Clarification on how we infer the theists intent wrt free-will/omniscience

Originally posted by googlefudge
EDIT: HAH. finally spotted what the robo-mod was complaining about, stupid thing.

I am not happy about the freewill being necessarily contingent on the
existence of a mind.

If the action is predetermined, or predestined, it is so not because god knows it.
God knows it BECAUSE it is predestined, because the nature of the universe is
dete ...[text shortened]... Thus for it to be possible for god to be omniscient, [libertarian] free-will cannot be possible.

I've got several problems with this, but I'll start with the one most striking to me. You have a universe which is a three dimensional space (let's ignore compactified dimensions and so forth, they don't really change the argument) with time as some sort of parameter.

My first point about this is that is seems to me to be a very Newtonian view. In General Relativity time is a dimension and the past and future really exist - otherwise space time curvature doesn't work, you should only be able to get curvature in the three space-like dimensions in that case. Having said that this is contingent on General Relativity being true which it could well not be.

My second objection is more philosophical in nature. The system you've described has a history, and current states depend on past states. If only the present exists and the past does not you have current states depending on something that does not exist. I do not see how that is possible. So my claim is that the past exists as otherwise no dynamics would be possible.

Originally posted by DeepThought
I've got several problems with this, but I'll start with the one most striking to me. You have a universe which is a three dimensional space (let's ignore compactified dimensions and so forth, they don't really change the argument) with time as some sort of parameter.

My first point about this is that is seems to me to be a very Newtonian view. In G ...[text shortened]... ossible. So my claim is that the past exists as otherwise no dynamics would be possible.

How do you factor in the probabilistic nature of the quantum world into your reply?

Originally posted by DeepThought
... So my claim is that the past exists as otherwise no dynamics would be possible.

Well the "universe only exists in the present" idea is popular with certain cosmologists***,
so there are evidently GUT formulations that don't require time, and are consistent
with current observations. This isn't to say that this is true, but it's possible based
on our current understanding, which is sufficient for our hypothetical.

*** Reveal Hidden Content

[I don't have references on me, but I have read countless articles on such topics over the years, including while at university studying physics. So while I don't claim to even remotely understand them mathematically, I do know that they exist.]

... So my claim is that the past exists as [i]otherwise no dynamics would be possible

No. the current 'state' includes properties like momentum which tells you what direction
a particle is moving in. The current state of the universe [in this model] tells you everything
you need to calculate the next [with the caveat that in reality it's likely that the next state
is only probabilistically based on the previous one] without needing to know any previous state.
As long as you know all the rules of the system and have sufficient suitably capable computing
substrate. Which we assume god has.

Originally posted by OdBod
How do you factor in the probabilistic nature of the quantum world into your reply?

That was the other problem, googlefudge's point is based on the idea that the future is only knowable if the universe is deterministic. If the universe is not deterministic then the future cannot be known in his view. For us that may well be true, but for a creator god it's not so clear. The point, I think, is that my knowledge of something does not cause it to happen. I don't see why God's foreknowledge of everything causes the universe to suddenly become deterministic. So expecting omniscience to amount to predestination is expecting it to do too much work.

Originally posted by DeepThought
That was the other problem, googlefudge's point is based on the idea that the future is only knowable if the universe is deterministic. If the universe is not deterministic then the future cannot be known in his view. For us that may well be true, but for a creator god it's not so clear. The point, I think, is that my knowledge of something does not c ...[text shortened]... stic. So expecting omniscience to amount to predestination is expecting it to do too much work.

You have it backwards.

The knowledge is only possible if the universe is deterministic.
Although it may well be the case that omniscient knowledge of the future is
only possible in a subset of all possible deterministic universes.

If the universe is not deterministic than god cannot know what will happen in it.
[beyond the ability to make probabilistic forecasts such as the ones we make,
but with commensurately greater scope]

Thus if god has omniscient knowledge of the future, then the universe must
be deterministic.


For non-deterministic universes, then the future is not predetermined, and thus
will explore a path through it's possible probability space. Each time such a universe
is run it will produce a different result and that result will not be predictable before
hand. It's therefore not possible in such a universe to have omniscient knowledge
at the outset.

Originally posted by googlefudge
Well the "universe only exists in the present" idea is popular with certain cosmologists[b]***,
so there are evidently GUT formulations that don't require time, and are consistent
with current observations. This isn't to say that this is true, but it's possible based
on our current understanding, which is sufficient for our hypothetical.

[i] ...[text shortened]... the system and have sufficient suitably capable computing
substrate. Which we assume god has.[/b]

Won't work, our theories are local theories these things are based on a differential relationship, so you need at least a small patch of the past and future to evolve anything. Besides where exactly does the time-like component of a four-vector point if there is no future?

Grand Unified Theories are Yang-Mills theories and only work properly in four dimensions, they need a fourth dimension to work properly.

I see the present as an event horizon that we are stuck to. We can "see" the past, it is analogous to the region outside a black hole. We cannot see the future, which is analogous to the region inside a black hole.

Originally posted by DeepThought
Won't work, our theories are local theories these things are based on a differential relationship, so you need at least a small patch of the past and future to evolve anything. Besides where exactly does the time-like component of a four-vector point if there is no future?

Grand Unified Theories are Yang-Mills theories and only work properly in four ...[text shortened]... e a black hole. We cannot see the future, which is analogous to the region inside a black hole.

The relevant cosmologists disagree with you.

Given that they are experts in this and you are not I am going to state that
their opinion bigfoots yours on what is theoretically [mathematically] possible.

There is absolutely no need mathematically for their to be anything other than
present in existence.

Now this obviously might not be the case in reality, but we are discussing
hypothetical possible universes.

Originally posted by googlefudge
IF free will existed and intelligent agents could make choices and chose ~P instead of P, then every run through would be different and it would be impossible for god to know in advance what would happen in any given run.

Thus for it to be possible for god to be omniscient, [libertarian] free-will cannot be possible.

The problem is that many of the terms being used are not well defined for the discussion.
Given a non-deterministic universe, it is impossible to predict the future based on the current state of the universe. But this does not rule out the existence of said future, nor does it rule out an external entity knowing about said future.
Given your ant example, we could create a similar program that is non-deterministic. We could run that program once and know the outcome. Thus we, as external to the program, can know the future.
However, the ant can never know what that outcome is, and we cannot tell it without modifying the program and thereby making it deterministic.

Originally posted by DeepThought
We can "see" the past, it is analogous to the region outside a black hole. We cannot see the future, which is analogous to the region inside a black hole.

In reality, we can see to some degree both the past and the future. However we can see the past much better than the future due to entropy.

Originally posted by twhitehead
In reality, we can see to some degree both the past and the future. However we can see the past much better than the future due to entropy.

No, that's not an explanation.

That's a buzzword.

We don't 'see' the past, or the future.

We 'see' the present.

We remember the past because our present brain state is the product of previous
brain states which are linked to past states of the universe.

We can 'see' back in time because light doesn't travel instantaneously from one
point to another. But what we are detecting is the present state of the universe.

The universe is predictable, it follows rules and laws which means that we can
work out potential futures and possible pasts.

But we cannot directly detect either.

Originally posted by googlefudge
The relevant cosmologists disagree with you.

Given that they are experts in this and you are not I am going to state that
their opinion bigfoots yours on what is theoretically [mathematically] possible.

There is absolutely no need mathematically for their to be anything other than
present in existence.

Now this obviously might not be the case in reality, but we are discussing
hypothetical possible universes.

I'd let "I can't find the reference" pass if you only relied on it in one post. But you are now claiming that your cosmologists provide an argument which trumps mine. So I'm going to insist that you provide references. Also since we are talking about the actual universe it has to be more than theoretically possible.

Edit: wrt to your reply to twhitehead - what we actually see is the backwards light cone. I cannot see Mars now, in fact what me mean by simultaneous is frame dependent, I can only see what it was like 20 odd minutes ago.

Originally posted by twhitehead
The problem is that many of the terms being used are not well defined for the discussion.
Given a non-deterministic universe, it is impossible to predict the future based on the current state of the universe. But this does not rule out the existence of said future, nor does it rule out an external entity knowing about said future.
Given your ant example ...[text shortened]... ome is, and we cannot tell it without modifying the program and thereby making it deterministic.

If the future exists [and/or the past] then you are talking about a different
hypothetical universe from the one I am talking about where only the present
exists.

However in a non-deterministic universe where all times exist simultaneously
god still cannot what I will do in 20 years time next Thursday.
Because a universe where what I do in 20 years next Thursday is already set,
whether I know it or not is by definition deterministic.

For it not to be the universe must be in constant flux at all points in time.

So, I will go back to my "universe as a film reel" analogy.


God can see all times in our universe, from beginning to end, simultaneously.
And we will envision this as if god has a film reel laid out before it with each
frame representing a snapshot of the universe [say one per plank time].

In a deterministic universe each frame is static, and you can tell exactly what
will happen to the people as they move through time as it never changes.

However this is a non-deterministic universe where people have libertarian
free will which necessarily means that for every decision they chose to do P,
they could have chosen to do ~P.

So in every frame where there is a choice being made the choice that gets made
changes between the available possible options.

And these changes alter the next frame on, and these changes propagate through
the film reel. So the future god sees for us now, is not the future we will have when
we get their. The differences in choices we make now, will alter the future we get.



The problem with your argument is that if all times in the universe exist simultaneously
and all are created at the same 'time' by god, and are static and unchanging then by
definition that universe is predetermined and deterministic in the strongest possible sense.

Originally posted by DeepThought
I'd let "I can't find the reference" pass if you only relied on it in one post. But you are now claiming that your cosmologists provide an argument which trumps mine. So I'm going to insist that you provide references. Also since we are talking about the actual universe it has to be more than theoretically possible.

Edit: wrt to your reply to twhit ...[text shortened]... me mean by simultaneous is frame dependent, I can only see what it was like 20 odd minutes ago.

Also since we are talking about the actual universe it has to be more
than theoretically possible.

Bull. Nobody knows how the actual universe does actually work [in this sense]
and thus theoretically possible is the best anyone has got.

Edit: wrt to your reply to twhitehead - what we actually see is the
backwards light cone. I cannot see Mars now, in fact what me mean by
simultaneous is frame dependent, I can only see what it was like 20 odd minutes
ago

What part of I studied physics at university escapes you?
What makes you possibly think I do not know this??

We sense the photons hitting our photo receptors [of whatever kind] in this
current present state of the universe.
The light cone tells you where they came from.
Hitting the photo detector is where they are in the present state of the universe.

Originally posted by DeepThought
Edit: wrt to your reply to twhitehead - what we actually see is the backwards light cone.

And yet you don't know for sure which path that light took. There are several possible pasts for each photon. There are just a lot fewer than the possible futures for each photon.

Originally posted by googlefudge
Because a universe where what I do in 20 years next Thursday is already set,
whether I know it or not is by definition deterministic.

Well that depends on what you mean by deterministic. Can you define it please.

My understanding of 'deterministic' is: following rules whereby the future state can be predicted from the past.
As such it is possible to know a future state of a non-deterministic system if you are not part of the system. You just cannot predict it from the current state.