A worldview which does not include a god or gods does not mean events are "either... random or... determined." You can't just assert this and then base your argument around it.
Science has found, through quantum physics and relativity, that determining future states by examining past states may be impossible, no matter how completely the past states are known. Neither scientifically nor logically does existence without a god or gods mean events are predetermined (though theism presents great difficulties to proponents of free will).
Events do not have to be random in a universe without a god or gods if they are not determined either. The universe is not random. It works in certain ways which science attempts to discover and codify as theories and laws. That the workings of the universe could produce beings able to think and act with volition is neither logically nor scientifically impossible.
You have made the mistake of the excluded middle here. This is not an either/or proposition. The universe can work according to certain principles and laws that influence events, but not determine them, while allowing for a certain amount of chance but not giving way to sheer randomness. Free will can easily exist in between these extremes.
Further, you make the mistake of assuming that meaning must somehow exist outside of the people who find meaning in things. It doesn't. Where does meaning come from? It comes from you. You create it. You associate things and thus find meaning in them. You decide that something is valuable, pleasurable, or important, and thus there is meaning. That's all. Nothing further is needed.
I think this is pretty obvious by looking at the people around you. Do they all find meaning in the all the same things you do, and do you find meaning in all the things they do? No. Meaning is personal, not universal. Does it "disappear" when you die? Well, yes, in the same way that your memories disappear. But that doesn't mean they never existed. That's like saying that because a house won't exist forever there was never a house.
mooglar -- your second point first: actually, I believe what I wrote is consistent with you: in my post about meaning, I claim that meaning has to be created by the individual to be worthwhile -- exactly the opposite from the meaning coming from outside the individual. You might want to re-read my post on that point.
As for the first part of your comment: when I used the term, "random", I should have said more precisely, "probabilistic". The point is that a key piece which one needs for meaning and for morality is individual choice. But this is just the one piece denied in a purely material universe. The material universe may be completely deterministic, may be chaotic, may be random, may be probabilistic (which is I believe the case to which you are referring), and of course, could be in different ways a combination of these -- but in each case, the one thing it cannot be (in a purely material universe) is influenced by something with a cause outside the universe of material events.
For example, in the case of what you refer to as "excluded middle" -- the idea that the universe (and our brains) work according to certain principles and laws that influence events, but not determine them, allowing for chance but not insisting on sheer randomness: what is the nature of choice? If my environment, genetic code, etc wires me such that I have a 90% likelihood of deciding one way, and a 10% likelihood of deciding the other, how is my decision made? If it is made by "rolling a random die" and 9 times out of 10 going with the 90% choice, then we are back to the same situation as a random universe with respect to choice -- I had no choice -- someone (the universe, or whatever) rolled a die for me to "make" my choice for me.
On the other hand, the scenario which would allow for a real sense of choice in this case, is if "I" somehow can shade that roll of the die. If there is something independent of my environment, my genetics, my wiring that allows me to independently attempt to force the decision one way or another. Even if the decision is still probabilistic, if there is a way to "influence" the decision by "me", then there is a sense of choice, and I claim, the possibility of morality and meaning.
However, this "I" and "me" (which I intentionally put in quotes) are precisely the non-material pieces excluded by a materialist view of the universe. They are the pieces which are independent of physical cause, but which can somehow affect the material world.
I admit that I do not particularly like the "spooky" concept of mind or spirit which somehowe exist apart from the physical body and yet somehow influence it. But the only thing less palatable is the world in which there is nothing but the material.
Oh, and this has not so much to do with gods, but only the existence of something outside of the material world. I have carlelessly used "atheism" in these posts, when all along what I'm really mea
whoops -- here's that last paragraph again, which got truncated by the 3000 word Haloscan limit:
Oh, and this has not so much to do with gods, but only the existence of something outside of the material world. I have carlelessly used "atheism" in these posts, when all along what I'm really meaning to discuss is a world view in which only matter and energy which obey physical laws exist. I've used the codeword materialism (with or without capitals) for that. Others have called it Naturalism or Nature and sub-Nature together (to distinguish the deterministic and probabilistic components).
donalgrant,
I just realized that I probably should not have responded to your initial post because I realized I don't think this discussion means anything. If you are right (which I don't think you are) and a wholly materialist universe with nothing outside the universe -- no god, gods, or supernatural -- is indeed deterministic or random, it doesn't in any way mean that the materialist universe also isn't true. Just because a proposition has a negative consequence doesn't make it untrue (as I am sure you know).
Further, by your theory, if correct, it is incoherent to assert that atheists and/or others with a materialist worldview cannot have a self-consistent worldview, because you are right about a material universe being either entirely random or probabilistic, the question is meaningless. Because, in such a universe, no one has control of his or her worldview, since there is no free will.
Therefore, those with a materialist worldview should simply respond, "Well, if you're right about a materialist universe, then I have no choice about what to believe. So there's no point in dicussing this further."
That is to say, all you can gain from this argument is a concession that those with a "materialist" worldview have no free will and therefore cannot believe otherwise than they do. You haven't made any argument for meaning and free will under theism (which is very problematical in and of itself). There's really nowhere for your argument to go after that. In fact, the person with the materialist worldview should cut off any further discussion by saying, "I know you believe that there is something outside this universe. It's okay. As you have proven to me, you don't have any choice."
In other words, I don't think this argument leads where you want it to lead. Even if successful, it doesn't lead to theism and theistic morality, free will, and meaning of life. That is an unwarranted jump in logic from the actual consequences of the argument.
However, having started the discussion, I will point out that, unfortunately, in your rebuttal, you have begged the question. First, you say:
>>but in each case, the one thing it cannot be (in a purely material universe) is influenced by something with a cause outside the universe of material events.>If my environment, genetic code, etc wires me such that I have a 90% likelihood of deciding one way, and a 10% likelihood of deciding the other, how is my decision made? If it is made by "rolling a random die" and 9 times out of
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>>If my environment, genetic code, etc wires me such that I have a 90% likelihood of deciding one way, and a 10% likelihood of deciding the other, how is my decision made? If it is made by "rolling a random die" and 9 times out of 10 going with the 90% choice, then we are back to the same situation as a random universe with respect to choice -- I had no choice -- someone (the universe, or whatever) rolled a die for me to "make" my choice for me.
Message truncated and finished here (2nd attempt, it didn't work the first time).
>>If my environment, genetic code, etc wires me such that I have a 90% likelihood of deciding one way, and a 10% likelihood of deciding the other, how is my decision made? If it is made by "rolling a random die" and 9 times out of 10 going with the 90% choice, then we are back to the same situation as a random universe with respect to choice -- I had no choice -- someone (the universe, or whatever) rolled a die for me to "make" my choice for me.
>>If my environment, genetic code, etc wires me such that I have a 90% likelihood of deciding one way, and a 10% likelihood of deciding the other, how is my decision made? If it is made by "rolling a random die" and 9 times out of 10 going with the 90% choice, then we are back to the same situation as a random universe with respect to choice -- I had no choice -- someone (the universe, or whatever) rolled a die for me to "make" my choice for me.
Here, you assume your conclusion, that an "I" separate from the material world is required for free will, as part of your argument. You assume that your environment, genetic code, etc. is not the "I" that you are looking for, but that the "I" is something else. Therefore, if those things are the source of your choices, there is no free will.
But I would contend, in fact, that your genetic code, the wiring of your brain, your memories, and such are what the "I" who makes your choices is. Those things are, in fact, what "I" comes from. Those things determine who "I" is and without them there is no "I" to have free will in the first place. Your argument has a chimera in it, this "I" separate from your brain and its physiological processes.
mooglar -- thanks for the dialogue on this. Let me try to sum up, because I think you're missing a little bit of what I'm driving at. I have been maintaining all along (from the original short remark in Meta-Post #2 which triggered this whole thread) that a materialist view *can* be made self-consistent. That's not the problem. The problem is that it's not a very "livable" world-view. All of the things we think of as important components in our lives: meaning, morality, rational thought (I have not made the case regarding rational thought yet), disappear in a completely consistent purely materialist world-view.
You are correct that a materialst should say, "there's no point in having this discussion, because I have no choice about what I believe." However, the fact that we *are* having this discussion, I assert, implies that we at least act as if the world is not purely materialist. If I believed that the world was purely materialist, I wouldn't be arguing about it. Or maybe I would -- who knows -- it would either be a probabilistic decision over which I would have no control, or it would be a deterministic decision over which I would have no control.
I am arguing that if there is no "I" outside from physiological causes (even probabilistic ones) then there is no true choice -- no free, or even partly free, will. (This is related to the age-old mind-body problem.)
Finally, I have *not* been making any arguments for theism here at all. I have not offered any "proof" for the existence of the supernatural. (I'm not convinced that it is even possible to do so.) I'm only asserting that a self-consistent purely materialist world-view is not livable.
I wonder if Austin Cline has ever read Mere Christianty by Lewis, he does a great job of proving that with out a God we would have no morals, and that God (christian) is the real and only God.
Chase Whittemore
"However, if I am convinced of a purely materialist world-view, then all events, including my own actions and the consequences of those events and actions are either determined, or are random."
I think you have a false dichotomy here. You want to try and back this up? How in the world would all events and actions be either determined or random in a materialistic world? I am totally materialistic in my worldview, but this is not how I see the world working at all. I see a mix of random events tempered by predictable natural law--nothing like the either/or idea that you propose.
To Chase Whittemore, in case you are still following the discussion:
Lewis never proves we have no morals without God--he merely assumes it, makes some examples out of our innate sense of 'fairness' (which is explainable in evolutionary terms) and then goes on from there. He proves nothing.
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