A revolution in thought

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

He said it's a modal fallacy because of the confusion between what has happened (necessarily so) and what has not yet occurred, which is contingent and cannot be predicted ahead of time. Who are you trying to fool LadyShea?

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Saying that Lessans argument is fallacious is not the same as saying the whole concept of determinism is fallacious. You are not very careful in your language use.

Oh really? So what concept of determinism is not considered a modal fallacy?

Says LadyShea, Ms. All Knowing I refuse to get into this with you.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

I have laid out my arguments which you have been unable to refute. Your refusal to discuss it is because you can't refute it.

If you believe what science has taught you, that is quite understandable, but it's impossible for me to breach this subject, which contradicts the major premise [and the longstanding beliefs that go along with it], without derision on everyone's part. That is why I am done with this topic.

[LadyShea]

If you believe what science has taught you, that is quite understandable, but it's impossible for me to breach this subject, which contradicts the major premise [and the longstanding beliefs that go along with it], without derision on everyone's part. That is why I am done with this topic.

You are fake done with the topic because you can't make a coherent argument and you are a weasel. Why you keep coming back to I'll never understand.

[LadyShea]

Are you ever going to address this post, peacegirl?

Originally Posted by Spacemonkey

Let's try this another way, Peacegirl. Let's start by assuming that the photons at the film/retina came from the Sun.

Assumption #1: The photons at the film/retina came from the Sun.

Now lets define traveling and teleporting. Traveling is getting from A to B by passing through all intervening points. Teleporting is getting from A to B without passing through all intervening points. Clearly these are jointly exhaustive - if you get from A to B you must do so either by passing through the intervening points or by not passing through them. So...

Conclusion #1: If the photons came from the Sun then they either traveled there or teleported there.

Now you insist that they neither traveled there nor teleported, so we can conclude via modus tollens (If A then B, not B, therefore not A) that these photons cannot have come from the Sun.

Assumption #2: The photons at the film/retina did not travel or teleport there.

Conclusion #2: The photons at the film/retina did not come from the Sun.

So now the million-dollar question: Where the fuck did these photons come from? We can note also that the exact same reasoning as above will still apply for any location other than the Sun - as long as the photons are getting from A to B, they have to either travel there or teleport there - so we can know that...

Conclusion #3: The photons at the film/retina did not get there from anywhere else.

That leaves two remaining possibilities: (i) These photons were always there, i.e. sitting stationary at the film/retina surface; or (ii) They did not previously exist, and instead came into existence at the film/retina. But of course neither of these are plausible either, as photons cannot be stationary, and they do not pop into existence in our eyes or on film. But unless you accept one of these options we are forced to conclude that...

Conclusion #4: Assumption #2 was bollocks.

Basically, what we have proven is that you have only four options for the photons at the film/retina:

(i) Traveling photons.
(ii) Teleporting photons.
(iii) Stationary photons.
(iv) Newly existing photons.

So which is it going to be? (Remember, weaseling and fake-conceding are not honest responses.)

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by LadyShea

You are fake done with the topic because you can't make a coherent argument and you are a weasel. Why you keep coming back to I'll never understand.

I believe my father's claims are right. I can admit there is no way I can reconcile Spacemonkey's premise with this model. It won't work if you look at light as traveling to a destination (afferent vision) which has the frequency/wavelength of the object that it was reflected by. The very premise fails, yet he is trying to get me to fit a circle into a square and because I can't do it, he says I am weaseling. Oh well. You can't understand why I keep coming back? At least you admit you don't understand something, which is refreshing.

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Are you ever going to address this post, peacegirl?

I have answered this so many times in the past, I am not going back. The most I will say is that light travels at a finite rate of speed (which we all know) but the idea that light is traveling with the frequency/wavelength of the object through space/time is incorrect, according to Lessans. Therefore, light itself is just a condition of sight, it does nothing other than reveal what substance is out there in the real world if the conditions of efferent vision are satisfied.

[davidm]

LOL, so peacegirl thinks I said determinism constitutes a modal fallacy, eh? It has always been an open questions whether she is more dishonest than dumb, or vice versa. I've come to the conclusion that although she is plenty dumb, he defining trait is dishonesty. No honest person, no matter how dumb, could possibly construe what I wrote as saying that all deterministic conceptions constitute a modal fallacy. I was specifically referring to Lessans' construal of determinism.

I'm not going to get into this again, because the Weasel Queen can read what I wrote: what Lady Shea linked. I'll reiterate briefly that Lessans' own retarded conception of determinism constitutes both a modal fallacy and a fallacy of circular reasoning, but the main point I want to focus on is something peacegirl (though not Lessans!) claimed: She has claimed that some event x, prior to its occurrence, is contingent; but after it occurs it becomes necessary!

That is a freaking textbook example of the modal fallacy. As Professor Norman Swartz writes here:

Finally, no proposition ever changes its modal status. We will call this principle “The Principle of the Fixity of Modal Status“. And for the purposes of assessing the deterministic arguments we note especially: no contingent proposition ever ‘becomes’ necessary or impossible.

Bold and italic for emphasis are the author's not mine.

But peacegirl -- O, shock! -- is not completely wrong about her description of my view on these matters, either. It so happens I do think that all forms of determinism are actually false, and the modal fallacy has a great deal to do with it. In fact, I think determinism is as misconceived as most skeptics believe free will is misconceived. I think that the whole topic needs to be reconsidered. But clearly, at least three forms of standard deterministic arguments -- epistemic determinism (The "God's divine foreknowledge" argument); logical determinism (Aristotle's Sea Battle argument); and relativistic determinism (the idea that relativity theory points to a pre-set, existent future; with the past, present and future all existing) -- all glaringly commit the modal fallacy when these arguments are employed to try to invalidate at least some version of free will. That leaves only causal determinism, but I'm not getting into that here for space reasons, except to say that the claim of causal determinism can be undercut by what is sometimes called the neo-Humean regularity theory of physical law. At bottom, I suspect causal determinism also is undercut by the modal fallacy, though it's a bit tricker to show this and would take much more space than I am going to allot myself.

I also mentioned, some pages back, the two mathematicians who claimed, about decade ago, to have mathematically demonstrated,, in conjunction with a quantum mechanics experiment, that compatiblist free will is necessarily false and that either hard determinism or contra-causal (libertarian) free will is true; further they claimed to have proved that an outlandish result comes from assuming hard determinism, and so we should plump for contra-causal free will. These are all wonderful topics to explore, but not in this thread. Maybe someone would like to start a determinism thread and we can talk about all of this in much greater detail.

A final, quick word about determinism and free will: people often make, I think, a broader, more conceptual error about what these critters ought to look like, as opposed to what they do look like. People have the intuition that the future ought to be "open" in some sense, for free will to prevail. That is, we think of the past as "closed" and immune to change: there is no use crying over spilled milk. Because we can't change the past, we think we have no free will with regard to what's over and done with.

Now of course it's true we can't change the past. The critical point, though, made so well by philosophers like Norman Swartz and J. J. C. Smart, is that we can't change the present or future, either. However, this fact does NOT mean we lack free will.

If you think that you change change the present, try to do so. Do it right now. For instance, raise you arm. Have you raised it? Good. Now, ask yourself: Have I changed the present? The answer is NO. You did not change the present; rather, you made the present be what it actually is. To change what you actually made happen, would mean that you would have to both raise your arm and not raise it at the same time: a violation of the Law of Non-Contradiction. But no conception of free will requires being able to instantiate logical contradictions. Another philosopher who understands this quite well is William Lane Craig who, justly maligned for other reasons, has written a wonderful analysis of Newcomb's Paradox in conjunction with idea of change and who, I think, has come up with the correct solution of the alleged paradox (a supposed challenge to free will). His analysis is here.

If free will exists at all, it does not require that we be able to change states of affairs, but rather that we be able to make states of affairs be as they are, freely, with available alternative options and without coercion. Thus it may be true that the whole future exists, but from this it doesn't follow that what we will do in the future will not be done freely.

But enough about that. As to this thread, I would like to suggest that people hold the liar's feet to the fire about a point I made upthread: For the last two years at least, she has been defending a conception of light and sight that is not what Lessans claimed. She is defending her own, idiosyncratic and logically impossible conception, which is different from what Lessans claimed. This shows, of course, that she doesn't even understand Lessans' writings, which is particularly rich given how many times she has whined about how we don't understand what he wrote, whereas every one of us in this thread, except for peacegirl, understands perfectly what he wrote about everything, and we also understand why all of it is wrong.

Lessans claimed that the eye is not a sense organ. He even claimed that nothing need strike the eye; indeed he asserted that nothing in fact impinges upon it! This is why he claimed that if God turned on the sun at noon, people on earth would see it immediately, even though it would take the photons eight and a half minutes to reach the earth. Lessans was specifically asserting that photons need not make contact with the retina, in order to be seen! However, under his "model," since the photons at the sun haven't reached the earth yet, one could not see one's neighbor until the photons reached the neighbor (eight and a half minutes after God turned on the sun).

Now, of course, this is ridiculous. It's wrong. But it's not logically impossible. One could imagine a logically possible (logically consistent) state of affairs in which light and sight worked like this; of course in that case, the laws of physics and biology would have to be unimaginably different from what they actually are, and one would still need to posit a mechanism for how the eyes see the photons at the distant sun, without the photons first reaching the eye. Lessans never did that. So his claim is conceptually bullshit, and also empirically false to begin with.

But still, even in the absence of an explanatory mechanism for this (non-existent) phenomenon, the concept remains logically possible.

To be clear, it is the case that some phenomena could be logically possible without being physically possible. For example, using the possible-worlds heuristic of modal logic, we can posit that there are logically possible worlds at which donkeys talk and pigs fly. These species just don't exist at the actual world. In modal logic they are therefore called "possible non-actual worlds." The only worlds that are logically impossible (i.e., necessarily false) are those that instantiate a logical contradiction: There is, for example, no possible world at which four-sided triangles or married bachelors exist.

At some point, by some obscure means, peacegirl accepted the idea, contrary to what her father claimed, that in order for sight to occur, the light must impinge upon the retina. This immediately puts her at odds with Lessans. But, unfortunately, she failed to notice that in repudiating Lessans' claim that the eye is not a sense organ, logic dictated that she also repudiate the rest of his claims.

Unable to bring herself to do that, she is stuck trying to argue as follows. 1. As Lessans claimed, people on earth would see the sun immediately, if God turned on the sun at noon. 2. As Lessans claimed, even though people on earth would see the sun immediately if God turned it on at noon, they would not see their neighbors standing next to them for eight and a half minutes, the time it would take the photons to reach earth. BUT, because unlike her father, she now accepts that in order for sight to take place, it is necessary for photons to strike the eye, she is left arguing in favor of the logically impossible proposition that when God turns on the sun at noon, the photons are immediately at the retina, while at the same time the photons require eight and a half minutes to reach the retina!

IOW, Lessans' "model" is merely physically impossible, but not logically impossible. Peacegirl's "model" is BOTH physically AND logically impossible. It belongs in the category of worlds with four-sided triangles and married bachelors.

One wonders why peacegirl is defending a claim that Lessans did not make. Maybe it's progress? Unlike Lessans, she seems at least to understand that sight can take place only if photons reach the eye. The Great Big Genital-Loving, Translucent-Sex-Robe-Wearing, Dinner-Table Rumpy-Pumper did not even understand that elementary proposition.

BTW, peacegirl, I no longer read your actual posts, and haven't done so for a year and a half. I only read the snatches of your posts that others quote. Since I only read other peoples' posts and not yours, there is no reason for you to address me directly or to respond to my posts at all.

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

Really? Then let him speak for himself.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Yes really. And he has spoken for himself the multiple times he laid out the modal fallacy for you, which you never were able to refute. Such as this post Freethought Forum - View Single Post - A revolution in thought

Here is the post:

Originally Posted by davidm

If I understand correctly, the argument seems to be:

1.Whatever I do, is simply defined to be what I think is best for me.

2. Therefore, I could not have done, other than what I did.

Of course, 2. does not validly follow from 1., so the argument is a logical botch.

Of course I could have done, other than what I did. But, had I done, other than what I did, then this other thing I did would be defined as what I think best for me, for no matter what I do, I do what I think is best for me!

Needless to say, a logically botched argument like this does not disprove free will.

It's not botched at all. If he had done other than what he did, then that other thing would have been defined as giving him greater satisfaction under those particular circumstances. This choice would be part of the deterministic framework, not outside of it. We cannot go back in time to prove that under those specific circumstances, he could have chosen otherwise which is required for free will to be proven true.

Originally Posted by davidm

This is why I don't like this type of levity.

It wasn’t meant in levity. I was being quite serious.

Your argument commits the modal fallacy.

Let us assume, for argument’s sake, that all of us invariably do what we think will bring us the greatest satisfaction (a premise that I find highly dubious, but let’s just assume it for argument’s sake.)

That is because your idea of "satisfaction" is not what Lessans meant. We aren't always satisfied but we are ALWAYS moving in the direction of "greater" satisfaction than what the present position offers.

Originally Posted by Davidm

Your argument, or the author’s argument, seems to go: If option A is best for me, than I must choose option A (hence, no free will).

This commits the fallacy of modal logic, illicitly assigning necessity to a contingent outcome.

It is true that you must choose what is better for yourself, even if it means sacrificing something you love to help someone, or even dying a heroic death to allow someone else to live. I could change my mind the last minute because what I thought was the most satisfying choice under the conditions has changed, now that other factors have entered into my decision. No one can assign necessity to a contingent outcome, granted. But Lessans is not assigning necessity as a precondition; in other words he is not saying that determinism dictates there is only one outcome that has already been predetermined. He isn't saying a person must, out of necessity, eat only eggs for breakfast. We all know this can be disputed very easily by eating pancakes. This does not negate his accurate proposition of no free will.

Originally Posted by Davidm

If indeed there is a “necessity” component to your argument (true in all possible worlds,) then the necessity lies, not in the consequent, but in the conjoint relation between the consequent and the antecedent.

The necessity you are ascribing to this concept (the way Lessans defines it) does not apply. This sounds like fatalism (that we can't change direction because it has already been preset), which is not at all what he talking about.

Originally Posted by davidm

Assuming the truth of the claim that we all invariably choose what we think is best for us, the proper logical construction is:

Necessarily, (If I think A is best for me, then I will (Not Must!) choose A)

And NOT:

If I think A is best for me, then I must (necessarily) choose A.

The modal fallacy here is plain to see, and the author’s argument against free will is formally logically invalid, and needs no further rebuttal.

Of course it needs rebuttal because it's lacking in careful analysis. You are misconstruing the argument. If I think A is best for me, then I will necessarily choose A unless something else comes along to change that decision. For example (he gave a similar example in the book), if I am allergic to red apples and know it is best for me to stay away from them, then I would not eat red apples. But I am going to show you that I can eat what is not best for me while moving in the direction of dissatisfaction (because I am certainly not satisfied to eat the red apple). Can't you see that in trying to prove a point (that I can move in the direction of dissatisfaction), the reason for my uncharacteristic choice has changed thereby altering what gave me greater satisfaction at that moment? There is no fallacy here. His proposition holds like a charm.

For more on the modal fallacy, see here, for example.

[LadyShea]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

I have answered this so many times in the past, I am not going back. The most I will say is that light travels at a finite rate of speed (which we all know)

Irrelevant to the problem in need of addressing.

but the idea that light is traveling with the frequency/wavelength of the object through space/time is incorrect, according to Lessans.

Its incorrect period. Nobody claims that "light is traveling with the wavelength of the object".

Light is traveling with its own wavelength. If it isn't traveling and doesn't have a wavelenth, it either isn't light or it is light with completely different properties than it is known to have and violates the laws of physics. As you've been told many times, but you keep posing strawmen because you don't seem to understand the properties of light or optics in general.

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by davidm

LOL, so peacegirl thinks I said determinism constitutes a modal fallacy, eh? It has always been an open questions whether she is more dishonest than dumb, or vice versa. I've come to the conclusion that although she is plenty dumb, he defining trait is dishonesty. No honest person, no matter how dumb, could possibly construe what I wrote as saying that all deterministic conceptions constitute a modal fallacy. I was specifically referring to Lessans' construal of determinism.

I'm not going to get into this again, because the Weasel Queen can read what I wrote: what Lady Shea linked. I'll reiterate briefly that Lessans' own retarded conception of determinism constitutes both a modal fallacy and a fallacy of circular reasoning,

I have been over this umpteen times. Just because whatever I do is in the direction of greater satisfaction (which you call circular or a tautology) does not mean it's meaningless in the context of a no free will environment. It is the pivotal bit of knowledge that gives us the ability to prevent what no one wants; war and crime. So I think you need to rethink your rebuttal since it's got holes in it.

Originally Posted by davidm

but the main point I want to focus on is something peacegirl (though not Lessans!) claimed: She has claimed that some event x, prior to its occurrence, is contingent; but after it occurs it becomes necessary!

True, and free will cannot save the day. Although your imagination runs wild David, we cannot go back in time which is required to show that a person could have done otherwise. If that can't be done (which it can't) free will cannot be proven true no matter how many logistical errors you come up with.

Originally Posted by davidm

That is a freaking textbook example of the modal fallacy. As Professor Norman Swartz writes here:

You are confusing the standard definition of determinism which sets everything in stone in advance, and how Lessans describes what is actually going on in reality. You are building your logic on a weak foundation. It makes your rebuttal unsound.

Finally, no proposition ever changes its modal status. We will call this principle “The Principle of the Fixity of Modal Status“. And for the purposes of assessing the deterministic arguments we note especially: no contingent proposition ever ‘becomes’ necessary or impossible.

That is true. No one is saying that it does. It is not necessary that I eat eggs for breakfast. It is not impossible to choose cereal. But once it is chosen, whatever it is, based on his accurate proposition, it could not have been otherwise.

Originally Posted by davidm

Bold and italic for emphasis are the author's not mine.

But peacegirl -- O, shock! -- is not completely wrong about her description of my view on these matters, either. It so happens I do think that all forms of determinism are actually false, and the modal fallacy has a great deal to do with it. In fact, I think determinism is as misconceived as most skeptics believe free will is misconceived. I think that the whole topic needs to be reconsidered.

It already has. The work has been done.

Originally Posted by davidm

But clearly, at least three forms of standard deterministic arguments -- epistemic determinism (The "God's divine foreknowledge" argument); logical determinism (Aristotle's Sea Battle argument); and relativistic determinism (the idea that relativity theory points to a pre-set, existent future; with the past, present and future all existing) -- all glaringly commit the modal fallacy when these arguments are employed to try to invalidate at least some version of free will. That leaves only causal determinism, but I'm not getting into that here for space reasons, except to say that the claim of causal determinism can be undercut by what is sometimes called the neo-Humean regularity theory of physical law. At bottom, I suspect causal determinism also is undercut by the modal fallacy, though it's a bit tricker to show this and would take much more space than I am going to allot myself.

I also mentioned, some pages back, the two mathematicians who claimed, about decade ago, to have mathematically demonstrated,, in conjunction with a quantum mechanics experiment, that compatiblist free will is necessarily false and that either hard determinism or contra-causal (libertarian) free will is true; further they claimed to have proved that an outlandish result comes from assuming hard determinism, and so we should plump for contra-causal free will. These are all wonderful topics to explore, but not in this thread. Maybe someone would like to start a determinism thread and we can talk about all of this in much greater detail.

Contra-causal free will is an illusion. The only thing left is determinism but not the way you are defining it.

Originally Posted by davidm

A final, quick word about determinism and free will: people often make, I think, a broader, more conceptual error about what these critters ought to look like, as opposed to what they do look like. People have the intuition that the future ought to be "open" in some sense, for free will to prevail. That is, we think of the past as "closed" and immune to change: there is no use crying over spilled milk. Because we can't change the past, we think we have no free will with regard to what's over and done with.

The past is closed because the past is gone; it is just a memory that reminds us of what happened a minute ago, a day ago, a year ago. We have no free will not only with regard to what is over and done with but what choices we will make in the future since we are controlled by this principle of "greater satisfaction."

Originally Posted by davidm

Now of course it's true we can't change the past. The critical point, though, made so well by philosophers like Norman Swartz and J. J. C. Smart, is that we can't change the present or future, either. However, this fact does NOT mean we lack free will.

Now you confusing what is meant by the word "choice". Lessans said he used this figure of speech all the time even in his own life, "I did it of my own free will" which only meant that no one forced him to do it; he did it because he wanted to, but this doesn't mean he or anyone else actually has free will. I knew you didn't understand the first thing about this chapter. Ultimately, we cannot change the present or the future because our choices are driven in one direction, not two or three. It's an illusion that appears we have more than one choice, but that could only be true if we could choose what was dissatisfying to us when a more satisfying choice was available. That is impossible!

Originally Posted by davidm

If you think that you change change the present, try to do so. Do it right now. For instance, raise you arm. Have you raised it? Good. Now, ask yourself: Have I changed the present? The answer is NO. You did not change the present; rather, you made the present be what it actually is. To change what you actually made happen, would mean that you would have to both raise your arm and not raise it at the same time: a violation of the Law of Non-Contradiction. But no conception of free will requires being able to instantiate logical contradictions. Another philosopher who understands this quite well is William Lane Craig who, justly maligned for other reasons, has written a wonderful analysis of Newcomb's Paradox in conjunction with idea of change and who, I think, has come up with the correct solution of the alleged paradox (a supposed challenge to free will). His analysis is here.

If free will exists at all, it does not require that we be able to change states of affairs, but rather that we be able to make states of affairs be as they are, freely, with available alternative options and without coercion. Thus it may be true that the whole future exists, but from this it doesn't follow that what we will do in the future will not be done freely.

I am not disagreeing with you here. Free will in this regard only means without coersion, but in no way means that man's will is actually free. You are more confused than I thought you were and you have no understanding at all of this book.

to be continued maybe...

[peacegirl]

dupe

[LadyShea]

Can't you see that in trying to prove a point (that I can move in the direction of dissatisfaction), the antecedent conditions changed thereby altering what choice gave me greater satisfaction? There is no fallacy here.

But the fact remains that you have simply defined any and all actual actions taken as being necessary ( due to compulsion) choices made in the direction of greater satisfaction after the action has happened. That's fallacious. You are merely asserting an element of necessity that you can neither logically demonstrate nor provide empirical evidence for even existing.

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

I have answered this so many times in the past, I am not going back. The most I will say is that light travels at a finite rate of speed (which we all know)

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Irrelevant to the problem in need of addressing

.

but the idea that light is traveling with the frequency/wavelength of the object through space/time is incorrect, according to Lessans.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Its incorrect period. Nobody claims that "light is traveling with the wavelength of the object".

It is not the full spectrum LadyShea which indicates that whatever wavelength was absorbed is not being reflected. This is what creates the decoded image. Please don't play semantics with me.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Light is traveling with its own wavelength. If it isn't traveling and doesn't have a wavelength, it either isn't light or it is light with completely different properties than it is known to have and violates the laws of physics. As you've been told many times, but you keep posing strawmen because you don't seem to understand the properties of light or optics in general.

I think it is you that is denying your own belief in that the reflected light, according to the afferent model, is made up of the partial spectrum which gives the object its identifying characteristics once it's decoded by the brain or seen on film.

[LadyShea]

Reflected light may or may not be full spectrum...it depends on what wavelengths were reflected, rather than absorbed by or transmitted through the object. All of this can be directly observed and measured, it is not a "belief" .
http://ocw.mit.edu/resources/res-6-0...s-spring-2008/

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by LadyShea

But the fact remains that you have simply defined any and all actual actions taken as being necessary ( due to compulsion) choices made in the direction of greater satisfaction after the action has happened. That's fallacious. You are merely asserting an element of necessity that you can neither logically demonstrate nor provide empirical evidence for even existing.

When given a number of alternatives to choose from, the comparison is necessary but the choice is not free for the reasons I have given over and over again. Colloquially, we can say we did it of our own free will if this means nothing outside of ourselves made us do it, but this does not in any way, shape, or form mean our will is actually free. If it is impossible for me to choose B because it gives me less satisfaction in comparison to A, I AM NOT FREE TO CHOOSE A. Of course there is an element of necessity in determinism, or it wouldn't be determinism. But there is much confusion with the words "necessity", "compel", and "choice". I'm trying to unravel it for you, but you keep going back to accusing me of the modal fallacy. Actually, whatever one chooses had to happen but we are not robots as if we have no say in the matter. We are not forced to choose something without our consent. This is one of the reasons people don't like determinism in the way it's defined. I don't either but the definition is far from useful since it does not accurately explain where the confusion has always been for all these centuries. No one is taking our accomplishments away. The only difference is that our accomplishments are not done of our own free will. People think of determinism like a cue ball hitting at a certain angle and the 8 ball has to go into the pocket due to cause and effect. It doesn't work that way when it comes to decision making because we do have options, but that does not negate the fact that we are not free to go against our nature which is to move in the direction of greater satisfaction.

[LadyShea]

If you cannot choose what is least satisfying when given alternatives to choose from

How would you conclusively determine if one "cannot choose" something?

If it is impossible for me to choose B because it gives me less satisfaction in comparison to A

How would you conclusively determine if a choice is "impossible"?

See how these are just assertions? You cannot demonstrate it logically nor can you provide empirical evidence.

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Reflected light may or may not be full spectrum...it depends on what wavelengths were reflected, rather than absorbed by or transmitted through the object. All of this can be directly observed and measured, it is not a "belief" .
Video Demonstrations in Lasers and Optics | MIT OpenCourseWare

I know that LadyShea, but the argument is whether we are seeing the object in real time due to light's presence at the retina when we look at the object directly (efferently), or whether the light is traveling away from the object through space/time bringing us the image to us.

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by LadyShea

How would you conclusively determine if one "cannot choose" something?

What are you talking about now?

If it is impossible for me to choose B because it gives me less satisfaction in comparison to A

Originally Posted by LadyShea

How would you conclusively determine if a choice is "impossible"?

It's not theoretically impossible to choose eggs instead of pancakes in any given situation that has not yet been decided upon. But it is impossible to choose that which has been chosen when meaningful differences have been compared. This goes back to his valid observation that we are always moving in the direction of greater satisfaction. If you can't accept his explanation, then there is no basis for further discussion.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

See how these are just assertions? You cannot demonstrate it logically nir can you provide empirical evidence.

No, these are not assertions. You either can't grasp, or you won't accept, that his observations have merit.

[LadyShea]

Newton's Prism Experiment - YouTube

[LadyShea]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

I know that LadyShea, but the argument is whether we are seeing the object in real time due to light's presence at the retina when we look at the object directly (efferently), or whether the light is traveling away from the object through space/time bringing us the image to us.

There is no argument as to whether light reflects and travels with a wavelength. It does. It can be directly observed and measured.

[LadyShea]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

What are you talking about now?

Prove that one cannot choose something, rather than one does not choose something.

[LadyShea]

Experiments on refraction, reflection and total...

[LadyShea]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

It's not theoretically impossible to choose eggs instead of pancakes in any given situation that has not yet been decided upon. But it is impossible to choose that which has been chosen when meaningful differences have been compared. This goes back to his valid observation that we are always moving in the direction of greater satisfaction. If you can't accept his explanation, then there is no basis for further discussion.

No, these are not assertions. You either can't grasp, or you won't accept, that his observations have merit.

If it must be "accepted" without evidence, as it can't be demonstrated or directly observed, then it is an assertion by definition.

[LadyShea]

bump

Originally Posted by LadyShea

What about the experiment itself led you to think it is pseudoscience and what prompted you to refuse to recognize the researchers as scientists? The researcher was speculating about emotions during an interview, but that was not and is not part of the published study or the data set.

And anyway, Lessans inferences may not be accurate either, but you refuse to admit that. A bit hypocritical don't you think?

The data used were empirical measurements of facial and head movements using a high speed video camera and a computer recorded the movements precisely. What part of that is open to "confirmation bias" in your opinion? Also, how is that related to your initial charge of nutty pseudoscience?

Additionally, the "premise" wasn't facial recognition, which demonstrates that you didn't even look at the experiment at all. I gave you a video, even!

So please detail how you analyzed the variables and controls and construction in this experiment that led you to call it pseudoscientific? Also please support your opinion that the researchers are not worthy of being called scientists.

[Spacemonkey]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

I have answered this so many times in the past, I am not going back.

Liar. You have weaseled in response to it many times in the past, but you have never answered it. Not once.

Originally Posted by peacegirl

The most I will say is that light travels at a finite rate of speed...

Did the light at the film/retina travel at a finite rate of speed to get there? If not, where did it come from and how did it get there?

[Spacemonkey]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

If you believe what science has taught you, that is quite understandable, but it's impossible for me to breach this subject, which contradicts the major premise [and the longstanding beliefs that go along with it], without derision on everyone's part. That is why I am done with this topic.

It's not that you contradict longstanding beliefs when you discuss light and vision. Your problem is that you always end up contradicting yourself. You have no consistent account of how efferent vision is meant to work.