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You can read: o Yes o No Two trees are explicitly mentioned: the tree of life, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. 'Accepted as true' is not the same as 'true'. Therefore no science should stick to axioms, and philosophy neither. Taking them temporary for granted is ok, but one should always be prepared to drop these 'axioms'. I slowly get the impression you have no idea how science and philosophy work.

I interpreted a text, not what somebody once might really have meant, said or written down. Eh? I claimed it was the New International Version. I got it from www.biblegateway.com, where it obviously is the default. I agree, except maybe with that 'it is fundamental'. But that also means axioms have no fixed place in science and philosophy. Honest observations and reflection can lead you anywhere, and axioms would work out as a dogmas, blocking ways to real understanding. Axioms surely can have a place in theory development: assume something to be true, and find out where the theory leads you too. (Maybe to nonsense, so then your axiom was wrong, or your theory is wrong, or both).

That would be the death of most sciences. As an antidote to such ideas I recommend to read Feyerabend, Against Method. And equating methodology and metaphysics seems also wrong to me. Compare: methodological and metaphysical naturalism (the only source of knowledge is nature vs. there are no supernatural phenomena) methodological and metaphysical behaviourism (the only way to study people's minds is by observing their behaviour vs. there are no minds, only behaviour) That excludes mathematics, astronomy, history, literature, just to name a few. I highlighted the important words for you: So, no, what you wrote above is not a possible correct interpretation of Genesis 2:9. Maybe something like the red and blue pills... What axioms? Philosophy is trying to understand thinking. In the first place how we actually think (depends of course a lot about what we are thinking: natural sciences, politics, 'Geisteswissenschaften', ethics etc). Then how we should think, to come to valid conclusions. And then how we should think to live a good life. Your view on philosophy is a bit one-sided. I highly doubt that. But to find out, one should ... guess what.

New International Version, Genesis 2:9:

My interpretation of the paradise story contains a certain wisdom: 'knowing' the difference between right and wrong, good and evil, led to the banishment of Adam and Eve from paradise. What is 'bad science'? E.g the development of nuclear fission: it gave us nuclear energy and an arms race. Or is 'bad science' science that is methodologically unsound? If the latter, then bad philosophy would be that you stop with an honest investigation when you do not like the result of your reasoning.

Wondering what definition you are using. Make a comparison with science: would you only accept science that gives the answers you like? Keeping a viewpoint fixed is the end of philosophy. Any honest investigation can lead to results you do not like. But faking truths might be worse in the end. Take the idea of God, who gives people a purpose and the right rules of conduct for people to be happy. Wouldn't that lead to the highest possible good? So we keep that fixed and do not discuss this? Is that philosophy? Or dogma?

No posting of mine was ever moved to speculations or trash. And as of this writing, I am not banned... And if you think you base your life on facts only you are deceiving yourself.

Forgot this: pragmatism is a philosophical viewpoint.

Now that is an example of bad philosophy... And a pretty good example of my present disclaimer: With other words: what you say is a philosophical remark. E.g. it is based on the assumption that only empirical facts matter in life. But that itself is not an empirically verified position, so, according to you, it distracts from true knowledge. Your position is self-refuting. As to the question of the poll: of course there is good and bad philosophy. But we should keep Strange's distinction in mind: 'philosophy' as a 'philosophical theory', i.e. the contents of what a philosopher is saying about the subject at hand; and 'philosophy' as an activity. Which of course agrees more or less with the same distinction in science. Good philosophy, in modern times: Is well informed about relevant science, culture and politics Takes into account other viewpoints about the topic at hand Confirms or refutes other viewpoints with good arguments, i.e. arguments that are relevant and well supported by sciences and other well argued philosophical viewpoints Is extremely aware of the methods it uses to argue for a certain position. Bad philosophy: Only expresses opinions without arguing Uses arguments that are already refuted by others Confuses scientific speculations with philosophy The specialty with philosophy which distinguishes it from sciences is that in science the domain of knowledge it tries to gather differs from the (transcendental...) subject (i.e the one that observes, experiments, and expresses ideas about the object) of the domain. A physicist investigating certain phenomena does not investigate herself. As I said elsewhere here, the object of physics is not physics: it is the natural world as we observe it. As soon as physicists investigate physics, they are philosophising. Philosophy is essential reflective: it tries to understand our thinking with thinking, just as the physicist thinking about physics.

One example of what I mean: Major Study Casts Doubt on COVID-19 Herd Immunity After Patient Antibodies Disappear From the article:

This is what is worrying me. We know that about one third of all common colds are caused by some corona virus (I thought I read somewhere that there are 3 main Corona stems that can cause common cold). Assuming that people in Western (and Northern) countries get a cold a few times per year, a gross estimate tells me that people get the common cold at least once in 3 years of the same corona virus. So no long lasting immunity. So wouldn't that mean that a vaccine also is effective for at most 3 years (probably less)? Add to this another statistic: that the common cold is economically seen the illness that costs the most in terms of ill leaves, less productivity etc. Any pharmaceutical company could earn billions if it could find a vaccine against the common cold. But we have none. So no, I do not bet on finding an effective vaccine. When we find one, but it is only effective for say 2 months, then it is only useful for special risk groups (elderly, people with other conditions that might be dangerous with COVID-19, health workers).

Hi Alex, I think the USA could learn something from the North European countries. Your proposals are very much in line with what I know of the police in the Netherlands, Switzerland, and probably also the Scandinavian countries. Try 'the norden - police' on Youtube (24 Minutes; the part about Prison might be interesting too).

I think it makes no sense to say that the vedas were twisted or not. They have grown organically. There are so many reasons for a text to change, especially when it originally was an oral tradition. Without having the 'original' how would you see that the texts changed? There are methods to find out which of the present versions we have are probably the oldest, but of course we can have no idea what the first written down version of the vedas were. And then there are many reasons why texts change over time, just to name a few: errors when copying the texts corrections of (language) errors authors putting in their ideas into the texts, in good or ill faith I only know a little about the history of Christian texts, which are of course not so old as the vedas, and also here already the problem exists that we do not know exactly what the original texts were. But we know copyists made errors, corrected errors, put in sentences or even complete stories, often because these copyists had a theological agenda to promote their version of Christianity. From some texts we know that there must have been more original texts, but they did not survive. With the vedas this will be worse, because they were orally passed to others for a much longer time. In Christianity, especially the new testament, there are at most only about 100 years between the oral tradition and the first written down versions we have (often less: the gospels were written till about 100 years, the earliest one probably only 30 years, after Jesus' death). With the vedas it is several millennia before they were written down.

Twisted? From what to what?

How would such a proof look like? That is wagging the dog. Choice is a result of the reasoning, even when the reasoning is determined. A bit gross, one can say that your reasoning causes your choice, and your action is caused by your choice. If you are blocked to act according to your choice your free will is restricted. If not, then your action is free. You seem to think that 'being able to do otherwise' under exactly the same circumstances, including the state of your brain and body, would be necessary for free will. It isn't. Free will means to be able to act according your motivations. Electrons have no colour, as protons and neutrons. So how can objects made of them have colour? Think deeper. I'll give you a clou: endless loop. Yeah, it is a herculean job, sure. Principally I would say 'yes'. But we must agree on what we understand under 'free will'. If it means e.g. the above 'could have done otherwise under exactly the same circumstances, including our brain and body' (1) then the answer is no. That follows from the concept of determinism: if the start conditions are exactly the same, the same results will happen. So also your choice and action will be the same. Also when one means with free will 'not caused by natural processes' (2), then the answer would be 'no'. But if one takes as definition 'being able to act according your own motivations', then yes, we have free will. And in my opinion, this is the only aspect we empirically know of ourselves. Decide to do something, and you can do it! But there is not any empirical basis in our daily life that fits the previous two attributes: they are interpretations: (1) is not empirically given: we cannot play the movie again exactly the same. It follows from the idea that the world is determined. Besides there are far better analyses what exactly we mean with 'could have done otherwise', much more realistic, and with no contradiction with determinism and with my concept of free will. (2) is a remnant of Christian theology, in which in the Creation by an omnipotent, omniscient, and good God an explanation was needed why people do bad things and are responsible for their actions. More or less, but the brain of course plays a major role. Not necessarily, but grosso modo yes. One needs certain capabilities that most people have, some only a bit, others much more: self knowledge, experience of how actions can work out, awareness of what other people do, i.e. see the consequences of your actions. So definitely some people are freer than others. I have some difficulty to understand what you mean, but maybe this reaction touches it: People's minds are not a unity. Different motivations exist in us that can contradict each other. It can make choice extremely difficult, and in your example one must have a very strong motivation to overrule the other motivations, of not to like feeling pain, or destruct (parts of) your own body.

For those interested, I now read the whole article "Is everything determined?" of Stephen Hawking. I find it funny that already in the third sentence, the ambiguity of Hawking's position becomes clear. It is one of the leading questions of the article: Bold by me. I would have formulated: Is everything we do determined or preordained? Reason is that they are different things: Being determined is not the same as being preordained. I would answer 'yes' to the first question (at least when no quantum effects are considered, which in the question of free will seems a good approximation), but 'no' to second. What we do matters, also in a determined world, i.e. we have influence on what happens. Hawking seems to be aware of this difference, but just does not dive deep enough in the difference. Reason is what he takes as outstanding attribute of free will: Both determinism and predestination in principle offer the possibility that we can predict human behaviour. But is unpredictability really an attribute of free will? I think it isn't at all; and Hawking thinks it isn't practically. Two reasons: Hawking's end conclusion: The other one is that if one would be able to predict what I will do based on laws of nature and present conditions, and then tells me his prediction, I can change my behaviour based on this prediction. The way out for the determinist is of course: keep the prediction secret. Put it in an envelope and bring it to a notary. Then after the prediction was fulfilled, show the prediction to everybody. But if he predicted something I did out of my free choice, should that bother me at all? The question if I was forced to do something by somebody, or did it because I liked to do it is not changed by the fact that the prediction was correct. So even under perfect prediction, I can still make the distinction if my action was free or not. At a more daily level: people who know me very well, will often be able to correctly predict what I will do in a certain situation. But really, I have not the feeling that this possibility somehow is an argument against free will. It just show I am a person with certain character traits. Would be funny if I do not act according to them, wouldn't it? But then, I found this statement of honesty of Hawking: I assume that he was often asked his opinion, as a world famous physicist, about the free will 'problem'. So he decided to write down what his way of thinking is. He does not claim to deliver a solution to it. What is left is an interesting, thought provoking, and well written essay about how he himself sees the solution of the seeming contradiction between determinism and free will.

No, I did not. Hawking uses the concept of 'predestination', and his argument is pointed against that. And predestination and determinism are simply not the same. Why do you think he uses the word 'determined' in these few paragraphs, but exactly in those lines he uses 'predestined'. The answer might be simple: because he realised that his argument about the gallows and the ship in the storm, resp. looking if a car is coming, only works against predestination. And predestination lightly leads to fatalism: the idea that 'whatever you do, everything is fixed' fits to both. But not to determinism, because there what you do matters. Even if what you do would not be an expression of free will. Sure, you have no argument why Hawking's argument would be a valid argument against not having free will.

In philosophy, one does not give a viewpoint without reasons why this viewpoint should be valid. As you don't, I can just put it aside. For me it is only obvious that Hawking means it to be an argument against not having free will. But he is wrong: it is an argument against fatalism. And I explained why.

Yes, but the original quote does not support it, as said, it is an argument against fatalism, not against not having free will. But also note that Hawking bases his view in favour of free will on the fact that we cannot explain human behaviour from fundamental laws of nature, just because it is too complicated. I would translate that as 'theoretically, we have no free will, but practically we take, and should take it, for granted'. Personally I think he misses the point, but to be sure I first should read the text as a whole.

Ah, well, that is interpretation too, and it is not bad as an abstract, but it is generally not a good idea to base philosophical discussions on abstracts. I found the complete text, and here is what, in my opinion, makes clear what Hawking means (added an empty line for readability): I think he should have left the red lines out, because they do not fit the rest argumentation. In all the text he is talking about 'determined', but in the red lines he switches to 'predestined', which are definitely different concepts. 'Predestined' means that whatever you do, your fate is fixed. For this Hawking's red lines fully apply, but it is not an argument against determinism. Say we are determined: then what we do is determined as well. But the 'whatever you do' is not valid anymore. If you die on the gallows or in a storm at sea depends on your decision, even if your decision is determined. That is simply not what 'predestined' means. The red lines are an argument against fatalism.

No it is not. There is a huge difference between 'predestined' and 'causally determined'. I do not even know if Hawking meant it as an argument in favour of free will. Seems more an argument against some funny kinds of theology. The only way is to find the citation in full context. May Google be with you.

Sorry, dimreepr, but most of the times I am missing concreteness in your reactions. I discovered that when I react to possible interpretations of vague arguments or questions I have to write a long reply, then I get another short reaction that at one side seems to show that I interpreted you wrong, and at the other side forces me to write another long reply, etc. And then you react you do not have the time/energy/intention to read long texts... If the topic interests you, I would suggest to illustrate your questions or arguments with examples, preferably taken from real life, that can give your reactions the clearness for a fruitful discussion. It is true, iNow and me are trained in scientific, resp philosophical discourse, and so we can meet (and cross swords...) on a pretty abstract level. But that in itself is not a sign of intelligence, it just means we are used to the words (I hesitate to write '.. and concepts ...'), and ways of thinking. But abstract thinking can also hide a lot of differences and nuances. Therefore I often ask for concrete, real life examples. If an abstract concept really means something to a speaker, shows itself if the person can still make the connection with concrete life. And that also reduces the chances that two people use the same word, but think different things by it.

Well, I am pretty sure that I did not design myself. What I am, at least originally, is of course beyond my control. Just as a real life example, my wife very much likes fruit, vegetables raw and cooked etc. But I like chocolate, beer, whiskey, smoking etc. So I said to her she is awfully lucky that she exactly likes food that is healthy. But I cannot change myself (well, a tiny bit maybe). 'I' am build up by many influences, most outside my control. But they made 'me' who 'I' am. And if 'I' can act according to who I am, I am free. There is only one person who decides if you will react again on this posting: you. But 'you' came not from thin air, you have a (causal) history. It build up your character, made you to the person you are now. The question if you are free or not has to do with how well you can act according to what you have become.

Yes. I see that you use 'being able to want what you want' as definition of free will. Doesn't that sound absurd?

Isn't this an open door? This sounds nearly as 'OK, it is your opinion'. A showstopper that is as good as 'it is just semantics'. I use the simplest definition of free will that I know of: being able to do what you want. Whereby the 'you' is that bag of water, that hears, speaks, walks, acts, thinks, creates scientific theories etc, not some entity in the bag of water, that is supposed to be causally independent from the rest of the body or universe.