesn't mean that it can't do that", you mean "it's physically possible that it can do that", I disagree.

Then you disagree.

The problem is that you think any physical event could ever be incompatible with the laws of nature. The laws of nature describe physical events, they don't prevent them from happening.

Night Ripper;147935 wrote:

2. No mass ever accelerates faster than the speed of light.

And why is that? Pure chance? Or is it because "that's just the way the universe is and will continue to be", i.e. because of some (permanent) property of the universe?

Then you disagree.

The problem is that you think any physical event could ever be incompatible with the laws of nature. The laws of nature describe physical events, they don't prevent them from happening.

Well, obviously if there were an event incompatible with a natural law then that would not be a natural law, but only believed to be a natural law. And that is why is it (physically) impossible for there to be an event incompatible with a natural law. But that is exactly what I have been saying. (Such an event would be physically impossible, but not, of course, logically impossible). No one thinks that any event could be incompatible with a natural law. Such an event would be physically impossible. That's the point. What make you believe that Z. or anyone thinks an event could be incompatible with a law of nature?

Exactly. If an event happened which was incompatible with a natural law, we would have been wrong about that natural law - which is to say it wouldn't have been natural law to begin with. And you're right, it wouldn't make sense to think that an event would be incompatible with natural law, since natural law is supposed to be true; if we think that an event would be incompatible with natural law, we wouldn't be making sense, since events cannot be incompatible with natural law (we would, I suppose, mean that we think an event is incompatible with what we thought was natural law)!

Maybe Night Ripper thinks that by us stating a natural law is true, we are stating we are infallible. But that is certainly not the case. What is being claimed is that natural law is true and that events cannot be incompatible with natural law, while also acknowledging (for what reason, I don't know - he seems to want us to admit this) that it could be (logically possible) different.

Exactly. If an event happened which was incompatible with a natural law, we would have been wrong about that natural law - which is to say it wouldn't have been natural law to begin with. And you're right, it wouldn't make sense to think that an event would be incompatible with natural law, since natural law is supposed to be true; if we think that an event would be incompatible with natural law, we wouldn't be making sense, since events cannot be incompatible with natural law (we would, I suppose, mean that we think an event is incompatible with what we thought was natural law)!

Maybe Night Ripper thinks that by us stating a natural law is true, we are stating we are infallible. But that is certainly not the case. What is being claimed is that natural law is true and that events cannot be incompatible with natural law, while also acknowledging (for what reason, I don't know - he seems to want us to admit this) that it could be (logically possible) different.

And you're right, it wouldn't make sense to think that an event would be incompatible with natural law, since natural law is supposed to be true; if we think that an event would be incompatible with natural law, we wouldn't be making sense, since events cannot be incompatible with natural law (we would, I suppose, mean that we think an event is incompatible with what we thought was natural law)!

Yes, physically impossible means incompatible with the laws of nature.

I'm glad you finally see my point I've been trying to make since post #495.



Therefore, it doesn't make sense to think anything is physically impossible. I win.